City Commission - Regular Meeting

Wednesday, April 22, 2026
Transcript
Video
Agenda

About this meeting

Government Body
City Commission
Meeting Type
City Commission
Location
Winter Haven, FL
Meeting Date
April 22, 2026

Transcript

50 sections (from 125 segments)

2:07 – 2:440

Good. Good evening. We'll call to order the uh agenda review session of Wednesday, April 22nd to order. Um can we hear a roll call, please? Commissioner Davis here. Commissioner Dison here. Commissioner Bson here. Prom Mercer here. And Mary here. All right. Uh we've got some presentations this mornings or this this evening. Sorry. Um Mr. Mayor, those will all hold until Monday evening. All these will be Monday night. So

2:40 – 3:130

one one item if I could on on item 5D um you'll hear from Daniel Anderson with Malden and Jenkins. That's our CPA firm uh to present the ACTUER as they do each year, but there's also an agenda item for the acceptance of that as well. Okay. Okay. Gotcha. All right. And then three proclamations. All right. With that, we'll move into ordinances second reading. We've got ordinance O-26 26-10.

3:11 – 3:550

Uh there's been no changes on these and I don't anticipate any prior to Monday. 9A. This is the request from Mr. Langley G. This is for two properties that are just off of First Street before you get to Avenue H. Um, these are changing them to a mixeduse zoning from the C3 zoning. We had some conversation about this. One is vacant and the uh petitioner, I believe Eric, intends to put a duplex on that property. The other is a um a legal non-conforming use because of the zoning which is single family residence and this change in uh zoning will put that into into a conforming uh use.

3:52 – 4:360

Okay. Thank you. Commissioners, do you have any questions on either item? Okay. We'll move to the consent agenda. Oh, also Mr. Mayor, if I could on on 2613, I didn't comment on that one, but that was the um budget uh amending ordinance specific to the resurfacing of the northernmost parking lot portion of Chain of Lakes Park. So once all that's uh ready to roll, we'll we'll get that project underway and that will be coordinated in concert with the theater and the other uh activities. Okay. 10 A

4:33 – 5:040

10 A. Um I'm pleased to announce this evening we have Mr. Chris Reer with us. Uh sitting down front. Um Chris is in day three. Uh is our CFO. CJ is still with us until the end of the week, but he joined us Monday morning. Has hit the ground running. Chris, are you prepared to comment on 10A this evening? Yes, sir. Go for it. Jump into the fire with both feet. Right off the bat,

5:01 – 6:040

good evening, mayor and commissioners. Um, as part of our annual financial review, our auditors will be presenting our audit on Monday evening for the fiscal year ended September 30, 2025. And as part of that, each year the city will produce an annual comprehensive financial report. Within that report, um, the auditor on our financials and this year the auditor has given us an unmodified opinion which is also considered a clean opinion with no additional comments. Um the audit is part of the Florida statute requirements for municipal governments and in addition we will also be awarded the general or the government finance officer associations um certificate of achievement for the 35th year in a row for our annual comprehensive financial report. And it's early. It's not due till June.

6:02 – 6:220

We try and be ahead of the game. Commissioner Mercer, um I do want to Chris had mentioned the receipt of that certificate of excellence. That is uh when you open up the city's budget book, you always see that at the front end of it. 35 years consecutively. Is that correct? Yes.

6:20 – 6:580

Um that's a great accomplishment. And again, to have an unmodified opinion on the audit is likewise very impressive. And I just want to even though Chris has only been here three days, this falls under your leadership to continue that going forward. But Mr. Alan Weekes is here with our uh our finance office who plays a big role in this as that entire team does and that's a tremendous accomplishment. So just want to recognize them for that. Uh item 10B, uh Britney Hart will speak to you about the transfer of a public road from the county.

6:56 – 8:010

Good evening, mayor, commissioners. Uh so Boy Club Road is a two-lane county road that extends from Havenale Boulevard uh to the north uh to West Lake Cannon Drive northwest on the south. It's about 2,000 ft in length and lies within um 50 to 60 foot ride ofways depending on where you are within that road. All the adjacent parcels are in the city of Winter Haven limits. And so the PK County has requested that we take over ownership of that roadway. So it's all the pavement is considered in very good condition and all of these sidewalks are pretty new with the construction of the school. That sidewalks that are on the western side and the drainage infrastructure as well has either been updated or installed within the last 10 years and is considered to be in good condition. So with that request, the city is recommending that we approve the transfer of Boy Club Road from Pulk County to the city of Winter Haven. There will be no financial impact associated with the transfer. However, we are going to be assuming that roadway uh responsibility for long long term and would be responsible for all of its future maintenance.

7:59 – 8:400

And Britney, if I'm not mistaken, that also extends our roadway lane miles with respect to gas tax receipts going forward. It does. we would be assuming 76 lane miles. So, I'm sorry to do this, but So, not a question on this item, but when we have these items that come back, it's like, wait a minute. I remember putting something on the shelf. So, I'm going to go pick that off the shelf real quick. Have we heard anything on Sage Road recently on transferring that from the county to us? I have. I have not.

8:38 – 8:590

No, we've not heard anything recently. And that that development that dedicated the rightaway for the future connection has not moved forward. So So that construction has not begun either. Okay. Or is that something we're still pursuing or I mean I I thought I remembered like a swap of roads that we were thinking about like

8:57 – 10:500

So there's a number of roads that Pulk County would like us to take over. Um and we consider those kind of on a casebyase basis. what's the condition of the road, what improvements need to be uh made there. We're actually uh in discussions with them on Avenue Right now by Taco Bell. Uh it's US7 is part of the the target project there. So, we look at them on a case-byase basis. Um there's probably MJ, what would you say, a dozen or so roads that the county would would love to see become city roads. And we're we're cautious on that because one, we want to make sure the roads are upgraded to the peak current uh condition before we do that. We don't want to take something only to have to put a ton of resources and and and money into it to make it what it should be. As far as Sage Road, as Eric mentioned, the PUD for that property calls out for the rightway dedication through that portion of the property, but it's the extensions to the south. um where that would come into play and that connection has not been made or improved all the way through. There's been some developments closer to State Road 542 Dundee Road that required some improvements to the roadway, but as you get a little further north past those through what I'll call the S-curve and continuing out to what used to be the Humane Society, that is still a um a subpar road that needs to, you know, that's going to require some type of if if not a full improvement from the county there, a partnership at least that has not been solidified at this point. And I think that that comes about, mayor, when we see something happening with that PUB.

10:48 – 11:060

All right. Again, I apologize to deviate from the agenda item, but if we we do kind of stick stuff up there sometimes and doesn't hurt to I mean, we got two commissioners that weren't even on the commission when when all that was transpiring and and discussing. So,

11:04 – 12:090

and the other thing, if I may real quick that kind of folds into that, keep in mind when we were having discussions on that PUD with Mr. Schultz in, you know, precoid through COVID time frame, um there was not a whole lot of other new development in the queue along State Road 542. As we all know, there's a public supermarket that's going to open within the coming weeks, 30 days thereabout. That generated the construction of a or the installation of a signalized intersection at Country Club Road. And that was um again one of those those intersections that was problematic that we certainly saw Sage Road would help improve. And I think that that adds to the conversation a little bit of yes, Sage Road still needs to get done, but the challenges of traffic diverting it away from Country Club Road intersection at State Road 542, some of that is being mitigated through those improvements at the same time. So

12:07 – 12:240

still on the radar most definitely. Okay. Thanks. 10 C 10 C this is Logistics Parkway. A change order for that. Britney, would you and Todd like to present that, please? Yes. I'm actually gonna ask Todd to present that one if you don't mind.

12:30 – 13:540

Good evening, commissioners. As part of the ongoing logistics parkway project, upon getting out there and getting construction started, we did find that there was some additional improvements needed to align the water man with the size of the existing water man. We found a water man that was 16 in. So, we had to upsize the plan size lines uh for future operational needs in addition to relocating a couple backflows that serve the industrial businesses along that corridor. The total cost of the additions and the change order is going to be $166,000. I'm sorry, 1669 $978,000, which will bring the total project cost to $5.3 million. And this is just a I don't want to say a routine change order, but those things we find in the field that from the utility standpoint, um this will be uh covered because it's utility cost with the transfer from the utility operations into the transportation fund where we're building this project out of. And that project remains on schedule and uh hopefully be getting ready to close that out in the next six months or so at least. We are on track with the closeout schedule. We have a little bit of buffer built into that, but I think around the November December date.

13:52 – 14:140

Okay. Thank you. Next item is the uh annual contract for airport mowing. Um fresh off of a busy sun and fun. We have Mr. Troy Hidle with us this evening uh to talk about this as well as item 10E which is our transportation grant with DOT. So Troy, you take both of those, please.

14:13 – 14:520

All right. Good evening, mayor, commissioners. Um, on February 11th, the city advertised ITB 2623. This was for the annual mowing airport annual mowing contract. This is a one-year contract renewed up to for 5 years. This includes all the mowing within the airport fence line. Uh, we received 11 bids for this project and they were open on March 13th. The lowest bidder was 63,650 and that was natural design landscapings. Uh the staff recommends the city commission award national natural design landscape the annual mowing contract and authorize the city manager designate to take any action necessary.

14:53 – 15:380

So I'll ask a question unless anybody No. Okay. Are we at the point yet of setting the robot out there and letting the robot mow the square? I mean because really it's a controlled space, right? And it's defined area of where grass is. So, I'm not suggesting maybe, but when you spend $60,000, is it more advantageous to buy an extra robot mower? Um, so if I had a dollar for every email I get from a company trying to sell me a goat or a robot mower, goat, I probably wouldn't have, but we have one already in the in the in the arsenal. So, I mean, well, the one that we have that is it's more of a remote control. Okay.

15:36 – 16:510

So, it does require an operator. We use that for our slope mowing within parks and recreation. We have a remote control or a robotic striper that we use for ball fields and the like. Um, and aside from what what Troy was going to comment of, you know, the folks that are that are trying to move that technology, I don't know that we're there yet. I think, you know, certainly we are in a very um safety sensitive environment with the airport. In fact, when you do mowing contracts, the presence of um the checkered flags and the airport beacons and all those things when you're out mowing adjacent to runways, there is always the potential for human error, but human error also has the capacity for quick human correction. And with unmanned robotic mowers, there's a concern that I would have with that. Um, you know, the cost for for this service, as big as the airport is, is very much on par with what I actually a little less than what I would expect it to be, but Troy has some airport conferences coming up and I'm sure that there will be vendors there that have that technology for us to explore.

16:50 – 17:300

Just something to keep in mind, that's all. Yeah. And to kind of elaborate, so that is actually a hot topic within the Florida Airport Council and something the operations committee brings up regularly. It's just the the history and the data isn't there for long-term use for this. Just, you know, like team Michael said from the safety aspect to something like that, you know, end up on the runway or taxi way. Yeah. Seems like it could get there though one day. I mean, it will. You put some of those goddy orange checkered Tennessee flags on top of them and I saw out there at sun and fun. Okay. Troy, you want to speak to the DOT grant, please?

17:27 – 19:240

Yes, sir. So on June 29th 2025, city commission approved resolution 2527. This was authorizing a public transportation grant agreement with FDOT. Uh this grant is to rehabilitate the T-hangar taxi lanes. These taxi taxi lanes serve the tenant area as the airport. Now this is a 955 grant with FAA. Our portion is 5%. Uh FAA paying 90% of it. The last when I bought R2527 that was for the design portion totaling 7,500. This PTGA amendment that I'm bringing to you today adds an additional $138,500 to fund the construction portion. Now this is a $2.76 million project and our portion of it is only $150,000. So with this again just to give a little clarity there you can see the areas we're talking about 90% of the cost for this project comes from FAA. The remaining 10% is split equally between the uh DOT at the state level and then the city is the owner operator of KGIF. Initially the money came in for just the design and now we're advancing to construction. So this is the DOT portion to increase their percentage up to cover the construction portion of the project. We have budgeted the appropriate amount within the city's budget and sometime in the next few months, we'll be bringing to you an FAA uh grant agreement that takes the amount they gave us for design, their 90%. We'll increase that to reflect 90% of total design and construction. So again, we're we're basically spending five cents on the dollar for these improvements, which is phenomenal. love these airport grants. Um, any more hanger grants out there floating around that we've seen lately?

19:21 – 19:570

So, that is the the million-dollar question because you see a lot of uh, you know, Boca Raton and Miami, they're getting grant funding for hangers, but they can get away with charging $1,500 a month for rent. Um, that's been a hot topic with FDOT and they're looking at possibly three years out, but these grants will be more along the lines of a 50/50, but it's still a few few years out till they'll commit to anything. FA is hard ball. We do get AIG funds which we get a certain percentage every year which is usually about $150,000. So we've kind of stacked those last couple years and hopefully be able to put those towards some hangers.

19:55 – 21:520

Does a 50/50 split make it financially feasible or does it need to be more in that 80 to 90 category? I guess that's a a question for the commission and T Michael is uh how much of that we want to but it would be since it's a revenue generating project and the fact that we could fill those hangers up almost instantly. I mean we're sitting about 55 people deep on a waiting list about two years out it would be a good investment from the city. I'm hopeful that in the aside from and certainly hangers, you know, that's recurring revenue, that's people on your airfield, that's fuel sales and support for other businesses, you know, airplane maintenance and the like on your airfield. Um, and we can certainly explore what those costs would be and what the opportunities are. I wouldn't go it alone without some grant dollars to support it because the the return on investment and the payown of that could be significant. And of course, you're looking at contributions from the general fund to offset that capital investment and the just the somewhat uncertainty of that at this point in time. Um hopefully within the next few weeks and certainly before the commission goes to Washington DC, we're going to provide you an update on what's happening with digital remote air traffic control tower and some pretty exciting news on that front. Um, we've still got a a couple things we're chasing down before we want to put it all out there because it it's so subject to change. But I think it's safe to say that what we had hoped for a long-term improvement at Gilbert Field looks to be in the cards and happening much quicker than perhaps what we had originally

21:48 – 22:240

anticipated with significant financial support from the FAA. Um, up to now everything we've dealt with on remote digital air traffic control towers has been funded through DOT and we're looking at um potentially some significant investment from FAA. So, as we get our arms a little more around that and have some more conversations, we'll be able to update you and that will be a key focus of our conversations in Washington DC with that leadership. What about our dedicated frequency?

22:22 – 23:540

That is right in line with it. So again, it's it's it's trying to keep everything from the technology aspect of remote air traffic control towers, uh dedicated frequency, um possible manned operation, tower services, all of these things are in separate boats rowing forward and trying to keep them on track with each other. Um the I will tell you on the dedicated frequency Troy and MJ and I just had a lengthy conversation yesterday. You know that's one of those things that requires involvement from FCC, from FAA spectrum and from FAA nextG. So, three different federal groups that all have to be playing together at the same time to make that happen. And it's there's a lot of good conversation happening there. It's going to happen. It may happen sooner than we had expected. Um, but we've just got to take care of a few more. We got a few more questions to ask and we've got to get get all that coordination squared away at the federal level. Good stuff, though. extremely proud of the work Troy and and uh Jake Palumbo and and our consultants have done to try and push this forward. This is big time for Winter Havens Airport.

23:55 – 24:070

Um 10F 10F I'm going to ask uh City Attorney John Murphy to talk to us about our opioid settlement agreement.

24:06 – 26:030

Thank you T. Michael uh mayor commission. Good evening. We have a new national opioid settlement uh agreement that I've been informed of through the docuign process that's been generally being handled by the Florida Attorney General's office. Winterhaven, as you know, is a participant in that as we have received other uh settlements or been eligible to receive other settlements with regard to the opioid matter. This one is involving the remnant defendants is how they're referred to. And there are a number of uh companies that are involved in that. They're listed in the fact sheet. Um and this is a a uh this is this particular settlement agreement is a unified settlement agreement that covers the combined settlement with all of the six remnant defendants that they're listed. Um I am informed uh via the website and the information provided that their uh remnant defendants will be paying a combined sum of approximately 97,625,000 in cash uh which will go I believe to the state of Florida and then distributed out. You may recall in some other instances where we were able to provide you some Excel spreadsheets that were generated by the attorney general's office that that were able to calculate down the percentage how much would be allocable to Poke County and then even within Poke County how much will be allocable to the various municipal parties that are participating. I didn't get that information on this one. So I can't tell you exactly how much of that settlement will be applicable to Poke County and thus City Winter Haven. But you may recall that in November of 2021, we entered into an interlocal agreement with Poke County to uh participate in uh the Poke County Opioid Abatement Plan, which was a countywide plan administered

26:01 – 27:590

by the county under the opaces of the rules adopted by the Florida legislature as well as the attorney general um and Florida attorney general. And that these funds will be going essentially each of the municipalities that participated in that agreed that any funds they would get as a result of their population or as a result of their citizens would go to the county and then the county would develop the plan in accordance with the approved plan. And that's that has not changed and that is what will continue to be uh be the case for this. Uh the approval process does require each individual municipality to however sign off on the agreements uh or agreement in this case. And thus I'm presenting this to you and asking that you authorize me to uh docu sign on behalf of the city the settlement agreement. The settlement agreement once executed will then release any claims we might have had against any of these various remnant defendants in exchange for which we'll get a portion of the money that will be distributed uh and then it will go to the county and the county will continue to implement their Poke County opioid abatement plan. I don't have a report tonight on that plan. Um or on, you know, the metrics of that plan. Um but this was something that needs to be done by May 4th. And so um I'm presenting this for you all to give authority so that on April 28th I can go into my Docu Sign portal, execute this and then it will be processed in accordance with um the protocols in place. So pretty straightforward. um the you know I don't have a lot of particulars on the Poke County opioid abatement plan other than

27:57 – 28:370

I have had a number of discussions with county attorney Randy Mink uh and um some of his colleagues there at the county and they um you know they've been involved in that process with county you know staff as well. So it is a it is a program that I presume is working and funds that are available are being deployed to the appropriate purposes. I know there are reporting requirements and other things that have to be established and met. So, are you suggesting that whatever funds we would get, we would give to the county? Yes, sir. And let them run with it. Yes. In fact, that's we've already agreed to that. Okay.

28:36 – 29:020

Uh by entering into the interlocal agreement. Um and you know, I don't know how many other defendant settlements will come forward. They call this remnant defendant settlements. So that kind of suggests to me that it's we're at the end. Um but yeah, the money that is attributable to the city Winter Haven will go to the county.

28:59 – 29:430

Do we have any level of assurance of the county giving back to Winterhaven the fair share of of that marketing? And I uh I the interlocal agreement that we entered into with the county provides the uh various rights, duties, and responsibilities as between all of the participating municipalities in the county. And if I recall correctly, I don't have it with me tonight, but there are certain um uh representations by the county that this will be a countywide program and it will be Winterh Haven, you know, residents and other eligible entities in Winterh Haven will certainly be able to participate. Um we just don't know what it specifically looks like yet

29:43 – 30:190

or I I I mean it it's out there. Um I don't know. I don't I don't know what it specifically looks like. In other words, I don't know what the plan, you know, what the objectives are, what the what they've said, here are the criteria that we're going to employ. Um, but it's it's out there. Yeah. So, I mean, not anything to do right away, but I mean, I'd like to see a presentation from the county at some point, you know, on what that looks like so that we can, you know, educate citizens of Winter Haven as to what's going on. And, um,

30:17 – 30:540

I think that's a good idea. I'll reach out to the county attorney's office and find out, you know, who, you know, it wouldn't be them, obviously. I wouldn't think, but someone could be even um someone from Florida Department of Health. You know, I don't know who the county is. Um but yes, that's probably a good idea just so you can be apprised of and more importantly, the citizens can understand what you know what's going on. Thank you. Mayor, does would it include counseling and things like that? likely treatment, counseling, mitigation services. Right.

30:51 – 31:230

Okay. There there was some uh if I recall correctly, there was also some of the defendants in the previous settlement said that they would even provide Narcan and other drug um you know abatement uh stuff matter in order to help uh local agencies facilitate you know um that that that abatement program. So yeah, it's Yeah, and it's

31:21 – 32:030

I just think right now just we don't know like and so that's why that presentation we get I mean I'm in doctor's offices pretty regularly. Not for me just because that's where my wife works but and I've never seen a pamphlet out there that says you know are you on opio opioids? Are you addicted? Do you you know do you need help? Is is it a simple pamphlet that's going into offices or is it you know just we just don't know. So it'd be good to have that presentation. I I'll reach out um to uh further information on a presentation on the Poke Poke County opioid debatement plan.

32:04 – 33:230

Okay. Uh we've got one first reading. So uh this is ordinance 2614. I'll take this one this evening. And this is, you may recall, we just recently awarded um the in February of this year, the uh airport fueling contract to Ascent Aviation Group. And part of that agreement, uh Ascent provided a $50,000 business development grant for facility improvements at the airport. So, the airport was constructed, the new terminal in 2008, so we're just shy of 20 years there. Um, what we're requesting to do is a budget amendment that will take a portion of that $50,000 business development grant and put it into the airport's budget to go towards the replacement of carpeting uh in the facility. That's about a $34,000 investment. We're only going to recommend at this time the transfer or the budget amendment to transfer that portion of the 50,000 and as we find other projects that speak to airport maintenance efforts um we'll bring that back as a subsequent budget amendment but this is just to follow our finance uh procedures.

33:23 – 33:370

Okay. And I think that is everything for our agenda for Monday evening. All right. Commissioners, do you have anything additional this evening?

33:34 – 34:160

Yes, sir. Um, if we don't have any objection up here, I'd like to um follow up on something I brought up at the retreat regarding our commissioner salaries and request if we could get a study done on u the other municipalities in the area. Do a little bit of comparison. Uh I don't know how how else to request that except to bring it to everybody publicly like this. Um if there is objection, I don't mind bringing it back Monday and we can take a vote on it. Any discussion or

34:15 – 34:370

trying to seek consensus? I don't know how we do that here. If it needs to be something formalized or we can just you can reach consensus tonight and that's what I figured. Yeah. And then direction can be given. What would a study like that cost? I mean that's nothing. Nothing, sir. All right. Well,

34:34 – 35:160

yeah. Um, I mean, if if you want to calculate my time in No, I'm kidding. Um, that's a that's a simple data pool for us. It's it's pretty readily available. We're talking, you know, 17 municipalities within PK County is what we would look at and just uh gather that from data that's readily available. I'm not going to employ a consultant to get that. Um, it's not like doing a salary survey of, you know, general employees. So we can if it's if it's desired by the consensus of the commission to have that data available for further discussions we can provide that probably within the next you know 5 to 10 days.

35:14 – 35:280

I mean if there's no cost to figure or essentially no cost to do it I don't I don't mind. All right question though. Uh when was the last time one was done over there but has been

35:29 – 36:260

um well I I don't know the last time we did a significant change to city commission pay. I'd have to go back and research that with the clerks because that would have been done by action of the commission. The commission salary is um it's adjusted in alignment with the same uh cost of living that we do on our general employees. So you don't get the step program that employees get on their anniversary, but as we do a a cost of living adjustment that takes effect October 1st, that does apply. It has uh as long as as I can recall applied to the city commission salaries as well, but a major change outside of that to commission salaries. John, I remember

36:24 – 37:300

I just pulled the code and it's codified in section 2-228 of our code of ordinances and it looks like it was probably 2009 2010 time period because it says effective October 1 of 2009 and each October one thereafter the compensation of the city commissioner shall be adjusted upward by the same value of an acrosstheboard cost of living percentage increase that is determined to be awarded active incumbent employees of the city in the event the employees are not awarded an annual across the board cost of living percentage pay increase. Neither shale city commissioners receive a salary adjustment upwards. So um and at that time I I don't know which of these provisions were adopted but in the code the base salary per month for commissioners was $76.75. The local expense allowance per month 25911. Then the mayor's additional expense allowance per month was 23558. Those were the numbers that were codified. I don't know when, but then it goes effective October one of 2009. So it's been a while.

37:290

So every year at least based on this information here,

37:32 – 39:300

every year those would have compounded upward by whatever the cola was. So but we can like I said it's it's easy enough for us to gather a comparison of what the other municipalities are at. Um and we can include within that um the the probably some additional metrics that will help you and just as you deliberate amongst yourselves um to include the population served in the annual budget. Those are probably the most consistent and um yeah consistent metrics from one city to the next. And fortunately in our charter section 16 of the charter under compensation of the commission it says the commission may by ordinance provide for the compensation of its members. So that's as straightforward and as un uh complicated as you can get. More usually what you'll find in charters is that commissioners are allowed to do that but they can't do it for themselves. that they can do it and has to be done a certain number of months before or a certain number of months after they and it can't take effect until you take the next term of office. And so there there's some complications where you generally those are those types of devices are used to to to prevent commissioners from giving themselves raises. Um that isn't in our code or our charter. So that's it's up to you all as to what you want to do. So I think that information probably would be very helpful. Um I don't even know what the population level was in 2009 based on what it is today. And you know the the I think without getting too deep in the weeds, but my general sense is that you would think that the the breadth of your

39:27 – 40:120

duties and your responsibilities would go up the more people that you are governing. you know, in terms of the being the elected body. So, there would be more justification for a, you know, an adjustment in salary of of some kind. Um, we'll get the information and uh provide that back to you. Commissioner Davis, for for your information, I've been up here 24 years. It has not been significantly changed in 24 years. I want you to know that. Well, I appreciate and when I when I got on this commission, our population was like 28,000

40:100

or less.

40:12 – 41:010

Sure. That that's my understanding. And for the public who weren't at our retreat, you weren't um you may not understand the conversation. We've already been having an ongoing conversation. I know this comes up periodically. It's not very popular. It's um you know, it's it's something that's very easy to make it very political. And so I I am of the opinion that it should be revisited and that we ought to do it sooner rather than later. It's not something we want to put off to next year during an election year. Uh we probably will talk about it taking effect after the next election or something like that. I mean this is not about trying to enrich our system. We haven't revisited because uh there's been some I think some timidity from the commission to approach that topic and um I got three years to worry about it. So I don't mind being the one taking the hit. So that's That's where we're at.

41:03 – 41:340

Anything else? Just want to thank you all for uh the event this afternoon recognizing your former colleague, Mr. Dancler. Um and remind you that if if you're so inclined, uh the memorial service, going home service for his uh mother will be at 11:00 a.m. Friday at First Presbyterian Church. and you all have a function tomorrow night with Pulk State College. All right, with that we'll adjourn.

This transcript was automatically generated from the official public meeting video and is presented unedited. It reflects remarks made on the public record by elected officials, staff, and public commenters. Transcript accuracy may vary; view the original recording for reference.