City Council - workshop

If we want to have a discussion about something, it leaves us more time, and we don't get... I'm good either way.

Do we have any fear that that may increase more than that?

Do we have monitoring mechanisms that we can kind of, I mean?

Yeah, I just want to make sure we've got a trending mechanism to keep an eye on that. 19% is pretty sizable.

Impact. That transfer from general funds is 23%?

And you see us decreasing another 31,000? No, 31 million?

Is that better? So page one. Line 1200. Line 1200. 314-896, up under regular salaries and wages.

So do we have it breaking down what's the amounts for each position?

So there's two positions. That's a city attorney. That's a city attorney. One second, please. But we have another line item for 475 for the city attorney as well?

But then we have professional services at 702 as well. Is that included for professional services for the outsourcing of a city attorney as well?

But I thought the 314 was for the city attorney risk management for 314.

But I just don't think that's a realistic estimate, because we cannot run a city off of one attorney. We just can't. So I'm just a little confused with budgeting for a city attorney, but then still keeping something for an outside attorney when we know we cannot run a city with one attorney. So I just don't think that's proper expectations to set.

So I guess the question is, realistically, will we have enough money in the budget for paralegals, for about two to three attorneys? What does that look like? Because right now it's just not a realistic...

We need to budget for it now. If we're going to go in-house or we're going to source it out, I think we need to budget for it now because if not, we're going to have a deficit.

Can't make it now. We can't make it on the fly. Well, we need to remove this out the budget.

We have right now, we're budgeting for two things, and we can't make both things happen within this budget. So while we put a city attorney in here and a risk management position in here when we cannot fulfill that obligation, even if we decide to go. We do have risk management. We have to just keep the risk management, but not the city attorney. It just doesn't make sense. Maybe we need to plan for it next year budget.

But what we need to do is, once again, we're putting something in the budget that we're not going to use.

That's why we're having this workshop now to make sure we're not making the same mistakes again. So we should not be budgeting for a position that we're not using and we cannot use because we have not properly vetted what that looks like. So because we have not done it and we had other workshops focused on other things that wasn't important, like removing me from Metro plan, we should have been discussing it then, but that's here or there. So with that being said, we need to remove this city attorney position out the budget until we're able to properly figure out what that looks like. Because

We need to prioritize our needs, not our wants. We can't just write blank checks.

Absolutely. And a city attorney that we know that we cannot fulfill right now is a blank check. Thank you for that support, commissioners. That wasn't support. Well, it sounds like support to me. That's a blank check. If we're saying that we have a city attorney that we know we cannot fulfill because we haven't properly budgeted for it, that's a blank check.

We had all this discussion when we were trying to set our millage rate.

No, you were actually more concerned removing from Metro plan.

But of the 314... This includes the risk management position. That includes the risk management position.

What I'm saying is that we know that we does not have enough money in the budget to create a whole entire legal department. So why would we staff for one position when we know we can't fulfill that position?

I mean, that makes sense if you don't have another outside attorney, but we have outsourced it. We still should not have it in the budget.

Well, no, we'll be doing more than that. We'll be creating a whole entire department, I mean, a legal department. So I guess my question is, so we're not taking anything out of this budget? Do we just sitting here just going through? Well, we just started. But I'm just trying to say that we're not taking anything out. So are we removing things out of the budget or we're not removing things out of the budget? So I can understand what we're doing here. Is this like a listening session? Are we removing things out of the budget? Mayor, I'm just wondering.

No, concerns can come at any given time. And I have a concern that we have something in the budget right now that we have not properly budgeted for. That's half budgeting. Why would we budget for one position when it's just a entire department? So I just don't, I'm making a recommendation that we remove this out the budget because it's just half budgeting. That's just my recommendation. I had approved it last year. We're in a different year. Things changed. The needs have changed. We're going to get better. I promise you that. But the needs have changed of the city, and I'm able to express at any given time where I feel like in this budget there needs to be a change because we approved it last year. We are trying to be more efficient this year. I agree. To say what happened last year, I don't think we should keep talking about last year's budget. What I approved, we're working on a new budget this year.

The only thing that I want to suggest is if we're going to make these ads, because we've got a balanced budget. what I'd like to say is if we're going to make an ad, we need to suggest what we're going to cut. So, I mean, we've got to remember, we work really hard to get to where we're at. I mean, we can wish on one hand and one on the other, but at the end of the day, if you're going to make an ad, give us an idea of where you're going to go cut so as we can also look in that area and, you know, I hate to belabor it, but I don't envy your job.

Which is why I'm emphasizing this now, because we're already below our projected where we need to be.

Of which for other contractual services.

It's on page three. In the 2027, apparently we took 639,500. So it's.

So I make the recommendation that we... where we have $75,000 for city hall second floor renovations that we remove that from the budget and add back in $100,000 for the nonprofits. Because a lot of nonprofits actually depend on that money and have it already budgeted for scholarships and things and senior citizens and stuff. So I think we can delay $75,000 or we can make it the same exact. We'll put $75,000 into that fund and go ahead and take off the city hall second floor renovations.

Renovations, yes. Because that's not a direct impact on the community, the renovations for the second floor, but that $75,000 is direct impact. For the non-profits. For the non-profits, yes.

I don't think, I mean, I walked up there, I mean, a lot, and I don't think these conditions are that third world country living. It's just not. That's not how I would describe it.

come to work every single day complaining about the walls and the paint and the flooring.

I do not think every single day the staff come there complaining. I just don't think that's realistic. I think that's a mischaracterization of county. What happens? But I feel that the community does want the grant program. And removing that grant program would affect a lot of the communities that we serve in the nonprofit agencies that we serve. I mean, that's something they was proud of. There's a direct impact of that. And I'm 100% against removing that nonprofit grant. but if the council feel that the needs of, you know, of marble floors and new carpet and new paint is more important than

And I'll do a live video so I can show the community that there's not paint chipping They're not sitting on floors. That's not what's happening up there. And I'll definitely, when I leave here, I'll go and do a recording of that, because that is not what's going on there at all. That's fine. And of course, I do not want staff, and if staff is never complaining to me about feeling like they're walking into a third world country when they go up into the second floor. No one's ever referenced the third world country. Well, the sand and paint is chipping off the wall. That's just not what's happen

No, it hasn't been decades and decades, but that is your personal opinion. And if the whole entire council agree that it's more important to renovate the second floor to provide more luxury than to serve the community, then I 100% disagree with that.

And to be clear to the community, please, the mayor has decided to remove our discretionary funds. I didn't decide that. Who took out the budget?

But you took it out the budget. We didn't take it out the budget. This is your budget. This is the mayor's budget. You presented us this budget, so you removed it. So the mayor has removed it. Our discretionary funds, the commissioners can no longer support your organization. So all the ones that we have been supporting for years, we can no longer do that because the mayor has moved out the budget, his budget. Our request is put back in the budget. So you can put that on line item as well. Then I'm requesting that it be put back on the budget as well. The commissioners discretionary funds that

We need to keep the conversation to the topic we were talking about was commissioners.

Right now I'm taking a position that because of the budget cuts and stuff, I'm not even entertaining the idea of addressing our salaries right now. Because I understand the needs of the community. I'd rather take whatever increase in my salary and put it back into the fund for the nonprofits. That's my position on it. So I won't be taking an increase in the salary right now.

I'd like to take that $75,000 and hire a fireman or a policeman, too.

and then we can take that $210,000 as well for the office furniture replacement. That's in the budget as well. I wanna remove that line item out of the budget as well. I just think right now that's just not critical, it's a critical need right now. It's a nice want. I mean, I work in city government, I worked in the federal government, and I worked in the county. And some of our furniture was 20 and 30 years old, but it was a service industry and it was about the community. And I think our staff would want a pay increase instead of a new chair that they can't take home and enjoy.

I'm pretty sure they would want that. They want to continue to get a pay increase. Or they would want us to be able to create a new position to help carry the load.

We've moved off commissioners. Are we somewhere else? I don't see none of the stuff we're talking about. There's a line item. Oh, you're right.

75,000 city hall floor renovation, $210,000 for office furniture replacements. So I definitely think we can find some money there to contribute to the nonprofits.

Bouncing back. We're going backwards. We're not going forward. I guess facilities is going to take the hit.

I do. So the $75,000 for printing of the city newsletter, what does that service look like? There's another $75,000 that we can put into the budget for the nonprofits.

But it's out of the public information, so we move that to that budget?

Is this for utilities or is it not for utilities? The newsletter is 72. The 72,000?

It's transferred from utilities over to this? Yes.

But $74,000 of other beautiful printed materials.

That's $74,000 right there. Plus the $2,000.

No, I just wish that the mayor would have consulted with us before he created a whole entire department. That's all.

Yeah, but we didn't do it through the budget process. He just created it and threw it on us.

You did not have a meeting with the council to discuss creating a whole entire department. You reclassified a transportation coordinator essential service position and created a whole entire department without coming to the council. That's exactly what happened.

With resident's input following the strategic plan. There was no resident's input when we reclassified this position. It wasn't resident's input, it wasn't a commissioner's input, it was an executive decision of the mayor to create a whole entire department without speaking or talking with the residents. It was the residents' money, and you did not, having any conversation with residents or with the council before you create this position. Now we have the positions in the budget and we gotta figure out a way to pay for it.

I want to thank you for working with them on that. That was a good catch.

Ideals like that's going to help us get through this tough time.

Can I add something to that? Absolutely. I would suggest to the other commissioners, both applicants, the police chief and the fire chief, there is a lot of work going on behind the scenes that everybody... I encourage you to reach out to them because the information they're sharing is, it's mind boggling to know that there's some low hanging fruit out there that we can take advantage of. Both police and fire.

Impact fees and other creative methods that we can do, but strategically locating our whole strategic plan for the city as a whole. Because like I said, we've kind of expanded A lot more than our coverage can maintain right now, and there's some creative ideals that are being had behind the scenes, and I encourage you all to catch up on it.

The ideals that I'm hearing that are coming from the creative minds that we've got a fire chief and a police chief that are, they understand the problem at hand, and they're very active behind the scenes making sure that we adapt to it.

Any other questions? The only thing that I would suggest is the $25,000 for the tree maintenance. At least send somebody from our staff out there to evaluate. Some of them trees are at their extended life cycle. It's only going to get worse. So make some decisions on... Yeah, you know, cosmetic. At least get the ones that we know are going to fall in this upcoming year. Okay.

So our city attorney, can we elaborate? Because from my understanding, we can partner with and use city funds, but we just can't 100% do it ourselves. I thought there could be no type of city funds used for those events.

Not the CRA, no. We're talking about like Hispanic Heritage, Martha Luther King Jr. Parades, Juneteenth. New Senate bill. I'm sorry, I couldn't hear what you said. That new Senate bill that passed. New Senate bill that passed.

So my recommendation is that the $210,000 that I requested be removed for renovations, for furniture, that we put all these events back into the budget and just Because these are community events. They get the community out. A lot of different nonprofit organizations, this is kind of how they support their budget throughout the year. Definitely counseling Christmas parade has been going on for 50 plus years. I think that's bizarre. But I do think that if we remove that $210,000 for office furniture, then we're able to continue these different events. So I'm recommending, should I go line item

Health and Fitness Fest, the Community Events Grants Program, the Halloween in the Park, the Holiday Tree Light Up, Camp WeWAP, Breakfast with the Bunny, the 4th of July Hispanic Heritage Emancipation Day, Martin Luther King Jr. Parade, South Apopka Minister Alliance, Spring and Fall Rotary Fair with Apopka Rotary Club, the Apopka Christmas Parade, Memorial Day Ceremony with the VFW Pulse 10147, Veterans Day VFW Pulse 10147, the Apopka Art and Foliage Festival, Juneteenth, our New Year's Eve celebration, and also the scholarship revenue from AdventHealth scholarships. I think removing the othe

Okay. So there's more funding for it. There's Christmas at the budget meeting.

Yes. That could be included back. I thought it was added back to it.

Yeah, we added, it was like $35,000. Okay, so $35,000. Okay. Well, I'm pretty sure there's other furniture cuts we can make in here as well.

Oh, I didn't ask for that. Yeah, I didn't ask for that.

It was pretty cool, I was there. Yeah, it was great this year.

We made $4,000, but we're saying it cost us $4,000. So is this... And then the... Well, it just helps offset the cost of...

Well, I think we keep it in the budget and depending on what the advertisement looks like, we get with our city attorney to see if there's some needs to be with that partnership, that language fits.

The fairs, and they've been around forever.

I think a workshop would be great to kind of, because I know a lot of the commissioners, including myself, don't know the history of Can't We Wild. Of course, we went back and looked at some of the videos, but I think having a council, a meeting to kind of look at what the, because parks are not made to generate money. They're not. That's not what parks are for. So I don't think, I know from, I understand the history and the reason why we purchased it was because of the, it's been around forever in Apopka. And I know that's a lot of the residents want us to keep the park. So I think that we ne

I'd be somewhat hesitant to, it is an asset. It's a property that we have already made a major investment to. I want to kind of let everybody know that 20 years ago we were promised a downtown center and we spent a major investment on that. We got a shopping center. Not that there's anything wrong with that. It was just I think we went backwards when we sold it. So let's be careful. It's a prime piece of real estate. And what you'd hate to do is let it go. And once you sell it, you can't control its destiny. And right now we can. So I would urge you to. to at least entertain the thought of mak

Mr. Mott, doesn't the Olympic team still exercise, do their exercise through Ferndale up through the high points of that ridge and you start at Clarny and run over to, that would be a good opportunity jump off point to have an ending over here that could actually do the whole lake in a loop.

We're talking about the same thing. I just used the wrong term.

Page 52. What pages are these? Page 52. 52 through... 54. 54.

On what was removed. But a lot of that with Metro Plan, like the Vision Zero, I mean, when you guys receive the training, you can see that's some of the things that they can incorporate. So some of the data you can receive from Metro Plan as well.

Please. Yes. Building inspection falls under community development.

Is there any reason why we can't have that pushed over to fire? That is. And the only reason I say that is as a marketing tool. Yeah. Our developers, they'll come in here and they'll plaid something, mixed use, and then down the road, they reinvent the wheel and turn the development into something else. If we had a means, the building department's the last people to go through that, them and the fire marshal. At that time, we can make sure that the mixed use is compliant with the impact fees that were charged for it.

And the permits because they follow the permits. What I'm trying to do is create a mechanism to follow the permitting process but yet have a, having the means to either make the developer adhere to the change or ensure that we get the necessary collections of the change back way of impact fees, make sure the services meet the intent use of the project.

This is when I saw that I was like, well, when did they go to community? And I'm just trying to circle back and find out why they're there.

Well, the only reason I say that is we have a couple items that come before us where the intent of the project has changed and it's either gotten litigated or there was a mixed use or we come to find out they changed the project and they don't have the right exit plan. or business items like that that come before us.

But the fire marshal and the building official, they were... They were can in hand.

And I just see service fees there that we could, you know, that we're not picking up on. We're being asked for the service, but we didn't get compensated for it.

Can we have a discussion with the police and fire chief to make sure that we can strategically locate our fire stations where our service area needs are? and have a better understanding about fitting our extended boundaries to fit the stations that we currently have and our response times are not gonna be affected.

I think that strategic plan would be better served if we could collectively with those two partners you know, get a consensus on our area served and our services are required to service the areas needed.

Are we taking into consideration that Seminole County is, if you go by all the retention ponds, they're full. So, I mean, we need to really pay attention to our surrounding partners because they're getting to a point where they're gonna start shed their water and we're at the bottom of the hill, so.

I'm not trying to put you on the spot. Yes, no. I'm not sure the other dais members.

Do we have any spray fields that we can divert that water to? Yes.

The next four weeks are going to be our rainy season.

Ish. But we don't have any concerns with this upcoming season of an event occurring there.

Please. Do we do our own backflow preventer? preventative maintenance, especially on our commercial backlog preventers, or do we sub that out?

That department's fully staffed, so we're not running any deficiencies there?

I know it's very important that we stay on top of that, that especially our quarterlies and preventative maintenance on it don't need to be overlooked. Yes.

I commend you for doing that because it's greatly needed. Yes, thank you.

Do we see Amendment 3 affecting our tipping fees?

Could we be asked to make any offsets in that area from the county?

I have a quick question. So the home buyer assistance program, did we remove that $50,000? Yes.

That's why I was saying in the final budget. We'll have those changes. You'll have those changes. Perfect, thank you.

So to be clear, you said the 15 positions is what are those? Is it the ones that are already?

So it's 15 plus the six? Or the six plus the 15?

Okay, so those were the six firefighters. And the 15, you have the list of those 15? It's in your book. Where in the book? I'm sorry, which page? This one, okay. New positions, request those.

So these are the positions that are still in here?

In addition to that, I know I've brought up several times that if we can create some type of policy for any type of time a position is reclassified, I think that's extremely important because when we actually look at this budget and we decide on which positions are essential positions, we vote on those positions. So anytime that those positions change, I think there should be a policy in place to make sure that the council agrees with that change. So I've asked several times that a policy is put in place. So I'm asking Mayor, would you put a policy in place or bring forth a policy so the commi

Thank you. And the goal is not to take away from the professionalism, but also to make sure that we kind of understand what's going on. Because once again, I have expressed my concern that essential position was actually reclassified in the residence nor the council had any say so in it. So I do think it's definitely important. So thank you for that.

I got one from Blanche. And really, it's kind of a softball. And I love the transparency of what we've done. We've actually, you know, you've gotten really, you got out of the weeds and really got into the nitty gritty of what we're showing here on the board is a true representation of what it takes to run the city. You know, we've thrown all the, we've actually thrown everything at the window and got the budget down. How much of this, of the reserve, are we actually using to adjust where we are now? Is it $4 million?

$6 million? Yes. And that $6 million, I just want to try to circle back to our original millage rate that we were trying to set. None of this pain that we're feeling right now is a direct reflect of that, correct?

And there again, with that said, us spending that extra $20 million up there at Golden Gem Pond had a drastic effect on what we're currently doing now.

The funds used to make the repairs, did they come out of a separate fund?