Remarks by Erica G. Ávila
112 remarks on the record, newest first · Page 1 of 5
- Play at 53:32
“Thank you, Chair. Thank you for the updates, for the analysis, for the proposal. To my colleague, I see everything that you're pointing out, and the numbers are quite astonishing when it comes to the overall investment. I don't want to lose this opportunity tonight, but I don't think that this is a slam dunk win in terms of a negotiation. I did ask what was the process and the procedure for how we negotiated these terms. And I can sense our director's confidence in the structure, but I really would like to have our legal team go back at this and give it a real thorough review and…”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 1:01:19
“Thank you. Just a few more points for consideration. I agree with Vice Chairwoman's comments. I do think that the contract having some phasing and some real clear control measures on how we have matching with investments I think would be prudent for the council to have for the for the board to have. And as well as, you know, looking at this from a perspective of, you know, that two and a half million dollars at the end of the day, with regards to the gap from what we've invested into what the purchase prices and the overall re contribution from the CRA for building out. That's an investment…”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 1:18:36
“Thank you, I just wanted to make mention for the further negotiations that one of the first things that I had mentioned when we had the unsolicited unsolicited proposal come in was my desire to see a D restriction with regards to residential. so just keep that in mind as you continue um you know seeing phasing vetting of the of the proposer the restrictions you know fine-tuning the terms and and final investment um if if if we're not potentially seeing the fruit of our investment until year eight the latest according to this um Councillor Stroud.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 1:20:42
“Thank you. Yeah, I'd like to continue to think that this is a potential catalyst for our downtown and that our investment into this project would would trigger those other things that we can be a little bit more intentional or more controlling on but I do think that there is opportunity to fine tune this more. Okay, I appreciate it. Thank you.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 1:38:17
“Thank you, Chair. So my colleague, Board Member Roth here does have extensive experience in the food industry many years ago, but his advice on this, his experience, his wisdom, It's very valuable, at least to me. I would love for this to be a unanimous approval when it comes back, but do your best to really meet all the issues and the challenges here. Director Jarrett has my full vote of confidence on this item. But I think Matt will seal the deal for us. And I do think Bear Atlantic could do it best in this situation. Your renderings, your design, your concept, your plan, it really is…”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 1:42:27
“board member roth has weighed in with the first one board member thank you chair yeah the first one with the homestead just the way you read it homestead the future lives here and i think it's very appropriate that it's in the park where the kids are where the future of the city of homestead will be and you know the future lives here it's our tagline and i do want to be careful on how we maybe outplay it a little bit and you know, the other renderings that were in the packet, I think are nice too to maybe consider in other areas. So here in this spot as an entranceway to the park where our…”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 1:47:08
“Yes, thank you, Chair. I mean, the reason why I was asking for a little bit more oomph was because I did kind of see the opportunity to make it a little bit more picturesque and not so blocky and plain. So out of the options that I had, if I had to pick one, it would be option number one. But if there's appetite to do something a little bit more Instagrammable and more engaging, I would like to see that option. So I am interested in seeing your sketch see your sketch and put a price tag to it compared to what this would be and maybe bring it for the the next uh meeting if we're going to do a…”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 1:56:31
“I'll second the motion. Was there a motion? Yeah.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 1:56:35
“Thank you. I do support this item. I just out of curiosity, if the property owner wanted to ever expand or do any additional redevelopment on the property, what's our term with regards to any repayment due to redevelopment? Is anything?”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 1:57:22
“Okay, so Kathy thought they has, I think, is a very local favorite. And that's a great, you know, a great venue to have in our core downtown. And I, you know, I look forward to, you know, improving the condition of the parking lot, which is right across from our seminal theater. So it's very quite visible. If there's any additional curb appeal that we can do to maybe enhance it as well, that would be ideal, but not a condition of the approval. But that's just my comments. Thank you.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 2:39:05
“Thank you, Mayor. Definitely heeding a lot of Councilman Fletcher's concerns and questions, which, of course, I'd like to learn the answers of as well. My question for staff is, where are we at with the reimagination process with our consultants? Is that the same consultant that was referenced as providing the letter of support on this?”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 2:39:42
“I've met with Parks and one of the consultants, so I don't know if there's a secondary step. And I know that I held a walkthrough of the Doral City Park to get a lot of ideas and vision for continued workshops. Where I'm at with timeline is I'm not sure where we're at with the timeline of our plan. So while I think that this is a great opportunity, how does this fall in terms of our public input, our drawings, our vision? With the sports complex, I feel like we were very experienced at that point. We had multiple visioning sessions, several opportunities to identify our amenities, our goals,…”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 2:41:37
“Sorry, and it's not to identify like who's holding up the or identify where any barriers are with the consultants currently, it's just but where are we in terms of the logistics? So we haven't done any public input yet, right? That's coming subsequent to some meetings.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 2:42:01
“And when is, according to the original timeline, when was the scheduling of public input engagement?”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 2:42:22
“Okay. I want to make sure that we have all of our reimagination process done and completed so that we are coming to the table with a full vision that we can then entertain. with VSGS or any other competitive bidder to execute the development of Harris Field. I don't see why we would trump our current imagination process or re-envisioning process to jump into spending their money to negotiate. We implemented a process, right, for unsolicited proposals. We collected $25,000 from you at this point. I think we need to be very fair and transparent that before we spend your money into investigating…”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 2:59:32
“Thank you, Mayor. I just want to reiterate that I'm not saying I'm against the opportunity or the overall partnership at the Harris Field location. I just want to bring to the attention of my colleagues, for example, Vice Mayor, when you brought up this particular field, during my one-on-one with the consultant, it did not come to consideration how close this one was to the residential But in just this last week, there was a huge event at the field, and so I did receive a number of complaints on the noise issues that were pouring over into that residential community. And so there's more to…”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 3:02:22
“And then also you want to have the dedicated programming time when there's already a draw for for dates and time and the demand is high for those fields and now we're going to add in another 20 games. I think we need to finish what we started.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 3:09:23
“Thank you. Vice Mayor. Mayor. Yes, sir. With regards to the security is the is the answer that you're going to provide the security for all the activities regardless of whose game it is. I think that was my understanding of the point.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 3:11:21
“I was looking for the, you know, I was looking for, you know, hopefully the confidence that this would be an add-on and an incentive, you know, that this would be a less of a cost to our end user, which at the end of the day supports our kids and the programming. So I would like to see some benefits.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 3:12:08
“Right and, in my mind i'm referring to our schools and nonprofits mayor, is it your vision that for the rest of the fields, the rest of the park itself that that would go out to competitive bidding or an opportunity for.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 3:12:28
“Right. So is the negotiation or the contract going to have a non-compete or a first right of refusal? I think they'll bid on whatever we do in the future.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 3:12:41
“I'd like for that to be something that we're making a point of now, that we're not foreclosing the opportunity to get the job done with multiple options. Not at all. And I'll support the negotiations moving forward.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 3:20:04
“Before we vote, I just wanted to ask, in heeding just the public comments, is there an opportunity to coordinate and expedite the public engagement with our consultants? Can we start that now? Plenty of opportunity has come and gone for the one-on-ones. One-on-ones can continue to happen over the next month or two while the negotiations are happening. That way, I feel like we're getting the best of both worlds.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 3:20:32
“I feel like I've done mine. I met with them before breaks.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026
- Play at 3:20:56
“Can we while you're scheduling and finalizing those interviews or one on ones, can we proceed with calling for the public engagement pieces and schedule it.”
City Council · Jul 7, 2026