City Council - workshop

Thank you. you Thank you. you Thank you.

Good morning, everybody. Welcome to Tampa City Council Workshop. I would like to call this meeting to order. And who has the invocation this morning? Moment of silence. Moment of silence. Can everybody stand for a moment of silence, please? Council Member, would you lead us in the play?

She just stepped out for a moment, but she'll be back any minute Okay First up on the agenda, we're going to talk to Ms. Abby Feeley.

Before we turn it over, Councilwoman Herjig.

I just wanted to say, please make sure you send us all those invites so that we can put them on our calendars. You got it. Thank you.

Good morning, Joe. Start with your name, please.

Hold on one second. There we go. We're trying to get the presentation on our audience. Okay. Everyone sees it? We got it? Good to go.

Do you feel like this is an appropriate place to pause for questions? I think we could, yeah. Council have any questions? Councilwoman Hurtado?

Can you go back to the slide that had the really, really small font?

Yeah, the Dennis slide. The DR font. So the thing that concerns me about this is that as the building gets larger, the rate gets smaller, and I really don't want to be incentivizing larger residential properties. Commercial... that's fine, but residential, what we're trying to do is build more housing here. And some of that's going to be smaller by nature. Um, anything that's above 5,000 square feet, they really need to be paying that 33.35. I'm sorry. I just like, if you're, if you're building a massive home, then you can afford massive. like fees like that I just I don't have any I don't hav

That's fine. But I was just curious because that Hillsborough County is a significantly more. And so I'm just curious. Hillsborough County generally is because it's our true next door neighbor. I'm interested. I don't know that was Hillsborough County in all of these comparisons. OK, it was so. But this is the one that just made me stop for pause. And I wanted to make sure that that was like a rationale because we don't have a lot of commercial And we do need to keep the commercial that we have and incentivize more. So is that one of the reasons that we're? And whoever has their phone that's m

Well, I appreciate it. But also the secondary thing, I would love for someone to talk to Hillsborough County. Like, how are they coming up with these numbers? It doesn't mean that we need to do that, that we need to go to these numbers, because I do believe that being lower numbers for commercial really does incentivize commercial to stay within the city limits but but how are they how are they coming up with those numbers just because they're our neighbor yep and jc probably can also talk too because of he sits on boa which is building officials across the state you know how other municipalit

Yeah, first point of order, Mr. Chair. Especially on workshop days, could you please, and nobody's done this yet, but could you please enforce the rule that we have to be called on to speak and that we don't interrupt each other? Because we're going to have probably more back and forth later, but I want to make sure that we do it in an organized way. Because just like we can't hear, the public can't hear if we're talking over each other. So just for the public, this is the fees we're paying, not impact fees, right? We're not talking about impact fees here?

This is just application fee. Okay. Just to clarify that. And the law says you can have a, you said, just to repeat what you said, you can have a certain fund on top of it. reserve fund on top but we can't charge is there a certain percentage that we besides the reserve fund is there certain a Percentage kind of markup that we can charge on top of what the actual cost is or it's just it's just we charge the actual cost plus Whatever the reserve fund is We can charge the actual cost of the department Plus if you have the ability if you have cushion from where your current reserve is to where yo

And Ms. Feely mentioned an expedited fee. Is that in here? Did I miss that or is that? No, no. Could you just talk to us about those fees? Like if somebody, I forgot what you called it, a rush fee or expedited fee, an additional fee.

Can I ask you, I know your office gets a lot of complaints because there's so much growth in our area, and you've come before us several times to talk about how you're trying to address that. right now we're talking about cost recovery with the process you have and there's a lot of money there but is is there a higher level of service that we could offer if if if customers have to trade off between speed and and cost and it is there so on set aside the the the outside services is there a way that if somebody needs to do something urgently that they could pay more? Is there like an expedited te

Are we recovering any of that cost in here?

Because the budget for fire has always been under what it should have been for years. If there's a way to do cost recovery where we could help expedite that. Because I pass on the complaints to Ms. Feeley, and she always does a great job with her staff of responding to them. But a bunch of them are around the fire review. And if we could make sure that the team and fire is covered by these costs,

So the thing I would just encourage you all to do in working with the consultants is my colleague pointed out that our costs are lower than the county and other cities, which you have on this chart here. um it could be that we're just more efficient and and and that we don't spend as much but the other thing is that if there are expedited services or ways that we can improve customer service i would just ask you all i know you do this already but i would ask you all to take another look at it just to see that because real estate is so much of a big part of our economic engine in our area how c

And can you just tell, I know the answer, but can you just for the public tell where that, who pays that?

So I think the point is that what the public would like is for us to be fair. If somebody's using a service, we charge a fair amount for the service. We're not trying to make a profit. We're just trying to charge a fair amount for the service. What the public doesn't want is to subsidize somebody else's services. And so if we can help keep property taxes low, for example, by making sure we're covering somebody else's costs, if somebody's not using a cost, they'd like to not pay for it. They'd like to not subsidize somebody else's costs. So anyway, thank you. Councilman Miranda.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Somebody called my eye a little figure that you had for automobile cost. Can you come back with that figure? I know it's a small amount. And the reason I'm asking that question, it's a small amount within the larger amount going in or part of. My answer to myself, my question to myself is what I'm posing to you now is, is that money taken put into a separate account to repair, to replace the car? I want to make sure if it's a car that you're charging for, is it going in to replace the car and a fee where it's not touched?

But the question is, is it going to a special account for a technology or whatever that you're using that you have to replace so that the time you have to replace them, you already got the cash going in?

So then you have an account now that you don't have to go to the general fund or any account to buy a car. You buy it from that fund. That is correct. Thank you very much. That is correct.

Ms. Go ahead. Mr. So then in LOGIC what we're doing here is creating

And thank you. And I know you have a difficult position, a different job, because now when you lose somebody from that division, it's very difficult to replace that individual.

Thank you, Ms. Field. Question for you, don't go far. The issue that Councilman Carlson brought up and that expect to be able to get some of the stuff because the things that we hear. And you have the other departments that are not necessarily within your control. Is it possible to sign a interdepartment MOU between these departments so they clearly understand what it's like with a fire issue? An applicant is going through the expedited process that that would bind fire to that as well?

Chief Tripp and we could see because that falls under the fire marshal's office I mean all those all those lines of business if you guys had a interlocal agreement that you know this doesn't so that you have common language that you all understand that when a system is moving through that process that everybody is moving through the same process

Yeah, I because I'll be the few times that I've gotten in. It hasn't been like J.C.'s department. It's been a hang up somewhere else. So if we were able to figure out so obviously there must be something there. So if we could figure out a process that everybody speak in the same language and you know, if everything is, you know, goal tagged or something, you know, that they know that this is something that's a priority project. They have to move through it and, you know, get it done because that person is, you know, have that expedited service. I think that might be helpful. And so I appreciat

Could I just add in a minute ago, we talked about a fire fires of our involvement. So if you look at this as a it's not an enterprise fund, but if but if you look at it as like a business within that, you also mentioned stormwater and some of the other departments. And if we should, we should maybe you're doing this already, but we should look at this as a larger service pool. And one of the ways to get our department cooperation is is financial incentives. And so if, for example, we're not doing any cost recovery at fire and they could, if they could, if there's, for example, I don't know wha

This may not be something for you all, maybe it's something for JC or somebody else, but the DIY projects, you talk about hot water heaters. It just seems funny to me that in 2027 that we're even talking about permit fees for hot water heaters since nobody's pulling to permits for hot water heater replacements. We're going to Home Depot and we're buying our own hot water heaters and we're putting them in. So who is looking at these things and going in 2027, is this something that we really should be doing?

may not know how to do it but it's for those future owners that will also occupy that structure and making sure it's done correctly but again like i mean i get gas i mean i do get gas because of the liabilities with gas but for like a electrical i mean i guess a great such a great example of a hot water heater it literally is putting threads on a threads on a thing and nylon threads on plugging it in go ahead yeah i i

I think you overestimate. I think our generation might be one of the last that kind of does that stuff themselves. Just going to throw that out there.

I think a lot of people now are just paying to get it done.

I am shocked at the amount of things that people pay for.

I am pitching for the folks that go to Home Depot and Lowe's.

I agree, but I'm just saying I am shocked at the things that people won't do themselves.

So I have a ladder, let's say an attic stairwell, and the ladder broke and I need to replace my attic stairs. Would that require a permit? Okay. Now, why wouldn't that require a permit?

No, I'm replacing it with a new set of stairs.

I'm just trying to find out what I'm doing against the law and what I'm doing legally.

I can change out a plug, but I just can't run the home line. There you go.

See, that hot water heater just throws me off. But it's electric hot water. It's a plug and play. They're very simple. Okay, I'm done. Would you like to disclose any stuff that you've done without permits?

One other thing, and it's just my curiosity. When you're doing these affordable housings, you're charging for the sidewalk. How can it be affordable housing when they've got to pay $290 a foot? to put the sidewalk in, then they gotta pay the house insurance and the taxes on the house.

There is no affordable housing. This is not what we're hearing.

No, I know that, but I'm just saying it out. There is no affordable housing as far as I'm concerned, to what it should be. And it has nothing to do with baseball.

Okay, why don't we finish the presentation? Oh, you have something else?

Can I just say one last thing? You mentioned a couple chain stores, and the chain stores employ locals, and that's great, and they use subcontractors, but we also have a lot of great independent entrepreneurs that we should support. Famous Tate is one of them, but there are a bunch of others, and it's fun going to a local store and seeing the flexibility they have in delivering things and getting them put in.

I don't, I'll just, I'm just going to be clear, I don't like to hear that he's reducing his head count because, just one, but still, I'm, like, those are areas where we still had some money, I mean, I know we're going to be talking about this in October, this is now on my list of things I want to talk about because this is a department where we're constantly hearing we need more people, so even if it's just one head count, we can help you with that. So I know, I know, but I just, this is not a department that needs to be reducing costs.

I've got it really expedite this process because I got to get home and change out my hot water heater Okay, could you finish with process?

Well, what I wanted to say is that the cost for a PD, I believe our chair would agree, should be high. um i have the note right here it's good to be higher because we really want to disincentivize pds like our goal not not right now but we will once we have our new land development code the whole goal is to disincentivize pds so that people use what the what the base zoning because that's why we're redoing our land development code so that might not be something that we change now and make higher, but this is something I really want to be high, to disincentivize PDs once we pass our land devel

That's interesting. The two things I wrote down was PD and petition for review. Those are the two things that I identified as well. And I'm not on the incentivize, disincentivize, because of course this is cost recovery for actual cost to the city, these things. However, though, We do have, if we're going to be subsidized, then we can choose what we're subsidizing and what we're not subsidizing. And the petition for review is something I think that because of generally the folks that use that process, it shouldn't be so cost prohibitive that would so penalize the average citizen for positively

I think as much as possible with all of these, we should, especially in the public hearing, show what the cost is. You said we're not going for full cost recovery. I think, except for maybe the folks who are using this, everybody else would not like to subsidize it. So if we can show what the actual cost is, that would be helpful to justify why we're doing it. Because we're not just trying to change rates just to try to get more money. We're trying to actually cover the cost because it's not fair to everybody else to subsidize things.

Yeah, it's difficult in this review because of the pomp and circumstance of it all and how many people are involved in that stuff. That's a tough one.

Yeah, absolutely. So on that point also, Is there a cost recovery for the legal fees at all on these? Um, because if somebody, if somebody, um, asked for a, a review, then it's not just the, the, um, the clerk's office that looks at the legal departments looking at too, is there, I mean, what's the cost of that? It must, that must be really high.

Any further questions? Hearing none, I'm going to allow the public to speak. Anybody in the public would like to comment on this? And it's only on this particular item, item number one.

Thank you, Mr. Briggs. And just FYI, I threw my automatic pilot mode this morning. I didn't wait until the end of the workshop to call for public comment because don't get used to this. This was a one-off. Miss Pointer.

I need to know where I can get a roof for $12,000.

Thank you very much. Next speaker, please

Thank you. Okay. That concludes public comment. Councilwoman Hurtig.

So as far as some of the things, is there a specific email for this? And if there is, if you could tell us what it is and make sure that it's on the website for this. It is.

because they really will read those and put those in. But not only that, after October 21st, whenever you're coming back to us, I really think that you should bring us back this new information and everything you learn from these emails, from that meeting. I think we need another conversation before a vote. So that's what I'm going to ask for. It doesn't necessarily need to be in a workshop manner. It can be a little bit quicker than that. It can just be a staff report. Maybe on that day we could have four staff reports instead of five or something like that. But that way we have a little bit

Not a problem. One thing, and maybe this is for the consultant, but it would be helpful if you could go back to the last time these fees were increased and look at what the subsidy was each year by the general fund. It's probably... a very large number, but it would be helpful to show what the rest of the public, how much the rest of the public subsidized it. I don't know what the number is, so let's say it's $10 million since 2001. That's a lot of money that the rest of us subsidized when we didn't need these services. I think it would help to talk about it.

Thank you. Ms. Feely? Also, in the interest of public disclosure, since one of the last public speakers talked about AI, I think it would be helpful if you just spent a minute talking about what we're doing with AI.

And before he says that, I think that what's important is on an intake phase because nine times out of 10 when we seem to have a permitting issue, it is emissions in that first application and that's that delay in that first 30 days that caused the problem. So hopefully this is something that you guys are doing proactively to address that issue.

Councilman Miranda. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for everyone who spoke. I believe what you said. However, when we have to make a decision, it's got to be based on the facts that are real. I'm not saying what you said was unreal, but if you have a business and you're creating property that you're building in Hillsborough County or in the city of Tampa, if you go down Animal Drive or 22nd Street or you go down 7th Avenue all the way to Hillsborough County, does it cost you more or less to get a permit? That's my question to myself. From what I saw here today, it costs you more in Hillsbor

Thank you. OK, if no other discussion, I think you've captured enough information from this council to move forward. And we'll put this one to bed for now. Thank you so much. Thank you guys for showing up. OK, for items number two and three, I suspect that we can open them up together because I've got proposals that are incorporated in. So we can do two and three together. I have Sam printing as we speak the recommendations from the Charter Review Commission. And here they are, I guess. This is something I did. Thank you, sir. So Mr. Shelby is going to kick us off with just a brief introductio

You can zoom in a little bit on that. Cause it's awfully smite. It's done it. That is dense or hero font and I'll push it down a little bit. Well, actually we're already now physically pushed it down.

That's good. Okay. Perfect. Okay. That's why I have the acoustics. People don't realize they're talking out there. We can hear everything. Even whispers up here. It's crazy.

And that's for them to put it into Spanish as well.

So my question is, does the mayor have a deadline for which she can veto?

Okay. Y'all should have good experience with that one. Okay. Yes. Is there any other questions for Mr. Shelby on this process? Process questions. Okay. That means. No, I think that's it.

I think that's a significant question because the last time or one of the times that we talked about this. It was tight. The administration slow walked it and at the end blamed us for deciding at the last minute when actually they had delayed it for months.

Okay. So this, Councilwoman Hartag. Okay.

I'll wait until we get to that part, sorry.

Okay. So before you, this document is the structure items that the Charter Review Commission had recommended. So this is what you have before you that is newly printed, not the press. You have another document that is on my letterhead was the list of the questions that we had submitted to the Charter Review Commission for their consideration. And then you have just a plain black and white page. This first one is Independent Inspector General. That is a document that I've created for your consideration for the items that I felt like were worthy of discussion today. Not to say that I know some o

Um, how do we want to, how are we organizing this? How are we going to go about this? Are we going to go based on the strike through?

Well, I think, why don't we, why don't we do three minutes of discussion from each council person about where their head is at? Because this is a workshop. This is an opportunity for us to have, you know, just for just general discussion in the beginning. Okay. That's fine. We have plenty of time. Cause I want to get, I want to get out here about one o'clock. So we have plenty of time.

So give us the framework. Okay. So why don't we do this? Charlene, set the clock for five, timer for five, please. And we'll start. I see Councilwoman Hurtek. So you want to kick us off?

Yeah, please. Go ahead. So I'm looking at this amended sections, the part from... Just so people, and I don't know if there's a way that we could put this on the screen for folks to read along. Mr. Selby, would you be willing to be our Vanna White?

Well, but no, I would bring more than one. Yeah, bring all of these things. Oh. Alan's thing, the questions. The questions I'm going to let other people deal with, but Alan's thing in this is what I want to. Can you pause my time until he gets up there? Thank you. Please do.

Do you want me to bring a legislative aid into this? Yeah. Yeah, we can get... Can we get a volunteer legislative aid? Sam, if you can't get anybody else to do it, Sam, can you come out here and help us out, please, and be our Vanna White?

Because I really believe that we should have people, like, as we're talking about it, the public should be able to see what we're talking about.

What is... We need somebody's copies. What is... Wait for a second.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Hold on.

Yeah. Maybe we can borrow the clerk's copies.

Perfect. The most dangerous thing Sam Thomas has done is going to Costco or wherever he does and gets the big bags of candy. I know, I mean, it's constant. Yeah, I mean, Sam Thomas's best or worst thing he's done. I'm 1,000% with you. Can you, yeah, go back. Yeah, there you go.

Yes, you got the hands for it. So Lisa, can you go to the second page, page two? And you can start my time again. So I'm just going to say I don't know that the rezoning process of a zoning hearing officer has any support with this council. I'd be shocked. I don't necessarily think it's a bad idea in the long run. I just don't think that we're quite ready for it. Also, I believe that this should be handled during the land development code updates. We're having some conversations about this there. So that's just my two cents. If you could go to page five.

Anybody have an interest in this? Okay, well, there you go. Problem solved. Okay. Yeah. So then page 5 of 8, the progress of city projects. This is fascinating and this clearly I don't think they understand the cost of projects because any funded project in excess of $100,000. that would take us that would take us multiple Council meetings and I just don't know if this is a needed thing we get updates every six months on major projects through the city I just I'm now I'm asking for me just looking at this initially I just don't I mean, I'm fine opening it now. If you all want to comment on it

Anything that has a dollar figure automatically becomes antiquated.

So I guess for me, I just instead of letting, I mean, you can talk during your time, but do we have like a show of hands if we think this is a good idea?

Anybody think this is a good idea? Oh, okay, well then. Yeah, we'll wait for your.

This was something that I wanted to talk about, but what I had given to my appointee to discuss during the CRC.

Yeah. And then the, I'm going to Alan's. It's just a black and white that says independent inspector general. Okay. So I agree wholeheartedly with this, especially the fact that we should not have the mayor, the council, the city attorney. This independent inspector general idea is great, but it should not be touched, it should be wildly independent it should have none of us should have fingers on it except for the day-to-day operation can be addressed by ordinance the ordinance that the City Council puts together I think this is a great idea I know other people want to talk about it so I'll l

Okay. Okay, anything else? Okay, Councilwoman Young wanted to speak next, and then Ms. Vieira. Okay.

so with the um so the progress of the city projects pretty much so how that came about i remember when we were um at a cra meeting and i think it was you councilman herzik who had made a motion to have like this progress tracker of the cra projects and um many times i get a lot of questions uh from my constituents about and they're like hey what happened to this i thought you know this was supposed to be happening at this year that year For example, with Palmetto Beach, with the seawall. And so I've had some constituents ask, what happened to that? And then we have, you know, go and of course

Yeah, I don't miss I mean my input on that is I understand the intent I don't necessarily believe it's a charter issue, so I would unless there's somebody who really feel strongly about this I don't think it should be in the charter um i mean i think we can handle that via a resolution did you want to talk about that if i may uh so am i is this general speaking time or just on this topic were you done with your with your is that all you wanted to say yeah we can always go back again this is a workshop we have we can be more informal councilman thank you sir so a couple of things obviously the

I see my appointee, Mr. Cohen, who's here. Good to see Alan. And I think this is a great, great, great idea because then you can get a more objective analysis on allegations of ethical violations, corruption, different things like that. And I think there will be vast support in the public on this issue. So I salute that. I think that's wonderful.

well that we'll talk about that yeah i know i know i know and you're right councilwoman that that our fingerprints must be on it as little as possible uh yeah because we don't yeah we we don't want any uh puppet strings to be alleged or to be interpreted in any way and and so that'll certainly by the way i don't think i'm going to be here to vote on this so i'm just talking in the wind here right but for whatever it's worth um and then with regards to the um to yeah i know we're going to be here to vote on it no no yeah yeah that's what i'm saying he's certainly going to be here on on october

Yeah, just on these two issues. To the last one, we had the situation, Station 24, what was it, 15 million that we allocated, and then we found out the next year that they just didn't spend it, and then they spent it on something else and didn't tell us that when we moved it, that we'd moved it to something else. We also have the example of Tampa Union Station, which was actually a CRA project, but they decided just not to do it because the city owns it. And it's been funded for six or seven years, and it took most of that time for them to even start. Same thing with Jackson House, where it wa

to your first comment about, we were talking about projects and the money that is allocated. I think there was a suggestion made, I cannot find what page, but to have whatever money is allocated to a project that you have to spend it within that fiscal year on the project.

Oh, okay, that's the one. The clandestine questions. Which number was that? I think I circled it. number 22 yeah yeah 22 be required to expand within the same fiscal year in which the budget is approved yeah so I mean I think that that is and even if again, going back to the accountability and the transparency. If we allocate something and then we find out, oh, well, we haven't done it yet. Well, now we've allocated this money two, three, four years, and it hasn't been spent yet on a certain project. So again, it may not be something, I don't know if it's something that goes in the charter, bu

We saw that in real time this year with paving, that we had allocated all that money for paving. And it didn't get spent. I've actually handwritten a note on there. On that page, I've got 22 that should be held by an ordinance. I think that 15, we should be able to deal with that with an ordinance. And those are the two that were hot button items for me.

What about 16? 16 is a hot button. You have that, Lisa, you have that page, if you could put that up. I have it up, this one. Oh, sorry, you do. You're like way ahead of me, I'm sorry.

That would be required to be a charter amendment.

I know, but I think that that's something that we did ask them to discuss, and that's the biggest one, really, that was un...

That would have to be a charter amendment for sure.

But I do believe that we should discuss that today as a, I don't know, I feel like we need to go in some type of order.

I think this is, we're kind of flushing it out, throwing it all out there and then we can, so this is a broad net and then we'll start focusing as council members have the conversation. I see Councilman Miranda's light is on. Thank you very much.

When you look at the administration, no matter who's there or who's in the council, And you look at what happens, sometimes it happens because there's no other way of doing it. For the pipes program, the pipe program was started years ago. We were spending 35 to $40 million just repairing pipes every year, every year, every year. So finally we decided sometime back that we're gonna have a pipe program change all the pipes on the ground, water and wastewater, at about $2.9 billion cost. We started collecting the money at $2 a month for water and wastewater. Now it's up to $8 or $9 a month becau

Yeah, and I think Councilmember Moran's point is good about who's going to review the IG. I think that the overriding issue, though, is in the first few points on this clandestine sheet, we're calling it, but it is who has control of the city attorney's office. Right now we have a city attorney who seems very even with all of us. But we've had city attorneys who don't act in the best interest of city council. Actually, it's one of the letterhead, Lisa.

Yeah. And if we had control of the city attorney, if we had the right to fire the city attorney, and I think we should have the right to fire the mayor's senior staff, we should have fired the communication director and the political director already years ago. But I mean, there's just been too much political chaos in this city, and the taxpayers should not be paying for it. People on the outside want to do it, that's fine, but not people being paid. And I mean, an example in the city attorney's office, 2018, and we found this out by accident in like 2020, 2018, a city attorney wrote a two-par

Okay, so Mr. Shelby, as we further in this conversation, if you could start taking notes. Well, I expect you to improve your skill level.

We'll tell you what you need to jot down.

I understand that, but stick with me. If you could capture... If someone points out something very specific that needs to be captured... No, I, I, Mr. Shelby sitting. Okay. Let's, we're not gonna talk about this.

So if you would just capture, if, and if I have to point you and say, please capture that, that'd be fine.

Uh, I mean, Ms. Scharf is truly the best note taker.

If you wanna throw your facility, your, your aid under the bus and ask her to come out here, that'd be great.

Well, um, Ms. Scharf, if you wanna come out here or if you can keep the notes yourself in your office, whichever works. would you like her out here it's up to her i mean there's been yeah so miss sharp it's your choice but if you could take notes and i want you to start with this one we are not doing section 2.15

That being the rezoning process. We've decided no on that. No action? No action on that. So if you could go to the next page, please, which is 3 of 8. The one thing I forgot to mention was the appointment on Section 6.03. They basically took out the nomination and went back to confirmation. That's a no-go for me. May I share something?

And that's one of the reasons I'm saying no to it. But also, one of the reasons this is very important is because we currently have an interim chief of police, and that's illegal.

Okay, so real quick. Sam, would you please make a copy of the documents we're looking at? That one, the Charter Review Commission one, the one on my letterhead, and then the suggestions that I printed out so that we can give that to Kelly so if she's making notes, she has an actual copy in front of her. If you need just the hard copies that you make copy, come grab mine and you can copy them on the machine. So, Sam, if you could do that, I'd appreciate it.

So, I just wanted to bring that one up for a quick vote to see if anybody thinks that we should go back to the mayor appointing. Okay. So, does anybody think that that's a good idea to go back to the mayor appoints? The 6.03. May I just?

Councilman Carlson. Yeah, I just want to add the city council, I forgot the year, 2020 or something, we had

we put this on the ballot and the voters voted on it and now they're trying to change it back. And so this has already been decided.

Okay, so then Ms. Scharf, 6.03 appointment, we're not approving that.

Can I just add one more? Yes, sir. To the point about the police chief also, that was put in there also intentionally because the last administration, I think this administration too, I can't remember exactly, had people as interim forever. Yep. And I think one of them was the CFO during the last administration. It was a great person, but they should have been appointed. And I actually talked to... Chief Owens and Bennett about making the interim chief permanent. He's got to know that whoever wins may pick somebody else, but for the sake of the community, I don't think we should have an interi

Agreed. And that's exactly what I said. I think that interim chief Owen is doing a phenomenal job. I really love him. I think that he should have the title. If something were to happen in this city, we need to have someone whose job it is that can't be switched immediately. People need the confidence in the chief. And him being named interim just says that we don't have the confidence. And I have the confidence in him. And I think all of us do. I don't know why we wouldn't just approve him. So, I mean, I 100% agree with you on that. So, so far we have said no to section 2.15 and section 6.03,

Are we done with general discussion? Okay, then if nobody wants to have any kind of general discussion, that's fine. That could be our next direction.

Okay. So section 2.03, the only quick, there's a...

To require the attendance of the members, meaning that members of city council have, what, certain days that they're allowed to miss on meetings? What is that exactly? It says compel and then switch to require the attendance of the members and to enforce the same by fine or penalty if they so elect. I don't know.

What is the legal definition between compel and require? And why was that? Does any of the members from the Charter Review Commission remember what that discussion was about? What is the difference between compel and require?

Can you please put that back up? There you go.

And if I may, Mr. Chair, I was actually, you said that if we could recognize the members, I think three that are here. Oh, that'd be nice. If I may. That would be lovely.

I see three. Four, because we have the interim.

You guys want to sit close to us so that we can call you up if we have to?

Just come up and introduce yourselves. Just say it for a thank you.

We're just talking. So introduction is fine. Thank you. Bobby, would you like to introduce yourself?

You guys are already politicians. You get a microphone and you have to give a speech.

And just so you know, people ask me if they should be here, and I said don't, you know, that you didn't have to be. So this is not an indictment of why other people are not here. They actually asked and I said no.

I thought we had one. Oh, so does anybody, does anyone, what is the difference between a compelling and a require? Mr. Shelby or you guys, what was the discussion there?

But there's nothing to prevent us. It says council members may adopt by such bylaws, regulations, and rule procedure. Yes. So if we found there was a problem, we could fix it with rules and procedure. Yes, you have the ability.

Okay, so I'm not hearing any objection. We accept the rule language in Section 2.03 from the Charter Review Commission. Without objection? No. Okay. Okay, and 2.03. Yeah, that is a yes. We're accepting the language in 2.03 from the Charter Review Commission. So in Section 2.04, staff allocated within... It's just a formality. Allocated instead of found. Yeah, I agree. Is there any objection to that language? Yeah, that's fine. I'm hearing no objection. We accept the language from the Charter Review Commission in 2.04. 2.08. This is about the readings. Mr. Shelby, would you like to chime in on this one?

So hearing no objection, we'll accept the language in 2.08. Any objection? Hearing none, okay, we're going to accept the language in 2.08.

For CTTV, as much as everybody loves looking at my face on TV, if you guys could just leave the documents up on the public monitor for people to review while we're having this discussion. Yes. You just have to imagine what we look like. Okay. We've already eliminated 2.15. That was the rezoning process, rezoning hearing. Unanimous consent. Affirmative. Okay. So we've got term 6.02.

My guess is that they did mention somewhere in the Charter Review Commission, I believe someone said that there were quite a few things that didn't make it in. Councilman Carlson alluded to it earlier. I think this is one of the things that was inadvertently left in because I'm almost positive we took out anything that had to do with 1979 and all of these dates. So I think this was just missed. Stale. I don't think there's anything wrong with this.

I agree. I agree. I say we accept the language without objection for 6.02.

And what this is is terms. So this is the terms of the council members and it talks about the 1979 municipal election.

Yeah. So it's stale. Okay. So I don't hear any objections. We're going to accept the language from 6.02 by unanimous consent. We've already agreed by, and just one more time, by unanimous consent to not accept the language in 6.03 under appointment. I hear no objections, so that's on unanimous consent. That is gone. Okay. Oh, they struck through a resident of the city and is, let me ask a question.

What does that mean that they do not have to live in the city of Tampa? Meaning who an elected somebody running for these positions does not have to live in the city of Tampa. Am I reading it wrong or what? This is 6.05. It says that the officer is Mr. Creighton.

When you struck through a resident of the city and is.

So this, this actually accepts the other language that had been approved and trans was supposed to be transmitted.

You have to live here in a certain period of time before you qualify and all that.

As I've read through the paragraph, I agree. I think we should accept this language. Yes. Thank you. May I? Congressman Carlson. Because we no longer require the department heads to. Right. Correct. And you're also entitled to hold. So they've already got that. So it's, yeah.

I was trying to find the exact language. I voted against taking away the residency requirement. I know the majority of you all voted for it. When it went to the ballot language, the way it was translated, the effect of it is that it asks the public, do you think that city council and the mayor should be required to be residents of the city? It was completely misleading. I only I noticed that by the time it was too late I went to the city attorney at the time and said this is biased. It shouldn't be allowed and The only remedy I had was to file an individual lawsuit to stop it, which I didn't w

Okay. The next salaries, let's put a pin on this because this will be part of the other discussion. We're going to accept the language of 6.05.

So I agree with council member Carlson. I, I, this isn't something I wanted and it went through and I'm not thrilled by it. I know. I understand what you're saying in that we have, it's already done. Please don't interrupt. Sorry, but please don't interrupt. I'm just saying that, that if you all want it to go through, that's fine, but I don't. So I'm just, I'm saying no.

Now here's the problem, then you have an inconsistency.

Yes, and I think we should fix it like Council Member Carlson said. But again, if we don't have a majority that want to fix it, then that's fine.

Okay, but our charter... Mr. Chairman, I'm sorry, what...

The fix is to make sure that the actual language doesn't say city council and mayor and only speaks to directors, which that was not the language that made it on the ballot. Council Member Carlson is correct.

The word officer to me means an elected official. It says the officer has been elected or appointed. We're the elected ones.

Yes, let's do that. So I know they're listening. City attorney's study, if you would look at the Charter Review Commission's proposed language at 6.05 for consistency with the charter and what was voted on by the citizens of the city of Tampa and how we can fix it. Fix that for consistency. We're putting a pen in 6.06.

I was going to say also 6.05, we shouldn't just have the city attorney. We should have the CRC attorney look at that as well.

Yes, so you all know that Mr. Tankler, the attorney that we contracted with for the Charter Review Commission, he is still on retainer. He's finished the work with the Charter Review Commission. When we decide what is going to make it to the ballot or not make it to the ballot, he's going to review that product for us. That's additional work.

Um, I don't think we should put a pin in 6.06. I think let's just have the discussion I think that there's I think that we can do exactly what you said if you could pull up number four on Councilmember clendenin's the blank page the independent inspector general one. Yeah, the one that starts within a spell Yeah, if you it's it's like the second to last page. It says number four City Council comment compensation Thank you So I really believe that we can do this by ordinance. And there was not an appetite for this at the beginning of our term but I believe now at the end of our term when the ma

Yeah and so I think this is perfectly fine and I think we just do an ordinance and get it done. Because if you put compensation in the charter, I think that's too tight. I understand, but A, I believe in this, I think it would have a hard time passing. B, I really do think that it's just not a, I think this is an ordinance issue. I do not think that we should be talking about salaries in our charter.

Okay. So then do we actually just eliminate 6.06 then? I mean, how do you.

No, because 6.06 just says the salaries of officers of the city may be increased or decreased at any time by the concurrence of the mayor and a majority of no fewer than four votes. This is for staff. This is salaries for staff. When we're talking about salaries for us, I think the ordinance would do just fine. And I think we could ask the city attorney's office to come up with an ordinance that says just this and let's just get it done. Does anybody have opposition to it at this point? I know Council Member Vieira, you had a lot of opposition earlier, but now that you're leaving office, and t

It would probably be, I mean, I think, I agree with Councilwoman Hertek. If we wanted to do this by, I think ordinance would be better. That would take, that would leave, the gravitas would be there and it would eliminate this stuff, the back and forth we have on this. Councilman Vieira, then Councilman Miranda. How much does the mayor presently make?

About $200,000. It's like $189,000 or something like that.

Yeah, I mean, look, I could support a salary range in that regard. My big challenge was voting for something and doing it after an election. It was more of a procedural issue. I did think council salary needed to be raised. That was more of a procedural issue. Something in this neighborhood I could support. I don't wanna marry myself to this, but something in this neighborhood.

Next October, the beginning of next fiscal year, so a year from now.

But not only that, the most important reason we're having this discussion is because somehow when this was done after the election, when Councilwoman Henderson focused on this, Somehow it ends in May. It goes back to $53,000. So we have to solve this. We cannot kick this can down the road any further.

Yeah, and I would support even something more than what I would be comfortable with for a position like this to take it out of the hands of council members with a set salary and formula so that it's not politicized. That's the biggest issue for me. That was my thinking too. Yeah, that's the biggest thing.

No, no, I tied it to, um, ATU, but again, it ends in May. Right.

So that's kind of moved. So even that happened in front of us because it ends in May.

I can only say this, that I believe that I know I didn't, and I'm sure the other six members didn't either. None of us ran for office thinking of the salary. You ran for office to make the city better than when you had it the day before you got elected. And that's what it's all about. Now that we're here, we're discussing salary. That's all I'm gonna say.

Yeah, I think whether it's by ordinance or resolution or by charter, I think it needs to be a formula so that future city councils don't have to vote on it again. I feel, and like Council Member Ertecht said, this is gonna affect the next city council, not us. I'm termed out. It's not going to affect me at all. By the way, the PACs that ran negative ads against me last time ran three ways of direct mail saying I had raised my salary, and I got elected by 60%, so it doesn't matter anyway. But I believe in good government, and if we were earning $52,000 or something like that before, that's not

Councilwoman Young. To Councilman Vera's point saying having something kind of set in stone so that it doesn't become politicized I think is important. I oftentimes people ask me, so what else do you do? I don't have time to do anything else. Oh, you don't have another job? No, this is it. Like, this is not, and this is just, you know, from, from my experience, but I think having something so that we don't, because nobody, it's like the conversation that you know is important, but you really don't want to have to have and so if you have something so that you don't have to you know even people

You know what I want to set in stone? This assertion has been repeated so many times about part-time, full-time. This is not a part-time job. And by the way, the mayor's position is not a part-time job. It doesn't differentiate itself in the charter. We are working. I know Councilwoman Young, you were here when I got here yesterday. You were here when I left yesterday. I mean, so I mean, we know how this goes. Councilman Maniscalco.

Yeah, no, I'm glad that you brought that up. You know, Regarding the mayor, I once caught a glimpse of her calendar. I don't know how she does it. I mean, it's from morning to night. That's one thing. My wife can attest of that common of a part-time job. I think I sit on seven or eight boards, and I try to get on another board.

Would you like one of my boards? I already asked, and I can't. And I'm sorry my wife isn't here. She doesn't come to the meetings. But I get calls at 8 in the morning on a Sunday. When they have your personal cell phone, it's different. You're on call. We get complaints. We get requests. And I'm glad because I know what I signed up for, and I'm here to serve the community. But it's not part-time. And then the events that we go to... And then the community events and the neighborhood events and the association meeting. I mean, it goes on and on. It is a full time job. You can make it part time,

Well, I guess I have to confess I had three full time jobs in City Hall, the racetrack and the restaurant when I used to be part owner of Cafe Pepe. And you know what? It never tired me out. I'm 86, and I still do what the hell I want.

No, I did not. They fired you. No, they did not. You're getting close. You're getting close. They called me. I worked one day a week, starting in November to May.

very good only because i speak another language uh i saw councilman carlson first and i'll get back to you yeah the only thing is um if you i i would rather leave the full-time part-time thing out but if you um if if if it's in there it needs to be not not exclusive because

Yeah, no, I just wanted, because, you know, the most inaccurate assertion, if repeated often enough, assumes an error of truth. And that is what's happened with this, is people keep repeating, oh, it's a part, no, it's not. It doesn't say it's a part-time job. It doesn't say it's a, it's just a, it's just a job. it is just a job no more than any no more than when you get hired with anything you know any other type of leadership type of you know if you're a ceo or you're whatever you are a director of a company it's a job it doesn't tell you it's a full-time job or part-time job it's not like y

And even if we change it to $100,000, any of the seven of us can earn easily double that in the private sector. So it's not that anybody's trying to make money off it or upgrade their job. Any of us could earn more than that.

So I'd like to make a motion to ask staff to come back with a ordinance that uses number four as its base of the document, the document that he had that's on the screen right now. It's called city council compensation. I drew it like to direct staff to come back on October 15th.

I'll get, I'll get, I'll get staff a copy.

We're not doing the charter. We're doing this ourselves as an ordinance. Understood. Which is why I want city legal staff to come back on October 15th. Ideally, if that's not enough time, that probably isn't enough time. You know why? So let's do November 5th. I'd like city staff to come back on November 5th with this ordinance, proposed ordinance that follows number four. And I'm going to throw chair under the bus and have, since this was something that you wrote down, I'll have city staff talk, work with you on getting this done. Does that, is that fair? Okay. So that's my motion. And then I'm sure. Oh, and then I know he wants to talk.

I have a motion. I have a second. Councilman Vieira.

Yeah, no, you know, folks were talking about their experiences, and everybody's different. For me, I've been in office about 10 years, and I've done about 100 town halls, and I know that there's people that, for them, stuff like that and going into the community is very, very stressful. For me, that's not work, if that makes sense. Like, I do my legal practice. I'm a mediator. I handle cases and everything. I had to go to Missouri for a client a couple weeks ago, and I'm a very involved and active city council member. Everybody's different. There's a reason why you have a lot of lawyers in pub

We, we have legal staff in the room. Come on up.

Okay. Okay, good. Well, thank you for that clarification. Thanks. I appreciate that.

No, that's what we chose. My motion was November 5th. And then thank you, Mr. Vaske. I apologize because that is what I was told. Obviously, something got lost in translation. So thank you for the correction.

Okay, very good. No worries. Okay, I have a motion on the floor. I have a second. Is there any further discussion? Yes, sir. Yes, Johnson, Mastocco.

So just to clarify, the salary does not revert back to the 50-something thousand that was prior to this, correct?

I have a motion. I have a second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed?

If it would have reverted back, I would have said yes.

Okay, very good. Thank you. Okay, and that being said, I think 6.06, we should accept the Charter Review Commission language.

Okay. Is there any objection to accept the Charter Review Commission language in 6.06? That's fine. Okay, we're moving on to 7.05, millage. Is Mr. Vaske still in here?

Oh, so I have a question for this for Mr. Vaske, 7.05 with the millage. My concern with this, and you can see it, it's on the screen. okay um is that state the state law number is put in there i'm concerned about that because state law changes all the time would it be better just to leave the word state law i know it says as it may be amended from time to time but that makes me uncomfortable it's it's been that

No, I thought you said you didn't want to keep it.

Okay, so you do think this is fine. I just wanted legal.

Well, let's stop there for one second because I think what he just brought up is something that we probably, while we're in this process, let's talk about this. And as you're reviewing this, maybe you could throw this into review. Because of the change in state law of when we have to notify the state of millage It does not coincide with when we passed our millage for legislative. Do we have a conflict and does that have to be resolved?

Or are we bound? Well, in other words, since you were doing that, that's why I wanted to throw that out there. So when you're doing that review, if you could look at that in your review, so if we had to make some modification to be in compliance, I think this would be an appropriate time to look at it. Okay. All right. Okay. Okay. Councilwoman Hurtek.

We already passed that motion. I would prefer to take the number out. And that, again, is just me, just because. So that's going to be my recommendation, is that we take the actual statute out, because nowhere else do we really use the statutes. And I'm just uncomfortable and worried, because we're taking stuff out that talks about 1979. Anyway, that's just me. If nobody else agrees, that's fine.

I'll support it. Because of legal's recommendation to leave it in, I think I would give them the difference.

Okay, so then I motion that we accept that.

So for right now, I think we have a motion to accept the language of Section 7.05 from the Charter Review Commission. Is there any objection? Hearing no objections, unanimous consent, yes. Okay, we'll accept that. Okay, now we're adding, going back to the 7.12 on the progress. Again, I think this should be an ordinance.

And I'm fine with that. When I was looking through the documents, so the city of Jacksonville does have an ordinance for, I guess, for similar language. As long as there is just some kind of accountability. Because I think of myself or us, when you get a dollar, it's in your pocket for what? Maybe a couple hours, a few days. If somebody gave me $15 million... want to spend it so I want to be sure like if we allocate money for something for project that we're spending it that we're being accountable to the community with the projects letting them know like this is where we are this was happenin

work with city staff on it sure okay okay so i'm going to hear that unless there's any energy around this that we are not going to accept the language in 7.12 and instead councilwoman young is going to write a proposed ordinance and submit it and i'll probably have a date to be determined

Yeah. Date to be determined. I'll probably, cause we kind of have it something outlined here and from number 22 from the other documents. So we can use that.

Very good. Councilman. Yes, sir. Mr. Chair. But I, again, for the charter of you, I wanted to salute them for 7.1 too, because this, even though it may not necessarily get in there by ordinance, it will. So, um, one way or another it'll get but thank you all for this because this does tackle a very important issue because again when you pass something as a council member that is a unique project to something you had envisioned you have to stay on otherwise it could evaporate so this is good so thank you everybody for that with the chart review and council

okay 9.02 personnel and it's just it this seems like a no-brainer now can we uh can we uh accept that language which so we're going to accept the language of the charter review commission for 9.02 without objection hearing no objection that's unanimous okay 10.06 yes one okay

Actually, I believe the state of Florida just said no city elected official can't be, I think it's six years now. It's now six years. And that's a state law. This is kind of null and void because the state has already.

So do we delete that section completely or do we give that to Tinkler to have him review that?

Or actually I think we could just simply solve it by saying until one year after the expiration of the term to which they were elected or in accordance to a state law.

Okay, fine. Then, then send it to. Okay.

So we're, so for 10.06, we're gonna send this back to Mr. Tankler for conformance with state law and pro current policy.

Yeah. Yeah. So 10.07 initiated referendums.

10.07, the initiative and referendum. What was the thoughts on that for anybody from the Charter Review Commission? Y'all have no thoughts either. So it's 10.07, which is the initiative and referendum section. And you guys added a bunch of language. The bulk of the language was, so it was an insertion of the zoning, the comprehensive plan, and then the procedures to be followed for citizens. Initiatives and referendums will be provided by ordinance in accordance with, and it quotes the statute.

No, I don't want to put restrictions on the ability.

So do you guys remember the conversation surrounding this?

Let's send this back to Tinkler for review and explanation. Yeah, 10.07, back to Tinkler for review and explanation. Okay.

I think I know the fellow who started all this back in 1972, but I'm not sure. But when you look at the city, you're talking about 10% of the people who, it says here, who are qualified to vote. So in other words... Pardon me? Yeah, registered voters. So then if you run... What you're saying, they're qualified to vote. If you run in a district, do you have to have the same amount of those that run city-wide or not?

This is just citizen initiative and referendum. Pardon me? This is just for citizen initiatives and referendums. This is not about running for office.

Well, it should be then if it's the same thing, basically. But I'll yield. Yeah.

So 10.10, charter review, why go to 12 years instead of eight?

Because that was the question we just asked and answered, correct?

no um because this this issue uh the county does it every five years and the reason that we went to eight that's what i'm saying it was that it just went to eight yeah we just went to eight no i mean it went to eight in 2023 when everybody voted on it i really think that this is an asked and answered question i don't think we should change it until um at least another charter review commission I'm uncomfortable with. The only thing that I don't have a problem with is citizen participation, including dedicated city staff for administrative and research support to allow for a comprehensive proce

thank you sir you know and i and i tend to agree on the 12 years but if if the members here here um had opinions on that i would if if i may just voted on i know and that's that's why i'm curious because we just changed it um if nobody we don't seem to have opinions okay well maybe maybe maybe they weren't the champions of that i don't know again i said i i would agree by the way

So if we this actually slows it down, I mean, this slows down the charter process if we if they were to adopt the change. Yes.

Yes, since the voters just voted on this, I just don't have an appetite for this. Is there anybody that has an appetite for this?

Well, you know, when this first came up, when the Charter Review Commission was established with under councilwoman campaign and that era we hadn't had a look at the charter since like 1975 or 74. the thing is if you look at you know sticking and just staying with the eight years look how much the city has changed in eight years and what has happened i mean we have you know the pandemic in between and everything i think 12 years is just is too long yeah and leave it at eight years and again people just voted they just voted on it yeah so is there any appetite i know i say then we reject the la

10.10 is rejected. Charter review is rejected. Okay. Article 11, 11.3, all elected official. Yeah, so without objection, let's accept the language in 11.03. Okay, now the big one. I'm going to say, let me put it right on the table. I want to reject the language that is in the Charter Review Commission because it's not strong enough.

I want to take your language. Lisa, if you would, it's the first page of this Inspector General one.

That's the first, the second, and the third.

And then it's the first, the second, and the third. So let's just leave it on. If you can zoom out a little bit, and then that way we can leave it on for the public to look at while we're talking about it on each page. But I strongly believe that... So for me, someone mentioned earlier, how to, who inspects the inspector general, whether there's a retention committee and that committee, that is their job. Um, so I I'm, I'm fine. I believe that the inspector general will be, uh, um, judged by the people who are on this board, but I want to take the mayor and the council people off. Um, which I

Oh, F, sorry, I didn't see the thing down at the very bottom.

That's what we do through ordinance after.

Oh, okay. So you want to do that through ordinance. But my only problem with that is that I like the fact that in the charters that they're very specific about who it should be and members of the judiciary.

Yeah, the problem with that, if you look, the problem is you look at that. Okay. And you think about the current political circumstances.

So, and by the way, so we do an ordinance of the selection committee, and then that still comes back to council for an affirmative vote of five. Okay. Yeah. Signed by the mayor. Right, correct. Yeah. Yeah. Any further discussion? Sure.

You know, I mean, I support this, you know, inspector general position, because I mean, we have a, our own ethics commission, uh, locally, we have a state ethics commission, but beyond that, you know, something like this would be, you know, truly independent. And like you said, uh, council member her tech lead the mayor and the city council completely out of the process. So it's not tainted in any way. Um, And then you have the selection committee. They choose that person as unbiased or, you know, as unbiased as you can be and take it from there. But I appreciate this. Thank you.

I have one question that concerns me though, and this goes back to our same problem that we're having with our CRA right now is that our CRA still has to abide by the HR. Oh no, this, these people wouldn't be no, no, but, but actually they would be because wouldn't we be moving the auditor department under this?

I believe that the entire auditing department should be moved under the inspector general. Miami Beach does that. And it's a really phenomenal ‑‑ I did not anticipate that. Let's see. Hold on. I have it somewhere. Do I have ‑‑ So I think we should approve this, but I also think that maybe let Mr. Tinkler maybe speak on it, but also maybe is there, how do we get someone to come and talk to each of us about this?

a domino effect exactly so i make a motion to send this number one independent inspector general to uh mr tinkler for review specifically looking at the city of miami beaches inspector general and how they put the auditing department under that but also looking at um um

That could be done via an ordinance too.

Yeah. But again, I would like him to weigh in on it.

I have a motion. I have a second. I see lights. I saw Carlson and Vieira. I was going to say, I haven't heard from Councilman Carlson in a while. So Councilman Carlson?

Yeah, I just wanted to add, if HR, the Ethics Commission, and the auditor and the city attorney all report to the mayor, then they all can be weaponized as they have been against city council. And so we have to change that. They should represent the city, not the mayor. The mayor needs to have control of administration But when HR refuses to do an investigation, when something is happening against city council or city council has made aware of something that the mayor's office is doing, then that's wrong. We need to make sure we have some controls. And I'll come back to that in a minute. I thi

We'll ask Mr. Tinkler to look at that. Councilman Vieira, and then we need to move on because we've got several media issues to deal with before we break at 1. Okay. Councilman Vieira.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So correct me if I'm wrong. Under subsection C, we're taking out the mayor and city council, correct?

No, we're not using this language at all. We're going with this language, and we're asking Mr. Tinkler to write better language.

So good. So what I was going to suggest is if we do include membership in your bar associations along with George Edgecombe, we include Mejente with the Tampa Hispanic Bar. That's going to be dressed to be an ordinance. Okay. So I guess I won't be here, but remember Mejente and the Hispanic Bar. That's all. Ms. Sharpe.

So you know that we're... With looking into the audit issue. And the ethics commission. Audit and ethics. Audit and ethics, yeah.

So you know the mayor of Miami Beach, right? I do. So when I was thinking about this and looking at Miami Beach, I knew you did. And so I thought maybe you might be able to reach out to the mayor and talk to them about how they handle HR.

Well, if they're at the Florida League of Cities conference tomorrow, I will see them tomorrow.

Well, then that would be great because my concern is the same concern we have with RCRA, is that because the staff who work for the city full-time still have to abide by the HR rules, they're still required to have someone they report to. That's the problem that we're having with RCRA right now. And so how do we... how do we make sure that these people are truly independent of hr and of of all of that and so that's my that's and it's a concern that councilman carlson has brought up over time and time again and we have to fix that with the cra i just don't know how we're going to solve it yeah

But by the agreement that the CRA has with the city, the city staff and the mayor's office should not be running the CRA, but they are. Because there's a not so subtle threat that you do what I say or I'm gonna fire you. Only the CRA board should have the right to fire them, but they can't move forward and do what the CRA board wants because the mayor's office has their thumb on them. And that's the influence of the HR. And I think the HR department is way too politicized as well. You know, one of the complaints I filed a few years ago, I copied the city attorney in the HR department. Guess wh

Okay, let's kill this conversation here. I'm trying to get us out of here in 45 minutes.

I understand. Listen, I've been listening to accusations a long time. Maybe we'll have an investigation of what you just said, sir. Find out who in the hell is telling me the truth.

Well, we may have an IG here shortly. That's for right now. Why don't we, this is mostly your, this is a little bit your issue. I have a proposal on the mayoral term limits in my packet. Page two. No, you're on the right. You're on the right saying page two.

Well, I mean, just make sure, I guess, is there any, are we good unanimous consent on the Inspector General? That's what I'm saying. Are we good with unanimous consent on the Inspector General moving forward?

But we all need to vote. Can we just say all in favor?

All in favor? Well, yeah, we haven't. Aye. yeah we haven't done it yet but i did i said i said to send it to mr tinkler i made a motion but with unanimous consent okay we have motion we have a second all those in favor say aye aye opposed i said thank you okay so now we're going to mayoral yes term limits yes yes yes yes okay um i mean this this i kind of adopted this out of some of the conversations that we've had in the past agreed um thousand percent can i just which one is this councilman carlson

Before somebody writes a front page story about this, it wouldn't, this election would be, this vote for this would be at the same time as the mayor's vote. Correct. And so it would not apply to whoever is elected the next time. Correct. So it's not something that's punitive toward anybody who's running right now.

Is there any objection to sending this to Mr. Tinkler for language? Okay, without objection, unanimous consent. Item number two we'll send to Tinkler. Oh, this is a good one. Item number three. Mr. Shelby, would you like to set this one up? We've had a lot of conversations about this.

I don't have a problem with this, but I want to figure out a way to put in item number 16, the question that's on the letterhead. It's on the second page. Should Tampa City Council be able to initiate amendments to the city budget during the current fiscal year? I think these two things might come together. overriding of executive orders and initiating amendments to the city budget. I think both of these things are super important to bring some levity back to or some more balance back. Uh, I think that we should be able to override executive orders, but I also also think we should be able to i

Mr. Shelby, could you please for the public? Could you please explain what happens when it ha and what council's remedy is if the mayor signs an executive order that conflicts with something that the, that the, uh, city council has done.

Yeah, the first thing I object to is the term strong mayor.

No, no, it's in here in this writing. Technically, it's correct, except that some mayors, especially the last two, look at that as being kind of like dictatorships, and that's not the intention of that. The term strong mayor is not in the charter anywhere. If we're going to refer to it, we should call it executive mayor because that's really what strong mayor means. All it means is that the mayor doesn't sit on city council the mayor, the mayor runs the, the organization, but I would, I would be okay. I would be okay, limiting this to conflicts as defined in the charter. and also the financial

Yeah, that's why I would be cognizant of the time for that very reason.

So I say that we just move forward and send this to Mr. Tinkler. My only... other thing that i wanted to say which of course i didn't write down so chemo brain just um uh we'll delete that first line tampa has a strong rear form yeah well i mean that doesn't this is just right it's fluff yeah this is just fluff this isn't going in the part i'm just saying this is this is what should go so my recommendation is that we send this to mr tinkler um uh to look at and add um Oh well, okay. So that's my motion.

Okay, I have a motion. Second. From Councilwoman Young. Is there any objection? Hearing no objection, okay, we'll send that to Tankler for review. Okay. And... That's it. We already answered the... Let's see. We've got...

Yeah, we already did the city council compensation. Yeah.

Okay. We're done. Yeah. We've done with that part. There's still other issues on the, um, questions that we're going to discuss. Yep. Exactly. Um, councilman Carlson wanted.

Okay. At the same time, can we just cherry pick my, my only, I would like, to maybe ask Mr. Tinkler to come back with a modification of the charter to give city council the right with super majority vote to fire either the city attorney and or the mayor's direct report.

Oh, no, I'm sorry. Can they put the questions up, please? Yes, thank you. Those are the questions. Oh, can CCTV put them up, please? Thank you.

But that so that's kind of a summary of several of these just that the remedy to the to the number 12 the remedy to the conflicts and they flip it over to number 12. The idea that the city attorney represents in by charter represents us and the mayor but has been used as a weapon against city council is that we should have the power to to fire the city attorney by supermajority. The city attorney the city attorney is is is easy to understand because by charter, they are our attorney. We have our own attorney, but the city attorney reports to or represents the mayor, the city council, and the d

I disagree. I agree why. No employee can have two bosses. And if we're going to have the right to fire people, who in the hell wants to be city attorney? Who wants to be a department head? I don't understand. If we want a separate government, that's form one. That's form one where the mayor sits with us. I mean, but you can't have one party and the other party looking both ways. It's about the public, not about me and what I want. It's about what good are we doing for the citizens that we serve? Whether they're right or wrong, that's up to the courts. Take it to court. But I am not one that's

Okay. Councilman Maniscalco, do you want to say anything on this one? Councilman Young, do you want to say anything on this one?

I motion that we send this to Tinkler. Second.

Okay, I have a motion and I have a second from Councilman Maniscalco.

I'm sorry, to send number 12, question number 12, to Tinkler to bring us a language.

Okay. Okay. So I have a motion from Councilwoman Hurtek, a second from Councilman Maniscalco, I heard first. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed?

I vote. Okay. Hold on councilwoman her check.

Well, no, if he has more, I just want to add to that and, and, um, clarify for the public, the city attorney, uh, represents the city, but also through that represents all these different entities. And so. If a city attorney has a conflict, they ultimately represent the city. So, anyway. I understand.

Item number seven. And I would like to – this is should the city council attorney be allowed to hire additional staff and outside attorneys subject to budget approval of city council? So I think it shouldn't just be city council attorney. It's should the city council be allowed to hire – That I would be more comfortable with. Yeah, so instead of just city council attorneys, so if I take the attorney out and just say should city council be allowed to hire additional staff?

That only works if we do something with 16.

And it's also Yes, but that's again, so that was my secondary one that I wanted to talk about. So we can talk about them together. So I think it should be the city council should be allowed to hire additional staff subject to budget approval or to the budget, period. Yes.

Yeah, please let me finish. So should the city council be allowed to hire additional staff subject and just period, no subject to anything? Just should we be allowed to hire? I think we should be allowed to hire additional staff as necessary. So that's going to be my thing for Tinkler. Going along with number 16, which is on the other side, should tampa city council be able to initiate amendments to the city budget during the current fiscal year and i believe that we should be able to do both of those things and so i would like mr tinkler to come together and bring a language to that effect ok

semicolon funds for such positions must be found in the city council budget and any additional costs thereof must first be approved by the mayor okay well then i apologize um that i thought i didn't realize that made it through on the last one well that's been that's been that's been in there since like but again then you have the issue with the mayor the mayor yeah so i think we should be able to take that mayor part out um so that's section two you'd have to be able to get this then you then we have to go hold on so what section was that Two point.

Sub D got it. Thanks. And then what about 1616?

Well, and that's the practice that we use. The budget amendments are recommended by the mayor, and then they initiate it. That's the process that's used, but we can't initiate one.

Just saying we want to change it so that City Council can initiate amendments. So that's just let him.

So your direction would be ask Mr. Tinkler to evaluate Section 7.07 of the City of Tampa Charter to modify to allow Tampa City Council to make or suggest midterm cycle budget amendments.

She can still vote to veto and we have no right to veto.

I think that's a perfectly fine thing, but that if, if that applies to city council, it should also apply to the mayor.

Correct. So again, once again, Section 7.07, is that what you read? 7.07, direct Mr. Tinkler to evaluate that to modify the language that would allow Tampa City Council to make mid-year budget amendment recommendations And period.

So I have a motion by Chair Clendenin. I have a second from Councilman Menescalco.

Well, then the mayor could make a veto and then it would have to come back to us for an override with a super majority.

Okay. So I have a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay.

Okay. Now, I see a couple of other things. I'm going to take an IOU on the debt. I think we could do that via ordinance. I think that when...

Number 15 I believe that when we need to clarify and and it's that when we are submitted with a Proposal it should be very clear how that I mean, I understand that they have it in a catch-all This could be paid for by blah blah blah blah blah blah blah, but it was we've seen in the past We see with handle we see a fair oaks. We all see a lot of these projects It's not specific and I think if if it is if If a project is going to be paid for by debt from the moment that it is brought to the attention of city council, there should be a line in that proposal that this project is going to be paid f

Do we need to make a motion to approve the ones that we did by NAMS consent?

Yeah, I think I think no, I think we're just gonna bring those back to the next one.

That's what Miss Sharf looks like. She has some questions. Can you come up to the microphone? You can't and then state your name. I

And Ms. Sharpe, I just want you, just for the record, I want you to know, I did not volunteer to do this. Your boss did.

Actually, I need to change that. I rescind question number 7 and instead what it really is is question 14 on the other side. It's should City Council be allowed to hire additional staff. So it is section 2.04 subsection D.

What's the, we want Mr. Tinkler to add language to, um, the mayor.

Well, that that's all about budget amendment.

Yeah, this is about, but so this is, uh, and to, to, we also want, um, him to remove that the mayor has to approve that.

Okay, sorry. It's item number 14. Should city council be allowed to amend the budget to hire additional staff to carry out their legislative duties, which is under 2.04 subsection D, but taking out the fact that the mayor has to approve such budget changes? Yeah, that was unanimous consent. And so I'd like to restate that motion. Actually, I need to amend the motion to not be number seven, but to be number 14.

Well, again, what we're doing today is a workshop. We are crafting the information that's going to come back to us at the next meeting for actual definitive votes. So this is just directing Tinkler for the work product. And so we'll still have another bite of the apple. Okay, is there anything else? Is there anything we haven't discussed today that people feel compelled to talk about? Okay, I think we accomplished an awful lot. Okay, is there anybody in the public that would like to address any of the issues that we've just discussed in this item and that is referenced the changes to the chart

Thank you very much. Next speaker. Start with your name and you'll have three minutes.

Mr. Doss, Mr. Shelby has a copy of that you had asked me about. And by the way, it does have an initiate. I highlighted it underneath there for you.

Thank you. I want to, when it comes to that particular Inspector General, I would like that Mr. Tinkler receive both a copy of Ms. Llewellyn and Mr. Creighton's emails on this matter because I think they had really good points. Without objection.

I'm sorry. We have one more speaker. We just talked about that. Michael Randolph.

Ms. Scharf, can you please print out Ms. Llewellyn and Mr. Creighton's e-mails in full and bring them here so we can put them in the record? Thank you. Yeah, and then forward them. You should have them because they went to City Council as a whole.

I saw them, yeah. Okay. Mr. Randolph, thank you for your patience, and I apologize for almost missing you after we've been reminded at least three times in this meeting.

Mr. Randolph, you've got to have your name.

I believe our city clerk just seconded that motion. Thank you, Mr Randolph. We always appreciate your comments. OK, that concludes our regular scheduled business. We are Mr Shelby.

I make a motion that we accept all the recommendations today to pass along to the, um, Mr. Tinkler.

I have a motion. I have a second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed. Okay, very good.

I move that a time certain of 1.30 p.m. next week, October 1st, for final review and approval of council of charter amendments to be presented to voters and then direct the CRC legal counsel at that time to bring back an ordinance for the first reading that places the charter questions on the ballot for March 2nd, 2027 ballot.

Yes. Oh, that's why the time is certain. Okay. So I have a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay.

Yeah, our staff and Sam. Sam, if you're listening, please let's make sure that we invite Mr. Tinkler to invite, command his performance next October 1st at 1.30 p.m. I hope not. Okay. I'll just take that. I don't need a motion for that. I'll just make sure it happens. And since I've got the microphone, let me, I know, I'm sorry. I know, I'm sorry. So I have had some coordination with development, some development coordination staff, and they are backed up in cases, and they need an extra evening hearing in December. This happens, it's happened before because of having fewer evening hearings in

My recommendation is only if we limit staff reports to four.

For the day meeting? For the day meeting. Actually, I'd say, listen, what do we have on there now? Okay, I'd say let's eliminate staff reports to two.

Okay, limit staff reports to two for the December 3rd. December 3rd. Now, I will have to say, Ms. Young, or Councilwoman Young, when I joined council, it was right after 2020, and not only, we were so backed up, we had to add a second meeting every month so we did a full regular meeting and this was like brand new for me i i i i was new to council and so it was it was awful we had a full year well yeah and this that was stuff we have to it was unbelievable it was it was just anyway so yeah So I have a motion from Chair Clendenin and a second from Council Member Maniscalco to add a December 3rd

Okay. Very good. That passed unanimously. Okay. New business, Councilman Carlson, Councilman Vieira? No, no, no, no, no.

Social action and arts funding applications last day, September 30th. For fire prevention week, you have until September 25th to register online at tampa.gov slash fire to get your free smoke alarm. And then also I just want to thank Adam Purcell with the mobility department. We were at the Tampa High Civic Association meeting last night, which went very, very well. And so I just want to thank him, but also the mobility department, everything that they're doing in regards to transportation in the city of Tampa.

They're rocking, and they're going to get us a streetcar here. Councilwoman Herzog. No. No. Very good. Moved and received. Moved and received by Councilman Mascocco. Seconded by Councilman Miranda. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Aye. We made it by 1 p.m. Yay!