Sustainability and Resiliency Task Force - Regular Meeting

Good evening.

Recording in progress. Good evening, everyone.

Hello, hello.

Good evening.

All righty. Calling the meeting. So fresh and so clean. Is that you, Jessica?

That sure is. That's my business.

Hey.

Okay.

All righty. Calling the meeting to order at 630. Roll call. Brenda?

Here.

Harbor Island. Awesome. Jessica? Here.

Here.

Oliver.

Calling in from Mexico.

I'm here. Oh, nice. Thank you for joining. Good evening, Frank. Good evening, Christina. Good evening, Thomas. Good evening, Johnny. Good evening, Madam Mayor.

Good evening, Madam Chair and board members and Tom Klein.

Good evening.

Good evening. Approval of meeting minutes. Did everybody get a chance to go over the minutes?

Yes. I move to approve. I'll second.

Awesome. All in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Very good. Okay, old business. Update on stormwater master plan?

Good evening. Roger should be joining in, but I'll get this started. When it comes to the stormwater master plan, just a little recap, because I know we have some new faces here today. We conducted a stormwater master plan project. We wrapped that up in 2022, and there were a lot of recommendations in the master plan. And based on that, we created different projects. across our three islands. So we have three islands, Harbor Island. I'm saying this because Tom, you're new. Harbor Island and Treasure Island and North Bay Island. And we currently have different projects going on in each island. Harbor Island, we are working with Ribic Engineering. And Redburg is awaiting some subsurface utility exploration for the site that they're working on. So we're putting a stormwater pumps station on that site and it's connected to a park, which will be a civic park in the future. And for North Bay Island, we're also installing some stormwater conveyance there. And for that, the primary designer is VCC. And we're currently working with FPL to underground some of the utilities from 79th Street Causeway in order to, you know, have a better conveyance of our stormwater system. this week or with FPL so that's currently still in progress and then lastly for Treasure Island we had a series of work orders we had multiple consultant working on that and so that's going to be an item on discussion for the upcoming Commission meeting next week so the the issue that we have with Treasure Island is We had too many cooks in the kitchen. So different consultants with overlapping projects. So we've decided to streamline this and eliminate some of the blockages that we were getting working with multiple consultants. And we are opting now for just working for a single consultant and merging some of the phasing. Because the way the Stormwater Master Plan had Treasure Island, it was six phases with varying... uh you know varying scopes with very varying pricing so we're hoping to streamline that so that we can proceed quicker so that's the the latest on the stormwater improvement project So it's a bit of a short update. I think Roger's coming, but he might be here at the end. So if you have any additional details that you'd like, I'm sure I can help, but Roger can also give some insight.

On my end, I don't have any further questions. Does anybody else on the task force have any questions for Christina?

It's Oliver. I'm just curious. I know you did a lot of work on the... The document that guides the city in terms of choosing types of materials, like sustainable materials for the stormwater, is that consistent with what's being done in our current stormwater projects? Or was it kind of too late and the stuff that you have been working on in your recommendations? Yeah.

Oh, so the ongoing ones with Ribic and North Bay. For North Bay, it will depend. If there's like a change order, I will be a part of it. For Ribic, I was a part of the... the scope of work part of the order. So I did manage to put a lot of resilience, resilient components in for Harbor Island. North Bay, it has to be because they're already under contract. So it has to be if there's any changes, I will be there like a hawk to make sure that there's some resilient features added to it.

Okay, great. Thank you.

You're welcome.

Yeah, I just want to jump in also and reiterate that from the very beginning of the Stormwater Master Plan projects, the RFQ was crafted in a way that emphasized resilience and green infrastructure and that for two years I met weekly with our engineering team privately. And then on top of that, we had public discussions and commission meetings about the green infrastructure and the resilient components for all of the projects. And one of the reasons why we are starting over on Treasure Island is because the engineering team failed to meet those expectations. And I'll tell you that for North Bay Island, for your new pump station, we were promised water quality improvements above and beyond the bottom line basic thresholds required by the county. um and one of the reasons we redesigned the north bay island pump station was because again the engineering team and their original design failed to meet the most basic water quality improvements so the fact that we're implementing a green infrastructure policy is really amazing but it doesn't mean that for the last six years there have not been adamant in like voices pushing for these things. So just wanted to share that.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. And anybody else have any questions or comments? If not, we can also go back to you, Christina on the resilience update update.

sure thank you alicia um so for resilience update we've touched on this it's the green infrastructure structure policy is the main thing we've had this in front of us a couple times so i'm excited to say that it hasn't made it um through to the commission agenda for next week so um synopsis, so all village infrastructure projects have to incorporate green stormwater infrastructure and low impact development strategies as much as possible. We had a little bit of pushback. We were scared that there maybe would be some house bills or some sort of preemption from the state. But I think that was a misunderstanding. So this will be going in front of commission next week. So we're very excited about that. But this is going to be a discussion item. And we're hoping that the commission will direct this towards a resolution to adopt a policy. I also want to mention that it is very hot and we've just started a strategy for advising our residents of heat conditions. And thank you, Johnny. Johnny actually posted the banner on the website with a heat advisory that goes directly into the NOAA's website with the temperatures. and the current advisory at the time that you'll click on it. So we do need some more coordination for HEAT. We had a good meeting last week with the managers on how we're going to proceed. And while we're talking about HEAT, I just want to also mention that we have some final proposals for shade structures at Schaumburger and Vogelpark. I think I think they go with the current designs. They match the current aesthetics. So I think it will be really beneficial aesthetically and also for the heat benefits for our residents. And another thing going to commission is the waste discussion with Dave Dobler. So I've been working with Dave Dobler on prepping for that meeting next week. So I'm very excited. And we've done a lot of research to see what other cities are doing and how they're implementing paybacks. pay as you throw. You know, some cities are doing it with the bags, like Plantation, where you get a plastic bag. So you try to reduce your waste and compost as much so you can fit your waste into a bag. Other cities, they're giving cart size options. So that's very exciting. Even the county is doing different cart sizes. So if you're a small family, a bigger family, you can choose a different cart size and each size has a different pricing. So we dealt deep into that. So this is going to be a discussion item next week in front of the commission. Another thing that we worked on was the fertilizer awareness because from May 15 to October 31st, is, you know, Miami-Dade County, you're not allowed to fertilize. So I've been working with Lily and she posted that on social media and also on the island newsletter. So you might see it at the end of the newsletter. So I'm really happy that we're communicating that and keeping our bay clean. And I think that's about it for my resilience update. I'm excited about Tom's presentation next. Let me know if you have any questions on any of those.

Would anybody like to go first? Any questions? Comments?

Further insight? And Alicia, I know we've exchanged emails on the tile project. So I'm looking forward, because I know we spoke about an updated proposal when we met with legal. So I'm looking forward to that from Art. I don't know if you've heard directly from him about that.

Yeah, I'll give you an update. I know I met with Frank and the product designer, Nick, and Art I think should be sending us over the direction of permit to apply for no permit. I'll get you up to speed on that of the last discussion that we had with Frank and everyone. But it's... It'll be quick. It'll be quick and good. So we'll talk soon. Other than that, I don't have any questions or further comments. So we're getting shade at Vogel Park.

We're getting an extra shade structure on top of the swing set. Nice. It's good.

And then for the Green infrastructure that's going before the commission. What was the... I don't know if you said it was pushback or there was concerns.

What were those? Sure, of course. So there is a bill. It's called HB 1217, and there's been a lot of discussion about it. But it's a bill on emissions regulation, and basically we have to rephrase anything with emissions, or we can't say net zero energy, for example. So it's not related to stormwater at all. But that was a concern. And yeah.

So it's no longer a concern?

No longer a concern.

Back to Vogel, please, if we can. So the Australian pine had to come out. Is there anything else that can go in? Or does that space belong to the apartments next door or...?

That's a great question. I'll have to ask Stephen on that and look at a survey to see where the property lines are.

Yeah, because it was kind of shocking to show up on Saturday and they were just gone. And I must have missed if we had already discussed or gone over that. Okay.

I'll just jump in here also, if you don't mind, Madam Chair. Okay. I also was not advised that there was going to be significant tree removal at Bogle Park. And so this is something I'm going to bring up on Monday night at the commission meeting during the manager's report. That said, I'm going to ask for tree replacement on Monday night. And hopefully the will of the commission will be tree replacement. But I will just say Australian pines are invasive, prohibited species. They're terrible to the ecosystem around them. They kill anything that tries to grow around them. But we do want to replace the canopy. So that's where I am on that. And, you know, hopefully the next time there's a proposed tree removal, the manager will know to come talk to us about it first. And we'll have a discussion about replacement.

Great. It was just so shocking that I went, it was a world oceans week. So then very next, I took the yoga class and then I went over to the, event that was, I guess it was like on 79th or 81st and the beach. And there was Urban Paradise Guild. And so I spoke with them about possibly, you know, getting some natives in, but at a substantial size. And I didn't know how to proceed to give you support, Madam Mayor, for that request rather than Little saplings. But to see something that's 15 stories tall just come out, it was just shocking. So thank you at the next meeting for asking about that. But Sam seemed to think that there could be, if the will of the commission is to invest a little bit of money, that larger trees could be brought in. So thank you.

No problem. Any other questions on this item? If not, we're going to move on to new business. Item 4A, we have a presentation by the University of Miami. It's sent in by Thomas. Thomas. This is for the Sponge Park. Did everybody get a chance to take a look at the Sponge Park presentation, the attached PDF and the agenda? Thank you. Yes. Awesome. Looking forward to it. Thank you so much, Thomas.

Yeah. Thank you so much for having me here. Can you all hear me okay? Yes.

Yes.

So I will share my screen. Perfect. And you all can see my screen as well, right? Yes. Awesome. So thanks again for having me. And I'm really excited to present the work that we're doing around spongy parks, spongy cities, spongy urbanism for you all today. And I'm happy to keep it informal. If you'd like to interrupt me along the way, if that's appropriate, happy to do that. If you have any questions as we go. But as was mentioned, my name is Tom Klein. I'm the director of the Center for Urban and Community Design at the University of Miami. I'm also a landscape architect and urban designer, and I have eight years of experience designing and constructing mostly coastal waterfront resilient infrastructure parks and trails and other types of elements that help to create a resilient waterfront in our cities. So who are we? What do we do? So the Center for Urban and Community Design, or the COCD, is a organization, it's a center of the University of Miami that was created by the School of Architecture after Hurricane Andrew in 1992. And the idea was that the center would be an external facing arm of the university that would be able to develop work that could help support community goals. And so really how we view ourselves as a catalyst for impact work that isn't ready for engagement by a private firm or by an RFP process. Basically, we like to work with nonprofit organizations, municipalities, counties, other organizations when they have a project that's an idea, but it isn't fundable yet, maybe, or there's only a little bit of funding, so not enough to actually do a full master plan or concept design, we can come in and using our resources, our research resources, our faculty, our students, we can help support that process at a lower cost than maybe some of those other organizations are able to do. And we have three pillars that we really focus on in our work. So we're focused on Research, teaching, and service. So fundamentally, what we hope to do is to evolve research as an organization that helps you all to support the work you're doing. That could mean, you know, like, for example, Keylon Bishop, who's a part of the University of Miami, just released some research about heat that you might have seen in local media. So research that helps support the work of creating, you know, investing in shade structures, which I just heard you're doing, for example. We also like to engage in direct teaching. So how can we use teaching as a model for showcasing to our students what it means to work with municipalities and communities and interdisciplinary teams? But also the reverse of that, right? Because sometimes the student can be a really great messenger and a really great way to an insertion point into a project. An example is I just led a series of workshops in another state. And those workshops, we had students, they're able to ask questions that maybe you and I as professionals can't ask because there's a little bit of a, well, we're just learning. We don't know. We don't know the rules yet. And it helps to like maybe stoke conversation. And then lastly, service. So we have a student population that's really eager to engage in direct service in communities. And that can mean a lot of things. It can mean hosting community listening sessions and charrettes and workshops and It can mean trash cleanups. It can mean doing actual drone LIDAR survey work to understand your tree canopy. There are so many ways that we can engage. And I also just want to add that while we were founded by the School of Architecture, we have access to the resources across the university. So geography, engineering, ocean sciences, law, we can bring together faculty and students from across the U to support projects as needed. And here are a few of the ways in which we do that work. So we host quite a few community workshops. These can be design charrettes. They can be visioning workshops, listening sessions. We also do planning and design work. We don't want to compete with the private sector. So we focus on projects where we can be a catalyzing force. An example of this is Rocco's studio here at the University of Miami. Meg Daly reached out to Rocco many years ago and asked him to develop a studio of what the underlying could look like and then those drawings from that work were used to help fundraise and then ultimately led to the design of the underline we can also work on special projects that could look like a storefront tool kit a tree ordinance developing a tree ordinance for a community which we're doing right now maybe even helping to unlock funding opportunities for projects. So if we help to do a conceptual design, we can also be a part of the process of helping to find fundraising opportunities, which leads me to this next initiative. So we have been working on this project in many layers for a while now, but I'm calling it spongy urbanism. I jokingly tell folks I'm in my spongy era because I think there's just so much Awesome opportunity of thinking about what it means to be a sponge region in South Florida and then zooming in and thinking about what it means to create spongy infrastructure in our communities. So this might be review for you all. I imagine you all understand this stuff pretty deeply, given your role on this committee. But what is a sponge park? A sponge park really is any community. permeable green space that is designed specifically to manage stormwater nuisance flooding, reduce the velocity of the water, clean it, and then recharge or discharge as needed, either into the waterway or into the groundwater. It includes both green and nature-based infrastructure, but it also includes gray infrastructure. These systems are redundant in their approach so that they don't fail if one of those systems fails. But I like to show these two images because they're so stark in their contrast. So the image on the right is of the Gowanus Canal Sponge Park in Brooklyn. It is literally like six parking spots in size. It's very small. And you can imagine a system of these where these exist periodically as a systems approach to managing the water. Whereas the image from Forest Park in Bangkok, Thailand, which was designed by Kung John Yoo, who is the founder of the idea of spongy urbanism in Sponge Park, as you can see, this is a district-wide approach. So they designed the district around this very large water feature. As I mentioned earlier, this concept was first popularized by Chinese landscape architect Kong Zhenyu, who unfortunately passed away last year. His firm Turrinscape does still do this work in China, but it moves far beyond China. So for example, Rotterdam in the Netherlands had an ordinance for about 20 years that was focused on sponge plazas and developing these sponge plazas throughout the city. Ultimately, the goal here is really to reduce runoff by slowing cleaning and recharging stormwater. If you're doing this systemically, if you're thinking about this as almost like an urban acupuncture, if you will, like a series of smaller systems throughout the region, it does have the potential to have a profound impact on regional water quality and on the issues of nuisance flooding, which we have in our region. That's what I love about this is that it can operate on so many scales, right? Like the image on the right here is Lakeside Village at the University of Miami by Architectonica. This is just a series of those types of systems on our campus. But if you imagine this being deployed readily throughout the region, what could that mean for our nuisance flooding, also our stormwater, and also our water quality? And with that in mind, we've developed a proposal for an ongoing project. And this project has a lot of layers and tentacles. And so I apologize in advance because there's a lot kind of here to cover. The first aspect is a studio course that we're teaching this fall. And that studio course, we're teaching it in collaboration with a number of institutions. So we're offering it jointly with Penn, with the University of Pennsylvania, Weitzman School, in Philadelphia. There I'm collaborating with this professor named Matthias Bau, who is the founder of One Architecture. One Architecture famously has worked on sponge parks throughout Manhattan, New York, and beyond. And Matthias is Dutch. He's a Dutch citizen and has spent a lot of time working on the Dutch approach to water. In addition to working with Matthias, we're collaborating with TU Delft, and the Dutch embassy on this work. So we're actually really excited. We're gonna be taking students and also some of our collaborators for those who are interested to the Netherlands. The dates are, we're still working on the details, but October one through four is what we're looking at. And so we're collaborating right now. I just had a meeting this morning actually with the Dutch embassy to understand what that might look like. And we're also bringing them all down to Miami the week before that um september 25th through 28th tentatively to show them the sites to meet with stakeholders to really help the students from and what's really exciting to me is the cross-disciplinary approach here right so my students are mostly urban design and architecture students i will also have some engineering um environmental science soil science students you know some of the undergrad environmental science students as well But Penn is primarily going to be landscape architecture and planning students. And TU Delft will primarily be urban design and civil engineering students. So what we have is this really great mix of students and faculty and researchers from across disciplines thinking about this challenge together, which is really exciting. And you can see here the faculty who are a part of that team. So in addition to myself and Matthias, we also have Teresa Pinto, who is a faculty member and the director of civic engagement for the Abbott Center for Ecosystem Science here at the University of Miami. And she's also trained as a lawyer. So she brings a policy lens to this work as well, which is really exciting. And then we also have some private sector collaborators in cadence landscape architecture and in one architecture, whom I mentioned previously. So what this looks like is, so we have the studio and we're using the studio as a catalyst for conceptual thinking for a few sites in the region. And then from there in the spring, our team at the center will take that work, take those interactions with our stakeholders, whether that be community or whether that be municipal, and evolve it into a concept that is practical, buildable, like a 30% design level, um schematic design that can then be um a source for developing an rfp and and seeing where things can go from there we can also look at at that point we can start to look at funding opportunities we can start to think about um what are some key policy implications or you know you we don't know what we will uncover through the process but basically the goal is that the studio is the first phase and then the second phase during the spring semester is to really help work directly with christina mayor mayor and everyone else to like understand what we need to develop for to be ready so in addition to working with you all we do have a site within miami-dade county um in bizkane gardens that we're going to be collaborating with um and it's a similar scope for both of those so scope a is the sponge park concept development And then scope B is, and that's through the studio. And then scope B is the schematic design package, which is through the center after the studio has concluded. And I just wanted to show you some examples. So these are examples of the type of work that I, Teresa, and Matthias have built, either as project managers, principals, but always as the primary firm working on these projects. So you can start to see a little bit of a track record of developing Coastal and stormwater projects. I personally also helped to develop the Waterfront Edge Design Guidelines, or WEDGE, in a prior role with the Waterfront Alliance many years ago, and also have helped to move that forward now that it includes inland riverine and lacquer stream ecosystems as well. And I just want to add one thing that didn't make it into the presentation because it's so fresh. So Aaron DeMeo, who is on the Climate Resilience Committee for the city of Miami, heard about this initiative and got really excited about it and thought it would be a missed opportunity if the city of Miami wasn't also participating. So he has passed. He is supporting a resolution called Sponge. um let me get the acronym for you because i want to mess it up because i thought it was pretty pretty smart and i don't know if chat gpt or how how do people come up with these cute names um but he's working on this this thing called sponge which is the resolution uh the crc passed it unanimously And it is now on the agenda for Thursday for the commission with four co-signers. So it sounds like that will be supported. If it passes, ultimately what it means is that it will compel the city to also join in on this effort and to be a part of this process. So there will be a third site. somewhere in the city of Miami to be determined. But we're going to have 40 to 60 students. We won't know our exact number till late July. So we'll have plenty of brain power to think about all these sites holistically. And most exciting to me is how different these sites are likely to be. So we have the county, and we have a county park that's inland, but also at a low point with a very high water table in Biscayne Gardens, surrounded by single family residential. I imagine our Miami site will ultimately be more urban in a more dense area, maybe along a river or a canal. And then we have this site that we're working with you all on. And I think what's really interesting to me is that I think your community is representative of so many in South Florida and Florida and even up the coast in like South Carolina. And so the things that we can learn from your site are unique. compared to the other sites we're looking at, but they have the potential to be a case study or an exemplary case model for other sites and other communities who may not think that they have the means or the capacity to do this work. And that's why I'm very excited to get to collaborate with you and I will shut up and answer questions.

Thank you, Thomas. Does anybody have any questions before I ask? You can go first. We get a lot of water here at our site. From what you said, there's inland sites. What do you imagine and what would you like to study with our with our site like do you have any ideas on that like how much water we could filter because we get a lot of water i keep saying that so yeah i just want to pick your brain more on like what you would like like what you imagine of doing with this site because it it really is a good site like we're near salt water we are a man-made island. We're improving our infrastructure, but we're also dealing with sea level rises. This is like, let's see how tough these sponge parks can be.

Yeah. I mean, it's such a great question. So there are so many things. So it's early enough in the process that I don't want to speak too much out of turn about what the solutions could be. I can speak to some solutions I've seen on other projects and how those have manifest working on Coney Island, for example, or on the other coast in Sarasota. The challenges are their water is coming from below, from above and from the side, right? So there's a lot of water. Some of it's salty, some of it's not. So I think that everything should be on the table when we're initially researching these things. And we can ask the tough questions about like, is there some road raising that needs to happen? What are the coastal conditions look like as far as like, how do we use any sort of coastal green infrastructure as a tool for helping to absorb storm surge and testing that in this site? Are there any technologies that could be deployed? I think you maybe are familiar with some of the technologies that the University of Miami has piloted, like Sea Hive, for example. Are there other elements that could be a part of the solution? But if the goal is really to reduce the nuisance flooding, which I imagine is a primary driver on any of the adjacent corridor streets in the neighborhood, What does that look like, right? Because in this context, you're really trying to move the water off of those non-permeable surfaces as quickly as possible. And you're trying to get it to another location. So it's not posing a health risk to the community, right? A safety risk to the community. So your site is absolutely going to be one of the most challenging site. If not, I think it could be the most challenging site from that perspective, right? Because there are competing needs here. And it will actually help us to really understand what is the capacity of this one site And what does that mean for the whole island? Is this one site sufficient? Would you need multiple? Would you need additional sites? What does that approach look like too? So as we're working with our engineers and we're calculating capacity and we're thinking about what we're able to achieve in the single location, that's going to be really interesting for us to dive into, I think. But also there are questions about permeability. Can you increase permeability at upland in your roadways or elsewhere as well? Sorry for not having a more direct answer. I haven't explored the site deeply enough, I don't think.

I'm sorry if I missed this, but where exactly is our site that we're starting with?

This is going to be on Treasure Drive on Treasure Island, right at the corner.

I think 7560 West Treasure Drive at the corner of West Treasure and North Treasure. It's currently a single family home that's being demolished very soon.

Okay.

Thank you.

I have a question. I really like this presentation, the idea, and I happen to be an acupuncturist, so I like how you describe these as little like points. And I'm thinking about the microcosm of these parts and the macrocosm and also wondering about if there's any common elements, even if it's just a small little design detail of a post or something that ties together Because I think it's an opportunity for bringing awareness to people about this thing. So if there's any educational signage or just something where we can, you know, you go to this park, you see it, and then you start just like, oh, people go, oh, this is what's happening. And they can connect it to all over the county or world and say, this is a really cool thing. It's really important, I think, to connect to the vision of the people involved. So this kind of work can continue for sustainability and resiliency because they can see something positive is being done. So I don't know if there's anything as you're designing these things that you have those elements in mind.

I absolutely love that. I think that it would be so impactful because I want the students to first, I want to think about what does it mean for South Florida to be a spongy place? What does sponge urbanism look like for the region? We know what it looks like in China. We know what it looks like in the Netherlands. But we're a different place, right, culturally and ecologically. So what does it mean? And then to zoom into the sites. And is there something that we could pull from those individual sites? I'm actually going to share my screen because I want to share an example. So I worked... I did... I was a project manager on quite a few of the Gowanus Canal redevelopment projects in Brooklyn, New York, if any of you are familiar. And one of the things that we did across sites, because people sometimes don't understand that tide levels fluctuate across sites. So we created these elements that if you go to the canal and you stroll this waterfront, which is still emerging, only about 40% of these sites are built, you can see these lights will light up and they will tell you what the normal tidal range is. But then this will show you on the other side what the tide is now. So when is high tide going to be today? Where are we at at this moment? And so it starts to show you those fluctuations. That's just one idea. I also was really inspired by... In China, I just got back from China and apologies, I'm scrolling through my photos and I know that's not the most like professional thing. But I went to China and what I was really inspired by was Kong Zhenyu did this project at the expo grounds in Shanghai. Wherever you see this red bench, it indicates the 100 year flood level. wherever you see this bench, anywhere in the parks. And it became the signature move because it was like, you can sit there, you can enjoy it, but it's a didactic thing, right? It like reminds you that, oh, this is a hundred year flood level and it floods regularly. Similarly, I mean, if you saw Sea Change Boston, there was this art installation where they painted a blue line at the height on every building and everywhere where it was going to be an estimate for climate for sea level rise by 2030, right? So it's like, oh, whoa, this park I'm in is gonna be completely underwater or this building I'm in is gonna be underwater, you know, above my head, right? So I think there's so many interesting things and I would love for us to come up with something that is really rooted in South Florida and in this place, whether it be like imagery, color, element, and to have that throughout, I think is a really lovely idea. Hopefully you will join us for some of our reviews and you can plant that in my students' head because they'll listen to me a little bit, but I think they'll listen to others more.

Yeah, I think the whole entire task force has a lot of good insights and Christina does as well when it comes to infrastructure. I do wish Dave Dobler, our vice chair, was here. He has a lot of knowledge on this, so maybe it would be good to get with him. I'm sure he'll get in contact with you. And what is the most similar sites that you guys have worked on that's like comparable to like our site? I just want to kind of dig a little deeper, find out. This is exciting.

Yeah, I don't know that. So as a center and as the University of Miami, I don't know of any sites that we have specifically worked on that are maybe this similar. But I do know that the folks at Seahive have worked on quite a few coastal sites here in South Florida. So Landolph, who is in the engineering school and will be actively involved in this project, he's done quite a bit of work. on very challenging low-lying coastal conditions across South Florida, including other smaller communities and villages. I think there's an ongoing project in Miami Shores Village, for example, and on Kivas Cane. And then I personally, so I've worked on quite a few. So one that comes to mind maybe is China Basin Park in San Francisco. San Francisco being a large city, but the site being a very low-lying coastal park where the focus was on how can it be designed so that all of the housing that was being built directly adjacent to it is protected from future storm surge. That one comes to mind because it's also not, it's pretty small. It's not quite this small, but it's small. But if we're talking about the tools, the tools can be deployed at different scales. And for example, many years ago, I worked on Hunters Point South Park in Queens, New York. And that is, I think, such a great example because we deployed soil cells which support tree health but also hold water. And there's some emerging evidence about the capacity of soil cells and engineered soils for holding water. And so that's something we're also working with deep root, who's the manufacturer of Silva cells to help them develop more data. They have a lot of data around root. density and root health, but they want more data around like moisture content and what that soil is capable of doing, especially if you use permeable papers. And then we also deployed a gabion. I'm not sure if everyone here is familiar with a gabion, but think like a chicken wire that's filled with rocks. You oftentimes see them above grade to hold like land, but we actually did this underground and planted a rain garden in it because what it does is it increases the surface area for water in the soil, but also reduces the velocity, reduces sedimentation. And it was embedded into the planting. So you don't even see it. And it was this linear moment that permeated through. So these are the types of technologies and design thinking that we think, even though that park is much larger, would be applicable here. And we have evidence, actually. That particular park was completely built two weeks before Hurricane Sandy. devastated New York. And so we actually got to see that park perform in real time against a pretty intense hurricane. None of the housing that was being developed or none of the parcels up adjacent to that park were flooded or impacted in any way. The park actually did hold. We thought it would hold a category four and it did hold a category four. The only unfortunate aside is that the Army Corps doesn't always believe us that green infrastructure can do it on its own. So they did make us embed a wall into part of the site, which we turned into an overlook with our architectural collaborators, Weissman and Freddie. So one of the unfortunate things is that we can't say the green infrastructure, the systems of the spongy wetland park performed solo, but we're pretty confident they would have.

I just wanna say, because Alicia, you mentioned Dave's not here and like it would be good to connect Dave with Tom, not doing that. There are gonna be so many opportunities for public engagement as this project gets moving. I have no doubt in my mind that anyone and everyone who wants to provide feedback on what this might look like is gonna have ample opportunities to provide feedback. So this is just the first time you guys are getting obviously the sort of first opportunity to provide feedback and vetting. And we wanna make sure that this is something that you guys are excited about, but community engagement is going to be a fundamental pillar of this process.

Understood.

I'm going to, this is Roger, CIP director. I did join a little bit late. I caught the tail end of Thomas's presentation. One thing I do want, one concern I do want to bring up is how this plan, and I guess really a question for Thomas, since we have a pretty well-developed plan for Treasure Island and we're moving, I mean, we have some assets already in design for what was phase one and phase two of Treasure Island's stormwater improvements. I guess the question I have for Thomas is what information that the village already has on hand would you take into account in developing the park or at least the concept for the park? And how do you see this integrating into larger vision that, um, we have for the island? Cause at the end of the day, we, you know, Christina and I have to actually execute this in the short term, in the near term, getting a full design from root to tip. And my concern is from a technical standpoint, how are we going to integrate this into the larger scheme for. for Treasure Island stormwater improvements.

Yeah, absolutely. I think so. That's like a fundamental part of the process and the project, right, is to understand what initiatives are already happening, have already been adopted, what code items exist. So at the very beginning of the project, our students, our faculty, all of us, we're going to collaborate with you to understand what has already been done. what is being done now, and how this site can support that work. Like the goal would not be for this to be a different thing that's like on an island thinking about itself and being developed solo. But based on what you're doing for your stormwater master plan and where you're moving water to or from, like how can this park support those goals and what you're doing already? For example, if there needs to be a pumping station on this site, how can we integrate that into the site? You know, so... And the way that, that's how I would approach it as like a consultant, but also just as a center. And also that's very important for my students to understand, right? That we're never, We never have a blank piece of paper. We're never drawing or designing from nothing, right? There's always other things that are happening. And there are other interests, too. So you mentioned the stormwater plan, which I think is really awesome to hear that you've been working on. And I was filled in a little bit by Christina and Rachel previously, which was great. But... you know other things too what are the development trends on the island what are any other competing interests as far as like social aspects to the park because one of the great things about that i think is really terrific about sponge parks is that they're designed to perform both you know ecologically and socially so they they oftentimes embed like the human landscapes and the things that people like to do in these parks in a way that is holistically engaging with the water um So yeah, so the short answer, Roger, and thanks for the question is like, we would never disregard those things. And in fact, we would find those things to be really important to how we would evolve the design. And so constant engagement with you and your team, understanding what your goals are, understanding how the park fits into those plans as they exist today, and how the park can be catalyzed is, I think, really important.

And I think ultimately, you know, the other thing that we need to understand is, and I appreciate the answer, Thomas. The other thing that we need to understand is, you know, and make clear as we move forward, and this is not a question that needs to be answered right now, but I think there needs to be an understanding of hierarchy. Because we will have a separate consultant doing the design for Treasure Island. And they're going to be looking at this stormwater, this sponge park, ultimately. They're going to have their own ideas. And the question I have is, whose idea will supersede whose? My concern is, I don't want there to be overlapping or competing efforts. as far as the ideas that if we do go move forward with this, the ideas that, um, that UM introduces and that our consultant might introduce and champion. Like I know ultimately it's up to us to make the decision as far as, you know, the task force and the village, but, you know, I want to avoid as much friction as possible as we move forward because we've had a lot of it over the last few months.

So this is, uh, This is the city manager. This is Frank. You know, Roger brings up some points that we need to consider, but I think the overall process is a collaborative process of what you find with your project and what we're finding with our consultants and to integrate the two together so that one can play off the other. Because we've already talked about having to locate some equipment on the area that we're talking about with the project with the University of Miami. But the pumps themselves would be in the roadway and there'd be some electrical equipment that would have to be located there just out of necessity. So it's on our property and we can maintain it. But those are just technical things to integrate. I think the major things we need to look at is how your project can augment or supplement or or maybe even have an impact where we can adjust the other projects we're looking at on land, especially up in that upper area, because that's a flooding area for us to begin with. So how can we merge the two together and you bring this to the table and the engineers and whatever, who are not even aware that you exist at this point, we would merge something together in a collaborative effort to take advantage of both elements of what we're doing already, what Roger is technically involved in, and what is being proposed with this project. So I don't look at it as competing, but I look at it as something that we need to work with each other to get the advantages of both projects that are going on because this little spot that we're doing is not going to be able to handle the whole issues that we got on treasure island so i think we all recognize that but it can be an important element uh in how we make the whole project for treasure island as successful

Frank, thank you. I really appreciate you weighing in there. And I just wanna say that for quite a while, this site has been slated to be a stormwater park, not just a piece of land where we can site mechanical and electrical equipment to support a pump station. I mean, we have always, even before we took title to the property, For a very long time, we have had our eye on this property as a stormwater park. The engineers working on Treasure Island should be aware of that. I see it as being completely collaborative. Obviously, that will be staff's responsibility to ensure the collaboration is running smoothly and to schedule calls and make sure that the projects are moving in alignment with And not an opposition.

Absolutely. And I think that the engineers that we have that are the probably technical engineers and stormwater control and so forth. are probably going to get an education from the people at the University of Miami as to other areas to look at or other elements to consider in the controlling factor of the stormwater. So I see it as a great opportunity for both parties or both groups merging together to have a successful project of which This park is an element and the mechanical part that we've got in the rest of the island is a part of the project.

I agree, but I do want to make the point. I know we're talking about the engineers as if the engineers exist on an island and the team that we're looking to put together for Treasure Island will include landscape architects. They're not just going to be engineers designing pump stations and doing soil calculations and drainage calculations. There will be We are already including landscape architecture as a critical member of any team that we hire. So there will be ideas that may, there may be conflicts. And like you said, Frank, my hope and the way I see it is that this approach would be like a second set of eyes to supplement the work that we're hiring that team to do.

Well, actually, I just want to add a little bit to this because I think it's a really important conversation and really great. So we as a center oftentimes are engaged to lead in community-led design practices. So that can mean any variety of stakeholders. It can mean the general public. It can mean this group. It can mean staff with the city. And one of the things that we can do is we can provide a different perspective lends an opportunity for understanding what the program, what the goals are, maybe thinking a little bit more systemically about the overarching goals. So for example, I did a project with Coney Island where there was a technical advisory committee we created, there was a community advisory committee, and then we were just bridging the divide between what are the technical challenges, what are the adaptive challenges, what are the solutions for the site from an actual resilience perspective, from a stormwater resilience perspective. um and so i i would say like the student work is aspirational like a lot of the work you're going to get is big thinking outside of the box pushing boundaries, maybe it's great because it enables us to be like, oh my gosh, I didn't think about that. That's interesting. And then when I found in the past is because we don't take it through construction, that's not something we can ever do. And that's not something we think is part of our role. So we don't see ourselves ever as competing with private sector design firms, whether that be landscape or otherwise, because we come up with these big picture ideas And then we hand them off. And then the design teams that are hired by you all, and then you all, and we are happy to still be a consultant and to help. They take those ideas and they evolve them as needed. And as you go further into the details, as you know, things have to change because what may look like a great idea at the concept phase doesn't work at DD. I understand the concern and I've seen it happen that way as well in my career. um so just know that like from our perspective the goal is not to like say our idea go with our idea it's really to stoke a conversation add depth to the conversation bring together stakeholders who maybe otherwise wouldn't talk to each other or be as engaged come up with some ideas that are interesting and theoretically will work and then from there um you know, work with the design team to help actualize what makes sense on the site. Does that make sense?

It does make sense. And I think I look at this project, listen, I'm certainly no expert, okay? I'm looking at it from the outside. But I look at what you are proposing to evaluate and come up with ideas as sort of a petri dish type of a thing that it's an element that we can incorporate into the overall project that can be a center of people looking at things in a different lens of how to control things other than just mechanically with pumps and pipes and pumping the water, you know, deep into the Florida aquifer and that type of thing, which is a traditional way of controlling this water. So I think it's an important element to have this incorporated so that we can see exactly what the success or failure or the neutrality or whatever that we do something like this because the world needs to start looking at different ways of interfacing with the environment. And we need to be an active part of that because we will be actually building some of this stuff as we move forward. And so we need to take that leap of faith too and try to implement some of these things in coordination with what we're doing uh, the traditional way. So listen, I think it'll be a great project and I think we'll, we'll work well together.

Yeah. And I just want to, um, I understand Roger's point of view, but I think there's probably an opportunity to, um, because we're still, we're starting from, not from scratch. Uh, we're going to incorporate what we can from EXP and Chen Moore. But we are revamping this. So there is an opportunity to, when we create the scope of work for whoever's going to get engineering, to shape the landscape in a complementary way, the landscape architecture part of it, so that it works well with this. Because I do think when you have landscape architecture under an engineering as a sub, you may not get the best type of landscape architecture. You know, there's a conventional landscape architect and there's a landscape architect that is wedge or site certified. And those are the kind of landscape architects that we want to attract for our future sponge park, our future stormwater park.

totally understand and i agree christina and frank but like i said we can ask for whatever um certification from a sub that we want like ultimately we get to choose and um i i guess the long and the long and short of what i'm saying is that yes this this would be aspirational and you know we It's an opportunity to incorporate brand new elements and new ideas into the stormwater park and into the sponge park. But, well, not but, and we'll still have that, we can still have that level of expertise as well, which will only serve to improve the final product from the, on the consultant side. We can still ask for that. That expertise doesn't have to be missing from the consultant side. Sure, but

Correct me if I'm wrong, Tom, but I feel that wedge or sites certification is much more rare in landscape architecture. architecture than lead or, you know, envision. So we would have a very small pool of people that they would pull from. So I feel it's going to be, yeah.

I was just going to say, so I'm very thankful that I've worked at a couple of the firms that are like the leading resilience firms that do this stuff that care about wedge. But because of that, I know of the ones that we have a lot of great ones in South Florida as well. um whom i think would probably be interested in a project like this you know i don't know if it's appropriate to say names but like i could think of like five or six off the top of my head whom i'm sure you've engaged with in the past and also um you know there are some really great engineering firms that have in-house landscape that also have like wedge verif like there are quite a few folks um who have wedge verification who have landscape architects who are wedge verified at some of the engineering firms that you all work with as well What I think is interesting about a process like this, and I think, Roger, I think it would be really important for us to work collaboratively and understanding your schedule. If you're onboarding that team, if you're going through an RFP process right now, RFQ process right now, could they become a part of our review process? Could they be providing feedback? Does it become almost like a... um a creative charrette session where they're using our students and our faculty as well to like brainstorm ideas right like how can we integrate it so that it feels like it's productive towards this goal because you know an example i can give you is at scape when i was working with scape we um we work directly with a non-profit in tennessee called the tennessee river line they're trying to create a blue corridor they brought in students and faculty they did some shredding and ideas and there were ideas that came out of that that we would have never as consultants thought of because we you know when you're, when you've been a consultant for 10 years, you know, you can, you have your go-to things that you think work or what, there are a lot of things that happen, right? So, and that was really productive because some of those ideas and some of those things ended up in the final plan for that project. So I hear you and I think that everything you're saying is absolutely like totally valid and like happens all the time. So how can we think about this process in a way that it's integrated more so to maybe alleviate some of that as well?

Roger, I think what I'd like to see, because, you know, the other things I've got to cover on this Zoom, is that I think it'd be good that we set something up with myself and you and Christina and Thomas and Alicia, and we sit down and we just have sort of a collaboration meeting and we talk about our concerns, uh, in the open. And we talk about what our overall objectives are that we're trying to accomplish. Uh, so that it's not, it's, I don't want it to be competitive. I want it to be collaborative. And, and that's what we're going to, that's what we're going to strive for. And, uh, let's, let's set something up and get together and, and, uh, and narrow it down a little bit more so all of us are on the same page with how we're headed forward.

I just want to emphasize also that this is a short term. We don't have a lot of time because the studio starts in August. Right, Tom?

That's right. The studio is in August. And then we can continue working with you all on the next scope of work in the spring. Or we can push to the summer. But it sounds like you're already working on procurement. So we're happy to move fast. And I'm happy to meet, yeah, like immediately following Fourth of July, I'm in town and I'm happy to meet you all. Great. All right.

So, Christina, let's set something up, OK? I'm gone the first week of August, but I'm here the rest of the time.

I think if there's no other questions, we could probably move to the next item. Tom, this was a great presentation. I'm really excited to work with you on this.

Thank you so much for coming. Thank you so much for your time. And yeah, Mayor and everyone, thank you for being here. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Thank you so much, Tom. Thank you. I'm kind of having bad reception. Moving forward to item 4B, discussion on sustainability and resilience standards for existing buildings.

Hi. Jeff's item, yeah.

Yes. So it kind of actually plays into some of the themes that we were just discussing, but kind of an all over big picture theme. And I totally agree, by the way, with everything that was just said. I think that we have to have an interdisciplinary approach to move forward and get better. things done whether it's you know collaborating with other you know task forces or you know also the committee obviously the city manager permits zoning there's so many elements engineers you know and architects landscaping there's so many elements to it that everyone needs to be on the same page and I also agree that bringing the community together through goals And maybe creating like an environmental education center, perhaps. I don't know if that was ever discussed, maybe in the community center to incorporate all of these things. I love when Tom brought up, you know, the art infrastructure that has gone on in other cities, as well as around the world, creating, you know, that infrastructure. the actually like showing the sponges, maybe a display, you know, showing the lights of the high tide. I love that. Giving examples of what pesticides do when they leak into Biscayne Bay. Tidal examples. I know in Boston, that's where I'm from. We always used to have examples of the tides and how that can affect the shoreline. So basically, kind of education of the community, I think would also really help. And then as Tom was saying, like incorporating the trash pickups into the community through the center and all of those things, I would be happy to help out with that and bring the community together. So on my discussion item, My discussion item is how North Bay Village can encourage or require older buildings to stay current with sustainability, energy efficiency, EV readiness, water conservation, stormwater protection, and resilience standards. So this could include exploring phased compliance, initiatives, education, grant opportunities, or requirements tied to major renovations, permits, recertifications, or redevelopment. So why this discussion is important is because many of North Bay Village's residential and commercial buildings were constructed before current sustainability and resilience practices became standard. So while new developments increasingly incorporate these elements, Um, existing buildings also play a critical role in reducing environmental impacts, protecting Biscayne Bay, supporting evolving transportation needs and strengthening the village's ability to adapt to climate related challenges. Um, so my question before the task force is how can North Bay Village support and encourage existing buildings to become more sustainable and resilient over time? And how do we relate that back to what the green infrastructure policy, the stormwater master plan, Biscayne Bay protection, waste and composting, sustainable procurement, EV infrastructure, and our potential approaches. So I'm just going to kind of open up the question and then I have some follow-up questions and kind of points that I think that we could relate back to.

So for existing buildings and new construction, I think this might fall into the bill SB 140, if I'm not mistaken, that we have to kind of be cognizant of. If somebody can remind me of that, that kind of could. You mean SB 180? SB 180. 180. 180.

We are not permitted at this time to impose new requirements on private property owners.

Okay.

But let me just, I think this is a really good discussion, Justin. I'm really glad you added it. So I don't know, and maybe Brenda, you can advise. I don't know if Miami-Dade is going to continue with the BE305 program. But in the past, North Bay Village has really gone above and beyond to do very targeted outreach to our commercial buildings and our multifamily, our older legacy buildings to encourage them to participate in the BE305 program, the Building Efficiency 305 program, basically shepherds, commercial buildings through like an information and training program, connecting them with resources to make them more energy efficient from a standpoint of water usage, electricity, all kinds of stuff. In fact, in the very first year of the BE305 program, North Bay Village had the highest percentage of participating buildings in that program. And once a building goes through BE305, they sort of have the resources and the points of contact to continue with the emissions reduction and the various sort of energy savings and all of those things. So that's one thing that we have done. And I would say, Brenda, I don't know, maybe you can weigh in on the BE305 initiative and whether or not it's gonna be continuing.

So, yes. Sorry, the lighting's bad. There we go. The trick is that with the dissolving of the Office of Resilience 15 months ago, most of the building functions have gone over to PIOD, which is the public infrastructure infrastructure. So, yes, these initiatives still exist, but under different people and also being very careful to not ever word it as carbon reduction. So always it's fine. It appears with all of what's happening at the state level to continue to work on all these great goals, just focusing on the money savings to people. So I think, yes, it's continuing it. And of course, the mayor, Mayor Levine Cobb and everyone else still feels it's very important. It's just to be very, very particular and careful with how it's presented to the public, if that helps. And then Julie Dick, you know, would be one at the county level if we ever wanted a little bit more insights. But because of the legalities of it all, there's the interest there. It's just the wording has to be very precise.

So this is something that they're still sort of tweaking and working on in terms of having it continue?

Yeah.

Okay. Can I ask, what are the incentives for that program for buildings to participate?

Reduction in costs. Okay. Yeah, it's a free program. And they are connected to county officials. So if you're an older condo building and maybe you need help with a permit or, you know, now you've got, you know, first name basis, cell phone type relationships with officials. And that's helpful too. But I think the primary incentive is to reduce the overall costs for association maintenance and that type of thing. Exactly.

Perfect. Brenda, did anyone from the old Office of Resilience get assigned to PIODs? Two or three people did.

Jason Grant, Ileana, what's Ileana's last name? I can't remember. And then Marta actually moved to Spain.

Yeah. Yeah.

So Marta, the Italian and her husband moved to Spain. I think they just felt it was a better opportunity for their children to grow up in Europe right now. So a couple of people did go to those two people did go.

Okay, so there is somewhat, they're not completely starting from scratch would be 305. Yeah, that department.

Yeah, they have continuity of those people that have known the programs from the past.

Have we spoken about doing an environmental education center before in the community center?

We have not, and I think it is a great idea that should be like discussed here at length and like just, yeah, I mean, that is something that we have the facility, we have so many incredible resources in this meeting and outside, absolutely.

Yeah, I feel like you, Miami, and they would do an excellent job of like implementing that and having like amazing kind of science museum like exhibits of showing these different things and how they're incorporating like into our environment. And also just kind of seeing and just the education of the past of Miami, the sponges and how... And oysters and how we had, you know, an influx of them. They were able to filter out the water and then what the current situation is and then, like, what our plan is to change that. So just kind of educating the public. But I'm glad that... I threw that out there.

I would actually say, you know, not forget about UM, but we can do this with the resources here in this Zoom, right? I mean, to me, at a minimum, it's like a mural on the wall on the third floor that's educational, right? And the ground floor space, we would need to be creative because it's mostly a cafe and locker rooms and bathrooms and a couple of offices, but there's certainly opportunities there for education. um and the second floor space is mostly for youth programming so that's a great opportunity um and the third floor as well as flex space so i i would love for this task force to brainstorm you know maybe if you guys want we can schedule a site visit so that we can all go to the community center together so that you guys can really soak in the space when it's not pouring rain and there aren't a thousand people there.

That would help.

Yeah, yeah. No, I mean, I would love I would love to do that. So if you guys and even if you guys want, we could do our next task force meeting at the community center, I believe we're going to have a TC Frank is probably killing himself right now. But I think we're going to have a TCO at the community center very, very, very shortly. So for our July meeting at the end of July, we may well be able to do an in person meeting at the community center.

I would love that. I think that's a great idea. I like that too.

And Frank likes it.

Frank, is that okay?

Frank likes it too. Listen, it's a community center. And all of these different ideas that are going to be coming to us for its use are back and forth and this and that and scheduling and all that. But listen, for having a meeting like this, it's very opportunistic. And it's great. I mean, it's a great venue. We need to use it. So I'm on board. I don't kill myself too often, so we're good.

I just want to say there is a lot of, there are a lot of opportunity for sustainability programming there. For instance, IFAS, they offer. Yeah, so IFAS, for example, the extension program with UF, they offer a lot of free courses and they have a lot of staff and that's just their job to go from city to city and offer courses to the community so we can establish some sort of programming with them to have them come to our center once a month or once a quarter. Yeah, lots of opportunity for artwork.

That would be amazing. Yeah, the IFAS extension is amazing. I had a client once a couple years ago who was certified in like everything that IFAS certifies in. She was a master gardener. She was Florida-friendly certified. I mean, she had the most beautiful garden in the front of her house of Florida native plants. um pollinators all day and she was just like she she was a retired woman who took advantage of all of this ifast extension education just you know and became became a teacher and i can see a lot of residents like wanting to take advantage of that type of stuff

Also the Pelican Harbor Seabird Station, it's a great space for them because they have like a little small room over there. And it'd be great once we have our facility to offer them to host their classes for their educational series they do sometimes or other groups like that.

That's a great idea, because I think a lot of people care if they saw if they understood that the impact that it's actually making on our community and on our environment. I think that they would in the plan that's moving forward to combat that. I think that they would care even more and really want to be part of making a difference and contributing to these programs. Yeah.

My recommendation would be for the task force to appoint like a sort of project manager on the task force for this. And for you guys to, I mean, probably just start with a Google doc of ideas and then we can modify and organize and format and have like an NBB SRTF, you know, sustainability education initiative. And we just sort of build that out. And, you know, when you guys are ready, we can present it to the commission, get the blessing from the commission, have the discussion at the commission level about various projects, ideas, classes, partners, and then that can make its way to the administration once the commission blesses it.

I would be happy to volunteer for that.

All in favor for Jessica to spearhead this?

Aye.

Aye. I think all of us are excited to hear this, so looking forward to it. I guess to kind of collaborate on this with the different ideas for the task force, We could submit. Yes, Frank.

I just want to sort of say a reminder that as all the boards, you're an advisory board to the commission. And if there's something of this sort that you would like to do, then I suggest that you make it in some form of a motion and you pass it and that it be forwarded to the commission for them to consider whether they want to make it a discussion item as they're doing with the last item on the solid waste. So that there's a, because it's a advisory board for the entire commission.

Yeah, I think that's consistent with what I recommended in terms of appointing a lead on the task force to sort of manage the project. And then the SRTF, you know, over the course of however many of the next meetings to sort of really drill down and put together what you'd like to see and then finalize a document and a motion to make recommendations to the commission.

Right. I didn't mean it to have to be tonight. I'm just saying that we want to go in that direction so that there's a continuity with the commission.

Yeah, absolutely.

Alrighty. So commission staff liaison updates.

Um, I, I think Christina, you, you've covered your update, right? Yeah. Roger, do you want to provide any additional updates?

Uh, nothing for me, madam mayor.

Okay. Um, well, There are a number of stormwater project related items on our commission agenda. The commission meeting for June is actually Monday, June 29th. scheduling for June and July was outrageously challenging, mostly on account of me and my travel schedule. But so Monday night, we have a couple of stormwater items basically moving the projects along. There are purchase orders and you know, scope things. We also got really good news. Christina was able to get an expanded scope. I think it was Christina. Maybe it was Roger, the two of you working in concert. But we have a $2 million project fund from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection that was previously limited to stormwater outfalls. But we have now expanded the scope of the type of work that can be done with this money. And so now it's Harbor Island stormwater. So that is a huge win for us to be able to use this money more flexibly. So Christina, Thanks, girl. Really excited about that. We also are going, like Christina mentioned, the green infrastructure policy is a discussion item on the commission agenda for Monday night. We also are going to hear Dave Dobler's presentation on pay as you throw. Also, Christina mentioned this. So if anyone on the task force wants to come to the commission meeting at six o'clock and weigh in during public comment, on any of these items, that would be extremely appreciated. I have a feeling that my personal political capital may be somewhat limited on Monday night. And so anything that you guys as residents and stakeholders can do to communicate your desires to the rest of the commission would be incredibly helpful. especially on the item where we are going out for a new RFQ for the Treasure Island Stormwater and Roads Project. Roger and I have been working on a new RFQ to streamline things. As you guys are aware, that is going to be on the agenda. So yeah, this is a strong push for me for you guys to come in and weigh in.

Is Monday hybrid or just in person?

We always do a hybrid.

Okay.

Always. And so that's the update for Monday's commission meeting. I will also just share that we are about to begin the real work from a legislative policy. The commission is about to begin its work on our budget. And this is not a specific to sustainability and resilience, but we are, going to have an extraordinarily challenging budget season. And the manager has done what the commission so far has asked, which is he's presenting a budget that keeps our taxes flat. That budget... necessarily cuts a lot of things. And so what we're going to be doing in our budget exercise is making really difficult choices. And so I would encourage everyone to pay attention to village communications and to budget meetings. I am going to do my best to be overly communicative about the choices that we are making. But this year is the first year in a very, very long time that we are going to have to make. Well, last year we had to make really hard choices, but it got even harder this year. So I just want you all to be aware of that. This is a public meeting. It is recorded. I'm hoping that people are paying attention. Budget season is going to be really, really challenging this year. And so I just want you all to be aware of that so that you can stay in the loop and be engaged.

Just a reminder, that meeting's the 25th as opposed to the commission meeting on the 29th. So the budget workshop's on the 25th. And that will be virtual or in person if somebody wants to come in person.

Yeah.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you, Manager. Does anybody have any questions or comments for them?

All right. Madam Chairperson, I know I just said that I didn't have anything, but there was something I'm driving and I just came to mind as an update. I'm not sure that Christina covered it, but it's something that came across my desk this morning that I'm actually happy to report to the task force. We just completed the installation of the last few stormwater inlet filters for phase 2. Um, on treasure Island. So we have the field work and the installation for that project is, is no officially complete safe for a single inlet where there's a car that's constantly parked over the inlet. So the vendor can't actually get in and scan it, put all the other, um, everything else has been done and installed.

Roger, let me know that location. We'll take care of that.

Yeah, we're already on it. Timmy has already gotten wind of what needs to happen. So as soon as that car is parked or we get in contact with the person who owns that vehicle, we're going to place cones around that spot. And then the vendors will come in and do the scan. So we're on top of it, Frank. Thanks. Good, good.

For the stormwater inlet filters, these are installation or de-installation?

They're installation. So each of the inlet filters are 3D scanned and custom made to fit the individual inlet.

Understood. Okay. Thank you. Moving on to public comments. No public comments. Everyone is good for potentially doing an in-person meeting at the community center on July 21st? Yes. Brenda, Oliver?

Yeah, I think so.

Yes, yes, yes. Very good. All right. Sounds good. Motion to adjourn.

I'll make the motion to adjourn at 8.02 p.m.

I second.

All righty, all in favor?

Aye.

Thank you all. Thank you, thank you.

Have a good night, everyone. Looking forward to seeing everyone in person. Likewise. Thank you all. Bye.