City Council - Regular Meeting

Well, good evening, everybody. It is Monday, July 6. And welcome to the regularly scheduled Mark Weiland City Council meeting. Jim, would you call the roll, please?

Councilor Henry? Here. Councilor Goler? Here. Councilor Dom? Here. Vice Chair Champagne? Here. Councilor Schwan? Here. Councilor Gray? Here. Chair Palumbo?

Here. All right, guys. A couple of things to go over before we get to our invocation. For starters, we have rules of decorum in effect. These have been going great lately, both for council, staff, and anybody in participation. I always say, passionately debate your point, have a little fire about it, but be respectful to each other. All right. Belated happy anniversary, happy birthday to America, 250 years. A couple of people would like to acknowledge. That's definitely worth it. I think for most of us in this room, we were around for the centennial. So we got to see 200 years and 250. Yay, us! Some real generous folks helped out, along with the whole island, visitors, guests, full-time residents. But when it came time for the fireworks, which were spectacular this year, if you saw them, grand finale was wonderful. Beach had everybody out there being respectful and enjoying themselves. But some folks helped make it possible for us, Laura Bauer and her whole yoga clients and club. had donated $250. We appreciate them. And you can hold your applause until the end of this. The Hilton, Mark Weiland Hilton, was kind enough to donate $5,000 towards the fireworks. We have the Mark Weiland Civic Association, MICA, as we know them, donated $5,000. And the JW Marriott also kicked in, and they were kind enough to donate $10,000 to the fireworks. So we thank everybody who helped make that financially possible. Looking forward to seeing all these wonderful donors next year. On a positive, we'll try to move this meeting along because the United States, are they playing Belgium tonight? Round of 16. So let's wish the best for our American team. Fought hard to get here, so we'll see how that goes. I would say a little more, maybe not somber, but on another note I need to share. Hayward Boyce, some of you may or may not know this name. And I want to thank our city clerk, Joan Taylor, for highlighting this for us. I remember a counselor, when I was a counselor, And that was 2002 to 2004. He passed, lived a long, wonderful life. And I just want to acknowledge and read a little bit of some positive information about him, excerpts from his obituary. But I took the liberty on the wall in the back. Now, if you watch these meetings, if you watch on TV, there's a wall of honor for all past counselors. And you will all be on there at some point in time. So I took Hayward's picture off the back. And if you could maybe see that right there. And I'll tell you, I remember voting for him. I didn't know him, and we didn't have quite the social media back then. But I voted for him because he had a military background. So let me just read you a little bit. We'll have a moment of silence after that. Hayward E. Boyce III, Commander U.S. Navy, passed away peacefully of natural causes on April 23rd, 2026, at Bentley Village in Naples, Florida, just shy of his 92nd birthday. A native of Baltimore, Maryland, Hayward dedicated his life to military and governmental service, civil engineering, and most importantly, family. He began his distinguished naval career as an airman recruit in 1951, graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1957, and served aboard the cruiser USS Northampton. He was later accepted into the Navy's Civil Engineering Corps, rising to the rank of senior officer as a commander. Hayward served with honor in numerous locations worldwide, very important, including Vietnam, where he earned a Bronze Star Medal with combat, I believe it says VR-5, during the Tet Offensive. Hayward was also a devoted public servant, getting elected to the Markle Island City Council from 2000, excuse me, to 2004, where he made significant contributions to the then new city and new government in growth and development. And you're going to love this part, guys. He's survived by his wife of 68 years, Ann Albert Wilson Boyce. There are three children, Ann Elizabeth, Thomas Hayward, and Louis Francis, grandchildren and extended family. A celebration of life will be held on August 15, 2026 at the Marco Island Hilton from 2 to 4.30. He'll be interned in the U.S. Naval Academy. In lieu of flowers or donations, please, in lieu of flowers, please make donations in his honor to the San Marco Catholic Church. So if we could just have a moment of silence to reflect on that. For Hayward, I'm going to miss you. Amen. All right. Tonight we have the invocation. My item three on your agenda, Reverend Timothy Navin of the San Marco Catholic Church. And right after that, for the Pledge of Allegiance, Councilor Schwan has agreed to lead us in that. Reverend Timothy, are you here? Come on up. If you're able, please stand.

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we come to you this evening asking for your guidance, wisdom, and support as the City Council meeting begins. Help them to engage in meaningful discussion, allow them to grow closer as a group, and nurture the bonds of community. Fill them with your grace, Lord God, as they make decisions that affect the citizens and the visitors of Marco Island. Continue, please, to remind them that all that they do here this evening, all that they accomplish is for the pursuit of truth, for the greater glory of you, and for the service of all humanity. We ask these things all in your name. Amen. Amen.

All right, councillors. Item five on the agenda, approval of the agenda. Can I get a motion, please?

So moved.

We have a second? Second. Motion by Vice Chair Champagne, second by Councillor Schwan. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed, say no. Agenda approval passes. Item 6, approval of the minutes. We're going to start with 6A, approval of the City Council Capital Budget Workshop minutes of June 15, 2026. Councilors, any changes to those minutes?

Move to approve. I'll second it.

Motion by Councilor Henry, second by Councilor Schwan. All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Anybody opposed? The ayes have it. Second. Second. Sorry. Go on. Apologize. Okay. 6B, WE HAVE AN APPROVAL OF THE CITY COUNCIL MEETING MINUTES FROM JUNE 15, 2026. COUNCILORS, ANY CHANGES TO THOSE MINUTES?

MOVE TO APPROVE.

COUNCILOR HENRY, A MOTION TO APPROVE OR A SECOND? SECOND. SECOND BY COUNCILOR SCHWAN. THANK YOU. ALL THOSE IN FAVOR, SAY AYE. ANYBODY OPPOSED?

THE AYES HAVE IT.

ITEM 7, APPROVAL OF THE CONSENT AGENDA. WE HAVE TWO ITEMS ON IT. COUNCILORS, LIGHT SIGNS IF YOU WANT TO REMOVE ANYTHING FROM CONSENT AGENDA. We have a light sign hold on for one second please councillor councillor dome, please Okay, so 7b will now become 16a That is the first item under 16 Can I get a motion to approve as amended I'll second motion by councillor gray second by councillor Henry. Oh call the roll on this please Jim Counselor gray.

Yes, I'll slow Henry.

Yes, I

Vice Chair Champaign. Yes. Councilor Goler.

Yes.

Councilor Schwan.

Yes.

Councilor Dome.

Yes.

Chair Palumbo.

Yes. Passes seven to zero. All right, Council. We're on to number eight, proclamations and presentations. We have one employee service award this evening. If you can meet me down. Scott, please.

Thank you, Chair. Today, we are honored to recognize Scott Hendrickson for an incredible 20 years of dedicated service to the city. Since becoming chief plant operator in 2013, Scott has led the Northwater Treatment Plant and source water facility with exceptional professionalism reliability and expertise he oversees two of our most complex facilities and leads a team that keeps them operating safely 24 hours a day 365 days a year his extensive knowledge strong leadership and proactive approach have helped maximize the life of critical equipment while ensuring our facilities remain in compliance and continue to provide outstanding service to our community Scott, thank you for your 20 years of hard work, dedication, and commitment to the city. Congratulations on this well-deserved milestone.

All right, Scott. A couple things for you. Kind of loud music. A couple things for you here. A little pin from the city. That's going to be something to commemorate your 20 years, and we greatly appreciate that. And we have an Amazon gift card for $100 for whatever you'd like. And before I turn this over to you, I want to say quickly, I've been a resident here full time since 98. A realtor, a citizen, now a public servant. That north plant used to get a few complaints by the residents of Rose Court. And I can tell you in 20 years, I have not heard one complaint over that. So we do appreciate that. Anything you'd like to say?

No, actually, I never expected to have a job with one employer for so long, so it says a lot about Marco. And you're also, it's good to have good staff with you. It makes the job a lot easier.

20 years says a lot about you. We're grateful to have you. Thank you so much. Congratulations. It looks like we might be a little early for Item 9, Citizens' Comments Not on the Agenda. Jim, how many people are signed up for that?

We have three registered speakers.

All right, so that's not going to take us. So we're going to circle back to that. We'll move on to Item 10, the City Manager's Report. Light signs if you have any questions for Dr. Lucia. Is there a case if anything you'd like to add?

Yes. Actually, I have one correction. On my city manager's report, I note that we received confirmation to receive reimbursement from FEMA. This was a project as a result of Hurricane Irma, which was in 2017. You may remember we reconstructed the Heathwood-San Marco Road intersection. We did that several years ago. And we did get confirmation that we will be reimbursed. The figure I have in my report is $188,000, but the actual reimbursement figure is $1.2 million. So the news is much better.

That's an applaudable moment.

Yes. So I just wanted to make sure that I put that on the record. Thank you.

Councillor Goler, you have a light sign on. You're up next.

I just want to thank you for this is incredible. Getting the money from the federal government is always a great achievement. And I just want to thank everyone involved in this incredible achievement. Great job, everybody.

Absolutely. Here, here. Is there anything else for Dr. Lucius? All right. We're moving on to Item 11, the City Attorney's Report. Alan, anything for us?

Yes, Mr. Chairman and Councilors. This might take a few minutes, so just bear with me. Please. So House Bill No. 655 became effective as of July 1st of this year, and it created a new section, Florida Statute Section 7090. which applies to public meetings and records regarding a claim under the Burt Harris Private Property Rights Protection Act. As I've mentioned many times, we have at least one claim that is already pending on that. So I'm, as your city attorney, I'd like to, I desire to actually asked for an attorney session with you to schedule that for it's there's two items that I want to form I have to do this so bear with me the Burt Harris Act is known as 666 6th Avenue LLC 682 6th Avenue LLC 658 6th Avenue and 674 6th Avenue LLC There's a request to a flugia relief, which is the Florida Land Use Environmental Dispute Resolution Act, which is Florida statute section 70.51, Florida statutes. So that is the subject matter in which I wish to have an attorney-client session with you. But in addition to that, as you know, there's another matter that is similar in topic and subject matter that is a petition for writ of certiorari that was identified as 666 6th Avenue LLC versus City of Marco Island. case number 26AP02, which has consistent facts and information that also will come up as part of that attorney session. My suggestion is that we have two meetings in August, both of which start at 5. If you are able to schedule that attorney session, it probably will take about two hours. We meet in public. Start the meeting we go and adjourn into a closed-door session where it's you me city attorney I'm sorry city manager and the attorney who's representing the city on behalf of the matter the two matters And we'll discuss this and be looking for strategy discussions and maybe other things that we need to talk about at that time so that's something I wish that you would agree with and give me some ideas in terms of dates and

Alan, can I ask you before we, and I appreciate that, so we start in a public, this is a little different than I've experienced, we start in a public meeting, it kind of segues into a shade meeting, would that be?

Well, you're the only one who's been here before when we had one of these, so last time that we had a session like this, we started at the fire department, We noticed a meeting in the conference room in the fire department. The door is open. We announced that we're going into closed-door session. We closed the door. We have a court reporter who's present with us at that time who takes all the information and information down, and that becomes public. after the lawsuit or subject matter is concluded. Then when we're completed, when we're done with the discussion, the session, we open the door again, and we announce to the public that we're done, and then you would be free to come and go as you wish to.

Before I turn it over to the councillors, there are light signs. Time is of the essence of this. How soon do you need us? The sooner the better? Do we have a little time on this? The sooner the better.

Okay.

Councillor Gray, you're up first.

I'm flexible to the meeting. I thought I'd read in some of the past legal reports that this was headed to arbitration.

Was that a misinterpretation on my part? MR. No, sir, this is not, but this is an opportunity that the statute has allowed us to be able to meet in session, and I frankly have discussions that I need to have with you as a collective group for those items. MR. Thank you.

MR. Casey, how do you want to – do you want to have Joan put something out so we start collecting dates we're available or try to figure it out right here and now, or what would be the best path?

The two options are August 3rd or August 17th. And as the attorney indicated, you already have a 530 meeting scheduled that day. So I think if you can agree right now on one of those dates to meet at, you know, 130, that would be the preference. And then we'll know and we'll get it noticed.

All right. Maybe, Counselor, do you need a few minutes? You got your schedules up? Or, Counselor Gray, either one of those works?

Whichever one you'd like.

Counselor Schwan?

Both work for me.

Vice Chair?

I'm flexible.

Both work for me.

I'm good.

Good. I'm good.

Why don't you take the sooner one, then, if you want to get together quicker?

What we need to do is get a court reporter. I'll work with Joan to see if we can schedule a court reporter. The sooner, the better, obviously. And we'll let you know as soon as possible. You'll confirm with us? Perfect. All right.

Guys, anything else for our city attorney?

No.

Anything else, Alan?

Not on my part, no.

Thank you. All right. On to item 12, departmental reports. Councilors, light signs if you have anything for the department heads. And this includes all of them. We're going in no particular order. Councilor Henry.

I just have a quick question for Joe. I saw that the two new tennis courts are being resurfaced. Are they going to be redone as clay, or will they be changed over to something that is less, I don't know the name of the surface, but that doesn't require as much?

They're both with clay we do have pricing for hard surface but that has not been decided to do yet so and that's the we would like to do that at one point in time with the course that's at the very end the one that has the irrigation that can't be replaced Justin is it true according to your report that the intersection of Collier and Barfield will be open this week It is true

So great job, and thank you to all the residents and their patience. And then also I just want to say thank you for the completion of the crosswalk at Heathwood by the library, because it's so important. I wish Samantha was here, because it was something we were driving for together, for the safety of our residents. And I'm not sure if everybody realizes how many kids go from Mackle Park to the library and back and forth on a daily basis, so that crosswalk is awesome. So thank you very much. And I also want to encourage the public, read these reports because they're facts. And it's great knowledge. And the staff puts a lot of hard work into it. And so please, check them out because there's a lot of information there. There's no secrets. They work really hard, and they get a lot of things accomplished. So I encourage everyone to review them. Thank you.

Counselor Henry, I'm going to just follow up on that quickly. I was going for a little run a few days back, a brutal one, and I saw one of our officers by the turnabout on Yellowbird. Stopped to say thank you for policing this. I appreciate it. By the time I got down Collier and Barfield, North Barfield, or I should go heading south to get to the Lee Plummer Park, I saw the same officer was over there now patrolling. And as I was going by, the crosswalk spoke to me. So, Justin, great job. I was going to stop and video it, but I couldn't get my hands to work on the phone. I was so sweaty. But it literally talked when you were going by. So we spoke about that. An unbelievable job. So thank you. Councilor Goeller, you are up next.

I have two comments. First of all, Justin, thank you so much for opening the barfield in Collier. I mean, we were expecting, what, September, October? And I think Your team is doing a wonderful job, and residents are going to be very happy. And congratulations. Thank you. Now, the next comment I have, I would like to give our police department a huge, huge wow. Excellent job, everybody.

Thank you.

You guys are incredible, and we are so grateful. This community is very grateful for your hard work. I have only a couple questions. I spoke with Chief earlier, and Ray as well. I watched the magistrate meeting the other day. It was very long. I could not make it, but I did watch it. I had a question about the noise ordinance complaint that we issued citation remember, I have my question is what is the mechanism that we can take when we issue citation to the private citizen, not the owner, obviously owner will pay the citation, will pay the fine, but what is the authority the city has to retrieve those funds that we will issue the citation? for the noise ordinance violation.

As you know, we can put a lien on a homeowner so their house is here. But when it comes to a, if you have somebody who's renting a house, for instance, who doesn't live there, once the fine's been levied, if they choose not to pay it or they don't pay it, there's not a lot we can do unless there's some mechanism in place to issue a scoff law or something like that. But right now, I don't believe there's anything in place to scoff law

person who is not a who's not a resident here anything like that once the fines been been levied so do we have any idea how many of out standard situations we have from not homeowners but the renters because we are using our resources and I don't know I don't know maybe it's a question for attorney sir

Yes, it is. Thank you, Joe. Actually, with regard to the citation, the citation is typically $150, Joe, right?

That's correct.

Yeah. So it's a minor number. We can go after them and try and collect on that by securing a judgment. It's $250. $250. Okay. Thank you. A judgment. But chasing that means they don't live here necessarily. They live somewhere else. So how to get the judgment and file a small claims court action is probably not worth the dollars. But we could get attorney's fees. The statute does allow for that, but I'm going to suggest to you it would be a difficult road to follow in most instances, which is the reason that I have been trying to push us to move towards the property owner, because the property owner, we have a lot of other avenues in which we can enforce and take action on them.

But according to our ordinance, we do issue citation to the renter and the property owner as well, correct?

We have the ability to do both, yes.

Okay. I just want to make sure that, you know, you already know where my point is, but thank you for your answer. Thanks, Joe.

Anything else, Councilor? No, sir. Okay, very good. Thank you. Councilor Schwan?

Yes, I just had a follow-up question for Joe about the pickleball sound barriers and where we're at with that, because we did have two different ordering dates for the various sound barriers, the original, like, 52,000, and then the additional one, too, if you could update us on that.

So the original ones have been ordered. We had to do field measurements for them and verify all that, so that took a little bit longer. So all of that has been ordered. The secondary order that you're talking about with the middle fence, that one we're still waiting on field measurements for the fence that will be installed before I can order the panels. So those POs have not been issued yet.

So your expectation for the first order that you put when kind of approximately when they may be installed?

We're hoping for the beginning of August.

Okay, that'd be great. Thank you.

Anything else, Counselor?

No, thank you.

Counselor Gray. Thank you. Mr. Poteet was kind enough to exchange e-mails on his report today. So it was useful for the community that they've tested over 4,000 water lines for lead. And the results, which I think Mr. Poteet will confirm, no lead. Now, there's 8,000 more to go, but a 30% survey results is very encouraging that there's little to no lead in our plumbing system, and I just thought that was beneficial for the community to be aware of that. I did have a couple different questions. Injection well number one, great rehab job. Do we have any way of assessing the remaining capacity when you go through that process?

so it's been rehabilitated it's been blessed i'm just trying to understand how we monitor capacity yeah uh for the record jeff boteach general manager of your water and sewer department um i i think you're referring to the mechanical integrity test yes sir okay so so that doesn't uh have anything to do with capacity it just verifies that the well is in working order The well is 3,500 feet deep, and so they do a testing of that well to ensure that we're not having any leaching into the environment where it shouldn't inject into.

Thank you. Yeah. Good answer. So we really don't – we have no way of measuring unused capacity on these storage wells.

well we have a permitted capacity and we know how much we put down um so so there is capacity there but that it these wells are for um reject water for the wastewater plant as well as the south water treatment plant brine water that is rejected from the membranes so got it thank you um

Looks like we're going right on schedule or ahead on the AMI installations. And obviously your department's performance this year is favorable or better. Always leads me to the question, can we draw down less of that capital lease with some of our additional earnings and reduce the debt that we have to carry forward out of that project?

if there's a benefit there would say yes I don't know that there's a benefit to do that so we'd have to look at the the financial details but I don't believe that if I recall right it was about eight years before we could do that okay

I was just hoping if we could knock down the debt, please proceed because your business is being run well. That's it. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

While we're talking about that, I do want to make a note for the record. I did make an error in that report, and I sent counsel an email regarding that. But for the record I did have a number of four million dollars in gained revenues, which was not true It was closer to five hundred and eighty five thousand dollars.

So just for the record to have that cleared up Thank you for the clarification Counselors anybody else I'm gonna follow up with what councillor goaler said I'm regarding the police and I'm just gonna read this This was a post This afternoon at approximately 4.30 p.m., the Marco Island Police Department and Marco Island Fire and Rescue responded to a reported non-fatal drowning incident in the 900 block of Hunt Court. This is important. Listen to this part. The Marco Island police officers arrived on the scene within approximately 90 seconds of dispatch and immediately began providing life-saving measures to an injured juvenile. The juvenile was taken to the hospital through EMS. I saw the news today. The mother was talking about this juvenile getting stuck. to the bottom of the drain in the jacuzzi. So let me start with that. Childproof drain replaces the old flat cover with a dome-shaped anti-entrapment cover. We have these on our pool, guys. They're about 30 bucks each. You can install them yourselves. There's two screws. If you're not that nimble or can't get down to the bottom of the pool and hold your breath while you're turning a screw, have the pool company do it. It is imperative. It could save the life of anybody, including a juvenile. But let me speak to the police department and let me speak from an elected official. Folks, if you're watching, if you're in the audience, about 50% of your taxation, property taxes, go to education and the school board. About the other half goes to the budget. And out of that budget, about, if I remember correctly, about 60% of that is police, fire, and first responders. As an elected official, I'm always wondering, how do I cut that number? How do I whittle that number down? It's a huge portion of our budget. And I think if this was my kid, I would raise it 1,000% and have no problem with it. So great job, officers. Across the board, police, fire, first responders, county services, sheriff, everybody. It doesn't matter until it's your kid, and then it matters. So thank you. Great job, guys. We appreciate it. All right. We could circle back to item nine, citizens' comments. We're right at 6 o'clock. Jim, would you please call the first person up?

Yes. Our first registered speaker is Mr. Len Schuman, followed by Ms. Barbara Ann Hegan. Len, welcome. Come on up.

Thank you very much. Thank you Mr. Chairman, councillors for the opportunity today for my wife Sandy and I we're here this is my personal 52nd year on the island we're here now for a full decade permanently all year round and with 9-11 coming up the 25th anniversary we know that Diana Dome is going to put together a a marvelous event for that. Sandy and I wanted to present two things. We were both in the financial markets on our way back from Singapore in 2002. We stopped off in Hawaii and we picked up, and it's still in its original envelope, a flag that flew over the battleship Arizona. And we want to present this, and hopefully it will be used by Chief Byrne for flying in Aftwood in front of his fire station or some other station that we think is well-deserving. Chief, you want to come on up?

This is going to be for you, and this is an awesome moment.

And the second item is something from our financial markets that was put together by Life Magazine at the time. It's called One Nation. It's a photo picture, almost a library unto itself that we hope will be placed in our library. through Diana and the rest of the team, because we want our students here to always remember two days, December 7th, 1941, and of course September 11th, 2001. And this is a photo journal that I want to present to our chairman, and hopefully it will be presented into our library so the students will always remember. I'll come down for this.

Thank you.

Well, it is with great honor that we accept these and we thank you.

Thank you so much. And Sandy and I are grateful for the years that we're here and for the wonderful community that we belong to. Thank you all.

Our next registered speaker is Ms. Barbara Ann Hegan, followed by Mr. Alex Parker.

Good evening, Chairman, council members, city manager, city attorney, and city staff. My name is Barbara Ann Hegan. I'm the Director of Business Development at the Arlington of Naples. I do have a flyer I wish to share. The Arlington of Naples is a life plan community for seniors, and we are having a senior expo. It is going to be on July 15th from 10 to 2 at the Arlington in our Cultural Arts Center. We will have over 40 different health care providers. We will have different seminars for aging and wellness. And we also will have all of our community partners, some right here from Marco Island. I am also a very proud member of the Marco Island Rotary, the noontime club where I'm a board member. and I'm active as our Daily Bread food pantry volunteer, so I care deeply about Marco Island. And just here to invite you to this event and to share it with your constituents and the community at large is invited. Thank you so very much for having me, and thank you for all of your leadership.

I was going to say, Barbara, thank you for putting this on. Thank you for making us aware. Aging in place is such a strong thing on most people's minds here, so we appreciate you for all your services. Thank you.

Our next registered speaker is Mr. Alex Parker, followed by our final registered speaker, Mr. Michael Josephs.

Alex, welcome.

Thank you, good evening. It's good to see you all. I'm officially registered tonight to speak on behalf of the Mark Weiland Area Chamber of Commerce, but actually I'm going for a trifecta here. I'm gonna take part of my time. You'll hear from Alex Parker, one of the directors of the chamber. You'll hear from Alex Parker, the building contractor, and you'll hear from Alex Parker, a Mark Weiland resident. All three of these categories that I mentioned focus around the word thank you. As you know, starting out of the chamber section of this, as you know, per our mission statement, we are nonpolitical, but we desire to stay in tune and react to the actions and the decisions that take place within our city. We always strive to find ways to assist and improve business, tourist, residential climate on the island. And we have made a decision as a board recently to attempt to have one board member attend a council meeting, one per month, so that we may be informative and also interact with the chamber. Today I represent the board in the form of a thank you. I'm going to put you on notice right now. I've experienced something extremely powerful and yet intimate. And there are times I have trouble speaking about it. But I'm here to thank you as a board member, to thank you as a result of your actions that allowed us to proceed for the construction and the erection of the amazing Vietnam Memorial here on this island. We truly believe that it's a gift that will keep on giving, and it speaks profoundly on behalf of this island. To anyone who visits this memorial, it says, we remember. We remember not all past veterans, but present veterans. And I know there are veterans in this room tonight. And this island wants to say, we remember through that memorial. I will jump over now to Alex Parker, the contractor And I want to say it's been my extreme honor to be involved this past year with the dedicated veterans of the American Legion 404. And allow me to be part of that effort to allow their dream to become a reality. I want to say thank you to the council for the unanimous vote that allowed us to proceed with the construction and erection, as I had mentioned, but before coming to you as a council, We had to go through an extensive criteria, to say the least, to be met and satisfied before we could go forth to growth management, to the permit application for a very, very special and unique project. To that end, I want to direct my attention to this side of the room because I am deeply indebted to staff Casey was all over it. Dan was so instrumental. Mr. Poteet, Jeff, thank you. Joe was involved. I know Samantha was involved. Martha was involved. And I want to swing over here to our police. Chief, thank you. Our police department was there on site to guard our statues. until I could securely mount them in their place. And we appreciate your watchful eye over that while those crates sat there overnight. Going to Alex Parker, the resident, I would like to encourage everyone who has opportunity to listen to a song. It was put out six or seven years ago entitled, Meet Me at Arlington. I reflect on a few of the words, a couple lines in that song where he says, meet me at Arlington. I'll introduce you to my son. Maybe then you'll know just how I feel. White stones that go on and on. 400,000 strong. Wounds and broken hearts that never heal. I believe that to be true. But I also believe that anyone who has the experience of visiting our memorial will again know that we remember, that we care. And that, in some ways, may help to mend some of those wounds and some of those broken hearts and I'm confident it will for me personally I will be reminded every time I encounter that memorial that the freedom that I so fully enjoy every day was never free it was paid for the price So I thank you for your time. If I offended anyone with my words, take it out on me, not the chamber. And I would like to say thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Alice, can you stay one second, please?

You got us all choked up. It's hard to...

It's not us that deserve the thanks. We made a very powerful but simple vote. It's you who served and fought and defended and sacrificed that we thank you. So thank you for all you've done.

Our final registered speaker is Mr. Michael Josephs.

Michael Josephs, Marco Island. I'm going to stay on the theme of positive tonight. There's a lot of real positive stuff. Some very, very touching stuff. I'll get to that when I get to it. I'll start on the positive. We were at the Snooken on the upper level. We were entertaining a guest, having a fantastic time. And I said, look at that boat. That's our fire boat. And our friend said, what boat? I said, that one, that boat that looks like a tank. It's just awesome. It's just awesome. And I said, that's our boat. I said, I know a lot of people say we spend too much money. I like that boat. I like the fact that we have that boat. And here's one of the reasons I like it. So while we're up on that upper level, someone just to the right of us had a medical emergency. And our friend is a nurse, and she went over and took care of business. I immediately dialed 911. And that boat came right back to the Snook Inn in two, I'm going to say less than two minutes. Fantastic. And then the parking lot filled up with a fire truck and police. We have fantastic emergency services here. Thank you for what you do. I know this has been said about the police, but boy, something is changing. And I'm saying we like it. We like the change. I don't like people doing 52 miles an hour anywhere on Marco Island. And if I'm doing 52 miles on Marco Island, yeah, throw the book at me. I deserve it. Some people have been saying, I've heard very few complaints about it. Most people are like, wow. And I'm telling everybody, there's something that's changed. You better slow down and be safe. So thank you very much. On to the Vietnam Memorial. at Veterans Park. So I went over there the other day, took a bike ride over. I saw that memorial and oh my God, Yeah, I guess I'm a weak man. The first thing I did is I started crying. And the second thing I did, Father Tim, is I hit my knees and said a prayer for all those people. What an amazing tribute. I've seen so many, but this tribute is the finest I've ever seen. I videoed it. I sent it to my friends and all said the same. We've never seen anything like it. So fantastic. I know I got another minute. Please. Take as long as you need. It needs maintenance. I personally volunteer to maintain however I can. I told some veterans about this. I said, I'll do it. Please, let's not let that fall apart. It's not your typical bronze statue. This thing is going to need maintenance. I volunteer to maintain it. I hope I'm allowed to do that, or I hope the city does it. It's just such a fantastic tribute to these vets. I know many vets that aren't here from that war. Please, let's maintain it. And you know how to get me. I'm here to help maintain it. If I got to go there once a month and spray something on it or hose it off, I'll do it. I'll find a pack of people to come and help me as well. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. That is our final registered speaker.

Well, that was powerful tonight. Yeah.

Councillor Henry, I don't think it's any violation of Sunshine Law for you to send that picture to maybe KC and have it distributed to Council. I'm sure everybody wants a copy of that. That's just amazing. And thank you to everybody for tonight. Just heartfelt. Plays right into perfect with the anniversary of America. I wish we didn't have to have a memorial, but I'm grateful that we do. Thank you. All right. We don't have anything under item 13. QUASI-JUDICIAL PUBLIC HEARINGS. WE HAVE NOTHING UNDER ITEM 14, UNDER ORDINANCES. SO WE'RE GOING TO ITEM 15, WHICH IS RESOLUTIONS AND CITY COUNCIL ITEMS. AND WE'LL START WITH 15A. THIS IS AUTHORIZE A CITY MANAGER TO ISSUE A PURCHASE ORDER TO BID DIRECT FOR 125-FOOT BIMINI BOAT IN THE AMOUNT OF $173,687.80. USING TIPS COOPERATIVE CONTRACT NUMBER 230105. CHIEF BILARDO, YOU'RE GOING TO BE PRESENTING.

Good evening, everyone. So we are... Chief, we know who you are, but your name for the record. Oh, I'm sorry. Joe Bilardo, Interim Police Chief for the City Police Department. So we are looking to replace our old Ranger patrol boat. It's approximately 10 years old, and it's in pretty rough shape. So we're looking for some support to purchase a new boat, a 25-foot Bimini boat to replace this patrol vessel. All right. This old boat has reached its operational – it's at the end of its operational life. So this is the most – proactive, the most cost-effective way to address this issue. The repairs that we've been putting into it, they're becoming less and less. We're getting less and less return on our investment for those repairs. So this money's already been allocated. The money's already in a bucket for this purchase. We were putting off the purchase for a couple of years to see if we could repair it. At this point, it's really not worth repairing anymore because it's in such bad shape. So we're looking to take that money that's already been allocated and purchase this new boat at this time. Very good. Thank you, Chief. Thank you for the presentation. Counselor Henry, you're up first.

I just have one quick question. Where will this boat be stored?

Well, right now, the current ranger is stored over at Caxambas. We would look to store it in the same spot. It would be in that same lift.

Okay, quick story. When I did my ride-along with Smitty, we went down to Caxambas Park at night, and there was an emergency off-island, and he said, shall we hop on the boat? And I looked at it and went, no way. So I have to say I move to approve. Okay.

We have a motion. Do we have a second? I'll second. A motion by Councilor Henry, second by Councilor Goler. Deb, anything else to finish up?

That's it.

All right. Councilor Goler.

Thank you, Chief, for the presentation. I just have a question. Can we get anything, any monies from the old boat?

Well, I'm sure that the process for taking something like city property would be probably put out to auction. I'm going to be honest with you. I know very little about boats. I don't know what that boat would be worth on auction, but I'm sure there will be some amount to recoup if it's put out to auction.

That would be wonderful. Anything we can get back. Thank you, sir. You're welcome. Thank you.

Councilor Gray. Thank you. Just a couple points of clarification. Sure. Memo didn't indicate that the money had been allocated. So we approved this money and allocated it a couple of years ago?

There's money that's in a capital account that's been allocated to address purchase of the marine equipment. That money has already been sitting in a bucket that's set up to make these types of purchases. We were holding on to it because we were going to try and stretch the life out on the Ranger, but we're at the point now where they're filling holes in with tape. So now is the prudent time to purchase a new boat because any more money that we sink into this boat, it's really just we're throwing good money after bad, repairing it at this point. understand that clears up a couple things we just had a capital workshop and reviewing the police budget in the five years yes I remember seeing this boat on there is that because it was previously approved well this this will be part with this budget this isn't gonna be part of the 27 budget this is money that's already been allocated previously so it's not part of the 27 okay thank you Thank you, Councillor. Councillor Dunn.

Chief, I'll ask you for both chiefs. There's been something on my mind for a long time for boaters here. It's the old saying, it's not a matter of if it's when you're going to run aground because of our tidal problems in the shallow waters. And I've been all over the world. I've seen fire departments, police departments in areas with super tides. They put to use air cushioned vehicles, hovercraft, specifically made up for rescues, things like that. Maybe we could get together for the future. They're not cheap, but they are really, really great utility type things for what we could use on this island. Just something to think about in the future. Okay.

That's well considered. Thank you. Well said. Chief, I have one question. Can it save lives? Absolutely. Councilor Henry, I get what you're saying, and it was a bit of a funny chuckling moment, but it's not funny when our equipment is in that shape. So, Councilors, remember this when we're going through budget. It's going to be a deep dive conversation on taxation and fiscal conservative values meets the needs and the safety of the communities, where I draw the line on that. I can negotiate a lot of things, but not safety. Gee, this is a no-brainer. Thank you. Thank you. Anybody signed up for public comment on this?

There is no one signed up for public comment on this issue. Will you call the roll, please?

Yes, sir.

Councilor Henry.

Yes.

Councilor Goler?

Yes.

Councilor Dome? Yes. Councilor Gray? Yes. Vice Chair Champaign? Yes. Councilor Schwan?

Yes.

Chair Palumbo? Yes. Motion passes 7-0. Congratulations. Thank you, Chief.

Thank you, Councilor.

All right, we're moving on to 15B. Authorize the city manager to award a contract to Rikon Construction Inc. for the construction of the SWTP portable generator open storage structure in the amount of $1,658,476.60. Jeff, there you are. Thank you, sir.

Good evening. For the record, Jeff Poteet, General Manager of your Water and Sewer Department. Before I begin, I do want to mention that Hayward Boyce, post his time on City Council, worked for the Water and Sewer Department. Justin and I had a pleasure to work with him for about two years. He was an inspector for us. amazing person and just a huge loss for all this thank you for the shout out yeah so this item request authorizes there's a request to award a contract to Rikon construction for the construction of the open storage generator structure at the South water treatment plant in the amount of one million six hundred fifty eight thousand four hundred seventy six dollars and sixty cents This project will improve the Water and Sewer Department's emergency preparedness and storm resiliency by providing permanent storage for some of our facility portable generators. Funding this project is included in the approved FY26 Water and Sewer Capital Improvement Program And the project also has a $600,000 grant, reimbursement grant, from the Florida Department of Commerce. And with that, I can address any of your questions. Very good. Thank you, Jeff.

Councilor Henry.

Thank you for your thoroughness. Thank you for the complete reports. I move to approve.

Need a second, guys? I'll second it. Motion by Councilor Henry, second by Councilor Dome. Councilor Gray?

Sure, I'm going to get there. I was looking for a little insight and understanding. So I've had the generators for several years. Arguably, would we have put them under cover when we bought them? I was just trying to understand the timing of when we acquired the generators and then doing this now.

So we had, I think at the time, 24 portable generators, and then we got a grant for an additional 60 generators. Yep. Those 60 generators are in a generator storage warehouse at the north water treatment plant. However, we had to move some generators outside that are in the weather, but also a good portion of those generators are in another warehouse on the north site, but it's using up warehouse space, and this generator storage will move those generators over into a covered area.

So this just improves our operating efficiency. You probably can't answer this question. For hurricane hits and you need those generators, how long does it take to deploy all those?

Well, it does take some time. But we do have staff and we have it organized in such a way that we have identified our critical lift stations that they need to go to as well as our critical water wells. So none of our water wells have emergency backup. so we have those identified where we're going to deploy them and then and they're set up in and I believe sections of ten and so it's going to take as long as it takes but if we're out of power for two weeks they're all going to be deployed within the first week

Your 84 generators, I suspect Justin's got some. Do we have a master generator service contract? Are they all in working order? That's a lot of generators.

We do have a contract. I don't know if you have any large generators, Justin, or not, but we do have a contract.

Those are all small engine generators that we maintain. Okay.

Yeah, most of mine are for larger pumps that would pump water. Some of those pumps are 40 horsepower. Others are 10, 12 horsepower pumps, but...

So do we do annual services?

We do quarterly service on those.

Quarterly. Okay. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Counselor. Jeff, my questions are going to be in the same direction. I'm thinking as a homeowner with my two portable generators that I've got to change the spark plug and I'm limited in what I'm doing every year. I thought you had a quite extensive lifespan and that I was impressed. And with these, if we can have the same track record, I think we're in great shape.

Yeah, and we do try and keep up with them. It is a task for our maintenance team, as well as we do have a contract that the contractor comes in and services them as well. But we have to run them under load, too, so that takes time.

Well, I always get a kick when the hurricanes are coming and people are buying the bottled water. I'm thinking, my water never stops. I'm getting the blue tarps just in case. So we do appreciate it. Jim, anybody signed up for a public comment on this? Not on this issue, sir. If you can call the roll, please.

Yes, sir. Councilor Henry. Yes. Councilor Dome. Yes, sir. Councilor Goler? Yes. Councilor Schwan?

Yes.

Councilor Gray? Yes. Vice Chair Champaign? Yes. Chair Palumbo?

Yes. Motion passes 7-0. Thank you, Jeff. On to 15C, approval of a purchase order to... Is that Geneserv LLC for supplies and install a new generator on the Marquardt Police Department in the amount of $234,070? Joe, there you are. Thank you.

Good evening, Councilors. Joe Pirelli, Fleet and Facilities Director. During a routine maintenance inspection of the generator for this building, we found that the fuel tank had been severely deteriorated. So I reached out to the company that does our annual fuel tank storage tank inspections and asked them to do an integrity test, which is a pressure test on it to make sure that we don't have any issues. They came out and they were not able to perform the test because the outer shell, there's two linings. You have the actual tank and then you have an outer lining, which is basically a protective layer. That layer was completely see-through. So they said they couldn't even do a test because if the inner tank gives up, then you have nothing stopping the fuel from escaping. So we looked into two different options. One, replacing the tank as is. which we got a price of just over $105,000 because of the amount of labor removing the old generator and putting it back onto the tank. This generator was installed in 2007, so with a lifespan of about 20 to 25 years, we thought that that wasn't a good way of spending the money. So we also looked into replacing the unit altogether, which is the price that we are bringing to you today. So we do have funds in the bucket funds for the police department for all of the maintenance. I basically was able to mush all the bucket plans that we have together so that we have enough money to do this. So this is all money that's already been allocated and is sitting there. So any questions?

Thank you for the presentation. Councillor Schwan?

Thank you, Joe, for the presentation. I'd make a motion to approve. I'll second the

Motion by Councillor Schwan, seconded by Councillor Goehler. Councillor Henry, your light sign's on.

I just have a quick question. From the deterioration of the initial tank, granted, yes, it was almost 20 years old, but is there, because I'm not quite sure where the generator is kept, is there a means of protecting so that this kind of failure, even if it's 20 years from now, could be eliminated, some kind of safety elevation or something?

So actually what happened was the generator and all of the AC equipment is on a raised concrete pane outside in the back, and it was pitched into the middle, so every time it rained, it just filled with water. So one of the first things I did when I got here was I saw that that was starting to rust away the equipment, so I had a company come out and cut a drain trough like you would have in a pool with drains in it, and ever since then, the water's gone. But the damage had already been done.

Perfect. Thank you for the explanation. Great. Thank you.

Thank you, Counselor. Vice Chair Champagne.

Yeah, thank you. And good presentation, Joe. Unfortunately, I want to prepare the community and, quite frankly, the city council because what we've already heard after two or three presentations, things have deteriorated beyond their life cycle. These upcoming budget sessions, let me tell you, it's going to be replete with these kind of examples. We've waited too long as a city. We've not properly budgeted. for the future. We've had very short-term views of how to budget money, forgetting about infrastructure wearing out. And we're finding now almost every day, every month, something is wearing out. There's no longer time to wait. So in these budget sessions, I hope the community joins us in approving and supporting expenditures that will keep the city viable for long stretches of time. If we don't approve those kind of funds, we're going to be forever dealing with emergencies which are going to cause havoc in our planning and execution of running the city. So I just prepare everyone. Thank you. You're a good example. You're dealing with a lot of it. in your job. And we hope that we can budget properly so that you can have the opportunity to fix these problems before they turn into emergencies. Thank you, though. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Chair.

Has anybody signed up for public comment? We do have one registered speaker. Please bring them up. It's Mr. Michael Josephs.

Michael, welcome back. Michael Josephs in Barco Island. Thanks, Joe, for the information. I really like the two previous big expenditures. I really like them because there was a comparison and multiple bids, multiple bids. I know I'm going to be that broken record. You're going to hear this all the time from me. i know it's only two hundred thousand dollars and joe i i appreciate everything you've done but even for two hundred thousand dollars i heard a very smart businessman over here that said I get three quotes for everything in my business. Joey, Joey, I'll see you this weekend, Joey, at your place. So please, let's consider that. I'm not saying to stop what you're doing today, but I'm hoping that everything that is brought forward gets met with the challenge of, did we get multiple quotes? I know it's difficult. I know how difficult it is. I'm in the contracting business, but... It's really required, especially when we don't have the money and we're trying to figure out what are we going to do, how are we going to have the Christmas lights on this year. Please consider multiple bids for all projects, at least projects over $50,000. Thank you.

Thank you.

We have no other registered speakers.

Call the roll, please.

Councilor Schwan.

Yes.

Councilor Golder?

Yes.

Councilor Gray? Yes. Vice Chair Champaign?

Yes.

Councilor Henry? Yes. Councilor Dome?

Yes. Chair Palumbo? Yes. Motion passes 7-0. Thank you, Jeff. All right. We are on to 15D, approval of Amendment 1 of the interlocal agreement between the City of Marco Island and Collier County regarding disaster debris removal and joint utilization of disaster debris management sites. Justin Martin. Is this not being read in the record, or is this a...

No, just wanted to make sure. Justin, please. Good evening, Council. Justin Martin, Public Works Director. I love that bow tie, Councilor. It's awesome. Very patriotic and spiffy. So the item before you is an amendment to an existing interlocal agreement. And no, this does not need to be read into the record. This is just an interlocal agreement. It just needs city council approval to authorize the city manager to sign the interlocal agreement with Collier County. There's an existing interlocal agreement dating back to 2009. It's between the city and the county regarding storm debris removal and... disposition so as you are aware we don't have any real estate here on the island that we can use unless you want to use Veterans Park to to stage storm debris and have it taken off of the site so Collier County has been gracious enough to provide these facilities we partner with them and and through this interlocal agreement. And they do a lot of the legwork on getting reimbursement from FEMA for the costs involved. And so this amendment to that existing interlocal agreement from 2009 is essentially the same, but what it does is it memorializes and formalizes the debris management sites according to a new law that was passed last year in 2025. And so what you have in front of you is an amendment that includes the debris management sites with a map and locations. as required by by the new law and Collier County takes care of the reporting to FDEP as required and all we have to do is just coordinate with them which we do anyway after any tropical storm or hurricane event and for the debris removal in that period during the aftermath of those storms.

So with that, I'm here to answer any questions. By Councilor Dome, suggesting that the meetings could be held from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., and then if we did have a hearing in one of those three categories, we would just schedule that separately for after 5 p.m., Alternatively, I also would ask you to consider possibly an afternoon time frame, scheduling meetings from 1.30 to 5.30, which would allow for a public comment session after 5 p.m. for any residents who may be at work during the day or for any of those state-required hearings. And then also because we often do have workshops during the day, that would allow us to host a workshop, say, at 9 a.m., take a break for lunch, and then come back for your regular meeting at 1.30. So that's just for your consideration. And then I also just outlined kind of an implementation plan. If you do decide to change the time of the meetings, that we could begin that after the budget hearings, which are in September, and we could institute this beginning October 5th. And I'll turn it over to Councillor Dome for any additions that he has.

Well, thank you. Actually, it was, as I stated last meeting, looking around at all the city employees and the long days they put in on these nights we have our council meetings, I was looking at those 1,000-mile stairs. I know what fatigue looks like. We were trained many, many times with continuing education. And it's not just this one day. You get up early the next day and start it all over. It's cumulative. And the last thing I want to see is us being responsible for a horrendous accident, somebody driving home and getting one of those momentary blackouts, and you end up in a canal. So if we can do anything to help our employees and keep their health and welfare in our care, let's do it. And I'm more for the 9 AM, but I'd be willing to listen to a discussion for a possible 1 o'clock.

Very good. Councilor Noem, before I turn it over, I want to thank you. This is real value. We've talked about this bouncing around. It's been whispered about a bit, but you actually brought it home when we've been just kicking the idea around. It seems like a simple idea, but until somebody stands up and says, look at it, it's just an idea. So thank you. Councilor Henry, you were up first.

OK. Yes. Thank you both for the work you put into this. Interesting enough, I know I have the luxury on Tuesday mornings to just not make early appointments. And you guys don't. And we thank you for that. One of the things I was thinking was more of a time frame, and this is obviously discussion, 3 or 3.30. And I took this, looked at this as a boss for, and I don't want to be taken the wrong way, for quality loss of work production for staff as they're at their desk. If we have a meeting at, say, 9 in the morning and it goes until noon, 1 o'clock, you've lost those four or five hours that they would have desk time. So now you're actually giving them more work that they'd have to make up other time because they would lose those hours at their desk. So that's what I looked at. If we had a 3 or 3.30, they're not missing a dozen phone calls in this world today, 50 or 100 emails. Because I do respect the fatigue and the loss of productivity due to the late night meetings. But then it's also the loss of productivity if they're at a council meeting instead of getting their job done. Because people don't always understand that, well, I was in a council meeting all day, so I didn't get back to your email. So that was just my overall was just looking at if we have the council meeting during the workday, we're then giving them backlog of work that they have to make up. So if we start at 3 or 3.30, you know, out of here no later than 7.30, 8 o'clock, it's not the 11 o'clock getting home. So that was just my observation. Thank you.

Very good. Thank you. Councilor Goldberg.

Thank you for – I think it was a great suggestion, and thank you, Casey, Dr. Lucius. And obviously you spoke with your team and you came up with the 1.30 to 5.30 suggestion. That's my thought process perhaps.

No, I didn't speak with the team. I spoke, I think, with the city clerk and the city attorney. I think generally the staff would appreciate an earlier hour, no matter what the decision is, whether it's 9 a.m. or, you know, 1 o'clock or 3 o'clock. But I think generally we all agree that an earlier hour would be better.

Yes, and I thank you, Casey. I really think that somebody who attended, like, midnight meetings to school board, it is frustrated. It's not productive whatsoever. And quite often we even do not want to continue any discussion because we don't want – we have majority of our staff live off the island, and it's just – it's absolutely I agree with you. And I do agree. I think 1.30 to 5.30 will be a great idea because we still give opportunity to the residents to come and speak and ask questions. So I would definitely support that suggestion. Thank you.

Thank you, Counselor.

Counselor Gray. Yeah, I just need a little more context. You said that there's at least five state statute required meetings after 5 p.m. Three was there? Three. Three. And the reason they choose after 5 p.m. is?

I have no idea.

Okay. My impression, first, we're here to serve the community. We have many residents that are 65 and older, and I don't know if you know what it's like for scheduling medical appointments and the demands that can come with that. So I don't know all the history here, but I think that for a lot of people, they might not be available until after 530. So I didn't think we were going to get involved in the operational strategies and how to maybe change operational arrangements. I would assume from a staffing level, you have these people come in at noon or cut their day. You can switch the burden on them, which may or may not be an inclination. Essentially, I'm not hearing enough. I don't think we've had the community input. I think this could be a burden to many of our residents for a number of reasons that work and or have other demands. I do think all the business community does benefit because they're here, they're working every day, et cetera. Appreciate our staff and everything we're doing, but I was just concerned that I think we've lost what's important to the residents here.

Council Gray, can I ask, would you prefer to leave it as is or do you have any other suggestion?

We've been doing it this way for quite a while. I keep hearing that I've had a number of conversations where I suggest creative approaches and part of it is, well, this is the way we do it. My inclination is to keep it the way it is unless I understand why this helps improve our community dynamics and the community communication. I would hate to have to run out of a doctor's office at 5 o'clock at night so I can come in and make a comment right before the meeting closes. And I do know we have a number of residents that actually like to digest or absorb the meeting and sometimes step up and make comments later in the meeting as a result of that. So I do think that it's always prudent to look out after everybody's best interest. I just haven't seen enough for me personally that it's the right model for our community.

Very good. Thank you. Councilor Champaign, Vice Chair Champaign.

I'll stop by saying I'm in favor of changing the hours. I am flexible as to what this council chooses, whether it be 9 a.m. or 1.30. I would not be as supportive of a 3 or 3.30 start. I'm not concerned about the community. When you stop and think, we're talking about two council meetings per month. And we wouldn't begin that until October of this calendar year. Seems to me community members would be well noticed about changing doctor's appointments twice per month. I don't think that's going to be inhibiting any change of time. Plus I look at the advisory committees which start usually early also. And I look around and I don't see a lot of people in the audience on most committee meetings unless it's a topic that there's a high degree of interest in and then the room gets quite full just like here. So I think it's more issue oriented that determines how many people come and listen or watch on TV or review the videos. And I think we have a lot of interesting topics coming up in the next several months that would cause people to To watch more carefully. I would hope So I would I guess my personal opinion would be 1 30 Because I you know 9 o'clock. I that's considered from my personal point of view the middle of the night. Yeah, I I'm still sleeping. But I will get up if that's the decision. I said to myself as I left the Navy, never again will I get up at these ungodly hours. And I haven't been able to live to it, quite frankly. You know, there's nothing worse than at 12 o'clock at night, Mr. Champagne, it's time for your duty. Oh, thanks. I was looking forward to that. Anyway, I guess I favor 1.30, but I can go for 9 o'clock. Either way is fine with me. I think it would be very helpful to everyone, including the city council, to be all honest with you.

Thank you. Councilor Dunn.

Yeah, I heard a couple interesting opinions at best, starting with work productivity. When the employees show up and they're in that morning fog after leaving here at 11 o'clock at night, finally getting to sleep by 2, 2.30, getting up three hours later, I don't think they're being real productive that next day anyways. So to get them here and start at 9 o'clock, maybe even 1 o'clock in the afternoon, and And what little work they're gonna miss or the yes citizens are gonna miss an email here a phone return Phone call there. I think it's well worth it and of course the discussion of you know, we're basically a retirement community and It's not a case where people just can't get off work and talking about doctor's appointments as Counselor champagne said these are two meetings a month if you can't arrange your doctor's appointments around this I then you need to reevaluate how you're doing things. I'm more in favor, again, probably from my union background with the Airline Pilot Association, of taking care of the people who take care of us. And I would prefer to see the 9 a.m., but I would go with the 1 in the afternoon also.

Very good. Thank you. Councilor Schwann.

Yes, thank you, and I want to thank Councillor John for bringing this forward. It's very thoughtful, and I appreciate the paper that you provided us with, too, on fatigue. It was very important. I am agreeable to both 9 a.m. and 1.30. Perfect.

Thank you. I see no other lights. You know, Marco does things a little different. We have a chairman, not a mayor. We have a spending cap. You all received an email from a gentleman, Mr. Lipovitz, I think it was, from Fort Walton Beach. I talked to him for 30 minutes how excited he was that his city has a spending cap. We roll back, or we had rolled back. So change doesn't happen very quickly here. It took six votes to become a community. With that said, I do think there is room for change here. I think 9.30 is a little bit too early. And I'm nothing against the suggestion. I think it's maybe too much change for our citizens. And I agree with Councillor Gray a bit that they do still want to physically come and speak at these meetings.

They consider that one of their marker privileges. And it should be, their voices should be heard.

So that 1.30 slot allows that. It might not be perfect. It might not give two opportunities to speak, but it does. We could be emailed. We could be called. There's other opportunities to reach out to us so their citizens' voices are not stifled. So what we have here, Councilor Dome, you're 9.30 or 1.30. Casey was 1.30 with her presentation. Councilor Gohler, 1.30. Councilor Schwan, either or, 1.30. I am 130. You're leaning towards 130, Vice Chair Champagne. Steve, you want to keep it as is. So it looks like we have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5... Just a little straw poll here, about six people consenting to look at the 130 number. Steven, my guess is why the budget land over 10 acres comprehensive plan is 5 o'clock, I would assume, so the working population could be here.

I would just take a guess and admit that's why the state did it that way.

So you do make a good point there that we should bleed over into that time to allow those voices to still be heard as they were. I'm for the 130. I think it's perfect. I think it gives everybody half a day to get going, get ready. It's not too radical of a change for Marco, and it meets us right in the middle. So that's my thoughts.

I'll make a motion to approve that our new meeting time starting in October for City Council is 1.30 p.m.

I'll second that.

Motion by Councilor Schwan, second by Councilor Dome. We have a light side on before we get to public comment. Councilor Goldberg, please.

Mr. Chairman, I just have one question. We have so many staff members here. Anybody wants to say anything? You guys mind it?

Dan looks like he's ready to go. I love it.

Yeah, chime right in. I don't know.

Just so you know, it usually takes me by Thursday by the time I'm back to... As I got older, the nighttime kind of gets to you. When I was younger, it was no problem. But as you get older, it's a little bit different. So usually it's Thursday where I start feeling good.

It's called jet lag.

So I guess nobody's... Well, I guess we're good, right?

Nobody... Anybody, any other staff want to voice their opinion? Please do.

I'll speak up. I am completely in favor of having it earlier. I think 1.30 is a great time period because that would allow us to spill over to the 5 o'clock time period. And thank you very much, Councillor Doan, for bringing this forward. Well, excellent.

I would just say, if you go back and watch some of our meetings, I got up at like 5.30, so you could see me at the end. Motion for another 10 minutes, okay. I am fully in favor, because you wear down physically, and it's tough even to sit here, not even just for the staff, but for you, the counselors. It's tough up here. It takes time, energy, and effort. Anybody signed up to speak on this?

We have one registered speaker. Please bring him up. Mr. David Boggs.

David, welcome. David Boggs. I think it's a fantastic idea and almost a no-brainer. We keep hearing the word retirement village or place. I've never seen so many people so excited to be older. So this is a family place to live. So let's be a family. And an advantage of having the meetings during the day opposed to night is you can get younger people involved, like the moms of the island. And their kids are in the evening. They got stuff going on. They're making dinner. They got sports or whatever. But during the day, they could be here and attend and become more vocal. The other thing is you could do in somebody made a comment and worried about public comments and the public being involved some of the a lot of the other municipalities and cities in Florida utilize zoom and call in for public comments and if you open up that portal so that they can participate at home it will also eliminate the purpose for them of not being able to make the meeting but they if they something they're passionate about and The technology is there that we can just include it in Zoom. That would be the only idea I would express to you is I think that would be a benefit to eliminating any public concern about not being able to make it for public comment. But outside of that, like the staff, everybody's fatigued. I mean, I come to these meetings, I'm fatigued, and I'm like, I can't imagine how y'all feel. So change it, make it better, and maybe open it up for more people to join in and participate in the city. And let's don't be a retirement community anymore.

Thank you. All right. We have no other registered speakers. Call the roll, please. Councilor Schwan.

Yes.

Councilor Dome.

Yes.

Councilor Goler. Yes. Councilor Henry. Yes. Councilor Gray. No. Vice Chair Champaign. Yes. Chair Palumbo.

Yes. Motion passes six to one. Very good. Once again, Casey, Councilor Dome, thank you for bringing that up. Casey, thank you for facilitating that. We are on to item 16, items removed from the consent agenda. So 16A is what I believe 7B was. Councilor Dome, you had some... informational questions, so we'll let you start.

Can I please read it in the title into record, please?

Thank you, John.

Thank you. This is Resolution 26-30. I'm reading the title into record. A resolution of the City Council of the City of Marco Island, Florida, approving the use of the parking lot located at the Jewish Congregation of Marco Island, 991 Winterberry, Marco Island, Florida, for community activity for an additional 28 days and providing an effective date. Thank you.

Oh, OK. It's really just I'm in favor of it. There's no question about it. I just don't like inconsistencies. It was maybe a meeting or two ago. We had an hour and a half discussion regarding alcohol being served at the new restaurant, whatever, next to the Jewish center. And we've heard comments about the anti-Semitism going on in the country. Yet here we're going to tell them, yeah, park whatever cars, trucks you want, as long as they pay for it. I find that just a little... at odds. But overall, I think the Jewish Community Center could probably use the revenue, and I'm in favor of it.

I see one light sign. We'll start with Councilor Gray.

Councilor, thank you for bringing this forward for a conversation. I don't like inconsistencies either. So we are approving the dates of July 5 and July 4 here on July 6, as opposed to approving this ahead of those parking dates, just as a side point from an administrative standpoint. The Jewish center is not for profit. The restaurant next door is for profit. I have no idea in the books and records of the synagogue, but I really think all of our houses of worship are incredibly important to the fabric of this community. And I think this is a kind of a unique variance. I do think that we're aiding and abetting the survivability and the financial well-being Of the synagogue while we're also aiding and abetting the parking options for tourists So this one to me is a very simple approach to nobody's harmed Everybody benefits. It's the kind of variance that I think is warranted for those reasons But this is a not-for-profit and so I have a little trouble comparing it to our for-profit Thank you

So you know, the light signs – Councilors, I agree with the both of you. This is helping them survive. There's never been a problem with it before. Stephen, you put it very well – nonprofit, helping them survive, servicing a need. This isn't a business that's asking for an ask, and I'm good with God. I've been to the synagogue many times for many different reasons, even as a council. They always seem to invite you for things over the years. And you could see, sadly, the congregation is smaller than it was years ago. Less money coming in, less people attending, and that's not a good thing. So if we could help them a little bit, I stand behind them 100%. Dan, I don't think there's any questions for you, sir. Has anybody signed up for public comment on this?

We have no registered speakers on this item.

May I like to make a motion on this?

I'll second the resolution.

Motion by Councillor Doan, second by Councillor Gray. Call the roll, please.

Councillor Doan. Yes. Councilor Gray? Yes. Councilor Golder? Yes. Councilor Schwan?

Yes.

Vice Chair Champaign? Yes. Councilor Henry?

Yes.

Chair Palumbo? Yes.

Motion passes 7-0. All right, guys, we are 7 o'clock. We're doing great. Anybody need a bathroom break or are we good? All right, keep going. And USA's playing. Item 17, counselor communication. Light signs, please. Although, Counselor Schwan, you do have something posted on here. Did you want to start first?

I don't need to start.

Okay. Vice Chair Shanfield, we'll circle to you.

I'm going to take a few extra minutes, if you don't mind, because I'm going to touch on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. It is your time, sir. Thank you. First of all, I want to thank the, I was chairman of the committee that finished the design and erection of the memorial, so I want to thank my team. There were 12 people, just a small number of people working on this project. They were Terry Kehoe, Alex Parker, Al Benarach, Greg Schneider, Joe Verano, Bill Duncan, Harry Weathers, John Appleson, Joe Beatty, Skip Merriman, Martha Montgomery from the city, and Lee Rubenstein, and occasionally Joe Pirelli would sit in also. In addition, we had an incredible outpouring of assistance from the local community vendors, the companies, the stores. Lowe's was number one. Lowe's saved this monument project just hundreds of thousands of dollars by donating material that they offer in their store free of charge. Just incredible. Not only that, they offered manpower to implement some of the equipment that we were installing, and that was very helpful. Affordable Landscaping has just done an incredible amount of work, much of which they have donated. Condi Electric has stepped forward just with incredible assistance, AP Builders, another Really really good company doing a good job the police department. I can't Thank our police chief and the staff more than what I'm about to say they took as much interest in this project as Did the veterans? probably because many of them are veterans and They were very, very helpful. They offered assistance that we had not even imagined, but they were patrolling very frequently during a very sensitive time where we needed it because we hadn't yet fully secured the site. So thank you to our chief. I want to thank our chief of fire and rescue because he came right over, quite frankly, as we were unloading and unboxing the statues and offered whatever assistance we might need. And I just found that unusually grateful and gifting and I appreciate it. The city manager backed this project from day one. Day one. And so as I go through this, I may lose my voice from time to time. I apologize for that. But I'm very thankful. Dan Smith. really, really helped us a great deal. We appreciate that. Samantha Malloy, Joe Pirelli, the city staff could not have been more positive in assisting. And there was a period of time when the American Legion Post 404 doubted whether that support was really there from the city. And I'm pleased to say, not only was it there, it was stronger than we ever imagined. What the memorial has done, in my view, it has brought this community together at a point in time when we were saying we were very divisive, we couldn't agree on very many things. Well, let me tell you, everyone who has come to that memorial site not only was very thankful for the American Legion, doing the work and putting it up, but said it was very necessary. Because what it did do is unite this community. Like I haven't seen, I've been here 20 years, this was really magic. Now it's a somber site, so people don't come expecting to jump up and down and celebrate and, you know, shoot off fireworks. I mean, this is where many of the visitors say a prayer, tears run down their eyes, and Many of them remember friends who they've lost over the years because of it. 58,000 people who served never came back. Their families were really hurt, obviously. More than 300,000 came back injured, and many who are still living today are suffering from those injuries as we speak. They will be coming to the monument also, I guarantee you. So we remain a work in progress. We opened it on July 4th for four hours, from 10 in the morning until 2 in the afternoon, and people came away from their family events. Every single person who came left a family event to come over and see the memorial. That alone was very appreciated by the veterans who were there that day, and for Alex Parker and Al Benarach and and Greg Schneider, Terry Kehoe. Everyone on our side of the fence really appreciated that. So the typical question is, why do you keep this fence up? Why aren't you opening these doors constantly? Everyone should have the opportunity to come in and see this memorial. Everyone will. It's a work in progress. That's why there's a fence up. We still have a considerable amount of work. Not the statues. The statues are finished. They're up. They're not going to be changed in any way. But there are things from an aesthetic, decorative point of view that do need to be changed. So the fence will remain up. The biggest obstacle at the moment is the police foundation donated four security cameras. Unfortunately, they can't be installed because one piece of those cameras is back-ordered. We're trying to work to shorten the back order. Right now it looks like it can't be available until November, which is absolutely crazy because that's the official day for dedication. So it will be open whether there are security cameras or not. It's too bad that is going on, but Condi Electric is working with our IT department trying to shorten that delay. Or maybe we just get four more security cameras. I don't know. But nonetheless, it's a problem. So it will be opened at some point in time, hopefully not too long down the road. But in the meantime, I do want to express my deepest thanks to the community, to the city council, to the city staff from American Legion Post 404. who are so appreciative of your support for this very special memorial, which touches every veteran's thoughts and hearts to the core. Thank you, folks. We look forward to continued support. And please help us monitor the memorial so no one does anything that would harm the memorial at any point in its future. Whether it's an innocent child trying to get up and be posed with a veteran called a bronze statue, or any adult trying to do the same thing would be seen as less than desirable. The police have already assured us that if any act of that type occurs, they will be swift in their reaction. And so will the city staff, I'm sure. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you, Vice Chair. I'm looking forward to the grand opening of our festivities or the celebration of those who served for us. Thank you.

It's hard to follow this. Tough night. It's a lot of emotion. It's tough. My mom and I went over to see the memorial. And the fence was still around. I took video. Everybody was working. And I just asked permission if I could see it. And my mom, we lived up in the DC area for almost 20 years. And we've seen every single memorial up there. And my mom's face was like, oh my god, there is a nurse. There is a canine. It was unbelievable. And thank you, everyone involved. It's – like I said, there is nothing that – and yes, like I said, Mr. Mark Joseph said if anybody needs to clean, I will volunteer as well to maintain it. My next subject will be – I want to make a – I want to say a special thank you and shout out to this young man. His name is Christian. And I tell you, I am so impressed by this young man. He is clever, he's funny, he's innovative, and he is a great, great addition to our social media police department. I just want to thank him. I know he's not here, and I know how much he works. And he's so clever, and he brings so much humor to us every time I look at those videos. And I just want to thank you. And once again, police department, you guys are on such a great track. Keep going. Thank you, sir. Very good.

Thank you. Yes, follow up before we get to Councilor Schwan, quickly? Oh, my button's broken, so I could just get in line.

Oh, go ahead.

Councilor Henry. Please.

Broken button, Henry. Ironically, I had it on my notes to do. The gentleman's name is Christian Davies. He's our new public information officer. And not only is he bringing humor, But he's bringing the seriousness of the various things. So he's doing a great job publicizing the dedication and efforts of the Marco Island Police Department. So yes, a big thank you to Christian. Martin, if you could put the slide up, please. I just wanted to repeat what my fellow Rotarian and friend Barbara Ann spoke of earlier. The Senior Health and Wellness event is next Wednesday, the 15th. The Arlington is just off Collier Boulevard, on Lately Boulevard, across from the South Regional Library. Hopefully, it's a great library. You've all been there. It's a community partnership with many local organizations, including our Jelly Bread, the Y, NCH, and Avow. So I just look forward to our Marco Island community. Take a little time. Leave the rock. Educate yourselves. Once again, for our senior members of our community, I think it's just a well-wiled place to have all of these amazing organizations in one spot. So hopefully we'll see you there from 10 to 2 next Wednesday. Secondly, I would like to thank all the campers at Mackle Park, as well as all the other contributors for their fabulous artwork. Hopefully people got down to Island Walk. commemorating America's 250th birthday. A huge thank you to Brittany Richards and the Coastal Breeze for their wonderful articles and photos. Really, they did a beautiful job. So please, before they clean the windows, please check out everybody's hard work. And lastly, I just wanted to make sure I was looking on things for future agenda items. I am working on my white paper for EV chargers, so if that can be added to a future agenda item list, please. That's all. Thank you.

Vice Chair Champlain, was there something quick before we turn it over to Councilor Schwan? I'm going to bump her.

I wanted to apologize for not mentioning my thanks to Coastal Breeze for July 2nd article on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, which was fantastically done. by Brittany Richards and obviously informed the community of things that needed to be known and we appreciate their effort very much thank you very good Thank You councillor Swan Europe thank you I have three items actually and Martin if you could bring up that slide that I shared with you and I like to thank the city attorney for forwarding to me the ordinance with the amendment

This is the ordinance, the police pension fund ordinance number 19 dash zero three to fund the police pension. at 100%, which I fully support. It's the law. And I want to make sure that we are supporting it and getting this funded. And that's why I wanted to bring this up tonight. I do want to just give a little short summary of the ordinance, because a lot of residents have been asking about it. And so just to clarify, the city of Marco Island administers two different fiduciary funds. One is for the firefighters, and the other one is for the police. This attached amendment was passed on January 22 of 2019. And what it did, it established a board of trustees and administered. The plan covers that all full-time police officers, that they are fully vested after six years of service. And it also requires an actuary evaluation every two years. so and it does most importantly it's the ordinance stipulates that the police pension is to be funded fully at 100 not below that amount so then i would just like a little conversation with the counselors and how we want to proceed with this because with all these guardrails in place The fund, though, was running a deficit now of $2.6 million. And so this certainly is something that we need to address. We can't do anything more about it in our 2026 budget, but our 2027 budget is coming in. So I don't know how, and I don't know if somebody can explain this to this, how this happened back in 2022. I don't know if our city manager would like to speak a little bit about this, because I think we're all getting a lot of questions about it.

Unfortunately, I can only speculate. I don't know how the deficit occurred. Obviously, we had a different city manager and a different finance director at the time. Sometimes those deficits are a result of the way the market performs, the way the fund is invested. Sometimes it's a result of the employee contribution not being enough or the city's contribution not being enough. When, in this case, when police officers receive a pay increase, then there has to also be an increase in the pension contribution. I don't know if that happened in 2022, so I'm just speculating. I can't really speak to exactly what happened. I know that this deficit started in 2022 and has continued, and it was brought to my attention a couple of months ago.

Well, and I appreciate you bringing it to our attention. And I know, Chair Palumbo, you were on the council back then.

Absolutely.

You're the only one. None of the rest of us were. Do you have any insight on what happened since 2022 in this regard?

Sure. Those who are not doing their job are no longer here. And the ones that are doing their job have been heavily advocated on to make sure the city runs properly. It's about that simple. We rely heavily on staff to bring us the correct information. I understand what Casey's saying. Some of this is not all in the city. This just isn't the city of Markle Island didn't write a check. There are variables. However, those checks and balances should have certainly been brought to us. If you listen to Councilor Foley, He would talk about when he first joined council, the fire pension needed some work, and he jumped all over this and took care of it. So, yeah, you're correct. This does not make me happy, and that's why you see new faces here. So this does not happen again. And I appreciate you bringing it up. Thank you.

Well, and it is something that I know we're going to have to be talking about this and how we can get this fully funded at the 100% level. And how are we going to make up this difference? And I know we'll have more specific conversations coming up in our budget meetings and things like that. But I know it's been thrown out. Is this something that we could use our emergency reserves for, or is that even not a possibility? Or what are other ideas that the council, other council members may have? And I'm not saying we should use our reserves. I'm just trying to, we're going to have to be creative, but we have to get this funded. So I don't know if any other councillors want to throw out ideas so we can start thinking about it.

Sorry, no button. If I'm correct, and I don't want to rob Peter to pay Paul, but isn't the pension for the firefighters overfunded?

Yes, it is.

So that could be a solution. I guess Chris is shaking his head. If one's overfunded, I didn't know if that was an option.

Let Councillor Henry Finlayson go to Councillor Gray next. That was just a question.

Somebody that you were like, I just was trying to understand the process of if one's, and Chief Burns shaking his head, so clearly that's not an option. But that was just a thought. I think we, I think we, Sorry to interrupt.

I think we would need to probably get some legal advice on that and take a look at what state statute allows. We do have a contractual obligation and an obligation by our own ordinance to continue to make contributions to both pension funds. And we do that. Every payroll, there's a contribution that is made to both pension funds. And then there's also a state contribution that homeowners pay on their insurance, property insurance. You pay a little premium there that goes to support these public pensions. So we would need to continue to fund the fire pension as well. Whether or not we can fund it at a lower amount and divert some of those funds may be possible, but I wouldn't want to say for certain tonight.

I wasn't alluding that either. One has too much adjustments that could be made. It was only my suggestion.

Chief Byrne, would you like to comment? Do you have any comments on that at this time?

The fund is...

No, I think the city manager spoke to it. We would need legal counsel advice.

Thank you. Guys, before we go through all the light signs, this is definitely something that's going to have to be on a future agenda and spoken about in much greater detail, by all means. It's not going to be a one-stop-shop solution tonight.

But, Councilor Gray, were you on for this topic or for the next Councilor? No, I just wanted to add a couple of points. I think Casey captured it. Our commitment is to keep these pension funds funded 100%. So there's the mission statement, fire and police. So obviously, if the fire department was overfunded, you could potentially consider that with legal advice and potentially just reduce that contribution, keep them at 100%, do not erode below 100%. Just two other perspectives. I spend too much time following the equity markets. And I listen to a number of advisors. Some do raise serious questions about the returns in the next 10 years compared to where the returns have been over the last 10 years. Folks, we've had an incredible stock market. For those of you who are involved, it's another reason I say God bless America. It's been an incredible run, but it reinforces that we have to close the gap. On the existing pension because I don't think you're going to get a tailwind from equity markets So we're going to help solve this problem for you So the normal course of action was how do you burn off the liability over what pays? You're not going to come up with 2.6 million Arguably you might say over five years. We got to close that gap as an example We have to make a commitment at an acceptable and tolerable pace to get the funding gap closed It should be at 100%. My question was entirely different. There's a Police Pension Foundation board. We have roles, whether people are paying attention to the shortfall or not, it was disclosed in their board meetings, but where's the role of the pension board to say, folks, we got a case of the shorts that come to us and you need to solve it? Where does that fit into this conversation? Normally, if I was sitting on that police foundation and I had a case of the shorts, I'd be coming here pounding the table and saying, I've got to close the gap. So I didn't know if they'd spoken to that or if that was lost in translation.

I have had some conversations with members, and actually they have been quite gracious in recognizing this shortfall and actually kind of giving us time, recognizing that, okay, we've acknowledged it, a city as city management has acknowledged this brought it forward to City Council we're gonna work on a plan and and come up with a solution they've acknowledged that and they've been very gracious and giving us the time and space to come up with a solution but they didn't so they did bring it to our attention in a timely basis no it was brought to my attention by Carol McDermott okay thank you very much Thank You councillor councillor goaler

Thank you. This is a great discussion. Thank you, Chancellor Schwandt, for bringing up. I had a scheduled meeting with our new finance director, and I have a long list for you. And Marcia was sick, so we could not proceed in meeting. And this is one of the questions was to direct you, because you are in charge of the – I mean, I know you're new and I know you're working hard. Probably my next meeting will be some of the questions about these pension funds as well and how can we actually close the gaps. But I don't think we can do anything about it tonight. But I'm just giving you a heads up, so when I meet you, I will probably have some questions for you. Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Counselor. Vice Chair Champagne?

Yeah, I have a couple points. First, I'll start from my perspective from the business world. Not terribly unusual to see pension funds Turnout at various times to be underfunded Typically what caused it was the budgeting process by the pension board built in far too aggressive Estimates on what the equity return would be on the investments of the pension fund and they usually do that to keep the contribution level low, as low as they can. And typically, it often works because the stock market has done reasonably well, if not outstanding, over time. But there are periods when the stock market doesn't do quite as well. So my first guess would be this might be a poor investment estimate that was made by a pension board. So one of the questions we should ask the pension board is, what did they build in? for investment returns in the last four or five years. And that'll be a telltale sign because you just look and see what the stock market did then. If the two don't match up, bingo. And what are they doing to budget for the future based on what do they think the market is going to do? Mr. Gray, our Councilor Gray, is correct. The market, which has been doing unusually well, might cause people to predict that will continue to go on. I think that would be a dangerous assumption to make by any pension board or any council on going forward a period. The market production in return is likely not to be as aggressive as it has been and if it is great that's frosting on a cake but if you if you build in the plan to to count on it you might wake up disappointed as we already are And then one last comment on the memorial. I believe I left the name of one committee member off. I apologize. It's Lee Rubenstein, who was involved from day one. So he is... I did mention him? Okay. Absolutely. Thank you.

Counselor, I'll give you one more, then I'm going to weigh in on this a little bit.

I was just going to try and help and add to it. I think their estimated return rate was about 6.7%, but it's a combination of bonds and stocks, and I think they had a You're over a very important topic, which is the assumptions. There are people that have actually thought that maybe their assumptions, even getting us to 2.6 million, might be a little aggressive. But you're over one of the most important toggle switches in how you try and dial in what is your potential run rate. But you have to be mindful that they have a material percentage of that portfolio in bonds, which Reduces your total per for but you're I just wanted to confirm what you're saying So guys I see this as two separate items.

All right. This is similar to the material weakness We talked about a while back. It's not that it was so egregious It happens in cities is that we were not notified was really the issue behind that was really what? Chair breakfast was bringing up at the time more than anything else this too.

Why were we not notified? I

Now, the other thing is, what is it about? Why are we here? So we need to know. We need to investigate that. Was it underfunding? Do the officers owe more funding? I could tell you we do need to put the brakes on for the moment for the firefighter conversation. They're doing great. They are funded well. They might need to just be left alone and thanked for the way they're functioning. I'm not saying, but that's not the way I want to lead first. I want to give Casey time to say, how do we get to where we are? Casey, if I'm correct, some of this, our ordinance differs a little from what we're required to do by state law, correct? Do I understand? By state law, are we required to fund this 100%? That's a market ordinance, not a state law.

That's correct.

And we do need to follow our rules, but we're not in violation of state law. We're in violation of our own rules. So my thought is, how did we get where we're at? Was it poor investment choices? Was it over-analyzing? There's a lot of checks and balances, and you're right, Councillor Schwan, to get here. There was four hurdles, including me, including the advisory committees, including the members themselves, staff. So how we got here can't happen again. What was the reasoning is the most important conversation now. Make sure it doesn't happen, and how do we fix it? That's just my thoughts on it. Councillor Schwan, do you want to add anything to that?

No, I just wanted to make sure that everybody understood the ordinance and the dating back to 2022 and that we start giving thoughtful considerations of ways that we can build this in so the police is 100% funded.

Casey, your light's on. Where do you want to go with it?

Well, first, I want to thank you for bringing this up and having this discussion. And this has been a great meeting tonight, especially because there has been a lot of praise for city employees, particularly police and fire. I want to just share with you briefly that we, the department heads and myself, and our finance team had a very long and very difficult meeting today. And it was a meeting to go through our FY27 budget. And I've told you all already, I've asked the departments to cut their budgets by 5%. I've also let you know at our last capital workshop that, you know, typically we transfer about $3 million a year into our capital improvement plan. for FY27, that transfer is looking like $7 million. So that additional $4 million squeezes the operating budget, right? And we're looking at all different ways that we can fund our operations and fund our infrastructure needs. We are budgeting as if we don't have a transportation bond. If we do, that will be great, and that will really let off some of the pressure But we're budgeting as if we don't have those additional funds. So I'm glad to hear you bring attention to this issue because if you're really serious about funding the pension plan, you may be looking at a millage increase. And if you're really serious about funding public safety, you may be looking at a millage increase. If you're really serious about Funding the maintenance items that Joe brought before you today the broken generator and broken elevator and all these the sod at Veterans Community Park and the Monument maintenance all of these things that come up every meeting you may be looking at a millage increase because the status quo as is is we're in a very difficult position. So I'm just giving you a preview to what you're going to see at your next meeting, which is a workshop, our operating budget workshop. We'll talk about that in detail. And we'll also be able to talk more about how we can potentially fund this pension deficit. Thank you.

with that said it's the perfect time to remind the counselors we have a july 13th workshop starting at 1 pm uh order uh review physical year 2526 just so you know so put that on make sure that's on your calendar it should be already uh casey do you have any closing thoughts as to sorry As to where we go with this pension discussion from here forward, future agenda item, get together, talk about it. Any thoughts as to how we wait on your recommendations?

On July 20th, we'll have our operating budget workshop, and it will be a topic of discussion at that meeting. Very good.

Thank you. Councilor Schwan?

Yes, I was just going to confirm that we'd be speaking about this at our operational budget. So thank you. I do have two other items under councilor comments. The first one is a question for our city manager regarding the pickleball pod app that you were working on and if you were able to get the numbers of the cost of that.

Actually, we have a, myself and I think Dan and Samantha, we have a meeting this week with the individual, the salesperson who will give us the figures.

Good. So it might be possible for us to have that on the next agenda item just so it could be presented as to.

So we will have some idea in time for that budget workshop because if it's something that the council wants us to implement, we'll add it to the FY27 budget.

Thank you, and thank you for the follow-up on there. I did just have one last councilor comment, and this was a question I asked at the last councilor comments, and it was regarding the audit committee and the standing of the attendants and Joan at that time, and thank you very much. You said you were going to research it, so we've been asked for some follow-up on that. Were you able to confirm the attendance requirements?

so there is a member that has missed several meetings under the audit committee some of the meetings have been postponed and rescheduled for that so the audit committee members had to be very flexible to meet those meetings so yes there is an individual that has missed those meetings

And I know that we addressed this issue of committee attendance at our last council meeting too So I don't know is this something we want to discuss then if there is a committee member who's not meeting the Attendance or is there anything else we need to know about this I?

Yeah, I'll just add, and Joan and I have talked about this, as you know, there is an audit committee meeting scheduled for this Thursday where our auditor is going to present the results of the audit and go through a thorough presentation with the audit committee. Unfortunately, without that member, we would not have a quorum and we would have to cancel the meeting. So that's why we have delayed in booting that member is because we want to make sure that we're able to proceed with that audit committee meeting. I know they've been really wanting to meet and wanting to get the results of the audit.

Councilor Gray, you want to weigh in on this? I think there's two separate questions here. And that audit committee actually is the scheduled nomination of the chairman and the vice chairman. It looks like we're going to have thin ranks at that meeting when they're making an important decision about selecting the next chairman, the vice chairman. So that's a concern. I keep learning or finding, or I've been haunted and hounded since I got here to stay in compliance. And I keep hearing that over and over. So my simple point is if somebody's out of compliance and hasn't met the terms, I'm not sure why that doesn't rule in that decision and hold that accountable. I'm concerned why we would make an exception here just because they're having an attendance problem.

Yeah, I will say I made that call. I made the call to make the exception because once a year we have an audit presentation to the audit committee. The current audit committee that we have has been more engaged than probably any audit committee we've had in the past. No offense. we have a very engaged audit committee and They have been engaged with our finance department. They've engaged with the auditor and it would be I think very disheartening and disappointing to have to cancel that meeting because one member has been absent three times So I made the call to make that exception allow him to participate so that we have a quorum and can continue now You are the decision makers. If you want to override me and you say this is unacceptable, cancel the meeting, then we will follow that direction.

Mr. Chairman, may I make a comment, please?

We have a light sign, but if it's relating to doctor, you can bump and share, please.

So what is the process if we will allow him to attend this particular meeting, and after that, since he's not in compliance, then he has to be removed?

That's correct.

Well, think about this. You can come save our meeting, but we're firing you the day after. Who's going to show up?

Well, actually, I think this may be the last audit committee meeting of this.

That's where I want to go with. Can I bump you for one second and just finish this thought? Sorry, I was going to go after you.

So what would be the process, Casey? So after he attends, this is the last committee meeting, correct?

I believe it to be the last committee meeting, but I'm not involved in scheduling the committee meeting. So if the audit committee decides to have another meeting next month, they may choose to do that, in which case we would reach out to the member and say, you're being asked to step down because of your absences.

OK. Thank you. I think that's what I would suggest.

I was going to follow up on that thought. We had Martin Winter here last week. He missed some meetings. Vice Chair Champaign wanted to bring him back. We were a little bit lenient. We had Rick Woodworth, who resigned because he was suing the city, then came back on. We did him on. We reappointed him as an- He resigned because he was not suing the city. I'm saying, but then he came back on because he wasn't suing the city. We reappointed him as a consent agenda. Nobody pulled him. Maybe we're a little bit lenient on some of this. You are correct. Our audit advisory has been spectacular lately. And why bite our nose to spite our face? Sounds like that's what we'll do if we exclude them from the meeting.

Councillor Henry? One thing to remember too, and kudos to the Audit Advisory Committee, because they have been doing a wonderful job, but their meeting dates have been moving targets. It's not like other committee meetings where it's the third Thursday or their dates, because I know people... They'd have a date. So I think when it comes to, say, rule following, I think the exceptions here is the Audit Advisory Committee, because somebody could plan their entire vacation, because the meeting's June 20, and then it gets changed to July. They were working around the date they were given. So I think this one is an exception to the rule, because the dates for the audit advisory have been a moving target.

Well said.

No argument here. Vice Chair Champagne.

I'm hearing that we were worried that a quorum wouldn't be present. There are seven members of that committee. Only four are required for a quorum. So three people are not going to make that meeting. Hello. Why are we focused on one individual when three people are not showing up? Is it because the meeting dates keep changing? I would think that's a contributor. Yep. But are we unnecessarily focused on one individual because the problem exists for other people too? Three people missing out of seven? Come on, something's going on. I suspect it's changing meeting dates, which would be bothersome even to someone like myself who is here not moving or traveling. I would still find that upsetting, to be honest with you. So there is a problem. But I would hesitate before we jump to solve the problem and create a bigger one in midstream. Now, the other thing is I think we got to follow a more organized way of discussing whether someone is in violation and should be removed. And that seems to me to start with the committee involved. There is a chairman of that committee. That chairman should bring that issue up before that committee. there should be a vote it doesn't have to be the end-all vote but let's see what the committee says do they think this person should be removed then we have a finance director who serves as the advisor to the advisory committee uh what does that person think before it comes to why is the committee the city council getting involved in the nitty-gritty weeds before the people involved start telling us what they believe needs to be done. We're doing things ass-backwards. Let them start... I'm sorry.

That's okay. We'll forgive you. You got a whole monument to those who served. You got a little credit in the bank.

But I would think, let's play by the organizational rules. Let the Don committee tell us what they think, let the finance director, and it should go right up the line. Then the city manager hears from the finance director, and the city manager tells us her opinion. We then debate it, and we decide. We should not be intervening way before any of that other stuff occurs. Okay.

Well said. Councilor Schwan. Let's try to tie this up, guys. Last one for this.

So I appreciate Dr. Lucius acknowledging that the committees the advisory committees report to council and that's under our rules this is how it is laid out that it isn't the committee's decision if they're going to keep somebody on or off because we have specific guidelines that we have to abide by but thank you for acknowledging that dr lucius that this is a council decision and it concerns me because you know we are changing our processes and we're not abiding by our rules then. And that does concern me. All this person, if this person does go off for the lack of attendance, they, like Mr. Winters, came back and then was reappointed. So we need to follow our processes. That very much concerns me. It concerns me because it's the Audit Committee and there's been very many inconsistencies with the Audit Committee. And while I appreciate the quorum issue and things like that, I just think we need to follow our rules as established, the individual in question, he can come back and be considered like everybody else has come back and be considered. We just had the example of Mr. Winters, and we had the example from Waterways with Rick came back on there, and we were following that process. So it concerns me that we would set a new precedent that we are not going to abide by our ordinances and rules on this, and that he can come back if it's so chosen by his appointee to come back and be reinstated.

Very good. Thank you. Councillor Gray, last one. Yeah, thank you. I'll just add a couple comments. One, I have my own set of frustrations because I put so much importance on financial reporting and the integrity of financial reporting in the audit. We were challenged in getting this audit again out on time, so this meeting slipped because of that. I've sat in a number of committee meetings where the topics are so important that they really, you want all your committee members present because it's really, this is a bloody important meeting. It was a review of the audit. And to the extent we want to ask the community for a lot more money or discuss that topic, we should at least make sure we got our books and records in order, which is what's terrified me. Because I've seen a number of shortcomings that still worry me about our books and records. And I know we're on the right journey. So as far as I'm concerned, I support the way Councillor Swan just described that. I don't know if this meeting for the audit committee gets moved again, what the consequences are. I really don't. We've moved them enough, but I would rather try and stick to the rules for a change. It is our ordinance and it is our obligation as a council. Thank you, Councillor Swan.

I'LL THROW A FEW LAST THOUGHTS. WE ARE THE BUSINESS OF THE CITY OF MARCO ISLAND AND NO BUSINESS IS PERFECT AND NO BUSINESS WILL FUNCTION PERFECT. THINGS WILL GO WRONG WITH ANY BUSINESS. TO THINK THIS WILL BE 100% PERFECT, IT'S NOT ACCURATE. WE DO HAVE RULES AND WE SHOULD BE SEEKING TO FOLLOW THEM. COUNSELOR HENN, YOU MADE A GOOD POINT. THERE WAS A LOT OF CHANGES TO THE SCHEDULES. THESE ARE APPOINTEES. respectfully have a job to do and have done it very well, but may not be quite as deeply committed to it as we are having been elected to show up every meeting, cancel vacations, change them, call in from cruise ships, do whatever it takes to make it work. It's a tough decision going forward, Councillor Schwan. I tend to agree with Dr. Lucius. She had a seven to nothing appointee here from this council because we trust in her. If she says this is the best path for this one meeting, then this is the best path, in my opinion. And it's a big path. And we do know that the audit, and even some of our citizens have been calling us out, the audit has taken long. It's coming right down to the legal wire. But that's OK. We're going to make all our dates. Everything's going to look great. We're in great physical condition. We're still AAA bond rated community. So let's get through this one, and then we could decide as a council if we want to bring this person back up for reappointment or not or how many meetings are left. That's just my appointment. But, Councillor Schwann, would you like any formal consensus on this or any direction would you like for this?

I think, you know, what you are proposing then is that you are asking, you would have to ask the council that we will make, not follow the ordinance, the word you proposed.

Ellen, is this within our rights to let this meeting happen? Is this a decision council can make?

This is a big issue because your audit is coming to an end, and you might need whatever this audit committee is going to be discussing to have part of your conversation when we meet with the auditor, I guess next month, next week. So I'm hesitant to postpone the Audit Committee meeting at this point in time when we are in the midst of discussion about the audit itself and the report coming forward. It's very problematic to me that you might be tripping us up because of a concern or a comment regarding the committee member. It's at your discretion to enforce a rule as it's been put before you. It could be today. It could be next week. It could be tomorrow.

So, Alan, a follow-up, though. The same individual or a different appointee could be brought forward at our next city council meeting in two weeks and approved.

The audit committee, the audit is coming. We have a special meeting to discuss the audit.

We do. We have a special meeting next Monday to discuss the audit.

This is what's bothering me and concerning me because that's coming before you. It may be just that having that committee, that audit committee, go through whatever they're going to talk. I don't know what their agenda is, but I would presume it relates to the audit that we're going to be discussing next week.

And what is the timeline in that regard? Could they meet after our meeting, our next city council meeting?

Not if you want their advice or comment from them. When you're having that conversation with the auditor, the timing would not, it doesn't work. And we have a state mandate as to how quickly we have that audit approved and move forward. And I don't have those dates in front of me. So the conversation that we're having is problematic because it's like dominoes. You might pull that one piece out and everything else falls apart or doesn't fall.

Dr. Lucis, do you know what the timelines are?

Well, the audit has been submitted. The deadline was June 30th. Everything's done and submitted. So these are after-the-fact reports and presentations from CLA, our auditing consultant, to present to first the audit committee, and then the chair of the audit committee, along with the auditor, plans to present findings to the city council, as well as next steps, because there are a number of next steps that happen even after the audit is reported. Now, if the council decided you want to dismiss this individual, we cancel the audit committee meeting, and they can reschedule for August. So we would still go forward with the council meeting on Monday, but the audit committee would get it a month afterwards. That is certainly a possibility. I do want to just clarify something procedurally. This issue of absences I don't believe is in a city ordinance. I believe it's part of the committee handbook. So the committee handbook is what outlines don't miss 30% of the meetings. If you do, you get kicked off the committee. And generally, the way we handle that is we don't come to city council every time someone misses three meetings because, by the way, it happens a lot. And it happens so often that I came to you at the last meeting and said, can we reduce the number of the meetings because people are missing so many meetings? um so every time that happens what happens is the liaison the staff liaison lets the city clerk know the city clerk reaches out to the individual and says you've missed x number of meetings she gives them a warning first you've missed two you can't miss one more they miss another one then she says okay you've missed too many you're going to be removed from the committee then she puts on the council agenda the opportunity for you to appoint a new member That's the way the process has worked. So That process has worked pretty smoothly I don't necessarily think the council has to be involved every time someone has missed three meetings again You're the decision-makers if you want to be involved in that level we can certainly do that, but I wouldn't recommend it I think the process that we have works in this case if you want to remove this member immediately and reschedule the audit committee meeting we will reschedule it for August and

Let me let me let me I got a question for the city turn out as my question that started this so Alan you are saying we are within our rights to decide as a council if we'd like to Enforce this tardiness record or overlook it for this next meeting. We had this was within our jurisdiction.

Yes We have a lot of well, first of all to the extent that we have a lot of ordinances that have rules and regulations It's your choice to whether or not you want to implement or enforce an ordinance but we just heard that this is not an ordinance issue and

So essentially we're talking about somebody's attendance record. Do you want to enforce it or not? That's basically as simple as it gets.

And you want to enforce it now or you want to enforce it next week?

So we're going to be asking for some consensus here, guys, and it's going to be very simple. Do you want to enforce? Alan, help me with what I'm looking for here. I'm looking for consensus for do you want to enforce the attendance record of this member and remove them or let the meeting happen?

Well, it wouldn't be – we just know the ramifications if this person isn't a member because we know that they won't have a quorum. But it really is – it's really more of a general question in terms of this moment to enforce it at this juncture with this particular individual or not.

That's the question we want to fabricate. Do we want to enforce it on this individual or not, simple enough?

Is there also a possibility that if the appointee in question who's missed these meetings was appointed by a city councilor who will not be up for a vote in November, that person automatically is off the audit committee anyway. So we need to know. Not now, but we should know who appointed that individual. And if it's one of the three of us who are not going to be running, or two of us, one person is running, then that person is automatically gone anyway.

So, all right.

Counselor Gray, you kept coming on. One quick list. Point of clarification. If you choose to go ahead with this, could we delay the vote on the chairman and the vice chairman until we got a clean committee that's seated correctly? I'm a little worried that that's in the next meeting.

That is the discretion of the chair of the committee. So just as the chair of the council sets the agenda for this body, the chair of the committee sets the agenda for that body. If that's when they chose to put on the agenda their voting of chair and vice chair, that's up to that chair. So I just have to say respectfully, you are so far in the weeds. And I think while it's well-meaning and I understand the desire to follow procedure, I don't think this is a really good use of the council member's time. And I would ask that you respect my decision, which was to allow the member to remain so that we have a quorum so we can move forward with the audit results.

Casey, well said. My actual point was going to be we have so many bigger things to attend to. Somebody's attendance record should not be the most important thing. All right. All those that consent to respect Dr. Lucia's decision and let the meeting happen, please raise your hand. one two three four we got five to two all right dr lucius thank you so much i have a couple of things for council communication i have one actually um it is i'm gonna make it very quick uh planning board member hayden dubois reached out i want to talk about uh being able to zoom call into certain meetings he did get back to us at my request and emailed everybody some examples of other communities that do it. I know our city attorney has some concerns with allowing the members of Zoom call in, but he did put in here Collier County Planning Commission board members. He's got the Collier MPO, City of Naples, Boca Raton. Is this enough information where this council would like to give consensus to the staff to just simply ask the planning board to come back to us with their proposal as to Zoom call meetings that they'd like to do? And do we feel we should give them the consideration of looking at their request? Very simple. So I'm going to ask for consensus if council would like to direct staff to direct planning board to come back with their requests, and we will look at it and make a decision on it if we want. So all those that consent, please raise your hand. One, two, three, four, unanimous, I think, or did you not put your hand up? Okay, so it's six to one. This closes councilor communication. Councilor Henry, you've been waiting patiently for item 18, council reports, and thank you for bumping this from last meeting to this meeting. I do appreciate that. Discussion legal services for city attorney, Councilor Deb Henry, the floor is yours.

Thank you. I just wanted to have this discussion to put the legal services of the city out for an RFP, request for pricing. This was last done in 2015. At the present time, we are paying $12,500 per month in retainer, which covers preparation for and attending up to two regular monthly council meetings, two planning board meetings, note that we only have one, and one magistrate meeting per month. The retainer also includes all telephone calls with city councilors, city manager, and individual city board members. After that, it's all at $275 per hour for all legal services. From April of 2025 to April of 2026, our monthly invoice from Wiserota has averaged approximately $38,000, which includes the retainer of $12,500. I'd like to note that in the retainer is attendance of five meetings per month. However, we only do have four. So if you just start saving money, that's $30,000 per year that we pay for. I want to suggest going out to get pricing from other firms, hopefully including Wiserota. My expression to do this is not because of an issue with our current firm. It's to find any savings, other options, et cetera. So nothing personal. So as a part of the discussion, if this is something we want to do, the thing is writing a scope of work. One thing I discovered in my research is Orange City, Florida, They have an all-inclusive arrangement with the law firm. It's how this law firm does it. It was bid. It includes all services, including litigation. They pay $24,000 a month, and that's how this law firm bid it. So that's an idea for a scope of work, all-inclusive. Another option is do we want to hire an in-house attorney? I'm personally not a fan of this, but it's always an option, which would cost roughly somewhere around $250,000 to $300,000 per year. But because an in-house attorney can't handle all issues, we would also need to have a firm on retainer as well. Option three is our scope as it is now, except the retainer would only include attendance for the meetings that we actually have, two city council meetings, one planning board meeting, and a magistrate meeting, with all other items billed hourly. And then also, in doing all this research, because I now can tell you pretty much every legal bill for months from the past year and a half, I just want to remind, and something I learned through my process when I was trying to make the changes to the ordinance for swell parking, to remind our council and our citizens that when you have an idea, extensively changing an ordinance or pursue something such as a lawsuit against the city. This is a cost to all taxpayers. This is not an internal city cost. So that's just something to remind people as we're looking into these things too. My goal in looking at what other cities pay, I would like to think that from the $420,000 we now budget for legal fees, I would like to set a goal of maybe saving somewhere between $50,000 to $100,000 per year in looking how other cities have it packaged. So I guess discussion or if this is something people want to look into other options, how we would like to direct staff in preparation of something for an RFP.

Councillor Henry, thank you. You did a lot of work on this. Appreciate it. I do see a light sign now, so I'll let Councillor Gray go first.

Thank you. I don't want to reinvent the wheel. First, I think we learned with the audit process that we went and put our order out to bid. We ended up with a new order, and we got some great insight. So I think our responsibility is in certain responsible time frames to at least go and look at our offerings. So I think that's a very responsible suggestion. I have looked at some municipalities that do have in-house attorneys. And some of them actually designed the in-house attorney as the assistant city manager. We started getting into operations today by talking about staffing, et cetera. Casey mentioned to me quite a while ago, excuse me, Claire Bobrowski had brought this up about looking at whether or not we should look at the attorney in-house, and I think they actually went through a thoughtful process that brought those analytics forward. I think the city council chose not to, but instead of reinventing the wheel, there might have been something out of that conversation that might point to its usefulness or not. So I always believe in a respectable way getting bids forward, And looking at the contract, there were a number of contacts in that contract that was presented. I don't think those people are here. In other words, some of the players have changed since that contract was written. So it always helps to have an updated list of who our contacts are. I think some of them have changed relative to that.

I'd be happy to give you responses on everything that you've talked about. Go ahead. Because first of all, yes, the retainer is old. And the concept of how we've been providing you with attorney services has changed, not necessarily according to that retainer. For example, how many public meetings does counsel have? Do you have only two? You have workshops. You have what? How many? 24. You do not get charged any extra time, any hourly fee for that? to the point that was made that there was, yes, the planning board does meet twice, supposedly, but it hasn't lately. But you don't get charged. You're not being charged with work that's not being performed. The services, what you don't realize is that I have a law firm of 90 attorneys behind me. Just for your services, let me just read to you the people. They're not listed in that because that was done years ago. By the way, I've been your city attorney now 11 years. Is that the second go around, Alan, or? Second go around. I was your city attorney in June of 2007 through May of 2011 for four years. At that time, they decided they wanted to go out and get a better rate. So they hired another law firm that came in and had an attorney and a law clerk that provided legal services. Four years later, they brought me back. And that was in 2015 through now. When our original hourly rate was 210, when we came back, that rate became, let's see, that was 220 with a retainer of 10,000. The retainer was to try to make sure that I could provide or we could provide, this firm could provide you services and not be charged hourly. You dictate what services I need to provide. If you don't get sued, I don't have work to do. If you don't have ordinances that need to be modified, I don't have to worry about that. If we're not doing vacation rental arguments or things of that nature, you don't have to pay a lawyer. It's in your service and best wishes to have to not pay the lawyer. And frankly, the lawyer doesn't always like having to do the services that he has to dictate to do, because sometimes it's very time consuming and difficult to address. With regard to the firms, the lawyers that are dedicated to you, I'm just going to tell you from just regular services, there's myself, of course. David Tulsis, who you know, is the Planning and Zoning Board Attorney, who's also been the deputy. We don't really have titles in our firm. We're all basically the same. Joe Natiello is the Police Code Enforcement Risk Protection Orders, and Joe handles the police regularly, works with them. Robert Myers, who you've all heard his name, public records, Sunshine Law, and Robert is also the Collier School Board attorney. Milton Collins is a labor attorney. He does police, fire, human resources, and provides services all around in that regard. Deborah Reese is a procurement attorney who's helping the procurement department right now. And Lurie Lala is bonds and finances. So all of those services are under my umbrella, the hourly rate that we're talking about. If you had a single lawyer, if you had two lawyers, you'd still have special services needs. And you'd be charged for those special services needs. When we, as a law firm, are out doing special services, we're getting paid $500 to $600 an hour for those special services. To show you, we represent you, of course. We represent Naples as special counsel, $450 an hour. We represent the Florida League of Cities, $394 an hour. North Collier Fire Control, $340 an hour. Lee County School Board, $375 an hour. And Collier School Board is $327 an hour. That's just an example. Right now you're paying $275 an hour with a retainer of $12,500. It was my intention, and I have talked to your city manager about this, because the law firm has dictated to me and to us that they want any of our current clients that are long-term clients that we have, the fee should be $325 an hour. Come forward in your, I guess, the next operating account, operating meeting. That was going to be proposed to you. I'm happy for you to look elsewhere. You'll get what you get. I can only say it that way. I want to tell you about litigation. One of the things that you don't realize because it's behind the scenes is that your city insurer is preferred government insurance trusts. The law firm happens to be an approved attorney for that trust. When you get sued, it goes to the insurance carrier who assigns it to the law firm. The law firm is me with them working collectively to help you. And it's at your rate, not at the other rates. So it's at the lower rate. Right now, you have Matt Mandel, who happened to be the department head for litigation. He's the one who did the vacation rental cases. For those of you who weren't here, that was a very difficult time and a very hard time. But we managed that, and we got you out of what could have been a very hellacious and very expensive condition. Matt Ramada is doing code foreclosures right now, and he's the one who's been successful getting you those dollars amounts that we're still working on to secure on your behalf. Eric Stanton is the workers' compensation. That's all he does. Anne Flanagan is doing the mail in the city case. That's the camera, the road camera case. Richard Rosengarten is the lawyer who will be representing the city with regard to the 666 appeal and the Burt Harris action that you would be meeting at that special meeting session that we talked about. And Samantha Soto is representing the city with Gallup versus Citi. Those are all the attorneys. I didn't count them. Those are the number of attorneys who actually work on your cases regularly, and there's more behind the scenes that are in the office that work with me and others. You can go out and find whoever you want to, of course, and there's always someone cheaper, but we do the best job, and we're not the most expensive. We're not. Do whatever you think that you want to.

Thank you, Alan, Vice Chair. You're going to be up next, and I'm going to ask Councillor Henry for a little clarification if this, but you first, please.

Yeah, I just have two points of view. First, I never resist RFPs, particularly if the original contract has been years ago. It sounds like in this case it's been many years since we've gone out. Probably worthwhile. That's true, by the way, in other departments also, not just legal. We've heard members of the community come up and say, listen, go out and get bids. I think it's a well-deserved attitude and recommendation. Secondly, does your firm, Alan, ever rotate partners? So would you be rotated for someone else within your firm to sit where you are? Only if you throw me out.

No, we, I mean, yes, I mean, that does.

Because we occasionally get David.

Well, when I go on vacation, I'm weird. So David is a city attorney for other cities. If he's not available, sometimes I fill in for him. I mean, we have that kind of depth in our firm.

Yeah, that's what I assume. But I'm basically asking. Want somebody else?

You can have David.

No, I'm only joking.

Yes, we have others, and that could happen. For example, I don't expect to work forever.

Well, I didn't want to get to that point, but I assumed that was the case.

But, I mean, eventually there will be somebody else that could be sitting here. If you decided today you wanted somebody else to sit here, that would be something that we would work out.

Okay. Councilor Arnott, you had three options you presented, right? Can you review them again one more time, please?

Option one is as a scope of work to be all-inclusive. That basically would be a bid off the averages. Secondly would be hiring an in-house attorney. And option three would be the scope as written with the city accountant meetings and such with the retainer and then billable hours.

May I ask one more question? Please. One more question for Alan. Under normal circumstances, forget this particular inquiry at the moment, when would be the next time you would come to the city requesting a fee adjustment?

Next month.

Is that typically the case?

That was coming. I was going to ask to be raised to $325 an hour. By the way, let's not forget on June 1st, the city approved the building services fee schedule, noting that the Labor Department Bureau of Statistics from October 2022 calculated inflation and fees should be raised by at least 12%. That's what you raised your own city fees. The fees that I was going to be proposing would not quite do that.

General, one other quick question.

Please, quickly.

This is a banker question. We always ask our clients, if you got hit by a bus, what's the succession plan? I hope you live a long and happy life and come to my funeral as opposed to the other wives. If something were to happen to you, what is the procedure in your law firm?

So if you recall, well, we have able-bodied attorneys. I mean, for example, Robert sat in. Robert Myers sat in when I was unavailable. And David sat in. The three of us sit together. We have offices next to each other. And each one of us are... fully knowledgeable of what happens in the city and can step in at any time because we work together just like I am. I was the Collier School Board attorney but Robert took that over and I still do work for Collier School Board. And I could and I've been called in to do that or I can so all of us we have and we have Other lawyers that we have five. We have three offices. We have a Dade County office We have the Boca office, which I'm in now in the Fort Lauderdale office and we have attorneys in Tampa So I mean there's we have a deep bench that somebody could come in at any given time You would never be alone is what? Unless you wanted to be

Thank you. No more light signs for a few moments, Counsel. I'm going to talk to Counselor Henley here for a second. Now, we have three different options.

Deb, some of these are taking... And I'm open to other suggestions.

Let me try to tie it up a little. Some of them will take some time. In-house attorney is a long discussion. There's pros and cons, but Alan's right. You still have to hire a firm. One person cannot know or do it all. He has access to 90 people. All-inclusive. Is the logical start to just put this out to bid, allowing Alan Stern, you mentioned in there, allowing them to bid?

Would that be... It's not due to... It's just... It's been... Over 10 years. That's purely –

So if I'm hearing correctly, that seems to be I'm seeing heads nodding. And maybe that's just the logical start to this and everything else we put on hold for the moment. Just put it out to bid to let them bid also. In-house attorneys and these things could be brought up at another time. But I'm asking you, how do you want it? This is your.

Well, I have to say the all-inclusive I found very interesting. And they have represented, and I'm sure it's Voss, they represent a number of cities across the state of Florida. And that's their unique way of going about it as an all-inclusive pricing. I find that very interesting.

Ellen, is that even an option for you? Can you speak to that?

Actually, we do anything that the client wants. I mean, we have other clients who have asked that, but it works, but it doesn't work to the extent that you think you're getting a lump sum fee, but you have to recognize that your service is dependent upon what your needs are. We're talking now to some of our school boards are trying to move to that kind of thing because They're more independent in terms of what their needs are because they just have school board meetings as opposed to all the other activities that they do. So it can be. It can be. But I will tell you that Naples tried that.

Yes. And it failed. And it failed. Completely. But then I saw all the other cities that have. So, yes. Yes.

That was the most recent.

So let me circle this back. Casey, how much time, if we started just with the, if Councilor Henry agrees, I put it to consensus that we're just going to start with an RFP, let's go out to bid, how much time, staff time, is that a tremendous amount of staff time? Are we putting a huge burden on you as I'm trying to just pick a direction to start this conversation?

Well, we can certainly put legal services out to bid. It is a lengthy process. It takes about 30 days to get something out to bid. We have to do advertising, and then we have an opening period. And then we would bring results forward to the city council for you to weigh them or grade the submittals. So it would be at least 90 days.

If I can, I think we're, what Chair Palumbo is kind of alluding to is not the timeframe it would take, but the effort on staff. Is that correct?

I wanted to know, so before we pick a direction, this seemed like the most logical maybe direction to move forward was that, but I want to know how much labor hours, or get an idea if we're going to be overburdening to them if we're just throwing ideas out.

Well, we have a purchasing manager, and this is his job, and this is what he does. So it's not going to create any overtime, if that's what you're asking. We would fit it into his normal workload. We do this all the time. I would say in terms of the scope of work, it could be written so that firms can – either provide an all-inclusive proposal or a You know line item individualized proposal So I think we just leave it open so they can submit whatever they want two birds at one stone.

Thank you. That's excellent idea Counselor, honey. How do you feel about the in-house? Do you want to explore that? I mean, do you want to ask the council?

I think in a perfect world. It's a great idea and but I think in the real world it's not.

Guys, I'd like to, before I hit your light signs and we try to get all this tied up, I gave you all a chance to speak. Anybody in favor of exploring in-house?

We got two? Okay, just. I got to have this comment. Please. It is a complicated process. There's a lot, and I don't even know what came out of the last work product that was probably very well created. It's a question about the operating model. I think what we need to do, that one would have to be parked for a future conversation. I have two reactions to this, real quick. One, Alan is, it was a good presentation, Alan. Um, number one, number two, we got a price increase coming. So our community go, aren't we going to put this out the bed? How do we validate that? We just heard about three bids. So there was an argument that maybe the timing is right to at least hear what else everybody has to say to us. But I have a feeling that this man just explained why. They have a very good value proposition.

Guys, you'll all get a chance. Let me stay on topic. So, Councillor Henry, you got two out of seven that want to go in-house. Are you okay with, this is your paper, are you okay with dropping in-house for this purpose of the conversation today? All right, guys, so now we have down to all-inclusive and putting it out to bid. Last go around for the light signs, they'll make a decision. Councillor Goehler.

I just want to know the pros and cons of the in-house. I'm very much interested in learning more about the in-house firm. So what would be the pros and cons of Dr. Lucia's? Would you come back with maybe your thought process about it. At some point, it doesn't have to be me right now, but I would be very much interested in in-house law firm. MS.

I think only if a majority of the council directs me to make that presentation, I'll do that. Otherwise,

I was going to make a suggestion so you don't lose out on this. This is something you could do one-on-one with both the attorney and counsel, and you don't want to lose that ability. We might talk about it again, but today I'm trying to just narrow us down to a couple simpler decisions so you don't lose that ability. Vice Chair Champaign.

Thank you. I'm kind of retreating on my support of an RFP on the standpoint that I've heard now what the proposed fee increase is, and by the way, I like it. Cheap. Do explain. It's inexpensive. We pretty much know the work product of the firm that we're dealing with. And in all honesty, this city has far more important issues at the moment to wrestle with that we don't seem to spend a lot of time on, but we do spend a lot of time on these ancillary kind of topics that just consume discussions and go on and on. If we went forward with an RFP, we the city council and they the staff are going to spend a heck of a lot more time on the issue. There's no way we would take looking into a new law firm lightly. We would get very involved and should get very involved in interviews and not only on what the price is but what is the work product of the firm and who are the people and how do they fit in with personalities. It's a complicated subject that isn't resolved very quickly and yet you look at where we are And what we're trying to accomplish in the balance of this calendar year, folks, we don't have that kind of time. We don't have that luxury. And he's only going up $25. Hey, grab it.

It's $2.75 right now. $2.75. $3.25. All right. I was close.

Very good. Thank you. Counselor Schwan.

Yes, thank you. I did want to let you know I'm very opposed to in-house. And part of the reason, you know, Ellen's firm has 90 attorneys working with him. And that's so crucial that by just putting it out to bid, you know, will we be knowing the strength behind these various firms, et cetera, because having practice law with 100 firm, attorney firm, it was very important. We were able. We all had our specific areas, et cetera. So I do want to emphasize the importance of you listed how many attorneys are working with us right now, Alan, and that's a very important thing because they have the expertise. In-house may work for us. A few communities, but it's highly unlikely with all of the things that we have to look at here, too.

All right. Vice Chair Champagne, can I push back a little respectfully? Yep. We were okay, and I don't want to brag, we were okay with just looking at numbers for the police. I wasn't a favor, but I understand what you're looking for. I respect that this council wants to have the numbers in their back pocket. Would we not be okay with simply looking at numbers for the attorney? I think this is even more imperative, and it's something against Alan. I'm actually in favor of his firm, and they do a great job personally. been around long enough watching them long enough however we just had citizens coming up and saying you know get bids get bids get bids do your job interview and it's been a while since we've had that so that might be the prudent decision for the citizens i suspect we're going to find our firm is great great in pricing and do represent a ton of people in the area however let me try to tie this in counselor henry i'll ask whatever consensus you would like what i'm hearing is Put this out to bid to include all-inclusive and retainer slash hourly-based. Does that sound about correct? Casey, am I missing anything there? Does that make sense for you? Is that a good enough direction for you? All right. Any other quick comments before I ask this? I say quick.

All right.

Consensus on this? Please, please help me out. I'm on uncharted ground here.

I just want to add one point of context, and that is the time frame. I mentioned probably about 90 days before it comes back to council. It could very well be that you're going to have new council members in early November, and they will be making the decision, and it could be one of their first decisions. with no experience. And I'm not saying that to influence your decision one way or another, but, you know, timing can be important, especially when you're managing change. MR. Counselor Henry, your paper, your call.

MS. It ended up last month. No, I'm just kidding. MS. That is a very valid point. I can't say I even thought of that. This is July.

Push forward, ask for consensus, or table it. Either one's OK. You want to do a little more research, that's up to you. I'm not trying to decide for you.

Well, I think in the fact that we're going to be discussing next month a price increase with our current attorney, I don't know. I feel like maybe moving forward. Because this is one of those things, and I have to admit and go back to the Audit Advisory Committee. I think it was my second meeting was watching presentations to select a new auditor and doing all the research. And the current auditor submitted pricing and information. You don't know what you don't know. I think it's silly if we just stand still. I think, you know, there's an election, but I think as councilors, we're trying to make responsible decisions that are best for the city. So I would say I would be supportive of moving forward.

Let me throw a cog in your wheel and ask you a question. Would it not be prudent to hear out their price changes given the month we've come this far? I'm just asking. See what they bring to us then before we decide what we're going to go out and let them also, their price change will be in the bid. One or two ways. You make the call. I'll ask for the consensus. Which one do you want?

But I did all this.

It's where the big decisions come.

I'm going to say no. Let's move forward.

OK. So all those who consented. Would anybody sign up to speak on this? I'm sorry.

No, sir. No one spoke.

So let me just be clear. Staff, correct me if I get this. We're going to be, I'm asking you for consensus to put this out to bid. They will be bidding for all-inclusive services, and they will also be bidding for a retainer-based hourly service. They can bring both of those back to us. All right. All those in favor, raise your hand. All right. So we got three. So it fails four to three. Councillor Henry, I would be willing to look at this again, to be honest. I would like to see what they have to say first. Not a definite hard no forever, but for now, I want to see the numbers. Sounds good.

All right.

Thank you so much.

One last point, though. Please. May I ask the legal counsel to update the contract to reflect more current information than what it does right now?

After we have our meeting in October. Yes, sir, of course. And actually, I mean, I can inquire with my management group about a different all-inclusive. It can't be all-inclusive because there's too much litigation that's involved. So you've got to balance that. You don't want to pay for work you're not getting.

Yeah, I mean, I worked on averages. Some months our bill's been $40,000.

Oh, that's because that depends on the work. On the litigation. Well, the litigation, a lot of the litigation is not included in that bill. Some of that insurance litigation is not included in that bill.

Oh, I see. Okay.

Yeah, so there's more work in there. Some of the things that we do are not covered by insurance. For example, the Gallup wasn't covered by insurance. The Chanel wasn't insured as well. But most of the stuff would be.

Okay.

But I can see if they wanted to try and include a different rating schedule or something to see if maybe I can present something of that type.

One thing I did find in the proposal from 2015, kind of lacked detail.

On purpose. No, not because we're charging you different. Because one of the things that you don't pay attention to because you don't see the bill other than that and the work that's being done, you're not getting billed a lot of work that's being done that's part of that retainer. No one questions how I do it. I just do it and take care of you. I mean, that's just the way it's been over the years.

Which is one of the risks taking of doing an RFP, which it's the risk of...

I'm gonna tell you that they're not gonna come in at 325 an hour guys.

We're gonna we're gonna close this one down Deb Counselor Henry project. I appreciate all the work. I'm not not with you on this if I'm back at the citizens at me I'd love to work with you on it Respect everything you did timing for me as I said, but we should be talking about this and it is best practice for the citizens All right, we're moving on to citizens comment. Do we have anybody signed up for citizens comment?

We have no registered speakers at this time.

You guys know what to do, right? We are adjourned.