Commission - Regular Meeting

I'm here on this almost bright first day of spring Friday morning as we kick off this workshop. This is the first one of these I've had with y'all. Our newly appointed city manager tells me that this is free flowing and other than a kickoff, I think he's going first and then Justin's going second because Justin's got a hard stop he's got to go do in his department. Other than that, it's going to be kind of free flowing. We'll talk, we'll discuss, and this is just a chance for us to all get together and do a professional huddle. So looking forward to it. And with that, kind sir. The floor is yours.

Yes, sir. Thank you, Mayor. So you're right. Today is just going to be free-flowing through the departments. Justin will go after me, and then we'll just kind of go from there per department or whoever wants to go next. But today is the feedback that we want to give you all of what we plan to prepare for the next fiscal year budget. and kind of in the years ahead as well. We'd like to hear some feedback from you all on if there's things that you see that maybe you don't agree with or things that are missing or take it all in today and we can discuss it later in one-on-ones and future budget workshops and commission meetings. This is kind of our goals for next fiscal year and the coming years and to ensure that we're all on the same page with the same priorities for the city. So we've had a lot of talk on the zoning and the new ODC changes. So based on those conversations, we've got a proposal to look at our zoning plan and change everything or convert the city to zoning. It's going to be approximately $200,000.

It will take about six to nine months to complete.

This includes public workshops, the data, the maps, the map creations, and then everything that has to go before the state. Approximately $200,000 to achieve this. We do want to talk about that in future budget workshops and see if that's something that the commission does want to move forward with, and if you would like for us to remain on budget in that express in fiscal year 2027. We currently are looking at a fleet lease program. We've met with Enterprise. Chief Blanchard had another company that were probably too small for them. They haven't been really interested in giving us a proposal yet.

We're working with Enterprise on the official proposal.

cheaper, but it would be for our white fleet and our police vehicles. It would be all of our pickup trucks, our SUVs, the public works, facilities, parks, fleet, sports and riding, to replace those vehicles on a four-year program. We've given Enterprise all of the information, and they're going to put together the proposal of what it would cost year one, year two, year three, and year four. You should have this number back. We're meeting with them again on April 12th. We will present this during the budget, and if it's cost-effective, we will potentially present it in the year one option in fiscal year 27. As you can see, of course I used the worst looking vehicle we have to show this, but we do have some Asian vehicles. We have several vehicles with over 100,000 miles.

And we have several vehicles, and especially the fleet, and the sports and rec, and the community services department that are 2003 to 2007. So we have some Asian vehicles in our fleet for sure.

Cybersecurity and IT needs. So as you all know, we recently had a cybersecurity attack, our phishing scam that we had some issues with. We're looking at, Corey has put together a proposal for an RFP for some IT needs. Gonna review that in the next week or so and potentially put that out. and we will look at see what it costs to have some of our IT needs contracted out maybe a little more cost effective and efficient for the city to do. We did have a vulnerability assessment done with previous IT directors here and we have got some issues that are high risk and need to be addressed so we will be putting money in the budget to address those cyber security issues and make the city a little more or a little less vulnerable than it is now. This is just a little bit of the cybersecurity analysis that our vendor did. It kind of shows where we're at now and where we will be once we complete the broadcast date. Website needs, it is a requirement to be 8 days compliant by 2027 on our website. We want to improve our video and agenda software and also incorporate a public record model. We added that funding in mid-year. It's approximately $21,000 to get that started. It will increase our news annually for our Civic Plus website. So the annual news will pick up going forward. But we will have, if you look at Bay County, it will be something like their agenda video software. If you watch a county commission meeting, If you want to see item 12 on the agenda, you click on it and it takes you right to that segment in the video versus having to scroll through and find it in the video. It will go right down the agenda and video log everything there.

It will also make CJ's life a little easier.

Right now, every department head is emailing the car, the agenda packet, the resolution. She's getting 100 different emails come at her to prepare the agendas. that will all be in the software so each department head will have access possibly their admin they submit the the agenda packet through that it goes through the phases from the department head to legal for review to procurement for review or whatever the roles we create and then it will get to cj good to go she'll see that everybody has made the proper reviews

Can I ask a question? Yes, sir. So two things. So the workflow that they can always kick it back if there's something wrong with it. Right.

So for example, if Public Works puts an agenda item in to purchase a vehicle and it goes in and there has been no, there's no state contract or there's been no proper procurement process, it can get kicked back out before it goes to the agenda. If it has, it can be reviewed by Corey in procurement, it can be reviewed by Amy in legal or whoever who does the contract to make sure that the contract has been approved and the proper procedures have been followed.

And it keeps an audit of all that stuff? Yes. And then the other thing is, I think I know what you're talking about with the counties. You're talking about where it shows the video and it has the agenda packet and it shows where they're at. Yes, sir. I've seen that in other cities and it seems pretty standardized and it's pretty clean.

easy to follow if you're trying to do it online so even for us for staff if you need to go back and listen to you know a meeting you have to get on your own tube and you're trying to remember exactly where it was and track it with that you just click right on the item and it takes you I've had to do that many times welcome to 2026 I brought this up quite a few years ago that's the one that's more I think more standardized more familiar if you look at municipal websites all over the country every website looks basically the same

But I think the initial setup, the most expensive part, once you're set up, then it's just an annual subscription.

So it will be the setup for all of this, was it $21,000 or $23,000? $23,000. $23,000 to do the ADA compliance starting, the video and agenda software, and then the public reference model. And that was added in your project. So we've had that proposal executed, and it will begin work on that very soon. Yeah, that's good. As we've talked about, we did budget this fiscal year to have a salary set-up done. They've actually been on site this week doing the employee interviews in one of the months. It's been going great. But we will get the results from that. We don't know what the results will be, but very likely it will be that we have shortfalls in some of our departments, if not all. And we will need to develop an incremental plan starting with fiscal year 27 to get those salary findings in place. utility rates in the wastewater plant, kind of meeting the dead horse here. You all are pretty well aware of this. The Raftelis is working on our rate studies, and as soon as those rate studies are done, it will be a joint decision to be made between the Glenhaven Commission on which route we want to take, and then the Bay County Commission, if that's the route we want to go, and then accepting the proposal from us, if that's the intent.

And what's the current ETA on that, Chris?

About six months. Any

Concerns with meeting deadlines with DEP or anything like that?

No, sir. DEP has had significant turnover in the past year themselves. They're running very behind on things, but they know what we're working on, and as long as we're making forward progress, they will work with us. If we weren't doing anything, we would have issues, but they know all the work that we're doing and working on. Then a couple miscellaneous things. Talked to some of you all about it. You all did get the investment policy.

You all made the decision to have the Finance Review Committee review that.

So at their next meeting, they'll review it. Commissioner Ward, you and I had talked about potentially an ideas program or something along those lines for staff. They save money and they have incentive pay doing that. Implementing something along those lines that may not be exactly like you and I talked about, but we're legally allowed to do this work. But something there that we're enormous employees for saving time. Regional stormwater ponds, we'll talk about that in public works and the COA and economic development as well. But we are working on the east side regional pond and then working on grants for the west side as well. So we'll come back and do something to help incentivize, especially the COA, but the economic development throughout the city. River has gone to several Triumph funding board meetings and looking for ways that we can get some Triumph funding for some industrial growth here in the city. And then city growth means storage. One of the options we're looking at, I think I presented before, is purchasing 1315 Illinois Avenue, I believe is the address, right next to Public Works. A portion of their parking lot will be lost during the 390 expansion, but we will look at purchasing the building, kind of moving our Public Works staff into that, and then utilizing the existing Public Works building for storage, fleet, and sanitation. But we are out of storage. Justin and Ty, especially with all the stuff they have from the different sports programs and parks, it is very tight around there. We've got stuff kind of stored everywhere. We did in the past year eliminate all of our storage units and all of the rental storage pumps.

We have one left and this is the final payment this month.

So we've got to, in the next two to three years, find a small alternative for storage. As our fleet grows, as our equipment grows, and just different items and different events, the parks and the schools. um is it possible to explain what triumph funding is and what it can be used for yes so the triumph is the money from the bb oil there's a board that they have a very very tight grip on that money um river has attended some of those meetings to see how difficult it is to get it we've met with them two or three times in the past i don't know three or four years so looking at maybe some money for wastewater treatment plants. It doesn't bring jobs.

We want something that brings jobs.

So we have to get very creative how we submit those grant applications. how it plays into creating jobs and expanding industry in Lynn Haven. But as that money sits there longer and longer, we do feel that their grip will get a little less tight on that and maybe open up some doors for us in the future.

I know when I got the tour of the Atlantis Event Center, that's one of the things he brought up, but I don't think there'd be a good candidate for it, unfortunately.

Yeah, it's the regulations they have on it and the control that the board has. Questions on any of that?

Go back to the zoning slide, if you would, please, for just a moment. So the company that you're looking at that got these quotes, is this the one that's been working with Callaway?

Yes, as well as Vacuum.

What's the name of that company?

Ray Greer is his name, and his company is called...

I just called Ray Greer.

No worries. This is one of the most important things I think we can do in terms of planning our work and then working our plan in terms of future growth. I don't know how Lynn Haven's not had zoning for 20 years. And I've talked to Walt Kelly. I've talked to some of the old-timers, Antonius Barnes. I said, why did y'all get rid of it? And they look at me like I'm crazy and say, we didn't get rid of it on our watch. So everybody's kind of doing this.

I don't know how it happened. It happened in 08.

But we definitely need to relook at this and figure out a way to make this happen. $200,000 is a lot of money, but we really need to get this done, especially moving forward, smart growing, effective growing, instead of just the kind of patchwork growth that we've been doing as a city.

So would you all like to hear Ray Greer speak on what the results would this be before we commit some money and how it will work?

And I honestly think we need to do this sooner than later.

So would you like to do a workshop, a stand-alone workshop with Ray and kind of discuss that? How would you like that to do? Yeah. A stand-alone workshop?

I believe so, because I think there's going to be a lot of questions I have. I'm not going to make it sound like I'm an expert at it. I'm not. There's a lot of things I have to learn. There's a lot of things I've learned so far, but there's still a lot of things I've just got questions on, and I don't think I got the full picture.

I can reach out to Ray, get some available dates from him, then coordinate with 5, set up a workshop for it prior to even budget workshops so we know exactly what we want to do and have a plan going forward for that budget number.

Let's get the whole team here. If zoning is part of what you do or you have some skin in that manner, let's huddle and let's go through it.

If this is something we plan on doing, we're going to have to do a good job of selling it to everybody on why it's important because it failed on the ballot. So it would be really, really bad if...

We'll put it on the ballot. I think it would fail because the price was inflated. It was what the question was, where did we add an extreme cost? Right. And I think Chris brought the cost down considerably on his estimate. We'll see where it goes.

I mean, we actually sat down with Ray, Bobby, and I.

The original numbers we got were like something like, and the cost was like somewhere around $800,000 to do it, you know, to get a zoning map and do everything. And his numbers are lower than that right now, I think. Not only that, I don't think a lot of people understood what it was. I think it's one of the most important. As the mayor said, it's an important investment in the city's future, especially the way to grow right. Not to have four gas stations on every corner.

Smart growth.

Yeah, I agree with what all your guys are saying. I'm just saying we got all the stuff that you're saying right here. We need to make sure that the citizens understand that. Because if they just go, we voted no, now we got it, what gives? Right.

You have a pretty creative guy on your Facebook post right now, so we'll make sure you guys put a workshop out there.

Yeah, nature boy Ric Flair this morning. You've got a gift there.

Anything else on that aside from the planning and zoning, and we'll get a workshop scheduled?

Thank you. No, sir.

Okay. Mr. Ward, the floor is yours.

Can I say something before everyone begins? Yes, sir. I just want to let everyone know that I know a lot of work has been put into this. I know that this is not what we've done traditionally in the past, and so... I'm sure as you go through these, we're probably going to have a lot of feedback as far as maybe things to improve on or what we'd like to see. What I don't want to happen is you take it as criticism, as more of collaboration. What we're trying to do today, in my opinion, is not perfection, because this is probably for some, if not most of you, this is new to you. So I just don't want you guys to leave disgruntled or disappointed if we ask a lot of questions or we're like, hey, we'd like to have more information on this. And I'm glad we're starting early on this because now we have plenty of time by the time it comes up to budget season. But I just wanted to make sure that when we start pinpointing things out that you don't take it as a bad change but and i know i've talked to mr lightfoot quite a bit about this and i know you like i said i know you guys did a dry run in that so i know a lot of work has gone into this and i just want to say thank you so and i'm really excited about this because i think a lot of good things are going to come out of the whole this whole thing so just appreciate it and the answer to your question um ray grier's design west group his name is west design west

All right. Goals, staffing, and budget. 27. All right. Our department goals, we would like to provide a safe developmental fun and competitive learning environment for all levels of youth and adults. We would like to establish a brand for marketing our own sports, recreational activities, and tournaments. So when you see the LH, I want that to be a sign for Landhaven Sports Department. uh... four four four tournaments uh... people ask what is four four four uh... zip code three two four four four we're trying to provide our own sports tournaments now we want to start those and get them off the ground uh... we would like to establish credible sports tournament partnerships we currently have a few of those at the sports complex uh... u triple s a we had the world's which is kind of the biggest adult softball organization uh... we would like to develop a miracle league which is a baseball league for children with disabilities We would like to establish a Lynn Haven Youth Soccer League. We get asked about this probably four or five times a week about a youth soccer league. We would love to increase female participation. And our biggest one right now, I highlighted, is retain our current league participants and league quality. So when I came in, it was all about growth. Where we were at post-hurricane, our focus now has shifted from growth to retention. It's quality over quantity.

May I ask a question? Yes, sir. Have you been getting a lot of people reaching out, wanting, looking to have leagues in our city, asking, requesting that?

Absolutely. So the beach calls all the time about field use. Soccer has blown up. So if we had...

So they don't have enough room over there?

No. Wow. And we get overflow all the time at the sports complex.

Okay.

Miracle League field. You got to have a field, a Miracle League designed field for that. And it's got to be turf. And I know you're good at getting sponsors. Do you have an area in mind? I mean, you're not going to tear down one of the fields we have and put a Miracle League field. No. So you got space available and you have something in mind for someone to help build it?

Not yet, but I'll have that post later in the presentation. We'll get to that. All right, and right here is just some of the numbers that we have currently. In our flag football league, we had 530. Volleyball, we had 296. Spring ball, as you all know, 1323. Fall basketball, we had 379. And in fall ball, we had 1,135. So that's a big jump from fall ball to spring ball.

I figured the larger drop-off in fall ball.

That was crazy this year to have that many in fall ball.

When I was a kid, it was only like 25% of people played fall ball.

Yeah, because they were all playing football at that time.

That was a couple years ago, wasn't it?

No. Have all these participants increased over the last year in every sport?

100%. Increase in every sport.

One last thing. So it just brought to my attention the – the develop a miracle league. I think that's awesome. But one thing that brought to mind is, I don't know if he reached out to you or not, but there's a guy named, his last name's Duncan. He runs an organization called the Alternate Baseball Organization. And it kind of falls within the same thing where it's a baseball league with adults with disabilities. And so I don't know if you might want to reach out to him.

We are. We tried to host their game last November. They canceled on us, but we were going to host it here at the Sports Complex. So we're trying to take that over. They did the first game, I believe, at Gulf Coast, and I tried to steal it from Gulf Coast, so hopefully it'll happen. Alright, our organizational chart, obviously you have me, then we have a sports manager. He manages our day-to-day operations. Oversee our five coordinators. They're full-time. They're basically the ones responsible for organizing and implementing our recreational programs. And they're responsible for the daily maintenance of our sports facilities. That's dragging, that's top dressing, overseeding. Quick drying, drying up fields after rains, all that good stuff. Then we also have five recreational specialists. I call them our customer service. They're basically ones that are setting up and breaking down games, the ones that are at our games in the afternoon. Then we have four rec assistants, and they're basically the ones that oversee the splash pad, the seasonal. Work hours, next fiscal year, Kiki, we're asking for one additional part-time recreational specialist to cover the gym. This could possibly be seasonal. Somebody from March to August. Due to the increase in weekend rentals and participation in our facilities, the gym is currently open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., Monday through Friday. Saturday, we're open from 8 to 5, unless we have a tournament. And then Sundays, rentals only. The gym is currently booked until June. That's from Special Olympics. They rent the gym out every Sunday. And then at the bottom here, we already have eight basketball tournaments that has been booked inside of the gymnasium. So that will be Saturday, basically from 8 to 8, and Sunday, basically from 8 to 8. So we will ask for an additional staff to cover those summer seasons. All right. one of our goals to keep us a safe fun environment obviously do uh... arden park fall and spring we have one this afternoon that's why i requested to go now so i can prepare for this afternoon uh... we partnered with lynn haven we do lynn haven elementary we do the lynn haven nights they do volleyball basketball in our gyms now uh... we begin to sanction our baseball and softball leagues it makes us eligible for the world series and you guys know that we had a ten u softball team that won the world series last year put lynn haven on the map We're currently the only municipality to run an official NFL flag league in Bay County. Our teams are not eligible for the regional NFL flag tournaments. No, you see the Cowboys on there, right? So I appreciate you guys improving that for us to get the uniforms this year. Great feedback from the community from that. With that, I'm saying they're eligible. They can go play in these regional tournaments where there might be the Jacksonville Jags, the Atlanta Falcons. If you win that tournament, you represent basically that stadium, and then you go into basically like a Super Bowl on the Atlanta Falcons because I won that tournament, and you go play for that. So big growth for our leagues. Another thing for the safe, fun environment behind the scenes, what we do. Sports and Rec, responsible for all aspects of field maintenance in-house. This includes top dressing the ball fields, dragging the maintenance of all nine, adding clay, edging. Department staff also manage post-rain, drying, chalking fields, performing summer overseeding, winter ryegrass, all of that good stuff. So this is a before and after. Fields get like this in spring. I have my staff go out and edge everything. Takes us a week to probably do that on all our ball fields. Top dressing Kinsaw. We know it's ruddy sometimes up and down. I'm trying to grow the fields back for 4th of July. We'll take the trackers out there, some sand, but top dressing Kinsaw. We'll do that probably in late April. And then obviously every day, daily maintenance, we're dragging all the fields, all nine fields. It takes us about 45 to 60 minutes per field to get that right. And obviously if it rains, this can extend the preparation time for games or even council. You would know about that, Commissioner. So if we get a rain early in the morning, it might cancel games in the afternoon or even the following day.

So, Justin.

Yes, ma'am.

So, even though we see sports and rec as fun, there's a whole lot of behind-the-scenes labor going on, right?

A whole lot of behind-the-scenes labor going on for us. I mean, a lot. Non-stop. A lot. Yes. Yes, ma'am.

With young folks. With young folks.

Out there every day.

With it on you.

Coming back sometimes orange because of the clay. But, yeah, rain, it doesn't matter. We're out there trying to push word off the field. So we've got to do what we've got to do to make sure people can play the game.

And he's been out there wearing a tie pushing clay too. Yeah, yeah.

Some days I'm out there, yes, in the tie and pushing it around, trying to get the game to trip.

So a fun story about that. During winter co-ed, it wasn't supposed to rain. It wasn't even on the radar. So, like, all the teams showed up, and it just – Showed up like rain just started coming and then it stopped like 30 minutes later So like all the teams go out there and we're all like squeaky and water off the field to try to play We get ready. We're about to start and then it just rains again.

Yeah, so the story with that is Prepared the fields. It rained that afternoon. And then we did everything we could to dry the fields up. Then right when it's time to play, it rains again. So I'm getting calls nonstop. Oh, we still want to play games. We still want to play games. But I'm like, listen, I don't have staff anymore. If you guys want to play games, all the captains and teams need to get out there and help us clear the fields. And sure enough, we had 20 adults out there trying to clear the fields out. They clear it out, and it rains again. Yeah.

That's crazy.

All right, another goal, establishing our brand. You know we have the robot, the turf tank. When I talk about the LH, now I want to put the LH on the fields. So at Flag Football, we're going to start putting LH in the middle of fields. Maybe this baseball season, we'll start putting it in the outfields. And this is the logo for our 444 sports tournaments. That's what we're going to start using. So when we start seeing that, that's the brand and marketing that we're going to start preparing. All right, capital improvement projects. The top one, to complete phase four construction, build another outdoor sand volleyball court with lights, water-based resurface for the gymnasium. We need new temp fences for the sports complex, artificial turf for the ball fields, and additional batting cage for Kane Griffin Park. Start on this good one. I'm going in my fourth year, so this is my fourth time saying this. Phase four, construction of the sports complex. It's what we get calls about legit every day. We get a call about this. Originally, it was for three multipurpose fields. Now with the growth of baseball and softball, we cut it down to two multi-purpose fields, which will still allow us to run our soccer league and grow our flag football league. As I told you guys before, our flag football league, we had to practice at the sports complex baseball fields because we did not have enough green space at Kensal. Alright, so we want to add the two multi-purpose fields and now one double A baseball field to help with the growth and alleviate some of the pressure of Kane Griffin Park. The multi-purpose fields, those two fields with lighting is $1.2 million. Like I said, used for soccer, flag football, lacrosse, rugby. And then the baseball field would cost approximately $730K. We'll use 6U, 8U, and 10U baseball. For everything, it's $2 million. That's not including parking. If we were to add parking, it would be somewhere around $4.5. I think that makes sense. Somewhere around $4.5. I'm willing to compromise. We do not need parking. I grew up playing sports in Lynnhaven. We never had parking back there, and it ran smoothly. So I'm asking if we could just at least get the fields and one baseball field, $2 million.

Justin, that goes back to the soccer league discussion that you had earlier. You could do your soccer leagues there, the football fields, and it will help alleviate the pressure that Kinsaw gets from the beat down on that grass.

Yes.

Do other cities in the area have a lot of soccer, football fields and that?

I know Callaway does. Yeah, Callaway does, and then you have Bay United that's at Harters.

Is that on baseball fields there?

that this in. It's part of what is that by George area. Yes, so all of our residents are driving to Callaway or. Only to put in the beach.

Are they doing anything on 23rd Street at the oil turner field here with the name of that you are turning out.

I know they're trying to redo Frank Nelson in Panama City. That's right there. That's where you're talking about. But no, I strongly believe if we start soccer that we would take over soccer because the majority of those kids are from Nunnhaven. All right. Phase four. Phase four. I'm going to say it four times.

Before you go, that is something, too, that we've looked at Triumph funding, and the reasoning is if we keep bringing industry and growth to Bay County, these people need a place to live and something for their kids to do, and there was a no-go on that as well.

Well, not only that, back to talking to the traveling teams and that, I mean, that could spur growth of other businesses like hotels and stuff like that. Sure. I don't know if that can relate to Triumph Funds or not.

So you look at the public sports complex and they built a hotel in the complex. Yeah.

Built hotels, plural. Interesting. All right. And I want to say this again. I've said this before. We're at max capacity. We're going to have to start capping our sporting. So that's why we switched to Lynn Haven residents first. But going forward, if we grow any more, anybody that's moving into Lynn Haven, it's going to be hard to accept any more participants than what we currently have. We can't accept another team at King Griffin Park. Period.

It's a good problem to have.

It's a great problem to have. All right. Outdoor sand volleyball courts, we've seen an increased participation in volleyball at Sports Complex. You know, that was one of the major issues about indoor space, so we built them an outdoor space. Now they're requesting another court. Thank you to Bobby. Our Public Works Department was able to build a beach volleyball court for us. Saved us approximately $20,000. We were able to build it for $10,000. But we're requesting to try to build another one of those in the next fiscal year with lights. Lighting for that would cost approximately $22,000. Most efficient way to light up those volleyball courts without going to the same Mooseco system that we currently have. If we went to those same systems, it would cost us around $100,000. So these would be solar lights. For four lights, it would cost us $22,000. Lifespan on that is approximately 20 years, but we'll have an eight-year warranty for those. All right, jump floor. On average, a jump floor has an 8 to 10 year lifespan with proper floor maintenance. Regular cleaning and recoating will extend the life before a full floor sanding and repainting is needed, right? Currently, we resurface those floors every year. Y'all know that's when I shut down the gymnasium around Christmas, New Year's, for a week. We currently do what we call oil-based option. It costs us about $6,000 a year. I would recommend us going to a water-based option. The reason being, oil-based, it has a process where it's called ambering. It has a yellow tint to it. So we have these nice blue borders with a yellow tint added in there. It makes it turn greenish. All those white lines end up turning yellow, and we're starting to see that now. So I would like to switch to a water-based option, which would cost us an additional $4,000 a year. Okay.

That's not cheap. Not cheap. You know that you got a company that does it. Did you bid it out? Yeah. So you know there's several companies.

Yeah. We actually switched to the company that does all of Bay District schools and Gulf Coast. That's the cheapest you're going to get.

I got selfish reasons. I want to share. If it's possible, will you share that information with me?

Copy. Will do. All right. If we continue with the oil base in the next two years, I feel that we're going to have to repaint the white lines, the volleyball lines, and the blue borders. Pricing that I got on that would be 5K. And then the five-year look ahead, which I said before, the lifespan is eight to ten years. The gym has been there for three years, so that would be our minimum lifespan, eight years. We would need to look into a full sanding and restriping. It's going to cost approximately $350 to $4 a square foot. So if the gym needs a full resand in five years, we're looking at approximately $50,000 to $60,000 to redo that floor.

How long does it usually take to redo it?

Two to three weeks. We just shut down during the Christmas break.

That's probably the slowest time.

Yeah. Spend time with family, right?

But Justin, if we went to the water, would it still need to be redone?

Yeah, so a full re-sand is because you're going to get chips in the floor, deep scratches. Eventually, you know you're re-coating, they sand it down, but you're putting basically surface on top of surface. So after a while, that top coat is not going to stick, so they recommend you sand it all the way back down to the wood and resurface it again.

Are all floors like that, where they're 8 to 10 years?

Yeah.

Okay. All right.

All right, what we're trying to do to extend the life, maybe we can get 12 years out of it, I don't know. But we have the gym floor covering. We're using the event of a storm or any major activities inside of the gymnasium. We've put that out. It looks great on the floor. And then we would like to get a floor machine. Currently when people spill things in the gym, we're spot mopping, which is something you should never do. I'm not saying we need to have the fully autonomous machine like they have in Walmart, but we would like some kind of self-repair machine that we can use on the weekends to kind of get all the dirt off the floors. That's going to cost us approximately $10,000 for that. These are the temporary fences, temp fences at the sports complex. We've had them since we opened up, so they've last three years, but each temp fence is approximately two grand. We have them on four fields, so next year we're requesting eight grand to replace all the temporary fences at the sports complex. And you can see them on those fields. That allows us to play different age divisions. So the sports complex fields are currently 300 feet to the home run, right? But we can bring in that home run fence line to 200 or 175, whatever we wanted to do so we could play different age divisions on the fields. Y'all get that? And then this is my dream big, artificial turf for the sports complex. The sports complex is set up for tournaments. We know that. It's beautiful. Again, I would only like the artificial turf, the infields, to save money. Approximately cost $300,000 per infield. Maybe we can use, Commissioner, like we said, naming rights for somebody to pay for that. I'm not sure, but approximately $1.5 million for the project for the sports complex. I'll talk to the city manager. He's asking how we can stay ahead of the game. I feel like we are the premier sports department, but artificial turf will definitely be one way that we can stay ahead of the game.

This goes back to the conversation earlier about rain, bad events, where the staff is out there spending hours trying to get a field ready where we had one of those Florida afternoon showers. North Bay Haven went to Dothan to play the tournament last weekend. They had rain. Exact same thing. The fields are turf on the infields, grass on the outfields. Within 20 minutes of the rain quitting, it's ready to go. It's not like how we have now in clay and you're having to dry it up and get the field ready. It's ready to go all the time. You also don't have to do the work that Justin showed with our edging and replacing the clay. So it would eventually pay for itself as well as cut back staff time. All right.

I think this is the important part with things like this and metrics. You know, how much... Because I'm sure there's some cost savings to labor, right? Yeah, for sure. To have less people on shift. In the long run, I'm sure, you know, I don't know how long artificial turf lasts for. But yeah, this is something I think would be important to have some numbers on as far as what are the potential savings in the future and things like that. We will gather all of that for you.

Artificial turf is thought to last 12 to 15 years. If it's installed properly.

Right. We'll say... Also, at the public sports complex, for example, they play tournaments nonstop. There is no healing time for the field. They're finishing the tournament on Sunday during the summer, and another tournament's rolling in starting Monday, and that field never misses a beat. It's rolling. So you don't have the beatdown of the fields like you do in the grass and clay.

Well, like now for us, Kinsaw, truly we couldn't play another league on there until June. That field was beat down. All right, and that goes back to another one of my goals, allow us to establish a Miracle League and attract the big name tournaments, the USSSAs, UFFAs, etc. Pitcher, Commissioner Perno, what I was talking about with the Miracle League, smooth surface, you can have wheelchairs, etc. on there. Then artificial turf, like you were just saying, Chris, will allow us to prevent cancellations as it's playable within minutes. So that is why we can't play games. If that happens, that field is no good for the entire day. All right, the additional batting cage for Kane Griffin. Are we keeping up with our league growth? Currently, there are only four batting cages at Kane Griffin with four playable fields. So we have eight teams that practice, but only four of them can use the batting cage. So I'm requesting to build another batting cage right there within that stakeholder area. I'm dreaming big. I'll provide Bobby $85,000 to $100,000 for another batting cage. But we need to be efficient. And that's all I have. Any questions?

One thing with the batting cage is that we've got to figure out how to enforce is only allowing uh teams to use them when it's designated for the team you know i there's been like well i guess i should say like this it's there's a sign on there that says like for example a travel ball team can't just come in there and use our cages without reserving them but there's definitely been times when that happens

So the batting cages are definitely, we always say first come, first serve. Now during our league of practices, we put up the practice schedule on every batting cage. So we know that this batting cage is designated for this team during this time. Now outside of those times, they're basically first come, first serve. But if a team was to call me and say, we're going to go up to such and such batting cage, we will make sure that you get that batting cage. I will have a staff come and say, you have to move out. League takes priority.

Okay.

Do they have any kind of locking system or code system?

No. Any other questions?

No, I'm just going to say I know that program has come leaps and bounds. Appreciate all the phenomenal work that you and your team have done. The only other input I would ask, and I don't know if it's something you have numbers for, but I know the numbers have grown quite a bit as far as participation. Do you have past years, numbers where you can graph it all out? I can get you that. And I don't know if there's a way you can get, like, how much revenue did it bring in and expenditures and kind of get an idea of how much it brings in so we can project in the future. If we go to some of your dream things of some of those tournaments and things like that.

For sure. Back to the retention thing, I do have some questions. I think that would help with retention, maybe in a different form. Okay. That we can talk about.

Well, keep up the good work, Justin. You guys, you and your team do phenomenal work. We're proud of you. Seeing 13-plus hundred little rugrats of all shapes, sizes, and backgrounds out there last weekend was amazing. And you truly did a great job of organizing chaos. So you made it look like a water on the surface, right? He's just cruising, but underneath he's just steadily going.

The sound system, though. The sound system, though. Oh, my gosh. You do a good job at it. All right. I appreciate it.

Yes, sir. All right.

Thanks.

All right. Who we got?

Who's up? Who's up?

She's ready. She's in Oklahoma.

Can you hear me?

All right. Good morning, everybody. We're going to talk about the fire department this morning and the needs that we're doing. In 17 months we've done a whole reset for the fire department. We've done a great job with the backing of commission and the city manager about getting apparatus. We're at a point now where we're good. The new one came in, the second new one came in on Monday. We're going to be doing a push-in party that you probably got on your schedules. So on that reset, the last apparatus vehicle that we're trying to get is a second rescue truck. The reason for that is station two on Mosley Drive is almost reaching the same call volume as station one here in Pennsylvania. Our call volume is increasing as we go. And you're probably going to hear from every director here, growth, growth of the city. How do we stay ahead of it? The one luxury that some directors have is when they're done at the day, they go home, they're good. When I go home, I still have to service and protect 22,000 people. And how do we do that? So we go to the top line. What level of service do you five expect from the fire department? What do you want? Do you want mediocre? Do you want us to expand on what we're doing to try to protect the individuals? Now if you follow our Facebook page you can see that We've signed six mutual aid agreements and we spent all week this week training at the Navy base, making sure that we know what we need to do if they have a shipboard fire out there and what land-based support would do for them. We participated in an airport drill. We're third due out there on mutual aid. So we've increased our training and what we need to do to prepare ourselves and not think in the 90s we got to think of 2026 and what's coming and what growth is coming with that so with the apparatus which are very very expensive and you know buyer's expensive there's nothing i can do about that but what i can do is try to save money in other areas um but not much we don't create a lot of revenue so we don't have that option so for next year since our apparatus are good we're going to be looking at growth within that growth i have one fire inspector that can't keep up he's behind right now about six months on his inspections we've only had one inspector um in 17 months um chief delonge did do some inspections when he left We're down to one. We're going to be asking for one or a second inspector to help with that to make sure that all the commercial buildings are within code and stay up to date. With the second rescue truck that we're buying this year, we want to put that second rescue truck at station two to help out with not running that million dollar fire truck on every EMS call. To do that, I need three people. I need three people so I can put that truck in service and those million-dollar fire trucks that we bought won't be running on every call. We have to save those trucks. We can't run them on a daily basis. Only two fires, fire alarms, car accidents, but on the day-to-day what I call band-aid calls, the sick person, stuff like that, they don't need to run. So the benefit of adding the three people is you're not putting the wear and tear on those apparatus. And in result, the maintenance cost won't be as high. I can tell you that the ladder truck that you have in service now is very, very beautiful looking, but it cost me about $10,000 a year just in tires. So the new engine that we got will supplement that truck, and we're going to try to run them in tandem in some way to make sure that we are also following NFPA requirements and ISO. The ISO is your insurance ratings that we have for all the citizens here in Lynn Haven. Currently, we're a two. We want to stay a two or be a one. I don't know if we're not going to be able to get a one because we don't have the personnel for that criteria. But if we can stay a two, that's where we want to be. And the last request is I have a young lady that is my front desk person. She's also my community risk reduction person. She's the one that coordinates all the school visits. She coordinates everything within the city for outreach to educate the public. She's doing double duty. so i'm asking for a front desk person to alleviate some of that pressure off her so she can only concentrate on doing the outreach to all the citizens in the community she also does our facebook page so those are for next year's budget that's what i'm asking to do to alleviate some of the pressures so before i go into the the capital part is there any questions about that i just have a general comment for you i think the world of you i think the world of your department

But to say y'all are stretched thin when the fit hits the shin. In case of point, I live in Hawks Landing, so right across from Station 2, right across 389. And I've seen two examples. We had a medical emergency. My elderly neighbor lady across the street, you guys were there in like three minutes to help. And your crews did an amazing job. And that big pretty fire truck was there. So I can understand what you're saying there. Last February, and I actually spoke to the commission about this before I joined them, Last summer, prior February, we had lightning strikes, thunderstorm rolls through. I know, crazy in Florida, right? But it caused multiple fires at once. Station two had already rolled out and was responding to another house fire. And a house four doors down from me got struck by lightning. And the entire second floor was ablaze, and roof. Your resources were already deployed to another fire. When 911 got called and me and another neighbor literally went and got those people out of their house. They were dead. sticking straight up. They acted drunk and they weren't drunk. It was afternoon. You had the whole school traffic debacle, right? Fire trucks trying to get in. So it's a lot of issues at once, but it all kind of came together. It was, you know, school had locked down. The kids couldn't get out. So the parents and grandparents couldn't go anywhere. It was just gridlock. And then you guys were trying to, or the Bay County Fire Department came in. We ended up with three fire trucks there. one command and control, and two normal fire trucks. But only one of them had a pump that was actually working. So you had three fire trucks there, but only one working and spraying water. And by the time the county guys got there, because you guys had deployed to another fire and you couldn't be in two places at once, that house ended up being a total loss. And short of it being your own house, four doors down from you, and you're there consoling the people you had to get out of their house and watching that burn is very eye opening. So we as a community, we definitely, and I say this from the heart and from honest experience right here in Lynn Haven. This is one of the areas where if we need some fat, If we need to grow and feed more than the bare minimum, it's with our first responders, fire and police, bottom line. Thank you for what y'all do. We got to figure out as we grow as a community, our first responders, y'all absolutely have to have what you need. And not only for that initial call, but what about the second call that Murphy's Law is invariably going to happen. Especially with big storms, lightning doesn't strike in one place and go away. It's all over the place, right? So as you have multiple fires at once, how are we responding to that as a city? And how is the county backing us up and local municipalities? Can we make that more effective? I don't know, but part of it's resources and part of it's manpower.

i totally agree with you mayor um the one thing that we have done is we have signed mutual aid agreements with panama city panama city beach tyndall air force base the navy base and the airport so my battalion chiefs have full authority if they're en route to a house fire to request that mutual aid on on the way to the call um due to the fact that The ladder truck that we run has two people on it. The rescue truck that we run has two people on it. The engine over by where you live, we have three, but there's no rescue truck out there. So we, by NFPA and ISO requirements, we have to be on scene in five minutes and 20 seconds. That's the standard. We're meeting about 90% of that right now. So we're above average when it comes to being on scene and meeting those standards. The issue that we're going to have as a city, as a city grows, it's only gonna grow one way. That's east. And as far as the city limits go. So that's why what the, we'll go back to that one. I'll get there. That's why we have an appropriation station three. up at the state level. Now we've made several trips to Tallahassee to get that done. Two weeks in a row I was in Tallahassee. I met with the Lieutenant Governor's aide. I met with the budgeting director at the state. So we've passed the House as far as getting the design and permitting for that station. But that station right now would be built out in the Mill Bayou which would also cover Deer Point Elementary. Right now that's an 11 minute response. to get to that area. So we really have to take a deep dive and look at how we're going to get there financially to build that station and the people that we're going to put in it.

So I spent 45 minutes on the phone with Missy last night, and there are some concerns budget-wide, I meant statewide, about anything that's going to be approved this year budget-wise. So definitely I'm concerned about will we get this As an appropriation, Eastside Regional Stormwater Fund and the Water Main Projects. It does sound promising, but the conversation with Missy was concerning. You know, when they reconvene, where will it go? There's a lot of, you know, sitting in the house, not working together and not agreeing. So fingers crossed that Station 3 design still makes it through there.

11-minute response at Deer Point Lake, not to beat a dead horse, and we'll talk about it more later. I bet that's not during peak school traffic time either.

No. That is... No. And the way that I sell this, and it's kind of crazy what some of those things that I come up with in my brain is, hold your breath for 11 minutes. That's how long it's taken us to get there. So if that's one of your kids or family members, and they're not breathing, and it takes us 11 minutes to get out there... So think of it in that course.

It was about 15 minutes from my neighbor's house and it was a total loss. So they were responding and trying to get in from the school traffic and they got in and the house was already based. They were just putting out ambers and making sure other houses didn't go down.

So what scares me most about that area out in that area is the elementary school. if there's a fire at that elementary school, if there's a medical emergency at that elementary school. We have a lot of schools in this town and we have to cover them. That one scares me the most. That school keeps me up at night thinking on how I can make this better and how can we get to the point where we feel comfortable on the response out there. And I know it's expensive. I know the finance director's like, how are we going to get this done? I understand that. You can't find grants for stations. I mean, we can look and look and look and look, but we have to look ahead. And the way that my brain works is, I don't think of today. I've got to think of next year, the next year, the next year, next year, because the fire department is so expensive. And I understand that, but how do I... financially and physically prepare for that you know it's not just me saying hey kiki i need two million dollars what is she gonna do she's gonna she's gonna say no i don't have it right now but as a city and as a group how do we fix this issue of putting that station out there but also being responsible to every other director in this room of their needs It's not just me. It's PD, where are they at? It's public safety, where are they at? It's Justin, what he needs to bring in the revenue for the stations. It's some parks and recs. So this is a bigger issue than just the fire department. It's a city problem as far as growth within all the departments. But for my presentation today is how do we get there and what level of service do you expect?

Quick question. As you look forward to planned growth and expand east and potentially north one day and kind of fill in the unincorporated areas, is there anything else multi-purpose we could do with the fire station, i.e., you could have a police substation?

Well, the station three could be that, and I probably have to ask the city manager because he was part of some of that project before I got here. There was a police substation put in, I believe, in the initial design that we did, but the former police chief nixed it, if I'm correct, or was it still in there?

Right.

So whatever that looks like in the future between the commission, the police chief, the city manager, how we want to create that station, that would be conversations that we would have to have to see if we can maybe fund half and half through different appropriations and different funding from both. Because police has... options of different funding than I do. I'm not going to speak for the police chief on how he's only been here a couple weeks, but you know, that's a conversation that we might have to sit down and have on how can we fund this on two different avenues.

With the design, the design is not picked out or committed yet, but It would be a conversation with Chief Blanchard, Chief Johnson, but very likely there would be some type of substation in there. With police nowadays, their vehicles are their offices, so they're out roaming around. So it's not like we need a substation sitting there with an officer in it. If they wanted an office or something out there to use, that would be the chief's decision.

That's kind of what I was thinking. And it's probably limited use. You wouldn't have a jail in the firehouse, per se. But if you have an extra office or an extra workspace, we can do a purpose. And I don't know what other city departments could also make use of that. But just trying to think ahead, like you're saying, commingling of funds, synergy of effort.

so my former employment that's what i did i built stations i did those things so once we have the conversations with me and chief you don't have to look at this just as a day-to-day station for police You have to believe that if we have a disaster or something, how can we house them out there along with the fire department and they don't have to come back and forth. So on the design phase, we would have to really look at what best fits that station. But don't think of the station being built for 2026. You've got to think about building the station that will last 50 years. and get you there. Most police stations and fire departments don't get built every 10 years. It's either 30 or 40 years to when they get redone. Now the only thing that they do fix in these stations that are older is they go and they rip out the technology and put new technology in these stations. But if you build it the correct way with the hurricane windows, the block walls, and do the design properly, this will be a 50-year station and that's what you have to look at for the future.

I know that that's the biggest part of our budget is safety and security. It just is. It's expensive and it's tough. So I get it. I know I probably should know this, but with Mill Bayou, isn't there already an agreement or impact fees or something we have money for the station?

So it's not in any agreement that we've read where the developer is paying for it. We will utilize impact fees to construct it, but we won't have enough impact fees to construct a fire station. It will have to be bought. Is there already a plot of land set? We do have the three acres. So we have an easement on the three acres. It's not deeded to us as of now, just an easement.

Okay. Can I clarify something, please? Sure.

Everything that you've heard thus far, with the exception of the sewer plant, is general fund money. Every request that you've heard so far is general fund money. And the only real lever you have for increasing general fund revenues is the outlaw. You can tinker around with fees. You can tinker around with registration. But your main lever of revenue is the act.

So.

It's on the ballot.

Let's not live in the world of what if. We can't live in the world of what if. If it passes, if it doesn't happen. There's five different versions of the Avaloram tax that's going to the House to be passed. None of them in Tallahassee have any clue on what they're doing. The Republicans aren't talking to the Republicans. The Democrats aren't talking to the Democrats. And nobody's talking to anybody. That's why last week they did a dead gravel stop of session because nobody can campaign while they're doing this. So that's why they're going back for special session. to try to alleviate it nobody's talking to the governor right now because nobody even likes the avalon tax bill that's on there and there's four or five versions so for purposes of the day let's not live in the world of what if this passes let's deal with what we've got to do today and if that does pass then we'll have to go back and look at it and see how we're going to fund it because fire department is funded by avalon taxes We'll have to deal with that when it comes across the board and I don't have an answer for it right now until I see the correct bill. Moving forward for capital improvements for the fire department. Currently right now we have no camera system that guards that station down there at Mosley. We're looking at putting a camera system in down there for about 25 grand. We're going to try our best to get that price down, and maybe we can mirror the camera system at Station 1 and see how we can tie that all together. The pricing that you see here, they were just bullet points, but we're going to do everything we can to get these price points down. Our SCBA fit testing machine right now is extremely old. This is the machine that when you come on and once a year you put the mask on so you don't breathe toxic gases. That's how we get tested and make sure that your mask is the proper size. That machine is about 20 grand. We've already talked about station three. Right now we're going to, we're looking at putting a SCBA bottle air filtration system that trains, that fills our air bottles that we have on the back of our backs. We're looking at putting one down at Station 2 because that training tower that we have there is now operational. We've already had several municipalities throughout the county want to come out and train in our tower instead of us going to train with them. It's open to the police department. It's open to the sheriff's department if they want to do close quarters, ammunitions, or any kind of their K-9 units to use. So our tower is a, it's their tower, it's our tower, it's a city tower. So that's where it is. And right now, if any of our extrication equipment, which is the equipment with the jaws of life, go down, we have no backup. So we're asking for one new set of extrication equipment. As that stuff gets used, it gets older, there's maintenance on it. But right now, those pieces of equipment, if they go down, we have no backup to put on the truck.

ISO. This is the big one.

Our inspection is in 2027. That's our insurance rating for all the citizens of the city and how that goes. So right now, if you see this, we are a class two. We've been a Class 2 for a while now. That's where I said the 5 minute and 20 seconds comes in. That's where the 11 minute comes in at the Mill Bayou area. So we're doing everything we can to make sure that we stay in ISO 2. We've already started. We've already reached out to the inspector that's going to be inspecting us to tell us how we can get better and how we can stay a 2 and or gain points on that. We've already had four meetings on this. I have one individual. That's my training officer but he's also my compliance officer that's doing a deep dive and getting all this information and making sure it's correct so we stay in ISO 2 and our citizens insurance ratings don't go up. So typically right now what is expected with a from a two to a three. So a class one typically sees the lowest rates with potential of 25% or more. The class three benefits for more moderate discounts to 10 or 15%. So you can see the difference in what it is on your insurance premium and the percentage. I don't want you to get class one in your head because we're not going to make it. It's just not going to happen. It's very hard to get. It's very hard to keep. And it looks really bad. If you get it, then lose it. So if we can stay right at a two, a solid two, I would be really, really happy. And I think the commission and the city manager and the citizens would be happy with a two.

From my understanding, it's very rare for a station to get it.

It is.

Are we even close, Chief, to one criteria?

I can get you the correct number, but I think we were like eight points from a one last time. We're not going to get there with those eight points. That's all personnel. That's putting four personnel on a ladder truck, three people on an engine, two people. It's all about how many people you can get on scene and keep. We're not going to get there with the retention, trying to keep retention and the people we lose with people even going to other departments. It would be crazy for us to even think about trying to get to a one. Now we can dream, but I just don't think we can get there. I don't think we can sustain it is what I'm saying.

Gotcha. Capital improvements for 27-28. This is where we have to look for the future.

This is not a today. It's a future problem, but this is the station. So when you build a station, it's not just the station. What's the soft cost that comes with that station? Well, that's a new fire truck, a new rescue truck. Without that area, we'd have to put in a brush truck because of all the woods and 15 personnel just to get that station open. And that's not included. When you build a fire station, if we do it correctly, we'd have to put the contingency money in there to put in the furniture and all the dispatch equipment that have to go with this. This is not a cheap project. The city manager tried to get me to get him some kind of price, but with the fluctuation of everything going on and construction prices going up and down, up and down, I didn't feel that I could put something in there and stand by it because I just don't know until we get to design or we get to an architect to say, what is this? And what are the construction prices at that time? Because to build a station, is it next year? Is it the year after that? I can't tell you depending on funding. Now, Kiki had an open checkbook, I'll tell you, but she doesn't. She's doing everything she can to support all the divisions within the city and still stay on budget. So I'm not going to put that pressure on anybody.

So you're looking at this fire station now?

is the 15 sets of bunker gear, the SE bottles and packs, the radios, the generator, ice machines, and station equipment of furniture, chairs, beds, tables, and all the et cetera that go with it. That's the soft cost I'm talking about. Moving forward to 2829. We do know that there is a, over in the old fuel depot, there's supposed to be a fire station that's supposed to go in there. That is part of that contract or that DO process that they will build us that fire station and we just have to supply everything that goes with it. Don't know where that was. It was hot and heavy about 10 months ago and it went dead again. But for me, I have to think about it. I have to keep the city manager abreast of that and at least put it in there as a holding place if it does come up.

Is there a location discussed for a fourth station?

Marine Island. That was hot and heavy when I first got here. But like I said, it kind of went dead after they got their DO. But I don't know what they're doing with that. I haven't heard anything in probably, what, six months, Chris?

They reached out to us in December, January with some utility questions, but no big traction.

So that station right there is just a holding place for you to think for the future of what might come up. And with that station is the same thing, the bunker gear, the 15 people, everything that goes along with it. Future, down the line, I'm talking four years down the line, we're going to have to replace some gear washers. And we're going to have to replace the old ladder truck. That's down the road. That's not even on my radar at the moment. But I have to think about it. It's getting older. It's our reserve. And it's starting to cause some issues with hydraulic leaks and stuff like that. So we have to at least look at it. No, no, no, the old one. Well, the new one's going out of service for two months because one of the computers is down. So we have to take it out of service. We'll get there later. And then eventually Station 1 was built in 1988. What do we do with that? Do we renovate it? Did we look at other options? Station 2 was not much farther after that. It was in the mid-90s, so those two stations are going to have to be looked at in the future and what we need to do with those and how we fix them, renovate them, sell the property, buy a new piece of property, renovate it. There's some options that are there. It's just where do we go with it?

I'm surprised Station 2 is that old. I assumed it was newer. I moved here from the Pentagon in 13 and it was here, but obviously that got put in around the same time as the hammocks in the early to mid-90s. Station 2?

Yeah, what year would you say, Bobby? Mid-90s? Late 90s? Mid-90s?

Because a lot of land haven growth has been over there on the east side. Yes. All those new subdivisions, townhouses, all that.

Right, and you know the traffic out there trying to get through that traffic, pass that station at 3.30 in the afternoon.

For two hours in the morning and two hours in the afternoon.

Right.

A conversation I actually had with Chief Delange for that, I think it was built for $285,000? Yeah. Yeah, $285,000 built that station.

Good thing we got our historian here. Was that a St. Jim donation?

Mm-hmm.

So I'll go back to my original question for you to think about after this presentation and the days to come. What level of service do you expect? You tell me. I'll do everything I can to make sure it matches what your vision is for this, but also the level of service to the 22,000 residents that we have here in Lynnhaven and growing.

You're kind of giving us the opposite. Good, cheap, and fast pick two.

I'm just giving you the information, how you take that information and you go with it. But like I said at the beginning, the fire department is not cheap.

Most things worth having aren't, Chief.

No. Like I said, when I go home at night and try to sleep a little bit, the 22,000 residents are on my mind. And how do I best protect them? How do I keep up with the growth to protect the next 10,000 that might move in? And now we're at 30,000. and i'm sure that when i get done here and the police chief takes over he's going to tell you the same thing how do we get there protecting 22 now another 10 shortly and another 10 after that as we go as we grow so any questions appreciate what you do thank you the only thing i had was um what i would like to have seen is uh like a list of all your vehicles you know

what age of it what's the cost of maintenance for the year kind of like a waterfall thing of like your priority of all right this next vehicle we need to replace this is the next one right so we've done a good job we've done a really good job and i'll get you the information we've replaced 100 of our staff vehicles already

So they're all 20. The only last one is like a 2020 or 2018 is my battalion chief's car, but it's still in good shape. And we replaced it. Oh, I can get you that list. Yeah, our rescue truck is old. And I'll just let you know, the boat, our boat that covers the bay is out of service. We put it in the water the other day and we sank it.

With that, we do have a grant that the river submitted before the first government shutdown for a million-dollar fire boat that has a 20% match. Is that right? Yes. So we hope to receive that grant and then bring to you all to hopefully accept it and then be able to fund the match and have a new fire boat. The closest fire boat, Chief?

Seattle.

No, I mean the closest fire boat.

Right now, Panama City, but it's not on a dock. It's on a trailer. So we've had these conversations over the last week because the county's going to our new dispatch system. So one of the questions was between myself, Panama City, and the beach is where do we cover in the water? Whose jurisdiction and lines, where do they fall? And we have to go back and figure this out. There is a boat. at Panama City, and if they're out of service, the next closest boat for putting out any kind of boat fires is Destin. If the Coast Guard's in, they may help you, but the first response the way it goes is FWC. Who knows where they're at? Next is Coast Guard. If they're offshore, they're not coming in the bay. And a lot of times, they won't come in the bay. So then you got Panama City and us. If we have two boats, that covers from the inlet all the way out, all the way to North Bay, all the way down to Boondocks for West Bay.

Steve, whenever the guy hit the power line out here, whose responsibility are we supposed to respond to that or

all right

Would that so? With that being the homicide or death fatality, do we investigate that or does FWC investigate it?

So a prime example is, I don't know if you remember the jet ski accident we had. We couldn't get on the water. We had to wait for FWC. So those are the things that we need to look at. And myself and Chief Blanchard have talked about this boat if we do get the grant of having it as dual police and fire. Both of us can use it. We'll put a couple people through some captain schools. If it's a police incident, The fire department would run down and drive for them. They can do their police stuff if they need us. If it's a fire incident, one of their guys on duty or something could drive the boat while we do fire activities because the boat that we're looking at has a pump on it. It's not just a rescue boat. But we're doing some kind of joint effort here between police and fire to make sure that that happens, that we both can get on the water to do what we need to do.

SWC did everything on these jet skis. Yeah.

Yeah.

What are we looking at for a rescue mode?

The rescue boat that we have for the grant is 950 right now. We're looking at 950 to a million dollars. And it's built out of Seattle. It's a specific boat with specific pumps and flotations. I mean, it's not just a regular go to the boat show and buy one. You know, if you're out in rough seas, the seas have seatbelts, a specific lighting for outside into the water. So it's a specific fire boat manufacturer.

I'm assuming that doesn't affect our iso rating?

The boat doesn't, no. No. No, it's more or less, I've got, well, with Marine Island coming, and they're having a fill station there, who knows what size boats are going to be in there. As I've been here, I'm seeing bigger and bigger boats in the bay. Well, if one of those catches on fire, it's more or less, let's put it out, let's rescue these people, and move on. If the boat sinks, it sinks. I'm more worried about getting to the people. It's the cheapest

Yes, on the water too.

And that's why it's kind of a thing with me and Chief to do that duel. Well, if I send three guys on a boat and they're doing cardiac arrest on the way in, they can't drive the boat. So we'll have a plan for that if we get the grant. Chief and I will bring back a plan to the city manager and we'll try to game plan on how we're going to do this.

So, yeah, so we're going to do a break. You see the police department wants to go next or somebody's got a warrant. Everybody showed up. So, so do a 10 minute break and then we'll come back and have to turn it over to Chief Blanchard.

If y'all are ready, we'll go ahead and get started again. Good morning.

Good morning.

Good morning. Appreciate the opportunity.

Before I start, I want to say thanks to Deputy Chief Dunfinger because a lot of this was already done before I got here. Chief, you need to have the mic. Oh, I'm sorry.

Yes, ma'am.

So my goal today is to provide a clear picture on how the police department operates, how we want to strengthen public safety in Lynn Haven, and how we want to move forward. Public safety is one of the most visible and also consequential departments within the city. The responsibilities are enormous. Citizens expect their police department... to be professional, responsive, proactive, all while protecting the community. Public safety must also be balanced with responsible financial stewardship. That's extremely important. One of the things I believe heavily in is getting grants. Most of the grants for public safety won't come until October for the next year, so that's something that we'll be working on along with our personnel here that do grants. So today I'm going to provide an overview of just how the department operates, the demands placed on our officers, the strategic investments needed to maintain and strengthen public safety that we need for the city. So first of all, our mission is to protect life, property, prevent crime, serve the community, maintain public safety. Our officers work every day doing just that. Modern policing emphasizes strong community involvement and strong partnerships. We've got to get out there in the community. Some of y'all came to the event that we held at Starbucks. Those are things that are positive. I'll be speaking, I just spoke at the Heritage Club, I'll be speaking at the Country Club coming up. We've got two other events planned as well. I believe I'm also going to Rotary Club at 7 a.m. for breakfast one morning coming up very soon. So strong community partnerships are extremely important, and that's something that we certainly want to improve on. Our service area. So not only do we provide service within Lynn Haven, similar to the fire department, we have to go outside and we have some agreements that have been made in the previous years where we cover unincorporated areas as well. So it's not just Lynn Haven, but other boundaries. That's extremely important to know. I'm still learning a lot of that myself as to how those were done. It's part of it. We have to serve the residents, the commuters, and the business owners within our area. uh... police services is twenty four seven three sixty five so we do it twenty four hours a day seven days a week three hundred sixty five days a year within the city of lynn haven and within the unincorporated areas emergencies don't stop at night or weekends they don't stop on the holidays so we're gonna have people out there working all the time and we must be ready in a moment's notice including people are off duty we have a shift so that some people are able to respond back in maintaining that readiness requires proper staffing levels sorry, requires proper staffing levels, proper equipment, good vehicles, and everything else that police have to use, and they need to be properly maintained. So how patrol staffing actually works. Some people don't understand. They'll say, well, we gave you another police officer last year, or we just added a police officer. So with patrol staffing, it's 24-hour coverage. That also includes the time that they have to take days off, their vacation time, their sick leave, being in court, and training. So if you say we want one new police officer to patrol the streets of Lynnhaven, we need actually 4.5 to 5 police officers to do that. Because it's four shifts a day, one officer a day. All the time off, all the court, all the training, all the sick leave, the vacation, you almost need five. It really is 4.5. It's just hard to find that .5 officer. So, you know, unless you're adding two positions and you're going for ten, that makes it a little bit easier. But just want to make sure that everybody understands that when you're talking about adding an employee, unfortunately in law enforcement, it's typically not just one employee. Our personnel, we have our sworn officers, we have our detectives, our traffic units, we have records clerks, dispatchers, code enforcement, and school crossing guards. We're looking at different ways in regards to our school crossing guards because that's coming out of the budget for the city. So we are looking at ways. We're meeting with the school superintendent next week to discuss possibilities with them as well. But everything else does come directly under us and for us. Our calls for service, as you can see, they've maintained at around 20,000. In 2025, it went up a little above 20,000. But that's the calls for service that we're receiving on a yearly basis. Those calls for service will probably continue to go up each year, especially as we expand and we have more people in the area. And then there's a lot of things that we do that aren't included in calls for service, whether it's building checks and taking care of businesses and going and watching and observing our parks to prevent things that are occurring in those areas. School and traffic safety. I can certainly say that this has been the number one complaint since I've been here in the last month. I have multiple emails. I have phone calls on a daily basis. I have received feedback at the event that the mayor and I were just at with Ms. Tender. So it's something that's extremely important. We have nine schools. We have five child learning centers. We have morning and afternoon congestion. We have speeding requests. We have constant requests for enforcement. The superintendent, that's what he's actually meeting with me about. We also have a preacher from a private school here that wants to meet because they almost had another incident the other day. The BCSO and the school campus police, the way the laws are written in Florida because they're handled through school police, they handle the campus only. We handle the traffic. Once they pass that sidewalk, it's on us. So I'm going to meet with the sheriff and see what we can do to coordinate because at any given time, no matter how big of a department we come up with, nine schools, you're just not going to be able to cover that every morning and every afternoon. So I'm going to meet with the sheriff, who has been extremely helpful and very receptive to various ideas and working well together. So we will see what we can do. But it certainly is an area that is up for discussion and how we can improve more. The other thing is we're meeting with FDLE in regards to some grants. So they have traffic safety grants where basically you can allow your personnel to work overtime. So if you do have some officers that want to come and let's say they get off shift at 6, if they want to work one extra hour till 7 or 7.30, an hour and a half to cover the schools, that could be covered under grant money versus our own budget money. So those are things I'm looking for. I was big with the governor's office of highway safety for the state of Georgia. I called my director there. He put me on the phone with the director from Florida. They were actually at a conference together, so he just handed the phone to him, and he's sending somebody to meet with me next week to see what we can do to help in those areas. So what can we do without personnel to help solve our school zone? So this is an option, and I'm presenting it totally as an option. You might see that they just added this over in the city next door. But it's a school zone safety option camera program through Red Speed. If we were to do that, my recommendation would be that we only look at one school at this time, and that's the area where people are driving the fastest and where we have the most traffic, which would be Highway 390 at Mowat School. It supplements enforcement option for the school zones So basically, you don't have to have a police officer there. The cameras slow down people. It operates only during designated school zone hours, so only the 45 minutes in the morning and the 45 minutes in the afternoon. Otherwise, they're shut off. It is a civil citation process. Some people say it's a money generator. First of all, I can be very clear, I do not believe in policing for profit. Policing should never be about profit. There's obviously profit that comes with policing. We get money on our regular citations now, but that's not what we're about. We're about saving lives and keeping the community safe. If somebody were to get a civil citation through this, it's a $100 fine. That's the max. If one of my officers was to write a ticket for somebody speeding in a school zone, it's a $400 fine. So it's certainly not about policing for profit as far as the citations. But this ensures that one of our most dangerous areas is covered all the time. And it's proven to slow people down. There's no question about it. National studies show that if you can just slow a car down, if it was to strike a child, if you just slowed that car down by five miles an hour, it increases that child's life expectancy by 30%. So it's something to consider. It's designated to improve compliance, reduce speeds wherever children are present. Traffic crashes, we handle all the traffic crashes in the area. Each crash, it requires officers to respond, assist victims, assist the fire department, direct traffic, investigate the incident, and prepare detailed reports. So every time we have a traffic crash, that officer is spending several hours at work. And most traffic crashes, if they're going to be out in the streets, you're going to have Two officers there for traffic control, and that's going to be for a few hours. So traffic crashes is something that we definitely want to work to reduce. Also, they affect the people that we know and love. Whether it's an injury or fatality, it's something that we want to prevent.

So you're looking at about 10 a week then, Chief?

Yes, sir. And we're not talking minor fender bender in a parking lot. These are our true traffic crashes. Yes, sir. staffing needs so if you're going by national standards for law enforcement national standards are that you have two point two officers per one thousand residents based on our city that would be forty eight officers positions currently we have thirty eight officer positions the department goal for twenty twenty seven would be forty two to go up by four What we also have to remember, in addition to the 22,000 residents that we have, is when we run the lines across the street from DOT, there's about 60,000 people coming in and out of Lynn Haven on a daily basis.

So it's not just the residents here, but it's all the visitors and people that are coming into our community. Chief, does that play into any of our accreditation standards as well, the number of officers we have per residence?

So it would if we were nationally accredited. So back home, I can talk about national accreditation. It would. Honestly, I have not had enough time to study FDLE. Maybe one of those can speak to that question. But I would assume that you have to have X number of people doing X number of things with response times and things like that as part of accreditation.

Sir, when it comes to accreditation processes, the police department's policies and procedures when it comes with traffic safety, traffic accident investigations, other patrolling operations, things of that nature. As for exact personnel levels, no, sir, it doesn't affect that.

so what we're looking for this year is to have a patrol lieutenant right now we have four sergeants we need a lieutenant over patrol an additional two traffic officers and then one community services officer traffic is one of our biggest things so that's why i want to add two traffic officers we need to have traffic coverage more than what we have now And a community services officer will be someone that's dedicated and solely responsible for all the different plans that we have moving forward with more Starbucks events, more events at the park. We're putting together Touch a Truck, teaming up with the fire department to do different events to have the city that can meet with us. There are also recruitment events and things of that nature. So that's what we're looking for in regards to our staffing improvements. And it certainly would help get us to where we need to be.

Excuse me, just a quick question. Community service officer, would that be a badge wearing uniform?

Yes, sir. I'll be honest, it's personal philosophy. If we hire people in the police department, most all personnel should be certified law enforcement officers. Like back home, I didn't have an administrative assistant. I had an administrative sergeant. And the reason is, is because when you do have a true emergency, you've got all of these certified people, even if they're in the office a lot. So instead of hiring nothing wrong with an administrative assistant. I'm not trying to be negative towards that position in any way, shape, or form, but I'd rather pay somebody a few more thousand dollars a year to be a certified sworn officer that can go out and do anything for us. So our police budget trend. The police department budget has remained relatively stable over the past several years. However, operational demands continue to grow. Calls for service continue to grow. And as you've seen, we have plenty of crashes within this community. At the same time, law enforcement equipment, uniforms, vehicles, technology, through the roof. What used to cost for a pair of pants from Blauer, $60, is now $95. Everything's gone up about 25%. Remaining the same doesn't allow us to get to where we need to be. I've spoken with many of our personnel, and sometimes it was one uniform. You're working three days in a row on a 12-hour shift. You've got to have three or four uniforms. You need to be able to switch them out constantly, and if something happens even during the day, you need to be able to switch your uniform out. uh... uniforms don't come as quickly as they used to just like everything else i'm still waiting on my uniforms i've got one i've got a few of these shirts but it does take a while to get stuff and prices i don't anticipate are going to be going down anytime in the near future if anything they're going to continue to rise we have to rise to the occasion and move up with it on some of those years for twenty four twenty five it appears that capital improvements or vehicles pretty much helped us get uh... you know go a little bit higher in the budget But, The bottom line is we're pretty much staying where we were, and it's time that we make, at least from my point of view, public safety, policing, one of the top priorities. Public safety together, whether it's fire, whether it's law enforcement, it's one of your most visible. The police officer is always out in the field. And then furthermore, we're also one of your most risk management potential issues. So investing in your police helps solve what might could become a risk management issue in the future. Police budget context, just to put it in perspective. In previous years, the LHPD received as much as 12% of the budget four years ago. Our current share of the budget for the LHPD is 7%. In comparison, Panama City is 14%, Springfield is 14%, Panama City Beach is 31%. The Sheriff's Office is 53% of the county budget, and the typical national range is 20% to 40%. The requested share for this year is 9%. Now, it's not really about the percentage of the budget. The budget might go up in a lot of other areas. But this does help put it in perspective as to where the police department is at this time and where we need to be to get us to where what I've heard from each of you that you want your police department to be, which is one of the best in the state. And that's our goal.

So when you say share, what do you mean by that? Share the budget? Yes, sir. So basically our entire budget, or is it just general fund? I don't know. So 7% of the general fund? Is that what that means?

I'm not sure where he's getting those numbers. General fund.

I know for sure Panama City's number is the general fund. They don't include the enterprise fund in that.

So the general fund budget is $25 million. $5 million of it is for the placeholder.

Recruitment, retention, and community policing, we have to have competitive salaries, experienced officers. Community policing is extremely important. A lot of the problems that we have here that we've been able to study over the last few years, we've gone through 45 officers in just a few years that we've lost at this agency. We get these officers. They're here for a year or two. They don't get to know the people. They don't get to know the businesses compared to the officers that you see sitting behind you that have been here many years. They know the people. They know what to do. They know that when the alarm goes off at the Home Depot or whatever, it's probably false because the train's coming through at that time, all those kind of little things that they know. They know the different people that are in the community that potentially are causing problems. So when you do have the bicycle that's stolen or the burglary that just occurred. And that's what you want. You want long-term relationships within your community along with your police officers so that we can make sure that we have the best type of community policing possible. Salary comparison. It's pretty straightforward. LHPD, I'm sorry, Lynn Haven right now, if you were to come to us, you start off at $46,000. Once you graduate the academy and once you are certified, you go to $51,500. And we just recently, with the help of everyone in this room, from Kiki to the city manager and city assistant manager, got us up to the $51,500. Previously to that, it was the 46. So right now it's 46 to start, 51.5 once they become fully certified. Panama City is 51.5 to start, 54 once you're out there working. Panama City Beach is 56.5. Bay County Sheriff's Office is between 58 and 60,000 with a $5,000 bonus. That's in addition to the state bonus of $5,000. And the Florida Highway Patrol is 60,000. I took the four that we're losing the most to, which is Panama City, Panama City Beach, Bay County Sheriff's Office, Florida Highway Patrol, divided that by four, and came up with a recruitment salary of 53, with a certified officer starting at 57.

Chief, I just wanted to call attention to the rest of the room here, particularly my commission brothers. Panama City Beach, notice how they're the highest? at the local municipal level, they redid their pay grades last year. They did a study. They basically were trying to improve their retention and recruitability, and so they bumped theirs up. And there's been a significant draw from other municipalities to the beach because of that. You'd think, well, 5,000 a year, well, it's significant. In terms of recruiting and attention, that's what we're up against. So we've got to do this pay grade study for sure, but we've got to take a really, really hard look at that. That's the driving factor in a lot of cases causing us to lose good police officers.

Yes sir, absolutely. In 2018 Lynn Haven was fully staffed and they were one of the highest paid agencies around but we've not kept pace with recent salaries. All other agencies in our area have increased their salaries and they've taken some of our great personnel away from us. I've listened to, I've interviewed all of our employees in law enforcement and the majority of our few others and they said we've lost some great sergeants, we've lost some great leaders in this agency simply because of salaries. Let's just be real. It's not going to be easy for a sergeant or a lieutenant to leave, but you still want to make sure they're paid properly. But all those people over there at the police academy that are going through and they're deciding where they're going to go, 50 cents an hour will make the difference. It just is what it is. People are looking for proper salaries. So when you've got a flyer up that says $46,000 and right next to it there's a flyer that says $57,000, you don't have a chance. They're not coming to us. We have some really good officers, so this next comment isn't meant towards anybody that we currently have. But we have to understand, we don't want to be the person or the department that is just hiring people because they're the leftovers. We don't want to be hiring people that have been fired from other places. That is a huge risk management. You can either pay up front, or you can pay the $3 million when they go out there and do something extremely wrong, because that's just how it is nowadays. uh... the other thing is is chief ingfriger myself and lieutenant or excuse me captain blaylock uh... have been going through when we put the newer salary up on the board we received a lot of input it was pretty great we were excited we received about fifteen applicants within about a week so far after background checks we've allowed two to move forward that's the way it is in policing right this minute uh... you don't have many good choices coming to you people don't want to be police officers those salaries are comparable to a frontline supervisor at McDonald's. here in Panama City. And that's what we have to think of. A frontline supervisor at McDonald's or put on a gun and badge and go work a 12-hour shift. By the way, those frontline supervisors at McDonald's, they work 40 hours a week. Our guys work 42 to 43, depending on. So an average employee who's a 40-hour-a-week employee is a 20-80 employee. Ours are 21-84. That means they work two and a half weeks a year more to get the same salary that somebody else does as a 40-week employee. Because law enforcement officers come under a 171 rule, they can work up to 171 hours per 28 days, and they don't have to get any overtime. We don't pay them overtime for that. I know the fire department is exclusive. They have their own rules as well, where they're kind of the same thing. But we don't want to be the training ground. I know we're currently participating in a salary study. I know that's going to be six months. We certainly greatly appreciate where we've come to so far with some basic salaries. It did, and we talked about it beforehand, it did create a little bit of, you know, I had to do a lot of explaining to the people that currently work for us that are up here at different ranks that didn't get raises. But as I said, these weren't raises. These were an immediate salary fix for our frontline people that were coming in with a wage that they couldn't even afford to live at. So that's why we, you know, agreed that for right now we're going to get it bumped to $51,500, which we're very thankful for, and then proceed forward with the salary study. Fleet modernization, currently we have six vehicles that are over 10 years old. We have 18 vehicles over six years old. An average police car should last between three to five years, depending on how it's used. This is a smaller city, so therefore you're going to have a lot of idling time. We've tweaked our policies for when cars idle, but no matter what, you go work a wreck for an hour and a half, that car's going to sit there and idle. And it has to stay on because the lights and all have to be running. The MDTs in their cars have to be usable. So therefore, our cars, even though at times they might not have a ton of miles, They're in the shop constantly for new air conditioners, new compressors, new this, new that. Chris and I spoke, along with some others. It's not 100% yet, but the initial study shows that fleet management leasing is what looks best for law enforcement or even for potentially other areas. If you take a $50,000 vehicle and you lease it and you pay for it over the six years, you're probably going to pay $60,000 for that vehicle instead of $50,000 for it. So yes, it costs $10,000 more. However, if you go on a five-year cycle and sell the vehicle, you're going to get a lot more out of it in return. Furthermore, your maintenance costs greatly decrease because you're turning them every five years and you've got a newer fleet. The other issue is gasoline, gas prices, newer vehicles. they get better mileage. Not much, but better than what you've got now, especially on your vehicles that are over 10 years old.

What are we averaging proceeds when we sell one of those Probably $2,000.

Yeah, so. Yeah, yeah, you're basically, if you can sell your vehicles every five years and you can get $8,000 to $10,000 versus the $2,000, you've almost covered your difference in getting your vehicle switched out every five years. Now, if you were a city or government that had plenty of money, then you don't have to do the leasing program. You could still turn them every five years and solve it this way. However, instead of needing to come up with $500,000 for 10 vehicles, you can come up with one-fourth or one-fifth of that, basically, and you can keep your vehicle fleet where it needs to be. Newer vehicles have newer features that are better for risk management as well, whether it's safety features such as ABS. I know that's an old one. I'm not a car guy. But there's always new features that make cars safer than they were 10 years ago or six years ago. And if you're a police officer, 12 hours a day, that is your office. It's all part of it. I remember when I got my Crown Vic that had 15 years on it, I was thrilled. The people that we're hiring nowadays, they walk in the door and they want to know where their new car is. Just it is what it is. It's part of it. And if you want to be competitive, you have to match what other people are doing. That's the least of all the importances as far as that. And I'm not saying the employee is the least. But the saving of the money, having the new fleet, it looks good. It's part of community policing. Saves on maintenance. Saves on downtime. all those kind of things.

Lastly, can you also hit on the standardization with the safety of the officers where they get in the vehicle and everything is the same?

Absolutely. Yes, sir. Last two things in regards to the fleet. Right now we have a hodgepodge. You've got different lights, different sirens, a button here, a button there, a button here, whatever was thrown in together because you just didn't properly have enough at the time to fund that vehicle. If I'm a police officer and I go from this vehicle to this vehicle, it should be the same. It's just memory recall. I'm sure the mayor can get into all the different reasons why that's extremely important. The same reason why we wear the same weapons. If I was to get shot and I needed to grab something from my fellow officer, it needs to fit straight there in my weapon so that I can continue doing what I need to do. Lastly, and this is not a shop at maintenance or the shop, it doesn't matter if you're using a city shop or if you are using the Ford dealership or some other shop in the city, the cars that we currently have are going back in the shop repeatedly over and over and over. We had a police officer the other day, one of our new recruits that you saw in the photo, they had to switch vehicles three times in one day. So to switch vehicles, that's an hour. of so, I mean, moving all your stuff, getting it ready, taking it to the shop, getting a new vehicle, getting another employee to come help you do it. It's perception, it's reality, it's frustration, it's all of those things for employees. So all of those combined make it necessary to have a proper modernized fleet. And I don't have the exact numbers yet to show you in regards to how it would be best for the lease program. But everything that I've studied thus far From here and for other agencies, leasing is the way to go. The one catch is, which we verified, it's not a buyout clause. You can keep the vehicle at the end of the five years. It doesn't matter how many miles are on it. Those are some things that previous governments have done where you get messed up is when you start having mileage limitations and things of that nature. What we're looking at is you're turning the vehicles every five years through a contract. Basically, you know... This is how much money is going to be a line item in the police department or the maintenance department or whatever department you use those vehicles from pretty much on a yearly basis to keep your fleet where it needs to be. For this year, if we were to go with the 10 cars, that's $127,000 annually. Upfitting. Upfitting on police vehicles is anywhere between $20,000 and $30,000. So what I mean by upfitting is lights, sirens, computers, all the equipment that goes within that car, the cage that keeps the officer safe. One thing we have looked at doing away with, currently right now all of our officers wear body cameras, and all of our fleet has an $8,000 camera inside the car. I believe those cameras are necessary for our traffic division, because you're working DUIs, you're working crashes, and things of that nature. However, we can do away with the $8,000 camera and our other patrol cars moving forward as we go. It doesn't mean we want to take the ones we have and go try to sell them, because you're probably not going to get $1,000 for them. So we'll keep using them while we have them. But where we were spending $28,000 to $30,000, we can lower that drastically simply because of the fact that we don't have to have in-car cameras in all of our vehicles.

So when you lease them, you still got to pay for the upfitting?

Yes, sir. Well, you can put the upfitting into your lease program. The only reason I would recommend that you buy the equipment is because when you go to sell that vehicle, you're going to pull that equipment off anyways. And most of the time, not all of it, but most of the time, I would say about half of that can go into another vehicle because its shelf life is longer than five years, especially the cage and things of that nature, there's no problem. Training and development leadership. Training is one of the most important investments the police department can currently have. The state of Florida requires forty hours every four years. That's ten hours a year. I'll be honest, that's laughable. A police officer nowadays probably needs a hundred hours of training a year as a minimum. Our goal now is forty hours of training a year. We don't only need law enforcement training, but we need supervisor training. Right now, at our police department, If I was to say, okay, Mayor, you've done a great job as an officer. You're a corporal. Here's the keys to your corporal car, and here's your stripes. No training, no program, no nothing. Same as a sergeant. You get promoted to sergeant, you're over all these people. we don't have that training program built in. And I'm not saying they don't get any training, but there's no training program. And we need a full program where they understand leadership, they understand risk management, they understand physical responsibility, financial responsibility, the bigger picture, and they understand the burden of command. Burden of command is easier in a large department because sometimes you're dealing with numbers and you don't know the people that well. But when you're in an agency that's 50 or less, everybody knows everybody and they're friends. When you get that rank, you've got to understand the burden of command. You don't tell your friend what they want to hear, you tell your friend what they need to hear. And you hold people accountable. You just have to. It's in the best interest of the entire department. It's in the best interest of your shift and the best interest of the city. So a lot of training and leadership development is what we're going to be doing going forward. We're going to make sure that everybody understands community-oriented policing, how to speak to our citizens at every single occasion. And then another big one that a lot of people have come forward about, and we do have plenty of veterans here, and that's crisis response and mental health training. We have very little training that comes from the Academy with that. We need to make sure that when we respond to those situations that we are de-escalating, not escalating. You might have seen on our Facebook post yesterday, one of our dispatchers did a great job. She stayed on the phone with somebody for almost two hours. But clearly it was over an hour and talked them through a situation that they were going through. And he was very appreciative. Even since I've been here, we've dealt with plenty of mental health issues. We need to make sure that we have the crisis response within all of our people and that we do that. Here's the catch about training. Not only do you need money in your training budget, but it also increases what you need in your regular budget. Reason being, I've either got one of two choices. I pull them off of road patrol and off of their regular duties to go to training while they're at work, or we train with overtime because you don't have enough manpower to always be pulling people off the streets. The approach that we took was almost half and half. So it's not always pulling off the road, but it's not going and asking for everything to be under overtime. But all of those things are extremely important. And unfortunately, it's a never-ending situation. You've got to make sure that you're continuing to train if you want to be the best.

Chief, and just to foot-stomp that fourth bullet down there, crisis response and mental health training, real quickly, talk about what your top demands are on you and your officers right now.

Top demands of training or critical response training?

Well, it all goes hand in hand, but the calls that you're getting, the top two responses y'all are responding to, one of the two is domestic violence.

Yes, our top calls are traffic and domestic violence. There's no question. And domestic violence is certainly with critical response and mental health training, because lots of those times they are having mental health issues, and even if they're not, you still need to be a critical incident trainer, and you need to understand de-escalation, you need to understand negotiation, you need to understand all the things. Look, we're not walking into... When I started policing, it was, I told you to do this and I told you to do that. Those days are long gone. Or you walk into the domestic situation, well, it looks like you hit him, you're going to jail, have a nice day, there's no conversation. Those days are long gone. So we've got to be prepared to do things. Police officers nowadays, they are counselors, they are peer counselors, they are teachers, they are mentors, they are law enforcement officers, they're all these different things. And What you really want and what the public is asking for and what most people demand in their police agency is extremely tough. You've got the type A personality that's the SWAT cop over here. You've got the school police officer who loves to hand out ice cream and deal with kids. But look what happened in Florida. That school officer who everybody loved stood outside the building when a shooting occurred and he didn't even want to go in. You've got to have the guy that can hand out ice cream and be handing it right over here to Justin, spot and see the threat, draw the weapon, and take out the threat. That's very tough, but it's possible with proper training and constant training and constantly moving forward and getting them prepared for what they're going to have to do in life.

My late grandmother used to say you can't put a hat on a young person. You can't put an old head on young shoulders. So you and I could walk in with 45, 50, 60 years of life experience and handle a situation a lot differently than a 21, 22, 23, 25-year-old young police officer rookie cop would, right? That's why that training is so desperately important to protect our officers and protect our public.

Not to mention the fact that we have 19-year-old police officers. You know, and I've had it kicked back before. Well, I mean, what's the difference of being a 19-year-old police officer and being a 19-year-old in the military? No disrespect to the military. I believe the military does a great job, but it's completely different. There's nothing compared to what you're doing as a police officer in the United States, walking into somebody's home to help them versus the assignments that our military are dealing with. So, yes, training is paramount. Leadership development as well. My goal is if somebody wants to be a police chief, if somebody wants to be a captain, if somebody wants to leave our agency and go somewhere, let's get them trained up to where they need to be. Not that we're trying to get rid of them. That's not the goal. But you don't just not train people because you're afraid you might lose them. People, you show that you care, but you're also getting the best out of your agency. Your other people are going to want to be trained and become the best that they can be as well.

Thank you for that.

Yes, sir. Technology and equipment, we're not asking for any additional money for technology and equipment this year, but we do just want to keep you up to date on where we are. We have to continue to pay for our body cameras. That lease expires next year, so we'll have to re-look at that. My public records and redaction software, we need that. We can move some monies around and try to find it. It'll help us. But at some point in time, probably next year, I'll be coming back and saying there might be one more position that we need. And that is because our public records are going through the roof. Requests for what happened where. I want to see the body camera footage. I want to see this. I want to see that. I know it's happening in the city just in general. So it's certainly happening. Oh, there you are. I was like, I know it's happening in the city, but it's also happening with the police department. The catch is this. When somebody asks us for body camera footage for an hour, I mean, that's a lot of work. That might take an employee three or four hours to go through it, do the redactions, get the children out, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Yes, we might charge for it, but again, we're not policing for profit. The police department does bring in profit. There's no question. We charge for a lot of the... public records request. When we write citations, we bring money back to the general fund. When we have our detectives that are out there working, something new to me completely, in Florida, we track all the hours and we bill. And the judge basically orders them to pay for the hours that the detectives had to spend. And I've seen check after check come across our desk helping to pay for what our detectives are out there doing. So there is a money component to the police department where we do bring in funds, but that is not our goal. That is not something that we ever want to talk about. When we talk about going out there and solving traffic problems, we talk about stopping people and correcting behavior. I don't care if they write all warnings. I don't care if they write tickets. That's just it is what it is. Now, there's a difference. We get somebody for a DUI, they need to go to jail. But on regular stuff, We don't. Our mobile data terminals in our cars, we can't just use laptops. A $1,000 laptop is going to break in a patrol car that goes from whatever temperature to whatever temperature on a constant basis. So we use mobile data terminals. Those are around $2,500 instead of the regular price for a laptop. Printers in our cars, same thing, along with our radar equipment. A lot of the different things that we need for technology, criminals have the technology. We've got to have the technology in order to do our jobs. Cost of losing a new officer. So between what we pay them to go to academy, what we're paying them to go to field training officer school, what we're keeping them in out there, the majority of the stuff that they wear can be returned. Gun belt, radio, all that can come back in. But their pants, their shirts, their bullet resistant vest, which is personally fitted for them, all of that is part of this estimated cost. The recruitment cost, the academy salary and benefits, the field training, the uniform, and the ballistic vest. So depending on how long they stay with us, That's what we're losing every time one of our new people walks out the door. It's a lot of money. I'd rather invest it in salaries instead of invest it in losing our officers. The strategic risks of inaction. Without enough personnel, good equipment, and technology, we can easily become a target for more crime from nearby cities. There's no question. There's a little bit more crime. We do live in a fairly safe city. Not trying to say we don't. There's no scare tactics here or anything like that. But we want to keep it that way. And how do we keep it that way? High visibility, making sure they're not inland haven. The less visible the police are and response times increase, proactive policing decreases, crime will increase in any city. It takes generally three to six months for the criminals to understand certain things, but it happens. There's no question about it. The next complaint besides they're speeding here, they're speeding there, they're speeding here, is I don't see police officers in my neighborhood. I want to see the police in my neighborhoods. And we hear that repeatedly. We heard it at Heritage, and I did my best to explain why. We aren't able to accomplish that to the best of our ability right now, but I'm hearing it constantly no matter where I go and speak. So it's a strain on your personnel. It's a use of overtime. I loved overtime growing up. I think most of these guys in the audience that are police officers loved overtime. Our young deputies, our young police officers, they're not about overtime. They're about when do I get to get off and go home and enjoy my personal time, my life, and all of that kind of stuff. The last thing you ever want is required overtime. I've seen it happen time and time again. You start requiring overtime, your people are going to go somewhere else. Reduce proactive policing. Again, we need to stay out there doing the traffic stops, being visible, and making sure that we're taking care of business. Our aging equipment in our vehicles, greater recruitment challenges, and higher risk management exposure. I've always said this, whether you're talking about a jail or whether you're talking about your police department or anything else in law enforcement. We are a pay me now or pay me later game. If we don't invest the proper amounts up front, you will pay it in risk management at some point in time. Strategic investment for 26-27. Personnel salary adjustments and positions. That's an estimate based on the suggestion. That's not coming directly from the salary study as of yet that's being done. $645,000. Training and overtime, $40,000. Training programs, professional development, $20,000. Expense for equipment, in addition to what we normally spend, $10,000, which most of that's going to be our redaction software. Vehicles and emergency equipment, $275,000. It's a total proposed budget increase of $990,000, which is a lot of money. I totally understand it. But again, it's pay me now or pay me later. It does raise us to a 9% stake in the budget. And while that's still below national levels and other levels and even our history levels here, it does get us to where we need to be. It puts us on the path to be the police department that each of you and that the city stated that they wanted moving forward. Investing in Windhaven's future, competitive personnel, a modern fleet, updated technology, very well-trained officers, and strong community partnerships. We get there together, I can assure you, just like the fire chief has accomplished a lot in seven months, within a year or so, you will have one of the best police departments in the state of Florida. And that's the goal, is to be one of the best and to make sure that our citizens are well taken care of, they appreciate what we do, and risk management is lowered dramatically.

I'd be glad to answer any questions or talk on anything else if you'd like me to.

A lot of great information, a lot of great metrics, so that definitely helps us a lot when we start looking at the budget in the future, so appreciate it.

I just want to double that up. All those numbers and metrics helps a lot, so thank you for doing that.

Yes, sir, I appreciate it. One last thing. It wasn't in my presentation, but I will say that what the fire chief has done, if he gets the ground on that boat, I know we're going to have to come up with a little bit of money. But we've already spoken, and he's offered that we could have some of our people go to training to become captains. There are situations where the police need to be in a boat as well. I know we talked about one just recently where there was a suicide. Do what? Oh, you don't have to be a captain. But it is something that I believe. It would be the fire departments, but he's offered for us to participate in that program as well, and that would be very beneficial for us. So thank you.

Chief, we also talked like during your interview process and when you first got here, you know, we're not a large agency with different divisions and everything that entices officers to come here. What are ways that you see that we're going to be able to recruit, aside from salaries, of course, to kind of get some more officers and fill those vacancies we have?

So one of the things we're doing is meeting with, so like for example, if the deputy chief is a U.S. Marshal, part-time. So he does it full-time to the agency, but he can do part-time in that, and they reimburse the city for any expenses. Those are things that our officers would like to do. We're not gonna have a crime suppression team, we're not gonna have all the different things that you can do out there, so those are important. Also, the fact that we are small, it is a family atmosphere, Those are my one-on-ones. That's one of the things that people like best about Manhattan is that it is small. It has a family atmosphere. And those do help. You've got to find the right officer for that and that fit.

But it certainly helps bring us forward in there.

The little things that you'll start seeing different. You saw we just rewarded a dispatcher just with a letter and stuff like that. But you've got to take care of your people. You've got to care about them. You've got to show that you're investing in them. This guy's wearing Nike's and this guy's wearing black pair of shoes from Kmart and this guy's wearing, we don't even find them in boots or uniform shoes.

So, you know, I know it's a little bit unique or whatever, but you can go online through our preferred vendor and you can get Under Armour boots for $165. But one hour away from here, we can get Under Armour boots for $45 at the Under Armour outlet.

so just for 45 a person we're able to fully make sure that we're getting boots around people little things like that matter to police officers and to any employee that you know that they're taking care of we will be the agency that gives you good leadership we will be the agency to make sure you're taken care of we understand we might not ever be the best paid best It's totally understandable that we're not the best paid.

You're never going to compete with the Florida Highway Patrol.

And you're probably not ever going to be able to compete specifically with the Sheriff's Office. But you certainly want to compete with the like-minded agencies that are in this area. It's not quite as important. You've got to watch the way I word it. It's not quite as important for those who are like myself or others that have been here a long time. But you're not getting individuals that have been cops for 20 years that are coming to Linux. You're just not. You've got some that have been here. But to get those new kids in and to get them to stay, it's all got to be a holistic approach. And we've just got to make sure they're well taken care of.

Parting shot on your budget, you had 9% there.

I teach public administration, budgeting, government.

good governance courses as my full-time university professor job. And nationally, the average percentage of a police budget for a major city or municipality is somewhere between 10% to 12%. So 9% is not too far off.

Excuse me, ma'am. Currently, the police budget is 20% of general fund, with the additional money that the police chief is requesting, it would go to 23% of general fund. And I want to commend you on your staffing numbers. My little pencil sketch here, you and I are off by $5,000. So we did a great job in calculating how much the salary increases would be.

So I don't know whether those metrics are different. We'll certainly dig into that. But generally, if we're talking, you said 20% versus 9%.

Currently, 20% of general fund. I think they might have used the entire city budget is what I'm saying.

But even then, your major general fund budget, police force in a large city is typically about 10%. Fire would be about another 10%. So just keep that in mind as we look at our own. We're not like everybody else. I get all that. Numbers change and vary. But 10% for fire, 10% for police is the general rule of thumb.

Well, you know, every single department's important. There's no question about it. The numbers and the matrix that I provide you with, for example, the 2.2 officers per 1,000, those are national standards. If you want to be a nationally accredited agency, that's part of national standards. I'm not saying we have to be a nationally accredited agency. I'm not even asking to get up to those numbers. But we do have some things that we need to improve on. Traffic is certainly one of them. What's the advantage of being nationally accredited? So nationally accredited just brings up higher standards, same as being locally accredited for the state of Florida. It can help you with lawsuits, it can send experts in that can say they are meeting national standards, they are doing this, they are doing that. And you are following the highest level of standards. The other thing is, it's not just your police chief telling you that. It's people that come in and inspect you every three to six months that are making sure you're actually doing it. You have to show reports. You have to show photos. And they'll take an email in front. They walk in. They ask for this. They ask for this. They ask for this. It would be no different than an auditor coming in and checking behind finance and what our city administration is doing.

Do you know if that helps with grants or anything like that? It does help with federal grants. Federal grants.

Thanks.

I'd like to clear up the budget for fiscal 26 for revenues drawn from the police department activities for $28,000. Yeah.

That's not even one police officer.

No, sir.

Nope. Placing is not for profit. I understand that.

And you don't want police officers facing for profit.

That's the last thing you want is them going out and trying to get tickets and generate revenue. You don't want to be that agent. Good brief, Chief.

All right, thank you very much. Thank you.

Chief, that was definitely informative and less lower expectations. I'm gonna say that right up front. I streamlined mine down to basically begging. Community services.

Community services encompasses four different cost centers.

The animal shelter and animal control, the bayou park and preserve, parks and grounds, and most recently marketing and communication. So what I'd like to do is go ahead and start with animal shelter first. Right now, what I'm going to ask for in the coming year is an administrative position. And I think the reason this is important is To work in that environment, it's almost like a teacher. It has to be a calling to work with animals. And that provides, man, an emotional stress that I think a lot of us don't understand. You're bringing in animals that have been abandoned. You're bringing in animals that have been hurt. You're nursing these animals back to care, and then nobody wants to adopt them. And over time, there's euthanasia that's involved occasionally. So it's a stressful, on an emotional level, it's a stressful situation that I think our staff, we occasionally see those peaks and valleys where they get stressed out. On top of that, if you've ever spent any time at the shelter, You can't sit there for two minutes and have a conversation without the telephone ringing, somebody coming in to see an animal, or having to take another volunteer and switch out another animal. It's a stressful environment for those folks, especially emotionally. And right now, Kiki can tell you... Once a month, twice a month, where are deposits? And when we ask, they're like, we just haven't had time to do them. And I think having an administrative staff will lessen that stress and in the long term provide more emotional stability for their well-being. Even though we have an older truck, we could almost bypass replacing that truck in the coming year if we can use that funding to help provide an administrative position.

It's out before you go. I just want to let you know I very much appreciate what y'all do here. I spend my own time. I have a house full of rescued animals, one-eared and damaged and PTSD-type animals that I nurse back to health. I support and volunteer with two different animal rescues. Y'all are truly doing amazing work. I can't say enough about the three people that you have out there. Courtney and the guys, they do phenomenal work. Y'all really do a special, unique, just like Justin and his team do, special, incredibly niche, meaningful work across the community. Y'all are the same way.

Well, I appreciate those kind words, and I'll pass them on. Those folks earn their money, there's no doubt. Between the two ACOs, you know, they're also on call after hours. So they may put in a full eight-hour day, and then at 11 o'clock, we have somebody call us, PD may call to say, hey, we've got an accident, we need you to come pick up an animal. And it's not uncommon for three hours later at 4 a.m., a second call comes in, where it'll take both officers to get out there and handle the situation.

It's near and dear to my heart, and I just wanted to publicly say thank you. Your team does an amazing job.

I will definitely pass that along. So moving on to the Bayou Park and Preserve. It opened in 21, and so we're just about reaching the five-year mark on this. The grant is a 10-year grant, so the first three to four years, things look pretty good out there. We're starting to see the wear and tear accumulate. And that's requiring additional work. So I'm asking for another staff member out there, and I'd prefer to have a crew leader. Having two the same out there, they may get along great, but you're going to have to have one holding the steering wheel. Parks and grounds, we're asking no changes this year, so no money involved in that portion. Parks and grounds, some of you already are aware. They take care of cleaning the parks, cutting, what have you. We also support the Senior Activity Club whenever they have to set up or break down. We support Justin's folks on, like, Art in the Park. Our guys will go get all the tables, set up the chairs, break them down, and what have you, in addition to all of the city events. All right, and we'll start now with the proposed CIP projects for the bayou. In the coming years, I've tried to give a five-year snapshot here, and I'm going to break down each one of those through the slides. So that's just a quick snapshot. All right, so the playground, although it's only five years old, we're starting to see wear and tear on the turf out there right now, and it's going to turn into a safety issue. Where that connects, there are little nails sticking up to tack it down, which now becomes a rusty... safety issue for a kid running out there barefoot. So I've already reached out for quotes and have three quotes, but unfortunately they're all exceeding $35,000. We're estimating it's going to come in about $40,000, so I'll put that out to bid in the coming weeks. The second one we've already started on. If you've been out to the bayou, there's a ton of wood amenities out there. If you see the handrail on the right, if you'll notice the color, it's faded and gray. And the one on the right has been stripped, and we started staining the one at the end. This is going to have to be done every three to four years. The wear and tear on it. I wish I would have included a picture. It shows a path right down the middle that's stripped from the wear and tear, but yet everything else is looking good. So I'm estimating $75,000 this coming budget year and another $15,000 a year just to kind of catch up. When this was originally constructed, they used cedar wood. Well, cedar absorbs moisture just that fast. And you'll notice there's a lot of stuff over water. And we've had to replace multiple boards. And a lot of times, we don't even realize it until we get a call that says, hey, I just stepped on a board and it cracked. So this has been an ongoing process. Now, part of the reason I need another individual out there is I'd like to hire a carpenter. That would help us with the crew leader position and replacing much of this stuff without having to depend on our facilities maintenance staff to come out and help us with this. And the last project we have is something that we really noticed and was exacerbated during Hurricane Helene two years ago. The excessive tides and winds coming out of the northwest just beat the shoreline to death. And as you can see, we've probably lost 15 to 20 feet of shoreline as a result of that storm. So Commissioner Perno has been working with us with the St. Joe and St. Andrew estuary programs to get a grant. And we just missed the window this past year. I think everything was compressed. But things are favorable for us to get this grant. That's estimated at $150,000, but that's over a three-year period. The first year we estimate it to be about $100,000. And what that will entail is putting out oyster reefs to try and get seagrass and what have you growing back out. And I'll give you an idea of what kind of problem this is. The area that you see right there that's eroded is the yellow box right there. But the pink box is what Jacobs Engineering has identified as needing to be fixed. So we're going to try and get a grant to get the living shoreline throughout that entire area. And I think that's either 1,100, what's it say, 1,100, 1,500 feet of shoreline. So it's substantial. And the first year, we will be able to get everything installed. And much of that, even with that $150,000 cost, includes volunteers, not necessarily hiring a contractor to do it. The second or third year will primarily be monitoring.

We are anticipating having a workshop from the estuary program and Jacobs at the April 28th, I believe, is that commission meeting. Prior to that, they'll do a workshop and let the public know. We've got this one in the area over at the wastewater treatment plant, the retention pond there, that living shoreline. So they'll present all of this information April 28th.

Yeah, the estuary folks have been fantastic helping us to try and achieve a grant. Just to give you an update, some of you have come on board after this project started. The Bayou Preserve was actually part of the, I guess you'd call it Triumph Funds really, it was Deepwater Horizon oil spill money. And we received that property out there, which is 98 acres. And we have a $3.5 million grant for operations and maintenance over a 10-year period. The problem we've ran into is those are 2012 funds. So we inherited the project in 21, but yet those funds were actually put into place between 2012 and 2015. So those dollars are not going to be the same as they are today. So we are allocated through the grant to have three full-time and two part-time positions. We have really kept it down to one or two people for the last five years to try and make those dollars stretch. And as you can see, we're currently at the four-year, nine-month mark, so almost halfway. And we've spent 51% of the funds. And a large portion of that was initially to get started for the vehicle, for the tractor, for some of the equipment we needed to maintain out there. And next, I'm going to move on to the parks and grounds projects, unless there was any questions on the Bayou. All right, again, this is a snapshot over the next five years. And I will, in turn, go through each slide here in just a moment. If you've ever been out to Sheffield Park following a rain, you'll notice it holds a lot of water. When that playground was initially installed, I'm not sure why it was prior to my being with the city, the rubber safety surfacing was only done through half of it. So the rest of it has mulch, and it holds water after every event. And two things happen. After every event, kids can't go out there and play. And if it's a heavy rain event, all that mulch travels with the water and then we've got to go out and clean it up. Now what we're encountering now is much of that, it's called port in place, PIP. It's that rubber surfacing is starting to deteriorate with the wear and tear and we're starting to have to patch it. And the more you patch it, the more often you have to patch it. we have two choices we can replace the whole thing of that $65,000 estimate is to replace all of that area with new PIP and we may be able to come in cheaper with artificial turf and that seems to be the trend in parks now is getting away from PIP and going with an artificial turf it's a little easier to patch another thing on the list this year being that we just completed the Kane Griffin renovation on the playground You have a splash pad, a brand new playground, clean restrooms, more than ample parking. That's going to turn into a destination park very quickly. And we only have one pavilion out there. So on a Saturday or even in the summer, the splash pad is nonstop. Everyone's eating under the little concession stand awning. Now, although there is a small pavilion out there, you can't have two birthday parties and they're out there constantly. So I think there's a need for two more. We will pour the slabs in-house, and the 45,000 should be enough to cover the two pavilions plus picnic tables. One of the things, we just announced that we were going to put up a new playground, and on social we got bombarded with shade, shade, shade. It hadn't even started yet and people were screaming about shade. When we demoed the existing playground, we tried to salvage as many of the existing poles for the sunshade units, so I think we can save a little bit of money. That would have normally ran us around $45,000 for that location. I've reached out to a couple of companies in town because we salvage those poles. They think they can shade it for about $30,000. And as soon as the temps start heating up, you're going to see more and more posts on Facebook. When are you going to shade it? Oh, and before I get past this one, I don't know if you were able to see the post on Facebook yesterday with the kids out there. We had sod laid yesterday, so I went out just to inspect the sod, and there were three kids on the playground, even though we had it taped off. And I asked Mom, hey, would it be okay if I take some pictures? And she said, absolutely. From the time I walked to the truck to got back, there was four or five more kids, and by the time I finished, there were 15 kids out there, including... a kid in a wheelchair and that's the whole purpose for doing this because we didn't have an ADA park where a kid could get on a merry-go-round so it made my heart smile seeing that yesterday and I had to share it online so Ben thank you for the CRA funding that and it shows that it can CRA money can be spent a lot of places that do a lot of good for our community um the last time we talked about this the roof started leaking so let's hope that we're beyond that now Yeah, that elephant in the room was, what are we going to do with the splash pad out at Kinsol Park? I think regardless of what we do, it has to be demolished. Even if we choose to rebuild it, it has to be demolished. And that cost is going to be probably $10,000, $12,000, Bobby, give or take. If we leave it as a green space, we grade it, we sod it, we're looking at about $30,000. That's on the low end to demo and green space. These are the various options that was discussed with the commission previously. And again, it doesn't have to be done in 27, but I would suggest as a minimum, we demo and go ahead and green space. From a parks perspective, what our greatest need is pavilion space. Just like what we have out at Porter Park, any given Saturday, every table is slammed. And I don't know, the last time I spoke to the commission, I told a story about going out, and there were two families arguing because one was there first, and that is what we need. And Justin, you can probably...

I can say this. We received several calls about birthday parties. Now that the weather is starting to warm up, birthday parties, birthday parties, it's always Cain Griffin Park. Leslie Porter. We have another large pavilion like we have in Leslie Porter at Kinsaw. It would be a great addition to what we have.

And the reason I think it's so important here is because you see behind you have clean restrooms, ample parking, there's a playground, and the scenery out there is gorgeous. I think that would be money well spent.

I mentioned just from a safety standpoint, one splash pad is tough to handle from a safety and liability standpoint. A second splash pad, we're getting into an area on a safety issue with is it water clean, slip and fall, the people, are they certified? I'm not trying to— No, no, no.

These are important items.

From a safety standpoint, you see a lot of cities across Florida getting rid of their splash pads. Because of the liability, and Ms. Jim would know more than me on liability, but from a safety standpoint, having a second one, it's going to be quite the issue of trying to keep it safe.

Well, it's not only keeping it safe. In addition, it's staffing. I was going to say, keep in mind, there's no adults that want to go out there and monitor in the hot sun. So we're hiring kids who would open, the slash pad opens at 10 and at 9.50 we're getting a call, hey, I can't make it today. So now I've got to pull a staff member, Justin does, to go out there and monitor.

Like I said, Ms. Chin, on the liability issue, she has way more experience on that than I do. But like I said, from a safety standpoint, employee standpoint.

I would just say this. I spend time at the splash pad because people call me on the last minute. On a Saturday or a Sunday because we have nobody to meet.

Was it last year or the year before that we actually put an email out to all employees? that they could get overtime at their regular rates to go work over it.

But I would add that a squirt pad is just on the same level. When you have water, slick, with little to no supervision from the parents. And again, our splash pad attendants are not guardians of the children. And we've gone through a lawsuit with that, and one, they are not guardians of the children, but it is ripe for accidents. Kids are going to run, scream, slip, fall, break, open up their head, and it's, yes, it is a... high-level risk activity.

And because it's recycled, that also includes the time it takes for facilities maintenance to come out and prep it each day.

All of those things can be said for any aquatic feature at all. All aquatic features are high-risk additions to the city.

Yeah, so regardless of the way that the commission chooses to move forward, I would ask that you please consider a pavilion for sure, regardless of what else goes in there. I think that's a need that the community would fill immediately. If you've been out to Kinsaw recently, we've started construction on the new gazebo out there. And that's the actual look of what it is. It's got a very coastal look. And the reason we went that way was so we can start hosting weddings out at Kinsaw. I get calls. I bet I get three calls a month. Can we have a wedding at the bayou? And unfortunately, our deed restriction prevents that. So what other park can we have a wedding at? Well, there... Kind of limited, but I think this would provide a great venue with North Bay in the background. And rather than putting picnic tables out there, I think we're going to throw some chairs out there and use it as a community space in the evenings to watch the sunsets and what have you. The ultimate plan is on either side of that gazebo to put a couple of the pergola swings like we have at Porter out there to be able to enjoy the sunsets. And we anticipate this should be complete in the next two to three weeks.

And I'm assuming that if we get that up and running, that will be a reservation. Exactly.

It's something that we can reserve. And the reason I don't want picnic tables out there is because it will turn into a birthday party location. And if you've ever gone out to any of our pavilions on a Saturday afternoon after the parties have happened, there's four pounds of confetti and shiny. It's just a mess constantly. And we want to avoid that at this location since it's so close to the shoreline. Next, still saying at Kinsol, that existing playground needs to be replaced in the next two to three years. As you can see, the rust starting to occur. We've had to replace a couple of pieces out there recently, and I think we're getting into some safety and liability issues the longer we allow this to go without replacement. Anytime you're near saltwater, you can expect a shorter lifespan. So this playground, I want to say, Bobby, you know how old this is? I want to say this is 10 years old at least. At least. Yeah, so it's fared quite well, but it's starting to show the rust. Now, the piece that you're looking at right here at Porter, that piece right there was four and a half years old. because of its proximity to the saltwater at Porter Park. Some of you may remember, we had a nine-week closure during spring and summer two years ago, waiting on these parks to come back in. The company we purchased this from was sold. So the new owner was balking about some of the warranty issues. And we've replaced about $12,000 worth of equipment between those two playgrounds that are five years old just in the first five years. So what I'm proposing is whatever we go back with at both locations be more resin-based. Minimize as much steel as we can, what steel there is, powder coat it to give us a little added protection. I know this shows a metal slide, but we will certainly go with plastic or HDPE. Next, a couple years down the road, I want to go ahead and refurbish the equipment at Sheffield. It's in great condition, but it's really starting to show its age. There are no rust issues occurring. And I found a company in South Florida that actually comes in and recoats everything so it looks like a brand new playground for really just a fraction of the cost of replacing it. And I think it would serve us well to do so in the next few years. especially the use that that playground gets. Alright, here's the pie in the sky over the horizon that I'd like to do. Right now, the Old Bailey Bridge is a fishing bridge. It's bicycles, joggers, walkers, golf carts in the evenings. To me, I look at that much like Kinsaw Park. It is a diamond in the rough that we can do so much with because of the visibility. You're on an elevated basically an elevated park above the water. What I want to do is create a completely unique amenity that's a one-of-a-kind destination. So my thought process is to take half of the bridge, the bridge that's closest to the newer Bailey Bridge, and landscape it, which will still leave plenty of room for golf carts, bicycles. It won't change anything. But I want to put in concrete planters. We already have a six-inch water line going across there. We have water. All we need to do is irrigate it, throw in some soil, some plants. And when we reached out to DOT, they were like, holy cow, that's the only bridge in Florida that would be like that. That's a destination. That's a one-of-a-kind in Florida. I think we would have to do it in phases, and the way I've got it set up, I think if we started with $200,000, we could do it in at least three phases minimum, probably more. Now, in order to utilize CRA money, Ben and I have talked over the last three or four years about this, if we can rework the turnaround nearest the bridge to make the bridge and the park contiguous, we can utilize CRA funds for that. Basically, rework the turnaround, and it'll take some design as you work on it. We already have a pretty good idea of what we want to do. But the first phase could be going that route, and suddenly we can get grants and sponsorships for some of the rest of it. But it will be partially funded. We're going to have to fund some of it.

So what's the one?

The insurance? I'm going to let Chris talk about that one. Relocating the water lines.

So nowadays you don't put a water line or force main on a bridge. DOT won't allow that any longer. It's all going to be bored. If the decision was made to go to Bay County for the sewage treatment plant, we will have to have a bore under the Bailey Bridge there. It will eliminate the forest main that's currently on the bridge. And when we did that, we would also bore a new water main and eliminate the one that was on the bridge. Aside from we could downsize it and use it for the irrigation if needed. So we'd have to move the water line, is what you're saying? Not to do this project. They're going to have to be moved regardless if we go to the county.

But we could tie in for irrigation purposes at each end of the bridge and still irrigate whatever we choose to put up there.

We did recently also have what we assume was a homeless camp under the Bailey Bridge. And they probably moved 13 yards of dirt out from under the bridge and had a camp there.

So there are vendors.

They actually worked a little more efficiently than some of the contractors. We had a whole lane under there and we had to actually flowable fill it. They used nine yards of flowable fill to fill the cavity under there that they had dug out. Wow.

And the water lines are not insured. Insurance companies will not insure them.

If you don't believe how limber Bobby is, Bobby got up in that cavity and it was right below this water sewer line so there was just one piece of concrete

Not to try to mire in the past, but I know we got insurance money for the bridge, didn't we?

What was that for? So there was FEMA money given to repair the Bailey Bridge. About 1.4 million?

1.8 I think, but it went to tables.

I know, I know. I'm just trying to remember what it was for. It was to make repairs on the Bailey Bridge. I believe lights, the piping, and painting. Yes. We're going to have to do that regardless. So the lights will need to be upgraded soon. We did just put in the mid-year budget $25,000 or $27,000. to prepare a task order because there is damage to the bridge, not hurricane related, but that bridge does have damage from the bridge inspection. So we put money in the mid-year budget to build a bid package and we will have to bid that out in fiscal year 27.

Jennifer, correct me if I'm wrong. Once the water is taken off that Bailey Bridge, if we did this, we could get that insured.

I can't speak for the insurance company. All I know is they put a big X on the bridge and said we will not insure the bridge. Irrigation should be treated different, but you never know. All right, another one of those over the horizon projects.

We are outgrowing Sheffield Park for events.

If you'll notice, the most complaints we have is when we have to close down adjacent roads and we have people parking in front of homes and what have you. And I think, again, I mentioned Kinsol as being a diamond in the rough. It's a larger space, more scenic. We have overflow parking just two blocks away. There's no reason we shouldn't have something like this, our next signature park. And again, the first design on this is probably going to be, again, $40,000 or $50,000 just to design. I have some preliminary work done on it already, but it's a much larger venue. We still have restrooms, still have a playground, and ample parking.

If the future decision is made to eliminate the wastewater treatment plant here, you will have all of the area for space. There is potentially some DEP grant money for the mitigation of that. That would be green space only where the wastewater treatment plant is, but that would expand the amphitheater and the parking right there. That's right. That's where we would build the wastewater treatment plant.

And we wanted to come up with something that was a tiered amphitheater, so blankets, chairs, what have you, but also help direct some of that sound up away from the neighborhood. Not that there's going to be a concert out there every week, but it could be a rentable space as well, whether it's weddings, whether it's kaleidoscope theater putting on plays, what have you. These are a couple of grant-funded projects that are on the horizon. James E. Rogers is our last park that has not been rebuilt as part of the rebuild effort, and I'm not sure where we are on that. I do know that we had 1.1 or 1.2 million available. i think we can probably get a hundred thousand dollars a year in grants over the next few years to try and do that park in phases if we chose to use that 1.2 to help pay down some of the debt service i don't know is that negative okay it was originally budgeted in um 101 fema money we have the

The citywide parks money is the 428 money that you hear me talk about. It's fungible. We can move from here to there. And the determination was made not to apply for the FEMA money for James Rogers because it was going to delay all we can, and in order to do that, we have to close out projects. We have to finish this for the money to start flowing again. And it's kind of, I know it's confusing, but one way or another, whatever you do with James Rogers is going to end up coming out of general fund. Because the FEMA money is...

So we're not going to get that money, is what we're saying, for James Rogers?

We can get it, but we're already negative $18 million. So it's going to go into a fund that we're already negative. We're going to have to spend $1.2 million out of pocket that we're already negative in. So it's not like we're getting $1.2 million in hand to build it.

There is no more FEMA money for anything.

And I think we have a strong case for obtaining a grant because it hasn't been rebuilt, and it's not serving that neighborhood. That's why I think if we can get a couple of grants over the next three years and build this park in phases, I think that's a better option.

So we had a standstill right now at James Rogers Park? Yes.

You all approved what design that you wanted to go with back in August. So that is designed and ready to go. We just need to figure out how to fund the construction of that.

If you decide to go forward with James Rogers, it will come out of general fund. There is no more FEMA money.

Okay, one of the other ones that we're looking at right now is trying to get some irrigation and trees on the rail trail. If you walk that during the summertime, you know how precious shade can be. And I think there are plenty of, and River, you may be able to chime in on this one, I think there are plenty of grants out there that promote communities planting trees and what have you. I don't see that as a major factor. We get a lot of requests for lighting around the perimeter of Kane Griffin. And that's another one that if we can get solar lighting out there, even if it's two lights per side, I think that's going to make some folks that walk out there in the evenings much happier. And again, I feel like this is something that's grant related. And lastly, to rebuild the wetlands boardwalk on the backside of the sports complex. It is, if you've been out there recently, it's in bad shape. The boardwalk is pretty much shot, but the asphalt track needs to be reworked as well. Samuel?

Harold.

Oh, Harold. Whoa. That was a blast from the past.

Shots fired.

Yeah. Used to things going wrong, I guess. Maybe subliminal. Because the last slide is the most important slide. All right. I tried to find a Sarah McLoughlin soundtrack to go with this last slide, but.

The tension. Yes.

Boy, this is quite the buildup, is it not?

The last time you caused the roof to leak.

Yeah, no kidding. I'm seeing a pattern here, so there we go. So, yes, whatever works.

So instead of Tiny Tim, we have Tiny Ty. Please, sir, may I have some more?

The real question is, does it work?

Maybe you should sit outside the commission meetings.

Sit in the front row of that.

Any questions for Parks or anything? Or any suggestions, things that may be a different vision?

No, I mean, I thought he described it really well. I think Kinsaw is kind of a I think a lot of it's probably going to be experimental as far as what's going to work, what's not going to work, and I think we need to kind of start small and working towards, like, the amphitheater thing, you know. I think that's always been something we've always wondered, like, what's going to happen with Kinsaw, and I think you've got a lot of great visions with that, so I appreciate it.

It's a beautiful piece of property. It is. And I think it can be such an asset to Lynn Haven in the future.

I have a question. We have recently had issues and you know we have people crying about the crosswalk and I know on Presidents Day we had a little issue with a lot of kids being over here and a couple kids running toward the water in Sheffield Park and I know you talked about a little bit but but Is there any way to fortify the area that we're so close to the playground, so close to the water there? And I know you're looking at fencing or whatnot, but we need to try to get a fix, especially kids, autistic kids. Yes. They don't even think. They see water. They run to water.

I went to the parks conference last year, and one of the things that surprised a lot of directors were by 2030, any new parks coming out, or the feeling is by 2030, any new parks being built will have to have fenced playgrounds for that very reason and adult-size diaper-changing tables. for the autistic kids that are you know they're almost adult size oh yeah so there are some changes on the horizon based on some of that um with respect to sheffield because of the shape of the circle you know the sidewalk because the shape of the pond we could fence it it would look pretty funky we may be better off possibly fencing just the playground portion itself and finding a way to redesign

And then I know we got the grant for Florida Avenue. I know, Ben, we always lean on you for funds from CRA or whatever. But I know we've talked about it. And I know you put up a picture of the amphitheater and whatnot. But I'm not going to not say it, because I've said it before, is that one day we're going to have to tie Florida Avenue to this area. In the future, basically I think our Florida Avenue corridor is going to connect to our city hall and this park. It's all going to be an area that people can come to. Not that the city is going to take over Florida Avenue, but you're going to need egress between the two. And I've seen it, and it lives and breathes in Foley, Alabama. They built a crosswalk, and they got a grant. They got a cavalry grant or something, or a Mustang grant, whatever it was. It was a federal grant. And they built an overpass, a pedestrian overpass. over over the state highway in alabama they built it and they have it's all lit up it's a focal point of the downtown area there and it connects their antique shopping area and their city park um and people talk about the lot you know you can see how they light it up and stuff in your middle foley alabama and they've got the skyline of new york on this crosswalk you know it's really cool so that being said um i don't want you to add it to anything but it's just something that we need to think about that that we're talking about kensal park we're talking about the what-ifs of everything um yeah and i think the the big step is this this first little grant that we have for florida avenue but we're gonna hopefully end up having a great little area back there with with shops and restaurants and whatnot and then tie it into this area

And I think it's important sooner or later.

We're going to concert at this park where people need to park and get to it or a function, you know, and people are going to be running around on Florida Avenue or there'll be an event on Florida Avenue. Exactly that.

So in the park over here. Yep. So, yep.

It might happen sooner than later.

I believe we've touched on all the general fund projects. Is that a true statement? General fund.

No, we still got the street department. We still got

It ain't easy.

Are you totaling up streets? Uh-huh.

We want to have a good day. It's Friday.

My job.

So anything else from the parks? So lunch will be ready in about 10 minutes. We'll go ahead and take a break. We'll grab some lunch and then eat in here and reconvene.

Sounds good.

Ready for the break.