Community Economic Development Advisory Board - Regular Meeting

We'll do a roll call. John, would you like to start?

I'm John Perkins. I'm here.

Hi. Mike Hendy, San Jose Technical College.

Ursula Eisenhower.

Lacey Holland. James Jerome, Cruz Bank.

Terry Cheney. Cheney. Michael

Mehrman, the city's liaison to this board.

Jackie Waterhouse, Ag Services, Economic Development. Michael McHausa, just joined. On April 15. K. Presentation of new board members.

So first, you would have to do a motion. I thought that was why I was signing. Okay.

I'll make a motion to approve the minutes as written.

Thank you.

I second.

Thank you, James.

All in

favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Thank you. All right. Now, new members, would you like to introduce yourself? Are you a new member? Yeah. Okay. What's your name?

My name is Michelle Simon.

It's French. Okay.

I'm currently a student at the University of Florida, and, I live in Northport, five minutes away from here, next to Lamarck. And I'm really excited to get more involved in my city government.

Perfect. Thank you.

My name is John Perkins. I probably started in maybe March. And, I work for Adams Holmes, in the Port Charlotte, area, Deep Creek. And, I did do the North Port University course. I was in the first course that did that, and that's where I learned about a lot of these committee meetings. And this one seemed to be the most interesting one to me to learn more about the city and what's happening in business growth within the community.

Thank you. Welcome. Michael, you've been with us.

Yeah. So for those who don't know me, I'm Michael Endy. I am the executive director interim executive director for Suncoast Technical College and Career and Technical Education Sarasota County Schools. I represent our workforce education on this committee.

Yep. Ursula Eisenhower. Lived in Norfolk about twenty five years. I was in Norfolk University, too. Thought you looked familiar. So just, happy, happy that we're having meetings and, yeah, that's about it.

And Sean is our chair. He's he was going to be here. I'm not sure if something must have came up. Usually he's the one running the meeting. And I am Lacey for the new faces. And I'm here to now maybe, local to North Port just for about ten years, two small kids. That's why I joined.

I'm James Jerome. I'm a commercial banker with Cruz Bank and Trust representing the finance side of this committee. Been on the committee, started in January, and been in Northport for about thirty years.

I'm Terry Cheney. I'm a new member. I live over in Huron Creek Country Club. I've owned there for about eight years. I've recently retired about two years ago. After sixty years in the drugstore business, My wife and I had other alternative businesses, but that was our main interest. I'm anxious to help out any way I can.

Great. Welcome.

Hi. Michael Matassa. I've been down here for about five years. Retired well, I had a restaurants three restaurants up in Maryland that I designed and operated. COVID kind of took me out of that. So I came down here, and I am now doing some consulting for SCORE. And I'm part of the Rotary Chamber Rotary in Puerto Vallarta. And I was always involved in economic development up north. And I just really like Northport and want to be a part of it. I

am not a new board member. I am not a board member. But by way of introductions, I am Michael Mehrman. I am the staff liaison on behalf of the city. And I am the economic development manager for the organization.

I'm Jackie Waterhouse. House. I'm pretty new to the city of Northport. I started in February in planning and zoning and recently my position now in economic development. I'm really just here to kind of see how all of this plays plays together and how we can better help assist and navigate any type of issues that you all may have.

Thank you. Okay. So for new business, it says discussion and possible action regarding the twenty twenty five CDAB board meeting schedule. So is this discussion based on changing what we've had or just since it's already 2025? Yes.

Just to Okay. So part of the reason why we're here today is because several of the meetings have been canceled, and you have to have one at least quarterly. So we just wanted to go over the the meeting dates and make sure that everyone's aware and what the expectation is going forward. So it does look like we just have three more for the rest of this year? Any comment or concerns based on those remaining for this year?

Why were the other meetings canceled?

I believe there was just no agenda items. Is that correct? Some of them were canceled because of a lack of a quorum. And

is the best method for us to RSVP, is that the preferred process so you guys know that we'll be here for a quorum? Okay.

Absolutely. Because if we know in advance, then we can cancel in advance. But if we're just finding out the day of, then we have to have the meeting. So 20

So with regard to my comments on introducing introducing the issue, you've done a great job already of figuring out what we're talking about. But I would say, just to reiterate, that, in fact, it's not the city's role to dictate to you the cancellation inclusion of new items on the agenda or for us to put forward items on the last meeting to the next one because they weren't discussed. This board controls those agenda items. They communicate with the city clerk's office for inclusion on the agenda. And as Ms.

Crave has already noted, RSVP is an appropriate method of communication so that there is, in fact, a quorum so that a meeting doesn't get canceled because only two of you, unless they show up for the meeting. And or there are no agenda items, in which case there wouldn't be a meeting. If you sometimes wonder about what the heck is my role in all of this then, as different from the city clerk's role. I act as your liaison to the city. If you have tasks that you might want to assign me, Michael, can you find out some more information about some economically development based matter, I would then research that and then collect that information and provide it back to this board.

If you have other types of needs from the city with regard to economic development, I am that liaison to provide the information. If I don't know it on the spot, of course, I get it back to you. From time to time, I might interject like this. But in fact, it's your meeting to host not the cities. We will take your direction Because we do have several new members here, I would suggest that this group, through motions and quorum discussion precede that.

If you have things that you would like the city commission to take up and discuss at their upcoming city commission meetings, it is appropriate. In fact, I encourage it that you feel like there's an economic development issue that this city should be working on. And if this group gets consensus through your motion, it will be so noted by the clerk and passed on to the commissioners so that it's brought up in chambers at the most convenient next occasion for them to review your issue. So that is appropriate action for this committee. In fact, it's primary that you help guide the strategies of economic development in the community as community board members.

It's not always something that our commissioners are as rooted in as maybe some of you.

That's what I was wondering as you said that we had some things that we voted on in the last meeting to send to the city commission. I'm wondering if we had any results of how those were voted on.

Yes, I believe there were two matters. And Ms. Gray, is it appropriate for me to comment on them? Or is that something that's true? All right. So there were two matters, both of them related to zoning. And the two matters in zoning were related to the sale of and please don't quote me on the exact nature of what you recommended. I don't have it in front of me or how it was heard by the commission. I'm paraphrasing in general so that we can make quick sense of it. But one of the matters was the proximity of a business that sells alcohol to an educational institution.

And the city code has not been updated in quite some time with respect to the distance. And of course, course, the community has grown and developed. And standards have not been maintained to address that growth. And I believe you recommended that the commissioners undertake a discussion and review of the change in the number of feet from a school property a church. Thank you very much, sir.

And I believe that was put forward for further discussion. So it wasn't necessarily decided upon on that commission date meeting. All of the commission meetings are recorded and documented. And you can view them live, which is really interesting if you didn't know that. Just go to YouTube, and you can type in Northport Commissioner meeting.

And you'll get some choices. And if you find the live button on the far left, boom, you're right in. And you can listen and watch and observe. Or there's a historical count of those meetings as well. And you can go back and look at the commission meetings historical basis. And you can go back and look for the specific item that you want to hear about. Or you can listen to all day or all hour whatever length the meeting went.

I just wanted to answer Lisa's question. I

I'm fine with it.

The only date I have

a conflict with is October 21.

Okay.

So we'll

keep the agenda or the calendar as is.

Ms. Gray did make the comment. And again, not to direct your activity, but just to share because we do have some newness here, Ms. Gray did make the comment that, in fact, the requirement of this board is that you meet quarterly at a minimum. And so in looking at your schedule, if you wanted to make changes to the schedule, if you felt monthly was too much and quarterly would be adequate, that would be the minimum standard to which to go to.

And it's the reason we're meeting today because if we did not meet in July, we would have violated the organizational guidance for this group, which did require a quarterly meeting. So this is the quarterly meeting today. So when you look at this, you can amend that. I think the quarterly is by our the city's fiscal year. Or is it the calendar year?

I thought I would have to double check. Yeah,

because looking at it, there is no meeting scheduled for the third quarter. If that's going by calendar year.

I think the June yeah, well, this was the calendar that was set forth by a vote of this board at some point I think it

was November.

Yeah. Again, just helpful guidance. If you return here in October for a meeting and in advance you ask the clerk's office to add the meeting schedule to the calendar again for discussion, you can do that. It's not as though you can't have another discussion about this. But you would have to ask the clerk's office to add that to the agenda. You just can't pop up. Or me. Yeah. You can tap. Yeah. I'm the one that actually prepares the agenda. Jackie and I are up in the system.

While we're talking logistics, how many people have to be here? How many members?

Six.

So right now, because we have a total of 11 members, at least six, we need the forum requirement. Well, that was helpful to basically put it back on us to make sure that we're bringing to the table topics. I mean, that's the point of the board. So that's helpful for new members because I know I wasn't really aware of that as a new member as well. So thank you.

So I have a question. Can we meet individually or as a group outside of this?

No.

To discuss topics or discuss

We also bound and all of you should have received in your package on introduction.

I know you've got a lot

of stuff. But we are bound by Florida Sunshine Law. And if anybody needs more clarification, please refer to those original documents or the clerk's office who can clarify the value of abiding by Sunshine Law. Okay.

I can write that. Yeah.

I have a question. A previous economic development organization that I was involved in, of course, was a county, but we were presented all business activity as far as people inquiring about opening a business or inquiring about land. Does that not happen here?

All is such a big word, sir. I think the question is you'd like to see some information.

Well, guess I thought that's pretty much what we would judge things on.

You may ask me and put on your agenda to receive from me at each meeting economic updates. And I love talking about the city. I'll be happy to come to this meeting and give you those economic updates. You can do that, yes. But it has to be agenda ed. I guess there's a word there.

On the agenda.

You can get it on the agenda. And at the meeting, you get an update from the city, specifically my department, about the goings on. Of course, economic development is a broad term for some of you. You might say, what are the new groundbreakings? What's the latest on this location, that site, and so forth and so on. And I can give you updates. We get a lot of that kind of stuff. What's going on with Aldi? What's going on with Dutch Brothers Coffee? What's going on over here?

I see that such and such lot has sold. Who's going in on that? We can give you updates. But it would have to be an agenda item for you to ask us to make a presentation that I am thrilled to do.

I don't know about the rest of members, but I would request that maybe that become a permanent agenda item.

I don't know about specific I mean, specifically, we have to bring up what your concerns are. I don't know if a broad spectrum is I think it's a lot of information. I would

add that as the staff liaison, I can provide for distribution to the clerk's office a upcoming link that'll give you it's a public link, and it provides you insight to current economic development projects. And you can go to that link. You can see a map with the city boundaries. And you can see the polygons that are multicolored. And you can click on that, and you're like, oh, look at that.

That's this. And then there's pop up information. We call those infographics that correspond with the parcel or parcels. And you would have more insight like what the size of the property is, who the principles are. They would also show you, if it's available, the site plan.

And so if you're interested in that kind of core economic data, I can, through the clerk's office, provide for distribution to you. When it's available, it's just getting ready to go live this month, later this month. We can provide you with that public link. And you could query yourself anytime you wanted. We do have a current development map on the city's website today that does something similar.

Are we the liaison between the public and the city and the EU? So if the public has concerns, somehow they because I guess we are on the website as economic development advisory. So let's just say that Ms. Betty down the street says, hey, I have an issue. And somehow she gets a hold of you, me, whoever. And we are emailed that concern. Obviously, we have to take that information and give it to you. And then you give it to the city. Is that correct?

It's appropriate to follow through for our fellow citizens, yes. Citizens have other vehicles through which they can communicate to the city. They can come directly to the various departments and divisions of the city where their questions may be better answered than going through this team. But if it's economic development specific, it would be appropriate for you to pass that on through. If somebody says that the property between her and her neighbors I'm just making up something that the property between her and her neighbor, that the properties were graded at different levels, and now there's water gathering in between the two properties flooding onto her front yard, that's not economic development, is it?

That's a very different matter. Not that we wouldn't want to hear about it or help. But it's an example of something that's economic development. If the grass is too tall or the trash isn't being picked up on the construction site, those aren't economic development matters. I'm giving some things that I hear about about from the code enforcement folks that goes on around town. So if it's an economic development matter, yes, I think it would be appropriate.

I read if we don't 70 that in addition, that's actually a violation on Congress, or if it pertains to economic development. Is that correct?

I would just say that a violation I understand the value of your word. But as a city rep, I'll use different words. Fiduciary roles is probably a better way to put that. So we all have a fiduciary role, right? It's not like we're going to string you out and say bad things about you if you don't tell us what's going on in the community. On the other hand, we have a fiduciary role to communicate. We would want to do that anyhow as citizens. And so yes, and let's not forget the name of our board. It's the Citizen Economic Development Advisory Board. So yes.

So

then by way of example, a real example, since I gave you some fictitious ones, Mr. Endy might want to add to the agenda, because he represents the Suncoast Technical College campuses here in the county. He might say, at the Northport location, there is a trio of properties that shares the driveway with our school. Right now, it's all timber. What is going on with those three properties? You may want to bring that forward for discussion or update from the city. That kind of thing makes good sense.

And it's also why we brought to the team the discussion about alcohol being close to a school because they're looking to put a McDonald's, potentially a hotel and something else on that property right next to the school and a library. So those old codes won't allow for some of those things to go on those commercial

sites. You're

You're off of Craberry. Yeah. Yeah, that's right down the street from there.

So if those things come to fruition that are planned, some of our zoning and whatever you want to call it, our ruling in the city has to be changed to make that happen. So those are some of the things we'll bring up here.

Can we talk to the board members about personal issues outside of your like if I have something that I would like to say that has nothing to do with economic development.

I'll let Ms. Gray address the members of this board meeting outside of this forum.

Right. As long as it's not something that violates Sunshine Law, you can still interact with each other. Okay. Okay. Thank you.

So is this something we can vote on right now about what Terry said about having you do a presentation everywhere? Do we do that for next week or next month? Two months from after month?

Be an issue with your agenda, I guess. Yes.

Because I agree with Terry. That's what I would like to know more of from Michael and everything about that. So yeah.

And I don't think that it has to be a necessarily formal presentation. I mean, even historically, Vinnie would just list off such and such came, such and such is thinking about coming. This is who we've reached out to. So I don't think it has to be a full blown power.

And once it gets moving Yeah.

Yeah. It

just needs to be new updates on here. They need to see that stuff over and over unless there's big changes.

So So I I put a motion out there if we you know?

I'll second. Okay. Great.

How about any other future agenda items that anyone would like addressed, discussed?

Did you want to are you having a concern with December? Like, did you want to put it on next month to January?

I think we should discuss the December meeting next month.

Oh, in October. October.

Yeah. And I know I keep saying

next month, too, in October. You for the correction. Correction.

Okay. So for you, I'll do motion I'll motion it. Thank you. I'll second.

Thank you. I'm sorry. I didn't hear you.

About putting on the agenda for next month about the December meeting to discuss it. Yeah, October. For December.

To discuss having ongoing EDC updates from Michael?

Maybe October. I don't know if October is too early to start talking about schedule for next year. But obviously, there's a flaw in this schedule. But maybe we

do Just as a matter

of One question a quarter.

You brought up all these just as an ancillary type of word. But say we have five grocery stores that want to move into the North Port area. Does that something that comes to the economic board?

Or does it not? It does not.

Okay. So who makes I'm surprised, I guess, that an economic board doesn't address that because of the fact that it could take and put somebody out of business. So if we gain three more grocery stores, for example, it may put another one out of business. That's an economic issue, I would think.

Yes. And yes, the way you have described it, it potentially could be that way. The city does not have domain over already zoned and ordinance matters. And if a property owner is compliant with zoning, if a property owner is compliant with all those things that are related to the code, we can't stop that that the builder developer owner from doing what they want to do on their property. The city doesn't have that sort of jurisdiction.

How is economic development related to infrastructure?

What type of infrastructure? You talk about utilities and roadways. It's a great question. So economic development does include developing infrastructure that is compatible with the proposed development. And as a result, since we have a lot of greenfield space and we have a lot of greenfield being undeveloped property, where there are some utility lines that are available, obviously, points and then all the ensuing services fire police is a good example for that business in the future.

There is a fee schedule known as an impact fee schedule. And so depending upon the type of business, the size of the business, the location of the business, there are then designated impact fees that relate to completion of the infrastructure to service that business, both from the ground up and then after they're there, and in the case of police and fire.

So in economic development, would you say that that kind of already flows into residential development too because it all affects the roadways and the infrastructure?

Thank you for that question. It's a great question. Residential single family housing environment is a space that our department does not dabble in much. That comes comes as as a a result result of of market market conditions conditions and and organic organic growth. Growth.

So we are not in an active role here in the city looking for the next homebuilder to buy a track of land and develop it. If a homebuilder has a track of land and so long as it's owned appropriately and wants to build homes on that property, homebuilders will tell you that that's a matter of economic organic growth. They're not going to build homes if there's no demand is the point. And if there is a demand, they will build. And some build and have made mistakes because then nobody can.

But we don't control that. If it's appropriately sound and it's that level of organic growth, then it's suitable. We, in the economic development division, my division, we are very focused on creating a tax base that helps sustain the future of this city. The city is not and any municipality is not sustainable on just the residential communities in it. We do need a cross section of development to include commercial, light commercial, manufacturing, and industrial.

The tax base for those items will generate significantly higher values that go to the general fund for operating. And of course, the impact fees equally are appropriate. So economic development here at the city in our division is more focused on the development community who is going to create, if you will, village concepts, live, work, play. Welland Park is a good example of that, live, work, play. It's a great example of multi uses of the code.

You've got a mix of residential and retail. And we are looking for, based on the properties, we do have code for mixed and residential use on any given property. So if somebody wants to put some residential on a property, well, we're looking for a significant mix of, like, commercial and retail as well. Again, live, work, play. And that's all defined by the city.

And so we have that regularly. If somebody comes in and is trying to propose one without the other, it's not necessarily following for the zoning that's in place. So yeah, we are extremely excited about growth but balanced with having the infrastructure to support that growth. Yes. Yes. It has to be.

I'm pro business, 100%. Look, I've been down here five years. Sister was down here for twenty years. And she went up to lunch. She was a nurse. It's

We are one of the fastest growing communities in the country, if you hadn't heard that. By the way, if you don't follow our LinkedIn social media page, you should do that North Port Economic Development, city of North Port Economic Development. Follow us information on LinkedIn. The city has their own LinkedIn page, but our economic development team has a separate LinkedIn page. We put out there last week that LendingTree has rated us the third in their ranking.

We are number three as a boom town in this country, the number three boom town in The United States, rated by LendingTree. Southern Hospitality Magazine last month evaluated the city as one of the best places to buy a home. So the accolades keep coming. Yes. And the growth keeps going on.

I just saw one that said that the real estate holdings of people I think it was people 65 was more in Northport than any other in the country. It was

like 95,000,000 or something like that.

Think I just saw that on either LinkedIn or Facebook.

Haven't seen that one. We are, but from the demographic of age, we are a young city in comparison to the other communities along the West Coast, and specifically in Sarasota County. We are in the upper 40s as an average, or a medium. I forget which it is. I can get you all those metrics. If you ever want more demographic data, I have a large compilation of those sort of things. But yes, the accolades are tremendous.

This is kind of I don't know if it's related or unrelated, but I know there had been some hearsay about the Buckeys coming to Northport. And now we all know what's going on. Port Charlotte. Was there something we lost out on that why they went there? Do you have any information or knowledge about

I would tell you that I never once heard that Buc ee's was coming to Northport. It was always Port Charlotte.

I think it was in when I did the Northport University, I think there was a lady don't remember her name, but she was in the economic growth and development department, not the committee, but the actual department that, I guess, we work with, part of the city. And she had kind of whispered possibility.

It wouldn't surprise me if Puckeys had looked from a site selection standpoint all over the region. But I never had heard that Northport was a finalist or that any specific property was being evaluated. No. And I think the question was I want to get back to your question. Did we lose out?

And I believe the answer is a very clear no. We did not lose out. Well, again, if you look at the properties and you look at what it would take to build something like that, I'm sure the site selectors carefully evaluate. I talk to site site selectors all the time. Not every property is suitable for what the potential purchaser wants, whether it be size or location. I don't know much about the deal in Port Charlotte, but I do know usually has a pretty big footprint.

I think this project was including

a I lot of don't know that we'd appreciate that in our interchanges. It's just

It was a a lot of residential, too. So it's more than just the gas station.

Right. And so It was a big Thank you, Mr. Cheney. We don't have a lot of interchange property. We've got two interchanges. And some of those properties are already spoken for, already developed. Some of them are not for sale. I mean, you're talking about the if you just classically say Cloverleaf, the four points, not all of those Cloverleafs are even for sale. And some of the ones that are held by people who have other master plan ideas that particular concept.

And then maybe moving forward, once we request your updates, the board will feel a little bit more informed and maybe can ask more specific questions based on what you give us.

I think that's all. It's great stuff. I love I told you I love what I do. I get to talk to all these developers and master planners and site selectors. It's very exciting. It truly is. And if it's not, if I'm not bound by in advance by them through some form of level of confidence, through a confidentiality agreement, which we do have on occasion. But if I'm not bound by those, I'm happy to share what I do know.

I wanted to ask, what is the extent of our powers to recommend certain infrastructure projects such as a court system in Northport or a more recreational infrastructure?

You're free to make those recommendations, sir. If there's something that I get asked regularly that goes along those lines is, how about if you bring us ABC to the city? Probably the two that I hear the most are, Michael, get us a Longhorn steakhouse. And the other one that I hear is, Michael, get us a Debweiler's. That's not economic development, you say.

I mean, it's not like I pick up the phone and I call Mr. Henry Detwiler and say, Mr. Detwiler, I'm not sure what your plans are. But our citizens really want you here. And then he says, you know, that's a great idea. We're going to start building in January. I mean, that's not economic development. Economic development is driven not only by what the citizens feel their preferences for lifestyle are, but it's driven by that business's level of conducting business in a community. And is it economically feasible for them? Is it affordable for them?

Can they make a profit there? There's many, many factors. As an example, a LongHorn Steakhouse or some of the restaurant chains that people would like to see here, they will consider us. They won't consider us because we don't have what they call density. They want density. They want and I think I mentioned a few of you here at one of the meetings this year. They're looking for a minimum standard of around 100,000 residents. That's a density minimum before they'll even consider your property or your principality. There are other components. I was at a trade show in Vegas just a month ago, a month and a half ago.

And I went over to the booth for the folks that had it was the competitor to Tractor Supply, farm and fleet. I went over to the farm and fleet booth thinking, hey, there's a Tractor Supply south of us. There's another one to the north over in Venice. My idea is like, oh, this would be perfect. And they looked at me and they said, well, we're not buying property.

We're not building from the ground up right now unless you can introduce us to a vacant building that has 100,000 square feet, you can't come in the booth. They were screening you before you even got into the booth. And their booth was probably five times the size of this room. They draw national attention. We didn't fit the basic economic development factors that they would even consider.

And economically, they decided by way of example that they're not going to buy a piece of property and then start from the ground up and build what they want. They want an old grocery store that's 100,000 square foot that they can remodel and then repurpose. That's their view. If we would have had that for them, I would have gone through the doors and got to talk to someone. On the other hand, I talked to a woman and her team who have that chicken salad chicken salad.

Chick or something like that. It's a huge successful business. And they've got one in Fort Charlotte. So it didn't make sense for her to come here. But their models are equally as unusual.

They only need about 1,200 square feet. And they don't have that 100,000 citizen demographic that I was mentioning earlier. But they do have the requirement that here in Florida that they're in a strip center where there's a Publix because they find that their their demographic is a female from 25 to 35 with young children who goes to Publix. And then while she's out with the kids, does what? Pops in and gets chicken salad. And they've figured out that that's a successful formula. And so economic development

So Publix would let that go? That would be

Not in the store, in the same shopping center.

Yeah, that would be a not competing with that.

Well, are those things. Publix is very good about that. They're careful who else goes in.

Hurt. But, yeah. Yeah, that's wow.

I mean, they do sushi, and there's a Chinese place too. That's why they probably do $5 sushi on waistings.

Oh, it's the draw of people that you have. Right. Mean, Publix owns Florida, basically.

That's why I mentioned it. That's why they have that that's why that particular franchise chain has that particular economic driver to do business in Florida, because they know that about publics. So economic development is far more complex than just, let's call Mr. Dettweiler, let's get a store over here. There are the economic drivers that put those businesses at the forefront.

So just to be clear, you said that calling Gellwaters and saying

By the way, I have done that. I have called the Gellwaters. We have done that. That's you said that's not economic development? It's not how economic development is formulated. It's a very sophisticated process. Imagine if you are Mr. Detwiler, what's the first thing you've to figure out? Do I have the money to do this? I just built a new distribution facility in Palmetto.

I just gave all my kids a store all over the Sarasota County. Can I afford to build another store somewhere? And yes or no, we don't know what their finances are. We just all assume because they're successful or they appear to be successful that things are great. Then does the South County location make sense for them?

Do they have personnel to run a South County location? Their distribution facility that they're building is in Palmetto. Think about that. They're not Publix where they've got freight liners on the road all day, how they're going to get product from Palmetto down to there's a lot to consider when you're doing that. So yeah, I know they have considered it.

I will tell you, they have looked at us. And they are talking to some folks about potential things. But yeah, it's not the will of the people alone that draws somebody here. It helps. And it's not all retail.

There are plenty if you drive along any of our areas to the Toledo Blade Corridor area right South of I-seventy 5 is a great example of commercial and industrial logistics and warehouse space. It doesn't even look that industrial other than the stuff that Benderson has put up, which is beautiful. And we've got commercial, industrial, logistics, and warehousing in there. We've got it on the other side of the road back along Commerce Parkway. And we've got all kinds of entrepreneurial and small businesses in that area.

I know the banking community is very active in supporting all those small businesses as well. So we do have that mix of commercial and light industrial going on, and we love attracting those people. And we love helping the small business community expand. Great example of that would be Euro Wall, a local business that's off that area. They moved across the street and have expanded into that warehouse space that the vendors and companies has.

And you'll see their signage now upfront more prominent. So we love expanding the footprint of local businesses as well. We work actively to do that. Another piece of economic development just I love your question, Michelle. Mr.

Simon, what's really great is Mr. Endy and the Suncoast Technical College, we are always interested in their programming, their curriculum, because they are actually supplying the future workforce. And we would love nothing more to keep the students who are coming out of those programs right here in the community. So a piece of the economic development model is workforce development. And so we work very hard to create jobs and keep our workforce here in town.

How in touch are you with I mean, know you're not, as in the city of Northport, aren't realtors per se, but considering the vacant spaces we do have, coming to mind the Venderson and Wendy's that's on the corner, are you able to, in your position, somewhat poach potential buyers or companies to check out those areas?

Or your

hands somewhat tied since it's not land per se?

Yes, ma'am. We do do that. And in a more basic sense, to summarize what you're just describing, I make fun of it. But it's the truth. Part of my role is playing Cupid.

That's what I

was That's a big piece of what I do every day. And I'm the matchmaker. And I will bring together a property owner, a developer, a realtor, a franchise, location. And I'll say, let me introduce you to Mrs. Smith over here. Mrs. Smith has a property that sounds like the kind of property you're wanting to buy. And it's zoned for the kind of business you want to build there. And so I'll introduce Mrs. Smith and this developer put them together. But I know you mentioned Wendy's because everybody's wanting to know what's going on with Wendy's.

Oh, I was just using that as an example.

Just What's meant a good example of that Wendy's you're talking about that is, I'm assuming, because said you Venderson, you're talking about the one at Sumter And 41, which has been shuttered. That place was shuttered by corporate. Wendy's corporate shut it down. It was a successful franchise location. The franchisee was not wanting to And And company. Then

we'll start

property. So that property is a leased property that has an extended lease. That lease runs for another twelve or thirteen years. And so the property owner where that building lives that's now shuttered is collecting a monthly rent check from Wendy's corporate, whether the Wendy's operator is in there or not. And we know they're not in there.

And so the property owner, which is a real estate investment firm, is sitting back saying, I get monthly check from Wendy's for the next twelve years or the term left. It's more than ten. And so as an investor, you're like, wow, that's a sweet deal.

Is that a separate parcel from the shopping center next door?

It is a separate parcel from the Cocoa Plum property, which is Venderson. Yes. So, Ms. Holland, I did speak to the real estate investor about two and a half, three weeks ago. They're based out of California. And he just explained the scenario that I gave you. And he says, what's the city want me to do? I said, we want you to do something with it. We don't want that property to live in the state that it's in. Of course, I can't tell him what to do.

We'd like him to do something. He says, well, I'm getting offers to buy that property every week. I said, well, why don't you sell it to somebody? He said, because the price keeps getting higher every week. Imagine if you sold the property. And week after week after week, people called and offered you money for it. And every week, the price keeps going up.

But does the commission, like at some point or the city of Northport, have the ability to say, listen, that's been vacant for too long and it's an eyesore, so you've got to do something with it. It

wouldn't say it's an eyesore. They would say that it might violate the zoning ordinance. And yes, that property owner was recently cited.

Because at some point, it's like

But you're prepared imagine also if you're a real estate investor in California and you get a citation, you're like, Okay. Citation. Mean, we have to be practical about how business works.

Right?

It's not like they want to create an eyesore for the city. It's not like they want to be noncompliant. But it's also a protocol for them to figure out what's best for their real estate investment portfolio. And they're very, very structured, very friendly, very amenable. They're business like.

I had great conversations with them, nurtured the idea that you ought to sell it to somebody who will do something, because we would like to see that corner change. Would like to see that. He asked me what the challenges were about redeveloping. If you've been down to that corner, I'll just share with you so that you know there's no access onto Sumter. So imagine if you own that corner and you wanted to put something there, you'd want access from Sumter.

And there isn't access from Sumter right now. Told him, that's a potential challenge for you. Obviously, you'd have to come before the city and get all kinds of approval and write whatever they do to make that happen. I'm not a planner. But I do know that's a challenge.

It's almost hard to believe that Wendy's would pick that location with the ingress, egress that's

there. Wendy's was there forever.

Yeah. Probably maybe when they was one

of my first move theory Yeah. Was just the

And the Winn Dixie's.

So yeah, it's been thirty some years. That's all there was.

Then that's all there was. Great information.

Yeah. Thank you for that.

So we'll put that on the future agenda. Yeah.

Yeah. I'll make sure. Yeah.

Well, that means zoning code. Yeah. Long as there's not zoning violations, FTS service, Randy. So long as there are not zoning violations, there's nothing to prevent the investment firm to continue to collect the rent that Wendy's is obligated to pay.

Ms. Shannon, I just wanted to confirm that we have the future agenda items set. Did we need to vote? Is it We don't need to vote. Okay. Thank you.

Is there any way that us as the committee can try to change that? Because of the fact that with that possibility of someone being able to just own that property and not use it for ten years, that does present a bad precedent, especially if we want to continue growing the city.

Real estate holdings have been held times. But forcing someone to sell their property to another private property owner, I think, if there's no violations, I suspect the answer is no. To answer your question, if there are mitigating circumstances, I don't know what they would be, then yes. I mean, every community, every neighborhood, and every place in The United States has properties that somebody wish something would happen with, whether it's residential or commercial.

All right.

Do we have any other future agenda items that are requested?

The calendar.

Do we want to go over the calendar? I'll answer.

Anything else? No. Still no public comment? No public comment. All right. We can adjourn.

Motion to adjourn the meeting. We have make a motion, right?

Second. 11/28

adjourned.