City Commission - Regular Meeting

It's the day. So, how do you got nothing?

This is yours, right?

Absolutely. Recording in progress.

You doing well? Yes, sir. Good. All right, good morning.

I want to welcome everyone to a beautiful morning here, April 14th, here in the city commission. We have a lot of business at hand, but we have a lot of things to be grateful for and to celebrate for. Uh I'd like to call uh Rabbi Stolick to come up here. This is one of my most favorite individuals on the planet. So, if you haven't met the rabbi yet, and by the way, I'm a Catholic, so I don't have the privilege to be part of his congregation, but I've become very close friends with this gentleman over the last few years. And the work and the and the the efforts that he puts forth, his entire family on behalf of the city of Coral Gables, we are truly blessed to have this gentleman in our community. So, I tell you after the meeting today or maybe in a break, get to know the rabbi. Uh, no matter what denomination you are, he's truly doing God's work for all of us. Rabbi, good morning. Thank you, my friend.

Good morning. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Almighty God, I invoke your blessing today upon the legislative leaders gathered here at the city commission as they prepare to resume their work on behalf of the citizens of this great city of Coral Gables. We ask your divine blessing for all their constituents wherever they may be. As we have recently celebrated the holiday of Passover, gathered here in a chamber of elected leadership, in our prayer, let us recall the preeminent leader, the biblical Moses, who led the Jews out of Egypt to the promised land. As the contemporary spiritual leader, the Rebi Rabbi Manaksher of righteous memory explained, Moses was not merely a leader who set guidelines and imparted knowledge to his people, but he also had the unique gift of being able to reveal every individual's inherent potential. Almighty God, please bestow the wisdom upon the elected leaders gathered here today to legislate laws that are not only just and compassionate, but ones that enable citizens of all ages, backgrounds, and cultures the ability to achieve their true potentials. Please give them the inspiration and humility to unite across all divides in the pursuit of a just, meaningful, and moral society, as was outlined in your seven universal laws that you gave Noah and his descendants after the great flood. One of which, the command to govern by just laws, is the purpose of their gathering today. May it be your will, God Almighty, that the tireless efforts of the commissioners in these directions be successful, empowering all

the individuals of this great city to be decent human beings, considerate of others, reverent of you, and ready to do their bit toward the ultimate goal of a perfect world in which your presence will be manifest. And let us say, amen. Amen. Amen. Rabbi, we'd like to extend our best wishes to you, your congregation, and worshippers on behalf of the city of Coral Gables. Thank you for being here. More importantly, above everything, thank you for your friendship and always being present for the city. Beautiful. We're really blessed to have the Jewish community and your congregation here with us. Thank you very much. Thank you. We look forward to you coming back soon.

Uh I'd like to now take a moment here and request Captain Matt Roofy to help us lead in the pledge of allegiance. Captain Mad Brophi is a longtime Coral Gables resident and former United States Army officer commissioned through the University of Arizona ROC in 1981. He served in Europe during the Cold War and later in special forces as a Green Beret with assignments in Panama and at Salvador where he earned a combat infantry badge. He continued his service in the Army Reserve attaining the rank of captain.

Please rise. 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.

Thank you, sir. Now we move on to the merit moment. Good morning. Good morning.

The Mer House Governing Board brings you the Merrick moment. Little tidbits that add up to a remarkable story. As I moaned about a 4-day iPhone transfer odyssey plagued by technical issues, I reflected on others who have endured much more hardship. Having lost her four-year-old daughter to dtheria in the winter of 1899, George's mother, Althia Finink Merrick, soldiered on, agreeing with her husband, Solomon, that purchasing a 150 acre homestead in what was then part of hard scrabble Coconut Grove was worth the risk. Solomon and George traveled here first so as to make their new dwelling ship shape for the rest of the family. Althia left her comfortable Ducksbury, Massachusetts home with four children in tow in January 1900. She had promised her father she wouldn't complain for five years. The 38 by uh the 38x 20 foot board and batten structure which you see in this photograph was a far cry from the home that they had left behind. It had no running water, no stove. Everything had to be cooked and cleaned out o in the back over an open fire. It was affectionately and accurately called the shack. Here are her reflections. When at last I saw the shack, just old boards unpainted with cracks where we could stick our thumbs. It was then I nearly fainted. But there we were, our bridges burned. There was no other way but just to all go to work. We knew that we must stay. So with shack well cleaned and cracks well closed and screens up to the doors, we hung the paintings on the

walls, the rugs upon the floors. Come for more of the story weekends at 1, 2, and 3:00. And this Sunday, uh that of course is at the Merrick House at 907 Coral Way. And this Sunday, enjoy croquet, poetry, flower arranging, demonstrations, and more at our uh petals and pastimes garden party event on the lawn from 1 to 4:00 p.m. The event is free. You heard that right, totally free. I hope to see you all uh this Sunday on the lawn at the Mer House. Thank you.

Thank you. Over the past year, as part of the centennial celebration, we've had the privilege of beginning our commission meetings with America moment. A thoughtful reminder of the vision, history, and people who shaped Coral Gables. What began as a centennial initiative became something more. Joanne and the dedicated volunteers of the Merrick House board have provided us with many inspiring moments recognized what it what recognizing that a centennial is not just a date, but a full year of reflection and appreciation and we're all better for that. As we mark one year of these meric moments, I want to offer my sincere and heartful thanks to Joanne and the entire board. Your commitment has been extraordinary. These moments have been consistently insightful, meaningful, and at times truly inspiring, depending, deepening our understanding of our city's rich history. As we now turn the page, our nation approaches a historic milestone, America's 250th anniversary. Beginning next month, we will carry this tradition forward with a new series of moments that celebrate the story of our great country, the ideals, the people, and the events that have shaped the greatest nation on earth. Just as the merry moment enriched our appreciation of Coral Gables, we hope these upcoming moments will expand our understanding of American history and remind us the values that unite us all. Thank you again, Joanne, and the merit house volunteers for leaving a lasting imprint on this commission and our community. We are truly blessed for you. Thank you so much. And I made a mistake, so I want to bring back our dear friend, Mr. Brophie, I missed a page in what I was reading. And I think we had need to do a little bit more justice to this gentleman's service, not only as a leader in this community, but also as a servant in the armed forces. So, if you indulge me, sorry about this. I apologize. I missed the page. And I should be wearing my glasses, but I'm not going to wear my glasses just yet. I'm still fighting it.

So, as I mentioned this morning, we're proud to welcome Captain Matt Broofphy, a longtime Coral Gables resident of more than 30 years, local business owner, and active member of the American Legion. Thank you for that hard work. Commissioned as a second lieutenant through the University of Arizona R2 ROC in 1981. He served in Europe during the Cold War in a Hawk missile battery, holding roles as tactical patrol officer, platoon leader, and executive officer. He later completed the infantry officer advance course and the John F. Kennedy Special Forces Qualification Course, earning the Green Beret. His military training includes airborne, ranger, Pathfinder, and Combat Diver qualifications. He served as a combat diver detachment commander in Panama and as an adviser in El Salvador, where he was awarded the combat infantry badge. He continued his service in the Army Reserve, achieving the rank of captain. Captain Brophrey, thank you for your service to our country, your continued involvement with our veteran community, and your many years as part of the of Coral Gables. At this time, I invite you to please come up and just say a few words. Talk a little bit about the amount of work, not only your leadership in the armed forces, but talk so people can understand the amount of work that you do in regards to philanthropy in this community. I think people need to understand a little bit about the Knights of Columbus. People need to understand how you continue to advocate on behalf of our veterans, especially disabled veterans. And more importantly of all, and I know it's you can't judge more than one other, but just your advocacy on behalf of Coral Gables is something that you do it very quietly, you know, you know, very elegantly, but you're always a voice of reason and support here in this community. Welcome to your city.

Thank you, mayor. Uh, one thing that's kind of interesting on the pledge of allegiance, I'm a past grand knight at the Knights of Columbus here in Coral Gables. We're the second oldest uh, council in Miami Dade County and we have a hall for 76 years in Coral Gables. And uh, in the mid 1950s, the pledge was modified by the Knights of Columbus to add under God in the pledge of allegiance. that was not part of the Pledge of Allegiance prior to 1954, 1955. A little tidbit, but I'm here really on behalf of the American Legion. Um we're doing a series of pledges uh for the 250th anniversary. Uh our hall is right around the corner here on Saledo. It's the original city hall and city administrative offices, uh over a hundred years old. And uh we do a lot for the veterans in our community. Um there are quite a few older veterans that served in World War II and Korea and even in Vietnam, including our past mayor, Mayor Don Slesnik, who I think did the pledge last month

as American Legion member and he was a gun commander in Vietnam. But uh uh the Legion and as well I'm a lifetime member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars. Uh we do a lot for disabled veterans. Um we've done a lot of we've done a lot of fundraisers at the Knights of Columbus for veterans. Uh especially Tunnel for Towers and what they do, the great work that they do. But thank you uh mayor for uh your proclamation for 100th anniversary for the American Legion. That was last year. uh very appreciative. It's proudly hung in our Legion Hall and I thank you

Mr. Brophrey. Thank you for your service to this community. And by the way, if you're not aware, the Legion, it's been revamped. The exterior has a new skin, new lighting, new windows. Those windows were donated uh by residents here in the city of Coral Gables. Uh and you're really taking it to the next level, not only on beautifification, but also really offering a home to res to to residents and non-residents who have served in this great country in the armed forces and sometimes feel that they've been forgotten. Uh but they're not forgotten here in the city of Coral Gables. We honor them. We're grateful for them and we're incredibly grateful for you, sir. Thank you for your service to our great comm. I thank the commission and the mayor. Thank you. Thank you, sir.

So, moving on to presentations and protocol documents. Item A1, landscape beautifification award presentation. Good morning. Good morning, mayor, vice mayor, members of the commission. Today I'm very honored to have the landscape beautifification advisory board president and members with me. Would you enjoy to join me an here who's currently the chair of the board

and I will let you say a few words about the mission of the board and then after that we're going to have an awards presentation where I'd like to invite any of the award winners that got a letter stating that you were one of the award winners please make yourself over and stand here and we'll give you your presentations after. Thank you. It's very exciting that we have winners with us today. The landscape beautifification advisory board. Uh our mission is to protect and enhance the distinctive landscape of Coral Gables through thoughtful design, sustainability, and preservation of its historic beauty. So, we uh work to honor people in the community who have contributed to the beauty of Coral Gables through their own landscape. England. We also work with Dena on ideas for things that the city can do to improve the beautifification of the town.

Thank you, Ann. And is there a presentation, Mr. Clerk, that you can pull up? There's a PowerPoint. Okay. So, here we have the landscape beautifification advisory board awards for 2025. This board works very hard throughout the whole year canvasing zones in the city. They're out there looking at residential gardens. Um they are taking photos from the street. If you ever see them out canvasing, that's what they're doing. Don't call the police. But they're they're taking pictures of the most lovely well-kept landscapes in the city. And then they convene at a board meeting during the year. They cast their votes and select one winner from each zone in the city. Since its incorporation in 1925, the city's lush tropical flora has been an integral part of the quality of life shared by Coral Gable's residents. Recognizing this, the city's landscape beautifification advisory board has had a long established tradition of acknowledging the efforts of residential property owners who add to the beauty of their neighborhoods through landscaping. Focusing mainly on botanical improvements, the board bestows awards of appreciation every year to the residential properties that contribute the most to the overall beauty of the area. submission criteria which they follow. I won't go through all this but the property has to be in Coral Gables. Um it it hasn't won an award in the past 5 years and it utilizes the most beautiful and sustainability sustainable um practices for gardening and landscaping. The city is divided up into seven zones

because we have seven board members that want to canvas each zone to um put together their nominations and they might nominate between three and five homes per zone and then they convene and vote and pick one and these are the award winners for this year. Zone one is 800 Catalonia Avenue. Zone 2 is a duplex building 3404 and 3406 Pon. Zone 3 is 45504 Alhhamra Circle. Zone four is 4900 Granada Boulevard and zone five is 6506 Leonardo. Zone 6, 600 and 620 are Vita Parkway and zone 71090 Snapper Creek Road. So, I want to thank the award winners. We have you here and we have plaques of appreciation to give out to you each and then after we'll I think get up and take a photo, right? Can we get them out real quickly?

Yeah, of course. Thank you very much. Congratulations.

Amber Circle, it's 45. Thank you. Congratulations. 4900 Granada Boulevard 6506 Leonardo, one of our board members. Just like to say Karolina is has been a board member for many years and um it was a big surprise to her when her house was nominated. She removed herself from the voting on that zone and she won. It's just great.

3406 y. Would any of the homeowners like to say a few words? Please, please come forward.

Good morning and thank you for the hard work. Mr. Mayor, uh, members of the commission, uh, I just want to speak because I'm not the one that should get this award. Is this gentleman? He He gets here at 5:30 every single morning, Monday through Friday, sometimes on the weekend, and he manages three others that are the ones that maintain this. So, I brought it with him and give him the award. His name is Raphael Garcia. Raphael Garcia. Mr. Garcia.

He was shy of just coming and he didn't want to speak. So just imagine. So anyone else would like to say a few words, please. Well, if you want, we we'll say some words very briefly. Thank you for your hard work. the reason why the city beautiful is a city beautiful is because of your hard work and your pride and always putting your best foot forward. Uh thank you for elevating the quality of life here in the city and we're incredibly thoughtful and we're very grateful to have you here uh with us as members of the community. Thank you for putting your best foot forward. Thank you. Let's take a photo.

That was nice photo. Thank you so much. Get in. Get in. Get in.

No, it's okay. Everyone look over here. beautiful.

So, we're going to skip item A2 for the moment while we wait for a few others to arrive. Uh we'll be moving on to item A3, a presentation or proclamation declaring April 15th as American Airlines Day in Coral Gables. Good morning and please our our members, our friends from from American Airlines, please join us. I love it. How are you, sir? Wonderful. Thank you. What a special what a special day. Can you hear me? Yes, sir. If I may read the proclamation to the record and the floor is yours.

Okay. American Islands proudly celebrates its 100th anniversary on April 15, 2026, marking a centure of connecting people, cultures, and economies through air travel and becoming one of the world's leading global airlines. And whereas for more than three decades, American Airlines has played a transformative role in the e economic and cultural vitality of South Florida through the establishment of its Miami Hub in 1989 at Miami International Airport, which today serves as the premier gateway between the United States, Latin America, and the Caribbean. And whereas from its Miami hub, American Airlines now operates at peak scheduled 430 flights to nearly 155 destinations in 46 countries, linking South Florida to cities across Latin America and the Caribbean, Europe, Mexico, Canada, and throughout the United States, strengthening Miami's role as a global crossroads for travel, trade, tourism, and international business. And whereas the city of Coral Gables, located approximately 10 milesi from Miami International Airport, has long embraced its identity as an international city, a vision first conceived by founder George Merik. And the connectivity provided by American Airlines continues to support that vision by enabling businesses, visitors, and residents to remain closely linked to global markets and cultures. And whereas American Lines employs more than 15,000 team members across South Florida, many of whom call Coral Gables home, who contributes significantly to the region's economic strength, workforce vitality, and community life. And there and whereas American Lines celebrates a century of aviation, leadership, innovation, and service. The city of Corables recognizes the airlines enduring impact on the growth and international stature of South Florida and looks forward to continuing our continued partnership and connectivity for decades ahead. Now therefore I Vince Lago as the mayor of city Coral Gables along with the members of the city commission do hereby proclaim April 15, 2026 as American Airlines Day in Coral Gables.

Well, thank you, mayor, and the and the commission at large. I want to My name is Kevin Mays, longtime Coral Gables residents. Um, and I'm here with Zulie as well. But I I got a uh some comments that I'd like to make on behalf of American Airlines. Thank you to the city of Coral Gables for this recognition as we celebrate our cent centennial tomorrow, 100 years of connecting the world. Coral Gables was envisioned as an international city, one defined by connection, culture, and commerce. The global reach of American Airlines helps bring that vision to life every day, supporting travel, trade, and commerce, and tourism that link the community to the world. Our impact is not only global, global, but local. As a region's largest private employer with more than 15,000 team members, we know that many of those connections begin right here at home. The city's proximity to Miami International makes Coral Gables a natural home for many of our employees and their families. For nearly 60 years, I'm a proud to call Coral Gables home. alongside many of my colleagues including our vice president JC Lisano, our former senior vice president and late um vice president Peter Delora who which called it home. We also have retirees who continue to contribute to the fabric of the city including individuals like Martha Pantene who now serve the city of Corables. We are proud to be part of this community. Proud to support the continued growth and success. Especially proud to be recognized here today by the city that reflects the same values of connection, opportunity, and forward thinking as we celebrate our 100th anniversary. We are honored to be recognized by the by the city beautiful and are proud to be Miami's hometown airline. Thank you.

Thank you. Good morning. Good morning.

Good morning. It is a pleasure to stand before you on this auspicious day. Um my name is Zulie Partardo. I have resided with my husband and four daughters in our city beautiful for over 45 years. I have also had the privilege of being a part of the American Airlines family for over three quarters of that time. Today I have been given the great honor of representing American Airlines as the city of Coral Gables proclaims April 15th American Airlines Day, commemorating its 100th anniversary. This proclamation is a testament to the long-standing fostered relationship our Miami hub, a cornerstone of the airline, has shared with the city of Coral Gables. American Airlines, I can safely say, looks forward to the next 100 years of mutual positive growth and commit and continued community engagement. As a proud member of the dedicated American Airlines Miami Hub team, past and present, happy centennial. Thank you.

Thank you. So, I'd like to I'd like to get up have the other American Airlines employees get up. But before we do that, so this gentleman here mentioned uh Peter Delora, a lifelong family friend, an amazing person who uh was truly a trends setter, a person who always advocated uh for this community and always set the heart very high, set the bar very high, excuse me. But Zullie doesn't fall too short. Zulie is an amazing Coral Gables resident who always always does what's in the best interest of the city. Uh there isn't a week that doesn't go by that I don't speak to Zulie about a city of Coral Gables issue. May maybe be philanthropy. It may be about beautifification. She's never ever talked to me about American Airlines. But one day, one day I ran into her at the airport early in the morning. I was catching a flight for work and she was completely startled. And I got to see the love affair that she has for American Airlines and the love affair that she has for this community and the way that she treats people. You know, she she's beloved by everyone who works at American Airlines, who works at MIA. Uh she does her job with immense amount of pride, which is the same way that she does everything here in the city of Coral Gable. So, Zullie, we love you. We're grateful. Uh, American Alliance has an amazing amazing not employee but partner uh in you uh because you're always doing what's in the best interest not only of the city but of your of your employer. So I want to thank you for being here. Thank you sir. Uh let's take a photo together all of us to the proclamation. Thank you.

I'm gonna come right here so you can get it. Congratulations. Yeah.

All right. We're going to do one more before we come back to A2. And this is a personal favorite of mine. Item A4, presentation or proclamation declaring April 17th, 2026 as Briada 25006 day in Coral Gables. I ask our friends from Labria to please join us while I read the proclamation. Mr. Montavo, thank you for being here with us. It's truly a pleasure. Gracias. Whereas on April 17th, 1961, a group of 1,414 Cuban exiles known as Briada 25506, the Brigade 25506 landed at the Bay of Pigs in a courageous effort to liberate their homeland from a communist regime. Whereas these brave men repres representing all walks of life answered the call to defend freedom and democracy fully aware of the risk involved and demonstrated extraordinary valor in the face of overwhelming odds. And whereas the mission was carried out without the promised air support contributing to its failure and resulting in the loss of life and the capture of many members of Ariada 25506 who endured imprisonment under the inhumane conditions and suffered physical and psychological hardship for nearly two years. And whereas despite these hardships, the veterans of Labria 256 have remained steadfast in their commitment to the cause of freedom continue their advocacy for for a free Cuba while building meaningful lives and contributing to their communities, including here in Coral Gables. And whereas today, 65 years later, approximately 200 veterans remain and their legacy is being carried forward by future generations who are committed to

preserving their story and ensuring that the lessons of history are not forgotten. And whereas the establishment of a new state-of-the-art Bay of Pigs Museum in Miami's Little Havana will serve as a lasting tribute to the sacrifice and errorism of Labria Ventino, preserving artifacts, oral histories, and the brigade's flag. and educating future generations on the enduring values of freedom and democracy. Now, therefore, I Vince Lago as mayor of the city of Coral Gables, on behalf of the city commission, do hereby proclaim April 17, 2026 as veterans of the Bay of Pigs Day in Coral Gables.

Mr. Montavo, the floor is yours. Thank you. I am deaf so I I heard some of what you said.

I am Rafael Montalman, the president of the Veterans Association. And on behalf of the brigade, we are honored by this recognition and this award. 65 years ago, I was an 18year-old rifleman with a second battalion. And uh that is a an action that we will never forget and that this country should never forget. And 65 years later, we're now in the 15th round of this fight which has not ended and which we hope we end very soon. And we're still active. The new museum that we're doing is going to be an educational vehicle to show the world what happens when you fail fighting communism. And and it's a vivid uh example. On the one hand, you have a country that is destroyed. On the other hand, you have those of us that came here. I came to this fantastic city. I've lived here for 45 years in Coral Gables. and we have formed a life, raised families in in a free country and and the difference is is amazing. So the recognition here is that at that difference and and the significance of the failure and and we thank you Mr. Montabo, you're a patriot, okay, on many fronts. You embody everything that is good with this country. You came to this great country like my father came to this country alone. My father was Pedro Pang. Um, and dedicated yourself to this country above everything, even above your own family. You have built multi-million dollar businesses, had hundreds of employees,

sold those businesses, been incredibly successful, but you have never forgotten who you are. You're an American at heart. You're a Cuban American. The work that you have done with the museum is to be commended. If you don't know, I highly recommend that you contact us. I think it's on the 22nd, correct? It it will it will be open in in in in May. In May, but there's a public coming. It's it's going to be open, but but we have a lot of commitments with with veterans and families and so on. So, on May 1st, and it's worthwhile. It's a new technology. It's audio visual. It's it's and and the the message it's it's even for kids, it's going to be engaging.

So, you have you have raised millions of dollars for this new museum. Yeah, the museum is finished. Uh we'll be cutting the ribbon and I won't be cutting the ribbon. They will be cutting the ribbon. Uh I will just be there with my father and my brother who's here today. Uh which is truly a privilege. My brother doesn't come. I don't think he's ever been to a commission meeting in 13 years. It's the first time he comes to a commission meeting, but he's here for another matter. Um on that point, the reason why I bring up my brothers because my brother did all the pro bono legal work pro bono on behalf of La Vriada Ventino Cos. Um, our family, our family has a deep respect for Cubanameans.

For your family. Without your family, we haven't been a we wouldn't have been able to do the museum. Like your brother was instrumental in changing the city of Miami's view about the Sony. So that that effort and the effort of my father and my grandfather is a testament to the work that you've done. Yeah.

The work that many Cubans have done who donated to this great cause. So, we want to honor you. We want to thank you for your hard work. We will be there uh the day that we cut the ribbon. It is my privilege to be there along with my family and other members of the commission who I imagine will be attending that day. This is a very special moment not only for the city of Corables but for the entire community to honor a group of men who would have given up their life and some of them did for democracy, for freedom, to truly protect our way of life. And if it wasn't for individuals like yourself, many of you, many of us, many of us would not be here today. So, on the cusp of a major change, God willing, uh, via the leadership of, uh, Mark Marco Rubio, our vice president, and our president, God willing, in the near future, we'll have a free Cuba. We'll have a free Cuba. And people like my grandfather, who will never see it, of the brigade, of the whole brigade. There's still 200 of us alive. So, thank you very much.

Thank you. If you get a chance, please make sure you go to the museum. U make sure you go to the museum. And I want to thank Leslie Panting and Martha Panting who helped us out put this together today. Um, if you get a chance, please go visit the museum. I went to the old museum. I haven't seen the new one yet. I'm looking forward to the ribbon cutting. It's an amazing experience. It will it will it will motivate you and it will and it will showcase and it will remind you if for some reason you've forgotten the fragility of our democracy. I I would like to take this opportunity to thank you and thank Coral Gables because I've been able to live here all these years to raise three kids, 10 grandkids, and one and a half great grandkids and and this this city has been amazing.

Yeah.

So, and I also want to thank Mayor Suarez, who's no longer the mayor of the city of Miami, but he also played a very integral part in making sure that this uh this museum uh was a reality. Thank you for your hard work on this. Let's take a photo. Come on. Come on.

All right. Now, we're going back to item A2. Uh, Leslie Pantene gave me a hard time for jumping over item A2 and Carlos Mgoya, but I think Mr. Megya would appreciate the fact that the Bria went first. Item A2, a presentation proclamation declaring April 14, 2026 as Carlos Megoya Day and Coral Gables. Mr. Mgoya join us. So this is a point of personal privilege to me. Please join us. I'd like to read the proclamation on the record. Whereas Carlos Agoya has dedicated nearly 15 years of distinguished service as president and chief executive officer of Jackson Health Systems, Miami Day County's only public health system and one of the largest safety net hospital networks in the United States. And whereas upon assuming leadership of Jackson Health Systems in May 2011, Mr. Magoya confronted an institution in severe financial distress, facing the very real prospect of hospital closures and the loss of essential healthc care services for the residents of Miami Day County and through bold and principled stewardship reversed the trajectory of massive annual losses to deliver the system's first financial surplus since 20 2006. A standard of fiscal responsibility that has been maintained without interruption throughout his tenure. And whereas Mr. Magoya led a historic and transformative $2 billion capital investment campaign anchored by the Jackson Miracle Building Bond Program approved in November 2013 by 65% of Miami Day County voters which funded the renovation, modernization, and expansion of Jackson's facilities across the entire county, ensuring that

every resident, regardless of zip code or economic circumstances, has access to worldclass medical care. And whereas throughout his tenure, Mr. Mgoya championed the principle that excellence in patient care and financial stability, sustainability are not competing ideals, but complimentary pillars of a thriving public health system, transforming Jackson into a model of operational performance while eva elevating clinical quality, patient safety, and community trust. And whereas prior to his service at Jackson Health Systems, Mr. Megoya brought more than four decades of leadership in the banking industry and served as city manager of Miami during a period of significant fiscal challenge to say it mildly demonstrating a lifelong commitment to public service and the communities of South Florida. And whereas Mr. Megoya has generous generously contributed his time and talent and his own wallet to the broader civic life of our region serving on the boards of the United Way of Miami Day County, the Florida Chamber of Commerce, Miami Day College, and the Beacon Council among others, and has been a steadfast champion of education, economic opportunity, and the quality of life for all who call South Florida home. And whereas on the occasion of his retirement, the city of Coral Gables wishes to honor Carlos Agoya's extraordinary legacy, his courage in crisis, his vision for growth, and his abiding compassion for the patient, families, and communities Jackson serves, and to express the enduring gratitude of this community for all that he has given in the service of others. Now therefore, I Vince Lago as mayor of the city of Coral Gables on behalf of the city commission to hereby proclaim April 14th, 2026 as Carlos Megoya Day in Coral Gables.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, commissioners. Um, as you were talking, I remembered, um, with your leadership and Peter's first round here as city manager, uh, we worked together on building an urgent care center, which is actually the busiest urgent care center we have at Jackson and North Gables on Galliano on 8th Street and soon we'll have even further expansion of the city of Corable. So, we're very, very proud of our relationship with with the city at Jackson. Um I remember also the first time that I was involved with the city was when we bought Corg Gable was federal in u January 1st 1996. Um so it's been a long time a lot of partnerships. Uh thank you very much for this honor. um as you just honored um the the people from the reg 256 and reminded me that shortly after that my parents came uh with me from Cuba and that's how we were able to get out of the country and we had no reason we had to leave the country because otherwise my father would have gone to jail during that period of time. So, um, this city, this community has done a lot for us Cubanameans, um, and for a lot of, um, a lot of foreign residents that have moved here and made Miami their home. And, um, and I'm just proud to be able to give back to this community. I think we all we all owe owe a lot to the community and thank you for your service because I think that's what you're all doing here. So, I really appreciate it and thank you for this recognition.

Thank you. Uh, So after reading the proclamation, I was giving it some thought and I was working with with my team and and Martha Batine talking a little bit about my relationship with you, my personal relationship with you. And I put down a few words that I think really encapsulate how much you mean to me and how much you mean to my family. So, it's an an opportunity that comes around very rarely to celebrate an extraordinary leader, a dedicated public servant, and someone who I'm proud to call a mentor and a friend, Carlos Mgoya. Carlos, you your impact on Jackson Health and on this community cannot be overstated. You stepped into one of the most challenging roles in public health care and transformed it with vision, discipline, and with your heart. Because of your leadership, you transformed a system that was losing hundreds of millions of dollars a year. into a system that generates over $3 billion a year. You made the difficult and at times unpopular decisions necessary, always putting the hospital and patient care first. A lot of the decisions that I make here in the city of Coral Gables are sometimes unpopular. I've learned from you that we have to do the right thing and we have to always stand by our convictions. No matter the pressure that people are putting on you, the unions, the special interest groups, you led by example. What makes that impact even more remarkable is experience is the experience you brought with you. Before Jackson, you built an impressive career in both public service and the private sector. You have a reputation as someone who can take on complex challenges, restore stability, and deliver immense results. That same steady leadership is

exactly what brought that what brought you to Jackson when it was needed most. But today, I want to speak not just about the CEO, but about the person who is Carlos Mgoya. To me, you've been a mentor in the truest sense of the word. You've led not only with intelligence and experience, but with humility and integrity. You've always made time to share your perspective, to offer guidance, and to remind those around you that leadership is ultimately about service to people, to community, and to something greater than ourselves. You never said no. When I called you and I said I needed to have dinner two weeks ago, the only question you asked me is when. when we needed to go to lunch to bounce ideas to come up with opportunities to see how we can work together or when I needed your advice whether it's in my personal or my private capacity or my public capacity you always said yes you never said no and you never forgot to return my call I've learned a great deal from you resiliency accountability and about staying grounded those lessons have stayed with me and I know I'm not alone in that legacy is not one that you've built. It's in the people you've influenced, the leaders you've shaped, and the lives you've made better. Just look around the community leaders who are here today to honor you. I also want to mention my brother who's here. My brother had the privilege of being assistant chief of staff for Mayor Suarez when he finished law school. He worked for him for two years and I think hopefully maybe you'll share that story how you called the mayor and said, "I'm moving on to Jackson from city manager. I want to bring some talented people to help me write the ship. You chose my brother. You gave him an opportunity. He worked with you for two years and then he moved on to work at a major law firm where he's been there for before my tenure as an elected official. You gave

him an amazing opportunity to shine. You held him. You held his feet to the fire. You pushed him. You made him a better man. You made him a better lawyer. You made him a better leader. These is this is your legacy. This is what you leave after you retire. even though we know you're not retiring. On behalf of our entire community, thank you for your service, your leadership, and your friendship. Congratulations on a remarkable career that's just getting started. And best wishes in your next chapter. So, thanks to your lovely wife and many of your friends, I've asked people to come. Uh, some couldn't make it, some sent videos. Uh, so I'd like to invite them just to say a few words on your behalf if you would indulge me. I know you don't like the limelight, but we're going to do it anyways. Mr. Clerk, can we roll one of the videos?

If cable TV could put up a video.

Mayor, commissioners, members of the Corables community. Good morning. Apologize for not being able to be there in person, but I am honored to truly recognize a great leader and a great friend, Carlos McGoy. Carl's career has been remarkable not just for its length but also for its impact and his deep love and commitment to this community. See, I had the privilege of working with Carlos for over 20 years. He was a mentor, a role model, and at times a very effective source of pressure. Carlos's leadership style had what we affectionately called a tough love component. We always said it was time to worry when Carlos wasn't picking on you. The truth is many of the people serving in leadership roles across this city today are there because Carlos took the time to push them, to challenge them, and to believe in them. His impact continues through the people he developed. One thing about Carlos is you always knew that once he committed to something, he was all in. Whether it was banking, city management, or running one of the largest public hospitals in the country, and even cycling. When Carlos decided he was going to become a cyclist, it really didn't take long before he was training like Lance Armstrong Jr., minus the scandals, but with the same level of intensity, trust me. And when he transitioned from banking to healthcare, I had absolutely no doubt he would succeed. Not because of his technical knowledge, but because his common sense, his work ethic, his understanding of the key metrics, and his ability to create real followership. And those are qualities that translate anywhere. One of my favorite stories comes from during almost every hurricane season. See, a lot of people don't know that while everybody was watching the forecast, Carlos actually became the weatherman. He predicted landfall, he predicted the cone because success meant

to all of us at that moment in time under his leadership, it meant being the last bank to close and the first bank to reopen because clients depended on us. but truly because Carlos was incredibly competitive and he wanted to beat every other bank in town in every possible way. So that's really Carlos in a nutshell. He's hardworking, smart, aggressive, competitive, but always always with a great sense of humor. Carlos, our community is better because of you. Thank you for your leadership. Thank you for your friendship. And thank you for your unwavering commitment. Now that you're retiring, enjoy the slower pace. Though, knowing you, you're probably going to treat retirement the same way you treated cycling. Full speed, no coasting, and leaving the rest of us trying to keep up. Wishing you all the very best, my friend. Good luck.

Mr. Clerk, will we call up some of the guests who are here? have I don't have any more to speak. Mayor Suarez.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. It's uh I thought the days of me speaking in these kinds of forums were over, but I you look very relaxed, by the way. I like I like the look. This is the new me, right?

Yeah, of course. Uh, I can see that there's a common theme among Carlos's mentees. They have great hair. So, I think maybe there's something, you know, psychological about that subconscious. But, uh, I I'll echo some of your your sentiments and and what George said. He was, uh, actually he worked for me in a sense because I was a commissioner when he was the city manager. And although he worked for me, he was my mentor as well and remained my mentor throughout my career. uh he taught me some very valuable lessons. Uh two of them uh have stuck with me throughout my career. One of them is to do significant things you have to have courage. Um we had to make some very very difficult decisions the first year that Carlos was our manager and it took tremendous courage for us to make those decisions and they ultimately benefited the city for uh for decades. The second thing is the most important currency in public service is credibility. Once you establish credibility, um there's a lot of things that you can accomplish because once people believe in you, believe that you're telling them the truth, you can uh get things done and they'll rely on you to give them good advice. Uh we always had a lot of fun. So that was the third thing that I learned from him which is you can do good and have an enjoyable time at the same time. Um he took the job seriously but he never took himself too seriously which I think is also uh an important lesson. And um I if I can tell uh a story or two that I think are reflective of who he is and maybe embarrass him a little bit. One of them is we were um making some very difficult decisions with our employees and we had to make some dramatic cuts which he always understood that debits equal credits and I think that was one of his superpowers. Uh sometimes in government we don't realize that to balance a budget debits have to equal credits sort of from his banking days

and uh you know he would come to work every single day very early. he would leave very very late and we're making some tough choices to make some significant cuts. But I I I told him, you know, Carlos, you don't need to come to work in the Ferrari, you know, when when we're doing these things. And uh and and and so I think after the first or second time that he would come to work in the Ferrari, I think he understood that uh maybe it wasn't such a good good look. How much how much are you paying him for to be a match? Oh, I I apparently he claims he never got his dollar, so I I I brought the dollar here. I'll take your dollar for his uh I'll take your dollar. There you go. So his salary was $1. He did the job for free.

He had just uh I guess retired again from I think it was Wakovia at the time. I have a hard time keeping track of all the iterations of First Union, Wakovia, Fargo. I think it was Wakovia where he was a regional president. He was the the president or CEO of First Union before that. But uh I remember the first conversation I had with a then member of the public health trust about Carlos being the CEO and it's something that I very much advocated for given his success as our city manager. He said, "Well, you know, he doesn't have any hospital experience." I said, "Well, he didn't have any government experience before he came to city hall and in one year balanced our budget and turned around a financial crisis. We're literally on the verge of bankruptcy." and as he did with Jackson, he took a a an institution that was so critical to our the framework of our our society, our county, and saved it. And so, again, to your point and to George's point, you know, we've maintained this incredible friendship. He's someone that I can call on for advice, someone who I admire, um someone who has demonstrated a deep level of integrity, uh and courage. It's not easy to pass a $2 billion budget. I'm sorry, a $2 billion bond voter approved. That shows how much credibility he had in this community. But I think it's even harder to execute on that. And I think what he did was not just make a promise to the public that the pro that the public believed in, but he delivered on that promise. And this community is better as a result. So, I'm honored that you invited me here. I'm honored to be here and share some of these stories about someone who I think the world of. And I thank you all for your indulgence and for the time that you've given. If you would, if you would indulge me, I want to ask you just because I think just for posterity purposes, can you provide us your first encounter when you worked with Mr. Magoya?

Yes. And I think you were in college. I think this is another testament to who he is. I was applying to be a teller at First Union Bank, which I ultimately became. And I got interviewed by the CEO of the bank and uh he hired me and that was one of my first jobs in college as a teller for First Union Bank. And then later on in life, of course, we hired him to be our city manager. So I think there's a couple of lessons. The lesson, the first lesson is you never know when your employee becomes your boss. So you better treat them well. And the second lesson in life was clearly he had an eye for talent. So thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh is could we have uh Stuart Miller?

Will you join us for a moment? Mr. Miller, please come up here. This is a true privilege to have Mr. Miller here. If you're not aware who Steuart Miller is, uh, again, an incredible member of the community, has had an endless uh, an endless thirst for giving back uh, to not only the University of Miami, but to countless amount of charities, and we're blessed to have you here. Thank you for everything you do for our community, my friend. Thank you. Proud to be here, Mr. Mayor. I didn't know I had a speaking part.

I have to take advantage that you're here, my friend. You don't come to commission me. It's like my brother and Francis. You guys never come, so I got to take advantage that you're here. So, mayor and commissioners, thank you for your service and uh thank you for honoring what I think is critical in our community. I was here as you honored the beautifification initiative in Coral Gables. And Coral Gables is just truly a magnificent city, but it's because you take the time to honor beautifification and what it means to bright uh to shining a bright light on on things that really matter. Um, at the same time, you're here honoring another beautifification. And um, I I'm I'm first going to add a little levity and say unfortunately I can't credit Carlos with uh, mentoring me on anything except learning how to drink here in the city of Coral Gables and

fine wine

and Yes. So, but but the important thing is the why and um and the why is that Carlos felt that bringing our community together was critically important. uh he knew of my commitment at the University of Miami, another citizen of Coral Gables, um and especially the health system, and he felt that the partnership that was in disarray uh between the University of Miami and Jackson needed to be brought together and strengthened to better our community, to elevate our community. Um and we spent a tremendous amount of time uh getting together to think about how we bridge the divide that had that had taken place. And um and over years over years we spent a lot of time strengthening a partnership as a piece of a puzzle to make Jackson strong to make Jackson the critical element of our community that we need it to be. Um, and so I think about the beautifification of landscape and I also think about the beautifification of an inner core. Um, and an inner core and its beauty is critical to making community come together. So the partnership between the University of Miami right here in Coral Gables and Jackson serving our broader community brings together community to create a beautifification that you honor here today in such an incredible way. Um, and I thank all of you for recognizing the absolutely tremendous work that Carlos has given has done for our community. And he's done it with that quiet dignity that is a shining beacon for all of us to reflect upon because he doesn't seek recognition. He doesn't like recognition, but he rejoices in the

ability to bring great things to community. So, congratulations on today's uh proclamation to the city and congratulations to Carlos Magguya, my friend, my compatriate. And I know that you've claimed retirement, but we're not going to let that happen. If anybody else would like to say a few words on behalf of Mr. McGoya, now's the moment. All right. If not, um, I'd like to also honor Mr. Magoya with something that I've only done about a dozen times over the last five years since I've been mayor, and I to honor him with a key to the city of Coral Gables. This is something that this is a this is an honor that is reserved for individuals who have truly dedicated themselves and have distinguished themselves and have tr truly done things that have only benefited not only the city of Coral, but this community. you and I worked on for a few years to bring to bring the urgent care center that's on a street and now it's a great uh part of the city beautiful uh thank you for bringing that a lot of people in this community have their lives have been saved uh they've also been able to reach great care as a result of your leadership and thank you that you everything that you've done along with Steuart Miller uh to bring M and Jackson closer I know that Mr. K was supposed to be here with us today, but uh he couldn't make it. Um but thank you for really strengthening that bond because that bond, you know, people don't really realize what Jackson does for people in this community except for when there's a disaster. Except for when you're in a traumatic situation, except for when a loved one calls you and says, "Hey, they're on the way to Jackson to the trauma center." And then you realize what M surgeons do with Jackson's knowhow. uh that partnership as a son of a doctor uh is something that we're blessed to have and we truly take for granted because nobody's thinking about

that moment that's a tragic moment in their life when until it happens until they're face to face with that. So I want to thank you for uh both of you. Carlos, thank you along with the mayor. I know you've worked very hard uh to really strengthen Jackson. Uh even though it says University of Miami, it's in the city of Coral Gables. It's in the city of Coral Gables. But we can both take credit for the University of Miami. It's downtown,

a little bit in downtown is also city Miami, too. So, I understand that. But, as a result of the three of you, uh, over the last few years, we've really worked hard together uh, in making Jackson University of Miami and our communities u a place where everybody wants to live. And that's a result of your hard work. Carlos, thank you. And if I may, I'll be honored to give this to you. Let's do a picture. Yeah, of course. Jack All right, let's get together.

Mayor That's already nice to see you. Sorry.

Yes.

Before we move on, we're going to take a five minute break, bathroom break, and we'll move on to item A5. Thank you.

And we're back. If I could have everyone please sit down so we can continue with the meeting. I didn't know. Madam Vice Mayor,

everything good. Thank you. I could probably I could I could probably move things around. Let's see. Mr. Mayor, we have a I just want to try to get to the presentations and protocols, which is a lot. We got some. All right, Mr. Clerk. Item A5.

If I could have everyone's attention, please. Okay, I got If I could have everyone's attention, please. If I could have everyone's attention, please. Thank you very much. We have a very long agenda today and I want to keep moving. I know we have a lot of people here waiting. Item A5, a presentation or proclamation declaring April 24th, 2026 as Arbor Day in Coral Gables. Madam Vice Mayor, thank you.

It's a wonderful day to celebrate Arbor Day here. We have everybody dressed in flowers and colorful things. Um I don't have the the colorful things on but I do have a little tree. So I thought it would be appropriate for today. So with a great um city that we have that is a tree city USA and I'll proceed to read the proclamation. Whereas Arbor Day was first observed with the planting of more than 1 million trees in Nebraska City, Nebraska on April 10th, 1872. An idea that was first proposed to the Nebraska Board of Agric Agriculture by J. Sterling Morton. This event later evolved into a holiday that is celebrated and sponsored annually since 1985 by the city of Coral Gables in conjunction with the city's landscape beautifification advisory board and the Coral Gables Garden Club as a reminder of the significance of our city trees. And whereas trees provide countless benefits to our community, including environmental, public health, social, and economic benefits by improving our air quality, providing us with shade, enhancing our parks and public spaces, filtering and reducing storm water runoff into our waterways, providing a natural habitat to our neighborhood wildlife, while simultaneously increasing property values, and enhancing the vitality of the city's business areas while beautifying our community and business areas alike. And whereas Coral Gable's founder, George Merrick, recognized and emphasized the importance of the natural beauty of this tropical landscape and consequently hired landscape architect Frank Button, designer of Lincoln Park in Chicago to design the grand vistas and treeline streets that still convey the quality of century old permanence. And whereas in 2026 marks the hundth and one anniversary of

the founding of the city of Coral Gables, as well as 41st year as Tree City USA, accentuating the city's commitment and involvement of our citizenry, board members, and employees alike in furtherance of conserving our city's picturesque landscape. Now therefore, I Vince Slago as mayor of Coral Gables along with the members of our city commission dear hereby proclaim April 24th, 2026 is Arbor Day in Coral Gables. So, uh before I before I hand it over to to the board members, I just want to thank you all for all the hard work that you do and making our city better and prettier. Um, I know you worked hard on Builtmore Way and later this year we'll be cutting a ribbon to celebrate the planting of the trees on Builtmore Way finally. It's taken decades of perseverance to do that. And we have Arbor Day coming up in which we're going to uh plant some more pine trees in Fuel Park. So um with that, no further ado, I'll hand it over to you to Carrie Ford. Thank you very much and we look forward to seeing you all all of you who want to come to Arbor Day at Fuel Park a week from Friday at 9 9:30 uh where we will do the planting and celebrate another wonderful park in Coral Gables. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Like we said before and I will never get tired of saying it, thank you for everything you do for the city. you. Not only do you make this city beautiful, but you truly truly truly personify and really push us to the next level. So, I can't thank you enough. You mean a lot to the city and uh we're beyond grateful for your hard work and I know you do it for the love of the city, but if it wasn't for your hard work, I think we would fall a few notches. So, thank you so much for your hard work and especially to our director. She's amazing. I say it all the time and I will never get tired of saying it. She does an amazing job along with her team who's here in the back. Can you please stand to be recognized, please? Don't be shy. Don't be shy.

They make it happen.

When you drive around the city and you see all those beautiful flowers, something that we've worked on, Dina, for a few years now, we wanted to have more flowersing. You know, I know it costs more money. It costs more maintenance. It costs more time. But if it wasn't for these three individuals and all the individuals in the back, um the city would not look even close. It takes vision and it takes implementation. And if I may, if I may, do me a favor. When you're out there in public, I do this all the time, you can ask them. When you go out there and you see these gentlemen out there working hard in the sun, sweating, you know, removing the dead trees, cleaning up, planting, go up and say thank you to them. Say hi to them. Uh these are the individuals again that are at the forefront of really beautifying this city and keeping our standards at the level that they are. Everybody plays a role, but if it wasn't for these individuals, you know, they take that they take that extra step. They remove that little weed. They pick up that extra piece of garbage. They move that extra rock. They add that little bit of mulch. You know, they call code enforcement. They call public works. Hey, there's a curb that's broken. They go the extra mile. And that extra mile is what continues to keep our standard the way it is. So, I want to thank you. Thank you. And I tell you all the time that I see you, thank you for your hard work in the city. We love you guys. Thank you.

Through the mayor. Yes, sir. Briefly, I also echo what the mayor says. Good morning everybody. Um we're very proud of all that you do. You make the city, you put the beautiful in the city beautiful

and we really uh appreciate it and it doesn't go unnoticed. And to that end, in addition to recognizing these gentlemen and these ladies that work so hard and you see them out in the streets um because it's uh it's not set it and forget it, you know, it's uh plant it and nurture it and it's an ongoing uh operation all the time. I've personally taken it upon myself to walk the city often and when I see something beautiful like a bed of flowers or a beautiful tree or landscaping that just looks picture perfect, I'll take a picture and then I'll put it out on my own personal social media. You did it yesterday. I did. On one on one of the uh on one of the fountains.

I did. Very good, Mayor. That's true. And I You saw it as well. And see, this is my point, right? So, we all live here and we're so very proud of being residents and we're honored and privileged to do so. Take a picture, send it out to your social media crew, and you'll see that it'll come back tenfold. How people will feel better because you took the time to reflect and share something beautiful and it's infectious and then people will do so as well. And what better marketing and what better pride to show in our city than doing something as simple as that. So, make that a suggestion that you can maybe take to heart. I think it's a lot of fun, too. So, thank you for all that you all do. Thank you.

Take a photo. Yes. Congratulations. That's who I am.

Moving on to item A6, presentation or proclamation declaring April 2026 as Parkinson's awareness month in Coral Gables.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Parkinson's is something that has uh touched our family. Um my for those who don't know my father-in-law uh died due to consequences from Parkinson's disease. Uh he was a um sergeant in the police city of Miami police department and unfortunately he had to retire at the age of 52 because of early onset Parkinson's and uh he passed away about eight years ago uh due to consequences from the disease. So it's touched our family in particular. Let me read this proclamation. Whereas Parkinson's disease is a chronic progressive neurological disease and is the second most common neurodeenerative disease in the United States. And whereas Parkinson's disease is estimated to affect approximately 1 million people in the United States and the prevalence will rise to 1.2 million by 2030. And whereas Parkinson's disease is the fastest growing neurodeenerative disease with 90,000 new people diagnosed each year in the United States. Whereas Parkinson's disease is the 13th leading cause of death in the United States according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And whereas it is estimated that the economic burden of Parkinson's disease is at least 52 billion dollars annually, including direct and indirect costs such as treatment, social security payments, and lost income. And whereas the symptoms of Parkinson's disease vary from person to person and can include tremors, slow slowness of movement and rigidity, difficulty with balance, swallowing, chewing and speaking, cognitive impairment and dementia, mood disorders and a variety of other non-motor symptoms. And whereas the fastest growing subset of Parkinson's disease diagnosis

uh diagnosis is in people under the age of 50 known as young or early onset Parkinson's disease. And whereas research shows that a combination of genetic and environmental factors such as exposure to pesticides like parakquot and certain metals are tied to Parkinson's disease. But more research is needed to uncover the exact cause and progression of the disease. And whereas there is no objective test or biioarker for Parkinson's disease and there is no cure or drug to slow or halt the progression of the disease. Whereas volunteers, researchers, care partners, and medical professionals are working to improve the quality of life of persons living with Parkinson's disease and their families. And whereas increased research, education, and community support services such as those provided by the Parkinson's Foundation, and other organizations are needed to find more effective treatments, provide access to quality care to those living with the disease today, and advance efforts towards a cure. Now therefore, we the city commission of Coral Gables do hereby proclaim April 2026 as Parkinson's awareness month in Coral Gables.

Thank you for being here. Thank you very much. Good morning.

Good morning. Thank you. Miss Camila Gadala Maria. I'm here on behalf of the Parkinson's Foundation with my colleague Sophia as well. We want to thank you for this recognition. The Parkinson's Foundation makes life better for people living with Parkinson's disease by improving care and advancing research toward a cure. In everything we do, we build on the energy, experience, and passion of our global Parkinson's community. Since 1957, the Parkinson's Foundation has invested more than 513 million in Parkinson's research and clinical care. We thank you for this recognition for Parkinson's awareness month to the city of Coral Gables. Thank you very much. Thank you very much uh for your hard work uh for the organization for really um doing a lot of outreach and education. I'll be honest with you, I wasn't very educated in Parkinson's until my my own family was afflicted. My mother uh has Parkinson's along with she was recently uh diagnosed last month with dementia. Um, again, I've also seen uh with other members in my family that have Parkinson's a very a different type of Parkinson's, not exactly Parkinson's. Um, but this is a a very tough disease, especially not only with a person who's afflicted, but also with a family. So, I want to thank not only for the research and the investment that you're doing, but also for I was looking up your organization. you spent a lot of time uh truly investing in in families and awareness and helping families meet the needs of the individual who's afflicted with Parkinson's. So, uh thank you so much uh for all your hard work. I know it's a labor of love and it's not something easy and you don't get many accolades, but hopefully today not only we bringing awareness, but we're also saying thank you uh in gratitude for your hard work. So, thank you so much.

Thank you very much. And I just want to share as well, we do have a helpline. I think that's something very unique for a foundation where anyone living with Parkinson's family members um can call and get the care that they need in both English and Spanish. So I want to thank you again for your recognition for Parkinson's awareness month. Thank you. Let's take a photo.

Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Moving on to item A7, a presentation or proclamation declaring April 2026 as Landscape Architecture Month in Coral Gables. Welcome back.

I'm back. Dina Bell. It's the third time. Third time and not last.

I know. I'm Dina Bell, assistant public works director for the city. I'm also a licensed landscape architect. I'm very proud of this profession. Um, landscape architecture month is um the celebration of the founder of landscape architecture which is Frederick Law Olmstead's birthday. And if you know who he is, he was the landscape architect who designed Central Park in New York. and he's very famous for the Garden City um movement in landscape architecture and civic design which is what Coral Gables is patterned after. I have my colleague here from the American Society of Landscape Architects. She's the local chapter representative and I'm going to let her introduce herself and where she works and what she does.

Thank you, Dina.

Thank you and thank you to the mayor and the city commissioners. My name is Min Suburvy. I'm a landscape architecture professional for Revena Hamil here in Cor Gables and I'm also the Miami session chair for the ASLA American Society of Landscape Architects. ASLA missions is to advance landscape architecture through advocacy, education and community engagement, promoting the design of healthy, resilient and beautiful places. Working here in Coragavos, I truly appreciate the city's commitment to the public real tree canopy and overall urban design and excellence that we all see throughout the city. So, thank you again for supporting landscape the landscape architecture month and it is an honor to contribute to a community that values a total design. Yeah,

perfect. Well, Mr. Mayor, yep. I think this is the time maybe to read the proclamation. I don't know. Yeah, there is aation. I I tried to just rename it the Dina Bell proclamation. Dale, I think that might be more appropriate.

I was confused the third time we come up. You know, you're forgiven. Uh whereas landscape architecture is a multifaceted profession that encompasses the analysis, design, planning, management and stewardship of the natural and built environment playing a crucial role in shaping the spaces where people live, work and play. And whereas landscape architects design and create community master plans, walkable neighborhoods, multimodal transportation networks, green storm water systems, and accessible spaces such as public plazas, schools, residential common areas, playgrounds, and trails that lead to active lifestyles and healthy communities. And whereas landscape architects as licensed professionals have a responsibility to protect public health, safety, and welfare through the thoughtful design, analysis, management, and stewardship of the natural and built environments in the city of Coral Gables, contributing to the overall well-being of its residents. And whereas landscape architects have consistently demonstrated their commitment to public health, safety, and welfare by designing accessible and safe public spaces, promoting active lifestyles, and fostering resilient and sustainable outdoor environments. And whereas landscape architects play an integral role in shaping the economic, social, and cultural fabric of the city, beautiful, contributing to the creation of vibrant and livable communities that enhance the quality of life for all residents. And whereas landscape architects play a vital role in shaping healthy, equitable, safe, and resilient public and private outdoor spaces, contributing to the overall well-being of citizens. Now therefore, I Vince Lago as mayor of the city of Coral Gables and on behalf of the city commission do here come here hereby uh proclaim April 2026 as landscape architectural month in Coral Gables.

All right, let's take a photo.

Round three. We'll get Oh, goodness to you.

Moving on to A8 presentation proclamation declaring June 21st, 2026 to June 27, 2026 as Ocean Pollution Week in Coral Gables.

Good morning. Whereas the city of Coral Gables is home to a diverse marine ecosystems which provide resources, recreational opportunities and ecological services to our community. And whereas our oceans and waterways face significant challenges including pollution, habitat, over fishing and the impacts of climate change which threaten the health and sustainability of marine ecosystems worldwide. And whereas recognizing the importance of raising awareness and taking action to address these challenges, the community organi organization ocean precious stop ocean pollution founded by vishnavi renam in 2020 has organized ocean pollution awareness week in coral gables, Florida. Whereas, ocean pollution awareness week aims to educate our citizens about the importance of ocean conservation, promote sustainability practices to protect marine environments, and inspire collective action to safeguard the health and beauty of our oceans for future generations to come. Now therefore, I, Vince Lago, as mayor of city of Coral Gables, along with the members of this commission, do hereby proclaim June 21st, 2026 through June 27, 2026 as Ocean Pollution Awareness Week in Coral Gables.

Good morning. Thank you for being with us.

Thank you. Thank you so much for having me today. My name is Vice Renham and I'm the founder of Ocean Precious, an environmental nonprofit organization I started in 2020. Over the past six years, I've worked towards recycling over 500,000 pounds of plastic waste and educating more than 500 students across the nation. Now, as a freshman at the University of Miami, it's truly an honor to expand Ocean Precious here in Coral Gables, which I'm proud to call my new home. Through Ocean Pollution Awareness Week, I hope to bring our community together to take action and address the growing challenges of ocean pollution. Thank you again to the mayor, the vice mayor, and commission for this opportunity, and thank you so much for approving this proclamation.

Thank you. Thank you for being here with us. We're very grateful for your hard work uh and for a city that has an immense coastline that depends on that coastline not only for uh you know the amount of it's over 100 million people that visit the state of Florida every single year in regards to tourism and a lot of them come here obviously for our beautiful oceans and our beaches but also the tax base is critically important because there's some of the most expensive most most incredibly costly highest property values are on the water. Uh and why is that? because the water's clean, the water's beautiful, everybody wants to live on the water. Everybody aspires to live on the water. So, if you don't, if you're not protecting your oceans and you're not, you know, protecting your bodies of water, uh, property values are going to go down

at the end of the day. So, it's a win-win, not only for the environment, but also for us financially. So, I want to thank you for your advocacy and your hard work on behalf of the oceans and, uh, for the environment. Thank you. Thank you to the mayor.

Yes, ma'am. So, um, at 3:00 today, we're going to have our presentation on some of the recycling efforts and some of the green, uh, projects that the city works on. So, um, watch it later on. And I think the synergy between what the city's doing and some other organizations are going to do, are doing is very, very powerful. University of Miami is a great leader in our community with many of the things that that we can do together. So, I look forward to working with you in the future. Thank you. And keep coming back to the mayor's office, the commission's office. Uh we look forward to continued collaboration. Let's take a photo.

Thank you. Moving on to item A9. Congratulations to Lieutenant Christian Garcia, recipient of the City Corable Firefighter of the Month Award for the month of March 2026. Chief, good morning.

Good morning, everybody. It's always uh a great honor to celebrate the great work that the men and women do in the Coral Gables Fire Department. Today, I want to highlight an individual that is a firefighter of the month. This individual I would consider a go-to guy. If you need joy, you go to him. If you need a remedy for a situation, you go to him. If you need a SWAT paramedic, you go to him. If you need uh someone to climb up and do a technical rescue uh scenario, you go to him. And that is Lieutenant Christian Garcia. Today, I want to specifically highlight his efforts that he has played in mentoring uh new firefighters as well as ensuring that all of our technical rescue uh members are trained to the highest degree. So, today we congratulate Lieutenant Christian Garcia for firefighter of the month.

Thank you, Chief. Appreciate it. Uh just wanted to say um extremely humbled and honored to be up here today and grateful. Um we take a lot of pride in the technical rescue team for this department and this city. It has been a long time coming for a lot of us. It's been many years waiting for this moment and it's a it's a dream come true. It really is. But it it wouldn't be possible without the support from you and the city. We thank you very much and our command staff and the fire department. So from everybody on TRT, we're very thankful for that and your support and your continued support for the future. But like any any real leader in the world, it's not about me. It's not about me being up here talking. It's about the guys that I serve along with each and every day. Um I get to the station every morning. I have a cup of coffee. I sit down at the kitchen table. I look left. I look right. I look in front of me and I see some of the most hungriest, most motivated firefighters I've ever been around. And because of them, they inspire me to want to be the best leader, motivator, instructor for them. So I do that by going outside the fire department, being an instructor outside of here. I go take classes. I always stay up to speed on the current practices and I bring it back to the firehouse because in order to maintain that, you always have to be a student of the craft, a student of the profession for your whole career. I've been on almost 18 years now, and I'll never stop learning. And um I I wear this uniform, this patch on my shirt, this badge on my chest. I wear with a lot of pride every single day when I get up to work. Um I love it very much. I love the people I work with. Um again, this is our life. This is not just a 9-5 or a check-in, checkout kind of career. This is this this this job is this is our life. This is what we do, what we dedicate ourselves to every day. And um extremely blessed, especially when it comes to technical rescue. The smallest details matter. Whether it's, you know, checking a rope system that you're going down

over or making sure a car is stabilized correctly, everything matters and the and the repetitions matter a lot. So all that, you know, makes us have to work hard to ultimately not only be a one of the best fire departments in this country, but to ultimately serve the citizens at the highest standard. And um I think the future looks really bright in this fire department. and for Coral Gables TRT and I'm just happy to be a part of it. Thank you all very much and have a beautiful day. Thank you,

Chief. Let's do uh A10. Also, congratulations to driver engineer Ryan Verdesia, recipient of the city coral gables firefighter of the month award for the month of April 2026. Thank you.

Wanted to celebrate and recognize Ryan Verdesacia as our firefighter of the month. This individual uh is one that took part in our recent uh SWAT paramedic training. This training was conducted in conjunction with Bart Sheriff's Office. Uh he not only completed the program, but he completed as number one and the class leader. So today we want to celebrate the amazing work that he did and not just completing but leading the way and showing that Coral Gables Fire Department continues to thrive uh throughout our region. Congratulations.

Thank you. Have a little speech. Nice. I like that you're prepared. I like it.

Uh good morning. Uh I want to start saying thank you to the department, to the leadership, and to this community. Wait, scroll down. Uh for this recognition, being named firefighter of the month is something I truly I'm truly honored to receive, and it's not something I take lightly. I really appreciate the commanding staff for giving me the opportunity to represent Coral Gables Fire Department. This recognition comes from completing BSO SWAT school, which was one of the most physically and mentally demanding challenges I've ever faced. It pushed me past my limits, tested my discipline, and forced me to stay focused under pressure. There are moments where quitting would have been the easier option. But that's not why we do this job. Everything we do in this profession comes down to one thing. Showing up when people need us on their worst days. Whether it's fire suppression, rescue, or supporting law enforcement in high-risisk situations. The standard has to stay high. There's no room for shortcuts. I didn't get through this training alone. This recognition may have my name on it, but it reflects the people behind me. My crew, my department, and those who continue to push me to improve every day. And most importantly, my wife. To my wife, thank you for your patience, your strength, and your constant support. While I was focused on training, you were at home holding everything together and taking care of our two boys who are six and three. Uh you you cared more than you're sure without hesitation. and you believed in me or in the days when I came home exhausted, stressed, and you pushed me to my limit. I wouldn't be standing here without you. At the end of the day, this is about responsibility. I'm committed to continue training, to improve, and to serve this community at the highest level possible. Not for recognition, but because that's what the badge demands. Thank you again for this honor. I truly appreciate it.

Let's take a photo. Congratulations. Thank you. Hello.

Rose. Moving on to item A1. Congratulations to Officer Alexandra Vega, recipient of City Coral Gable's Officer of the Month Award for the month of February 2026. Chief, good morning.

Morning, mayor, commissioners, Mr. Manager, Madam City Attorney, Mr. Clerk. Today is my honor to present the officer of the month for February 2026. On January 31st, 2026, on her first week in patrol, officer Alexandra Vega made her first arrest at the 7-Eleven here in Coral Gables. along with her training partner, Officer Trillo. On February 16th, she then recognized an individual in a video that was stealing packages from one Alhhamra. She saw the individual and followed up with the detectives that she that stole the package and put it in the same in the person's backpack. On February 20th, officer Detective Taha put the bolo out for the individual as she had previously arrested and observed in the in the videotape from the second theft. And then on February 26th at approximately 2:14 2:15 on the a in the afternoon while officer Vega was off duty traveling to work restbound on Southwest 8th Street and we know how busy Southwest 8th Street is. She recognized the individual walking down the street with another backpack. She immediately contacted the onduty personnel as well as the detective kept visual sight of the individual. I think this is what your third week on the job at this point. Her third week on the job at this point and the subject that was later identified to be the person who committed all three crimes. It's because of her diligence and her enthusiasm that she has brought to the police department and her attempt to constantly do what's right for the citizens that she took this three-time loser uh here that comes and prays on our people in the city of Coral Gables and made that person held accountable for that arrests for all of

those crimes. Because of this brand new officer, we've been able to take within the first three weeks of her job one of our repeat offenders off the street. And because of that, she was awarded officer of the month for February.

Congratulations. Welld deserved. Thank you. Thank you. Good morning everyone. I would like to begin by thanking God, Chief Hudach, assistant chief, the command staff, the commission, and the award selection committee for this recognition. I also want to extend my gratitude to my FTO's sergeants and fellow officers. Your guidance, support, and teamwork are what makes moments like this possible. To my family and friends, thank you for your constant support. This recognition is not just about me. It reflects the teamwork and dedication we all bring to this job every day. It is truly an honor to receive this award. I am grateful to be part of this department and proud to work alongside each of you. Thank you.

Let's take a photo. Sure. Three months. It's the And he just hit he just hit two years. Just just hit his anniversary. Miss Bell back again.

A fourth time. Yes. De's getting her money's worth today. DCM. It's going to cost us. This is GOING TO COST US. Going to cost us. It's going to cost I can't I have I'm not going to say you do a good job again. You do a good job by the way. What's going on, sir? How are you? Good to see you. Morning, mayor, vice mayor, commissioner. So, yeah, Stina's back up. Um we recognizing Charles Carr from her team. Charles is the urban forester for the city. So his job is maintaining the tree canopy, you know, very important tree canopy. So he was a um actually nominated by Dena. So Dena's back up on the mic. So Dena, tell us about Mr. Carr. Congratulations.

Okay. I'm so happy about this Arbor Day Earth Day Landscape Architecture Urban Foresters employee of the month. It's perfect. So Mr. car came to us about two years ago and he has a lot of experience as a certified arborist. He's currently working to get his master arborist certification which is high the highest certification you can get in the field. He what he does in our department in green space management and public works specifically is tree maintenance. He works with code enforcement and all the the code enforcement um issues with tree pruning. He reviews tree pruning and removal permits. He manages all the black olive treatment for staining. He is on a 247 text message with the police and fire department. Every time a branch falls after hours, he's on the 247 response call. He manages the city's um contract for tree pruning citywide of more than 30,000 trees in the rideway. What else? Oh, the reason I nominated him,

he disappeared from the office for a while one day. Couldn't figure out where he was. He was helping a child get a balloon down from high up in a tree. So, because the mother had asked for it and a child was crying. So, he's our employee of the month. You want to say something?

Yeah. I forgot about the uh balloon incident. Uh well, she made a point. She was worried about the environment and getting into the ocean and stuff, so made an effort to go get it out of the tree and save money for the city from sending a vendor to go get it. I just want to thank Dena and Hermes for making my job easy. Uh my staff and my fellow co-workers who you all have already acknowledged the work they do. uh those commissioners, elected officials, Gomez, people that I have worked with in the field collaborating with to solve issues for residents. I thank you all as well, making the job easy. And that's about it.

Uh Mr. Carr, thank you for your hard work and going above and beyond the call of duty. Um also, you have a very hard job. You said you make it look easy, but you have a very hard job, and we have faced it on emails. You have a resident who's unhappy about one one issue or another. a tree is staining a car or a limb falls or you have to sometimes cut a tree and the resident doesn't want it.

Because obviously, you know, we're all attached to our trees and you have a beautiful treeine canopy street uh that someone has lived there for 20, 30, 40 years and you have to cut a tree down because it was hit by lightning or a portion of it is rotting as a result of one issue or another and you have to make that very very tough call and replace that tree. Um, I've seen I've seen, you know, staff, all of you, uh, have to deal with that in one form or another, and it's not easy. It's not easy at all. So, I want to commend you on your hard work. I always see you out there on the on on the field, uh, going above and beyond. So, just want you to know that the commission, the city's incredibly uh, grateful for your hard work and for your commitment to the city. Beautiful. Thank you for the canopy. Thank you.

Thank you. Let's take a photo. I don't remember this many Times up. Uh before we move on to the approval, minutes, do we have any deferrals from the commission on the agenda? Any All right, moving items B1. I

I do. Give me one second. I'll tell you. Did we move it? I'll second. Excuse me. F5. You're deferring F5. Okay. Um, yes. I need a motion for B1, please. I'll move it. I'll second. All in favor? I. Thank you. B2. I'll move it. Second. All in favor? I three regular city commission meeting of February 24th. I'll move it. I'll second. All in favor? I Thank you. Public comment.

First speaker this morning, Mr. Mayor, is Ted Defenbacher, I believe. So, if I may, I just want to make sure that everyone is aware when you come up for public comment, uh, we give you three minutes to speak about a city related issue. And if you speak now, we're we ask you to not speak about the same issue when that item may come up again. But if you have to leave, for example, now and you can't make the item because it may be later on in the morning or in the afternoon, please use the opportunity uh for this reasonable opportunity to speak on the issue. Good morning, sir. Thank you for being here with us. I'll be very brief.

No, take three minutes, please. Granada Golf Course is 101 years old. The oldest nine-hole course in Florida. It is beautiful not just for golfers, but also for runners, dog wat dog walkers, bikers and community in general. Located in the heart of the city, it is visible to all who drive, walk, or run by. Importantly, it is a community course whose proceeds go into the city and for whom all benefit. It is a place for great golfers, hackers, women's group kids learning the game, and even 80 year olds like me. The Gables already has two 18hole country clubs. Very unusual for a town of 6 thou 60,000, but affordable only to those who can afford it. But Granada is unique. A community course. Adjustments in all organizations are necessary from time to time, and they are taking place right now. But please don't try or inadvertently make it into a mini country club. Burger Bobs was popular for a reason. It served the community. Don't lose that vibe. Thank you, sir. Thank you.

Next speaker, Mr. Mayor, is Connor Pemmville.

Good morning, sir. Um, good morning, commission. Uh I I'll be pretty brief. Um here this morning as a lifelong uh South Florida resident. I've lived in Coral Gables for most of my life, all that I can remember of it. And I'm here today to speak against the uh city police's cooperation with ICE through the 287g agreement. Um since this uh agreement, many like it have taken effect in Florida. South Florida has become uh one of the nation's leading hotspots for immigration arrests under the uh Trump administration. Uh it bothers me very greatly uh that this is taking place in the city that I call home and uh that uh the taxes I pay are going to support programs like this. Um perhaps it's a naive request. Um but I would just like for this uh partnership to end and for commission to do whatever they they can um to restore this this trust in our law enforcement because I feel that this doesn't um make our community safer um and erodess trust in law enforcement. Um, so thank you for your time and um, yeah,

thank you, sir. That's it, Mr. Mayor. All right, we'll close the public comment section. Uh, we have a time certain at 11:00 a.m. Items E3 and E7. Would the commission like to roll right into that or take a two-minute break? Just you got to do anything. Should we just do consent? Okay, we'll do consent. Before the vote adopting the consent agenda is taken, is there anyone who wishes additional discussion or review of any item on the consent agenda? If not, may I please have a motion? I'll move it. Second. All in favor? I. Thank you. Do we move on to items E3 or E7 or does anybody need a break? All right, we move on. Perfect. Time certain. Items E3 and E7.

E3 and E7 are related. E3 is an ordinance of the city commission approving the vacation of a public alleyway pursuant to zoning code article 14 process section 14-211 abandonment and vacations in city code chapter 62 article 8 vacation abandonment and closure of streets easements and alleys by private owners in the city application process providing for the vacation of the 45 foot wide alley which is approximately 125 ft in length lying between track A and lots 27 through 31 block 156 section part 8 Coral Gables Florida providing for repeater provision severability clause and providing for an effective date E7 Seven is a resolution of the city commission approving site plan review pursuant to zoning code article 2 zoning district section 2-408 University Station Rapid Transit District Overlay for a proposed mixeduse project referred to as the mark on the property legally described as a portion of track 8 together with lots 27 through 31 and together with that portion of the 45 foot platted alley block 156 Vira section part A Coral Gables Florida providing for repeater provision severability clause and providing for an effective date. This is a quasi judicial item. Um, Mr. Clerk, please swear in those individuals who will be providing testimony today.

Those who will be appearing on this item, please stand and raise your right hand. Do you swear affirm testimony you'll provide today will be the truth and nothing but the truth? Thank you. Thank you very much. Morning.

Good morning, Mr. Mayor, members of the commission. For the record, my name is Laura Russo with offices at 2334 Pon Leon Boulevard. I am here this morning representing LCD Acquisitions LLC, um, who is currently in the process of trying to develop the property we know is 1250 South Dixie Highway, also known as the University Shopping Center. Our first request E3 is for vacation of an alley that exists on that property. Most people don't recognize it as an alley. It's actually the northern a portion of the northernmost access driveway into the property. It runs about 125 ft deep and it's about 40 ft wide. And we are making that request. It has been the driveway for the university shopping center since this shopping center was built back in 1952 or 53. Uh we are making this request in anticipation of developing the property under the recently passed U RTZ overlay in the city of Coral Gables. and LCD is very happy to be back in the city and we want to thank staff for working with us and making sure that this project can be something the city can be proud of. And what I'd like to do now is ask Javier Font who is the architect of the project to come up and take you through the site plan.

Thank you, Mr. Russo. Mr. Font, good morning. Thank you for being here.

Good morning. Thank you, Mayor Commission, manager. uh Javier Font Behar Font and Partners 4533 Ponellon Boulevard. Um happy to be back with this project before the city. Uh I will have a brief presentation. As Laura mentioned, we've been working with staff for a while on this um trying to design it under the new overlay that you have approved recently. So um we're all very familiar with this site. great location directly across the street from the University of Miami, right at the bridge. Um, and just a wonderful corner in the city. If you look at the upper right hand corner of the drawing there, that is the hard corner where the bridge comes down. So what we've done is shamfer the corner, cut cut it back to create a plaza um to receive all the pedestrians that would can be coming over the pro corner or from the bridge and also to create a nice visual at that point. The top of the drawing is along US1 which is all retail and our main leasing office. So we've activated that street as much as possible. And then on the upper left hand side of the drawing is our vehicular ingress and egress which is basically in the same location as the current shopping center has today. On Mariposa which is the street on the right hand side of the drawing. We turn the retail um on the corner and then we've got a lobby into our residential component right off the bridge there. And then the rest of that street is ground floor units to try and activate the street as well. the lower right hand um side of the the drawing is um another plaza area that we've cut back to give a little relief from the existing residential components across the street and then most of um Madruga along the back is also lined with residential

units and then on the left hand side lower left hand side of the drawing you see our service areas which we've tried to minimize um and tried and put most of our services sort of along the left hand side of the drawing, if you will, internally, so they're not facing the street. Our typical floor, which runs from the second floor through the eighth. Um, you can see it's all lined with units. We have an internalized parking garage, so there is absolutely no parking visible from any of the streets or even from our neighbors. Um, we create two courtyards that you see in the middle of the building there. And then our rooftop, all of our amenities are on our rooftop. We have two amazing pool areas. We've got a gym, some study areas, um some some um additional um club rooms if you will, and they all face the US one side of the property. These are the elevations. Project is designed in a Mediterranean format as per the new ordinance. And this is the view along US1 with the retail on the ground floor, activation of the street, the large sidewalks, and this is um the elevation along Madrugo on the back side of the property. So happy to answer any questions you may have.

Thank you very much. Anything else? Madam Zoting director, good morning.

Good morning. Got the PowerPoint, please. Thank you. So, we're aware where the location that um rectangle space in that yellow box is where the alley location is. And you can see it here in the aerial as well. It's in the parking lot. It's kind of hard to see um as far as a built uh parking lot. Um but there is dead end to the the site. Um as you're aware this they did apply for this back in 2024 was afferred by the planning zoning board. Um afterward uh the the city commission adopted an overlay district which included this property which changes zoning and land use uh for this area. So they are requesting now just a vacation the alley and a mixeduse site plan. So this is a image of the alley. It's 125 ft long and 45 ft deep. This is the site plan as I just went over the garage entrance from US1, a 20 foot setback along US1. Retail facing US1 turning the corner there on Maliposa as well as living units on the ground floor along Maliposa and on the back along Madruga. A 15t rear uh yard and sidewalk along Madruga with another entrance into the garage off of Madruga. And the loading and back of house there would be um also on Madura with the crosswalk I should say along uh Manipula to connect um Manipula south. The um the private property is 132 square ft. The alley 5600 ft for a total of 137,000 square feet for total building site area. The F proposed is a little under the maximum which is 3.5. They're proposing it to be 4 point sorry 3.46. 46 uh F. The building height would

be 105 ft to the roof deck. Um there would be a proposal of 393 units which is just under the maximum density which will allow 396 units. The commercial area would be 17,000 square ft again along US1 and turn the corner um Amariposa. Uh the parking would be provided would be 670 spaces. open area would be exceeding the requirement of 10% at 15% of the property area which is mostly along the setbacks on US1 interior setback along the south side of the property as well as site the setbacks on Mipulsa and Maduga and as you can set backs there 20 feet along US1 um interior setback of 20 feet and then 15 feet on Madruga and Manipulsa um has had a lengthy timeline. Uh DRC reviewed this back in 2023. Um again, neighborhood meetings back in 2024. Um moving forward, it was um deferred the sorry the planning zoning board in 2024 and came back with just the alley vacation of February of this year. City commission of course is right now for alley vacation. Uh letters were sent to the property owners seven times throughout this entire um extent of the project. Uh four times property was posted. Uh six times a website posting and advertised three times. This is a map that shows the 1,00 ft that includes the properties that were advertised sorry that were mailed notice to staff does recommend approval with conditions. Those conditions are outlined in both of your exhibit A sorry exhibit B and exhibit C. Um the alley condition approval um requires that they have to withdraw their pending application with Bay County before um moving forward with the city. Um if they do not then the alley vacation will be

null and void. Um their the proposed uh site would have to would have to conform to the site plan as it presents today and then um they have within two years to build the city permitted um site plan. for site plan condition approval. Um the standard uh condition approval are outlined in exhibit C. Um but you can here are the the highlights of that. So again the vacation of the alley would have to be completed before applying for a building permit. Um signal retine would be requested by the applicant at the intersection Maripulosa and US1. Uh speed cushion on Hardy and Madruga. uh signage uh for vehicular uh delivery and parking again along along Madruga but mostly in Mariposa and then to update their loying operations plan. And as far as their profered uh um public realm improvements, they are profering to have a multi-use path to connect uh the neighborhood to the bridge across US1. They're also proposing to um extend a new sidewalk along Pulsa again to encourage that walkability to access um the bridge across US1. And then they're also proposing to um improve the conditions of sidewalk and and festering infrastructure along Madruga, which is their neighboring property to the southwest. And they're also proposing to have um bike boulevard uh Cheryl markings um beyond the property along um Mayada Mariposa and over to Cabayto.

That's it. Thank you. Thank you very much. Uh Mr. Cler, do you have any public comment? No, Mr. Mayor. I will close the public comment. What is the will of the commissioner

through the mayor? I just uh haven't had a chance to sit down with the uh developers since the the prior plan. Okay. And some of the things that we had discussed were the sidewalk improvements and walkability uh to be able to get people across US1 and um also the residents that I had spoken to wanted trees on both sides of the streets. Is that something that's been included on this as well? if we could if you could have your your attorney. Thank you, Miss Russo.

Uh yes, Vice Mayor, as you could see, the sidewalk connectability was what was just illustrated by uh Jennifer Garcia. The sidewalk will be coming down uh from the bridge and going across Madruga and continuing south all the way to the intersection of US1 because it's got a big huge gap. It it goes from the bridge which comes down and it goes along Mariposa Court and then crosses Madruga and continues down Mariposa Court for the block that is for the east side of the Villa Capri condominium. All right. Thank you.

Any other further comments from the commission? Okay. I'll entertain a motion. I'll move it. I'll second. And this would be on E3. Yes. Vice Mayor Anderson? Yes. Commissioner Castro? No. Commissioner Fernandez? Yes. Commissioner Lada? Yes. Mayor Lago? Yes. Moving on to item E7.

Do we have any public comment? No, Mr. Mayor. Perfect.

We'll close the public comment. Do we have any comments from the commission? Yes, I just have some brief comments. Um, while I wish I could turn back time and go back to 2024 when this project was a much smaller and compatible uh development, the uh time I cannot reverse. It is a beautiful project nonetheless and is respectful of the community. So a no vote on this item is a yes vote for live local is a yes vote for larger development through the county RTZ. We have no choice because we don't have the ability to turn back time and go back to 2024 when this could have been a very different project. So I'll move it

through the mayor.

Yes, sir. So, I want to echo the vice mayor's uh comments and also add that this is a result of uh tremendous hard work, tremendous commitment to adhering to the city beautiful standards and really taking a situation that was unfortunate, delayed, frustrating, and um through diligence able to uh bring it back to something approximating what it could have been, but decidedly better than where it otherwise would be um given the tortured history of the um of this project and development. I um think it's going to be uh as was shown in the renderings a beautiful uh environment for people to live and to work. Um and I think it represents um a rather remarkable compromise that in the end falls in my view squarely uh to the benefit of the residents and it's enhancement to it's an enhancement to uh the city beautiful. So I commend all those that work so very hard, developers as well, attorneys, right, and the architects and the commission, at least those who of us who are going to vote for this. I uh I thank you for your support on this. I hope they join me on a on a on a yes vote. So um I guess I'll second

the mayor.

Yes, sir. Um so I I agree with the comments that have been u voiced by the vice mayor and and commissioner Laurara. Um it's not the perfect situation that the the neighbors would have wanted. Um but it has been a labor to get to where we are today where we have a project that's not necessarily what we are being preempted by the county on. Uh that would be totally out of scale with this community. Uh but it is something that we have been able to bring back and we're having this vote today because of the hard work that has been put into it. uh that we're able to make decisions and we've been able to make recommendations on sidewalks and on connectivity uh that otherwise we would not have been able to do had this gone through the county process. So, I appreciate uh staff's uh work on this to to get us back here. um Miss Russo for for your work and the developer for uh working with us to get this back to the city uh and making some concessions uh that uh needed to be made in order to make this a project that was more manageable for for the neighborhood and more consistent with what the city of Coral Gables is.

Uh thank you. Um do you have a second? Second. All right. Commissioner Castro, no. Commissioner Fernandez, yes. Commissioner Lada, yes. Vice Mayor Anderson, yes. For the reasons stated. Mayor Lago,

before I vote, I have a few points. So, what you will witness after this vote is taken is a political onslaught of misinformation. It will come from the blogs and it will come from a select few in this community. It's political season in full swing. The effort will be to mislead, but I hope I hope that people watch what I'm about to say. The developer has been working for three years since 623. In two months will be six years. Excuse me, three years. They have gone to every board. They have addressed multiple boards. The planning and zoning board reviewed this project. It was a 50 vote including Commissioner Castro's appointment. I want to explain again why we're here today and I'll be brief. There are three items. There are four items on the table. Number one, the city code. Madam Madame director, will you please join me? I want you to correct me if I'm wrong, please. I may step out of line. I want to make sure that I'm correct, that I don't speak out of line, even though I won't make the blogs because this is the truth and it it's the facts, but I actually want to make sure that it makes that it's factually 100% correct. So, please jump in when I make a mistake. I'm pretty sure I'll make one. Okay. We have four options on this site. Correct. Number one, the city zoning code. If the developer would like, they can move forward with the city zoning code. Correct.

Is that correct? Yes, that's what they're doing today. Yeah. Okay. Number two, we have RTZ from the county. They could immediately go to RTZ County if they wanted to. Correct. Correct. This property is already incorporated into the RTZ, the sub zone. Yes. So, this is this was out of our hands. This was done by the county. This is not done by us. Correct. Correct. Okay. If it goes to the RTZ, the city of Coral Gables would lose million millions of dollars in impact fees. Correct. Yes. Right. Okay. Lose. It would not come to us. It will go to the county. We would also lose the ability to manage setbacks. Correct. Right. We would also lose the ability to manage usages. Correct. Correct. Yes.

Like for example, gun stores, pet stores, certain things that we in the city do not allow, but the county allows. Is that correct? Yes. Bars and etc. Yes. Okay. Anything else would you like to have? Bars. What? Bars, for example. Bars for use. We don't allow. How about gentleman's clubs as well? Yes.

Gentleman's clubs. I want to repeat that again. Gentleman's clubs. Okay. We would also lose our ability to control signage. You know how we love in the city of Coral Gables how we're sometimes people don't realize it but we have a very understated signage code. Our signage code outside of a building says the building it's required to fall within a certain fixed size and it has to be approved by the city. Would it be excessively larger by the county? the signage code most likely and it could probably be pull signs attached from the building for example or box signs that we wouldn't allow in the city right

setbacks usages signage millions of dollars of impact fees and if it went the RTZ what would the height of the building potentially be so the RTZ is written in a way that a quarter a mile within the property they can have that height so it would be 150 ft because property next to them is 150 ft so 150 ft correct what is it going to be right now 105

105 five. The reason why is because they're going what we call the RTZ light or RTZ Coral Gables. I do not want to pass the RTZ Coral Gables, but like I've told certain residents, the nice lady who's here who I visited her when I visited some residents in their home on the waterway. We are back, our back is against the wall. The developer can choose to go the city route which is significantly less in scale or we'll go the RTZ which holds a city powerless and the fourth and final one which the commissioner to my right Castro uh advocated for which is live local. You can go live local at the end of the day. So my point is this. Am I 100% happy about this? Under no circumstances. But like I've told you we had to negotiate to get where we're at today. By negotiating, we lowered the building by 45 ft. By negotiating, we controlled setbacks. By negotiating, we controlled usages, gentleman's clubs, gun stores, a line of other usages that are not allowed in the city like pet stores. We also controlled signage. I heard certain other individuals, and we're going to cover this bridge later when we get there when we talk about the RTZ for the waterway project. It was said, "Why don't we just go to the county? Why don't we just go to the county? Let's go to the county and take our chances. This is already law. The RTZ already exists. It's passed. The train is out of the station. You can go and advocate all you want. By the way, Commissioner Regalado has been here four or five times to talk about the RTZ. Nobody except myself and I think one or two other commissioners on the commission made statements about the RTZ and ask questions and opposed the RTZ. The train is out of the station. We're moving forward. We have no other choice. Our hands are tied behind our backs. I wish I wish I know the Herald will

publish this, but I wish instead of using this as a political tool in an effort to get reelected, join the commission, join the commission in banding together and say we tried the best that we could and I'd rather have a 100 foot 105 foot building than have the developer go to the county and get a 150 foot building. That to me is intrusive even further than where we're at right now. So, this is where elected officials have to decide whether we're for the city or we're for politics. And this is a very tough decision for me. I have to vote yes because I'm left with no other choice. But this is a much better outcome than what could have possibly happened if they would have gone the RTZ route. In closing, I want to thank the developer. I want to thank the architect. I want to thank the the the lawyer. And most importantly, I want to thank staff. Okay? I want to thank you, madame director. I want to thank our manager, our DCM, our ACM. This commission selected me in an effort to try to negotiate as much as we could with the mark. How many meetings did we have, Mr. Manager?

About a dozen. About a dozen meetings. We negotiated hard and the developer negotiated hard. You could have turned your back on us and said, "I'm going to go the county, right? County route." And you could have gotten a significantly larger building, more units, more height. less setbacks. So, I want to thank you for that. I want to thank you for that. We worked on something together that I think is going to be it's not perfect. It's far from perfect, but it's much better than 150 ft that could be allowed by the RTZ and the city would have lost six or $7 million in impact fees. Correct. That's correct, ma'am.

Where does those impact fees go? I want to put it on the record. It's not going to make the blogs anyways at the end of the day, but where does it where does where do those impact fees go? Impact fees go to parks, mobility, police and fire, and also building permit fees. I want you to understand that the RTZ, which is a county ordinance, takes all those impact fees away from the city of Coral Gables. Now, they're staying here with the RTZ Coral Gables iteration. So, my vote is a yes. Thank you very much. Moving forward, Mr. Mayor. Yes. Before you move forward, uh, you had a couple of speakers that

Yeah, I'm I'm going to get back to that right now. Thank you, sir. Thank you for bringing to my attention, by the way. I appreciate it. Uh, we have a few speakers on the item on the public comment. They didn't make it, so I'm just going to go back open the public comment section. It's two speakers and we'll hear them out. Thank you, sir. First speaker, Joan Valdez. Miss Valdez, please join us. You can either speak now or you can speak in Okay. Okay. Perfect.

Hello. Good morning, mayor. Mayor, commissioners. And now, hi. I'm the second speaker, Don Fine, which is on the card. Thank you. I'm um you first. I'm here on I apologize. If you could please state your name and address for the record before speaking. Yes. Dawn Fine, 5300 Fairchild Way, Coral Gables, Florida 33156. Thank you. Go ahead.

Thank you for allowing us to speak. I'm speaking on behalf about um supporting uh Commissioner Castro's proposed F12 F5 through F-15 resolutions, excuse me, where these resolutions pertain to the Granada Golf Course. I'm um one of the officers on the Granada Women's uh golf association. There are two women go ladies golf associations just to educate everyone that currently have been we just celebrated our 60th anniversary uh being at Granada. We were established in 1966 and we just celebrated our 60th anniversary last year with our special guest, former mayor Don Selnik, who spoke about his mother an Selnik Lidell with along with Kay Behringer who started both the Granada and the Belt Moore's Women's League as well as the Coral Gables Ladies Association, Golf Association. We're here today all of a few members of mostly our senior citizens but we're here to protect our tea times which the ladies play for the last 60 years on Mondays from 8 to 9. We're talking about six tea times with slots for four players. And on Friday, I believe there's four tea times for the Coral Gables Golf Association Women's for um four slots for four players, 16. We pay green fees. We've paid the increased green fees um that they just implemented of April 1st. And there were majority

are senior citizens and retirees. And I believe one of the core values in the mission statement for city beautiful is to promote the health and well-being of seniors. And these women, there's a like 80 year olds walking the course. And one of we are requesting that these tea times be protected. We don't have to call we don't need they don't can't afford to join the Coral Gables country club at 2100 to have a uh request a tea time a week in advance. That's not going to happen. That would be an undue burden placed placed on approximately 85 members. Um, so we want to protect the limited tea times. It's at 8 to 9 in the morning on Monday morning. So they're the city's getting the revenue and everyone shows up. There's never been a case maybe one woman so they're not losing any money. Um, I just want to read that we um, you know that the discount for senior we we want to be on par with the Builtmore has a women's ladies league. So, we would like they get a discount on the fees. So, we would um, what I I want to say is that we understand that Granada has been on the low side of changing green fe of charging green fees. However, a discount to show the members whether they're a Coral Gable resident, which a majority are, or not, would be warranted to show how much the city values its senior citizens as it does its veterans by offering them a 50% discount. So, um, currently the Builtmore offers

the Women's League a 20% discount on nine holes and 30% on 18 holes. Um, those are the facts. Um, I don't know why, we don't understand why after 60 years of tradition and supporting this gym of a golf course for the community and for the Coral Gables residents and the seniors, why they would want to take away this great uh, community building um, legacy. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Now, if Joan, do you have anything or Susan?

Oh, the only thing I want to put I'm speaking to you on behalf of the seniors affected by the changes in fees and scheduling. It is tradition. I've been living in the city of Coral Gables since 1987 and I've probably been playing at Granada since well before that. It's tradition for the city of Coral Gables to give senior discounts and uh at the movies, at restaurants, at the theaters, at uh and entertainment and golf, and seniors are the backbone of this community. Many seniors are on fixed incomes, budgets, and we know that good health is the highest priority. Golf is an excellent way to stay healthy. Why? It's impact free for the most part. Hard to get hurt on a on a golf course. Golf is an excellent way to uh because it involves walking, fresh air. We were able to use the course during co socialization most important. See this group? It's a small it's a handful of women. We've become really friendly over the years. We support ourselves. We support each other during times of trouble and we it's no isolation. We go to the golf course on Monday mornings and Friday mornings and we have someone to talk to. So I think you've been seeing articles about loneliness and so uh isolation. It's a real thing. So, the city of Coral Gables has recognized seniors by building the AAC, the adult activity center on Andalucia

across from the palace. And it has free parking. Trolleys go there, freebies go there, people walk there, and in that facility there are there's all kinds of activities as well. Many seniors are not technically able to use iPhones, to use computers, to use anything really that's techy. How do I know? I used to teach iPhone skills at Ali at the University of Miami. And many seniors got their iPhones as presents from their kids. And the kids said, "Oh, stop using that flip phone. It's ridiculous. Use this. And of course, they didn't know how. And I was I taught them I taught several probably more than a hundred seniors at at Ali to use the iPhone. Why am I telling you this? Because you want to have people scheduling. The new rule, there's a scheduling problem that they have to schedule maybe one week before. You can't do it without a computer and iPhone. And that's about it. I mean, I think uh really please consider our requests. Thank you very much.

And then good morning. Just uh one more um just a little history on our What is your address? I'm sorry. I'm sorry. My name is Susan Bloom and I'm the treasurer of the Greenway Women's Golf Association. What What is your address? Your address? Your home address? Uh 2645 South Beayshore Drive. Sorry, what? 2645 South Beayshore Drive. Okay, perfect. Thank you.

Okay, so um we just celebrated our 60th anniversary last uh year with our special guest, former mayor Don Slesnik. Um, it'll it's interesting to know that his mother in the 30s, 1936 to be exact, started this golf association both at the Granada uh women's league and at the Builtmore. uh he came to speak and spoke about uh in memory of his uh mother um an Slesic Ledell who was also uh a part of the Coral Gables uh women's golf association and bridge club. Um so together with both of these associations we're celebrating 60 and 90 years of history of women's golf. Thank you very much for listening to us today.

Thank you very much. Thank you for being here. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

May I just say something quickly? My name is Jean Connelly, 100 Andalusia Avenue, Coral Gables. Um, I played since I retired from teaching. I played for 11 years. And I was astounded when I first got there that there were women who were in their 80s and their early 90s who are still playing golf. It's a very, very valuable asset to the adult community. I myself am 80 years old. I walk the course and I am still in touch with one of my dear friends, Shirley Adams, whom I played golf with, 97 years old. She is unable to play golf and regrets it deeply, but always remembers dearly the way she was able to make friends and community and be of value to the community at the Granada Golf Course. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Okay, we'll close the public comment. We're gonna have a 12 o'clock time certain, but we'll see if we can tackle a few issues before that. Items E1 is E1 and uh items E1 and E2. E1 is an orance of the city commission approving amendments to the text and maps of the city of Cro Gable's comprehensive plan pursuant to small scale amendment procedures and zoning code article 14 process section 14-213 comprehensive plan text and map amendments to one modify the required multif family densities and height to allow higher intensity within the university station rapid transit district overlay and to allow multif family high density within the mixeduse overlay districts located within the University Station rapid transit district overlay to include additional properties 6100 GO Boulevard within the University Station rapid transit district overlay on the mixeduse overlay districts map. And three, amend the future land use map from commercial low-rise intensity to multif family high density for lots 1 and two, block 5, lots through three, block six, rever waterway section track K, addition to rea waterway section and lot 8, block 208, rea section 14 for multif family low density to multif family high density for lots three and four, block 5. Rivera waterway section for multif family duplex density to multif family low density for lot five block five and the southern portion of lot five block six singer subdivision from commercial low-rise intensity to multif family medium density for lot four block six rear waterway section and for multif family duplex density to multif family medium density for lot 5A and the northern portion of lot 5 block six singer subdivision providing for provision providing for severability clause and providing for an effective date is an ordinance of the city commission providing for map and text amendments to the city of Corable's official zoning code pursuant to zoning code article 14 process section 14-212 zoning code app amendments by one amending article 2 zoning district section 2-408 university station rapid transit district overlay to a include requirements for multif

family development and provide additional property 6100 gave boulevard to the boundary of the university station rapid transit district overlay to amending appendix a sight specific zoning regulations to remove inconsistent site specifics three amending article 14 process section 14-204 transfer of development rights to expand transfer of development rights receiving site sites with the New York City station rapid transit district overlay. And four, amend the zoning map from mixeduse one to multif family 4 for lots one and two, block five and lots one through three, block six, rivera waterway section track k. Addition to Rivera waterway section and lot eight block 208 Rivera section 14 for multif family 3 to multif family four for lots three and four block five river waterway section for multif family one to multif family 3 for lot five block five in the southern portion of lot 5 block six singer subdivision for mixeduse one to multif family 2 for lot four block six river waterway section and for multif family 1 to multif family 2 for lot 5A and the northern portion of lot 5 block six singer subdivision providing for a provision seability clause codification and providing for an effective date this is a quasi judicial items. So, Mr. Clerk, please swear in those who will be testifying today.

Those who will be appearing on this item, please stand and raise your right hand. Speak. Okay. Speak. Do you swear or affirm that the testimony you'll provide today will be the truth and nothing but the truth? I do. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Director. Yes. Presentation for us.

Yes. Um, just a very brief overview of what you're considering today and then also some comparison slides. So, as you know, you adopted the uh overlay district next to the university station. We are now proposing to expand that to include a project known as the Gables Waterway. Again, you are only looking today at legislation, the rules in place, map changes, but not a site plan. So, you can see that in the area right here where the expansion would occur. What's proposed to you today is to change the land use um mostly to be uh multifamily high density for most of the property and then to scale down to multif family medium density and multif family low density as you go south into the single family and duplex neighborhood. The mixed use overlay district map would be amended to include this property um in the university station rapid transit district overlay. Uh the comprehension plan would be amended to um allow the maximum density of 125 units an acre and this would be to uh mimic and mirror what the county's current RTZ subzone allows. The map would be amended for the zoning code to be MF4 for most of the property then scale down to MF2 and MF3 um abuing and adjacent to single family and duplex neighborhoods. And then the zoning code would be amended to allow for multif family development in the RTZ um city's RTZ version of RTZ uh for the overlay to limit the height to be 120 ft for MF4 but to also allow 150 if the MF4 property would have would provide 10% additional open space. Um 125 units an acre would be the density for MF4 and MF2 would be a step back along the waterway of 10 ft. an upper story step back of 25 feet when you're adjacent to or across the waterway from single family. Um a 50 foot setback when you're budding single family or duplex and that would be a setback with landscape. A

50oot setback is more or less the size of a property, a single family lot. Um and also some general uh development agreement would be um reviewed by staff and approved by the city commission. And then a change from first reading would allow the building the green building certification um requirements. They would have to be green certified but um the requirements would be um determined by the city manager and then um the university overlay district would be designated as TDR receiving site and then the retaining and sight specific to be consistent with what's proposed today. Now as you are aware the county did pass an RTZ sub zone in our city in September of last year. This is a comparison of the RTZ on the left side, the existing mixeduse zoning in the in the center column and on the right side is the proposed multifamily zoning that we're amending in our um overlay district. So the review of course would be by the county if it would be an RTZ um and the mixeduse um and the multif family would be reviewed by city staff and also by the city commission. The height would be similar of 150 ft for the RTZ for the county um but 120 ft with the city and allow for 150 if they provide 10% additional open space. The density would be the same at 125 units an acre. Um we would have a maximum 3.5 F where the county has no limitation of the square footage that would allow for that property or any property for that matter in the RTZ sub zone. We would allow TDRs to have a maximum F of 4.375. The open space would be required 10% for the county um on the ground floor. We would require 25% for multifamily as consistent with the rest of our multif family zoning in our city and then the setbacks would be 20 ft on US1 uh 10 feet again on the waterway and 50 feet when you're adjacent or budding single family.

Um the uses we talked about the last item. The county of course would be in charge of approving any uses. It would include bars, uh parking lots and parking garages and those uses that we don't usually have in our MF in our sorry in our um multif family zoning. Of course, we don't allow any commercial uses which is what this property is supposed to be uh zoned as. The design will be met Mediterranean style. The impact fees again would be um collected by the county and so the police, fire, municipal parks and mobility would be collected by the city if it would be built in the city itself as well as armpug places. So the top image in red is showing the RTZ zoning. Um as you may know RTZ is one zoning district with one height. So the entire property has one height of 150 ft. The city is proposing that the height would be 120 and then there would be scaling down built in with the zoning. So the MF2 and the MF3 would be scaling down to the neighborhood to the south. There's a bigger image of the RTZ that the county has already adopted and as you know they are uh the property owner of this property is communicating with the county to be incorporated into the RTZ sub zone. is what the city's proposing as far as extruding that um zoning, showing the height and showing those setbacks. So I toggle between the two of these. You can see the setbacks disappear with RTZ sub zone with the county with the city. We have those setbacks on US1 on those side streets. Also along the uh waterway again 50 feet set back when you're budding single family 25 foot upper story setback 97 ft for that um MF2 zoning that light brown area. The dark

brown would be 120 ft with a 20 foot setback again on US1 and on the side streets. So you can see the difference between the two of these. And then the images on the left are showing the existing um county's RTZ at the um Cascade at the Douglas and Douglas station. And on the right, of course, is your typical Coral Gables uh development with architecture. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Director. Uh Mr. Clerk, you have any public comment? All right. Perfect.

So, it's going to be on Zoom. I have Cecilia Malonaga. Madame Judge, the floor is yours.

Good morning. I'm not sure I I can't turn on the video. I thank you for giving me the opportunity to be heard. No, we hear you. Go ahead. Thank you. Uh my address is 400 North Miami Avenue. I don't give my home address for obvious reasons. I was at the meeting last week when this item was discussed. I appreciate Madam Judge, if if I may, I'm sorry to interrupt you, but we have a major echo and I want I want to give you the respect that you deserve. Uh is can we have the IT the IT team just look for one second and we can address it. Okay. Just give us a second, Madam Judge. Sure.

Can you try right now? No. Still Is she on two devices? I'm here.

She would hear it on her end. She was on two. If the problem is on her end, she would hear it. hear some of the individuals here. There's no one here. She's the only one. Okay.

Your honor, bear with us. Thank you. Do you want Hello? Are we good? Okay, give me one sec.

He's asking for a minute. Give me Let me Let me make sure. You're right, Mr. Mayor. Yes. Let's go ahead and take uh Lisa, the attorney. She's actually here in person and would like to Okay, thank you. Perfect. I thought we didn't have anyone else. No worries. Please.

Hi, Lisa Deto 10 Aragon sweet 1405 Corgas. I also own a property that's close to the Mahi Canal and I used to live in the Mahi Canal, one of the four homes that's being affected um by this development. I just want to say I have been involved in fighting development on this property since 2004. Um the last time we were fighting a different developer, we ended up losing in both Miami Court and in the third Yeah. But when I started speaking, third

district appeals, I moved then to California. Kept coming back and forth for work. Moved back here and here we are again. Same property, different developer, but much much larger. I think one of the pictures that Jennifer was showing of the even the RTZ light the Mahi Canal will be completely in the shade by the height of those buildings. That's a pretty big manatee area. One of the few in in Florida I mean I'm sorry in Coral Gables for the manatees to come at the end of the canal. I used to live there and I I know how many would come down especially with the calves. So I don't know why the RTZ is even being discussed in this because it's a new thing, right? So that's why this property is now looking into RTZ. But this property has special attributes being the canal and the low density of the homes right up to this size of these large buildings. I just want to say that I am against allowing any development of this height. the restrictions, the current zoning codes are much, much lower. And as I've mentioned at a lot of our meetings, even though we have our codes, everybody that seems to buy a property wants to develop it, ask for far greater height limits and things like that, changing the codes is like the codes don't even matter anymore. And if you do want to buy a house in an area that you think will be safe from large development based on existing codes, uh you're in for a surprise as things go on and and the codes keep getting changed to upsize. So anyway, thanks for your um your attention.

Thank you very much, madame judge, your honor. Let me see. Can you hear me now, Mayor? I'm not sure if I'm being heard with an echo or not. I don't want to take up too much of your time. I thank you, mayor, vice mayor, commissioners, for allowing me to be heard on this item. I was at the meeting last week. I understand that our hands are tied. We can all relate to that. We understand that. The one question I asked at last week's meeting, and I continue to ask if is what if anything more can be done than has been done. Is there any ability for the city to negotiate anything to scale this down just a little bit? This is not just any project. This is not just high deings are bigger and taller and there's more density. We all know that this is also a a waterway with marine life. You all spoke uh hours ago about our oceans, about our city, beautiful. Um and my concern is the scale of this development on a waterway. Um, and one of the comments you made, mayor, in the Coral Gables magazine with the hail may you made a mo few moments ago on the other item on the agenda with the RTZ zone is that we're talking about

millions and millions of dollars that would have been lost if the developers had gone the county route instead of the city route. I ask you, would we be willing, for example, to give up those millions and millions of dollars in exchange for some concession on scaling this down? Has that been explored at all? And the last thing that I would add is that we need to have some guarantees that we're going to limit the number of users on this waterway in this massive development unless we lose uh the waterway completely. I thank you all. I know you've given this serious consideration. You know that we're very unhappy with what's happening. We know that your hands are tied. But is there any room to do anything other than this? That's my question. Thank you.

Uh thank you your honor and I apologize

for the issues that we're having. Uh we have reviewed this as I mentioned before in the mark. We had over 12 meetings uh myself, our city attorneys, our manager, his team, our zoning director in hopes of finding an appropriate project. that project is 105 feet when it could be 150 feet in the RTZ. All a developer has to do is just go to the county and circumvent the city altogether. Our hands are tied and we're trying to find the best deal for the city. Would I give up the money uh to to find a better project? 110%. But we also have to understand and we tried that already. We discussed reducing fees. Um but the project again they have the development rights that they can go to the RTZ and just circumvent us anyways. So, they're going to pay it to the county or they're going to pay it to the city in one form or another. I'd rather have those monies go to the city and benefit the residents of the city. Coral Gables

to the mayor. Yes, sir.

Um, I think this is something that has been completely taken out of the hands of the city. Uh, we hear, you know, why are we talking about RTZ? This is something that's new. It is new. It was created by the county. Uh, and it is a way that the county has the ability to preempt our city zoning codes. We have live local which also has the ability to preempt the city's zoning code when the project meets those parameters. Uh and it's really taken this commission's ability to control what these development projects uh are scaling to and what is coming in these projects completely out of our hands. Um, and proposals like these are the ones that give us the opportunity to kind of bring it back to the city and for us to sort of find a way to work with the developer. Uh, your honor, you were asking about, you know, is there any way to scale it back. Now is when that can that negotiation can possibly begin with the developer on the project that they actually present. Uh, because this will be the the change to the zoning that happened with the mark. uh we were able to reduce the the scalability of that project. We were able to incorporate some of the connectivity issues that were necessary through a lengthy negotiation process. Um so I I do believe that there may be a possibility. At the end of the day, it's at the hands of the developer and unfortunately our hands as a city have been completely tied and you know completely cut off at this point. Uh we no longer have an ability to control our own zoning code. Um something that as a city we have always been proud about protecting our zoning code and has been a priority that has been set by our residents for us for years. And now we don't have an ability to do that because the county and the state have decided well we're going to do something different to ensure the developers can do what they want in these these properties. And it's really unfortunate uh because

levels where we have to figure out they approve a a uh live local project. All of a sudden we're not getting the funding that we need and we have to provide the security we had to provide the services that that are required. But in order to alleviate issues that they have in other parts of the state where the their live locals may work doesn't work for us here and they're trying to impose that legislation here on us. Uh it's really unfortunate. Uh it puts us in a very tough bind. Uh the one thing and and I share with my colleagues now that we can have this conversation that I had shared with staff was I would like to see if we have the possibility of having an extra conversation with our residents. I know we had one last week, but have a second meeting. I think people still don't understand. And, you know, I I think our staff did a great job of trying to show what the two differences are, the difference between the RTZ and the city's RTZ light. I think we need to do a better job of visualizing it because until you started explaining it, I didn't even realize the differences in the two features, even though there's different colors. Um, I think if we can make it a little better for people to understand, visualize, and also explain what has brought about that RTZ and how we no longer have the ability to do. I know we did uh I think Martha and her team did a PSA that that was put out on live local and the RTZ. Um, but I still think that we need to do a better job to get that information out to our residents because they're still not understanding where we are today, how we've gotten to where we are today, and the actions that have been taken by other governments which are now dictating uh what we're able to do. Um, what I had asked is if we could push this off to the next commission meeting so that we can have at least one more community meeting to go over things, explain it to them, maybe create a better presentation that can be more visual uh, for people to understand uh, and then move forward with it. That was

the conversation I had with the manager and our city attorney during my my pre-agenda through the mayor.

Yes. So, um, with regard to notice, I know that, um, our staff are in our e-news, we notified folks about the April 7th meeting. I did it in my social media. I did it in my letter. We only had a small group of folks. Um, I had an individual that wrote me and I suggested to them that they need to sign up for the e-news so that they can get notice of these types of meetings. Um, the cost to send out notices is tremendous. Um, and you know, residents participating plus we had individuals that participated via Zoom. So, the history is there. I made ICE took time. I made efforts to meet with our county commissioner to try to scale back what the county RTZ was to move the building to move the parking lot more than just an arms length away from the neighboring property. The steps that were going into an underground garage that was de dubbed as being a park space. Okay. There was not willingness or flexibility there. The message was clear. When the county commissioner came here, she made it clear that if we didn't do our own version of RTZ, which is now dubbed the RTZ light, that that project would be coming forth under the county control with the height and density and density and underground parking garage a few feet away from the next door neighbor. So, it is our job to do make the hard decisions because the longer you drag things out, the more likely it is the developers will choose to take the county route. We almost lost it before on the mark. We now have a more

intense project, a little taller, but it's far better than what the county project would have been. So, we sometimes are going to have to make these hard decisions. The outcome is going to be the same. and we still have the opportunity to go through the actual project itself. This is just the zoning issue. So, I sat down with the developer and I showed them why a 5- foot sidewalk is insufficient. And that's the county's requirement on US1. If you take Google Maps and you pan it across to where uh the thesis is, you'll see a nice wide sidewalk, something that you're not cringing at walking along US1 about. The proposal by the county was five feet. I'm taller than five feet. Okay, that is how close people would have to shimmy their way down US1 trying to get somewhere. You'll be splashed by the mud. You'll be breathing the fumes. You'll be subject to all that. So, we can either make the choice to allow to go the county route by taking an action at this time or move forward and seize the moment and prevent this from going through the county.

Okay. Anyone else want to further comments?

Yes. Mayor, commissioners, um the the RTZ uh plan would provide a building that's 150 ft high, unlimited F, no setbacks, no parking building that would be a county building in Coral Gables where we would not have uses, we would not have signage and we would certainly not get any building or impact fees. Uh if we want to consider what that is, that's a box. That's a box from from property line to property line, 150 foot high. That's what that's what you can do because there's unlimited unlimited area, a height of 150 ft, and no setbacks. And by the way, no parking for residential plain about about cars. There's no parking. it's assumed that the that the folks will be using the rapid transit. So, uh if we want to imagine what what RTC is, it's a box. It's just a box from property line to property line. And I think some of the pictures that our director showed are quite nice compared to what it can be as as bad as that was. Uh so so I just want to to reiterate that what we're dealing with from the RTC perspective is 150 foot box from property line to property line with no parking and and and uh and that's the that's the RTZ concept.

Thank you. Anything else before I I give a few comments to the mayor?

Yes, sir. So, um, to not beat the dead horse, but I I I do think it's important for the residents to know. Um, and by the way, I I thank very much Judge uh Cecilia Alanaga for for providing her comments today. I've had the pleasure of trying cases before her, and she's an extremely educated, reasonable, and dedicated public servant, and her suggestion uh her request that we uh do what we can uh to try to negotiate uh some further concessions on that project are taken to heart. Right. But like the vice mayor said, you know, what we're discussing today is a zoning change. I find that we're in this unique position right now to not commit the same mistake twice. the the the delays occasioned by the previous project, the mark, were an infirmity that put us on the brink of what the city manager is referring to is having a box sitting right there on US1 because the delays and the delays and the delays um caused the project to nearly slip completely out of our hands. millions of dollars lost in impact fees, signage, um usage, and uh everything else that we we hold so dear with respect to the city's zoning is um is giving way to what's coming out of Tallahassee and which is in fact law today. So, I'm a huge supporter of working and being strategic and working within the parameters that we're dealt. Um the problem is never solved by putting your head in the in the sand. the problem is not solved by walking away from it, but rather meeting it head-on, being professional and being civil and being strategic in negotiating with the players. So, uh, while I'm always in favor of providing notice to the residents and I I take to heart, Commissioner Fernandez, your suggestion

as well, uh, that there be more, uh, conversation had with the residents. I I do feel in this instant it's been met and met probably and then some, right? This is one of the more um public and um hot topic matters that the city has seen in a while. And you know um from the mayor and the vice mayor uh having met with the residents so many so many times um it's not a new it's not a new item, right? It's it's something that's been going on for some time. I think we need to learn from the past. Take the bull by the horns. move this thing with appropriate notice, appropriate speed and focus on where the the the efforts should be best put and that's in negotiating directly with the developers to ensure that we take as much as we can for the city. I'm I am not ashamed in saying I am as a representative an elected representative of the city in the business of taking from those who want to take from me. I want to negotiate and take more for us. And I think that that you've done an amazing job mayor. uh in in doing that with respect to the mark let's work uh with respect to this this project always mindful of the unique nature of where it's situated always mindful of the of the natural habitat and the environment that it provides for the manes but where we are right now it's it's a far better place than if it was um seeded to the the county under the RTZ and through delay I fear that that's where it would end up.

Thank you. Um, without any further ado, if my colleagues are done, I'd like to put my comments on the record. Madam Finance director, will you please join us? Excuse me. Madam, zoning director, I apologize. Finance director started sweating there all of a sudden. Um, I have a presentation. Uh, can we please present it? There's a presentation in regards to E1 RTZ overlay. Okay. So, I want to be clear and I want to mention this for the record again. I know it's not going to make it on the Gazette or on the other blogs. It will not make it because this is this is politically expedient to make sure that we avoid this. This is pure politics again, but I got to put it on the record. I have to put on the record at the end of the day because it's critically important. It's critically important to put things on the record that make sense. I've lived in this community for over 30 years. I didn't show up here four years ago. Okay? I've served on the planning and zoning board. I've served on every major philanthropic organization. My grandparents, when they came from Cuba, they moved to the city. They died in this city two blocks away. So, I care about this city. So, I take it very close to heart when people tell me that I don't care about this city. I want to vote no today. But, you know why I'm voting yes? I'm going to explain it to you. It is reckless what is happening here in this city with certain people on this commission. I don't care if you're running for public office. You cannot mislead residents. If the developer leaves and goes the county route, he goes the RTZ route. What is the height of the project if he goes the RTZ route?

Oh, 150.

150. Let's go over these items. Number one, the planning and zoning board of the city of Coral Gables voted 50-0 in favor of this project. Both Commissioner Castro's appointee, Ignasio Alvarez, and Commissioner Fernandez appointee, Felix Partardo, voted in favor of this project. And I quote, so basically the decision for the board is take this or else we're going to look at the picture on the left. What do they mean? It's the picture below. Look at the difference in the design standards between Coral Gables on the top and what you could get with RTZ in the county below. It's right a stone throw away. That's 37th Avenue in the metro rail. We can play this game about politics and run for office and I voted no on the RTZ. Fine. But thank God that we have people on this board who have been living in this community for for dozens of years and are willing to take the tough stand and take the beating politically when you have to go in front of the residents and tell them hey I had to vote in favor of this because if not we would have had a much more significantly larger project. Now, the city, to give you an idea, there's a very stark difference between the county RTZ versus what the city allows. As I pointed out to you, a vote against the city RTZ is a vote in favor of the county RTZ. Very clear. If you vote against this today, you're voting in favor of the county RTZ. You're voting in favor of a bigger project. You're asking the developer to go to the county. You're asking to lose control of signage. You're asking to lose control of usages. You're asking to lose control of millions of dollars of impact fees. You're last you're asking to lose control of the zoning, additional height, and by the way, additional density. Am I correct, madam madame director?

The density that say the same at 125 means an acre, but I think you mean intensity, the size of the property.

Yes. Okay. To say that this is an upzoning is incorrect, is disingenuous. There's no change to density. It's very clear right there. Planning and zoning board recommended it 50-0. I know this is not going to make it on the blogs. I understand that. And it's going to be pumped through text messages. Commission votes in favor of the RTZ upzoning. It is what it is. But I feel fine. I feel comfortable as a person that's lived in the city for decades. I feel comfortable with making this decision today. It's a tough decision. It's not one that I want to make. But I have no other choice. Next slide. Here we have some design elements. This is what happens with the county RTZ versus the Coral Gables RTZ. We lose we lose setbacks, no site residential parking requirements, minimum landscaping, county requires permit and impact fees, multif family and commercial uses which are not allowed in the city. Now, here are the design elements in regards to the Coral Gables RTZ, pedestrian arcades and connections, just like what the vice mayor mentioned. In regards to sidewalks, priority, priority on landscaping, Mediterranean architecture, very different from what would happen in the county, design review by the city architect, setbacks, minimal signage, on-site residential parking required, as the manager mentioned. City receives permit and impact fees which goes into the neighborhoods. Public art. By the way, that public art comes from developers in permit fees. It does not come from the general fund. Another ton of misinformation that is being spewed out there. That's incorrect. Multif family use only and the residents receive notification. Let me also make something aware which again will not be published.

The city of Miami has not bonded their lawsuit against Miami Day County. Why have they not bonded their lawsuit? Why, Mr. Manager, would you like to explain why the city of Miami has not bonded their lawsuit in regards to the RTZ? Because of the potential liability of stopping a project of this size, it could be certain profits and u it could be substantial. We've already had that happen one time in Edgewater when we stopped the project. It cost the city $5.5 million and that was 25 30 25 years ago.

So in closing, this is very simple. As you can see, there's a stark difference between the county RTZ and the city RTZ. This is something where you have to hold your nose and just vote in favor because if not, what's being proposed is significantly massive in comparison. So in closing, this is being done to protect the city beautiful. We have no other choice. If we go the RTZ route, we lose control of our own zoning code. So, we have no further public comment. If there's anyone here that would like to make a motion, I'll accept a motion.

I'll I'll make the motion. Um, and uh, Madam Director, I do have one question for you. Our landscape buffer on this um, zoning from the single family homes is 50 ft. 50 ft. Correct. And in the RTZ, I believe I'm looking I'm looking at the floor a minute was 10 feet. So I made the motion. Second, Mr. Clerk. And this would be the motion on E1. Yes. Mr. Clerk. Commissioner Fernandez. Yes. Commissioner Lada. Yes. Vice Mayor Anderson.

Yes. Because I don't want to vote for the county RTZ to proceed in this area. Commissioner Castro,

I think it's very clear that I don't agree with the city's stance and that I sh and that I share a very different perspective from my colleagues and I think that's okay. I don't think um we need to go ahead in here display that this is political or whatever the case is. My strong opinion is that the city should have taken a stronger stance, shown some resistance, and at very least sued the county, showed the residents that we're here for them before continuing this route like city of Miami did. I know the city manager is going to come up saying they haven't bonded, but you know what? They're at least showing they care that they're trying to do something. So, no. My votes going to be no once again because I do feel that our hands are not tied 100%. We could still do more.

Mayor Lago,

I would love nothing more than to agree with Commissioner Castro, but then we would both be wrong. Uh, let me also make you aware of the simple fact. The reason why it's not bonded is because the city of Miami knows they're going to lose this lawsuit. Okay? Why not just bond it? Pay for it. It's a It's a fee, but if you're gonna do something, put your money behind it. So, at the end of the day, it's a waste of city resources. It's just a waste of city resources, and it jeopardizes the city. This is about protecting the city, not about trying to win a re-election. These are the tough decisions that have to be made by people who have lived in the city for decades and take a great pride in the city, not Johnny Cumles. Yes. Moving on to item E2.

I'll move it for the same reasons I moved the last one. A second. Mr. Clerk. Commissioner Lada.

Well, I just want to say that with respect to any comments that more could have been done, more should have been done. Um, it's um it would be feudal. It would be a pirick victory. You would be spending money, wasting resources on an endgame that you can't win under these circumstances. The win, as difficult as it is, the win for the cities is this vote of a yes today. That's the win because that's the effort that we're putting into to try and take back for us uh a remnant of home rule, some control over our our destiny. This decision is a difficult one, but it's the right one for decades to come. We're on the right path. Anything other than a yes vote today is well, it's been said before it it is nothing more than just a show of defiance without any real intention to make a meaningful dis uh difference. And it is uh unfortunate I'll say this as well that we won't have a 50 unanimous vote which would show not only the residents but also the county of how we think and we stand together on behalf of the residents but say my vote is yes. Vice Mayor Anderson,

for those who don't litigate and stuff, it's hard to understand why city simply just doesn't sue. But for those of us who have had done litigation in our lifetime, we understand this is a pure legal issue and it's a losing one. It's a dead loser. The only thing we'll do is lose for the city. We'll lose for the residents. will cost the residents lots of money and expedite the route that the developer will take going to the county. Now is the time to to seize the moment and make sure that this goes in the right direction so the residents do have a voice up here. the what the residents do have an opportunity to affect how this building is designed to be able to protect the manatee zones to be able to make sure that the water quality is improved and to have the the neighborhood amenities put in that we can and I'm glad to to report that my meeting yesterday with Senator Garcia uh along with the the individual with the underlying on the FDOT is moving in a good direction. We've made the request for Cababiato Boulevard to have a light and hopefully we'll have some fruit on the end of that tree. Those are the types of things you can do if you want to make a positive impact on this community. My vote is yes.

Commissioner Castro, I will continue to vote no on upzoning on a corridor on a parcel that is on US1 is highly congested. The traffic there is I mean It's terrible. The quality of life next to the homes that live in this parcel that we're upzzoning to the to to the residents is going to be really bad. And I will continue to vote no because I believe there's another route. But this administration and this commission is not willing to go ahead and enforce it or even take a chance. No.

Commissioner Fernandez. Um, as I stated earlier, I think we are really left with no options. Um, we have an opportunity here to now try to sit down with the developer and reduce the scale. Um, every property owner has the right to develop their property. We as a city cannot say you don't have the right to develop your property. They have the rights based on the zoning code. What we need to go back to is our zoning code is no longer valid because the county has implemented its RTZ on this property. So the only way that we can bring it back to the city and scale it back is by creating this RTZ zone which would allow us to bring it back. You want to know how you can change it? Start appealing to your county commissioners and you know find ways to ensure that this doesn't continue to happen. that there aren't new changes or new openings on the RTZ zone. Uh your state legislature to make sure that they don't continue to expand on uh the live local act. Those are active ways that we can prevent it. As for this project, the wheels are already in motion. If we vote against this project today, tomorrow they'll file their application for the RTZ and we will have a project there that will be completely out of scale with what the city of Coral Gables is. And all you need to do is drive on US1 towards downtown Miami and you see the size and scale of some of the buildings that are being put into those locations. Um I I just wouldn't want to see that in our city. Uh that's the reason that I'm voting yes on this item today. Um and whoever is going to be sitting down over the next few weeks uh with the developer but you Mr. Mayor, I hope we're able to get them to make some concessions and reduce the scale a bit as the residents

have been asking for. Uh if the developers watching, I would ask that you sit down with the residents, the neighbors in that area, uh as other developers have, the developers of the Almria project, uh the devel developers of the project um up in the Flagler section and they worked on a project that worked not just for their ends, but also for the community that you're being uh coming into. Um, when you're developing a project, it's not about developing a project and then moving away. It's about develop developing a project that's going to stay with this community. And you need to ensure that when you're building these projects, they're in scale with the community that you're building into. You bought a property in Coral Gables. Try to live up to those Coral Gable standards and respect the residents who live in Coral Gables and who have owned their properties around this project for 40 and 50 years. Uh, that's my request today. Uh, as I said, I I I don't think we have an option. I have to vote yes on this item today.

Mayor Lago.

Uh, yes. I reluctantly vote yes as a result of the simple fact that this is common sense, not politics. I would love nothing more than to vote no and then send out an email tomorrow saying, "I voted against this upzoning." But the moment that we vote no is the moment that they go the county route and they go the RTZ and they build a monstrous building here. Think about it. You just witnessed the mark. It's coming in at 105 ft. I'm still not satisfied with that. But it could have been 150. Could have lost millions of dollars in impact fees. Could have had a gentleman's club there. If they would have had the usages from the county, a gun store, they could have had massive signage in comparison to what's permissible here in the city of Coral Gables. They could have had the buildings like I showed you there that are not in Mediterranean in fa in flavor. So the idea of going to I heard this over and over again, let's go to war against the county. You have two incredibly competent, incredibly competent litigators that are bookending this commission that have litigated at some of the highest courts to the Supreme Court and they're telling you that this is a dog and we're going to lose, but we're going to listen to people who have no formal legal training. If the city of Miami was so certain in their lawsuit, and I've called and I've inquired with attorneys, and the manager and I have talked about this, they would have bonded that lawsuit. They didn't. It's very easy to be the hero and say,

"I voted no. I vote no. I'm the hero." And then come to you as I walk door to door and say, "Vote for me." But at the end of the day, that behavior is risky and jeopardizes the city in the long term because if that developer goes and takes those impact fees or builds a larger building and you lose that lawsuit, what happens then? What do you do? Oh, well, you know, I tried. I lost a lawsuit. It is what it is. But I was a hero and I look good and I got reelected. So, my vote is yes. It pains me to do that, but at the end of the day, we have to move forward and we have to think about not ourselves, but the residents here in the city of Coral Gables and what the blogs will write tomorrow and the insanity that will be sent out by all these text messages that should have a disclaimer. By the way, start putting disclaimers on your text messages. I put them on mine. It's illegal. Just so you know, there was one sent out today that didn't have a disclaimer on it. Um, we need to be more responsible and thoughtful. That's against that's against the elections code here in Miami Day County. Just so you know, vote is yes. We're going to take a a two-minute break. A two-minute break. Uh hold on one second. We're going to take a two a fivem minute break and then we'll come back and we'll take F11, which is time certain for 12 p.m. Thank you.

Recording stopped.

It's insane when you look at that. Check check two check two check check check one two. Okay.

Check one two. Check. Check.

Testing audio on Zoom. One, two, three. Check. Check. Testing Zoom audio. One, two, three. Testing Zoom audio.

I don't know. Mario. Check. Check. Check. Two. Check. Two. There was a proposal. Testing. Zoom audio. One, two, three.

Zoom audio. One, two. Zoom audio one two bought another one in we're in the process of and it's so crazy but yeah it's been there forever gate Check two. Check check check. Getting feedback. That's why you guys protected as much as you

check checks.

Zoom audio. One, two, three. Zoom audio. Zoom audio

we would like Zoom audio one. The thing is I I'll tell you I am 100% there's no right turns like you buy a cutth through neighborhood house and then you try to close it and all you do is make it 57 on the south side never that way that on the north of Bird Road but never on the south when I was growing up it was audio wall it houses.

Zoom audio. One, two, three. You guys could do it just as you know because people who live, you know, if you live off 57th Avenue and you're stuck and you can just turn to go home. One, two, three. One, two, three. Check. Check. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay. And no echo whatsoever, right? Audio is good. Perfect. All right. I'm talking on Zoom. Testing one, two, three. Testing audio on Zoom. Testing one, two, three.

Testing audio on Zoom. One, two, three. Testing audio on Zoom. One, two, three. But I want to see five by five. Good. How are you? We can put flowers flowers and trees. Are you serious? I'll get mine. He comes the same day. All right. Okay. I'll call you up when I'm ready. Hey, can you come over here too while you're on it? The thing is the guys look my wife. She'll absolutely tell you.

It's a 10,000. You want a couple flowers. And I already there's the organic geometric. I don't know if that's been discussed at that level. What a beautiful park. Which You justify everybody knows about the flowers. Don't even think about flowers. I can design.

recording in progress. F11 is a resolution of the city commission supporting the Mat Hammock market and supporting their efforts to employ individuals on the autism spectrum and those within the special needs community.

Thank you. Hello, my name Thank. Oh, there we go. Perfect. Okay. So, this this resolution is is about Mat Hammocks. They have a farmers market. I invited um Avenger, William, um Michael, and Armando if they can come up to the podium just to say a little more about this organization. Um before I go ahead and and tell you guys a little bit more myself.

Hi. Uh it is our privilege to speak to you guys today. Uh we run a farmers market on Saturday and Sundays with the expressed intent of hiring from the neurode divergent community and providing employment opportunities as well as acting as a small business incubator and a family-friendly event for the weekends. Um we you know we have really worked hard to get to this point and we are really looking for the community support because this is something that we want to grow. We want the community to be involved with and the neurode divergent community deserves it. uh they are deserving of employment opportunities, they're deserving of opportunities and you know as of April So, let's take a five minute break.

Except for mine. I mean, we'll just take yours and pass it around. How we doing?

Thank you. Yes, sir. Go ahead. Thank you. Uh, so we're really seeking the community support. We understand the park is in unincorporated Miami Dade, but the community we we serve is the municipality of Coral Gables. Um, so we would like to be able to partner and reflect some of the community values at the market and just create an atmosphere in which uh these individuals can have gainful employment. And the way that we do that is bringing in uh more people and um advertising such. And I'd like to introduce Armando. He's been with us for a couple months and he can kind of talk a little bit about his experience.

Well, I my name is Armando. Um I belong to the Demoa Foundation where they hired from and hopefully we we can get your support for the for the farmers market. Thank you. Um welcome welcome to the Gables. Thank you. Armando, do you want to say a little more about what you do in the market? Well, I helped to unload the I helped to unload the truck and load up the truck and I also work with Mike and some of the management skills. The manage I also learned management skills.

Armando's been with us for about three months and he has grown so much. He's learned a number of different skills. Uh more recently, he's taken on more of a management role where he has a few individuals uh working under him and you know, we can't be more proud. Um Ronda, do you want to tell a little more about your story and how you came around to you know talk about your K malfformation? I also have K malf formation and I'm also on the spectrum.

Yeah, we again Armando when we first started he was um he's very shy and here we are today talking in front of the council and this is amazing. uh we would never have imagined how far we could have come together and again we're again we're just so proud of the the impact we're making in the community and we just want to expand that and and really you guys are are very crucial to making that happen. So So how can we help you?

Well again we want to reflect the city's um the city's values. So if maybe you guys can you know advertise in some of the city calendars, put us on the city calendars, maybe some of your printed materials. Um because you know we are serving this municipality despite it having you know border of unincorporated um so you know and I've reached out to a few of your offices. I'm happy to meet with each and every one of you and kind of see how we can uh expand on some of the things that are most important to you. You know, again, we we want to reflect the values of this city. So, if I may, so why don't you do me a favor and do the commission a favor? Sure.

So, why don't you put together a proposal of I mean, we don't have the money to be investing in in uh in advertisement. Plus, the commissioners can't do that on their own. We have very limited budgets and they have to be spent for the offices. uh why don't you put together a proposal of how you would like for us to be included in the calendar, what you would like to be involved in, how we can work synergies together and pro provide it to the manager and the manager uh can assess it to see if if uh if that's feasible through the mayor. Let me just get an answer from the general. Uh sure. So, you know, I think that you know, we're not asking technically for funds or anything like that, but you know, programs that you're already running, whether it's printed materials in the city, just maybe add something that would include us.

Yeah, agree. I'm just saying like let's run it. We we run it through the manager and his team, Martha Ponting, and and we ask them to see maybe we can figure out a way to add you to we have a calendar online. Uh we have other things that we do uh that deal with autism. Uh we with with children on the spectrum. There's a lot of different organizations that are involved here,

right? And and given that this is autism acceptance month, I think it's very important for all of us to kind of support this community. This goes beyond anything that we do. um you know and uh I'm happy to meet with the you know again with everybody in the city but if there is something you guys are already doing that wouldn't cost you anything I think that would give us a lot of support just you know add it adding on an extra you know maybe an image or a blurb about what we're doing or the ability even uh you may logos if you could you know Instagram post would go very far away for us and come come by and see me at my office. Uh yes, I I've reached out to your office and we'd be happy to do that. Come by on Friday if

you'd like. You reach out on Fridays. I have open office hours starting at 2 o'clock. You come by and I'd be more than willing to meet with you and we could put something together. Okay. Commissioner.

Yes. So I've already partnered with this organization. I will be in the farmers I was in the farmers market last weekend to go ahead and see how this was and I was astonished and really amazed with the quality of work that they are doing with the inclusive community. Now I'm already going to be there once a month and my office is already working on um like flyers, PR, marketing because this is like we're I'm co-hosting. So all this material is already being done. My office is advertising it. I'm doing it through my newsletters as well. So, all we would really have to do is get the permission of this commission to go ahead and piggyback on that material through the city calendar and through the city newsletter. This there's no cost burden at all. I mean, if if my colleagues would like to take the extra step to go ahead and advertise this or market it in their own newsletters or social media, wow, that that would be amazing. Amazing. The foot traffic. Yeah, the foot traffic to get into Mat Hammocks is not a road that you drive by and you see this market happening. So, they really do need a little more help with entering the park and actually going down. It is a beautiful farmers market with a backdrop of the water basically. And I mean you can go get a blanket, buy some food, mingle with the people in the market, have a picnic, family picnic. It's it's a great great great cause. Um last commission meeting we supported a resolution of inclusivity. So I think this is the perfect timing now in April to go ahead and support this. Um this is this is just very simple. It's a six-month effect. We're not overlapping with the prior farmers market. Let's

have them just get started and support our our residents to support this farmers market. There's no cost burden, no financial burden as well. Sir, are you a non for are you a non forprofit? Uh, no. We're

So, you're for profofit. Correct. So, first and foremost, I can't vote on anything today that benefits an organization. I need if you told me you were like for Crystal Academy or you were involved in nonforprofit and well, we also have our own farmers market here for three months. I want to I don't need Majority of the residents that do come by, they are so surprised that the city isn't already advertising it because they say that this is one of the most needed things in a park which is, you know, historic 1930s. It's the oldest park. It is in Coral Gables. uh you know many of the residents dock their boats there and they find it to be a you know pleasant surprise when they actually come across the market. So, you know, vote no. It's okay if you're going to go ahead and vote no on this. Everything's already been established. All the PR is already there. The flyers are already there. There's nothing that they need to put together to present to you. Everything's already ready to go. It's very simple just to vote yes on this resolution. It is only to direct the city manager to advertise on their plat, not advertise, but to just notice it on their newsletter and put it on the calendar. There's nothing hard about this. This is happening every Saturday and Sunday from 10:00 a.m. to 400 pm

and we're not going to overlap with our farmers market. This is only for a period of 6 months. Okay. And to speak, excuse me one second, sir.

First and foremost, I've asked for more information. It's a common courtesy you give to your colleagues on the commission. I want to make sure that again you're you're a for-profit organization. So you want us you want us to advertise which will draw more people to your organization. I understand and I appreciate what you're doing uh with our neurodeiverse community, but I need to see more information before I allow the city to start advertising. I want to see your insuranceances. I want to see I want to speak to Miami date county. I want to make sure that we're on the same page. I want to It's a simple thing. I don't just shoot from the hip. So, I've asked you the third time I asked you just to have a little common courtesy and come back and we can send the information, put together a memo. I do memos on a weekly basis and I send them to my colleagues to educate them about things that I'm bringing before the commission. It's just common courtesy. It takes a lot of work. A lot of work. Send me a memo with all your information. What you're doing, where your plans are, where the money's going to go, what you're doing, what are the benefits, how can we advertise together, how can we collaborate.

So, I'm all for it, but I I just want information and I don't like to vote on things without having information.

That's fair. And, you know, I'll say that we ran through the parks pros department, so all appropriate insuranceances and all the processes that have been, you know, we have accommodated and done all those things. and to speak to the nonprofit. Those typically take a couple months and we're working on it. But in the interim, we are offering free, you know, spaces to to different organizations like the Rising Start, the Demoya Foundation, Wow Centers. We we do not charge uh nonforprofits. In fact, we have another organization that creates bags from battered women. Um and we have another tent for foster youth. So again, the the profits are minimal and the profits do go to hiring more uh you know members from the neurode divergent community. At this point, you know, with the amount of traffic we have, we're limited on how many in that community we could hire. So that is why, you know, we're hoping that you guys will allow us uh to grow uh with you, represent your community, and really this is more about them than anything else. At the end of the day, I run a number of successful businesses and this is uh this is more about uh doing something positive in the community and and uh you know purpose.

I agree with you. Great. So I look forward to your memo and you can send me the information and we look forward to engaging in one form or another, but I need I need background information through the through the mayor. Thank you. Yes. Yes. So there is a video that I want to go ahead and put, but before the video goes on, I want to go ahead and move this item. I'll second. Okay. Go ahead, Mr. Clerk. You have a a motion in a second. So, I I I want the video be before Yes. I want the video so that my colleagues can actually see what's behind this beautiful cause. So, uh through the mayor before we vote, I'd like to ask a few questions.

Okay. So, for the the folks that don't know where to go into Mat, can you describe which parking lot? How far down? Is it near the Red Fin Grill? If I was going to bike in there, how would you find, you know, where it is?

Absolutely. And thank you for that question. Uh, we're located on the rim of the ATL. You would go to the very end of the park by Noah Beach. I know it was Red Fin Red Fin Grill for a while. They they changed the name. It's a beautiful restaurant. and they actually uh gave us a waiver to allow us to sell food because they also understand what we're doing is, you know, about purpose and moving the community forward and helping a community that's typically underserved. Uh so if you actually go out uh to the end parking lot and you come in uh you know the opposite side of where the restaurant is, you'll see us lined up along the sidewalk so it's ADA compliant and we allow for you know people with disabilities to access the market as well. Uh it's a beautiful location. I really hope that each and every one of you gets a chance to come out and bring your family and see what we're providing uh to the community.

So, uh for the city attorney, I have some questions about, you know, what are our requirements if we uh are going to vote in favor of this resolution insurance-wise? Uh what is the normal protocol? So, we don't have a protocol for just the the resolution. what it does is spreads the word about Matis Hammock on um city platforms and communications. So, we don't have any established protocol for something like this. Okay. And uh city manager um if this goes through your office um what are you going to be looking for?

Well, it's it's um it's a for-profit corporation, so we would handle it uh through through that means. uh we would look at what what they're proposing, what our costs are and uh and what advertising uh the this organization is looking for. My only concern is it's not a 41c3. It's a per it's a forprofit. So we would have to handle it in that in that as a regular corporation. So my concern is a simple one and that is um same situation as what we do with uh when we give grants out to corporations to entities. We hope that they would do the event within the city confines in the city of Coral Gables. Um and not only that, it's got to it's got to be something that again benefits the city and all those are 501c3s. They're 501c3s where the money goes back into the charity. So the request is a very simple one. We're going to vote on it's perfectly fine. I just don't vote on things like this. I don't have information. I don't have a video. The video doesn't give me I don't I haven't looked up your company. I haven't seen anything. I thought we were going to learn about what it was today that we were going to potentially do. That's why, like I said before, in the last three weeks, my colleagues who they can't deny it. They've received four or five memos from me on issues that I'm bringing before the commission. It's just being considerate. That's the way that you do things in a body like this. You're going to bring something. You're going to ask, "I don't know you. I've never done business with you. you. I don't know your background. I don't know who you are. I don't know where you've been. I don't know if you ever done this before. Have you had a bankruptcy? These are things, normal things. You're you're a business owner. So, at the end of the day, if I'm going to get in if I'm going to get into a partnership with the city of Coral Gable's name that we have to respect and we have to protect, I don't I don't know who you are. So, at the end of the day, I'm going to vote no because I but I want to vote in favor of it, but I'm just asking for you to send me a memo with the information so that we can do a background check. We can look at your insurance. These are simple things that we do with everybody that wants to do an event here in the city of Coral Gables that we're going to tie tie our name to it. Just simple things.

So So speaking, but if you want but if you want to push it do and ram it down through today, then it's your choice. Well, just hold on one second, Mr. Mr. Commissioner.

Well, I I I just wanted to say that um first of all, I think that from what I've heard so far, having just met you both today and Yeah. Um it sounds like a very noble cause. um the the the the the spectrum, the individuals on the spectrum, autism in general, you know, to raise awareness for it, especially in this particular month, is something that I hold very near and dear. You know, my niece is autistic and for over a decade, I've served on the board and currently serve as the chair of development services for Easter Seals, which is a nonforprofit um you know, uh providing services in the community across the country actually um both for Alzheimer's as well as autism. um individuals, right? Especially for the the the program and those that are out there that help provide opportunities for individuals who are autistic over the age of 21. It's a very difficult um thing. A lot of government uh support for that dries up when you're no longer considered a minor, right? So, I'm supportive of that. Absolutely. But what I've been hearing from the dis and of course I haven't heard anything from you all denying it, right? is if there's a request for a little more information, you know, and I'm I'm sure you're not saying no to to providing more information before um this vote is taken. I don't know if it's appropriate perhaps to to table it until we get it. So, I don't know, Mr. Clerk, if this is something that is appropriate now, if I you know, is it a motion that I can raise to defer until we all have an opportunity to see the information that's being requested? I I know it's in the middle of another motion that's been seconded. I don't know

through the mayor. It has been seconded. Right. So there's I can't entertain a motion to defer. Not a motion to defer. No. Um very good. Okay. So which I think would have been appropriate just to give us a little more time, you know, to to to follow up on on what it is that we're we're being asked to uh the vote on a resolution to support. Mr. Manager.

Thank you, Mayor Commissioners. We are very um diligent in who we support and we when we we have a corporation and in this case it's per is per for profit and even even if it was for nonprofit that we do research and make sure that before we put our name on on a corporation that on any entity that it makes sure that this entity has and I'm sure it's is it's a great cause but we want to make sure has that entity has all the values that we that we uh that we have in Coral Gables and that we cherish. And so we would we would look into the corporation uh look to see what what what it's doing and also uh dig a little deeper to make sure that that that those values that that that we propose are are are part of that corporate structure. And at this moment I I I don't know.

Oh, we have a motion and a second. Mr. Cler, through through the mayor, I asked for a video which is going to give you guys a lot more information. And I'm sorry some of my colleagues really didn't get a chance to read through the whole resolution because the resolution actually tells you the corporation and the information some of you are questioning. Um I know that sometimes the agenda can get a little full and that might be difficult for some of us but if we can please um have the video. Hello, my name is Janine. I work with liquid gold honey and today I have the privilege of working with Alejandro. Hello.

He's been my helper today. I'm also teaching him about honey and how things work. And can you tell everyone a little bit about what you learned? Do you remember what the darkest honey has? Um, I know it's a big word. Anti oxidants. Yes. The buckwheat is the darkest honey and it's the strongest with antioxidants. Also, the wildflower. Do you remember what the wildflower has? Another anti- inflammation. Inflammations.

Yes. Also comes from the Everglades. Very important. And I really appreciate today and I appreciate working with Michael which is the owner of this market because he allows people on the spectrum to he allow he trains them gives them the opportunity to work and I really appreciate that because my son is also on the spectrum and non-verbal and it gives me hope and much gratitude that people are going to treat my son with the same respect and give him opportunity as well. So, I really appreciate being a part of this community and this market and giving someone like Alejandro an opportunity and just loving the full experience. And we hope you come and see us here at Mat Hammock every Saturday and Sunday. Thank you.

Hi, we are here in Maten Hammock's farmers market and today we have the pleasure to work with Melissa. Melissa, how was today? Well, I made lemonade to the people. I did peel her lemon out and then I did a squeeze the lemon. I put ice water and a different fus and a cooking. I serve the people serving on their emonade because they selling a coconut water and flesh emanate.

We think it's very important that we hire people from the unique abilities community because to just give them an experience to play on an equal playing field with all of us. Hey, today we're at the Mat Hammock Farmer Market fruit stand with David. David, you had an opportunity today to work with the fruit stand. What's your main takeaway? Doing the the mangoes and the kiwi and the orange and and guava and guava. That's awesome. What What kind of skills did you learn today? Or did you learn mostly classifications of fruit? Picking up the the the stickers. Okay.

Okay. Awesome. And uh you know this is very important for us to give opportunities to those in the neurody divergent community to get gainful employment also to learn different life skills like working with fruit, peeling fruit and preparing them for consumption and papaya as well. So is this something that you would find beneficial and want to do again maybe? Yeah. Awesome. Well, thank you David. We appreciate it.

You too. Well, I was making candles in rising star the school and we make with wax fragrance and old things for for buy. So, thank you. S Nico, do you prefer making candles or going out and selling? What do you prefer? Going out and selling. to take Nico around with us and go out and sell with the community. And I got to tell you, they are great salespeople.

Um, and so this is really, really important to the community, the ability to get our kids out. This is our classroom. You know, we don't lock our kids up inside classrooms. This is our classroom. They get out in the community, they engage, they learn how to sell, how to engage with the community, and then they can take those skills later on in life and and and and be very productive, accepted members of our community. So, what we need is the support of our community. We need people to come come to these fairs, buy our products, support our kids, uh, and get very very actively involved uh, with the autistic and neurody diverent community. I belong to an organization called the Demoa Foundation and they help people with unique abilities find jobs.

That's awesome. How long have you been with the market? Three three months or four months. And how do you like it? All right. Yeah. What have what kind of skills have you been working on here? Management.

Do you greet people when you come in? people as well. Yeah. And then what's your favorite part about the job, Armando? That you make me feel like family. We do. We do consider you family. So, uh, in reg in response to, uh, Commissioner Castro's comments, I did read your resolution. It was very short and brief, but it lacked the substance of actual documents. Your license is not here. Your insurance is not here. Just because you say you have insurance doesn't prove that you have insurance. So that's what I meant when you actually lack documentation. So if you'd like, we're going to take a vote now. Whatever happens at the other end, I still highly recommend that you provide that information. Uh one form or another. Mr. Mayor. Yes.

I'm sorry. I just want to clarify with um M commissioner Lara's question about a motion to defer. A motion to postpone is postponed is one of the motions that can be made while there is another pending motion. So I just want to clarify that. Do we have a motion? M commissioner lot has a motion to postpone. Do we need a second? Is that the way it works there? A second is required. Yes. I I will second that. All right. So, we have a motion and a second. Mr. Clerk, give me a vote. Commissioner Castro, no. Commissioner Fernandez,

it is really disappointing uh to watch that adding your event to the calendar in an area that has very few events in the city uh has become political. And we see events from not from for-profit corporations on the city calendar all the time. So I would ask for a full list of every event that has been listed on the city calendar over the last three years since I've been in this commission. Um this should be a no-brainer. Armando, I want to congratulate you for the work that you're doing. I want to thank you both for the work that you're doing for the nur divergent community. Um, it's disappointing that it's come to this. I'm not going to vote uh to defer. This item should have been voted on today. Uh, it's a no-brainer for me.

Commissioner Lada. Yes. Vice Mayor Anderson.

Uh, the the pro profit uh items that do get advertised in our city do go through the rigorous process. Uh, deferral doesn't mean no. Okay. you're being here today and describing where your market is itself is an uh advertising, but we do have to follow a normal procedure when you're dealing with a for-profit company. In the meantime, I was looking up organizations that you have in uh under the Florida Corporations Sunbiz area. I see a number of them. I don't know if they're all you or there is a mixture between where you use your middle initial and you don't use your middle initial. I know that our city can do a beautiful job of clearing all that so the residents know that we're doing things the same way for your organization that we do for everybody else. And I'll enjoy going down there and seeing all the fine work that you're doing, helping the autistic community and disabled community u enjoy a productive life. So, thank you.

You uh so yes on the on the deferral for now, Mayor Lago,

so before before I say yes on the deferral, um this is simple. Send me all the information through the manager's office, copy all the commission, put together a comprehensive package explaining what you're asking for. You're a for-profit organization. You're going to benefit financially from the city, which has the best brand in South Florida, attaching themselves to you. I understand why you're doing it, and I also understand why you're helping u the neurode divergent community. By the way, before the record, and you know this, everybody follows the city of Coral Gables in regards to the neurode divergent community. I've been here 13 years. We started with a card center. We have Crystal Academy. We have the University of Miami. So, we've been doing this for a long time, a long time. In this building alone and in city hall, we have Project Victory. We have a litany of different organizations that already engage with the city. You're not in the city of Coral Gables. You're a for-profit organization. and I have to protect the brand of the city of Coral Gables. Two points really quickly uh in regards to Commissioner Fernandez. I second his comments 110%. Not three, give them the last five years. In the last five years, I'd like to know all the pro all the non for all the for-profits. And I also want to make sure that again remember we had a cowboy here at one point for a year. His name was Amos Rojos. And we did insane things as saying that this building was going to fall and rush people out, which I never moved out of city hall. We embarrassed ourselves over and over and over again as a city when we allowed a an elected, you know, a non-elected official to walk in the middle of a commission meeting and be the manager at a $365,000 a year salary. I asked for a vet. Let's vet and let's find the best manager. What I hope that you do and you would have done is when I ask you for something as simple as, hey, just give me some background information before I tie the city's hitch to you and we give you free publicity and we start pushing people towards your way, let me at least know what I'm what I'm what I'm getting involved in, what I'm engaging in. It's a simple ask. It's a simple ask. I didn't I didn't say no. I'm in favor of it 110%. But I'm just asking you. You don't have to come here and try to ram

it down my throat. That's what they did for two years on everything. On every single thing. I couldn't even get up to go to the bathroom here. What I'm asking here is protect the city of Coral Gables and make sure that our brand is not tarnished. Not saying you're going to tarnish our brand, but you do understand that, right? If I give you free publicity and something happens at your market that is not up to our standard, they're going to come back and they're going to blame it on us and we're going to be in a position where, hey, will you recommended me to go there? So, I just want to be careful. That's all I'm asking. Put it together in the next week and we'll have it on the next commission agenda and I look forward to presenting it. Commissioner Ker presented. And I look forward to voting in favor of it as long as the manager and the team and our procurement department and our staff and our legal department vets it and it seems it is appropriate. It's a simple request. We do it in the private sector. We should do it in the public sector at the end of the day

through the mayor. Mayor through the mayor. Um Armando did such an amazing job. Thank you so much Armando. Um mayor, I'm going to ask if maybe we could take lunch sometime soon because I did buy Armando some lunch. I said um that he would have the privilege of having lunch with me in my office. That's why I asked for a time at 12:00. So, you know, we can rush lunch.

We sure just take two other items and I will now. Armando, it's you're it's a blessing to have you here and you have the greatest privilege to have lunch with Commissioner Castro. So, I hope that you have a wonderful lunch and you enjoy it and I look forward to you coming back in two weeks presenting here before the commission again and getting it approved once all the documentation is provided because I really enjoyed your presentation and I love your shirt by the way. Thank you, sir. All right. All right. So, next item. Um, next item here is item E5, Regency Park.

Thank you, mayor. E5 is a norance of the city commission amending ordinance number 202232 as amended which approved the planned area development for the property known as Regency Park and legally described as lots 1 through 12 and lots 35 to 46 including the public alleyway lying in between block 10 and lots 1 to 4 block 15 Coral Gables craft section Coral Gables Florida to allow for the issuance of a temporary certificate of occupancy prior to completion of the public park to the city subject to the terms and conditions of a performance bond. Um, E8 is related, but it's a resolution that will not be voted on today because it will be uh considered and voted on if this is approved today on first reading when it the ordinance comes back on second reading. I know the applicant is here. Mayor, sir, good afternoon. Good afternoon, Mr. Mayor. You think we can

Thank you very much. You think you can present in two minutes? I'm sorry. You think we can present in two minutes? I can present much faster than that if there's a motion. All right. Um,

well, first of all, Joe Himemenz JMZ Group, offices at 2020 Salado Street, representing Regency Park. Um, I know you're all very familiar with this project, and it has been a labor of love for a lot of the people in this room, um, and a lot of the people across the street. One of the requirements for TCO and CO um is the construction and deeding of a public park located on the corner of Almaria and Saledo. The park has been contemplated since the beginning. Mr. Mayor, I know how hard you especially uh it was not in our original plan to give that park and it was asked for. I didn't control that property at the time. Um it it wasn't it wasn't ours to give away. Um but it soon became very clear that the mayor would not allow it um any other way. So we did acquire and we've we've planned on building that park this whole time. There have been design issues as we've gone from different philosophies in the city on what would go there, what wouldn't go there. So we finally got around to a design. I think you'll be seeing it today. Um, but we've also used it as a construction parking site. So, we've put 40, 50, 60 cars on there in the middle of downtown without affecting the neighborhood. And quite frankly, I'm glad we hadn't built it yet because, as we were talking earlier today, it's probably not a good idea to have an active park next to an 18story construction site. So, we've used it as a construction trailer. U, but we have not built it. The design is up there. We would like your blessing on it so I can release the architects. This is this design has comments and approval of and I'll let the manager speak for his staff. But um this reflects comments that we've received from staff, from public works, from green space, from

planning and zoning, from the manager. Uh and hopefully it meets your meets your satisfaction. But we're never going to get this done obviously before TCO, which we would need in the next probably two weeks. I mean, and county permitting alone for this park, I'm afraid, is probably going to take a few months. So, we would like to amend the authorizing legislation of this to take that requirement away as to TCO and even CO. We have agreed on a price that has been reviewed by the public works department, approved by the manager. It's $622,000 to build this park on top of the $1.2 million that we paid uh for it. So, you are getting close to a $2 million park. Uh there's the sidewalks, there's um obviously the landscaping, trees remain, trees will be added, the green space. Um and we would also put the deed in escrow. So, if you have to call the bond, you already have the deed. We do not anticipate that being a problem. We are builders. We want to build this. We just It's hard to build a park and an 18story tower at the same time. Um, and like I said before, I'm personally glad to be asking for this because I think it would have been it would have less in the park to have the construction. My dad goes to that post office all the time and as much as my dad loves me and supports me, I think he's still mad at me that we've made it harder to get to the post office. So, we would have made it a little harder to get to this, too. Um, but this will be a jewel and Mr. Mayor, the jewel that I think you wanted for one of the urban parks. It's It is not an insignificant amount of money. It is, like I said, it's a $2 million project at our costs. I can only imagine if if you would try to do it with with I know what public procurement requires sometimes. So, I ask for your support on this legislation. I'm here to answer any questions, but it is not for lack of

trying. It has been we have been moving forward all the time, but we have used it as a benefit to the to the neighborhood by keeping because I know how much that's a complaint of construction sites when people park all over the place and they affect the neighborhood and they take parking away from other businesses there. We are jam-packed in that lot 247. You can see it. So, I know it's an ask. I know it's it's it's a it's an amendment to what we agreed to do, but it is in good faith and we will deliver what you fought so hard for. I mean, I know and I smile about it now, but it you fought me you fought me tooth and nail on that one. I you you put it in there as a requirement. I had to do it. So did you. Um and we do look forward to the complete project being completed soon.

So Joe, first and foremost, thank you for being here and thank you for bringing this in for fruition. You know, it's it's um it's been a labor of love for the last three years. When I got elected mayor, we had one park in the downtown, Pawn Circle Park. When you include Pawn Circle Park, now with the additional ones, we're going to have six parks in downtown. All negotiated at zero cost with the developers. Publix has a 20,000 foot park. John Marquez has a 15,000t park. Jose Boschetti in front of Nordstrom's has like a 6 or 7,000t park. And then we have obviously um the site uh adjacent to your home um madam vice mayor which is a beautiful little site a little site there with a with a nice park there. Uh and we're working on two other ones that I'm not going to discuss right now but uh that are that are potential uh seven and eight for our downtown. We fought we we talked about this for a long time. Uh for me this is this is a legacy item. This is real legislation. This is bringing this is years of hard work that you see here before you. By the way, Joe, you and I both know and the manager can attest to it and so can the DCM that property is no longer $1.2 million. A corner on Sevilla is more like $4 million now. Okay, $3.5 million or so. I'm just telling you that's a city asset. And now to build it another $600 700,000 which is going to be enjoyed in perpetuity for everybody in this community after we're all long gone and not serving here on this commission anymore. This is what truly it takes to effectuate change in our community to come to work every single day and negotiate and really deliver excellence for the city. So to me I want to thank you. You worked your tail off. Armando Manny. Uh it was a tough negotiation as the manager can attest. Uh this was a sticking point uh in regards to the 17

additional feet uh on the building. Uh and I think the trade-off was was an amazing windfall for the city coral gables. Um I have a few asks that I want to make sure from staff, not from you.

Um Mr. DCM. I want to make sure that we have decent mature trees, that we have shade trees, that while I respect and I follow the lead by Miss Bell, I want to make sure that we have oak trees, we have beautiful shade trees that that you know, 15 years from now, they're beautiful in nature and they're welcoming in our downtown, especially as we continue to grow. That's the mark of a world-class city, a town with plazas, a town with open spaces in the middle of your downtown. And that's what we're going to have in the next two years once we're done with these six or seven parks, God willing, along with the underlying which is being completed. A piece of legislation that I wrote 10 years ago and now you see it coming to fruition. So I like to make sure there's shade trees, real shade trees. I also want to make sure the sidewalks is part of their contract anyways. The sidewalks are replaced on both sides. You have, especially around the fire hydrant, there's some they tapped into the fire hydrant. There's been some issues there. They're going to replace it anyways, but I just want to make sure that gets taken care of. Um, and I also want to consider for here, I know we're working on it right now, uh, here comes Miss Bell to talk about trees. Um, is to talk about the issue of I would like one day to put a work of art, a work of art in this um, in this park. I know that the developer is bringing a world-class piece of art that they're putting in front of their building, which is amazing. It's already there. It's encased. It's protected, and you'll see it. But I would like in the future using our public art and public places fund to take advantage of this incredible park and put something there. And what I'd like to see there potentially to be considered is a work by Carmeera, a Cuban American artist who was discovered in New York when she was 90 years old and she recently passed away uh I think it was two years ago at an age of almost 104 105 years old in New York. U so I would love to see that one day. Maybe we get some funds from other projects and we can put it into this park. So I I like the design of the park. I'd like to see it the greener the

better. I know the less hardscape the cheaper it will be. Um I'd like to see some shade trees and I have no issues with granting the extension because I understand building this park with 300 workers on a job site. The disaster that it would been. This is what I do for a living. you need a place to park and I'm okay with that because this is a massive investment that the city is getting in regards to a park just like the one for Publix just like the 15,000 square feet on Sevi I think in Sevilla correct the corner Sevilla uh and also the one where Jose Bushetti in front of the Norths these are massive investments in the future so if we have to make some accommodations as long as we have a bond we're perfectly fine on the job I have no issues

Mr. manager. Yes, thank you, mayor. It is a 10,000 foot park. It was used very effectively uh for parking vehicles, which is a always a problem and uh through a a a construction of this size. The the title is an escrow. We have a bonded job and uh we have a a park which is being reviewed and and uh and our assistant director of of greencape, Dina Bell, has done a has done a wonderful job in in creating a beautiful park there. So, get us some shade trees, Dina. Make sure, Miss Bell, make sure that they're shade. Shade cuz we have some oaks in the back, but I want to make sure we get some oaks on the property.

And by the way, I forgot a project. Tremble Crow project corner lot. That's another park that we negotiated that was deed to the city. And by the way, just so my colleagues understand, um, these these properties are all deed to the city. When we started doing this, the Tremble Crow property was not deed. Now they're all deed to the city. These are assets that belong to the city. assets that belong to the city. So that's another one that I forgot. So that's the sixth one that that we have right now and we're looking at two other ones. So through the mayor.

Yes. Uh, so, mayor, because of all these issues, I think uh we we have we have no problem in in and uh in having the the title neescrow a a bond for $622,000 and and the TCO and CO extended uh and providing a TCO as long as long as as of course as it's in escrow and and we have a bond for the full amount. Okay, Mr. Mr. Mayor. Yes. Um just to clarify, we've with discussions with Mr. Himenez, it would be a letter of credit in lie of a performance bond is what we had discussed and um and we will work out between now and second reading, Mr. Jimenez and I will work out the mechanics of the timing and and when the letter of credit could be called if for whatever reason and all that to make sure that the city is protected

through the mayor. Mr. Mr. manager, can you do me a favor if the the commission will will, you know, give me this latitude? Will you uh work with your team um you know, maybe Chelsea at your office and have her be the point person with the county so we can shepherd this through and push this through as quickly as possible and and address the issues of getting the approvals either through Durm Wasa because I I want to see them get the TCO and I want the project started. I want to deliver. This is the first one. This is the first one of six. No, Tremble Crow is going to be first. Tremolo Crow will be delivered probably in the next few months, but this could be the second one. I want I want to see these parks in our downtown come to life through the mayor. Yes.

Yeah. So, I think this is just very simple. Um, we're going to go ahead and have a letter and we could just wait for CO. We're not going to give you a CO if the park's not done. And if the park's not done, the city would probably do it for $700,000, which we'll have the money. So, I'll go ahead and I'll move this item. I do want to clarify though, commissioner, and like I said, we're going to be working on the details of that, but if they are ready for CO, they will the the what we've discussed is that they would be able to get the CO because my understanding is that the CO will be months after their TCO is when they'll be ready. So, they would be able to get the CO, but we would be able to if the park is not completed within the time frame that's agreed upon, which is they've asked for a year, then the city would be able to call on the letter of credit and we the the the deed would be released from escrow to the city. So, at the end of the day, we're going to get a park no matter what. That's why I am in agreeance with with this legislation.

I think it would be easier just to to clarify everything. I think we are coming to second reading. Uh I think we would we've been asked if we can modify it on second reading to bring a letter of credit and and the title and and the title kept in escrow. The reason we are keeping in escrow is so that the all the permitting can be through the codina property through through codina instead of through us. And then and then at that at that time we can issue the uh the co uh as long as the as the as the title is is an escrow we have a revocable letter of credit and we will work all all those details out and then bring it back on second reading so that the TCO and CO can be issued based on that.

Okay. All right vice mayor

through through the mayor. Um just couple couple things and I appreciate uh Mr. Codina's working with community. Uh the number of things that you that he's done to try to make sure that it didn't impact the area any more than necessary, including not just the parking, but using the cement trucks that made less noise uh to make sure that the neighborhood was not impacted. I met with some of the uh condo owners that were nearby and they were very appreciative of that. They're also very appreciative that this is going to be a park with green space, no artificial turf. Um I've asked staff to look at um maybe some some more flowers in some areas because some not everything's going to be able to grow underneath an oak tree and in the shaded areas, but some of those sunny areas we might be able to showcase some of the some of the flowers that's going to bring in um some more nature, some more butterflies, some more birds and things of that nature. And uh you know uh I appreciated the fact that when I asked you all if you'd have any heartburn making it 75% green space, you didn't push back.

I think it's more. I think I think it's a little more. I think it's a little more. And because that's what this community needed. They were walking across lun you imagine to get come into the neighborhoods because there's so there's no green in that area at all. So, we've really transformed the community and I appreciate the efforts that uh the Kodina uh group has done to to make this come to uh in for a landing for this area. Thank you. So, we have a motion and a second. Commissioner Fernandez second. I think Fernand. If you didn't, I'll second. No, I had seconded. Yeah. Okay. Do you have any public comment? Anything? No, Mr. Mayor.

All right. Okay. Commissioner Fernandez, yes. Commissioner Lada, yes. Vice Mayor Anderson, yes. Commissioner Castro, yes. Mayor Log, yes. Thank you for your hard work, my friend. Appreciate you. We'll see you in the second room. I really do want to call out the manager, his staff, and the attorney because we've been we've been at this and I really do appreciate the attention that they've given to this matter. Thank you, sir. We're bring we're almost there. All right. Um I'm going to I think we have a we have a two o'clock time, sir. Is that what we have? Yes. Want to make sure. Let me check that. Yes, sir. public. Yeah. Give me one second. E6. E6.

All right. We're going to take a 30 minute lunch. We'll be back here by 2:15 and we will take that time surger. All right. Thank you very much. See you here at 2:15.

Recording stopped.

Recording in progress. Mr. Mayor. Yes, sir.

No, Peter's right there. Right there. You're right there. Can you turn them on, please? No. Yeah, there we go.

Yours. Okay, we're back. Mr. Manager, check yours. Thank you.

All right. And welcome back from lunch. Uh, thank you. Welcome back from lunch. Uh, time certain items E6 and E9. One second, Mr. Mayor.

Oh, we're going to No, are we going to we're going to defer those items for a little bit. Uh we're we're still negotiating on that point. Excuse me. Let's move on to item E4. E4. trying to trying to iron out the last details. I was meeting with our friends from Publix, our city attorney, city clerk, excuse me, city manager uh and my staff along with uh the attorney and we're just ironing out a final few details for E6 and E9. Hopefully that the commission will support these final changes. E4 is an ordinance of the city commission amending chapter 74 traffic and vehicles to create article 10 personal delivery devices and mobile carriers to impose certain safety and operational requirements for personal delivery devices and mobile carriers consistent with state law providing for severability clause prepared provision codification and providing for an effective date.

Good afternoon, mayor, vice mayor, uh commissioners. Stephanie Throck, deputy city attorney along with Matt Anderson from sustainability and I'm gonna get the title wrong. Mobility.

Mobility. Thank you. Um, this item is sponsored by the vice mayor. As you know, we've seen a recent influx in those I'm going to call them delivery robots. They're actually called personal delivery devices and mobile carriers under state law. So, this ordinance acts within the ability we have under state law to regulate the safe operation of those devices. We are generally preempted as to the personal delivery devices, but we do have a narrow area about safe operation in which we can legislate. So, this ordinance today is sponsored by the vice mayor is very similar to one adopted in Miami Beach um a few months ago and what it does is it incorporates those definitions into our code and also has a few requirements for the safe safe operation of the devices. The main ones are that the devices themselves have to have lights and penants. They cannot have commercial advertising on them. They have to evidence insurance um to the city annually to make sure that we're covered for any accidents that may occur. There are also speed limits for the operation on sidewalks and crosswalks. And most importantly, they require that they cannot be stationary on city sidewalks or swailes for more than 30 minutes. And they must leave accessible paths of travel. Um the city wants to work closely with the vendors that we have operating in the city to make sure that they avoid those narrow sidewalks that we know we may have in the downtown area so that we ensure that there's proper um ADA accessible access on all of our city rights of way and that pedestrians have safe access to all of our downtown. So happy to answer any questions and turn it over to the vice mayor or Matt if you have any questions.

Madam vice mayor. So, um, as you all have been observing, there's more and more of these personal delivery devices around. I've seen a number of instances where, uh, pedestrians are shoved out of the way by the devices themselves. The sidewalk is blocked. Um, a stroller can't make it down or they're sitting for an entire day and into the night in front of or besides someone's home, uh, blocking the sidewalk and forcing people to take another route. So that is why, you know, I brought these things forward so that we're in compliance with the ADA that these devices themselves are not creating barriers to access to for individuals with disabilities and that they don't create a hazard where uh also vehicles are hitting them. It's less likely uh as well. So I I appreciate staff's work on this and um hopefully the vendors will embrace it uh totally and we'll be able to move forward.

Thank you, Vice Mayor. One thing to note, enforcement wouldn't begin for 6 months after adoption. That's similar to um other neighboring municipalities. And we think it will give time for um us to meet with those vendors and make sure that everybody's able to be in compliance. So, okay. Uh any questions from you all? If not, I'll move it. I'll second it. But I do have a question. Yes. Um, do these device and this may just be not not specifically about the legislation, but do they have a an identification number on them that's visible? For example, let's say that there's an issue with a unit so that it can be reported name.

Yeah. State law requires that they have a a name and the company name on them and they they are required to be under state statute to be actively monitored when moving. They don't have to be uh a human being doesn't have to be right there, but they are supposed to be actively monitored and we've already been in contact with some of the companies. So, we we do have contact information as well. I don't know that there is um an explicit requirement under state law for like a phone number or complaints, how am I driving, etc. But we can look into Maybe I didn't I I mean an identification number for the actual unit. Yes, they all have names. So, they have human names. Yeah. Okay. Yes.

Okay. There's a number on the top there's of that little device on there and uh just for clarification in the definitions uh part of my editing was incorporating the ADA as well so that our code incorporates the federal code. Okay, Mr. Clerk, do you have any public comment? No, Mr. Mayor. We have a motion, a second. Commissioner Lada

through the mayor just a question. So, um, vice mayor or to city attorney, when I'm looking at the the proposed ordinance, it says the devices in section I guess it's uh C D under operational restrictions says devices shall not obstruct pedestrian movement or impede accessible routes or access to buildings, ADA ramps, fire hydrants, trans transit stops or public infrastructure. So, just walking the streets, some of them are narrow um sidewalks, right? And I don't know what we do when it's like a showdown between me and like Wall-E when you're walking down the street and if I was in a wheelchair, I don't know. So, I understand the intent, but like have we thought through like what the enforcement of that looks like?

Sure. So, it's it's as always an operational challenge to enforce some of these restrictions. That is the very issue that the vice mayor brought up. um they are supposed to yield to pedestrians um but they are also treated as pedestrians legally under the state statute. So it's a an interesting case there. Our intention is to work closely with our public works staff and with Matt's team to identify those roads in which we would hope that they would avoid passageway. We do have some narrow sidewalks in the city along Lune or some other busier roads where you may not be able to step out of the way robot or human. And so we would like to work um to identify those roads that we would sort of like to be off limits to the extent that we um later want to completely restrict them from those those sidewalks. We we may be able to do that. We can look at that. Um but at this point in time, we really wanted to identify those roads and and work collaboratively with the vendors to sort of um you know restrict their usage there. If that's the only path to a location where they're going, that may be the only path. They just need to back up. be it a block or two if somebody's in the way andor um if we can sort of map out um roads that we don't think they're appropriate on if we can work with the vendors like we've done with the scooters etc we would like to do that and and work collaboratively but at the moment it doesn't ban them from any specific sidewalks

through through the mayor yes

so I bought brought up specifically to staff you know particular roads and staff can identify those roads like for instance Lun Road there's no place to go there's absolutely no place for a human being to go that is disabled other than the sidewalk. Uh I did take a picture and I sent it to staff where the human being was forced into the grass that was able-bodied, but a person in a wheelchair cannot. So we don't want to stand down like that. That is an extremely busy highway. It's a very dangerous highway. And to have a stubborn machine that's not going to move force an individual with disabilities to go in reverse on a side like sidewalk like that is utterly dangerous. So there will be streets in which our staff is going to have to say that is too dangerous because you can't imagine going backwards in a wheelchair down some of these streets. There's another route that these robots can take. It's going to be longer. Okay. And but it's exactly why on every single one of these developments that come forward, we need to press for wider sidewalks so that there is space for both all these gadgets and devices and people to be able to walk and stroll and strollers and wheelchairs and be able to pass each other. So that that's why under operational restrictions paragraph C there's a sub paragraph E that says all efforts shall be made to operate these devices only on those sidewalks providing more than 5 ft of clearance and free of any infrastructure obstructions which may inhibit the use of the sidewalks by pedestrians. Okay.

Is there a staging area for these vehicles like that there are they picked up every night? Uh I know in some areas they pick up the scooters uh at night. Uh, is that the same way that they operate or is there a place where they park these on on a regular basis? I'll defer to Mr. Anderson, but my understanding is that there are some arrangements with private property owners in the downtown where some of them are being staged. I believe they're also station uh staging over on where the fountain is on a hamra um right over here in the business district. Uh they've been I've seen them staging there where they're circle they're dropping them off and staging them surrounding that uh fountain area right there. Right. So they're picking them up and dropping them off. I guess they're not there overnight cuz if we have a 30-minute limit,

no, it's not my understanding that they're overnight, but if they are, that would be prohibited if this ordinance is adopted and enforced. And I I would suggest is if there's a possibility that we can maybe rent them space to store these uh on an overnight basis as a revenue uh generating way of of doing things as well, maybe within the downtown. Uh we can find maybe space that we can rent out to them for for them to store them. I think they need to take them back for charging access to probably recharge them overnight similar to how we do

just food for thought. I guess going forward if that need does arise. I know the technology on these things is changing just as quickly as everything else is. So, you know, I'm sure that the the solar ability for some of them may may become just their regular longevity anyway. So, um just food for thought going forward. Our our um intention is between first and second reading to reach out to those vendors that have already been in contact with the city to make sure they're aware of these um uh new restrictions should they be adopted on second reading. Okay. Through the mayor. Yes, sir.

So, just a comment, you know, and I'm not the guy that thinks that we should ever allow perfect to be the enemy of good, right? But one thing that comes to my mind in looking again at the visibility enhancement requirement under I guess it's B that all such devices must emit a period audible sound. Periodic that's a that's a typo but yes a periodic audible sound period but okay periodic it

u that was before a period it'll be on but okay periodic audible sound swishing or occasional beeping when emotion sufficient to alert nearby pedestrians of their presence. I mean, we treat these as as individuals, right? But we don't require individuals to walk around with uh um swishing or occasional beeping when we walk and and already you've got a flag that's three feet high on off the top of the um uh of the the device. I'm just thinking out loud, you know, maybe in practice we'll see, you know, if adopted, this is what we're going to be experiencing. But if like I'm sitting um having a coffee at Morton's or you know I'm somewhere outside enjoying the city outdoor cafe land se may not want the BB

I have a sense because I've seen quite a few of these PTEs right that they're just go is it going to be a constant R2-D2 kind of motif going on you knowep beep at all times my understanding is that um city of Miami Beach has also adopted this and the reason is for pedestrian safety if you are visually impaired or if you have your back turned, you may not see one. But sort of like an electric vehicle has that sort of low swishing hum noise when backing up or moving that it would alert you to their presence. But we can certainly um you know think about modifying that agreement if the sponsor wants to. But it is similar to what Miami Beach has adopted. But I do understand of course the concern and we're happy to address it however you would like in the ordinance.

Well, I I I'm not asking for it to be amended. I was just kind of thinking out loud and maybe there's no good answer until we see what it's like in practice. But I I'm envisioning something like where the amount of uh operational usage right during a given evening might even diminish at the effectiveness when all you hear is just beeping going on or swishing going on at all times and whether that's really um going to achieve the goal or diminish the experience for people who want to enjoy you know but I don't know because I don't know how loud the beeping is. I don't know how it's audible within 100 feet I believe is the well the 100 feet for the for fear rear facing oh the lights are the lights are 100 feet

and they're the option too is require sufficient to alert yeah right so there's a lot of I don't know um but I understand the intent behind it which is more than laudable right but like we don't require that of people we don't require that of people on a bicycle we don't require that of dogs that are also being walked any one of those could present an issue for people who are visually ually impaired as well. Um, you know, but I was just throwing it out there just for further conversation, you know, regarding through the mayor. Yes.

Um, I think the the biggest difference is a person who's uh walking a dog or or a person walking can say, "Excuse me, if they find somebody who's standing in the way otherwise, this device is just going to stop there and stand on the sidewalk." if it's not notifying that person may just turn around and fall right over it because they're not paying attention or they're not seeing it. So that that may be the difference. Maybe it's not a beeping sound that we want. Maybe it's something similar to what the electrical electric vehicles have which is just that humming sound which may be emitted at at a if if it comes to a stop. Uh or I don't know we could try to between first and second reading maybe we can find a solution.

Yeah. you say a solution, but I don't know if we have a problem either, you know, like I'm I'm just kind of musing out loud and really in practice is when we really know. Um, but yeah, good suggestion there through through the mayor. Yes.

So, I had brought up the swishing sound. The Miami Beach ordinance only had beeping. And you know, when you're riding a bike, the thing you do is you ring your bell or something and say, you know, and you tell people where that you're coming. You're to the left or you're to the right. You give them a heads up. Okay, I'm out walking my dogs at night. I try to avoid people. Problem is we these things aren't avoiding people. They're going they're blocking the road. And for an individual that's that's sight impaired, this is a huge problem. Now, whether or not it's swishing or beeping sometimes will depend on the context. So, I left staff some discretion here because if you're on Lun Road, swishing is not going to do. So, I think uh you know staff will need to make an assessment of that. I prefer the swishing over beeping because we're beeped enough as it is. Um

but I did leave that flexibility in there for staff. So, we can make sure the people that are sight impaired do know that these devices are on the on the street and um that they look around, turn around. Here it is. It's behind me. Oh my god, I can't go backwards. Perhaps this is something we can address between first and second reading. To the extent we um are able to schedule a meeting with the vendors in between, I think that would be helpful to learn the capabilities. I don't think they can talk yet, but we can um we can speak to them about the through the mayor. Yes, sir.

Uh vice mayor. Uh as far as OSHA is concerned, white noise and beeping are considered both safe. So a swishing type sound that's white noise is used in equipment where you have a lot of residential area around. And so both actually comply with with OSHA from a construction perspective. So I'm assuming they all comply with with this with this kind of issue also. Okay. So and and if if that's the case then I just amend it on the floor here and let's scratch beeping and just make it swishing. Okay. So we have a motion a second with an amendment. Correct. Yes. Yes. Okay. Do we have any public comment? No, Mr. Mayor. All right. Well, Commissioner Lada. Yes. Vice Mayor Anderson? Yes.

Commissioner Castro? Yes. Commissioner Fernandez. Yes. Mayor Lago. Yes. I'd like to run through H1, H2, and H3 quickly if possible. Thank you. One. Mayor. H1 is a resolution of the city commission accepting the recommendation of the chief procurement officer to award the bridges repairs and rehabilitation contract in the estimated amount of $800,378 to PNP Contracting Inc. the lowest responsive and responsible bidder pursuant to IFB2025046 and section 2-763 of the procurement code entitled contract award. Do we have any public comment? No, Mr. Mayor. I entertain a motion. I'll move it. Second. I see. Procurement director rushing in. I don't know if Gohead. We have a motion, a second.

She wants to hear the vote. Okay. All right. Vice Mayor Anderson? Yes. Commissioner Castro? Yes. Commissioner Fernandez. Yes. Commissioner Lada. Yes. Mayor Lago. Yes. Great work. Item H2. H2 is a resolution of the city commission authorizing the renewal of the property and casualty insurance program which includes but is not limited to property general liability, automobile liability, public officials, errors and emissions, excess workers compensation, crime liability, special risk, terrorism property and liability, pollution liability, deadly weapon protection coverage, flood, as well as other ancillary lines of insurance coverage and insurance broker fees through Arthur J. Gallagher Risk Management Services Inc. in the amount of $2,877,999 for the period of May 1st, 2026 to May 1st, 2027.

Yes, sir. Microphone. Thank you, Commissioner. Uh we've had a we we had a good hurricane year last year, so insurance rates rates are down this year, which which is a good thing. And uh we we've uh uh I will I will let uh our HR director and risk director uh handle this, but we we've uh had a good hurricane season last year. Hopefully, we'll have another good one this year. And actually, we needed it because our rates are down compared to the prior two years that we have multiple hurricanes.

Good morning, mayor and commissioners. Cliff Freriedman, HR and risk management director. As the city manager stated, uh this item is for the annual insurance renewal for the city's property and casualty uh insurance program. The uh property insurance portion of this has actually reduced 21.6% year-over-year uh bringing the total premium down 11% year-over-year uh while keeping the same or better coverage. Let me ask you a question. I haven't I haven't gone over this with the manager and I'm sorry that I'm bringing it up here and not usually when we have our meetings, but I just was thinking about it right now. In an effort to be a little more redundant, what was the difference between our our payment last year and this year?

The difference is about $350,000. Can we take those $350,000 and put it in account? And I believe this was something we had discussed last year. So, uh it is a policy decision if if that is something we can do. I don't know what

I'll tell you. I'll tell you why. Okay, look. Um, when things are good, we got to prepare for the tough times. I know that some of my colleagues don't like to hear it, but when I got here, we had $15 million in the coffers. Now, we have over $60 million in cash in restricted reserves. When I got here, we had 52% funded in regards to our our our pensions. Now, we're in the mid70s and climbing. Just because you have extra money now, we got to prepare ourselves for what could be potentially coming from Tallahassee. And everybody knows the insurance game with all due respect to our brokers. Thank you for your hard work. It's up and down. You know, it's a it's like gambling sometimes. It all depends. And we've been in positions where our back has been against the wall and we get coverage that a lot of other cities don't. And I'd rather I'd rather know that when I walk away from here, I left the city in the best financial position for the employees and for the residents and that people weren't scrambling that 350. Yes. Could I use it for more sidewalks? Could I use it for more trees? I know staff is kind of at the end of the year when budget season comes, everybody scrambles for 100,000 here, 200,000 there. As a matter of fact, I'm I know it has nothing to do with this, but I'm negotiating now with the manager in regards to our our our cinema and I'm going to be presenting something with the manager in the next commission meeting potentially

through the mayor. I'll move it. Okay, I'll second. Just want to be as financially prudent as possible. Thank you for that. Through the mayor. Are those funds restricted? The funds for the left over 350 and I think No, I don't believe so. I think last year what has been what was discussed was that that money should not be uh redirected to other recurring costs that it should stay for one-time costs but I would defer to finance on on the particulars of that the only items and this is very simple math okay the only items that are restricted are for example are the fees that we collect from permitting

that are are restricted funds that have to be used in that department these are funds that come from the general fund that come like everything else and we have to pay our insurance. We have to pay our health insurance. This goes up. Thank God it's going down. Thank God it's going down. And that we have a team of people, our staff and our outside consultants along with yourself and the manager that are the DCM and the ACM that are working very diligent to try to find solutions that are the most cost effective without compromising coverage. Mr. Manager. Mayor, thank you. Thank you, Mayor. And we're also negotiating on health insurance now. So, we don't we're not sure h how how that's going to go and more than likely it's going to go up somewhat.

So, my point is this, health insurance goes up, if you have an extra 350,000, maybe we could use a little of that money to offset that cost. I hope it doesn't. I pray it doesn't so that money can stay in that bank account and continue to maybe earn a little interest. Not much, but earn something and we could just build upon that. We have a motion and a second with an amendment as per the vice mayor. Commissioner Castro. Yes. Commissioner Fernandez. Yes. Commissioner Lada. Yes. Vice Mayor Anderson. Yes. Mayor Lago. Yes. Great work on your new position. Congratulations. Thank you for your hard work. Uh item H3.

Thank you, Mayor. H3 is a resolution of the city commission ratifying the collective bargaining agreement between the city of Coral Gables and the Fraternal Order of Police, Coral Gables Lodge number 7 for the period of October 1st, 2025 through September 30th, 2026.

Yes. Thank you, Mayor Commissioners. Cliff Freriedman again, HR and Risk Management Director. I'm pleased to announce that we have reached a one-year agreement with the Fraternal Order of Police. Uh the uh as the deputy city attorney stated, this agreement would run from October 1, 2025 through September 30th, 2026. It has already been ratified by the FOP and is before you today for final approval and ratification. Um the highlight is that it provides for a 3 and a.5% salary increase which will be retroactive to October 5th, 2025 as well as other financial uh incentives for uh training officers for the new class that we have incoming. Um we believe that this is a financially sound contract and is a prudent contract for the city and is beneficial to its employees as well. I'm available to answer any. Chief, you have anything you'd like to add? No sir, I think uh it's a it's a fiscally prudent decision on our part as far as the city's concerned. Uh and it opens up the ability for the manager to negotiate with the FOP on a longerterm deal when the financial stability of the city is more intact which was the manager's direction.

So if I may add just a few points, I want to congratulate both of you along with the manager. I know that we were teetering on not having an agreement. Uh you stood firm. The officers understand that this is a partnership. Uh right now I think we have one or two open positions. Correct me if I'm wrong. We have five as of this morning. So as of this morning, but we have how many people in the We have six in the pipeline, nine in the or 21 in the academy.

Okay. So we are we're in good shape. That's a testament to your hard work. The manager, the entire team, procurement, our background investigators. Uh thank you for your hard work. Um, I want to I would like to see and I hope my colleagues agree with me a three-year deal hopefully next time with the police officers. I hope that we commence negotiating that. And I'd like to ask you a question that it runs through the manager. Mr. Manager, uh, have we already contacted the fire the fire union in regards to negotiations? Yes, mayor. We've contacted them twice.

Okay. I want to make sure that we send I would like to send a third letter. If they don't respond within a week, I would like to send a third letter uh that we're ready to come to the table and that we expect to negotiate uh in regards to in regards to that we want a three-year contract. I want to make sure that we put ourselves in the best position for the next few years with both of our unions. Let me make it very clear. I wrote a letter that went to all homes business owners. I'm personally paying to have it published in the Coral Gables magazine. I just sent it out yesterday in the magazine via email. do not risk having the state of Florida make a decision in regards to our tax revenue. I'm not going to raise taxes. I'm not going to be in a position where I'm going to hurt the city. Those days that happened two years ago with the colas for 20 million. You know what we did with that money? I'm going to put it on the record. Instead of giving $9.5 million that we gave two years ago, we slashed the co we sl we slashed our 13th check by $2 million to pay for that cola. So we only gave seven half million dollars. While we gave the cola to past employees, we hurt our current employees paying down their pensions. That was never the unfunded. That was never my intent of why the chief, the manager, and all the employees here decided to start overfunding the pension 13 years ago with a 13th check. So, I would like to see, and I hope my colleagues agree with me, that I'd like to see the fire union come to the table and start negotiating a three-year deal along with our police officers. We need to be partners. They're going to slash property taxes. It's coming any moment now. You're going to Well, they're not going to slash it. They're going to put forth a proposal, and that proposal is going to go to the voters. We need to be proactive here. We need to protect the city and protect the voters. Okay? I want to thank you for your hard work on this, both of you, all three of you, the whole staff. Do we have any u public comment?

No, Mr. Mayor. All right. Can I have a motion? A second. Perfect. Commissioner Fernandez? Yes. Commissioner Lada? Yes. Vice Mayor Anderson? Yes. Commissioner Castro? This went for a vote, right? Do you do you know do you know what the vote was? Uh I believe it was 58 to 58 to 46%. So it was 52 to 48. 52 48. 52 48. Yes, Mayor Lago. Before I vote, yes. Uh, this obviously has to go to a vote. This cannot come to the commission without being ratified by the members of the union. Correct. Correct.

So, this is obvious that this went to a vote. Um, I want to take this opportunity to thank all the police officers. Thank you for using reasonable judgment and being our partners moving forward. Thank you. Yes. Okay. Uh, we had a time served for 3:00, correct? Thank you, Chief.

F9. F9 is uh updates regarding basically our recycling program. Is uh Matt here? Yes, there he is. And I also invited uh some individuals that have been working with Mommy Blue on recycling plastic. In the black back of the room, you'll see a piece of artwork and I'll invite that person to come up and and speak as well at the appropriate moment. So Matt, I know you can talk about this in your sleep. So that is that is why you're the lead one speaking on this. But we had a wonderful presentation that we did at the farmers market and brought a lot of people up to date on what is and isn't recyclable um in our city regular recycling bin. And it really gets down to what is marketable? You know, can it be made into clothing? Can it be made into furniture? Can it be made into a piece of artwork such as the piece that you see in the back of the room? So, uh, Matt, I'm going to hand the floor over to you and, uh, if it I know that that piece of artwork, although it looks heavy, only weighs about 20 pounds. Perhaps, um, it can be brought forward to where it can be seen in a camera for the public as well.

Thank you, Vice Mayor, uh, mayor, commissioners, if we can bring up the PowerPoint presentation. And again, Matt Anderson, assistant director, mobility and sustainability. So briefly we want to go through just to remind um everyone what is accepted in our single stream recycling. So I wanted to start off by really we talk about the three Rs. Reduce, reuse, recycle. Rec recycle is really the last R there. Uh the most environmentally thing we can do is reduce our consumption or reuse. Right? So I just wanted to start off by by emphasizing that. So, Waste Management, who we take our recycling um materials to, just opened a brand new facility uh up in Pemrook Pines. I know that the uh deputy city manager and the assistant city manager and I were able to tour the facility on its grand opening. It's very impressive all the new technology that they are incorporating and how they're sorting materials, how they're processing it, the volume now that they're able to take. Um and again, it was really, really impressive. You could see some photos that we took on the right. basically what the recycling looks like at the end of the process before it goes to the distributors. So what's new from Waste Management? Well, recently Waste Management actually added cups into their uh accepted like their program. So we have hot and cold beverage paper cups and plastic cups made from polyropylene. So those are now being accepted widely throughout the um throughout the recycling process because they have again as the vice mayor mentioned you know obviously recycling is great for the environment but recycling is a commoditydriven market. It's if there are markets for these materials to be able to be processed and you can see they're listed with the types of cups that are not uh accepted which obviously styrofoam is not accepted in any form uh within the within the recycling process and you have all the others. And then something that we have that you'll see in our messaging is always reminding

individuals, empty all the liquids, remove straws and any food uh debris from any of these materials. So waste management, we've really aligned over the years our recycling message uh with waste managements, right? That's where we're taking our materials. We wanted to make sure that our messages are always aligned and we make it as simple as possible for I'm sorry. I'm sorry to interrupt you, Commissioner. Before you move to the next slides, right? I was a little confused about in what's accepted. You said, "Okay, fine. You've got um styrofoam." Yes. The foam is not accepted. It's not accepted. Yes. Um so a plastic cup that's made from polyropylene. Is that like a like like a solo cup? Like a red solo.

Yeah. What you kind of Yeah. Either clear or the red as opposed to what's not accepted is rigid polystyrene. I'm sorry, but what's what? Polystyrene is same. It's another term for styrofoam. Uh, so it's yeah, you see it in both forms. So like your coffee cup, like your styrofoam coffee cups wouldn't be something you would be able to put in your recycling. Yeah. Okay, great. So styrofoam, foam, no. And then everything else that's plastic, yes. Could go in. Sorry. Through the mayor through the mayor on that though. Oh, go ahead. Um, Starbucks cup, is that recyclable or not? If it if depending on the material. I don't go to Starbucks that often, right? But the clear the clear cups that they they give you. So the sorry not for for hot coffee for cold for ice coffee.

Yes. If it's if it's the the plastic polyropylene if you see the you know on the bottom you'd have to look on the bottom turn it upside down and see then it would be accepted. Is there a chart that we can maybe have available so you can see which codes are and which ones are not. So the thing is with the codes is that's how can we do something right now? Can we can we print out 51,000 charts and we'll send it to every single person so they can walk around with this? You see how difficult this is? This is what this is insane. I agree. So then you start and then you start returning you now you start trying to do the good thing and you're actually contaminating the waist stream. Exactly. Yes. So and you'll you'll see something that we have on our market. By the way, we have the lowest contamination rate of any city in Miami County. So I want to say we're doing our best. Yes.

So I'm going to make it easy for you. Jesus Christ. They take narrow neck bottles. Yes. On the bottom of that is your number that you're looking for. There's your chart. If it matches, it's recyclable. If it doesn't match, it's not recyclable. Not at this point. Okay. But the styrofoam, remember, you can rinse it out, clean it, take it to Publix. Yeah. The food grade styrofoam containers. But I guess my question on the on the codes was, do we have that available online?

Yeah, it's so you can't always go by the number because the number was developed by the plastic industry. This is something that Waste Management has has been clear with us. So we they tend to market it where you have by shape. So you have the narrow neck plastic bottles and and that description versus the number because you can't always say the number. We used to have our materials when I first started with the city 10 years ago. A lot of our marketing materials went by number like 1 through five and seven and number six is your styrofoam which has never been accepted. Um, and we've gone away from that because again, it's aligning with what Waste Management and their marketing materials are going out to try to simplify the process on on the shape. Right.

So, I'll interrupt one more time because we know we know we we know that they also take butter containers and things of that nature. Yeah. So, these are some of the guidelines you can use. The number matches at the bottom. Great. But some people can't see the numbers. So, that's why they use shapes. Yeah. Okay. No charts. Okay.

So again here is waste management's um simple five. So your plastic bottles, cups and containers, paper and paper cups, glass bottles and containers, uh flattened cardboard and paper board and food and beverage cans do not include batteries, foam cups, containers, foods, liquids, clothing, furniture, uh loose plastic bags. We'll talk about the different uh alternative recycling programs we have in the city uh that not all cities have and then obviously green waste which I'll talk about a little bit as well. So this is our updated recycling flyer. Again keeping it simple um similar to how waste management has theirs. So we have plastic cups, bottles and containers and paper cups. We just updated that based on the new information from waste management. Flatten cardboard boxes and paper glass bottles and containers and food and beverage cans. And then the items that definitely you do not want in the recycling bin. plastic bags and obviously your expanded polystyrene, your styrofoam. And then the additional tips we have there, we want to also remind our residents, keep the recycles clean, dry, do not bag them. I know that sometimes, you know, we have folks that do uh bag the recycling. Keep food waste and liquids out of the recycling event. And this is the key one we added a number of years ago. When in doubt, leave it out. Don't even contaminate the recycling stream. Um if you're if you're undecided about it, leave it out. So, I'm going to clarify your don't bag it. If you have paper and you put it in a paper bag, it's the plastic bags that are the problem.

The plastic bags are the problematic ones. And and if I may, can we add the vice mayor was mentioning Publix as a place to recycle certain items? Can we add a list of of or include in there these items can be recycled at Publix? So we do we do have information for alternatives on the website which I'll talk how we how we get that information.

What I would ask is if we can create this graphic as a social media graphic so that we can share it on our socials as well. Uh but it would be good to have that information on there that you can recycle the uh the plastic bags at Publix. Uh because a lot of people don't know uh and they just sit around. They end up in our garbage anyway. If we don't have to throw those away, if we don't have to go through that process, that also removes uh extra costs for the city. Absolutely.

So, I also want to mention when we uh when public works and and the city went to the blue recycling bins, one thing that we added that I want to definitely emphasize to our residents is there is a QR code on the side of your recycling bin on every every residential recycling bin. you scan it, it takes you to the city's recycling education page that gives you all the information, what's accepted, what's not, alternatives, uh, and that that has that has that information readily available for our residents. So, this is our city website. Um, what's accepted and what's not. So, you see the list there. Uh, it again mimics what we have um, and it goes into a little more detail there, um, on what's accepted and what can be recycled. And then obviously what can't be recycled and we have information there on the alternatives. A lot of the programs that that our team uh manages like the plastic bag recycling that we have at the adult activity center, the war memorial center and our parking mobility services office along with our next program. So these are some of the programs I know um we've uh showed in the past, but we have our cigarette litter uh program. We also have the plastic bag. The the the rectangular box there is uh for the specialized plastic bag program that we have that we've collected over 2,000 pounds since we started. We also have the battery recycling available to the residents. These programs are extremely popular. Um uh my team is always going out and collecting uh with the assistance of it on the battery side. Uh going out and collecting these as they uh fill up within our city facilities. We also have the other programs like the Christmas tree drop off and the holiday cardboard which was our most popular year uh this past year uh with all the cardboard being generated with online shopping. We also have our events. We have our recycling drive-thru event happening uh next Saturday, not this coming Saturday, the following Saturday, April 25th from 9:00 to 12 in the city hall parking lot. And all the items that we take are the

items that are the alternatives that aren't accepted in your regular signal stream recycling. So, your electronics, your household hazardous waste, your sensitive documents, we'll take plastic bag and film at that. And then clothing. So, the city has a lot of uh alternative programs in place for those items that aren't accepted in your single stream recycling. So, we want to give the residents the opportunity to be able to properly uh either recycle or dispose of these products. And that's something that really sets our city apart because there are not a lot of cities that have this amount of alternative programs for our residents. And again, anytime we have these programs, they are incredibly popular with our community. Speaking of, which I'll talk about a little bit later on the other item, but we have our composting program starting on April 20th, next Monday. You all should have the um invite in your in your calendar. Um we're looking forward to it. We're finalizing our contract right now with renewable and I'll speak a little bit more about that in the next item. You'll see here what we'll be accepting. Again, I'll cover that in another item. And then just overall how we're marketing recycling um and sharing this information with the community. We have our city website. We have the waste bills every year that go out. We insert that information into the waste bills and working with communications um and the finance team. We also at our community events through keep core givers beautiful. We alone have done over 300 events since 2020. or out in the community all the time and promoting not only the programs that we have but also uh helping educate the residents businesses on on recycling practices. City facilities we have information posted in the city facilities social media obviously e-news we have our green business program where we're going out and actively working with local businesses on what they can do to be more sustainable. Included in that is a big uh category on waste diversion. We work with waste management. They go out and do education. And then obviously too, probably the key to all of this, our solid waste team, uh, who does an excellent job at out at collecting and and really helping educate our residents as well on the items that should and

shouldn't be going into the bins. And all of that kind of comes together to the to the mayor's point on really maintaining that below 10% contamination rate, which is the lowest in the region. Um, and it's it's one thing that again our city really does well. Um, and it's something that yes, we can constantly uh look for ways to improve, but overall our contamination rate on our single family residential side remains below 10% when we're audited by Waste Management. Um, and that's something to be really really proud of. So, um, next to you is an item that's made from plastic. And I asked these these young men to to bring it in to show people what can happen to plastic bottles and so forth when they are collected instead of being allowing your gardeners to throw them into the trash pits and so forth. Uh, I get pictures from people questioning why they're in trash pits. So, if you just give us a brief description of this piece of artwork and uh how it was made and and the purpose behind the organization creating it, um maybe it'll inspire more people to pick those bottles up out of the trash pits instead of u leaving them there and getting their gardeners and put them in a recycle bin.

Good afternoon to everybody. Uh, Major Lara and Major Lago, Commissioner Lara, Vice Mayor uh, Anderson and the rest of the panel. This is a perfect example of plastic that's being collected from the ocean. And we have different programs, one of them being Blue Ocean Program. uh Marco Olivier, the artist, he's the official artist for the Mandela family in Cape Town, South Africa, also one of the winners of uh Art Basil's uh awards. Created this piece of work and he's created many of them. But his purpose wasn't really art only or making money like most of them are. It was basically helping the environment. We love the city of Coral Gables basically because of what they're working towards and this is a perfect example of what those pieces of plastic like Vice Mayor Anderson mentioned you throw it on the floor or the garbage hopefully uh this is what comes out of it and it's not only this image it could be many other images something that can maybe be customized to the coral gable 's image, which is what we're thinking about. I think that's what you were

right. So, I appreciate you bringing it here today because it's one of many examples. The other example we have is with the plastic bags over at the youth center. Uh that it's made a bench and I think we're close to what a second bench soon. We've already received the second bench which um the commission has voted on. We will be tri tribute to Mark Trobridge. So, we're going to be uh ordering that plaque and putting it on and finding a location, working with the chamber.

Okay, perfect. So, um, I appreciate you bringing this today because I think it puts a a real face on what can be done with, uh, plastic as well as the benches and other useful materials that we can we can make in in the future. And hopefully instead of throwing stuff in trash pits, people will put them more in a recycle bin where they can be made into productive uh, pieces of artwork or benches or uh, furniture of other nature. So, appreciate you doing this presentation. It is Earth Month. There's lots of different things that we've worked on. I mean, in fact, we received um messages before that we could um take our campaign signs and even have those recycled.

That's another specialized pickup that we've we've had in the past. So, thank you. Appreciate it through the mayor. Thank you for the opportunity and thank you everyone. Yes, sir. So, you know, I I want to say that I look at that and I I I I feel like I mean that's just garbage, right? Because it's what it is. But it's beautiful. It's amazing. It's gorgeous. And I'm at sitting here in awe that that's made out of plastic harvested from the from the ocean, right? Is that what you're saying? All right. So, Vice Mayor, that was a good move on your part among many to bring this in because it caught me pleasantly um by surprise. It's like I almost think I I want one, you know, that kind of thing.

I know. I I surprised the mayor, too. So, you're not alone. He was like, "What? This is not on the agenda." But it's wonderful. Yes, it is. It tells you what you can do when you care about the environment, what when you think outside the box, right? And when you um you you aspire, you know, to to to take to spin and turn on its head, a problem can become a solution. And uh and garbage, you know, is is something that everybody just always gives such a negative connotation to it, but you you're turning it into something amazing. So, are you the artist?

No, I am actually the artist representative. My name is Juan Garos Garcia. I am the managing director of his gallery here in Miami, the local gallery that I helped start up a number of years ago. And now it's my pleasure to introduce you guys to this because as a child of Miami, someone who grew up here in Coral Gables, I was always inspired by our ecology here. I was one of the first classes in university here at FIU that I fell in love with and how do we attack these things from a very Miami perspective. We are a beautifying city. We are a city that donates its time and its efforts to making it more beautiful for everyone who lives here. And what a perfect example this is to be able to upcycle something like trash, like plastics that are polluting our beaches and making it more difficult for our families to enjoy their time at rest than turning it into art where they can enjoy it forever. But thank you so much for the time. And

this is also the fragment series. The fragment series in gold dust. This is gold dust that's layered onto plastics that have been gathered from the ocean alongside the Blue Ocean Research Project. They specialize in sending out boats across the world to plastic patches and we purchase their recycled material that is then cleaned up. We put it into our process and we come out with art that looks like this. The best part is that it gets wet.

Exactly. Yes, sir. Um, is there a way to get some of the product that's collected in Coral Gables and create an art piece that maybe we can place uh at a location where we're currently doing recycling to showcase what can be done. I think that might be something that we can do to expand on the vice mayor's uh bringing this to us, but maybe it's something that we can incorporate to uh what it's currently in our art, public art. Uh, but it's it's different. It also promotes our recycling program and maybe it can be taken from the products that are being recycled from Coral Gate. 100%. We'd love to be able to facilitate that here in Miami.

And I'll add uh I've been talking with Katherine to see where we can find opportunities to have environmental art and art similar to that. So, we've already been kind of exploring that. So, let's work on it. Thank you very much. Thank you. We're going to take a five minute break because we're going to we have to discuss E6 and 89 that are the next items that we'll be talking about. I need to meet with the manager, city attorney, and uh anyone else that needs to meet in regards to that matter. Five minutes. We'll be right back. Thank you so much, everyone. Thank you.

Thank you for coming. I don't Recording stopped.

Ready?

You ready, Mr. Clerk? Recording in progress. Now we're ready, sir.

All right. Perfect. Uh, now items E6 and E9, the final items before we move on to city commission items. E6 is an ordinance of the city commission amending ordinance number 2024-11 which approved a planned area development for proposed public's grocery store and liquor store on the property legally described as lots 1 through 48 block 8 Coral Gables craft section Coral Gables Florida modifying certain conditions of approval due to revisions necessitated by flood zone requirements and to remove or modify certain off-site traffic improvements and bicycle lane requirements. Um E9 is related. It's the resolution regarding the site plan, but that will not be voted on today. So, it's just on for your information, but it will be considered at the the time of second reading of the ordinance. Counselor.

Good afternoon, Mr. Mayor and Commissioners. My name is Mario Garcia Sera with offices at 600 Bickl Avenue and also now 901 Pon Stellion Boulevard representing Public Supermarkets Inc., the owner of the site located at 2551 Leune Road. There has been a public store at this location for many decades. And in 2024, the city commission approved a new state-of-the-art store which would include an enclosed garage, a liquor store, and very importantly, a 20,000 square foot public park on the east side of the block. All of these components remain the same in the project. What we are requesting today is a modification of certain conditions of approval which we cannot comply with because in one case we are located in a flood zone and in the other the county has provided certain comments requests for information uh and denials regarding certain offsite roadway improvements. Uh if we could bring up the presentation please. Here are some images of uh the design. Right now you see the park on the right hand side on the east end of the block here. We'll go refer back to these as necessary but they are proposed red lines for the conditions of approval. We're going to have some modifications based on discussions we've had today. There's basically two categories or topics that we should discuss. The first one is base flood elevation and the need to elevate the buildings uh to a height the both the height to the roof as well as to the top of the architectural feature and then the offsite traffic improvements. I'll go first into detail on the flood zone and base flood

elevation issues. As you could see there before you, uh, the that's a flood map zone of this area of the city. And while the vast majority of the central business district is not within a flood zone, there is a sort of flood zone that creeps into the central businesses district here and covers the block where Publix is located right now. Originally the project was designed to be at grade uh but because the base floor needs to be at a minimum of a 10 foot elevation that means that the other components of the building need to go higher. So up to the flat roof before was 36 ft 3 in now it's at 42 feet and the very top of an architectural feature which was before at 61 ft is now at 67 ft. These heights are all well within the 190 ft of height for which the property is zoned. Uh, additionally, the transition from sidewalk into into building for the pedestrian also needs to be modified because we are no longer a grade but elevated. Certain stairs and ramps need to be incorporated to comply with FEMA and ADA. You see the stair areas in yellow and the ramps in blue. Um, again, this is not our whim. This is to comply with FEMA and ADA. The look of the project remains the same as I'll show you now in some before and after uh renderings. This is the southwest corner of the property. Take a look at the area where the umbrellas are. That's what goes from gray to elevated with stairs. Here is the northwest corner, the entrance to the liquor store. You can try to look in the corner there of that

building right now at grade. And then there's a stairwell there uh with the proposed new design, but still the overall design and aesthetics of the building are remaining the same. Here is the Andalusia frontage before and after. As you can see, there's a ramp at a very low slope uh that's coming up on the on each side of the main entrance. The park side of the property uh remains the same. No modification done here. The only difference between before and after is that we incorporated more green space consistent with a recent amendment to the to the code. Um, you know, the use of stairs and ramps for this purpose is common in Coral Gables, both within and outside the FUD zone. It is really the only practical way to get a pedestrian from a sidewalk to the elevated uh floor. Here, we're just pointing out various buildings uh within that same flood zone as you go west, including buildings very familiar to you like city hall, development services department, sanctuary of the arts, etc. All of which have stairs taking you from ground to base floor. Uh here are some more. As you go further west and then even outside of uh the the flood zone, you have certain circumstances where the buildings also have stairs just for the sake of resiliency and sustainability to be at a higher elevation. Um, for those of you who are in the commission at the time of approval, you remember there was a lot of incorporation about incorporating bike lanes. Uh, we ended up submitting the proposed uh, bike lanes as well as certain other off-site traffic improvements to the county. The county

responded with some comments which made compliance problematic such as the fact that a city master plan for the bicycle uh lanes was required and that is not ready yet. Uh we are pledged to continue working with the city on that. We have talked about preserving and leaving enough sort of pavement in an area for future bike installation. Uh we are also based on discussions today going to include the city in the continuing discussions with the county. As we said at the original approval we're saying today what the county approves we will cooperate with and implement but there is still considerable disconnect between county and city. Uh, and the same goes for what was proposed as a sort of road diet, limiting or narrowing Valencia Avenue and reducing the lanes of traffic and trying to incorporate a left hand turn lane at the intersection of South Sedo and Valencia. Feedback from the county has not been positive on that, but we will continue to work with them on that. The most important thing is that we cannot have building permit held up based on uh on those discussions. Uh all these conditions were premised on county review and approval and that's where we are right now but we're exper experiencing some uh roadblocks with the county not to use a pun on words. Um and I would just conclude by saying thank you for your patience. Uh this project has had a lot of perhaps technical challenges but we've been working through them including today in discussions we've had with mayor manager vice mayor. Uh importantly as part of the project and trying to address a concern that's been coming through and we've been talking about conveyance of

the park. We are profering today a 35,000 square ft of development rights that correspond to the park will be conveyed to the city uh so that the city could ultimately sell and monetize those development rights but on the condition that they be used for the advancement of historic preservation that publics be recognized uh as part of that effort of historic preservation a and that as I mentioned before that the issuance of the building permit not be tied to finalization on the agreement for the conveyance of the park and that issuance of TCO not be tied to the completion of the park similar to the previous uh project you had today we're expecting that will probably be a co deliverable the completed park uh and lastly the park would be conveyed in fe simple there's a old condition that caused concern on the part of the city that perhaps the park wouldn't be conveyed in fee simple that we would give an easement. We agree that it's definitely going to be a fee simple conveyance and the city has agreed and reiterated what was discussed before that that land will always be a park and perpetually be a park subject to a restriction agreed upon. And uh that is the conclusion of uh my presentation. Thank you for your patience today, especially considering that it took more discussions, but this is a very promising project and we're confident that it's still going to be the great project that we've always envisioned. And importantly, we're going to have an oasis of green space in the middle of the central business district. Now,

thank you, Mr. Garcia. So, if I may, just add a few points. Uh if you notice, we had uh multiple uh breaks during this commission meeting where myself and the manager and Mario and his team from Publix uh held two separate meetings uh to finalize some final points to this negotiation. Um as I said before in the project that we dealt with Armano Godina and Manny Gad where we're giving a 10 where we're getting a 10,000t park about two blocks away. Uh this has been a vision of mine uh to deliver with public's hand in hand to bring a 20,000 square foot park to the city of Coral Gables. This is one of the six parks that has already approved and now will be feast simple given to the city. This is what defines a world-class park and this is accomplished with a partnership of Publix and the gentleman and the young lady who's who I'm sorry I said gentlemen I didn't see you there. Um who are here with us from Publix today. Thank you. Thank you. This has been, Mario, if I may, four years that I've been working.

Didn't make it. Yep. So, Mario will tell you, uh, I was at my cousin's wedding in North Carolina sitting at a restaurant with my father, uh, at a sandwich shop and we were with on a Zoom call with Mario and the public's brass, uh, trying to get to consensus in regards to a design for this project. There has been many, many iterations, many, many meetings to the point we had two final meetings today. I want to thank you for indulging my final request. My final request that you indulged uh was I requested 35,000 square feet of TDRs. What is the value of that? Just a rough number. What do you think, Mario?

Uh $35 a square foot. So, let's figure it out. It's close to it's about $40 a foot.

1.4 million. So that request and thank you for public's for indulging my request is going to be done the following way with the support of my colleagues of course. We're going to put it into a bank account. The bank account will only be used for historic preservation. Case in point, uh, if we're short on the water tower, if we're short on the building in the Builmore Golf Course, uh, that we're hopefully going to move, uh, if we're short on some areas of historic preservation, uh, we will add this money. Publix will play a major role. They will get credit for it. We had a plaque with Publix's name on it along with all the elected officials and staff, the architect, the engineer, whoever was involved. I also want to make sure, please, this is this is for staff to make sure that it's memorialized. I don't want to later find out it's not. Um, that Publix receives all the credit that they get public relations. They're giving 1.4 million worth of funds that will only be used for historic preservation. I want to make sure that at the ribbon cutting, at the historic preservation, whatever money that's used for, if a little portion of its use for city hall, let's say $500,000, which is something that I would like to do, and I will tell you what it is today, and hopefully my colleagues will agree with me. If you go to city hall today and you walk in and you see the stairs that go up to the second and third floor, that is not real stone. That is not real stone. Correct, Mr. Manager. What is that?

It's actually white concrete. Microphone. Sorry. It's cast white concrete.

What I would like to do, and I asked the manager about a year ago and the DCM is to get a price, get a price to do that in natural stone. Maybe a portion of that can be paid for by this monies and we can put a small plaque thanking Publix uh for that donation. Publix is a community partner that is involved from Key West all the way to Tallahassee on multiple different fronts really engaging in charity, giving back and philanthropy. They're a community partner. They have four stores in the city of Coral Gables. Five stores. Four or five. Four. Four. And he thinks he's going to get maybe five. Four stores in the city of Coral Gables. So, this is beyond a partnership. We're family. So, I want to thank you uh for stepping up fe simple on the park, stepping up uh in regards to the design, stacking the parking because remember this was when we started talking about this, we were going to build another Publix on Lun and then demolish the existing building and move seamlessly. What we did was we decided to build a Publix in the middle of the lot and have the parking stacked on top of it. What did that open up? that opened up a 20,000 square foot park that I requested publiclix to do. So public has stepped up to the tune of millions and millions and millions and millions of dollars. This will be transformational along with what you just saw right now from Armando Godina and Manny Gadre. It took leadership, it took patience, but I'm proud to say that this is part of not only my legacy, but our legacy. This is what real leadership is. This is what leading by example is and pushing to push this city to the next level and protecting our city. So I want to congratulate you, Mario. Uh I know that it was not easy in that conference room right now.

Took some effort.

It took it took a lot of effort. I want to thank the manager uh for holding firm and always, you know, making sure that the integrity of the city is always upheld. I want to thank my colleagues on the commission, especially the vice mayor, uh, who's also been played played, uh, I don't want to say hard ball, but she's played hard ball, uh, in regards to landscaping, uh, infrastructure, uh, sidewalks, bicycle lanes, and if I forget, I apologize. Uh, thank you for our our our city attorney's office, our DCM, our ACM, our public works team, and especially Publix. So, I don't know if I have left anything out. You're going to get credit on the buildings as the donations are made with a small plaque. You're going to be part part of the public relations campaign and marketing as we announce that we're let's say cutting a ribbon for the water tower if we use money for that project for city hall. You will be invited and we will give you the necessary uh the necessary u recognition for your hard work. But I just want to say thank you. Thank you for putting up with our requests and thank you for delivering on something that is going to be way beyond Publix. This is not about groceries.

There's a reason there's a reason why you have four stores in the city of Coral Gables. This is going to be transformational and the reason why it's transformational is because of your commitment to deliver a 20,000 foot park. Mario, thank you my brother. I appreciate you. And the park always stays a park which is important to the park always stays the park which is to me I I it's to me that is going to be no words. No words. Imagine taking this when I took office 13 years ago and I hate to reiterate this again. We had one park in the downtown. Now we're going to have seven parks in the downtown. Think about that. That is truly truly transformational. That's why people want to live in our downtown. That's why companies want to move here. That's why people want to open businesses here. Thank you.

It's also why I prematurely grade, but it's Yes. Yes. That's why my dad was involved in a uh in a Zoom call with the with the with the public's board in the middle of I was on vacation too at the time. We were on vacation. We were both so it got done. Madam vice mayor.

So um might explain why I'm getting more gray hair too. So you know we spoke about a few things and um I'm hoping that publics will continue to take the lead and set the example for sustainability and safety for pedestrians uh going forward. And I know we have a second reading so we can have some more discussion about this. And I g provided you the example of the number of months and years quite frankly that I've been working with um you know FDOT uh and now we're going to be taking even a bigger step with the county on trying to get some of these things done. for instance with the FDOT been having discussions and we'll continue to have more discussions because we I just had discussions yesterday about improving safety along US1 guard rails, speed radar sign uh detection signs uh and so forth going forward on very difficult intersections much more difficult than we have here to deliver pedestrian safety for individuals um that are riding bicycles or disabled or otherwise. So my ask from you was not to go this alone with the county because it takes a conversation and it takes a village to get things done. Just because you know you get a a no from the county doesn't mean you give up there and just move forward because our boards our committees we had a bike master plan but it needed updated because Valencia was not a good corridor putting a bicycle lane. It needs to move to Andalusia on the side that was requested. um city manager has um consulted moving forward on that and we'll have a a bow on it. that yes, there is a plan and uh one of our other projects down the street on Salo has cooperated by putting in the wider sidewalk that will eventually be both pedestrian and bicycle lane, moving those those bicycles in an area that is much safer

than what they're doing right now, which is taking the lane and blocking traffic. And it's just it's going to be better for the future. So let's work together on all these projects because uh it it is a synergy that will help us move forward and Publix will have the opportunity to be setting the example for everybody from everything from recycling, okay, on down to being able to get to the public's in a safe fashion because as I shared with you, a resident right in my neighborhood was hit at the corner of Valencia in Ljun Road because we don't have proper safety measures there. We can deliver this together. So, I applaud the fact that you've we have the green space in the back which is desperately needed and we have set this building back at a distance from Ljun Road that makes it a comfortable place to walk now, a safer place to walk. And then we'll have a two-way cycle track as they call it or a bike lane for people to be able to safely transsect our downtown community and to be able to go to Publix and go to the adult activity center and be able to uh enjoy the amenities that we have downtown including the beautiful park that you're going to have behind the Publix. So, thank you for your efforts there and I'll continue to work with you.

Before Before we entertain a motion for working with the county, Before we entertain a motion, I just want to memorialize your comments. So the park is going to be used during construction just like we had right now which is perfectly fine. Our downtown is tight. I want to make sure especially now that we're going to have construction at the mobility hub which may parallel or you know interline inter inter wrap. That's number one. Number two uh we had talked about the TCO or CO for the park. Obviously we have to obviously get TCO for the public and then obviously we can move forward on that. Is there anything else that's pending that I missed? I mentioned the fund. I mentioned Publix. I mentioned marketing, advertisement, I mentioned the 35,000. Um, I mentioned the issuance of building permit. Yeah.

But that we're not going to have any hindrances. We're moving forward right now. That's not a problem. Um, I also, Madame ACM and DCM, please let's make sure through the manager that we hold everyone to the same standard on trees. You know, let's not plant six foot trees on this 20,000 square foot park. It's going to take 30 years for it to be shade. Let's do this the right way. Okay. Through the manager, through the mayor, please. Uh and also the uh the issue on the dedication of the Yes. of the park on the on that ver conveyed in fe simple to the city. Period. With all that being said, yes.

So, I have one more that uh that'd be um bad for me to forget. And I asked for our um landscape director to look at uh trees that are reusable on a lot. for instance, the Gumbo Limbos there. If our um city staff makes a determination that we can reuse those trees somewhere else in the city, uh public's be committed to um doing their part on having those trees moved. City manager, uh I don't know if uh your team has had a chance to do that evaluation on what is reusable through the mayor. Yes. Uh, vice mayor, we will have our uh uh our uh uh landscape our

arborist, excuse me. No, uh our uh landscape department take a look at that and and have we will have our assistant director, Dina Bell, take a look at at uh at those trees. Okay. If you have any use for the trees, they're yours. Thank you. Okay. So, we have a motion. Do I have a motion? No. Can we have a motion? I'll move it. I'll second. Any public comment? We're good. All right, let's vote. Commissioner Lada, yes. Vice Mayor Anderson, yes. Commissioner Castro, yes. Commissioner Fernandez, yes. Yes. Mayor Lago, yes. Thank you very much. We'll see you back at second reading. Mario, thank you, my friend. Thank you.

All right, we don't need E9. Uh, we're going to move on to item F1. Can we Can we start moving to F1? All right. I know. I just want to I I want to make sure I hadn't forgotten anything. Uh item F1. What? Golf. You want to do that first? Yeah, if you want to do golf, it's fine. Which item do you want to hear first? I think we have item H4. Oh, along with they want to do golf. Okay. So, H4 along with items F11 through F12. F12.

Oh, excuse me. F12, F13, F14, F15, and F-15. All right. Could we have the presentation up, please? Mayor. Yes.

The mayor, I have a statement I just want to clarify uh concerning golf. Uh this discussion before the commission today is ultimately about how we responsibly manage a public asset so that it remains accessible, sustainable for the entire community. Granada golf course is a historic 9-hole municipal course responsibility to preserve it and ensure fair and consistent access. The current model is out of balance. A small group of accounts for dis uh account for disproportionate share of use. At the same time the border the broader public pays more and has less access to tea times. This is this is an equity issue. It's also a management issue. The course is operating beyond sustainable levels. The incre the this that increase is wear raises maintenance costs and impacts overall conditions. At the same time operating costs are increasing faster than revenues that that creates ongoing pressure on the general fund that that is not sustainable. The commission has adopted changes that address these issues directly. The annual the annual round cap improves access and reduces overuse. It maintains bene member benefits including priority booking and discount to play. It also aligns with standard practices for municipal courses. Retaining the existing memberships would maintain the current imbalance. It would limit access for the users and conflict with the policy direction already established. There is also a need to formalize how outside groups use the course. Use of public asset should be structured consistent and tied to clear public benefit. In closing, the changes are necessary to correct a current imbalance and ensure the course is managed responsibly. Staff recommends moving forward as adopted.

Thank you, Mr. Manager. Madame ACM. Thank you, Mayor, Vice Mayor, members of the commission, manager, city attorney, and city clerk. Um, this item was brought at the last commission meeting in the form of uh restructuring of the memberships and the fees and we're going to provide some additional background and analysis on the position of the city and the policy direction of the city.

Good afternoon. Uh, for the record, Fred Cusero, community recreation director. So today's presentation um just an overview. We're going to present a comprehensive operational reset to protect the city asset. Our goals are to balance the access, the sustainability, and the financial performance of the course. Um, what we are trying to do is we're trying to align with our market benchmarks. We're looking at cost recovery. We want to enhance the user experience and we want to ensure long-term sustainability. So back on March 10th when we presented the fee structure um you see on the slide there um we increased the fees. Uh the main ones to look at that are are discussed are our previous fee was $22 for a tea time and it was increased to 30. Um and the non-resident tea time was 28 to 39. uh we tried to when we did our funds uh we looked at the increases and we looked at keeping that 30% uh non-resident uh premium uh for that we do maintain a 5-year schedule um but we did change this based on what we were looking at for our maintenance operation change. So part of that fee uh proposal and what was adopted is we looked at um the club membership. So breaking it down a little bit, uh what we did is we had a golf membership that was just golf. What we looked at is we looked at tying it in as we wanted to do with our phase 2 development when we presented our country club management uh proposal a few years back um to start to combine those memberships. The country club um it would be the membership would have all the country club benefits and then in terms of golf benefits you'd have a maximum of 30 complimentary rounds per

year that was with cart. Um, and then an additional $5 discount each additional round played. And you would also have a 7-day priority tea time. Uh, with the uh the current fees that were when we presented it was 921. The new adopted fee went to 2100 for residents, 2730 for non-residents. When you take out the country club value, you can see what the net golf fee was, which was 1,50 and 1380 for the non-residents. And then the couples ones you can see there as well. um that,50 if you look at the 30 complimentary rounds of what it's cost for a ride and save which is um uh including the cart it kind of gets you there and then you have the $5 discount and you have the priority tea time as well and you have all of the different amenities of the country club including the discounts that are part of that with the park and everything else. When we were looking at this, we also looked at our round usage. So, in our round usage, um you can see there there's a lot of categories that are tied in with our fees, which is our normal resident non-resident tea time. There's our twilight, our ride and save, which includes the cart during the weekdays, our junior rounds. Then there's our member rounds, and then there's our our board and employee rounds. So, if you look at what the average was of the last two fiscal years, 24 and 25. Our resident tea times made up 21,000 rounds. Um, the non-resident uh was 4,000 rounds. And then you're looking at resident twilight was 8,900. The ride and save resident was 99,900. So, the majority of our rounds were um the resident variety of the different categories. Our member rounds which is of the 86 members average over the two years approximately 16,270 a rounds and our board and employee comp rounds were,037.

So if you look at it, um the the chart to the to my left uh is looking at all the different categories and the resident tea time was the highest percentage of use which was 31%. But then the next level was our member rounds which were 23.6 of all the rounds were played by members. So if you look at um the the chart to the right um all of the paid tea times twilight junior everything comprised about 74.9% the member rounds were 23.6 and then you look at the final category born employers 1.5%. So 86 members accounted for 16 uh 278 rounds which is close to 24% of the total course usage. So if you look at the revenue breakdown that we looked at um our average of the last two fiscal years of revenue that we got from the memberships was 88,000 whereas the tea times and the different categories was 1.155 million. Our revenue from our carts was 120,000. So there's our total. So you can see um you know the annual in comparison in comparing that to the annual expenses the expenses for just taking care of the the grass the maintenance part was 926 when we factor in all of the other operating expenses which is the pro shop the maintenance shop all the different costs that we have and then the increase in cost that we have for Bright View and also the T renovation projects. So you're looking at a a significant increase where that 1 point uh 364 is not going to meet it. Now if you look at the sales revenue impact which is what we're looking at you know 84% is all the tea times. Um

the golf memberships make up 6.5% of the revenue which compares to 24% of the total rounds that are played. So you get 24% of the total rounds are played versus 6.5% of the revenue. Uh our cart rentals are 8.9% of the revenue. So the member memberships have um the lowest contributor on the chart of the of the city revenue, but it does have one quarter of the total course usage. So it's something that we had to look at. So when you look at breaking that down further, the city golf membership cost per round, the average of the two years approximately $541 per round when you factor in the total amount of rounds versus the members that we had. So the members were averaging about $541 per round to play a round of golf.

May I ask you a question, Mr. Director? Yes, sir. Because I want to memorialize that $541. Can you give me one example, one example of of of a golf course where people pay $5 around? No, I I'm not aware. I can't take I can't say one off. How about $10? Not in South Florida that I know. Yeah, but that's you. You You took my point. You took my point. Sorry. My apologies. How much are we losing a year?

Well, this coming year we'll we'll lose close to 600,000 with all of our new improvements and our new maintenance. So, they're clamoring, rightfully so. It's a very important golf course. It's important facility. They're clamoring for increased maintenance, increased quality. Yep. But we have an issue obviously with revenue. Yep. We had the same situation at Vis at Venetian Pool. Pool. Yes. Yep. We spent millions of dollars on renovations. What did we do? We raised the rates. We still continue to pri prioritize the residents with lower rates, but we had to raise the rates.

Yep. We had the same situation at the Coral Gables Country Club where certain members that I'm not going to mention were Coral Gable's residents came here and said, you know, save the Donado. Save the Donadoos. Let them stay. How much are we making a year on the gym memberships from from the Coral Gables Country Club?

$50,000. there. Once we caught the dinado stealing the computers out the back door, I received that phone call. I was in New York in a meeting and our then city attorney, Marian Ramos, called us and said Christina was there says we just caught them stealing the computers out the back door along with some wine. Remember, am I am I correct or no? You are correct, ma'am.

Okay. They left. What were the Donados doing in regards to the gym so that it could make it seem as if they were only making $50,000 to pay the city corables? What were they doing, Mayor? Um, what they were doing is they were leasing it to the the nephew for $50,000 and the they had 1,200 to,300 members. How much was How much were they making a year? Uh 1.2 to 1.3 million. How long was this going on for? Four years. Mayor,

we lost easily over $10 million here. Okay. We had a long conversation. Some members here in the commission fought tooth and nail said there was no way no way that the little shop could afford to pay a reasonable rent. Remember we talked about that? Mhm. Members of this commission. Yep. How much are we making a month now on the on the uh little shop after the renovations that we paid for? The city taxpayers who are here. They pay for it. For Le Park Cafe, we do about 22 to 24,000 a month. Who makes that? The city does as a revenue share.

So when you add the 20, let's say 25,000 a month, that's $300,000 a year plus the 1.4 four from the gym. We're at $1.7 million of money that belongs to the residents. How much deferred maintenance was in the Coral Gables Country Club? How many millions would you say? Save that for our last slide. We'll go into Sorry, I'm jumping the gun. I apologize. We have that information.

So, my point is this. My point is this. Trust me, I'm all for it. I I don't golf. I don't golf. I have family members that golf that are part of this group, by the way. So, I've heard I've I've heard it at family dinner when they've told me, you know, can I have a conversation with you about this? Trust me, I hear it. I understand it. But at the end of the day, we have to be fiduciaries on behalf of this community. We have to, especially now, you saw me do it right now with the insurance. Let's not just take that insurance and spend it on something else. Let's put it away. Why? because we're going to see a significant tax tax revenue reduction over the next two years because everybody's going to vote potentially in favor of a tax reduction homestead. So, we'll be impacted. We don't know if it's going to be 5 million or it could be how much 30 million, 40 million. We don't know yet. We're waiting for the governor. So, I want to be I want to be clear because this has become this has gone from a financial decision to an emotional decision. And I understand this is important to everybody and I don't want to take golf away from anybody, but we have to also understand that we're losing millions of dollars here in this golf course. And we have to be very careful, very careful what we what we're doing. This is a decision that the commission has to make together. Cannot be politicized like the RTZ and like all the things that we politicize here. We have to be very careful, very careful what we do here because the decisions that we do here like the cola affects the city for the next 10 years. Okay.

Yes sir. If we can have the slide back. Thank you. So as we were discussing, so the average cost per round for the membership over the last two fiscal years approximately $541 per round in comparison to the publicly accessible tea time cost per round which was approximately $2230.

Let me put it into context for you. Go to your app and ask to order a Starbucks coffee right now. Right now to have it delivered here. It's $7. Just think about that. $7 to order Starbucks coffee and you drink that coffee in 30 minutes. How long does it take you to play around the golf? Two hours for nine holes. Yeah.

So, um there's also been discussion about the non city memberships. There are a few independent assoc associations that are at the Granada Golf Course. There's three of them that that we found. It's the Granada Golf Association, the Greenway Women's Golf Association, and the Women's Golf and Bridge Club. Um these are associations that have been had relationships with Granada Golf Course well beyond all of our service time here. Uh the 1960, 1964, 1936. Um and they do have varying number of members between 35 to 60. The member benefits uh they are uh priority access to certainty times. They do pay their greens fees. Um a couple of the the associations do use a conference room there. Um they collect dues uh and the dues are used for various expenses in some cases handicap fees. Um we did get we did ask all the associations. I did ask for all the information um to look at what what all the associations entail. Um the Granada Golf Association did tell us that they had over the years of collecting their money that they had donated over $500,000 to different charitable organizations. Um so we did get that. We tried to look at and see if there was a formal agreement or a documented arrangement. Um we went through the city clerk. We did record searches. I asked all the associations to see if they had anything. Maybe because this was long ago, but we we we really couldn't find anything formal. Maybe there is something out there, but we couldn't find it.

So, let me ask you a question. Okay, you just saw me negotiate right now with Publix to the tune of one a last minute negotiation to the tune of $1.4 million and that money is earmarked for a trust for historic preservation. I know for a fact that if I brought here to this commission and I said I'd like to earmark that money for a charity outside of the city of Coral Gables, I don't think I would get the support of the commission. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't. I don't think I would get one vote here and that's okay and I expect that. Do we have any financials? Do we have any audited financials? Do we have any checks? So, this organization runs a nonfor-profit golf tournament or a nonfor-profit event on a facility that's owned by the city that we maintained that we're losing $600,000 a year and then the money is diverted to charities outside the city of Coral Gables. I just want to understand and put that on the record to make sure that I'm correct because I'm concerned about that. Yes or no?

We do not have any financial records at this time. We had asked for any records that they could provide us so we haven't gotten any at this point. Okay. So, through the mayor, yes,

we had a similar situation with the Coral Gables Garden Club at back of the napkin or someone's conversation for use of a room at the Builmore Hotel. We finally memorialized it in writing and it didn't give you a right to to have a room. It's if a room is available type of an arrangement. you have to find some some other space. But now now it's in writing and there's an insurance requirement which never existed before. Okay. And you know like a golf association that does good things for the community so does the garden club and you know predominantly the um the things that it does is in the city of Coral Gables but it also does some things outside the city of Coral Gables that are beneficial for the environment for the schools etc. Um, I am going to have some questions for you regarding reserving time. I'm having a little fun here with the um the website just to give you a heads up um on how to reserve time and a phone number to call and how far in advance you can you can reserve some time. So I'll but I'll reserve those questions for later. Okay. So, as we looked at the memberships and we tried to benchmark with comparable municipal courses, we came up with a few. Um, uh, Winter Park is one that is a a nine-hole course. Um, and we were, um, looking at that as a comparison. The, you know, in speaking with with, um, the director there, they have a total rounds played of 50,000, which is significantly less than Granada, which is 68,000. um they have third 300 active members and those 300 active members uh they play 12,000 rounds. So they do have uh

24% of the rounds but it's 300 members. So it's 300 uh membership rates and their charge is a little higher than what we had before the new adoption. So it's about 1300. So you have 300 of them take up 12,000 rounds. Um so the rounds per member are significantly less. um Brier Bay and Miami Beach. Um their models are more of a of a um they use the patron card. Um so there's there's different models. It's not an unlimited round model um that we looked at. So um the unlimited round model seems to be a little bit of an outlier unless you go into country club um uh different setups that um are more private courses. So looking at the model scenario Granana right now for the members it has a high capacity share and a high uh consumption high amount of rounds per member and also it's a pretty high percentage whereas for instance Brier Bay has a high percentage um but it's a low number of rounds per member. Um the same with Winter Park and Miami Beach is kind of low on both sides and that's using the patron card. So, what we're trying to do with the 30 round uh cap is trying to eliminate some of that use. Um, you know, reclaim some of that member held capacity, increase the public access because it's not all member unlimited rounds. We can expand the the membership base and we can also look at um it's reduce wear. We can lower those those rounds down from that 68,000. Our current usage with 86 members, it's 189 rounds per member. That with that 24.6 capacity impact with the existing member count of 86 and 30 rounds per member, it's it would be 2580 total member rounds. And then if you do a balance model with 300 members

at the 30 rounds per member, that's 9,000 rounds. So that's 13.6% capacity, a larger capacity some. If you go to a full capacity model of 500 members and you do the 30 rounds per member, that brings you back up to 15,000 rounds, which is 22.6. So the members accounts for almost a quarter of the usage. Um, so those 86 members do use the course at a much higher rate. when we were looking at what we were looking at a recommended rounds um we were looking at that 50% 50,000 uh annual rounds I did um we did speak with a a consultant from the National Golf Foundation who had done some work on Granada previously um and you know we we came back to him to look at are we on the right track here um and you know we did get a letter from him as after we looked at all the information for a 9-hole core especially of our size um anything over 50,000 rounds would signify overuse and would really result in deterioration of the course. Um when we shared those findings with Bright View, who is our new maintenance provider, um they confirmed the recommendation and they hold uh National Golf Foundation um in the highest regard as the authority and that's what they're going to follow. Um so that's where we are with with with those with that number. That's where we got to that number. So based on that and the industry standards, we're exceeding the those standards by about 36%. Um, and that comes into a lot of things. Declining uh turf conditions. Um, our last major renovation was was 12 years ago. Um it results in higher maintenance costs um to obviously reduce player experience if the course is not in the condition that we can and deterioration accelerates as we hit that 67 68 70,000 70,000 rounds um it does

accumulate um the discussion is well everything was going well but it accumulates time after time after time when you start hitting that number you start looking at the conditions um and then our last thing as we've talked about is is the equity Um we have a small group that makes up 25 almost 25% of core usage course usage. So our financial reality um approximately 1.33 million was our total revenue in FY25. Um what we're looking at for our cost which is not only of maintenance but it's the whole grounds um the operation of it all and our improvements that we're trying to do on with the T renovations we're looking at approximately 1.95 million. um that's not going to cover we're not going to cover uh what we have and we have to look at um how we move forward with the revenue generation and if we have the majority of our rounds are not um unlimited or $5 a round then we have the ability to have further revenue generation. So, what we were talking about earlier, these are this is the capital uh picture of what we're looking at um now and into the future for that whole area, which is the country club facility, the golf course facility, and the tennis facility, which makes up that entire campus. Um up to date, we have already had 5,896,

$5726. Those are in that's already invested in what we have to date in those different projects. Um, we have a bunch of investments in Q both at the country club facility, the golf course, and the tennis facility. That's an additional $7.4 million. And then in looking at future capital investment needs, um, we're looking at in the future up to $15.5 million. So, total capital city investment when it's all said and done will be $28.8 million. And that includes a lot of different things, whether it's the country club, you're looking at the pool, the windows. Um you're going to have to do future air conditioning issues. Um the tennis facility is going to need uh most likely a new building eventually. Um and you know the stuff at the golf course where we're looking at which we have to fix the entire maintenance barn. Um uh we're still working on the shelters. We got some other grounds and we're going to have some other projects. So um that is a complete picture of what we uh presented in terms of the golf course. Thank you.

We got you another 1.4 today. every every little bit counts through the mayor before uh yes ma'am you sit down because I reserve some some questions but of course it has to be a historic facility that you're doing maintenance on and and it is yes

it is it is it is um regarding reserving time I I see that there is a phone number that can be called I haven't tried to call it so it asked staff to to test it so folks that don't know how to use these fancy phones or have it programmed on their flip-flop to to call to reserve uh tea times. Um my real question goes into how far in advance you can reserve the time and pay for the time because if I wanted to reserve a time for Monday right now, next Monday, I can't can't you can't and that makes it difficult for people to plan.

So we have a fiveday priority. So it's a five-day advanced tea time is what you can do. Um now with the new membership proposal for those members they would get 7-day priority. So you Press it again, Fred. Press it again. Yours is working. Is it on? Oh,

yes. So, yeah, the new membership would give you the seven days priority. So, the members could get those extra two days. That's what we tied in to add value to that membership. Alex, what kind of members are we talking about? the the members that the the membership that was adopted at the last which was the the uh new golf course membership that was the 30 rounds and it had a 7-day priority.

Okay. So, if we're talking about, you know, the historic individuals that have been part of the 86 or the the women's club, the two different women's clubs, you know, how can they reserve an advance to be able to have if they want Monday's tease times? So we've got we have four people together or we have two people together and we want to reserve this time. How far in advance can they reserve a time?

Well well currently um those tea times are reserved for them. The Monday, the Friday and the Saturday and Sunday for those three associations we discussed. They're always set. So they have those tea times. They don't have to Yes. So those are set. So I'm trying to understand why we have a disagreement here. If they're set, why do we have a disagreement?

No. So they they serve almost like a room block, right? These associations, if we're correctly speaking about the three associations, they have a room block that's exclusive to the members of that association. So, a patron that might want to call in advance or reserve in advance, they never have the ability to hit any of those times because they have a permanent room block. Okay? So, if I'm a member and I don't play golf, um, nor do I have the time if I wanted to right now to play golf or pickle ball or any of those things. and I want to plan for next week

and I'm a member. Okay, I can reserve the time. Correct. With the new restructured membership, one of the benefits was the seven days in advance priority. So, they can actually be almost like a priority bracket before a general public could go and play. Okay. And if these groups right now wanted to reserve the time, what would they have to do? if they do not get the room block or from the association benefit you're saying?

Currently they currently they have it set. It's already in the books. If that was different then they would have to wait for the five days. But right now those those days are those tea times are already attributed to those associations and they're in place. They're always in place.

I'll give you an example from the Builtmore. uh when we spoke to the Builtmore staff, they had at one point uh a couple of associations and part of the benefit of having those associations was to garner a certain demographic player like a women's group when there was not many female players. Um their business model has also changed and what they have done is for those members they've had the option to fold in to become an actual member, right? So not an association member but a golf member so that they can have access to some of those benefits. Okay. So is that what the staff is proposing that they be that these groups be folded into membership?

Well, the restructuring that was presented at the last commission was basically there was no more associations as there's what we have found staff there is no documentation of a relationship a formal relationship. So if the commission wishes to look at a formal relationship staff can explore that. But right now there is no formal relationship with essence. We we're no longer honoring those past benefits. Okay. And the past benefits were what? A block time.

A block time for different brackets for different associations, but basically Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday mornings, no general member of the public ever had the opportunity to play. And and that's something I want to voice because there's two sides of every coin. And I've had residents reach out and say, "What is going on here? Why can I never play in the mornings? Okay, so that's a a comment that came up. All right. So, also the the planning aspect of it, you're not able to do it on the website. Are you able to do it telephonically?

You can make a reservation over the phone reach the pro shop. Right now, the reservations that the right now, just to set clear, the staff that manages the pro shop is not community recreation or city staff. That is part of an agreement with the Builtmore. So that is the pro shop staff is staffed by the Builtmore and they have their software both POSOS and reservation software. Their reservation software does not require payment. So you can go and online and reserve without making a payment or you can call the pro shop and make a reservation within the allowable time and then you pay when you arrive at the pro shop. Unless you are paying previously paid membership user, you didn't pay for the greens fee or the tea time. So to block a time I don't have to pay. Nope. Not right now.

Not right now. Um I don't know if that's equitable though for for individuals. I think you should have to pay because there's going to be times when people cannot show up. Real concerned about the wear and tear on the course. Absolutely. Because of the overusage. I'm very concerned about the amount of deficit that we're running because it's not uh equitable to uh residents in general. But I also would like to see um for seniors etc that um we offer something you know especially those that have um issues uh with affordability. Has staff looked at that?

What was presented at the last meeting was at you know we looked at both the military active military and veterans as a discount because that was proposed. Um generally the demographic is older. We have older players on the golf course. So, typically you don't have uh a senior discount. We can explore. If you want to benchmark other facilities, we could do that. Um primarily we looked at having the resident non-resident rate and of course what was added at the last meeting was the military and veterans discount. All right. Go ahead. Through the mayor.

Yes, sir. So, um I had a lengthy conversation yesterday with uh the ACM and and the city manager. Um I wanted to see if we could find a middle ground that still allows for us to cover our expenses as a city but offers um a package or a membership for the people who have been part of these these groups for for an extended period of time. And what I explained to staff was, and it was just a numbers game. If you're getting 30 rounds for the $2,100 and you're getting the additional rounds of $25, in essence, a 100 rounds is going to cost you 3875 a round, which is much more than you just go and pay the $30 for a regular round uh of golf. So in talking to the manager and the ACM, we came up with a potential solution which would be a golf membership like is offered at at Rivier. Ravier has golf only memberships for for their club. This would be a golf only membership that would give you 100 rounds of golf. So it's not the 189, it's a 100 rounds of golf. In essence, you're probably playing two rounds a week because people travel. Um, and it would be a $2,500 membership. So, you're paying $2,500 for the 100 rounds. You're in essence playing $25 a round. So, you are getting a benefit for being a member. We're reducing the number of um rounds that are being played. And this would be specifically for the people that are being affected by uh these these rate hikes, the ones who are members of these organizations at the current moment. Um, I I think if we're forcing people to to join the country club in order to get a membership, the 30 rounds of golf really doesn't make sense for them to join because a lot of them will not use the benefits of the

country club. Uh, whereas members of the country club might see an advantage to the 30 rounds of golf, which they're currently not playing, and getting the discount going forward. In this case, it would be the $2,500 for your 100 rounds. Additional rounds would be at the regular rate. So, and we would give you for those first 100 rounds your ability for pre-booking on those uh those first 100 rounds. Um, so that that's that was kind of a a solution. It would be subject to continued inc increases on potential uh fees going forward. Um cuz if we do have these increased costs year-over-year, not knowing where we'll be in two years or in a year with the property taxes, we may have to find a way to cover 100% of the cost. The city can no longer continue to uh subsidize uh the cost of the golf course. So, I wanted to put that out there as a as a potential um I guess bridging the gap solution um that doesn't that that'll kind of alleviate some of the burden that we're placing on on the our regular golfers which are using the golf course because we we are saying that they're using the golf course 24% of the time, but there also are regular golfers and I think we need to take that into account. This would also only be applicable to Coral Gable's residents.

Okay, Mayor, if I may, just one second. Mr. Clerk, how many how many individuals do we have in the public comment? At this time, we believe we only have three. Mr. Mayor, let's listen to public comment because I want to they've been waiting long enough. I want to make sure they get heard.

Okay. So, first speaker I have here, Steve Elmore. Good afternoon and thank you uh for giving us this time to uh speak to you about this. Mr. Mayor, thank you vice mayor. Commissioners, my name is Steve Elmore. I reside at 621 Navar now for the past 43 years. 42 of those years I've played golf at Granada Golf Course. Uh my wife grew up on the Granada Golf Course. Her father was a golf pro there. I ran the golf tournament at Dural for the PGA Tour for 30 years. I'm very familiar with golf and what it entails. There's several issues that are in front of you today and you've chosen to group them all together and talk about this. So what I want to do first is I want to distance oursel from some of the conversations that have gone forward um that have carried a great deal of angst. I'm here representing the Granada Golf Association. You've heard all about us. Uh if you want qualifications of what we do, if you want proof of what we are, we'll be happy to provide that to you. But we really didn't think that was necessary. We've been an organization that operated at Granada Golf Course and in this city now since the 60s. We've done numerous things to benefit residents of this city as well as organizations that are in the city. Um for those years, we have stood strong supporting the Granada Golf Course through good times and bad. The past two years have been very difficult and for that there's no blame. There's only a

way to move forward and I would like to thank the commission for taking the time at the last meeting to take the first steps in this direction. Since Troy Hall was our superintendent and left, our conditions at the golf course have depreciated significantly. No surprise to anyone. Why? There are a number of reasons why. We could go on for hours and decide this. None of that is gerine to what we're here for today. We are here, Pete and I, to talk about the Granada Golf Association and explain to you what we're asking for during the day at the golf course. You have approximately eight hours. You have tea times every nine minutes. So, you're talking about eight tea times per hour. The Granada Golf Association uses seven tea times on Saturday morning, four tea times on Sunday morning. We have adjusted the time of those tea times over the years to accommodate the golf course. We take up times where there hasn't been a desire. We moved from 10:00 to now 8:10 on Saturday morning to fill a void. Okay. We are not poaching revenue from the city. We have 60 members. Of those 60 members which are held at 60 because we only have 17 times which means I can only accommodate that many groups during the day. Okay? So everybody doesn't get to play and doesn't get the ability to participate every weekend. We have four annual members. In the past, we've had quite a

few more. They come and they go. I did with last month's or last uh the last rate change, I went to the membership and I asked them two questions. I said, "If these rates stay the same, will you continue to participate as much as you do now?" The answer was no. So, you've made headway there. You're trying to reduce the amount of play on the golf course. You've accomplished that through our organization at least. The second question I asked him was, if you were presented with a membership for $2,100, which includes a membership to the club, will you become an annual member? They all said no. So again, you have reached a partial goal in what you're trying to accomplish. There is too much play at Granada. That goes without saying. There are many reasons why there's too much play. But before CO, you had none of these problems. Okay? And you need to understand that this will be cyclic. It will happen again. The Granada golf course is not going to make you money. It's never going to be where you don't pay anything for it. Okay? The people that play are going to pay. There's no doubt about that. Are they paying too much? Are they not paying enough? I don't know. I'm not here to talk about that. I'm trying to preserve an organization that has been here since the 60s doing things for this city and the groups in this city. All we're asking for is seven tea times on Saturday morning, four on Sunday. In the summer, we may not even use those. On Monday morning, I send out a notice to

our membership and I say, "Do you want to play Saturday or Sunday or both? They answer me back. By Tuesday afternoon, I have everyone slotted for the weekend. By Thursday, if I don't use the times that are given to our organization, I give them back. So, we're not costing you any money in any way, shape, or form. We're paying for the use of the golf course. We want to do that. Yes, we use the banquet room once a month. We can do that outside. We do that for Rita. Rita at the old Burger Bobs, now the Beastro, takes care of all our lunches. All of our monies and our monies are very it costs $75 to join our group for a year. $40 of that goes to the Builtmore for for your golf handicap. The rest of it is what we use for operating funds so that we can have events so that we can raise more money to give away to charity. So I ask you to be careful as you move forward and understand that we're residents here for the most part that have been doing this in the city for years. We're not looking for a handout. We're not looking for anybody to pat us on the back. We're just looking to be an organization that stays together, that is a community organization that enjoys living in the city of Coral Gables. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Good afternoon. My name is Peter Sag. I am the president of the Granada Gulf Association for the past 24 years. There's only two points that I want to make that came up before which were not necessarily wrong but they were they weren't presented the right way to uh Vice Mayor Anderson's question about how these groups including the the ladies the senior citizens that were presented before how do they get to get their group to play on Friday. I believe it was Friday and Monday. If these tea times are taken away, they cannot call the golf course. They can only do it online. The golf course does not take the times on the telephone. Number two, what they it's been said that people call and they say we can never play in the morning. It's a little bit of an exaggeration. We only use 42 minutes of tea times on Saturday and half that on Sunday. So, it's not like we're taking the morning. We're taking 42 minutes on Sunday and about 20 24 minutes on on Saturday and 24 minutes on on Sunday. The second point is uh based on uh what uh Commissioner Fernandez said about the membership for golf only. I have a little bit I'm a member at the at the uh at the gym at the gym. Okay. And I have a little bit of a problem the way this was put together. It's been

discrimination discrimination against golfers because if you move here from Nebraska yesterday and you want to join the gym at the country club for the country club atmosphere, it'll cost you $900. But if you move here from Nebraska and you just want to play golf, you don't want to go to the gym, you have to join the gym. You have no choice. You have to join the gym even though you're not going to use the gym. I use the gym three times a week. I go Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. I don't know of any golfers. I have never seen a golfer from Granada in the gym. I'm not saying there isn't. It's possible they're using different times that I am, but I would venture to say that maybe 10% of the golfers are going to the gym. So again, I don't have a problem with the membership. I will join the membership. I don't have a problem with the what they're charging. I understand. I was a business business businessman for 45 years. I just retired a year ago. But I have documentation here as to when Granada was established, which was August 31st, the GGA August 31st, 1960. not in the 60s, 1960. As I've sent some emails to some of or all of the commissioners recently, I keep hearing that we donated the money that we donated was donated outside Coral Gables. Charlie Homes for Children was disbanded 30 years ago. So, I don't know if I can find those records, but we

donated over $500,000 to Charlie and they were a Coral Gables organization. They were headquarters in Coral Gables. I was on the board of Charlie and we used to meet in the building behind the little flower. So, this is not something I'm making up. I I'd be crazy to do that in this venue here. We donate to the Coral Gables Community Foundation every year for the past 15 or 20 years. If you go to the gala that the Coral Gables Community Foundation does at the billboard every year, the wine that you drank came from us. I was in the liquor business for 45 years and in the opice of the GGA and a foundation that I had, we donated the wine for the gala every year for the past 10 or 15 years. There are other things that the organization does and again if those tea times goes away all of this is going to go away because the organization cannot exist without those tea times. Uh we do a a lunch for the green keepers city employees every year in December. We buy them all lunch. is done by Rita at at the bistro. We did do a few charitable donations to Bain High School. We sponsor their golf team. These are things that we've done over the years. We don't stick with one charity and we we don't do the same charity every year, but we sponsor their bell team. We sponsor the FIU ladies team for two years.

and we we've done uh the Corg Gables Fire Department toy drive a a few times in the past few years. So again, as uh Steve stated before, our only concern is tea times very minimal if you think about it. And and I think that the the o overall contribution that the go the uh Granada Golf Association does, it's far higher than than the results otherwise.

Thank you very much for your time. Next speaker, Mr. Mayor, is going to be on Zoom. I have Amy Amy Grim Grin Grum.

Ma'am, you're Miss Ingram, the floor is yours. Good afternoon. She is unmuted. So, but she's not coming through. All right. Well, we'll come back to her. Uh, I have one more on Zoom. It's going to be Donna Fails. See if this one works. Good afternoon, ma'am. You're unmuted. Okay,

I can see her microphone is moving which means she's speaking but the sound is not coming through. All right, we'll try to come back try to come back after ready. Okay, just for Sorry, Mr. Mayor. I'm being told you the that she can be heard on Zoom. However, she's not coming into the room. Okay. Just for the records, I want to make sure we put on the record. Uh the first speaker spoke for 7 minutes and the second speaker spoke for 6 minutes and 22 seconds.

Thank you. Anything else from All right. Then we'll close the public comment until somebody I guess is available uh to be able to uh join us. Uh any other comments from the commission through the mayor? Yes.

Yes. There's still Are we going to go through every item so we can address each item separately or is is is this part of the update? Well, I think what's the best is to have a conversation amongst the commission. You have you have put four or five items on the agenda that are completely different. Um, and I think that the commission should speak about what what we think is appropriate uh before we start passing any resolutions or changes uh to the proposal that the staff has put forward.

Okay. Well, that being said, then I'll go ahead and I'll I'll make a comment about um Commissioner Ariel Fernandez, what he was proposing and um what what really what I'm going to ask him is to like hear me out when that item does come about because I did keep those things into consideration and really what I was presenting was a pilot program just for a year because since there has been so many a significant increase in 40% and I did increase the non-resident significantly still makes sense. are still getting a discount and I put guard rails. So that right now it's 156 rounds that they're actually playing um per member according to the data that the the city is giving me. They don't have specific data. If you read the resolution, it'll be more detailed. And I presume that with the guard rails that I'm putting for that membership, each member should be playing around 100 to 120. Um, and then after that, the city can go ahead and evaluate a data, not assume, not on assumptions, especially when we're going to make something so permanent and change policy from one day to another. I think it's prudent to actually make policy changes with accurate numbers, not just assumptions.

So the mayor, if I may, I just want to address that. Madam Madame ACM, we heard from Commissioner Castro that we're making assumptions that we're not using actual data. Is that correct? Everything that was presented was on actual data collected from the last two years. And who collected that data? That is reporting from the POSOS system that was given to us by the Builtmore and put together by myself and the director of the department. We have but

if I may, we have to be very careful the things that we say here because I know you worked on that for the last three weeks very diligently because we went over it multiple times, you and I along with the manager. Uh thank you for that. Thank you for your hard work. Uh Mr. Manager, would you like to make a point?

Um yes, mayor. Thank you. Um, what we have is a golf course that cannot pay for itself at best. If we look at 50,000 rounds at $30, that's $1.5 million. And that's what the at $30, that's the maximum that this uh golf course can generate uh from from the rounds played. We've got one almost $2 million in in cost to run the golf course. So, as a minimum, it'll be a general fund uh hit for half a million dollars. So, the more money that we remove, the more money we must take from the general fund. But even even 50,000 rounds, that that's what this golf course can sustain because it's a ninehole golf course. And that's and that's been uh shown in the presentation that that's the capacity of this 9-hole of this 9-hole course at $30, which is what we're charging now for residents. That's $1.5 million. So those are the real numbers.

Those are the real numbers. Let the manager just finish one second. I'm just Are you done, sir? Uh yes, mayor. Thank you. Okay. Go ahead.

Okay. Let me go ahead and correct the record when I was talking about data. Yes, you have accurate data but it's not specific data as I am asking in this resolution according to the actual pattern of behavior of how golf members are playing. Now when I say there's not accurate data and assumptions is because there is an increase of 40% which is a significant increase in one year and there's an al there's also another difference that we cancelled the membership for golfing. So, that being said, and with what I'm proposing, which is a pilot program, there's a lot of different variables that um come into play, right? So, when I say we're making assumptions, it's because it hasn't happened yet. It's because we're not following the same procedures as we were following before. So, we cannot use that data accurately to predict the future. Okay. Now,

we we did present several modeled scenarios. Now, with a 40% increase, we're going to have a change in behavior. Okay? Because not everybody is going to play at the same rate because 40% is a very big increase. We need to take that into account. Not only that, with the pilot program I'm proposing, I'm proposing minimum maximum three rounds per week with no rollovers. Now, the reality of life is that nobody is going to play three rounds per week every single day. Days that are raining, days that you're on vacation, days that you're sick. So, automatically those 156 rounds are going to go down. That's what I put guard rails. There's no rollovers per week on those rounds. So I'm asking for the opportunity to give it a chance to evaluate the real numbers, the real data of these members for a year. We owe it to them, okay? Not to stop a membership abruptly. After we have that, you guys can bring the data back to the commission and if we can tweak it or discontinue it depending on the feasibility or viability of that data, then we can do that and it'll be up to the commission. But I really don't think it's going to make a big impact. I think it's going to work out. That's my hypothesis. However, the numbers will speak the truth.

So the mayor, yes, we currently uh the current the current use is 189 rounds. I know I was going to tell him that, but he doesn't versus 150. That would be a reduction of 39 automatic reduction of 39 rounds a year. So I I Can you repeat that? Because we're talking about hypothesis and we're talking about, you know, all type of Can can you repeat that? These are factual numbers. These are fact. The actual number of usage for the average for the past two years has been 189 rounds. That's the average.

The average per year. And if we going to reduce it to an average of 150, it's going it's not even going to go lower. It's very difficult because it's three rounds per year per per week. And most most of the golfers are averaging are averaging more than three rounds. Yeah. So those are the those are the facts. Those are the numbers. It's not it's not a hypothesis or testing testing ideas and a scientific experiment. These are the actual numbers. We have data here. Am I wrong? I mean we have Peter G. Pete says it's not. Tell me where we're Tell me where it's not the numbers.

As I explained in an email previously to the commissioner, the only data we were not able to provide was specifically to each specific member their usage patterns. We do have data which was presented on usage and like the manager said they're averaging close to four to five rounds a week. So I understand what the commissioner saying that if you consider like a membership to a gym maybe not everybody goes to the gym, right? But we're talking about these specific members. We are already understand what their trends are. These are not new members coming in that might have a different demographic. They might not be retired. They might be working and they might not have the ability to go three times a week, four times a week. We already know the habits of our current members.

Again, listen, let me be let me let me be very clear one second. This is no skin on my back. I don't play golf, okay? And I have people in my family that are members of your organization. I'm only upsetting people by making the the right decision, the tough decision here. I know. I know it's tough. I know. But the idea is this. When you go in a gym, for example, the gym that I go to, you pay a flat rate and the flat rate gives you access to the CrossFit gym and it gives you access to the gym. I don't use the gym that often. I do a lot of CrossFit, but they won't sell me just a gym membership if I'm a if I want a CrossFit membership. It's a bundle. That's the way it comes. It's a flat rate, $200 and something dollars a month. I've told them, "But I don't want to use the gym membership. Can you reduce it by $50? Can you reduce it by?" No, Vince. That's the way it is. So, you have to make a choice. If you want to be involved in that organization, you have to pay for the bundle rate to use the CrossFit gym and to use the gym. That's the way it is. And I choose to do that because I want to be part of that facility because I like that facility. I like the people who are there. I like the quality. I like the location. And it's a good opportunity for me. But look, I want to be very clear about what we're discussing today. This is not about golf for me, okay? And I have the utmost respect for the golfers and everyone who decides to do that. Okay, this is about fairness.

Right now we have a situation where 86 individuals are using nearly one quarter of all the rounds played at Granada Golf Course. 76 are residents, 10 are non-residents while contributing only about 6.5% of the revenue. Meanwhile, the rest of our residents, families, seniors, young individuals are paying significantly more and getting significantly less access. That is not equitable and frankly it's undefensible. What that means in plain terms is that the entire city is subsidizing a very small group of high frequency users. every resident who pays taxes, every family who wants a weekend tea time, every young person trying to learn the game, they're all effectively paying the price for an outdated system that no longer works. And now let's lose and and and let's not lose sight of the bigger picture. Granada is a historic public golf course envisioned by George Merrick as a community asset. Let me repeat that. A community asset. The current model has allowed overuse, limited access, and created a structural imbalance that is impacting the condition of the course and the city's finances. We are operating far beyond recommended capacity. As you can saw by the presentation, it's not my recommendation. It's the professional's recommendations. And we're headed towards higher costs and declining quality if we do nothing. The changes that this commission already approved are about restoring balance, fair access, responsible use, and financial sustainability. The idea of grandfather grandfathering this inequity by continuing to allow unlimited use for a select few simply

locks in a system that is unfair to everyone else. We were not elected to preserve special privileges. We were elected to serve the entire community. This is a public asset. It should be accessible, fair, and sustainable for everyone. Not just for those who have benefited the most for a system that is clearly out of alignment. I have never played golf. I've never played tennis. I've never used pickle ball. I've never had any of those benefits while I've had the privilege and honor to serve for 13 years. Sometimes I've never used the gym again. I use my own resources. At the end of the day, we have to make tough decisions as elected officials here. And I would love nothing more to make 76 individuals 6 months, God willing, if elections are changed in November, 6 months before an election. I'll be a hero and I'll be supported. But that's not why I was brought here and that's why I was not elected. We're here to make tough decisions and do what's financially correct. So, I stand by the adopted changes and I urge this commission to do the same. Am I willing to tweak things a little bit here and there? Not a problem. But the idea the idea that we're going to continue in the same path and we're going to continue putting this amount of pressure and subsidizing this golf course to the tune of $600,000 a year. There's no way of doing it. It doesn't make sense. If you told me that we had an 18 hall golf course and that we had other amenities that we could figure out some way to get more people on the golf course and spread it spread the use across it or bring in more revenue. We can't bring more revenue. We can't charge more than what $30 for people to use the golf course.

Currently for residents is $30.

Yeah, we can't. There's really no way. No one's going to use it. So we have to find that balance to make sure we give preferential treatment to residents whether it be maybe with preferred tea times to a certain extent but we should all the residents should have be able to use the tea times. What if you're a doctor for example like my father he likes to play golf and the only time that he can play golf is on a Saturday in the morning before he has to go to the hospital. my father can't play golf and that's you know people have times that they can do things so I understand and I and I would protect this also if I was a member here but we have to be equitable and we have to understand that there's a community that we represent and it's not a personal vendetta against 86 people it's that financially we have to address these issues just like we addressed them at the Venetian pool just like we addressed them at the Coral Gables country club just like we addressed them at Burger Bobs just like we addressed them at the at the little restaurant over and over and over. We've had to tackle these issues and this is one that needs to be addressed one way or another

through the mayor. Yes. Okay. So, I'm going to go ahead and clear the record a little when you were talking about numbers so maybe I could get a better clearer understanding from my colleagues what I referred to. Um, number one, each player plays at different ways in different ways. They have different once a week. Maybe there's a player that a golfer that plays five times a week. Okay. But when I went ahead and the number that the city is giving me 189 is an average. Okay. The average is over the actual usage over two years. It's not like a estimated average. It's a mathematical average.

Right. But let me go ahead and explain something. Okay, that means every golfer plays different. But the average you're giving me is in conjunction of the whole membership, right? Because when I asked you for data

and I asked and I asked the city manager for data and Fred for data, telling me exactly how every member is playing so that I can evaluate that data and the pattern of behaviors in which they are playing so I can make a I I can come up with better policy. You guys told me that you couldn't do that. So, the average came exactly from all the members, the 86 members together. Now, correct me if I'm wrong. This is what you guys told me. What I explained to you in an email was I don't have specific data on each individual member, right? So, I don't have usage patterns on member A versus member B. I can tell you based on the total number of members and the actual amount played over two fiscal years and averaged out to give you one number over a period of two years of data collected. I have given you an accurate number through the I'm so sorry um city manager let me go ahead and finish my point. Okay, the 189 is an average basically divided by the 86 is what you're trying to tell me. Correct? Now what I'm telling you is that that information is not sufficient for me. That's why the resolution said we need to evaluate this data in a more pattern way of behavior of these golfers so that we can see the trend and so that we can find a balance between what's profitable for the city and what is also a balance for the golfers. Right now we don't have that data. We just have an average and every golfer does not play at the same the same days and the same amounts. There's golfers that play one day and there might be golfers that who knows plays seven days. Okay. But we're averaging that number. It's not a very accurate number to come up with good policy. Okay. Now, what I'm asking is is not to reverse policy. This is just a one-year

pilot to evaluate the policy that was just passed. We need real numbers moving forward. I understand we have accurate data for what we have, not detailed according to the membership from the past. I'm not I'm not um I'm not discussing that. But moving forward, um we just made major multiple major changes at once. the 40% we eliminated memberships we changed operations we have zero real data on the impact I think we need to measure first and decide later okay that's I'm I'm excuse me mayor I'm I'm still not done um about fiscal responsibility and I know that's really where we are headed right now that it's not sufficient the money that we're getting for the golf course I have to defer to that. I think I think the city could give the golfers a year to determine if what I'm putting in place and I'm even willing to, you know, compromise if if Commissioner Fernandez wants to come up with something that maybe you think is a little more equitable. Um, I'm willing to do something to move forward, but to take a balanced approach. Um just getting rid of the golf membership from one day to another without transitioning is very unfair especially since our mission statement is the health and priority of our senior citizens. So um we need to test measure and adjust.

Are you done through the mayor? But before before Mr. manager okay everything she said right now is completely and utterly wrong. Okay. Let's be honest with ourselves. This is on the record. Okay. How many members are part of this organization? Which organization? The organization 86. Correct. Right. So the paying Granada golf memberships and I just want to make sure again so we differentiate the two. Right. So we have three associations that pay an association fee and then we have a group of members and I just for the record I want to clear up. The city did not eliminate the golf membership.

I want to make that very very clear. There's still a golf membership. was restructured which was always presented as part of the acquisition of the operational plan for the country club four years ago to this some of the changing commission but the mayor was here and we presented

be responsible you have to be responsible you have to address issues you cannot continue to hand out bundles of money here and expect the city to be solvent okay it doesn't work that way that's what they did before I got here and we got ourselves into s significant financial issues with the benefits and a lot of things that were given out here to the point that they had to go back and take it from the police and firefighters here and all hell broke loose. I'd like to address her comments because they're completely and utterly off basis and we went in like 50 circles and you confused half of the planet. Okay, Madame ACM, please explain the numbers that you worked on for over a month. Please explain that we do have accurate numbers, that we do have all the information

to make a decision, please. Yes. To the mayor. Mayor, go ahead. I'm sorry, mayor, but I I have a little experience in statistical analysis. I know I know you do. Uh I know you do. When when when you have a a two-year sample of of 86 and you have and you have the fact that it's used almost over 34,000 times in a in a two-year uh sample size, you have 86, such a low number, and you have an average of 189. That's a hugely accurate statistical sample. I wish I had something like that for hurricanes. I I I really do. It would be fantastic. But we don't. And

and that's why you that's why you sense the frustration in me where where there's someone to my right trying to justify that we don't have numbers when I have when what you're saying right now. We have incredibly accurate numbers.

It's very accurate because our stat statistical sample is very low. Our average is over two years and our average is 16,500 rounds uh per year and an average of 189 nine rounds. So that statistical sample is very accurate. And to go back and look at each each statistical uh uh member would be just an anomaly. And that's really that's really you you really have rarely have anything like that in science. So this is a strong sample size. It's it's it's a very good average. It's it's based on two years huge numbers and and 86 players. It tells you that those 86 players play a lot and that's because that sample size generates that much data. So it it's it's very accurate sample that you can look at this from an individual member and and and and peak things out is is not statistically correct and it it it just wouldn't yield uh any statistical

and by the way issues. And by the way, even if you did look at at individuals in that 86 sample size, even if you did one individual and you had one person's playing 500 times, another person's 300 times, and you had the numbers, it doesn't matter at the end of the day. It's all the rounds combined because there's a subsample of 86 people that cannot grow. Those individuals have preferred tea times pay $920 and they have unlimited golf. So at the end of the day, doesn't matter if one person is playing a thousand times or another person's paying 300 times. The entire sample of 86 people are playing this amount of golf. You can't

defense. So excuse me, sir. With with all due respect, if you'd like to say something, everyone's more entitled to speak, but let's not scream from the grand stance. Now, let's address if I'm sorry, sir. I said my apologies. No worries at all. Please, I would be more willing to bring you up if you'd like. Let me let me address this. Let me address the statement. I think it's appropriate. I think it's appropriate since you did make that statement. Are there preferred tea times for these for the associations? The membership as it was previous did not. As adopted, we were including that as a benefit. Okay. So, we do have preferred tea times. as adopted. It was with seven days notice they would have preferred or priority access. Yes, sir. Would the commission indulge in giving me five minutes to take to There's something I want to look into.

Um and then I I have a few comments. Can we take a fiveinut break? Five break. No problem. Can we take a five minute break? Okay. I appreciate it. Oh my goodness.

What was it?

check two. You know why I don't want I don't know why I don't want I defer. I don't want to defer, but

Okay. Um, defer. I defer. Thank you.

Okay, Mr. Mayor, we're back. Um, so basically we all know we we're having a lot of technical difficulties today. We're not going to be able to bring audio back from Zoom. Can we do something? We can share. Can we can we do something? Let's just do something here. Let's let's just let's do this. Right. Okay. This is not going to work out. I have a lot of items that I want to talk about. So, it's a lot of Let me Let me deal with this one. I'm asking I know that we have a lot of I'm willing to defer the rest of the of the agenda and bring this back in May because we can't we have so many technical difficulties that we're just going back and forth back and forth back and forth. I'll second that. I

I don't want to. Trust me, I have a lot of items that I've been working on with staff, major items, but we we if it's not the microphones that are back on right now, it's a TV. We can't get people We can get people who want to give public comment on you know there's a lot of things that are going on. I just don't want later say we rushed through something and then people say I wasn't able to get public comment. What do my colleagues think about that?

Mr. Mayor, actually what I was coming back to ask is that we defer these items so that we can really figure out what all these different groups are, how many members they actually have because I think our number of 86 isn't even the actual number. Uh I think we're off on that number. There may be more members. So, uh, what I was going to ask for was to defer this item to, uh, the May meeting so that I would like to sit down with each of these groups and see what each of their expectations have been and see if there is a potential for something that we can come up with. Uh, and if it's not if it's not something we can come up with, then, you know, we'll figure it out at that point. But what I was going to ask for is that we defer this uh item to the the May commission meeting so that we can properly have more conversations with the folks uh who are the stakeholders on this item.

Are we back? Is this back? Are we back now? So this is back. Yes. For because we've been dealing this for the last four hours and I want people to know on the record that we've been battling with this and it's not staff's fault. It's just we have a glitch in the matrix. I mean I'm fine to move forward but if this continues it's going to be a problem. Can we get excuse me one second let me just address the issues okay now can we right now that we have a moment can we get the two individuals that we're trying to get on the phone can we get them on the phone no sir we cannot bring audio from Zoom you told me you wanted to get somebody on a cell phone call correct yes commissioner Castro was going to call someone on the phone and basically hold the phone that's what I was talking about okay

hi Hi Don, you are on the microphone and they are hearing you right now. This is public comments. State your name and address. Good idea. Yeah, I have about three uh members of the GWGA that want to speak. They think that y'all are very confused. She already spoke. Don Fine already spoke in the beginning. I'm not going to speak. I'm gonna I was trying to patch in someone, but it's not going to work. I think deferring this because you're you guys are talking apples and oranges. Okay. I mean, okay, Commissioner,

you're confusing the three associations with the 86 membership, right? And just for your information, I and about two other women are a member of that 86 group. We play twice a week, but but do whatever you want to do, but I think deferring this and meeting, but let's do the right thing. Madam city attorney, you know, we talk about the not speaking in both issues, not speaking on an issue twice. So, commissioner, will you please hang up the phone? Thank you very much, Don. Yeah, there's a lot of different items that you can Mr. Mayor, I I did want to say I did have two people on Zoom who were not able to speak um and they did email me her their comments and have them to have them read into the record if you would allow it. Yes, please. And then we'll close let's close the public comment and let's move forward. Go ahead.

Okay. So the first speaker was Donna Falls. Says, "I want to piggyback on the last two speakers. We're only talking about seven tea times on Monday morning, one hour for the GWGga. We pay to play. For many of us, that is the only time we play. The organizations have been in existence for over 60 years. These organizations are what make a community. Please continue to protect these tea times." The second speaker was Amy Hayes. I'm sorry, Mr. Mayor. I I didn't hear the number, Mr. Uh, clerk, the number of tea times, seven tea times on Monday morning. Thank you.

The second speaker was Amy Hayes. She says, "I've been a member since 2021 and I typically play four to eight times a month and my husband plays even less. How did he get your statistics? The golf course keeps the member records in a notebook and nothing is computerized. How do you know how many rounds each member plays? Did you audit T-wire, the only booking system? Also, couples are considered one membership even though there are two people. If I book a time for four people and I am a member, how do you know who plays with me and if there are also members? Your data is inaccurate. I understand the need for higher green fees, but the court is in horrific shape. I would like to remain a member, but I cannot justify paying double for a course in its current state. Half of the greens are unplayable. I suggest closing down the course for a period of time and also spacing out the tea times to every 15 minutes. The course is an embarrassment in its current state. I would say the worst condition of any course I have ever played. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Thank you, Madame ACM. We have to discuss these points because they keep they keep repeating that we are our facts are not correct. We need to make sure that just because someone says something that's not the truth. Madame ACM, take it from the top. So, just to explain again, the pro shop is managed by the team from the Buildmore. Um, T-wire, what was mentioned is the booking software and then they have a separate POSOS system. The reporting that we're going off is not on what was reserved or booked, but what was actually paid for. So, they gave us the records of two fiscal years. That's where the numbers are coming from on items purchased and paid for as well as comps. Okay. So, we need to we need to stop undermining the data. It it's not going to work. It's not going to work. These are the numbers. These are the facts. These are real numbers. We got the real numbers. Okay. Let's work together to find an answer, but not undermining what the city's doing because that doesn't work well. That undermines everyone. That makes us look like we're incompetent. That makes us look that maybe we're taking money. That makes us look that we're not that we're being corrupt. Let's do things the right way. Let's address the issue. Let's find a system that works, but let's not say, oh, throw our hands up and say, "No, no, no. This is this is bad data." When it's not bad data. Second thing, will you address Commissioner Castro's statement that there's insufficient data based on the fact that we have 86 members and we have X amount of rounds and we divide it and obviously that gives us an average. If you had half that, if you have half that amount of use, amount of members, you're still going to get the average. If you had 25%, you still would get the average. So, it doesn't really matter. The point is that you have the amount of rounds through through the work of of our ACM and her team, and you have the amount of members, and you divide it, and that's how you get your number.

Please tell me if I'm wrong. Enlighten us. I think the manager made it very clear. But I want to go over again because they repeat it over and over again. It's a small sample size. It was collected over two periods, two fiscal years. And let's say for in the scenario there were two very large inconsistencies. Then I would say, okay, maybe we need to look at it in more depth, but they were pretty consistent the two fiscal years. And again, it's an average of the total usage by year and by the amount of members. And I want to reiterate again, these are paying Granada golf members that we're talking about, not the three associations. We are not tracking the usage of the associations cuz that is not managed by the city of Corables.

Repeat that again because I think that that was something that touched our dear friend Pete over here because he agrees now. He sees what we're talking about. Can you repeat that again, please?

All right. So, we're we're talking about a couple of different items. There's Granada golf members, which is the amount of numbers that we've been talking about. That is an amount that we're tracking through the report provided by the Builmore staff. Then there's three separate associations who are paying green fees. They have a room block which gives them the priority access to that room block. I call it a room block because that's how I see it simplified. Uh a tea time that's exclusive to them and they're paying their greens fees. I do not track those. The city does not track those and we do not have those numbers because they're paying as part of the generic public. And if you see in the presentation we provided earlier when we did the nice little uh pie chart, you'll see that their tea times are part of the total tea time that is from public access. They're not what we consider members to the Granada golf course

through. It cannot it cannot be any clearer. So we can try to confuse and jumble and make numbers up and say there's no data. The data is there. It's a fact. You have used statistics. It's there. We don't need to talk about hypothesis and all kinds of things and try to get real scientific. These are very very simple numbers. It's there simple math. Simple math. Let's not get too complicated through the mayor.

I'm not done yet. So very simple. We have to make a decision here. Do we uphold the current standards or do we try to do fuzzy mask to accommodate everybody? What I'm trying to tell you is eventually you have to face the reality. You cannot have a golf course where the costs continue to go up like they are as a result of Bright View, which is a what from what I've heard people I've asked golfers who've told me that they're a very serious outfit and that they do very, you know, wellestablished landscaping. They have serious contracts in golf courses. These are very a serious outfit. You cannot spend the amount of money that we're spending to take this golf course to the level that it deserves and not be able to charge when, as I told you very clearly, you have 86 members. You have 86 members that are almost 30% of the use of of of this golf course. So, at the end of the day, we have to come to terms with what we're facing. I know we want to kick the can down the curb and maybe deal with it a year from now, but that's another $600,000 that the golf course loses. The same situation that we had with the Donados in the Coral Gables Country Club. I remember when we talked about this and the community came out, people were screaming at us about taking it away from the Dina. Remember?

Yes, ma'am.

Remember that? They were screaming, "How could you take it away from the Donados? They're a pillar of the community." And guess what? We found out such a pillar of the community. They were stealing from the city of Cro Gables. But I remember we had Jav Bos here screaming here. Screaming here. Remember screaming here saying if you take it away you know we're going to we're going to take you we're going to take you away. So yeah facts remember you know you know what's going on. You know very well. So my point is this. We have to face the consequences of the of the situation that we're in right now. We got to find I'm not saying it has to be a profit center, but let's at least break even. Let's at least break even. Let's be able to pay so that so that like I've told you before, 86 people can enjoy the golf course and they have they're part of this organization and they have unlimited use, but there has to be a moment where we we they give a little bit and we give a little bit. Let's get to the middle

so again I what I would ask is that we defer this item. I I I think no changes right now. I want to have a sit down with the different groups and understand how each group is operating before I vote on anything else because I think there's so many different components to this that work completely differently that we there there is no onesizefits-all for the different groups because they have different expectations and they operate completely differently. Some may be happy with the end solution, some may not. we have to figure out what it is that has been happening with each of these groups or at least I do. Um so that's why I asked that we defer this item to to the next meeting so that I can really grasp what what has been going and see if you know even the proposal that I made earlier if it makes sense or not.

So let me respond to you on that front. Okay. Number one, the the work that the ACM the DCM and the manager did and your entire staff did is a very comprehensive factbased data driven document. I don't need more time. Okay. Well, what we were doing is kicking the can down the curb. I'm ready to address this issue right now. Okay, that's number one. Number two, you're not going to make there's not going to be a solution to make everybody happy. I know it's election season and I know we want to make as many people happy as possible so we can get as many votes as we possibly can. But we have to face the consequences. We have to deal with this. We have no other choice. If we kick it for the can for another year, yeah, we buy another year and what happens? Everybody's happy. But at the end of the day, we're going to have to face it in a year for those who are here. Okay? So, at the end of the day, I say face the consequences now. Deal with the issue. Find common ground. The city has already put together a plan of action. When does this program expire?

Oh my god. Mayor, we we uh we it's expired. Okay. And that's it. And we move on through the mayor. That's it. Okay. Um, I'm going to go ahead and I'm going to second your motion, but I'm also going to go ahead and add all the other resolutions that are there so we could take better consideration. Now, with all due respect, mayor, I really don't think you read my resolution for I read them all. The grandfather wanted I read them all and I'm I'm in opposition to that.

Let me go Let me go ahead and finish. I don't I It is my opinion. If you did, you did. Then maybe you didn't understand them. Okay. um the math if you go through it you would understand how the rounds would go down. Nobody's arguing that your average is 189 for past data. What I'm arguing is that moving forward we need to collect new data that's more specific to the membership so that it can work for the city and it can work for the members. Okay. So, when the mayor here is saying that I'm here trying to confuse, I'm not saying your numbers are incorrect. However, I am saying that's that's the numbers 189 for the past two years. Now, with what I'm proposing, the maximum, which is not going to happen, if you read my legislation because it's three rounds, no rollovers per week for 365 days. It's going to go down to 156. If nobody gets sick, if it's never raining, if you don't go on vacation, I mean, I estimate 100 to 110 rounds. Now, if you want to go ahead and, you know, um, since I went ahead and I seconded his motion, if you want to go ahead and take a little more time to evaluate those numbers a little more, you want to talk to the members, I am all for that. But let's not form any confusion between what the past data is and what the present data the assumption of what the present data would be because we don't know because there's a lot of variables that have changed. Not the same patterns of golfers are going to play with a 40% increase. Not the 86 members are going to opt in to this new membership that is not unlimited. the data of 189 was for unlimited golf.

We we don't have unlimited golf anymore with the new proposal. I think that's something you need to take in consideration. There's a lot of different variables here and we need time to evaluate the numbers a year. I think it's sufficient to then come back to the commission and say, okay, this was we lost this much or we made this much or we're even. Okay, very quickly. Past data. What is the past data? She keeps harping about past data. What is past data? I just want I would like to just answer because I need to I want to get to the point and we have a motion in a second. I want to move on. Um past data. What is the past data? Two years. Correct. Correct. When was the last day? When was the last day that you took the data? The last moment.

We did not count this fiscal year. So that was your the two last fiscal years because we're in mid-fiscal year. Perfect. So past data, that's what you do. You count the past data that you have. We got to do it from fiscal year. It's pretty simple stuff. Um, one second. And then when you talk about when you talk about unlimited golf, these gentlemen here, the three gentlemen that are here along with the individuals who called, they want to continue with their programs. They don't want to they don't want to consider anything else. They want to continue with unlimited golf.

We have a we have a motion. We have a motion and a second on the floor along with an adoption of all the things all the items that the that commissioner put on here. Uh Mr. Mr. Man, Mr. Clerk, after our vice mayor, I'd like to take a vote on that.

Okay. So, I'm gonna I'm going to put a couple observations that I've gathered from listening not only to the individuals that were present, but also the individuals that visited me during my office hours or wrote me during uh on emails. Majority of the folks, the most critical issue here is reserving tea times. And we can work on a system for those groups to have an arrangement with the city to have an agreement with the city to reserve the tea times because the organizations and the camaraderie that exists between them goes around the tea times. The monetary aspect of it was not the priority issue. It was the tea times. So I did a little research here as you can do on the internet these days. And note the following numbers for the record. Uh going forward, other cities, other nine-hole golf courses charge close to twice as much if not more for playing um nine holes of golf. So based upon that, it's consistent with what I'm hearing that it's the tea times that are critical to maintain what the organization is trying to accomplish. So go ahead. we can go ahead with a deferral, but keep that in mind that the most important issue for the women's groups and for the association that's come forward here to speak today is preserving the tea times and staff can work on that just like I had to work on it for the garden club to have an agreement with the Builtmore Hotel that never ever existed in the past, but there was a practice and that's what happened here. Now we need to memorialize it so it's protected in the

future. because it can be pulled away from you if you don't have an arrangement through the mayor. Mr. Clerk, we have so again I'm against a deferral, but we have a motion and a second on the floor. Let's take a vote. We have a long commission agenda left to do and I'd like to to get move. Mayor, just to clarify, my understanding is the motion is to defer items F12, F-13, F-14, and F-15. Correct. Yes. But before before that through the mayor, um vice mayor, if I can have your support on the tea times as as it is as stated, I will amend that motion and take off that item.

What I'd like is I'd like to give staff the opportunity to memorialize this in writing with the groups as to what the tea times are. I know that our staff respects the groups and will do what they can in the interim to make sure that they get the play time that they need, but to have this in writing right now on the fast and loose during in the middle of a commission meeting without giving staff the time to memorialize this, I think is is something that is just not a wise decision at this time. Madam Vice Mayor, this is why we should allow staff to handle this. This should not be politicized like it's being here right now. This is not an issue that should be addressed. I know you're upset about it. I You're politicizing. No one else is.

The only one that's screaming from the grandstands is you. I'm screaming. Yeah, you are. You're raising your voice. No one else is screaming from the grand stands. It's It's disrespectful and it's actually immature. So, at the end of the day, it's you should conduct yourself like a professional when you come into this room because I have to conduct myself the same way with you. So, at the end of So, at the end of the day, at the end of the day, you have an option. We have a deferral. We have a motion and a second. I think we should move forward, but at the end of the day, let's def let's let's let's hear the let's hear the votes. Through the mayor, I'll continue with the deferral and I won't go ahead and amend that just because I feel the probability if it comes back, it's going to be a little better than now because as you can see, this is we're not going to have the votes.

Go ahead, Vice Mayor Anderson. Yes. Commissioner Castro, yes to deferral. Commissioner Fernandez, yes. Commissioner Lada, no. Mayor Lago,

no. All right, moving on. Deferred. Let's move on to the next item. F1. Okay, this is an this is uh something again in an effort to try to push the city forward. I have a presentation that I'd like to present. So, these are some photos that I took myself over the weekend here in um on our downtown, and I would like to really showcase staff's response. And this is the reason why I think that we need to continue moving forward with the proposal that I'm presenting, which we're working with staff that hopefully will have it in the next month or so to move forward with something that is holistic and all-encompassing for the downtown to maintain and beautify the downtown and clean the downtown. Mr. DCM Belis, thank you for your hard work.

Thank you, Mayor. And by the way, and this is the end result after calling staff, the manager, the DCM, the ACM came through big. Look how clean it is in comparison to the way it was with street sweeper. That's the way our city should look every moment of the day. It's investing in our downtown and making sure that we get things done. So, Mayor um Belisp with the economic development department, at your request, we are exploring a landscape and maintenance uh assessment program for the central business district um to provide consistent highquality level uh cleanliness, maintenance and landscape enhancements all through the central centralized service model. So the proposed boundaries of this assessment district would be the boundaries of the central business district. Uh among the scope of work that we're looking for uh looking at is and and by the way this is enhancing the services that are currently provided by the city. So this is above and beyond the services that the city provides. So the scope of work would include routine sidewalk and alley maintenance and scheduled pressure cleanings which you've talked about before. We would have enhanced trash and litter removal, installation and maintenance of landscaping, preferably drought resistance and some minor alley restorations and aesthetic improvements. There's something that has also um that you have mentioned before which is having a dedicated supervisor as part of the process. So, they are overseeing the work that happens um uh as far as landscape and maintenance, but also uh elevating any issues that occur um when they're out on the street. For example, if there's a sign that needs to be replaced, then they escalate it to the correct department for more um more

service. This is again not it's supposed to supplement not replace the property owner's responsibilities because there is the responsibilities right now that the property owner does have to maintain their property. And so where we are right now is that we're trying to finalize that scope of work and then we'll have to engage with a consultant to come up with an um assessment a a methodology for assessing the property owners. If you want to add anything, Joe. No, I think that's it. Okay. And that's it from our end. We're good. Mhm.

Okay. So, this is what we're working on. And I wanted to use the examples of what you saw there as what the downtown could look like in regards to cleanliness and the ability that we have to really address something. When do you think we'll come back with with a plan of action? We can come back in in May with the finalized scope. Mayor and a price breakdown or what we're looking at per per that's gonna that's going to take a little more time, mayor, because we have to hire a consultant to kind of come up with the with the revenue model.

I'd like I'd like it made to be able to present before the commission about this and have my colleagues work with you on this front um so that we can hopefully take the next step to hire a consultant to then be able to address this issue. Okay. Through the mayor. Yes, sir. So, is this a continuation of the last time that we Okay, we talked about this before to to preserve or enhance continuity, for example, when you're talking about pressure cleaning. You this is already an obligation that city um storefront owners, property, commercial property owners have already.

Yes. And so eventually we're going to find out what the assessment is going to be looking like so that in deploying it they may even save some money um depending on how much it cost to do it ad hoc versus one centralized way to do it and then the city should look a lot cleaner and it should the beautifification should be enhanced if you do it on a on a routine regular scheduled basis. Right. Exactly. Mr. Clerk,

if um I'd like to in the next uh commission meeting, please have an item that brings us in for final consideration so that the an action item so the commission can can take action in regards to so we can potentially hire uh an entity or an outside entity to be able to give us a roadmap to be able to deliver this to the business owners in the downtown. Okay. Thank you. Item F2. Thank you so much for your hard work. Thank you Belis. Thank you Mr. DCM. discussion regard golf carts LSV parking study. How are we doing with that madame director? How are we doing? Good afternoon.

Good afternoon, Monica Belchan, director parking sustainability and mobility services. Um when when the attorneys were studying the potential legislation regarding the LSVs, etc., We talked a little bit about what you brought up um how do we charge these folks, right? So there was a an understanding that because these vehicles would be operating only in the lower um MPH miles hour uh streets like 25 miles per hour that maybe it is not such a big issue. However, Salceto for example is 25 miles per hour and we do have um meters, right? So we do have paid parking. So, I I reached out to the um the pay by phone and the park mobile apps and indeed we we I I've worked with PD to come up with a decal that we would place on these vehicles when they register, right? And we would design these to mimic a tag, a license tag, right? So, we would record these these tags and pay by phone and park mobile have confirmed that I cannot scan them because when I scan these these these decals, it'll communicate with the county and we cannot site them through the county because these are not tags, right? So, we would manually input the information. we would generate a a Paul Gable citation, not a county citation. If that's the direction that we want to go, there is a method for doing it.

Okay. So, moving forward, what is our next step? What do we need to do? Um, I would I've been working with PD about the decal. Okay. And then we need to work I need to work with my city manager and DCM and and determine um how we want to schedule the citations. There are different options uh including holding these citations against people if they don't pay and then not renewing their permits annually etc. So it would be an in-house and in city uh citation process. Okay. All right. So, do you think in one more meeting, two more meetings, three more meetings to flush this out and finally bring this uh to the residents? What do you think? How long you think it'll take?

So, I'll work uh with the city attorney's office. I've already worked with PD. It's a matter of coming up with a decal that we want to something that's very specific and that cannot be um duplicated and then um yeah, we'll put something in place.

Okay. I also want to commend you by the way um you and your team uh had a meeting with uh the tax collector that he had Fernandez this past week since we had a conversation and we brought him here to talk about uh the disability tax your team has been out there um really enforcing uh and about I think it was three or four days ago we had a meeting with the tax collector here in your offices and it was incredible the amount of falsifications and false tags we were able to find duplicate tags printed tags you know stickers on top of the the the sticker. Um, you're doing a great job, Mr. Manager, and we're really we're really addressing the issue of these disability tags that are be being used for nefarious reasons so that people understand they're saying, "Vince, but why does it really matter? Why do you why do you think why do you get caught up on doing these things like addressing disability tags for people who don't have disabilities? Number one, my mother's disabled and I think it's a shame if you use a disability tag and you don't you're not afflicted with anything. Number two, you have veterans who fought for this great country and for our freedoms who are disabled and they can't find parking. And number three, which at the bottom of the barrel, but it's still an issue. And I know that uh I talk about it a lot, but it's just the financial responsible part of me. Does my colleagues on the commission here know when our staff, our director did a sweep of Miracle Mile, how many parking spaces by percentage were taken up by disability tags, which by the way, a disabled tag parking in a regular parking space does not pay for a meter. Do you know what the percentage was? Commissioners, anyone want to guess?

30%. You hit it right on the head. I can't believe you guessed that.