City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening, we're gonna call the city of Orange City Council meeting regular meeting Tuesday July 14th at 6 30 p.m. To order roll call Councilmember Knight here Councilmember Johnson here vice mayor Graham here councilmember Stafford is absent councilmember Richardson

Councilmember dorms here mayor marks here and the invocation pledge allegiance Invocation is Elliot Smith from the Advent health fish memorial For a word of prayer to start Gracious God we pause to acknowledge the need for wisdom beyond ourselves as we begin this meeting Thank you for the opportunity to serve this community and for every person who has chosen to invest their time and talents for the good grant these council members the discernment as they consider the decisions before them and We remember those who call this community home, the families, businesses, schools, first responders, health care workers, and all who work each day to make this city a place of hope and opportunity. Bless them with safety, peace, and prosperity. Guide us to seek justice, encourage unity, and care for those who are most vulnerable. May the work accomplished here today contribute to the well-being of both present and future generations. We offer this prayer with grateful hearts. Amen.

thank you number one absences 1a show the absence of councilmember dana knight from the june 23rd 2026 regular city council meeting be excused council i make a motion to excuse dana knight on that said meeting night i second We have a motion, we have a second. Any public comment on this? Seeing none, we'll bring it back for the question.

Council Member T. Omson? Yes. Vice Mayor Grimm? Yes. Council Member Richardson? Yes. Council Member Darms? Yes. Council Member Knight? Yes. Mayor Marks? Yes.

Number two, presentations and proclamations. 2A, budget overview presentation. Devlin Moore, finance director, is presenting.

Good evening Devlin Moore finance director This is the preliminary overview of the proposed fiscal year 2026-27 budget. It is intended to provide you context for the general fund ahead of setting the proposed maximum millage rate on July 28th. And so as such, we will touch briefly on the other major funds, but the primary focus is going to be the general fund. We'll discuss the other funds in greater detail during the budget workshop and the 101s in August. And I do want to share that we have a corresponding report that will be included in your next Friday communication. It's going to provide additional detail on some of the items that we'll discuss tonight. Thanks. so again uh... council's gonna be asked to set the proposed maximum millage rate on july twenty eighth this isn't uh... pursuant to uh... the trim requirements established by the state of florida uh... so again setting you up on making an informed decision when it comes to that we'll start by briefly discussing the current fiscal year budget, the preliminary outlook for the fiscal year 27 budget. We'll talk about the major revenues and expenditures in the general fund and taxable values and millage rate considerations. This slide illustrates the coordination effort that goes into preparing the proposed budget. You'll see that the departments, the city manager, finance met several times over the course of the last five months to kick off or to prepare a proposed budget for your consideration. The process kicked off in February. and through the review process staff either reduced or deferred approximately 880 000 in operating and capital requests and i have to say the departments really did a good job in my opinion on preparing their individual budgets they really were quite conservative and i think you probably saw that during the budget one of the budget individual budget presentations that were given to to the department so you know these cuts were really just to narrow the budget while maintaining the current service levels and high priority items there's going to be in your supplemental packet that you receive via Friday communication there'll be a list of what was deferred and or reduced as part of the budget Brief recap of the current fiscal year 25-26 budget. The current budget is balanced with a millage rate of 7.2387 and it maintained all existing service levels and programs across all funds. It provided for pay adjustments for all city employees and it funded eight new positions. Three new positions were added to the general fund, two police officers and one special events coordinator. the utility fund two positions were added a senior water treatment plant operator and a customer support specialist and in the stormwater fund pursuant to the 20 of the utility stormwater rate study that you adopted in 2025 there were three positions added including a stormwater crew chief a field specialist and an equipment operator The current budget includes $37.5 million in capital outlay. Some of the larger projects, to name off a few, are the Rhode Island and Levitt Traffic Circle, the infrastructure improvements on Industrial Drive, the city hall complex parking lot improvements, septic to sewer infrastructure, and various other water, wastewater infrastructure improvements, and then final design of the police station and fire station 68, bringing those drawings to 90% completion so that staff can go out and seek grant funding to help support the construction of those facilities. This slide provides a high level view of the city's projected fund balance, fund balances by fund as of September 30th this year. Across all funds, the projected balances total $23.2 million. General government funds total approximately 12.2 million. So general government funds are made up of the general fund which is projected to have a fund balance of 6.4 million, the capital improvement fund with 1.9 million and the facility construction fund with 3.9 million. Then you have your two enterprise funds. The utility funds are projected to have unrestricted fund balance of about $8.3 million, and the stormwater enterprise fund is going to have approximately $610,000. You have your impact fee funds. These funds can only be used for capital outlay associated with new development and growth. You have the fire impact fees, which total about $580,000. The police impact fees, approximately $50,000. Culture and recreation, the balance is about $350,000, and transportation's at about $590,000. Then you have your special revenue funds. These funds are restricted for their specific purposes. The CRA is going to have a fund balance of approximately $130,000. So again, these are balances that are not obligated or committed to activities currently. And then all other funds will total $330,000. That includes your solid waste fund, your street lighting fund, the building safety fund, tree bank fund, forfeiture fund. Here's a snapshot of where we're currently at with the proposed budget for the major funds. And we're gonna focus primarily on the fiscal year 2025-26 adopted and the fiscal year 2026-27 proposed. Because that's a little bit more apples to apples, because you'll see there the amended budget has actually increased the adopted budget by about 60%. And that's primarily attributed to the carry forward, cash carry forward of all unspent funds associated with projects in the prior year that weren't completed in the prior year. So those were reappropriated through budget amendments. The general fund is projected to have an increase of $1.1 million or 5%. The capital improvement fund and the facility construction fund has a decrease of 5.6 million when compared to the adopted fiscal year 26 budget. Again, there's a number of ongoing capital projects that will likely carry forward into fiscal year 27 once we start the new fiscal year. utilities revenue fund increased by three hundred thousand or three percent stormwater fund decreased uh... the budget proposed budget we've seen a decrease of two hundred thousand or twelve percent this year a fund will have a decrease of seven hundred thousand but that's again because you have obligated some large projects within the serious on the news will carry forward at the end of the fiscal year and uh... again will take a closer look at all these funds during the budget workshop So we'll shift back to focusing primarily on the general fund. So this gives you a snapshot of the proposed fiscal year 27 budget compared to the current amended 26 budget. Looking at revenues first, the general fund is balanced with a reduced millage rate of 7.0387. And that generates additional Avalorum revenue of approximately $162,000. That's attributed to primarily new construction. All other revenues saw a decrease of 2.9 million. Not to scare you, most of that is gonna be attributed to one-time grants that are currently appropriated in the current budget. That includes 1.5 million that has been set aside for LAP for the roundabout, 840,000 from the Department of Transportation for the West French Shared Use Path, $420,000 from FEMA for flood mitigation improvements on East Graves Avenue and then $293,000 for CDBG or Community Development Block Grant funds which have been appropriated to the 220 East Graves parking lot improvement.

And the budget is balanced, the proposed budget is balanced with no use of fund balance.

Looking at personnel costs or expenditures, we'll start with personnel costs. Personnel's seeing an increase of approximately $1 million or 6%. This includes funds that are set aside for the union negotiations as well as implementation of the compensation study. there is one new position also in this personnel budget which we'll touch on here in a few minutes and then also some increases in some of the fringe benefits including health insurance and Florida retirement system The operating budget you'll see has a decrease of 700,000 approximately, or 14%. This is mostly attributed to a one-time expenditure that's budgeted in the current fiscal year, which is the Hurricane Milton recovery effort. So there was about 685,000 in the current year budget that carried forward from the prior year to finish the repairs of Monastery Road. So once you back that out, you still see a decrease in the operating budget as proposed of approximately $23,000. You'll see the debt service also reduced by approximately 44,000. That's because the city's gonna make its last debt service payment for the pumper truck that was purchased for the fire department back in 2020. There was a decrease in the capital, the transfer to capital fund of 3.8 million. Again, lots of projects happening currently that will carry forward into the new year. and then you see an increase of about $90,000 for transfers to other funds. That is because the proposed budget includes a $100,000 contribution from the general fund to the facility construction fund to set aside some additional funding for new construction of the police station and fire station 68. This slide takes a little bit of a closer look at the recurring expenditure within the general fund. Personnel costs make up about 78% of the general fund budget. 22% of it is everything else including operating and debt service payments. Also on the slide to the right, there's a sustainability test. So best practice is to ensure that the recurring revenues fully cover the recurring expenditures. And we've passed that sustainability test with a surplus between recurring revenue and recurring expenditure of about 119,000. So that means you could budget up to an additional $119,000 and still be sustainable. On to the revenue assumptions, the proposed budget again is budgeted with a reduced millage rate of 7.0387 which represents two-tenths of a mill decrease to the current millage rate. It would generate approximately $164,000 in additional ad valorem revenue, which would represent a 2% increase. We did have some decreases in the revenues that account for new legislation that had passed, and we had talked about this at your last meeting. We had House Bill 7031, which reduced the card room operating tax from 8% to 5%. The impact to the pari-mutuel tax then would be about 33% reduction or $68,000. Then we had House Bill 925 which called for the redistribution of civil traffic violation penalties and the projected impact of that is about 17% in fines and forfeitures or $12,000. Fortunately, we saw a nine percent increase in total across all other recurring revenues some of the bigger increases we see in the projections include the electric utility tax garbage franchise fees and state revenue sharing and again, the budget is balanced with no use of fund balance and onto the expenditure highlights again maintains existing service levels and programs the proposal includes 75 000 for contingency so that money is set aside and we will come to you if it's needed for anything that may come up during the new fiscal year it includes the funding for the union negotiations and compensation study and it funds a new planning technician position So on April 28th, council approved the implementation of a new online permitting software for development services to meet House Bill 1059's online requirements. And as outlined in Joe's presentation at that time, he indicated that there was a need for a new position in order to support the implementation of the new online permitting software as well as the management going forward. So that is included in the proposed budget. Again $100,000 transfer to the facility construction fund and then 1.4 million in capital outlay This slide compares personnel and operating costs for public safety and it compares it to all other general fund functions over the last 10 years. The maroon line represents the cost of police and fire. It does exclude the city of DeBerry's fire services and it excludes capital outlay. So it's just personnel and operating for Orange City Fire and Police. The gray line represents the cost of all other departments including city clerk, city council, development services, finance, administration, public works, and parks. And as you can see in this slide that the The growth in public safety expenditure is outpacing the cost of all other functions in the city. In the proposed budget, the cost of police and fire exceed all other functions by approximately $1.3 million, and in fact, it exceeds the projected ad valorem revenue by 56,000, which essentially means that all other functions in the city are being funded from other sources other than ad valorem revenue. there's one point four million dollars in capital outlay for the general fund this includes seven hundred ninety one thousand dollars in street infrastructure that is going to provide for design of infrastructure improvements along harley strickland boulevard and it provides for road resurfacing along road island between u s seventeen ninety two and thorpe avenue as well as some other uh... road resurfacing projects basically going after those roads that failed in the critical analysis that was done on the road infrastructure. So again, you'll have a list of all the capital, proposed capital in your supplemental packet, as well as descriptions of what these things are. The fleet equipment total $345,000 includes six replacement vehicles and a dump trailer for public works. Non-IT equipment is at $163,000. This is public safety equipment and field equipment used by public works and public Parks and Recreation You have IT equipment at 83,000. That's our IT computer replacements as well as a server replacement that has met its useful life and then facility improvements is at 13,000 and that is to replace the kitchen cabinets and fire station 68 There were six new position requests as part of the general fund budget. Five of those requests are recommended for deferral this year and the thought is that we probably should see what happens with property tax reform before we add any more positions to the payroll because we may find ourselves having to look at those positions later in the process if we're not able to, or later in the year if we're not able to fund them. So the first one is going to be the planning technician that is funded in the proposed budget. And then you have two police officer positions, year one cost for the general funds, $200,000. An EMS captain position at $127,000. And then two maintenance specialists, one for parks and one for streets and sidewalks. And these positions will be listed in your supplemental packet as well as there'll be a chart of all the ads or position changes over the last 10 years so you can see the different positions that have been added to the budget in the last decade.

There are items pending.

First and foremost are the union negotiations and then we're also always at this time of year unfortunately waiting on the premiums for the property liability and workers comp. And of course there's always other items that may come up as we work through the budget process. And then we have future unknowns, property tax reform, which does not have a direct impact on this budget, fortunately, but it's in the back of our minds. And then we always have the opportunity for more preemptions on funded mandates that may come up during the legislative session next year. And then economic uncertainties. I wish I could tell you what was happening with the economy. I have no idea. Between inflation, interest rates, market conditions, there's a lot going on. we'll take a minute to deep dive a little bit into the fund balance of your governmental funds because part of the that balance that I reported to you earlier is committed and I'll show you that here in a second so your governmental funds again are made up of three funds a general fund a capital fund and the facility improvement fund The projected fiscal year-end fund balance in the general fund is $6.4 million. And through your policy, your fund balance policy, approximately $4.1 million is set aside to address contingency issues, emergency relief, budget stabilization. I do want to note that this is a million dollars less than what the policy actually states we need to have in there because I'm taking into account or anticipating another million dollars in FEMA proceeds and insurance proceeds. Staff continues to work very closely with FEMA and the insurance provider to get as much reimbursement as possible. It's a long, tedious process, but I feel confident that we'll get there, so I've reduced the balance to give you a little bit more unrestricted balance, which is $2.3 million. The capital fund, the projected fund balance at the end of the fiscal year is 1.9 million. We're pulling out 800,000 to address those road infrastructure improvements, leaving a balance of 1.1 million. the facility construction fund we're adding a million dollars to that so we're going from the three point nine million ending balance to four million your total unrestricted fund balance so with consideration of your policy thresholds is seven point four million dollars onto millage rates and taxable values so this slide provides you a snapshot of taxable values in the city over the last 10 years the taxable values for tax year 2026 is 1.5 billion dollars uh over the last 10 years the tackle taxable values have increased on average year after year 10 percent This year, tax year 26, it's only increased by 5%, which is an indication of slower new construction and market value appreciation is slowing. So it seems like the housing market and the real estate market in general is slowing, and we're not seeing those drastic increases, especially with non-homesteaded properties. a little bit of a closer look at new taxable values. So new taxable values for 2026 is 26.7 million. The bars represent the new taxable values for each tax year, and then the dotted line just represents a moving average. Again, new construction for tax year 26, 26.7 million. This is a drop of about 54% compared to the last year, but you're still doing way better than in 2017 and 2018, where new construction ranged from 3 million to 8.7 million. This slide represents the millage rates that have been adopted in the last nine years and the proposed millage rate for the current upcoming budget. The budget is balanced with a rate of 7.0387. Again, represents a 2 tenth of a mill reduction compared to the current rate. Also, when you compare it to 2017-18, it represents a full one mill reduction. This slide provides kind of a snapshot of scenarios with the millage rate with the 7.0387 being the proposed millage rate. And you'll see that it is slightly below the rollback rate of 7.0523. The rollback rate again is the revenue neutral rate the rate that would generate the same amount of revenue Excluding new construction. So this does represent a tax decrease for homesteaded properties and And just for your consideration, each tenth of a mil generates about $132,000. So if you were to go up a tenth of a mil, you would generate $132,000. If you were to go down a tenth of a mil, we would need to cut the budget by $132,000. so in your next meeting you'll be setting the proposed maximum rate and as you recall that is the maximum rate so going forward through the budget process you can always come down you just can't go above what you set that being said staff is going to recommend that council set the uh proposed rate at the current rate of 7.2387 to give you flexibility as we work through the budget process but then come back with the final rate of um of what we presented so far and then as you recall in the last presentation i gave gave senate bill 4f changed the voting requirements So anything up to the rollback rate of seven point zero five two three will be four votes anything between rollback and seven point seven five seven five will be five votes and any millage rate above the seven point seven five seven five will require unanimous vote and Here's a recap of your summer agenda. So pursuant to the city charter, you're slated to receive your proposed budget on or before July 30th. Staff is working diligently to get it wrapped up sooner so that we can get it to you to give you a little bit more time to review it prior to your one-on-ones. Because as you recall, we had to move your one-on-one meetings up a week. Because many of you will be at the Florida League of Cities annual conference So your one-on-one meetings will be on August 3rd. So hope to have the proposed budget to you before then and Then we have a budget workshop scheduled for Monday, August 17th, and then your two public hearings are scheduled for Wednesday, September 9th, and Wednesday, September 23rd, and those Wednesday meetings will also serve as your regular council meetings. So we had to move both of those to prevent overlap with the school board and the county setting their millage. And that concludes my presentation. I would be happy to answer any questions.

Any questions, council?

I just have a couple. So on page six, you mentioned that that $65 million that was amended, how much of that roughly will carry forward of the, because it's already a carry forward from last year or from prior years?

So it will depend on how much money is left in the projects at September 30. And we generally don't know that exact number until about November, early December, because of the timing of invoices coming in. But I can provide you in the next, for the workshop, I can provide you that information, if that'd be okay. I can give you an estimate of how much I think we'll carry forward.

Just because I was looking at historically when we've had bids or we've had the the amounts come in for what it's going to cost Historically, there's always been an amendment to the budget because it's been more so I was just curious if that if that number will increase So it wouldn't it will night

We're not gonna increase the carry forward without bringing it to your attention that we are increasing the project budget. A lot of these projects are already in progress, like we already have the contract for the construction of the roundabout. We already have the contract in place for industrial drive. So whatever is not actually cash out the door is what's gonna carry forward. And we generally do the carry forward in January.

okay so nothing significantly large that's gonna be like a surprise I can't think of anything that's going to be a surprise no okay and then page eight looking at the proposed general budget fund you mentioned an implementation of a compensation study and that was part of that 1 million I believe is that what you said yep it's built into that 1 million Can you expound upon that a little bit? What is the compensation study? Is it something that we've paid for outside of?

Correct. So as part of the adopted fiscal year budget, council approved the... the compensation study to happen and that item is actually stated to come before you at your July 28th meeting and so there'll be some detail given to you at that point yeah I think I'm confusing that one with another study that we were talking about that we didn't think about doing it was something about

job specifics we were looking at I can't even remember what it was but it wasn't this so you've already answered that question and then 119k sustainability that's basically what you were saying when we're in that we have that we have that surplus okay that's all really I had just that question

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any other questions, council? My only concern is, I'm not an advocate of raising taxes, but when you talked about the millage rate and going down, down, down, so I've been on the council for about eight years, and we started out in 2018 at 8.0340, and we went down since then, which is awesome. That's great that we can continue to lower taxes like that.

um and i'd like to keep that trend personally but i'm just worried about like we said we don't know what's coming and i i feel your your stress i i i think the city manager and i both feel comfortable with lowering it to the to the proposed millage rate we fortunately have had some really good years with new construction and we've also had we've seen increases in other revenue sources but again I think it'll boil down to if there's anything additional that you would like to fund as part of the budget that we'll discuss as we work through the workshop but otherwise as presented this is completely sustainable and we have no concerns okay thank you thank you for all your hard work we were actually very happy and excited to be able to provide a reduction thank you any other comments questions

Okay, thank you so much.

Thank you.

Okay, now we're going to move on to three citizens' comments. And since this one kind of goes with what we were just talking about, I'm going to call that one first. Tom Hewitt regarding the city budget.

What's below that?

fire protection special assessment.

Yes, I believe at your last meeting, my name's Tom Hewitt, 1060 Tappan Circle. I believe at your last meeting you voted to not do the presentation and the discussion for the proposed fire protection special assessment program, which would authorize a another area in the millage rate to be included for the proposed special assessment. Now y'all had meetings, if I'm not mistaken. Let me find the thing here. Y'all had meetings back on with the Council members and the consultant and staff had meetings on May 11th, 2026 to discuss staff recommendations and answer questions. And on June 9th, 2026 staff and consultants presented the proposed assessment during a special workshop for this purposes. Following that discussion, four of the seven council members decided not to move forward with the implementation of the fire assessment at that time. Uh, later council member Stafford requested that under new business that the fire assessment program be brought out, be brought back again. And y'all said, well, yeah, we could do that at the July 28th, which is a little bit later on this month. Okay. My question, and this is just a question and, uh, I don't know how many people thought of it was, uh, why. Why did you guys decide not to discuss it when the presenter was here? To discuss it where the citizens could listen to it and try and understand what was going on prior to the budget presentation tonight?

No, not right now.

Because it doesn't make any sense. Yeah, I know. You're not supposed to answer. But it doesn't make sense. You're supposed to be open and free with your information to the public, but you're not doing your job. If y'all are setting in a special meeting and then all of a sudden have a workshop, that's not sunshine law. Sunshine law is supposed to be open. And I understand you're going to bring this back. And it doesn't matter to me whether you bring it back or not. But what you're doing is supposed to be open to the public. Not having special meetings with staff and the presentator and find out what questions and stuff. Your questions should be answered here, in front of the public.

It's wrong.

And you know it.

I'd invite you to stay for a while and we can comment on that sir Jason balls About 1220 East Industrial Drive mayor council

I'm Jason Bowles and I manage a lot of property here in Volusia. Tonight I'm here on behalf of the owner of 1220 East Industrial. I want to bring to your attention a serious flooding problem. It's dangerous and financially devastating. The owner of this property also owned 203205 North Industrial. These properties flooded during Hurricane Ian and Milton. They sustained 30 inches of water each time. The damage totaled hundreds of thousands of dollars, and it affected 25 tenants. Shortly after Hurricane Milton, the owner, Mr. Russo, passed away. I believe the stress of rebuilding these properties affected his decline. His daughter inherited both properties and had to sell one because she could not afford to fix it. The same issue has now become, it's the same issue at 1220 East Industrial. The construction you have going on there is flooding my property. The last two months, the flooding, I've had four separate flooding incidents up to three inches in the buildings. Not a hurricane, just rain. It's just rain. The damage is extensive. At least 11 bathrooms, offices, drywall, and tenant disruption. Estimated over $500,000 and eight tenants. I have emailed the city multiple times. I have not received replies, but I know shortly after the emails, crews are out there working. So that tells me you know. The issue's still there. If this continues, I have no choice but to condone that building. That means I have to displace another eight tenants. The city's gonna lose another commercial property on this. Tonight I'm here to request three things. The contractor's insurance information, the bond information, and the city's insurance information. I also plead with you on behalf of the owner to help me stop the flooding. Clean out my storm drains. They're full of dirt that was brought onto the property from the construction. Eight feet of dirt in each one of them. The water has nowhere to go but in the building. I'm done.

Thank you. Also, if you'd like to stick around for a little bit, I want to touch on that later too. Tom Hewitt, you want to come back up for your second one? Contracts and work orders on the consent.

Tom Hewitt, 1060 Tappan Circle. I want to talk about the consent agenda. And I understand the consent agenda is mainly just to pass routine stuff by so you don't get all squabbled up. But there are some things, and I know people talk about it a lot, there are some things that are in the consent agenda that should be brought up to the public and gone over with the public, especially if you're adding money to something. If you have to add money to a work order, it shouldn't be in the consent agenda. It should be brought up to the public so the public knows what's going on and why the money is being spent. Today, you have a consent agenda that has an item in it Approval for amendment number two to work order number 235-32, consumptive use permit engineering services. Okay, this is for the consumption use permit engineering services. Now this, I don't know when this work order was created, doesn't state it. But what it does say is that you want to increase the amount of money for this work order. But it really doesn't explain why this money needs to be put in the work order. It doesn't. This proposal covers additional expenses associating with responding. Responding, talking to. requests from the, uh, St. John's, I guess St. John's river water management district for information and anticipated costs for continued coordination and responses to future RFIs. So we have to pay extra money just to talk to people. I mean, that's what it sounds. Pardon me. I'm just like, that's what it sounds like to me. And in the amount of $36,000. But not too long ago, you guys were, pardon my French, complaining about $30,000 we had when we were deciding upon to send to a consultant, when we were deciding upon a new manager, city manager. But y'all will pass this without telling the public anything. It's in the consent agenda. Oh, we went ahead and passed it. And if it wasn't for the fact that some people look this stuff up and actually read what's going on, most people don't know. And then all of a sudden, $30,000, where the hell, what are we doing with $30,000? Why are we spending an additional $30,000?

Thank you, thank you.

It needs to be brought up.

Daryl Victor? Regarding... Connecticut corner new information.

Good evening, council. Darryl Victor, 244 North Levitt Avenue, hopefully soon to be a historic site, house. Today I am here, I always bring good news to the council, hopefully I am here on a new document that you all have that was discovered in the city archives, dated 1989 from Harriet French Boyd, that was sent to two people, a council person and Mr. Jim Kerr, who was on planning and zoning, which among other things, the last paragraph, and I know I have a short amount of time, clearly states to Mr. Kerr when setting up the historic district, and again, this is in 1989, that she is indicating that there are three houses on Levitt Avenue that are historically important. And as we know, they were left out of the historic board. And there are four reasons why this letter that were found in the city archives and were in read by city officials are important is because the Orange City approved the boundaries of the historic district in 1997 which is eight years after the date of this letter and This is the National Register of Historic Places for Orange City, which was approved on April 6 2004 15 years after the date of the letter and and there are no homes on the 200 block of North Levitt Avenue. In fact, if you look at the historic map, it totally just misses North Levitt Avenue completely on the 200 block. Ms. Boyd is a bona fide direct descendant of the Levitts and the French. I don't have enough time to go into it, but you've all heard my talks before. She has direct knowledge. And this letter clearly is denoted as being read by several Orange City officials as dated on 6-29-1989 and 7-05-1989. This isn't an attack on the council. This was just... uh... an oversight uh... any uh... the city attorney would understand these oversights do happen and it's i think it's wonderful if the city now in twenty twenty six we can bring you know we can correct this this oversight but there was When, before the historic district was being made, a direct descendant did notify the city, hey, there are three houses, and I believe I have given enough evidence in my talks, I don't think I have to do more talks, to say that these houses are historically significant. Thank you, I'm out of time.

Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, that closes citizen comments. Moving on to the consent agenda.

So I want to pull item 4A. I did read through that and I do agree that we should have discussion whenever these things are increased especially significantly so that's why I want to pull that consent agenda item okay so you would just need to state a motion if you're making a motion to a motion to pull consent agenda item 4a I second okay we have a motion we have a second any public comment on this

See and then we'll bring it back for the question.

Yes.

Council member Richardson. Council member Darms. Yes. Council member Knight. Yes. Council member Thompson. Yes. Mayor months.

Yes. And the consent agenda passes. That was just without for a sorry the motion was only to remove item 4a from the consent agenda we don't have a motion to approve the consent agenda okay i thought that's what we were doing was approving the consent agenda and then pulling it okay so now we need another we're going to discuss it first and then go through city attorney usually make a motion for the consent agenda and pull the item then we discuss the item and then we decide if we're going to move forward with that item so tell me how we proceed

So we would proceed by, we need a motion to approve items 4B and C. Oh, you didn't say that again? We need a motion to approve consent agenda items, agenda items 4B and 4C.

I'd like to make a motion to approve consent agenda items 4B and 4C. I second. We have a motion, we have a second. Any public comment on this? Seeing none, I'll bring it back for the question.

Council Member Richardson? Yes. Council Member Darmes? Yes. Council Member Knight? Yes. Council Member Thompson? Yes. Vice Mayor Grimm? Yes. Mayor March?

Yes. And the consent agenda passes with 4B and 4C. Now we'll discuss 4A. Correct.

um councilwoman tiamson would you like to start the discussion since you pulled it yes of course um so we are looking at an increase so i see that just going through it for public information if you did not read it um on january 30th 2023 the city staff executed a work order with plumber to assist with the consumptive use permit a cup process under city contract in the amount of twenty four thousand three hundred eighty four dollars and then We approved the work order on August 22nd, as well as assisting with adding the model future reclaimed water expansion and the aquifer recharge results from industrial drive stormwater system expansion in the amount of $83,503. So on June 11th of 2026, staff requested a proposal for additional consumptive use permit support services Coordinating efforts from plumber and the proposals cover additional expenses associated with responding to the request for information and anticipated costs for continuing coordination I'm paraphrasing because some of these things are just the acronyms and you guys don't need all that at any rate it goes on to say that There was a the finalization of the city's water conservation plan amendment number two is in the amount of thirty six thousand thirty nine dollars for additional information Please refer to the detailed scope attached under amendment number two So that's what we were looking at, the 36,000 work order increase, and I just wanted to expound upon it for public knowledge and for constituent knowledge, the 36,000 and how that came to be, if you want to just kind of give a little bit more information, or whomever you have for that.

Yeah, we have both staff, Chris Mayer. Go ahead. We have both Chris Bailey and Plummer, and I'm sorry, I've already forgotten your name.

Paula Camposino.

Say that again.

Paula Camposino Carlins.

It's a long one. I know. Paula, and then we'll get the rest later.

Before you say anything, I just want to touch on something for Mr. Hewitt. So when we get our agendas about a week ahead, so everybody knows, in our agenda has the amendment number two that explains the breakdown of what's happening in the consent agenda. Hopefully everybody reads it and understands it. And That's how we determine whether we're going to accept the consent agenda. So I can specifically say that I read it and I do appreciate you bringing this out because a lot of people want to know what's going on. And if you don't go online and look at our agenda packet, you won't know these particular things that they're about to say. And in the packet there is a sentence on there which I'm sure they're gonna talk about is what the 36,000 or you know the added budget thing for plumber so I just want you to know that We I personally i don't think that we make our decisions up here without looking at this i hope not i know i don't i can only speak for myself but i'm glad you brought it up because if any of you have a question you should tell us that so we can pull it thank you councilwoman so that we can explain it so you know what's going on because if there's anybody up here that's not reading it i hope you're all reading it you should know what's going on because it is money like you said go ahead

Yeah, I'm Chris Bailey. I'm the water plant manager for the city. We have been working with Paula since 2021 on the consumptive use permit. In 2018 was when it initially expired, but they gave us an extension as they were doing some water modeling and things of that nature. In 2024, the St. Johns River Management District switched to doing their modeling themselves instead of West Volusia. uh water management district They are in their finalization phase of doing their model. We have provided them with the well field operation plan, the water conservation plan. We've provided them with all the documents that they've requested at this point. The purpose of this amendment is if there are any RAIs, requests for additional information, as they finalize their model, if we have additional requests for information or if LSG, one of their sub consultants, has questions that don't fit with the city's long-term plans. then that will be addressed through these funds. This is a time and material amendment, so if these funds are not needed, they will not be used. And if there are any other questions, I'm sure Paula can answer those.

Any questions, Council?

Um, so to that point and to two points, one is your point and a couple of meetings ago, I have pulled consent agenda items that have been significant because we want to know what they are. So thank you so much for that, sir, for bringing that up. The other thing is, is that, um, of the $36,039, the amendment is project management and meetings, consumptive use permitting support and hydrology and modeling support services, liquid solutions group. So this is in case. Some changes, can you kind of give a little bit of a brief explanation since you're SME on this?

yes of course so once the water management district finalizes their modeling we will get a chance to review that modeling and as part of that our hydro geologist on staffs of the lsg will review the data provided by the management district and then provide comments and also support the city in trying to attain the cup limits that we really would need for the city in the future in terms of water supply

So it's safe to say then if anybody has any questions about this consent of use permit, everything that's going on behind the scenes, it's pretty much they need to reach out to the entities that are involved in it to get all of those specifics because it's a little bit more than Our pay grade pretty much with hydrology, I don't know any of that, so I'm not going to be able to expound upon that. So that would be what people would need to ask if they have those specific questions, and this $36,000 is a contingency in case there is some additional.

Correct. Okay. Thank you for explaining that. I appreciate that. Of course. Thank you, guys. Do you have any questions? Mr. Hewitt, come on up. Come on up to the microphone while they're here.

So my question is this on the work order on the work order was placed at X amount of dollars for that time. And I understand, and I do understand things come up and you need to get something else done with it. I understand that. I really do. I've, I've, I've, I've worked in management before. I understand that. But my thing is, is this is just for talking. Because you're saying well in case this happens in case we need to provide more information This is for talking for communication.

Can you address the council, please? Well, well you told me to ask the people We just don't want you directing at them.

Okay, they'll answer your how can I how can I not directed at them if I'm not looking at them? I

Just ask the questions.

So this is for talking, for communication purposes only. Is that what this is for?

So it is for coordination of these things. As we explained a moment ago, there have been some adjustments with their procedures with St. John's. So there's been several delays from the St. John's Federal Management District that were not originally.

Kaylee, can you hear us? Okay.

not originally accounted for with the initial change or work order in 2021. Okay, so there have been several adjustments. St. John's River Management District is now doing their modeling themselves. So as they coordinate and LSG does the evaluation of the model, if there are questions that come up, then LSG has time and expertise to address those so that we can get the proper consumptive use permits.

So who's paying LSG? We're paying Plummer, right?

LSG is a sub-consultant of Plummer, yes, sir.

We've already paid the consultant correct X amount on the work order or do we have I'm Okay, so we've already paid the consultant or have a work order there with the money set aside Correct has the money been spent that we already have set aside. I

Yes.

The money has been spent? Yes. Okay. So the additional monies, right, is for continuation of consultation? Or are we not pricing our beds correctly?

No. It's a continuation of the process that we're going through to renew our cup. And it is a requirement to work with the St. John's River Water Management to do so.

and and and i understand that it's a multi-year process yeah and and i do i i do understand that but in order to plumber had to submit a bid for what this process was going to be correct for the work order no no they're a continuing consultant and they're a continuing consultant regard we work under work orders okay work orders are priced based on a

Group of continuing consultants that the city has awarded to under a previous bit bit Well, that's that's what that's what I'm asking For continuing consultants, okay plumber is one of our continuing consultants Okay, so we're basically and this is the reason why bringing this up because not a lot of people know this and

And people should understand what's going on with their money and how it's being paid out. So this here is to continue the consultation services or is just on this one particular matter?

This is just a work order associated with the cup renewal for the City of Orange City's utility.

Okay, just for this particular matter. So they have an overall... Contract with the city as a consultant, correct?

They do. All right.

Every year we pay them X amount of money.

No, sir. It's based on work order.

Only based on a worker. So if we write up a work order to them, we have to pay them X amount of money for that work order.

Based on whatever it is contractually, we are hiring them to do in that matter.

In this matter, it's the consumptive use. I'm asking because we have a consultant contract with them, none of these work orders need to go out for bid.

No, sir. The pricing is already bid.

The pricing.

And established previous under the contract that was awarded.

Okay.

Previously.

All right. So we're just adding money to them for talking to them or to have them to be able to talk and discuss. But that's what I'm reading. That's what it says. It says for discussion and communication. That's what it states. For discussion and communication in case they need more information. That's what it states on the stuff that was written up. And that's the only reason why I'm a little upset. I can understand if it gives us something. And I understand you guys are working very hard. I really do. And I appreciate everything you guys do. I really do. But sometimes it's stuff like this, little monies going out back and forth. And because it's not presented to us, which is the citizens, which is supposed to be listening and saying yay or nay, because we vote on you guys. And if you guys aren't talking to us, then how do we know what's going on? I'm gonna but I understand I understand so this is where the consulting for the new updates is that what you're saying that could possibly and if it's not if it is not used it comes back to the city coffers correct it's a contingency okay so we're setting but we have to set monies aside so it's basically spent out of our out of our budget correct If we're setting money aside, where is it?

What happens is, say they approve this $36,000 and we spend $30,000. At the end of the year, when we reconcile and close out our budget, that $6,000 reverts to the fund balance because we never spend it. We don't issue $36,000, and then they refund us what we don't use. It doesn't work that way. It's progress billing, and it's based on this work order. They have three tasks, and they will bill us on a monthly basis anything that's associated with the three tasks, and then that goes through an approval process.

Okay, so this money, if it's not being spent, it'll come back to us at the end of the year. Will the city council and you guys give us an amount at the end of the year saying this money came back to us and this is why it came back to us?

No, it's all part of the audit, not by line item, but overall budget, yes. We go in and we will show through the audit how much was spent, how much was not spent, and then therefore what gets added to the fund balance, and that's per your charter. that says anything that we don't spend that they appropriate reverts to fund balance.

Okay, so this is an appropriation bill to set money aside, then, basically.

It's an appropriation to spend the money, and if we do not spend it, it reverts to the fund balance at the end of the year.

Okay. All right. Thank you.

Thank you.

I wanted that to extend out just because if anybody has any further questions about a consent agenda item, I would revert you to the city manager. You know, not during the meeting, but if there's more questions like this, she can answer that so that we can move on with city business. But I wanted you to understand how it works, okay? So... i don't want you to feel unheard we heard you and we pulled the item just to show you that we were looking at it and i wanted everybody to understand what the city manager was bringing up as far as how it works but if you have any more questions feel free to reach out to her and um you know with any items and thank you all for coming up here and thank you thank you thank you Okay, so with that being said, now we need a motion to approve or not approve the consent agenda 4A. Any more discussion? Everybody good? Any more discussion? Come on up.

I just have one quick one. I heard, did I hear you right?

Injection well with recline water? Say that again? I heard it. Is this a plan for it?

Go ahead city manager.

There was nothing mentioned about an injection Well, this has to do with the city's consumptive use permit which is up the amount of water that we can distribute I think you might have misunderstood when I said Thanks Anybody else out there

Okay. Council, any more discussion on this? Okay. Looking for a motion.

Madam Mayor, I'll make a motion to accept item 4A.

On the consent.

On the consent agenda.

We have a motion. We have a second. If there's no further public comment, we'll bring it back for the question.

Council Member Darms. Yes. Council Member Knight.

Yes.

Council Member Thompson. Yes. Vice Mayor Graham.

Yes.

Council Member Richardson. Yes. Mayor Marks.

Yes. And for any consent agenda passes. Moving on to five ordinances. First reading. We have none. Six public hearing ordinances. Second and final reading. We have none. 7A resolutions. Resolution number 439-26. Mr. Waters, would you mind reading that into the record?

Sure, Madam Mayor. This is resolution number 439-26. This is a resolution of the City Council of the City of Orange City, Florida, adding property located at 244 North Levitt Avenue to the local register of historic places to be known as the Thompson Bungalow, repealing all resolutions or parts of resolutions in conflict herewith, providing for severability and providing for an effective date. Thank you, Madam Mayor.

And we have Joe Ruiz.

Yes, good evening, Mayor, City Council, respective members of the public, Joe Ruiz, Development Services Director with the City of Orange City. So today before you, as has been written to the record, resolution 439, that's 26. I don't know that I have to present much. Mr. Darrell Victor, who's here today, has said a lot on the property. But no, all jokes aside, I will be presenting this to you all for consideration today by the council. uh so just to kind of give some some background uh before we kind of go on to the the slide that you see here uh on october 22nd 2025 uh mr del victor one of the property owners of the property submitted application to development services for consideration of adding 244 north 11 avenue to the local historic register and place a historic marker on the same property back when this application came in Unfortunately, we were not able to process the application when you look at chapter two of our court of ordinances There is a requirement that essentially all of the historic resources that we have in our city have to essentially be registered through the Florida master site file, which essentially is the the registry held and historic documents held by the state and on there with the list that they keep and they provide and they update upon request or provide the updated documents upon request. So until we got that, Mr. Victor got that done, we were not able to process the application, which is why you can see the October date to now. I want to say we've been working with Mr. Victor about a year now when I came into the position, when I was coming in and transitioning. Mr. Victor came in with the same passion that we've known, historic passion that we've known to see him with. Came in with a load of documents on the property and on what he's called and what he's advocating for with Connecticut Corner. And when I saw it, I said it's hard for me to deny that there is history here and that we have to look into it. So upon him getting that Florida Master Site File document ID and site ID, then we were able to proceed and process that. So on June 18th, it was brought to the Historic Preservation Board, which provided a favorable recommendation for the property. And so just to kind of get into the property details itself and the structure, because that's what we're looking at, right, the structure. So around circa 1914, you see the property here that's shown in the photo, which is Mr. Victor's residence, is known to be a Florida bungalow cottage. As mentioned, it was added in May of 2026 to the Florida Master Site file. And this property here is a one story building with a raised deck and porch and a two tiered hip style roof. And if you see here architecturally, the roof has essentially the two tiers, the first one being for the porch and deck area that sits out front and on the north side of the property and on the west side there. And then also the second tier roof is for the main house, which includes a dormer. As well as a chimney so when you look at this style the Florida bungalow It is typical of the year that it was or the years in which it was debated that it was built I say debated because of mr Victor and I and staff we've been kind of going back and forth based on historical data if you go on the property appraiser website It says that the property was built in 1910. If you go back and look at historical articles, it says that the property was under construction in 1914. And so just to kind of give a little more background, the original home was built and owned by Helen and Walter Thompson. To the left here, you see Ms. Helen Thompson, and to the right, you see Mr. Walter Thompson there. AND SO ORIGINALLY THIS PROPERTY HERE ON THIS CORNER, IF YOU LOOK BACK AT THE ORIGINAL TRAFFORD MAPS THAT WAS ESSENTIALLY ORDERED BY MR. FRENCH TO THE SURVEYOR, MR. TRAFFORD, TO CREATE A MAP ESSENTIALLY FOR HIM TO TRY TO INCORPORATE ORANGE CITY AS A CITY. AND SO THE LEVITT FAMILY, WHEN YOU LOOK AT THAT TRAFFORD MAP, ACTUALLY HAS PROPERTY DESIGNATED ON THERE WITH, SO YOU'LL SEE FOR EXAMPLE W.F. LEVITT, W.W. LEVITT, AND YOU'LL SEE THE DIFFERENT PROPERTY OWNERS THAT WERE INVESTING PROPERTY INTO THE CITY AND BEING RECRUITED BY MR. FRENCH TO HAVE A VESTED INTEREST IN THE CITY AND CREATE AND ESTABLISH IT AS IT WAS DONE IN 1882. So when we looked at documentation, it states that Mr. W.F. Levitt purchased the property in 1876. And so the lands owned by the Levitt family, as mentioned, are on that 1877 Trafford map. THE LEVITT FAMILY WERE VOTING MEMBERS IN THE DECISION IN 1882 TO INCORPORATE AND ESTABLISH THE CITY HENCE THE LEVITT AVENUE RECOGNITION ON THE MAP IN 1877 OR MR. VICTOR WAS ABLE TO FIND DOCUMENTATION ACTUALLY AFTER WE PUBLISHED THE AGENDA THAT IT WAS ACTUALLY 1976 THAT THE LEVITT HOMES WERE BEGINNING TO BE BUILT ALONG LEVITT AVENUE MR. VICTOR IN PREVIOUS PRESENTATIONS HAS SHOWN OR PRESENTED THE GUNNERY HOME AND THINGS LIKE THAT THAT WERE ALL LEVITT PROPERTIES AT THAT TIME BACK IN THE DAY The Levitt family themselves originate from Washington, Connecticut. They relocated to Wisconsin, and then from Wisconsin to Chicago, and then from Chicago they ended up here in our city. IF YOU LOOK BACK TO IN HISTORY, THE LEVITS AND THE FRENCH ENDED UP HAVING CONNECTIONS AS FAR AS BEING CONJOINING FAMILIES BY MARRIAGE AND CERTAIN MEMBERS OF THE FAMILY STARTED TO, THEY GOT MARRIED AND BECAME IN-LAWS, PER SE. SO THERE IS SIGNIFICANT HISTORY HERE WITH THE LEVIT FAMILY WITHIN THE CITY. Ms. Helen Thompson, who became the wife of Mr. Walter Thompson, was the granddaughter of Woolsey, Levitt, W. Levitt, and Jane Levitt. Helen's parents were Nellie Levitt Andrews and Edward Andrews. Ms. Helen Thompson is notably known for her roles in the city's early history as a descendant of the Levitt family. So just some interesting facts. Ms. Levitt was with her husband. They were entertainers or opera singers. Mr. Victor has noted in the past in some documentation where they actually sang and did opera before English royalty and did many, many engagements where they were known for. Other facts of significant, and I say this because there is criteria behind everything I'm speaking on. uh miss thompson served as the city's postmistress at one point she was also on the villages improvement association so the via and as a board member of the historic city historic orange city elementary school so on the plaque that mr victor was able to obtain you can see her as one of the original board members of of the school which was built right 100 years ago uh so you can see her significance and her impact um on record of what she did and who she was and what she gave to the community also not noted in here she was an advocate for women's suffrage as well when we look at records one of the fun facts and something that mr victor brought up to me was that she ran miss helen thompson ran for district 2 volusia county executive committee member in 1932 and lost by one vote. So I don't know what the recount rules were back in the day, but if I was her, I probably would have asked to see what was going on. So when we look at these properties and we look at these sites, a site, the criteria is, does it meet these criteria, right? And so what we have established and evaluated and what the Historic Preservation Board concurred with is the site, building, structure, object, or district must meet the following criteria before it may be listed on the local register. A, it possesses integrity of location, design, setting, materials, workmanship, and ambiance, which we have noted that it is characteristic of 1910s. And it is associated with events that have made a significant contribution to the broad patterns of our history, noting the importance and the significance of the Leavitt family. And also is associated with the lives of persons significant to our past. As mentioned, I want to say there were 52 voting members that voted to incorporate Orange City and they were, the Leavitt family members were on that list. UM SO WHAT IS THE EFFECT OF BEING LISTED ON THE LOCAL REGISTER SO AS WE'VE WE'VE GONE AND THERE'S BEEN CONVERSATIONS ABOUT THIS PROPERTY IT IS CURRENTLY NOT IN THE NATIONAL HISTORIC DISTRICT AREA HOWEVER IT IS IN OUR BLUE BOX UM AND THAT AREA THAT IS OUR THE CITY'S HISTORIC DESIGNATED HISTORIC AREA And so with our local register it allows us to evaluate properties historic properties to make sure and see Do they qualify to be on our local listing and so staff has found that it does and so the implications that come with or the what comes with essentially being on the local register is There's Florida, there's a modified enforcement for existing buildings under the Florida Building Code as historic. And then also there's a historic marker program. And so this property, if listed, would be number 10. Mr. Victor has paid in advance for the marker and hopes for this. And so it also authorizes the city manager or the city to allow marker placement on this property through the local historic register program. So in your packets, originally what was published, so just for transparency's sake, there were some layering issues on the map. Some of the lines were skewed. My mapping staff was on a vacation, and so once she returned, I asked her to update the map. We've provided updated resolution and updated exhibit into in in the resolution to correct the map and so the the blue box appears Which is our historic city's historic area and then the red line is the National Historic District And so as you can see mr. Victor's property here, which would be OC o 10 on there on the local register would be listed and shown on the map and So at this time, Historic Preservation Board has recommended approval and has found that the property is eligible for listing on the local register and recommended approval of resolution 439-26. And so today, staff recommends that the city council adopt resolution number 439-26 and authorize local registered listing of 244 North 11th Avenue as the Thompson bungalow. Thank you.

Thank you. First, I want to say congratulations for all the hard work that you did. It's amazing your passion for this. And I just love that you followed through and, and now we're here talking about it today. And I know it's got to really make you happy. So I want to say that. Council any comments?

I would just like to say so moved by Joe Ruiz when he said take the recommendation.

Okay, we have a motion on the floor?

Second.

We have a motion, we have a second. Any public comment? Okay, we'll bring it back for the question.

Council Member Knight?

Yes.

Council Member Thompson?

Yes.

Vice Mayor Grimm?

Yes.

Council Member Richardson? Yes. Council Member Darmes? Absolutely yes. Mayor Marks?

Yes, and resolution number 439-26 is approved. okay we're moving on to 7b resolution number four eight four four eight dash two six mr waters would you read that into the record

Certainly, this is resolution number 448-26. This is a resolution of the city council of the city of Orange City, Florida, pursuant to section 4.04 of the city charter, notice of election and certifying the form of ballot for the 2026 general election, repealing all resolutions or parts of resolutions in conflict herewith, providing for severability and providing for an effective date. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you.

Kaylee Burleson, city clerk. Good evening. Kaylee Burleson, city clerk. So this is more of a housekeeping item for elections. Section 4.04 of your charter requires that we give 45 days notice to the supervisor of elections that we will be Participating in an election and we also have to certify the ballot prior or 21 days prior to an election So we are a little bit early because ultimately we're only gonna have two races that go on the ballot in November however, it's just a housekeeping item to that needs to be taken care of and the paperwork needs to be sent down to supervisor of elections and So ultimately, staff is recommending that the city council adopt resolution number 44826, satisfying section 4.04 of the charter. Thank you. Council?

Would you like to expound upon who's running just for public knowledge?

I mean I sure can. So Fran Darms qualified unopposed for District 5. Anthony Papello qualified for District 4 unopposed. We have two races, the District 3 seat, which has two individuals, Brett Marquez and Sherry Pugh, and then we have the at-large position, and we also have two candidates for that position, and it would be Dana Knight and Steven Jensel, Jr.

Thank you. Okay, any other discussion from the council? Okay, we just need a motion.

Madam Mayor, I'll make a motion to accept the resolution 44826, notice of election certifying the ballot for the 2026 general election.

I second. We have a motion, we have a second. Any public comment on this? Seeing none, we'll bring it back for the question.

Council Member T. Onsen? Yes. Vice Mayor Grimm?

Yes.

Councilmember Richardson. Yeah councilmember darms. Yes councilmember night.

Yes mayor marks Yes, and resolution number four four eight dash two six is Okay Number eight discussions in action. We have none tonight. We're moving on to reports 9a city manager

So since we last met, I attended the Chamber Legacy Investor Appreciation Meeting and accepted our Certificate of Appreciation on behalf of the city. I attended a few items. I wanted to touch on our Orange City America 250 Freedom of Fireworks. That was a resounding success. I left my house, it was 101. I arrived at Orange City and we were blessed with 77 degree weather because it was cloudy and a little rainy and it never got over 77. The weather held out and the skies started to clear about the time the sun set.

Can you pull your microphone down just for record?

Thanks. Our numbers exceeded what they were the previous year and the year over. We do have out there a... Survey and we will be resharing it so far. We've had about 18 responses all positive Great feedback. We did do a staff follow-up action meeting with all parties involved. I Can't name everybody by name, but the event is a six was a huge success Thankful to our city staff from Parks and Rec Public Works and some utilities our police department The after action report showed that we cleared out traffic out of there in a record timing in about 22 minutes or less from the time the officers were placed to help traffic flow till they were called off of that. So I just can't thank staff enough for the success of the event. And we appreciate the feedback and we're just looking for as much as possible. I have started meeting with our candidates who were mentioned. I attended a chamber event that was hosted here in Orange City where it brought in candidates from all over the county for a No Hob, No Knob sponsored by the chamber. We held our appreciation luncheon. It was a success. Again, thanks to staff and thank you to the members who attended. I also attended a Team Volusia meeting, economic development, and that information will be in your Friday communication, what was distributed. Some upcoming events. We have the Volusia League of Cities dinner in Pearson on July 23rd. We are tentatively set for a executive session regarding our union negotiations on July 28th at 5 p.m. And then we have the Orange City to bury night at the Daytona Tortugas Starting at 635 p.m. On July 31st and that completes my report any questions any questions council for the manager I

I have a I have a question. I got an email from Elizabeth better off ward requesting the city to send a letter. It looks like other cities are going to make it bigger. other cities are supporting this it's uh to support for the establishment of a volusia county domestic violence offender database they're asking for our support as a city to write a letter to the volusia county council i can email it to you city manager i just want to make sure it's okay with our city council to do that to show our support from our city that we would support the offender database for domestic violence everybody okay with that so i will forward that email to you with a copy of daytona beaches from their mayor it would be a letter from the mayor to volusia county council and this will give you a good you know template of what they're saying or what they're asking for i think it would be a good cause to have that on the you know have us as a fort for that so and um let's see Thank you for the flowcharts, but I did notice that, are they being updated weekly? Because I noticed that Carrie Byers is still on there, but I'm hearing rumors everywhere that she does not work for us anymore.

She did resign, but through the process that we do to pull the information, she's still in the system and hasn't reached final payout. And until an employee exits the payroll system, they will still show on that chart.

Okay, that's great. Thank you. You're welcome. Okay, that's all I got. Anything else from anybody? No?

Okay.

Are we at new business?

No, not yet. He's ready. Okay, moving on to 9B, City Clerk.

So I do not have a lot as of now the Florida League of Cities conference is coming up middle of August August 13th through the 15th As of now, I have six council members attending. I have not heard any different from anybody else So if you have any change of plans or anything, please let me know so that we can cancel registration fees and hotels You know within time to get refunds. So if there are any changes, please let me know. They did send out an updated itinerary. I want to say it was yesterday, so I will get that emailed out to each of you as well. But that has been updated by them. Other than that, that is all I have.

Thank you. Any questions for the city clerk? Okay. Moving on to 9C, city attorney. Do you have anything? Thanks.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. There's a lot going on, but nothing for the group.

Okay. Thank you. Okay, moving on to new business. Vice Mayor?

Yes, thank you.

Okay, I happen to be on the Zoom meeting for the Florida League of Cities yesterday, and they were talking about Amendment 3. If it should pass, several things could be— Wait a minute.

Can I stop you for a second? Sure. Is this something that you're going to ask us to bring back to discuss, or is this just a report? No, this is just people— So this will be under your reports, City Council reports? Right now we're just looking for new business that we would bring back for us to discuss at a new time. Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you. all right so we're just if there's anything that anybody has at this time to they want to bring back for discussion under new business council no sorry vice mayor okay moving on to approval minutes we already did that um now you can say you go first sorry it's just procedure okay so like i was saying um i was on this zoom call and um

Let's see. So what they were saying is if this were to pass, it would need 60% of the votes to pass. But if it would pass, the millage rates in the cities could possibly double. That's one thing. Also, where was I going with this? Okay, where did I want to go? Okay, they were also talking about downstream effects, which could be... reduced stability in bond ratings, capital investment, debt capacity, municipalities, there could be cuts to police, fire, public works. And so you really need to look into this. But the only thing I'm going to finalize, my house is homesteaded. So I could receive a $500 tax break if this passes. but then when I go to get new homeowners insurance, it could be $1,000 more because we don't have the same safety rating that we did have before. So there's a lot to this, so you really gotta read into it, and the general public needs to look into this before they vote on this matter. That's all I wanna say. Thank you.

Thank you.

Any other comments from the, you got a council comment, nothing?

No? Wow. Okay. Well, I'll go. Okay. First of all, I got a message on my cell phone that the state appropriations were declined. I thought we had that in the bag. So I was kind of surprised to see that. because I know that we had a lot of meetings with them and I just wanted to say that was the same way the year before when I went met with them several times we thought we had this but when it goes to the governor we never know what he's gonna veto so you can never say you have it in the bag and that's what I heard so I wanted to make sure you everybody knows we didn't have it in the bag so we don't have that funding now for the firehouse or the police um let's talk about the fire assessment um mr hewitt had brought up i wanted to discuss about that so i think the timeline was a little off mr hewitt um we did discuss it already we had we had the consultant come out the consultant talked to everybody right and then we had the meeting and we discussed it and then we closed it off and we brought it back again for discussion again councilwoman Stafford said that she wanted to bring it back on her new business to discuss it again and then it went to a vote and it and then it was not successful so we did actually talk about it two times before we actually voted on it and to be clear it wasn't that the council didn't want to do the fire assessment it was that the council didn't want to do the fire assessment now and the reason was was because um we weren't sure where the state was going with the funding um everything was rush rush rush trying to get things on on the uh the tax roll and it was just way too fast for my opinion that's what I said I saw it on social media that I was giving misinformation or I forgot what I was saying or maybe I just have you know dementia or something I don't know but no I don't I actually did my homework I read these things vice mayor and we really don't know what the unknown is so it I think it was a good decision for the council now because there's no rush it's not going to happen this year and so we decided to vote against it right now but do we see it in the future absolutely we see it in the future it's coming you know we're gonna if we want a firehouse or we want a police uh station a new one yes it's gonna come fire we're talking about fire assessment though i'm a little confused because a while back we talked about it was the police station that was on the top of the list and somehow it got changed to the fire station and i don't know what happened there we got a new city manager and everything kind of changed so i don't know why but we need both and so there's no there's no and you know we know this um so i wanted to be clear that we we may not have passed at this time but i see it in the future i do see that it is going to we are going to do a fire assessment it's just not happening now so i don't want you to think that the council doesn't think that it's not coming okay it just seemed like it was being shoved down our throat let's do it now quick quick quick and that's not the way we should do our business um the industrial flooding um mr voles I have a business on industrial also. It's on north industrial. And the construction on there, and correct me if I'm wrong, city manager, was to do stormwater, you know, to help that problem there. Not necessarily fix it, because we don't know that we can fix it, because that whole area was built in a basin. So whoever developed that, they put it in a basin. And what happens when you're in a basin? All the water goes in the basin, right? That's unfortunate for all of us business owners in that area. A week or two ago, we had a really bad rain, and I don't know how it was today, but not even a hurricane, and there was a guy stuck in the middle of that flood with his car. Somebody pulled in with a pickup, tried to pull him out, ripped his whole bumper off his car, got him out of the water. His car was flooded inside and out. His bumper was gone, and he was distraught. This is a regular rain. We're right in the middle of this construction, and it's making it worse. Like you said, it's making it worse. How do we get to where we make it better is what I'd like to know. When was the regular completion date for that project? It wasn't supposed to be done in April, but I know they ran into other issues.

there's definitely been a few extensions time extensions over the course of the project and it's it's still on I'm trying to I think I read it was 68 percent complete at this time most recently and so it's it's well underway and unfortunately when you do a construction project while you're under construction it does tend to make things a little worse before you can make it better and I think that's that's but that that you've received a report on this a couple meetings ago that showed that these are not a typical afternoon thunderstorm or rain. They are the equivalent to a 50- to 100-year rain based on the volume and the time. And I am cataloging a lot of areas around not only the state but the nation, but definitely our state, where fortunately for us, unfortunately for them are experiencing the same things. Yesterday I got a report from the news that showed in Orlando where cars got bogged down and were driving through just on a regular road, not a road on construction, and the water is up over their hoods. So this is definitely something that was not an afternoon. We had some flooding here subsequent to that May 20th incident and Fortunately, we have the floodgates and you know if they're up they're gonna work but these are not a typical afternoon thunderstorm when you do the math and and you analyze it they are very large weather events that are not associated with the name storm and it is something new that we're facing um thank you so a couple things with this i'm not affected by it my building's up on a hill but i see everybody else affected with it

And the city workers that are out there are busting their butts. They really are. They're hard working out there. When the storms are coming in, they're trying to get everything, get out of the way. And I appreciate that. But what I was told is they're running, it's like an old house. They're running into old pipes and things that were so old that it's like they think they're gonna get any, you know, they're gonna redo something and then they run into another problem. Then they run into another problem. And that's why it kept going on and on and on. That's what they told me. So I wanted you to know that. But does it help our situation? No. But what can we do? Because no offense, city manager, but I don't care what's going on in any other city or state. I care about what's going on in our city and what affects our residents or in our businesses. And we don't want businesses leaving because their buildings are condemned. So what can we do to help that area on a regular fifty-year rain or whatever you're calling it what can we do to help them where's the tiger dams where how can we get this water out of there because it's happening on a daily basis now well we did put in an emergency work order and did fix the back side and it has

been beneficial so we've already taken some action i think we'll have to do an analysis and bring back a report to for you all but you have a stormwater program that you've adopted and that's what's going to be used to address and we prioritize the areas and in that we may need to look at in a year Let's re-look at it. We've had these events that we did not have in the model previously. Maybe it's time, given these different circumstances, that we look at what your current stormwater plan program that you've adopted and implemented based on the models and the the information maybe we need to update that and i can go back to staff and we can look at it internally and see what we can do but you have a very comprehensive master plan that you've adopted and then the the funding to implement that and that area is under construction to help improve it but we can't build which you've heard this i'm sure before to a stormwater standard that's going to meet every possible scenario. It's too cost prohibitive. And so we do what we can based on the current data and the models. And I'm here to say that based on what we've seen, these are not normal afternoon thunderstorms. Is that pump working right there? That's supposed to pump the water out? Yes. The one that was there that we're upgrading?

Yeah, because there's a little storm water drain or pond there.

No, my understanding is it's still online and we will switch to the new one once we get it, once it's upgraded.

So when there's a little lake in front of the post office, what happens to that? It's just sitting there. Like I saw it there for over 24 hours. It was sitting there. So what do we do to pump that out so that the businesses can operate and that it's not ruining? That's just one area.

I know you're on east industrial. It's a time and the volume. We can only pump so much. You saw it with Mill Lake. It takes so many days to draw down. So depending on the amount that falls, that pump is only going to pump a certain volume. And so it's being pumped. It's just a matter of how much and how much the pump can move over that time to produce the volume that has fallen.

Thank you. So I just wanted to express that about, you know, keep an eye on that area. When you said we're looking at our stormwater plan, industrial was at the top because we just invested a couple million dollars there to redo that. So that is at the top of the list, I believe, when we made our plan. So I don't think we need to relook at it. I think we need to be more reactive of what we're gonna do to, I mean I can't they can't go any faster than they already are and I know that um on the back end of industrial there's like an auto body place and all that on the corner and I remember a couple like a month ago they were underwater so it keeps moving from different areas of industrial because they are putting in sidewalks they're they're digging up the road they're putting their pipes in and I and I know it's it's it's in progress it's you know it's it's it's a headache everybody but I just think it's good that everybody knows what's happening there and I know that we we are trying to make it better so if you want to talk to the city manager more about it maybe she can help with that okay vice mayor I had a question for you about your comment about your handout you said they if they do pass the the property tax thing the millage rate would double that's what you said that's what they're saying they said the potential there it could double and that just goes back to what we were talking about with the fire assessment is that we don't know so i'm just going to say it one more time if they do pass that it's going to be double millage rate so when when for people that aren't homesteaded if you're homesteading right right you'll be good so all these young people that are buying homes and and some of the other businesses their millage rate is going to double and still going to be a big shortfall

you just can't you know what what they mainly said is there needs to be another resource another Avenue it's not a tax increase it's just shifting it over one part to another basically okay so thank you you're welcome okay I guess that's all I got for you

With that being said, I just want to say congratulations again to Victor, Mr. Victor. I think it's amazing and I wish more people would do that with the marker system because that's why we created it, right? And we're just looking for a motion to adjourn. I'll make a motion to adjourn. Second. Got a motion, got a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Meeting adjourned.