Remarks by Dori Howington
65 remarks on the record, newest first · Page 2 of 3
- Play at 1:23:12
“The millage has already been set. There is no changing that. It's already been voted on. I never once said anything about deleting all of Parks and Rec. Please tell me where I said that.”
City Commission · Sep 21, 2026
- Play at 1:24:01
“There were a lot of opportunities. If you look at the expenses, I believe you had made a comment at some point about the revenue and how it should offset the expenses. I saw those numbers. And if we're gonna be doing events like this, we need to handle them better. That is my concern. I have a list of things. However, I'm not going to bring them forward because millage is already approved. You have already accepted keeping that tax rate, which increases the coffers by almost $700,000. That's about exactly how much is in events. I would never say cut all the events. But we could scale back.…”
City Commission · Sep 21, 2026
- Play at 1:25:22
“You can shift it however you want. But we gave the manager the ability.”
City Commission · Sep 21, 2026
- Play at 0:52
“I pledge 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. And if the commissioners can please join me on the floor. I'd like to call Jason Volz forward, please. So tonight I opted to honor three veterans, and unfortunately, just after 6 o'clock tonight, I found out that two of them would not be able to make it this evening. However, Commissioner Caldwell has been gracious enough to do the honors for those two at the next meeting. So we have Army Sergeant Jason M. Volz and…”
City Commission · Sep 9, 2026
- Play at 4:23
“I'll let you keep that. And then I have this certificate of recognition that I'd like to present to Jason Volz, Combat Engineer 21B, U.S. Army, in recognition of dedicated service, sacrifice, and commitment. Deep gratitude is extended for your contributions in defending and protecting our nation. We thank you for your service. Signed, Mayor Santiago Avila, Jr., September 9th of 2026. Thank you for your service. Yes.”
City Commission · Sep 9, 2026
- Play at 6:34
“I'd like to get a consent to add an action item to tonight's agenda for the ratification of the District 4 appointment to the Planning and Zoning Board. This action implements Article 3, Section 1 and 5 of the Planning and Zoning Board bylaws adopted by resolution number 2025-55. Those provisions authorize each commissioner to appoint a member subject to the commission ratification and require a vacancy to be filled within 60 days. The District 4 vacancy occurred on May 4th, 2026, and the application process was completed. And we are officially at, I believe, 128 days of a vacancy where the…”
City Commission · Sep 9, 2026
- Play at 26:15
“In December of 2024, we had opted to require vertical construction with commercial on the bottom floor. How does this change that requirement?”
City Commission · Sep 9, 2026
- Play at 26:47
“So it would preempt that judgment that we made on that. Correct. Thank you.”
City Commission · Sep 9, 2026
- Play at 1:00:25
“Thank you, Mayor. So given that we do have the potential for losing a lot of revenue through property taxes if this amendment passes, we need to be conservative. And I know that we always put the tentative millage rate before the budget because that's required by state statute. It's a little backwards because if you end up voting no on the budget but you vote yes on the tentative millage, you're still collecting those funds from the residents, whether it's being allocated to something in the budget or not. As part of the consent agenda, we just approved increasing stormwater fees by $20 or…”
City Commission · Sep 9, 2026
- Play at 1:13:09
“Thank you. I move to appoint Timothy Belagia as the District 4 member of the Planning and Zoning Board.”
City Commission · Sep 9, 2026
- Play at 1:16:31
“I'd like to say thank you to the city manager for correcting the stanchion issue that we had and helping to prevent us from having ADA issues. I do appreciate that. For the fourth time, I'd like to request that we get an ADA presentation. If I can get consent for that, I would really appreciate it. Our residents have been asking for it.”
City Commission · Sep 9, 2026
- Play at 1:17:09
“I've given clarity on the past three times I've asked.”
City Commission · Sep 9, 2026
- Play at 1:17:14
“What the city has implemented. Obviously, we just heard a complaint this evening that the ADA email is not working, the ADA phone number is not working, so we need to make sure that what we're doing in the community... is efficient based on what's required by federal and state requirements. And what have we done? Because I know that we have done things to help the ADA community, and it would be nice if we could tell the community what we've done. This is not supposed to be based on individual needs.”
City Commission · Sep 9, 2026
- Play at 1:17:51
“Our ADA program that we do here in the city. How it works, how people would reach out for assistance.”
City Commission · Sep 9, 2026
- Play at 49:32
“Thank you. We have some subdivisions that have been built with parks that are available to the entire public. If that is the case, can those possibly be counted because they are not excluding anyone? However, we have other ones where they're fenced off and only available to residents via keys and things like that.”
City Commission · Aug 31, 2026
- Play at 49:55
“No, they're owned by the subdivisions. They're part of the plan.”
City Commission · Aug 31, 2026
- Play at 1:04:33
“Thank you. So we currently have an Adopt-a-Park program. How does this work with the program that we currently have?”
City Commission · Aug 31, 2026
- Play at 1:12:09
“Thank you. To Member D'Arrico's point, 1-4-1 for reclaimed water and then also in 1-4-3, reclaimed water use is permitted. The language seems rather strong. It's talking about specifically for agriculture that reclaimed water must be used if it's available from the city. We might want to look at that verbiage as well.”
City Commission · Aug 31, 2026
- Play at 1:18:54
“ultimately sanitary sewer is a better option so we'll see if there's a way we can come up with a solution to meet both criteria thank you is there a way that we can build language into this to allow us to make that more restrictive item effective once sb 180 is no longer in effect”
City Commission · Aug 31, 2026
- Play at 23:34
“I would like to get an item added to a future meeting, perhaps put it on a consent agenda. This is my third time asking. I would like to get a presentation on the ADA improvements the city has made. This is not specifically tied to any particular person, but what we have done to be in compliance with various state and federal regulations. I would like us to be able to tell our residents what we have been doing, Because I know that there has been action taken, but we have not received a report. And again, this is my third time asking, and I have yet to see it appear on an agenda for a consent…”
City Commission · Aug 24, 2026
- Play at 1:34:19
“Thank you. Did the study look into dredging the existing lakes?”
City Commission · Aug 24, 2026
- Play at 1:34:34
“So what are we looking at with that? Because we have a lot of lakes that have trees, other things in them. It's obviously displacing water.”
City Commission · Aug 24, 2026
- Play at 1:35:40
“Okay, thank you. And this may be more for staff. Do we have a regular maintenance schedule for the conveyances? How frequently do we clean them?”
City Commission · Aug 24, 2026
- Play at 1:36:49
“Do we have any recommendations for what the best way of reporting that is? Because I know that I receive lots of calls, as I'm sure my colleagues do as well, when people notice that they have vegetation growing in their stormwater system. And frankly, I've been a little afraid to bring things forward because I would be accused of trying to help friends.”
City Commission · Aug 24, 2026
- Play at 1:39:53
“I'd like to pull B and C. B as in boy, C as in Charlie.”
City Commission · Aug 24, 2026