Remarks by Christi Fraga
2,372 remarks on the record, newest first · Page 63 of 95
“Thank you very much. Any other council comments? Councilman Pinedo?”
“Thank you, councilman. Any other comments?”
“Thank you, Councilwoman. I also wanted to mention, just before we move on to the manager's report, it was also Lorenzo's birthday, March 5th, so happy birthday, Lorenzo. Thank you. Forgot, sorry. And I also wanted to, yeah. I also wanted to recognize, we have some students here from Miami Dade College, and their professor, Ralph. Welcome, Rivas. Nice to see you guys. They are political science students, so we'll be doing a tour of City Hall, and they're here to just witness our council meeting today, so welcome to all of you. All right, city manager's report.”
“We're happy to have you. Jane, thank you for holding down the fort. I know it was a tough two months, month and a half. So thank you for holding down the fort. And it's rare you see women in construction management in the field. And so we're happy to have you. And I know you come with a wealth of knowledge and experience for many years. And I've already had several people that have sat with you and have said, wow, I finally got the answers I needed and progress and solutions. Not to say that Jane and her team have not done it. They're wonderful. But it's definitely important that people feel…”
“I know she does. I've seen her. Thank you.”
“Thank you, Eileen. Congratulations. Thank you, Eileen.”
“There's a trend here. I don't know if you all have noticed.”
“Thank you. Awesome. Great work. All right. City Attorney's Report.”
“That's a birthday this month. Okay, if that's it, then we just need a motion to recess to our 6 p.m. meeting. And we do have 5 p.m. protocol. Motion to recess by Councilman Reynoso. Second by Councilman Pinedo. All in favor say aye. Aye. All right, we'll see you all. The time is now 6.12 p.m. Today is March 12th, and this is our second session of the day. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.”
“Please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance led by Vice Mayor Porras. allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay, agenda order of business. Is there any additional items? No, all right. Being none, we will go ahead and open up public comments. The public comments portion of this meeting is now open. If you would like to speak to anything on this agenda or anything germane to this council, now would be your opportunity. Please approach the podium. You have three minutes…”
Not quoted here: it may name a member of the public. Hear it at the meeting.
“Thank you. Anyone else would like to speak? Public comments? Seeing none, okay. Public comments is now closed. We will move on with our public hearings.”
“All right. I'm going to go ahead and take any ex parte communication on this item at this time before I move forward. Been any ex parte communication? I did speak with the applicant, and it will not affect my decision. We will now hear from staff.”
“We're gonna do public hearing real quick. Sorry, I didn't realize this was a public hearing item. We're gonna go ahead and do public hearing. If there's anyone who would like to speak on this item, please approach the podium. We're on item 25-6077. Public hearing for this item is now open. Seeing none, okay, we'll go ahead and close public hearing. Thank you, Michelle.”
“Did the renderings change from this? No, it didn't.”
“Thank you, Michelle. We'll hear from the applicant.”
Not quoted here: it may name a member of the public. Hear it at the meeting.
“Thank you. Thanks, Carl. Thank you, Councilman. Any other questions, comments? Okay, if there being none, we need a motion to approve. Motion to approve. Motion to approve by Councilwoman Cabral. Need a second?”
“Second by Councilwoman Reynoso. If there's no further discussion, Madam Clerk, please call the vote.”
“All right, I'm going to open up public hearing. Anyone would like to speak on item 25-6050, please approach the podium. Being none, we now close public hearing on item 2505, 6050, sorry. All right, this is my item. Basically, in review of the rules of procedure to make sure that we have efficiency in our meetings, working with the city clerk's office as well as the city attorney's office, decided to take a deeper dive into this part of our code and rewrite the section. Really, what... The reason we went to go and rewrite the entire section was because there was a lot of duplicity in the code…”
“Okay. Our Rules of Procedure will always supersede, but if there's a silence to it and it's not addressed directly, then we'll use Robert's Rules and how it's addressed in Robert's Rules. Okay, perfect. Which is really the way we've always governed our meetings.”
“Again, that's something that has always been in our code. It's always been required for if a member needed to exit the meeting that the mayor be notified as the chair. We need to make sure we don't lose quorum if we're in the middle of a discussion. It's required in the code. And so we just rewrote it so that it's in here the way it is. And really, it's so that we don't have a disruption in the middle of a debate. Clearly, no one can force you to stay in a meeting if you don't want to. You can leave, but this is really a procedure that's put in to make sure that there's protocol, policies,…”
“You're supposed to notify the chair, yes, because we may be in the middle of a discussion, and either the chair can decide to take a recess or ask the council if they'll take a break so that that way everyone continues to be a part of the conversation. So notification and permission are two different things.”
“I think that the way it's written, again, it was the same way it's always been in the code, and it's because the intent is that the mayor should provide permission to say, yes, you can go right now, or hold on one second, we're in the process of taking a vote, let's take a vote, and then you can go, and that's the reason that language of faith is there, but I leave it up to our city attorney.”
“Yeah, we did include that because there has been several instances where people have left, stormed off of a meeting because they haven't liked the way, the direction the meeting is going and that's not a reason to leave the meeting, so.”