City Council - workshop

Welcome everyone to the City Council Budget Workshop of August 6, 2026. We're dealing with overflow from other issues tonight. We will go ahead and begin with a pledge and invocation if you'll join me in standing. Lord, Heavenly Father, thank you for gathering us all here again today. Lord, and thank you for sparing most of us from the rain for most of the day, but thank you for the rain, Lord. Thank you for replenishing our groundwater. And Lord, please help those here at the dais make decisions that are both good for our citizens today and those in the future. In your name I pray. Amen. All

All right. Ladies and gentlemen, the Lake City Council has opened its public meeting. And since 1968, the city code has prohibited any person from making personal, impertinent, or slanderous remarks or becoming boisterous while addressing the city council. Yelling or making audible comments from the audience constitutes boisterous conduct. Such conduct will not be tolerated, and there is only one approved manner of addressing the city council, and that's to be recognized and then speak from the podium. Failure to abide by the rules of decorum will result in removal from the meeting. Like I sai

what's up council how you guys doing today i have an idea i would like to i would like to float i thought about our meeting last night a whole lot last night um i understand that district 10 uh is facing unique challenges to to district 10 um and i think this may be a solution that we could get behind and shape a little bit uh so what i'm going to suggest is that we give Richardson Community Center, the 70,000 that we gave them last year, that we create a committee. We can call it the District 10 Youth Program Committee or something like that. The committee would be made up of five people Some

Thank you for that. I'd like to start off by saying I apologize to Vice Mayor Young. I was a bit confused on the $200,000, which she was clear. But again, being clear sometimes, to me, it fogged my brain, I guess. And then when Carter said something about giving the Richardson Community Center 70,000. I just agree with that. Uh, So I want to apologize to her because it looked like I was Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, I guess you could say. So I want to make sure I get this out here. I'm in favor of the $100,000 for Richardson Community Center. I'm totally in favor with that. Not 70,000, but 100,000.

with Ms. Young being the overseer of that district and that's something that she wants to accomplish, I'm in favor of giving them something. That amount, I don't know just yet. I got a piece of paper up here today With some of the activities and programs that they have out there that community. I mean that animatics Park so Whatever we come up with I'm gonna do all I can to make sure that whatever council vice mayor wants We're gonna come I think we should come close to it to make sure the mission is accomplished that she's trying to do because Her thought is the children. I don't think she's

Still going to heaven. My thought is very similar to Mr. Carter's, which is interesting because Pastor Nelson and I were talking before this meeting and I shared something similar that I was going to propose. I I'm in favor of that. The only thing that I would change at all is having a Lake City Youth Committee. I think that's a good idea. I don't know that it should be district-specific on who sits on that board, but have the vice mayor, whoever the vice mayor is, and Vice Mayor Young would initiate the chair of that committee and just have whoever the vice mayor is at the time be the chair o

Yes, ma'am, Ms. Harris. I want to be clear with what you said. $70,000 for Richardson alone. $70,000 for any medics and anybody else that wants to use money out of that? Or is that $70,000 for...

Yes, my suggestion would be then that that committee is basically like, because it's advisory, it's not like just handing it out off on its own, but it's an advisory committee with a pool of money to advise to spend from of $70,000 towards youth programs. So if you have a program, you come to that committee and say, this is what we'd like to do, and this is how much we're asking for. Maybe they get some, maybe they get all, and then that is recommended to... And I don't know if it needs to come before the council or if once the committee has made a recommendation, you know.

My question was, you said $70,000 for Richardson alone. Yes. $70,000 for not just Animatics, but for other organizations that need to get money out of that $70,000? Yes. It's not specifically going to Animatics?

No. As a matter of fact, I'm not in favor of any checks being written by the city government saying to Animatics Park. It's a problem. Not to say that they aren't programs hosted at Enigmatics Park. Like I said, if I understood it correctly last night, many of these football programs like that have their own organizations or leagues or what have you. I'm not in favor of the city giving money. I thought some of us were on the same page with a private organization that has the ability to at any point close their doors. I'm not saying they're going to. I'm not saying that they are likely to. But

So you said you agreed with him, what he was talking about?

70 to Richardson, and then forming a committee like Vice Mayor Young suggested the first night.

So you're saying the 70,000 will be not for Annie Maddox, but it will be for anybody that comes. That's what you're saying as well?

Yeah, but primarily in the people who have their stuff together here tonight and have a budget, I would imagine they'd be able to approach that committee pretty quickly. My thought actually would be to have somebody from both boards on that committee have youth pastors, have the vice mayor at the time, and to make sure that money was allocated for the wellness and oversight of good programs and after-school programs and stuff like that for children, yeah. whoever's hosting them and putting them on at the time. Because let's be fair, it might not be, the park could be leased out by an entity be

Yeah, but you all keep bringing up leasing and all of this. They're not saying that. The only thing they need is they want to have funding in order to run certain programs there. It has been clear. that funds have at Richardson Community Center, their overflow a lot of time goes to Anna Maddox. The city, we do not have anything recreational for the children, period. So if children are our true concern, Anna Maddox should be our concern as well, whether it is private or not, if they are running programs for the children, the same children, our children.

Mr. Carter. Canucks is not the only private organization that runs money for children. It's not the only private organization that survives mostly on donations.

Let's not speak over each other. Yes, but there's something called a can of worms.

And if you start doing that, you're going to have every private organization that runs programs for children come in here and asking for money. And at some point, there won't be any left. That's why the main focus of what I'm trying to say is keeping things somewhat general.

That still can happen with the 70K. That still can happen.

Well, two things, though. One, it hasn't set a precedent. of giving to one specific private organization over another. Two, it's got a limit. It's got a hard limit. $70,000. Once it's spent, it's gone for that year. If we find that it is a successful program and that it is thriving, I can't imagine a situation in which this board doesn't increase its budget the next year. If we're getting what we want out of this, if we're seeing youth succeeding and all the stuff that we hope it does, then I can't imagine it not continuing to grow. But my thought is we've got to start somewhere. I get that mu

And you say that, but we sat right here and we added another, which I wanna revisit that, as far as having a CRA person, we added something else. We had all the departments cutting everything, but we added another position that we don't even know what that person is gonna do. So we're cutting, but it's just, it seems like we're choosing what we wanna cut on, we're choosing what we wanna add onto. Then we had, I don't want to point nobody out, but we had the Humane Society come up here, jump from 201,000 up to 300,000. But when it comes to children, there is a problem with, make it make sense t

May I just real quick? Sure. We didn't agree last night to pay the Humane Society another $100,000. We very clearly, as far as I can tell, we told them, well, the services that you've been providing for us are now going out for RFP and we get some competitive bids on those things. So we didn't agree. Y'all got that? Yeah, we didn't agree to pay them. Their contract ends in... in a month and a half, and so we didn't agree to continue paying for that. As a matter of fact, I look forward to seeing those RFPs, and I want to see some competitive and interesting solutions to the animal issues, right

We've spent the last year, administration, not being able to meet those goals. So the administration has determined that we need a person whose job that is, or in this case, two people whose job that is.

We'll get back to that. I mean, you, you mentioned it. I'm sorry.

I got that. We added more than one position yesterday.

We said that we would add that position. We just funded the CRA at $1.2 million to roll out programs for, I mean, so to be fair to Annie Max, I want to read what this is real fast, right? So he presented a budget. It's very well put together. It's on a quarterly basis. But half of this, in terms of probably miscellaneous and improvements to that part, can be pulled out of the CRA. That CRA manager who will be overseeing those funds can help process grants to pay for renovations, to pay for improvements, et cetera, et cetera. That person will also be helping folks who are in our community, our

I don't wanna talk about CRA and all that. What we are talking about, I just, I wanna talk about giving money to Anna Maddox and to Richardson. And I say this, we do not have anything in the city for our children, nothing. If our children are going to Annie Maddox Park and if our children are going to Richardson, why would it take Richardson to get 70 and then Annie Maddox Park where everybody else have to split that pot? Everybody else isn't up here asking for money.

That's why there's an advisory council that would be overseeing that.

And they'll be able to see that. Don't separate Richardson Community Center from Anna Maddox or anybody else. Put it all in one pot and let the advisory board give out the money to whomever like that.

So I'm going to finish my point now. My point is based on, my view is based on a meeting that I had with several of our pastors from that area about three weeks ago. Pastor Nelson was involved in that meeting. What they said and what I took away from it was that the children need several things. They need counseling. They need tutoring. They need all of these things. But when I asked, where would this be, Pastor Nelson, what did they say? They said, we need to put funds into Richardson. And then have somewhere that these kids can get counseling as well. So that's where I started thinking, okay

Just to piggyback off of what you're saying, yesterday when Mr. Nelson first came up and spoke to us, when he began the list of needs, they were needs that weren't necessarily programs, but they were needs that the CRA can absolutely help with. So there's two different things going on here. If the facility needs all kinds of upgrades, I think the CRA can help with that. Furthermore, we did just fund the CRA to a degree that it hasn't been funded in years. It would be irresponsible to not put someone in charge of that. So... There's two different ways that they can be successful in this way, an

And then the programs is just a separate thing. And there's a degree in which, again, I just think we ought to be best to keep it general. So that if there is someone who's across town but still a Lake City resident who has a great program that wants to do something over in your district over there or mine or Ricky's district over here. They can come to that committee that we're starting to create and say, we have this program. We're looking to get, I don't know, $5,000, $10,000 or something like that. In addition to creating this thing, we'd have to have rules for it. Like, are we matching 50

Ms. Young. I'm just, I'm hopeful, I'm just, praying that we come to a resolve tonight. And let us keep in mind, this is not about Annie Maddox Park. We're not talking about the property. We're not talking about the basketball courts. We're not talking about the lighting. We're not talking about the building. We're not talking about the pavilion. It's not about us board members. We're not talking about City of Lake City board members. It's not even about Annie Maddox board.

And I think we've gotten off on some personals and beating around the bush and be transparent and say what you say and mean what you mean so that we can get through this. Our children are suffering because of foolishness like this. We got to get past all of that, people. We have to get past. It's not about all of that. But this decision tonight is about Lake City's future. We talk about crime. What can we do? Where do we go from here? We talk about crime. And the majority of it is in our young people. We say we don't have recreation. What are we going to do for recreation? We don't have recrea

Hey, we're not going to. We'll go in order.

Say what the issue is. That's the problem here. If we get over that bridge, then we can come to a resolve.

Mr. Carter, you indicated that you wanted to speak?

Yes. Miss Young, I admire your passion. I have spent the last 18 years of my life in Kiwanis Club of Lake City. I have been eagerly in my spare time attempting to serve and help children. I appreciate your goals. I appreciate your passion. I have no interest at all forgetting anything because that's not how you learn. You live and you learn, and you make judgment calls based on past experience. So, no, we are on the same page as far as our ultimate goals. We want to help children. We want to find ways to help them thrive. That is, I don't think anyone here disagrees with that. But that doesn't

So that wasn't your idea. It was actually her idea. You just repeated it today.

Yeah, well, we didn't forget yesterday happened. I said I thought a whole lot about it, and I came back and said that's a good idea. I like it. And I specifically like this particular aspect of it being the role of the District 10. Now, we can cut it up into pieces and make it something else as we all talk about it, but I think that the District 10 city councilor has a vested interest in these issues, and I think that that person serving as the chair of that committee is excellent. regardless of who's vice mayor.

Mayor, I appreciate you. I appreciate you. Mayor, yesterday, I said, I'm not saying put $100,000 in Annie Maddow's account. That's not what I proposed. But what I proposed is that it be broken down into quarters. And it may not be Anna Maddox who received the first quarter. And matter of fact, cut the first quarter in half. Come on, mathematician. Cut the first quarter in half. And the first quarter kickoffs. Get this started. First quarter. This is Anna, who came up with this? This is Reverend Nelson. Pastor Nelson bringing all these pastors and educators and all who we need to play a part in

I would say this because I think there was a fair amount of failed accusations there. And I don't know that I can address them all. Ms. Harris asked why 70 to Richardson, why 70 that's allocated to everybody else. I think it's a fair question. And after thinking about it and listening to Ms. Young say it doesn't matter who... I think you're right. So I think that we take the full sum that was proposed by Mr. Carter at 140 and we create that council and we let them allocate it to youth programs that come and ask for it, regardless of where they are, as long as it's as long as it is not for oper

to clarify then that would be a general Lake City Community Youth Program Committee fund pool, right? So to be clear, and this is the only thing, I'm fine with that. That sounds fine with me. I think that the average citizen from across the city would probably find that more amenable. If they had a complaint before, it might be that one district is getting something the other districts are not. But to be clear, that is the case. If we go with something like that, there was an element that was focused directly in District 10.

Please repeat that. I missed that. One district, what now?

I said, someone that lives in a different district could say, hey, why is $140,000, $70,000 being spent specifically in one district on a specific thing? Whereas if we go with a general 140 across the board, that is something I'm saying that the entire community from anywhere they live could say, okay, that's fine with. But to be clear, my original suggestion made sure half of that money stayed in District 10 no matter what. I understand.

I would still have whoever is the vice mayor over that. But what this would do is it would disable the silos of each board from not working together. It would force people to work together. right to to not duplicate or even triplicate the same programs but work together so that if we want to get more done and do more things for the kids we're not doing three or four of the same thing we're doing one of the same thing and coming to that committee for that money mayor that makes it not organized I think that having it split up into five or six different entities makes it not organized. That's wh

Okay, we have a majority of the Animaddox board here. Could y'all stand up for us? Y'all came out here for the money, right? Yes, ma'am. So the list of stuff. Yeah, y'all come to the podium. Y'all come to the podium.

Thank you. One more time, your name, sir?

Thank you, Mr. Nelson. I've got a question for you. The programs that you have at Antimatic Spark, is there anywhere else that has those programs that duplicate those programs?

Let me ask you another question. On that board, and I think that we can all look at it, are there any monies for youth services on that board currently?

Animal shelter, senior services, historical museum, chamber of commerce, none. I'm not saying don't give you guys any money. I'm saying let's put all of it into a youth council so that the organizations of the community can work together to best allocate those funds for the most use and the most impact on the most children. Okay, I got one question. I think that I was misinterpreted whenever I said that.

It might seem that way to you, but it's not true. What that advisory council would do is they'd be able to look at the allocation, the programs that they allocated to, and say, hey, maybe this money could better be spent in your programs doing this because we already have a tutoring or this because we already have a counseling. So no, absolutely not. Well, I can tell you now. I dismissed that premise that you're saying that I don't trust you because I've gone from – no money to money by an advisory council that can oversee it and make sure that we're not duplicating funds into different bucket

We'll have public comment at the end of the meeting. So what I would say is make sure that you sign up for public comment at the end of the meeting. We're talking to the Antimatics Board right now because it was invoked by Ms. Harris. But we will have that order.

Yes, Mr. Carter has been waiting, then Ms. Young.

I want to address like seven things real quick. First of all, a lot of people have been calling you Pastor Nelson. I don't know you as that. I know you as Coach Nelson. You taught me in school. I understand why you would feel distrustful. I understand why you would feel like you're not being treated fairly by anybody. And I understand why what I said earlier may have been misconstrued as in some way distrust. But I want to first assure you that I don't need to close my eyes. None of the considerations that one would need to close their eyes for are relevant to me at all. Okay, we have to be re

I agree with you. There's no way that we shouldn't be self-supporting on that technology. So if we're working on that network, then we should be paying for it.

We're going to address that because we should be self-sustaining on our own network for sure.

Yeah, absolutely. Again, if we're operating, if that's part of our operations, we need to be self-sustaining. So, Mr. Rosenthal, would you like to address that?

Okay, Ms. Young, you've been waiting to speak, and then Mr. Carr.

We have it. We ought to have everything we need. Every question come up, we ought to have it. I don't have that. Oh, okay. Okay, so, yeah.

We have it right here. Richardson Community Center has been our saving grace for STEAM, science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics. And how can we pull out now? Because we're, they asked for $100,000. So we should not put their money in a cubby and then it be distributed out to them as we requested. They've been our saving grace. Long as I've been here and probably before that. Now, so we need to deal with Richardson Community Center and then deal with this side of the scale differently.

I'm going to ask you another question, Mr. Nelson. Yes, sir. And I asked you this before the meeting. Did your board work with Richardson Community Center board?

Do you think that if there was a collaborative board with representation from Annie Maddox and representation from Richardson Community Center, that those people could work together to allocate funds to serve more children?

Hold on. Hold on. Hold on, sir. If you want to come up, come to the podium and speak. We can't have yelling from the audience because the people at home need to also hear why this is an issue.

Mayor, I have spoken with both sides. And for the record, this has been, I've been working on this, working with the community, talking to the pastors, wanting to bring everybody collectively to work for our community. So my question is, to the pastors was, are you all willing to come out? Will you come out and work with the community and let's get in our proper perspective, the church. I have asked Richardson Community Center if they could work together with Annie Meadows. And like I said, we need each other. And this is just, to me, this is the ideal moment. This is the ideal opportunity to

I am having a hard time saying that that's not what I'm proposing. That we have one board that everybody is coming together to work together on it. Well, that's what I've been saying. And you guys have been saying, no, that's not going to work. No, I'm saying everybody come together. Everybody come together and allocate those funds out to serve more children in more ways.

Yes, but listen, I don't agree with putting all the funds in one pot. What I asked was, and like I said, I stand on that, Richardson, $100,000. Whatever the other amount is, that's the amount that would be allocated.

Wait, so we did Mr. Carter, and then you're next.

All right. Sorry. So, whatever issues there exist between various boards communication-wise, there is no issue, because I just heard Mr. Nelson say if the two of them got together, he's not confident they could get much done.

To be clear, if we're creating, I want to be super clear, if we're creating this committee, I'd be recommending that you're on it. I'd be recommending that the young lady from Richardson Community Center yesterday is on it. I'd be recommending that Ms. Jennifer Anchors at the United Way or someone that works with her who helps serve underprivileged communities is on it. I mean, to be clear, I'm buying in. I'm buying in to the idea of getting you guys involved, trying not to exclude you. There is issues with the fact that you're a private park, and people will bring it up. Other people will bri

I like the suggestion that you made, whereas Richardson get $45,000, and the Maddox get $45,000, and then the advisory board get $50,000. and do it like that.

May I ask you a question, Mr. Mayor? Why would Richardson and Annie Maddox each get a set amount of money and then there's an advisory?

That is what your suggestion, if you may.

I know, I know, my original suggestion was Richardson Community Center, as Ms. Young has said, has been our tried and true. They've been there, they've nailed it every time for the last couple of years, they've done a great job, we give them the money, they do the thing. So there is an element of the first suggestion I made saying the 70 that we gave them last year, we give them again because we know that they're gonna do what they did with it last year and it's great.

That was my initial suggestion. Technically, it's because they always come up here asking for money. They should make sure they get their $70,000. And because Annie Maddox don't come up here often and ask for some money, they should be put in the pot with everybody else to get some of that.

No, that's not what I said. I said what I said. I said they came, they got, they did. They came, they got, they did. They've done it for the last three years that I've been on this board. They have been successful with the thing. So saying all of a sudden now, no, you don't get that and stuff like that. And that was the suggestion when I came in was I was going to protect the amount that they had gotten last year and then create a pot for everybody else. And that idea had been shouted down. So Mr. Mayor came up with a general pot that everybody can come to. And I said, that's a great idea, too

And let me be clear, Anna Maddox have a lot of people going there as well. It's not just Richardson Gym that everybody is visiting. They come to Anna Maddox just as much as they, probably even more. Because even when Richardson shut down for the evening, Anna Maddox is open. They have their fields open, the basketball courts, and all of that stuff, and people are there. So I think we don't, like I said, the city does not have anything for recreation. So to me, this would be like an investment. Investing in our own So I believe we should go by the way he said, which I wish it was 100K. I wouldn

I have a question, Mr. Mayor. So it seems like there's kind of two general things going on here, right? There's either a $140,000 pot to be kind of spent by an advisory committee that we create on youth recreation, or there is... 45, 45, 70, or whatever the math is. 50. So there's two things here, right? There's five of us. Mr. Rickey hasn't said much in a little while, but I don't think anybody wants to watch us argue about this for another hour. Can we kind of start nailing it down to something? Ms. Young, you had one more thing.

But I would like to bring, and you brought $140,000. We started out $200,000. Well, you did. That's what I just said.

We talked about 200,000 yesterday. You brought 140 here today. One thing I am not is a liar. This is what Richardson offers during the summer, right? Summer camp. We're talking about throughout the school term and summer. So I think that's a plus. That our children will be offered steam throughout the summer. school year as well as throughout the summer. I'm telling you, this has me won. When I see these men with these credentials and knowing them personally, these people, I'm sold.

Let's get down to the number. How much are we going to give them? Because at the end of the day, they're here for money, and we don't talk about this for an hour.

Yeah, so again, we have two defined ideas. One is to break money up. One is to throw it on the pot. So what do we want to do? Yes, sir, Mr.

If I may just one more time advocate for a particular idea. Like I said before, we all agree that That it is a shame that the city government is not more involved in recreation. Used to be very involved, isn't anymore. We all agree on that. A general focus is going to be much easier to generally grow from over time. That committee will have the opportunity to get more and more institutional knowledge. more and better members as it goes on. More people will want to serve on that committee. The people will recognize the importance of the committee to the youth in the community. I think the way t

I also think, to add to that, I think that having a committee like that makes it attractive for other partnerships and to add to that pot. It's seeded by the city, and then you have corporate sponsors that have allocated youth funds like Blue Cross Blue Shield, TD Bank, First Federal Bank, monies out there in the community that can also go into that pot to serve that mission. that is then allocated out to the people who are doing the work.

The sign on the splash pad that we were talking about the other day. Whoever pays X amount of money to put their sign on the splash pad, that money would be going into that pot, theoretically. Creating an organization under our umbrella like that may allow us to apply for grants. I can't imagine all the grants I know that are for that sort of thing. We may need that committee in existence in order to get grants like that. We could grow that fund theoretically the way the mayor just said through local sponsorships and through theoretical grants way more than the city would have to put money dir

My God, man, we're going back and forth and forth and back. You know, it's in District 10. We have to recognize that. We have the schools that just come out combined, and it appears that Mr. Nelson has got a passion, just like Ms. Young does. She's got a passion for children in that district. I think that me personally, if, listen carefully, if it's not a private park, I think that we should honor Vice Mayor's Young request. 100,000 for Richardson Community Center, 100,000 for Anna Maddox. Is that what you said first, Ms. Young?

We'll get to that once we come to an agreement of what we're going to do, see how much the money we're talking about.

Well, that's a good start. Mr. Jernigan, the figure, I mean, we've had $140,000 and we've had $200,000 tossed out. Which one?

I'm going to go by her request. She said $200,000. That's where I'm going. Ms. Harris?

Mr. Jernigan started out his comment by saying, if it's not a private park. It is. It is objectively a private park. I'm not still stuck on the idea that we don't write that park checks for certain programs they're having, to be clear. But it is a private park. There's no confusion about that. It 100% is a private park.

Well, Mr. Nelson just got up and said it wasn't.

No, he said the public is welcome to come. The public is welcome to go to Walmart. The public is welcome to walk into any store in town.

Hold on, we're not taking, you cannot yell from the audience. We do need clarification on this. Last night we looked it up on the property appraiser. It's owned by the Annie Maddox board, right? Yes, ma'am.

Why don't we get a title search done on that property?

I thought they just got one. Oh, that's not a title search.

No, I know, but I didn't think about nothing private about this.

Didn't you all have a, and correct me if I'm wrong, didn't you all have a title search done on that piece of property? That's correct. It's owned by the board.

Okay, so it's owned by the board. Just like Richardson, it's pretty much owned by the board. So you may want to, no, the county owns Richardson Community Center. It's a public-owned entity.

I think that may reflect on one of the deeds. That's not a title search.

I believe you need a title search. Do you guys know for sure?

So it's private ownership. So would you like to clarify your comments, Mr. Dringen?

Well, again, Ms. Young, I think she's got a passion for those children. I'm looking at it from that perspective. And with those two schools close by, I still think we should honor Ms. Young's request.

Okay, so you're saying $200,000. Okay, we're just going on the number right now.

$200,000, Mr. Jernigan, yes or no? Yeah, $100,000 for Richardson Community Center, that's no question. $100,000 for Animadox, no question, because that is the request of Vice Mayor Young.

Okay, all right. Mr. Jernigan says $200,000. Yes, ma'am.

So we will talk about that the $100,000 doesn't go directly into the account. It would be quarterly distributions. Does it go quarterly into the account?

Let's just talk about the number first. The number first. Ms. Harris.

My suggestion would be $70,000 for Richardson because that's what they wanted. $70,000 for Annie Maddox because that's what they wanted. Take the remaining $60,000 and put it for the advisory board. So if anybody else come up and... Y'all killing me here.

So $200,000 for Ms. Harris as well. I'm going to say $140,000 myself. We're just talking about the number right now.

No, but I'm saying, oh, you're talking about the $140,000. Just the number, yeah.

I think the numbers that she just added up, I think are $140,000.

She said $70,000, $70,000, $60,000. So she said $200,000. Oh, yeah. Ms. Young? $200,000, okay. So now we need to talk about where this $200,000 is coming from. Staff, do you have any recommendations? Because $50,000 is coming out of the Mayor's Matching Grant, so...

So we cut about $30,000 out of float rental and an event out of that promotional budget. That still leaves us in a $120,000 deficit. I'm cutting about, I think, $15,000 in events.

Sure. So if you just took it out of the surplus, if you just took it out of what we're taking out of surplus, it sounds like this full amount is likely to come out of surplus, which is a dangerous investment. That's correct.

I'll open, yeah, Mr. Jernigan. No suggestions. I just, who's the president of the Animatics Board? President? Ms. Warman, right?

We don't have one at this time. You don't have a president? They don't have a president. Okay, good.

As to where to pull that $150,000 out of. I would like to start by making a suggestion.

I would just appeal to my fellow council members to pull back to a slightly more responsible number. We just cut a bunch out of our own budget and every other department in the city just cut mine. We just advertised and are going with the rollback rate. We're bringing in no new revenue this year.

We're already at a point where we're talking about 100 to 140,000. That's a number in the middle from the original 15 and the 100 that was asked for.

And this is no surprise to administration because I've been asking asking, asking, where's recreation? We can't just drop recreation. So no, they should not be alarmed. And going through pages right now, you should already have some sort of idea of where the money will come from.

To be fair, we did just drop a rollback on them and they have a million dollars in recreation allocated where we're building a million dollars worth of parks right now.

Sounds good. Exactly. That needs to be emphasized. We just spent a million dollars

I mean, that we have not spent in many, many, many, many, many years.

I'm going to suggest that we take a five-minute break. Thank you.

We left, and we're speaking about where to get the $200,000 proposed from. Yes, sir, Mr. Recorder. I have an idea.

This is a great idea. Everybody loves all my ideas. It's just an idea. Listen, this year we've chopped this budget to pieces. We've tried to cut everywhere we could. But this money has to come from somewhere. I do not think that it's a good idea to make a habit out of pulling the money from contingency for various things just because it's what we want. We still have to make smart budget decisions. Here's my idea. Staff, Mr. Rosenthal, maybe Mr. Brown question. How much money is in the budget this year for roads and District 10? Can we go to that roads and District 10?

Don't even try it. Don't even try it. Shut that down right now. I'm just asking. I'm just asking.

I think it's close to $200,000. I think it's close to $200,000.

Well, to be clear, I was suggesting that we do a smaller amount and we centralize it to the whole community where it feels like we're turning back to a much larger amount and very specifically where it's being spent. I mean, it makes a lot of sense. All I ask, this isn't necessarily how it would need to be handled every year, but this year, We roll back. This year, we cut everywhere. This year, we have to find the money somewhere. And if y'all want to spend $200,000, we've got to find it somewhere. I don't know. I mean, I can't. Listen, there's five of us. It's going to be an even and an odd n

That's what I was about to say. When you think about District 10 and the road, we have one road that's very imperative that we take care of, and it's gonna cost quite a bit of money. So let's find another curb.

Center. Center Street. Yeah, I can go one more year without you. No, no, no.

If I may continue to elaborate. All right. Obviously, when we started out yesterday, we were spending, based on what we did last year, $70,000. $50,000, $50,000. Mayor talked about maybe doing another $50,000 to $100,000. I was pretty stuck at that $75,000 mark, understanding that we're constraining ourselves fiscally this year. I feel like we started out $70,000 and $200,000. I came in earnestly wanting to be like, you know, listen, we're still going to have to find somewhere to get it from. We're going to have to take it from somewhere. But trying to meet in the middle, right? Trying to serv

Do any mayors get funding from the county?

It's funded from the county. Because it's owned by the county. They still get the funding.

Mayor, let me make something clear. These two recreation centers are in District 10, but they don't only serve as District 10. So I think it's very inconsiderate to say, don't pave a road in District 10. and take the money from District 10. These two recreation centers serve Lake City. Many of your constituents comes to Richardson Community Center. About this time of the evening, go right there. It's Lake City. So it's kind of, I take offense to that.

I'm just doing some math. I understand. It might be too much. I understand. I understand.

Let's do 70. 70,000 for Richardson and 70,000 for Ann and Maddox. And do the advisory board to get the money to them quarterly. And that will lower the amount of money we have to come up with versus 200,000. That'll be 140,000.

Mr. Mayor, I have a question of clarification. If we're just gonna give 70 to one organization and 70 to the other, that makes the board pointless. What's the board gonna do? We're just giving each organization 70.

Are you saying put it in the advisory committee? She's essentially saying.

So is the suggestion, sorry, I'm sorry, go ahead.

but is it a suggestion that the board exists to determine what those two organizations get only? I'm asking.

Hold on. Mr. Jernigan, yes. See, this is where I got caught up in night before last and came up with the $70,000 because Mr. Carter had suggested that. So that's where I got caught up in it because it didn't appear that the $100,000 for Richardson Community Center and 100,000 for Anna Maddox Park was gonna survive. So when he suggested the 70,000, that's where I said I agree with him. So that's how I got, I didn't flip or flop, but that's where I got it from. And you know, Mr. Carter says some things that's very clear.

We asked all the departments, I usually do that too Dee, we asked all the departments to cut back. 10%, 18%, 17%, 69%, 18%, so forth and so on. All these departments we had to cut back. This year here, I think it's a bad year now, listening to all of the, where are we going to get the money from? How are we going to do this? And we requested everybody to cut back. So this year here, I would hope that Animata understands we are in a pickle right now. So with that being said, I don't think that we could fund the amount of money that you're requesting. But I do think we can give you some monies.

It's Ms. Young, then Mr. Carter. Mayor, and Jeremy has agreed with everything everybody said. I don't know. Everybody. Mayor, I really want to use the advisory board, and especially if it's going to have youth on it. That's something that... I've been wanting to do for some time.

Okay, so the advisory board. And it's not the only responsibility in the funding. There'll be other responsibilities that will come with the advisory board, and we can talk about that later, right? So we're all agreed by the advisory board. Okay, so I'll agree to the 140. I'll agree to the 140. And I'll agree to Richardson with the 70, right? And the other 70, I'll agree for Annie Meadows. But I do want it in quarterly. Now Richardson has, like I say, they have a relationship with the city. They've redeemed themselves. So I want to see Annie Meadows working toward getting in that same space So

Real quick. First, some math. Mayor's matching grant fund is $100,000, $50,000 of which you were going to allocate to the Richardson Community Center originally, right? We cut $30,000 out for the codification situation from our budget. We cut $12,000 out for the float that nobody wanted. And we cut $15,000 out for Lovefest, right? From our budget. So that is, I'm hearing, $100,000. Basically, $30,000 and $30,000. I'm hearing $160,000 is money that we just made. That's the stack I just made up is $160,000. So my suggestion is if we're doing a $140,000, that's where it comes from. We've got a float that we're not getting. We've got $30,000 that we're not codifying. And we've got $100,000 in the mayor's matching grant.

I was only saying $50,000 from the mayor.

Well, last night at the end of the meeting, you had suggested that you were going to suggest another $50,000. So I'm asking if we're trying to find the money, I've found the money. $100,000 that's out of the Mayor's Matching Grant Fund. That would work.

So we're going to eliminate the Mayor's Matching Grant Fund?

I would say that we're going to empty it. We're trying to find the money.

There's just a lot of people that use that throughout the year.

If we want to pave Center Street, that's fine. So we don't get to use that one. I'm just saying, we don't get to use that. We don't get to use that. I'm trying to find the money. At the end of the day, it's all just math.

Okay, I can go for that. But what I don't care for, if we're going to, the Animadocs have to report errors. Can I just finish? I was almost done.

I was real close to done. This is the last time I'm going to try to make this point. And I promise, after this, I'm going to give up. Until next year. And listen, let me just say to everybody that's here and everybody that's left, I thank you all, everybody who serves the children in their communities. I thank you so much. Again, I can't emphasize enough what I said earlier. It hurt my heart, Mr. Nelson, that you thought that I might be looking at some way, some kind of thing that wasn't that way. It is not that. I promise it's not that. As a matter of fact, I can't wait to talk to you after the meeting because I want to find something out there that I can help do. Okay?

That's what I'm talking about. But we do a math. We do a math. So anyway, to be clear, though, because I'm coming back around to something that may aggravate people. That's why I said the nice stuff first. Do we want to take the money that we are going to spend? We just come up with it. We just come up with where we can fund it, theoretically. Do we want to take that money and piecemeal it to a couple of organizations this time as a thing that we're doing? Or do we want to start something? Do we want to begin something, something real that can grow into something more? That's what I'm saying h

Okay. Can we use the K of the CRA? Okay. Finance? You can? I don't believe so. What's up? So, I'm with you on that. The only thing I do not like is, I don't like it, whereas it feels like, to me, Richardson doesn't have to be accountable every three months on what they're going to spend their money for, but with Annie Maddox, it's like, there's a be sought out in quarterly. So, if you're going to do it for Annie Maddox, let's do it for Richardson.

I mean, you have a lot of faith in Richardson, I thank God for you, whatever, but you can't speak for all of us with Richardson in that area.

The reason I say that is because Annie Meadows have no programs going now. There's no organized programs going effectively. Maybe one. So this gives Annie Meadows, give them time to build this program fully. and let us see progress. Richardson pretty much had to do the same, not quarterly because we just didn't come up with it then, but they had to... You challenged them really because of a situation, right? So... This is not saying I don't trust them. I know all of them. It's not saying I don't trust them, but it's not about me. It's about the taxpayers' dollars, and we just want to see progr

Mr. Carter. Mr. Mayor, let me, Ms. Harris, let me appeal to you specifically. It doesn't necessarily matter if you do or don't trust the Richardson Community Center. If you go with the plan. I did not say that. I said do or don't. I said do or don't. If you go with a plan more like my plan. If you help me out here and you vote in this direction that I'm trying to steer us, it doesn't really matter if you're comfortable or not comfortable, trust, don't trust, because there'll be a board and it will look at each program individually and see what they're gonna do with each program individually, o

It also gives a centralized entity for businesses to write checks to.

I want to ask Pastor Nelson, Reverend Nelson, I want to ask him a question, if that's okay.

How do you feel about the quarterly reporting and the quarterly distributions?

They turn in a roster for all the programs that they provide.

Okay, Mr. Carter. I have a real quick procedural question. I feel like we haven't done our best to confound Mr. Martin tonight. Real quick, as we're talking about a lot of things at once here, we're talking about creating a committee. Once we make this decision, it will be very soon that some of these financial balls will be rolling. Is there a way that the current council can serve as that committee until the committee is created? So that there is a committee effectively pretty soon? Is there something like that?

I guess to be clear, what I'm not sure about is how stringent the requirements are from a legal standpoint for a committee versus like a board or some sort of...

So the facts that we seem to have stacked up so far, it feels like I think we're all at 140,000. I think we're all for an advisory board. I think right now it's whether or not that advisory board is in charge of managing giving money to and how they give money to particular organizations or any organization that does youth programs in Lake City. So we're almost there.

Let me say this. I did not mean show a receipt for every penny you spend. When I say progress, show progress, I'm concerned about the organized programs rather than whether you went to Walmart and spent $20. That's not what I'm saying. You said receipts. Help me with that. Is that what you meant? No. Wait.

Okay. When we say accountability... And I don't want to keep bringing up Richardson. Richardson, how many students enrolled? How much does it cost per student? Just say $400. $400 per student. We don't ask them to break down that $400. Well, lunch was $6. Breakfast was $12. That's not, no.

When we take our children, I'm sorry, Mayor. When we take our children to daycare, they give us a cost per child. And we don't know how much that breakfast costs. We don't know how much that tablet costs. that they use. We just know how much it was per child. So I want to see progress on these programs. That's what I'm, that's my baby.

It's actually, that last part you said, Ms. Young, it kind of, it's funny.

Not that kind of funny. If you ask the daycare what they spend it on and how, they'll tell you I do, actually. Because I've learned this last year how much daycare costs. It's pretty... To be clear, but no. Honestly, like... Mr. Dakota left, but you ask when... Anytime anybody gets grants for anything from any legitimate organization, it's a pretty stringent process with all kinds of things, receipts and this, that, and the other. So, yeah, anybody who's getting grant fund money from the city should be providing... very clear accounts for what they're doing with the money. I mean, the idea tha

But pen and for pen and no. Your mayor's matching grants. Do we get receipts? Yes. Is it dollar for dollar? Yes.

They have to submit those to be, because it's a reimbursement grant. So it's.

Be what they give before and tell me what they give after.

So they do an application, then they have to submit.

Oh, that's not a reimbursement grant. It's not a reimbursement grant. But I don't have a problem with receipts.

I don't have a problem with receipts. If you all say receipts. If we say receipts, that's what y'all say. That's what y'all say. But I don't see penny for penny. I mean, go ahead.

Yes, Mr. Jernigan. Yes, sir. Thank you, Mayor. you know I think I know Dr. Pollack several of the people that's on this list here so you know spending let's say we spend $25 where is the money going are we paying the people who's putting on the after school programs is that what we're doing if they require it is that what we're doing here

Mr. Jernigan, you're asking me something.

Okay, the reason why I'm asking you that question, I'm going somewhere with that.

And if I take too long in questioning and action, I apologize for that. However... Most people, when I was coming up in school, attending Anna Maddox and Richardson Community Center, and then when I graduated, I came back to the city of Lake City from the military. I volunteered my services. So I'm just looking at the professional people that's down here, these folks. And when I see Santa Claus, but I I volunteered my time. So I'm just wondering where the money is going to be made. Just maybe we would have to buy some merchandise, like maybe a tablet or I don't know, paper or pencil or somethi

Let's go ahead and get these people this money so we can move on. We're going to beat this cow. It done been two hours and we only talked about this one thing. Now we done came up with the agreement of 70K to Richardson, 70K to Annie Maddox. I say if we gonna need this money, 50K for the mayor's grant, that position we made for the CRA, that's for 47, that's another, we can use that, we gonna take that.

Mr. Mayor, if I may, we don't have to do that part. We just don't have to because we've already found the money. For the sake of math, we found the money. Mr. Mayor, Council, we got two things. Is it general or is it specific? It should be general. It is the community's tax dollars. It should be general. Please see reason and hit it with the general. It should be general and it's something we can grow off of. Please.

Agreed. All right, so it is a decision point there, so we're going to come down the line and get the tally on it. Mr. Jernigan, the— Go down there, please. Sure.

Do what you were doing. He don't run it. You run it.

You know what? I'll start. I'll give you—I'll start in the middle, and I'll work my way back in. So be prepared, because, Mr. Jernigan, I'm coming to you next, and then Ms. Young, and then Ms. Harris, then Mr. Carter. There's a proposition here for two different things. One is to put money into a general committee that will allocate the funds from that committee. We've agreed on $140,000. The other option is to take and split that 70 and 70 and give 70 to Richardson Community Center, give 70 to Annie Maddox Park, and create a committee that just does oversight. Does nothing. Does very little.

Same thing as you, ma'am. I'm with you, ma'am. Thank you.

Okay, all right. Well, that's three. Let's go. So we're going to create the committee. All $140,000 is going to go into that committee, and then they are going to allocate the money. Okay. Sounds good. Great. Well, that was our one thing for resolution.

All right. Now that we've finished our overflow, Yes.

That's right. Collaboration is key. All right, so that closes out our one item. We do have public participation, so I will now... Mr. Mayor, I just have two sentences to add to this.

No, listen. It's just... Hear me out. As soon as we can, I think we should set a workshop.

As soon as we can, I think we should set a workshop to go ahead and begin the process of putting together this committee. I want the organizations that need the money to be able to access it as soon as possible. So as soon as we can. I don't want them to feel like it's going to be six months from now before there's a committee and they can ask. I want there to be a committee as soon as we can get it together in October 1st and we're new budget year, then we can start however it works. But I just think we should next week. staff figure out when the committee, I mean, when the workshop will work for everybody and take this very seriously. I'm very excited about this.

Yes, ma'am. Ms. Sykes, you got a question?

Do we have a workshop the first meeting in September? Maybe.

And that is a non-regularly scheduled meeting because it's not going to be on Monday. It falls on the week of Labor Day. And because of our budget, we are doing it on the 10th because we couldn't have it on the same night as the school board or the county. So the 10th was our only option there to fall within those guidelines. So we will have that workshop before the 10th. And it will be a Thursday night. On the 10th? Yes. That's our council meeting, and that's when that workshop will be for the creation of that committee.

You guys have a pit in finance's stomach because that's our only night available. We have to approve our budget that night. Okay.

I had two things I wanted to talk about, but y'all done drilled their holes over there.

You want to go back into budget? Yeah. Okay. I mean, we're going to talk about it. Let's talk about it. Okay, so we're not done. We're not done, apparently. I'm sorry, folks. Ms. Harris.

I want to talk about City Hall. We were talking about, it was said that we had already voted for the City Hall to be

I don't think we should create another position. And it's just like I said before, we have cut everybody this and that. And then we're going to add on a position, put more money into something.

I would say on that, with the amount of rollout that we're doing and the anticipated workload of the CRA this year, which we haven't had the funding to do anything... up to this point we're putting i think five times more than put in in the last decade to roll out for a residential program for a a commercial program and and really to develop other programs that could benefit the people who live within the cra and bring up their property values i i think it's a necessary position

I feel like that too, but my thought process is we don't cut everybody else's and then we're gonna add something on it. There's nobody in that office. He said he had eight people, nobody else in there could do whatever.

nobody's specifically working on this. Nobody's focused on the CRA. In my opinion, if it's going to work, need somebody laser focused on the CRA and CRA only.

And take somebody out of a current position. And whoever it is would have to be. We're paying for something and we don't even know what they're going to be doing. We're talking about, what, $47,000? We don't.

Okay, one of ours is about a CRA. Then that's the salary go back into our fund.

Any other items to go back into? We're done with the budget? Yes, ma'am. Ms. Young.

Thank y'all so much. I mean, I'm not totally satisfied, but I do understand sometimes we have to meet.

Close to the middle. But you could always give up that role. You could always give up that role.

You could have been through. You could have gave up that role. You could have been done. I ain't giving it up. All right, y'all. Appreciate y'all so much.

I think partial satisfaction is a true hallmark of democracy.

Yes, sir. Mr. Jernigan. Yes. Again, I'd like to appreciate... Angie and her team over there and Mr. Rosenthal and all the department heads for cutting the way they did. So I think that's amazing in times like this when everything's very, very expensive. So I'd just like to let you guys know how much we really appreciate each department head for cutting the way they did. So thank you all very much.

So now we'll conclude the budget. However, that does not conclude the meeting. We do have public participation because I announced at the beginning of the meeting that we would have public participation at the end. So we will now open up public participation. We had two people sign up. I believe the young lady, Ms. Caitlin Register, is no longer here. I do not see her anymore in the audience. But we do have Mr. Michael Harris, and we will now recognize you.

That's my husband. What? Recess, let me find out what you're talking about.

Thank you, Mr. Harris. And to recap, I want to commend this board because we are putting more money toward recreation this year than we have since it got cut out, and more money than this board ever has. Close to $100,000 more than we put into it last year in our budget. Thank you. The youth are important, and that's why we're spending a million dollars on parks, and we have sown the seed of recreating recreation again here during this process. That's all I have to say, and that's all we've got for tonight.