Town Commission - Regular Meeting

Yeah, we've got an issue probably with the Zoom.

Present. I'm going to try if headphones reduce the feedback.

Thank you. Chief, if you'll lead us, please, in the Pledge of Allegiance.

They took away the mic, right? No, no, this is working, but the other one, it's gone. I don't know. I mean, it's whatever. I can use this one. It's fine. Yeah, yeah.

Congratulations to the flag of the United States of America, to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you. Moving on to item two, resolutions and proclamations. Item 2A, rescissions, modifications of town of Surfside, number 2024-3336. Mr. Mayor, do we have opening remarks? Not on this meeting, no. Okay, but again, it's not on the thing, so we're all...

It wasn't on the agenda then either, but we...

Yes, I would like one. All right. Please take the three minutes, though, Commissioner. Sure. I want to just say that one of the things that I love most about being a commissioner and one of the things that attracts me to the job is the possibility of open dialogue and debate, honest debate where we work together with people who may agree with us or may disagree with us and try to arrive at the answers. What I feel is happening today with these two meetings is a travesty of those ideals. Everything about these meetings, the short notice with which they were called, the sheer volume of the mater

well yeah i'll i'll go just real quick it's it was it was very hard to be prepared for this meeting i mean uh we got the agenda what like four or five pm 4 p.m yesterday i think there's a lot of stuff a lot of history um so i i i don't see why we couldn't have done this conversation with time, maybe after we tackle some of the more urgent emergencies that we have and we make sure that we have a town manager, that we fix some of the other emergencies that we have. So some of these are easier, some of these items. Some others are, I don't know, I don't have the time to look into that. Thank you.

Just a brief note. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I've received calls and emails regarding different matters, and I want to let everyone know I'm doing my best to respond to each and give proper attention to them. understand that we have a population of about 6,000, of which about 3,400 registered voters. So while I receive emails of opinion and encouraging me to vote one way or the other, there are many factors that I weigh in. Independent research, I take this stuff seriously. I devote a tremendous amount of time to it. And I appreciate everyone's involvement.

Thank you. Any other comments? All right. I'll just, I guess, because we're doing this, I'll just legally or quickly address some of the issues in front of us. It was stated that this is legal but shameful. Again, I feel the same way about a lot of the stuff that was put on the agenda and passed initially. I get it. There's a lot of items here, but it's pretty simple. It's all essentially one item. It's a rescission of code. of advances that were made in the last two years that some of us up here may feel restrict our ability to do our job. They were put in the last few years. Some of them are

And quite frankly, a new commission was voted in, new direction, and I hope we'll see that new direction play out today. So again, moving on to item 2A, rescission modification of town resolution 2020-4336. Madam Clerk, if you'll read the title of the resolution into the record, please.

All right, thank you. So I'll just do a quick introduction, request a motion. This is a modification to the travel policy. I don't have it in front of me, but the travel policy was changed over the last two years. Some of that vindictively to, oh, we'll have public comment in a moment. Some of that was specifically to restrict the ability for someone up here to, and by someone I mean anyone up here, to lobby. Now, ironically enough, this commission, when we were addressed with some of the bigger issues at the beginning of our term, said, hey, we're going to ask for money. We're going to ask fo

All right, second. All right, so we have Ms. Salzauer. Two minutes, please. All right, three minutes.

Thank you, Mrs. Salazar. Mitchell Kinzer.

Mr. Kinser, I believe you were a mayor and you recognize that public comment is not a discussion. Members of the dais here are not entering the discussion. You're free to make your comments.

Those are all the speaker cards I have for this item. If there's anybody that wants to speak on this item that hasn't submitted a card, now's the time before I close public comment. All right, seeing none, we're closing the public comment of this item and moving on to Commission discussion. If there's anybody that wants to start,

I would happily start. It's hard for me to see who's moving there, so.

All right, again, Commissioner, I'm going to ask that, you know, if you have a lot to say, we're going to stick to three minimum comments from the commission and move on, and then we can get back to you, but.

All right. Please start the timer now, though. All right. What I would like to say, first of all, because it gets bandied around a lot, the mayor throws around this number that he got $12.5 million for the town. That seems to come straight from his campaign literature. It's not substantiated as far as I know. And I think if you're going to be moved by that to vote for this, we should get clear documentation of what money he's claiming. A lot of the money that we got in recent years had to do with grants that were applied for many years ago. Many people helped to get that happen, like including

I'll just share a few thoughts and also respond to my colleague that called me out earlier for not being involved in communal matters. I actually kept a close eye on what was going on and It's exactly the reason why I'm up here. I didn't like what I saw in the prior commission, and that's why I'm here, and that's why I'm devoting my time and effort when I could be putting a lot more time to my family and businesses. Regarding this particular matter, I completely agree with what the mayor was sharing, which you need to be involved. Yes, we have lobbyists and we voted for that and I'm very proud

Yeah, so I want to look at this from PRACTICAL PERSPECTIVE. TO ME, THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IS THE BENEFIT THAT WE CAN BRING TO THE RESIDENTS. I MEAN, THIS IS THE BENCHMARK, RIGHT? SO WE'VE GOT TO DO EVERYTHING WE CAN TO MAXIMIZE THE BENEFIT FOR THE TOWN. SO I'M GOING TO PUT MYSELF FOR A SECOND HERE IN THE MAYOR'S SHOES AND TRY TO UNDERSTAND WHAT HE'S TRYING TO ACHIEVE. I don't disagree that we can maybe take this up a notch and try to maximize our influence with Tallahassee, D.C. here. But it is true that we have to do that as a team. That's the way I see it. To your point, Commissioner Weing

All right. All right, so I'm going to address a couple of the items that are things that were discussed. First of all, to, you know, Mayor Kinsdrew got up and was very shameful and made certain accusations. I just want to remind the public that most of these things that we're changing and adopting existed during his term. These are reversions and rescissions going back to what previously existed, not new code. um to my fellow commissioner gerardo i think you you kind of highlighted what this is right your three minutes turned into a rant against my credibility um it was extremely accusatory of

Sure. Because I wasn't, and I'm sorry if it came out that way, I wasn't advocating for all of us go up there. What I was saying- But I am, by the way. No, no, but I mean, that could be excessive, I think. But- What I'm saying is why not having this reporting system that allows us to discuss these things before you or any one of us goes?

Well, there's reporting and there's discussing ahead of time, right?

Yeah, yeah, ahead and after. That's what I would like to see. That's what I would like to keep.

So again, every meeting that is done is in my calendar. The fact that you try to put in this reporting and then penalize somebody who doesn't submit a full report, read the code the way it was written, right? It's actionable. This was done in personal animosity, as was very clearly described by the commissioner. because this went against my virtue. This wasn't against any other mayor that walks in. This is a problem with Shlomo Danziger going and asking for money. And then that's what this became about. And that's what all these items that we're bringing forward today. They are done in persona

All right, Gerardo, I'm going to remind you again. You can't just talk over me. This is a meeting. You need to be recognized, right, as per our rules. So please ask for the floor. I'm trying to, but I'm on Zoom, remember. Yeah, yeah, that's fine, but you can't just keep talking over me. So I'm going to ask you again, just be recognized. We want to hear what you have to say, but there's a process to this, okay?

Well, if I may, and I want to say to you directly, Mr. Mayor, I have no animosity towards you. That was never a motive. What I what I question here primarily is that this is structural. This is institutional. The reporting requirement is a protection against anybody going to Tallahassee for reasons that are not related to the town. If you get rid of that, what's to stop somebody, anybody who has a business or another interest from going to Tallahassee and lobbying for that on the town's dime? So I'll answer that very quickly.

Yeah, you're going to say four points and I'm not going to be able to respond to the first. So let me just answer that. It's a very simple, Gerardo, it's very simple. The law.

No, no, no. Listen, please. As the chair, you have given me the floor and I would like to make my comment now. You question my motive. I'm explaining...

All right. So I'm just going to respond very quickly. The law, the law prevents me from going up there and having personal personal. OK, I can't go up there and lobby on behalf of myself. I can't lobby for things that are not within the city purview because I will go to jail. OK, I hope that's clear.

Why did you do it? You got to do it. This is not all right. The reporting requirement is to make sure that people don't do the wrong thing. And why would we get rid of that if people aren't doing the wrong thing? That's not personal, that is institutional. That is good government policy, okay? The second thing is you claimed that the calendar was transparent. I made record requests in 2023 about those trips and they came back empty. so and the the meetings don't tell you what was discussed i encourage everybody on the commission do a public record request for my memo from the safe streets summ

Great. So again, to respond to you, there are already checks and balances. The state has very strict laws when you go to lobby. If I go up and I do anything personal in there, it's a criminal act. State, county, all has this. Now again, you are going to propose to be the arbitrator of ethics. Yours was the commission, I'm going to remind the community, yours was the commission that changed our laws to allow a commissioner to vote remote knowing that she didn't live here in violation of our laws. So to sit up here and arbitrarily tell me that you have worked very hard on an ethical law to contr

I don't know where she lives. I have no knowledge.

Of course not. All right. Madam Clerk, let's call the roll, please.

I have to vote no because I'd be inclined to vote yes if there was a modification, including the reporting. If there was that, I'd vote yes. But the way it stands now, I've got to vote no.

County and state established requirements are sufficient for me, so I vote yes.

Thank you. Moving on, item 2B, rescission of the town resolution number 2025-3358. Madam Clerk, if you'll read the title of the resolution into the record, please.

Thank you madam clerk, let's get a brief introduction, this is one of those items that I actually wrestled to see if I should bring it back or not because I don't want to make this a personal back and forth every 2 years, but this is more about. recognizing, remembering, and establishing, and I think 2B and 2C are kind of together, the work that is done prior to when we sit in this chair. And if we are going to get in the habit of coming in and undoing commission initiatives, undoing relationships that are built, and if you look at the original resolution in front of you, specifically for Hial

Second. And now we will open up public comment before discussion of the commission. Solita Krasner. I'm setting it to two minutes because we're running out of time. I'm sorry, we have a lot to get through in this meeting.

Thank you, Mrs. Kranzer. Mrs. Salazar, two minutes, please.

Thank you, Ms. Salzauer. If there's anybody else that wants to speak on this item that didn't submit a card, now's the time before we close public comment. There's no minute, Mrs. Granzer. Okay, I'm not going to get into an argument with me. We spoke? All right, we're closing public comment at this time since there's no other speakers and moving on to commission discussion. I will introduce the item again. I QUESTION WHAT PROCESS IS THERE? THERE IS NOTHING IN OUR CODE THAT DESCRIBES A PROCESS FOR CREATING A SISTER CITY. THIS IS A DIPLOMATIC PROCESS DONE THROUGH RESOLUTION. YOU CAN GOOGLE IT. Y

I do. Thank you. Well, I want to hear especially, Mr. Mayor, your point that this is motivated by spite fails because the Quintana Roo sister city was created, in fact, by the Burkett Commission. So the Burkett Commission repealed its own sister city. And that shows that this isn't being done out of any desire to erase. It was done out of principled reasons. And that's the proof right there that the Mexico City is on this list. principal reasons let me explain these for anyone who wasn't part of the discussion and i thank vice mayor paul for bringing the sister cities organization into the int

Thank you, Commissioner. I need to move on. Anyone else?

I'll go very brief. I didn't have the time to really dive DEEP INTO THIS. THERE WERE MANY ITEMS. WE TALKED ABOUT THE SISTER CITY ORGANIZATION. I DON'T KNOW ENOUGH ABOUT IT. I DON'T KNOW ENOUGH ABOUT THE IMPLICATIONS OF THIS PROPOSAL. AND FRANKLY, HONESTLY, I DON'T THINK THAT THIS IS SOMETHING THAT WE SHOULD BE DISCUSSING NOW WITH ALL THE EMERGENCIES AND THINGS THAT THE TOWN MANAGER AND THE STORM WATER AND THIS AND THAT THAT WE GOT TO FOCUS ON. I'm not even ready to discuss this.

I think sister cities are a really nice idea. As a resident at the time, I thought it was really nice to have these. I didn't necessarily know all the background of each one and which commission, each sister city was established, but I do feel that it's nice to have and I would like to bring it back and I'm in support of this. Thank you. Vice Mayor.

I think everybody's position is very clear and I'm ready to move on.

ALL RIGHT. I JUST WANT TO QUICKLY ADDRESS I JUST WANT TO QUICKLY ADDRESS TWO OF THE ITEMS. TWO OF THE ITEMS. YOU KEEP SAYING THIS WAS A MAYOR YOU KEEP SAYING THIS WAS A MAYOR INITIATIVE TIED TO THE MAYOR. INITIATIVE TIED TO THE MAYOR. I WANT TO REMIND EVERYBODY HERE I WANT TO REMIND EVERYBODY HERE THAT THESE ITEMS, THE TWO THAT THESE ITEMS, THE TWO SISTER CITIES AT LEAST THAT SISTER CITIES AT LEAST THAT PASSED DURING MY TERM WERE PASSED DURING MY TERM WERE PASSED 5-0. 5-0. EVERY SINGLE COMMISSIONER EVERY SINGLE COMMISSIONER APPROVED THIS. APPROVED THIS. THIS WAS DONE AND WE ARE THE THIS WAS DO

Yes. Thank you. Moving on to item 2C, rescission modification in town resolution 2026-3509. Madam Clerk, if you'll read the title of the resolution.

Thank you. Again, this item is tied to the first. It goes with the history. And there was something that created where there was none before. This wasn't a new bush that was planted. And I know someone's going to say, well, we planted a new hedge. Great. Where are we sodding the park now? Should we take down the sign and put our own? That's not the process of this town. And for all the older elected officials here who have been here for decades, I'd be curious how you feel if we decided to take down your signs and put something else because we repainted the side of a building. So it's pretty s

I'll second. We'll move on to public comments. Salida Kranzer, two minutes, please.

No, there's a Salida Kranzer. Oh, I'm sorry. But you know what, you have a card, so just go ahead.

All right, Mrs. Salzhauer, two minutes, please.

And I don't give a crap what you call this park. Thank you. Thank you. All right. No other speaker cards on this item. Closing public comment. Moving on to the commission. Again, this is pretty much hand in hand with the other item. It's aligned. I'm not going to sit here and waste out our two minutes having the same conversation.

Can I have a word? Yes. Number one, there is no chaos here. I feel that now, please, thank you, respect. I feel that now we have a new commission in place, now we're actually getting out of the chaos that we've been in since the last term. What we're trying to do here is basically undo the dictatorship, the Burkett term, that they tried to basically tie our hands. This is very clear, all the things that it was done by Burkett administration. And I want to say a personal experience, me as a resident. I live right there. We live across the street, Commissioner Valdosta. And I remember driving by

All right, I'm going to pass the gavel and make a motion to call the roll.

No, I'm sorry. I'd like to speak on this item as well.

Gerardo, there's a privilege motion on the table right now. Is there a second?

Wait, we haven't even had a discussion. This is important. This is important. All in favor? I'm missing submission.

Commissioner Weingart? Yes. Wait, there's no discussion. How can there be no discussion of an item?

Commissioner, there's a privilege motion on the table. It needs to be responded to right now.

Point of order, I want to ask the parliamentarian. How can we have a vote without any chance for discussion? There was no opportunity. The vice mayor got a chance to speak. We should all have a right to speak. Come on, what is this? And I have facts that are relevant to the vote that need to be stated. So, please, I would like a chance to speak right now.

Understood. There's a privilege motion on the table that needs to be responded to. Okay, but come on. Madam Clerk, can you finish the roll, please?

Vice Mayor, can you give me a chance to speak? You know this is important to me. Vice Mayor, don't call the roll right now. I have facts to offer.

Excuse me, Commissioner, I'm going to ask you to allow the process to go. We've heard you. Madam Clerk, finish calling the roll, please. Isn't that a point of order, though? But there was a point of order. Which was responded to. It wasn't really a question. By the parliamentarian? A point of order. Madam Attorney, if you want to respond and explain the concept of a privilege motion to Commissioner Valdostegui, we can respond to that point of order. There is a privilege motion to call the roll.

Is there a privilege motion on the table or not?

That's what I meant. Thank you. Madam Clerk, let's finish calling the roll.

I do have a privilege motion then. I move to suspend the rules.

Madam Clerk, again, there's a privilege motion on the table. You can't override a privilege motion. I think I can.

I think the parliamentarian, I think a motion to suspend the rules. All right.

I think you are playing your hand. You're trying to delay this process and keep it going.

No, I'm trying. who's not letting me speak.

So what, and I'm sorry, please educate me. What is that?

As the chair of this meeting. So that precedes the point of order, basically.

No, please let me talk. Let me say something that you don't know. Vice Mayor Van Martin? Vice Mayor, please, don't do this.

Yes. Madam Clerk, call the roll, please.

This is on the item. And this, so with the yes on the privilege motion, the point of order was superseded. That's the way it works?

The point of order was responded to. The point of order was requesting from clarity from the town attorney, which we got. Okay, so. All right. Now the roll is being called. It's a yes or no, that's it. It's a no. Okay.

Look, the discussion of the current plaque is completely not based in reality. The existing plaque recognizes Mayor Danziger and the previous commission. This vote is being based on false information. I'm trying to screen share the existing plaque. If you go and you look at it, it is- Commissioner, it's a yes or no at this point.

Guys, discussion is over. Commissioner, please respect our rules. Vote yes or no. You can make your comment on why you want to vote yes or no, but the discussion is over at this point.

I'm so disappointed in those of you who called the question no. Understood.

Thank you. Moving on to item three. I'm going to request we link these items as a discussion since we are already five minutes over. Can I get a motion to link the next one, two, three, four, five, six items into one discussion?

No, these are too important to be lined together like this.

These are like six ordinances. No, this is ridiculous.

Every ordinance is going to come back as a separate item.

The process is discussion items. This is this is this is rushed and this is a garbage process. Understood. Commissioner Wangot.

Vice Mayor Van Merge. Yes. It's a number three. The sixth.

I know, but we're combining, but then discussing, then we didn't discuss the preview. I'm going to explain it very simply.

I mean, I studied. It's a lot of stuff in two hours, guys.

Exactly. We don't have two hours now. We're already outside of this meeting and in the next one. The next meeting literally covers every single one of these items, and every comment you're going to hear now is going to be repeated in five minutes. So it's linking the items. Let's move it forward for the next meeting and start our next meeting, which we're already seven minutes overdue.

ALL RIGHT. SO I'M GOING TO OPEN IT UP VERY SO I'M GOING TO OPEN IT UP VERY SIMPLE. SIMPLE. AGAIN, THIS IS A RECISION OR A AGAIN, THIS IS A RECISION OR A DISCUSSION ON THE RECISION OF DISCUSSION ON THE RECISION OF THESE ORDINANCES. THESE ORDINANCES. I HAVE DRAFTED THOSE I HAVE DRAFTED THOSE ORDINANCES. ORDINANCES. THEY ARE FOR THE MOST PART THEY ARE FOR THE MOST PART SIMPLY JUST UNDERLINING WHAT WAS SIMPLY JUST UNDERLINING WHAT WAS CROSSED OUT IN THE LAST TWO CROSSED OUT IN THE LAST TWO YEARS AND UNDERLINING WHAT WAS YEARS AND UNDERLINING WHAT WAS CROSSED OUT AND CROSSING OUT WHAT CROSSED OUT A Second. All right, we are, since they're moved, we've got Salida Krasner. Two minutes, please.

Thank you, Mrs. Kramser. Michael Kurukin, two minutes, please.

Thank you, Ms. Salazar. All right, Mr. Koussos, two minutes, please.

Thank you. All right. Thank you, Mr. Chrysalis. I've seen no other cards shutting down public comment. I do want to respond to that again. The only thing that wasn't fire and ice and seemed to only be logical sense. This takes away the requirement. George, like this is not, obviously the commission wants input from the P&Z and we have addressed that in the past. But as you saw with the memorial, this almost went on another month or two months before it goes to the commission. The commission sometimes has initiatives, whether it's a park, whether it's park benches that were brought up earlier i

I'll step in, just address a few points, some that were discussed or brought up. As far as having a place to conduct meetings, while I talk to residents on the street all day long, I walk a lot, I run a lot, I engage in casual conversations, some more formal, or meet up in Starbucks. I'm a fellow commissioner at Starbucks last week, meeting with another constituent. And I commend you for your dedication to the town. To be confused, simply reverting to having a office space to hold some formal meetings on behalf of the town to benefit the residents. To try to spin that as grifting or benefiting

Yeah. So, um, all right. So we're doing three, uh, three, eight up to three F. So public participation, I think I'm, I'm going to vote no on this one, like hard. No. I mean, we've, We've been using this new system for the past few meetings. I don't think it created any major disruption. It was an opportunity for the residents to speak more, to let their voices be heard. So I think I understand the reason why, because you're thinking about efficiency and doing things more expeditiously. However, government is always messy and inefficient. There's a certain degree of inefficiency that has to be

All right. So I think that there really isn't time to go through these issues individually. I do want to speak later to Commissioner Weingart's concerns about the office and to some of the specifics. But I'm going to take a very big picture stance here to begin. The mayor presents what's happening here with these ordinances as a simple reversion to past practice. But that's really not, I think, the right way to view this. The departure from past practice, I think happened during the Danziger term. The law stayed the same, but things happened that never happened before in Surfside. You had a ma

I mean, there should be, talking about the sand situation, there should be more. I'm a mother, and I don't let my young kids go alone. So there should be parental supervision in the beach. And I mean, I grew up very close to a beach. I used to dig holes, dig deep holes. But I had parental supervision. We never suffocated because of sand situation. There was no such a thing. Parents were there supervising their kids. And it's part of childhood growing up to dig holes and make fun and make castles. But now you have to like, don't dig, don't do. Everybody's scared to do anything because so many l

Ladies and gentlemen, please, this is not a conversation. So I'm just going to make a couple of quick comments in response not to go through every item. For those watching this meeting and, I guess, recording, feel free to watch the next meeting where we discuss these items in detail. I'll give some background, but again, Commissioner, I appreciate you making this about me because this is not, again, about changing laws, right? You change laws to stop me, which is essentially what you said, but you don't do that. You vote the person out if you don't like the way they do their job. You don't st

We're voting to just to be clear to Brett asked the town attorneys to bring back the ordinance is drafted.

So if I vote no if the commission votes no then the discussion all these items dies. Correct. but if I vote yes, then we're going to keep talking about it later. Yes. Yep. All right. Now I'm okay with keep talking about it. Yes.

All right. Thank you. Uh, can we get a motion to adjourn?

second all in favor aye all opposed all right let's take a five minute recess and then return back at 12 40. seven minutes