Town Council - public_hearing

I can explain that. Thank you. So back in 2019, I believe, the council, when they initiated the short-term rental fees, they had a clause in there that enabled condo associations to totally opt out. So each individual owner would not have to pay. I got you.

Yeah. So the thought process was they're going to do the policing of the weekly, nightly, all that, and we wouldn't have to. Now, if they want to opt out, one payment for the entire complex. So I personally think that fee, if we can do it, should be even more because you're saving the condos thousands of dollars. So we can talk about that later, but that's what the opt-out is.

Let's keep that one for discussion, yeah.

So Nancy, this is Scott. I just want to make sure that changing the opt-out fee is not changing the ordinance. So we're still protecting our grandfather abilities, is that correct?

Given that, it'd be my recommendation that we table the short-term rental increase until we get a full picture, maybe the MMP meeting, we can look at everything.

I just want to make absolutely sure because the state, you know, they could come in and say the entire state is nightly or the entire state's weekly or the entire state's monthly. I mean, we want to protect our island.

Carolyn, can you pull the mic up maybe closer to you?

have a quick question mayor um why did we separate it i like it separate but it sounds like we we separated them to make it cleaner uh with the uh the add-ons is is there a reason we did that is it helping us with our record georgina why don't you come on up and explain how we were um

THAT MAKES SENSE. SO CERTAIN PORTIONS OF THAT FEE ARE ATTRIBUTED TO A RESOURCE THAT NEEDS TO DO SOMETHING OR JUST, OKAY, THAT'S PERFECT. THANK YOU. OF COURSE.

I do have one question. Yes. Have we seen an increase in the use of the private providers for plan review and inspections, or has that been somewhat?

My question was really around, is this a trend that we've seen developing or is it kind of just been pretty consistent since the start?

Yeah, I'm trying to determine the risk of it actually having a greater impact versus less, that's all. Okay, thank you.

I've got probably what might be considered a stupid question, but sometimes I can be stupid. You're talking about deferring, and it costs us $158,387 a year. Why is that if we're not paying any interest on it?

How is delaying not paying anything costing us?

I did watch it through the whole thing. Thank you. I guess a couple of things. The first comment I want to make is that finding the cuts across the entire thing I thought was a good job that the town staff did as opposed to looking strictly at the large line items but actually taking out of each of the small line items. So I want to commend you on that. I wasn't sure if it was the time to ask it, but when we started looking at some of the fees that did not carry forward, I was surprised to see that the personal watercraft and parasailing fee was not carried forward. Could you give me some reas

That's all you had, John, from this whole presentation?

I can go ahead. I do like the removing her room. fee out of the short-term rental um that seemed to complicate it although it was something i had considered on the 9th but yeah so i'm i'm good with that um the opt out i think we should perhaps talk amongst ourselves about perhaps maybe raising that a little bit that is that sounds low compared to what they get um The chairs and umbrellas, I agree. The per unit fee would only make the cost of managing it higher. And then that would raise the rate and it would be a cycle. I'd like to talk about the parking when everyone's ready. Maybe we can jus

And I'm also good with removing the percentage as well. Because those fees, if I'm understanding correctly, they have to be in line with our cost to manage that, right? So whether it's a 3% or a dollar figure, you're going to be doing the same thing.

Okay. So I'd like to start with parking fees. One of the things I'd like to discuss is maybe having different rates at different times of the day and different seasons. An example would be I talked to some of the business owners up in Times Square and said if we could reduce the parking rate after a certain hour in the evening, Would you, do you think it could bring you more business? And I heard from a few of them that said, if you could drop that down to maybe 7 o'clock, I could still get a dinner crowd that may not come. Maybe it wouldn't be dinner, maybe it would just be drinks and hors d'

Yeah, they have a dynamic pricing model based on how close you want to be to Mallory Square, how close you want to be. the downtown area and they also have a seasonal dynamic to it. You know, I think the best thing and most prudent thing we should do is perhaps go with the 6-5. It's my understanding that that would be easy with our software company to do, maybe Thanksgiving to Easter or November 15th to April 15th.

Make it $6. But I think we need to have a longer, more in-depth conversation about what our software company can do, what our goals are. These guys will be able to run some numbers. We can do some forecast modeling, what that dynamic pricing would look like. But it makes no sense. I totally get what the guys in Times Square are saying. The same spot, March 17th, today is September 23rd. That same spot costs the same price. it makes no sense. And, you know, the technology we have, but there's a cost associated with it. So I'd like to maybe approve the 6-5 and then table, because we can always c

Even better if it doesn't cost us anymore if we don't have to.

Yeah, because I think it makes sense. Right now, sunset after 5 o'clock, two, three bucks to park. We'll get some cars because we're getting none at $5. And we're certainly going to get none at $7. Right.

And you advertise it and maybe draw them here.

And I know, Dan, you had said, hey, people want to know what they're going to pay, but if we could have, you know, a sign at the bridge, just like when you're driving through an express lane, you know if you hit that express lane, it's going to be $3, $2, $7. Maybe just have something like that or have it on an app.

I'm saying for right now, I think we should have a discussion in a month or two just about parking and come up with a solution that everybody, I mean, not everybody's going to be happy, but come up with a solution that makes sense.

So on ‑‑ I don't ‑‑ does the public have this? Is it available?

So I have a specific question about if we're going to raise the short-term rental fee, if you look on the far right, you'll see that it would be a $50,000 benefit to the town. If we currently have roughly 1,250 rentals and we're raising the price by 100, why the numbers don't work unless we didn't credit any staff into the short-term rental program and we're budgeting people next year. That's the only way. Am I making a mistake?

Okay. Because one of the concerns we had was, and this is back Six seven years ago when this discussion came up I mean we we looked at a source of revenue and then I was gonna be how we're gonna how we're gonna fund workforce housing on the island and then it in the the counter argument was all you're gonna do is Bring in all this money just for staff and what's what's your benefit? You're just you're just paying for staff and it seems that if we're raising a The fee is 33%, and considering doubling or tripling the opt-up fee, I think we should get, it should not just go to staff. I think ther

Thank you. Going back to Bay Oaks Pool, I see we're providing and paying for internet, even though it's going to be closed. Help me understand that, why we're doing that. No, sir.

Thank you. Good. I guess, you know, we've talked about the parking. I have a concern. I mean, I drove by 7-Eleven today and gas was $4.48 a gallon. That was up, I think, what, 20 cents since we were here two weeks ago, and that was a concern then. I did not get any emails praising us raising parking rates. They were all against it. So I guess that's a major concern of mine of raising that. I talked about a tipping point two weeks ago. I'm not sure we are not at a tipping point right now When you spend $4.48 a gallon to come down here and then have to pay an increase in parking, I think we're h

It doesn't sound like we're even in... even on the same page with that. If Chad says six, you're saying four. I thought there was only two, honestly.

Don't the rakers have to pay for the bird monitors?

But what are you enforcing? If they're paying for a monitor, what are you enforcing?

no um well we did receive an email at least i did regarding the non-resident passes and it had me thinking about the fact that is that an optimistic number to say i get that we'll be able to sell that many passes or we believe we will be based on the santa bel model However, does that actually get offset by. Folks that are no longer paying an hourly rate and also limit the services that are available for a residence to use those available lots. And I'm thinking especially obviously in season. Does that defer those non resident parking passes to. potentially employees of local businesses which

Yeah, I was just wanting to include that in the larger parking discussion that I think you were talking about having at a later date as far as... Yeah.

If we do want to pick up to that point, right, the larger items, for example, elimination of performance-based pay and seniority pay has got a 214, but is that a binary decision, or could that be Split, sorry, is that a binary decision? In other words, is it all or nothing? Or could it be a reduction in the performance-based pay of capped at 10%, maybe down to 5%, for example? That might be an opportunity to gain a good chunk of money that would be not a complete reduction of services or a complete elimination of a benefit to our town employees.

And that, Talisa, would be in addition to the COLA? Yes. Is that right? And in the past, has everyone received a bonus or some may get higher percentage because they really went all out? Sure. And some didn't perform so well and so there was no bonus. There was COLA but no bonus.

Thank you for that. I have a soft spot in my heart for the employees of this town. I really do. But I remember being in the private sector as well. And when the company didn't do well, I didn't get a bonus. And I just think that's a reality of the world. You shouldn't be expecting a bonus is a bonus. So I mean, when I was in radio, my ratings were high. I got a bonus. Bought a real nice TV, lost it in a divorce. But again, it was not something I counted on.

Could you refresh my mind about the pay plan study adjustment of 45,000, what is that again?

I will. I will point out that while I wasn't on council last year, I participated in the budget hearing and felt that our reserves were inadequately funded, and I'm not a big fan of paying tomorrow for what you bought today. Yeah, I mean, it's ‑‑ So that's my comment.

No, I think I'm ready to hear from the public. I think they've waited long enough. Sure.

Scott, you want to add anything before we go? No, I'd like to hear from the public.

Okay. John? Just something that was on slide 50 that we didn't get to about the mooring field. It says one of the expense increases is a merchant credit card fee of $6,000. We're absorbing that instead of passing that on?

I'm talking about on slide 50, the proposed expense increases under mooring operations. We pay a fee that we can't pass on. Merchant credit card fees, $6,000. We're incurring that instead of passing that on?

I guess I'm not following, but that's not unusual for me.

Earlier, we had talked about how we had absorbed credit card fees instead of passing them on. Shouldn't this just not be a pass-through to the customer instead of us absorbing that?

I think I'm kind of understanding, but it should be revenue neutral if you pass it through anyway, shouldn't it?

I guess I'm okay with it as long as we're not eating the costs. No, we are not going to eat the costs anymore. Because I didn't see anything break out in the revenue increase, I guess, is what concerned me.

Because this one's just showing the mooring field, but we have other fees associated with other things. You use your credit card to pay your water bill. Yeah.

Yeah, but shouldn't it then have shown as an increase in the mooring field revenue?

All right, I don't need to beat this to death, as you would like to say, Mayor.

Oh, I hate to be the heavy and the bad guy all the time, but what the hell. I guess I was born for the role. I guess I'm not going to be here next year. And so consistency is always important to who I am. But I think if we tighten our belts a little bit more and raise some of the things that we have talked about raising, YOU KNOW, WITH THE THREE THINGS FROM LAST TIME, WITH THE PARKING TICKET INCREASE, THE ANNUAL PARKING PERMIT INCREASE AND THE NON-RESIDENT PARKING PASSES, THAT ELIMINATED THE 339,000 OR I'M SORRY, THE 290 SOME THOUSAND. YEAH, 299. SO AND THEN LET'S TIGHTEN OUR BELTS A LITTLE MO

Actually, I didn't include the credit card fee recovery because to me that should have been done a long time ago. What was the other one? The 500 non-resident parking passes, the parking ticket increase, and the annual parking permit increase.

Yeah, I wasn't counting the merchant credit card fees, but that's fine.

And then no bonuses. So then there's over $830,000 in savings there.

If this was proposed, though, why wouldn't that have already been done? You're the folks that brought this to us with these additional cost control actions with the figure of additional hiring freeze. I didn't ask for that. That was brought to us with this figure. Why wouldn't that have already been done?

Honestly, and I won't beat this dead horse either, but if we're talking about all options, I'd like to see the sale of the old house. It should have been on there. I mean, if we're talking about all options. You can't put that on budget, John. It's an option. If you're talking about closing other places like Mount House, is that really a true option? We have closure of Bay Oaks Recreation Center on there, closure of Mount House, and closure of Mooring Field, and cessation of marine operations, closure of Bayside Park. So those are real options? I mean, they're there, but they're not real optio

John, let me, they're, they're options and selling the lands also an option, but you can't budget it because you don't know a, what you're going to sell it for, or if you're even going to sell it. So you can't, you can't, you can't make a budget based on, you know, I've, I've, I've, we've got a lot for sale right now. I'm not basing my next year's budget on us for sure selling that lot. I mean, there's, hundreds of watts for sale. So you can't budget something that you haven't sold yet. That's the whole point.

I'm just saying all options should be on the table.

I understand you can't put a dollar figure right now. Right. I think the exercise we're going through here right now is what can we highlight in dark green to get that yellow number bigger? And do we do the stuff in the brown? Because as we said, we'd like to get some reserve money. And I think Will's gotten some good priorities. Now, if it were me, I think we should do everything in that dark green, I think we should do. And we should come back in a month or two and revisit the parking. I think it's just too much for us to figure out today. If we know based on Jeff's analysis that we raise pa

Rebecca? I can handle all of the dark green. To me those are easy. I, too, am concerned about staff. And the reason I'm concerned about staff is it is not fair. It's not fair. It is a fact that in season our staff sits in traffic a couple hours every day at least just to come here. There's no pay for that. And we do compete with someone who might be able to get a job in their community that's five minutes from their home. I don't want the ones who were laid off who may be not great employees becoming our employees because we're the only job they can get. That one worries me. So I'm totally com

um that's where i am i i have to think about this the left side but i could tell you the 931 000 that one's easy for me john uh i agree with everything in the dark green being required um i know we talked about deferring the parking discussion That's one of the largest revenue sources that we have. I don't know that we are at that tipping point actually. And I would personally would be okay instead of going from the 6-5 split to the 6 solid and that puts another 130,000 back in there. 131,000. 131. And that could go to reserve.

I for sure think we need to all agree that we need to have a Further discussion, whatever we decide tonight, we need to look at different models, dynamic pricing. We need to get more public input and maybe offer, as the mayor said, maybe offer some lower rates when things are slow or free. But we've got to give Jeffrey time to do that modeling. We just can't chat GBT right this second. And it's more than just CHAP GBT. It's getting input from the business owners, island residents, you know, everyone, and looking at what that revenue will be.

I'm going to throw something out there. Yeah, go ahead. I'm going to throw something out there because we were stuck here for quite a while on the 6-5. I'm going to say it. What if, what if we go to 7-6? Just what if? How much more does that give us, Jeffrey?

So one of the things I'm thinking is if the audit committee meetings start back up monthly Scott, could you see something that could be looked at at the audit committee to see with a report from Jeffrey or Phil, you know, how's that revenue coming? Are we on target or did we really cut ourselves, you know, cut our nose off to spite our face or get feedback, you know, on a monthly or quarterly basis to see if we should make a better decision?

Carolyn, help me if I'm wrong, but In the past, Joe would have financials about two months behind, three months behind. So if we're meaning in April, he had January's numbers. Is that kind of what your target's going to be?

So to answer your question, that's kind of why I want to have this on the MMP meeting, because they can not only take that data that Carolyn's going to provide and say, hey, look, the tricky thing with parking, though, is the way Joe had it, Let's say you're hoping to do $1.2 million. Well, January would be at $200,000. Well, you've got to remember, January is a seasonal month, so he didn't have it perfect. So it's almost like if you could really do it well, you say, hey, we're going to do half our revenue January through April, which makes sense. It's just like a vacation rental. You know you

Or like some year-over-year numbers, you know, with that increase to see if we're still on target. That's really what works in this town.

By month, right, because we are so seasonal.

Yeah, we're so seasonal. Looking at your Parker revenue in September, you're like, oh, we're off. Well, no, because you're only doing –

So anyway, we haven't talked about seven. I'm just saying let me let that sink in because knowing that we can come back if we've shot ourself in the foot, that can give us some money to do some of these other things or put more in reserve.

Can you explain that further? We're just not going to raise anything then or until we have the further discussion or?

So I originally had thought that because we're coming into season that we do the 6-5 and then we make sure that we all come back and have a lengthy discussion with all the partners on, you know, our business partners or, you know, Residents everything else to see if we can come and with mr Rizzo see if we can come up with a good plan and do some price price modeling see what what's best and it I Just don't think it's today, but I'd sure like to see it in One of the next two M&P meetings and that way we can adjust we can get a final adjustment on our parking fees for season that everybody's not

Well, we can't do that now, but I think in our M&P meeting... But I think it's part of our discussion in the M&P. Absolutely part of our discussion in the M&P. How can we encourage people to come down here and help the businesses, especially downtown?

Scott, I agree with you completely about being able to refine it, et cetera. I support what the mayor is saying about not going 6-5, but actually going to the 6th. it's another $130,000 that then will be budgeted for us to be able to use.

I'll tell you what, let's do some horse training. I'll do six if we can make sure that we get that M&P meeting done as quickly as possible.

You're saying six across the board you can live with. Talk about it quickly.

Yeah, I'm okay with six, but we've got to talk about it quickly. We're budgeting reasons.

Because that will help us determine what to do with the extra.

I have trouble supporting an increase. I understand, Mayor, where you've come from with your history, and I appreciate that and thank you. But my concern is I think a lot of people came here to support this island after what we had been through. And I worry that we're now pushing that goodwill further, that they'll just go other places. So I just can't support the increase.

I don't have a desire to do either of those. I think there is probably room in the performance metrics to make some improvement. I am certainly not in favor of eliminating it. However, it's an area that I feel like there could be some substantial savings available. Like I said, I felt like those were all affirmative.

I cannot put a hiring freeze on the financial director. I just can't. That's too critical. And the Bay Oaks, what is that role? I can't put that one. What would that freeze be? Do you know, Talese?

I think we all have to remember that this is a budget.

That's it, I think, were you talking? No, I'm good.

John? Already weighed in, so you know where I am.

Oh, no, I just thought of something. And when you said maybe Carolyn, sorry, Carolyn, that she's in the room and here we are talking about her. Or her role, that role, that FTE, that comes with the benefits and all that other stuff. I would have a feeling if I'm wrong, let me know, but to outsource her probably comes with a much higher fee. So we're not saving anything by outsourcing this one FTE, or not an FTE if we outsource it. You know what I'm saying? Like we can get Carolyn either way. I'm thinking one way. Oh, we don't pay the... One way, we're not paying expenses, you know, insurance a

When you see an increase like after the hurricane, we need way more permitting people. That's where you don't hire the people. That's where you use contractors. But in a permanent position like a finance director, be much better to have, not go through, no offense, but not go through a contracting company like a Robert Half. And keep continuity.

Do we have to pay to end that contract and bring her on board, or is there a cost associated with that?

So we don't have to pay anything to bring her on board as a full-time employee? There's not a buyout provision.

It's the negotiation queen. Okay. That's good to know.

I think we keep kicking that can down the road. At some point, and you saw after Ian, we didn't receive any funding because we didn't have a plan in place, and our waterways are crucial, and it's part of our strategic plan. So if there's going to be something that we – SPEND MONEY ON, I THINK, OF THE REST OF THE, WELL, YEAH, BECAUSE WE MAY WANT TO START REPAYING THAT BRIDGE LOAN, BUT THIS IS, OF ALL THOSE THINGS, THAT'S THE LOWEST AMOUNT.

Could you prioritize those, Will, and or Talisa? You know, these, I mean, I think we have to answer the public's outcry for short-term rental, you know, code violations in property.

I think that's already covered. That one is covered outside of these. I think the best way to look at this one, Rebecca, is we've got, I'm hearing a lot of complaints about all the empty lots that are overgrown. eyesore for sure, health and safety for sure. It could be a revenue generator for us. It's either going to be one of two things. We're either going to get those lots cleaned up, which we want, or we're going to get code on them. Get them done. There's a lot of front-end work that Nancy and Phil and their team has to do, but I think that person would pretty much pay for himself.

And or help, you know, just clean up the island.

I agree. I agree. That's answering the public's concern and paying for itself. I think that's a no-brainer for me. It sounds like you feel the same way.

I agree with the discussion that's gone on so far. I believe that the canal dredging is something that should remain a priority, although as long as it's just part of the general fund, I could also, my concern has been the reserve, the reserve account and being able to ensure that we're able to cover that. how that money actually gets allocated to the projects through the year, I think we can wait to make that decision. And as far as the FTEs, I believe that the grant staffing is almost like our lobbyist in that it's going to pay dividends for itself far beyond the cost of it. Obviously, the c

I'd like us to explore with the canal dredging that the owners of the canals would help to fund that if that's possible.

Yeah, historically we did that, excuse me, but this is just the study.

But you want them to chip in for the study. Yeah. All right. Good to you.

Everybody should have skin in the game. Fair enough.

Did that model not take then revenue from the whole island and just use it in Fairview House, at least for the half that the town covered?

Were there outcries from the rest of the island that said,

That's $650-ish. So it increases, the increase goes up to $1,062,641 on the revenue options, and that brings our emergency funder reserve to $658,839.

I've already expressed what my concerns were about the fee increases.

No, I'm good with the previous discussion. Thank you.

Thank you for all your hard work today, for putting in the extra hours, and for being here, and appreciate you. Thank you. With that, I'll move to adjourn.