City Council - Regular Meeting

You join me in prayer this afternoon.

Gracious God, we are thankful for your leading. We ask that as we pray that you help our citizens. That is best for us. We thank you for all that you do.

It is now 4.05 on Tuesday, June 16, 2026.

And this meeting of the O'Kelley City Council is called to order. Agenda item two. Clerk, please call the roll.

Mr. Marciano.

Here.

Mr. Musling.

Here.

Ms. Dreyer. Here. Mr. Hilty.

Here.

Mr. Mansfield. Here. Mr. Bethea.

Here. Item 2A, new employees. When I call your name, if you would, if you stand. Connor Hardwick, electric. Jonathan Paus, electorate. Anthony Eaglin, growth management. Crystal Hadsall, public works. Thank you, and welcome to the city family. Item three, the clerk will do the public notice for this evening meeting.

The June 16th, 2026 City Council meeting was publicly noticed on May 22nd, 2026 on the City of Ocala's website. As a reminder, public comments and presentations are limited to three minutes unless authorized to extend beyond that time by the Council President or majority of Council. All materials for the mayor and city council must be given to the attendant staff and distribution. Prior to speaking at the podium, please state your name and address for the record. And to maintain order, speakers must be recognized by the council president. Please silence your cell phones and all electronic devices for the duration of this meeting. Thank you.

Item 5A, a presentation of the Mayor's Citizen Recognition Award to Eddie Leedy.

Eddie, come on up.

ALL RIGHT.

IT IS MY HONOR TO RECOGNIZE EDDIE LEADY WITH THE MAYOR CITIZEN AWARD. EVERY MONTH WE RECOGNIZE SOMEONE FOR DOING OUTSTANDING WORK. we get to recognize an exceptional individual in the work that you're doing. So I'm going to read your nomination. Eddie Leedy is highly deserving of the Ocala Mayor Citizen Recognition Award for his lifelong service to this community. As the director of the Humane Society of Marion County for over six years, he has helped save the lives of thousands of animals while fostering compassion among staff and volunteers. He's also founded and led the Ocala Police Department Mounted Union, training both officers and horses that continue to serve Ocala at community events and throughout downtown. Not only has he saved thousands of lives in our city, both human and animal, being retired as a captain from the sheriff's office and now the director of the Humane Society, but he also voluntarily started the OPD Mounted Unit. So we are so thankful for the work that you do. Eddie loves gardening. I don't know if you want that out there, but we're going to say that. That's awesome. My wife would appreciate that. You have three children, lots of grandchildren. which you love and love. You have a love for family. You juggle all of this and still ensure that you have the time for your family and friends. So congratulations and thank you for all the work that you do in our community does not go unnoticed. Would you like to say a few words?

Thank you. I do love our community. I retired from law enforcement. I didn't found the mounted unit chief Balkan and myself actually revitalized it. So, 20-plus years ago, we had a mounted unit here in the city, so me and the chief got together. He had a vision. I had horses, so we brought that back to life. So I do enjoy giving back to the community. Just this weekend down at Citizen Square, we had children lined up to pet the horses, so it's a great program, and I'm honored to be part of bringing that back. Thank you.

Item 5B is the 2026 Citizen Academy graduation.

Good afternoon. Greg Davis, information officer. Today's the day, a great graduation for the 2026 cohort for Citizens Academy. Over the last 11 weeks, they've had the privilege to go around the city and learn about the different departments that we have and what we do here every day at the city of Ocala. And we're so proud to have these members of the Citizens Academy because they took the time out of their Thursday evenings from 5.30 to 7.30, sometimes 8 o'clock, to join us and take the time to engage and ask questions and be a part of our community. Now they're going to be the ones out there talking about our story and some of them have even gotten some viral posts out of some of the things they've learned from Citizens Academy, so we're very proud of them. At this time, I'd like to ask all the Citizens Academy graduates to please come up on stage. Misty will hand you your pen and I will hand you your certificate and we'll take a photo.

Good to see all of you.

You're fine.

Thank goodness.

All right, so try to get it together as much as possible. Squeeze in, that's why I brought the wide lens. And here we go.

Three, two, one. And three, two, one. Congratulations.

Okay, that was 5B. So we're going to have a 5BA. Mr. Lee, can you tell me who all those young people is over there? Yeah, we have our...

Where are our students?

Stand up.

Interns. It's our intern program. Come on up for a minute.

Oh, they look mortified.

Explain where we are in the process, Alex. Hi. Hi, council. Through the first week.

My name's Alex Schnortz. I am the staff development and training administrator with Human Resources. This week, the last two weeks, we brought on our Ocala Future Leaders interns, and this summer is all about learning about what leadership means and that everyone can be a leader at, you know, in their own way. So they spend two weeks with me learning all about the city. We're going on field trips, visiting you guys. And then at the end, they're going to interview with departments and get selected as their intern for six weeks to finish out their summer. So they get a lot of really good practical work experience. All of the kids behind me earned their spots. We had over 110 people apply for the position. So everyone back here earned their spots with an interview and really great ideas about leadership and what they want to do with their community.

And I only got to spend a little bit of time with them, but they're a serious group, and I can tell that they're going to be the best group we've ever had at this. I'm counting on you.

Thank you so much.

Hold on a minute.

So, Ms. Councilwoman Dyer, will you say something to these young people?

I'm not glad anything made her. Oh, God, that's scary.

You must be mad at me. Okay. No, I think it's great. You know, I've run into some of these kids throughout the past. Actually, I think it was before you guys started. I think it was during the interview process. And just meeting them for 10 to 15 seconds at a time, this is an impressive group. And so if this is what our future looks like, the future looks bright. So congratulations to all of you to be here. I know that I have children. I have a 14-year-old and a 16-year-old, and the bed rot is real. So I have a lot of respect for the fact that you guys are showing up somewhere every single day when this is your rest time. So good luck to all of you.

Thank you. Thank all of you. All right, 5C is the presentation of the America 250 flag from Ocala Main Street to the city of Ocala.

Good evening, Council, Mr. Mayor. So my name is Sarah Lambert. I'm the Executive Director for Ocala Main Street. I'm excited to present all of you on behalf of our Board of Directors and the organization with an official America 250 flag that commemorates the United States' 250th anniversary of independence, designed by the U.S. Semi-Quincentennial Commission. It is presented by Ocala Main Street to the City of Ocala as a gesture of goodwill and partnership. To coincide with this landmark anniversary in our nation's history, Ocala Main Street will play host to a week of interpretive historical programming at our headquarters at Heart of the Park in historic Tuscawilla Park. Kicking off with our museum exhibit grand opening on Sunday, June 28th. The America 250 Celebration Week will feature a robust lineup of historical speakers celebrating many facets of our local and national history. This celebration will be capped off with our picnic in the park on July 3rd. We're very grateful for the city's support in this initiative, and we look forward to welcoming everyone to Heart of the Park in the coming days. So for more information about that celebration week, they can visit our website or our social pages. Without further ado, we'd like to present you with the flag.

Should we all go up and do a photo with it? Let's do that.

Yeah, there you go.

All right, same thing.

Three, two, one, and more three, two, one.

We have 5D presentation by Upward Communities. CEO Jason Roberts and Curt Kelly.

Hello. Jason Roberts, I'm the owner and founder of Upward Communities. Nice to see all of you. Thank you so much for giving us this time this evening to talk to you. I'm from Texas, just south of Austin, Texas, but I spent half my childhood growing up all over the state of Florida, so it's my second home. I was invited to your community by former state rep Kurt Kelly, who saw what we were doing in Texas and asked me to come bring our resources and our mission to Ocala. We spent a lot of time here doing a lot of work, a lot of investigating. We've worked with the school district quite a bit. And so now we're here to present to you the city like the official P3 process way of what we are and what we're all about. What I would say is we're not affordable housing guys. We never really have been. What we are is we are the best private partner to a public entity. We do things like I'm building a $100 million city hall for my hometown in San Marcos, Texas, and we are funding it. We're the private partner, and we are doing that for our town. And we've kind of created a business model where we are Trying to solve the housing crisis problem for our essential staff. And what we realized in Texas and we're realizing here in Florida is that inflation, cost of living, everything is quickly outpacing our ability to keep up with our essential staff and to allow them to afford a quality lifestyle that they seek for this profession. We set out on a mission over three years ago of investing millions of dollars and have created our privately funded solution to solve this problem. And so we're here in Ocala to present to you guys that we would like to, based off of an invitation, investigate this process and see if you guys have a need or if your staff has a need that we might be able to provide that solution for. There's a lot of work that goes into this and I just want to kind of briefly go through it in summary and then obviously there's a lot more details into the financing and all the money that we provide for this project to make it work, to be a good partner. But what I want you to think of it as is, We're going to build an amazing single-family home community, everything that the essential staff would buy if they could afford it or got paid more money. Instead, we provide 100% of the capital. The city does not need to raise property taxes, does not need to contribute any additional funds for the project or subsidize it. We provide 100% of the capital with no government funds or restrictions attached to it. And that's kind of the thing as we examined all the programs across the country we saw each one had some pretty major flaws with it in order to solve this problem and that's why the problem wasn't being solved. And so you need a private, Entrepreneur, you need a private partner, somebody to step up to the plate to take on certain elements of risk that knows what they're doing, that's professional, and that's really who we aim to be. Out of all the companies we created, this is our favorite. This is our legacy. This is what we want to leave behind for our kids. This is the most impactful business and thing I've ever done in my entire life. So I'm very excited to share it with you. You've got a wonderful community. I've met wonderful people here. I'd be happy to serve you guys if you see that it fits. But I'll stick to the script because I can talk. Just some basics. The median house, average house is $300,000. The median pay is $62,000. This is information we pulled off of several websites. And when you break that down to the mortgage payment in today's world and you weigh taxes and HOAs and maintenance, you're at $2,500 a month. Choose up 35 to 50% of their paycheck is gone right away. So single based income household, has $50 in the bank account at the end of the month. We spent days with staff, not your staff specifically, which we intend to, but we spent days with staff all over across the country. And the staff is a great staff. They're a great employee. They're a prideful employee. They don't like to complain very often, so you don't hear the uproar as much as you might with other type of residents. But we see it. We see that our benefits are no longer allowing us these people to pursue this profession for more than five years. And we see that they're leaving the profession and never coming back. And so we kind of got to go back to our roots of offering the benefits that are so attractive. You're no longer competing for other cities for these people. You're competing against other professions where this profession is highly desirable because the benefits are amazing and they're long-term, um, Because we are providing 100% of the capital, and we are 21 years of real estate experience in every facet you can think of, we provide everything turnkey. We do everything. Because we also want the project to be successful. So, therefore, we provide the building. We provide the capital. We provide the leasing. We provide the strategy on retaining staff with recruiting staff. But you need to look at this as if it was yours. If you had an amazing community that you could use it to retain your essential, most essential people and personnel so that way they could afford to live in your community for the next 20 years. And then also as you grow and as you change over the next 55 years or more, you can go recruit the staff that you need. It may refer some schools as special education teachers, certain unique programs that are there. What I know is you need flexibility and I know people always need a good quality place to live and so you need that asset because people want to recruit them to know where they're going to live in Ocala if they're going to work here. And you also want to incentivize people to get promoted, to get additional certifications, to make more income that they are not restricted off of income here. They can get promoted, make more money, and continue to live in the community that they're living in. One of the unique aspects to our project, our project is a hundred percent budget neutral. And the reason being is because we didn't have to raise property taxes. We didn't have to create revenue. Your folks were already paying rent or mortgage somewhere. We just intercepted that mortgage, which is usually, or that rent, which usually is 30 or 45 miles further away in less quality conditions because they have to afford to raise kids and family and make it in this world. So we really just captured that and brought that home and left it right here in the middle of the community. These are photos of some of our actual houses and some of our actual drawings. This is a lot of Lockhart ISD. If you Google us, you'll hear, and we did 117 homes for Lockhart ISD, which is 30 minutes east of Austin, Texas. 363 houses for Hayes ISD, which will be, the groundbreaking ceremony will be here in July for that. That's of a thousand homes. Both Lockhart, we have 205 people on the waiting list and they haven't even seen a doorknob. Hayes ISD, one email, we have 605 on the waiting list, have to talk about phase two because the demand and the problem is so large. So for you, we have to go through an investigative process, if you would like us to, which is really intimately interviewing staff for ourselves just as well as you to say, where are you living? How am I benefiting your life? If I can give you an amazing house at an amazing price because you're an employee of Ocala, You get to live here, you get to work here for the next 20 years, just focus on your career, focus on your family, but am I really benefiting you? Are you saving hours in your day? There's a lot that goes into this and we have granularly broken down every minute of staff's day to make their quality of life better. We have childcare facilities in our communities. We are real. I do exactly what I say we do. And if you don't believe us, just come look at it. And we want you to know that we wouldn't be in Ocala today if it wasn't for people in your community asking us to be here because they saw what we were doing in other places. And so I'm thankful for that. And I think that's what we like. We like to serve where we're wanted. We actually do have a piece of property. We've been active in the area. We think it's a highly desirable location. Under contract, we have the opportunity to move forward with it. It is already fully entitled with many, many units, many water meters, and many things. It would obviously need to go through the City of Ocala's blessing and approval. We use DPZ out of Miami that designed Rosemary Beach and Seaside analysis and They design all of our communities. They're wonderful. Their properties get about twice as much money per square foot than the other communities around because they're just beautifully well done. That's what we want to provide our staff. It's not just a cheaper place, not just a little bit lower rent. It's an amazing quality of life. And that goes into product. That goes into quality. It goes into everything, the pedestrian type of the community. So that's what we have. So we're really, really far along for Ocala. We should have talked to you much sooner collectively like this, but we were discovering Florida, Florida politics, Florida laws, and all those things. And so we feel like we've gotten to a space where it makes sense to approach you appropriately now. investigate it there but there's does not mean that this is proven that you're signing anything you're eligible for any money it just means that we if you would like us to and you believe that this is worth it to you we will dedicate our money and resources at our expense in our staff to come to town and figure this out and see if it's going to make sense The P3, a couple points that, you know, some people just say it's too good to be true is in California where we saw a lot of early examples, people are raising their own general obligation bond debt to solve this problem. You want to see the future of rent and the future of home prices? California's real. That's why there's a lot of people leaving California and coming to your beautiful state. But that's what it looks like. And so all the programs we saw there, we were able to look into the future of all the issues that go wrong. The demand for so high for some of these housing options is so high that they restrict it to seven years. At the end of seven years, the people have to move out, move their families. And they came to the rents double of what their current budget and pay was. And their pay didn't go up by 50% either. We do end-to-end absolutely everything because when you're providing the capital and you're responsible for it, you really want to control it. And we want it to be successful. However, we also don't want to burden a government with more operations, more expenses, and more things that you're not professionally good at doing. This is a little bit of the type of the deal structure. We do put everything in the 501 nonprofit. We get tax exempt bond financing. We put it in the 501 and so we do a very, very long term lease. We lock in our rents. So there's no way we can get out of it. There's no way it's built for us to take away from you in the future at future value. There's no way for us to increase the rents unexpectedly. And so we've been through 13 bond councils, 12 financials advisors, and past every one we only had one grumpy attitude. So we think we've done a pretty good job. But this is part of the process once we find that there's a need, we would thoroughly investigate with your staff as well and your legal counsel. So really today, just real keeping it short and sweet, it was our fault that we were not on the agenda appropriately today. Our attorney and kids and summer vacations somehow got slipped through the cracks. So I was in town. Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to talk to you. I've enjoyed working with your staff. I've enjoyed working with all the people in your community so far. Our position is to take us into consideration, but before we would engage and follow the P3 process 100 steps, we just want your blessing that you really want us to do this and this is really worth your time that we should be talking to your precious staff. offering this potential opportunity. And we just want to make sure that we follow the order, we follow the rules and we do this in a servant type mentality which is serving you. And this is something that's not for us. None of the units are kept for us for our profit or for our cash flow. The entire project is dedicated to the entity for the entity's benefit to use this as what you would do to make Ocala great. And I'm just trying to give you more resources and more tools to use as much flexibility as you can to enhance your community. That's our goal. Our goal is we love this tenant. We love this employee. We're one of the only privately funded companies I know working our rear ends off to make their lives better, which is why it's so meaningful and so impactful for us. And we're very thankful that God gave us this opportunity to do this.

Do you have any questions?

I don't have any questions, but I think Jason touched on the two words that I think were most important in the presentation were recruiting and retention. And that's always been something that we've struggled with, right? Not struggle, but it's something that we've always been concerned about. I know when we were coming out of COVID and prices started creeping up, you know, materials were hard to find, housing was exploding in cost. We did explore providing childcare for our employees, right? So if we could we know that we can't keep giving them raises We don't have money for that and if we're going to lose homesteaded property tax, we really won't have money for that But if we could provide them with beautiful how I mean I've been to I've been to seaside I would like to live there. I don't make that kind of money so if we could provide them housing like that that would be an amazing perk and to recruit for our first responders, even if you had a temporary ability for our first responders to live somewhere while they found where they wanted to live permanently. There's a lot of, I think there's a lot of different avenues that we could go down with this, but I definitely think that there's no harm in exploring it. I mean, I love the concept, and I think that I would, I don't think, I know I would 100% support going down the road of exploring if this is something we could do.

Yeah, so we are where we were at the last meeting, generally, that we'll get together. Chris contacted their attorney. We just didn't hear back from Upward. Jason just told you that. And so the pieces, the front-end pieces of our due diligence haven't been done, and their due diligence, frankly, also, to poll our employees and then also to get a City of Ocala-specific contract draft all over it, but something for us to actually read and understand the cross T's and dotted I's of the document and have a rapport and a dialogue back and forth with their group.

Yeah, no, I think it's a really great opportunity, and I think it's something that we could open up and expand to, you know, doing some type of agreement with the school district as well to open this up for their employees and the teachers.

I mean... That's part of, yeah, part of my notes, you know, what's the need, what's the demand. Those are two different things, right? Right. So to talk about that, what... Are there any budget or revenue impacts, especially now? We don't know what's going to happen in November, right? So we have to understand as fully as we can what the impact of a decision like this would have on us. Yeah. What's the scope and the scale? Are the county or Marion County Public Schools going to participate? And how will it differ if they don't? Because it's a relatively large piece of property. And it has... You know, I think that the scope of this would be relatively large. So I think those are all questions that, you know, we've sat with Jason. I know that he's running around the country and Florida, and I'm sure it's difficult, but we'll get together with their group and we'll get to the next step and come back to council so that you can do, we do due diligence and you can make an assessment of whether we go forward.

I think the fact that it's already using a piece of property that's been already approved for that is really a plus. Again, trying to maintain the workforce, give them the ability to have some affordable housing, I think, is a great thing. Can you find the people to support it? Yeah. That's your job.

Yeah. It's the most important part. I think this is one of the most beautiful partnerships we've ever created because our interests are 100% aligned. We can't afford a bad deal. We lose millions of dollars. So there's probably nobody out there discovering or trying to find out who's going to be in those units more than we will right away. But you're 100% correct.

And I would just echo that. I mean, I think we would need at least a school board to go along with us. They have, what, five times the amount of employees we have?

Yeah, they have 7,000 employees, I believe.

Yeah, and we've got it right at 1,100. And the scope of that property, that's a big piece of property. If it makes sense to fill it up, then I think we've got to have another public partnership. But I think we should, by all means, at least investigate it and see what we can do.

Yeah, your school district's amazing. I could build 1,500 houses for your teachers tomorrow and not lose any sleep at night on filling them up. So the issue is the property is approved for a substantial amount of units, 1,200 or something units, and we would work with the city and the county to design a good-looking community, but I don't think we would – The first phase would be like 350 units. That would make sense. That would be pretty much with a 600, 500 person waiting list and things like that. We're cautious. We're very conservative and we need to design a master plan that would be what the city of Ocala would be proud of. Again, you'd be one of the first communities in the state of Florida to do our program. We're in Texas and Tennessee right now. It has to be a statement piece. It has to be substantial. It has to be substantially impactful. And so it may be that this might be nice to have, but not necessarily, you know, must have compared to some of these other communities who have called us. And so with this all the part that we just do with you as our team member, as our teammate, and figure that out. We've been through a lot in Ocala and Marion in trying to figure this out for the school district and for you guys, and so we feel comfortable, otherwise we wouldn't have presented it. We just need to go through the grind, and the P3 process is very structured, very detailed, and we want to make sure we do everything 100% by the book on that process.

How long does the process take to interview the staff?

We can do it in a week. We usually bring about 12 people in. It usually just depends on the physical constraints of meeting them. You like to get to get the most accurate information you need to do in groups of 12 or less. Not everybody wants to raise their hand that have a hard time paying rent from 150 people. So we offer lunches, coffees, breaks. So we'll work with your staff on that. your break times or before, like if the maintenance crew goes to work and just kind of coordinate, we're here for all day, every day for a week, trying to capture the morning shift, the night shift, all those things. And then we have all that consolidated and we did emails and emails are fine when you have 14,000 people, like, you know, 2000 say yes right away, it's pretty easy. But when you're dealing with the city and staff here, you have a much lower amount of staff. It's going to take a much more direct hands-on approach to get accurate information. And a lot of them may already own houses, may already live in town, and that may be a big factor. And so city staff is definitely a lot different than school district staff of the needs. And that's why I think we'll just dedicate. It would be good for all of our whole team to figure it out and discover, but it will probably take a full week worth of work. And you've done this work already with the school board, the school teachers? Yeah, the school, we had to stop. I went and visited one school, and I had to stop. I was like, this is going to be too much.

So one of the things that we need to have come out of this for our explanation is your 501c3. So that means we're not going to get property taxes at all. Yes, sir. We will get the water, sewer, electric, and all that type of stuff.

We will have all of that, all of those ends tied when we bring a presentation back to you.

Okay. We'll typically be somewhat of a net massive positive from the savings we give you, those things. We also add commercial components to the property that do get property tax and sales tax that we try to add like the town center to that normal developments wouldn't put in. We do it to enhance the quality of life. So we'll be able to put a financial model together for you. Okay.

I think it sounds great. I know our police department is in favor of opportunities like this. So thank you.

You're all great. Thank you, Jason. Thank you guys so much. I appreciate your help on helping us adjust. Thank you. Very much. Thank you.

Awesome.

Item six is our consent agenda. Are there any items which the council would like removed?

Council President, I motion to approve all items on the consent agenda. Second.

Are there any comments from the public on this matter? The clerk will call the roll.

Mr. Hilty.

Aye.

Mr. Mansfield.

Aye.

Mr. Musling. Aye. Ms. Dreyer. Aye. Mr. Bethea.

Aye. Item 8 is an introduction and first reading of Ordinance 2026-19. Is there a member of the City Council who will introduce this item?

I'll introduce.

Mr. Hildreth.

Okay.

Thank you.

An ordinance amending the zoning map of the city of Ocala, Florida, changing the zoning from 01 Office District to B2A Limited Community Business District for a certain property located at 619 Southeast 17th Street. parcel 2917-002-000, approximately 2.04 acres, case number ZON26-0002, providing direction to staff repealing inconsistent and or conflicting provisions, providing for salvability of ordinance provisions, providing for modifications arising from consideration at a public hearing, providing direction to the codifier, and providing for an effective date.

Item 9 is a public hearing for adoption of Resolution 2026-41. Is there a motion? So moved. Is there a second?

Second.

Chief Planning Official Indira Mandraviran. See, I sat here and studied it a moment ago. Mandraviran.

Great.

Good afternoon and dear imagine of Aaron with the city of Ocala growth management department, the applicant, uh, pastor done of legacy view church is requesting to abrogate a segment of Southwest 25th street, which is located between blocks 91 and 101, 111. which are lying south of the intersection of West Silver Springs Boulevard and Southwest 17th Avenue in the original West End Ocala Platte. There are several prior actions that have taken place from both the Board of Adjustment and the Planning and Zoning Commission without the knowledge of the existing City of Ocala right-of-way, Southwest 25th Street. Specifically, the project has previously received conditional approvals for a special exception to allow a church from the Board of Adjustment, as well as off-site parking, within 300 feet from the Planning and Zoning Commission. The required conditions, including conditional site plan approval, have been met as of January of 2026. The city attorney has indicated that board actions remain valid subject to the abrogation approval. The existing Southwest 25th Street right-of-way was not discovered until further survey and title search were conducted as part of the site plan review process. Approval of the site plan is therefore contingent upon the approval of the abrogation request. At their meeting in May, P&Z voted to recommend approval with a vote of 7-0. Staff also recommends approval, and Pastor Nunn is here to answer any questions. I'm also available to answer questions.

Any comments from the public? Council? Call the roll.

Mr. Mansfield? Aye. Mr. Hilty? Aye. Mr. Musley?

Aye.

Ms. Dreyer? Aye. Mr. Bethea?

Aye. Item 10A is the adoption of one-year renewal of an agreement for fuel supply and transfer services. Do I hear a motion to approve? So moved. Second. Fleeting Facilities Director John King is recognized for a presentation.

Good evening, City Council. John King, Fleet and Facilities Director here to ask your approval for this agenda item that's consistent with the city's strategic goal of fiscal sustainability and operational excellence. So I'm seeking your approval here to renew a one-year contract with Petroleum Traders for fuel delivery and transport services. Currently, Petroleum Traders delivers fuel in tankers tanker trucks, 8,000 gallons, and they transport that to our various fuel sites. We have three major ones at the complex, MLK, and at Fire Station 6. They transport the fuel, diesel, at 9 cents a gallon and unleaded at 8 cents a gallon. So basically a tanker, a fuel costs us about $650 for them to transport it. And we use a benchmark pricing index called OPUS. It's an oil price index that sets a daily price for, competitive price for fuel at the rack or at the, Port of Tampa and currently today at 10 a.m. that price was $3.39 for unleaded and $3.86 for diesel. So it is at a substantial savings because we're purchasing fuel at wholesale rates versus the retail stations. Here to answer any questions, staff recommends approval of this contract renewal.

Is there any comments from the public? Council?

Call the roll. Do we wait a week? Maybe as fuel maybe comes down a little bit more. That's all I'm wondering. Yeah.

But we'll capitalize daily. Okay. So as that price fluctuates, we'll be able to capitalize on it. Gotcha. Call the roll.

Ms. Dreyer? Aye. Mr. Mansfield? Aye. Mr. Musling?

Aye.

Mr. Hilty? Aye. Mr. Bethea?

Aye. Thank you. Item 10B is the approval of the purchase of laser shot judgment training system. Do I hear a motion to approve this item? So moved. There's a motion and a second there. Police Information System Director Joshua Sassou is recognized for a presentation.

GOOD EVENING CITY COUNCIL. THIS AGENDA ITEM SUPPORTS THE CITY'S GOAL OF OPERATIONAL EXCELLENCE. IT DOES THAT BY ALLOWING OUR TRAINING DEPARTMENT TO PUT OUR OFFICERS THROUGH A MULTITUDE OF DIFFERENT SCENARIOS INSIDE THE PD UTILIZING A MULTI-SCREEN SETUP. FOR EXAMPLE, THE OFFICERS WILL BE ABLE TO INTERACT WITH THESE SCENARIOS IN A BRANCHING DECISION-MAKING PATTERN. the trainer can escalate and deescalate the situation and have immediate feedback with the officer as they're going through the scenario. The product will allow us to train with our firearms, our rifles, our OC spray, and even work through nighttime courses by working with a flashlight so that we can simulate nighttime training and what the officers will actually see out in the field. Staff recommends approval, and I'm here to answer any questions.

Comments from the public?

Council? I think we should try this out when he gets it in at the next council. Absolutely. Awesome.

We have some qualifications courses that we'll be able to put you through. That would be great.

How is this different than the training session I went through about two years ago, Chief?

Mike Balkin, police chief. Great question. The one you went through, sir, is a virtual reality headset. If you remember that, it's extremely cumbersome. It does not mimic our actual firearms that we issue. And quite frankly, it's outdated. I don't think it's even supported any longer under warranty or anything like that. you know I've demoed this product myself up in Alachua County it is a state-of-the-art training platform that really allows me to focus on what's most important to me which is de-escalation it forces the officers to make real-time decisions and allows the instructors to insert changes as Mr. Sasso indicated, that go along with the officer's decision-making. So if they're using our appropriate voice commands and techniques, then the outcome of each scenario is going to change based on how they approach each scenario. And that's really what we're looking for. You know, if you remember that, I don't want to call it cartoonish, but it was first-generation virtual reality equipment that we were using, and quite frankly, it's just outdated.

But I remember you were able to change the scenario Because there was a lack of a better word, a puppet master over on the side that was directing them.

Correct. And this platform is similar to that. But if you remember, the scenarios that were in that system were extremely limited. This wasn't real-life scenarios. It was a cartoon, for lack of better terms. These are live-action videos that these officers are interacting with. They're full-size targets, things like that, which differs completely than, quite frankly, the video game we were using.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Call the roll.

Mr. Hilty.

Aye.

Mr. Mansfield.

Aye.

Mr. Musley.

Aye.

Ms. Dreyer. Aye. Mr. Bethea.

Aye. Item 10C is the approval of a three-year contract with Cubit Inc. Do I hear a motion to approve this item? So moved. There's a second.

Second.

Facilities Division Head Gary Cruz is recognized for his presentation.

Good evening, City Council, Mayor. I'm Gary Cruz, the Facilities Division Head for the City of Ocala. And this evening, I'm requesting your approval of this agenda item relevant to Ocala's strategic goal for quality of place. The approval of this award is for a three-year contract that provides low-moisture carpet cleaning throughout our city. The services will be citywide for any building that has carpet cleaning. So staff recommends approval, and I'm happy to answer any questions you have. Is there any comment from the public?

Council? Call the roll.

Ms. Dreyer? Aye. Mr. Musling?

Aye.

Mr. Hilty? Aye. Mr. Mansfield? Aye. Mr. Bethea?

Aye. Item 10D is the approval of additional expenditures under the agreement for roofing trade contract services. Do I hear a motion to approve?

So moved.

SO WE HAVE A MOTION AND A SECOND. ARE THERE ANY COMMENTS? MR. CRUZ, YOU'RE RECOGNIZED.

GOOD EVENING AGAIN, CITY COUNCIL MAYOR, GARY, FACILITIES DIVISION HEAD FOR THE CITY OF OCALA. I'M REQUESTING YOUR APPROVAL OF THIS AGENDA ITEM RELEVANT TO OCALA'S STRATEGIC GOAL FOR QUALITY OF PLACE The additional funds requested from 500 to 579,000 that were used as an emergency roof replacement here at city hall. During our replacement, we found an area that we originally wanted to be on a second request, but during the rain that happened, we knew that repair was going to be too expensive. That wouldn't get us to the rainy season. So we moved forward with the emergency repair that now we're requesting for the approval. This staff recommends approval, and I'm here to answer any questions.

Any comments from the public? Council? Call the roll.

Mr. Musley?

Aye.

Mr. Hilty?

Aye.

Ms. Dreyer? Aye. Mr. Mansfield?

Aye.

Mr. Bethea?

Aye. Item 10E is the approval of the purchase of multiple acquisitions Somebody, actuators?

Actuators.

I don't see no vators there. Actuators? Actuators. Okay, actuators for water treatment plant number one. Do I hear a motion to approve this item? So moved. Is there a second?

Second.

All right, City Engineer Sean Lanier is recognized for staff presentation.

Good evening, Sean Lanier, City Engineer. This agenda item supports the City's strategic goals of fiscally sustainable and operational excellence. The agenda item is the purchase of replacement actuators for maintenance and repair of the sand filtration system at Water Treatment Plant No. 1. Staff recommends approval. I'm here to answer any questions.

Any comments from the public? Council? Call the roll.

Ms. Dreyer? Aye. Mr. Mansfield?

Aye.

Mr. Musley? Aye. Mr. Hilty? Aye. Mr. Bethea?

Aye. 10F is the adoption of Resolution 2026-40. Do I hear a motion to approve? I move. Is there a second?

Second.

Mr. Lanier, once again, is recognized for staff presentation.

Yes, sir. This agenda item supports the city's strategic goals of operational excellence and quality of place. This grant agreement is to provide grant funds for the construction of intersection improvements at Southeast 25th Avenue and State Route 464. Staff recommends approval. I'm here to answer any questions.

Any comments from the public? Council? Call the roll.

Mr. Holti?

Aye.

Ms. Dreyer?

Aye.

Mr. Musley? Aye. Mr. Mansfield? Aye. Mr. Bethea.

Aye. Item 10G is the adoption of budget resolution 2026-146. Do I hear a motion to approve? So moved. Second. Mr. Lanier, once again.

Yes, sir. This agenda item supports the city's strategic goals of fiscally sustainable and quality of place. This agenda item is basically to appropriate the funds from the grant approved on the previous agenda item into the current year budget. Staff recommends approval, and I'm here to answer any questions.

Boy, he was short. Is there any questions or comments from the public, from council? Call the roll.

Ms. Dreyer. Aye. Mr. Musley.

Aye.

Mr. Hilty.

Aye.

Mr. Mansfield. Aye. Mr. Bethea.

Aye. Thank you. 10H is the adoption of budget resolution 2026-147. Do I hear a motion to approve this item? So moved.

Second.

Chief Financial Officer Janice Mitchell is recognized for staff presentation.

Thank you. Janice Mitchell, Chief Financial Officer. This budget resolution is relevant to the strategic goal of fiscal use sustainable. This is simply a carry forward for two grants that were missed in the prior carry forward from appropriations from last year to this year so they can spend the grant funding. I'm here to answer any questions.

Any comments from the public? Council? Call the roll.

Ms. Dreyer? Aye. Mr. Mansfield? Aye. Mr. Musling? Aye. Mr. Hilty? Aye. Mr. Bethea? Thank you.

Aye. Item 10-H is the approval of the reaward of the contract for ground maintenance services for the city northeast quadrant. Do I hear a motion to approve this item?

It's 10-I, sir. 10-I.

It says 10-H, but it's 10-I.

All right, 10-I. My bad. My bad. I was reading wrong.

Motion to approve.

I knew it. Is there a second? Second. Okay, thank you. Public Works Director Darren Parks is recognized for the staff presentation.

Good afternoon, Darren Park, Public Works Director. This agenda item supports the city's strategic goals of operational excellence and quality of place. This is for a re-award of a mowing contract for the northeast quadrant of the city consisting of 66 locations. The vendor originally awarded the contract, was unable to perform and asked to be released from the contract. Staff recommends approval, and I'm here to answer any questions.

Is there any comments from the public? Council? Call the roll.

Miss Dreyer. Aye. Mr. Hilty.

Aye.

Mr. Musley. Aye. Mr. Mansfield. Aye. Mr. Bethea.

Aye. Thank you. City Manager's Report. Mr. Pete Lee. Thank you, sir.

In front of you, you have a copy of a draft executive summary. from the fiscal year 26-27 strategic planning session that we conducted in April. Summary was created together by Dan Blake and our staff, our facilitator Dan Blake. Between now and July 7th, if you could review the draft and let me know if you have any questions or concerns. On that meeting on July 7th, I'll ask for a consensus that the executive summary draft is ready to be finalized and published on the city's website. So I'll just keep that. We got the, our trolley is in for the downtown trolley route. It will go live on August 1st. And that is all I have.

Thank you, sir. Agenda item 13, Ocala Police Department. Police Chief Mike Barkin.

Mike Balkan, police chief again. Good afternoon, everybody. To kick off the public safety report, I did want to remind council and the mayor that much of what our officers are out there doing day in and day out is not simply investigating crimes or conducting traffic. A great example of that is certainly the work we do related to mental health and the substance abuse problems that we deal with. This slide here reflects the Baker Acts and Marchman Acts that we've worked through May of this year. and that's compared to last year's total numbers. Overall, for the first five months of the year, we've worked a combined 382 cases. If that current trend continues, we'll be on par, certainly, to match last year's Baker Act numbers. The Marchman Act, however, are ticking up. We've seen about a 14% increase in those so far this year. For the two-week period, we've worked a total of 7,200 incidents, with about 65% of those being proactive, preventative calls. Of those total calls, 310 were criminal in nature, resulting in 248 arrests. Officers also conducted 937 traffic stops and investigated 141 vehicle crashes, which is down by about 3%. A couple case highlights. Our ICAC detectives have been very, very busy over the period. They did arrest this 64-year-old man. He was under the belief that he was going to travel and meet a 14-year-old for sex. Instead met our detectives who quickly took him into custody. Our intel unit has been very busy launching a fugitive investigation in search of the of this offender. He was arrested for many active warrants as well as an altered firearm and the drugs that you see there. We also had several more cases come to conclusion in the court system. These three were arrested separately for multiple charges. They included DUI, manslaughter, drug trafficking, as well as fentanyl possession. Combined, they were sentenced to nearly 25 years. in the Department of Corrections. And then lastly, our traffic unit also worked a combined operation with Marion County Sheriff's Office to target aggressive and impaired driving that yielded 103 traffic stops, 46 citations, and 11 arrests. So again, we've been extremely busy over there. That's all I have. Thank you.

Thank you, sir. Chief. Yes, sir. Just layman's terms, sorry. Baker's Act and Marchman Act. What is the difference?

Yeah, so the Baker Act deals with anyone that is incapable of caring for themselves or pose a danger to themselves or others due to a mental illness. And the same for a Marchman Act, except instead of mental illness, it deals with drugs and alcohol impairment.

But your officers can do that, right?

Yes, sir. Yeah, police officers and doctors. Yes, sir.

Thank you.

Yes, sir.

Agenda item 14, Ocala Fire Rescue Department. Fire Chief Clint Wellborn.

Good afternoon, Clint Wellborn, Fire Chief. So for our two-week update, you can see the numbers there for all our units. Rescue 1 leading the way with 171, and on the engine side, Engine 4. 83 motor vehicle accidents, OFR responded to with a total of 149 across the city. Two structure fires, 22 community paramedicine and court calls. Total cost for this period was $998, leading us to a total for the year so far of $12,488. A couple of highlights. We did welcome two new hires on Friday, June 12th. We had two members, Firefighter EMT Blake there on the left and Firefighter EMT Caden Freehoff on the right. Also, on Saturday, June 27th, OFR will be joining Marion County First Responders for the PTSD Awareness Walk. The walk will be held at the McPherson Complex from 8 to 1030. We'd like to see you there. That's all I have.

Any questions for Chief Webb on? Thank you, sir. No report, sir. No report, sir? Okay, so we do have... A COMMENT, PUBLIC COMMENT. Yes, sir. I got it. Sorry, I'm nervous.

My name is Ellie Burrage and I live at 1315 Southeast Silver Springs Place, Apartment 12, Ocala, Florida, 34471. I've been here for five years. Sorry. I am a member of Promethean Action. From their website, Promethean Action is a political movement dedicated to defying oligarchy and unleashing the fire of human creativity. Those are fine words, but this organization is incredibly down to earth and practical. we seek to reinstate Alexander Hamilton's American system of economics on a national level and restore America's place as a manufacturing superpower and sovereign state. The American system of economics is characterized by protective tariffs, government partnering with private industry to build infrastructure and the energy grid, and extending credit to industry in order to promote growth. In this economic system, the strength of a nation is not in its profits, but rather in its physical economy, actual products produced, scientific advances made. Simply put, if businesses are able to grow and expand and innovation is encouraged, then employment rates will increase, technical developments will be made, and peace and prosperity will follow. This system has fluctuated in use. Lincoln used it to great effect during the Civil War with his greenbacks program, and William McKinley was assassinated for his tariffs and other policies promoting it. We have left it behind in the last century, emphasizing free trade and prioritizing overseas cheap labor, and have seen America's resulting decline in manufacturing and in wealth. President Trump is reinstating it now across the country. Why is this relevant right here and now? I am telling you this because I believe everyone in government and politics should know about it, and you, the City Council of Ocala, are my most direct representatives. Y'all are my people. I have voted for you, and I want you to be very informed. Additionally, the American system of economics is a valuable keystone and can be implemented at local municipal levels. Forgive me, my understanding of civil government is rudimentary. I could stand to attend the Citizens Academy. But just from some basic research, I'd urge you to continue working to strengthen city infrastructure, improving Ocala's electrical grid, our road, and our water and sewer system. Use land zoning and the economic improvement programming to prioritize manufacturing, logistics, and distribution centers. Support the Ocala International Airport, the equine industry, and healthcare industry. So many folks here are moving to Ocala, and our traffic situation reflects this. Let's make sure that businesses have the support they need to grow, train, and employ a strong workforce. I urge you to invest in training young folks in STEM and trades jobs through schools like the Marion Technical Institute. Foster technological advances in the healthcare industry. Efforts such as these will make the city of Ocala strong and vital. I would like to close by urging city council members and Ocala citizens to look up Promethean Action's videos on YouTube. Susan Kokinda and Barbara Boyd are two incredibly smart women at the head of this movement, and what they have to say in the videos posted by Promethean Action is eye-opening. Eloquent and exciting. Thank you for surfing Ocala.

Thank you for my time and hearing you I am 17 is information.

Yes, sir item 17 B I'd like Janice Mitchell to come up and make a presentation for you on the fire assessment update and request to establish a date for public hearing Good afternoon on April 2nd

THE CITY COUNCIL AUTHORIZED US TO UPDATE OUR FIRE ASSESSMENT STUDY WITH THE NATIONAL COMPANY AND DUE TO OUR CURRENT NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE UNION the management decided that it would be better to move ahead with just doing the tax roll assessment and not doing a full study this year, and we will do that next year to be able to encompass then what we're doing this year. So with that being said, as usual, we have to have a fire assessment public hearing, and we have to hold it between Wednesday, September 9th, and Monday, September 14th. So I have a couple options for you. We just need to make a decision on a date. So Wednesday, September 9th is our preferred date. This would also serve as our first budget hearing. So it would be a special meeting on Wednesday, September 9th. At that point in time, we would, after that meeting, we would put the second hearing, publish it Friday, September 11th, and be able to have our second budget hearing september fifteen which is our regular scheduled so there's one special meeting which would be september ninth we have some other options if that's not uh... okay we have thursday september tenth we cannot have our first budget hearing that day because it's also the county's budget date and we can't have on the same day so our first public hearing for budget would be tuesday september fifteenth which is a current council day and then our second would be have to be on we'd have to have an additional hearing on Monday September 21st or the 22nd and then our last option is Friday September 11th or Monday September 14th This could be the first budget hearing, but this would also require us to have a meeting on Monday, September 21st, or Tuesday, September 22nd. I know these dates are super complicated, so that's why our preference would be to have a special meeting September 9th. There would be a public hearing and our first budget hearing, and then everything else would fall on your regularly scheduled council meetings. I like that.

September 9th. I'm good with the 9th.

Yeah. Was it 5 p.m. meeting?

Yes. We would have the budget meeting first so we could convene at the same time, but we'd have to have 5 o'clock would be the time for the night.

And that's Wednesday? Yes. Yes. You'll have Lori send out a calendar, of course. Yes.

Are we in agreement with September 9th? Thank you.

You're welcome.

Thank you. Mayor, comments?

Thank you, Council President. I just want to first of all acknowledge the turn lane that was put in on 7th and 32nd. It's working great. I didn't know how that was going to go, but I travel that way, and the traffic is significantly better. So it was a great quick fix. So I just wanted to acknowledge that. Great job. Also wanted to acknowledge the Sheriff's Department put on a sting to catch child predators. I'm sure you've seen it. It's all over the news. Fifty child predators they caught. We participated at the Ocala Police Department. You know, it's sad when you see those numbers. I'm glad we're getting them off the streets, but how prevalent the issue is. I wanted to recognize one of the things that we've done in the last six months is we have a full-time person going after child predators. And we've caught 49 since the start of January. People are coming from as far as North Carolina. I mean, all over the country to meet our kids in our community. So obviously, we're going to do a great job getting these scumbags off the street, essentially. But we really need parents to step up and also just make sure they're cognizant of what their kids are doing on their devices. It's Internet Safety Month. So the more that we can do to continue to educate people about the harms of it because it is extremely prevalent. And it's not an Ocala issue. This is across the country. We're just doing a great job catching them, and we're going to make it known. If you're a child predator in our community, we're going to get you. So, again, I wanted to acknowledge the work the Sheriff's Department is doing and then the great work that we're doing at the Ocala Police Department. Thanks.

All right.

Councilman Manfield.

I'm good. Thank you.

Councilman Hilty. I am good. Thank you.

Yes, quickly. Thank you, sir. The city manager and I have had some like philosophical discussions on data centers recently. And in an effort to not get blindsided by somebody trying to do this here in the city. I AM GOING TO ASK FOR COUNCIL'S BLESSING TO DIRECT OUR STAFF TO IDENTIFY IF THIS IS EVEN ALLOWABLE USE HERE IN OUR COMP PLAN. IF IT IS, WHERE COULD THESE POSSIBLY GO? AND ALSO IF IT IS POTENTIALLY CALLING FOR A MORATORIUM LIKE MANY CITIES AND COUNTIES AROUND US HAVE BEEN DOING. I DON'T THINK IT'S FULLY UNDERSTOOD YET WHAT THE TRUE RAMIFICATIONS TO OUR LOCAL RAMIFICATIONS AND STATEWIDE RAMIFICATIONS ARE WITH THESE. And like I said, before we get blindsided, I kind of want to know the information ahead of time. So is that something everybody would agree with?

Absolutely, yeah.

This is like the one of two or three bipartisan issues I think that we all agree on. It's questionable at best, leans towards no. So if you guys could just look into that and see how that would affect us.

We'll probably bring back first a survey of what other jurisdictions are doing and a possible outline of a sample ordinance.

Okay.

Thank you. That's it.

No further comment.

All right. I'll conclude this meeting. And it is adjourned.

Yes.