City Council - Regular Meeting

All right, go ahead and call this meeting to order. This is the City Council meeting for Thursday, July 16th, 2026. And can we all please stand for the invocation brought by Father Derek Saldana from the St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church and the Pledge of Allegiance.

Let us pray. Good and gracious God, we come here today with grateful hearts for a beautiful city we get to call home. We ask today for your wisdom, guidance and discernment upon our Mayor, the City Council and all City officials and staff. Grant them the insight to make decisions that promote justice, prosperity and the well-being of every citizen. We pray that they will work together in harmony and lead with integrity, compassion and a spirit of collaboration. We ask your special blessings upon our first responders, essential workers, and all those who work tirelessly to keep our city safe, strong, and prosperous. We ask all this in your most precious name. Amen.

Please be seated. Will the clerk please call the roll?

Mayor Robertson? Here. Deputy Mayor Gilbert? Here. Council Member Paul? Here. Council Member Urban?

Here.

Council Member Fletcher? Here.

All right, thank you. And first up, agenda update. City Manager, do you have any updates?

Yes, thank you, Mayor. I'd like to ask that we move Council Action Number 3, Resolution 2026-096R, the Boys and Girls Club Agreement, directly after the proclamation section and before the consent agenda. Additionally, I'd like to move consent item number 12, resolution number 2026-101R to be the final item under council action. And public hearing number 12. Ordinance 2026-32 needs to be before public hearing number seven, so we will read it with public hearing number seven. We'll read them together, but we will need Ordinance 2026-32 action taken on that first. And that's all. Thank you.

All right. Thank you very much. And first up, we have a presentation. We have a proclamation of recognition of Parks and Recreation Month presented by Deputy Mayor Gilbert.

Well, thank you, Mayor and Council. This proclamation is for Parks and Recs. A little background. There was 23,000 people at 4 July this year. Now, if you talk about community engagement, that was community engagement. You talk about the city, that's the city. If you talk about small-town city, I know we're getting bigger, but there's a lot of love going on this week. The 4th of July was a great, great event. If you were not there, come next year. I'd be remiss if I didn't say that my daughter works for Parks and Rec. She worked there well before I got elected. And so there's no conspiracy theory here, but we love Parks and Rec. I was a camp counselor in the 80s when I played football in college. I'd come home in the summer and counsel kids. and I became a social worker by degree. But that's where it starts, Parks and Rec, that's where it all belongs. So we'll be talking a lot about that today, but I'd really like to recognize the proclamation of Parks and Rec and the Parks and Rec Proclamation Month. So this is in King James, and I know a little bit about King James, so if I mess it up, please bear with me. I don't know if I can, it's that distance thing. Do I need my glasses or I don't? 63's getting tough. Here we go, we'll do it this way. Whereas parks and rec programs are an integral part of the communities throughout this country, including St. Cloud. And where parks and recs promotes health, wellness, improving the physical and mental health of people who live nearby parks and participate in parks. Whereas parks and recreation encourage physical activity for providing space for popular sports, hiking trails, swimming, and many other activities designated to promote activity, lifestyles, and. whereas parks and recreation programs and education activities such as out-of-school programs, youth sports, environmental education, and critical to child development. And whereas parks and rec increase communities' economic prosperity through increased property values, expansion of local tax base, increased tourism, and the attraction and retention of business, and it also has crime reduction. Whereas The United States House of Representatives has designated July as Parks and Recreation Month, and the City of St. Cloud recognizes the benefits and derives from the parks and recreation resources, and I, Ken Gilbert, Deputy Mayor, along with the City Council, all my friends out here, recognize the benefits derived from parks and recreation. I, Ken Gilbert, proclamized July 2026 as Parks and Recreation Month. In our city, I urge all citizens to enjoy the future time and leisure with friends and families and communities in our parks and recreation facilities. Thank you very much, Parks and Recreation. You're an integral part of our city, and thank you very much. Do I need to turn?

Parks and Rec, do you want to come up and take a picture with Deputy Mayor?

See that, Jay? I got you covered.

Deputy Mayor, go ahead. Do you want to get a picture with Parks and Rec?

Thank you, guys. Thank you all very much. I'll have this signed. Okay, thank you.

Yeah, thank you very much, Parks and Rec. If y'all didn't join us out there the 4th of July, they did an amazing job out there. Everybody was happy. Fireworks were amazing. So even though we had a little bit of rain, I think it cleared up just in time for everybody to have a great time out there. So thank you for everything y'all did out there. Take your time. We're here all night. All right. First up we have, would the clerk please read resolution number 2026-087R. Is that correct? Is that the one we're doing first?

The Boys and Girls Club.

City Manager, is that the correct one? Item number three.

I'm looking quickly.

Or no, we're doing council action number three.

2026-096R. Give me one second.

Sorry. That was on consent. Both of them are.

The one from council action.

All right. Yes, item number three, 2026-096R.

Resolution number 2026-096R, a resolution of the City Council of the City of St. Cloud, Florida, approving a facility use and license agreement between the City of St. Cloud and Boys and Girls Club of Central Florida, providing for conflicts, providing for severability, providing for an effective date.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council. Scott Davidoff, Deputy City Manager. This evening, you have before you here the facility use and license agreement with the Boys and Girls Club of Central Florida. Just a little bit of background. The City Council has approved a major expansion and renovation of Hopkins Park that includes a community center. City staff and the Boys and Girls Club staff have developed a proposed agreement that will provide enhanced services for participants. And this agreement will reduce the city's annual general fund operating costs by approximately $300,000 per year. Just to remind everybody on the upcoming expansion and renovation that the City Council has approved for Hopkins Park. That includes a 17,000 square foot community center, basketball court, baseball field, multipurpose field, community garden, playground, and parking lot. Additionally, the city has partnered with Toho Water Authority to build a new lift station, and that will be able to connect residents to sanitary sewer that are in that general area. That portion of the project was funded through a grant. When we talk about the project and the cost of the project, so the city council has budgeted approximately $13 million for the total cost of the project. All the funds from the project come from debt that the city has secured. The only grant that the city received is for the sanitary sewer portion of the project. That's separate from the park itself. That's the program that we're partnering with Toho Water Authority on. So this is solely funded through city dollars without grants. And the city has additional funding, excuse me, the city has had additional funding for the project that we had applied for and our legislators had been working towards, but unfortunately that's been vetoed by the Florida State Legislature. When we talk about the community center,

And again, we're focusing solely on the community center here.

The estimated annual operating cost of that new community center, again, the new building that's part of this project, is approximately $300,000 per year. That includes all the utilities, staffing, program expenses, and the general operating expenses for that new facility. and the estimated operating costs for the remainder of the park. So everything on the exterior of the building, all the grounds, the playgrounds, everything else that's out there is approximately $100,000 per year. And forgive me for reading some of this. This was, thank you to the Boys and Girls Club who provided some excellent points on what they do. The Boys and Girls Club of Central Florida serves more than 15,500 youth and teens ages six through 18 across 39 clubs in Orange, Seminole, Osceola, Lake, and Brevard counties. They focus on six key areas that are proven to help young people. succeed, and those are education and career development, character and leadership development, sports, fitness and recreation, health and life skills, the arts, and mental health. You can see here, certainly not going to read this, all the academic successes and the health and wellness successes they've had here. These numbers are from the local Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Florida. You can see everything with 100% of their high school seniors graduated with plans for the future. 80% are earning A's and B's. 95% of the youth surveyed are certain they will attend college. You can see the health and wellness numbers there as well. And then the Boys and Girls Club of Central Florida is already serving 1,000 children and teens across Osceola County and has served the St. Cloud community for years through its existing club that's been here in the city. Sports and recreation are among the most popular offerings at the existing club, and there are other programs that they focus on to help them develop positive skills. When we talk about the agreement, some of the proposed agreement highlights that we talk about is that the Boys and Girls Club shall be responsible for the day-to-day operation of the community center and the programs conducted within. Cities shall maintain all the operations of the outdoor facilities and amenities of Hopkins Park. Wanna make sure that everybody understands that. There have been some questions on that. This agreement is only for the building itself, nothing on the exterior. All staff, just like all of our programs and all of our contractors, were required to undergo background screenings. Boys and Girls Club will be responsible for all the utilities and maintenance of the community center. The city retains the right to utilize the building subject to availability at no charge. One of the things that was very important to the city was to honor uh, Hopkins park and the Hopkins park community. So the city will be installing and maintaining a historic display honoring Hopkins park and any naming of the building must include Hopkins park to recognize the city's historic and cultural significance. One of the things that this council and the community had wanted with the new facility was for there to be outdoor restrooms. The current park has not had that. So there are restrooms that are accessible from the exterior of the building, and those will remain open and available to the public during park operating hours. You don't have to go inside the building to access those. Those are solely from the exterior. The city shall be able to utilize the facility outside of the Boys and Girls Club operational hours for public rentals and programs. So what that means is that if the Boys and Girls Club closes at a specific time and someone wishes to have a rental in there or there's some additional programs that the city may be interested in, the city will be able to provide those programs, again, assuming that there's availability, and that would be done by the city. And then it's a 50-year lease with a 180-day termination clause for any reason. Some additional information is that the Boys and Girls Club has met with Hopkins Heroes and has offered to meet with any other community groups that are out there. They continue to reiterate their commitment to working with a variety of community groups. Every conversation we have had with the Boys and Girls Club, they have been very, very adamant that this is a community program, this is a community resource, and that's what they specialize in. And they want to continue working with community groups within Hopkins Park and within the city. Some questions have been raised about any city staff who would be impacted by this. Those individuals have been notified that if this were to happen, we do have maintained them as Parks and Recreation staff just in other areas of the city. So no one will be losing their jobs as part of this agreement. However, the Boys and Girls Club has indicated that they would guarantee any member of the staff an interview if they would like to consider employment with the Boys and Girls Club. They certainly recognize that if there's anyone who is interested in moving over to the Boys and Girls Club, that they would love to have them in there. And with that, I will turn it over to the Boys and Girls Club. They're here. I did want to mention one other thing. Please forgive me. To make sure that we get it on the record is that last night during the Recreation Advisory Committee, they did pass a unanimous motion requesting that there be additional time prior to the City Council making any decisions. So I just wanted to make sure that we did get that on the record. And with that, I will turn it over to the Boys and Girls Club.

Additionally, there were some changes made to the proposed agreement that have been distributed to the City Council so that you have that here.

Thank you, City Manager.

Good evening, Mr. Mayor and Council and our wonderful community members. My name is Jamie Merrill and I have the pleasure of serving as the president and CEO for this wonderful organization at Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Florida. And I'm gonna introduce my trusted colleague here in just a moment. You heard a lot of stats earlier. You heard a lot of information about our great organization and how many youth we serve across Central Florida and even here in Osceola. But I think what's important to know is that our incredible club directors and staff even though we have that big of a reach, they know every single child's name, family's name, and their story. It's actually how we get the results that we get to get 100% of our high school seniors graduating. And 99% of our kids across all of our organization having a trusted relationship with an adult, that matters incredibly. We've got our club director here in the audience with us, Mr. Durrell, and I spent the afternoon at our Saint Club club just a couple blocks down the road earlier today with the kids busting at the seams because we need opportunities to be able to expand. What's beautiful about the Boys and Girls Club is that we lead with legacy in every single community. It's one of the things that we're known for. We know this great legacy of Hopkins Park and Reverend Hopkins and all the great faith-based and community leaders that helped to fight for the youth to have a place to go. And we're honored to be considered as an opportunity to really consider all of the generations to come and develop them in all the ways that they need to. We are going to work with all of our community groups. And there's really great statistics that show in every single neighborhood that we place a Boys and Girls Club, crime reduces by 13% to 16% because our community protects us and we protect the youth. And we'd love that opportunity to continue leading this legacy as a partner in this great St. Cloud area. But I'd like for you to not take it from me. I'd like to introduce to you Adelise. who's currently a staff member, but grew up in our St. Cloud Club just a couple blocks down the road and was our Youth of the Year. In fact, our chief here was actually one of the judges when she served as Youth of the Year in that contest. Elise?

Hi everybody, hope you're doing well. My name is Adelise Marcano, or Miss Adelise, as the kids like to call me. If you just give me a moment. So, my journey uniquely starts with my father and my brother, my older brother. They attended the Boys and Girls Club in New York, back when it was called Boys Club, and when my family moved here to Florida, my mom knew that she wanted to put my younger brother and I into the Boys and Girls Club. So when we moved here, When we moved here, my mom looked into the Boys and Girls Club and unfortunately there wasn't a location around. But I don't know what came over my mom. One day she just decided to see if there was one in St. Cloud and luckily there was. And at the time, Mr. Lindsey was the former service director. We met up with him that day and we toured the Boys and Girls Club and we absolutely fell in love with it. And my mom asked Mr. Lindsey if there was any if there was any career, if there was any I apologize.

You're fine. You're doing great.

If there was any opportunity for teens, because she wanted me to be a part of the community, and Mr. Lindsay said that he would love to onboard me as an LIT, which is a leader in training. So at the time, I was homeschooled, and I was working at McDonald's. So when I wasn't working or when I was done with my schoolwork, I would dedicate my time at the Boys and Girls Club, religiously. That was my second home. And so when I was there, I loved it, to be honest with you. I was either helping Mr. Lindsay with administrative work, or I was helping the staff with the kids, and I grew a really strong bond with a lot of them, and that's what made me want to become on board at the Boys and Girls Club. And so the two requirements that Mr. Lindsay personally made with me to be hired as a staff was to become 18, to start college and at the time I did not want to start college I did not want to go to college but I did and I'm currently studying well I'm currently studying my bachelor's and I want to get in business administration so I So as you know, I'm a staff now, so I'm in school, and I onboarded as a youth development specialist, and I work with the youth, and I really loved it. And I recently got a promotion to be a social-emotional specialist, so I think that my work as an SELYDS is super important. I teach the kids about self-awareness, I teach the kids about self-management, and I teach the kids about relationship skills and I feel like those are really important things for the kids to know because I mean those are really important life skills and whatnot so it's safe to say that my experience at the Boys and Girls Club was great and it's still going great and I'm excited to expand and I'm excited to continue doing what I love but also serving the kids and most importantly like having fun thank you for your time

Amazing story. What was the acronym that you used? What's your position?

Social Emotional Learning Youth Development Specialist. It's a mouthful. S-E-L-Y-E-D-S for short.

That's it. Very cool.

Thank you very much.

She also told me earlier today that she's coming for your job, Darrell, and she is the future club director of St. Cloud, is what she wants to be. Born and raised here, and that is her dream, to continue leading the future generations of all the years to come. Thank you.

Thank you. All right, we have some members of the audience who would like to speak on this item. First up, we have Ms. Theresa Malhot. I assume this is the one you wanted to speak on, even though it had public hearing circled. Yeah, come on up. I just assumed this was the one you meant. You had public hearing number three circled, but I figured it was Council Action 3.

Teresa Melhot, 2924 Cool Breeze Circle, St. Cloud, Florida, 34769. I did want to comment a couple things. I do think the Boys and Girls Club is a valuable, good organization. My daughter went to one in California, so I kind of know how they work and their after-school program. But what I want to say, there's a big difference between children's after-school care and a community center. I have myself have attended many, many events out at Hopkins Park, and not all of them were for children. Some were for adults, and that's what a community center does. So they take kids up to the age 18, but what about 18 plus? You're not leaving no options for these people to have a place to go or still continue to have events out there? I do see on the thing it said you could have events afterwards, but if the city's not maintaining anybody out there anymore if this goes through. I also, yeah, I want to look at the timer.

No, you're fine. Teresa, go ahead. We love hearing you talk.

I also want to say is I don't understand this big rush. We don't even know if the homestead thing is going to pass. And I realize you're all caught between a rock and a hard place in trying to figure out all the cities in Florida are doing the same thing right now. All the cities, all the counties, everybody's saying, you know, we're not going to have money for this or that. But I also notice when I'm looking at the agenda tonight, the next one down under this one, you all want to pay $7,000 in parks and recreation impact fees to buy a 3,640-square-foot building located at 1401. New York Avenue, which I'm believing that's right next to Veterans Park. So on one hand, you have here that you're all saying we have to like give it away for a dollar a year, a brand new building that the city is taxpayers, not city, the taxpayers are paying for. The taxpayers. It is not really the city council's building or the city's building. This is taxpayers. So I just wish you all weren't in such a hurry and there's a lot more questions to be had or to go through. Like... And then you want to keep calling it a community center, which it really isn't then. If it's just going to be for kids, a community center includes everyone. And me at 70 plus, if I still went out and go to the community center for events, others do too. And why are we giving away a brand new building? Maybe it would be better to give the old community center that probably needs a lot more fixing up all the time than a brand new building for a dollar a year for 50 years when the taxpayers are paying $10 million for it. That just seems irresponsible to me in a way.

Thank you. All right. I'm going to correct a few things, Teresa. You can sit down if you like, but I'm going to correct a few things.

I don't know if you want me to sit up here to berate me.

No, no, no. But there's a few statements that weren't accurate. First of all, on the agenda, those are parks impact fees. That's different than operations money to money to operate that park. Different money. You can't use impact fees to operate that park. You know the difference. You've been around here for many, many years. I know you know the difference. The other thing is, city manager, what events, what adult events do we host out there? I just want to understand that.

We may occasionally do an event that includes adults, but that's not part of our regular programming out there. It's typically the after-school program in that building. We do have a monthly meeting with the Hopkins Park area residents, but the majority of the events are outside.

Okay. So there's no swing dancing, line dancing, or adults stuff that you do at the Senior Center? Teresa, maybe you know events. You spoke of it, so I'll go ahead and let you address that.

But we do have the ability in the agreement to still do events also.

All right, go ahead, Teresa.

But who's going to be in charge of those?

Hold on. What events?

Well, I attended a woman's empowerment event, but that would be considered DEI now.

Did somebody rent that facility, an outside organization for that?

I don't believe so.

Okay, so that was one of them.

Okay, and then I attended another one on... It was a workshop on vision board, vision board workshop, which was adults only, even though a couple people did bring their small kids that didn't have a babysitter. Okay. That's fine.

I've never been to an adult event. Other than I know the Hopkins Park community, they have their community meetings out there, and I assume that that could still continue if this were to move forward.

Yes, it can. So part of the revision, that was always intended to allow. I see the revision one now.

Let me get the answer from City Manager, please.

Yes. So the intent has always been, and the Boys and Girls Club has been amazing every time we've spoken to them about the needs of the residents in the area. Actually, the citizens of St. Cloud for the facility, and they've been very willing to work with us. So... Just to clarify that they were willing to work with us, we put language in this proposal today that would allow the city to be the person allowing some of these events outside. So the agreement already allowed us to use the property for any city events. And then we added language now that if there was an outside group, like the Hopkins neighborhood meeting that happens once a month, if the Boys and Girls Club doesn't have staff available to stay after hours, that city staff could go ahead and facilitate the use of the building moving forward.

I just want the taxpayers to get.

I'm sorry.

I just think the taxpayers should get. If we're paying $10 million for a building, then maybe the taxpayers should choose whether we want to give it away for a dollar a month.

Okay. Thank you for reminding me because that's the other inaccurate statement. Yeah. So nobody's giving anything away. So ma'am, I've got the floor.

Okay.

Sorry.

Okay. Nobody's giving anything away.

If you read the presentation, $300,000 a year to operate this facility. So we're saving. So parks and recreation, you don't make money on any of these activities, okay? So with this property tax reform, I'm just going to go ahead and say that for the whole room to understand. I'm sure many of you do. Parks and Rec, unfortunately, I know we've got our amazing Parks and Rec in the room, but everybody knows that those, I'm going to call them luxuries, are the first to be cut, and it sucks if that were to occur. And that's where we have been trying for many, many months to get out ahead of all of this in case that happens. Now, that's the citizen's choice. It's a menu. And I've said this in many meetings in the past few months, you want hot dogs, you want steak, right? Here's, here's your options. If you want hot dogs, vote for this thing. If you want steak, don't vote for it. I don't either way. It's up to the citizens, whether or not they want to vote for it. We can only provide the level of service that the citizens would like to have. And that is up to them come November. So thank you, Teresa. I appreciate you. All right. That's all right. We're all done things. Uh, next up we have. Stephanie Gilbert.

Good evening.

Good evening, Mayor and members of City Council. My name is Stephanie Gilbert, and I live at 2008 Pine Street, St. Cloud. As many of you know, my family's roots run deep in Hopkins Park. My children grew up there, My daughter continues that legacy today through her work with Parks and Rec. But Hopkins Heroes was not founded for my family. It was founded to honor the legacy of the elders in our community who built this village and to make sure the supportive village is there for the next generation. I want to be very clear tonight. We are not seeking to control the space or dictate how it is ran. Hopkins Heroes is a volunteer-driven nonprofit. Our board and supporters give their time because they love this community. We exist to support the community, or support the city, and serve as a bridge to the neighborhoods, not to get in the way of progress or demand control. I'm sorry, I gotta get my mic.

Take your time, Stephanie.

We got all night. For the past six years, we have proudly partnered with the city and Parks and Rec, a journey that began as a dedicated volunteer effort and officially grew into Hopkins Heroes when we became a registered nonprofit in February of 24. Together, we have expanded programs, served hundreds of local children, and proven what is possible when we work hand in hand. Because of that strong history of working together, the sudden shift in direction regarding the future management of the park took many in our community by surprise, mainly me. However, we want to move forward constructively. We recently met with representatives from the Boys and Girls Club in good faith because we believe collaboration is the best path. This is not about opposing any organization. It's about making sure the heart and soul of Hopkins Park remains central to the vision. A 50-year agreement is a massive milestone, and we all want to ensure it is an astounding success. Because summer camp runs through August and construction is still on the horizon, we have a unique window of opportunity. This transition period gives us the space to sit down together, refine details, and make sure structured community involvement is built right into the foundation of this agreement. Tonight, I respectfully ask you to place a six-month hold on this vote, commit to hosting five collaborative workshops, and work with the community during this time. Let's use this space to work together so that the neighborhood's voice is actively reflected in the final agreement. This isn't just about a building. It's about preserving the legacy of those who came before us, our elders, our families, and ensuring future generations inherit at Hopkins Park where the community is included, heard, and continues to thrive. Thank you for your time and service in St. Cloud. Yes, ma'am, thank you, Stephanie.

Let me ask you a question, Stephanie.

Yes, sir. So six months, so you support the Boys and Girls Club being in there, but you just want six months to hammer out any, just understand a little better, is that kind of where we're at?

I don't unsupport it at all. I think everyone should work together. And if it's in the best interest of the kids in the community, absolutely.

Okay, so you do support them. That's a little different than what Teresa was saying. So Teresa doesn't believe we should have the Boys and Girls, but you are good with the Boys and Girls Club.

I'm good with them as long as we bring community and build on what it's been there for the last 50 years.

Okay.

All right. Thank you.

All right. Pastor Augusta Odom, you're up here already. Thank you. Yes, sir.

Thank you. My name is Pastor August Odom. I live at 1621 Orange Avenue, St. Cloud, and I'm also the president of the Hopkins Park Community Watch, which I've been there a long time. But I'm here to agree with what Stephanie has said. We worked hard over the years in that park. You know, it was donated to us, to that community, you know, as a park by Mr. Clifford Frederick. And we as children, when we got out of school, we had a gentleman that worked for the Becks. He brought his tractor out there and his disc. And it was palmettoes, it was bushes. He dished it all down. And when we come after school, he had a tractor out there with a trailer where we picked up roots and everything else that was in the way, you know, of getting that park ready to have a building on it. And the children and all of us, we did that for a long time. And the building finally got built. But we are only concerned about, you know, us as a community, where we stand. You know, with this, with the girls and boys, boys and girls clubs coming in to the facility, where do we stand in the community, you know, to be a part of it? You know, we got people, Mr. Robert Hopkins, you know, he worked hard before the park ever got built, you know, and Mr. Edie. Okay, work with the children, you know, the baseball and everything, you know, and others like myself and Stephanie and some of the other relatives there worked hard with the children. Those children got out of school, and they went to the building, okay. They had computers in there that we got donated from the county, and they helped those children with their homework every day. Every day they worked with those children with their homework, you know, and those children was happy, amen, to be in there, you know. And the other thing we did, we had the, we used to call it the Hopkins Park Crime Watch meeting. We did have some crime out there, okay, but we got that situation taken care of by the grace of God and by St. Cloud PD, Osceola County. state troopers and others, you know, where we clean up that drug situation. It's been cleaned up ever since. Now, we've had a few, you know, that have been popped in there, but we have the crime watch. We changed it from the Hopkins Park crime watch because some of the parents in there that had children out there that was you know, doing their thing, and they quit coming, so we changed it from Hopkins Park Crime Watch to Hopkins Park Community Watch, and that's what we call it today, Hopkins Park Community Watch, because we're concerned about, you know, our children. We weren't trying to throw them in prison or nothing like this right here, but we was trying to get them to come in and talk with us, and we talked to them and tried to get them to straighten themselves out, but it never happened. You know, so anyway, but we are adults, oh God, and the children of Hopkins Park community. Again, we just want to know where we stand, you know, with this. And like Stephanie said, I think if y'all would give us more time for this to be voted on, voted on, you know, and let us, amen, Father, Lord, be here when it does happen. God bless you.

Yes, sir. Yeah, Pastor Odom, I'll tell you, you know, as a child, I played on those fields. As an adult, of course, I came and spoke at the meetings. With your nonprofit, I personally donated to your nonprofit. I know other council members up here as well. David Eady Day out there, we all participate. I know the police department does their water gun wars out there. We always enjoy that. No, you don't but that's all right. I think that the parks and rec and the kids they they will feel every time we love that park Amen, we would never do anything that would be disrespectful to the history of that park We love the history of our community as you can tell this council is focused 100% on the history of our entire community When it comes to this, yeah, obviously I would love whatever facility goes there obviously this has been in the works for how many years Stephanie and

A lot.

Three, four, five years?

Well, this one's been four and a half.

Okay.

Yeah, and I've been here a year and a half, right, on council. Oh, yes. And now we're finally getting to a point where we might see something there, right? And unfortunately, with the property tax reform, that really kind of changes the direction of wins. But I think... I know with me, and I believe with this council, that anything inside that facility would pay respect to the history of that park. I know with that field, I believe there should be a bigger sign for David Eadie on that field. I've spoken with that with the Eadie family as well in the past. I think every one of us loves that community. Thank you very much for both of your inputs on this.

One more thing I do want to say is that when we heard about the situation with the Boys in Gloves Club, we was told, understand that they had been communicating with y'all ever since April or May or whatever have you, you know, and when we found out about it, it was two days last week before we found out anything about it. We would have loved for them to communicate with us, come out to the park and talk to us about it, you know, see how we felt about it. We're not here to condemn. okay, we're here to work with, you know, but we didn't hear anything until then, you know, and we thought, you know, that it would have been fair, you know, for us to have known what was going on before, you know, last week.

okay yeah and i do understand y'all do many programs out there uh stephanie with hopkins heroes and i spoke with leonard thompson as well and heart cry church yeah and he told me they participate in some programming as well so yeah i wouldn't mind um some time for those organizations to speak with boys and girls club yeah i mean if y'all don't mind me continue i know we're kind of it's a little different tonight um I toured the Boys and Girls Club here locally, the one on Simpson Road, and I've toured the one in St. Cloud, and I think they're an amazing organization. I can't think of a better one if we were to go this route, and I think they'd be more than happy to sit down with you folks, and I think you've already had one meeting with them already. Okay.

All right. Thank you. Thank you. Council, do you have any comments?

We don't necessarily have any questions or suggestions. I'm wondering if staff, so you were talking about, you know, the folks out there being able to have access to the building. If one of the staff members could explain the one section of the amended agreement that we have.

That kind of answers their question. Oh, your mic's not on.

I'm sorry.

And confirms the ability for the use of the city and whatnot because that came, you know, here just in the last, you know, hours or so.

Yes, Council Member Fletcher. One of the things that we had done in this was following some of the comments from I attended the Hopkins community meeting last week from some of the other comments that were out there. And these were things that had been discussed with the Boys and Girls Club that they were happy to do, but what we made some amendments this afternoon to actually memorialize those items in there. And it specifically reads, The city's right to use the building shall include but not be limited to the right to authorize the use of the building by third parties during such times as licensee is not engaged in active programming and under such terms and conditions that the city may require. It is expressly agreed and understood that during such times as a city has authorized the use of the building by a third party, the licensee shall not be responsible in any manner for the supervision of such activities. activity authorized by the city. And what that means is we're making sure that the Boys and Girls Club has the ability to add additional programs to work with other organizations, whether it's Hopkins Heroes, whether it's any other third party programming activities and events that would be out there, that they have the ability to do that unfettered and they can keep moving forward with that. We also added language in there, as I had mentioned previously, that says that on the days and times when the facility is closed, so for example, if the building were to close at 8 p.m., say, and there was somebody who wanted to be in there and have a meeting from 8 to 9 p.m., We have now put language into the agreement that says that the city then can go ahead and facilitate those meetings or those rentals to happen, as well as additional city programs that may wish to occur during those times as well.

And then to follow up on that, so for example, if We were working with an organization that wanted to do, say, a large food drop, like a tractor trailer load of food to give to folks in the community who would need that. That would be able to happen because of some of these provisions.

That would have been able to happen anyway because all of those things are happening on the exterior of the building and the exterior of the grounds as it is now. It's a special event application process through city staff. All of those things, nothing changes as far as that goes. 99.9% of the special events that have happened at Hopkins Park over the years, at least since the city has operated the facility, they have all gone through that same process. So nothing changes there. Did want to point out also that one of the benefits to this, the city, we max out the programs. We've talked here at city council meetings with summer camp. We max out at 42. Obviously, they're able to have significantly more than that in the new facility, which means they're able to serve more children. And one of the other things that was not mentioned in this slide that I did want to point out as we're talking about the age of participants, Citi only serves participants up to 13. So those children from 13 up There has been a gap that the city has not been able to serve those children. And with the agreement before you with the Boys and Girls Club, that's a group now that will be served and will be recognized.

Thank you, Scott.

Can I ask a question?

Oh, yeah.

Not right now, but can I get a copy of that one as well?

Of course. Absolutely.

You can have mine.

Council Member Paul, you want it?

Yes, so we've already spoken about the history of Hopkins Park, and I do want to acknowledge someone that is a history person. The East St. Cloud Civic Club, they did fight to get this park into the community, and respectfully, I think, you know, we honor in that legacy because right now there are two current living, which is Ann Jones and Freddie Holsey, still around. And then secondly, wasn't here for the beginning of the conversation with Hopkins Park and I know I spoke to Miss Gilbert many times about Hopkins and how she can partner with them I do believe there should be transparency coming from the city regarding these discussions when they're out in the community, because these are the people that live in the community, they know their community, and keeping them involved, it makes a difference and the residents will respect that more. So I can't speak on before who promised what, I wasn't here for that conversation, I can only speak after 11-5-2024, And then there were misinformation pit out there about the agreements being approved. As of today, not one city council person has voted on that agreement. And then there was talk about the park being sold. Nowhere in agreement states that the park was being sold. And then lastly, If this does get delayed for six months, I would like to see we do have a Parks and Recreation Advisory Board. If there is future conversation, I would like to have them part of that conversation, so that way I'm not sure if they knew what was going on, but to allow them to be involved in the conversation moving forward.

Yes, ma'am. All right, next up we have Bobbi Lantry.

Hi, Bobbi Lantry, 3316 Cypress Point Circle, St. Cloud, Florida. I currently serve as the chairman of the St. Cloud Parks and Recreation Advisor Board, and I would like to elaborate on the recommendation that we unanimously approved by our board at last night's meeting. We recently learned of the proposed agreement for the Boys and Girls Club to operate the future Hopkins Park Community Center, a facility that has not yet broken ground, and given that this proposal only became Public last week our board felt it was important to carefully consider the potential impact before such a significant Long-term agreement was approved after a thoughtful discussion the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board voted unanimously Five to zero to recommend the City Council postponed taking action on the agreement until additional information became available. I I wanted to be clear that our recommendation was not a statement for or against the Boys and Girls Club. Rather, it reflected our belief that there were still many important decisions that our resident and community need answers to before entering into the long-term operating agreement. Some of those answers I heard in an updated agreement just now that they were talking about that we had ourselves questioned last night, so those were additional, some of those questions. But some of those questions that we talked about were including understanding the terms of the agreement, how the partnership would function on a day-to-day basis, what role the city would continue to play in operating the facility, how access would be provided to the public, and how other local organizations would have opportunities to utilize the community center, some of which it sounds like is already being addressed, so that's wonderful. Furthermore, as the advisory board charged with representing our parks and recreation system, we believe it is our responsibility to encourage a transparent and informed decision making process. We respectfully ask that the city council delay the vote until these questions can be better addressed and the community has had an opportunity to better understand the proposed partnership and how it worked. And we do appreciate the council's consideration of our recommendation and we do remain available to assist in reviewing any proposal or any additional information as it becomes available. Thank you again for allowing me to speak. Thank you, Bobby.

Council Member Fletcher, you still, you good? I just want to add, you know, all of us are citizens here as well, just like y'all. There's no difference. We were elected up here to make decisions for the benefit of the community. We didn't put the language together, right? Our job is to review it, take the input from the citizens, vote on it, vote our conscience. And, I mean, I just want to be transparent with the fact that It was only today that I received phone calls in opposition of this. So Stephanie, you could have reached out to me. There were things said on social media and fingers get pointed at council when we, this is the time where we get to discuss it with one another and work out details in front of the audience, right? So to start attacking the council or the city before a vote's even made, nobody knows where I land on this. So to say that there's backdoor deals or, I mean, that's to imply that either the Boys and Girls Club are doing a backdoor deal or our city staff or our council members. Who else is there? So to say those things, it's just not good for our community. So we need to respect one another. We're up here to do a job. It's a very important job. It's not, especially this year, it's probably the most challenging for any council that's ever been up here because of the unknown come November. And that's up to you. You know, we, we are here to provide the services that y'all want in the community. So we do. I know I appreciate everybody that comes up here and discusses this issue. Um, I already have my mind made up, but I appreciate hearing your words today. Anybody else have any other comments on this item? Deputy mayor.

Well, thank you, uh, mayor. And, uh, and I don't mean to be screwed chair, but I'm a business owner. Uh, uh, fellowship of Christian athletes. Uh, for, for years, I coached over 26 years. I founded a place for various ministries. I'm a social worker and I own three autism schools. So, so I get community involvement. I get that, but I have to get away from the emotional part of this. And I have to look at the fiscal responsibility that the citizens of St. Cloud hired me for. I have to be fiscally responsible for all 70 plus thousand citizens of the city of St. Cloud. That's why they hired me. We we're all independent thinkers and the mayor is right We did not have a chance to discuss this till just right now. We can't quorum We can't meet we can't do anything unless it's in a public venue So I I put over together a hundred pages of notes and I just like to give you my opinion and again, it's not going to be a great opinion, but it's my opinion for the 70,000 people and not just this park, but I love Parks and Recs. As you know, I made the proclamation for it. So I'm opposing very much the city to build Hobson Park Community and sign a 50-year agreement with Boys and Girls Clubs. The city proposed spending $10 million on new facilities that Boys and Girls Clubs would run for just a dollar a year. Staff claims that this would save us $300,000 in annual personnel costs. But even with the optimistic math, That would take over 32 years to break even on the city's investment, the taxpayer's investment. That is not including interest rates. So when you bond and you say that the city has got money for this, we don't. We're borrowing money for this. It's not that we have it in our pockets. We're buying this. This is something we have to bond out and have to pay interest for it. So right now, we're in a quagmire with the legislation coming on that we have no control over, but we have to be fiscally responsible for all the citizens. So this is before any interest rates. This is before any maintenance and any unexpected costs. But those costs go to the citizens of St. Cloud, not just the people sitting here, but the 70-plus thousand people that I report to. The 70-plus thousand people that elected me and chose that I could come back here for four more years. I've owned many businesses, multiple businesses, and this just doesn't make sense. This makes no sense to me at all. Okay, I'm talking as a businessman, so please forgive me, I'm emotional, I've got five kids, eight grandkids, I love parks, recs, I love that stuff, but I have to look for the City of St. Cloud. I don't think this makes sense for the City of St. Cloud. I just don't, period. At the same time, the city right now is working very hard and we have a great city staff. We have great people, but we're working at cuts for fiscal 27 which means October 20th, October 1st, 2026 through September 30th, 2027. We're making cuts right now in anticipation for a vote that we have no control over. The citizens have control over, but we want to maintain those, those, those, Those things that make us the safest city in the state of Florida. I don't know if anybody knows that, but we are. And that's because we have great police officers and great fire and great people. Again, we had 23,000 people down at Fortress Lie. Zero incidents. Zero. So how do you put your priorities? Again, I'm a business owner. I don't know. Again, I love kids. I'm a social worker by degree. But I just don't know how we can vote on something to decide a proposal when we're going to vote on eliminating homestead taxes and spending $10 million. I feel it's irresponsible for me to vote on this. I feel it's irresponsible for me to put that burden on the taxpayers and go in debt for something that we don't know what's coming up. It's the weirdest thing ever. If I have a bad year in business, I'm not buying 10 things. I'm cutting back. So to make capital expenditures on a borrowed note on something we have to pay back with interest, it makes no sense to me. And again, emotions outside of this. I'm looking at the taxpayer dollars every day. And they elected me to save their dollars and use them wisely. This building and this stuff, It doesn't make sense. Maybe it did six years ago, but this is a new era. We just found out we may not have homestead taxes, which is 10% of the city's budget. Now, think about that when you have a home budget. If you say, I'm going to cut back home budget, but I'm going to build a new garage, how's that going to work out for us? We're just going to borrow the money and put it on our credit card. How's that going to work out? You know. For these reasons, I respectfully ask the city to table this proposal for eight months or at least after November. I don't know, but we have to prioritize quality of life for all citizens. And what that means is the police, the fire protection is the utmost importance. We have a police department that has been built 28 years ago when they had 24 officers. They're in the same department. They have 107 sworn officers plus other people. Where's our money best spent for our citizens of St. Cloud? Right now, today. I'm not saying when we're moving on this hill up, but we're not. We have to look at that stuff. We have to tighten our belts. And it's hard to say that. You can call me Scrooge or Linus. I don't care. But the community center has served us well. A massive new building with a long-term contract is simply not a wise investment for the taxpayers at this time. In just my humble opinion, as one member of council, and this is the first time that other councils heard my opinion, but I just, it doesn't make sense to me. And what I want to do is I want to continue what we're doing. I want to keep this community. I want to keep 23,000 people at the Fortress Life. I want to have the safest city in the state of Florida, but Are we going to borrow money to build something and argue about who's going to run it? To me, that doesn't make sense. With that, I yield back, Mayor, and again, I don't mean to be a scrooge, but I just want to squash this whole thing for eight to ten months just to figure out after the November elections. I yield back to you, Mayor.

I yield back to you, Mayor. I can't agree with you more on the challenges we face come November. And y'all are watching this play out live. I mean, this is how challenging it is and how this will truly affect the services in our community. So I'm going to go ahead and recognize Council Member Paul here.

I do want to say I'm in agreement if we delayed the proposal and come back where all parties sit down together and work it out. And that's the beauty of working together. When it comes to the park, I think maybe This community has, that park has been like that as far as I know before my time of being born in 84. And it's not fair to the residents to have an old park like it is now in 2026, but then the city can go out and buy something else. That's a slap in the face to the residents that you can go spend money somewhere else, but the residents have to sit in a park that's been like that since the 70s. I think we also should consider maybe looking at the master plan again and downsizing it or something, but to just eliminate it off the table is not right to the residents because they've been promised this park for many, many years, and they still have not had one.

Council Member Irvin.

This might be a question for finance, but the money has already been bonded, right? It's already been borrowed, so we're already paying interest on it. Is that correct?

Jeff Cooper, finance director, that is correct. However, let me assure you that zero of your taxpayers' dollars are going to repay this debt. This debt is repaid with parks impact fees, also police impact fees for their share, fire impact fees for their share, and the remainder out of the 1% surcharge. So, ad valorem revenues are not involved in the repayment of this debt. Also, we have until September of 2028, and we are required to expend 85% of the amount borrowed, which is over $80 million total for all the projects, but again, Impact fees are the repayment source along with the 1% surcharge. The general fund is not involved in the repayment of this debt in any form.

Council Member Urban. And I just wanted to, because I agree with fiscal responsibility, like Deputy Mayor was saying, and we're facing some very challenging times ahead in the city with this vote, but the process is already... in motion here, and while I would be in support of taking a step back and having community meetings about the Boys and Girls Club, I do think we should still move forward since the money has already been bonded.

Council Member Fletcher.

Speaking to, I mean, I agree with the comments that Councilwoman Paul has mentioned. This community has waited for a new community center for many, many years. We worked very diligently to get to the point where we are today. Coop, I still got some questions. When it comes to the repayment of the bonds, you referred to impact fees. Can you please let us know where the impact fees come from to repay those bonds?

Okay, so for the citizens, impact fees are what are charged for new residential and sometimes commercial for parks impact fees. It's new residential, it's 2,800 and something dollars for the average new residential home. Our parks impact fee balance at the moment is somewhere in the $10 million range. So we will pay $1.5 million per year towards that debt through 2025, 2045 rather. Thank you, Q. Deputy Mayor.

Oh, I'm sorry. You said you had one more. Oh, I did. So we're looking at buckets right now. So it's not general fund. It's park impact fees and it's this and this. And if you look at the growth of St. Cloud, we're looking at how many more people are going to move in to pay for something that we're buying today. And we're not guaranteed how many people are moving in. If you look at permits and the slowing growth of the county and the state, You're a predictor. I'm a predictor. I'm just saying as a business person, I don't go ahead and spend $10 million when I don't know how much I'm going to make next year. It's the weirdest thing ever, but it's how you run businesses, and businesses would go out of business if they didn't balance their budget. So I want to balance our budget for the citizens of St. Cloud. And it's nothing against this park. I love this park. spend thousands of dollars in donations to everything they got going on. But we have to be fiscally responsible for the 70-some thousand people in the city of St. Cloud. And no matter what bucket you take it out of, it's a bucket that comes into the coffers of the city of St. Cloud, and it's up to us in council and management how to spend it properly. We can do numbers all day long, but it's a figure, and it costs money. And you look at our debt service, you just told me it's $1.5 million that we have to pay back in interest every year.

No, that's principal and interest.

Oh, I'm sorry. Sorry, I don't have $1.5 million to pay in principal and interest right now until I know what's going to happen in November. I'm just asking the council to consider, to wait to see what's going on with... the elections and the homestead tax before we make a move and a knee-jerk move. I want Hopkins Park to be great. I want the Boys and Girls Club to be great. I want many things to be great, but I also want to be fiscally responsible for our citizens and their taxpayers, the St. Cloud, and not just this park, but the 77,000 people that live here. So I apologize for that, and I know I'm probably the Not the most popular guy right now, but running multiple businesses, I never spent more money than I made. I yield back to you, Mayor.

You just turn your light back on.

Oops, sorry.

Everybody see how much fun this is now, dealing with this property tax reform? It's challenging, and it's not unique. Every city in Florida is going through this right now. And their residents, I know it's not just ours, but there's residents in their cities that are lobbing attacks at them every day when all of the elected officials and the staff, they're just trying to do the best they can with the uncertainty of what's gonna happen in November. So ultimately it's gonna be up to you guys. Y'all are gonna make that decision come November and we'll work with whatever y'all choose. Do we have anyone else in the audience like to speak on this item? And council members, anything else? All right. Let me make sure everybody's good here. And I did tell the people that did call me, I did tell them how I felt about this item and which way I was swinging on it. So anyone like to make a motion on this?

I make a motion to delay the proposal for six months.

All right. We have a motion from council member Paul to delay this project, uh, delay the item for six months. And we have a second from council member Fletcher. Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council member Urban.

Aye.

Deputy mayor Gilbert.

Aye.

Council member Fletcher. Aye. Council member Paul.

Aye.

Mayor Robertson. Aye. Motion carries five zero.

All right. Thank you. And next up we have, Consent item number 12. Is that the one we're doing next?

No, the consent agenda.

We're going to go ahead and do the consent agenda now. Thank you everyone for showing up here tonight and voicing your concerns.

Consent item 12 was removed from consent agenda and moved to council action.

Okay. All right, you're going to have to repeat that to me. It's removed?

It was removed and moved to council action. Moved to council action, okay.

It'll be the last item on council action. We'll go ahead and wait for some audience members to leave the council chambers. Thank you. All right, next up we have the consent agenda. Next portion of tonight's meeting is the consent agenda, which contains items that have been determined to be routine and non-controversial. If anyone in the audience wished to address a particular item on the consent agenda, now is the opportunity for you to do so. Additionally, if staff or members of the city council wish to speak on a consent item, they have the same opportunity.

All right, anybody? I would like to pull item two for discussion. You'd like to pull item two?

All right, anyone in the audience have any, would like to speak on, in fact, let me go ahead and find the sheets here first, because I think we have a few. We have any other ones we want to pull? No. I'll go ahead and pull that one. Council Member Paul.

All right, so this one in regards to the refundable, the security deposit for the Chisholm Park Pavilion, I would like to say last month I did take a ride along with Sergeant Lawson in regards to Chisholm Park and seeing how his day-to-day is. And in the future, I would like to also see, I know when the big pavilion is rented, then it's first come, first serve on the smaller pavilions. But in the future, I would like to see possibly where people rent that pavilion because it's not fair to Sergeant Lawson who has to go and pick up trash or whatever the citizens leave behind, the residents have to do their part and be accountable for when they're renting these pavilions, clean up after yourselves. So I would like to see that in the future where people actually rent all the pavilions at Chisholm Park.

Yes, ma'am.

All right. Mayor? Yes, sir.

City Attorney.

If you'd like to approve this item with that, staff could revise that if we have enough discussion.

You want to pull that for a separate vote?

Well, she just took it off to discuss it, so if that's something you'd like to add to the resolution, there is a language in there.

Do we want to have a discussion? I mean, with the rest of the council, I'm only one vote, so. I guess my point is you don't have to wait for the future to be able to do it.

Council Member Urban. Did I read correctly in this resolution that to rent the larger pavilion at Chisholm Park, it would require a special event permit?

Yes.

So does that come with a fee?

Yes.

But I agree with Councilwoman Paul. I think all of the pavilions should require some sort of rental fee and security deposit out there because I did also... meet out there, and it was eye-opening to see and hear about how the process is abused sometimes and how people rent it out and then cancel last minute and things like that. So I would like to see a security deposit and rental fee for all of the pavilions at Chisholm Park, if possible. Deputy Mayor.

I agree with that, but when you... Airbnb or whatever you do with that, there's a cleanup fee also. So we've got to get wise that you can't just throw your trash and then say, hey, somebody else is going to pick it up and put it on. We're looking at a budget constraint right now. So we have great facilities and great pavilions. But there's a deposit, but there also should be a cleanup fee or some kind of fee that it's a checkoff fee. I don't know that. I'm just talking private sector. If you rent an Airbnb and you trash it, you're going to get charged to clean it. Well, if you rent one of our pavilions and you trash it, you should be charged to clean it. It just makes sense. And I apologize for working as a business mind out here in a government entity, but that should at least cover our costs. So I don't know what we can put into that deposit fee or whatever, but I think our costs should be covered. Through that so I yield back to you Mary. I don't think people should use our facilities and trash All right councilmember Paul.

Would you like to make a motion?

So I was I was pulling up the the resolution so The the pavilions do do charge to rent them. It's $75 for a four-hour block $150 for all day and We have a $50 refundable deposit for the 4-hour block and $100 refundable security deposit for the 9-hour block. So if we do have to clean up the trash afterwards, we can withhold the security deposit or a portion of the security deposit.

Deputy Mayor. Do you think $50 is enough to clean up somebody's trash? Because if somebody says it's going to be $50, I'm going to walk away because it's going to cost me more than that to do it myself. If you have a gig going on, you have a party going on, people trash the gig, Is it $50 to clean up? Some people are going to walk away from that. We have to make it so you either clean up or you pay more. Again, I'm looking at it as a business venture in the taxpayer dollars. At $50, people will walk away, and it's going to cost the city of St. Cloud $150 to do it. These things just confuse me. So I ask council to consider a reasonable fee for cleanup. I yield back. Councilmember Paul.

I would like to also ask, if they did, would this still serve where if the big pavilion is rented, then someone else wanted to rent the smaller pavilion, could they do that at the same time?

Through a special event, yes.

The smaller pavilions?

If they're renting the bigger pavilion, they can rent all of the pavilions through a special event.

But I was asking about the small pavilions. Would they be able to rent the smaller pavilions at the same time while the big pavilion is being rented? Yes. Okay. Yes.

Okay. Scott Davidoff, Deputy City Manager. I think what I'm hearing Councilmember Paul asking is, and just so I understand what we're talking about here, that all pavilions should no longer be on a first-come, first-served basis, and that in order to use a pavilion, it must be rented.

Correct.

Okay. Okay. I just wanted to get clarification on that because that's a big change. So that means that if someone is out there, they would have to be removed from the pavilions that has not rented it.

I mean, yes.

Okay.

Just wanted to make sure.

We have to hold, you know, unfortunately the residents responsible for when they're renting these pavilions, you know, he's not out there to pick up trash from people that should be picking it up. And, you know, it holds them responsible for picking it up. If you want your security deposit back, you'll clean it up. Yes.

And does that, I just want to make sure then that this extends to all pavilions throughout the city or only Chisholm Park?

All of them. Deputy Mayor.

When we make policy, and this is what kind of makes me go bonkers, why shouldn't it be for everything? And why shouldn't the deposits be covering this? Fifty bucks, I'm telling you, I'm going to walk away if I have 40 of my buddies from college. It's cheaper to walk away and let somebody clean it for 50. Let's do a larger deposit. Let's do it across the board. Let's not confuse our citizens and put a... scale together for everything. I don't get it. We shouldn't change things and A's this, this is this. It should be one rate. It should be you're responsible for it. We're all adults in whatever you do. We have beautiful parks. We have beautiful lakes. This is the best city in Florida, the safest city in Florida. Let's keep it that way and let's make sure we charge enough so We're not having people come in and tear up the club and then walk away. That's, I don't know, it just makes sense to me. I yield back. Council Member Fletcher.

Just real quick. Is the process to reserve the pavilions, I should already know this, is it online and easy and simple, or do they have to actually go into Parks and Rec and then get it mailed to Jack and all this different stuff? I hope not. I hope so.

You can reserve the pavilions online except for the large pavilion. They have to come in to do that.

For a special event.

Well, yeah. They have to come in to rent it, but we want to require a special event permit just for the sheer number of people that it holds. 200 people is a lot of people. And if they're having a special event and they apply through the special event process, PD would require police presence.

Thank you. City Manager.

Thank you. We can implement the policy immediately if I could clearly have direction from three people.

City Attorney. Well, I was going to say, you've got an item in front of you. It sounds like the consensus so far is to apply the rental provisions that are contained in the resolution related to Chisholm Park for all basically require all pavilions in the city to require a permit to do that. So I think that's the consensus right now. The other piece that Deputy Mayor brought up, if you believe that the deposit is too low, we just need some direction on what you would like the amount to be.

Deputy Mayor.

Well, I agree. If you put a deposit at a level that is more economical for them to clean up, for them to walk away, then therefore they'll clean up. So if you make a large deposit, We'll give you back the money if we come back to... Look at Airbnbs. Look at what's going on. There's costs associated with that. Why can't we as a city do that, and why should we have taxpayers paying for somebody's birthday party?

So in the resolution, the deposit amounts are $50 for a four-hour block and $100 for a nine-hour block.

Okay, so if it's a Saturday.

Respect that. Staff is willing to follow whatever the council wants. So if you want to double them, triple them.

Well, respectfully, for $50, it's easier to walk away. This has got to just make sense. I don't know what's going on here. You charge a certain amount that encourages them to clean up after yourself. If you don't, you encourage them. to trash a club. I mean, it's just as simple as it gets, Council. I don't know how to explain it.

We should have a chair up here for you, Scott. Make it a lot easier than going back and forth.

Coming soon. Again, I just wanted to point out that all of our pavilions there's already a fee that exists to rent the pavilions. What it is is that the policy has been that the pavilions are available on a first-come, first-served basis. However, if you want exclusive rights for that, so if you definitely want a pavilion on X day, You can go and rent it because otherwise I'm sure many of you have seen it. People come to the park at 6 o'clock in the morning and start setting up so that they don't have to do that. So that's not part of what is in this resolution. Those fees for the use of the pavilion already exist. The amounts for the security deposits are separate from that. I just wanted to make sure that that was clear. and that the side of requiring a rental is a policy as opposed to being included within this fee schedule resolution.

Do you know if City of Kissimmee has or what their deposit may be for their lakefront?

I when we did the research I I saw and I don't remember but I can get that for you I would propose 150 minimum security deposit for all of the pavilions.

I don't know And again you do cost analysis on everything in my professional businesses we clean up after events and they're charged by hour to clean up by hour and and it's credit card on file. So I don't know that, Councilman, but I know we have to encourage them to clean up versus let them go and walk away. So I don't know the figure. You put $250 on there, I think they're going to say, wow, that's going to cost me some money, and they're going to pack up the stuff and go. But we have to pack it up, and we have to take it to the dump, too, and we have to pay for the dump fees and things such as that. I'm just trying to cover our costs. We have a great but I don't want taxpayers to pay for somebody else coming in and renting out pavilions. So I yield back to you. I don't know the exact number. You may be able to tell me, but, you know, 250 would clean up the biggest pavilion, do you think? Because this is like Saturdays and Sundays. This is overtime also. You've got to understand that. No tax on tips, no tax on overtime.

Are we talking just weekends when you say Saturday and Sunday?

No, I'm saying anything. I'm just saying most of the pavilion rentals, Mayor, are usually weekends and things like that for birthday parties and holidays. I would say 70%, 80%. I don't know. Maybe Casey will tell us when those pavilions are rented more.

Yeah, the pavilions are mostly rented on the weekends. But the large pavilion, to your point, Council Member or Deputy Mayor Gilbert, if it goes through the special event process, depending on the number of people that are going to attend the party, we have a chart that determines the number of trash cans which the party is charged for. So the big pavilion deposit will be taken care of. They're going to be paying for their trash anyway, trash pickup.

But they're supposed to pick it up.

Yeah, put it in the cans.

You can't just throw it on the ground.

Oh, yeah, no, they can't do that.

Our people just throw it in the trash can. Okay. Council Member Paul, would you like to state an amendment to this resolution?

May I ask one more question? Yes, Deputy Mayor. Mr. Lawson, can you come up here, please? Let's have boots on the ground.

Yeah, and with an amendment, I'm going to ask for a second, and then I'll ask if there's any public comment.

Sergeant Lawson, St. Cloud Police Department, and the caretaker at Chisholm Park.

You're the guy who picks up all the trash?

I pick up a lot.

You do a lot out there. I know you rescued some folks the other night or the other day. Was it yesterday, the day before? Yeah, thank you very much for everything you do out there. Thank you for your service.

Sir, what was the question?

My question is what would you think would be reasonable and how many people trash a place and leave and how many people are responsible? Your boots on the ground, I don't know, but I know it's a beautiful facility and we want to keep it that way. And we have to discourage people from messing up our neighborhood. Right. What's your thoughts, please? I just need to know boots on the ground.

So I agree with what you said about we got to make it. advantageous for us because it does cost us a lot of money to pick up that trash Constantly if you have a party in the morning That's got to be cleared up before the second party comes in if it's first come first serve they come in and They do what they want, and then they leave, and it leaves it on us to take care of. And I have two other helpers, or I have two other individuals from Parks and Rec that do a lot more work than I do out there, and I just try to help them as much as possible. And I see the amount of work that they do constantly, Monday through Monday, from very early in the morning when I open up the park until I close the park, and then even after I close the park, I'm still picking up stuff, cleaning up the park, and taking care of as much as I can to help out those guys because... I mean, we're thin, and I don't have a number for you, but it's got to be more than what we're doing. The first-come, first-served is where we're having, I think, is where the issue is coming from.

Gun Chai. Council Member Urban.

I had a question for you since you're out there. Do you see a problem with us starting to charge for every pavilion at Chisholm Park? Do you see an enforcement problem on your end for that?

I think that that would give us the advantage to making sure that we can enforce. Because right now I have no enforcement power unless there's somebody that's coming in where there is a first-come, first-served situation. person or party there and then we have a party that's coming in we've seen that multiple times where somebody will take over a pavilion and it causes a disturbance and then i have to i have to come in there and and take care of that okay with this deposit do they get it back if they pick up the trash if they leave it better than they found it

or as they found it yeah yeah they would get their deposit back if they left or if they left it like they found it but um the security deposit too is for like casey was saying sometimes he has to go respond because there's a rental and then another rental and they don't want to leave or whatever the case may be so if pd or the park ranger has to respond we would also hold back the deposit

Yeah. And I don't think that's the best use for a PD is to be the, obviously the, the person chasing out the people that have been there 10 minutes, 20 minutes too long. And, um, all right. Uh, do we, do we want to go ahead and make a motion, um, or an amendment to the resolution?

Yes.

All right. Go ahead and state your amendment to the resolution.

So I make a motion with the changes and adding the security deposit for all pavilions except for Pavilion B at Chisholm Park because that's a special event permit. And I like the recommendation of maybe $150 for a security deposit.

I'll second.

Okay, how much is the fee? So there's a security deposit, but how much is the fee?

So it's $75 for a four hour block or 150 for all day.

75 for a four-hour. So it's the 150?

Well, so it's a tiered structure. So pavilions that hold 20 people are $75 for a four-hour block, or all day is $150. For the pavilions that hold up to 60 people, it's $125 for a four-hour block or $250 all day. Okay. Okay.

So would you want to make the deposit just the twice of the rental rate? Exactly.

That's fine. All right. You want to restate that? So the deposit's going to be twice the...

Okay. I make a motion to make the security deposit twice as the rental fee.

Second.

All right.

We have a motion from Council Member Paul and a second from Council Member Urban. Would anyone in the audience like to speak on this? Yes, ma'am. Come on up. All right, you've got to come to the microphone. Please state your name and address for the record.

Bridget Lilly, 3666 Daydream Place. The City of Kissimmee and Orange County Parks have a first-come, first-served basis, no fee. So there's taxpayers pay for the pavilions. They get to use them. What you're suggesting is that a mother who's at the park with her kids feeding the Cheez-Its has to have a security deposit to use the pavilion, which is ridiculous.

Okay. Yes, ma'am.

Thank you. Anyone else in the audience like to speak on this? Yes, Theresa Melhot.

Theresa Melhot, 2924 Colbury Circle, St. Cloud, Florida, 34769. I agree because I have gone out there On the spur of the moment, with my grandkids, packed a few sandwiches and we're not allowed to use a pavilion then that my taxpayer money is paying for anyway. We have to pay a big security deposit. And I just want to say, $50 to some people might be nothing, but it could be a lot for some other people. So we can't judge everybody by... how much money you think they make or don't make. So don't outprice young families or older people. Grandparents don't want to bring their grandkids to the park. I mean, we should be able to not have to sit in the dirt when there's an empty pavilion. So what, are you going to have the police come throw out a grandma and her couple grandkids? Is that what you all plan on doing then? Because that's what it sounds like to me.

It's just not good.

Deputy Mayor. Yeah, there was an incident that came up that there was jet skiers renting jet skis via online, and they go from all over Central Florida, and other cities started charging jet skis to participate. Well, we didn't. So people from Winter Garden and Winter Park came over to our place, and they rented jet skis for free, they used our pavilions for free, they trashed our place for free, they did all that for free, and because we, other cities like Tavares and all that, charged for those services, but we didn't, so the folks rented jet skis on our lake, and they didn't pay anything, and they came and they took the pavilions and they trashed them and they did their thing. How do you police, I'm sorry, I don't wanna ask questions, but council, how do we look at that to make sure that our taxpayers aren't paying for folks that come outside to make additional dollars and use our pavilions without paying any fees? I don't mind the citizens of St. Cloud using anything because they're citizens and they're taxpayers, but we've known through the years that people from different cities and different counties come and use our facilities because we do not charge and other facilities charge. I don't know how to work on that, counsel. I'm asking for the pleasure of counsel to figure that out. But I don't want grandma to have to pay X amount of dollars. But there are people that seek these freebies and abuse them that are not our taxpayer dollars, but our taxpayers are paying for the maintenance and the cleanup of that. I don't have that answer. I ask for the pleasure of counsel to look at that. I don't want grandma paying 20 bucks to sit on a bench, so I yield back.

Yeah. Yeah, you can come up, Jim. It's still open for public comment.

It's called littering, and it's enforceable. And if somebody litters, there's somebody there to give them a ticket, and then that becomes the enforcement mechanism to solve the problem.

Oh, can you give me your name and address?

Oh, Jim Gale, 2970 Tally Ho Trail, and I've got something to share later. Jim brought flowers. Yes, I did. I brought some food for people, so I'll share more about that soon.

Who checks the littering? Who do we pay to check the littering?

Well, I noticed that there's some officers there sometimes, and there's some people there. Observation. There's already a law against littering, right?

No, wait a second. So you're telling me the chief's going to tell his cops to charge people for littering?

Well, there's already a law about it, isn't there?

There's a law about killing people, too, but I'd rather the police take care of that versus the leaders.

I'm not saying it's a bad idea to have for a scheduled event to have something. Chief.

Thank you, Jim.

Doug Gerke, police chief. And I appreciate everyone's comments. I think what we're dealing with is we have these takeovers of these pavilions that were having significant challenges. And it's causing significant challenges for officers to come out, even on their days off, and they're getting overtime to come out to address these things. Someone does have a reservation, and then people don't want to leave. And when they do leave, they are leaving a significant mess. And you are correct, sir. We can issue citations for littering. We just have to be there to do it, to be honest with you. The calls for service that we are going to right now keep us very, very busy in the city to ensure that our community stays safe. One crime is one crime too many, to be honest with you. So even a littering offense is something we will certainly take care of, sir, without a doubt. But I think it's a general tone that we're actually dealing with is a significant challenge of people just basically taking over the pavilions and just basically monopolizing them. It's a very difficult decision to try to work through, but I just want to make sure I put some clarity on this too. This is not to, I don't believe it's to try to charge everybody. We just have to figure out a solution because police officers can't always be down at the lakefront to always find someone dropping something on the ground. But we certainly need to understand how we're going to control the movements in and out of these pavilions. I think that's one of the bigger challenges. And again, you've experienced it. You've gone out and you've seen it. We've had people that have actually pulled some permits and they said there's 150 people there. Then we have 400 people in there and we have to actually call in additional police officers to come and actually assist and Chisholm Park at what's going on. So It's a challenge right now, that's all. We're just trying to work through the challenge with you. So just to give you more clarity.

Council Member Urban. Just to clarify, this fee is for the pavilion rental, right? If you're there with your kids playing in the park and you want to sit down and have some shade and drink some water, you don't have to pay the fee, right? This is for like a scheduled, this is for a rental. That's what, so if...

Yes, city attorney.

Well, under the discussion earlier, the deputy city manager asked specifically the question, if there are people in the pavilions without having not reserved it, would we want them to tell them to move out? So that's where this discussion is, I recall.

This was going to be on the workshop agenda as well, right? And, of course, that was canceled. Obviously, this is a long meeting. It's going to be a long meeting. I see what you're saying, and I understand what Ms. Melhot said, and I understand what everybody else is thinking. If you go out there, why can't you sit in a pavilion that your tax dollars paid for, right? But I understand also that our police officers should not be in the hall monitor out there with the trash and making sure people are leaving on time or Deputy City Manager.

What I was going to mention is that one possible option to consider that some places do is they do have a maximum number before a permit would be required. You know, the council could discuss that if it's, you know, more than five, if there's more than ten, something of that nature, then at that point, that would trigger a rental to be there. I think that would address some of the concerns that council members are having. Just an option that we wanted to throw out there that may address some of these concerns.

Okay. And I know that there's a group, there's a homeschool group. We've talked about this group. They go out there throughout the week when there's nobody using the pavilions. And I've spoken with them, with a handful of them, and they said that they make sure and leave it better than when they showed up. Those are not the intended targets here, obviously. It's the people who litter or our police officers are having to go out there and pick up the trash or their unruly bunch, but not a bunch of 12 year olds or 10 year olds that are out there learning. Um, and that's, I don't think that's who we want this to affect, but I think that should be, um, maybe a separate conversation with that organization or that group. I think we can work on some common idea for that and not fall under this. Is that correct? We can.

We can certainly do whatever the council directs. I think just to throw it out there again, another option would be to make it where that policy would be for weekends and holidays only. That's another option. That is our, as you heard Sergeant discussing and our Parks and Recreation Director discussing, those are the busiest times. Those are when we generally have the problems. We do, certainly not gonna say that we don't have it on a random Tuesday in October, which is possible, but the majority of the issues that we run into are on the weekends and holidays. That would eliminate any possible conflicts with homeschool groups or some of those other ones where you're not wanting to catch them. I might even suggest doing that maybe on a trial basis to test it out. Maybe we try it for a year, bring it back. Just trying to throw out some suggestions here.

All right, Council Member Fletcher.

So I agree with the lady's comments. When I was young, that's kind of where my parents took us because it was an inexpensive way to celebrate a birthday and so forth. And then to the gentleman in the front row's point, I don't remember off the top of my head not to put the chief on the spot, but, I mean, our calls for service in a year are a number of calls for service or what? There's a lot. Chief?

You can come up to the baby podium if you want.

I was going to go to that baby podium, but I'm not sure it's working. No, it's not a lot, but, again, I can only imagine. I know Chisholm is very busy, and that's where a lot of the pavilions are. And I don't even believe Sergeant Lawson logs every single call that he has to deal with. Most of the time he just sees it, he goes out as the caretaker for the park and handles it. But I can honestly, I'd rather see if he wants to speak on this, but most of the time he's the one dealing with the people on the pavilions. Along Lakeshore, I can't say that we have a ton of calls for service there, but if this is something that we're going to implement, I can assure that... we'll most likely get very busy, I would think.

And to correct what I meant in calls for service, engaging with different situations or, you know, if you're stopping and talking with somebody, you're doing all this stuff. I'm not saying we have a lot of, you know, calling for help or anything. I'm sorry.

Yes, we have a lot of interactions on the lakefront, of course. I apologize. But most of the time, it's all friendly.

For sure.

So, yes. But I'm sorry. I thought you were asking the other.

I apologize.

Thank you. Ken's member, Paul. Sorry about that.

I wanted to ask Sergeant Lawson.

Sergeant Lawson? No, you're not.

So compare Monday through Friday and then the weekends. Which is the busiest? I would say Friday through Sunday are very, very busy. So if we implemented a security deposit for the weekends, would that help you out as far as with holding the resident responsible for cleanup so you're not having to do that?

With... along with holidays, too, because they fall on weekdays as well. I'm sorry, Council Member.

We already have the security deposit. I just want to make sure, are we talking about the rentals or, just to clarify, are we talking about making sure that on weekends and holidays that we require rental?

Yes.

Okay. I just wanted to clarify, make sure we were all...

The rentals, yes, on the weekends.

All right, Council Member Fletcher.

I would just say I think we should do it on the weekends, kind of like being discussed, on a temporary basis, but bring it back to us in three months, give us an update at the end of the council meeting. Is it working? Is it not working? We can make adjustments. And then maybe we can have Lawson come back and say, all right, well, this has been better. We need to make changes.

Deputy Mayor Gilbert.

Chief, you're well-rounded in Central Florida. You've worked at many agencies, and you've done many areas there. Have you noticed uptake and takeovers of vacation rental properties in places where people gather and meet and be destructive? It's on.

Okay, it's on. I just have to get closer to the mic. Sorry. So at some of the pavilions, I think, I know we can attest that we've had some people renting out the pavilions. They misunderstood or misstated their numbers, to be honest with you, and we had significantly more numbers where we did have to pull people from the road, police officers that are on the road patrolling, to go over and actually address the issues that we were having there, which is significantly large crowds, parking issues. It was a full-blown party. If I remember correctly, I think they anticipated 150 people, and I think we were counting 350, or is that about right, about 350 people? participants that were there so we had to bring in additional staff and actually that sparked a lot of conversations that we tried to figure this out. We have to have a better understanding of what's happening.

So that's what I was trying to get at is the takeovers of these great facilities that our citizens should have and accessibility. There are things now that are called takeovers and they call everybody and they all show up at one place and they overwhelm our police department, our public safety and I'm trying to work on looking ahead versus saying, oh, now it's happening in St. Cloud, we have to do it. So I don't know. I'm trying to protect the citizens and the police in St. Cloud of making rules and regulations that they have to follow so they don't say, hey, that's our next spot because it's an easy spot. Yes, sir. That's what I'm looking at, and I know $50 or whatever. I don't mind people sitting on benches, but when 300 people come and take over a facility... then it burdens our taxpayers to pay the dollars that our police have to enforce that in doing their regular jobs. Am I wrong with that? No, sir.

No. So perhaps maybe we should reevaluate the numbers that the deputy city manager actually spoke to, maybe more than 10 people, but maybe put a QR code there or something that if it starts to get out of control, hey, you don't have this registered. You need to scan this and actually get this going so at least you can reserve this. But I think there's some unintended consequences and a catch net we're going to catch people in that, we don't want to enforce if they're sitting there with their family and they're not doing anything. We certainly don't need the park ranger walking up to them and questioning them and saying, what are you doing here? And do you have a permit? And so it's probably easier if we can try to digest this a little bit better and kind of figure out a, a path forward to try to figure that out. But you're right. The, the, the juvenile, the takeovers are happening. They're just, they're not happening here. I can tell you that. And it won't be tolerated either.

And I want to, I want to make efforts that they don't happen in advance. I don't want to, as Ms. Melhot said, the grandmother or kids, I'm looking at the takeovers in the future, so I'm looking for the future. I'm not looking for hanging out with the people in the city of St. Cloud, but I see a trend coming here, Chief, and I want to make sure that we have our ducks in a row so it doesn't overburden our police force in our city as the safest city in the state of Florida. So that's what I was looking at. I wasn't looking at grandma coming and sitting with her kids on the things. That is not the intention at all. It's, it's, it's making sure that they know that they can't come and take over our city of St. Cloud. Yes, sir. And it is happening. I see it.

It is. And we talk about that broad brush, unfortunately hits us all though. We do a big, big sweep of a brush. We're going to hit everybody. So obviously that's, that's clearly not the intent of what we're trying to do. And if we do have those juvenile takeovers, we would deal with them very swiftly.

Yeah. And I just want to be proactive versus reactive. And that's why I'm saying how we, how we adjust our accordingly and, and Sergeant Lawson over there does a great job at Chisholm park, but I don't definitely never want to overwhelm him or any of the police department because we're great. So I must miss stuck, but it's not grandma and her two kids sitting at the pavilion. It's 150 folks coming here and taking over the park. I yield back to you, Yeah.

And this, this is simpler, similar to the, you know, the sleeping or the camping outside, right? If I'm out there taking a nap underneath the tree, which, you know, I'm, You know, I don't think I'd be down for my eyes closed, but, um, you shouldn't, you shouldn't be arrested for that. Right. But you know, it shouldn't be a crime. Um, but I, it's the unintended consequences, you know, of having these kinds of rules. And obviously it's, it's going to catch some people that we don't want to catch. So we want to find a way to, to, to do this without affecting the, the, uh, unintentional council member, Paul.

So can we just do it for the next three months, try it out on the weekends and holidays, and ask Sergeant Lawson to come back to us and say, hey, it's working. If it's not working, then we know where to go from there. Council Member Urban.

Yeah, I was just going to clarify, too, about that scenario that happened where they said 150 people and 300 people showed up. That event organizer should be fined and maybe even face criminal charges if that happens again. I don't know if we have the ability to do that. But if that happens, they need to be held accountable. But I just want to make sure for the weekends, that includes Friday, Saturday, and Sunday and holidays.

So our chief needs to be like Mike Checkwood out there, you know what I'm saying? There will be no takeover here. I don't wear the short shorts like he does, but it's all right.

I wouldn't wear those, but he's a good friend. Yes. Now, are we leaving this? I'm sorry. I apologize for more clarification for us. Is this at a Chisholm Park so we have a test? location so we can work on it to try it out for the three months to watch it?

Chisholm only for now? Just there now.

Okay.

And it'll take us a little while because we're going to need to get signage out there to make sure that people understand that. We can certainly work with communications to get this information out there in advance. It may take a few weeks, two weeks or so to get the signage up there and just so we have some clarification and consensus. So what I'm hearing is Friday through Sunday and holidays, you are required to have a reservation to utilize a pavilion, regardless of the number of people that are out there.

I'd say more than five people. Is that a reasonable?

So what we're saying is, Every weekend, every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, a pavilion has to be reserved in order to be underneath it.

Yes. Just the weekends and holidays, and this is only at Chisholm just to try it out and see.

So you want to report back in three months.

Three months, yes.

You said five people. I mean, what do you think?

I think that's the people I don't want to hit with this are just people going out there and want to have a lunch. They happen to be out there playing ball on the field and want to go over and sit down in the shade. If it's a family of, say, ten people. Do you want to max it at ten? That's fine. Okay. Okay. Anyone else in the audience like to speak on this item? This is where we need all the input.

I just had a couple of questions.

Monica Lee, 301 Minnesota.

I'm short. You're good, Monica. 301 Minnesota Avenue, St. Cloud. You said, Deputy Mayor Gilbert, how would we give someone a summons for littering? You don't know if it was them or not, right? But how would you fine someone for leaving a mess behind? So if I had a party, I cleaned it up immaculately. I left it a little bit early. Somebody shows up and they decide to make a huge mess. Now I have to pay the fine? How do we know who to charge and who made the mess?

Well, again, you're getting into semantics right now. When you occupy a facility for a certain period of time, you're responsible for that facility for a certain period of time. If you leave early... you're responsible for that facility for that certain period of time. Correct. So what's your question?

What if it was over 3 o'clock and I left at 3 o'clock? Good. Somebody comes at 3 or 5 because the cops weren't there to check to see if I did it good. They made a mess.

You're good.

But they showed up at 3 or 5, now there's a mess. Who's they? Whoever.

Exactly. Someone showed up. You're getting into semantics about what ifs. If you say, I was there till 3 and I left at 3, here's my thing. There's AI, there's everything. We left it clean. I took a picture at 3. Bye-bye.

So you would be able to do that, the same thing with the summons for littering then as well?

Shouldn't you? I mean, we have so much technology here. If you're cleaning up the crib at 3 and you're leaving and somebody leaves at 3 or 5 and they said, it's your littering. I said, no. I took a picture at 3. It's done. That's what technology does. It's really cool. That's what technology does.

And then technology could also be able to help assist the police to issue a summons for littering then at the same token.

I'm going to leave that up to the police. Littering is probably least in my thought of what the police department should do. But you can say, hey, it's clean. I'm out of here.

Yeah, and this is going to be a trial run. So let's, I guess in the first three months, let's see how this plays out.

And I can address that situation very, very quickly, Deputy Mayor. Our staff that's out there, if a pavilion is rented, they're already going out at the end. So they're already, plus the park rangers, especially out at Chisholm, are easily able to verify that they're already out there.

Well, explain that to our citizens.

So, Mayor, you do have a motion on the floor.

For all the St.

Cloud City Parks. This is just for Chisholm that we're talking about. That's right.

Okay, the other question that I had is do you have additional charges for non-residents? Yes. Because there's many times that I go out to the park and I'm picking up dirty diapers at Lakeshore Boulevard, you know, out there in messes that are made from people that just come because our park is free, it's beautiful, and everybody likes to enjoy it. So we have a lot of non-residents that overpopulate the park and they make it very hard for those of us who are residents to utilize it.

Are you asking me? I'm asking everyone. Okay. Anyone who has an answer to that. Can I ask one answer? Because I tried to do a dual fee for St. Cloud residents and non-St. Cloud residents for all of our parks, for the baseball league, for all of our leagues, because the citizens of St. Cloud pay for the baseball fields, but Osceola County has 67% of the players that play in Little League, and the county said, no, you cannot do that. Okay. So although I wanted to do that, it got shot down. So I hear you loud and clear, but I wasn't able to do that because I felt that the people in the Little League that didn't live in St. Cloud should pay more because our taxpayers paid more for the Little League, and the county told me I could not do that. So, yes, I tried it. It did not work. Please believe me, if you want to come along with me and try to talk to the county about it, I will. But that was one of the first things I did over three and a half years ago, and I got shot down.

And to answer your question, there are different fees for residents and non-residents who rent facilities.

But further clarification, the non-resident rate is outside of Osceola County. That's correct. Through this proposed resolution, we are equalizing the price of St. Cloud residents with all of Osceola County residents. The only people paying the non-resident rate are those outside of Osceola County.

Correct.

Thank you.

Council Member Paul.

I think there was one more.

Anyone else in the audience like to speak?

I'm also short. Haley Revels, 5186 Black Hedger Court. I am the homeschool group that you referenced earlier, and I'll come up and speak about that later, but I wanted to offer a proposal to the discussion that our group is all about giving back to the community and leaving things absolutely better than we found them. So if we could come together with some kind of group similar to Hopkins Park to where we are like the stewards and come in and pick up and volunteer our time to do that, I just want to enter that into the discussion as well.

Yes, ma'am. Thank you. All right. Anyone else in the audience like to speak on this item? City Attorney.

Yeah, I just want to clarify. So we have a motion already on the table that would be to increase all the deposits related to the pavilion to twice the rental rate.

For Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

Well, that's what I wanted to clarify.

Yeah, and I think we want to amend some of that language, right? Just Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. But up to 10 people.

I think we're getting confused on what the rental is versus the... I mean, it's staff's recommendation. If you want to increase the rental for the units, anybody that rents the unit, whether they rent it on any day, wherever it is, that they pay a deposit and that the deposit would be, based on what the council just said, the double amount of the rental rate. The other issue regarding the requirement to rent a pavilion other than the 200-person pavilion, basically use it on a first-come, first-served basis if it's not being used under a permit, that would be the program we'd look at, only apply on weekends and holidays, and we'd look at it in another 90 days.

Okay, so there is a pavilion available where a citizen and their family could just go and sit down and eat and not be charged or...

Not on a Friday through Sunday based on what...

But Monday through Friday they can do that. Correct, as long as it's not someone who's... Monday through Thursday, yes.

Correct, as long as it's someone who's not operating a commercial business, a for-profit business.

Right, so that would be the trial point to put that in place to apply Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

And holidays. How many pavilions do we have out there?

At Chisholm? Just at Chisholm. Three, right? Nine. Nine.

Nine.

Total. But only one very large 200 capacity one.

So we're only talking about the 200 one?

No, we're talking about all the pavilions.

And that's where I get a little heartburn with that. If somebody's out there and they just, even on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, if nobody's using it and they just want to, Sit down and eat.

That's where we're running into the problems. Instead of it being just somebody sitting down to eat, it's a big group that's showing up and causing trash or damage or additional people that are out there.

What are your thoughts? That's why I said more than 10. If it's more than 10, then it's a party. Okay.

10 or less, they don't need a permit. Is that what we're saying? Is that okay?

Monday through Thursday?

No, all the way through, right? Yeah, even on the weekends, right?

If it's less than 10, yes. If it's more than 10, yes, they need to rent it. Yeah.

Okay. And we expect them to be good stewards of the area and the park.

But keep in mind, this is only just a trial for three months to see how it's going to work. It's not been permanent right now.

And I did want to point out still that the no commercial businesses is still, that's separate from this.

That's separate. Yeah, obviously we don't want anybody advertising a business out there or exchange of money. I understand there's some homeschool groups during the week, but that's a topic for another day. Obviously that does not apply to this. So let's go ahead and restate that motion. City Attorney, you had some of the language.

Well, the only formal motion was to basically provide that the deposits for the pavilions would be twice the rental rate. That was the motion. We talked about a trial program which would apply Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, where groups more than 10 would have to rent any of the pavilions, I'm assuming anywhere in the city.

We were focusing on Chisholm Park for right now. Just clarify it.

Just Chisholm Park.

Three months, right? Yes. All right. Would you like to make that motion again? You can just say so moved. So moved. Second. All right. We have a motion from Council Member Paul, second from Council Member Urban. Will the clerk please call the roll?

Deputy Mayor Gilbert. Aye. Council Member Fletcher. Aye. Council Member Paul. Aye. Council Member Urban. Aye. Mayor Robertson. Aye. Motion carries 5-0.

All right. We're going to take a five-minute break.

I didn't even do that.

Can we call this meeting back to order? All right, we are still on the consent agenda, and it is only 8.45. Thank you to everybody that's hanging in there tonight. I need some glasses to read what I'm doing. All right, we're going to go back to the consent agenda, and that was, we've already voted on consent agenda number... Item two, anyone in the council like to pull any other item on the consent agenda?

May I, if I would, like to pull consent agenda number three because it coincides with what we talked about earlier?

Yes, sir. All right. Deputy Mayor Gilbert, would you like to speak on that?

Yeah, as we spoke of earlier, the building of the facility, but the resolution for the agreement between the license agreement between City of St. Cloud and Boys and Girls Club, I'd like to pull that from the agenda at a later time. So it adds up to the first eight months of the six months that we push back the building of the facility, sir.

Okay, so you want to... move the award of that project, you said six months?

I want it to coincide with the other, I don't know, did we vote on it, Mayor, for six or eight months? I know Ms. Paul said six months, and I didn't know what we went with that.

Council Member Irvin. With respect, I just want to say, since the money's already bonded and being in the construction industry, I know six to eight months from now, the construction costs Who knows where they're going to be? Could be double, could be triple. I don't think it would be beneficial to the city to put this off if we're going to build it anyways. That would be my only counterpoint, but I'll yield back to you.

Council Member Fletcher.

I would be in favor of it moving forward.

Council Member Paul.

In favor of moving forward.

Okay. And it's full plans. Cause I know you had spoken about possibly downsizing or looking at the plans again.

What are your moving forward as is I get, um, I mean, if it's already bonded in, I mean, we just move forward with it. I don't know if we, at this point can look at the plans again to maybe downsize. I don't know. City manager.

I can point out that of the $10 million contract, the building is $6 million.

Okay. And this contract is for the entire project, right?

Yes, sir.

Outside, inside the building?

Fields. I'm sorry if I may. If the city had moved forward with Boys and Girls Club this evening, we were going to do a change order to remove portions of this. We would no longer need the security cameras, for instance. So it is potentially tied to whatever use is in there, because there was going to be a potential savings in the construction costs.

OK. Did you make a motion deputy mayor Gilbert?

I did not.

Okay. That's fine. Um, would anyone in the audience like to speak on this item? Yes, sir.

My name is Alex Rodriguez, 2517 Bull Rush Drive. And I wrote out something that I wanted to share with you guys. A lot of things may have changed. A lot of questions may have changed because you all have answered a lot. And you motioned to push it back six, eight months, whatever the case may have been. So I'll start with this. Good evening, Mayor and Council. My name is Alex Rodriguez. I want to say up front, I'm in support of investment in our youth. I appreciate the mission of the Boys and Girls Club. My questions are about accountability, transparency, and protecting taxpayer dollar. The city is investing over $10 million to construct Hopkins Park Community Center, with a total project around 13.7. and a proposed 50-year agreement, I'd appreciate clarification on financials, which have already been done, right? We have a bond, we have debt that we acquired already. So with that question being done, and I know they're using fire and police impact, and I don't know if our financial director may answer this, can that be offset to the complex that is an option, right, that you guys will still have to vote on, can even that bond that we already acquired be used for the complex, if you guys vote yes on that? Alongside that, measurable performance standards, will they be required each year for the Boys and Girls Club, and annual reports and outcomes to present Present publicly. If standards are met, what enforcements or terminations options does the city have? I know I read it was about 190 days for termination, but what other options do they have? If so, and will the facility be available for public to rent? If so, who receives the revenue? The city or the organization? And how does the offset to the public investment Why a 50-year term instead of a shorter with scheduled reviews? I support investing in our kids, and I just believe that when the public puts it in this kind of money, we deserve clear answers and measurable results. Thank you.

Yes, sir. All right. Yeah, that agreement is not regarding this item number, but the park is. Council Member Paul. No, that's it. You're good. No, I'm sorry. You're good? Deputy Mayor Gilbert?

No, I'm sorry.

I think there's still a lot of questions here, especially to see what we're going to downsize. I would like to just move this to the next council meeting so I can get some more information on the scope of this project. Maybe we could phase it out and do the outside first. What are y'all's thoughts on that? I'm not saying no, let's not do it. I'm saying, you know, with everything that's been said here tonight and with the, if we go at full board and we have to build this and the property tax reform does pass, then we do have to do an agreement with an outside entity or we close the doors of the facility. We can't afford $300,000 a year to operate this thing if we build it. So I don't, if we pull the trigger on this now, then we're essentially saying we know it's going to, that we're going to do an agreement with an outside entity. And I'm not saying that we're not, I'm just saying that we're already making that decision. So I just think we need to gather some more information. Maybe we could have some other ideas with staff or city management.

Sorry, I think I didn't want to interrupt your thought process. I just wanted to add some additional information just to council was clear. I did approve the PO earlier this week for the trailer that was going to be used for the summer camp in anticipation of the construction because it's part of the approved project that city council had already approved. So I just wanted to, I think we're, I think it's a lease and I think we may be tied in at this point. We could try to get out of it.

What do you say the trailer for the summer camp?

Because the site was going to be under construction, the building was going to be demolished. Not summer camp, I'm sorry, after school program, for the after school program. We were renting a trailer for the after school program.

Were you going to have those kids in a trailer? All right. I mean, I don't think that that should be the determining factor whether we spend $13 million right now just because there's a trailer sitting out there. I mean, I just think that that's... But I don't think it hurts waiting 30 days to our next council meeting to make a decision either. Any thoughts?

I will make a motion to continue it.

All right. We have a motion from Council Member Paul to continue it to the next council meeting?

Yes.

Motion from Council Member Paul. I'll go ahead and second that motion. Will the clerk please call roll?

Council Member Fletcher?

No.

Council Member Paul? Aye. Council Member Urban?

Aye.

Deputy Mayor Gilbert?

Aye.

Mayor Robertson?

Aye.

Motion carries 4-1. All right.

All right. The rest of the consent agenda. Can we get a motion? Motion to approve. Motion to approve. Council Member Urban? Second. Council Member Fletcher, were you? No, no, no.

I don't even know why I did that.

All right. We have a motion from Council Member Urban, second from Deputy Mary Gilbert. Will the clerk please call the roll? I'm sorry. I want to ask again because I don't know if we did it an hour and a half ago. Did I ask for public comment? Anyone in the audience like to speak on any other item on the consent agenda? Yes, sir. Come on up. This is on the consent agenda.

At number nine? Number nine, yes, sir. Okay. It's Richard Collins. I'm at 2080 Emperor Drive. Yes, sir. Kissimmee being annexed in to St. Cloud. Okay. Happy to meet all of you. Mayor. Yes, sir. City manager and council. Everyone in our community... is a little up in arms, and I'll explain why very quickly. We received notices that our streetlights are going to be turned off October 1st, okay? So the safety and well-being of everybody and all of the elderly that's in there now is going to be at risk, okay? The information that we were sent out originally did not have cane brake on it with its expenditures. It included three other developments. So you have someone like me that's going on 64 years old. I'm going through my mail. I'm with Kissimmee. I have something that comes in from St. Cloud that says, oh, these other four areas and developments, and there's going to be these costs. Well, that doesn't pertain to me. It's just garbage mail. it went into the garbage. And that's basically what 90% of the people in my development did. They did not send this survey that they received back to the city of St. Cloud. And this survey was for our streetlights to be kept on. There's a 20-foot easement. that's by Neptune Road to be mowed. And I believe the pond is being maintained by Toho anyway. But these areas were not addressed. We were never given any cost until you dig deep. For the last 30 some years, we've had a line item called cane break and it was $191 basically. And that included the mowing and the street lights. Now, we have a letter from the city of St. Cloud stating that our street lights and landscape buffer alongside Neptune Road is going to cost each homeowner $91.34. Not a bad idea, right? Because the City of St. Cloud got a better deal. Congratulations. The one thing that's troubling about this is, along with these notices, it's stating that if not 50% of the community approves this, that the recommendations is to form an HOA, which we are not an HOA. That's what the people that live in that development want. is they do not want an HOA. Or hire someone else to take care of the services so that they have an address to mail the bills, someone's going to have to write the checks, and someone's going to have to collect the money from all the residents. And you know that person's going to have to be paid, so there's another expense. So basically, it's basically an HOA without documents. So some of the concerned citizens in the neighborhood went around house by house to speak to whoever was there if it was 2 o'clock in the afternoon and they weren't home yet.

Can you give it to the clerk, please, if you'd like to give that out? Are you going to provide that for the record? Yeah. All right.

61% of the homes approved this.

Now, it was with the help of Kevin that we were able to get this done because we had to take and get it revised to just...

include cane break. All we have is two things, street lights and a 20-foot easement off of Neptune Road. That's it. We don't have entrances. We don't have pools. We don't have community centers. We don't have anything. That's it. So Kevin got us the information to put on the survey. And we went door to door, and the people said yes. Because that they understood. Okay? I don't know if this has already been discussed and agreed upon, but... We haven't done that yet.

We're voting on it tonight.

Well, not exactly. What's that? There's no final vote being taken on this tonight.

Okay. But the one thing that... I have now as a future resident of St. Cloud is I'm going to just make it kind of clear that as a resident there for 35 years and to receive a notice that my street lights are going to be turned off as of October 1st, 26.

Hold on one second, sir. Did you say we've already worked up because you got the votes from your community saying this is the route they want to go?

I have 61% of the community.

Okay.

Some of them are rentals and some of them weren't home when we were there.

All right. So what's the problem now? Is there a problem now or is that using like the letter from back then?

Well, this is a letter that's back then that this is a letter that's from St. Cloud. Okay. And it's stating October 1st. So this is in the future.

Okay. I'll let the city attorney speak to this real quick here, Richard.

Well, again, this is the special assessment process. This is the first step of the special assessment process. The city under his code, has an ability to put a special assessment in place to be able to do this. What the city has done historically as essentially courtesy to the individuals that are typically involved in them, they polled them or surveyed them to say, hey, do you want this, to do that? Because typically prior councils have said, we don't want to go through this whole process, have staff do this, unless we know that the people that are going to be impacted by this are okay with having a special assessment. Because again, these are assessments that only apply to this gentleman's subdivision, right? That first step, those letters, were all part of the circumstances that because of the transition with the annexation and how the county eliminated the MSTU, which they were previously being paying on it, unfortunately the situation was that if these assessments weren't in place, then the rest of the city taxpayers would be having to pay for their streetlights or the streetlights would have to be shut off. Again, this is the first step on August 20th. It will come back if the council approves this resolution, and then that will be when the final action will be taking place.

So what you're saying, if we pass this and we pass the next one, their streetlights won't be cut off October 1st?

That's correct.

Okay. That's correct. So you are actually speaking in favor of this?

Yes, I am. I am in favor of it. I'm letting the council know that we went around and we're trying to do good and explain to our neighbors because when we spoke with our neighbors, they did not understand what they received. And once Kevin revised it, to where it only included cane break. They were all for it. And they do not want an HOA in this area.

Yeah. And this process is new to us, too. Obviously, with the annexing of that area, this is the first time we've had to do something like this.

And quite frankly, myself, I was a little displeased with how our annexation went because I went from a... $9 water bill now to $102 water bill. And these are people that are almost all living on Social Security. And the reason for this is somewhere along the line, someone dropped the ball between the county and the city of St. Cloud because none of these ad valorem fees were on last year's taxes. So now we have to play catch up. And instead of putting a one-time ad valorem fee on the taxes, okay, to make up for whatever happened, now this is on the water bills and also the garbage and the storm water.

Okay.

And it's not only a one-time fee.

I'm going to ask for clarification on that, Richard, from our city manager. Do you understand what he's referring to?

I think he's talking about the city bills, our city services on the Toho water bill, and I think I had notified the council that there was an error when they were annexed. Toho did test the system. It did work in the test, but when they implemented the bills, for some reason, solid waste didn't show up, so they did have to go back and back bill those people.

Okay, so they weren't charged. It's not like they were charged more. They were just not charged and then charged. Correct.

Right. So I guess my question is to the council is when we were annexed in from the county to the city of St. Cloud, all of the ad valorem taxes that were already in present there for the last 30 years, why did not they carry over?

When you were in the county, none of your taxes went to the city of St. Cloud. So for those 30-year period, the city got none of your taxes. They all went to the county.

That's what I'm saying.

But the county would have had to give those taxes to the city, and the county did not agree to do that.

No. No, we're on two wavelengths. Because taxes are paid in the rears. Okay, so... When we pay our taxes, our property tax, the ad valorem that's underneath there is not our property tax. Those are actually assessments that's placed on there, like from the council. What I am asking is not a why or anything. This is just letting you know that the citizens in that development and surrounding developments have been a little upset because When this annexation took place, this never carried through. The stormwater was on the taxes.

All right. It seems like you know a lot about this situation, but I'd love for you to maybe meet with the city manager or some of her staff and talk about this further. Can we get him a business card, Scott? I have it. You have Scott's or any of theirs?

We've met prior, and I'll be happy to have actually our finance director talk with him outside.

Yeah, because we're kind of trailing off the actual item, and we need to get moving on voting on the item itself. So we appreciate you coming up here, Richard. Thank you very much.

And our finance director is going to meet you outside.

All right. Anyone else in the audience like to speak on any of the items on the consent agenda? Can I get a motion? Motion to approve. Motion to approve. Hang on, Mayor. We got another one. Come on up. Name and address for the record, please.

Jonathan Follian, 2305 Emperor Drive, Kissimmee, Florida, 34744. Just wanted to make sure that I'm understanding what this resolution is about. This is about adding... Is this number nine you're speaking of? Yes, still number nine, yeah. This is adding to our taxes for the Cane Break neighborhood. So we do not have to have an HOA. That's correct. Just want to make sure that that is my understanding of what's going on. If that's the case, then I understand that we got to pay our bills, so... Absolutely, I'm not a fan of taxes. I don't think anybody is, but this is a way that the neighborhood wants to have it as the paperwork that we just filed shows. All right, thank you. Yes, sir. Thank you very much.

Anyone else in the audience like to speak on any item on the consent agenda?

The same thing for the Keene break. Steve Moore, 2320 Emperor Drive. When we got all annexed into the city, it seems like it didn't really matter. When I spoke last time, it really didn't seem to matter that we're gonna get annexed no matter what. And you stuck us with this, having to figure out how we could go around the neighborhood and say, we don't have an HOA. I'm saying to the next community that you do this to, Don't do it to them, what you did to us. Just annex us in and say, now you gotta figure out what we're gonna do with our community. Spending our time trying to figure out how we're gonna get access to funds to pay our bills for our community. That's what I just wanna bring up, that another community that you're gonna go all the way to Harmony, you're gonna have three or four or five other of these communities the same thing that you did to us. So think about it before you go and annex them. Make sure you got all your ducks in a row so you don't make them feel bad like you did us.

Yes, sir. Please go to Osceola County and ensure they don't do this to you again. Appreciate that, sir. They dissolved that district over there. That's why we had to do this.

Anyone else in the audience like to speak on this item?

Yeah, come on up.

I'm sorry, it's the same thing.

No, just come on up. I need your name and address for the record, please, sir, for the folks watching at home.

I'm Chris Thompson, 2313 Emperor Drive, Kissimmee, 34744. It's the same thing, and I'm just trying to understand what happened, because we were annexed. Why weren't the ad valorem taxes still on the thing?

City attorney.

Okay, so these are not ad valorem taxes. Right, okay. Let's start with that, okay? Okay. When the county decided that you needed to have certain maintenance issues that are typically handled by homeowners associations, what's typically referred to as common areas, landscaping, street lighting, those kind of things, because your subdivision did not have a homeowners association, the best that we can understand is sometime in the past, the county created what's called an MSTU, Municipal Service Taxing Unit. What that is, that allows the county... to basically annually assess you for the cost to do the work that homeowners associations typically do. And then people that live in subdivisions that have HOAs pay those as part of their homeowners association dues. So what the county did is they created an MSTU, and for years you were paying very similar costs on your tax bill through an MSTU. When the annexation happened in the city, the county, frankly, without notice to the city, and contrary to an agreement we had, terminated that MSTU, and it really just frankly expected the city to take over these expenses. So the mayor said earlier... Steve, did you understand that? The mayor said earlier you should go talk to the county. The county is that started this whole movie by not following an agreement that the city had. At that time, frankly, my estimation, the city had one of two choices. We could fight with the county, or we could determine a way to allow these residents to essentially pay for their maintenance as similarly to how they were doing it in the past. The city does not have an ability to create an MSTU. What we have is the ability to create a special assessment which is what this process is. So basically it's replacing the MSTU that you had in the county for all those years with a special assessment and this is the first step in it. So at the end of the day, you won't have to worry about paying the bills and the work will get done.

It'll be on the tax record. That was our big concern because when we met at Neptune Middle School, I asked the question, how is this going to affect our overall taxes because we are being told that we're paying it individually now. That's what we were told at Neptune, that we were going to be billed individually.

I was at that meeting.

And I asked, I said, how come it's not still on our tax bill? City Manager. And they said, well, because it's different than taxes. And I understand it's different than taxes.

Let me let the City Manager speak now.

So the original direction from the city council was that the council did not want us to become an HOA in doing the billing. We had the meeting with the residents, and it was very clear that the residents wanted me to come back to the city council and ask you to please help with the special assessment process. And I came back. I told you about the meeting, and it was a hard meeting. It was a very hard meeting. But I left with friends, surprisingly, after such a hard meeting.

This was the second meeting, so I wasn't at that one.

Right, this was the second meeting. I came back, spoke to the city council, and said, you know, the residents, they're asking for us to please consider doing a special assessment instead. City council agreed to do it if we got over 50%. The residents started working on it. We did get over 50% in the other subdivision. Cane break, we did not. And there was the door-to-door effort. I came back to the city council and said, I understand they're just not getting 50%, but they're asking for help. The city council, I think at the time, they might have been at 40%, and you had said, We'll work with them. And at the same time, they came back and said that they had reached the 50%. So it was a win all the way around. So I just want to point out, it was actually a great lesson in showing how government works for the people, right? You guys gave direction. People spoke. We came back. Council reconsidered. And now we're taking the steps to put it in place. And it was painful for everybody, but I'm glad we're at this point.

It was a learning curve.

We've not gone through this before. Everybody's just concerned that it's going to be on the property. It gets paid once a year, basically.

Yes, sir.

Thank you.

Council Member Urban.

They will receive another notice of another hearing.

Just make sure the members of the community know. You are going to be individually mailed a notice that's going to have the assessment in, and on August 20th there will be another hearing. when the final assessment will be presented, assuming you pass this resolution.

All right.

Oh, just wanted to welcome everyone in the Canebrake community to the City of St. Cloud. Fun fact, I was actually born in Canebrake 35, almost 36 years ago, and moved to St. Cloud proper when I was one, and now it's part of the City of St. Cloud, so I've lived in St. Cloud my whole life.

Okay.

Anyone else in the audience like to speak on any item on the consent agenda? Casey, you want to talk anymore? Are you good? Can I get a motion?

Motion to approve.

Motion to approve from Council Member Urban. Second. Second. Council Member Paul. Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Paul?

Aye.

Council Member Urban?

Aye.

Deputy Mayor Gilbert?

Aye.

Council Member Fletcher? Aye. Mayor Robertson?

Aye.

Motion carries 5-0.

Man, who put this agenda together? All right, next up we have, sorry. Citizens form, any person who desires to comment on any item not on this agenda is provided this opportunity to address the city council. Each person is requested to complete a sign-in form to be provided to the presiding officer prior to, or as soon as practical thereafter, the person addresses the council. Theresa Melhot. She went to bed. Nope, she's here. Oh, I love your shirt.

Thank you.

Theresa Melhot, 2924, Cool Breeze Circle, St. Cloud, Florida, 34769. As a citizen, I just want to say that the 4th of July was amazing, and you all knocked it out of the ballpark. But I also want to say I was down there on the 5th for the seafood, Main Street Seafood Bowl, and I couldn't find a piece of litter anywhere. And me and a few other people were talking about that, that the Parks and Rec Department, I don't know what they did down there, but they must have raked everything. I mean... Seriously. Or got on their hands and knees. They did a terrific job.

That was Chief Gerke. He stayed there all night.

The city of St. Cloud did a terrific job. And the Parks and Rec did. Yes, they did. So I wanted to get the other way. But I also believe that if you did something wrong, you should apologize. And I made a post when I was emotionally worked up that cast maybe some – Questionable things that might have looked like I was casting aspersions unto you, the city council, and I apologize for that, those that saw the post. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. I'm not perfect. I strive to be perfect, but Lord knows I fall down every day and just get back up. But anyway, I do believe when you say something and then you have a chance to reflect on that, how it could hurt people, so I just want to say I'm sorry. And it was on my personal page, and then I kind of shared it around. But I was emotionally worked up thinking I was back with other city councils, and I wasn't anymore. So trust and transparency, and you all are doing a good job.

Thank you, Teresa. We love you. Thank you very much. All right, next up we have, sorry, I can't read. Haley Rebels.

Picked a fun meeting to come to tonight.

So thank you for your time and your patience and hearing everybody still. I wrote something out so I wouldn't miss anything. So good evening Mayor Robinson and city council members. My name is Haley Revels, and I live at 5186 Flycatcher Court. I'm a resident, an active duty military spouse, and a mother of two kiddos. We're doing great back there tonight. My spouse has more than 15 years of active duty service in the Air Force and the Space Force. I hold a master's degree in governmental and nonprofit accounting. And I want to mention those things because I want it to be clear that public service and contributing to something larger than ourselves is very deeply ingrained in our family's values. When military orders brought our family to Central Florida, we chose St. Cloud intentionally because of its small-town feel and family-centered environment. Those same values are what led me to help create a parent-led homeschool co-op for local families. Homeschooling never really stops, so even tonight, our kids are here. All night, they've been here watching and listening and learning. They're learning how local government works and how to speak up respectfully and how to advocate for something they believe in. Our co-op is a group of parents who come together to teach our kids, share knowledge, and more importantly, build community. We focus on outdoor learning so our kids can get outside and spend more time moving and exploring rather than being behind screens all day. Families all jointly contribute financially toward curriculum, supplies, activities, field trips, and other experiences for our kids. We're simply just parents working together to give our kids an opportunity to learn together outdoors. Myself and some of our families are here tonight because we received conflicting interpretations of Ordinance 2026-26 passed at the June 11th meeting. Parks and Rec staff have told us that it applies to our group simply because families contribute financially, that we cannot meet at any public location or any park in St. Cloud. Based on the ordinance's intended purpose and the way our co-op actually operates, we respectfully disagree in asking for clarification. We do not use any city property as our business address, nor have we ever advertised it as such. We do not collect any money on site, put up signs, or prevent the public from using the space in any way. We're simply local families who gather at the parks so our children can learn outdoors together. I want to be clear that we fully support protecting public spaces from large companies that use taxpayer funded property to generate large profits. Public property should not be taken advantage of, and I appreciate the city's responsibility and action in protecting it. But that is very clearly not what our families are doing. Our families are St. Cloud residents. We pay taxes that support these parks. As parents and the elected officials of our city, we both have a joint responsibility to work collaboratively to invest in our youth by giving them safe spaces to learn, spend time outdoors, and feel connected in their community. Our public spaces should be accessible to help make that investment possible. Like you spoke earlier, Mr. Gilbert, about making the investment in youth. We can do that for zero dollars. My request tonight is simple. Please clarify whether this ordinance applies to our parent-led co-op using public spaces to homeschool our kids together. If the council determines that it does not apply, I respectfully ask for clarification in writing so our families can move forward with confidence in planning our school year. Thank you for your public service, your stewardship, and consideration, and I'm open to any questions that you may have.

Yes, ma'am. Thank you, Haley. Um, yeah, we spoke on the phone obviously about your, uh, the homeschool group. I think, I mean, obviously I love that you have the kids out there learning in an outside environment and this is some of the unintended consequences of these ordinances. And I hope we can find a way to, to work through this particular, uh, issue with y'alls. Um, So you meet three or four days during the week. How many days at Chisholm park do you meet?

Correct. Right now we're planning to meet three or four days. Um, and we're open to adjusting that or splitting it between different public spaces or whatever collaboratively we can come together to do. Um, we definitely want to do that, but keep all of our families together in St. Cloud.

All right. City attorney.

Yes, so when this ordinance was passed and was adopted at your last meeting, it was intended to address, as the speaker said, basically for-profit organizations that are basically using public property to make money. I think there's misconception about the ordinance. The ordinance does not prohibit that activity. What the ordinance says is that you need to have either a permit, an agreement, some sort of written authorization from the city to be able to do the activity. Now, I do not... I'm not disputing what you're saying. I do not know enough about their organization to make a determination about whether they are commercial entity or not commercial entity. So if you're going to ask, I'm not prepared to make that clarification tonight as to their particular entity. I will tell you the other side of it is they simply could come back to the city and talk about, okay, here's what we want to do, here's where we want to do it, and we could work on some sort of agreement, because that's what's provided for in the ordinance.

Okay. Is that good? You sit down with staff and explain your whole organization? And what they need and where they need it.

Right, right. Definitely, I'm open to that.