Environment, Agriculture & Natural Resources Committee - Regular Meeting

Yeah. Any further, events or projects, focuses that folks are hoping to see in 2026? Are people pretty happy with the, the list that the group came up with?

Do we it's a kind of question. And maybe this is just me having low expectations. But do you think we can accomplish all of these things? And if no, what people like, what thing would we wanna, like, tax off? Or maybe that's not the best way to say it. Maybe we could sign ourselves to these things and then see what doesn't get covered. I'm not sure. What are you what are we saying?

Kate's got her hand raised.

Oh, go ahead.

Or did. I had a question kind of in the similar vein because I was considering this also because we're a limited group of people, and we wanna, you know, make progress with these initiatives. But it's like, maybe priority isn't the best word for it, but I was kind of thinking what are short term goals? Like, more time sensitive things. Like, the Arbor Day, we have a deadline for that.

We have, you know, that timeline already kind of built out, and maybe we could lump the career fair in that. So those things, I could see having hard deadlines on. But for, like, the ordinance resource and the tree crib maintenance and I'm not really sure what all is involved with that and how time sensitive that is, but maybe there is a a short term goal where we can, like, split some of these out into short term, and then we can have some of these as long term goals where throughout the year, we're con we're thinking about them and working on them, but they're they don't really have a hard deadline.

Yeah. I think that's I think that's a great point. One of the things we talked about with the, the month summary was once we've got folks that are subdivided into project groups, they could, kinda fill out, you know, deadlines and goals within those projects, into, you know, kind of into the calendar there. And then, you know, provide, provide updates at tree board meetings to how, you know, how those things are going. You know, to your point, certain things, the Arbor Day events, the Earth Day events will have a very hard deadline, but most everything else is pretty squishy.

So we could, you know, have those, have those work groups kind of lay out their their calendar goals and, you know, just kind of use that as a guideline to keep themselves making progress forward.

Mhmm.

I don't can someone please tell me if this ends up going this way? Because I don't wanna kind of stick us down, like, a tunnel about this. But what Kate just said about something about, like, the career fair possibly being related to Arbor Day and Earth Day, I think one of the things we run into like, I think it's great that we, you know, like, have a presence at those events, but I feel like things that have kind of come up time again time and time again has been, like, what, you know, like, what does the trip or do? How do we market ourselves? And it just I have, like, a little light bulb, so maybe it's, like, something to jot down and note.

But I'm wondering if at events like that, we could possibly be facilitators of, like, sharing out career fair or job exposure type material at those events instead of you know, I don't wanna say, like and, like, dog on what we do already, but maybe have a more kind of if the focus seems to be towards workforce development and youth, which seems to be like a a theme through most of those things, it could be an interesting way to maybe market ourselves or, like, what we're tabling for at those events. Just a thought. And it could be something that that subcommittee talks about.

Yeah. No. Yeah. That's a great idea. Any other, comments or notes on the, the work plan?

I think this great job to the group who met for this. It seems like it's covered, I would say, the if the majority, if not all, of kind of the major things, I think, that have come up this past year that folks have been excited about pursuing in the upcoming year?

So just a comment from I mean, past years, we sort of set it up as Outreach as one branch policy as another. All of these that I'm looking at here do fall into that. Really, we only have one that's more on the policy side. We have the rest to me fall into more of the outreach side. I think lumping it that largely might be a problem, but I do agree that for example, the arbiter of the events, a lot of these are existing events.

It's not like we're creating something new. So I do feel like it could be wrapped into something else versus having that a stand alone committee where people would feel like if I were here and I'm like, oh my gosh. And I'm like in five different committees. You know, like, well then which one do you start to focus on? I feel the other day is pretty sort of isn't the word I wanna use, but sort of

terminal in a way.

Like, it's like, you do it, it's done, you move on. Mhmm. Career fair seems like it's gonna take a lot more planning even if it is partnering with somebody else. And then I feel really like the bottom one, partnering with land and water department. Gosh. It sort of dovetails with the career fair stuff in a way. Because it is if I remember right, Michelle, and please don't let me put words in your mouth, that it really was reaching out to those younger folks to get them to know that there's, know, the benefits of trees and the careers that surround them at a much younger age. And so I'm not sure if that one needs its own separate one even.

Yeah. I think you could almost have just, an events committee or whatever. You call the outreach committee. But all those events could be

We have one of those ones.

Yeah. And I think this

could it would make sense for those to all be run by the same people because they're kind of doing, like, Kieran is saying, like, you're gonna be doing you're developing maybe stuff for the career fair that you would provide to people at the Arbor Day. All that stuff is, yeah, seriously overlapping.

So I'm not sure if I

have a proposal there or not. I just do feel like some of these are relatively it could be relatively brief, succinct, wouldn't take too much to make them happen, and others take a lot more work and plan and maybe combining some of the shorter ones with well, I'm not I don't know.

I don't

know what that proposal is. Maybe somebody else can help with that.

No. I I Do

you think an events committee that makes sense?

I I mean, I think so. I think this is all this is all good feedback and, you know, to to several people's points, like the Arbor Day and Earth Day events, probably a smaller lift on the organizing side, to where, you know, something like the career fair, probably a larger lift, but it all does feel like it would fit under the same umbrella of exposure, like exposing folks to, you know, trees and or careers within the tree world. So I like the idea of combining kind of a career fair Arbor Day slash Earth Day events and partnering with the land and water department onto a single monolith.

I would suggest if we do that, though, that folks have pretty you know, that we don't lose these and that people are assigned. Maybe somebody says they're assigned to lead each one so that doesn't get lost. That's something different versus like, hey, Corey, you were you like the career fair stuff. You wanted to be in charge of that, but now you're also in charge of the Arbor Day and Earth Day events and partnering with Glenelg. That doesn't seem fair, and I feel like those other items will definitely be the very strong possibility to get the loss or at least you'll be overwhelmed with,

oh, there'll be a loss. Juggle all of them.

Yeah. Especially with the Arbor Day and Earth Day events, given how many there are. Yeah. I feel like that would also take some thinking through, though. Because even though those things are terminal, they it can be kind of intense when there's so much stuff going on that time of year. Are

those it it seems like the two people of the are the point people for all these events we've all appeared at are Adam and Matt. Is that a correct assumption?

Yeah. I I mean, I think Judy shows up a lot, and, Lisa, like, shows up. But, a a lot of times, yeah, it's like I think it's, like, Adam and me.

And sometimes it's several of us. Mhmm. It's all over the board.

But but it seems that we find out about them through either Matt or Adam.

Yeah. One of you one of you live talks now or Lisa. Yep. That's true. Sometimes it's Lisa. So

You know, me personally, I was planning on doing less. You know? Like, I feel like I get asked by a lot of different people to show up for these Arbor and Earth Day events. And and I was just gonna do less this year because there was, like, too many last year. Like, certain ones, like, you know, like, the party for the planet just, like, whole little loss and loss of exposure, other ones, like, you know, the extravaganza, right, at the Lucia Center, like, I don't know. Not that many people showed up. It's nice to be there and, like, contribute. I feel bad saying, like, being invited and not showing up. But

Okay. There's capacity issues. So, yeah, you shouldn't feel bad.

You feel bad. The role

of this community. Right?

Where you

get requests, you vet the requests. If there are people who are able to go and there's some and it feels like a good reason, great. If not, then we pass. Yeah.

100%.

And that's not been on any one person. You know? It's not on Matt making that decision. It's the group deciding.

Yeah. Yeah. We have to decide what's reasonable to accomplish.

Yeah. Yeah. I Now I

feel we're wandering into the weeds, I think it might have been my

fault. Well,

I like the idea of Oh, you're doing. I don't like the idea of consolidating these a little bit. I think we all agree that these are things we kind of wanna do. In my opinion, I think that we might other than the events, which I think we could all accomplish, I'm not sure if this is maybe the case going about some of the things being longer term. We could probably make progress on the ordinance resource and progress on the curriculum.

Would it be done in a year? I don't know. But I don't know. Maybe we should start thinking about signing people to this, and then the people who are in those projects can map it into the month's summer and for time.

Yeah. One run. That that's the intention 100% because I don't think we'll map anything into the calendar today. We'll just get get people assigned in the groups. But we did wanna open it up to make sure that folks were feeling good about the the list as it stands. So I do I do think the proposal of condensing the, the three points into a single events point, though, is good, and we should move forward with it unless anybody's got an issue with us condensing those. Is there any reason we shouldn't condense them? I'll take that as tested approval that we should. Mhmm. Awesome.

We're already, we're already kinda doing this. We'll skip down to e for the work plan project groups. So maybe what we can do next is we'll look at our three categories. So events, tree preservation ordinance, and the, tree crib maintenance and curriculum and have people self nominate for, each of those kind of subcommittees. So I'll I'll kick it off. I'd love to be part of the events, in particular, work on the career fair and job exposure event?

I'll work on tree preservation and help as needed.

I can help with the, events as well and just fit me in wherever we need help.

I'm torn between events and tree crib maintenance and curriculum, but I think I could maybe solve that if there's gonna be a bunch of interest in events. Doesn't mean I can't show up to be there.

Oh,

yeah. Yeah. And I do wanna make that clear. Like, these are gonna be the folks who are gonna probably needs in those smaller non core you know, non walking form groups to get things moving along. Everything comes back to the board, and the board can any member can be involved in in in anything, but there are be certain people who are gonna be accountable, if that makes sense. So, Tierney, you can be anywhere you want.

But you're

supposed to I just like Ted

would might have put me in events.

I put you out there, Tierney. Like, wherever you wanna be. I just

Tierney wants to be in both events and tree crib maintenance.

I do. It's true.

You want me to take you off? I'll take you off.

You can be in more than one. Oh, yeah. I'm gonna

So far, I've got Kate, Michelle. Michelle, did you say you wanted to be in events and Tierney?

Mhmm.

I didn't say anything.

Okay. I thought I just heard two voices.

For for clarification, Tierney, do you want to be do you want to be in events and tree crib maintenance, or are you thinking just one or the other?

I was thinking it would be I don't know. Maybe I can do it this way, tree crib maintenance. And then when folks, like, need bodies at events, I can be there, but may not necessarily be super involved in the planning.

Perfect. I feel like I the same as you, Charity. I have the same but also the same commitment to putting my body where it's looking.

Okay.

So so far, I've got broad back preservation, events, Kansiura, tree cribs, Boxy.

Mhmm.

Is that right?

Yeah. This is Michelle. I should be in the preservation ordinance one.

Okay? You can take the question mark up if you like too.

Awesome. Oh,

excellent. I would also I have some ideas for the treatment maintenance one, so

I would love to help there as well. Right? You're in the ordinance once twice, Brianna. Hope that's okay. Brianna's in the.

I was taking a.

Or

Brian just falling cold.

Much like WAA, I don't count here.

Okay. I'll I'll be in events, and I don't count. So

But you can still put your name in there.

I'm I'm gonna do that. And where where do you fall, Matt?

I already put myself in you know, like, for the events, I could show for Arbor Day, but, like, I'd rather, you know, like, put effort into, like, helping out with the career, fair, job exposure event. And then, you know, back to what Kate was saying, tree preservation, that's, like, a longer term thing, and that's gonna be evolving. And that's actually gonna, like, involve other people outside of the tree board and even, like, the tree crib maintenance and curriculum. Same thing. That's, like, something that's been evolving, and it's gonna probably involve some people outside of the tree board as well. So k.

And, Corey, where where are you wanting to be?

Events, specifically the career fair.

Okay. Yeah. I'm in I'm in there. And Perfect.

Oh, yeah. I I'm working on a different document here. Perfect. The minutes.

So Thank

you. Thank you very much.

Okay. And, Brian, where are you?

I am currently at

a tree preservation work. Okeydoke.

And then we usually see you at a bunch of other events.

Right. I was saying, as always, I'm just kinda smeared everywhere. And certainly, like

That's a terrible visual.

And certainly, like, you know, Matt, especially with the and maybe you wanna put me down on tree tree care maintenance. I mean, if if I need it or if you wanna balance the curriculum things off me, whatever, I'm I'm there. But

Yeah. Okay. That's true.

In terms of, like, actually guiding or driving any of these, I'd rather

Okay.

Matt, just one one quick note. I know that you've found yourself in all three subcategories. Yeah. That's good. Part of what we've been trying to do is take some of the tree board load off of your back. Do you want to reconsider your your monumental commitment to to everything?

Well, I guess, you know, so, like, there's different bullets in that event subgroup, and I didn't really include myself in the Arbor Day or Earth Day events Mhmm. That went below that. You know, I don't I don't feel like I need to do that as much, you this year or in

the future.

But, you know, those other two kinda kinda a little bit stuck with those two. You know, like, some of my, like, work responsibilities are Shoot. Going around the, tree preservation ordinance at this point. So I'm kinda, like, kinda in the middle of that, as well. So

Exactly. How that happened.

It's nice to, like, have a team, like, formulated like that.

Okay.

That that's gonna help big time.

Okay. Definitely, I just wanted to just wanted to throw it out there.

Good call. Right.

Try to look out for it.

Matt, just kind of on that same vein since we're since we're talking about it now, I'm just gonna continue with it. We've been talking about you and being overwhelmed and overworked and continuing to do everything. Probably why it's coming later. Can I say it now or no? Yeah. Never. At one point, we also had put on your to do list a list of all the things that you do so that we could break that up and help you with that.

Right.

Good And

if you don't provide us with one of those, we're just going to do hostile takeover.

Yeah. Good point. Good point.

Let me know. Tree board coup d'etat. Yeah. The, seamless transition, Brian, to discussion item e three of Dade County Tree Board division of later and leadership. So, yeah, Matt, have you have you had a chance to do any of that?

No. No.

Let's see. Oh, what what Brian just talked about? Or you mentioned something about

No.

Providing a list of all responsibilities? No. But that I just added it on next steps, and, like, I can get something together, like, pretty soon here for that to make it more clear. Does that help?

Or next meeting?

For sure. Yeah.

I think that'd be fine. It'll help us kick off in a year.

Be an agenda item.

Yeah. Excellent.

And then it also Brianna, for just for your point of reference as well. When we're trying to recruit people, it's really great to say, hey. You know, like, if you do join, here are some responsibilities that we need someone to take or, you know, here's a committee that you could potentially join if you're interested versus just, hey. Come to the tree board and talk about trees.

Okay. That's fantastic. Know, one thing I might suggest you consider, I think all of these different category areas will be meeting as a subgroup. Correct? Probably one of the first things they need to do is to identify who's gonna be the point person.

And I would suggest that the point person only is responsible for one area So you don't get back into the rut of, well, Matt is a point person here, but he'll he's a point person there. Yeah. And then that will be the person that will call the meetings, be a person of contact, and also be responsible for doing the monthly reports or through the the tree board. Because I think what happens is that and in caution against people, everybody will have a chance to review and come to a an event or participate. But I think you also need to know who will be the point person, but who's gonna be on that subgroup.

Yep. And be sensitive about you might not be able to be on every subgroup. But maybe you don't have a job and you have time for that, but consider your time.

Yeah. Absolutely. Great point. Alright. I think we've got, like, five minutes left.

We're gonna stay on time. Matt, you know, if you're if you're good working on, kinda writing down all the things that you do for the tree board for next, next meeting, we can start to look at taking that off your plate of that. We've got our work groups kind of, mapped out. So my proposal is, you know, have have somebody in that group, volunteer right now as the, you know, leader for the day just to send out an initial an initial email to get that group together. So I can I'll I'll volunteer as the event subgroup.

I'll send an email to Kate and Lisa to organize our first group meeting. Is there anybody that wants to do the same for tree preservation and or tree cribs? And from there, we can, you

know, schedule the I can do the tree crib one. Well, I yeah.

And then and then I can do the tree preservation because I'm already kinda coordinating that a little bit.

Excellent. So, yeah, send out emails and try to get your first subcommittee meetings scheduled. Obviously, we're we're working with short time before the holiday season and when things get chaotic. So no worries if you're not able to get them scheduled before our next meeting, just to throw that out there. But be good to have everybody connected and at least have a subcommittee meeting on the on the books before our next meeting.

Cool. We've kind of been doing the final action item, which is the work group's update for the document. So let's see. Any further comments before we move past the, the work groups?

You know, just another suggestion that, you know, because of the holidays, I think at some point and I don't know if it's now right now while it's fresh or right after the New Year, you send a reminder email that includes this project list of people and say the the people in Bold or the the point people will be contacting you. Please try to meet before the next tree board meeting so that it's takes place before your next tree board meeting. Sure. I guess if it was me, I'd probably do it right away and get the meeting scheduled so that they're meeting the January so that, you know, they have something to report on. But it's gonna be very at this time of year, things get really lost.

Yeah.

Agreed. And I don't think it would be totally terrible if nobody met until, you know, you pick this up in February. Just trying to get those meetings in, you know, with the holidays is gonna be tough.

That's kind of my thought is, you know, I'm I'm curious to see what people's schedule availability looks like. With, you know, like, the events subgroup having only three members, I'm hopeful that we can get a meeting in prior to January January 20, but we shall see because I know that my start of the year is nightmarish.

Mhmm. So Mhmm.

Can I ask a question of Michelle? If Laura retires from the board and then we only have eight members, then our quorum number changes. And then, so instead of nine, we have eight.

So it would be five. It would be four.

Okay. Doesn't it I just wanna make sure we're legal.

So doesn't it go by seats? Not seated members, but seats that are open? I can't remember.

Do you want me to check? What I wasn't sure. Is it, like, the number that's slated to be here or the number that's actually members at the moment?

So Right. I can I can double check, but I think that it is seats that we have whether there are people in them or not?

Okay. That would be nice.

But no no group no group would meet quorum as it sits. Right?

Well, I was worried that, the tree crib, which has four members on it, if we're at I don't know. Let's see. Are we at eight or seven now? Now I'm all confused.

We're still at nine. We're full right now until Lisa Okay. Drops off. I mean, not Lisa. Laura.

Yeah. And I didn't think that Laura could legally retire. I'm gonna ask corp council about that.

Yeah.

I think she stuck with us for life. That was the commitment she signed to my understanding.

Of course. Well, you know, now

Yeah. You know,

she stands up. That's not her. Yeah.

Well, I'll

I'll I'll tell you that. It you know, I don't have a job, know, which is great, but I get much less I'm not as efficient because I get distracted a lot very easily.

Sounds very nice.

Just I'll just say to Lisa's concern, like, okay. So we have a tree crib maintenance meeting, and, like, all five of us are there or four of us. Two one person just drops off. Like, you know, it's it's not an

update through an email and Google Doc notes.

Mhmm. Yep. Okay. Agreed.

I wouldn't worry about that.

Yep. Alright. I won't worry, Ben. Sorry about the tangent.

Oh, I guess another quick thing, Corey. I don't know if this was maybe on your radar already, but at least just thinking ahead to January 20. I don't know. Matt, do you do you feel like it's still, somebody else to kinda take on the role of anything in terms of what you would normally have to do before that just to maybe give you a little bit more of a a break?

Yeah. I think let's talk to talk offline, the three of us. You know, I'm figuring that out. So

Okay. Cool. You guys are good. Three of us meeting, figure out,

moving forward.

Awesome. Perfect. Alright. Well, let's see. Future meetings. So 01:20 at same time, same place as our next meeting. We'll see you all in the New Year. We'll move down to page public comment on items not listed on the agenda. There I don't think anyone from the public has joined us.

He's still here.

Oh, he's still? Okay. Any any public comment?

He didn't sign up to speak.

So Excellent. Are there such businesses allowed by law?

None of my

knowledge. We've never had any the whole time I've been here. So last thing we got is to, adjourn. Do we

have anyone

in the motion?

Motion to right here. I'm not moving.

Noon seconds. The motion to adjourn.

All in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Meeting's adjourned.