Board of County Commissioners - Regular Meeting

Good to have so many folks in the audience today. We've got some some good presentations this morning for our emergency medical services teams. And we will get started with the invocation from commissioner Shear, and then the pledge by commissioner Scott.

Almighty god, we come before you today as a community gathered in service. We acknowledge the weight of the responsibilities placed upon this body and ask for your presence in this meeting. We are reminded by the scriptures that unless the lord builds the house, those who built it labor in vain. Therefore, we ask your hand to guide the work of this government. Grant us the wisdom of Solomon and the discernment to distinguish between what is merely popular and what is right.

Strengthen our faith, not only in your providence, but in the potential of our citizens to work together for the common good. May our service be defined by humility and a commitment to justice, remembering that to whom much is given, much is required. In the heat of debate, grant us a spirit of patience, and the face of complex challenges grant us clarity of mind. Let all that is said and done here today reflect a deep respect for our neighbors and a sincere desire to leave the county better than we find it. We ask for your guidance on every decision that it may be marked by integrity and truth. In Jesus' name, we pray.

And just before I get started, I wanted to recognize corporal Thornton, deputy McSweeney, and deputy Manley, our three Pinellas County sheriff deputies here to take care of us today. Thank you again as always, for that. Appreciate it. Okay. We've got a few proclamations and presentations.

Alright. Today, we get to recognize a lot of our emergency medical service personnel. These are the awards that we do annually. And at first, I'd like to acknowledge our our credit union representative this morning, Yariel Pinero. Is he here? Oh, good to see you as always. And we've been they've been doing it for thirty six straight years with us since we were start since we started back in 1990. He's the director of lending and is here to help us. So please come on up and join us. Each year, the Pinellas County Board of County Commissioners recognizes three individuals named emergency medical services professionals of the year.

First, we're gonna play a video that kinda talks a little bit about each one of them, and then we'll introduce them individually. So folks in the back will play that video.

Every day, Pinellas County Emergency Medical Services professionals answer the call, providing lifesaving care when it matters most. This year, we recognize individuals whose commitment, skill, and compassion set them apart. For this, they have been named the twenty twenty six EMS professionals of the year. Firefighter EMT Ivan Melendez with Pinellas Park Fire Department is known as a force multiplier. He is meticulous on every call and makes sure every patient receives the highest level of During a recent fire response, he arrived to find a patient pulled from the scene needing immediate medical attention.

Two story townhouse, smoke coming out, glass shattering. We saw a victim getting pulled out by our two of our own finest firefighters.

Ivan quickly jumped in and helped provide lifesaving equipment and care.

It was a very rewarding outcome and try to help the patient the best possible that we can from our knowledge and our experience.

For his dedication to excellence, we honor Ivan Melendez as the twenty twenty six EMT of the year. Paramedics make critical decisions in the most urgent situations. Bill Edling with Largo Fire Rescue looks beyond the emergency and makes lasting impact. After thirty eight years of service, Bill's commitment doesn't stop when he's off duty. He even stepped in to help save a life while out to dinner.

All of sudden, somebody come running out yelling, is there a doctor in the house? So I kind of jumped up just to see what was going on, made my way over there and found a male on the ground.

Bill did CPR until local paramedics arrived.

Apparently, he'd made a full recovery since then. So finished there and went back and had my meal. So, yeah, it felt pretty good to be in that right place at the right time.

For his lifetime of service and unwavering compassion, Bill Edling is named twenty twenty six paramedic of the year. Isaac Stevens, a system status controller at Sunstar Paramedics, coordinates both emergency response and nonemergency transport. He delivers calm, clear guidance through every dispatch call.

Sunstar Paramedics recorded line. This is Isaac. I think that a big contributing factor for me of enjoying my job here is being able to do simple things like making sure that, you know, grandma can get home from the hospital and have dinner with the family. So we'll do everything we can to get them back home to their loved ones.

Isaac, also a trained EMT, is a lifeline in the moments before help arrives. He's able to ask the right questions when seconds count.

I did have a patient calling in and said that, oh, like I'm having some abdominal pain and, I just feel like I need to get checked out. So it was a female patient and I knew because I'm an EMT that female patients, if they're having some sort of cardiac event they have a higher likelihood of experiencing pain in their abdomen from that.

Isaac's experience and dedication to patient care got the woman the right care at the right time. That's an example of how passionate he is about his work.

If I'm just driving around my town and I see Sunstar responding somewhere in the back of my mind, I always think, oh, I send those people sometimes, and it makes me happy that I'm a part of something that's bigger than myself and that I can help people every day.

For his consistent dedication to service, Isaac Stevens is named twenty twenty six emergency medical dispatcher of the year. The Pinellas County Board of County Commissioners congratulates Ivan Melendez, Bill Edling, and Isaac Stevens as the twenty twenty six EMS professionals of the year.

Okay. Well, that's just amazing stories. And I know there's so many others, but I really am glad we get a chance to recognize these three individuals this morning. I'd like to ask Isaac Stevens to come up and join me at the podium, please. And we just celebrated telecommunicators of of last last month, and we we heard about how important they are to our entire system.

And so it's with honor that we recognize you this morning. Isaac Stevens, communications training coordinator at Sunstar Paramedic exemplify exemplifies professionalism, precision, and calm leadership in emergency communications. Throughout 2025, Isaac handled a high volume of emergency calls while maintaining composure and clarity, ensuring callers receive calm guidance and responding crews receive accurate, timely information. His quality assurance score of 9.42 significantly exceeds the agency average, and he ranked among the top three call takers in overall call volume for the year. His leadership, consistency, dedication to patient care make him a deserving recipient of the 2026 emergency medical dispatcher of the year award, and your concept of the project or the the job being bigger.

I mean, you're bigger. Nothing's bigger than you or than excuse me. I got that backwards. Nothing's bigger than the job itself. And I really commend you for that attitude that you brought forward. It really is putting people first, putting your comrades, you know, second, and putting the job right at the top of the list. So thank you for all that you do. And, again, congratulations. Good to have you. And I know that you have I already gave it to him. Would you like to say a few words?

Morning, guys. I just wanted to say thank you guys so much. This is an amazing opportunity, and I'm very happy that I got to be a part of it. And congratulations to my fellow EMT and paramedics of the year. You guys are very deserving, and thank you for everybody for coming. Thank you.

And you wanna try?

I just heard about you. I thought that was a great point.

Oh, yeah. Of course.

Fix up fix what

I left out, please.

I am very just aware of the fact that, you know, this job is much bigger than myself, much bigger than all of us, you know, serving the public and being there for the citizens of Pinellas County. Nothing I'm sure I can speak for my fellow EMTs and paramedics that nothing brings us more pleasure. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you for helping me out this morning. Thank you again, Isaac. I'd also like to now invite Ivan Melendez to come forward, please. Firefighter EMT Ivan Melendez has dedicated nineteen years to serving the citizens of Pinellas County with professionalism, experience, unwavering reliability, often described by his peers as quintessential clinics clinician. Ivan brings a deep understanding of patient care that allows him to anticipate the needs of the medic and support critical interventions seamlessly.

Known as a calming presence on scene, his steady leadership helps crews perform at their best during high pressure emergencies. Beyond the call, he is a strong advocate for his team, supporting fellow responders while ensuring protocols are followed and patients receive compassionate high quality care. His experience, teamwork, and commitment to excellence makes firefighter EMT Ivan Melendez a deserving recipient of the 2026 EMT of the year award. Again, congratulations.

Good morning, everyone. I'd like to thank my EMS chief Mitchell, my lieutenant Jacobs, and the department for giving me the perfect opportunity to experience everything that I've had in my life. We've had some good and some bad, but we've all prevailed for the best to help our wonderful citizens for the city of Browse Park. You so much for everybody coming out here and I'd like to thank all the participants that are here to my right. Everyone here has done a wonderful job and to the people that I love. Thank you.

Thanks again, Ivan. Thank you. I'd like to ask, Bill Edling if he'll come and join me up here at the podium. Good morning. Firefighter firefighter paramedic, Bill Edling has dedicated nearly thirty eight years to serving the citizens of Pinellas County through the Largo Fire Rescue, where he serves as a senior paramedic and acting rescue lieutenant.

Known for his calm leadership, clinical excellence, and deep compassion, Bill has spent his entire career mentoring fellow firefighters and paramedics while providing exceptional care to every patient he encounters. Whether helping for prevent further injury for a vulnerable patient in their home or stepping in off duty to perform lifesaving CPR and a restaurant patron in a cardiac arrest, Bill consistently goes above and beyond the call of duty. His decades of service, integrity, and unwavering commitment to the community embody the very best that the EMS profession has. For these reasons, Bill Edling is the recipient of twenty twenty six paramedic of the year award. Congratulations again, my friend.

I

just wanna thank you for the award. I started my journey with Pinellas County Fire and EMS in 1987. I started with East Lake Fire Rescue, did twenty eight years there, and I've been with Largo for the last ten. But I wouldn't have it any other way. I love the job, love helping people, and I appreciate the recognition. Thank you again.

Alright. Thanks again to all three of you for your unwavering commitment to service for our residents. Alright. Alright. We're now gonna move on to recognizing emergency medical services week with a proclamation.

I'd like to invite chief William, I never call him William, Trip Bars, president of the Florida Fire Chiefs Association up here. He'll be accepting the proclamation this week. Good to see you always, mister Trent. National Emergency Medical Service Week is an opportunity for all of us to reflect on the dedicated service of our EMS system, personnel who provide compassionate quality care and service to our community every day. The high skill level and professionalism of our emergency dispatchers, emergency medical technicians, and paramedics have enabled the EMS system to attain clinical and operational excellence.

Our EMS providers make significant contribution and and and immeasurable sacrifices daily, responding to both routine and life threatening emergencies, including during some of the worst storms Pinellas County has ever experienced, demonstrating unwavering courage, resilience, and commitment. The strength of our EMS system is rooted in collaboration with long standing partnerships among fire rescue agencies, the countywide ambulance service, and local hospitals ensuring seamless and effective emergency care. National EMS Week brings our community and EMS providers together to celebrate accomplishments, honor sacrifices, and rededicate ourselves to the mission of saving lives and protecting the health of our residents. Now, therefore, be it proclaimed by the Pinellas County Board of County Commissioners that the week of May 18 through May 2026 Be recognized as emergency medical services week. Again, thanks.

Chairman Eggers and commissioners, thank you for this this great acknowledgement of the work that our folks do day in and day out to keep residents and visitors to our great county safe. I accept this on behalf of the municipal fire departments, our special fire and rescue districts, our Sunstar folks, county SES, and our hospital emergency department partners. It's that teamwork that working together, we we make sure that when people have their worst day, that you've got the folks like you met today out there serving. And as commissioner Scherer said in the invocation, service is heavy. It can be heavy at times.

So I'm just glad we have these folks out here doing this work. And on behalf of all them, I accept this proclamation. Thank you.

Mike, you just wanna pause for a minute because the person we're gonna recognize here in a minute has been become the face of our county during these emergencies that we have. The work that she does every single day and especially when things get a little dicey are much appreciated by by all of us. And so today, we're gonna get a chance to to recognize the special the special person. It's kind of like and I'll mess this one up too probably like I did earlier, but the conductor of a symphony. And working together to make sure that the music that we produce when we have to take care of our residents is right on.

And you've done an amazing job. And so today, I'm here. I'm very proud, and we are all very proud to recognize Kathy Perkins as the director of our Pinellas County Emergency Management for being named 2025 is it 2025? Yep. Chad Reed Emergency Manager of the Year.

And with that, I'd like to just have everybody recognize that. Come on up. And this is a state award, and and and Trip Bars is gonna stay stay up here as well because he's basically bring this bringing this to us. So Kathy has more than 30 of experience in disaster response and emergency management, serving communities across Florida throughout her career. Since October 2018, she has led Pinellas County's emergency preparedness, response, and recovery efforts.

During Florida's historic twenty twenty four hurricane season, Cathy led our community through the impacts of hurricanes Debbie, Helene, and Milton, coordinating response efforts across our 24 municipalities and working closely with the state, federal, and nonprofit partners to deliver a unified response. Under her leadership, the emergency operations center center managed more than fifty days of shelter operations while coordinating federal partners debris operations and large scale damage assessments. Kathy is known for bringing partners together and leading with calm and clarity during crisis, strengthening the resilience of the community she serves. On behalf of the board of county commissioners, we congratulate Kathy on this well deserved recognition and thank her for her outstanding service to the residents of Pinellas County. Congratulations.

On behalf of CFO and state fire marshal Blazingolia, I'm proud to present this award to you, Kathy. And I will take a moment of personal privilege. The beach communities owe this this woman a great debt. Her and her team got us through Helene and Milton. We would not have, I I would dare say, we would not have survived and we would

not be doing as well as

we are today without her work. So thank you.

Thank you. Thank you so much for this. Been doing this for a little over thirty years. I didn't even know this was a profession. I kind of fell into it, and I always refer to this as having a disastrous career. And but I couldn't do this alone. And and as chair Eggers pointed out, it takes the whole community. Our amazing other department directors, our county administrator, the assistant county administrators, the support of the board, all of our private nonprofits, all of our first responder agencies. It it really takes an entire team to do this, it's my privilege to get to be the face of disasters. I'm really hoping you don't have to see much of me in the future.

We're hoping we're in a ten year lull again. So but thank you so much. I I truly appreciate this. This is, this is quite an honor. Thank you.

Very well deserved.

Alright.

Alright. We're going to move into our citizens to be heard portion. And first up, James Murray.

James Murray. 16005 5th Street East, Redington Beach, Florida 33708. Thank you commissioners for all you do. As an elected public servant, I understand that your service can sometimes be a thankless job and a tough job, and thank you for hearing from me today. There's a sense among a great number of people, even in my town, that folks living in our beach communities have prepared and resolved all of the harm from hurricane Helene and Milton.

While a good number are back in their homes, there are still hundreds of us, if not thousands, in limbo working in Elvig, Florida are still finding resources to build our destroyed homes. I'm a town commissioner at Redington Beach, and my home was 99.6% destroyed by hurricane Helene. I wanna share my experience in rebuilding my dock as an example of the challenges that we are having with Pinellas County as we try to put our lives back together. In September of last year, I started my permit process to repair parts of my dock that was damaged by hurricane Helene. Due to the high cost to have docks repaired in the backlog, I decided to do some of the work myself and have a contractor help with the pilings and framing only.

I replaced the decking myself. Met with the Reddington Beach building department that was run by SafeBuild in person several times. They helped me navigate the process. I was granted a permit on October 22 and came to the SafeBuild office to get a copy of that permit. At that time, I asked them in person if there was anything else that I needed to be done before I could begin construction of my dock.

They told me no. The dock was completed in January and I asked for inspection early February. At this time, a new SafeBuilt team was in place, and they failed the inspection for not having a Pinellas County permit as well. I immediately applied for the Pinellas County permit with the help of the new SafeBuilt team. On March 27, I was made aware that in addition to the regular $400 permit fee, I would have to pay an additional $1,600 fine for the dock being built before the Pinellas County permit had been granted.

I learned that Paul Dean was handling this matter and that I should reach out to him and I wrote to I wrote him a note. Mister Dean wrote me back that the county does have a program for storm damaged homes that could help in the situation, but not for docs. Over the course of several notes between myself and Paul Dean, he said that he did not believe there was any intention by me or others to circumvent the permitting process and perform the unpermitted work. However, he is bound by the after the fact dock building ordinance, and that my only option is to seek a variance before a magistrate at the cost of a thousand $50. And if the variance did not go my way, I'd owe that fee plus 1,600.

The tone of his note did not seem like this option would be favorable for me, to be honest with you. I also found that another Reddington Beach resident also received a dock permit from SafeBuilt and was informed the Pinellas County permit also was not required. I would ask the commissioners to do the right thing and cancel the $1,600 permit for me, and please keep the hundreds, if not thousands of people in mind when creating and implementing policies and ordinance that affect us rebuilding on the beaches. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Greg Gardner.

My name is Greg Gardner. I'm from Largo, candidate for seat one, commissioner. I'm here on behalf of, the CRA that you all discussed in the last commission meeting. I'm here to say thank you. You really inspire me. The questions that you guys drilled. Largo, we're spot on. Miss Flowers, you mentioned the library. I can't thank you enough. It's bad.

And I'm here to tell you why you don't want to give them a penny. You have a real problem, and the problem is narcotics. And the city is literally owned, literally lock, stock, and barrel by the Albanian drug gang and has been for over twenty five years. How do I know this? I had the same problem on my street. I had two houses to my left, a house across the street. These are middle level dealers. These are not low end addicts. And after, about a year and a few months with Largo and their nonsense, I had the sheriffs come in. And it was the biggest drug raid in Largo's history concentrated on middle of the dealers.

And then I had a federal special agent come in and mop up on the section eight fraud. I also was persecuted to hell with, injunctions. Come to find out the injunctions was from another neighbor two doors down running a massive pill mill. That pill mill is well protected by Largo PD. It is really, really bad. And that area that they want CRA money will never ever materialize into anything, long as you have that element there that will repress it and promote crime. So someone mentioned crime numbers. No. Multiply times two. It's that bad.

And I know the streets. I work the streets. And these guys here have been like, the relationship has been phenomenal. They walk on water, and so don't give them a penny. And the only people that can clean up this mess are the feds. I know how they operate. I know how they infiltrate because it's also an element with the the DA. And we're not throwing McCabe under the bus here because he's done great things for me. So don't not until that element is cleaned up, it's going to be a hellhole. And Alan Zimmitt was the godfather for twenty five years in that area.

I know his handler. I know the whole thing. And is Woody Brown a part of this network? Yes. He profits from it. I know that intuitively on an operation happened in 2023. I can't say thank you enough. I'm gonna come back. I'm gonna answer a lot of your concerns that I delineated from all you questions, which is really interesting, and fill you in a little bit more of corruption that goes on in there. Thank you very much for your time.

David Ballard Geddes junior.

Good morning, commissioners. David Valor Geddes junior. I live on Georgia Avenue in Palm Harbor. You can't do wrong claiming that you're doing something right, not collectively, not individually. You don't have the liberty, the freedom, or the happiness of leading mankind into a trap constitutionally consigning mankind to his own destruction and death as declared.

Leadership that intends on committing two wrongs also does not have the right to claim rights to this as well, and it never will. We warned the legislation of our British brethren not to extend their unwarranted water jurisdiction over us. The declaration of independence recognizes the fourteenth amendment water jurisdiction and the taking of our liberty, our property, and our life as an unwarranted taking, constituting to capture the water supply in article one section eight clause 11 as a ship of war in article one section 10 makes our current constitution defective, Defective in the fact that this constitution hypocritically is being used as a bill of attainder, as a letter of marquee, as a form of reprisal claimed as process due in the fourteenth amendment. Based on the reclaimed water variance application, the further capture of water also includes the capture of my religion, Christianity, as deduced, thereby constituting water as a second amendment weapon of choice against Christianity intending to control man's will through the substance of water as based in Federalist paper number 79 using water as a power of the earth, eating us out of our subsistence, again, as written in the declaration of independence enslaving us in Federalist paper number 54.

This is not a constitution. This is hypocrisy on the high seas. As a Christian, I don't wanna be taken into captivity any more than the Israelites were taken into captivity biblically so. And if the so called not so perfect union of Great Britain and the tribes of Israel think that they're going to enslave the African population in this country again twice, they're going to be mistaken. Thank you.

Greg Pound.

Greg Pound Largo, Florida. You know, I wanna say we are in the most corrupt county in the state of Florida. That's why I ran for sheriff twice. And when I ran for sheriff the second time, you had Robert Guatieri, Jim Coach's attorney. You had Rice who was an attorney, and you had Swoop who was an attorney working for the sheriff's department.

Now despite what AI says, you cannot be an attorney, a licensed attorney in the state of Florida and be an working in any other office. You're in the judicial branch, period. And so what happens is that you guys, you either need to clean this place up. We don't need no feds. What we need is to get me where I'm supposed to be because I'm a shoe in candidate based on law, not how what I think or how I feel.

I was a qualified candidate. I attended every debate, televised, whether whatever it was. And these guys you guys got us this county is controlled. We we've got a monopoly. The these criminals these predators are praying on this county, and through this county, they're using this county to destroy the whole state of Florida. We are listen. We can clean this up with no problem. You just have to have people in there who know what's going on. Okay. Robert Guatieri, the guy literally, I said before, he should be in prison. He went to law school, and the guy's breaking the law. Alright? And then you and and you and you guys I'm saying if you don't change this, you should all be voted out of office. You shouldn't be here. It's like that old man Ron that comes in.

I mean, people should be in be be paid for telling all the laundering of money that's going on in our government. I mean, he's filed papers with you. He served you stuff. And and and you guys and he shows how it works in other counties is because you guys don't want this stuff exposed. We're in the most corrupt county in the state of Florida, Pinellas County. And if we don't clean this place up, when we have the corruption and it's all backed out this whole thing destroying the family. Once you destroy that family, we we lose our moral compass. We lose our conscience of right and wrong. We justify what we do, and it's destroying us. So the situation is is that it's either a situation like the bible says, you either repent or perish.

Like king David, he was the most loved king until he committed fornication, then he was the most hated king. His own children was trying to kill him. I mean, he gone and that's what we have. If we don't start building our families, that's what's being destroyed through our judicial system here in this county and through the sheriff's department, that's over DCF department, children's family. They're destroying our families and using our children for federal grant money called cooperative agreement contracts, where the feds are pumping in money into the state to come in and destroy our families. And that's what's happening to all of our families. And the men's responsibility, if we don't stand up and get people who can't be sexed, bought, or sold. That might be the kind of people we need. You guys have been stuck in the politics and we can't get you out.

We want

you out. Get out of here.

Alright. Next up, Kaylen Rowe. Kaylin Rowe? Nobody? Alright. We have a two on Zoom.

That's correct, mister chair.

Okay. Jennifer Duett. Jennifer Dritt, can

you please raise your virtual hand in the Zoom application? We'll go ahead and unmute you. You should be unmuted. You have three minutes. Please state your name and address.

Hello, miss Stritt. Can you hear us? Street, we're not able to hear you. We can move on to the next individual and then go back if

that's Alright. Charlene Sullivan.

Charlene Sullivan, please raise your virtual hand in the Zoom application. We'll go ahead and unmute you. Then you'll have three minutes to speak.

Can you hear me?

Yes. Go ahead, please. You have three minutes.

Go ahead.

Charlene, looks like you've muted yourself again. Can you unmute yourself? There you go.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Okay. I'm so sorry. We were actually just here. I'm, the general counsel for the Florida Council Against Sexual Violence. Jennifer Dritt is our executive director. It seems that she was having trouble unmuting. We want it to be present, as potential, field any questions or, that you may have had, after Kaylin's Roe testimony. It doesn't seem that she is there. I believe that Ms. Stritt was asked to be present during this meeting. So we were here really to just answer any questions, in response to any comments that would could come up, regarding Kaylen's testimony.

Does anybody have I'm not we're not really prepared to get into dialogue or questions. This is really for your opportunity to speak to us. So if you would if you have anything you would like to say to us, this is your time. Otherwise

Not at this time, quite frankly.

Okay. Thank you. Try Jennifer Dritt.

Miss Dritt, are you able to hear us now? And it looks like you are unmuted. So I think she's still having technical issues.

Okay, Jennifer. Last chance. Okay. Thank you. Alright. Moving on to our public hearings, Countywide Planning Authority item number five.

Thank you, mister chair. Agenda item number five is case number CW2605. This is a proposed ordinance by the city of Largo to amend the countywide plan map from activity center, residential low medium, residential medium, retail and services, office, employment, public, semi public, and recreation open space to activity center regarding 540 acres more or less generally located along Clearwater Largo Road between Bel Air Road and Rosary Road, including portions of alternate US Highway 19 and surrounding properties. The public hearing is properly advertised, and an affidavit of publication has been received for filing. No correspondence has been received by the clerk, and the matter is properly before the board to be heard.

Thank you. Is anything we had a a detailed conversation on Thursday at our workshop about the plan itself.

That's correct.

So this this

is we're doing. This is the act the change in land use. It's not it's

an activity center. It does not address any type of funding piece. Right. Okay. Alright. Any questions by commissioner Peters' motioning approval? Second. Second by commissioner Scott. Any dialogue on item five? Okay. Bring up the card, please. One more. Commissioner Peters. There we go. Motion carries unanimously. Item six.

Agenda item number six is case number c w twenty six zero six. This is a proposed ordinance by the city of Largo to amend the planning framework governing the West Bay Drive activity center while retaining the existing activity center designation on the countywide plan map regarding 316 acres, more or less, generally located in the vicinity of West Bay Drive and alternate US Highway 19. The public hearing was properly advertised, and an affidavit of publication has been received for filing. No correspondence has been received by the clerk in the matter's properly before the board to be heard.

Thank you. Anything else, Barry, from your end? No? Any questions? Do I have a motion? Motion by commissioner Scott, second by commissioner Peters. Can you pull up the card, please? Motion carries unanimously. Thank you. Oh, okay. Come on. Let's go. Alright. Onto the consent agenda. Anything that anybody wants to bring forward under the consent?

I just had one quick question, Kelly. On item number 12, It's for the Madonna Boulevard over Pine Key cut off bridge. Is is there a sequencing to that project, or is it's bridge piece. Could you speak to that project, please? Just

It'll be Kelly Hammerlevy, public works director.

It'll be constructed very similar to how we constructed other bridges where we'll close down half of it and utilize the temporary traffic control devices and keep one lane open at all times.

All done. Obviously, notifications and all that. Perfect. Thank you, Kelly. Appreciate it. Alright. We have a motion and a second for the consent. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion motion carries unanimously. Alright. On to item number seven, please. 16. Item 16. Where did I go? Oh, that's consent. Sorry. Yep. Thank you.

I want to clarify.

Alright. There we go.

Alright. Item 16 is a revised hazard hazard mitigation grant. So, again, this is for traffic control cabinets to mitigate for storm impacts. Revised grant is 9,500,000 with local match of 3.1. Total project cost of 12,700,000.

Any questions? I have a motion. Motion by commissioner Nowicki. Second by commissioner Latvala. Bring up the card, please.

One more.

There we go. Motion carries unanimously. Number 17.

And this is a resolution declaring one county owned parcel of land on Lake Dan in Hillsborough County as surplus and property donation agreement for to Hillsborough County. Jeremy addressed the issue, I think, last

questions by anybody? Motion by commissioner Scott. Second. Second by commissioner Nowicki. Rate the card, please.

Motion carries unanimously. Number 18.

Under item number 18, I'm requesting authority to file suit in the referenced case. This involves damage to some county facilities by a contractor.

You know? Motion motion by commissioner Nowicki. Second. Second by commissioner Scott. Bring up the card, please.

One more. Commission motion carries unanimously. Number 19.

Under item 19, I'm requesting the board approve staff's recommendation in the confidential item relating to the settlement.

Need a motion? Motion by commissioner Scott. Second. Second by commissioner Nowicki. Bring up the card, please.

Motion carries unanimously. Number 20.

I have no reports today.

Thank you. Number 21.

Item 21 under county minister's report. The only discussion here today is really, as you know, and I'd ask Leanne to come forward along with Blaine and answer any questions. And they they've got just a short presentation. We also introduce you to the legal counsel for this, and Don Kroll's gonna gonna handle that piece. But, you know, we've prepared an RFN. An RFN is request for negotiation. It really is gonna highlight the opportunities for redevelopment of our downtown campus here and really the revitalization of Downtown Clearwater. And so we look forward to seeing what actually the market will bear, what people propose, developers propose, and really get into the details of the structure. It doesn't prefer a lease. It doesn't prefer a fee simple.

It prefers to get into the details that will make either deal possible. And with that, I would turn it over to Leanne and let her kind of outline where we're at and ask for your concurrence, to move forward with releasing the RFN, that would then be done here in June. We would go through all that process and bring that back here before the board to where the board can see all of the details before they make a decision on how to move forward.

Thank you.

Good morning.

Leanne Corst with CBRE. Appreciate the opportunity, to be here today. The team listened and heard the discussion, robust discussion around ground lease versus fee simple. And we, after concurring or after really conferring with the county attorney and outside counsel that Mr. Burton just referenced, we've come up with, I think, some good news.

And that is a process that will allow for respondents to propose either way on their preferred transaction structure, ground lease or fee simple. But importantly also include the legal protections and controls under either structure. So we will bring those qualified developers back to this board for presentations after the proposals are received and we negotiate some of those legal protections. And then we'll have another successful town hall meeting before the board makes an award. So we think we've crafted a process that really accommodates allowing the market to speak and validate their approach with with either transaction structure being allowed.

So I'm happy to go through the process in more detail. But those are the high points of the RFN process. And with that, I'll turn it over to mister Crowell to introduce outside counsel.

This is someone you haven't, been introduced to, and so we wanted to bring, that forward here also.

So with that done

Good morning, commissioners. Don Kroll from your county attorney's office. As we've talked about this in the past, there were a lot of details that were still ongoing to be developed that we as we move through this, became clear that we needed some some more horsepower having done this. We reached out and we've hired Eric Singer with the firm of Bills and Somberg. He currently has more than $10,000,000,000 in ongoing development projects with his clients, ongoing. He has represented both local governments here in Florida as well as developers, so he understands both sides of this. And I could go further, but I'm gonna just go ahead and turn it over to Eric Singer. Eric?

Good morning, commissioners. Can everyone hear me okay?

Yes. Go ahead.

Great. So it's my pleasure to be here virtually with with you today. Happy to answer any of your questions. I'll just add very, very high level the the discussions I've had with the administration and and county attorney's office have really focused on how to get the most market feedback possible in order to determine what the county's options really are in terms of a sale with long term protections versus a ground lease. And the the process we've come up with, enables us to make the most informed decision possible with the benefit of, of that market feedback.

And and I'd be happy to answer any questions you have. I'll I'll leave it at that. Any

questions? Commissioner Flowers. So

I look forward to the information, that we will be provided with. Is there a possibility for the potential developers to submit using a combination of the two options for the property since there are several and they are not all contiguous to one another? Up Fort Harrison or Court or whatever the street is. I'm sorry. Perhaps those may be some that they desire to lease because they are they fit better with the footprint of a restaurant or clothing store.

I don't know. I'm just throwing something out.

Yes, ma'am. It it is completely flexible in that regard. Thank you. Commissioners. Thank you, mister chairman. Thank

you, mister chairman. Don can probably answer this question. We've discussed this before. So during we've connected the sale of the this property or the disposal of this property to buying the new county center and trying to get as much money as we can out of this property, which makes sense. But what happens, hypothetically, if we get a proposal during the RFN period for, say, like, $300,000,000 from someone, but they don't want deed restrictions?

They just wanna give us $300,000,000 for our property and tell us to have a good day. And we say no. Could we get sued for that?

I'm gonna give you a little bit of a flip answer, so forgive me. Anyone with a filing fee can sue you. It's whether or not they can be successful. So there's a lot of pieces in there that are are kind of open in your question, one of which well, several of which. The RFN that is anticipated to be put out does have financial compensation to the county as an element that is important.

But there are a lot of other important elements within the RFN as well. The experience of the developer and their financial ability to put forward the project that ultimately they propose and you select is a key component to it. There are some terms that we intend to put out there that we are seeking the market feedback on relative to important factors, some of which we will allow the market to give us feedback and say that's not anything we would ever accept, and that's information we then have in selecting the appropriate developer. And others we expect will take those on. So important ones within there are activation, timeframe for actually building the project, restrictions on the use of the property other than for those things they propose.

I know I'm giving you a long answer, and it's a very attorney answer. It depends. But assuming that they don't bring forth the activation and the background that we require as a as a foundation, and I believe it's $250,000,000 mixed use projects or kind of one of those threshold developer tie ins. Because from and I'm parroting, frankly, our outside experts on this. But the ability to actually get through and deliver and show that they have done this before is an important part of the selection process.

So regardless of who brings forward any kind of an offer, those are things that are going to be focused on. And ultimately it's going to come back to you as a board to determine what's most important to you and how you want to award this. So

And But but, commissioner, I mean, to to your point, we have in regardless of the structure, lease or fee simple. The restrictions placed on there are part of the RFN. And if they don't apply to that, you don't have to accept it. Okay. If they're not if those terms aren't acceptable acceptable to you, you're under no obligation to do that.

That's correct.

In my hypothetical example of the $300,000,000, if, for instance, a church offered us $300,000,000, no deed restrictions, and we said no to that, would that be considered religious discrimination in which we could get sued for?

Again, the RFN has a lot of considerations that are completely divorced from any kind of religious affiliation or religious practice. We are talking about objective use and activation. So again, anyone with a filing fee can sue you, but assuming that the the basis for the decision is based on those objective factors like activating downtown, having the uses that you want to see in conjunction with the amount of revenue that the the county hopes to realize to help support that other project to which you referred. All are appropriate, but they they are not separate they're not separated. This is for you as a body to determine on the totality of what gets brought forward.

Thank you. The the reason why I bring up the $300,000,000 example is years ago, there was a piece of property that was owned by the Clearwater Marine Aquarium in downtown. They were offered, I believe, three times the value of it by a church, and they said no to it. And that angered the church. Instead, they sold it to the city.

And as a result, that church quit communicating with the city and bought up 200 properties in Downtown Clearwater and and which caused some folks in Clearwater rightfully to get upset. And in April 3 during April 3 city council meeting, council member Ryan Cotton was talking about a meeting that he had with chairman Miskavich where he said, and I quote, he's quoting chairman Miskavich, And and he said chairman Miskavich said, and I quote, we own 200 properties. He's not talking about properties that just the church owns. He's talking about properties that the parishioners own as well. On 05/12/2025, Ryan Cotton council member Ryan Cotton is addressing a representative of the church, and he said, and I quote, you told me you own 200 properties.

And so and and I'm not the the church I'm referencing is a declared religion by the federal government, and I would never support, you know, any kind of religious litmus test. But, you know, it's very clear that they have used those 200 properties to use against the city. And I think when we consider our property and and how we're gonna dispose of it, you know, we need to to be mindful of it. And and that's one reason why I'm very clearly in support of a a a lease option. And I think that's something that developers need to be mindful that this is a probably the most unique, you know, area of the country.

And so I will have more thoughts, but but I I don't have any more questions at this time, mister.

Thank you. Commissioner Scott.

Thank you, mister chair. And just a basically a a comment. If somebody did come forward in that hypothetical and say, want to give $300,000,000 basically a blank check, no deed restrictions, and we'll develop it. We'll tell you later what we're going to do with the property regardless of who that was, what entity that was. I wouldn't support that because it would be a shortsighted decision. Because once those properties are activated and redeveloped long term, it's going to spin off far more tax dollars back back to us than that quick hit would. So that just in a hypothetical like that, I wouldn't support it. So that's all.

Commissioner Scherer.

Thank you, chair. Lee and I I remember you said that the developers are gonna be watching our meetings. So I wanted you to know when I when I first proposed leasing versus outright sale, I didn't know that it was gonna get so much traction. I'm delighted to see it. I was so happy to see the residents come out in support of it. That was just great. And I'm all for it. But there is another option that just so the the developers who might be watching know, when I watched several towers be built downtown Saint Petersburg, the property owner didn't wanna lose control. So and rather than doing a lease, they they built condominiums on top of the property. They built hotels on the property.

And as part of the development, the owner received the ownership of the condominiums on the first two floor, the retail and the whatever the first two Floors would be, whether it be entertainment, restaurants, retail. So it doesn't just have to be a lease. A condominium ownership that guarantees that the county can activate the properties on the first 1st And 2nd Floors would be something that I would very much consider. That might make it easier for them to obtain financing for the project, but it wouldn't be a gift. It would be compensation for us for getting on the property.

We we get the first two floors, then we get to make sure whoever comes in there as a tenant activates it and uses it for for what the people want, which is an area that they can enjoy Downtown Clearwater and go to a restaurant, go shopping, and then maybe even walk over to concert in the evening. So just just another idea. It doesn't have to be a lease. I'd be happy with the condominium ownership. So I wanna throw that out there for your

Commissioner, we've we've heard that we've heard that from CBRE's development team that that may be one of the kind of structures. It just depends. So

Yeah. That's that's that's interesting. And just just you know, the kind of the direction that we're going and you know the kind of interest we have in our in the properties and and working with city of Clearwater and the residents. Are there are there possibilities that again, this is over time, and I I really like the idea that you just talked about, where certain development can occur that meets certain standards that would then, I guess, you know, perhaps give the the the lease change a lease to a fee simple situation. Is that is that something that can happen based on how properties progress?

So it's not just on hearsay. It's not just doesn't transfer from one owner to another, but actually the things that we're looking for in that list in the RFN that says how to protect these for public public access, for commercial development, for housing, for is there a way at some point if things are done the right way that that can eventually happen?

Yes. And we did transact a ground lease in Downtown Miami that had an option to purchase after certain specifications were met. So yes.

Option to purchase based on certain things being accomplished.

Certain conditions being met.

So it's not an option just on the buyer's part or the less Correct. Okay. I'm not I don't I mean, just kind of we're mixing a lot of things in right now. But I think I mean, at the end of the day, we want things done and developed independently, accessible, that further the vision of the city and its residents.

And mister Singer may have some additional comment on that. But like I said, we do have experience having done that in Downtown Miami on behalf of that we represented the city of Miami, and there was an option to purchase after certain conditions were met.

Thank you. Did you have any comment on that? No.

Yeah. I'll I'll just I'll just add that that's that's a very viable approach under the right under the right circumstances if if the market supports it. But legally, we could have a ground a ninety nine year ground lease that upon completion of the project or stabilization of the project, the the the tenant has the right to purchase after that. So you would have sort of ground lease type control during the period of of greatest risk from the county's perspective, the the development process. And then after that point, the the owner would have the benefit of of or the tenant would have the option of full ownership.

So that is a potentially viable option for this scenario.

Commissioner Nowicki?

Thank you, chair. So would a developer be able to build condos on a ninety nine year ground lease?

Leanne and Eric.

Yeah. It's it's much more difficult to finance. So they and I'll give you an example. There's a project that my colleague is aware of out in California where the University of California San Diego entered into a ground lease. And they're very high end homes on that ground lease. There's only about twenty seven I think years left on the ground lease and those homeowners are having a really hard time selling it because they want to go get a thirty year mortgage and there's only twenty seven years left on the ground lease it becomes difficult. So there's the marketability of it to sell the condos, but there's also the financeability of it.

And so in that example in California, how long was that ground lease for? Because you said there's twenty seven years

It was a

long term ground lease. I would have to go back and double check the length of the ground lease. I believe it was ninety nine. But it it can be done, but it is a lot more difficult, and you're gonna reduce your buyer pool.

Was that

Mister Singer, anything to to add to that?

Yeah. I'll I'll just add that a a ground lease condominium is, sort of a proven model in certain parts of the country. So in New York City, for example, ground lease condominiums are not uncommon. My experience in Florida has been that they have been challenging is probably too optimistic a term. I'm aware of a number that have been attempted and then failed.

And so it's certainly something that we're going to get market feedback on in the RFN in terms of the viability of a ground lease for different options. But in my experience, I'm not optimistic about a ground lease condominium.

And so thank you for that. But if you did, like, a ninety nine year ground lease with an automatic ninety nine year extension where and then you can purchase the property for a dollar at the end of two hundred years, you still think it would have financial burdens, if you will?

I do, but but I also think that would help a lot if if the county were willing to do a purchase option instead of a straight ground lease where the property goes back to the county at the end. But I think we're also sort of treading on new ground here in in this type of model. And so until we get the market feedback, it's it's it's really hard to know whether that that would be viable or not. But but for sure that would help if we had the purchase option.

And I appreciate you setting you you know, you saying we're treading on new ground and, you know, I think partly of that is true. And so, like, that's why, you know, if there was, like, an analysis of of some sort to know, you know, what a value of a ninety nine year ground lease would be versus a sale would be beneficial to this board so you could make those decisions and and treading in this new water. And so, I mean, I'm, you know, I'm still a little perplexed, you know, on why, you know, we have the experts and, you know, we can't get an analysis of what, you know, net present value a ninety nine year lease would be, you know, for a ground lease. You know? And so I don't know.

Can you talk about that, mister Singer?

Sure. So that's that type of analysis is is sort of a common analysis once we have the benefit of of, you know, the numbers to to crunch. So there's, you know, always a discussion as to the right discount rate in order to determine the the net present value. But the starting point is understanding what what numbers to plug in to that analysis. And I I think where we are right now, we're we're trying to undertake a process where we'll get the benefit of that information.

So one of the questions that proposers will be asked is how they would value a ground lease relative to a fee simple purchase. And once we have that information, then then for sure, we can do that type of net present value analysis to see what, if anything, we would be giving up using one approach versus the other.

And do you think a lot of develop thank you for that. Do you think a lot of developers I mean, if we go to market with an RFN that says, hey, fee simple or a ground lease, Obviously, someone could just offer $30,000,000 to the county or $50,000,000 to the county, why would you not do that versus doing a ground lease for two hundred years where you're gonna pay $800,000,000. So I get, you know, maybe it's not in the best interest of the developer, but I think it could be in the best interest of the taxpayer of this county to examine that a little bit more. And so, I mean, I think there's different services where you could look at all the 22 acres, right, and you could get 30,000 square feet of apartments, 20,000 square feet of condos, and you can create a financial analysis based on, you know I mean, isn't there a a website or something that gives you, like, price per square foot, like, every 30 days for what condos cost to build, what apartments cost to build? I mean, so you'd be able to get those numbers and and do that kind of sample financial analysis.

So

So I I think we could make certain assumptions about what the product type would cost to build and and, you know, how how would rent in the in the market along the lines that that you suggested. But we would really the piece we would be missing is how that translates into what a developer would be willing to pay for the land, either fee simple or or ground lease. And so just just high level, there is a cost on the financing side to a to a ground lease. And until we and and different developers will perceive that differently and price it in differently. There, you know, there there could be a scenario where the ground lease prevents presents sort of the the, you know, best of both worlds for the county.

There's also a scenario where the market is so constrained that that that there's there's just no interest in it or or the the cost of the county is too high of of going down that path. And so

And that makes and that makes a lot of sense about what you're saying about the market, and thank you for bringing that up. In terms of the deed restrictions that we're talking about, what do you have to build, when you have to build it, and the occupancy rate, wouldn't that soften or cool fee simple offers that we would get? Wouldn't developers take all those restrictions into account and reduce their price thinking that, you know, we have all these deed restrictions and we have to be accountable for that, mister Singer?

There there is definitely a trade off between long term control and price. So the the goal of this RFN process as it's structured is to get market feedback on what's viable in terms of long term controls and what is the cost to the county of those controls so that once we have the benefit of that feedback in a structured way in a competitive environment, we can take that back to the commission, and you can make an informed decision in terms of where you draw that line. And and it's it's gonna be a bit of a sliding scale between what the what the purchase price is or what the ground lease payment is and the amount of amount of control that you want. And once we get that feedback, I I think the the commission will be in a position to to to strike that balance.

And then to my last question, and then I'll yield back for further discussion. Sorry for asking so many questions. I apologize. Would it be beneficial to a developer if they didn't have to pay for the land acquisition? So would there be a benefit to the developer, Mr. Singer, if they didn't have to pay $50,000,000 for land acquisition that they could afford to do more development and it would be better for them for financing since that you didn't have to put the land acquisition on their pro form a?

So there's different ways to structure that. So in a typical ground lease scenario, there's not an upfront purchase price. There's a long term rent obligation, and that long term rent obligation gets priced into into the deal. So it would be underwritten by the lenders, by the investors based on essentially the net present value of those ground lease payments. So it it the the the my generic response is that a fee simple acquisition even with the purchase price upfront is more favorable to the developer for financing reasons than a ground lease with no purchase price upfront and everything gets paid out over the the term of the ground lease, but it really depends.

And, you know, I I, you know, have spoken to developers that in certain circumstances prefer a ground lease. Just the the structure is is more aligned with the type of project they're they're trying to do and their financing sources. And I've seen other scenarios where a developer says, if it's a ground lease, I I won't even consider it for a particular site or particular project. And so I I I think that it's it's a good question to ask, and and it's something where where we wanna structure this RFN to get that type of feedback from the market.

Thank you, mister Singer. Thank you, mister Singer.

Thank you for the questions, commissioner. So, you know, obviously the reality is is that we are in a two step process. One is, and probably more than that, but we're learning what our our, the city of Clearwater has in mind and what residents might have in mind as well. I think really that's kind of open. It's really about control of the property and making sure that something's delivered that have a number of restrictions that we're gonna identify in that RFN.

Are you comfortable with the I think that's the term that was used, the restriction parameters that we're gonna put in there. Are we are you comfortable with those? Are there more that we need to address as we send it out? Because the next step is obviously finding out what the reality of the world will will accept either in the short term or the long run. And then it's our decision. Right? So but anyway, comments on the restriction parameters?

The indicative I I believe we're talking about the indicative terms. So

What? I'm sorry.

Indicative terms. So we're asking developers to provide feedback on those indicative terms. And Mr. Singer has developed a great list of them. One of them is a payment in lieu of taxes, which we've discussed here before. That one is non negotiable. We're saying that you must agree to that in the event that our legislature modifies ad valorem taxes. Otherwise, extensive, but it's open for developers to provide their feedback and really test their acceptance.

Okay. Thank you. Any other comments or questions? I mean, I think we're gonna we're gonna learn a lot Yeah. When we send this out to folks that have experience doing things that bring value to a community. I mean, at the end of the day, the community has spoken. They want real value to this community so that it when it moves forward, it has, you know, the vision not only of the county of the city city city council, but also of the residents. And so, I mean, this process is gonna let us know. Is that possible? And how's it how's it look?

And how comfortable are we with those trade offs on the short term given money upfront versus long term control. So, I mean yeah. Commissioner? No. I'm I'm finished right

now. I

had some comments about the town hall last week that I didn't wanna share last week because it was more about our residents than us. But I thought a lot about, you know, some of what our residents said. And I like y'all, I was expecting a lot more speakers and a lot more people in general, but I appreciate y'all participating in the town hall and especially for Barry and the communications staff and for Blaine and everyone else who facilitated it. But simply put, my constituents are hurting. I knew that before the town hall meeting, and I didn't really need a town hall to figure that out.

But I wanted other people to see it. It's not a small number of people. It's the majority of this city of Clearwater. They have felt like they have lost the heart of their city, the downtown Clearwater. I live in this beautiful city, and my neighbors are right.

I will always support our citizens' freedom to exercise the religion of their choice. The Church of Scientology was declared a religion by the federal government in 1993, and I'm not going to debate religion from this dais. What I will debate, however, is an entity that controls over 200 properties walking distance from here. What is undeniable is I believe they will be interested in this property. From my standpoint, there will be no religious lipless test for any developer for this project.

Like I've said before, I'm on a project I can be proud of twenty or thirty years from now when I'm your age, mister chairman. But I also do not want this project to be used as leverage against Pinellas County, our current commission, or a future commission as 200 properties has been used against the city of Clearwater. I do not know how we can guarantee absolute success without a long term lease, but I am willing to give it a try. While I support a lease, I am open to seeing the proposals from developers and what they submit, but they need to understand this project is unlike any other in this country, and my constituents are hurting, and they have every right to be. Their downtown has been taken from them and it is my job to represent the will of my constituents.

Thank you, commissioner Lettbala. And I think that's kind of, you know, this this process of the city being taken, so to speak, from what the residents always envisioned started many decades ago. This isn't something brand new. And, you know, I I would be concerned if any entity owning as many properties as they do in downtown because it certainly starts to dictate the way a community is going to be. And that's not fair and it's not right, whether it's the entity that has bought the 200 properties that you're talking about or anybody else that wanted to buy 200 properties in downtown.

It becomes their vision, not the community's vision. So, I mean, I think this is a a as as others have pointed out on this day, as there's this is an opportunity for us to maybe turn that tide a little bit, spread the property ownership so that other visions can start to materialize. And ones that maybe match what the residents of the community wanted thirty years ago, ten years ago, or or the young folks that are looking for a different downtown. So I think this is a a great opportunity, and I think list hearing what they the folks that are gonna make it happen is really important piece here. How they do that is important to us and hopefully will be important to them.

I'm assuming to the commission to the question that commissioner Flowers asked in the beginning that we could very well see proposals back that mix the properties. That this group really isn't, in their opinion, subject to that long term visioning improvements, and they're kind of outliers, and we think those should be sold or not.

I think you will.

And some of the more critical pieces that really shape that that that future and might be ones that we're more interested. But it could be a combination.

I think well, we're looking for one master developer, but I think it will be a a combination. Your downtown core, different from, like, where the Schwester Building is and things like that. So there's different areas of the city that will will play to different pieces.

But

but either way, you you'll see the detail. You'll see the indicative terms that are being proposed before and and then and that'll be viewed with the public, where you can get the public's input on those proposed structures before you need to make a decision. Yeah. And and that will then ensure that what is being proposed, people are actually built, you know, which is what you want as the activation. We heard that over and over again to make sure that there's an activation to downtown.

Yeah. And and so how and and I'm assuming, again, this may be to to to real estate folks, but is I'm assuming there's a combination that will the way we could see. That we could see people that value that long term lease and are willing to pay income for that long term lease with some down payment on that long term lease. That happens all the time. So it could be a combination where we actually do get some of those funds and at the same time keep the control in place. Yep. I'm I'm assuming We've

heard we've heard now first off, we didn't start off with this with the proposed RFN. We started off with a fee simple structure.

Right.

Based upon the feedback we heard from you as commission and the public, we've we've made those modifications. We brought on Eric to give us the illegal horsepower because the indicative terms, whether it's in a lease or whether it's in a fee simple process, it's the terms that control. At least without terms doesn't give you the outcome you'll look

for either. We'll be in the same place.

Exactly. And so the you'll be able to see those with the market. What what can actually be built in the market from developers as part of the decision making process.

Mister Singer, did you have any other comments for us?

No. I I agree completely that, that that where we may land is sort of a a mix and match where where certain certain properties are best developed under a ground lease and and certain might be best developed under fee simple with with strong controls and protections for for the county as part of the part of the restrictions.

But, again, with those strong controls and strong wishes on our part, there's still a market for people to build and make money. Is that would you would you summarize it that way? I mean, there's still depending on the structure, there's still ways to for developers to do quite well.

Yes. I I think I think there's there's a definitely a path for for the county to get fair value for this property and ensure that the commission's vision for a robust and timely development of of the property can can be insured.

Okay. Well, thank you for your comments. Really appreciate your being here this morning.

So just looking for consensus that we can release the RFN.

To send it. And if

we get that, then we plan on releasing that here in June.

Yeah. I was just about to ask, is the plan still to do it in, like, beginning to mid June?

Yes. Mhmm.

Yes. So we'll do all the final so we we didn't wanna assume the outcome of today. If you're in concurrence, we'll finalize all the terms, go through another legal review, and then release it here in June. Just real consensus as long as five people or four people are good. Yes. Yes.

Two. I'm not am I okay over here? I'm good. Good. Okay. We're all good to release. K. You've got a unanimous consensus Great.

To release. This is exciting.

Thank you. Alright. That all you had, Barry?

I I had one other item. There was a there was an article, or it's actually a news article, that Saint the Saint Pete Beach Pier, that they were waiting on permits from the county, and we hear that a lot. The the only problem with that one is that we can't rule on a peer application until we actually receive an application. So just for the record, we haven't received an application. Therefore, I can't approve an application. So be happy to work with them once we have it. That was made public, so I figured I would comment on it.

This is the the peer that we talked about? Yeah. And now

this is that's a that's a different one. Okay. And that's an individual that got advice from somebody other than us and and and now they don't wanna pay the after fact permit. That's a different issue. This one is the Saint Petersburg Pier Passegrove. The Saint Petersburg Saint Pea Beach.

Okay. Oh.

Saint Pete Beach Pier in Passegro. So but, again, we'd be happy to help them if we get an application. That's

all. Okay. Are we you're finished. Right, Barry?

I'm done.

Okay. Commissioner Scheer, why don't you start us off today?

Thank you, chair. I've had a quite busy month or since the last time we talked. I thought it might be appropriate to bring you all up to speed on the proposed MPO, Where I think we are on that, the MPO merger with Hillsborough and Pasco County, just real quick. Because I attended a meeting on April 8 with four Pinellas where we considered the apportionment that was presented to us. And then on April 17, I attended the TMA leadership subcommittee that was that was also formed to talk about the proposed MPO.

Just the my takeaway from those meetings are that most members of four Pinellas and quite frankly, maybe even Pasco County did not realize that the proposed am I talking too quiet? Because I'm trying to get better at that. Anyway, the I think most members didn't realize that Hillsborough County was gonna be receiving 52% of the vote of the of the MPO should emerge as the apportionment said. And so that kinda put a break on it at the Ford Pinellas meeting. But rather than send to the TMA a flat rejection at commissioner Scott's request, we we just delayed the vote and said, hey, we need to talk more to Hillsborough County about this, as well as commissioner Flowers here also understood that 52% might not be good for us to be in a minority position with the merged MPO.

So, anyway, we we didn't vote specifically, and then we went to the meeting with the TMA where the the port authority and the airport authority and a city councilwoman from Tampa and also Commissioner Bowles from Hillsborough County were present. And so we talked about these ideas. And we also talked about we didn't just need to approve the apportionment structure of a proposed MPO. We also needed to approve an interlocal agreement, and we also needed to approve the bylaws of the MPO. And none of those had even been presented.

And I think the general consensus at that meeting was with Hillsborough and Pasco present that we should be those three documents should all be agreed to in single meetings rather than doing it piecemeal like, oh, let's agree to the apportionment. Then we'll do the then we'll do the interlocal agreement, and then we'll do the bylaws. No. We need would get all three of those documents together and approve them as one batch. I would never recommend to this board that we approve just one.

We need to approve them all as a together so we know exactly what we're getting and we don't have to wait. I floated the idea at that meeting that we could we could form the board similar to Tampa Bay Water, which is a great example of inner inner county relationship. But, you know, Tampa Bay Water is three members from Pasco, three members from Pinellas, and three members from Hillsborough. Nobody has the upper hand there. So I like that.

Now we may have to get some of our legislators to help us with the state laws on that. I'm not sure. Jewel Jewel's working on that. But that's something that we're all looking at. So I I prefer five five five and three three three, make the board a little bigger, but we need to work on on that as well. And then for the like I said, for the MPO to happen, we should be approving all the documents together, interlocal agreement, the apportionment, and the bylaws need to be done together. And so that that's kinda where I see it. It's not dead. I don't want it to die. I think it could be been very beneficial for our area to to make the merger, but it's gotta work for Pinellas County first.

That's my first goal is to make sure it's it's a good deal for Pinellas County. And so that's kinda where we left it, and we're gonna work on a new apportionment with TMA, and we're gonna work on the I believe at the next meeting for the TMA that the Ford Panelsa is gonna bring forward proposed bylaws and propose in our local agreements so we can start working on all three issues at the same time rather than one at a time. So I just wanna bring you up to date on that where we are. Nothing's happening right now, but we're still we're we're we're still moving forward. We're still working on it.

So that's that. If you have any questions for me, that's great. And on April 14, I attended and participated in the Yam Hoshaha commemoration commemoration at the Florida Holocaust Museum. And I and I read the names of of many children who were who were murdered by the Nazis in political hate, and and it was quite surreal and upsetting, quite honestly, but I was glad I could participate. On April 16, I met with representative Fairfield to discuss downtown properties, the property taxes.

We also talked about the MPO merger, and I'm convinced that I our representative here from Clearwater just loves her city and loves her county, and she's a great asset for Pinellas County as a whole. On April 18, I went on my first international trade mission, which was awesome. I got to sell sunshine and beaches to the Brits, which was fun. And I learned a lot about what Visit Saint Pete Clearwater does and how they do it. And I think if I ever have the opportunity to serve on that board, that that's gonna pay off that I got to do that.

So I was very thankful that you all chose me to go. Thank you. And then on let's see. April 29, the town hall meeting was great. Thank you, commissioner Lottabala, for getting that done. I was very happy to see that so many people from Pinellas County came in that that the idea of controlling the property in perpetuity is taking off. So thank you for that. So and that is where I am. Thank you.

Thank you, commissioner Scheer. Commissioner Flowers?

Thank you, mister chairman and everybody. First, I wanna say thank you so much to commissioner, Kathleen Peters and commissioner, Chris Scher for allowing your aids to work with me, as volunteers on getting everything together for the Florida Association of Counties conference in June. It's a lot of work, but they were so gracious. So I share with them my sincere gratitude, but I wanted to also share that publicly with you all. I also wanna say thank you to commissioner Brian Scott for helping me to get some bags of art supplies back to Pinellas County because once you fill the bags with the things that persons will put in them, they become extra large and pretty, pretty heavy.

So I wanna publicly thank him for that. If you have not already registered, please do so. Please register. They have increased the size of the ballroom for the installation, but I have provided seating for my colleagues and or your guests and staff. So you don't have to worry about trying to get down there early or whatever to take care of that.

Here locally, I had a chance, as always, with commissioner Lott Valla to go to the CFY banquet that was held on the beach, and it was a fabulous event as always. The wind was very nice, so it was breezy. It wasn't as hot as sometimes it could be, but they raised quite a bit of money to help 14 youth sports organizations throughout the county as well as raising money for individuals who were looking for scholarship funds to assist them to go to college. I'm gonna give a special shout out to my dear friend at Ditech because and I hope he doesn't get mad at me saying for saying this, but he personally, provided three $10,000 scholarships for students out of his own pocket on top of what he does with the Education Foundation and all of that. So I wanna say super kudos for that because so many kids couldn't go to college without the support from the community.

So I had a great time there. I also had a chance to participate in some of the Earth Day events. You know, we always wanna plant some trees or tell individuals, some things that they can do, especially when it comes to the foliage around their home for irrigation, purposes. And we all know we have the water request to to kinda hold back on some of that. So when you are looking at landscaping that doesn't require a lot of water, that certainly helps all of us.

I also had a chance to attend the Pinellas Education Foundation's governance committee. We have some new members that will be coming on board because some persons are rolling off. I'm excited about that. This Friday, we will have our retreat to go over the mission and the vision. A part of what the Education Foundation does as well is to, help identify persons for specific employment areas of opportunity so that when we have companies that come to Pinellas County and they wanna hire, that we are, in fact, training people for the jobs that will be available that are high paying jobs.

So I really appreciate that, and I'm looking forward to have those continued conversations. The Florida Association of County started a new leadership training component piece. So it's separate from, our staffers when they go to the staffing, leadership training piece. Tristan was signed up to go, but we all know what happened with the legislative delegation up there, and so he was not able to make it. But, I had a chance to go and give the welcome, and they had about 35 individuals signed up for that.

So thank you, to those who were able to attend. And, hopefully, on our next one, Tristan, you'll be able to to make that. It was some good information. Good. There were persons that came from South Florida up in the Panhandle all over the state, so I thought it was a really good combination.

Again, kudos. You got us in and out like what you said for the town hall meeting, but I really appreciated the comments that individuals gave for the town hall meeting. I think they spoke from their heart. And like I said that evening, everybody was mindful and respectful of one another even though this is a very sensitive topic. So I just wanna say again, commissioner Latvala, thank you so much for suggesting and leading that charge.

On Saturday, I attended a maternal health forum at the hammock at Boyd Hill where it talked about women's health issues that come as a result of pregnancy and how it just doesn't affect the woman. It also affects the husband or the father of the child if the mom is not doing well either during her pregnancy or once she delivers. So it was really, really good, very well attended, and I'm grateful for that. I was going to attend another event at USF, but then there was a tornado warning, then lightning strikes, and then, unfortunately, the University of South Florida's marine science and research facility, was struck, and it was a massive fire. I was invited by the mayor on yesterday to come down, and see firsthand the damage that had been caused at that research center.

It used to be the buildings used to be the barracks for the coast guard. So if you could imagine how the walls and things were built, but, of course, they had nothing to do with the inside of the structure. So number one, glad that no one lost their life in that. Number two, glad that, the fire department was able to get the fire under control because there were, of course, chemicals and things from the research that were there that added to the urgency of the situation. What I am most sad about, though, is the professors and the doctoral students and the researchers because their research is gone, and that is a a hard hit.

I know when I was working on my doctorate, I was backing up on, like, three and four separate disc in case anything happened to the material on my laptop so I wouldn't lose anything. So I know firsthand what it's like when, you you're really worried about the data and stuff that you've collected. But for them, there were certain experiments and things of that nature within the confines of those walls that you just can't get back. So I feel really, really sad about that. The interim chancellor did state that they've already worked out some, ancillary support facilities for them to, work out of until everything is taken care of.

There was a representative there from Tallahassee, and I'm so sorry. I can't remember the gentleman's name, but he came down immediately to, see what can be done to help the University of South Florida. So for all of those, in case anyone is watching or listening, know that, our hearts and prayers go out to you all and that you recover, as quickly as possible. The Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council Resiliency Conference is fast approaching. That is on the thirteenth of this month, and the conference is the thirteenth and the fourteenth.

It's going to be held where it was last year at the Palmetto Marriott Resort, and I look forward to if any of you can make it over there. It is always a very good conference, So I'm hopeful, that you can attend. We have won awards. We, meaning Pinellas County, we've won awards before for our efforts in conservation. I don't think we submitted, Barry. I don't think we submitted anything this year. No. We didn't submit anything. So, anyway, they won't say it's rigged because I chaired the Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council. So maybe we'll look at it again in the near future.

Acts, some of you may have attended some of Acts, events and whatnot, but it is an organization that helps, those who are youth and interested in the music industry, whether it's singing, playing instrument, dancing, or whatever, that organization is having their annual championship breakfast, which is on the seventh at, the USF Saint Pete student ballroom campus center. It's early in the morning at 08:30. So if you are able to attend or would like more information, please feel free to chat with me, and I'll be happy to get you that information. And, in advance, happy Mother's Day. Mother's Day is Sunday on the tenth.

So for those of you that have wives, tell them I said happy Mother's Day. For those of you that are mothers, happy Mother's Day to you and to those in the community. And that's all that I have, sir.

Thank you, commissioner Flowers. Commissioner Latt Valla.

Thank you, mister chairman. Recently, in the Tampa Bay Times, they did a very well written article on issues at the Suncoast Center. And a couple years ago, their then CEO stood at that podium, and I remember asking her if they were having problems with their sexual assault kits and their rape kits because I was told that they indeed were. And I believe she straight up lied to us, and she assured us that that was not the case. But anyways, I'm glad she was she's no longer there because she did a horrible job.

They have a new CEO now. And according to the Times, there are some issues. I know we had some speakers today that unfortunately did not speak on Suncoast. But their CEO reached out to me mainly to talk about the article, but I took the opportunity to kinda share my grievances with things that Suncoast has done really in their mental health training. And I shared with him that I had a friend who his wife was a client there who no longer is with us because she committed suicide, and the CEO wasn't aware of that.

And but we had a good good conversation. And, hopefully, their CEO who's, I believe, been there for about a year or so We'll get things turned around. And if not, hopefully, there will be other providers in Pinellas County that will be able to pick up the slack, not just in the sexual assault space, but also with their mental health issues that they have because, as you know, there's a lot of folks in our community suffering. And, also, I you know, our their their CEO is welcome anytime to to come to one of our meetings. And he he mentioned that he was gonna reach out to to y'all as well about that article that that the Times wrote.

I attended the CFY banquet on the beach with commissioner Flowers. The food looked very good. Unfortunately, I didn't partake in any of it. I attended speaking of good food or food that looked good, I attended the employee appreciation picnic. The barbecue smelled really good.

I served food alongside Barry and gave out awards. The dodgeball game looked very intense. I watched the finals of it. I attended the Lift Academy Kentucky Derby party on Saturday, And I received a letter that will be coming forth hopefully at a future meeting about the SunSky ten k that I will not be participating in, but there there may be unfortunately, my athletic career is over.

I I've still got that training plan

for Due to medical reason I have a medical excuse now, so I can't I can't do any of that stuff. But I'm sure we have one commissioner that we can go and cheer on, but the SunSky 10 k will be over the Skyway Bridge, and I will be bringing forth a letter about that in the future because it will require closing down the the Skyway on a Sunday morning. Yeah. But we can we can go and share them on.

Are you assuming him?

Well, if you I mean, I don't know what the age limit is, but if they have a senior senior citizen thing, maybe you can just run

like Whatever division.

Yeah. Maybe you can just run to the top and then run back down. Also, one thing I wanna look at still, the chair resigned at the continuum of chair board continuum of care board, but I still wanna look at that during the budget time because one of her last acts was to kick off the Pinellas Housing Authority, which makes no sense since the Pinellas Housing Authority tries to help people get out of homelessness and the board deals with oversees the homeless population in Pinellas County. So I still want to continue our oversight responsibility in in looking at the continuum of care board. And then speaking of our senior friends, we have a very important day coming up June 2.

And I was doing some research, and he's a big baseball fan, as am I. And I believe one of his heroes growing up was Lou Gehrig. And June 2 happens

to

be Lou Gehrig Day in in Major League Baseball. So I thought that was pretty pretty interesting.

A lot of assumptions in those statements. That's all I have, mister. Thank you for doing your research. I

I had a question. Did you say that she resigned as chairman or resigned from the committee? Both.

I know she resigned as chairman. I don't know if she resigned. She resigned from both.

Okay. Good job.

Commissioner Noricki can answer. Commissioner Scott. Thank

you, mister chair. Well, I was out of town last week, but I wanna congratulate commissioner LaVala for sharing a great community meeting. I thought that went really, really well and got some great input. And I did have a chance to watch work session from last week, this past weekend, and some great presentations and a lot of really good discussion. Paul Saco gave us a good update on solid waste.

The discussion on the CAM, it looks like there's some bright spots there in terms of the marketing does seem to be improving the availability and you know, the awareness in the general public about what the CAM is all about. But long term, I still just wanna keep our eye on the sustainability of that of that program because the utilization of it is still less than 4% of available appointments, which works out to a per kept appointment of about $3,700, which is not sustainable. So I just wanna keep that eye on you know, our eye on that long term there. I mean, the goal is to make sure that people get the services they need. That's that's what we all wanna see happen.

But that opioid funding that we're using for the marketing is gonna run out at some point in the future. And I don't think any of us wanna see that become a general fund to ask when that is when that is done. And thinking about that further, I'm wondering if there's any are there any cost recovery opportunities in that process? I mean, we are promoting a program to direct people to about 26 providers, of which there are probably hundreds out in the community. But we're essentially sending them business.

So are there any cost recovery options in there in the future for us? So just something for us to consider down the road. But some bright spots there. So hopefully, the awareness continues and we can get more people that need those services into that program. The Office of Human Rights, I'm really glad that we had that discussion.

Commissioner Scheer, thank you for bringing for bringing that up. I also agree, concur with Ken Burke and Mike Twitty that it's performing an important function and it's integrated into more departments than I realized it was. And a lot of and a lot of grant support opportunities. And in some ways, it's you know, if it went away, the services available to the community would still be there, but there would be delays and it wouldn't be as high level of a service. So I do think it is important.

I think it continues and encouraged to see that Bettina is bringing forward a budget for 2027 that is a little lower than what she had last year. So I think that is encouraging. I completely support commissioner Peter's thoughts on data centers. Pinellas County is a home for many great, great things, but I don't believe that data centers are one of them. So you have my complete support on that.

Whether we can ban them altogether or just on the tax side, either way. And last year, I floated the idea of whether we should have our own ebike ordinance here in Pinellas County. Palm Coast passed one last year that I really thought was pretty good. And I think I passed around a copy of it at one point last year. And then the legislature had some bills that got introduced that were really pretty good legislation.

What came out in the final analysis was something that was very, very watered down and basically just kind of put some speed parameters around e bikes when they're in fifth within 50 feet of pedestrians. But it did create a task force to to take a look at that and bring bring suggestions back to the legislature for future consideration. So just wanted to toss that out there to see what the mood of this group is, to see if we should do something on our own. I mean, Tallahassee could do their own thing next year, and if we did something, they could preempt us or they could grandfather us in. But e bikes are here to stay.

They're only gonna continue to proliferate. I mean, it is part of the transportation network now. They're getting a lot more a lot more attention than they've ever gotten by law enforcement. And it's it's hard to I mean, you go it seems like every other day, there's a a story in the news about a serious e bike e bike crash. The Pinellas Trail is getting more attention by law enforcement than it's probably ever gotten, most mostly because of the proliferation of e bikes. And law enforcement doesn't really have a lot of tools in the box to really deal with them. So I'm kind of of the opinion that we should take a look at that, But I just kinda wanted to get a sense of what Mhmm. Everybody else around here thinks about that too. I think

I think it's a great idea. I mean, I think the more we talk about it and the more we kind of I mean, because our county's unique again to to the discussions that they're gonna be having on up there. And if we have our discussions, least it maybe we can give some input. Right. You know, and let them know kind of how that affects us and maybe some ideas that that make sense.

Whether it's enforcement because that's, you know, it's a tough one because there's so many miles of roads and trails and but at least from an education standpoint for the for the kids in our schools and the parents of those kids that sometimes don't even realize what they've gotten Right. And what they can do to augment their performance in in some way. So and the state state laws that allowed a lot of what I consider motorized vehicles on our trails, And that that's a whole another issue that

Right.

Again, getting back to how we manage our trail and, you know, all of that. So I I think it's a great conversation we should have as a workshop.

Okay.

I would like to look at it. Know, I Appreciate

that. Yeah.

They make me nervous. I see the e bikes running down our sidewalks doing 35 miles an hour, and I'm like, woah. Right. Yeah. That's, you know, you're endangering pedestrians. And so looking at it, I mean, whatever, you know, suggestions you have, I'd like to look at. So

And the enforcement piece is kinda like chicken and the egg. You know, enforcement, I think, evolves over time. But right now, law enforcement doesn't really have any tools in the box to even deal with it. Not really. You know? So but you look at Saint Pete just rolled out this drone squad that they've got. Right? So I think, know, the technology of enforcement continues to evolve and change. So I think, in some ways, you've gotta have some tools in the box enforcement to be able to use. And then I think the enforcement mechanisms will come over time.

Technology outracing what we have to control Right? Sometimes it happens.

Something like that. Right. Okay. So maybe something for a future future work work session. And then on activities, I recently,

in

the past couple weeks, was on the Kelly Kelly radio show. And I think commissioner Latvallo was on it as well. Kind of a fun show to do. And I don't know, commissioner Lott Valley, when when you were there, did Doug Kelly give you a copy of his book? Mhmm. The Sunshine State Mafia?

The novel one.

Yeah. Have you read

it? Yeah. I've read Dead Warriors.

Yeah. It's a pretty good book. Yeah. Yeah. It's really he's he's had an interesting life.

Yeah. I wasn't in there, so

Well, I wasn't either. I don't I don't know if anybody else was, but I wasn't in there either. But and then I had the opportunity to tour Oxy Ventures with doctor Johnson from Pinellas County Economic Development. They're manufacturing drones right here in in in Clearwater that are over in Iran right now blowing things up, and it's mostly being three d printed. It's really quite an interesting tour to take and to see what is happening with technology and how quickly they're how quickly and how cheaply that they're making these things.

It's almost a little almost a little scary. But anyways, very interesting tour, it's right here in Pinellas County, creating jobs, bringing federal money into into into our area. That's a good thing. Tonight, I'll be attending the UFIFAS dinner event at the Sheridan Sand Key. And just curious, did anybody else get this letter?

This was I got today from just a concerned citizen that is comparing the salaries of not for profit CEOs and how they've escalated in the last number of years to elected officials who have charge of much larger budgets. And what made me kind of think about this was the Suncoast Center situation that was recently pointed out, which in 2024, and I believe we have it's a different CEO now. But that time, the CEO was making $332,644 a year. So did anybody else receive this? Yeah.

You did? Okay. Alright. And I don't know that we have a role of playing any of this, but but, you know, I think when we do give money to not for profits, maybe it's something that we should just inquire about as to really where all the money is going.

If you if I can add to that, if you recall when that SunCo CEO was here, she complained about lack of government funding that she was receiving. Yeah. And she was making well over $300,000.

Yep.

And and I blame the weak board for approving that salary. And and after my friend's wife died, who was a client of Suncoast, and I believe that Suncoast, for a lack of better term, botched that case, I reached out to every board member to have a meeting with them, and there was only one board member that would meet with me. The rest of them refused. And and I met with Barbara and some some of her mental health team, and they didn't know that I was there due to a suicide because I didn't wanna tell them, you know, why I was there. And I said, what kind of mental health outreach do you do in the minority community?

And she looked at me and said, we have mental health counselor or we have African American counselors in South Saint Pete. Well, I used the term minority for a reason because I wanted to keep it kinda open ended. Well, we have all sorts of number one, we have all sorts of minority communities in Pinellas County, but we also have African American communities all over Pinellas County. We have a large African American community in Clearwater. We have a large African American community in Tarpon Springs and elsewhere.

Well, my friend happened to live I mean, they were right. He was African American, but he lived in Pinellas Park. So having African American counselors in South Saint Pete didn't do my friend any good. Well, finally, I got fed up with her during a meeting, and she said, you know, if I know what your grievance is, I could fix it. And I said, well, that's all well and good, but she's dead.

And so two days later, my friend gets a call from Suncoast for the very first time in, like, four months. And he responded, you know, by them calling him and said, now you finally know who the angry black man is that's friends with commissioner Latvalla. And they, you know, offered him, you know, count he has two daughters. They offered him, you know, counseling for his family, and he said, I wouldn't send my dog to Suncoast for counseling. I'm like, I'm done with you people.

But that was the only time that they cared to reach out to him was when they finally realized that I was you know, he was a friend of mine that I was so upset with them about. And so, I mean, Barbara was fleecing Suncoast for I mean, she did a horrible job but she's not there's high paid nonprofit CEOs all around Pinellas County. She's by far not the the only one.

I think it's a problem.

Sorry. I didn't mean

to No. That's good. Perfect. Good. Good. Yep.

But he agrees and so Yeah. It's

all good.

Alright. That's all I have, mister chair. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you, commissioner Scott. Commissioner Nowicki?

Thank you, mister chairman. Yesterday, I got to tour the Tampa Convention Center. The city of Saint Pete is moving forward with a feasibility study that I believe we agreed to pay half of to see about the merits of a, you know, analysis of a convention or conference center downtown Saint Pete. So I thought it was important, you know, to meet with the executive director of Tampa Convention Center. You know, they recently did a study where from the same person that's doing the consulting for the city of Saint Pete, where they recommended Tampa could double in size to handle more capacity for business and convention tourism.

So I'm really looking forward to the results that the city gets back from their study, and I'm sure it'll be assimilated with everybody here to see as conversations move forward over the years. Also, last week, I attended the COC Board of Directors meeting where I was unanimously approved to be back on the board. Congratulations. Thank you, everyone, for your support. With that, the chair did resign from her role as the chair and from the board of directors, but then I've been placed on the nominating committee to help select the new chair.

So, you know, maybe somebody will volunteer me. I don't know. But I'd happily go from being kicked off to being the chair of the COC in one month. So I'll be, you know, gladly take that role. Also, attended the YAC end of the year party at Sand Key Beach.

The kids did a beach cleanup. They got their cords for graduation, so it was really exciting to see them progress over the year along with commissioner Watanvala to go on the tours and and really see their progression and looking forward to them presenting their projects here. I toured First Contact that handles a lot of the two one one calls, you know, as we're, you know, talking, you know, mental health is a big issue in the county. And so it's kinda good to see, you know, what First Contact does, you know, hands on in real time, answering calls for housing, utilities, and and giving a lot of help. You know, they do a great great operation, and they do a lot of good work here in the community.

I also yesterday did a photo shoot, a k nine photo shoot with a two year old Holland who has been with the

Oh, yeah.

Shelter there for a good while and is becoming, I think, to where they could waive the fees for adoption. He's been there for a while, so hopefully he gets adopted. You know, they said I was very agile in my photos of getting down on the seawall.

Is that a dolphin in the background?

Well, I don't know if that's AI generated or not, but Shane did a great job taking photos, and I'm sure Shane captured that because you're normally just one and done, and he said, Well, hold on a second, commissioner. I need to take another photo. And I said, Shane, don't you think you got it? Know, you're mister one and done. He's great. He's like, well, that's the worst insult you could say to a photographer. But it's because he was probably getting the dolphin in the background and I couldn't see that. So hats off to Shane, animal services, everybody did a great job. And hopefully, Holland gets gets adopted. And and with that, mister chair, I yield back.

Thank you, commissioner. Thank you. Thank you for meeting with the folks from the convention center in Tampa. That's great. Better job we do over here on the study. You know? So that's great. Commissioner Peters.

Yeah. I don't have a lot. So I spoke at the Seminole Lane sponsored event that they've done for about thirty years now, their turnaround event, honoring students from middle school and high school that have turned themselves around academically and are doing really good and their stories were outstanding. It was really a pleasure to be there. We had PSDA moving.

PSDA, we're moving forward on buying a ferry boat. We've given the opportunity for them to buy one or two so that we can get moving on that. They've the Hubbards have done a really great job at finding options for us. Also, have a budget work workshop on Friday for PSTA. I wanna, you know, congratulate the communications department on that town hall.

I think they did it very seamlessly and did an outstanding job, so kudos to them. It is Mental Health Awareness Month. And, you know, I wanna commend the captain of the Lightning team came out and said that he was gonna step away to take care of his mental health. And I think, you know, it's it's harder for men, I think, to to come out and talk about that than women. And the more people that we have that are public about mental health and them needing time to step back.

We've seen it with a lot of athletes recently in the last couple years, that that's what it's gonna help to take to eliminate this stigma and get more people more comfortable with looking at their own mental health or mental illness. And so, you know, I I wish him the greatest success in his endeavor to take care of his mental health, his family, and his team. So since it is Mental Health Awareness Month, you will be seeing a lot of that I'll be sharing a lot of resources, things like that all month long. I encourage the comms department and all of you to do the same. It's an important issue for every one of our residents and and if you join me in in sharing more information, that'd be great.

And other than that, that's all I've got.

Thank you. And I always appreciate your passion and perspective on mental health. It is it is up it's there's a lot of problems and issues that many of of us have. And so I always think it's understated. It's never out there as much as the need the need is really prevalent. So appreciate your comments always. Yeah. Just another reminder about the Maroney thirtieth annual law enforcement responder dinner. It's on June 13. It's at Ruth Eckert Hall, 06:00.

We have at least one more seat at our table, maybe maybe three. We don't know yet. For sure, one. So if anybody's interested, please please let us know. Thank you, commissioner Peters, for bringing up the data center issue. And I'm not sure what role we're gonna be able to play, but I certainly support those efforts as well. And the e bike legislation, we already talked about that. I really appreciate that because that that is something that we've gotta gotta get ahead of and or try to get caught up. I say, I don't know if we'll get ahead of it. But and I think us doing our own kind of, like even though we may be, you know, superseded by the state, but but still I what's think that?

Or grandfather Dan.

What who knows? But anyway, think that's a great idea. Water conservation proclamation at Weed Nile. It was great with the extensions water stewards graduation ceremony out there.

They yeah.

That was it was really it was really fun, and it was really great to to have that. Also, it was an ambassador trip to Saint Pete College in Tarpon Springs to basically honor a small business, e bike e bike repair business. They have five people now, probably making I think their revenues were over 400,000, all all done in the last year. It's a exploding industry, as you commented on. There's it's they're they're here to stay.

And they take their repair to the people's house because those things are heavy. And so coming there to do the work, and I just really wanted to thank the the innovation hub at Saint Pete College for helping us put it on. They actually created a a little kind of infomercial for them while we were there, so that they got to talk about their business, put it on their website, and that kind of thing. So really great work. I also wanted to congratulate our Pinellas recovery program.

I got to go out and be there with Martha Cannon and her new home renovation. It was really the first one that was completed about I guess it was done just it took they had thirty days to do the repair, and I think they did it in a little over seven days. Not major repairs, but certainly significant for her. And I think that was the message we tried to get across that there's still opportunities for people to do some repair to help get some, you know, some funds back in the coffer, so to speak, if they qualify. And please don't assume anything.

But it was really it was really good to to be out there and to support her having her home back. So looking forward to my trip to Dublin next week. I'm going with economic development folks, and we'll be talking about some opportunities. Three county business community, I think there's 27 people that are going to talk to businesses about you know, looking at this region, if you will. We're gonna sprinkle in some tourism in there as well.

So I'm looking forward to that that trip. I'm sure commissioner Latvala will do a decent job at the workshop in spite of the fact that I won't be here to give a hard time to. Pick on somebody else next time. But look forward to to that trip. There's a lot going on on Alt 19. People have seen it up in Tarpon Springs. They did a whole new reconstruct storm water repaving. They brought it all the way down through Tampa Road. Some safety mechanisms put in place, repaving. Taking a little bit longer than I'd I'd like to have seen, but the work is just about complete.

Now they're doing some safety work down in Dunedin. And a lot of it has to do with this people using the middle lane for a passing lane at high speeds. And so, anyway, they're looking at that kind of thing. But the the next big one they're gonna be doing, I think construction starts this year, is the one at Alt 19 in Kurlu. So they're gonna widen that intersection.

There's gonna be two lanes going in all directions. There are already two lanes going west. There are gonna be two lanes going east, north, and south. Some more, you know, some better connectivity there with the number one state park in the in the state, obviously, right here in our backyard. And so we got a lot of traffic in that area. So that that work will be starting this month. So everybody be patient. We're trying to get through all that all 19 work and really wanna thank DOT for having ongoing meetings to keep me up to speed on what's going on. But it's never fast enough for sure. Heroes Fest was this past week in Downtown Palm Harbor.

I got there just a little bit early. It was awfully hot. And then they apparently I didn't get to get back there because when I was thinking about going back, the rains came. Much wanted and needed rains that we that came on on Saturday. And then apparently, they started back up the event, and it was a really a really successful event. The arrival of the Purple Heart monument there at at the White Chapel. There's gonna on the ground, so we're gonna have a Purple Heart monument, hopefully, to be able to celebrate Purple Heart Day on August 7 this year. We'll have to wait and see about that. But that was nice to see that get there. I really apologize to the employees for missing the appreciation picnic.

And just personally, obviously, wanna thank them for all the work that they do every day for our residents. I try to tell people, you just have to get out and talk to some of our employees. They are impressive. They are they service folks. They like to do for the community. And they do it every day, they do a great job at it. And really proud of them, and I hope they at least were able to enjoy the day, enjoy the food and the sports and all of that. So thank you again for all that you do and to commissioner Flowers comment about happy Mother's Day. Somebody had reached out to see give you know, get your take on your mom and all of that. And my mom passed in 2008.

So it was kind of kinda nice to be able to reflect on on on just mothers and what they do because we dads think we do a lot, but they we don't we pale in comparison in general to what moms do and what and what they mean to the family unit. So really really I miss my my my mom, but I got a chance to kind of reflect a little bit and was going through. It took about five minutes to reflect, and then I realized I hadn't pushed the record button. So how's that for so I'll have to do it all over again to capture it for the for the folks that were hoping to get it. But happy Mother's Day to everybody and to you all around this table who are moms as well. Anything else or the good of the order?

Anything Mister

chair, we need a vote, please, on the resolution for the joint meeting. Oh, thank you.

We got a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. Anything else? Alright. This meeting's adjourned.