Village Commission - Regular Meeting

Recording in progress. Hey, Gene. Sir?

How are you? I see you're in a good position.

We're live on Facebook, too. Oh, yeah. Oh, he's doing push-ups right now. In his office. Steve.

Thank you.

I already told you. Days like this. It depends. Sorry, I'm a few minutes late. I responded.

We have time to start and we didn't know.

I was wondering where he was. Hey, everybody. Hello, hello. Hey, folks.

Let's try to get this show on the road. Sorry for my delay. I had a Wi-Fi issue, and then I didn't have the Zoom link in my calendar, but here we are. All I can see is... Hang on a second.

We can hear, but it's not very loud.

Well, it's really loud for me.

Test one, two.

That's not us. Alaska. Testing one, two, three. Can you hear me?

Yeah, but we can't hear the mayor. I understand.

Do a test. Test one, two. Test one, two. 2025, 2026, 2027. That sounds good.

It's a little better. Is everyone in the chamber but me?

Yeah.

That's great. Thanks for being there, everybody. I'm sorry that I'm not with you all. Johnny, is there a way for me to look at the days so I can see my colleagues' faces? I mean, it's nice to see an empty room, but for our deputy chief and our chief of police, thank you, gentlemen, for your service.

Thank you. We haven't started.

There we go. Look at that empty chair right in the middle. Let's call the budget workshop to order, shall we? That's me calling it to order. Okay. I don't have a flag here, so... Would everyone be offended terribly if we skipped the Pledge of Allegiance and moved right on to the mayor's or to the manager's introduction of the budget?

You want to do a roll call?

Why don't you guys all stand for the Pledge of Allegiance and I'll be joining you in spirit. How about that?

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

Madam Clerk, do you want to call the roll, please?

Commissioner Acosta?

Here.

Commissioner Cervone? Present. Commissioner Rodado?

Here.

Vice Mayor Cook? Present. Mayor Streiffel?

I'm here.

You have a quorum.

Thank you. Mr. Manager, the floor is yours.

Good afternoon, Mayor and members of the Commission and the public that is viewing, hopefully. There doesn't appear to be any in the chambers. They trust us, I know. So we're going to go through a review of a budget that we have put together with the intent of staying within The current millage that we have. That's what will be presented to you. We'll go through, I will go through each department and give you the basics of what was taken away or what was added. And then we will get into the areas dealing with where you may want to make some additions or further reductions or whatever that you have in mind. So if you bear with me to run through it, you've got a copy of the slides with you there. If you have any questions or something, just sort of jot them down. I'm going to run through these, and then we can come back to anything that you want to go over. Okay? commission and as you see there you can see what the current budget is what the proposed budget is for next year in 2627 and whether there's an increase or decrease going across the board in the village commission there's a decrease of twenty five thousand dollars twenty five thousand six twenty four For some reason, telephones or cell phones were in your budget and they were also in Johnny's budget. So we pulled them out of your budget and they're just in the IT department. And then I eliminated the travel conferences and meeting expenditures for the other two commissioners that were not, didn't have them or kept them from last year. And I left the mayor as the head of the commission with the expense account. Next page on the village manager. There's a slight increase. We eliminated my cell phone siphon that I was getting. We reduced reduction in travel conferences and meetings. We took that away. We eliminated due subscriptions and membership expenses. I was able to reduce my gas and oil. My car doesn't travel very far back and forth across the bridge, so I was able to take a few hundred dollars off of that. And then there's the typical increases that you're going to see in all of the departments, where the increase in FRS, health benefits, and workers' compensation. In the village manager's office, the deputy manager, who is in two roles, Janice, She's 50% in my budget and the other 50% in the HR budget. So that 15% you see there in health benefits is for the HR director, a portion that's in the manager's budget. And I do not receive health benefits. So there's a reduction or an increase of $1,000 in the manager's budget. Human resources. We eliminated miscellaneous non-employee events. The birthday celebrations, retirements, flower baskets, that type of thing, they were taken out. We eliminated uniforms in the HR department. And then again, you have the increases in FRS, health benefits and workers comp. So there's an overall increase in human resources for $1,883. Next one. Village clerk. This is one of the three positions that we're recommending to be added. This is a records clerk. for scanning, document control, and public records requests. There's an increased professional services expense by adding document scanning, an increase in postage, increase in special advertising and advertising software, increase in election expenses where there's been election year, And again, the FRS, the health benefits and workers' compensation. So with that extra position, there's an overall increase of $68,410. In the finance department, we're reinstating the position of the controller. There's an increase in professional development for the finance team. And also again, FRS, health benefits and workers comp for an increase of $134,191. In the legal department, there's a slight increase in the annual contract fee of $8,528. Infotech, this is another position that we're adding or recommending to add. The addition of an IT technician position, which is sorely needed. We eliminated the CIS police dispatch software. We eliminated SMARSH archive text. I'm sure you all know what SMARSH is. I'm very familiar with SMARSH. And then we had the mandatory FRS, health benefit and workers' comp, for an overall increase of 29,508, even with the addition of an IT technician, the total increase is 29,508. General government. So... Off-duty officers get paid from whoever hires them for those events, and that has been historically in the police department. We've taken that out and put it in general government. It's transferred for them because it's really a wash. We pay, they reimburse us, and we didn't want to show that expense going against the police department. We've eliminated snacks and drinks for public meetings. We've increased in liability, automobile, general property, and workers' comp insurance. We've eliminated some equipment rentals, some mailing equipment. Merchant fees increase. And again, FRS, health benefits, workers' comp. and a reduction in the duration of administrative leave for police personnel through February 11, 2027, which I believe are the three amigos, right? Okay, so that's the three, the two lieutenants and the police officer, they're running time. And a couple of them will be gone in February of 2027. Let's see. In the police department, we've got a reduction of $117,109. We transferred the off-duty expenses to the general government. Two police officer positions that are vacant now are going to be unfunded and frozen. One is a police officer position, and the other one is a full-time Marine patrol position. Those two are vacant. There was a promotion and status correction for the public safety communications supervisor to manager. That is Chevy taking the place of Robert Miller, who retired. Again, a projected increase in FRS health benefits and workers' comp. There's obviously an increase in vehicle. We got new vehicle leases coming. I think it's six or seven vehicles replacing this time around that we didn't do last year that is overdue. And our maintenance costs to keep maintaining these vehicles is now beginning to upwardly skyrocket on the old cars. So there's an increase in vehicle leases and for oil and gas and a slight increase on the maintenance side for the older cars that are still remaining. There's an increase in equipment and uniforms and we eliminated education training from general fund is being paid again this year by the forfeiture fund and an increased budget for reaccreditation with the extra work that has to be done there and some outside help that we're getting on that. Code compliance is the next one. Code compliance increases by $12,000, $12,087. We eliminated uniform expenses, increase in gas and oil expenses. The body-worn cameras that they have are now funded by the police department. And then there's the increase in FRS, health benefits and workers comp. So that $12,000 is coming from just what you see those last three items, FRS, health and workers comp. Next is community engagement. So this is a new department and we have consolidated Parks and Recreation and Communications into this one department. So the budget for 2526 was $428,673. We moved that over into this year's, you know, next year's budget for this. And now we've got to run the community center. So the budget is $1,098,328. So an overall increase in the budget is $669,655. Parks and Recreation Department was consolidated to form the new community engagement department. All expenses previously budgeted on their communications have been fully transferred to the new department. Personnel needs for new department as of July 2026. Parks and Rec director, Parks and Rec counselors, and part-time custodian. the continuation of the YMCA contract, and we eliminated the four major events for the city, Halloween event, winter holiday, spring fling, and the 4th of July. Well, we're recommending taking them out, you know. All right, the building apartment has no impact on the general fund. There's an increase in the contractual services with CAP, but the increase that comes with CAP is the increases that come with the permitting that goes on because they get a percentage of that. And the permitting is now starting to increase with these projects that are coming online. And so their piece goes up and we have to, rather than debiting it going into the red. We're putting an amount in there up front, so we're pulling it from a black line, but it's paid for by the permitting fees that are coming in. There's an increase in an EPL software for mandatory updates. A reduction in professional services, microfilming and building permits, that's a reduction. And they're eliminating the contractual services for the Bluebeam studio software for plane reviews. And then there's the FRS, the health and the workers' comp, the same with the others. We show an increase of $1,464,939, but the bulk of that is with cap with the additional monies that we have to pay them as the permits come in. Street maintenance department. For now, there's an increase there of $857,000, $857,592. Transferred capital projects for streets, roads, and landscape improvements to the capital fund. Reduction and repairs and maintenance of grounds, trash receptacles. Eliminate cost allocation. There's already a transfer from the general fund. So the cost allocations with Sandra coming on board, we've been looking at the cost allocations and how we should be allocating or straightening, smoothing out the allocations. We've had to move them around a little bit. They come from the cost allocations from utilities and ones that come from the building department so that we're in line with how we're using that money. And then again, you got the FRS health benefits and workers comp.

Is that actually, is that labeled wrong? Is that a decrease? It's gone down. 19 to 11.

Well, that looks like a decrease to me too.

Do we need parentheses on that? Yeah, I mean, that's a big decrease.

Is that a decrease?

Yeah.

Okay. I will add my parentheses right there. Thank you, sir. All right. The Transportation Fund, CIT2, to decrease the $960,000, eliminate transfer to capital projects fund, eliminate transfer to general fund, and reduction in roads and street improvements. Enterprise funds, the utilities administration is a reduction of a quarter of a million, 252,000. We projected mandatory increase in FRS retirements, health benefits, workers comp. We have a reduction in overtime and we've transferred contract services expenditures for holiday lighting to street maintenance and a reduction in sampling and testing permitting. So a reduction there of a quarter of a million. We were paying for the holidays out of the streets, and we're not supposed to do that. So we've moved that. The enterprise funds for water operations. Increase of $412,000, $412,789. Again, FRS health and workers' compensation. We've eliminated repairs and maintenance to buildings, a reduction in engineering and planning, reduction in gas and oil, but there's an increase in repairs and maintenance of the water lines. We're having more water lines broken, and that's the increase that we have there that we have to fund. Here we have the enterprise funds and the sewer operations. Again, an increase. This one's $620,387. We had the FRS, health benefits and workers' compensation. We've eliminated repairs and maintenance. There's an increase in overtime also, by the way, because some of these breaks are happening at night and on the weekends, and we have to call people in to work. We're eliminating repairs and maintenance to buildings, increase improvements other than buildings, eliminate contingency funds, increase sewage disposal fees, and an increase in sewer lines emergency repairs, and a reduction in electric, gas, and water expense. On the sewage disposal fees, now with our vector truck, which can factor the stormwater. It can also factor in the sewer lines. But we were not approved by Durham to be able to discharge because we weren't licensed for that. And Steve has been able to get us a license. So now... We can use a vector truck. For instance, we just had to pull the pumps at the City Hall sewage pump station. We had to call in a contractor and pay to him, lift those pumps out, hold them out where we did the work and put the pumps back. Now we can do that with our own truck. With the vacuuming, we have the truck where we can pull the pumps up, but we could not pump the sewage out because we couldn't discharge it. Now with the license we have, we can make the discharge. However, when we make the discharge, we now have to pay for that. Just like a tipping fee, there's a discharge for dumping the sewage that the county charges us. Sanitation operations. This is another enterprise fund. We have a reduction of $205,634. Again, there's mandatory increases in FRS, health benefits and workers' compensation. There's an increase in overtime. We're having to keep up with the work that we have. We're having to run trucks seven days a week now. So we're collecting up garbage and so forth on Sundays. There's an increase in recycling fees. There's an increase in the vehicle lease for a garbage truck. We've had to lease now a third garbage truck to be able to keep up with the work that we're doing. So there's an increase in the garbage truck lease. They're running about $8,000 a piece a month for a garbage truck rental. With the third garbage truck, we have to have an increase in temporary personnel. We have a full-time person to drive the truck because temporary people do not have a CDL license, and we have to supply the driver. And so there's an increase in the temporary personnel to ride with that truck to operate that. There's an increase in sewer lines emergency repairs. There is a reduction in repairs and maintenance of vehicles because the ones who are renting are new. So most of them are under a maintenance contract. But the repairs that happen to them, if we damage something or something's broken that's not under warranty, then we have to pay for that. And we've eliminated some machinery and equipment. The next one. There's the Stormwater Fund, Enterprise Fund, Stormwater Fund. There's an increase here of $150,087. Again, FRS help and workers' compensation. An increase in overtime also. And there's a reduction in repairs and maintenance of equipment. And there's additional costs for gas and oil. So an increase overall of $150,000. Next we have the debt service fund. This is a general obligation. Is PFM on the line? Do we have PFM on the line now? They haven't come on? Okay. We're trying to get them to come on to talk about this, but we can tell you basically, this is a debt service and interest on the stormwater bonds. And I'm assuming these are the other bonds that we have that are already existing, right, Maite? This is all the bonds?

This is all the bonds.

This is all the bonds. Okay. So the debt millage has to increase from 1.66 to cover just what we're talking about now to 2.7767. That's the debt. Now, what's not there, which I wanted PFM to come on and talk about, because I'm not exactly sure how we can do it, but we're going to have on the next agenda, commission agenda, to authorize me another tranche of 10 million of stormwater money for the project that we're going to be installing on North Bay Island. That's a $12 million project, give or take. So we're going to need funds. Where we've gotten to kind of a bind this last time is that the millage was not enough to cover the principal and interest that we've had to pay on the first 10 million. So this 2.7767 now covers the cost of that, plus it covers to start to recover the money that we used in the general fund to make the payments, which is we're allowed to recover that money because the voters voted to pay for these bonds as a vote. And we didn't have enough that was coming in with the millage, and so it was being paid with general fund money. So we want to recover that general fund money. But what's not in here is how we address the next $10 million. So we have some money now from the first $10 million. I think about three something, Maite. We got about, what do we got? About three something million left in the first 10 million? 2.7. 2.7. So I've got started money. But in October, I've got to make the next payment on the principal and interest, which is about 1.2 million each time, right? 1.2. So I've got to make a $1.2 million payment in October. We already made the one in April. This year, I made $1.2 million. It came out of the $10 million. The money we borrowed, I paid the interest with. Now, come October, I'll do the same thing. Then come the next year, I've got two more that I've got to pay. So we need PFM to... Tell us how we can address this so I can get the money on the front end and not be paying it out of the general fund. So this is probably going to increase. I don't have the answer, but I know it's got to be answered. Okay? So that's the debt service on the GOB. The utilities increase that we know is coming is being worked on now. And that's another increase that will be coming to you for the utility fees. The debt service fund for roadway capital improvements, CITT, reduction of 1,200, slight decrease in interest for the GOB bond 1.5 funded from CITT. All right, so next we have the millage rate calculation. And I'm going to turn that over to Sandra. And she can run you through that. Do you want to take questions on what we got the first before we go into that? So if you've got questions on the group that I went through or anything else in the general fund, this is a time to hit us with it.

I actually think... Because I feel like once we start asking questions on the slides that you've all, I mean, I know that I have a lot of questions and I assume my colleagues do as well. Why don't we allow Sandra to move forward? And by the way, welcome back, Sandra. Thank you, Mary. If folks are in agreement, why don't we allow Sandra to move forward with the presentation and then we can dive in?

Okay, so we will go that way.

Okay, yeah, I'd love to hear this sort of big picture millage assessment.

Okay, so this is a millage representation rate calculation. As you can see here, we have On the top, you can see the taxable value of 1.84824 is what you received, the ad valorem, the taxable value that was received this fiscal year.

And the 2026 taxable value proposed, the estimated receiving June 1st is 1.8 billion. So the calculation based on your current managed rate of 5.7 will give you a $10 million at a 95% rate. So if you are going to the current, the estimated rollback rate would be 5.5. What does that mean? If we are going to receive the same amount of ad value that we have this year, we would lose $356,376. If we go back to the 5.5, which is the rollback rate. If we go to a 5.7275, that's a maximum village rate requiring a majority vote, which means three out of five commissioners. For a maximum military requiring two-thirds vote, you will need to have a 6.3002 meals. And everything over 6.3002 meals would require a unanimous vote, which is the five commissioners. For your 5.7062 meals, which is the proposal I'm in right now, you will need three votes, three out of the five commissioners. And if you go, and let me give you an example. So if you see the budget increase, you stay with the same millage rate, you will have an additional revenue of 356,376.

You wanna continue with the other slides? Any questions on the millage rundown?

Does anyone on the dais have questions about the millage summary?

Madam Mayor.

Please go for it.

I believe that there's something in the law, and I'm going to ask legal to explain that one for us, that next year we're going back to the, potentially, we're going back to the rollback rate of whatever we decide this year. Could you do a brief explanation on that one?

I will be prepared to do that at another meeting. The governor just signed that into law and I am not fully briefed on it. But yes, whatever you decide now will affect your budget next year.

Okay.

Was the summary from Commissioner Trevone generally, is that what you understand, Madam Attorney, to be the case? Generally...

My understanding is that it's dependent on the result of this year's constitutional amendment.

Okay. So this is tied to property tax reform. So it's a voter decision in November and then a legislative interpretation authorization in the following session if it's passed by voters.

The bill was signed into law yesterday by Governor DeSantis. And my understanding is that it is dependent on on the results of the November election, but in the weeds of the bill to make sure that that is actually the case. I don't want to give you a 1,000% answer.

Basically, my question, and it's really for the second budget workshop meeting, is the following. If potentially in November the voters approve the bill, In other words, they get the 60%. And we must use the rollback rate of whatever we approved this year. We have to be totally aware that what our rate based on this year's taxes are to cover our basic next year.

28.

So for the next workshop, hopefully we have... A clear understanding of what that figure is and how it affects us, because we may have to juggle, because that's the meeting where we have to officially set the millage rate, correct?

No, you have another budget workshop in July.

That's the one.

No, you have a budget workshop, and then at your regular July commission meeting, which is July 28th, you will be setting the millage cap.

So, yes. Five days.

Yes. Ten days. Yeah. Well, it's your millage cap, and then your tentative millage will be September. Right.

For the trim notice. All right. We're going to move on, Sandra, and go to, well, we're going to talk about the additional. All right. So we want to get into some of the areas that

Yeah, let's go back to the beginning of the slide presentation. And I want to ask my colleagues, I want to open up the floor to the dais who has questions on these summary slides, department by department. Who wants to go first?

I have a statement in general. Okay.

Our budget, for whatever reason, is divided into the general budget and debt service, which is all tied into our ad valorem taxes. But there's another tax that all residents receive, which is a monthly utility bill that includes irrigation, water, sewer, stormwater, sanitation, and germ fee. That's also another tax, except it's done... 12 months out of the year instead of being a lump sum in November when we get the tax bill. And we differentiate our union members as to where the funding comes from. Basically, all this is a tax and we should not differentiate and all departments are equal and all departments should function the same way whether they're basically their union, they have to abide by what the union rule says. If they're non-union, they have to abide by what the union says. But we're using two different measures in the non-sworn officers union contract to pay taxes. So that's the statement I wanted to start off with.

Do you have a recommendation?

I believe that everybody at Village Hall should be treated equal. My personal recommendation is a 3% COLA increase across the board to all employees because all employees deserve a raise. All employees have been for a year without the raise. And we had spoken also about giving the police back their full shift hours, a four-hour differential. So I'd like to see the reworking of all the sheets. where the police have the extra four hours and everybody gets a 3% COLA increase, which I understand that 3% COLA increase will have an effect on FRS withholding and FICA. So I don't know if we're ready to discuss those figures tonight or not.

I mean, we have that in there as one of the options with the cost factors for that too.

I have a question. Is that the four hours that Commissioner Chivoni is talking about? Is that this option number two here where it says cost to restore police, patrol officers to 2184 hours, that's it? Okay.

It's there, but what's not there is the utility employees or the enterprise employees are all scheduled to get merit, COLA, and longevity. While other non-union, I mean, union members, but non-sworn officers would only get the COLA. And that's where the difference is. We need to either agree everybody gets longevity, merit, and COLA, or everybody just gets COLA, or everybody, you know, we have to agree on what the figures are.

And that's one of those sheets that we haven't gotten to yet, which is a couple sheets down, which has each one of them. Well, if you...

It's on the screen.

Yeah, it's on the screen right here. Remove the utility here. The merit and longevity on all enterprise employees. It comes from the utility payments. which I am in favor of removing and just leaving it at the 3% COLA, is not shown in any of these figures.

As a reduction.

Great.

No, if that's what you, well. That's what I'm offering. But I'm saying if that's what the will of the commission is, then when we come back at the second, we will. The changes that you give us tonight, additions or deletions, we will make those and we'll bring them back at the next meeting to show them to you. And then we'll have the capital projects at that meeting also.

I understand, but I need the commission to be acutely aware that, for instance, when we're saying the cost to restore the police patrol officers to the right hours and the 3% COLA to all, will be offset tremendously by the merit and longevity that's being offered to the utility employees.

Yes, but...

This increase that we're talking about... I understand. ...will be offset by the...

But it doesn't offset the general fund.

because they're paying i don't disagree but what i'm saying is when you start looking at what the impact is on the millage

then you're not doing anything when you're reducing the people who are in need. It's the same, it's the cash coming out of the pot. I understand that. But what we're talking about here is the millages you're gonna be impacting on the ad valorem taxes. So doing that may save the money and treat everybody the same, but it doesn't, when you say there's that savings,

I'm looking at my bill.

Okay.

I will have maybe a little bit higher tax bill in November, but I will have a lower tax bill on a monthly basis, which equals out. It's still taxes are paying.

Yeah, I guess he's saying. I agree, but look at it this way too. So it's not going to be a total savings because the utility bills are going to go up. So we'll have that reduction. It'll be just like some of these have been. You take some already and some goes up. It doesn't go up as much.

Our utility is our cash cow. Our cash cow has fleas. we have to disinfect the cow. Let's be realistic. The last budget amendment that was done to water, sewer, and et cetera, et cetera, was done in 2021. For the last five years, we have been paying from general fund, the revolving loan payments that we need to adjust whatever, whatever.

That is correct.

If we have the revolving loan payments reimbursed to the general fund from the utility reserves, our cash cow is no longer a cash cow. And we should get it back. And that will be also a lowering of the general fund budget. And we have to increase it whether we privatize garbage, whether we do not privatize garbage. I mean, that utility bill is gonna fluctuate as well. I mean, it's all part of our budget. The way we're departmentalizing the budget has to be done, but I want everybody to have a clear picture of the budget.

And I agree. But when we talk, when you want to talk about how we're setting the millage, that portion dealing with the utilities has no impact on that.

If we refund the roughly $100,000 to $200,000 a year for five years that we've paid for the revolving loans.

That's true.

It's a million dollars towards the general fund. So it does affect the millage. We decided to do it that way. There's big ifs. That's for us to decide here.

But you are restricted on how you can use those utility funds. You can't just supplant into the general fund.

I'm using the utility fund for something that should have been used originally since 2021 that has not been done.

That is true.

So it is a factual use of the utility fund that we're going to do from this point forward. If we paid it from the general fund, we should be allowed to repay the general fund for what we did.

That's true. When we adjust the utility fund, we need to go after the general fund money that we used to pay the utility bills, to pay the state revolving loan fund. In that aspect, you are correct. We would have that The relief of that money.

And it's a good amount.

I'm sure it is. Well, PFM is on? PFM is here now? Okay. All right. Do we want to go back to the issue of the...

Because we have PFM here, why don't we go back to the subject matter where their expertise is needed and have that discussion?

Okay. Sandra, you want to jump in there?

I see Sergio. Is he muted? Maybe we have one. Yes. Good afternoon, everyone.

Good evening. I can hear you. Can you hear me?

Thank you for joining us, Sergio.

Of course. My pleasure.

So we're talking about the debt millage. Is he yours?

Yes, he's theirs.

Okay. So on the debt millage issue, what we're seeing in this amount that you've given is for the existing debt that we have now,

That's correct, sir.

Okay. So now we're looking to pull down another $10 million. We're going to hopefully get that approved by the commissioners on the agenda for another $10 million. As I pull that down, how do I fund that? How do I get the money to make those payments on the interest? Again, we're speculating whether we're going to get a five-year or 10-year, whatever kind of bond we're going to go for. How do we get ahead of the curve that I'm not using general fund money to make those payments that are due?

Sure. So, Mr. Manager, thank you for the question. Again, Sergio Mastral with PFM Financial Advisors, Financial Advisors for the Village. So to your question, what you're planning to do with the next $10 million tranche that you would pull down would be in the form of a line of credit. So effectively working capital towards the capital program, offering liquidity towards the capital program. We would not intend to pull down the entire $10 million at once necessarily, but But it would be a line of credit where you have access to 10 million and you would pull that down as needed for project expenditures. So as you spend money, you're going to draw on the line and then you will owe interest on the amounts due on the amounts you've you've drawn on the line. So let's let's just say for discussion purposes in the first year, you know, you spend two million dollars towards capital. You'll draw that on the line and you'll owe interest on that component. Typically lines of credit are set at a variable interest rate during the line of credit, the draw period. So once that happens, once we draw up to either the term of the line of credit, which is typically three years, a typical bank's line of credit is about three years. If we reach a three-year mark and let's say you've drawn the full 10 million, what we would look to do at that point is refinance that line into a longer term obligation. So because these are long lived capital projects, you would look to refinance that line at some point in the future, either, and we can make that determination, the board will have the full authority to make the determination as to what type of term we look at, but it could be a refinance in that for a 10 year term or a 15 or even a 20 year term at that point in the future at a fixed rate of interest. And at that point, you will owe both principal and interest on that $10 million. During the time the line is outstanding, right now, during what we call the draw period, while you're using that money for capital, you'll only owe the interest component of that line. Does that answer kind of the mechanics as to how the line of credit will work?

Yes. I guess my question is, when I start to make those payments, On the interest, where does that funding source come from if the debt millage is not covering it, it's not generating enough, then I'm back paying it with general fund? How do I make that payment?

Right. So another good question. So we would want to set the millage each year according to how you expect to spend that line of credit. So you would expect we should have a project expenditure schedule, how fast, how quickly those monies are expected to be spent. If you expect to draw $2 million, we would make an estimate as to what the interest payment would be on that amount. And you would want to incorporate that into the millage calculation moving forward. Now, that's one option. You could also use... While the millage is an option, it's not the only option the village has. So in addition to increasing the millage rate, commensurate to make that interest payment, you could use any source of funding that you have. If it's not general funds, you could use utility fees. For example, it doesn't have to be the millage rate, but because this is a general obligation bond, it's the full faith and credit of the village. So you can use any of your revenue streams that are available. But to answer your question directly, Mr. Manager, it would be we would want to estimate the amount that would be drawn each year. Once we put the line in place, we would give you a conservative interest rate estimate as to what the interest carry would be on that line for that year. And we would want to set the millage sufficient to pay that interest.

So we can set the millage ahead of the curve. I can set the millage before I have spent the money because I'm anticipating spending it within a certain period of time.

That's right. We would want a reasonable expectation. We wouldn't want to set the millage at some artificially high level. We'd want it to be reasonably set to the expectation as to how much would be drawn. and a reasonable interest rate, but we can set that millage now during the budgeting process accordingly in order to give you funding to repay the interest portion of that loan.

Can I clarify really quickly? The increase in the debt millage to 2.7767 mils, that is just to cover our 25-26 expenses, right?

Is that right? If that question is directed at me, and I apologize again, I'm on my cell phone, so I don't have the slide in front of me.

No, that's okay. The manager walked us through this slide. The manager can answer. Right, Frank? The increase to 2.77, that's just to cover our 25-26 expenses, or that's what's anticipated for 26-27? Right. That knowledge...

We'll also cover the recovery of the general fund money that we used to make the payments heretofore that should have been paid out of the debt millage.

But it's not going to cover the next $10 million tranche.

And we've got a project that's around $12 million, and I think it may go up a little bit with a change order because of how we've got to bring the power in from Florida Power & Light. But we haven't seen that number yet. But that's a project that will move along very rapidly, just the project itself. And that project right now is close to 12 that we've already awarded. So I put $10 million in figuring that I'm going to be probably, I mean, they're going to break ground here very quickly on their project. And that project, I think, is slated to be something like a year and a half. Do you recall what the length of time is for the North Bay Island stormwater project?

No, off the top of my head, I do not. But I think it was probably around a year, year and a half, I believe.

Well, I think it was a year and a half, if I recall. But this $10 million would be spent rather rapidly. So if that's the case, then what I'm hearing from PFM is that we need to address that debt millage and get that in there now or get a major portion of it in there now.

Is that correct? I think, I believe so, yes. You would want to address at least a portion of that now in order to cover the interest component.

As we attach it to a capital improvement project.

Right.

Makes a lot of sense.

Yeah.

You have to line that up.

Well, I mean, we've already the contract commissioner.

We've already started that process. So we should have an expectation of that line of what the expense is and what it is.

But I don't know what the rules are as to how much I can increase that debt knowledge to be getting a cushion. I would think that I can't just... Pick a number out of the sky. I got to have some justification of why I'm raising the debt to the level that we're talking about.

Whether we do it or not, we should have an expectation of how much that is going to be.

Well, I know we've got a project for $12 million. You have right now the value of what $10 million has cost in debt pillage that you have to pay in interest. So you base another $10 million on the same amount. That would be a logical way of calculating it. If you get it at the same interest rate or a better interest rate, it lowers it a little bit, but it's not going to lower it that much. No.

No, I think if we tell PFM, I'm probably going to spend the bulk of this money in the next budget year, then we're looking at another $10 million that I'm going to have to pay back.

I'm paying the interest that we've been paying with the same loan money on top of that. That's an added expense on top of the capital improvement.

We don't want to do that again.

We're going to continue to do it, but that's what we've been doing when you talk about calculating.

That's correct. But so this debt millage now, he has considered just getting back that money. So now going forward, we want to have enough from the debt millage to be actually paying the bills that the voters voted for.

If I may, Mr. Manager, just two points to add on to yours. One is if we, you know, whatever the village decides to set the debt millage at conservative rate, if the number comes in lower, the actual interest expense comes in lower, you would have, let's call it surplus millage revenues. Those would stay in the debt service millage fund, and those could be carried over to the following year, and you could reduce the millage in the following year by whatever surplus you had from a prior year. That's very often done, right? We can't estimate with perfect precision what the payment might be, so oftentimes that's what's done. The second piece to consider is I believe on the first $10 million, the village amortized that principal loan amount very aggressively over five years. Presumably, with a line of credit, when we refinance that, as I mentioned earlier, you would have the option to refinance it over a longer period of time if you desired, which would bring down the overall annual cost of the debt service payment.

I just want to share a point of information for everyone. North Bay Village at our debt millage of 1.66 mills is by far the highest debt millage in Miami-Dade County, by far. Just a point of information.

Is there any way that we can convert the $20 million borrowed or credit line or call it whatever you want to call it, because it's a credit line, it's not a geobond right now, into a geobond to be paid off in 20 years at a lower rate?

There is an option, sir, to convert that and refinance that over a longer period of time. Again, as long as the project, the useful life of the project, and these should be long-lived projects, allows for it, we should be able to refinance that over a longer term, which would bring down the annual payment.

That's a great suggestion, Commissioner Trevone. The useful life of these projects is probably 50 years. Yeah.

That's a good point. Right. So in other words, as long as the life of the project can extend at least to or beyond what the time of the debt is, then you can do that. And of course, these pump stations and things we're putting in would certainly meet that criteria. So I was looking for this next $10 million that we do, because we don't do it for three years. We do it for... a longer period of time? Can we initially do it for a longer period of time?

If that question is directed to me, we absolutely can do it for a longer period of time. We'll obviously have to work with you and staff to prepare that note issuance, but that should be an option for the village.

The first $10 million, we borrowed it when? Roughly. Two years ago? Two years ago. And we borrowed it for three years. So we have one year longevity on that one. We're borrowing another $10 million. So we're going to have $20 million that we owe next year, depending for how long you get the $10 million for. If you get it for five years, we have next year one that's due the $10 million, one One year and the new 10 million, the interest on that one. I would suggest that we look into creating the geo bond for whatever amount that we borrow. You know, break up the bond in two.

Or if you need more, you... Well, that's why we have PFM to start to look at these options because let's not... We don't stop at the $10 million because we've got these other projects.

I understand.

And we've got design still going on with other projects. And then we're going to look to actually start to build some of these other projects. So if we had some kind of thing we were able to do, like the State Revival Loan Fund, where you can increase and add on on a – you know, like a revolving bond or something like that would be ideal for us because we're not set at a deadline. We've got multiple projects that are contemplated with a $60 million bond program.

Mr. PFM, is approximately a month, which is our next workshop, enough time for you to give us some valid suggestions?

Absolutely, sir, yes.

to be discussed. I agree. And we set that. We set the bed most the same time we do the.

Same time and we're supposed to bring up the water and sewer bills as well at that meeting.

Yeah. Should we continue with general comments from the Commission?

That sounds good, Vice Mayor.

Okay. I'll go next. First of all, I want to say great to see you, Sandra, and it's even better to have you back.

Glad to be back. Thank you.

Welcome back. Welcome back. First of all, I want to thank all the staff on the work on this year's budget. I was in the office today for a few hours talking with a couple of the department heads and so this is really great work so thank you to the village manager to the cfo to the whole finance team all the department heads all the staff uh this is really really good i'm really impressed by uh all the work that's gone into keeping the millage at the same level um all the cuts that have been made uh and um i really appreciate everyone's uh sacrifices everyone's commitments and um and hard work on on this budget Um, so what I stand on the budget is, uh, I, I agree with my colleague commissioner that I would at the very least like to add this number 1 and 2, which is a 3% color for our employees and the restoration of police patrol officer hours. That's a bare minimum for me. I really would like to add members number three as well of placing all the police officers on the new pay scale. As for the commission funding, we don't need this commission budget. I mentioned this last year, so I'm okay with myself and everybody just cutting our budgets there. The community funding, I know that our community likes the events. I like them too. But I think we can go one year with cutting these out and seeing how it goes with the community and allow two caveats to that. One is that I would like to see if we can get this funded from outside sources. I think it's reasonable for us to be able to fundraise each of these events separately. From developers, other business interests, I've been able to fundraise things like our soccer tournament. I'm pretty sure we can all... find one event that we can sponsor through outside fundraising. So that's one challenge I would give the rest of the commission, but I think we could go one year without this. And then the second thing is that we have the community center opening this year. So we'll have, I think a lot of opportunities to host sponsored events there for the community, either with partnership with AFA or other outside sponsors. So I'm okay with all these. The things that I'd like added, again, just to reiterate, number one and two, absolute bare minimum. I'd like to add also number three. I'd like to see if there's anything else we could do with the budget, although it sounds like we can't mess with the debt service too much, and it sounds like we can't tap into utilities for that. But if there is, if there's any other way we can be creative, that'd be great. Otherwise, uh if the only other way to make up uh these uh these additional expenditures is to raise the knowledge rate i i believe that's something we should look into those are my general thoughts commissioner

Yeah, I appreciate all the time that was put into this. I personally think the $40,000 for the four events that we have is important to the community. I'd like to see a way for us to do this. I don't think that that's, I think we can find this 40,000. They bring a lot of pride to our community. Everybody likes it. So I'd like to try to put those back in. I had a question, not really with the budget itself, but where does our reserve account currently stand? that's still being it's still being audited 25 year so i don't have a figure yet do we have a rough estimate it's about two million or something about two million now we do not have the required emergency fund and funds that were in the operating that are for capital improvements like the town hall have been moved to a separate account yes okay

So we're going to, at the next commission meeting, we've moved it, and you're going to ratify my actions of moving it.

And this account has surplus of at least $20 million in it, correct?

Yes, correct.

Okay. And it's sitting, one thing we had referred before, it's sitting interest-bearing? Yes. What's it make in there? Okay. Something better than where it was. Well, it wasn't making anything. I had other, just to bring up, I had other questions. fda insured four municipalities that was offering like 3.66 i can i can share if that is something that but i mean that's we're talking about making up a big big difference of a lot of this funds here if we're not um i mean there's at least a half a million dollars in in annual that i know in the past we had left off the table that that's that covers a lot of this potential gap spending too if it isn't accounted for currently. So I think that could make up the difference in seeing, I could also get behind supporting, you know, one and two with the COLA. I think it's very important for our employees. I mean, that's first and foremost to support. So it can get behind both Vice Mayor and Commissioner Ciarone's recommendations there. And then the thing that I think would be important is finding a way to put these community events back into our budget and keeping those in for next year.

So those are my comments. In the sheets that we have there with the optional funding, those four events are...

about 10 000 a piece right yeah i i really think i think each developer should sponsor one of these events that's that's my stance uh they have extended hours over the weekends to work to finish their projects and i understand when these these projects finished as fast as possible for our tax base but that's also a benefit for them to get these projects completed as fast as possible. We're not charging them for those extended hours right now, for working after hours or working weekends. And I think it's a great opportunity for the developers to be able to sponsor one event each. It's great for their brand and their reputation amongst our residents. And it's a good opportunity for them to market their projects. So I think each developer should be sponsoring one of these projects. I think we're at the point now where It'd be fair to offset the cost of each of these events by one developer each and gives them an opportunity to build some goodwill with the community and also to advertise their projects.

I want to hone in on this very specific issue and pull the commission so that we can get answers and move things along. So if you are in favor of keeping the events as a Village General Fund expense, indicate so now.

My question is with the staff that we have, the fundraising aspect of it, the timing to fundraise is also not...

staff cannot fundraise the fundraising component the same way that the fundraising component fell on us for the community center grand opening staff cannot fundraise we have to go out and fundraise and direct those funds to 501c3 okay so that will go into the what is that the fund that we have that we use Miami a day whatever it's called It's the Miami Foundation, which is the sponsor of the North Bay Village Foundation. Fundraise.

No, no. The Miami Foundation doesn't fundraise. It's a vehicle. If we fundraise, they can donate it to the Miami Foundation.

Right. And we make about someplace between $2,500 and $5,000 at the Miami Foundation Day.

Yeah, but let me clarify something. The North Bay Village Foundation is not on its own a 501c3 foundation. We have a space sponsored by the Miami Foundation. So on Give Miami Day, we participate in that. But all of the funds that were raised for the community center grand opening Those funds were raised by us, the elected officials going out to the community. We obviously had materials prepared so that we could fundraise and there was a mechanism established on the back end so that people can make those contributions and that they would be directed to the right place, right? But we raised that money. Lily, Christina, they did not raise that money. We raised that money. And so that would be the precedent that we set. We would have to go out to the community, raise that money, have it sent to the North Bay Village Foundation, which is sponsored by the Miami Foundation. And that's how we would do the events for this coming year.

That's what I'm proposing.

I know. I want to make it clear to the rest of the day that it would be our obligation and that staff would not be responsible for that.

We also have the Chamber of Commerce we can now leverage and I believe that there's enough substantial business interest in the leverage to be able to fundraise for these events.

I'm not arguing with you, Vice Mayor. I'm just clarifying the situation for everyone.

Sure. But I'm seeing this as an ongoing process. because I agree the following year is going to be even tougher.

So what I'm looking at is how many times can we go to the pot and ask them for money?

You know, they're going to get tired of it, and they're going to finish building their buildings eventually, and they're going to say, why me?

Yeah. Well, we'll have until they finish the buildings. And then you have the new tax base to replace those costs, to put it back into the budget.

Depends what passes in November.

I think we could do it for one year.

There is one item that's bothering me on this fund balance. and it has a TBD next door, which is the emergency fund. That is a 20% of the general fund budget for emergencies. If we leave it blank as it is right now, and we have a hurricane, we're up to crap without a battle.

And we're just starting hurricane season.

and it is a required 20% of our general fund budget.

We'll come with a figure on the next budget version.

So it's at least $2 million?

Yes. I also think everyone needs to keep in mind that we are in an extraordinarily precarious position as we discuss this year's budget because we don't know what we will be able to do next year. There very well may be a reality where we cannot increase our budget. So if we go bare, bare, bare, bare bones on expenses this year, that is the level that we are setting for subsequent years. We cannot increase. And so I want everyone to think deeply about what that would mean for us in the coming years. If we're going to set the bar very, very, very, very high, modestly this year.

Madam Mayor, I agree wholeheartedly with what you're saying. That's what I said originally. We have to also figure out what our rollback rate would be, would be if the law passes based on what we decide is our final figure to make sure that we're covered next year in our bare bones minimum. And let's be realistic. The highest we can go with four out of five commissioners is 6.3 mils, which is only 3.6 mils higher than what it is right now.

But you can go over that. We can go over that unanimously. Unanimous, yes, unanimous.

So we have to keep that in mind as well, that we need a full commission vote to bring it higher than the 6.3 mil. But there's also a debt, a debt mill to add to this. And we're talking about another 10 million being borrowed and we're at the highest city with the highest millage. If we do the 6.3 and the 1.66 and add a little bit more to it, say two mils in debt service, we're already at eight mils.

Well, it's, it's, But it's not that simple. It's six mils on one bucket of money and 2.7 on a second bucket of money.

Right? And then we have the monthly tax of sewer, water, garbage, et cetera, et cetera.

Yeah, the utilities are going to go up.

What I think... we all need to do is a very deliberate and concerted series of conversations with our neighbors about taxes and how they feel about increases in taxes. You know, last year's budget season was also difficult. I know many of you were talking to your neighbors about what they were willing to pay for. I certainly was. And I got a lot of feedback that people were willing to pay more in taxes to, you know, continue supporting businesses the police department at the staffing levels that we have today. And so as we're in this workshop period over the summer, the next couple of weeks, I wanna ask each of you to be extremely proactive, as proactive as you possibly can be in having conversations with residents. Obviously, No one's going to sit on a three-hour Zoom and weigh in. So we need to go to the people and we need to be more deliberate about that than possibly we have been in the past. I mean, this is a big philosophical question that we're faced with. I mean, not to be so meta about it.

Let me be very truthful. We have stayed at a minimum increase, if any, for the last four years. I believe we have been at the same level for the last four years in general fund millage. And debt millage has gone up because of the borrowing of the $10 million. We really haven't. We have increased taxes because of increased property values, not because of increase in millage.

That's what I was going to say.

Property values.

Yeah, and I will also add, sorry to interrupt you, Commissioner, but the increase in the debt millage is not, I mean, obviously the 10 million in stormwater funds is a significant expense, but it's also, we have many, many, many state revolving loans that we are spending that money to upgrade our infrastructure, including getting the village out of a full building moratorium, right? Remember, we were in a building moratorium because our wastewater infrastructure was so leaky. And we got out of that in two years and that cost a lot of money. And so putting perspective, this is not money that's wasted. This is money that was long overdue and needed to be spent. And I think investing in our infrastructure is something we should all be proud of.

So we have our work cut out for us for our next budget meeting to finish hashing out our differences, unless anybody else has anything else to add to what we've discussed. Basically, it's one-on-ones with different staff departments explaining our positions. But I'd like to see at the next one, we need to have the emergency fund included in there and hopefully we'll have an answer from pfm and hopefully we'll have answers as to what's our what are we looking at as far as what have we paid from utilities in the past from the general fund that has to be reimbursed to the general fund to try to balance it out a little bit better and go from there.

What do you guys think? Do you want to keep talking about any of these things? Are there questions that you want to ask now? Or do we want to wrap this up and just consider this the introductory workshop and we'll drill down more into the weeds in July? I'm happy to do whatever the will of the commission is. It is excruciatingly difficult for me to not be in the room with you all, especially because I'm at this inn on a couch, and it's incredibly uncomfortable, and my entire family is at dinner. But I'm happy to keep going through these questions. What do you guys think?

You just received a lot of information that was broken down, I think, at the higher level. It's about time for us to digest this information, come back individually with questions. And then when we have our meeting, Then I think we can really dive in page by page once again, like we did last year. I appreciated the breakdown and the presentation today. I think it was on the higher level, very clear and easy to digest. I also appreciate, of course, like always, having these reports and paperwork printed and ready to call for us. And that's pretty much it. I think the information was provided tonight. It was the general information. well put together and it gives us a lot of momentum for the next meeting and also a short meeting like this will be easier for the residents to look into it and also receive that presentation themselves so um i'm okay for tonight unless anybody else have questions or anything else to go by no i agree with that i i mean basically early to make decisions or make a buy you did not get the last pages when you come back you're going to see the last pages

They have given us what the millage impact is for the four community events, for the circulator, for the addition.

I mean, I see it on the slide. I have my book, right? But I see the slide.

We can add what our millage is right now and basically add the impact of what we want to see to see how high we need to bring up the millage roughly, right? Because we need to see the other figures thrown in here as well that we've discussed.

I mean, that's what we're kind of looking for tonight is to get a little guidance. If we wait till the next budget workshop, you've got the capital projects coming at that time, too. And that's the end because we're having a commission meeting. We got to set the maximum millage the next month. Right.

I mean, I'm not particularly worried about setting the millage at the end of July because whatever we set the millage at, we can reduce it. We can't increase, but we can reduce what we spend.

Right. I mean, I personally want to see the millage with item one and two, potentially three, if possible. Potentially. We can give that to you right now. Huh? We can give that to you right now. No, because you cannot give, well, the millage, yes, because it's not the utilities involved, but we don't know what funds are being refunded from the utility overpayment by general fund that's going to make up the $2 million plus that we need for the emergency.

But you're not going to get all that in one year. You're going to get that over time. You're not going to be able to raise the utilities to recoup years of paying with the general fund to collect it in one year.

It's going to be over a period of time. We have a large utility reserve. That's our cash cow We may have to drain our reserve from the utility department to pay the, what we should have paid originally. We may have to. I don't know the figures. I mean, for me to say that I know where the, I mean, I can go up to my books and look at 21, 22, 23, 24, 25. Yes, I can do that.

Listen, are we in agreement with his position that we've got this cash? It is what it is.

I have to look into it.

We need time to look into that one. Okay.

I have to confirm.

I'm not so sure you're right. Not so that much.

Okay. I've heard for the last 12 years that that's our cash cow.

But in the last few years you've been spending the cash.

So we now have to leave and we've got to take care of it.

Do we want to give them what The millages on those items, if we were to do that, can you do that?

For the cost to provide the 2% quota to all the employees, the millage rate will go up to 0.1643 meals. And the impact on a $300,000 home would be $49.29 per year. And the cost to restore the police patrol officers to 2184 hours would be $95,761. The impact on the niche would be 0.0533 meals, and the impact on the $300,000 home would be a $15.99 per year. And if you can see the third one would be the same. It would go up 47.7 per year. So in the total would be.

Frank, the 3% increase would be for all, everyone in staff or just people who have been with us or not changed positions within a year. Or is it equal whether you just got hired or not?

No, the people that just got hired will not be getting a cost of living increase because they haven't been here for a year for the cost of living.

Right. Sandra, supposing we have the 5.7 millage.

Yes.

And we add one and two, because you have here three and four together. I mean, two and three together, not one and two.

Okay.

Bring our millage up, please.

Yes.

With those one and two.

We're doing that.

Excuse me, guys. I have to join over Zoom. I have a work event after this, so I'm going to go home and take the rest over Zoom.

No. 5.9238. 5.9238. Thank you. 5.92.

Yeah, 5.9238 would be the nearest if we add items 1 and 2.

Now, that's without adding.

What about 1, 2, and 3? We're going up to 6, I think, yeah?

I'm saying that's without adding the emergency fund of $2 million.

That's without adding that. But we don't know what that number is right now, so.

Now, the mayor asked if we added 1, 2, and 3. 6.08.

6.08. Okay. Okay.

Okay. Let me ask Jimmy this. That three takes with the police officers, but it doesn't take the general employees in that. When we're putting people on the pay scale, there was a pay scale run for the general employees too.

They're on there.

They're included in number three?

No, no. Are you talking about union employees?

Right. In other words, when we look at the numbers that we have here,

Yeah, that's just police department.

That's just the police department.

That's just police department.

So now, if we put the general employees on the pay scale that you corrected for them, that's an additional cost.

Yeah.

Which is not reflected here. And what Commissioner Chironi was saying, he wants, if they're going to put some of them on a pay scale, we put all of them on a pay scale.

It's equality. All or nothing.

I just want to make you understand that that group is not in this number. That's why I said one and two, not three. I understand. But if we do one, two, and three, three will be increased because we've got to add in the general employees.

We have to add at least $2 million for emergency funding.

Well, that's probably what you really need to say is, We need to put in the emergency fund. That's number one because it's required by the charter. Correct. All right. Then we start adding the other things that are optional.

Yes.

But the exact figure of the emergency fund is based on 20% of the general fund.

Right.

So we don't know what the figure is, so we can't add the exact amount. So for argument's sake, add $2 million. Correct.

Right, because as you add these things back, you're increasing the general fund and you're increasing the 20%.

Now, let me ask you a shabony question. We currently have in 25 budget $2,342,000 plus. Do we have those funds or those funds don't exist? They only exist on paper?

The

Emergency fund balance for 2526. It shows here $2,342,910. Does that exist or is that only on paper? It shouldn't exist.

It's paper.

It's only on paper.

That was the budget from last year.

That's what I'm saying.

That's only on paper. And we don't have the final. We don't have that money. We don't have the final, but we're close. That was before we finished the audit. We can ask... we can check with the with the auditors and find out what's the projected ending fund balance for 25 and then we can do an analysis for this fiscal year and see where we're going to end but it'll take a couple of hours to figure it out but we can come up with a with a figure for next uh and listen commissioner it's just not that two million you got to take into consideration the

donations or the development agreement payments that have been made. Some of that is just on paper. Because it's been spent. So, you know, we were fine on the community center and we've put the amount that is required by the county For us to be qualified to break ground and get their contributions. $10 million short on the. At least because we don't know what the bids are going to come in at. Yeah. This is just figuring what we figured. We've been rocking along for a couple of years now. So now the bids come in. with the tariffs and the time and so forth and so on, I'm figuring that our estimates may be on the conservative side.

But if we had these funds available and we could just push them over for the next year, the emergency funds, but if they're just on paper, I don't want to push numbers just on paper over.

No, but you may need them.

That's why I said I don't want to just push numbers on paper. I want the money.

And that is why all the money has not been restricted.

And Frank, we talked last year about...

It's just reality.

We need, and I hate to bring it up again, we need to restrict our funds that we need to restrict.

Agreed.

We need to run the city. But we need to do it. Well...

And, Frank, we talked last year briefly during the budget season about financing parts of the cost for City Hall, for example. Is that something that this financial advisor could also give us?

Well, I mean, there's always a way to go out and get a mortgage or try to pass another bond or whatever, but, yeah.

We don't have a chance to pass another bond until next month. No, but we can get a mortgage. We can do a special election, but that would cost us $20,000.

We can get a mortgage. And I think it'd be worth it to figure out what options we have with that too.

Well, I think we'll get a better picture when we get the bids in. And then we'll see exactly where we're at because... Frank, when is that happening?

Soon, right? We have like another two weeks until it's done. I know we had a lot of questions and we're maybe extending the response times.

No, hold on a second. We pushed it back because we got a lot of – there were over 400 questions that came in. Those are being addressed now.

Yeah, so that first round of questions is coming in. We're getting the answers published on the 29th. Due to the high amount of questions, we opted to – for accuracy of bids, opted to allow for a second round of questions because – Those answers may produce other questions. So basically the bid got pushed back by about 30 days. So the bid opening now is in August. I don't have the exact date on me right now, but it's been pushed back to August.

We are breaking ground with China.

Before August 30th, yes.

On Village Hall before the end of August.

Right. And just so you guys know, Commissioner Trevone and I had an in-person conversation with Miami-Dade County Fire Chief Ray Jadalla on Wednesday. We didn't really get into the weeds, but we assured him that we were breaking ground by August 30th and we will be.

That is true. We are working now diligently with Council on getting that taken care of.

Bayshore has been given notice to vacate.

Anything else that staff needs us to rehash regarding the budget? I'm looking at staff now. So you're clear on what we have expressed, the five of us, which each one of us has expressed a different opinion, but they're all more or less gelling together.

Yeah. Yeah, I think there's trending unanimity. Wow. I've been awake since 3.30. Yeah. in terms of where we're going to go.

And Chief, you feel comfortable with the budget presented? Yes, sir. Thank you. Unless you have, would you like anything to add or ask to consider also for our officers?

Listen, any directors out there that want to get up and speak, you're not hog-tied, believe me. This is a time to have, say whatever you want to say.

Good evening, Chief Carlos Noriega. And just to answer your question, Commissioner. Please turn on the mic.

I'm sorry. Microphone is off. Thank you. I can hear him without the mic for the record. Hey, Chief.

Hi. Hello, Mayor. To answer your question, we've worked very hard to do a very lean but efficient budget for this coming year. We have a lot of challenges, as you can see by just what's happening in this village. And also, we're going through our re-accreditation period, which commences in November with a mock assessment, then, of course, January with our on-site, and then we go into our Final part of the accreditation. We're trending very well in Lawrence. We're doing a great job. We're prepared to go down those two positions and move forward with it. So we're working. We get our workarounds with our grants. We get our workarounds with a fourth attorney, and we're getting the things we need to do our job.

I'm really happy to see you here. Of course, like usual, you're always representing really well. But I'm also happy to hear you say that and confirm that because I remember how tough last year was for all our officers. So to have your confidence makes me feel so much better as we work into 2020. the more detailed parts of the budget, especially for our police force. So I really thank you for that.

Well, thank you. It'll be a time to grow in the near future, but right now we're good with what we got, and we can keep our safety, our partnerships, and our efficiencies at the level they are moving forward with this budget. And I'm glad to see that we're looking to do some things. Obviously, for us as a chief and deputy chief, we'll tell you that It's really important, as we're going on a couple of positions, to get back those hours for the officers so we don't have to play with the schedule every single day, every single week, and make sure that we're at that constant level. And those hours will be very beneficial. The rest is up to you guys, what you deem is correct and fit for and pay scales and stuff like that. Obviously, those would be great things to see. It would be great for morale. They certainly have given their, maybe not pound of flesh, but certainly a significant portion. They've made their sacrifices, and it would be nice to see them get some things back.

I can imagine the hours are very important. We've all heard cases already where our officers have needed backup while responding to emergencies. And that affects us directly as residents. So hours are important for that kind of backup. But I also wanted to ask you about our Marine Patrol unit. I know we covered a little bit of the Marine Patrol. Can you just remind me again, what would be the operational hours? What are the operational hours for the Marine Patrol and what they are standing now with this budget that needs to be presented?

Well, one of the conditions that we are going to go down is the one Marine Patrol officer who has uh is transferring with his family to colorado county and the sheriff's office over there uh we are in the process of training uh a replacement marine patrol officer once he's fully trained and up and running uh we have a level of confidence that he can do the job by himself like jason rodriguez has uh we plan to have seven day coverage and hours of operation will be daytime hours uh night time with one officer just just doesn't work what are the hours right now as we said roughly 10 to 5 on the days the other boats out there. We are working on getting, thanks to you all, approving forfeiture money to get a high bid wave runner if you want to call it that which is obviously a lot better what we have to do rescue operations or respond to emergencies uh deputy chiefs to work on the specs to get that done and once we do that we'll cross train as many people as we can so everybody has the ability to use that particular asset and go out and do the job on the water thank you so much for that my pleasure

So if this was a time for the department has to speak freely a little bit, I just want to bring up one thing. I heard you, Commissioner Shirely, about pillaging the utility reserve funds. I just want to caution this commission against that. The utilities is a very, very important part of this community. I mean, we have to have water. We have to have sewer. And two years ago, we had an unplanned water break. They're all unplanned. They cost the city a quarter of a million dollars. This year, we had another one that cost about the same. Our system is old and aged. And that is why we are going through the water and sewer master plan now to see what... we have to do to keep up with what we've got. So I understand the feeling about that, but I just want to caution against it. Thank you.

I like what you brought up, Stephen. Sorry. I like what you brought up with the conversation because I personally find it that when we talk about taxes and utility bills, I 100% agree with Commissioner Schiavone. The way we perceive it is the way it is. It's still an expense, whether it comes out on a monthly basis or once a year, but understanding what the money is being used for, because I don't believe that that is common knowledge per se, that it's not just paying your water and your sewer expense, but it's paying for this massive repairs. It may be something to consider for us to be very public about something like that. You know, I mean, when we've had that expense that we covered in the commission meetings, but maybe put it in our communications where we explain This, you know, we have this expense. This is where your water bill go. It's at work, protecting your services, protecting your community could help also balance a little bit of how we communicate that.

The problem with that, Doris, is that there's only 500 homes that received that bill. The other bills are a conglomerate to the multifamily residences and it's passed down to them. They don't get a detailed bill. So to tax communications with putting out a statement for 500 homes, it's easier to put it in their monthly bill.

Well, again, we're talking about these things are luckily not happening every weekend. We're talking about three, maybe two to three times.

Can I ask you guys something? I appreciate this conversation, but I don't want to spend more time during a budget workshop. talking about a communication strategy per se. I think it's a very worthwhile conversation, but Commissioner Acosta, you made a really good point earlier when we were talking about the length of the meeting and whether or not residents can digest it. Let's not veer off into subjects that are not immediately relevant to the budget workshop.

We don't have to dive into the weeds, but that's why we're having these conversations. Is there anybody else with questions or something?

I think it's a worthwhile conversation, but I want to... We're not hearing you.

Lou. Lou, anything you want to add or say about your new Taj Mahal over here that we're vastly putting together quickly?

Mayor, Vice Mayor, Commissioners, I'll be short and sweet. This project is a great addition to the village. And thank you for supporting adding funding for the new community center. As a resident and also your community engagement director, I am probably the most excited resident on the island.

So you're going to be sleeping there? So it can be open 24 hours a day? Exactly.

Just want to make sure.

She's at the door. I don't know if anybody else, any other department or legal team, anything from the budget. You're good? Everybody good? Wink once if you're in trouble. Thank you.

Your shot.

Russian. We have... It's been painful because, you know, when you go through this line by line, you'll see all the different things that have been eliminated. And we took the approach of getting rid of those things that weren't absolutely necessary. So you're not going to see – there won't be – Coffee brought by the village for the people to have coffee when they're at work. There's not going to be food provided at a commission meeting. I mean, when you go through this line by line item, if there's things that you want to put back, then next time we meet is it. What you've got is bare bones. There's no more cutting out of this budget and continuing to operate.

I mean, I have not said my personal thanks, but at least four of you deserve specific thanks, and it's the three young ladies that are sitting there and you. who have really worked hard, and all department heads, actually, by bringing it to you and you fighting with them, to create what we have today. You have five commissioners. All five are willing to sit down with anyone, any person within City Hall, and explain our ideas, why we stayed where we stayed, anything you need from us, we're available to you as well. Some of us have a little bit more experience with budget. Some of us have a little bit less experience, but we all have our own ideas and we all need to have you understand our ideas so you can put it on paper.

We're all willing. And it's an open door with all of us. There's not a, you know.

Now, Sandra does not have an open door. She cannot leave.

And it's a team approach for the whole thing, and the commission is a vital element of it. But eventually it rests with the electorate to, I mean, the commissioners to decide, you know, where we're headed.

Well, it takes a village, and we really appreciate it. It's a great start, I feel.

I want to also express my gratitude to the staff, to the directors. But frankly, in this moment, I'm feeling especially grateful to the four of you on the dais for being there, for being so attentive. for being so cautious and such good stewards of the village and for helping carry this workshop this evening it really is a pleasure to work with all four of you and i'm really grateful for for everyone this evening thank you likewise enjoy your time there and hurry back okay thank you um Yeah, I don't have family in Miami anymore, so it's really important for me to be present on weekends like this. So if everyone's okay, we'll move to adjourn. Yes, second. Thanks, everybody. Thank you all.