Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee - Regular Meeting

Meeting of the Beautification Advisory Committee to the city of Marco Island. I'd like to start with the call of order.

Member Sippi?

Here.

Member Corey? Here. Member Myers?

Here.

Member Sullivan?

Here.

But, share of needles?

Marv? Here.

Does she make it on by Zoom? I know she intended to, but she didn't know if the connection would work.

Yeah. Zoom is currently, unavailable. I believe I heard that IT is waiting for for parts. I don't know how that works, but yeah.

In in other words, no.

Yeah. No.

Okay. Thanks, Jose. You're welcome. Okay. Pledge of allegiance. Please stand. I

pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to

the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. We have approval of the agenda. Move to approve. I'll

second that.

Do have a second? Any comments? All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Opposed? Carried. Approve of the minutes?

I do have a correction. I don't know if other people do. And it's on the Leland Way swale planting. On the draft, it says we're hoping attempting to obtain bids under $5,000. It was actually a formal motion and a dollar amount not to exceed $4,000.

We're not hoping. This is what was approved. And motions, particularly when we're spending the people's money, need to be accurate for a record in the future. And to that event, I did email Jose with a proposed how the executive brief would read. And I did explicitly put that in there, and it did get changed. And I know this is a real learning curve for you, Jose. But if you ever have any questions, you can reach back out to the members or rewatch the video to get clarity. So I just like it to reflect accurately. Thank you.

I understand. Thank you.

So the motion is as presented to us?

So the motion that he wrote was we're trying to get bids under $5,000 but the actual motion is we're funding it not to exceed $4,000

I'm sorry. I thought you said that he had changed it.

He changed what I said. Yes. To to hope to get 5,000.

I got you.

Alright. The bid's under 5.

Okay.

And that was my only correction.

Okay. Would you like to make a motion to accept as revised?

I'll make that motion.

I'll second.

We have and second. Second. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Carried.

Who second?

I did. Nancy. Thank

you.

Yep. Sorry. We're informal, first name basis, if it's okay. After all, we're in a sunny Marco Island warm day.

Relatively. Back in the

seventies now.

Are we in seventies?

Okay. Old business. Joe, would you like to help us out there? In the Way's whale?

Actually, that's mine and Joe's. So some of the things on the agenda have the wrong person directed on some items, I believe. And some things are combined that shouldn't be. But we'll get better on that. So Joe did send me a single or two lines. So last time we approved the $4,000 up to $4,000 to be spent. And I sent a map to Joe. He asked for it so that the water department could take a look at it. And I got a brief email back saying, unfortunately, the water department has denied the request stating that the water main depth in the area will not support tree plantings. So I'm going to put a few things up on the overhead.

Okay. Can you get that up, Martin? All right. You see it. So this is the area we're wanting to sorry, Victoria Myers. This is the area we're wanting to plant on. And this right here, this section here, is Mackle Park. It's a continuation of this street. This swale is not the typical 15 to 20 feet deep. It's almost 40 feet deep, the whole length of where we were requesting planting.

Here's a photo of trees on the swale side of the sidewalk all along Mackle Park. They're very large. I think the next one you need to put up, Martin, if you can here. Does that show? Yeah. So those are some mature thank you. Gumbo limboes. So they were obviously planted. I don't think we so I guess I wanna hear a clear understanding of why. So I will be requesting a meeting with Joe, would that be with Justin or who?

It would be well, we probably should set it up with Justin and Jeff. Okay. Jeff. Yeah. Jeff Petit.

Okay. It's Jeff's Because

a a blanket statement, it doesn't support it. This is one

of the

widest swales we have on Markow Island. And let's see exactly where those pipes are, where the water mains or pipes are, and to see within those 40 feet if we can still be adequate distance away to plant. So they did send other options that were approved last year, other areas where we could plant. But this is a heavily needed area. It has a lot of pedestrian who walk from the Y down to Mackle Park. And it would be lovely to have some shade trees for them there. So I'm not saying we're not doing this yet. I think I want to investigate it further and get more clarification. And I hope I have your support for that.

To respond to you, I did I I got a copy of what Joe had sent to you, and I also I didn't object to it as much as, it was like a clarification because it is. I didn't actually go out and measure it, but I figured it's at least 40 feet or thereabouts wide, and there should be availability for not only the water main, but also trees. So I would like I would encourage that you're meeting with Jeff and Justin possibly.

And I'll potentially ask Stephen Gray to join me during that.

Okay. Alright. We can't be together on it. So Correct. I would volunteer otherwise.

I will report back.

Okay.

If you wanna meet separately with him, be my guest.

K.

The more he hears, the better.

K. For just a a little bit more information, they what they said was that there's a water main on the North Side of Leland Way. And on the South side, there's a well line in addition to sewer laterals and meter services. So there's no plantings available on that. That's what it was told or sent to me. Yes. We can still have the meeting though and just kinda, you know, and see where they're at.

But I assume those are there where the gumbo limbo are planted also.

Yes. So, yeah, I'll set something up and I'll let you know.

Thank you.

Okay. Alright. Tree planning map, that's all covered under it. Are you done with that, Victoria?

Yes. I think, hopefully, you all received copies of some other areas that were approved that if we need to be because Leland can't be and we have a budget year that we could pivot to, but they're not as important as Leland.

So they also said they sent this to me and said that this had been because you had sent me something back saying that you had already received this. They said that they had put a lot of work into this to find different locations so that you were able to make the planting. So this was not something that was just thrown together. They said that they had actually put a lot of research into this.

Yes. I think they did till last year.

We did use that map to plant the trees that we planted on Heathwood. So that that was what that map was initially for. I don't know.

Okay. Subject then? Okay. Calusa Park. Well, we do Joe, you wanna take that because Linda's not here?

To be honest with you, I don't have an update on that. I thought Linda was gonna do something with that.

I was working with the Parks and Rec Committee and hoping to align, I think it was nineteen thousand dollars worth. And we will need to wait till Linda's back on that one. But we do need to jump on it because planting season will be here before we know it.

Let's Jose, if we can put that on the agenda for next month. Item five Okay. Excuse me. Real quick.

So are we trying to combine, like, an Arbor Day celebration between the two committees? Or what was I'm sorry since I wasn't here last month.

Not necessarily. Okay. Okay. We do try to coordinate with the parks and rec because we have asked them if there's some areas that we can that they would recommend. But and this particular one was for Occlusive Park, and I'm not privy as to the details of it. Okay. K. Cauley County banners. Joe, would you like to take that?

So the banners were brought up the last time. That was the fact that some of the street banners are starting to, wear away, and they're fading. So the committee's last discussions on that were that you were going to you were talking about possibly fundraising ideas and repairing a portion of those. So that's where we left off with that.

Who do we go or do you go to? Do you handle it for getting cost for replacement or repairs? Or

I can absolutely work on getting cost if you give me an amount that you want me to do or you know, because I'm sure that it's gonna be different with the a larger amount as compared to if we're just gonna do five.

Right. Right. Well, I think I miss please correct me if I'm wrong. I got the impression that you felt they were all going south.

Justin said that. Yes. Oh, great. I have not laid eyes on all of

Somebody from staff said it.

Yes. Justin said that they were all in kind of bad shape, some worse than others.

Some are actually up. And then the Valentine ones now and the Car Show ones are up, too. I don't know we have the budget this year, though we could try to fundraise separately. I don't want to waste staff's time pricing things until we're maybe closer to fiscal next year because I'm not sure the funds will be there.

It it would be helpful when we do get into discussions to have some kind of a ballpark number, though. Agreed.

So I you know what I'll do? I'll reach out to him, and I'll get in, you know, different packages, like so you'll know how much it'll cost for, you know, this many, this many, and then all of them.

How many do we have total ID?

I don't remember the exact number. He had said that last time. For some reason, I think he said 57. I don't know. I it sounds like you were thinking there's more than that.

Because if if there's only 25 that are in immediate need and the others are maybe a year or two down the road, it would probably be more cost effective to do order 50 now. I mean, when we're ready to order. So maybe if you can get like a twenty, forty and sixty or something like that.

So next BAC meeting, I will have pricing for you as well as an exact count, and I'll have Justin see if he can break it down into how many absolutely have to be replaced as compared to what probably could go a little longer.

I have a related question. I noticed there's one near the chamber. I think it's near the Chamber of Commerce building or something in that stretch that the thing is flopped down, and it looks like one of the support rods is broken. So I don't know. Do they people check that? Or

I'm sure we can have them take a look at it and see if they can do I mean, the the road crews can make those repairs. Okay. So what was the location on that?

It's on the North Side Of Collier Boulevard. I think it's, between, maybe Walgreens and, Bald Eagle in that general area.

Martha knows right where it's at. She said she'll look at it, and we'll go from there. Okay.

Thank And

I was, at the last meeting, we talked about getting some history on it, and I had said I would get in touch with, Windsor Colombo from Calusa Garden. And she did say that the project graphics, there was a vendor that they worked with, and they had even some wildlife photos and a name of a photographer she could probably find. She also said that there was the city purchased them because I think our question last month was about, obviously, funding and, their own vendors. So there was no fundraising done the last time, if she recall as she recalls. So that was, she doesn't recall donations at all that were asked, for the public.

And that designer had appeared in front of beautification meetings and also these meetings possibly, to give information. So they could research more if we need to in the archives.

We could also look at the BAC funding that we get for next fiscal year because I know this year is already spoken for. But we could take a portion of that and do those replacements if if you wanna put that on in the future.

Yeah. It could be too if at the end of the as we kind of look at because we we thought we might have some extra funds. So if we know what the price of these is, maybe we could take some action to get them ready for next year or so.

Absolutely.

Okay. Thank you. Chair Needles. On Item 6B, there was Arbor Day update. I believe I attached some pictures of the Arbor Day that Corey sent me? Committee member. I

had sent a picture. I have a picture of last year's tree that we planted that I've been promising. And and then I also have pictures, which we can look at later, of all the historical markers just so everyone can see exactly what they look like. That'd be great.

Okay. Thank you.

Thanks, Jose.

Welcome.

Anything further on the banners? Okay. Moving on. Christmas tree Christmas lighting issue. I'll I'll start that off.

I talked to the vendor who is storing them and also who is, did the installation. And I asked him I said told him that we're, he was not aware that it was supposed to be every other post and but, you know, it wasn't, moved on from there. He indicated that, and I guess supported what I had suggested, that if we added about 40 more units, that it would take it with every other, it would take it all the way from Jolly Bridge to the Savage Bridge, which is kind of what we've kind of been targeting eventually. And he said, but he has no place for storage. He said he's has a lot of the units that are stored in his garage.

He had to build special shelving and things in order to protect them. So that becomes an issue. And so what we need to be looking at as a possibility is to find a, storage facility someplace. And I asked him, I said, if it's up, you know, on 41 someplace, would that be a problem with him? And he said, no.

That wouldn't. He'd be happy to do that. So, eventually, I'm gonna try and get a, maybe in the next meeting, have, some place for storage, and not commit or anything, but to at least find something that would accommodate. And I asked him how big of a unit he would need, and he kinda indicated one that would take probably a whole car, rather than just a place for, like, store carpentry tools or things like that. So that's kind of the update on that. If anybody has anything to add to that, then please do.

I I may have a solution for the storage. Okay. It's off the island, but it's off 41. So Okay. I'll get the details for next meeting.

Wonderful. I'd appreciate it. Anybody else?

Chair Needles, are you going to get pricing then for the extra 40 units? Or is do you is he gonna reach out to me?

Yeah. I I've got the I've got the contact for that. Wanted to find out kinda let everybody share, you know, what I've discovered so far, especially with the being the storage issue. The cost, I I talked to the guy that makes them, and he said that, that wouldn't be a problem getting them. He said, depending on when you want them, how many you want, and, he could give me a price. So I'll go I'll cancel that. It's okay. Good. Okay. Okay. New business. Marco in Bloom.

Happy update on that. I don't know if any of you saw it. There was a half page ad. Thank you very much. Coastal Breeze. Beautiful. Last year, I think we got a quarter page, but it's very well done. I divided the island up into five sections, and I created a nominating committee. We met and had a little kickoff luncheon at my house. It's a great committee.

I'm starting to get addresses and pictures and what category it might fall in, funneled into me, which I will then, in return, go and contact the property owners and see if they will be, in fact, willing to enter Marco and Bloom. I already have one that came in via email and another one that's gonna be sending it to me in the mail. So we're off and running. And it was announced at the last city council meeting, not the last, but the one on the January 20. Marv was there to discuss our entire board.

And then after that, I followed up with the announcement of Marco and Bloom. So all is going well, but I still encourage everyone to enter. And we have an exciting new category of just Florida Friendly, which is Florida native and Florida adaptable. And we already have a couple entries for that, so that's great. Any questions?

Okay. Do we know when we're gonna go out and judge or if that's

gonna different this year? Yes. The bat the entries are due by, I believe, March 10, if I remember our flyer. Let me pull that out right here. Yes. And so we were looking for the weekend maybe after that to actually do the judging. So if anybody wants to pull up their calendars, we can take a look at that. Alright. Let me look at my timeline when I was hoping that to be. Okay.

We were hoping judging of properties would occur between March. So let's see what we have here from everyone. The twelfth is a Thursday. Last time, we did it on weekend, which I think usually works pretty well. People don't have their medical appointments or meetings and requirements. Right? So Saturday, the fourteenth, Sunday, the fifteenth. Saturday is probably preferred. What kind of availability by show of hand do we have for Saturday, the fourteenth? I

I will make it available if that is best for everyone else. The Friday might be easier for me unless everyone else is busy on the Friday. But I can make the Saturday happen if it's

Okay. We don't know yet if Linda can. Hopefully, she can join. And then we're gonna have two experts from the Garden Club advising us. So March 14 is primary and thirteenth as a backup or possible. So if you would please pencil that in on your calendars, that'd be appreciated.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you.

Any other comments on it? Okay. Nature Night, Marco Nature Night, I'll give you an update on that. Should have the first part of it, I should there was a flyer I got from Shelley that her daughter had done in the past, and she gave me the, p PDF on that. And I've got somebody that can break that down and modify it.

It's gonna have the same look to it as it did before, which is a big, owl sitting on the front. It was very colorful and very eye catching. And I haven't printed it yet because I didn't have all the comment all commitments from the speakers on what they were going to be doing. I now have that. I just got that.

It was in my mailbox, yesterday. And so I now have that. And so it'll be ready probably the end of this week or the first of the week, and we'll start getting that distributed. I will get with Val at the Coastal Breeze and have her hopefully do another article. I'd like to have it a little bit closer to the the date, and we'll go from there.

To give you a breakdown, instead of four speakers as we had before and we're running out of time. Martin was very disappointed in me for not being able to keep it to two hours. This year, we're going to be starting at 05:30. We will take it It'll be roughly forty five minutes instead of an an hour for on the outside, for the exhibits. We have right now six committed.

There's two others that have indicated they might. So I should have those, possibly. I have three speakers. And instead of fifteen minutes and running over, we're giving them twenty minutes. I don't think Martin's here, is he? Okay. Well, we may run over a little bit with giving out for the the plants. We have 10 plants that have been donated or they're being going to be donated by Island Garden Center that I'll have certificates, and then we'll do the numbers thing as we did before. We'll just give people certificates. They can go over to the garden center, and they pick out out a plant on it's basically a three gallon.

And if they wanna buy six more, then that's up to them. But we're gonna begin and that's a donation by Chris over there. Anything else? Oh, and Marriott is again doing the food, the snacks. And, there will not be a, the band, we will not be doing that because that seems to hold things up. It's I think it's more about trying to get people here and educate them about what's going on here in the mother nature and from nature night.

The republic, would you give the date again?

It's March 5, I believe.

March 5.

Yeah. March 5. Yeah. Where

do we have flyers for for that? You will have getting them printed.

I will have those Okay. Shortly.

Okay. Where where would we be able to, like, pick up flyers? We have them available here somewhere? Or

Yeah. I will get with Jose and tell you where they where you can find some to pass them out.

Okay. Because I I was I was thinking about going to the high school, and I believe they still should have an environmental science class that they would I'm sure they would gleam a lot of very good information from maybe even they make them do an assignment on it. Who knows? Yeah. It'd be fun.

If you would like, once I have it, I could always send Yeah. Jose the PDF. Yeah. And he can send it out to everybody.

Yeah, please. That would be great.

You can I'll I'll get the PDF out and print out as many as you want. Okay. Any questions about Marco Nature Night?

I have one comment. Not about Nature Night, but you skipped seven a. It looks like chairs report, political sign, ordinance, and event sponsorship.

Great.

Were you looking at

the same maybe you gave I'm looking at the one that was printed and put up put

up Oh, okay. Well, I'm not I didn't get

That's actually Linda's, isn't it, versus you, or is it you, Marvin? Marv?

Says chair's report on it.

I'm I'm I'm I'm looking at the one that Jose sent out last week. So Okay. 7A.

This is ID26Dash5137. Yeah.

Sign ordinance and event sponsorship. Okay. I am I can't handle the political sign issue. Okay. Linda was gonna do that. Got it. But I will give you an update on the sponsorship. I plan. I didn't wanna approach Casey because she's inundated with being new to the job. And so I do have plans to meet with Casey hopefully next week and talk about event sponsorship or advertising, if you will, of any event, whether it be sponsoring or supporting a website or whatever the case may be, March or your event or any other event that the city wants to do.

Just try and get because when I met with the previous city manager, he said we we don't have a policy, but we should have a policy, and we could probably start get something kicked in for that. And also have concerns that that there's strict two hour window for, I guess, not only our meetings, but other meetings. And I'd like to be have some flexibility on that. Yeah. So I'm gonna ask Casey where that comes from. Maybe, Joe, you would know.

It was in place before I got here. I was told to make sure that you would hear to it. That's I'm I'm not sure.

Yeah. Okay.

From what I understood with my conversations with Martin, it's a technical limitation. I I I don't know if that's the case. I might be pulling that from nowhere, but that's what it sounded like in in

Well, I'm gonna find that out, obviously, Casey. And if it can be changed or at least expand it a little bit because I know Marco Nature Night, the last time, we went, two and a half hours. Yeah. And Martin was wanted to beat on me. And, unfortunately, I had to get try and stop a lady in the middle of it and then had her in tears. So I I don't wanna be in that position again either. So no.

Is there is there anything you need any of us to help you with for

Not at we would get I will get to that next meeting,

which is the day before. Before.

Yeah. Basically, be available. Okay.

What time do you want us to be here? Certainly, before starts. Just

I'm gonna give I will give a schedule to Jose, probably the week before Great. And then have him distribute it. Alright. K. K. Super. Okay. Okay. I'm gonna go back to the one the most recent one. Sorry. Alright. Thank you for bringing that that up, Brian. Okay. We've taken care of that. Staff communication?

The only thing that I had on the Calusa Park Butterfly Garden is is that I have not yet been contacted back by the or the committee to discuss the replant or replanting of any of the trees or plants that were damaged during the landscaping. So I just wanted everybody to be aware that we still have not heard back from them yet. And if any of you had, maybe you could let me know.

I have a few follow-up questions related to that. It's my understanding that park does not have irrigation. Is that true?

There's irrigation for the Butterfly Garden.

Okay. And it works?

Yes.

Okay. Good. That's that's a key thing.

Different thing. Technicolor.

And and because Victoria, the tree that we planted last year You watered. Did water, but Al from Affordable Landscaping made there was an irrigation line right there. So that helped also.

Very good. So how many watering trucks do we have right now? Is it did we get another one, a second one? Or is it just one?

No. We just have the one.

One that I'm aware of from public.

But one of the companies has their own, one of the subcontractors.

So no, that's correct. We have one of our own. Okay. So when we hopefully partner and do Mackle Park plantings, is there irrigation there? Or will we need an additional source?

From the from what I've seen from the locations that you have in the park area, we're probably going to be able to get coverage from the local irrigation that's in those areas.

Very good.

Joe, do you know anything or what the cost is with these water bags that they get planted in?

So we can look into it. It's still they're still labor intensive because the company still has to fill the bags. But, yeah, we can look into pricing on that for all of you.

I noticed the county on 41 after you turned to to go towards Naples off Collier Boulevard on the on the north side about, oh, I wanna say, maybe a quarter mile down after you pass the that big shopping center there. There are a whole series, think, maybe half a dozen that are all have those bags.

They do actually work. Well, I mean, at the health care system that I came from, and rather than run irrigation to some of those areas, we just put the water bags on them and the trees, you know, flourished with them.

How often do you have to fill them or do you know?

You know, the landscaping company did it for us, and we just got a price for it. I I don't recall.

Okay. It might be not that good to know that because there are some areas that we might wanna plan in and and, like, there is no irrigation or if there we if there's irrigation and a whole stretch of them, then there's a couple with like, on Leland, where they're they just have stone, we could put the water bags there. Yes.

Correct. And then we could also, as part of our bid, reach out to companies that have their own water truck and have that be part of the bid too. That's an option we need to keep in mind. And then one more thing on water and maintenance. When the new landscaping company came on, they did the right of ways along Collier and places like that. We stopped and had and told the residents they were responsible. I think that was reversed. I think I was at city council meeting. And but some people have asked me because they feel like I should be in a position to know, and I just wanna be clear. So the city's taken that on again. Is that correct?

To be honest with you, that'd be a question for Justin. I can find out and let you know. Okay.

Thank you.

Right of ways are still public works.

Okay. Bet we have city council communication. Yes. Anady, would you like to introduce yourself and

Good afternoon. Bonita Schwann, Mark Wyland, city councilor. Thank you for all that you do. I just wanted to bring up two items today. The first one is in regards to the beach access beautification grant. I did wanna let you know that the beach and coastal committee did appoint a member to work with Anne. And I did provide Dustin, who will be that representative for Beach and Coastal, all the drawings and the pictures that each of you received too. It is something that we do wanna continue to move forward on because that work would most likely have to be done on the off season summer months. So we'll look forward to Anne and Dustin making recommendations, then both of your committees coming back to look at that.

Thank you for the update because I get I've had two or three people ask me about that.

Yeah. And people are really excited about that, with the educational aspects and the the possibility of the murals and things too. The second thing, it is that time of year that all our advisory committees are, electing or reelecting chair and vice chair. So that would be something, and I know you're down membership right now, that maybe it could be on your next agenda also. Okay. Thank you for all you do.

I don't know whether we is there anything update on applications or people that we might see out there?

You know, actually, it will come who so councilor Gohler is will be reappointing, and her appointee has to come before city council for approval. We have not received that on our agenda yet, but I'm sure Councilor Gohler is working on that and that will be happening maybe at our next council meeting or shortly thereafter also.

Thank you.

And just to let Victoria know, yes, there was follow-up on that in regards to the reversal of the Collier County, the Collier Boulevard residents and businesses being responsible for that. Doctor. Lucius did address that issue too, and there's an actual document on that that you could reference to Victoria.

Great.

Thank you for all How

are doing? Yeah. Benita, I just wanted to let you all know, that I did reach out to, Amber. And I just sent her a note saying that maybe the representative might like to get on our agenda for next month or get to me before that, and I haven't heard back yet.

Okay. I'll follow-up with Dustin about it too, because I know he's really excited to work with you on it and with the whole committee to move this forward too. Thank you, Anne.

Thank you. Will they be coming back to our committee because we kind of gave them priorities?

I asked that's what I asked, if they would like to come and introduce themselves and speak. So I'm waiting to hear

on that. And, Anne, if you need another set of those plans and pictures that were so beautifully done, I have a set, and I'm happy to pass it along if you need another set Okay. Thank you. For someone on your

Right. And I'll speak to Dustin because possibly then you and Dustin could meet quite soon before that, and then one or both of you come to the committee in Beach and Coastal too and to solicit additional ideas or advice. So thank you, Anne, for working on that.

Thank you.

Yep. Thank you.

Okay. Deb? No? Just came to observe. Okay. We move into any public comment. We have a public.

There is no public comment at this time. But I did want to mention that we skipped, 7D on Walnut Tree's outreach.

There is no update on that at the moment.

I think that's a finished project.

Well, there are ongoing things. I'll just any anything, upcoming with that, I'll just do on, other committee communications because there's very, very little updates on those going out from here on. It'll be sent an article to the coastal breeze, and they posted it, which you probably have all seen already. So I haven't done that yet. That will be ongoing over the course of the next

So

yes, you can take that off going forward.

I have a technical question. I'm not sure the answer is. How far ahead of our meeting does the agenda have to be published?

Two days. The agenda has to be published at least two days before the Wednesday. Okay. But I I did I did get asked that to to to do it earlier if I can. So that's what I was trying to do.

Okay.

And I'm I'm make I'm trying to make sure that you guys are all prepared for it, and and I apologize for the couple of mistakes I made on the minutes.

Okay. I the only reason I asked that because I was going off of the one you sent me, and I hadn't seen this until just

Yes. Because I I forgot to send the latest one because I was I got an email from Corey at, like, the two days before. And I've I've just been juggling a lot of tasks in in there in my

Okay.

I really appreciate the draft, so we can kind of see what's there and what might be missing so we can reach out. So I appreciate that. And then you always publish forty eight hours ahead of time, and we can pull it off of there. It would be on the city website.

Okay. And

that was printed when we came in too.

Okay. Next meeting. I wanted to sorry, just show the pictures of the Sure.

We certainly have time.

Jose? Well Michael, I was gonna

pictures that we could look at from that I sent you?

Yeah. Martin would have them.

I think Martin

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

Michael, what I was gonna do is the extra time. Was gonna put at the end of Marco Nature Night, but now we can't do that. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. Okay.

Love legend here. Mike, if I knew you were handing it out to everybody, I would have asked if you wanted help.

Mike?

That's Mike.

Yeah. No. There's another Mike.

Oh. Oh, he is.

It's a common name. Oh, is Martin not here?

Is Martin not here?

Martin is not here. We have a a sub in there trying to

Got

it. Cool. Since

you're on TV, why don't you introduce yourself?

Mike Corey. What I handed you is just a synopsis that was in the synopsis that was in the the Chamber of Commerce book for 2025 that Benita had given us all a copy of previously. What's good in in the book the chamber book is it it gives you the exact address or how to get to each one. So you could, if you wanted, start at one end of the island and make your way through all the markers and end up in Goodland because that's marker 13. Though marker one is actually right outside here in front of City Hall.

So I just wanted you to see what they look like. Some of them are some you can tell are taken care of by their neighbors that live nearby. Others look a little sad. There's one by the country club. Okay.

Do we have them yet?

I see them on the

Do you have hard copies we can put on the overhead if he can't get them to come up?

He's got them, but we don't. He's got them on his yeah.

Yeah. Or he has it on his

Cast to TV.

If you want any additional hand back there, I do this for a living.

Right. This this unprotected?

No. I don't need that thing.

It's the photos of the I

need the photos of the

Yeah. All just look really close right here. Pull out our magnifying glasses.

Well, I get so it is included with the agenda. So Yes. It is. Okay. You can all look. Okay. We'll go back there

and look. Ryan's gonna Yeah.

I'll I'll

I'm just gonna see if I know the system at all because I do do this for a living.

So Expert. It's like a job, Ryan. Another job.

Another job. Yeah.

In the meantime, if any of us know somebody that might wanna fill the empty seat, we should reach out to probably Tamara McGollier.

I had heard that Rhonda I don't know her last name.

There we go.

There we go.

I had a few people reach out to me and I gave them the information on how to. So I'll follow-up with them. Okay.

Hello, Ray. Yeah.

We're here.

Okay. In under ten seconds.

Alright. Okay.

Oh, communication issue.

Yeah. He didn't know that

we wanted it up. Alright.

So these two are in Old Marco all the way at the end right by the water by the Marco River. Go to the next one.

So that's not the one at City Hall we're looking at?

No. I thought it was I It's just one. Was City Hall, but obviously not.

You also have a clicker that you can advance with if you want to.

Ah. Oh, well, let me go back. Wait.

Marker two and three.

23.

Alright. 23 are the ones in Old Marco. You can see the river right back there. So you have to go into the condo complex to see it. So you can park outside because it is gated, but you can walk to the water and find them.

Not a lot of vegetation around, but that's an area that floods. So it's anything we planted there in the past has died. This is along Bald Eagle, the Collier home site, and it's right outside another condo complex. And Rhonda, who we were just talking about, had previously come to a meeting and volunteered to keep it trimmed, and and she has whenever I've gone by, it it does look good. This one is right down 30 feet away, still on Bald Eagle.

This is where the Calusa cat was found.

Which is leaving soon.

That's correct. Here's the cemetery. And the sheet I gave you sort of give some details on the year that these sites originated or a time frame that they existed. The cemetery one, it's attached to this big rock here. So there is some landscaping around it, but nothing too much.

This is the saddest one. This is by the Island Country Club. There was a railway railway at one point here on the island, and this was the turnaround. So this whole circle here could use some love.

Is it actually a cul de sac, or is it on their property and just a round bed?

It's it'd it's a cul de sac. You go around. There's there's a house, and then to the left here, that's the the golf course.

We should encourage them to spruce this up and then win the call best cul de sac next year for Marco and Bloom.

That's a good

idea. Because it's worth doing.

This is the this one's up on Inlet, the old cemetery, the Calusa Cemetery or Katsamba Cemetery. It's right in front of someone's home. And once again, it's attached to this big rock. The front of the house, the yard is has a lot of vegetation, so there's not really much you can do Yeah. Here.

You should have seen it before hurricane Irma. Goodness. There was that thing was almost covered. It was you had to dig to actually even see the sign back then. So it is a little bit a bit better now. Visible. Yeah.

This one's right around the corner from the cemetery one, just on a side road off of Inlet. There had been some plantings there that died, so I just cleaned them up and left it bare now. This is the best taken care of marker. It's further down on Inlet and obviously the people whose house is behind here have done a lot of work to make it look very nice. I don't think a lot of people even notice it when they drive by that it's there, but it's nice.

This is on Indian Hill at the bottom of the the road, so that's the highest point at the top in Southwest Florida. This one's a little sad too, but there is some vegetation around that has survived. This one is on Barfield. There was a pineapple. I think this was the pineapple plantation.

Yes.

Yes. So this is by the old firehouse that's empty. Once again, we did it looks like we did plant some shrubs, and and some of them have died. There's a few that have survived. But the ground around there is not really good for for plantings.

It should have a pineapple plant.

That's that's an idea.

That was an idea.

And then this is the last one. It sort of looks like it's in the jungle. This is on the way to Goodland by the water tower. And there is a lot of vegetation flowers around it. It just sort of sits back. It it can easily get lost because of it's very overgrown. Mhmm. And it took me a while to find it, so it would probably be difficult for other people. Though now, I mean, I cleaned it up so that at least you can see it from the road right now. Cool.

So and then this is just this is our tree that we planted last year for Arbor Day, the bridal veil in Calusa Park with our sign finally, and it seems to be thriving.

Yes. Beautiful.

That's it. Michael Thank you. Goodland has a local it's not an HOA. It's just a volunteer group that they kind of monitor, like a civic association, if you will. And I'm wondering if maybe they would take on that that site down there by the water tower.

I'll look into that. I didn't because

they're they're very I I built a couple houses down there, and they were very particular. You know, it's gotta be like an old old village of fact and architectural style and things like that because they wanted to preserve what was down there. And maybe they would be willing to take and maintain that. Mhmm.

Okay. I'll look into that. Okay. Thanks.

Thank you for doing that. They all Oh, yeah.

Great job.

And bronze and gorgeous. You

wanna speak?

Yeah. Can I count the public

comment? Yes. Okay.

And did you fill out the sheet?

We'll let it go.

Michael, thank you for that and providing those pictures and going and do all that. It's greatly appreciated. Just last week

Excuse me. For the public, this is

Oh, Bonita Schwann, city councilor. Sorry. Thank you.

We have masses watching.

I know. I know.

Okay. So Bonita Schwann, city councilor. Just last week, I was approached by somebody who suggested we, add a marker, a fourteenth marker, and I didn't have an opportunity to work on it, and I haven't talked to the historical society or museum about it either. But since Michael brought this up, thank you, I thought I would bring it forward to you now. So we have in the historical museum, when you're in the lobby and and before you go into any of the galleries, there's a wall that says, did you know?

And it lists about eight different facts about Marco Island. And one of those facts is is that the US Air Force had its missile tracking station here. And so many people are intrigued by that, and it is one of those front did you know facts. So I was approached by someone that we have a marker in that regard. That location actually is Cape Marco is where it's at.

And as I said, I've not done anything on this, but we certainly would want the opinion of the Beautification Committee too. And I can do my work. I can talk to Pat Rutledge and others at the museum because I volunteer there every Tuesday about it too. But just want to make you aware of that there was some interest, by a resident. It is who brought it forward to me.

Are there any remnants at all that it was there?

You know, there really isn't. Not that I've seen, but I'll work with Cape Marco too, because I don't think there is, but it's just that's where the location was. But Victoria, I'll talk to Cape Marco too.

Being a little bit of history since I experienced a lot of it down here.

Forty six years, we understand.

Mhmm. Fifty six.

Fifty six. Sorry.

Deltona, that owned it, they totally when when they were through down here, they tore everything out. And so ironically, that was a trailer park that they had down there for workers. So it went from a trailer park to multimillion dollar condo. But, yeah, probably a good idea.

Yeah. I like I said, it was a residence idea. Just so you know, at its heyday at The US, Air Force Station there, there were over 300 people employed there. And we do have pictures of it, at the historical museum too. So even though I don't think we have any remnants of it, we do have some photos and things like that that the society could bring forth with their over 48,000, things in our collection. So so thank you for listening. Thanks for the ideas. And I'll talk to some people, and I can come back to you about that.

Super.

Thank you.

Thank you, Benito. Okay. Let's see. Where are we here? Think we're done.

I've got one thing, if I could approach the overhead. We had talked about alternative places to plant trees, and I went out and I had spoken about that place on San Marco right where the near the schools. I'll go show on the overhead where I'm talking about. Alright. So this is a panorama photo that I took.

This is Sandhill right in here and then this is the empty stretch without any trees. I believe yeah. Go this way. You can see this is right where you turn in to go to Tommy Barfield and there's a fairly decent empty stretch of road right here that has no trees. There's a shady lady right here. This is where kids are a lot of kids are walking after school

Yes.

From the school to the YMCA. And then here, me turn this. You can see more of an more of a bird's eye view. Here's that road where you go into Tommy Barfield, and then here's Sandhill for the YMCA. This stretch right here on San Marco, I think, would be a perfect spot.

Also, the power lines are on this side of the road, so we wouldn't have to worry about that. Now, unless the water lines are on that side of road, of course. But there used to be, I believe in this person's backyard, a bunch of really tall trees that provided a lot of shade, but they recently took those down. So that was the area that I was talking about. And if we could get a the water company to look at that, that would be phenomenal.

That's that stretch. I'm the name of this road is completely escaping me right now, but it's to get into to get into Tommy Barfield Yeah. To Sand Hill.

There there would be no irrigation in there because that's up against people's backyard

Right.

As opposed to swales in the front yard. So it would have to be something mean, if we're gonna do something like that, I'd almost encourage us to

Leave that up there, Zach.

Oh, okay. Yeah. Encourage us to actually see how we could really beautify that whole strip with some landscaping as well. Not as necessary landscaping, but some sod. And so it's not just a dirty, sandy looking thing.

Yeah. Because right now, I know that the before and after school, the cops are parking right there. So

It's very barren. So from the aerial, it looks like that home has a fence along the back, and then the the property continues beyond that. Right?

I believe so. I believe so.

Let me see. Took down trees.

I wonder

if they were damaged.

This, I

think, is a hedge. That's a hedge, it looks like.

Okay.

Yeah.

That It's it's green for me. So

that area has been like that for a while. But if you move south from there, there was a house that they took down a bunch of to open it up. And some of those people own own property behind them because that strip was subdivided. Somebody bought it from Deltona, subdivided it, and sold it to individuals.

Yeah.

The one farther up on the corner, I had a model center right just pat right across from the y. And the one on the corner, we we donated because we had a sign out there, landscape it and all, and then we gave it to the city.

So doesn't look big enough for a house there on that corner.

No. It's not big enough. It's not big enough for a house.

Is it privately owned?

Yes. It's privately owned by their house next door now.

I wonder if they wouldn't mind trees. I wonder if they wouldn't mind having trees put on.

I'm sure they wouldn't. Well, they don't. I'm sure they won't. Actually, they're thinking about selling their house, so it might be an enhancement.

Yeah. I'm

sure they would absolutely love trees. But, yeah, I think that should be the next spot especially if Leland isn't looking as good as it was. Mhmm. But I that's the one spot on the island that I pass every time I go. That needs trees.

It is an ice core.

Well traffic. Well trafficked and would be

High pedestrian.

Eyed, if you will.

Little children always lined up over there heading to the y. Mhmm. And they're standing there waiting for others to cross the street. It would be

Then also putting trees between the sidewalk and the road just enhances safety as well. So with having kids walking there, I think that would add an even greater reason to put them there. Not that I'm trying to convince anybody even,

but yeah. That's a great presentation to us. Thank you. Absolutely. Maybe we can get, if we can find out from, Waterworks, see if Jeff would see how that might develop.

So just kinda like we did the last time, can you send me, like, a overview with the areas you'd like to have? I'll send it to the water and sewer and the public works, let them review it, and then we can bring that back.

Got it. When I when I send that, do you want me to just that stretch right there with from the road into TBE to Sand Hill? Yeah. Okay. Cool. Just making sure.

From TBE. Oh. The

the road from TBE. Balfour. It's Balfour. Yeah.

From Balfour to Sand Hill. And

I used to drive down that road every single day, and I just don't remember what it's called. So Balfour.

Yep. Mhmm.

I know, in general, our larger water mains are on our main through roads. Hopefully, we're okay. But that that's a regular size swale there. So Mhmm. Fingers crossed.

Okay. Anybody have anything else? Okay. We're done. Meeting is

adjourned.