City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening, everyone. Now, now it's working. Bienvenidos a todos. Thank you all. Wow, we love seeing our auditorium all full. We're like little kids. Yeah, we're like little kids. First day at school, back from summer vacation. Thank you, everyone, for coming. I will now call the Hialeah City Council meeting for August 11 of 2026 to order at 5.39 p.m. Madam Clerk, can you please call the roll? Mr. Zoghbi? Present.

Ms. De La Vega is absent. Mr. Gonzalez?

Here.

Mr. Marrero?

Present.

Ms. G. Perez? Present. Ms. M. Perez is absent and Mr. Rodriguez is absent. Mr. President, you have enough members to conduct business.

Thank you, Madam Clerk. Mayor, invocation information?

Absolutely. Well, good evening, everyone. Buenas noches a todos. Hoy nos honra los miembros. Today we're honored by the members of the Hialeah Faith Board Association. and the chair of the board, Pastor Juan Barak, to lead us in the invocation. Pastor, if you can please help us, thank you.

Good afternoon, Mayor.

Okay, I'm sorry. Good afternoon, Mayor, members of the city council, city officials, and everyone present today. It is a great honor, it is a privilege to be here with you. Thank you, Mayor, and thank you to all the members of the Council for this opportunity. Today, I simply want to remind all of us that leadership is more than a position. It's more than having power. Leadership is a responsibility. Leadership is a service. I will read from Proverbs 3, verses 5 and 6. This is what the Bible says. Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your path straight. These words remind us that we do not have to face every decision alone. Every city has challenges. Every leader has difficult moments, and we have seen that. And sometimes the right decision is not always the best decision. And that is why we need wisdom. We need God, and we need prayer in our city to lead us, to give us the hope to be able to listen, but most of all, to be able to serve. Can we stand, please, so that we can pray? My prayer today is that God will give us wisdom and understanding. Also, to give our mayor the strength that he needs. And to every member of this city council, wisdom for every decision, support for every challenge, and compassion for every person they serve. May we always remember that behind every decision there are people. There are families, there are children, there are seniors, there are workers, there are people who need hope. And when leaders work together with respect, humility, and a heart of service, the entire community becomes stronger and united. May God continue to bless the mayor, the members of the city council, and all our city employees, and every family in our community. And may Hialeah continue to be a city of opportunity, a city of unity, and a city where faith and hope help us build a better future. God bless you all. God bless you, Mayor. God bless the city of Hialeah, and God bless the United States of America. Thank you very much.

Thank you all. Thank you, Pastor Barak. Please remain standing as we recite the Pledge of Allegiance. Face the flag, and it'll be led by Councilman William Marrero.

To the land 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.

Thank you for your respect. You may be seated. Thank you, Councilman. Madam Clerk, can you please read the meeting guidelines for tonight?

The following guidelines have been established by the City Council. All lobbyists must register with the City Clerk. As a courtesy to others, please refrain from using cellular telephones or other similar electronic devices in the Council Chamber. A maximum of three speakers in favor and three speakers in opposition will be allowed to address the council on any one item. Each speaker's comments will be limited to three minutes. No signs or placards in support of or in opposition to an item or speaker shall be permitted within the council chamber. Any person interested in making comments or posing questions on matters of public concern or on any item on the agenda may do so during the meeting. Members of the public may address the City Council on any item pertaining to City business during the comments and questions portion of the meeting. A member of the public is limited to one appearance before the City Council and the speaker's comments will be limited to three minutes. Individuals should be respectful of the elected officials and staff and make every effort to speak with a moderate tone using appropriate language and avoiding personal attacks. Member of the public, Any audience shall refrain from shouting or making remarks from their seats to the mayor, council members, or staff sitting on the dais. The public can view public meetings on the city's YouTube page.

Thank you, Madam Clerk. We have some really exciting presentations tonight. The first one being Mayor Calvo and this council will present a recognition to Hialeah's elite dance and cheer teams. Mayor, please take over.

Well, actually, I'm going to call Liz because we have some champions in the house and we're very proud of them and everything that they have been able to accomplish.

Good evening, Mayor, council members and city and members of the community. My name is Lissandra Macias, Parks and Community Engagement Supervisor, address 900 East 56th Street, Building 4. It is my pleasure to welcome you as we take a moment to recognize our elite cheer and dance teams. Tonight we celebrate the dedication, hard work, accomplishments these talented athletes were so proud to recognize all their achievements throughout the 2025-2026 competition season. We will begin by bringing up Miss Chrissy Suarez, our cheer coach.

Good evening. Christy Suarez, 2250 West 60th Street. Thank you. So this past season was Hialeah Elite cheerleading's second season ever. And they did so much. We're so proud of them. I'm going to read to you guys a list of their accomplishments. They started with FCDA's beach battle where Hialeah Elite placed first in their division and Hialeah Heat placed second. And then they did the FCDA state championships where both teams came back Florida state champions in their division and Hialeah Elite actually came back overall state champions beating everybody in the entire session. After that, they competed in their first ever varsity brand competition. For those of you that don't know, varsity is one of the biggest names in cheerleading. And they started with Aloha Spirit in Daytona, where they not only placed second in their division, but they got a bid to compete at probably the biggest competition in recreational cheerleading, the recreational summit, where they placed fifth, but they placed fifth against the top teams in the nation. So that was a very big accomplishment. I would also like to mention that they brought home multiple spirit awards and poster awards, meaning that that's not only a testament to their passion and spirit, but the amazing support system that they have behind them with their parents, their families, their coaches and our staff. So they had an amazing season and we can't wait to see what they do this year.

Well, a heartfelt congratulations on behalf of the city of Hialeah. And we want to see those trophies. Can you come up here and come up to the stage so we can see them?

Mayor, come on up. Come on up. Bring up Ashley really quickly so she can stay with teachers.

Please come up.

Face the audience really proud.

Yeah.

Council, can we join them down there? Mr. Marrero, can we join them? Bring your trophy.

We might be taking their spots.

Yeah. Wait for us.

Oh no. Let's give them a round of applause. Yeah. Well, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Now presenting our elite dance awards will be Ms. Ashley DeChapelle.

Good evening, my name is Ashley DeChappelle. I'm the Performing Arts Coordinator at Gullit Theater, 4200 West 8th Avenue. It is my pleasure and honor to introduce you to the Highly Elite Dance Team. They consist of the little babies all the way to the older girls. This season, our dancers have the incredible opportunity to compete in two major competitions, such as FCDA and Star Power. At FCDA, our dancers deliver an outstanding performance earning first place and becoming two times national champions and top scored performance. When we took the stage of star power, we were competed against talented dancers from across the country and internationally. Our dancers continue to shine and earning two regional champions, along with first place and second place finishes and ultimately becoming national champions. Because of their outstanding performance, dedication, and hard work, the Highly Elite Dance Team also received an invitation to compete at Worlds in New Jersey. These accomplishments would not have been possible without the incredible dedication of our dancers, their families, and especially their coach, Ms. Genesis Romero. Coach, Genesis has poured her heart, time, passion, and dedication into this team. She has pushed her dancers to believe in themselves, challenged them to become better and stood by them every step of the way. Her commitment to the growth both on and off the dance floor has played a tremendous role in the success of Hialeah Lee Dance. To our dancers, we are incredibly proud of you. Your hard work, commitment, talent, determination and passion have brought you to this moment and you have represented Hialeah with excellence every step of the way.

Girls, please come up at the moment. Can we give them a round of applause, please? The little babies. Okay. Just hold it, just hold it.

Hold it, hold it, just hold it. Just hold it. One, two. Thank you.

Okay, so now we're moving over to item B, and this is a very special moment to honor our men and women of the Hialeah Fire Department. We'll be presenting the life-saving award to the crew members of Rescue 9, the Hialeah Fire Department, for their actions in rescuing three individuals from a burning house fire. I'd like to ask Lieutenant Mark Sanchez, Firefighter Juan Cabrero, certainly our Chief, and Firefighter Fernando Guadalupe.

Mayor, if I may, I'd like to give just a quick speech on this crew here. You know, so I have the privilege of recognizing these three firefighters here for an action they took that resulted in saving three lives. On July 2nd, Lieutenant Mark Sanchez, Firefighter Juan Luna, and Firefighter Fernando Rodriguez were outside of their assigned district attending to some stretcher repairs that they were doing. While they were transporting, going back to their station, Lieutenant Sanchez witnessed a column of smoke in the distance. He contacted dispatch and had asked, was there any cause relating to this fire? Dispatch said no. So instead of assuming somebody else would take care of this, Lieutenant Sanchez and his crew immediately went to investigate this column of smoke. When they arrived, they found a fully working house fire and immediately reported a code one fire. They were being advised that there was people trapped inside of this house. A bystander led them to an efficiency on the side of the residence where three women were trapped behind the window of that house with security iron bars. We have those three women here tonight. I'll bring them up in a little bit. Lieutenant Sanchez immediately directed his crew to deploy a K-12 rescue saw. Firefighter Luna and Rodriguez went to work right away, cutting through the security bars, removing the three women from the smold-filled structure, and all three of them survived because of their actions. What these men did was not luck. It was not a result. It was a result of awareness, experience, training, teamwork, and courage. Lieutenant Sanchez saw something and did not look away. He acted. His crew trusted his leadership. They went to work, and they did exactly what Hylia firefighters are trained to do, save lives. So gentlemen, tonight it's my honor and privilege to recognize you with a life-saving award.

Thank you.

Mayor, I'd like to bring up the three ladies that they saved from that house fire that night.

The first award will be presented to Lieutenant Mark Sanchez in recognition of your extraordinary performance, decisive leadership. Like the chief said, the courageous actions during a residential structure fire that resulted in the successful rescue of these three beautiful women standing here beside me. They're here because of your actions, Lieutenant. And we wanted to present this on behalf of the city of and a very, very thankful residents of the city. Thank you for your. Courageousness and thank you for your leadership.

Yeah.

The second award presented to Firefighter Juan Cabrero Luna, again, in recognition of your extraordinary performance, decisive leadership, courageous actions during a residential structure fire on July 2nd, 2026, in part of Crew Rescue 7. Again, on behalf of a thankful city, Firefighter Juan Cabrero Luna. And last but certainly not least, Firefighter Fernando Calzadilla Rodriguez, again, in recognition of your extraordinary performance as part of Rescue 7 on July 2nd, 2026. Congratulations to Firefighter Rodriguez.

I'm going to ask the ladies who were rescued by these firefighters, how did it feel to see these men so beautiful and come to rescue them on that day?

Well, first of all, thank you very much, because the truth is that if I didn't say it for you, we wouldn't be here now. It was something exciting, at the same time sad, because being trapped in there without being able to get out and seeing that they arrived was a hope of life. Thank you.

So the good work of the Hialeah Fire Department does not just stay within the boundaries of the city of Hialeah. Today, we are recognizing a very special firefighter who I got to meet personally prior to his deployment, firefighter George Lanzwith. the Hialeah Fire Department, who will be receiving tonight the Deployment Recognition Award. Firefighter Lanz was deployed to Venezuela for nine days with the Florida Urban Search and Rescue Task Force 2 following the earthquakes that affected that country. And we saw the videos online, the sheer devastation. And one of our own, Hialeah Firefighter Lanz, was deployed. And so he will be receiving this award. Firefighter Lanz.

Mayor, if I may really quickly, I'm going to share a brief story on what Lance was doing in Venezuela. So during his mission, George and his team helped rescue a 44-year-old security guard who had been trapped for eight days beneath a collapsed 10-story parking garage. Okay, that rescue operation lasted 53 hours, the operation. Think about that. That's more than two days of difficult and dangerous work to rescue one person still holding on to breath underneath all that rubble. George and his members did not give up. And because of their determination, the result was that man was pulled out alive. So great job, George. I'm proud of you. The city's proud of you. This department's proud of you. Thank you for doing what you do.

Council President is technically challenged. All right. Firefighter George lands in recognition of your extraordinary performance and selfless service in deployment of the South Florida Urban Search and Rescue Task Force 2 team in support of earthquake recovery efforts in Venezuela. Again, the saving of a life. Another individual Venezuelan national, 44 years old, was saved due to your actions. And we are extremely thankful and extremely proud of all your training being put to help someone that wasn't even a member of Hialeah but was saved to your training, your expertise, and your determination and courageousness. So we are eternally thankful and congratulate you. Thank you. Well, a lot of lives being saved here in the city of Hialeah. So our next item, our next presentation is the recognition of Hialeah lifeguards for their rescue actions on August 4, 2026 at Bucky Dent Pool. These were the lifeguards, Juan, Camilo, Tristan, Ryan, Stephanie, and also a good Samaritan who was at the pool, a U.S. Army veteran, Kevin Palmer. We'd like to ask them to please come to the front.

Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor, Council, Willie Sanchez, Parks and Community Engagement, 900 East 56th Street. Mayor, we're very, very proud of these individuals. They always are training for this, just for this thing that happened, and they showed their expertise, their training, and their dedication to the city of Hialeah. Very proud of all you guys. You know, the pool business is something that we take very serious, and we appreciate your service to the city of Hialeah. Thank you so much.

Okay, first one up. First one up is Tristan. It reads like this, and the rest are similar. Recognition of your extraordinary courage, your quick thinking, your decisive action in responding to a life-threatening emergency at Bucketown Water Park that helped save the life of a member of our community, an 80-year-old resident of our community. Because of your professionalism, your skill, your courageousness, you helped save a life. And for that, on behalf of the city of Hialeah, on behalf of the city council and I as mayor, do extend my most sincere gratitude and appreciation for your service and your commendable actions in the protection of the life of another person. So Tristan, Yeah, these are these are the good ones. OK, so Juan, Juan Morera, again, in recognition of your extraordinary courage. And Juan's actually the head lifeguard, right? So, you know, you had a very good squad, a very good crew of lifeguards. And because of your leadership and leading that crew, we were able to save a life. So we're eternally grateful, Juan. Camilo, okay, again, recognition of your extraordinary courage. And Camilo was actually the gentleman, the young man that began the CPR efforts and actually got this individual to be saved. So thank you, Camilo. Thank you for what you did and being able to administer that CPR. And I remember the other day when we were at the hospital, uh visiting the uh the resident uh some of the doctors actually congratulated you and said what a great job you had done and really saved his life so camilo congratulations okay we have ryan uh it's kind of like brian but a little different But congratulations again, one of the other lifeguards, part of this team. And that's what it's all about. It was a team effort. All of you played a role. You all had your SOPs and you followed that to the T. And because of that, life was saved. So Ryan, congratulations. And best for last, Stephanie, congratulations. Stephanie, you're 17 years old, right? A high school student in the city of Hialeah who has a passion for saving lives. We were talking the other day at the hospital. You might want to get into the medical field at some point. So you started here, and everybody that started at Hialeah ends up going very high and achieving great things. So congratulations. You did it. At 17, you achieved an amazing feat. Congratulations. And again, so now we're done with the life. And thankfully, thankfully on that day where our life had to be saved, we had a resident of our city, Mr. Kevin Palmer, who is not only a resident of our city, but a proud teacher and also a former U.S. Army veteran. Because of your quick thinking, your quick action, being able to be in that pool. And a lot of times people will look away. They say somebody else will got it, but you, you didn't do that. You didn't hesitate. You thrust yourself into the situation and you helped our amazing lifeguard. So Mr. Kevin Palmer, congratulations for taking part in this rescue and thank you for everything that you did. Okay, so it's coming. Kevin, Kevin's getting $100 after this. But Kevin was also one of our staff members that played an instrumental role. Thank you, Kevin. Thank you for everything that you did. Your work matters, right? Our work here matters. And what you did really, really saved and made a difference. And so again, we're extremely thank you, Kevin. Thank you for everything.

Thank you guys. Congratulations. Oh, yeah. Oh, sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Thank you everyone for your respect and congratulations again to the best of the best of Hialeah. Thank you everybody, it was wonderful having them here. Okay, we're up to agenda item seven, comments and questions. Madam Clerk, do we have any registered speakers?

Sir, first off, for the record, Council Vice President is present. And the first registered speaker is Jessica Artiles.

Please come on up. Jessica Artiles. We Hello. Your name and address for the record, and then you have up to three minutes, and thank you for coming. Thank you. Can you help her? That's a lot of material.

Thank you so much.

Can I have you help me pass this out, or can I give this to someone to pass out?

Welcome.

You can start if you like while she's distributing whatever you brought. Thank you. Oh, yeah. Name and address for the record. And you have up to three minutes. Thank you.

Thank you so much, Officer Zogby. Thank you so much, Hialeah, for being here. Muchas gracias. This is what real citizenship is like. Thank you, counsel, for having us. Brian, Mr. Cabo. My name is Jessica Artiles. My address would be 7825 West 6th Avenue, here in Hialeah, Florida, 33014. That's actually our headquarters right now for my work that I've been doing for decades now. And the invitation today is to get your support, counsel, on how to create a richer headquarters here in Miami, here in Hialeah specifically. So let me start with this quick, uh, quick questions. How many of you, and this is for the audience too. Okay. Show me your hands. If you know a student or two or three, a high school student that is stressing out about college applications right now, let me see your hands.

I see a lot of nodding.

Mom is raising her hand. Awesome. Let me ask you this also. How many of you have felt and seen the destruction of our connection within our communities, within our families, because of the social media algorithms, because of the technology that's taking over? How many of you have seen the destruction? Yeah. We're in a loneliness pandemic and we feel it right now. We actually have some tools for this, and we have some remediation.

I wanna tell you today about Project Believe, and you can see it on page three with me.

This is something that we've been rolling out at Matter Academy down the street. We have some of the students that have seen us in action this summer when we were at the art gallery of Miami Dade College. the Hialeah campus, por supuesto, and Marrero. I want to acknowledge Councilman Marrero, who's been in conversations with us for months now, months now, about how to bring Project Believe to the students. Okay? I'll say it briefly. Project Believe is an ecosystem of support. Now I'm at this age where I need glasses, guys. an ecosystem of support and services for high school students in the college pipeline to get clear and confident on their own self-worth so that they can take themselves to the next level and maximize the return on their entire life's investments. When you get to senior year and you don't feel the confidence that you need to do well on your SAT exams, on your college applications, on your scholarship applications, because that's where you get the money, right?

That's where your investment comes through.

We now have tools for this. We now have a system of support and of services for this. So I'm leaving you guys with the business plan in your hands. Mayor Cabo, it was such a cool post that you did to invite us to be to have storefronts in Hialeah that would help bring students to a place. And my idea has been thank you. I've been working on it with Councilman Marrero for some time now. And And I'm inviting you all, please ask me any question that you'd like. I'd love to know how to navigate the beautiful world of Hialeah. I actually started here. It was my first internship when I was, I meant to say, I started in Hialeah when my parents got here just a few weeks after Hurricane Andrew. And we saw incredible opportunity and we've been working within the city since then. I went at only 17 years old. I also went to the Northeast like Mayor Calvo. I went to MIT, except I stayed for 14 years, studying with the biggest minds and learning about how to help students when they're super hyper-stressed.

Ms. Hartila, it's a wonderful presentation. We need you to wrap it up. We've used up our three minutes. Is there anything you want to close with?

I love the idea. And by the way, your mom was actually my elementary school Spanish teacher. So very proud. Hi, Leah Roots. And I think Brianna is right outside from my office. She's wearing the white blouse. She's leading the Palm Center initiative. Yeah, she can get you the information to to put in an application. And now, absolutely, we will consider it. We've had a lot of interest. Over 300 people have applied. And so we're very excited. There's a lot of enthusiasm and We're going to try to do the best we can with the limited spots we have. But Brianna, if you can just raise your hand, if you can connect with her, she'll get you the application. No problem. That would be amazing. And thank you for coming down.

Absolutely. It's been a long time coming. I always knew I was coming back. I think like you too, Mr. Brian Calvo. It's so weird to call you my hair, but I love it. I was at your inauguration earlier this year and I was like, doing it right. You guys, I've never been more proud to be from Hialeah.

Thank you so much for everything you do.

Thank you, honey.

Thank you. Madam Clerk, next registered speaker. Barbara Canales. Ms. Canales. And as always, Ms. Canales, your full name and address, and then you have up to three minutes, my dear.

Okay. Barbara Canales, 1681 West 68th Street, Hialeah, Florida, 33014. Can you show me the first, that one, bigger, like exactly? There we go. Oh, I can start. I'm sorry. Honorable Brian Calvo, these are the pictures that I went and not to my neighbors door by door from the previous administration of City of Hialeah because they wanted to convert Hialeah as well into parallel parking. And all these people, they said no. We are against it because of the chaos. When you turn around the corner, that's what you see. Those trucks, it's a strip mall. Just look at the truck. Look at the yellow line. Anybody can see the yellow line. That's built for a compact car only. Number two, behind that distribution truck, There is a gas. It's huge. Can you see behind the truck? It's a tic-tac waiting to happen. Luckily, I saw we have good firefighters, and the first one to go will be the building, but then it will be my block. So please, remove those trucks from that strip mall. Even it says that, strip mall, not commercial parking lot. Those two are there Monday through Friday. Day and night, I guess the company is not doing well, because they don't move at all. It's either Vicky Bakeries or Distribution Dessert. Please, have them remove. Number two. Next picture, please. That's how pathetic I am. How pathetic. I'm so pathetic that this is what I'm fighting for. Since 2022, it has never, Hialeah as well, the lawless land look like that, ever. And before 2022, that's how it used to look. In front of my house and those two blocks from West 16th Avenue to West 19th Court, empty. The only few cars, like from my block, 20, 21 ton houses, you got four. Two homeowners and two tenants, terrible tenants, that parked there. From West 17 Court to 19 Court, 42, I think, townhouses, the same. Mostly five cars that always parked there. Five. It does not, can you show me the next picture, please? It does never look like that. There we go. And this is slapping my face to find out that those cars belongs to Link Construction Company. That's where they go and park.

Thank you, Ms. Canales.

Can you please, the last one, just give me a minute.

Yes, go ahead.

Go all the way to the last one. I'm sorry, all the way to the last one. Like, yeah, all the way to the last one. There we go, stop. That's West 14th Avenue, around the corner of 1420 where the construction is happening. Why they don't park there? Because they're home in my townhouse. I'm a shop believer. They're home. Nobody parks there. Right around the corner of the construction. That is slap in my face. Please. Stop with the employees' work. I'm going to contact, I already contacted Link Construction Company.

Thank you, Ms. Compton.

But I will send them the pictures that you just saw.

Thank you. Thank you for coming. Have a good night, my dear. Next registered speaker, Madam Clerk. Sofia Estrada and Xavier Valdez. Sofia Estrada, Xavier Valdez, come on up. Savior of Eldads. Okay. The first speaker, I guess, is Sofia Estrada. Can you give us your complete name and address? And then you have up to three minutes.

Yes. Hi. My name is Sofia Estrada, 2500 West 56th Street, California.

Yeah, 33016.

Thank you. And I am the outreach director for the Cultivo Initiative. So I've always spoken English and Spanish. And although I always spoke English and Spanish, I lived in two different countries. And although I was always great at math and language, and I excelled in most subjects, I did lack some social skills because I saw that the kids didn't really understand why I had lived in two different countries while I had lived in North and South America. And so throughout my life, I was always in two different poles and I was criticized for not assimilating one culture or the other respectively. Instead of completely assimilating one culture, I decided to incorporate both into my identity, into the things I bake, into the way I am. And so I chose to adapt. And today, We have the Equal TiVo initiative, which is my way of making many immigrants feel welcome and my way of telling them that we can create a community where we can collide and all learn and thrive with the English language.

Yeah, man, I need your name and address as well. And then you go on. If you're going to share it, then you've got a minute and a half left. Go ahead.

My name is Xavier Valdez. My address is 2403 West 76th Street, apartment 110. I serve as the material and awareness director at Cultivo. One of our biggest inspirations for founding Cultivo was our background. Personally, I came to the United States when I was eight years old, arriving at a country with a completely different dialect, Cuba. Over the next few years, assimilation to the language was an uphill battle. With the vocabulary and forced participation in class consumed me with fear and embarrassment. Although I was able to learn the language and know about the beauty of English, at many times, I felt like giving up on this battle to understand English. At many times, I felt like I needed more help. At many times, I felt like I needed my own cultivo. This exact thought is a thought going through many immigrants' minds. And this is the very same thought that led to the creation of our initiative, helping others access resources that I couldn't access to level the uphill battle for all. In a community like Hialeah, where English literacy rates amongst immigrants are behind other communities nationwide, it is important to level this challenge that learning English poses to many. And through Cultivo, I want to create that path to learning English from an uphill battle to a walk in the park. We are here today giving the speech to ask for your help, your help to shape a better community, your help to build a better future for all the residents of Hialeah. Cultivo hopes that the city of Hialeah can provide contacts to local organizations and directly partner us on social media to gain more attention and new learners.

And if you have any questions, you can find us at Cultivo English on Instagram.

Say it. I want to hear the website clearly so that everybody watching can go. Where can they contact us?

We are Cultivo English on Instagram, and you will find our handle for our website and our Gmail there.

Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for coming. Thank you for everything that you do.

Very intelligent young person. man and woman. Thank you. Pleasure having you here. Any other registered speaker?

Yes. Hansel Keudeles.

Welcome, sir. Full name and address for the record. And you have up to three minutes, sir.

Hansel Caudales. Caudales. 631 West 50th Street, Hialeah, Florida 33012. Yes, sir. That's what I said. Good. Well, good evening. My name, as I said, is Hansel Caudales. And before I begin my remarks, I'd like to thank each and every one of you for your great service to the city of Hialeah and for all the work that you do on behalf of of our community. I'm here to express my support for Yaneth del Carmen Baez for Miami-Dade County Circuit Court Judge. She's in group 69 and you can find her on the ballot with the number 128. I've had the opportunity to see firsthand her dedication to public service, her commitment to our community, and the experience she brings as a prosecutor. Yaneth has been with the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office for more than nine years, and she has served as the chief for the misdemeanor and domestic violence unit. She currently works as a prosecutor for the human trafficking unit, which is a a small task that has a lot of police officers, prosecutors, and experts in the field. And last year, in 2025, she was selected as the Prosecutor of the Year for the Human Trafficking Division in the state of Florida. So she has a lot of experience, a lot of passion for her judicial role, and I believe she's more than qualified to serve from the bench. She's got the experience, the integrity, and the judgment, to serve our community well. I'd love to have the chance to say this in Spanish as well for some of our members here.

You have up to three minutes. Go ahead. Oh, thank you, sir.

Buenas tardes. Como dije, mi nombre es Hansel Caudales y estoy aquí hoy para expresar mi apoyo a la fiscal Janet de Carmen Baez para jueza de la corte del circuito del condado de Miami-Dade. Ella está en el grupo 69 y he tenido la oportunidad de conocer de primera mano su dedicación a nuestra comunidad all the support that has been given to the interns that are in the court, like me, in La Pasantilla, and I have seen first-hand all the lawyers that she has trained through her years of experience, which are already more than 50 lawyers that are also Thank you very much for your time. Repeat the name of the candidate, the judge, very clearly. Thank you for coming, Hansel. Thank you for giving me the chance. Thank you. Madam Clerk, next. Francisca Encalada. Francisca Encalada. Venga. Venga.

I need, when you are ready, your name and you have up to three minutes. Thank you.

A pleasure to meet you all, to see you, the mayor especially. And this makes me a little sad that it is not to come to thank you. You can repeat me.

Your name and your full address have to come from you and follow up later.

31 East, 10 Place, Hialeah, Florida, 33010. Gracias. Francisca Aurora Encalada.

Gracias, mi amor. Sigue.

Y Alba Vázquez, somos las dueñas de la casa. Mi hija. Entonces, hace años se inundaba mucho Hialeah. Ya no tenemos inundaciones. Frente a mi casa pusieron unos tubos muy grandes y arreglaron el parterre muy bonito. Y nació un pino. Yo no lo corté, yo lo dejé. En este año, en el mes de febrero, creo, le cayó un rayo que nos dejó sin luz la casa en dos, después de ir al cuarto de mi nieta. Y se quemó el pino. Yo llamé al código, que me enteré cómo era, y me dijeron que tienen prioridades y que el pino no lo podían mandar a cortar.

Yeah, what's right?

Repite. 941 East 10th, please.

You want to refer to somebody?

Please.

Siga.

Entonces, el pino se está secando, cayendo de rama a rama y está muy alto y posiblemente tape la calle cuando se caiga y le caiga a la vecina de al frente. Es lo que pienso y es lo que les venía a hacer saber.

Es para avisarnos que evitemos esa calle nosotros. No se va a caer.

Gracias. Gracias por el aviso. Bueno.

Ya tenemos la dirección.

Tienen prioridades.

Sí, sí, no. Esta es una prioridad. No se preocupen. Es una prioridad para nosotros. Ya tenemos la dirección. 941 East 10th Place.

Gracias.

Ya está en la lista.

Deseo las dos S. Suerte y salud.

Gracias, gracias.

Gracias, mi vida.

Gracias. Gracias.

Next registered speaker, Madam Clerk.

There are no more, sir, but I believe the gentleman and the lady in the front, they did not register, but they're asking to speak.

You want to speak? Yes. Come on up. All I need is your full name, your address, and you have up to three minutes.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Buenas tardes, señor alcalde, señor presidente y demás staff. Mi nombre es Félix Serrano. Félix Serrano? Sí, Félix Serrano.

Gracias.

I don't live in the city of Hialeah, but we have a couple of buildings in the city. My address is 13046, Northwest, 9 Calle, Miami, Florida, 33182.

That's your personal address? Yes. Yes, not the properties here. Go ahead.

Okay. The company is called Segar Enterprises Incorporated. It's the company that manages two buildings of our family. Están situados los edificios en 1215 South East, 9 Avenida de Hialeah y edificio 930 South East, 12 Calle en Hialeah. Los problemas son los siguientes, señor alcalde. Existe vandalismo a los vehículos de los inquilinos en ambos edificios. Robos continuos de paquetes de Amazon, FedEx, UPS and USPS. Apartment invasion, which are under repair. Others are not rented. They are constantly invading. Then vandalism damaged the general painting of the buildings, breaking windows, throwing bottles and avocados from the tree that is in the building. Opening even the mailboxes of the mail. En varias ocasiones, rompiendo los vehículos, fumando marihuana constantemente en los pasillos del edificio y el estacionamiento. Estas personas están robando vehículos y dejando los parqueados dentro del estacionamiento de ambos, que se comparte un estacionamiento para los dos edificios. Luego, en una ocasión, nos apuntaron al manager y a mí con una pistola. El individuo fue arrestado. La Ciudad de Hialeah tiene la denuncia sobre este hecho, así como otras denuncias más. En horas de la noche hasta la madrugada ocurren y le han caído golpes al manager en varias ocasiones. Amenazas constantes de estos muchachos que son menores de edad y viven en el bloque 1200 South East de la Nueva Avenida. Tres... Casas antes del edificio nuestro que hace esquina.

Es un albergue para muchachos que están desamparados. Sí, conocemos el local. Sí, entonces esto es contante. Ya lo sabemos qué hacer.

Nos agreden. Yo le he dicho al manager, no bajes cuando estén ahí, no los enfrentes, pero es que él se siente como que defender a todo el mundo. Bueno, eso es todo.

Bueno, el jefe de policía aquí puede hablar unas palabras. Estamos muy enterados de la situación. Es un negocio, está un negocio sin fines de lucro que obviamente trabaja con estos niños y les da esfuerzos de psicología, consejería, todo tipo de servicio. Pero el jefe de policía puede dar unos comentarios ahora sobre el tema porque ya hemos hecho algunos avances para tratar de remediar la situación. You want a mic, chief? No.

Yeah, that's fine.

Good evening, George Fuente, 5555 East 8th Avenue. The property the gentleman is talking about is called Kiva. It's over there in Southeast 9th Avenue. And I know that the city legal, along with our commander, has had meetings with Kiva management in regards to the calls for service that we've been receiving from that location throughout the years. We've now established where extra duty officer will be at that site for an extended amount of time, where compared to previous years, we didn't have officers. We had some for probably the last year, year and a half for a shortened amount of time just to offset the amount of calls for service that a patrol officer would have to respond to because it requires a lot of man hours when they're filing missing persons reports and recoveries. So that's the issue with that. That officer is just there to basically write reports. We do receive a lot of calls for service. from them. We have incidents where we've been documenting individuals that are living there that are being arrested for crimes that are committed within that area. They're allowed to come and go through certain times, and that's just legally what they're allowed to do. We can't prevent them from exiting that establishment or that home. But that's something that we've been dealing with. I know the mayor's been involved with it also. We're going to continue trying to see how we could improve what I, you know, speak to the gentlemen outside and let them know that. Obviously, anytime they have any incident or they see something that's suspicious to please call us and we'll be responding. But the commander in that area is well aware of what's going on and we're going to continue trying to improve what's going on and documenting those incidents.

Thank you, Chief. In summary, in Spanish, basically, I have met with that entity called Kiva. The boss and his commanders have also met. We know the problem. It's something that has existed for years in that locality. But we are making an emphasis, meeting with them, trying to improve the situation to add the officer that is there permanently in front of the business at all hours of the day to try to prevent these things that are of vandalism that are happening. We are limited in certain ways because the business can operate in the city, it has the permits to operate. It simply obviously brings certain people to the neighborhood and also the friendships that those people have. We are doing everything possible within the confines of the law, but I know that we are with our business department as well. tratando de tener esas conversaciones constantemente para mejorar las condiciones. Y sí sé que han podido reducir el número de niños que están en el lugar a solamente 6. Antiguamente era creo que más de 15. Ahora está mucho menos el nivel... Those are things that more or less can help the issue as much as possible to try to remedy that situation. But thank you very much for your patience and the boss is going to talk to you later outside. If you have any other situation we can help you, okay? No, I've seen it, it's very ugly. And we send our trucks to try to clean up a little bit of graffiti, try to pick up a little bit of garbage, but it's constant, it's constant.

Yeah. Mm-hmm. You want to meet him in the hallway? Anyone, nobody online? Nobody else from the audience? Yes, sir.

Elite super dad. Cheer dad. Very good. Good evening. Give me your full name and address, please.

I just said 1130 East Fifth Avenue, Hialeah 33010.

Thank you, sir.

Go on. Mayor, council members, thank you. I'm sorry I'm informal. I was here celebrating my daughter's achievement today and I saw everybody was coming up to talk. It's the first time I sit in a city council meeting and hear that how people come and actually talk to you guys. Well, I wanted to ask you guys for a little bit of help. Our girls are thriving. It is a program that's been doing excellent. My daughter's been a part of it for four years. I've had some council members come and support us individually. But this is the first year that I've noticed that either budgeting has changed or shifted or that the city is probably growing or the program is growing faster than the budget can hold. And the girls are actually going to be struggling this year to do their competitions outside of the city. As we do travel more and more, us parents are seeing it become more difficult for us to actually travel. collect the funds that we do need. And this year in particular is going to be a pretty big one. I mean, we have a fundraising being done for about 20,000 just to get the girls to their competitions. And that doesn't even cover our parent expenses for the traveling costs and everything. In other seasons, we've done fundraising for parent expenses. And this year, our main focus is going to be just getting the girls there. So if there's any way possible, again, I'm completely informed. I didn't have anything prepared, but I thought I'd come and speak up a little bit real quick and say that if there's any way that anybody can kind of encourage the city or what, I don't know what the city can do, but.

Absolutely. Your concern is well noted. This is actually the time right now, which is very timely because we're building the budget for next year's, you know, we go on fiscal year. So it's not the calendar year, the fiscal year, which ends now September 30th and then October 1st. would be the start of the next fiscal year. So in this moment is when we're crafting that budget, looking at all those things. So your concern is well taken, well noted. We'll try to do the best we can, obviously, with the funds that we have available. But congratulations to the kids. And they do a fantastic job. And they're winning so much. And obviously, that raises the expenses. But we're going to do everything we can to make sure they can keep performing at the levels that they're doing. We're very proud of them.

I am as well, and I appreciate it. So anything that the city can do.

Absolutely. Thank you so much. Have a great night.

I think that about completes the comments and questions, Madam Clerk. Item 8, announcement of amendments and corrections to the agenda. There's none, sir. None. Okay. No board appointment. Yes, there is a board appointment. 9A. Can you read it into the record, Madam Clerk?

Proposed resolution appointing Alyssa Marie Rivas to the Youth Advisory Committee as Mayor Brian Calvo's appointment for a two-year term beginning on August 11, 2026 and ending on August 10, 2028.

Thank you, Alyssa. Alyssa is a student at Matter Academy Charter High School. She has a 3.8 GPA. She's ranked top percent of her class. She's on the softball team, National Honor Society, FBLA, and even the cooking club. So I think she'll make a great addition to our growing youth advisory board. And I ask for her approval. Thank you. Pleasure of the council.

Motion. Motion by Councilman William Marrero. Second. Second by Councilman Louis Gonzalez. Please call the roll, Madam Clerk.

Mr. Zogby? Yes. Mr. Marrero?

Yes.

Ms. G. Perez? Yes. Ms. De La Vega? Yes. Mr. Gonzalez?

Yes.

Motion carries. The item is approved.

Thank you.

Yes, ma'am. I just wanted to make a request to City Clerk. Is there any way we can just get an active listing of any boards that are not active and what seats are open so we can make sure these boards are up and running? Thank you.

Thank you. Consent agenda, is there anyone of my colleagues up here in the dais who want to pull any of the items in consent agenda?

Through the chair? Yes, sir. Item M? Item N for Marrero.

For Marrero, yes, sir. Okay, item N. Any others? Willie or anyone else? Through the chair? Yes, ma'am.

I just wanted to, before we vote on the consent agenda, I know there is several items on infrastructure and asset management and the selection committee. Is there anything we can kind of go over that? Who picked them? What is this project for?

I mean, if you want, you can maybe pull one of the items. But basically, in a nutshell, it's all of these are basically in response to an RFP or an RFQ. And essentially, these are vendors that we would have available at our disposable. It's by category. So whether it's architecture, engineering, or what have you. And then there's three companies that are selected in each one of the categories. So what we're doing today is we're simply approving these vendors as responsive to the RFQ so that they're available for our use once we need them for whatever project. Obviously, at that moment, if we do select a vendor for a particular project, then that item would separately come in front of the council. for the approval of the expenditure. But this is just to basically sign them up as vendors in response to the RFQ. We need to have a vendor pool in case we need to do some sort of professional service in this space, architecture, engineering services, et cetera, et cetera.

And if I may just further.

Yes, ma'am.

And Councilwoman, in regards to the projects that the vendors from this pool end up being engaged for, The city has, in fact, prepared, the law department has prepared contracts, which would essentially be three-year contracts with two one-year automatic renewals. And based on the expenditure for each one of those projects, it would then, as the mayor indicated, would come to you all for vote.

Okay. Thank you. You good? You good? Yes. Thank you. Anyone from the audience interested in pulling any items from consent agenda? Otherwise, except for item M, pleasure of the council on the entire remaining consent agenda.

Motion. Sorry. I would like to pull.

Yes, ma'am. Double O. Double O for Vice President Melinda de la Vega.

Nope.

Running out of pages. Okay. Any other? Second the motion. Who was the first motion? Lillian Marrero, first motion. And Luis Gonzalez, second. And Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Mr. Zonvi?

Yes.

Mr. Marrero?

Yes.

Ms. G. Perez? Yes. Ms. De La Vega? Yes. Mr. Gonzalez?

Yes.

Motion carries. The consent agenda has passed. Accept items M and OO.

Thank you. Madam Clerk, can you read consent agenda M into the record?

Proposed resolution authorizing the mayor or his designee and the city clerk as a testing witness on behalf of the city to enter into a proposed agreement between the City of Hialeah and IUSA Partners Incorporated doing business as IUSA Water, attach here to and reference herein as Exhibit A for the implementation of a citywide pilot program for approximately 180 days to demonstrate the feasibility of an advanced metering infrastructure program featuring 175 to 225 ultrasonic smart water meters to be installed and tested throughout the city. The program will be at no cost on the part of the city and providing for an effective date.

Thank you. Councilman Marrero, you have the floor. Just have a couple of quick questions. How many companies currently are participating in the pilot program?

So this would be and by the way, thank you for pulling the item. This would be the fourth company that we would be authorizing to engage in the pilot program. We already have three. The first one that already installed meters was Badger. So those meters are already live. We've we've had a lot of success in the sense that we're seeing that information, that data live. We can see even detecting some leaks right in the system. So the technology thus far, obviously, it's premature, but it's early, but it's thus far it's working well. On Monday, we're going to begin with the second company to begin the actual installations, which is Quarren, Maine. Again, all of these companies have already, you know, we've sent out letters to the homeowners. We've, you know, had meetings and different things to make sure that everything goes smoothly. So they'll begin that installation as well. And then sustainability, which is the third company that would be next in line. We're basically trying to stagger it so that it falls on the billing cycle so that when we get the numbers, we can compare with the old data. And then in regards to iUSA, again, it's just another company in the industry that has basically agreed to the same parameters as the other ones, which is to provide these meters for free between $175 and $225 in their technology and see, again, which one ends up being the most effective. So that's where we're at.

So every time when we're adding a company, are we adding 180 days to the pilot?

Like, do we have a... No, so from the day they start, the day they start the installation, it's 180 days for them to basically run their system, right? So obviously we sort of staggered the three companies. And then this one, again, it would be the same thing. Once we approve, then we have the initial pre-meetings. Once we tell them, hey, you're good to go, then the clock at that moment would start for that company, specifically the 180 days.

Got it. And do we know by when we'll be making a decision collectively as to what?

Well, I think basically we would want all the companies to finish. And then at that moment, you know, we'd want to come before the council, present that information to you guys. And then we'll have to make sort of a joint decision as to, you know, obviously the first option is not go digital. Right. Just stay with the analog technology. The second option is, OK, we're going to go digital. Which one of these companies work the best technology wise? And then aside from technology wise, you know, the costs. Right. And some of these companies are a little different than others. Some require you to purchase the meters outright. Others basically lease you the meter. So there's different things. Right. It's a it's a lot of things that we'll have to take into determination. But We wanted to see the technology, how it works out in the real world first before being sold on just, you know, we have the greatest product, but then, you know, it doesn't turn out that way. So that's why we're doing it like this.

Okay. Got it. And is there like a ETA or do we know more or less like.

Yeah, so we're putting we're we're putting I think probably in the beginning of next year and the first few months of the next year first quarter, I would say would be a. Realistic okay time to make that decision okay great perfect motion.

So thank you, we have a motion from Councilman modern a second from Councilman Lewis Gonzalez please call the roll on item and.

Mr Marrero yes. Ms. G. Perez? Yes. Ms. Dela Vega?

Yes.

Mr. Gonzalez?

Yes.

Mr. Zoghbi?

Yes.

Motion carries. The item is approved.

Thank you. Madam Clerk, can you read the consent item 00 into the record? Thank you.

Proposed resolution authorizing the mayor, his designee, and the city clerk as a testing witness on behalf of the city to increase purchase order number 10000420 issued to GS and EMA USA Construction Corporation for supplementary site improvements to be performed at the city's reverse osmosis plant in the amount of $275,000. In substantial conformity with the agreement attached here to him, made a part hereof as Exhibit A, authorizing the mayor, his designee, and the city clerk, as a testing witness on behalf of the city, to issue and execute a separate purchase order to GS and EMA USA Construction Corporation for budgeted annual major capital modifications in the amount not to exceed $70,000, which is inclusive of a $12,235.64 contribution contingency amount and authorizing the mayor or his designee and the city clerk as a testing witness on behalf of the city to issue and execute a separate purchase order for reimbursement costs incurred by GS and EMA USA Construction Corporation for the membrane replacement work performed at the city's reverse osmosis plant in the amount not to exceed $740,000, which is inclusive of a $3,000 $99.38 contingency amount for a total community of expenditure in an amount not to exceed $5,835,000, subject to a 50% reimbursement from Miami-Dade County and providing for an effective deed.

Wow. Madam Vice President, read it again. Madam Vice President, you have the floor.

Yeah, so I just had some questions on this, specifically on kind of if somebody can walk me through the additional 275,000.

So I don't know if Kevin's here, but I can basically walk you through it. So we went over to the facility, the reverse osmosis plant. The way the technology works, reverse osmosis is the water passes through these membranes. And these membranes are the ones that go ahead and filter the water before we obviously send it out into the system. So obviously there's a shelf life after some time. It's like a filter, like any other filter that has to get replaced. So those were replaced already by the company. So we're under contract with the company that they perform basically the running of the facility. And that's the cost you see there, the $275,000. Half of that amount was actually paid by Miami-Dade County and we pay the other half. But the way this is written, it has to, we basically approve the full expense, but we're only actually pay out half of it. And again, it's part of the regular upkeep of the facility. This will not necessarily increase any production, but just basically upkeep, making sure the facility is still running. We are obviously looking at the facility. I've actually directed a memo at our water department And making sure that we get basically an analysis done of the water plant and see exactly what our path forward is going to be. Is this something that we want to keep for the future? Is this something that we want to maybe invest more money and try to increase the production? Right. And that's going to be millions of dollars. Or is this something that. You know, we might want to get out of this plan as quickly as possible. So there's a lot of options that we have to consider. So that analysis is being done currently. But this is the regular maintenance of the facility. At the same time, you should know. One of the issues that we saw in the beginning when we got in is that the wells, there's four wells located on site. The wells have been used so much, so heavily without the proper resting that a lot of the wells are drying up. And that is what's causing a lot of the decrease in production that we're seeing. The production right now is like 6.7 million gallons a day. It should be a lot higher than that. It should be over 10 million gallons. So there was some wells that were dug back in 2020, but nobody hooked them up. So they were just kind of sitting out there. So that's what we've been working on the last six months, getting those wells up and running. My understanding is that we're at the cusp of those being able to be connected. We're just waiting on a few minor things. And once those are connected, then we'll be able to put our wells at rest. The ones that we're currently using switch over to the new ones. That should help a little bit in the production. And then with enough and sufficient rest, we can connect all the wells so that we can go back to the production that was supposed to be delivered by that facility. So there's a lot going on with the reverse osmosis plant. But really, the deeper question is going to be, you know, what the future of that plant is. We still owe $37 million on the bond, right? We owe money on that plant. We're under contract with the company that runs the plant. And that contract is until 2030. So if we wanted to get out of it before that, you know, there's a $3 million penalty just to get out of the contract. So there's a lot of things going on. Dade County, you know, they're in the plant half with us. So we can't make the decision solely by ourselves. We need the county also to buy into whatever we do. So it's complicated, but, you know, we're working on it the best way that we can right now.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you. You're very welcome.

Motion.

Motion from Council Vice President De La Vega. Second. Second from Councilman Willie Marrero. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Ms. G. Perez. Yes. Ms. De La Vega. Yes. Mr. Gonzalez.

Yes.

Mr. Zogby.

Yes.

Mr. Marrero.

Yes.

Motion carries. The item is approved.

Okay, we're moving on to item 11, administrative items. Item A is postponed until the second meeting of this month. Would you like to read it into the record anyway? No, I'm not serious. Item B, Madam Clerk, please.

Proposed resolution authorizing the mayor, his designee, and the city clerk as a testing witness on behalf of the city to execute a brownfield site rehabilitation agreement and site access agreement with Miami-Dade County, Florida to include city-owned real property located at 3620 West 104th Street and 10100 West 36th Avenue, Hialeah, Florida, and identified as folio number 0420170020030 in Hialeah Heights, the Annex, and appointing the City Council of the City of Hialeah, Florida, as the Brownfield Advisory Committee and providing for an effective date. Thank you.

I'll just recap what this is. For those of you who joined us at the town hall that we had in the Annex Hialeah Heights area, these are some of the steps that we were talking about that we needed to get to. So we already designated the site as the Brownsville. The council did that back in January. We retained the council that's helping us with that. And so this is some of the next steps that are going to happen concurrently, which is us entering into agreement with Miami-Dade County what they call the rehab agreement and then we were also designating what's the called the brownsfield advisory committee the brownsfield advisory committee is the one that will receive the reports from our environmental consultants and then be able to make a decision as to how to remedy the site and how much money that's going to cost and all those things the brownsfield advisory committee is going to be ourselves so it'll be the council and myself as mayor So we're just appointing ourselves, creating this committee, and then we will have to have some meetings as a Brownfield Advisory Committee to go over all this information separately. And then we can make those determinations. And this is all part of the Florida law that regulates Brownfield. So we're just following that process.

Any questions or pleasure of the council on item B? Motion from Councilman William Marrero. Second.

Second.

Second from Council Vice President De La Vega. Please call the roll on item B. Ms. De La Vega.

Yes. Mr. Gonzalez.

Yes.

Mr. Zoghbi.

Yes.

Mr. Marrero.

Yes.

Ms. G. Perez. Yes. Motion carries. The item is approved.

Thank you. Madam Clerk, Item C, please.

First, reading of proposed ordinance amending Chapter 1 entitled General Provisions of the City of Hialeah Code of Ordinances, creating Section 1-14 to be entitled Advertisement and Notice by Publication to provide for publication of legally required advertisements and notices on a publicly accessible county website, repealing all ordinances or parts of ordinances in conflict herewith, providing penalties for violation hereof, Providing for inclusion in code, providing for a severability clause, and providing for an effective deed.

Thank you. Item C is on first reading. Pleasure of the council. Any questions? Motion to approve. Motion from Councilman Luis Gonzalez. Second. Second from Councilman William Marrero. Thank you. Please call the roll, Madam Clerk.

Mr. Gonzalez?

Yes.

Mr. Zogby?

Yes.

Mr. Marrero? Yes. Ms. G. Perez? Yes. Ms. De La Vega? Yes. Motion carries. The item is approved. Second reading and public hearing is scheduled for August 25th, 2026.

Thank you. Madam Clerk, administrative item D, please.

First reading of proposed ordinance providing for an ad hoc legislative advisory board to review the city charter prior to the 2029 decennial review and make recommendations as to possible amendments to the City of Hialeah Code of Ordinances and other legislative matters. Providing for the composition of the board, establishing the board's term, organization, duties and responsibilities, and staffing. repealing all ordinances or parts of ordinances in conflict herewith, providing penalties for violation hereof, providing for a sorority clause, and providing for an effective deed.

Thank you. Administrative item D is a first reading ordinance. Any questions or pleasure of the council?

Through the chair?

Yes, ma'am.

On this board, Who will fill this board? What experience legislatively? Because this is a legislative board, so I want to... Sure.

The way we created this, and I guess, well, first question is the purpose of the board so people are aware. We want to have a group of people that meet at least once a month and go through our code of ordinances. You've seen a lot of the complaints that we're sort of getting as, well, you know, this ordinance has existed for all this time and, you know, it wasn't enforced. So we want a group to meet and to go through and read line by line. And our law department is going to prepare those presentations so that we can be more informed of what's actually in the code. And is there anything that we don't agree with and we need to update before and we need to clean up? Or are there things that we thought were in there and are not in there and we want to add? So that's the purpose of this committee. Typically, that's done every 10 years. The last one was done back in 2019. But there's nothing that prevents us from doing it sooner than the mandatory 10-year mark, which would be in 2029. So we're basically doing it sooner. The committee will only be around for one year. They will meet once a month, again, with this very specific goal. And then at the end of the one year, prepare a report And recommendation to basically see what changes we want to make at the end of that 1 year period. Now, the way this is structured is that we're all all part of the board are able to be part of the board as mayor and as the council. But if you, for whatever reason would prefer somebody else to sit in your place, you're able to do that. And you're able to appoint somebody to fill your seat, so to speak, or it could be yourself. So, whatever, whatever way you want to do it is fine. These meetings will be public meetings open to the public. we'll follow all those protocols but law will help us basically divide up into 12 chunks our code of ordinances and then you know go chunk by chunk at least once a month and we'll probably have to do that during the day so obviously i know everybody has their their own commitment so we just wanted to make it as flexible as possible

And I just want to further clarify that the mayor or his designee will serve as the chair of the board, but myself and another one of the attorneys from the law department will be present at all meetings and in order to guide the process.

And then those recommendations will be brought up to the council. Perfect. Thank you. I like that idea.

Motion. Motion from Council President De La Vega and second from Councilman Luis Gonzalez. Please call the roll.

Mr. Gonzalez.

Yes.

Mr. Zogby. Yes. Mr. Marrero.

Yes.

Ms. G. Perez. Yes. Ms. De La Vega.

Yes.

Motion carries. The item is approved. Second reading and public hearing is scheduled for August 25th, 2026. Thank you. Administrative item E. Madam Clerk, please. First reading of proposed ordinance amending chapter 2 entitled administration article 2 entitled departments offices and divisions division 8 entitled finance management department of the court of ordinances of the city of Hialeah specifically by amending section 2-236 to establish a grants administration division and creating section 2-241. to be entitled Grants Administration Division, repealing all ordinances or parts of ordinances in conflict herewith, providing penalties for violation hereof, providing for inclusion in code, providing for a solubility clause, and providing for an effective deed.

Item E is on first reading. Questions or pleasure of the council?

Basically, what this is, is it's an administrative thing, but we're creating an official grants division within the finance department here in the city. Basically, so people understand the history. We used to have a grants department in the city. That grants department was at some point renamed grants. The Housing and Community Services Department, which is similar, but it's different. A grants department is there to seek out money and seek out funds that are available. Housing and Community Services Division, they just manage existing grants that we've already been awarded, and they just sort of manage those grants. So, you know, we have one person right now in the entire city of Hialeah within the administrative side, and then we have one person in police, and that's it in terms of trying to seek out grants. There's some, you know, individuals within our city that they're proactive and they go above and beyond and they try to get grants throughout their respective departments. But what we need really is is a consolidated grants team that is constantly, you know, they're, they're nine to five is to seek out money for us. And, uh, you know, we've sort of outlined a vision and what that would look like. You'll see more of it, uh, when we get to the budget discussions, but there's almost $150 million out there in grants that we're just not tapping into because we don't have the proper mechanism. So that's what we're trying to create with this. Um, you know, we understand that there's, you know, amendment three is going to be on the ballot now in November. If that passes, which I think it will, and we'll talk about more of this in the budget discussions, but we will see revenues sharply decline for the city upwards of $25, $28 million. And so when those things happen, We need to be prepared and we need to be thinking from now on, how are we going to fill those gaps in the budget? So in order to do that, you know, one of our ideas or one of our strategies is to increase the amount of effort that we put into writing grants and getting those grants approved. So that is what we're considering here today. Thank you.

Thank you, sir. Any more questions or any questions for item E? Motion. Motion from Councilman William Marrero. Second. Second from Councilman Luis Gonzalez. Please call the roll.

Mr. Zogby?

Yes.

Mr. Marrero?

Yes.

Ms. T. Perez? Yes. Ms. De La Vega? Yes. Mr. Gonzalez? Yes. Motion carries. The item is approved. Second reading and public hearing is scheduled for August 25th, 2026.

Thank you. Item 12, unfinished business. Should I call item 13 new business?

Through the chair.

Yes, you have the floor.

Thank you. I have a couple of items that I would like to discuss. First item will be, I would like for parks, construction, streets, and public works to give the city council a monthly capital project report. I think it's important for us to be informed because we get phone calls from our residents and sometimes they ask us, oh, which street is being... It's next. So, and we are really not in the loop. So I believe it's important that, uh, we get a monthly report here at the council from these departments. So we can be, you know, have a better understanding what's going on.

Wholeheartedly agree. And I believe they're working on a tracker now so that we can share that with the council and you can see, you know, what this project status is by department. I think it's an excellent idea. Absolutely. Okay.

Second item. And I know you and I have discussed this, um, In the charter, this has to do with Zonius. Claudia, here. We have a downtown urban center. Now that we're going to be amending or expanding our charter and reviewing it, I believe that we need to look into the item that has to do with the downtown urban center is the only area that the zoning has the authority to over the exterior paint and colors of the buildings. I like us to look at expanding the authority, especially for commercial properties along our main corridors. So we have a better, you know, the city to look prettier and we don't have a building looking orange and another building looking brown. And we have more authority over the corridor, especially for commercial properties.

So yeah, if I may. Yes, ma'am. Just so Councilwoman Perez is aware, Councilwoman Monica Perez had asked from the legal department about two months ago, I would say, for an opinion as to whether or not the city could move forward with such a project. And I'll be sure to circulate that opinion to you and to all council members and then

I think it's important we look into that. Because right now, my understanding is that it's only the downtown area that we have jurisdiction.

That's correct.

So now that we are going to look into the charter and amending, I think it's important that we look into that. And thirdly, and I will not take anybody's time, um, I think it's important that we put HR together with the departments, we put a process in place to make sure when someone leaves the city, it's documented. And let's say that person is in charge of a certain, I don't know, for instance, like the grants, they have to do with a specific grant in Miami-Dade County and they leave the city. It's important that HR and the department head are in communication to make sure that they informed Miami-Dade County or whoever they have to contact that that person no longer works with the city. So we're keeping our records up to date. I think that's important. So we have no miscommunications in the future.

Yeah, and that's an excellent idea. And I think one of the things that Elsa was working on is to start doing exit interviews. So any employee that's very important, making sure document, okay, well, you know, what's the reason? Is there anything that we can do better to try to retain some of the employees that we have superstars and for those that we can't retain, at least like you said, be able to document everything, make sure that that's done in a clean manner. Yeah, agreed.

We tried when I was HR, we tried to do exit interview due to the, you know, that we didn't have the right staffing. It was a little challenging, but yes, I think it's an excellent idea that we do exit interviews.

Thank you.

That's it.

Is that a motion? No, there's no motion required. I think we're losing the ladies in pink. La Dama Rosada. Gracias. Gracias por su paciencia. Thank you. Gracias. All right. Thank you, everybody, for your patience. We're done with the administrative portion. Yes. I apologize. We're not done.

It's okay. I had a question for Parks. During last year's budgeting meeting, I know we spoke about an outside inspector or surveyor. who was being brought in to kind of go through the parks and give us a list of projects in priority, in list of priority. I think it was like gonna be the top 10. I know we discussed this during budgeting and just, I never really got a list of that. And so lots of events have happened. Just curious, do we have that report from the outside surveyor?

From Willie Sanchez, Parks and Community Engagement. Are you referring to the pool assessment or the... Yes.

I'm pretty sure that's what we had discussed last year.

Yeah.

Somebody was going to come in, assess our pools, and kind of give us a list in priority what should be done first.

Did we get that? Yeah, it was completed. We can share that with council.

If we can share that... Obviously, I know it's public that we've closed the pools. What is it that needs to be done for these pools to open?

So I made the decision to close all the pools. Again, it's an abundance of caution and general prudence. Obviously, we had facilities that were neglected for years and years and years and years. negligence completely in terms of the upkeep many of these pools are not operational they're not functioning buggy down was one of them seven years closed and so we were able to basically rebuild that pool completely you know pumps filtration all these things uh we were able to do that and Unfortunately, we get this Department of Health report saying that even though we did all these things and all this work and all this effort, they still highlighted additional things that we would have to do in order to be able to get their approval in order to operate. So what I've said is, listen, let's be prudent. Let's close everything down. Obviously, these are things that I inherited. I don't want to have these facilities open to the public unless I have an independent authority. uh expert that knows everything about pools because i don't i'm not an expert in pools to come in review every single pool top to bottom left to right and tell us exactly today august of 2026 what are the conditions of the pool what has to be done in every single pool and then we can do those things we can fix those things and know that the moment we open back up to the public that everything is in tip-top order so that's how we came to that decision and that conclusion in order to make sure that this doesn't happen in the future and that we are in the best, best, best shape possible. Because obviously, you know, it's a huge, huge liability for the city. These facilities, obviously, you know, they're full of kids. They're full of seniors even that are enjoying our facilities. We want to make sure that everybody's safe and that everything is as perfect as humanly possible.

Yep. And so what, I'm assuming that's going to be a priority?

Absolutely. So Willie's already working on that and trying to identify. I told him, Willie, who do you hire if you're the pool guy at Fountain Blue? Who do you hire if you're you know, running the pools at some top resort or some top aquatic theme park. That's who I want. I want the best that we can possibly get. I want them down here and I want them looking at every square inch of all of our facilities and know exactly what do we need to do. Right. I'm not an expert. You know, we have obviously the staff that we have. So we just want somebody independent that can tell us we need what we need to do and just get it done.

And do we think that that process will take a couple of weeks?

We want to get, so tomorrow morning, we're going to make contact with one of the sources we received today. And we want to move as fast as we can. Okay. All right. Because we know people want to use our pools.

Yeah. And speed is important. Right. But safety is important. You know, it's going to take however long it takes. You know, we can't we can't rush it. Unfortunately, it just it is what it is. I you know, nobody wants to open them up more than me. But, you know, we need to we need to just do the prudent thing at this moment. And again, years and years and years of neglect these facilities. Need a lot of money. I've asked Commissioner Garcia to help the city of Hialeah. He's taken, obviously, a lot of leadership on this issue to bring us money. We need at least $5 million. We know at least that much. We still have facilities that are closed. We have three pools that are still closed. I'm saying closed in the sense that they've been closed for a very, very long time. We need to fix these facilities, get them back up and running, and whatever maintenance items need to be corrected in our existing facility. So I've asked him to bring us at least $5 million. I'm sure he's very committed and he'll do his best.

Through the chair. Yes. Just to echo what councilwoman Jalene Perez, during this process, when you guys are looking for this outside independent auditor, can you keep us in the loop? Can we get regular updates if that's cool with the mayor?

Yeah, basically it's going to be relatively not that complicated. They'll visit each site and after each site, they'll give us a report. So absolutely. Once we get the report, we can share that to everyone. It'll be public record. You'll get a public records request. And we'll get it to everybody and we'll see. We'll all see together what hopefully the reports are one page and it says everything was perfect. But if they're not, you know, we'll fix them.

And they're in the process of looking for the person and all that. Can we get all those details as well as what we're going to bring in and keep us in the loop with that?

Yeah, depending on the cost, that'll probably be a council item. So it'll probably be a council item. I assume it's going to exceed $25,000, more than likely. So it'll have to come to the council in order to pick. Okay, got it. Perfect. Thank you.

To echo on council member my riddles, keeping us in the loop, please going forward. Um, I would also appreciate if the council can be kept, uh, informed on any critical issues concerning the city. I know the last couple of days have been eventful, but I found out through all of them through social media.

Yeah, I found that stuff by reading it in the paper. Right. So there's a lot of a lot of issues there that need to be corrected. But we're going to do that. Absolutely. And again, now we're on notice. We understand what's going on. And so we can react accordingly. Right. A lot of times, you know, it's just information that we just didn't have. So obviously that's going to change. Thank you.

Any other new business? We can move on to zoning. Madam Clerk, please take over. Thank you, everyone who is not here for zoning. You're welcome to stay. Otherwise, thank you for coming.

Will all those persons who will be testifying on an item, please stand and raise your right hand. Do you swear or affirm that the evidence you're about to give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? So help you God, if so, say I do.

Let the record reflect that I'll have responded in the affirmative. Thank you. Mandy, thank you for coming.

And you could stay too. All right. Zoning. Final decisions A and B are postponed till the second meeting of this month.

Yes, sir.

So we're going to move on to item 16, land use amendments and more good news. Item A, bad news for our second meeting. Good news for this meeting. Item A of land use amendments is also postponed. We'll move into zoning items. More surprises. zoning item 17 a 17 b 17 c are also postponed until the second meeting of august not more much more needs to be said about that right madam i mean unless the council has any questions can we move on to 17 d Yes, sir. All right. So, Madam Clerk, please read into the record.

First reading of proposed ordinance rezoning property from R11 Family District to P Parking District for the property located at 390 East 43rd Street, Hialeah, zoned R11 Family District, legally described herein, repealing all ordinances or parts of ordinances in conflict herewith, providing penalties for violation hereof, providing for a severability clause, and providing for an effective date.

Okay. Item D is on first reading. And do we have, yes, sir. You are here representing the property owner. Very good. Unless anybody has any questions or anything beforehand.

We don't have him. If we can have your name and your role so that we know if you're a lobbyist, please. Okay.

Already registered with the city as well. My name is John Lucas. I'm here on behalf of the applicant, Ricardo Largo. And my offices are at 2655 South Lejeune Road, Corrigables, Florida, 331. One more time. Sorry, 265?

2655 South Lejeune Road.

Cora Gables, Florida, 33134.

So you did register online? Yes, ma'am. Okay.

Thank you, sir. I want to remind anybody who may be here waiting, I know you're waiting, this is on first reading. We're not taking public comments on this one, please. We're going to make a decision here if we move it or not to the second reading. If it does move to second reading, then, of course, all public comments are welcome within the guidelines. But... Okay, now that we've gotten past that, Mr. Lucas, you said? Yes, sir. Yes, sir. You have identified yourself, and go ahead.

Very briefly, Planning and Zoning Board has recommended approval, as has your planning director herself. In connection with the approval, the discussion was robust before the board, and we ended up laying out specific conditions that the owner has agreed to. And in fact, your law department has already prepared a declaration of covenants, which is quite extensive. It has already been signed and has been tendered to the city as well. This is a change of zoning. We've Visited this issue a couple of years back unsuccessfully. We have advanced beyond with a better design. The proposed parking lot, which this is a change of zoning from R1 to P. And the P is uniquely and singularly applicable to this property only in connection with the existing use. So it can never be separated. It's going to be bound by a unity of title, if you will. And the proposed parking lot is going to provide a solution to the restaurant's parking. its needs and it's going to alleviate what has been experienced as unauthorized parking on the swale areas themselves. In fact, the planning director had a great suggestion. She indicated with regard to a swale area located in front of the vacant lot itself, that we convert that to a curbed and landscaped area that would prevent unauthorized parking or the type of swale parking that one would typically encounter. Let me not belabor the point because I know the public comment is not going to be forthcoming this evening. I would ask the council to please take a moment in advance of our next meeting in order for us, if this advances, in order for us to, for you rather, to better understand the conditions that have been imposed, which are stringent. They are enforceable by way of code enforcement or otherwise through a cancellation or termination of the actual process. authorization if we're good enough to receive that. Thank you. And I'm here to answer any questions you have. Maria Fernandez, the architect, is here as well if anybody has any questions regarding design features.

Yes.

Yeah, I know this has been a hot topic. And just to be clear for my colleagues, this is strictly nothing to do with the business, something to do with the business. This is turning a vacant R1 single family home lot, which is vacant at this time. And this is limited to changing the zoning of R1. into a parking lot for the use of the restaurant. I've got the first question, which was important, which I asked you last time, and I think, what time will the parking lot be closed and secured that nobody from the neighborhood can park in it? Obviously, the restaurant closes at a certain time.

Is that anywhere in the conditions? I don't believe that that is in the conditions.

I mean, I know it's going to be gated and it'll be able to be closed and locked, right? Yes. The answer to that is yeah.

But I can't give you the specific time.

I think by the second reading, because that's important, because nobody wants to think that there could be any possibility of loitering in that parking lot at night when the business is closed and nobody's minding the store. So could you see if by the second reading you can have that information for us and maybe we can include that in the conditions of the covenant? I don't think it's that difficult. I mean, McDonald's across the street did it years ago because they were having loitering there and everything. And we recommended when I was in the police department to start closing, chaining off certain sections, closing certain sections at night to avoid just this huge dark parking lot where kids would come and hang out. So I think that part's very important that the neighbors know that at certain time in the evenings, like clockwork, It'll be closed. So if you can find out what time is convenient for the business and I guess, right?

Council President, certainly we can work with Mr. Lucas. Tony Brescio is special counsel for the city on this matter. And I believe they have been in communication. So that could definitely be part of the conditions.

Thank you. Be happy to be prepared to address that.

Thank you, sir. Any other questions for this panel? change of zoning for Mr. Lucas?

Through the chair, I'm sorry if I missed it. Has this property in the past tried to change to a parking lot previously?

Yes. We had an application that was going to hold me to this approximately two years ago, three years ago, and it was not successful at this level.

Mr. Lucas and maybe Mr. Marrero will. Yeah, I was one of those that I did vote for it because I thought it was a solution they needed because a lot of the complaints, and rightfully so, where there wasn't enough parking, then they'd occupy the swale areas of the surrounding neighborhood. And the business was not a good neighbor for a while. They're good, hardworking people, but they were not good neighbors for a while. There was a lot of garbage thrown around. They didn't have somebody constantly monitoring that. But I've gone around. I haven't let the owner know or anybody, but I've gone around several times whenever I'm in the area in the past since when I knew this was coming up again. And at least the impression I've gotten, they've cleaned up their act a lot. They used to have vendors outside the business, which was a prohibited activity. Everything was to be contained. I didn't see that anymore. They had the corn huskers outside. It was a mess. uh it was clean they finished their construction they did their expansion and their storage in the actual restaurant but but i found it to be clean the times that i went and unannounced i don't let the owners or the operators know mr largo that i'm going i you know you want to catch them in a candid way and uh i've been very impressed personally i like that he's cleaned it up and i told him i was the one who told him years ago that listen you've been a bad neighbor You're too busy for your own good and you haven't been, you know, minding the store because the neighborhood suffered from it. But I hope that got better. It seemed to me that it looks better.

I can assure you it's gotten much better. Yes, sir. And in fact, in the declaration of restrictions that Mr. Ressio has prepared, there are two specific items there that address your concerns this evening. I'll just share those with you. Subparagraph.

Before you continue, just to clarify for Mr. Marrero, one matter. Whenever an application does in fact get denied a zoning application, there is a state like a ban essentially of a year. So this is something that was more than a year ago that's being presented now.

Thank you. What I was going to make is we have a condition here for somebody to be assigned for purposes of monitoring litter, particularly during those periods of time when you have peak periods of people coming in, either staying on premises and eating or otherwise just picking up and leaving. But also we have a specific provision and a condition which requires the owner to provide an individual who will be deployed for purposes of monitoring the traffic. It's facilitating the traffic so that you have that ease and facility of access without impairing or otherwise obstructing your adjacent right of ways.

Mr. Lucas, please, no matter what the decision is today, convey to Mr. Largo, who's just he works 24 hours a day, seven days a week. I know sometimes he doesn't have the time to look back at what's going on. We're going to hold them. If we approve this in any way, we're going to hold them to all that. He's not hidden somewhere that's an industrial area that you can be a bad player and it doesn't really, it doesn't become a nuisance. He's in a residential neighborhood. We're going to hold them to this, whatever the conditions and the covenant is, right? We have to hold them to us. We'll all be looking at it if we drive by, if it gets approved. We'll be looking at it when we drop it. I'll be keeping my eye on it because we have to act here like if we're the neighbors there and can we live with that. If he continues with what seems the right track he's on, I commend him for it, but I really hope he does. Any other questions from the council? Through the chair. Yes, sir.

Is the restaurant all in compliance with that expansion or has there been any complaints at all from the restaurant?

Claudia has been planning on certain official in terms of the restaurant itself all they have all the licenses and everything during this application we receive a couple of complaints for the property relating across the street that is also owned by the property owner and we have submitted that to code enforcement for code enforcement to to investigate and find out that process.

Thank you. Again, I apologize. I just want to remind anybody who's here for that. Any other questions from the dais on item zoning, item D? Or Whenever you're ready, pleasure of the council.

No rush. Yes, ma'am. I would put in a motion to deny.

We will take the motion at this point. We can't take it. What's the procedure? Okay, so we have a motion to deny. Should I ask for a second and then we call the roll? Is that proper at this juncture?

I mean, at the pleasure of you as holding the quorum, you could definitely just have the city clerk take a vote on the item.

Yes, gotcha.

We need a second vote. Vote, we need a second on the item.

On the motion to deny. Is that what you're saying we need a second? Because what we have is a motion to deny.

Yeah, and then you need a second on the motion to, Councilwoman De La Vega's motion to deny. Yes.

And then if we get the second, then we've got to call the vote.

Then you have to call the vote. That's correct.

Okay. Okay, we have a motion to deny from Council Vice President De La Vega. Do we have a second? Motion dies?

Yes, sir. Motion fails at the pleasure of the council for lack of a second.

I can't say dies. Okay. Thank you, Madam Vice President. Otherwise, again, if anybody has any more questions or whenever anybody is ready, pleasure of the council.

Motion to table for the next meeting.

What is it that, is there anything that we can clarify? That's okay. Motion to table, second to table. Now we're going to do, is there anything before we move to the vote? Is there anything that you'd like to ask Mr. Lucas to bring for the next meeting? Or would you like to go by there and see what's going on? Whatever. If there's anything, ask him now.

At the moment, no. I don't feel completely comfortable with the project. I do think it'd be fair to have a full council before making a decision for a denial. So that's the only reason I will. That's fine.

I just wanted to know. So, you know, so you can be ready, Mr. Lucas, that's fine. So you don't, you just want a full council. That's fine. Motion to table for August 25th. So this would be tabling. We do the first reading all over again. So, okay. And we have a second to table. From Councilman Luis Gonzalez, please call the roll.

Mr. Marrero?

Yes.

Ms. G. Perez? Yes. Ms. Dela Vega? Mr. Gonzalez? Yes. Mr. Zogby? Yes. Motion carries. The item is postponed until the council meeting of August 25th, 2026.

I think it's best that way for today. Let's get a whole council. Thank you, sir. My pleasure. Thank you. Thank you all for coming. Gracias, señora. No se ha hecho nada por si acaso alguien no se hizo ninguna decisión. Este tema se va a tomar otra vez, discutir otra vez a las cinco y media, agosto 25. OK. Thank you. So item E of zoning.

First reading of proposed ordinance granting variances to allow interior east and west side setbacks of 7.16 feet or 10 feet is required. Rear setback of 14.3 feet or 20 feet is required. 24.41% pervious area where 30% is the minimum required. 8 parking spaces where 11 parking spaces are required. And the proposed dumpster enclosure to be located 3.42 feet from the right-of-way where 10 feet is required. All contra to Hialeah Code of Ordinances Sections 98-590, 78-108, 98-2203, 98-591, and the Hialeah Landscape Manual for the property located at 533 East 22nd Street, Hialeah, zoned R35, Multiple Family District, legally described herein, providing for conditions repealing all ordinances or parts of ordinances in conflict herewith, providing penalties for violation hereof, providing for a severability clause, and providing for an effective deed. Thank you.

Item E is on first reading, not open for public discussion. If everyone agrees, we'll allow the lobbyist and architect, Manny Rose, to explain it.

Good evening. Manny Rose, architect with offices at 18501 Pines Boulevard, Suite 342, Pembroke Pines, Florida. This project is coming before you after being approved by the zoning board unanimously. This is like a sister project to the one next door that we got approved from you all back in September of last year. Both zoning board and council approved it unanimously. The history between these two projects is that it burned a few years back. because of lack of water on the street. The fire department could not connect to the fire hydrants and so forth. And part of our project for the project that's already being permitted at the moment next door at 541 is extending the water line sufficiently to the east side to accommodate the Proper pressure for the fire sprinklers and so forth.

Is that adding a hydrant, or does it need a hydrant? It adds a hydrant as well. Thank you, sir. Go on.

At the east side of the property. It's basically almost an identical project. We're doing a modern design, so we as architects don't like the same design, one next to each other, but the encompass is the same design. idea. And you've got pictures of the parking area on the street that is sufficient to accommodate the few parking spaces that were short, like we were next door. I personally went in and took some pictures and I walked the area. And we feel very strongly about this project and would love to have your approval on it. So if you all have any questions, I'd be more than glad to. And by the way, I brought the whole staff here today. Are you paying? Yes, sir. And we're having dinner after this. Anyways. How many units is it, Manny? I'm sorry? This one, how many units is this one? Five units. The same identical to the one next door. There's three two-bedrooms and two one-bedrooms. Thank you, sir. Go on. Okay. And that's basically my presentation. And if anybody has any questions, I'd be more than glad to answer them. Yes, sir.

Council, anyone have any questions for Mr. Rose?

Many. Yes, ma'am. Sorry, through the chair. The project obviously brings light, right? I think it's a nice project, especially that we already approved the one.

Right.

Yes. However, eight parking spaces, anything we can do to make it 10. It's five units.

Well, it just won't fit.

I mean, we had... Can we change the design a little bit to add parking spots?

It's very tight in the bottom area, man. I'm sorry to say that.

Yeah, I think what... Again, we continue to have parking issues, right, in the city. And so if we continue to approve projects where we are making variance changes to parking, we will continue to have parking issues and people parking in the swale. and people parking where they're not supposed to be parking. So although I love this project, I would love to see how we can make parking work.

Okay. If you, pardon for me interrupting you, but if you look at the pictures that I took of the off-street parking, there's like 10 or 12 parking spaces right in front of the property.

What is the picture you took of the properties in here?

Yeah, sure. They're inside. Eight and a half by 11. There's plenty of parking.

Are you talking about the parking in the front?

Yes, ma'am. Off-street.

The park in the front?

No, no, no. The residence, there's eight parking spaces within the... It used to be two short. Now they moved it up to three short because it's now required 11, not 10. So you have parking off-street. that you can accommodate probably in the neighborhood of five to seven cars easily. A minimum of those. You can see across the street that the railroad track is on the other side.

So there's a... Yeah, I do. I see the parking. I see the parking in the front.

And I've been there at all times and it's there and they're mostly empty most of the time. I've been there three or four times.

I see that.

I mean, we strive to get the most we can, but sometimes to facilitate the number of units and we don't want to go over three floors because it's just too much for the area. That's the main reason. But there's always studies on our end as architects to accommodate and the zoning director can vouch for that, what we do in our interest.

I'm going to, I mean, again, this is just me, right? We have counsel, everybody can feel differently. It's just, I continue, my office continues to get complaints. about parking, and I think I've been very vocal for the last year about how I feel about parking. I see the street parking in the front.

Yes, ma'am.

But if the units are across the street...

There are still units across the streets.

Well, the project is across the street. You're saying that there's extra parking in the front, correct?

Well, there's extra street parking, but across the street, there's a railroad track and there are no buildings.

Okay. But there's still that hazard of... Children, if they're parked in the front, they have to cross the street. There's a lot of reasons. Sure. So there's anything we can do. And I know, Claudia, we've had this conversation. I mean, for me, parking is a big issue. Again, every little unit that we continue to approve with variances, it just it accumulates. It's like a snowball effect.

Through the chair. Again, I respect your opinion. Through the chair, if I may. Yes, I am. Yes, sir. Sorry. And are all five units two bedrooms? I'm sorry? Are all five of the units?

No, there's three two-bedrooms and two one-bedrooms. Two one-bedrooms? Three two-bedrooms and two one-bedrooms.

Two one-bedroom? Yes. And three two-bedrooms, correct? Yes. Would you consider reworking it so there'd be more one bedrooms than two bedrooms?

We could. I mean, there's a bigger need for two bedrooms than there is for one bedroom, but... There's no base. The parking would be an issue.

And then... And Claudia, so the area in the front, if I'm not mistaken... Is that what we're planning? Because at some point, I know we're planning on activating under the tri-rail, that green space. Is that that area?

That is correct. Basically, the area fronting the project across the street from the project is where we are working towards creating what we call the Hia Line. So we are actively working with Miami-Dade County to enter into their agreement. Um, eventually to, to, to create that activation.

So yeah, today there's maybe parking, but in the future we're planning on creating a space where residents are going to be parking there and visiting. Right.

So, I mean, it can, it can work both ways. Um, you need also the density to activate these spaces. Um, but also yes, to your point, you will need the parking for those activities.

And do you feel comfortable currently with the spread of the two bedrooms and one bedrooms and the parking?

Definitely it is a position where the design is, it's a beautiful design. The area it is supporting for that actually they are high density, but it's a small lot. The option probably it will be towards either converting to one bedrooms or evaluating the fact if the project can become a four unit project, That is something that it could be evaluated.

Can we, yeah, I would like to explore those options to see if we could lean towards, I don't know what choice you'd rather make. Either, you know, come down to four units or make it more single, like one bedroom versus two bedrooms. Because if it's two bedrooms, we could be looking up to four cars, right? If there's two couples in each room, they each have a car. We're talking about possibly four cars per unit. So it'd be a lot more than just, you know, eight. So... I mean, again, I'm willing to table it and see if we would come up with a solution. So the parking is, you know, we have a better solution for that. That's where I'm at right now.

We have some table there.

William Marrero and Manny, correct this if I understood them well. A two-bedroom, neither by code nor by, they could have 17 cars, but a two-bedroom would not require four spaces. Was that what you were saying? One two-bedroom unit?

Yes, I know it doesn't require by code, but in theory, it could be up to four cars if they were, again, assuming two couples.

But by code, what are we... No, no city has that, right? I know what you're saying, but no, right.

That ratio is not commonly seen. Basically, you have... two bedrooms and you have two cars because there is two adults and a child, two children. So the ratio, it's not typically seen that you have an apartment for cars. So it's typically... I understand.

And just for my knowledge, what is the current ratio for like, I guess, per bedroom to two cars?

In this specific zoning district, it's two parking spaces per unit. So you have five residential units. You require 10 parking spaces plus one guest parking. That's why the requirement is 11 parking spaces for the five residential units.

Understood. I got it. And still, thank you for the information, for my knowledge. I still will feel more comfortable if we figured out some sort of spread where it'd be more sensitive for the parking.

Okay. Can I get a feeling of the rest of the members? Or if it's approved or not approved? I don't want to get it disapproved. If I have to rework it, we'll rework it. I mean, we didn't have any problems.

It seems I can't do a pre- Roll call. It seems like there's four of us left, right? It seems like if I push the motion, go ahead, please.

Mr. Marrero had indicated, Council President, that he's willing to table the matter. So if that's the motion coming from Council Member Marrero, then we can have a second and go from there.

We have a second. Okay.

There's a second.

All right. I didn't hear the table.

Second to take the vote.

So we have a first to table from Councilman Marrero. We have a second from Councilwoman Perez. Please call the roll.

This would be until August 25th, correct?

Yeah.

Ms. G. Perez? Yes. Ms. De La Vega? Yes. Mr. Gonzalez? Yes. Mr. Zogby?

Yes.

Mr. Marrero? Yes. Motion carries. The item is postponed until August 25th, 2026.

We're still, Madam Attorney, I think it's a silly question, but we're still within that scope that can individually, if any council member wanted to contact Mr. Rose before the second meeting, can we do that individually?

You can, so long as it's disclosed on the 25th as to the extent of the communication.

Okay. As long as it's disclosed, it's nothing that's going to...

It will follow our code.

I have a question. I'm not going to be around, neither is my wife, on the 25th. We're going away for a much-needed vacation. So I guess I'll have to contact the zoning department to postpone it for another day.

We can just reconsider the motion and we can...

We can reconsider the motion with the future date in September that will work. Yes. Parties.

What's the first, you wanted the first meeting in September.

That would be the one, the one after the nine, the September 8th is the council meeting.

Okay. It would have to be after that.

September 22nd.

Yes.

Okay. In September, our council meetings are going to commence at seven, not five 30, because we have budget at five 30.

Okay. That's fine.

So. The role, we haven't called the role on this.

We did, sir, but we can reconsider.

No, no, but I mean, do we have to call it again and change the date?

Yes, Council President.

Okay, so do you still, we still have motion to reconsider. September 22nd at 7 p.m. Tabling it to September 22nd. Very good. And we have a second still. I'm sorry. Councilwoman Perez was the second to September 22nd. Go ahead and call the roll.

Ms. Sala Vega. Yes. Mr. Gonzalez.

Yes.

Mr. Zogby. Yes. Mr. Marrero. Yes. Ms. G. Perez. Yes. Motion carries. The item was postponed until September 22nd, 2026 at 7 p.m.

Thank you. Thank you for your time, Manny. And unless anyone has anything to add.

Oh, yes, sir. The communications division has asked me to remind everyone that the mayor will be hosting a town hall meeting this Thursday, August 13th at 6 p.m. at Babcock Park.

Thank you. Also, yeah, you all got invitations for this Saturday at my lander. the Colonia back to school giveaway. So we're all invited, my lander, 10 a.m. this Saturday. Thank you all. If no one has anything to add, we will adjourn the meeting, the City of Hialeah Council meeting of August 11, 2026 at 7.53 p.m.