City Council - Regular Meeting

Line unmuted.

City Manager Mark Lebowski.

Present.

City Attorney Thomas Moss.

Present.

Administrative Services Manager Lourdes Lawrence. Present. City Clerk Felicia Bravo here.

Good afternoon. This meeting has been noticed both as an in-person meeting and a virtual meeting. The public may attend in person or participate in the meeting by calling 954-395-2401 and entering the access code 368262. Procedures for public participation and comments will be explained in a moment. Information for each item on the agenda has been and is currently available at City Hall and online 24 hours a day at www.sunrisefl.gov. Anyone interested is also invited to call 954-746-3430 for additional information. The city's provided various options for members of the public to address the commission. Prior to the start of the meeting, we asked if anyone wished to speak on any matters before us and we've maintained that list and I'll call upon the speakers at an appropriate time. I'll also open up for public comment at an appropriate time and ask if anyone Attending in person or by phone wishes to speak. For those participating by phone, you may press five star on your phone to request to be heard. I'll attempt to take the comments in the order that they're requested by the five star feature, but please be assured all comments will be included as part of the public record for this meeting and will be considered prior to any action taken. When addressing us, please state your name, address, and what you're here to speak about. I'd ask everyone on the call, please mute your phones until you wish to speak. Also, please do not place this call on hold as it could cause unintended interruption due to background music. If you're experiencing technical difficulties, you may call 954-578-4792, and our staff is available to assist you. As we do before each meeting and before the Pledge of Allegiance, we take an opportunity for a moment of collective and individual silence. It's an opportunity perhaps to reflect on our own lives, to reflect on the lives of those around us, perhaps those who are going through challenges, and maybe just reflect on the grace that we have to be here tonight to share this moment. and to share as neighbors the destiny of this city. We always take an opportunity to also make sure everyone at least tries to remember that as we are here tonight, there are so many that are serving our nation, many in harm's way, and so many more in ready support all over the world. We reflect upon that and the gratitude that we feel for those men and women, and also recognize that even within our own city, as they serve, it means someone is missing someone. These are families missing a place at home or an event, and we must remember that and have the grace to remember that. It's also a chance for us to reflect perhaps on those we've lost in our Sunrise family since the last time we gathered. And it's with a heavy heart that I ask you to keep in your prayers and in your thoughts the family Captain Christopher Benemio. Chris, who recently, I'll call him Benny because that's what everyone called him, retired in October of 2024. Passed away on February 17th following the diagnosis of brain cancer last year. It wasn't that long ago that we stood right here in this well Wished him the best in his retirement. Chris loved being a firefighter. He began by watching the TV show, some of you might be too young, called Emergency. Remember that? And when he went to high school, Chris began as a fire explorer in Palm Beach County and then in the Coral Springs Fire Program. The fire explorer, so from a young age he was committed to it. After graduation from Coral Springs High, he applied to the Briar Fire Academy and graduated. And in November 1990, he began as a firefighter and EMT right here in the city of Sunrise. Chris rose through the ranks. He bled the fire mission and the fire rescue teams and what it meant to meet that calling. In 1991, he received his first paramedic two patch And then September of 95, he became paramedic one. He received his first promotion in 1998. And then 2005, he was promoted right here in Sunrise to the rank of captain. He's been with us for almost his entire life. And as his time as an explorer, he would give back to the explorers because that's where he began. The board member of the Sunrise Fire Rescue Benevolent Association. And every time he was called to serve, he did. He was a member of our special operators team since February of 1993. In July of 1996, he was assigned to FEMA's Urban Search and Rescue. For those who know what it means to be assigned to that, called to emergencies and difficult conditions, more sites that no one should see. responded to hurricanes opal ivan charles francis irene katrina maria all over the state of florida and he was also a member of the team that responded to ground zero he was one of the hardest working people in the department and he gave so much to this community 9 11 may have been life altering for him. And it was in some ways a development in his own personal life. So he had met his wife Meredith in 2001. She had recently moved from Staten Island. She'd been a chef and she moved to Cooper City. But on 9-11 their worlds came together. The concern that she had and Meredith's family had for all of those in New York City He deployed to 9-11, to Ground Zero, and her family and her friends, and she was there for him. That same year, Christmas of 2001, he proposed, and their life was magical. A young daughter was born in 2007, Madison, and two sons who followed soon after, Alexander and Ian. He was a father and a husband, and so much to his family. survived by his parents, Bob and Johanna, his brother Greg, Meredith, Madison, Alex, and Ian deserve so much from us and gratitude. Over the years, Chris received, Benny received multiple recommendations and commendations from residents, from business owners. He was multiple times Firefighter of the Month And he was the only employee to be named Firefighter of the Year twice, 1999 and 2004. He retired on October 11, 2024, and he stood in this very room, and we wished him the best. He fought valiantly to his Sunrise Fire Rescue family. The pain is real. To the connections to those who passed since 9-11 from being on the pile and being a grand zero, we wonder. Tonight, just keep Meredith, Madison, Alexander, and Ian in your thoughts. Anyone else we need to remember? For those interested, there will be Reviewing on Monday, March 2nd at TM Ralph Funeral Home here in Sunrise at 2 p.m. With gratitude to the Faith Center, his memorial service with full honors will begin at 11 o'clock on Tuesday, March 3rd. Please stand for a moment of silence. And our lives go on at the same time. We have amazing celebrations tonight, and I'm grateful for all those who are here. We have young people who we're going to celebrate as future leaders, and some restaurants we're going to celebrate as making our lives enriched. Before we do that, we have the consent agenda. If I could have a motion for 4A through 4X. Motion by Commissioner Kirsch, seconded by I'm going to pull a few items. 4A, 4B, 4C, 4D, 4E, 4F, 4G, as well as 4W. Any additional polls from my colleagues? M. Sorry, N or M? M. M as in me. As in Michael. We'll go with that one. Okay. Any other polls from staff? No, Mayor. Anybody in the public wish to have any items on the consent agenda removed from the consent agenda and handled as a full public hearing? If so, please raise your hand or press 5-star on your phone. I see no hand raised outside. Any hands raised?

I confirm, and Commissioner Guzman is on the line.

Okay. Perfect. All right. Call the question on 4H through L. N as in Nancy, through V and X.

Commissioner Kurtz?

Yes.

Commissioner Skudo?

Yes.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Deputy Mayor Guzman? Yes. Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Those items pass five to zero. All right. We have the quasi-judicial consent agenda, 5A. Do I have a motion? Move it. Motion by Commissioner Kurtz. Seconded by? Assistant Deputy Mayor. All right. Is the applicant here? Limelight here. Come on forward for me if you can. Thank you. Thank you for being here. Please give us your name.

Aisha Johnson.

Nice to meet you. Thank you for being here. As the applicant, do you waive a full quasi-judicial hearing on this matter?

Yes.

Okay. Any polls from my colleagues? Yes. All right. No affected parties? Mr. Lebowski?

No affected parties, Mayor.

Commissioner Scudo? Could I just talk to Tom first? Yes, please. Don't go anywhere. Commissioners could have any polls this matter to be pulled for a full cause additional hearing after we do the vote then I will Okay, all right go ahead and call the question on the cause I judicial consent agenda Commissioner Kurtz.

Yes commissioners good. Oh, yes assistant deputy mayor Clark mayor Ryan.

Yes Deputy mayor's on Ah, she can't vote on that. Right. Okay. All right. So it passes four to zero. So congratulations. Uh, commissioner Scooter is going to have some comments.

All right. So I just to, I asked Tom, I didn't want to pull the item to postpone this, but I normally when we do like extended hours and things like that in your application, it says that they're going to have hooker, but it's only going to be on the inside or whatever it is. But then people tend to smoke cigarettes, then they tend to smoke cigars. So my question to the city attorney is, when that happens with a four o'clock liquor license, if people go outside of the realm, then we're allowed to pull their 4 a.m. liquor license and then they no longer sell liquor till four o'clock. In this, for instance, I just want to make sure for yourself going forward that if, you're caught, not you, I'm saying your patrons start smoking cigarettes, start smoking cigars, then you're going to get hit with a code violation. then the code violation, then you're gonna have to go to a magistrate and go to a hearing. But I just wanna make sure that this is not gonna become an issue going forward. Everyone wants to have a great business and we wanna support that. But then you have patrons that come that just feel like, you know, They want to just do whatever it is that they want, and they don't want to listen. But then, in effect, you're the one that's going to get hurt. So I'm just telling you, make sure you monitor, please, that you don't get hit with code violations if patrons start feeling comfortable. inside outside because you have inside and outside and you don't want people to be sitting outside and say well i'm gonna smoke cigarettes and smoke cigars and so forth so it was just a question that i had to ask the city attorney if i would have asked this before we voted then this item would have got pulled and this would have got postponed for another month or so so i didn't want to do that i have to give you my opinion as You know to make sure that you don't have patrons that affect your business.

That's all I'm trying to warn you for Understand, okay Just point of information the item that was just approved by the Commission was a special exception for operating as a bar There is no extended hours license at this time the the applicant for the bar is only proposing a beer and wine, there is no liquor. If they would like an extended hours license, they would come back in front of the commission in front of a full hearing. I think the point was that there's a lot.

Let me just finish. Now that you just brought that up, I will go further now. If you get a code violation, right?

Okay.

And then you want to come before us for a four o'clock liquor license. you have a very good chance of getting denied. So this is where I'm telling you. It is for your benefit that you do the straight and narrow and make sure your patrons do that. Because if you do come back... And want to get a liquor license and go for a four o'clock liquor license it could very much hurt you that's all I wanted to really add since you brought that up that's where I wanted to make sure you don't get hurt because there will be businesses that tried and because they had violations. you can't get the 4 o'clock liquor license. So I'm telling you.

Ahead of time.

I'm telling you ahead of time. So I'm not warning you. I just want to make you aware that if you want to go forward and get a liquor license because you're only doing beer and wine now, and then your business is successful and you want to go to 4 o'clock, but now you have a code violation, and then it comes before us and then we look at it, then we're like, are we going to take a chance? So I'm just telling you from day one, set your plan and say, look, don't jeopardize my business. You know what I'm saying?

Please.

You got it. So he's giving you a few weapons to use. You have somebody to blame, right? So that's good if something happens. First of all, thank you for your commitment and your faith and investment in our city. City staff has indicated that you've been great to work with and we really want you to succeed. As Commissioner Scudo pointed out, normally we do pull these items so that we can have a broader discussion and make sure people understand. And in this case, everything lined up and staff was very supportive. and what you've done in working with the city. So first, I wanna thank you for your investment, your faith, but I also wanna thank you for your openness in working with staff, particularly on the voluntary conditions. It really says a lot, because sometimes we have to work to get those. And you were right up front with it. And so I think that's why this went quicker for you, right? And for those that are out there watching and wanna do it, this is kind of the model how to do it. Now, going forward, I know you'll do the right thing. Of course. And just encourage your patrons. You can always say, I got finger wagged when I was at the commission meeting, so don't create trouble for me. Get inside. Thanks.

Of course.

All right. We wish you the best of luck. Thank you. Thank you. Let's give her a round of applause for being part of our Sunrise family. All right. We've got some amazing presentations. If you would start, Deputy Mayor.

Special item presentation A. Presentation honoring winner of the 2026 Taste of Sunrise Taster Choice Award, Kevin Picard, Director of Legion Services.

Come on, make some noise. That was actually a little weak. This is pretty special. Give him some more love. Come on, make some noise. So we have been partnering with the Chamber of Commerce and with restaurants in our community to put on our own Taste of Sunrise. And it started out small, and it has gotten to the point that it was really record setting this year. We had over 50 restaurants represented in one form or another. Everyone who attended gained weight. The dessert section, far too many started there. And most importantly, we had a sellout. And these tickets for this are, I mean, we're not allowed to scalp them, so don't scalp them. But if you could, you would be able to sell them because it's become so popular. Between the music and the work that's done. But before we congratulate these businesses, we really have to start with a big thank you to the staff who puts on this event and all the work they go into. Give them some love. The City of Sunrise staff.

you

And so every one who attends and has a ticket gets three coins that they're not real, by the way there, but you get to put them in the jar to vote for your favorite dessert or restaurant. And so this is the result of what really is the tasters choice, right. And so I'm going to hand it over first to the chamber just to give us a brief rundown on the work that was put in this year. And so we can give them some gratitude as well. Brian.

THANK YOU, MAYOR. THANK YOU TO OUR COMMISSIONERS FOR HAVING CONFIDENCE IN THE CHAMBER TO MAKE THIS ANOTHER SUCCESSFUL EVENT. AS MAYOR SAID, THIS CAN'T BE DONE WITHOUT THE COLLABORATION WITH THE CITY. SO THANK YOU TO THE CITY AND LEADER SERVICES FOR ALL THE HARD WORK. GREAT DEPARTMENT TO WORK WITH. WE WORK GREAT TOGETHER. SO WE LOOK FORWARD TO CONTINUING OUR PARTNERSHIP AND OUR COLLABORATION AS WE MOVE FORWARD. We have our treasurer, Mr. Vivi. We have the restaurants. If you don't know him now, he's the trash man from Republic Services. We have Lucia, and we have our secretary here as well. But as the mayor said... Big thank you to all the restaurants, not just the four that are here, but to all that attended. There would be no Taste of Sunrise with all the restaurants who showed up and not only gave samples, but gave almost meals out to the 600 restaurants that were there. So thank you to all the restaurants that were here. We had some new ones. We had some repeat ones. And... Again, to the city, the Signature Sunrise, our first time in a Signature Sunrise, and we could tell it was a big difference. Beautiful facility, and we were happy to be able to showcase the restaurants there. So kudos, again, to the city, to having us here in the Signature Sunrise. So we do have some winners. We have some repeat winners, and we have some new winners. No, no. All right. We had three. We have three tasters choice for restaurants, and we have one dessert winner. So our first restaurant. No, we'll start with our third place winner. I'm going to botch this name. Neil, you want to help us with this name?

You got it.

Huh?

You got it.

Yeah, I got it. Empacadero 41. Come on up. You all can come up. You guys can all come up. You're all part of the restaurant. Chef, there would be no E41 without you. You want to tell us a little bit about who you are, your team here, and a little bit about the restaurant?

Sure, sure. Hello, guys. We are Embarcadero 41. We are a Peruvian Nikkei restaurant, so Peruvian-Japanese. We opened... Thank you, thank you. We opened our doors in July of 2020, so right before COVID hit. It was really tough. But the whole family was involved. My dad here, he started the business. We have our corporate chef, Daniel, my sister, my mom, my brother-in-law. We started as a family business, and we still are. And I think that unity that characterized us then has made us this successful. We're about to open our location number six in Brickell. So this award makes us really proud, and we thank the city of Sunrise and everyone here present.

Thank you so much.

Thank you

Our next winner, Mantra Express, Indian Cuisine. And what's nice about all these restaurants is they came out to impress, they wanted to win, and now you're here.

Thank you. Come on, you got to give your shameless plug. There's millions at home watching right now. So don't mess this up. Come on.

Thank you so much, City of Sunrise. This is our second time to get this award because of the City of Sunrise and everyone's support. We located our restaurant at 2100 North University Drive, Sunrise. You guys can come anytime. And we have a lunch buffet every day. You can try our lunch buffet, so many varieties. Looking forward to you guys and thank you so much again for this amazing award. Thank you again. And our restaurant with the most coins 205 coins located inside Signature Sunrise in the back corner

Bell Gordon's Caribbean Restaurant. And please let Simone, your mother, know we do miss her.

Wow, wow. Thank you, City of Sunrise and to the Chambers, honestly, for just hosting that amazing event that I'm sure all of you guys were at. It's just an amazing thing when the community can just come together and just share vibrant food. So we look forward to the continued efforts that you guys continue to put on for the city. And yeah, it's amazing. It's amazing.

One more gesture that I don't want to go unnoticed is last May, for Teacher Appreciation Week, they supplied lunches for, I believe it was Bear Middle and Horizon Elementary. So thank you guys for doing that.

Alright, one more time, big round of applause.

Now after everybody had their samples, it was time for dessert. And about a month prior to the event, This restaurant came to me and said, Brian, I'm winning this year, hands down. She goes, I'm bringing ice cream, I'm bringing my cookies, I'm bringing the whole store, because I want this award. Congratulations to the baked bear for the Desserts Teacher's Choice Award.

Thank you, guys. This means a lot to me and my team. We worked so hard for this award. If you guys don't know the Bake Bear, it's located in Sawgrass Mills. It's a custom ice cream sandwich store where you get to pick two cookies or brownies. We put ice cream in the middle, and then it gets warmed up for you guys. So definitely check us out. We appreciate this award from you guys, and thank you so much. Also on Saturday, February 28th, it is our customer appreciation day where we give away free ice cream from 12 to 6 p.m. So if you guys happen to be in the area, definitely stop by and get some free ice cream.

All right, if we could have all the restaurant winners come up so we can get one big picture of everybody of this year's winners. You guys get up front, get a designee so we have all four of the awards. Perfect. And while they're coming up, Let me just make an observation. Sunrise is becoming a place where we have just great food selection, as was said, vibrant food selection. If you look at the winners this year, the taster's choice, it was Peruvian, Indian and Caribbean. Talk about great diversity in our community of food options right here. You don't have to go anywhere. And it's a great celebration. I want to thank the Chamber again for its commitment to this and the vision to do it, staff who's worked so hard for it, the restaurants who won, of course, and for every restaurant. Because keep in mind, for you all to decide to go out there, means you're leaving your restaurant. You're thinking, what am I going to be able to serve that's going to stand up, that's going to encourage people to come to our restaurant? This is out of your element for all the restaurants. And to see the commitment and the vibrancy of that says a lot about these entrepreneurs. So one more time, a big round of applause before we take the pictures with them. Good job.

All right, one more time, big round of applause for these guys.

Damato, Damato.

6P, presentation of the Sunrise Leadership Academy, students class of 2026, Robert Burns, marketing and communications.

Come on, make some noise for these students. All right, so this is a celebration of some young folks who committed to be in a program that was intended to help expand their knowledge of how local government works. That was the intent. What it's become over the years is an opportunity for these young leaders to share ideas, to learn how to organize, to develop bonds with people they didn't know previously. And yes, along the way, learn a little bit about city government, but most importantly, learn about how they can play a role changing the world and to our staff that has committed so much to this program they deserve a big round of applause let's give them a big round of applause for this And the efforts that go in by the students is a lot. And to understand, each of these students are selected. They have to be nominated, they have to show a commitment to this program, and they have to attend all of the programs. And so we're really, really proud. And out of SLA over the years, We've seen some amazing people who have gone on to be part of our local family and to make a difference in our world. So I want to turn it over to Robert to introduce, and then we're going to have a little bit of a celebration here for these graduates.

Thank you, Mayor. Robert Burns, Marketing Communications Director, along with Sadi Diaz, who is our Public Engagement Manager, and her team who, you know, again, to the Mayor's point, we really want to recognize not only the students for completing and going through the program, and all the students year after year after year, but to them as well who really curate the program and select the students and find these young minds in our community that are interested in what we're doing and want to make an impact and have that passion. We put you through the shark tank. You guys had some great ideas too, and some of them we're really considering that we need to start looking at a little bit further. So we're excited to see you guys here tonight. We're excited for the ideas that you have and the ideas that you're going to have. And so to present your certificates, here's Sadie and the rest of her team.

Thank you, Robert. I appreciate it. Thank you, Robert. My name is Sadie Diaz. I'm the public engagement manager for the city of Sunrise. Since 2010, Sunrise Leadership Academy has graduated 300 alumni from the program.

That's pretty good.

And this year we have two new facilitators Jamori Hall and Madison Fernandez and they breathed in such a breath of fresh air into the curriculum. Tons of hands on exercises. So we're very happy with that. And also I wanted to go ahead and thank our staff. So this definitely could not have happened without the help from H.R. finance leisure services our city attorney's office which was one of our fan favorites. And he was, yes, he was, he was one of our fan favorites in our finance department as well. And without further ado, I wanna go ahead and have our class. We're gonna do it now for order. So we're gonna bring you up. And without further ado, the class of 2026. We are gonna have Anne with an H, new year and come up please. And with an E, Joseph. Yes, yes. David Arna. One of our students was not able to be here due to lacrosse, so Jared Ross-Nortman, so we're still gonna clap for him. Joel Martinez. Karenza Jen Baptiste. Chloe Simpson. Makai Otten. With his wonderful SLA shirt, right? Sabrina Jensen. Whose sister also graduated from the program as well.

Mm-hmm.

And last but not least, Zachary Schultz. Also wearing his SLA shirt. And also I wanted to thank our SLA administrators. So we have Ms. Sonya Clay in the back. And she's from Plantation High. We also have Matthew Lewis, who was not able to be here today, Piper High School. and Ms. Donna DeConorva, and she is from Western High.

So come on, congratulations to the class of 2026, come on. And what we've seen over the years is that these graduates go on to greatness. They had already achieved it before they came here. But they continue to be inspired. And sometimes it's making a difference in our community, telling us how we can do things better, right? And we want you to be those ambassadors. But there's always one who's kind of the leader. And we offer the opportunity to talk a little bit about what SLA meant to you and to the experience. And I think it's you, Joelle, is what I've heard. So go ahead and introduce yourself to the millions at home.

Hello, my name is Joel Martinez. I'm from Piper High School. Honestly, this has been an incredible honor for me to be part of a program like this. This has been an amazing program, thanks to Miss Sally. She's made this a wonderful experience that I never thought I'd have, and this has really helped me progress as a student and as a person, honestly. And I really appreciate that. And I really appreciate all my peers being out here with me. It means a lot that we could all do this together. And we pushed through and we did it. And it's been a great time.

What did you like most?

I liked most how unified she made us feel and how much she managed to really open our eyes to what comes after high school, you know. And that was really important for me as, you know, I'm trying to find where I'm going to go with high school or after high school. And this really helped me see my options and, yeah.

Well said. Awesome job. Well said, and thank you for that. And to each of you, thank you for participating now. You're the stars, so you guys have to move forward and show yourself. We're just support cast here. All right, one more time, big round of applause. Congratulations to all. And I hope your parents spoil you tonight with a big dinner or something, right? All right, thanks you guys, well done, thank you. All right, we have a number of items, but if we could move up. That's good. 16A. Move it. Second. Motion by Commissioner Kirch, seconded by Commissioner Scudo. All in favor say aye. Aye. All right, this is, and is the MPO ready for this? Yes? All right, come on up. Presentation by Bauer County Metropolitan Planning Organization, MPO, regarding the proposed C-13 Canal Greenway project. City Manager Mark Lebelski, Rodrigo DeCastro, Director of Utilities. Deputy Mayor is on as well, I believe. Thank you. I know you have a presentation. There's a number of folks who are here who may wish to speak on this item. So what we'll do is after the item is presented by the MPO, I'll open it up for public discussion. All right, go ahead and introduce yourself, and thank you for being here.

Good afternoon. My name is Buffy Sanders. I'm a broad MPO staff. I want to bring up our consultant, Elise Dallas. She's going to do a presentation for the C-13 Canal.

Come on up. The floor is yours.

Good evening. Thank you for having me. So I'm here to discuss the C-13 Canal Greenway Project, and we are seeking a resolution of support for this. This is a part of the LAP program ran by the MPO.

OK.

So the Broward Metropolitan Planning Organization, that's a little bit of a mouthful, the MPO, covers all of Broward County, including the 31 municipalities, and also works with the Broward County School Board and the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority. The Broward MPO's role is to use federal and state transportation funds at a regional level to develop plans, conduct studies, and establish initiatives and programs. So we wanted to give a project timeline to show where the C-13 canal greenway came from. So about 11 years ago, this was included in the City of Sunrise's bicycle and pedestrian master plan. That plan has been recently updated and this greenway was also identified in the updated version. In February 2019, the MPO adopted a Regional Complete Streets Master Plan, which prioritized Canal Bank Greenways. In 2021, the City Commission adopted a resolution of support, which established eligibility for the LAP funding, the local agency program. Then the MPO incorporated the C-13 Canal Greenway as part of their long range planning framework. The MPO conducted an initial public information meeting in July 2025 at the Knob Hill Soccer Complex. at this meeting we went over role plots and a single concept and the project scope information was also unveiled in october 2025 the city of sunrise hosted a second public alignment workshop during this meeting the three alignment alternatives were formally presented to the public And then in October and November of 2025, the city collected comment cards, email feedback, and then prepared a summary of preferences. And then in the future, the engineering for the C-13 Canal Greenway is programmed for fiscal year 2027. So as you can see from this map, the C-13 Canal Greenway would connect to other facilities, including the Hiatus Greenway. This is a goal to enhance multimodal mobility throughout the City of Sunrise. The Hiatus Greenway goes from Northwest 44th Street to 595, which it then connects to the New River Greenway, which then connects, it follows 595 all the way to the Conservation Levee Greenway, which actually borders the Everglades. So this isn't just a part of the City of Sunrise, it's a part of a larger network throughout Broward County. So the project limits that we're looking at is starting... You had project goals? Yes.

What were those?

To enhance multimodal mobility, safety, connectivity to green spaces, and then also long-term durability.

What do you mean by safety?

Safety, a lot of times we see bike lanes on major roadways. Some of those are protected. Some of those are just on street bike lanes. Typically, you don't want to have your child learning how to ride a bike on those facilities. This would provide a safe place for elderly, disabled, young adults, not as experienced riders to have a safe place to ride their bike.

Thank you.

So the project limits are Hiatus Road, which is managed by the county, and then moving towards the east, we cover Knob Hill, and then Pine Island Road, and the eastern limit would be University Drive, which is a state maintained road. This is also a larger part of the canal, so the Middle River Canal continues east and Lauder Lakes, Lauderdale Lakes and Oakland Park have also conducted constructed parts of this Greenway. So the idea would be that eventually along the entire canal is a connected path that would connect other municipalities within Broward County. And these are the potential alternatives which we developed. So starting with alternative one, this would be located entirely on the south side of the canal going from Hiatus Road to University. Alternative two is starting on the south, switching to the north at Pine Island Road. One of the reasons we decided to have this alternative was because of the Lauderhill Sports Complex that's on the north side of the canal. Once you get to Pine Island Road and the north side of that canal, the right of way for the South Florida Water Management is much larger there. There may be an opportunity to have more room for the trail on that aspect of it. Then the third alternative is having it on the entirely north side of the canal. So for this project, we conducted two public meetings. One was held July 10th, 2025. For this meeting, for some of the marketing that we conducted was the flyer was posted on the city website. It was shared on social media and sent in email distributions. Based on some feedback, we decided to have a second public meeting and make sure that we were further marketing our project. The flyer was still posted on the city website, shared on social media, and sent email distributions. There was also a flyer that was distributed to properties adjacent to the proposed Greenway corridor, which ended up being about 3,000 mailers that were sent out. And message boards were deployed on Northbound Hiatus Road, Knob Hill Road, and Pine Island beginning over a week ahead of the meeting. At the second public meeting, we took comment cards to get feedback on which alternative the residents would like to see. So based on those comment cards, we had about 42 submitted. At that meeting, we had participation from the City of Sunrise, the Sunrise Police Department, the Broward MPO, and the consultant team. We wanted to make sure that any questions that residents had, we were able to answer with a diverse group being there. From those comment cards, we had 20 votes for alternative one, which is entirely on the South, 14 votes for alternative two, the South switching to the North, three votes for the alternative three, which is entirely on the North and 18 votes for other. This just included different variations, concerns, or some combined preferences. And that was the October 22nd meeting. Now I want to get into what we are looking at and some details of the alternatives. So this is looking at Hiatus Road between Northwest 29th Manor and the C-13 Canal. This is the existing typical section. I wanted to point out that we have sidewalks on both sides, about six foot sidewalks. And then we have bike lanes. These are on-road bike lanes, which are about four feet In diameter, the drive lanes that we're looking at are anywhere between 10 1⁄2 feet to 11 feet. What our proposal would be for Hiatus Road between 29th Manor and the C-13 Canal would be to retrofit the on-street bike lanes to create a shared use path only on the north side. So the sidewalk would change from a six-foot... Oh, wait, wait, wait.

hiatus runs north and sorry on the east side on the east side just so the image we're looking at here we're looking northbound essentially yes okay so let's um and so what the proposal is to eliminate the bike lane make a larger shared path that's on the east side heading north and south correct yeah only on one side of the roadway all of the lane widths would remain exactly the same okay gotcha what and what's the thinking of eliminating the bike lane

It's just so we're not expanding the right of way. We don't want to mess with private property in any way. So this would allow us to improve the safety of the bike facilities without expanding the right of way. And then this is the conceptual plan for that improvement. So you'll see on the east side is where that new shared use path transition would be. We also recommended reducing curb radii near the Hiatus Road Trailhead Park, just so cars are slowing down at that turn to make sure that they're looking out for pedestrians and bicyclists. Then also installing special emphasis crosswalks. Typically, these are safer because motorists can see them, so they understand that people are going to be crossing the road here. It's just more visibility. And then I also wanted to highlight at the top you'll see the hiatus Greenway averages. We're going to go over the amount of users per day that's typically on the hiatus Greenway because we feel like that's a good example of what we're proposing here. And this is the Hiatus Greenway. This is, like I said, a great example of what we're kind of proposing along the C-13 canal. It's about a 10 to 12 foot shared use path. And it would be very similar to the Hiatus Greenway. And this is a built example in the City of Sunrise. Some other examples that we see of canal trails are the Black Creek Trail in Miami-Dade and the Snake Creek Trail in Miami-Dade as well. similar context to these canals. We also spoke with the police department and the analysis of public safety data does not show a relationship between the hiatus greenway and changes to crime. So these are the counts that the MPO took on the Hiatus Greenway to kind of get an idea of how many users we're seeing on a daily basis. So we took these in October, which is typically a better weather month. So these are kind of the months that you would typically see higher usage of trails like this. We took northbound and southbound. So you'll see the Hiatus Greenway north is the closest thing to the C-13 and some of those single family homes, we see about 69 users northbound and 59 users southbound. So typically when you go for a walk, you walk up and you walk back down. Those people would have been counted going northbound and southbound. Same thing for the hiatus Greenway South. This is South of 29th Manor. We see about 100 users going northbound and 119 going southbound. This is on a Thursday. On Saturdays, we saw on the northern segment, 80 going northbound, 68 going southbound, and similar numbers to the Thursday. We saw 118 going northbound and about 125 going southbound. So this is the typical section for the northern alignment. This would... be that 12 foot shared use path on the north side. No vertical elements would be installed, including lighting, benches, anything like that. South Florida Water Management has a requirement that no vertical elements can be used within 40 feet of the canal edge. So with the northern alignment, there would be no room for vertical elements, including lighting. Continuing with the northern alignment, it would be a 12 foot shared use path running along the north edge of the canal. So with the northern alignment, once we get to Pine Island Rd, we're looking at installing special emphasis crosswalks and then also a pedestrian hybrid.

What do you mean by that? Just so we understand.

So it's the crosswalk where it's not just two white lines. It also has the white stripes within the crosswalk. It's just an added safety feature. It alerts drivers. It's easier to see at night, that type of thing. And then for users to cross Pine Island, we are recommending a pedestrian hybrid beacon. What that is is a user would get to the light, they click the button, and it would allow them to cross, the interval would be about 30 seconds for them to cross the roadway, and then the light would go from red to green. It would only be going from red if somebody clicks the button. It would not be changing on its own, just to be clear. We would also have just cut in the median, so allowing for pedestrians to have a refugee there if they need to, and then continuing the shared use path on the eastern side. The reason we decided to go with a pedestrian hybrid beacon was because of the distance to signalized intersections. We're looking at about 1,500 feet to the north, and that would be the Oakland Park Boulevard signal. It's a little uncomfortable for people to go that far of a distance to cross the road. Usually, people would just run it, so we want to be on the safe side and just have a pedestrian hybrid beacon there. Then to the south, it would be about 730 feet to the next signalized intersection. For the southern alignment, it's pretty much the same thing. It would be a 12 foot shared use path on the south side of the canal. Similar look to the north just on the south side of the canal. And then once you get to Pine Island Road, we would have a similar treatment with a pedestrian hybrid beacon. it would be the same concept as if it was on the north side. And then I will show Pine Island Rd. This is where we for the another alternative. If it's South switching to North, this is what that switch would look like. Another reason we did was that the sidewalk on the western side of Pine Island Rd is large enough that we don't feel like we would have to modify the bridge in any way. We feel like users could safely go North and then continue East. Similar treatment to the other ones with the pedestrian hybrid beacon. And just to show you what that would look like, we do have a rendering. Like I said, this would be where somebody comes, pushes the button, the light would go red, they would safely cross, the light would be red for about 30 seconds, and then it would go back to green. And then we get to the Eastern edge of our project. This would be with the Northern alignment ending at University Drive. Still the 12 foot wide shared use path. As you can see here on the Northern bank of the canal, it's much wider. So we have more right of way, less impacts on adjacent landowners at that point. This would be if it was on the south side. At this intersection, the next intersection to the north is about 940 feet, and the next intersection to the south is about 850 feet. Then to summarize, the next steps would be also to determine the alternative that is preferred. And then the city commission, I hope you will consider a resolution of support.

Okay. Thank you very much for the detail and all the work that's gone in into this. I do have a few questions and I'm sure my colleagues do as well. First of all, I want to thank you for the addition of the cyclist pedestrian beacons. One of the major components and criticisms and concerns that are presented is the difficulty of these mid-intersection crossovers. Some years ago, the MPO, in coordination with the city, hosted a tour of a lot of planning engineers and the like. We came out and we rode the Greenway at that point, which was still in its development, and the most common criticism was the difficulty of mid-block as well as just the Frogger-type effort even at the light. So if you go to the South Greenway along 84, at Flamingo, at Hiatus, at 136, at all of these It is a challenge even with signalization. There's so much traffic making lefts and rights and everything else. The overall view at that point was that having that dedicated cross cuts down on the what is inevitable at some point makes it hard to cross because of permissive right-hand turns both on green and on red so I thank you for that and the second part of that was you know initially and I think it's still the case but initially the concern was that just having the crosswalks not enough that's again not solving the problem and so we've seen not just but across the world, right, that these are the common ways of doing it, giving pedestrians and cyclists some authority for their own safety. So I thank you for including all of that in here. It's a real commitment to safety on behalf of MPO and makes this work. With respect to the connectivity, ultimately, on the 84 Greenway, one of the great frustrations is it ends at University. There's a lot of folks that would love to be able to go further east given the opportunity. It's a fantastic ride from University all the way to Markham. But folks would like to have the challenge, if you will, of going to the beach. Under this proposal and the work that you all are doing with other cities, there's an opportunity to really meet the connectivity issues that have been at the heart of the master plan that began in 2015. Connecting greenways, green spaces, urban centers, and giving the ability to do that is a key component. The work with Lauderdale Lakes and then I guess it's – who else would be after that? Oakland Park?

Oakland Park, yes.

All right. Talk to me just a little bit about where you are in the stages of that.

So Lauderdale Lakes and Oakland Park have actually constructed their portions of the trail. From past university, there would need to be construction to link to the Lauderhill Sports Park. A part of this, we have not identified how we want to cross university. Since it's a state roadway, there's some more challenges that come with that. A pedestrian hybrid beacon,

Yeah, I understand that that's the real work right we need to work with the state on that But we need to show first that there's the connectivity.

They're not going to do it until They're not going to build it and hope you come it's gonna have to be the other way with the state I will say the MPO is exploring how we can So they've already constructed on on the canal yeah, I have the dimensions of it one second or the start and end and So from the turnpike to Northwest 21st Ave has been constructed.

Is that on the north side or the south side?

It's on the north side.

Okay. Not that it makes a difference to... No, no, but I'm just kind of curious. And is the right-of-way the same all the way along the north side that prevents the lighting and any vertical?

Typically, yes. Okay.

Talk to me a little bit about that. There's two sides of that coin, right? On the one hand, some folks say the more lighting you put, the more vertical, whether it's benches or otherwise, you're attracting people to come and stay and hang out. In parts of the Greenway on 84, there's not that opportunity. It's just wide open space, and that may have been a judgment call. What's the position of the MPO on that?

So with not allowing vertical elements, that does include trees. So one aspect of that is that you can't have shade. In the areas that there is more right-of-way and we can kind of push the trail outside of that 40-foot buffer, there may be opportunities to add in canopy to allow for shade. So it doesn't necessarily have to be lighting. It could be tree canopy as well.

Yeah, it's a big component on 84. It gets bloody hot out there. In some sections of it and some sections in plantation and you go further west. It's not as bad, right? Okay With respect to from the position of the MPO These alternatives you're coming to the city and basically saying whatever you all want you will do is basically what we'll fund, right? Okay And I appreciate that, and I appreciate it. The issue of the crime, there's a lot of – we have a lot more experience now that we have the 84 Greenway. We have north to Oakland Park. We have the problem of crossover at Oakland Park for our connectivity that goes to Wellaby. We have to go to the Oakland Park. hiatus light but people scurry across in the scope of the data that you looked at whether or not there's complaints about increased crime in any of these did you only look at sunrise or did you look beyond we spoke with the sunrise police department in national studies that i've looked at there's no relation to these crimes having increased crime chief if you can come up just um We have now the experience where we have plantation, we have these other experiences that are in a mix of single-family residential, multifamily, and businesses and otherwise. Chief, you heard the commentary on First Sunrise. Tell us a little bit about what you did and what you found.

That is accurate. We ran data prior to the Hiatus Road Greenway and after. And there's no correlation between crime before and after as it relates to the Greenway. We've also reached out to our counterparts in plantation, same circumstances. We do get calls for service along the canal banks, whether there's a Greenway there or not. But the Greenway itself doesn't have any impact on those calls.

All right. Um, the other component of this is, you know, we've built the Trailhead Park. We're at that point, right? Um, and one of the concerns is that had been a space that had been, quite frankly, vacant and covered, and so people were sometimes staying in there. We've now cleared that out. Along the Greenway, have you had any complaints of folks that are living in the bushes or anything like that that you haven't been able to address?

We still do. We're dealing with at least one group in the area of Oakland and Hyattis Road, but given the installation of the Greenway and the clearing of those wooded areas, the population of homeless has decreased.

And you mentioned national studies. I'm just going to finish like this and turn it over to my colleagues. Tell me what you mean by that. Because I guess this is always an issue. Let me back up. Part of the pedestrian and bicycle plan that the commission passed in 2015 was to try to find... We can't build the whole thing at once. We have to find where there are... avenues, so to speak, of available space where we can provide the safest routes. And are canals like this and what we see in South Florida a popular choice for the policymakers?

Yes. So we're seeing trails. We've constructed and worked on designed planned trails in Miami-Dade County, the Black Creek Trail, the Snake Creek Trail, similar to The C-13 canal, those go through some multifamily and some single family areas. Once again, it remains in the South Florida Water Management property. It's not impacting anything to do with private property. We have not seen any major complaints. We have not seen an uptick in crime. I haven't looked into the numbers fully, but this is something that happens all over the state of Florida. We're trying to utilize our canals in a better way. Right now, you can still access the South Florida Water Management right-of-way.

It's not blocked. People can still walk that right now if they want.

Correct. Yeah, there's just not a trail.

And, in fact, many people use it for fishing all the time, whether it's the residents living on the canal or folks who park and go and walk to it. That's clear, right? It still has access, right? Yes. Okay. And I guess the other component of this, to go east and west, in this case, east and west, If you were to choose a vehicular path, you have right-of-way issues, you have expense, you know, it's roughly a million dollars a mile and relocating utilities and everything else. On this construction, you're not relocating any utilities, there's not any deep digging or anything like that? Nope. And there's no, at least in between the junctures, there's no interference with vehicular traffic or anything like that?

No, there would be no impacts.

All right, thank you. Thank you, Chief. You may want to stay close. Others may have some comments. Commissioner Scudo.

First of all, thank you for your presentation. Very informative. I sit on the MPO, so I know a lot about that. And I would just want to say how far we have come. And I say that because on the MPO, it's not just these little pilot programs. It's the sawgrass that we just voted to expand to connect to 95 to add that little overpass where Atlantic Boulevard is so that people could watch the sunset. The buses. express lanes for buses now the light rail so i mean mpo covers so much and i'll touch back to when mayor ryan first got on the commission we didn't have any bike lanes um and it was a pilot program that the city did on sunset strip and did on 44th street We as a city went from two lanes on Sunset Strip to one lane, put in the bike lane, and then that was just with bike stuff. We started a bicycle pedestrian board just for them as residents to get some of their input and what they would wanna see would say bicycles. I'm driving down Hiatus Road, I constantly pass the post office and I said to the city manager, The corner is all trees. Like, who owns that property? Do we own the property? Who owns the property? And then they said, yeah. Sean and them said, yeah, we own the property. And I said, wow, we should clear it out. Then comes forward a park, Trailhead Park. Okay. But this is after the county starts the Greenway Trail. Markham Park. Along 595. Okay. And they said, okay, where do we go now? Could we go through Sunrise? Could we go through Plantation? Could we go down Hiatus Road? People were like, I don't know if I want that. Plantation Acres was like, I don't think I want it on my side. Could you push it on the Sunrise side? And then they're putting in Hiatus Road through. It took a lot of planning for all of this. Now we get... The green way to come into plantation acres into sunrise. So we thought putting the Trailhead Park was going to be a good connectivity to now put in a change your tire, put air in your tire, put water, take a little bit of a break, whatever it is. we heard residents say crime was going to come and at the last meeting that you guys had no appeal right after the meeting i got calls got right on the phone said chief i need to ask you a question if you could look into what is it What crime since we put in the greenway and plantation and sunrise did it change it doing up you know tick or whatever it is and he informed us that not you guys have been in contact and what he said tonight. So now. The mix is really what side we're going to put it on you know so. On one side. the north side, if you started at hiatus, is going to run behind all of Holmes of Wellaby. But in one side, they all have fences. So they are pretty much protected for whatever. Not to say I want to put it on that side. switch it to the other side, you're gonna go behind duplexes, then you're gonna go behind townhouses, then you're gonna go behind phase four, then you're gonna go behind phase three and some residential going that way. That doesn't have any fences. So I see both sides, but then you mentioned about disability, About seniors. So now I say. Seniors. Could have access to that. And be on a nice clear path. With safety. Because that's what this comes down to. In the old city hall. It was packed. For a meeting. Because on weekends. The bicyclists. Used to be 20 30 40. Going back. taken over one or two lanes, and we had a couple of homicides. We've had some that were just single occupants where one person, 5.30 in the morning going to work, and this person riding a bicycle in the right lane because there's no bike lane. Putting kids on Oakland Park Boulevard in a four-foot bike lane, that's not where I would want to learn. I'll say it different. I learned how to ride a bicycle in Brooklyn. So we really... were very limited to where we were going. We didn't have a bike path. You had a sidewalk. And at the time, a lot of people walked on the sidewalk. Everybody rode their bicycles. I'm just saying. So, I mean, I'm not saying that people can't learn how to ride a bike on Oakland Park Boulevard just because it's busy or Sunset Strip because it's busy. But obviously, to get connectivity is so important. We've built bike paths that go, they end. And we want to continue them with the next city. But if the next city is not going to be a participant, we're stopped. So now you mentioned about this path going to University Drive. After University Drive becomes Lauderhill. So now there is no connectivity if Lauderhill doesn't get in on this. Because to get to Lauderdale Lakes and get to Oakland Park and then to go Fort Lauderdale to go to the beach, we're stuck. So my one question is, because I didn't really think of this until the mayor brought it up. From Lauderdale Lakes to Oakland Park, what did you do at 441? Is there a cross at 441 or there's nothing there?

There is a cross at 441.

So I'm just saying if 441 is a main thoroughfare, just like University Drive, Do we follow that? And I just want to add, going from the way this started to the way it is now, State Road 84, like the mayor said, there was no cut. People were just taking their bike and going the street and hop up on. So then we corrected it. Now you're putting all the stripes just so it's like traffic calming or whatever it is that you want to call it. visual, so when people get to the light, they say, whoa, they're stripe, stripe, stripe, stripe. This is a main intersection for something. You know, they're already thinking. So that's a good sign that now we're trying to teach motorists that, hey, you're not the only one on the road now. You got bikes. And we started with all of our vehicles in the city putting look twice for motorcycles, pedestrians, and bicycle riders. So we're trying to influence the people into listening. So look, we've come a real long way in all of this. And we just want to make sure that the residents are comfortable whatever side we put it on. And you talked about lighting. We can't go vertical, but if you see on people's homes now, they have these little lights that are on the ground that are very visual. They're blue, they're white, they're red. So I'm saying is if someone's questioning about lighting, You know, it's kind of like a reflector, but it lights. A reflector only lights when you shine a light on it. These are visual lights that light, I guess, in the dark, whether they're solar or whatever it is. So whether we do that here in Sunrise or could do it anywhere, it could be something where we could light it up because I've already asked the city manager about behind from Oakland to 44th Street that connects to our park. that it's very dark because it's behind a shopping center. And at nighttime, people do walk. Now that it gets dark early because it's winter, if there's a way to light, maybe that's a way we could light rather than doing poles. So look, the north side or the south side, we want to protect the residents. But I don't think we've had, like the chief said, an uptick in crime, loitering, you know what I'm saying? I think it's more or less for kids, families. You see a lot of families. You see mother, father, kids. I see them when they get up to Oakland Park Boulevard. They're waiting at the light to cross over, you know, because it's the same thing. From there, you got to go over. So maybe that could be something that we could look at on Oakland Park Boulevard. like the crossover, like you said, with the light. The light, I think, is a great idea, you know, for whether you do it for Nob Hill, Pine Island. But I say we really got to figure out the university. But if you're doing it at 441, I can't see how you can't do it at university. In order to help Lauderhill get that connectivity, because it would back up to one of their parks, like it backs up to one of our parks, like it backs up to Markham Park. I think something needs to be done. This is definitely not a rush thing. This thing has been going on for years, knowing that something is coming. So I am supportive of going forward. Let's just figure out the north side, the south side, if we want to stay on one side. We don't want to inconvenience the residents, but Either side, you're going to inconvenience either the duplex, the townhome, Sunrise Lakes, and then back to single family or single family. Because now we're building a new complex on University Drive. and University next to the Lowe's. That's gonna be a whole new apartment complex. So if it's on the north side, I'm saying on the east side, that could help that development to have access to something that we're attracting. We don't know what's gonna happen with any other developments right there. There's a development directly across the street that has 400 units. We're also going to have, building on the golf course, 900-plus units that could take advantage if it connected to the east side of university. That I'm saying. So it's all about connectivity, and it's always people don't want it in their backyard, but then once you do it, they end up using it. So we just have to feel... The last meeting wasn't a great meeting for the MPO because residents that came out were specifically the ones that live in Willoughby that specifically back up to that. So we as a city, city manager, the mayor, staff, commissioners, have to do a better job at the next meeting to explain the options and show them what it is, have the chief say what it is, that it's not what some people say it is, and that it's a program that's working. For the safety of kids, for the safety of people with disabilities, seniors and families. Having a bike path on a 10 foot, 12 foot wide sidewalk instead of on a traveling road with cars. I mean, it's there for the person who's experienced, but for someone who's not, it's not.

Thank you, Assistant Deputy Mayor.

Good night, this is like a three-parter. So first, Chief, do we have any drowning in the canal recently or has there been any drowning in our city canals?

Specific to the Hiatus Road Canal or the Middle River Canal? Recently, no. Have we had drownings in canals in the city? Yes. Have we had drownings in the Middle River Canal specifically? Yes.

And are these droning? Do you are? What age group?

So the Middle River Canal, I could think back, I have to pull the specifics, I could think of at least two or three over the 26 years I've been here, where elderly from the Sunrise Lakes community from phase four, all the way through phase two, have been victims of that canal. In their car or by walking? Pedestrians. Oh, we've had cars. And we've had cars as well. We've had cars in other canals throughout the city, not the Middle River Canal. I could pull those specific stats, but to generally answer your question, yes, we have had drownings in canals throughout the city.

Okay.

Both pedestrian and vehicular.

Thank you. City Manager. For the side that there is residential single family homes that has fencing, there has been a lot of concern because residents have stated that they paid for extra land use or something of that nature that put their fencing beyond their land points. This is what I'm hearing, I'm asking you the question. has that been, is that a true statement? Is that a statement and how would that affect, in the event that it's on that side, how would that affect those residents?

Mark Lebowski, city manager. Most of the homes on the north side have fences along their rear property line facing the canal. I have not looked at the individual, but most of those fence lines, when you look on the arrows, are on a uniform line, which leads me to believe they're all within their property line. So I would assume the answer is it should be within their property line. I would need to confirm, but. Unless they're all on the wrong side? Don't tell Marty Care that.

He may send you a tax bill.

And then my other question is, in the event that they're outside the range and we implement this roadway on that particular section, we would have to, would it be the range where they need to dig up their fence, pull away their fence? There's no street.

Whatever you do.

This is not a project of the City of Sunrise and it would be the requirement of the district to notify the property owner if they have an encroachment, not the city. Okay, all right.

So then can we look up those numbers and see if that statement that they actually paid for or got some sort of extra provision.

They didn't pay South Florida Water Management District. They would never let them have it. It never happened. The work that they've had to do to just get onto their property.

But that's the comment. I just want to make sure that we're clarifying the comment. They should bring their receipts if they have that. All right. And then for the side that there is senior citizens, and we are talking about putting out shades, or would we be moving any trees that are barriers? Are we doing anything to prevent? Okay, good.

And I talked to a couple of residents at the meeting that that was their concern. Obviously, this is a planning feasibility. This is not construction design, but from what we understand and what we're looking at, no trees would be affected with this path.

Mr. Kirch and then Commissioner Guzman.

So a couple things here. You know, one of the conferences I attended when I first got elected was Strong Towns. And you learn a lot about these types of projects. What is a road? What is a street? What is a strode? So for those who don't know, a road is an efficient connection between two places. It's a high speed and safe road. lane that allows traffic to flow. A street adds value to your community. It's a slow lane traffic where you want stops. You want to have to blend with other types of connectivity like bike lanes, pedestrian walkways. And then you got Strodes. And that's just really a hybrid of a street to road, kind of like Oakland Park and University. 50 miles an hour with a bike lane. I love the bike lines. I think it's important to have the connectivity. But if you're not going to allow your seven-year-old kid to ride on that bike lane, it's probably not the best idea. Older people want to get out on the and use those on 44th and that. Great. I do it myself. I use the bike lanes. I travel the Greenway. I go all the way out to Markham Park up along the 595 Canal all the way down to Stranahan River where there's another similar type project there that runs adjacent to that canal. So there is a lot of benefit to having these project done. It'll allow for greater connectivity, which coincides with our pedestrian and bicycle master plan that we spent years in the making and developing. And it's like Commissioner Scudo said, sometimes I'm driving down on Pine Island and I get to Plantation and that bike lane just stops. You cross the street, here you are in the middle of traffic and there's no additional bike lane to go down to 595. I've lived on this canal. I lived there for 16 years. My back window faced the canal. So I've seen it. I didn't live up north near Hiatus, between Hiatus and Nob Hill. I lived down Pine Island and University. I'm sorry, yeah, Pine Island and University. I've ridden my bike back there. I've ridden it back, my mountain bike, all the way through there to get to the Greenway. There's not enough space on the north side to do this properly, in my opinion. It is either all south or alternative. When you get to Pine Island, you switch to that north side there. Having lived in that area, there is a wide, wide area to make this happen. I didn't have any crime. When we were back there, nobody broke into my house. Nobody broke into my neighbor's houses. In fact, when break-ins did occur, They came from the front door because that's where the cars parked. Nobody was walking back there carrying a TV behind the house or other types of things. It's where they could get in and out and get the stolen merchandise in their car.

Somebody who has a criminal mind, thank you.

I'm a criminal defense attorney. So I don't believe there would be, by having the pedestrian area, I don't believe there would be an uptick in crime. But again, I don't think it's appropriate to put a bar in the single family homes between Hiatus and Nob Hill. I think it needs to go more on the south side, that area where residents and senior communities would have better access to doing it. As people age, people are getting more and more healthy, more and more walking, more and more activity as They get older. I mean, you look at their pickleball court is just jammed every day with lots of activity. So I think it allows them an additional opportunity to exercise and continue to stay active throughout your silver years. Is that the right political name?

Why are you looking at me? Silver years. Oh, you got the beard. I know. I got you.

But anyway, thank you for the presentation. I am supportive of moving forward with this, but I'm not supportive of the NORTH SIDE OPTION.

ENTIRELY OR ALTERNATIVE?

I COULD DO ALL SOUTH OR I COULD DO THE ALTERNATIVE BUT I CAN'T GET BEHIND THE NORTH SIDE.

OKAY. UNDERSTOOD. DEPUTY MAYOR.

HI, GOOD EVENING, EVERYONE. SO THANK YOU FOR YOUR PRESENTATION. I'D ALSO LIKE TO AGREE WITH MY COLLEAGUES IN A FEW OF THE STATEMENTS THEY SEEDED IN REFERENCE TO THE CONNECTIVITY AND THE HEALTHY LIFESTYLE AND EXERCISING AND being out there for the accessibility between walking and riding their bike. And as Commissioner Kirch mentioned that, you know, how he used to live and see this on the daily, I actually am currently in the same neighborhood where he used to reside. So I get to see this firsthand as well. Many of my neighbors actually walk back there with their pets. I constantly see people walking from University to Pine Island already, which is on the north side of the canal. there's actually a business close to the university. So a lot of times I've seen where people are kind of coming from the business and then walking back to their home or anywhere conveniently to get to the next side. So I believe this is a great project. I think it's another way to just promote healthy lifestyle, safety, utilizing our space effectively. I'm sure that my son will love to be able to work out back there and run and do what he does for exercising. It may even have me want to go out there and start walking more because it's easily accessible for me as a resident to utilize that walking space a little easier than just walking on the grass or the sand now. So again, thank you for the presentation. I'm sorry I'm not there physically to have seen it, but I do appreciate your feedback and my colleagues as well.

A couple questions. Talk to us a little bit about the space issue that was raised by Commissioner Kirch, north and south, and the space issues. That's something I know that was part of this, but we didn't really drill down. So can you explain that?

Yes, I would say that on the north side, especially by the single-family homes, it's a little bit tighter of a right-of-way. I do believe you could fit a trail there. It's going to be tighter. It's going to be closer to the fences that were mentioned. On that south side because there's not fences.

There's some trees also along that area You get a little bit more right-of-way second one of the things that occurs to me first of all if I Lived on one side of the canal and saw it being built on the other side I'd probably be pretty upset because there's no way to get there except to get all the way and I think it's gonna be highly used we see that north of Oakland and All the folks that live along there are going to Wellaby. They're coming in and out of that area, and it connects to the businesses, which was part of the goal in 2015, was to try to find places where people could go to the businesses. One thing that occurs to me is on the north side, as you look, almost everybody has fences. And there's no gaps between these homes. So on these major corridors between the roads, access is really limited only to those that abut, because there's no way to get in. And I guarantee you, if it's there, people are going to put a gate and they're going to go. But for the rest of the neighborhood, there's just no access. And so when you look at an area, you say, oh, wow, this will be really attractive. It'll be great for a lot of folks. It's actually on the south side that you would expect greater utilization that is connected to it. I'm not talking about what travels across the distance, but that is contiguous to and goes to it. And that to me was pretty compelling because as you look at the aerial, it's just almost every house has a fence. There's a few exceptions, and even where there's no break in the neighborhoods, these are all the way from one side to the other. Third, I think to the point that has been raised, these are used right now. They are. You can look at some of the aerials.

Worn paths.

Yeah. You can see the pathway. They're absolutely worn. It's not like you need a mountain bike necessarily. Obviously, it's easier, but it's not rugged terrain. There's already worn paths in some of these sections, particularly on the south side. That seems to have already been. Ultimately, what we're trying to do is create connectivity between green spaces and population centers. I'm confident that the chief in working with South Florida Water Management District, to the extent we need to install or have something within the systems for call boxes or whatever else, we'll figure that out. That's not something new. But this is one of the largest that are being done in a single set. And it's... It's unfortunate, I think, if we go south side, because I think a lot of folks on the north side are going to regret that they don't have access to it. I really do. I know there's probably some folks here who will dress me down for that, but they may not represent everybody that's there, because there's folks like myself and Commissioner Kirch that when you live on it, you want to use it. And that's the experience we're seeing, even on the sunrise side. And certainly when you go south on the Greenway inside Plantation, there's been no criticisms of that. And all of the parade of horribles that we heard were going to come when we opened hiatus just haven't occurred, other than speeding, right, which is a constant problem, right? But the issues of introducing crime and creating problems in my backyard, if anything, every morning out there on the pathways, you see people riding, running, and everything else. So it's been a huge improvement, notwithstanding the concerns. Mr. Lebowski, your light's on. I'll go back to you.

Thank you, Mayor. Real briefly, just to expand on something Commissioner Scudo mentioned, on the segment between Pine Island and University Drive on the north side, there is a project that's currently under review adjacent to the Lowe's projects called Marlowe. as part of that site plan the developer is actually proposing a connection to the proposed greenway they they that seems like the best segment of it right yeah they they see that as an amenity and uh something positive for the project so i just want to share that with the commission and that as i look at i'm just looking at the google earth overhead that that is a fairly wide section

that on what we don't face after pine island is that right that's why we recommended switching to the north side at pine island in alternative two um to utilize that larger right-of-way at that point yeah that makes that makes a lot of sense and access to the businesses in there that ultimately exist okay uh commissioner scudo and then i'm going to open up for a public comment so i i agree i mean if we're going to like you said but city staff

because we haven't really heard there about this because it's always been thought of to go on the north side. So I just want to make sure that your date is 2027, which is not too far away. And if they're not in the mix right now, especially if it seems like what we're saying up here is that we're going to do South to Pine Island and then Pine Island to University on the north side, you're going to affect phase four, phase three, and phase two. So please, you know, I mean, I know we all have our people there, but I think this should come from the city and have a meeting at phase four, at phase three, at phase two, because I mean, if you're just talking about the 50 homes or 40 homes that are on Wellaby side that are affected by this, now you're affecting hundreds, even though they may love it and benefit from it.

Did they get notice, by the way? Were they part of the 3,000? Okay.

But probably not thinking because everything that was promoted.

Yeah, that's her. I want to find out. Sure, absolutely.

I also just want to be clear that in fiscal year 2027 that is just design construction design. This is not being constructed in 2027, so funding for construction would be identified in that year and design would start. Public comment can still occur during the design phase.

But we want to move this forward. I think this is the point, right? We want everybody to be supportive. Yeah, we want to at least create a resolution in support of it. We know that the wheels of government go very, very slow on these issues. We'd like to flip the switch and get these in. that's part of why we did the master plan we know that doesn't it's not easy it's expensive and it has to be done when you can do it like the connectivity with other cities like we've done with weston and everything else thinks that this is coming correct so but mr lebowski what's your recommendation on timing and what you'd like from us this evening before i open it up for public comment nothing tonight but we i think uh the mpl would like something shortly from the commission in terms of resolution of support All right, this time I'm going to open it up. Thank you very much, and please stay closed because we may have more questions. I'll open it up for public comment. Anyone wishing to speak on this item, please come forward. I know you're signed up in our open discussion. You can come up. Anybody else who wishes to speak, why don't you come on down to the front row, and then we can just go through everyone who wants to speak. All right, introduce yourself to the millions at home.

Good evening. My name is Chad Dashnaw. I'm a City of Sunrise resident. I've been in the city for over 20 years. I worked for the police department as a 911 dispatcher for 17 years, currently working with Broward Sheriff's Office. Back in 2015, I met the mayor the week that he was elected. He went to a meeting at the old tennis center to discuss the parks that were going in Oak Hammock as they were in development. The whole purpose of me going to that meeting was to ask about bike paths. I had just been to Markham Park the weekend prior and noticed that there wasn't really a bike path that circled the entire park. And my concern was, why don't we have that? Obviously, it's a county park and that was what we discussed and Sunrise didn't really have a stake in that. At the time in the city of Sunrise, there was maybe one or two paths. They were not more than 18 inches wide. And being on 911 dispatcher, I remember the day that we had a traffic homicide at Flamingo and Oakland, just south of that. Right now there's a three feet, it's the law sign, and that sign is there because of that traffic homicide. So tonight in the presentation, which was amazing, I was formerly on the Citizens Advisory Committee with the MPO, and I'm the only original member of the Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Board, still on the board, so 11 years later. I participated in the master plan as a member of the community. I've attended the meetings. I've done my fair share. So my entire purpose of being on the bicycle and pedestrian advisory board is for this path. It's not for the guys who are riding in spandex up and down Flamingo Road because they're not going to use this.

Or gals.

Or gals, yes. So one of the greatest things I can say that has happened since being on the bicycle and pedestrian board is the bicycle boulevard that's gone along Sunset Strip. And it was a lot of people thought it was going to be an inconvenience. There's been a lot of issues where trash cans were placed in the path or vehicles were parking out there when they're cutting the lawn. There was a lot of confusion about the roundabout that went in there and people didn't know how to navigate it. Some people saw it as an inconvenience. Commissioner Scudo mentioned that to some people, this path could be an inconvenience. So I just want to point out a couple things. People have approached this path as being inconvenient or a burden. This is an amenity. This shouldn't be an amenity to a new community going in. This should be an amenity to the people in Sunrise Lakes that have been here longer than anyone. Mayor Ryan, Commissioner Kirch, you guys are young guys. You can hop on a bike and you can go to one of these major roads and get to the path from the north side. A 75-year-old grandmother is not going to do that. 75-year-old grandmother, anybody who's ever navigated along Sunrise Lakes Boulevard, Sunrise Lakes Drive North, they know with all the points of ingress and egress to 220-plus buildings out there, you can't ride a bike. You can't even walk on those sidewalks. They go up and they go down. Why not have one solid 10-foot, 12-foot-wide path right out their back door? People on the north side who probably tend to be on the younger side than what is in Sunrise Lakes can navigate their way to a path. But the people on the south side absolutely will not navigate to that path. And they're the ones that this path should be built for. They should be able to go out there with their grandkids, with their spouses, get out in the fresh air, enjoy the city as amazing as it is. The best thing that I've seen since being on the board, I'll try to say this without crying, was an older woman riding on the bicycle boulevard on sunset strip on a three-wheeler now she's riding in traffic not in traffic but a path that that is adjacent to traffic this path is completely separate from all traffic until you get to the major roadways i've done it i've looked on google maps pedometer i've measured it out one distance is point seven miles one distance point eight miles my only Disappointment in this entire thing is that the path is not on both sides, so everyone can benefit from it. This is not a burden. This is not an inconvenience. This is not something that's funded by the City of Sunrise. This is something that's funded by the MPO that meets up with our bicycle and pedestrian master plan, which is actually being revised right now. It accomplishes every single thing at literally no expense to the City of Sunrise and only benefit for the citizens. I strongly advocate for it to be on the south side so it benefits the people who need it the most. Thank you very much for your time.

Appreciate it. Next speaker. Anybody else wish to speak?

Hi, my name is Megan Paradis. I live in Sunrise in Willoughby. Thank you for allowing me to speak tonight. I'm here regarding the proposed path on the C-13 canal. I appreciate the goal of improving connectivity and promoting outdoor activity in the community. I am not opposed to the concept of the pathway itself. However, I do have significant concerns about its placement directly behind the residential properties. My home has a low backyard fence, so you can see the canal. A public walking path immediately behind our property would create serious privacy concerns for my family while we were using our yard and pool. Our area has always been a quiet residential buffer, and changing it to an active public corridor would change that environment. That said, I understand there has been discussion about placing the path on the south side of the canal. From my perspective, that would be much more reasonable solution and would avoid directly impacting homes like mine. I respectfully ask the commission carefully consider the impact on adjacent homeowners and pursue the south side alignment or other alternative preserved residential privacy and safety. Thank you for your time.

Thank you for being part of this. Look at that.

You persuaded all of us. It's on the other side.

We should have heard from you first, right? All right. Thank you so much for coming out and participating. Anybody else who wishes to speak? Come on. Come on forward. Come on down. You and I can remember. Probably some can't, though.

Okay. I'm Don Barnett, and I'm on the bicycle board also.

I'm 70, and I still get around.

I ride a trike and I ride a two-wheeler around town because I can no longer drive a car. And I use the bike lanes for shopping. I connect to the Greenway through 44th. And I connect to stores through Sunrise, Sunset Strip. This canal thing, this path is cool because it's going to get me to Lowe's without making me go down Oakland Park Boulevard on the sidewalk because my trike is too wide for the current 18-inch bicycle path that's there. Okay, so to those of us that have limited mobility or no access to vehicles and are bicycling, and there are quite a few of us, by the way, because if you stop at Publix up there in Commercial, you'll see that bike rack is pretty much full all the time. Okay. So there are those of us that need the connectivity to the stores. So alternative two to me is the best one because it's going to get me to Lowe's and those little stores back in there.

All right.

Okay.

That's great. Thanks, Don. Thanks for your service as well, you and Chad. Anyone else wish to speak on these items? All right, I'm going to close public discussion on this. Mr. Lebowski, the one linchpin here, I think, is as Commissioner Scudo raised. Let's make sure that we reach out to the leadership at the phases to get their input. I think the consensus as I hear it is... I misstated is the North side that switches over to the South side, utilizing that space at university from university.

You're starting at hiatus.

That utilizes that access, uh, on the North side between university and Pine Island switches over to the South.

Um, and I think, is that the general consensus or.

All right. We're not passing a resolution tonight. It's just a, opportunity for some guidance on it we'll reach out to leadership and let's by the end of march have a resolution on this and get this resolved so that you all can can be in the process and then um you know just go ahead and tell them it's okay to fund it right away and begin construction we're ready to to facilitate that okay i'm one of the 31 votes exactly thank you for your time and let's give them a round of applause for being part of this process really good Okay, let's turn to open discussion. Anyone here wishing to speak on any items, please come forward or press five star on your phone.

Good evening, Mayor, Commission, City Manager, and staff.

Just hand it to the City Attorney, and he'll pass it down.

I stand in front of you today as HOA president for Shannon Lake Estates, a small community in the west side of Sunrise. We are small, but we are mighty. I'm standing here today with some of my residents behind me to ask you for help. Our community was established in 1990. We are 36 years old, and so are the streets in our community. The pamphlet that you were just handed is what our community looks like. The front of our community, as you can see, this is the outside of our community. It's beautiful. Unfortunately, when you look through our community, the streets are not. Like I said, these streets have been in our community for 36 years. We've had 36 years of wear on our roads. As you can see, we have potholes. We have areas where the roots have made the roads lift, and our markings are worn. Our streets in our community are city roads. I have called the city many times and we're grateful for the help that you have sent out through Public Works. They've been in our community several times as you can see by some of the pictures where she patches where they've done repairs. Unfortunately, when they come and they do some repairs, there's always something else that needs to be repaired. The streets that were, the trees that were planted in our community when the community was built were required by the city. Unfortunately, with their age, they've also done damage to our roads, creating tripping hazards. We have had some of those repaired when Public Works comes out. Unfortunately, it's too much for just the work that they come and do. We're here today with some of my community behind me to ask you to please help us. We would love to have the roads in our community repaired and paved in a more permanent way. It would prevent the constant repairs, little pieces here and there. It would really enhance the integrity and aesthetic of our community. As an HOA, we are required to maintain the aesthetic of our community. As per our ARC guidelines, we are required to maintain the aprons of our driveways. It's very hard, as HOA president, to answer to my community why they have to repair their aprons when the roads look the way they do. We're asking you here for help.

Okay. Let me just hold you there. Mr. Lebelski. It's been said that there was an effort to contact the city for repairs. Talk to me about what efforts the city has in looking at this. Mayor, I'd have to get with staff and report back. All right. Any staff here that can help us? I would need some time, Mayor. All right. When did you first raise this with city staff?

This has been ongoing for a long time. They've come out. They've come out to our community. They've been great. The guys come out. You can look at the pictures. You'll see the patches. I mean, we're not complaining about the work they've done, but we just need more of it. And we are very grateful for the work that you've done, but it's bigger than that. We have 121 houses in here. We have a resident here today who is actually the second homeowner in our community. She lived here a long time. We've had a lot of wear and tear on our roads. In addition to the wear on our roads, all our markings are also worn off. If you look in the pictures, you see for safety, this is a liability. Our community is dark sometimes. We don't have so much lighting. There's only a few limited street signs in our community. At night, there is no markings where our stop signs are anymore. There have been several close calls at the entrance of our community where cars have been almost t-boned because cars come flying in, you can't see the markings. Our markings are all gone. So we're here today to plead with you to help us. I would love to invite any of you to come to our community. I would walk the community with you. This is just a sample of what we have. You can imagine this is just, I think, 39 pictures in here. But if you walk through our community, you'll see our streets really, really need some help.

When's your next HOA meeting?

Thursday.

Yours is with the gate, right?

Yes.

I just want to say, to answer one of your questions, the striping used to be done by the county, countywide. They eliminated that. So now we're all on our own. Am I correct?

That is correct.

As far as the striping.

The county is responsible for all striping here in the city, and they no longer restripe residential neighborhood streets.

All right. So here's what has to happen, right? First of all, staff has to get with the HOA president. You know Ms. Perry well. Sit down, have an outline. I'd like a report. The commissioner would like a report back on an inspection of the roadways there. Also, some history as to when the last time they've had any major work done and whether there's anything planned in the future, because that's a big issue, right? We want to make sure if there's going to be any utility work in the future. We don't go and repair roads and then tear them up again. So part of this has to be a holistic approach to what's going on in the community. And then come back to the commission with a report. You can provide it by email to the commission or otherwise. I don't know if by Thursday they'll get all this done, but they should be able to by the March meeting to at least have that engagement and to move forward on that. Is that fair, Mr. Lebelski? Yes, Mayor.

I can tell you since our community was built, we have never had our streets redone. And so with all the streets we had built, with the boring we had done in our community, they've taken a beating. And our residents feel it is quite dangerous for those of us who run at night or just even just riding your bikes, as you were all talking about. It's really dangerous in our community, so we're hoping you could help us.

And you're not the only one. You had mayors there, and you had a city manager who lived in there.

We're a great community. We have a bunch of great people. Several of them are here with me, standing up behind me.

I know the faces.

We're a responsible community. We like to be in compliance with the city. We work with you, so we'd love for you to work with us. I'd be happy to sit down and meet with anybody, go for a walk in my community, see what we are about, and we really do care about our community.

Okay, perfect. That's fantastic. Thank you so much. Thank you for everyone who stood up in the back. You can't see them because you don't have eyes in the back of your head, but you can assume. Now you do. Okay. Well done. Thank you. So, Ms. Hrabowski, you know what to do from here? Rodrigo? Yep. You're ready? You're going to give a card?

Perfect. So you'll be my contact person? Yes. Perfect. Thank you.

All right. Thank you. Thank you all so much for your time. Thank you. And you're an avid cyclist, so I hope you enjoyed that discussion. All right. Anyone else for open discussion? So please raise your hand and press five star. I see no hands raised online. Can you confirm?

I confirm no hands are raised. All right.

We'll close open discussion. All right. Why don't we move to the public art master plan approval? And there are a number of items on the consent agenda that were pulled that will relate somewhat to that. We'll start with 7A, if I can, for my colleagues to make a motion. Motion by Commissioner Skudo, seconded by Commissioner Kirch. All in favor say aye. All right. All right. The resolution of the city of Sunrise, Florida, adopting a public art master plan, authorizing city staff to utilize the master plan for planning public art projects, providing an effective date. City Manager Mark Lebowski, Danielle Lima, Economic Development Director. Motion by Commissioner Skudo, seconded by Commissioner Kirch. Mr. Lebowski.

Thank you, Mayor. As you're aware, the city embarked on our first public art master plan. We hired the contractor in 2023. In December, the consultant had a presentation in front of the commission regarding the draft master plan. I provided that to the commission to receive any comments from the December commission meeting. I've made a few revisions to the plan based upon some comments I've received. The document you have in front of you is in substantially conformance to the one that was provided in the presentation in December. And we're looking for, at this point, for a formal adoption so staff can begin working on the implementation of the phases of future public art.

All right, before we do that and open it up to commission discussion, if any, Open up for public discussion. This is a Public discussion anyone wishing to be heard on this matter. Please come forward or press 5 star on your phone Confirmed no hands raised.

I come from no hands.

All right, we'll close public discussion discussion for my colleagues All right, mr. Belsky. I want to thank you for providing us the opportunity engagement and multiple meetings to go over this Represents a blueprint not a mandate and that's what's important from it. So I thank you for it Go ahead and call the question on the resolution assistant deputy mayor Clark

Yes. Deputy Mayor Guzman? Yes. Commissioner Kirch?

Yes.

Commissioner Scudo? Yes. Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Item passes 5-0. There are a number of items on the consent agenda. If the will of my colleagues is to hear 4B or C through G, they're related to public art, maybe, since we're in that. Motion by Commissioner Kirch, seconded by... Seconded by Assistant Deputy Mayor. All in favor say aye. Aye. All right, B. A resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida approving 11 art sculptures for various artists to participate in the temporary art sculpture program, approving five alternate art sculptures, approving the form of a public art loan and display agreement, and providing an effective date. City Manager Mark Lebowski, Danielle Lima, Economic Development Director. Motion by Commissioner Skudo, seconded by Commissioner Kirch. This is a public hearing. Anyone wishing to be heard on this matter, please come forward or press five star on your phone. All right, I see no one come forward. I'll close public discussion. All right, I just wanted to raise this to make sure we're having a discussion about where we're going on this. The cost of this is pretty minimal in terms of the estimated cost both per artwork and per pad. Mr. Lebowski, what is the cost per pad as we put these out, once we put these out?

For the items in front of you tonight, the pads all exist, so there's no additional cost to the city. We have already constructed the pads associated with all the awards tonight.

Okay. And so as a result, this is an opportunity that has gone out to artists, and we appreciate the engagement of it. It's a small investment for a number of places, 11 different places that will be altered. Mr. Lebowski, across the city, where are these being located generally?

For the temporary art program, they're going in two locations. We have the Village Art Plaza and also the Flamingo Road Linear Park.

All right. Part of the master plan contemplates that in the future we'll be able to expand the temporary art program to other locations throughout the city, correct?

That is correct. And for example, from our temporary art program that we currently have, we are proposing to purchase two of those pieces of art. And the thought is that as we find pieces that we like through the art rental program, that we'll purchase those and then likely move them to other locations throughout the city to be able to enhance our art program consistent with what you just approved tonight in terms of the phasing of the future public art locations.

Okay. All right. That was only my comment that I wanted to raise. Any further discussion on that? oh which one was that sorry for me it has to do with ought to or was e you said m i thought you said m i said no you pulled e i did in fact i'm happy to have because quite frankly c d e f and g are all ones we should have a discussion and i had e pulled but you already pulled it great minds think alike but i just want to discuss i i'm fine with that and and um Mr. Moss, is it okay if we were to call each of these items so we can have a discussion all at once and yet vote individually when it comes time?

Yes, sir.

All right. What I would propose, subject to the will of my colleagues, is to go ahead and call forward for C, D, E, F, and G. Move it. Okay. Motion by Commissioner Kurtz. Seconded by Secretary Mayer. All in favor say aye. Aye. And what I'll do. For the purposes of the public, I'll read each of those items, and then we'll conduct a simultaneous public hearing in that regard, and then open it up for public comment, understanding that we have to call each item individually at the time of the vote. 4C, a resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida, approving a contract for purchase and sale of public art between the City of Sunrise, Florida and Flaminio Antonio, and providing an effective date, City Manager Mark Lebelski, Danielle Lima, Economic Development Director. Motion by Commissioner Skudo, seconded by... Second. Commissioner Kirch. I'll read D now. A resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida approving a contract for purchase and sale of public art between the City of Sunrise, Florida and Asia Scudder and providing effective date. City Manager Mark Lebelski, Danielle Lima, Economic Development Director. Motion by Assistant Deputy Mayor, seconded by Commissioner Kirch. E, a resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida approving a design proposal for the Flamingo Linear Park Signature Sculptures Project, approving a contract for commission and purchase of public art between the City of Sunrise, Florida and the Silverwater Creative LLC doing business as Cijin Chin Studio and providing an effective date. City Manager Mark Lebelski, Danielle Lima, Economic Development Director. Motion by Assistant Deputy Mayor, seconded by Commissioner Scudo. F, a resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida, approving design proposals for the Flamingo Linear Park Signature Sculptures Project, approving a contract for commission and purchase of public art between the City of Sunrise, Florida and MGA Sculpture Studio, LLC, and providing an effective date. City Manager Mark Lebelski, Danielle Lima, Economic Development Director. Do I have a motion? Motion by Commissioner Escudo, seconded by Commissioner Kirch. G, a resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida, approving a design proposal for the Panthers on the Prowl Project, approve an agreement for commission of public art between the city of sunrise florida and jewelry by nadine llc and providing an effective date city manager mark lebelski danielle lima economic development director of the motion question by commissioner skuto second by commissioner kirch i'm going to open up c through g for public hearing anyone wishing to have a comment on this please come forward or press five star on your phone so you know what come forward confirm no hands raised i confirm no hands raised i'll close public discussion all right so I had pulled a bulk of these because I wanted to have a discussion about this, particularly as it relates to some of the bigger ones, and that's 4E and 4F. These are really big investments that are going in, and it's almost $300,000. I appreciate what's being done and the decision to put in some temporary art, and I value what's there. I also credit staff with having the vision to say, look, we're going to get these pieces, we'll have a one-year opportunity to put it up, and then we can certainly purchase it if we wish, and we'll do that in the future, that we'll be given that opportunity, that right to do so. But I am concerned, given where we are in a lot of issues, whether or not two sculptures for what is essentially $300,000 is Stretching the money as far as it could possibly go in this context. So I'd like to get kind of the position of staff in this regard to make sure I understand, you know, what gives the background on these two, particularly that's for you and for app. And then we can talk about the others.

Thank you, Mayor. So very similar to the East Sunrise Improvements Master Plan, when we undertook that plan, the commission also provided direction to us to not wait until the plan was adopted to start implementing. And that's the same thing we took in terms of with the Public Art Master Plan. When we started that, the commission had asked us and tasked us with continuing to start the program. And the locations that we identified at that time were the Village Art Plaza and the Flamingo Road Linear Park as the two initial locations for us to create some grouping of public art here in the city. So within the Flamingo Lydia Park, you have smaller pads and you have two larger pads at each of the corners, one at Flamingo and Panther Parkway and the other at Flamingo and Oakland Park Boulevard. As you're probably aware, we previously had awarded a contract for two of those larger pieces. And unfortunately, the artist was in default to the contract. We had to terminate the contract. And what you're seeing in front of you is we put this call to artists out again to start over. The contracts that are associated with these two pieces have additional protections in here for the city. So we don't believe we're going to fall under the same challenges that we had with the first one. But we believe these are two signature pieces. There is funding in the budget for all the art that you have here tonight, and there is additional funding also for us to continue the program from the general fund. During the discussion of the art master plan, there was conversation of alternative funding sources. And we've been working with the city attorney's office over the last several months. He has performed a survey and there are a large number of cities in Broward County that have alternative funding sources to be able to help fund the public art program. I believe, and I want to speak for the city attorney, but the city attorney, the conversations I've had with him is that If the commission desires, I believe that there is a path forward for us to continue that process to develop some sort of a fee program for properties during the permit process, they would pay. What we see is in some cities, they pay anywhere between 0.25 up to 1% of the cost of construction as it goes to our public art. We have not spent a lot of time on it, because I needed, one, the city attorney to confirm we could go in that direction. And two, also to get consensus from the commission that's a desire for us to continue down that path.

All right. My kind of view on this is, one, on the protections. Let me ask it this way. What are the protections you think that are in this agreement that's going to protect us from the chaos and potential loss from the last one? And unless it includes some sort of bonding or opportunity for full collection, I may have some concerns. So talk to me.

So the challenge that we saw on the last go around was you had a concept that was provided during the called artist process. Then we entered into a contract with a rendering that was attached. When the artist and started to go through design process they realized there were some engineering challenges with their design. They then as they went went through and got their engineer to design the project it required them to modify the art and then that art concept change from what was. In essence, in essence, approved as part of the contract and the rendering so it was not material the same piece as they went into the permitting process. In this contract, what we've done now to be able to help alleviate that, there is a small portion that is paid at time of award that allows for the artist to start that work. And I can pull that out, but it's maybe 10% of the cost. Any future payments require at that time to receive their building permits to verify that what they are proposing is billable. So outside of that initial stipend at the award for them to start the project, the rest of it, there will be no payment until we know for sure that they have a permittable piece of art.

Okay. The other side of this is, I guess it's the two P's. It's protection. And I wonder if this big an investment is just premature before we've identified a funding source that is stable and legal in the future rather than us going to the general fund for it. I understand that we've set aside that funding, the circumstances of where we are today versus Maybe where we were when we first kind of looked at this and where we may be in six months could be entirely different. And so I think this is great work. I think these are fantastic pieces. I just wonder if, at least for these two, whether it's ideal to do it now, number one. Can we in the meantime achieve a bigger impact with a fraction of the dollars, a third of the dollars? We could probably figure out something that could be done and stretch it out a little bit rather than some more signature pieces, which at this time may be just not the best thing to go. If we were to, I'm not saying this is the case, but if we were to say, all right, let's take a little bit of a different direction and look at temporary pieces, expanding that, which

see in the first item it was 40,000 plus the pads were already there so some money there is that something staff would be able to pivot on if that was a direction mayor we could go whatever direction the Commission once however I will say that I believe we can do both so the temporary art that you're referring to in order to install that there is a significant amount of work that needs to occur before you install that temporary art and the largest investment of time is the pad the lighting the permitting side the design so even if you were to say all right we're not moving forward on these two signature pieces we want you to now spend and implement the temporary art in other locations throughout the city that's going to take us a significant time to get there and we were we were moving in that direction anyway after once this master plan was approved and we have the funding to be able to proceed but i don't think one is precluding us from doing the other

Maybe it's how I stated it. If we don't do this, you can pivot and go to the other distance of identifying locations, permitting the timetable, and everything else.

Yes, sir.

All right, I'll open it up to my colleagues. I know Commissioner Scooter had four he pulled.

Okay, so the Eve that I pulled it for is because you started the discussion about these two were supposed to be substantial pieces that were going to be. What you're proposing now is not substantial like what was proposed with the first one. So I'm just saying on a grandstand stage, what you showed us the first time that this person was getting paid for was substantial. What we're getting now just seems to be like a cutout. I mean, I'm not saying that it's not substantial. taken away from the artist of what that artist does. But when we first started this process and we picked the two pieces that we wanted, it was substantial. I mean, they were like unbelievable looking. And I understand what you're saying. And I, I'll agree with, like the mayor said, I know you went down to 10%, right? But if we're going to pay somebody, you know, $150,000 for something, I mean, they have an investment in it too. Let them put the bond up. You know what I'm saying? Here, I'm just, I don't know if we could do this. Put the bond up, and if it costs you X amount, if you do what you say you're going to do, I mean, how much a bond costs for $150,000? Do you have that idea?

No.

Okay, so I'm saying if they say they have to put up $10,000 for a $150,000 bond, right? We're giving them $15,000 or whatever, right, if you're going to get 10% of the $150,000. Instead of giving them the 10%, say put up the bond. If you complete the project, we'll take the bond off. I'm just saying. At least we're guaranteed. There's no guarantee, given this person 10%, we're in the same boat. And, you know, look, maybe someone that's an artist that's applying for this can't afford $150,000. You know what I'm saying? He can't afford $75,000 to lay out of his own pocket. Then that's not the person we should be hiring. So I say put up the bond or find that number out for us. Put up the bond, and then when you complete it, You know, we'll give you the bond money back or whatever. But at least we're guaranteed. But right now, we put down $100,000. We're going to lose $100,000. I mean, this could happen again. I don't care if he pulls a permit. Pulling a permit is not helping us at the end if we don't like what the guy made. So here, the other guy was making the peace, and we never liked it. You said you were going to go out and see it. You never went out to see it. You said the guy was going to send you pictures. It would be cheaper for him to send us the pictures. You didn't like the pictures. So I'm not faulting. I'm just saying if we're going to save money. I mean, if you were going to go out and see it with two or three people, that was going to cost five thousand. I'm just saying. So if the guy is really interested or the girl's really interested in doing work with the city of Sunrise. and it's $5,000 or $10,000 to put up the bond, if he says, I don't have the $5,000 or the $10,000 to put up the bond, then what is $10,000 going to do for him to get the deposit to get started? I'm just saying. It puts us in a bad spot again, and I don't want to go down that path because these should have already been up, and we're already two years out. Now you did this plan. And then the other thing I want to say off of this is, We missed the boat on a lot of projects. If you're telling me now 0.25% to 1% that someone could do. So that means we missed rise. We missed the golf course. We missed the people at Lowe's. I'm saying all these people are in. How could we tell them now, hey, They'll be like, hey, you know, I'm already in. I really don't have to do it. Not to say they won't do it. But, I mean, it would have been nice to know this. I'm glad that you had the discussion with Tom. But I didn't know this discussion. And now we missed the boat on a lot of these other projects. unless these other projects are willing to go back and say, hey, you guys have been great with us. Your staff has been great with us. You know what? We'll still be willing to do it. We may get a good amount of them to do it. So look, I just don't want to get stuck again with losing money and then what we're getting proposed with, with these two, with the bird and with the cutout, I don't see that as what we were getting before to what we're getting now. It seems like we just lowered whatever it is to have this. I mean, if we're going to pick a bird, I mean, I don't know what it is for sunrise. I don't know what the, maybe you could explain to me why they picked the bird or whoever picked the bird. I mean, is it something else that we could have picked that would be, I'm just asking. I mean, to spend $150,000 for this, I mean, I just don't know, should we waste $300,000 on a bird and a cutout right now when it's not the substantial piece that we thought we were getting on Flamingo Road? That's only my point. Thank you.

Okay, it's just a deputy mayor Both of you already kind of hit my points on Just one other comment when it comes to the selection of these Residents involved like what is the makeup? the selection committee is of city staff and we

Usually have someone on there from a building side, an engineering slash architect also to guide us to ensure that we don't get into the same situation with the first time or with the first piece of art, which probably was not really buildable. Although it was beautiful, it just probably wasn't buildable.

So when we have selected based on those criteria that you just talked about, does it also come to residents to look at the designs?

No, it's entirely city staff as part of it.

Entirely city staff, okay. So then we're doing G2, right?

Any one of those, yes.

Okay, good. So for G, when we selected that particular designer, when we're sending it out to commissioners or anyone, can we also see what the other options look like as well? Because we only got one option.

I can certainly provide the commission if they like all the submittals. There is a lot of submittals for these.

Okay, thank you. Commissioner Kirch.

So... Absolutely. We've got to find a way to fund this program.

If you're looking for consensus.

You know, when we first started talking public art, we had a different opinion from legal counsel at the time. I don't know what's changed, but if there's an opportunity or a way to fund it through projects being built throughout the city, absolutely. That's first and foremost. You know, I... I would be fine with holding off on these until after November. I'd like to kind of see what happens with property tax with respect to that. I mean, I don't have an opinion on whether it's good or bad. They look great, but I would need to see it in person and see a little more to do it. But if it's the consensus of the commission to hold off on this, I'll join you.

Okay, thank you. Deputy Mayor, if you're on the phone, just open it up. I can't tell if your hand's raised or not.

She's not on the line.

Okay.

Mayor, just to... Yep. I mean, because Commissioner Kirsch, when he first said he wanted to do... when you first got on, and then we were told we cannot do that. I'm saying, oh, I didn't know you. But if you're going to do that, then I would support. If someone else is going to pay for it, I'm all in. But if not for right now, let's think about how we proceed forward if we can't get the funding the way Mr. Lebowski said.

So first of all, the question to Mr. Moss, how far along is that analysis? It's not going to solve this tonight. We're not imposing it. This is general fund. I have my position on this. I'm not intending to vote yes on that. But where are you on the legal analysis?

Okay, so following the commission meeting in December, I conducted the survey of Broward municipalities with public art requirements and programs that involve developer-funded artwork or contributions to the city's art fund. In the meantime, I have spoken to several of the city attorneys that were instrumental in drafting those ordinances and creating those programs. I think there is a path forward. However, there is a short-term obstacle, and that is Senate Bill 180, which is last year's prohibition against enacting more restrictive land development regulations. That would slow us down a bit. There is a Senate bill this year that would shorten that time frame to July 1 of this year. But that's made it through the Senate. It's in the House now. So that remains to be seen whether we'll get that relief. So, like I said, there is a path forward that I have been working on with the city manager and some of the other city attorneys in Broward County. So that's something I can continue working on if the commission desires.

Well, I would say, Mark, work fast, get to every developer that is in right now and tell them you got 0.25 to 1% to donate to the city before July 1st.

Mr. Lebowski, your light's on.

Thank you. I just want to highlight, you know, there are several items in front of you tonight. You mentioned the two signature pieces. There's also the temporary art. If we don't move forward the temporary art, then the existing art is scheduled to be removed, and that would be removed from the Village Art Plaza and also Flamingo Road. We will have nothing back there.

I understand. Okay, just make sure everybody understands. I'm supportive of 4B, 4C, 4D, and 4G. I'm just not supportive of 4E and 4F. And that would solve the issue you just raised, right? Assuming that was the will of the commission. All right. Any further discussion on these items? And I'll just call them in order beginning with, we have not called 4B yet, correct?

I don't think it's been voted on yet.

No, I didn't think so either. I just want to confirm. All right. Go ahead and call the question on 4B.

Commissioner Skidow?

Yes.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Is Deputy Mayor Guzman not on the phone? She's not on the line. Commissioner Kirch?

Yes.

Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Item passes 4-0. 4C, go ahead and call the question.

Commissioner Kirch?

Yes.

Commissioner Skidow? Yes. Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Item passes. We'll check again. Is Deputy Mayor on the line?

She's not. She's not.

Okay. Yes, the item passes four to zero. Go ahead and call the question on 4D.

Commissioner Kirch?

Yes.

Commissioner Escudo?

Yes.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Is Commissioner Guzman on the line? She's not on the line. All right. Item passes four to zero. I voted yes on that. Go ahead and call the question on 4E.

Okay. Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? No. Deputy Mayor Guzman still not on the phone? She's not on the line. Commissioner Kirch?

No.

No. Commissioner Skudo? No. No. Mayor Ryan?

No. Item fails 4-0. Go ahead and call the question on 4F.

Just one second.

I know it takes time.

Okay. Hold on. Commissioner Skudo?

No.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? No. Deputy Mayor Guzman still offline?

Offline.

On the line? Offline. Offline. Commissioner Kirch? No. Mayor Ryan?

No. Item fails 4-0. I'm going to call the question on 4G.

Commissioner Kirch?

Yes.

Commissioner Skudo? No.

This was the only design that got highly rated on this one.

This was the item that was selected. So the rendering that's attached, it doesn't do justice. It's a mosaic piece. And if you look in the back up there, you can see the past work being done by this artist on mosaic, which really will signify what it looks like better than the actual rendering.

Yes.

Yes? Yes. Okay. Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Deputy Mayor Guzman still offline? Correct. Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Item passed is 4-0. All right. Let's go back to 7B, Resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida, appointing a member to the accessibility... No, I'm going to come back because it's out of order.

Excuse me, Mayor Ryan, I think you had pulled item 4A.

I pulled other four, but we're not at that section yet. That's the next section. Okay, gotcha. There's others to be held, but consent discussion is item 11. We're on number 7. Thank you. Resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida, appointing a member to the Accessibility, Inclusion, and Mobility Advisory Board and identifying the member's preferred disciplines, categories, and providing an effective aid to City Manager Mark Lovelsky, Felicia, and Bravo City Clerk.

Move it.

Motion by Commissioner Skudo, seconded by Commissioner Kirch. All right, so we had a new member apply. Please identify the new member, if you would, Ms. Bravo. Microphone, please. We like Carl. Is there a motion? Move it. Motion by Commissioner Kirch, seconded by Commissioner Skudo. Any discussion on that? Go ahead and call the question.

Commissioner Kirch?

Yes.

Commissioner Skudo?

Yes.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Is Deputy Mayor Guzman online? She's not on the line. Mayor Ryan.

Yes. Item passes 4-0. We'll thank her for that. All right. On to consent discussion. 4A. Resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida, approving the general parameters of the City of Sunrise Business Spotlight Awards Program, providing effective date. City Manager Mark Lebelski, Danielle Lima, Economic Development Director. Do I have a motion? Move it. Motion by Commissioner Skudo. Seconded by Commissioner Kirch. This is a public hearing. Anyone wishing to be heard on this matter, please come forward or press 5-star on your phone. I see no one come forward. Do you confirm no hands raised?

I confirm.

All right. So I know that this has been kicked around a bit and it's gone back and forth to the various boards. You know, this is maybe an area that's better left in a chamber spotlight. This is going to consume, I think, a fair amount of staff time. I mean, I'm a little concerned about how this is really going to to operate. I know that the idea is to take in all sorts of nominations. And then over the summer, the advisory board select made it July. I'm not sure that really works, but maybe it does. And it's going to a variety of advisory boards, but not all of them, right? It's going to sustainability, small business, economic development. There are other boards, for instance, on a community champion award, maybe the AIM board has a strong feeling about that. Maybe it's the bike and pedestrian board that has a strong feeling on that. And while I, you know, then we get July notified winners, there'll be a video production, and then the winners will be recognized in November. So number one, I wonder how much time this is going to generate for staff in organizing keeping it fair, et cetera. Second, there's a lot of small businesses, and getting to a choice on this I fear is going to be laden with a lot of other considerations. I appreciate the balance that is in this new proposal, which really narrowed the categories. There were way too many categories, in my opinion, before. This has been narrowed down to be more achievable. But, you know, Economic Impact Award, business that's contributed to the economic well-being of Sunrise through job creation, investment, development of innovative products. You know, I kind of understand that. I guess it'll be a smaller group. The small business of the year is just a huge number, and the principles of that are really not, you know, other than outstanding customer service and strong commitment to excellence. I don't know how that gets managed. And then Community Champion Award, You know, again, it's laudable. It's a great goal. Community involvement, environmental responsibility, local nonprofits and schools and workforce programs and steps to protect and enhance. And then ultimately, you know, for a long-term program, I think one of the things that, you know, couldn't potentially interfere with some of this is then these become politicized in one way or another. I appreciate the eligibility criteria, brick and mortar, located in the city and haven't received in the past and not a Sunrise employee, but I'm really trying to understand what we're trying to achieve here. The taste of Sunrise and the taster's choice is really very community oriented. People that are there vote on it and it feels good. This one is kind of in a black box where you don't really know how they got there. There's advisory board meetings. It's got to go to three according to this proposal. Maybe it should be going to five or six. If we're going to be talking about supporting nonprofits and schools, then the Education Advisory Board should be involved. They're going to resent that they didn't get a say. The name's going to say, why didn't we get involved? Social Services, Cultural Advisory Board. So I like the concept. I'm just wondering if what we're trying to really achieve with 3,000 businesses, what this is going to consume and what it will represent, frankly, at the end. Does it really represent everything? We have a few boards looking at it, but not all the boards. We're trying to cover all of it. And so I think it's ambitious. I just don't know whether or not this type of award system is better in a robust chamber. If we didn't have a robust chamber, I might feel a little differently about it. But they have the capacity to do this, both for chamber members and non-chamber members, and do something like this in a kind of once a year, the Sunrise Heroes Award. And so we may end up seeing some duplication there. And I know how much time that takes. I don't know whether this just needs to bake a little bit. I need a little more time to really think this through and talk to maybe some of the boards on this. But I'm just not ready right now to support this tonight in its current phase without hearing from my colleagues. Commissioner Scudo.

So I think this is going to be a great program. And I say that for tonight when they said that there's 3,000 businesses in the city, yet the chamber only has like a couple hundred members. So... taste the sunrise yet the great event we pay for it every one of our employees work that great event not knocking it going forward chamber of commerce we do employee of the month they have a breakfast and they give the same person employee of the month so i mean it's not They're not taking the time to do the employee of the month. We took the time to do the employee of the month. They just re-honor the person that we honor. So, you know, if they wanted to do a police officer of the month, a firefighter of the month, they should have went out and said, hey, chamber members, this cop came to my business. He helped my business. Somebody broke in, he actually went in, he found out, he looked at the camera, helped out, and that's why we're giving for the Chamber of Commerce this Officer of the Month. I'm just saying, they just took whoever we give Officer of the Month at their breakfast and represent that person. So I'm saying- Well, they also do Sunrise Heroes.

With the police officers.

I'm not disagreeing. You have an opinion, I have an opinion.

No, no, I'm just saying, just saying that there is- And like I said-

This just enhances maybe what staff communicates, what residents call in about businesses. I mean, we get a lot of information from some great businesses that the city gets the info from. If they're not a chamber member, the resident is not calling the Chamber of Commerce to say, hey, this business did a great job or they're doing a great job or whatever. Look, I'm supportive of the chamber. I think it's totally separate than what if the city and the city manager and staff is trying to promote a program that they think is going to be beneficial for the 3,000 businesses, not just the few, the 200 that are members. It's for everyone. It's more inclusive. Me as a business owner... I'm not part of the chamber because anything that they do, I can't enter. I can't enter Taste the Sunrise because I'm a sunrise commissioner. I have a restaurant, but I cannot be in it. If they have tunes and trucks, I'm a restaurant, but I can't do it. I'm just saying. So there are other businesses that maybe don't join the chamber for whatever reason, but they're great businesses, and there's 3,000 of them. So if the city has a way through whoever came up with this idea, obviously they must have more information about the 3,000 businesses and what they do to the community other than what the chamber does. I think we should separate what the chamber does because that's an outside entity. It is not a city, they're not a city employee. Even though we fund them or give them money, And then even going further, if you want to say about the chamber, I didn't know that during this event that they get 75% of the ticket and we get 25% of the ticket. Not one of the people from the chamber were actually working the event, doing anything wrong. At the event, I just thought it was very weird, because Mayor, when we used to do Relay for Life, and it was all the city employees at Relay for Life, and only two people would show up from Relay for Life, but yet at the end, they wanted their $20,000 from the city. Not from the city, but every dime that was made. So I think we chose to separate, they want to run an event, you run an event, that's your event. But if this is something that the city wants to promote, I have no problem supporting doing something for all the businesses of the city. And then I'll go further with the chamber. The next day, we had to go and clean all the carpets and do everything, and that was another cost to us. So even though it's a chamber event and it's all about the chamber, but yet the city – did the whole event. So I'm saying, I wanna separate the chamber do their thing, we do our thing.

Okay, Assistant Deputy Mayor.

Yeah, I think I like the idea of the city having its own recognition because one, there's so many other businesses in the city that is not a part of the chamber. I've been in chamber for many times and it's a reoccurring of businesses, but there's other places that I go that nobody knows about that are great staples in the community. And so I think that being able to have board members from other auxiliary boards that we have could say, hey, you go here because you have great accessibility to get into your restaurant or get into your place of business that is safe for me. I want you to be highlighted and nominated. There's other entities other than just customer services that could be a great highlight that I would love to be able to showcase. And so I think the city has in that opportunity where individuals from other entities outside of just the chambers and that small group that be able to recognize other businesses that are really doing great job in our community and being able to be a focal point that we may not necessarily know or highlight. So I think that this is a great program that we can have and maybe we need to fine tune it a little bit more, but I think it needs to be something that is owned by the city.

Mr. Kirch. Yeah, I mean, we recognize and do awards for a lot of people and a lot of things here in the chamber. Small businesses are the backbone of our economy. I think it does give them an opportunity to feature their business and raise awareness about their business, encourage people to visit their businesses and really Cost is de minimis, so I would be supportive of it.

According to the budget, it's $2,000. Yeah, I think that's just not accurate in terms of staff time. But let me go back a bit. I'm not against recognizing businesses, and I've spoken at every chamber event, but I've also encouraged the chamber to do ribbon cuttings, and they do them at non-chamber events for non-chamber members. So I'm not wetting to it. What I'm saying is that I'm not sure this is fully baked because, for instance, small business of the year, fewer employees than 25 obviously exemplifies outstanding customer service and strong commitment to excellence. This is really the first time I'm getting a chance to look at this. I don't know if that's really fully it. I mean, you raised the point of accessibility, a huge part, AIM board. I mean, kind of when I looked at these, I mean, I guess what I'd rather see is some engagement of the other boards that have within its wheelhouse is really what my point was. And I'm not sure that the... That's why I went through the timeline. A lot of the boards don't meet over the summer, and so we're going to have applications, and then they're out. So I understand there's a timeline issue as well. Personally, I don't want to vote against it if everybody wants to vote for it, because I don't want this to be, oh, he's against spotlighting businesses. What I'm saying is that I'm not sure it's fully there. The Community Champion Award doesn't include the Education Advisory Board. It doesn't include the cultural board.

I know, but we can't meet every board meeting. Point of information. If we do vote this, the program could still be tweaked.

But I want to, before we launch it, what I'd like to say is... is let's bring it back. And I agree. Let me just say, I see the chaos you're talking about. Absolutely agree with you. I want staff to think that through. To say, these are the nominations. And rather than free boards only having the say in it, to your point, right? There's somebody who's like... had exceptional accessibility or is uniquely sensitive to the community. I want to make sure we include those voices in saying that, which honestly vests the boards also in this. And if anything, it makes the reward grander if all the boards have looked at it. Now, staff may have to think through what that looks like because those board members can't talk across lines, I guess, but You know, it's very simple to say, look, these are the nominees. Go ahead and rank. And then you can kind of assemble it from there. And maybe staff looks at it.

But I'm just saying, I don't want it to be where you're adding more boards and sometimes they don't have a quorum. So just because this board didn't have a meeting, now the program can't go forward.

Yeah, no, I get you.

They're only advisory. So if they get their input, they get their input. If they don't, they don't. We're not going to stop a program just because one board didn't meet two months in a row that now we cancel the whole business of the year because... the economic development. No, no, I'm just saying. I wasn't even contemplating that. But you're saying you want to add more boards to who gets to look at it. Yeah, we could give it to all boards. If they want to take part and do it, then it's all more than good. But we don't need to have five boards to approve it in order to move the program forward.

No, no, I'm not even contemplating anything close to that. I mean, it doesn't have to go to P&Z and BOA. I mean, I'm not... But what I'd like to do is at least say, okay, these are the nominees. Go ahead and give us your views on it, and then they can kind of assemble it. And then let staff go through and calculate and assemble that and see what that looks like. Close calls, staff will have to weigh in. What I want to do is, you know, Get more in on it and also make sure that it doesn't become, you know, politicized where, you know, folks are going to the board to support something like that or whatever. It should be kind of just what we're trying to ask those boards.

like the young lady who came today and is opening up a business in the city. That young lady may become where she reaches out and touches people. And since the city staff met her and we met her and other people met her and other residents met her, and then they say, this is a new business that promoted this and promoted this, we never thought. Boom. But we knew her from when she started, not from...

So I'm just saying... Don't misunderstand my point.

My point is it's great. I'm just saying, I just think it's a point of view from the... from the employees where they meet them and watch them grow. That's what I'm saying. I think that's what whoever proposed this, which I don't know who proposed it. Came out of one of the boards. Okay, well, so that's probably someone who watched it, you know, watch somebody grow and wants to do something like that. Hey, that's what I would think.

Yeah, and by the way, you know, the Economic Development Board may or may not know big businesses right because they don't get to you know so part of this is just going to be community nominations it's going to be on staff to get beyond the board this is not i'm not trying to say this is where it's got to come from in fact if anything we want it to come from the community more so much like the gold coins that went in at taste of sunrise that's really what we're trying to achieve so um commissioner guzman's on the line mr guzman you're back on hi thank you mayor

Okay, I just wanted to, for the record, just agree with my colleagues that this program, I think, would be a great addition to supporting our businesses. I do agree with the Chamber doing a great job for their current members and always trying to get new members. However, there is so much more happening in our community that many of us are not all seeing together. Some of us do see because we're out there and sometimes you're reaching out to us. individually and for other reasons, so we get to see what they're doing. So I think this is a great idea for staff to highlight those businesses. I will also add that there are other cities that have a lot more incentives for our businesses, and I'd love to kind of expand on that. So maybe Mark and the team, if I can share what that looks like, that might help this particular program enhance for them wanting to be a part and being recognized. So I guess whatever needs to be done, I do support this so thank you for listening.

All right, so thank you. What I would suggest, we can vote for this program tonight. What I'd like to see is it come back at a very soon meeting with taking in all this, including what the plan is for community input from the marketing perspective. Is the community voting on these folks? I want to guard against that just being a series of bots, you know, right? Joey, that means automatic.

Right, people just voting for the same people, right.

Right, or creating an automated way of doing it. So some of that, I think, is worth talking about. But if you can come back, whether it's by the end of March, because you'll have plenty of time to get the information out, get the community involved, and stay on your timeline. And then, as was said by Commissioner Scudo, you give the advisory board some input. They can rank. Individual members can do it, however they want to do it. But give them all a chance, and then just have a cutoff. If they weigh in, they weigh in. If they don't, they don't. And then work with Again, what I do like about this is it's not coming back to the commission to select them, right? That's not happening. It's going to be done outside of that process. So I'm supportive. Is that something, Mr. Lebowski, that you can work with or you need more guidance?

In short, I think we have to work quick to be able to make this year.

I agree. You're quick.

You're light on your feet.

Yeah, you can do it. You don't have anything going on, do you? All right. Go ahead and call the question on 4A.

Deputy Mayor Guzman? Is she still on the line? Yes.

Okay.

Yes. Commissioner Kirch? Yes. Commissioner Escudo? Yes. Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Mayor Ryan?

Yes. I can pass this 5-0. 4M is in Michael. A resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida, awarding RFP number 25-06-08-MS and standard contract number C-25-06-08. MS between the city of Sunrise, Florida and United States Service Industries Inc DBA Grupo Julian for custodial services and providing effective a city manager Marco else a Rodrigo de Castro director of utilities so motion move it motion by Commissioner Scooter second by Commissioner Curtis public hearing anyone wishing to be heard in this matter Please come forward or press five star on your phone. Let's see. No one come forward. Can you confirm? No hands raised I confirm. All right. Thank you.

I'll close public discussion commissioners good up floors yours I just because when I went over this I just want to say I I know I need glasses, but this one page that gives all the rankings and the prices for the people, I mean, I don't care if you had a magnifying glass. You just can't see the writing, nothing. So I know I could go on a computer, but I'm just saying when I get it and I'm just looking at the backup, it's just very hard to see. The next thing I just wanted to say, the company that we had, Before, I just wanted to ask for personal information. Did we have a problem with them that we didn't like their service or whatever?

There had been some challenges with the current vendor.

Okay. Okay, thank you.

Okay, any further discussion? Call the question.

But please, whoever does the backup, that is just a little bit too small in the lettering.

We appreciate the effort to conserve paper.

Right.

Yeah, I'm sorry, but uh, but Won't help if we can't see it.

Okay call the question assistant deputy mayor Clark deputy mayor Guzman Yeah Commissioner Kurtz. Yes, Commissioner Skudo. Yes, we're Ryan.

Yes, I didn't passes five to zero for W Resolute resolution the city of sunrise, Florida awarding bid number 25 65 0 6 CM To RF Environmental Services Inc. for the Sawgrass Wastewater Treatment Plant Dissolved Air Flotation Thickening Process Improvements Phase 1 Project, approving contract number C25-65-06-CM, and providing an effective date, City Manager Mark Lebelski, Rodrigo DeCastro, Director of Utilities. Do I have a motion? Move it. Motion by Commissioner Skudo, seconded by Commissioner Kurtz. This is a public hearing. Anyone wishing to be heard in this matter, please come forward or press 5-star on your phone. I see no one come forward. Can you confirm no hands raised? I confirm. All right. I'll close public discussion. All right, I pulled this item. There's another item we had on this that was approved on consent where the projected cost was 30% lower. I have my concerns about when they're significantly lower. It's on the East Sunrise project. I'm going to raise it in my report later. I don't want to see the... change orders and all the problems that come with it. But I didn't want to slow it up tonight for that, and I do think on that particular item, it's also going to require a lot of community engagement and monitoring. On this one, we've got a different problem. Our engineer's opinion of probable construction costs was $1.5 million. We are going out to bid on a limited pool of available companies and specialists to do this. And the lowest bid was $2.6 million. And rightfully so, the engineers went back and they said, well, how could that be? How could we be that far off? And what they noted was that the major price difference between their opinion and the bid was related to steel canopies and skimmer systems. and the response to it wasn't that they had mispriced those or there was some linear foot issue or price per foot issue or some supply chain issue that wasn't identified well enough. They say the ongoing variability in the metal market combined with limited competition because of a constrained vendor pool, not constrained by our RFP, but by the existing pool that can actually do this work. So my interpretation or translation of that is that the risk of whatever steel prices will be, that is, based on the current pricing, it's not saying they got it wrong. They're just saying that the variability between now and when this would have to be, all the component parts would have to be purchased is so great that the vendor says, I'm not taking that risk. And there's no hedge against it. When we did City Hall, we had some pre-purchasing we were able to do. We were able to stage in other projects. But there simply isn't any. Basically, the city bears the cost. And likely, the vendor has shifted all the risk, which the upside of it Turns out it's even worse than, you know, they're stuck with that. In the million-dollar swing, it's cheaper. Then they've gained some profit on that. Staff had this on the agenda previously and pulled it to have some additional analysis and evaluation, and I appreciate that work by the staff. And the consultant and staff evaluated whether there were any alternative delivery methods or purchase methods. such that we could directly purchase the steel, something that if the price goes up, that's it, I'm okay with that. It's only where we're agreeing to this project, they're not purchasing it now, and they're saying, we don't know, it could cost a lot more. And they may be right, I mean, from variability of federal policy, international tariffs, supply chain, other countries' priorities, our own steel manufacturing. But we apparently have no way to hedge against that. And at the same time, we need to move forward.

So they wouldn't allow us to purchase in advance?

There are apparently no ways to do it because They're designed by the contractor, and they're manufactured by a third party. So the contractor has to design all of this, and then they go out to the third party. We can't really bid it directly. It's not like we're buying chairs, I guess is my point. We're going to look at it simply that we had a new theater, and they're saying, well, we don't know. The price of chairs could go up a lot. You know, we could go out and say, you know, the heck with it. We're going to go buy the chairs now. We'll stick them in the warehouse. We'll take care of the environmental issues, make sure they're preserved. Takes you a year and a half to build it. Then we'll put the chairs in. That would be a way of hedging our bets on it. There doesn't appear to be any opportunity for that. And at the same time, we need to move forward on this. And I raised it as one of the limitations that we have as a city is that sometimes we're taking on the chin these cost risks. And despite all the opportunities to try to hedge, and we've done that in the past, whether it was on the garage or some other things, we've been able to buy component parts of it ahead of time or purchase it ahead of time. There's not a spot market for us to participate in this. And I think it was important to have this discussion because when you see the probable cost of 1.5 and staff recommending going at 2.6, you've got to have a discussion about it and realize that there may not be any choices. And this is not a slight against the vendor for the bid. The performance of this vendor has been without exception. on prior contracts. I'm sure they have no issues in others. This is a very unique area of construction that requires specialty practice. The only other alternative was for us to go out and rebid it, say we're going to throw this whole thing out and start over. Well, what will happen from there, inevitably, because we've had this public discussion, is they're going to start at 2.6, and everyone will be probably right there. And we're back to the same spot. What we've done is we've taken another six months, staff time, expense, the engineering reports, all the things that have to happen, which is a challenge for us as a city because we don't have closed bids. If you're in a company and you get this come in, you can go sit and have negotiations and talk. It's all done in the open. So it's not ideal. This is necessary. It can't be put off. You know, I'm going to have to hold my nose on this one, but I want to, you know, really point out that there was virtually no way. As we've done in the past, and I'm going to turn to Mr Lebowski to confirm this, because I don't want to be the one that's just saying it. That's what I've read and had discussions with staff, but there's no way to hedge against these component part expenses such that we're not taking. such that we're not shifting the beneficial risk to a party that may very well be able to get it at a cheaper price later or have their own way of hedging the system. We just don't have the capacity to do that. Mr. Lebowski.

Thank you, Mayor. Your summary was spot on. We spent a lot of time at a staff level talking about this with utilities, procurement, and the engineer to come up with if there was any other solution. And unfortunately, we couldn't come up with anything. Like you said, this is a COMPONENTS THAT ARE DESIGNED BY THE CONTRACTOR AND BUILT BY A THIRD PARTY. IF WE INTERJECT OURSELVES INTO THAT PROCESS, IT ALSO CREATES A LOT OF OTHER PERIL THAT WE'LL PAY FOR IN THE LONG RUN. AND LIKE YOU SAID, IF WE REBID THIS, THE SECOND LOW BIDDER WAS $3.5 MILLION. SO THERE'S A STRONG LIKELIHOOD IF WE GO OUT TO BID, THE NUMBER WILL BE HIGHER THAN WHAT WE'RE SEEING TODAY. SO WE WEIGHED ALL THOSE FACTORS We are recommending approval, and we really couldn't come up with any other alternatives at this point.

I don't know if it's higher, but it's all going to be $2,544,000, $2,543,000. It's all going to be within that range. That's what's going to happen. Nobody's going to come in at 1.5, having seen this, right?

No, that is correct.

Sorry, Commissioner Skidow.

I mean, we went out to bid, so a closed bid. But how could you have put it out? beforehand, not as a bid, maybe as a request for proposal or whatever, to see how they were going to lay it out and not be locked into the bid where something like this. What else in the utility are we limited where if something goes out to bid, you're really only going to get one or two people that this is going to happen again? That maybe next time you don't put it out as a bid, you put it out as to see...

so so what what happens is during the uh... the engineer during development of their opinion of probable construction cost the major components oftentimes they will get with the subs and get preliminary pricing and that's what happened in this case and that's was howie how they came up with the one point five cost estimate but that cost estimate with that pricing that was provided didn't come in that price because of the variability and the concerns in the marketplace. The contractor had to hedge because the price of steel is significantly variable at this time.

So it's just the metal component. You're saying that it's 1.1 million more because of the metal component.

And skimmer systems that have to be designed.

What I'm saying is if they contacted subs... Obviously, they were getting quotes from subs. So how are they getting quotes from subs and then somebody else comes back 1.1 more? That's what I'm trying to say.

I see, I see.

So they already went out to the subs. There's other people that are doing it. Unless they just use one specific person and says, how much is this and how much is this as an average? Not that that person does the work. They were just giving them an estimate. So next time, get the estimate from somebody who could actually do the work and not the estimate to somebody to say, yeah, this is what I think it's going to cost. Because now, that's a big difference. I mean, it's... Unless it's just a metal component, but come on.

Yeah.

2.7 million, you're worrying about... I mean, my cheese is not going to go up that much. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, it may go up 10% or 20%, but, I mean...

Yeah, but steel is, and that's the problem.

I hear you, but it's not jumping like that, Mike.

It's literally not. I don't know what the timeline is between bid and when this is getting installed and the construction. What I would say is there's two components. There's variability in the market. Perhaps the bigger issue is a constrained market of vendors. There were seven bidders who did the walkthrough and had the initial meetings, only two bid for whatever reason. So you're talking about a double whammy of variability, and then two put in, and maybe they want it. Maybe they're like, listen, I'll take a swing at the fences. Somebody took a big swing at the fences, and we're at 3.5. The next one, higher one. I figure if I get it, great. If I don't, so how much of the variability is accountable? If you were to formulaically look at the price difference, I don't know how much of that's due to market variability. It could very well be that we're also working. The point is, whichever one it is, re-bidding in a constrained market only gets us back to same or similar. You can't re-bid.

You'll be stuck right now. We know that.

To staff, whenever we're facing the analysis that went in here, I appreciate that you pulled it at the last commission meeting to go and look at this. The analysis has to be the same at all times. How can we eliminate the beneficial hedge that someone else may be taking at the cost of the taxpayers. We have no choice. We have to move forward with this. And I know there was even an evaluation whether there was time to pull this, to have that. But, you know, unfortunately, I'm going to, you know, hold my nose on this one because I think everybody who votes for it will do that. But I do want to thank staff for taking the time. I know it was extra work, but it's critical. have to be able to justify this and if we can't get it lower and we can't find another way you know be very easy for someone out there to say just rebid it that's not realistic in a constrained market we're not buying paper clips here and trying to figure out who's hiking us on this so I appreciate that from staff Commissioner Guzman did you want to weigh in on the line yes I'm good thank you Okay. All right. Go ahead and call the question if there's no further discussion.

Commissioner Skidow?

Yes.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Deputy Mayor Guzman? Yes. Commissioner Kirch?

Yes.

Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Item passes 5-0. Do you need a motion for that? Sure, otherwise I was gonna just read the public hearing that passed last time real quick Public hearing Commission discussion our actuary secretary note orders the city sunrise, Florida adopting amended 10-year water supply facilities work plan and amending the city sunrise comprehensive plan to strengthen coordination between water supply and local land use planning by amending the infrastructure conservation capital improvements and get our governmental coordination elements provide for transmittal of this ordinance and the comprehensive plan amendments to the Florida Department of Commerce and other units of local government and government agencies is required by Chapter 163, Part 2, Florida Statutes, providing for adoption pursuant to Section 163.3184, Subsection 3, Florida Statutes, providing for inclusion in the City's Sunrise Comprehensive Plan, providing for conflict, providing for severability, and providing for an effective state manager, Mark Lebelski-Shannell, a Director of Community Development. First reading, City Commission, 10-14-2025, Pass 5-0. No motion. Motion by Commissioner Skudo, seconded by Assistant Deputy Mayor. Is there a public hearing? Anyone wishing to be heard by? Please come forward or otherwise press five five star on your phone. So, you know one come forward any hands raised I confirm All right, I'll close public discussion any discussion from my colleagues Good call question Commissioner Kurtz off days.

Oh, I'm sorry commissioners good. Oh, yes assistant deputy mayor Clark deputy mayor Guzman Yeah, you're Ryan.

Yes, I didn't pass five four zero. All right, we'll take a short break biological break a few minutes Listen, he knew, he timed it just perfectly. He knew when he needed that. Can I have a motion? Move it. Motion by Commissioner Seguto, seconded by Commissioner Kirch. All in favor say aye. Aye. All right. Commission discussion on our annual review of the evaluation of City Attorney Thomas P. Moss. City Attorney, Mr. Moss.

Yes, sir. It's been a busy year, but an enjoyable year. Mr. Ramnath is here. Mr. Ruiz is actually upstairs locked in his office because he's sick, but he's here. Right.

And which one of you was the one that was most popular with SLA?

This year, that was Mr. Ramnath.

All right. We're doing his review? All right. Mr. Moss, the floor is yours.

I provided a report, and I'll stand by for any questions you may have.

Okay. To my colleagues, I'll start with Commissioner Kirch.

All right. So in preparation for Mr. Moss' performance review, I had the opportunity to speak with him, conducted a comprehensive review of the following materials. The City Attorney's Office August 2025 Annual Report, the City Attorney's Annual Performance Review Memorandum dated February 18th of 2026, reviewed his monthly litigation reports, his legal fees spreadsheets, as well as the criteria outlined in the Sunrise Management Personnel Performance Evaluation. That criteria assesses achievement of objectives, decision-making and judgment, personnel development, planning and organizing, interpersonal skills, communication, administrative policies and procedures, as well as other relevant factors. Based on my review of the reference documents and Mr. Moss' presentation, well, very limited presentation tonight, but in his memorandums that he sent, I find that his performance clearly demonstrates significant achievement across these criteria, and I've adopted them into my decision-making and into my evaluation into your performance, Mr. Moss. I find that you consistently demonstrate a high level of analytical ability and sound judgment in identifying progress, opportunities, and areas requiring organizational change within the City of Sunrise. Your legal advice and guidance are instrumental to my decision-making and have contributed directly to the overall success and stability of the city. You've shown strong leadership in recruiting and retaining a diverse and effective staff, including Navin, Robert, Ilse, and Shabana, while successfully managing recent transitions, including the retirement of Roxanne and Anna. Mr. Mwasi, you establish and continue to lead a highly effective management team in the city attorney's office, and I'm extremely pleased with both your leadership and the overall performance of the city attorney's office this last year. I find that you do work collaboratively with the city commission and executive management, to develop and implement strategies that advance the city's mission goals and financial viability. Under your established performance metrics, your office has drafted 335 resolutions and ordinances, drafted and reviewed or amended 193 contracts. Many of those were complex and highly detailed, and you reviewed or amended 175 city policies. You work cohesively with the mayor and commissioners, city management, city departments, and the public to accomplish a wide range of functions that contribute meaningfully to the city's success. Through your professionalism and leadership, you have built and continue to enhance the respect and profile as the City of Sunrise city attorney. You've aided in preparation of budgets, monitoring financial performance, initiating operational budgetary adjustments as appropriate within your city attorney's office, and I find that you consistently keep me fully informed in a timely manner regarding the condition of any organizational key factors influencing its operations. You provide me consistent support and sound legal counsel related to those ordinances, resolutions, related to ethics matters, sunshine law, compliance and other legal obligations. I do find that you ensure adequate control and accounting of the funds that are provided to you and you maintain sound financial practices within your department. Your adopted budget for last year was $492,750 with an additional 200,000 going out to outside council related to the ongoing west construction lawsuit. However, you've managed to offset that quite a bit. Your office has contributed to revenue generation and recovery efforts. And you humbly point out that Mr. Rameth has played a key role in assisting code compliance and building division and settling 230 code liens, resulting in the recovery of an additional $537,315 in fines. These outcomes included negotiated settlements as well as contested hearings before the special magistrate. Furthermore, by protecting the city's interest in foreclosures, bankruptcies, and probate manners, your office has generated and recovered additional approximately $6,000. So based on the totality of this review, I find your performance excellent over the year, Mr. Moss. Good job.

Thank you, sir.

I, on a personal level, and I'm sure the commission feels the same way, I want to thank you for constantly and always being available at any hour on the weekends or otherwise. The job of city manager has always been complex in Sunrise. It's only gotten more complex. The interaction of state and, in times, federal policy, in addition to an ever-changing environment in the legislative policy area, on very complex issues that involve development as well as our ability to regulate locally. City attorneys have to be supported by a strong office because the issues are complex, and we have commissioned you with a mandate to do as much as you can in-house to avert what some cities face with outside counsel and substantial bills, and you've done that. And there's no doubt in my mind that the decisions that were made in hiring Ms. Kislin and her decision to not only work with you, but to endorse your role and your mission has continued to be something that has invigorated the office, but also proven to be wise and continues to do so. Over the past year, we've faced very complex issues, and we continue to do so. It's one of those attorney jobs that has so many hours associated with it that I think it's hard for those in the private sector to fully understand the complexities of it, not just in a specialty of, let's say, land use or particular issues that are facing a police department, but constant inquiry from five bosses and issues that span the gamut well beyond what someone in the private sector would have to. And I'll just end with this. Your reporting is excellent during the year. I appreciate the monthly reporting. It allows us to fully understand what's happening. It continues to be a barometer of what is potentially going on that we're not aware of. And as Commissioner Kirch pointed out, in the areas of complex litigation where we've had to go to outside counsel, you've managed that judiciously and efficiently, and I wholeheartedly endorse your work this year and give you the highest effective rating. Thank you.

Thank you.

Did I read that right?

So for me I I do appreciate last year. I talked about the fact that wanted to Not necessarily seen on the report for last year and I'm glad to see it on this rehears report that shows that I We have done due diligence. It's great to pick up the phone and call any one of the other attorneys and being able to get an answer. And so the camaraderie between all of you working together has really showed progression and great strength in what you do. And so I'm really, truly happy. I'm not calling you on the weekends like anybody else, but I like to see how that is progressing. So great job. Great job to everyone, including all your staff.

Thank you.

Oh, yes. You truly, really have grown into this job. Let me see. I mean, dealing with so many city managers that we had and then dealing with all the lawyers that we have up here. In the beginning, and now you got the flow, you said before Roxanne left, before you wanted to expand your department, you weren't afraid to say, hey, I need money for my department, but this is why I need it. And as you could see, and we see who you have hired, to make sure it's a smooth transition, Knowing Roxanne, who's been here for so long, you knew that you wanted somebody beforehand to get up to speed and hit the ground running because this is someone who has done multiple tasks, hiring the extra assistant city attorney. You deal with every single department. Many people, many residents probably don't understand, you're tied into every single department, whether Kevin's buying something, anything with personnel, I mean, you're dealing with so many different things. Then you have to deal with five of us. But you truly have got a great work ethic. You're never shy to tell us yes or no. could see when we now with these quasi judicials that we really haven't had like in a while but over the last couple of months the numerous ones that we've had i mean we're giving you a chance to on the fly to go sit there with staff and the developer right then and there with your staff to figure out how you could work it out or figure out a compromise i mean Some people would just say, you know what, I can't. Let's give me more time. Like Mr. Lebowski said tonight, he couldn't give an answer. He needed more time. You wouldn't have done that. You jumped right on it. Sorry, Mark. But truly, he's not shy. I mean, he takes the shot. If he gets it right, you could have came back and Mr. Blackman and those residents would have probably hated what you guys came up with, you know, but hey, you know, sometimes you got to work through it right then and there. And truly, it's been a good experience working with you on a personal level. You're there for them. I mean, we just had tag readers with Sawgrass, tag readers with us. We just had the speed cameras. I mean, we literally voted on the speed cameras, and literally they were being installed. Obviously, you were doing your background work just on little things like that, and we're already up and running. So to how you work with both of the chiefs and with the city clerk and with the city manager and the rest of the departments. You know, you're more than welcome to have whatever it is that you get on your nice little raise that you get, or if it's in your contract that you don't get a raise. Kim is probably watching this right now, seeing whether you're gonna get a bigger raise than her or not. But we appreciate everything that you do for the residents, for all the employees of the city, and especially, you know, years ago, we did a lot of outside counsel because we didn't have, enough people in there to do what it is previous city attorneys worked very hard to try to not to go out but some things you know when you need that specialty you know we had to go out but now having that extra person that's mainly dedicated towards the police side which we get a lot of uh... we truly appreciate your mindset in asking for the extra employees and to move your department forward. So I'm more than welcome to support your great appreciation that you have for all of us. So thank you, Tom.

Thank you. Okay, pursuant to the contract, it is up to the commission to decide whether or not to provide an annual merit increase of either one or two pay steps.

Deputy Mayor is on the line.

Okay. She's unmuted.

Yes, I'm here. Thank you. Tom, I just want to thank you for your professionalism, your patience, because I know I usually have a lot of questions. Sometimes it's difficult for me to navigate policy as far as learning and making sure that there's compliance and that I'm not making any poor decisions or choices. And so I really appreciate your feedback, even your entire team. You all work so well together from what I see. And I am beyond thankful that you are our city attorney. Again, because like I mentioned to you guys often when I'm out meeting with others and hearing their feedback, it's not always positive for their staff, but I always, always speak so highly of our entire City of Sunrise team. So I thank you for your knowledge, experience, your longevity in our city, and I look forward to working with you for many more years.

Thank you, Deputy Mayor.

Okay. Pursuant to the contract, the commission has the opportunity to consider an annual merit increase of either one or two pay steps, if any, retroactive to the first full pay period following the employee's anniversary date. What's the will of the commission?

Consistent with what we've done in the past would be one step.

All right. There's a motion by Commissioner Kirch consistent with the past treatment of charter officers, second by Commissioner Scudo. Any discussion on that? Commissioner Guzman, any discussion?

No.

Okay. All right. Go ahead and call the question on that.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Deputy Mayor Guzman? Yes. Commissioner Kirch?

Yes.

Commissioner Scudo?

Yes.

Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Congratulations, Tom. Thank you so much for the continued work.

Thank you. Thank you all.

Okay, we have a number of other items given the time. Maybe we'll address new business, Tunes and Trucks, and the Youth Advocacy Council. Motion to move those up? Move it. Motion by Commissioner Kerch, seconded by Commissioner Skudo. Commission discussion on our action rate, Tunes and Trucks concert series, Commissioner Joey Skudo. The floor is yours, sir.

So I just, knowing how much money that we spend for this amphitheater, I just want to get the most use out of it so i was just saying that i think that all the events that we have for the tunes and trucks should be held here at the amphitheater if we still want to do one at oscar win we could still do that if we want to do one at city park we could do that i understand that we we move it around now we were moving it around because we didn't have the empathy And it's been good going into the neighborhoods. And the residents, when we go there, they like it. And I'm not saying... It's just when we have it at the amphitheater, we get 4,000 to 5,000 people. When we do it at the other facilities, we only get a couple of hundred. So I'm not saying eliminate doing the other ones, but I just think... you know, one a month at the amphitheater just enhances everything that we do here at the city. So I'm not looking to spend more money by saying go to other places. I just think when the brewery opens, when the coffee shop opens on the east side, that's going to bring them more to the east side which we have a theater, and then we have a smaller theater. So it's going to bring entertainment there more than any other part of the city is going to have, even more than here, because the most we could have here is 12. But I still want to hit Oscar win. I still want to hit... I mean, if we do SAC... I mean, we're right here. So if we miss SAC, I don't think we get a big backlash from that. Flamingo Park, if we want to do one at Flamingo Park, it's more than we could do it. I just say because... When you're at the amphitheater, the lighting, the sound is so professional. You know what I'm saying? It's like you literally are at any concert, any hall. I mean, we would match up against anything that's out there. So I know when I brought up the other night, they said, oh, we don't want to do July and August, right? So I'm like, why don't you want to do July and August? It's too hot. I said, okay, let's cancel 4th of July. That'll save us $100,000 plus. No, I'm not saying that. You know what I'm saying? So don't say that it's going to rain in July, you know what I'm saying, when we have 4th of July. And yes, it's rained, but it costs us $100,000. So I just want to promote what we built here and give more events. I mean, if staff says we're to the wall, we cannot do it. I just can't see why we couldn't. The music is there. The lighting is there. The other places where you've got to bring the trailer, you know what I'm saying? It's more of a hassle, you know what I'm saying, than to do what we, I mean, we specifically spent over $10 million for this facility, and we're only going to hold eight events? I know we're adding the drones, but it's different, you know what I'm saying? It's a different event, you know? And I understand that if property tax cut comes, I'm not looking to, but it's not as much... For an event. Because everything is already there. It's just the employees that we have that work for the night. So. If the city wants to give me a breakdown, I'll give all of us a breakdown. Would it specifically cost extra? Her night. So we got to pay for the band. I mean, that's a given like we always do. Um. Could you just give me a basic of how much we spend for a good band, or is it we spend the same amount every month for a band?

Maybe just as a friendly amendment, go ahead and give us the cost of what it is, and include the employee time that's either the day before or day of, whatever.

So the band is about $3,500, and then staff time total is about $9,500. And the staff time starts on the Wednesday before, up through the Friday night.

Additional $9,500, or we're already paying them? They're just working to set up the facility.

Some of them are salaries, folks. Some of them are hourly.

So I would want to know that breakdown. And I only say that for... Are we bringing in overtime on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday just to pay for that? Or they're working at the Civic Center doing something else. We're just making them set up on Wednesday and Thursday. I mean, because then that's a true cost.

I can provide the commission a detailed summary of the breakdown. The true cost. Yes.

If overtime is involved on Wednesday and Thursday.

Let's just get the total hours involved, and whether they're being repurposed from another task or whatever. Just break that down so it doesn't appear it's a straight $9,500.

Okay, and then why wouldn't we be able to do one in July? Because just think right now.

Families don't have money to go on vacation in the summer just because it's the summer and the kids are off to school.

So a lot of people just want to – they're not going away.

You know what I'm saying?

It's one night. It's not like we're planning a week.

It's one night.

You know what I'm saying?

And for the people that are here and not going on vacation, to them, that's like their vacation in their backyard. So why wouldn't we be able to do July and August if there's a specific reason why we can't do it? You know what I'm saying? You know what I'm saying?

There's no reason I think historically as you hit on the mark is that we haven't done it over the summer because of the heat and the and the weather Unpredictability of the time but there's no reason if the Commission desires for us to do it.

We could do that We do one at 4th of July though Deputy mayor Guzman has her hands up I have some other lights on

I don't disagree.

I'm good August and September.

But you know what?

The BB&T is 30,000 people, and they're not 30,000 from Sunrise. They're people from everywhere else. So even though when we have tunes and trucks, people are from somewhere else. And majority of the cost is covered by others at Fourth of July. I mean, we do incur our employees, and a lot of employees. I'm not saying it's not. So then I would like to know that cost then, okay? And not for the day, just for the night, because it's a night event. I'm not talking about the parade. I'm not talking about the carnival, whatever, in the park. I'm specifically talking for... So, look, I just want to promote what we have. It is unbelievable, and every single person that comes there says, like, I can't even believe how clear the music is. I can't believe the lighting and the lasers, and when it shines on City Hall. I'm just saying, like, it's something that, like, we've never had before. So why wouldn't we want to promote that, you know, day in, day out when, you know, and that's why I wanna compare what you just did for the chamber, what that cost us employees for another event.

Okay. Assistant Deputy Mayor.

So let me break it down in like different levels. So level one, when we talk about July and August, We have to think about staff. They kind of need a break as well so that they can spend time with their families. We can't be at every event at all times. And now that we have implemented the every other Friday off, that kind of creates a problem as well. If they're taking a vacation, we have to consider that. So there might be additional factor of cost that we haven't thought about that may affect that particular entity of having availability for staff to be utilized in that capacity, add in more events to our already calendar. The next thing about moving the existing events that are happening at all the other parks, I can't tell you how many times I go to those parks and I meet those residents who talk about how great it is to be at that particular park because it's in their neighborhood. It's a walkable facility. You most likely will never see those individuals at this particular facility. So to remove that type of connectivity that we have been...

I didn't say remove it.

I'm just telling you my version. So to remove any kind of... connectivity that we have been creating with all the different parts of the city would create a little bit of a chaos with those communities because they look forward to it so to say to not have them that will be problematic for many residents so that's then to add a one more additional event. So that would mean that if we had one trucks and tunes at Baminga Park, then we would have to have another one here. So that means we would have two every single month. I think that would be a little bit overkill too, to have so many of them in one month. We need to also create the avenue where people wanna go. Like we can't just make it all the time where it's now not, a grand occasion for people to come and to enjoy themselves in the park. Plus, you know, individuals have other lives outside of City of Sunrise where they may want to go to a movie one night or they may want to go somewhere else. So I don't want it to become so overbearing where people no longer want to come, where it's not as a grand, lush occasion to show up at one of our events and have fun. I want to be able to have those events where people map out their schedules and they come and really enjoy it and make it be a luxury event for them.

All right, I'll turn over to Deputy Mayor in a second. Just a couple of comments. So yeah, I mean, as we get into the summer months, there is a little bit of a difference. The sun's up longer. It's brutal heat. Assistant Deputy Mayors, and I'm not saying I'm against this. I just want to make sure we evaluate this. This is Deputy Mayor's point. Generally speaking, I'm not out there all day setting up, obviously. I show up a half hour before, but folks have been out there dealing with whatever the heat and rain is. I think it is something for us to consider and whether we'll get the turnout. It may be worth trying and see what happens. Second, but again, I think we need to take that in consideration as to what impact it has. We know from July 4th, you see the staff, they're just It's amazing that they can pull off the morning and then the evening, and it's demanding. And they split up, right? Somebody does the morning, somebody does the evening, except for senior staff, but it's still really darn hot out there. So it's something to think about. Second, as much as I'm really thrilled about the amphitheater, we have some serious drainage issues. We have some issues that need to be addressed. If it rains Wednesday and Thursday or Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday in a heavy rain, there's going to be portions that have to be closed because otherwise we're going to do damage to it. And there needs to be a phase two on this that addresses the drainage. This is kind of like Nob Hill Soccer Park in a way that if it rains too much, we're closing parts and a critical pathway part. Second. It's not really related to this point, but on the west side, for whatever reason, there were no stairs designed to the bathroom. I don't know how it got missed, but it's not safe. As it is, you've done a great job of fencing to kind of redirect everybody, but you're redirecting them to the worst part of the drainage if that's soaked. And we're going to end up doing a lot of damage. I'm really concerned about how this plays out this summer, to be honest with you, what's going to happen. So I think it may be something we need to think about when we do this. What does it look like? What does this play out as? What are we going to see in terms of the impact on it? And then I guess the next part of it, to Assistant Deputy Mayor's point, is there's the cost we do at the amphitheater. What's the cost if we go and relocate around? I think Commissioner Scudo raises a good point. We've invested all this money in it. What's it costing us if we go to every park? And if we do two a month, you know, there is a, you know, kind of a concept, right? You don't want to act like a 15-year-old teenage boy. You know, sometimes one squirt of cologne is enough. You don't need five of them. And so I think there might be some merit in not overdoing it to the point. But I also think that part of that cost tells what that is when we relocate to each park. Because I think it's a fair point, you know, that there are some of the parks that have been pretty popular, some that I think to Commissioner Scudo's point, we don't need to go to SAC probably again. That's the same crowd that's coming to here. But there's merit in considering the others. But I'd like to understand what that is. We have seen very low turnout almost no matter what the band is when we go out west. There might be reasons for that. I don't know. But we should look at that and see what that – maybe it's worthwhile to pepper those through as well. I think this is a very worthwhile discussion because it's incredibly popular. We've spent a lot of money. And for those that remember, you know, the old amphitheater, we're crowding 2,000 or 3,000 people in there. It was that popular. It remains that popular. It is important that people have a local opportunity here. And, you know, as costs get harder and harder, this is a good investment for a Friday night. And it's the cleanest event we have. It's cleaner than any other event. People bring their food. They bring whatever drinks they want. They use the food trucks. They sit there. They pick up. And then they leave. And in, you know, since we've revised this to the bands, you know, in the last 15 years, you know, we haven't had a problem. It's the most peaceful event. It's fantastic. And I do think there's some merit to look at more. I just don't know whether this summer is it. I worry just about the rain and whether it's going to cost us, you know, 10 grand to cancel. I get it. It's not that much. But if you, you know, spend 30 on, you know, we have a bunch of cancellations. I mean, we know that It's hard to run outdoor youth in the summer, even at night, because of all the cancellations of fields and everything else. Let's just take a look at that, and we have a pretty good sense. We can't predict what it is. All we know is that if Chief McNamara goes out of town, we'll probably have lightning, and that's the reality.

What do you mean him and Rosa canceled the fourth? They both just got their job the first day. Call the duty that they make. They both canceled the 4th of July. Then the guy was like, oh, I'm not lighting the fireworks. And I'm like, we paid for the fireworks. You're lighting them.

Turned out to be a beautiful night. Yeah, it was. No, only kidding. Good job, McNamara Rosa. No, he's looking at it. But this is the point. It's really unpredictable. I'm more concerned about the fact that staff has to set up, you know, all day Thursday if that's really what's happening for the Friday or all day Friday or whatever it is. Let's get that breakdown so we have a better understanding.

We just put all the lighting and the speakers up on the top.

So let's just meet with SAP.

I'm saying, but as far as the setup for Wednesday, Thursday, I don't get if we have everything there. My problem is I'm going to go further. Why they're transporting the equipment from the stage back into the parking garage. I mean, if you're going to add the stairs, then there needs to be something where they store the stuff right there. So I'm saying, so I agree with you. Phase two has got to be maybe one of those little bays you have. Instead of building something out, use one of those bays to store all the stuff as a permanent thing. Then it's only go from here to here. But after the concert, I mean, we spent hundreds of thousands of dollars for that equipment, and then they're wheeling it all the way through. So look, I wanna, like you said, this is a great discussion, but as far as for phase two, Right now, when you look at half the green screen that's there right now, it just looks like it's a temporary site all the time. So we really got to look at, and I've said this, whatever it is that we could, whatever with styles, whether they help us do the stairs, okay, or phase two is all going to be on us. So here we have options right now. whether someone help us with it, because it's definitely a design flaw. It's either we didn't catch it, they didn't catch it, someone didn't catch it, and now we've got to live with it. So it's got to be corrected. So either way, either we're partnering to pay for it or we're stuck paying for it. So I think that conversation right now has to be had. If there's going to be any more money being transferred back and forth, it's going to be either someone's helping us or we're going to pay the full blunt of this. But it has to get done. You can't leave that temporary screening up like that. It looks horrible. It looks like it's an unfinished product. And how could you have the restrooms on that side and not have no access to them? You really got to walk around the whole back Or hop the little wall and go down. I'm just saying. So before we end up having another scenario, I mean, you understand and you know you're looking at it. It's not like we're telling you something new. All I'm adding to this is, you know, we have someone who did this project. You know, it's either somebody could help us right now or we're going to pay the full blunt.

All right. Deputy Mayor.

Yes, thank you. My biggest concern, aside from the overtime, is staffing, which has been addressed a few times, but not just any staffing, more so the camp staff. They are required to be there Monday through Friday from morning to the evening with basically no time off. That's their commitment is if you want to be a summer camp counselor, you have to be there Monday through Friday for the entire summer. A lot of those employees are the same employees that are utilized for these tunes and truck events. So one, the weather is unpredictable. Two, the overtime. But then three, most importantly to me, is overworking our staff. Even if it's for one night, I don't think it's fair to them, along with, like Commissioner Clark mentioned, is the other, every other Friday afternoon, new schedule, it's a huge conflict. So I personally do not support this, not one bit, even if we talk about this in six months, it's a big no for me. What I will suggest is we do have these beautiful parks, we have these great equipment and the stage and parking, even at City Park, and it is underutilized. And what I do suggest is us going back to considering the contracts are outside vendors because I know many times we get those calls that they can use a park. And if it's not our city event, we're not partnering with anyone. I know we tried doing it with the jazz and the park that one year we're putting parks about a few years ago and it wasn't as successful, but I don't think we shouldn't stop there. I do believe there's opportunities to look for the right vendor to utilize a space where it's not taking up our staff and they're handling, uh, Activating those those parts so But you get where I'm coming from so thank you Commissioner Clark for also your feedback Thank you Okay.

All right. Mr. Belsky. You have guidance from the Commission. You know what to do from here. I

Yes, Mayor. I'll provide some information and bring them back to the commission.

Okay, perfect. All right, C, Youth Advocacy Council. Commission discussion or action or a creation of a Youth Advocacy Council. Assistant Deputy Mayor Latoya S. Clark. Assistant Deputy Mayor.

So Youth Advisory Council is a combination of different levels of school board children that will be able to participate in this particular commission. It is not a paid council. It is from eighth grade to 12th grade. They have to have a GPA requirement. They have to be in good standing and all the necessary requirements. But as we can see today from just the SLA alone, how involved the youth would like to be in student government. And so it would be nice if we can be able to implement them into our thought process. Like we were imagining 2045, and we have all these plans and all these things that we want to do as we move forward, it would be great to have young people's thought process in these plans because most likely we're not going to be around when these things are being implemented. So it would be great to have their minds being a part of the planning. So that would be my suggestion to create this youth council. I created... a little flyer spreadsheet to talk about it in depth. Hopefully everybody got the opportunity to look at it. And I am open for questions.

Okay, so I've actually taken some time to... I haven't looked at it locally, what's being done. I can only find what's online sometimes. It's not that simple. But there are a variety of different iterations of this at different age groups and different... curriculum, if you will, of what is expected. Generally speaking, I totally support the idea of us doing something like this. I just need a little bit of time, because I think there's some really good models out there. The question of eighth grade starts to get me a little an issue, whether they're going to shadow department directors at that age. There's all sorts of other issues that have to be considered. But the point is, as a beginning point to have this discussion, I'm completely supportive of it. One of the Even the criteria of 2.5 GPA, you know, what if they're homeschooled? They may not have that fully, right? So we have to think through some of these things. And I guess also locally, what are some other models? I think Coral Springs has got one. I think Waterhill's got one.

I think there's some others.

To take a look at what works. I think some of these focus on going to Tallahassee a little bit. we've kind of gotten away from that model with this youth summit but i think it could be within the envelope of of that youth summit concept as well to make that part of it and combine the programs and then you know lastly i do think it's i don't know about elected members and things like that but i think as a general start when we first start before there's you know a president and all that is to begin the concept now the only question i guess would be we already have sla right so How do we make sure we're not – I mean, I know it's totally different in the sense because we're talking about more engagement perhaps with the commission and maybe there's some other curriculum issues. SLA is a unique program that I don't think these other communities that have these councils – and they're called a variety of different names. I don't think they have the SLA. So we already have a pretty amazing program. The question is incrementally what are we adding to it. I think the concept is good, and I think it's worth a discussion with staff and doing some more research and seeing where it fits. Again, the age thresholds caused me a little bit of pause, but I think it's probably doable. It may be that we end up starting a bit smaller and maybe having a younger youth summit maybe for eighth and ninth or something, and then having the separate. I don't know. I'm just throwing it out there. But the overall concept, I think, has worked really well. The only thing, again, I would say is take a look at the communities that have had this, and do they do SLA-type curriculum? SLA is very, very much a youth advocacy council, right? They're being taught, and they're going to the departments, and they're being taught how to advocate. So I guess the question is incrementally, what are we trying to do?

My thought process was not necessarily to eliminate or actually infringe at Paul on SLA. It's a totally separate framework from that. And in other communities, because it was a big part of when I went to Utah to talk about with other areas, this was one of my little focus to make sure I got as many information as possible according to how they utilize their youth groups. And so their council not necessarily consists of just understanding what government is, also being able to be an incumbent part of the other advisory boards as well to be able to gain information of making decisions in terms of what it overalls. So it would be a little bit more than SLA and incorporate things outside of SLA. So that would be the framework of it.

Okay, that's a good discussion point. Commissioner Kirch.

Yeah, I mean, I think it's a great idea to start something. My concern is, you know, 8th graders are 13 to 14-year-olds. 9th graders are 14 to 15. I think it's too young. I think 16 and above. Just my opinion. I think if you start at 10th, 11th, and 12th, I think they're a little bit more mature. Staff ain't going to feel like they're babysitting, trying to say it in a nice way. But I think they're more mature at 16 and would be able to have a better participation in that. But other than that, I'm good with that.

Yeah, I mean, maybe one of the things to think about is there's already an existing structure of student government within middle schools, let's say. Maybe the idea is having a... student council youth government day much like the youth summit for which is not aimed at student government but like hazel rogers she does that right something that we bring in and maybe there's a way to work with the school board partner with them it's a one-off to start the concept i don't know i'm just throwing out there's a lot of different iterations of this there's already student government uh structure right and they're thirsty for this engagement with the commission and government. You know, we could bring in local electives as well, you know, state reps and otherwise to talk about that. Or go with this. I would just need to see some of the other models to see how they manage the age issues.

There's a lot, and I can forward them to the committee. So there's a lot of different versions of it.

Just think we have... Just the only other thing is you probably want to run it on the school calendar year.

calendar year instead of a full year.

It would be start of school to end of school. It says serve for a period of one year.

All right.

The way Commissioner Guzman brought up that she wanted to start up the thing and then take the people to Tallahassee and take them to the National League of Cities. And then we totally went away from that and did it here locally, which I said would be better to take 15 kids and spend $30,000 to taking them on planes and food and hotels, that it's better to do something here local. And when we did it, we ended up getting more of a turnout. It was just a two-day or whatever event. We had every department head involved showing these kids what you could do in life, then had each of us go and attend. Then just tonight, SLA, that kid who spoke hit it right on the head. I don't know what I want to do. I didn't know what I wanted to do, but Going through SLA, I went to hear, you know, he didn't say where he went, but we know where he went. And then he said it opened up my eyes to see whether or what I want to do from high school now to go to college. And I think that's a great experience. I'm just saying, a student from Nova Southeastern just had to send me a 10 question thing for his school. And it was interview someone who's in business. Why you started it, how you started it, what are obstacles, like all this. And I point blank started off like this. I went to St. Thomas Aquinas, American Express was involved in junior achievement. Junior achievement used to come to the school and teach you about business, kind of like what a lot of people do now when you want to interact with the schools. Taught us how to start a business, sell stock that we had to sell to our family members or friends, come up with a product, make a product, sell the product, see how much you made by buying what you need, you know what I'm saying? And I said, I guess that's what started me. So started me in business because I seen that I could start something, go door to door and sell something. And I seen what I made at the end. So I just don't want it to be where there's a, a sole set thing where it is a president, a vice president, because then it becomes like a structured thing. And then sometimes when it's like that, the other people don't have input. It's only from the people that run it. So that's just my, I think it should be like a open thing. So I think between what we have for SLA and what we do for those two days, if we could tie this somehow to that, but to have now a third, you know, a third program going all for, like you said, from young to old, I mean, I don't know how the mix goes, but I'm all about, I'm saying I'm all about how we could get kids to figure out what it is that they want. And here's another, the band from Piper High School had called us and said, we know you guys give out scholarships, but you give out scholarships to kids that go to college. But we have kids in the band that want to be a plumber, an electrician. Will you be willing to give those kids the scholarship rather than a kid going to college? And we said, sure. We don't just because you're going. I didn't go to college. I said, no, we don't just do that. So I think there's a benefit for any program for a kid. Let's just figure out instead of doing multiple things for kids, let's see how we could tie it into SLA and the other thing that we have.

So one of the also the other benefits is that it's the council gets to actually have input in government decisions. So they would come here and like to advocate for us to do something that they don't see that currently they want to implement. So it is giving them a more open eye experience.

So you want it to be an advisory board like we have bicycle and pedestrian?

It is a board that is...

I started this 20 years ago. We just couldn't get a quorum. Kids couldn't get here. The parents couldn't drop them off. I'm just saying. So if you're going that route, we tried it, and it never played out because... Kids on the east side, kids on the west side couldn't get here for 5 o'clock. And then if it was 6 o'clock and it went to 8 o'clock, then the parents said, I'm just saying. Let's figure out how we can put the three of them together.

Because then it also becomes somewhat exclusionary if we're not careful. It's only those who have resources to get here.

Then we offered, wait, we already, we offered the bus system to go and pick them up. But it was one kid there, one kid there. It took too long just to even pick them up. You know what I'm saying? So we tried everything to get it.

I think just like how we have regular advisory board and individuals who have the ability to get here, they become advisable. And you know, work changes, life changes, they have to drop off.

But their parents, they're 14, they don't have keys yet.

They're playing baseball, they're playing football. A lot of these kids do Uber. Well, I don't know about, it's a great Uber.

I don't want to be responsible for putting a 13-year-old in an Uber.

I think we are creating issues where in the event that a parent is consenting to having their kid to be coming here at X amount of time, X amount of day. I think that is their responsibility. I don't think we need to negate whether or not it's gonna be possible. Just like when you go to soccer or basketball, if it's one of their children's initiative, not everybody is athletic. So if it's their initiative of the parent to make sure that their child is there, then they'll get them there.

I'm very responsible for that 13 year old now sitting at the city hall and taking an uber home i don't want that on my head i just said let's see how we could put it in with what we already have you know what i'm saying rather than trying to do something that i think because of the age doesn't work and by the way i've coached youth at all ages it is so much easier to get them to practice when they're under 10 years old after that it's a different ball game all right deputy mayor

Okay, well, I have a couple of things to share. First, I'm going to stay off topic. You know, being on this end on the phone is very challenging, not just as me trying to chime in, but even as a listener if I was a resident. One, it's difficult to hear you all, so if you don't have your mic close to your mouth, I can't hear you. And I'm sure others have that same issue. Not only that, I'm trying to watch online, and there is a little bit of over a minute delay. So when anyone's trying to discuss open or chime in on open discussion, you've already closed it. So I think we need to look back at the system and see how we can make sure that that is up to date because I still feel like we're working in dinosaur age with our current system that I have not been happy with. And we've spent lots of money on this years ago and it's still working crappy. So aside from that, I want to thank you Commissioner Clark for bringing this back on the board because I believe it's very important. And I don't think that us as adults, not all of us, because clearly I love everything about the youth, but a lot of times adults underestimate what our children bring to the table. And even if they're in eighth grade, I know so many students that are beyond their time and they're super smart and they've got a lot to say. And I think a lot of us need to take time to listen. You know, we talk about going back to 20 years ago. I did this 20 years ago and this and that 20 years ago. But you know what? I'm sorry. It's 2026. Times are changed. Our youth are way more advanced than they were 20 years ago. They have more opportunities. They use their voice more. They know how to advocate the right way, whether it's via social media or even in debates. and many other avenues. And a lot of cities have actually taken up on those opportunities for them. And the return on investment is wonderful to know that we have, or they have, all of these students that are in their programs, graduating, many are getting scholarships from other organizations, they're residents in their community, and they are making a difference. Whether it's speaking on a council, or if it's implementing a volunteer program, or even if it's being a part of something like a teen summit, it's something that goes on their portfolio so that when they're time to graduate and go to college, they can say they've done X, Y, Z. And I feel like there's a lot more opportunity for the city of Sunrise to invest in our youth. And it's very difficult when I tried bringing this up forward last year and a half, not having that full support. I'm glad we moved forward in a teen summit. but I do feel that there's more opportunity. And Commissioner Clark, I think the council for an advisory board is very much needed. I do support this and I really do hope that the rest of the commission does too, because time is of the essence and we always keep waiting and pushing things back and bringing it back and we're just wasting time. So I believe that we should move forward in another opportunity. It's not costing us all this crazy money. like we want to do for a July or June concert, which is absurd. If anything, I'd rather spend that money and invest in our youth. So again, thank you for bringing this up.

All right. So let me just clarify, since none of us have a monopoly on understanding the power of youth, and as someone who's been PTA president and worked with student councils and spoken and had them here, I fully understand that. And, in fact, that's why, as was indicated, I'm supportive of this concept. We're simply talking about is it fully baked. We don't need a series of talking points on supporting youth. We all support that, and we want this to happen. The question is how to do it. With respect to eighth graders, it's not a question of whether their voice matters. It's a question of whether we can manage it by bringing them here and have the safety issues and all the other issues that are attendant to it.

We can manage it.

Thank you. You want to let me finish or do you want to interrupt?

So I think all evening you guys have been hearing each other back and forth and no one's let me speak. So now that I interrupt you, you guys want to stop me. That's not how it works, Mayor.

Good. Then you should be at the commission meeting. So I'm trying to excuse me.

I'm actually advocating with the youth in our community. I'm being very productive, engaging with our community every single day. I don't just come to work twice for a month meeting. I work every day with our community.

All right. Well, we don't need to be casting aspersions. I'm doing my best to make sure that I call upon you.

Well, then tell your colleague that's sitting to the right of you.

Could you not interrupt me again? I've made the best effort to call upon you even when you weren't present on the phone for votes. So I am making my best effort. It's not ideal, and I've had to call in before as well. It's just the nature of it, and I understand it. My point is that this is something that should be fully evaluated. And there are models that need to be looked at. And there's opportunities. And the SLA is a great model that may be able to be replicated in other grades. We also have the opportunity for those student councils to maybe begin that process of a student council summit day to be able to have. Whether or not we get to an advisory board, I'd love to look at the experience of other communities, whether they've had this issue of quorum and turnout and what the age is. All I'm saying is let me see the research. What I saw here tonight was a draft with the City of Sunrise label on it. I hadn't seen any research. I don't know what was provided to staff in drafting this, who drafted it. I'm okay with that process. I don't care. I think it's a great start for a discussion, and that was my point, and I look forward to it. And if you want to put it on the next meeting, the meeting after, and every meeting thereafter, I'm okay with that, too. But I need to see the examples, and let's find the best way to do it that collaborates with the parents and meets the Necessity of safety and not just a bunch of talking points.

So that's my point on this so I just want to say that our city manager helped me do the research on this so it was advocated not just by myself but also by

Okay point of information on that since she just made that comment this commission is

we voted on that no staff member is to be drafting anything unless it's brought up to the city commission to be drafted. So I'll just make that point blank now. If when I was proposing to do the board for the AIM, I fully asked the city first, I brought it, not even asked the city, I brought it up and said, I wanna propose this and I'm gonna bring it back. This didn't get there. So if the city manager is doing background work, and then I didn't know that, and you didn't communicate that to me, one second, no disrespect to you, I'm just laying, we've had this discussion, before you were here, years ago, that if anything, if any commissioner or mayor was going to tell the city attorney or the city manager or somebody to draft something and do work, then we should all know that that's being done. So if you did the work and you just wanted to put this on the agenda is one story. But if the city manager or city staff did all the work, for you, then it should have been noted to all of us. But to get this tonight, and now you made that comment that the city manager is the one who did this, then that's not right. But that's not what I said, though.

I did say I went to Utah. I did say that I did research. This is what I said.

Okay.

I interpret it differently. You have a bunch of materials from Utah. And let's just circulate it. And let's look at that. Because I will tell you that I did look at this probably two years ago and looked at the latest models. And I was trying to figure out how to meld it. So I'm glad you brought it forward. But there are a lot of different models. And so I'm happy to have that discussion. And I think that's what the point of this was tonight, to start that discussion. OK. Any further discussion on that item? All right, let's have an update on the wellness initiative. If we can, can I have a motion to move up 16C? 16C. Motion by Commissioner Kirch, second by Commissioner Skudo. All in favor say aye. Aye. All right. Employee preventative screening wellness initiative update by the city manager.

Thank you, Mayor. As part of the FY26 budget, the City Commission approved funding in the Health Insurance Fund to enhance early detection of diseases and health risks for our employees through preventative screenings. Preventative screenings have proven a record of identifying critical diseases at early stages to help save lives and enhance wellness. Over the last several months, I have had multiple meetings with employees from each of the union groups at all levels and at all levels of the organization to brainstorm, research, and discuss screening options available. These collaborative meetings have been instrumental in identifying and narrowing the various options available for this important employee wellness initiative. The collaborative meetings resulted in a consensus from the attendees that the city should provide an allowance for each employee to utilize towards one of the recommended screening options of their choice. The recommended screening options are as follows. First option, ultrasound of heart for cardiovascular disease. An ultrasound for the cardiovascular disease is a quick, non-invasive, non-threatening screening which detects vascular disease and personal risk factors for cardiovascular disease and stroke. It can identify those elevated warning signs but not yet sick so they can seek medical advice, change their behaviors, and reduce their risk. Testing is mobile, non-invasive, and involves no radiation and no needles, and is very cost-effective. Each screening is completed with printed images, and the cost of this option is about $85. The second option is ultrasound technology. Ultrasound scanning is non-invasive, safe, and painless method that uses sound waves to create real-time images of the inside of the body without the use of x-rays. The ultrasound technician conducts a thorough screening of each employee's internal organs including the heart for cardiovascular disease, excluding the brain, and provides the patient with paper copies and still images that can be passed on to the employee's primary physician for further evaluation or diagnostic purposes. The ultrasound scanning includes blood work and a stress test. The blood work is scheduled by the patient at a local lab, and the stress test is usually performed at the same location and time as the ultrasound. The screening results are typically presented in a report and include a consultation to review the results. Since the patient will only have paper copies of still images and not digital images, the employee's primary doctor may still refer them to an MRI or CT scan to get official results, which could mean an extra step before someone could be treated by the doctor. The ultrasound scanning equipment is often portable and could be made available at a city facility, and the cost for this option is about $540. The third option is a CT slash x-ray technology. And the CT technology includes low-dose radiation, which is done in a quiet, open halo CT scanner made for non-claustrophobic experience. A full-body scan is from the thyroid to reproductive organs and is completed in approximately 10 minutes. The scanner captures clear images, which the computer software can generate into 3D images for the full body that can be passed on to the employee's primary physician for further evaluation and diagnostic purposes. The screening results are typically presented in a report and include a consultation to review the results if warranted. CT scan must be performed at the facility where the scanning equipment is located. The cost for this option is $900 for the full body, which includes the heart. It's an extra $300 to include the brain. The fourth and final option is an MRI technology. And the MRI is a radiation-free non-invasive scan that consists of strong magnetic field and radio waves to create detailed three-dimensional images of organs, soft tissues, bones, and blood vessels inside the body. The scan takes approximately 60 minutes and captures over 200 million data points from head to ankle, including major organs, brain, and spine that can be passed on to the employee's primary physician for further evaluation and diagnostic purposes. The screening results are typically presented in a report and include a consultation to review the results. An MRI scan must be completed at the facility where the scanning equipment is located, and the cost for this option is approximately $1,700. Our recommendations are, as part of this wellness initiative, I'm proposing to fund an allowance up to $750 per employee. That would include regular full-time and regular part-time employees towards one of the recommended scanning options. This allowance will cover the cost of a full-body ultrasound. However, it would only cover a portion, a cost of the MRI or CT scan. Each of these three presentative screening options utilizes a different technology. However, they will provide robust welding screening towards early detection of diseases and health risks, which is the goal of the program. This wellness program is strictly voluntary for all employees, and the employee will receive the screening results, the city will not receive any of the information from the screenings, only participating employees will receive the benefit of the $750 allowance, which is available on a one-time basis. For employees that choose the MRI or CT scan, we are proposing to allow the employee paycheck deduction over a six-month period to cover the additional costs. Funding for this wellness initiative is already budgeted in the health insurance fund. I would hope to bring four separate agreements, an upcoming city commissioning for each of these four identified vendors to perform these services for employees on an as-needed basis. And I'm available to answer any questions of the commission. Option two.

It's 540.

It's 540, that's the ultrasound.

All right, first question, tell us about the engagement you've had with the employee groups and employees as a whole, both on the available technology and the recommendation of a $750 stipend.

So the engagement was represented in each of the union groups. I also had in the group, we had both the chiefs on there. I had obviously my office represented. We also had HR and finance as part of the group, and obviously also risk was part of that. When we've met numerous times as we started to identify the different types of options available, each representative was assigned a task to go and research those options, present that in front of the group, and then the group then determined what options were the most appropriate to put on the menu. And everything in terms of the options listed, there was unanimous support from the group.

The idea here is ultimately, while we may not be able to show it, is to first and foremost help protect our employees, whether it's job-related exposure or just life.

So that's number one.

Number two, to the more cynical, the goal is if you catch things early, there are better outcomes. That's a general philosophy of medical practice. that means lower costs. To the person who focuses less perhaps on the economics of it, it means a better outcome for families. One issue that does present here is that we have employees across many different pay categories, as well as many different exposure levels. So I don't, you know, I recognize that of just life and people have risks in terms of family history or otherwise who may feel very motivated to do these things, may not have a particular job exposure that triggers, and yet we may have folks who have job exposures but aren't paid as much as somebody who has no exposure. And they're in the same category for the purposes of making up the difference in the stipend. So there's a little bit of, I have a little bit of angst. I have to think through what that really means for the person who maybe is working in chemicals but not being paid the same as a department director, right, who may not be doing that as often. This is across all employees, right? So is there a, I don't want to create kind of an economic part, but a need base. Is there a difference? between employees that are paid, and you said regular part-time, that's even more concerning for those folks who may be, for whatever reason, feel that their exposure or what they're involved in could potentially, they think, I need something higher. But for them, the six-month is a bigger challenge, right, to make up the difference. What's your thought on that, Mr. Lebowski?

So we didn't have discussions with the group in terms of the level of – different levels within the organization would maybe get different types of benefit. We did not have that conversation. If that's something you'd like us to consider, I would also like to pull in the city attorney to make sure that there's no issues there.

I get that point. And I don't want to slow this down. So I'm raising the point that it's a potential. I don't want, you know, Perfect to be the enemy of good on this, but I do note that. I also would say that the first, what is the proposal in terms of whether this is a one-off opportunity with a window that closes? Is this an annualized effort? Is there data that suggests that annualized makes any sense outside of risk factors and being prescribed? What's your take on that?

So that's a good question, Mayor. So we have some this whole the whole discussion also came about because we had some surplus in the health fund and we allocated some of those dollars, seven hundred fifty thousand dollars towards this program. So the this program, as we were proposing, is initially a one time program. Now, that being said, if it's successful, maybe it's something we offer every. three, five years with consultation with some of the medical professionals and see where that goes. But for right now, I would call this a pilot and testing it and see how we do, see what participation rates, because a big part of this and which also we're gonna continue having discussions with the group that if this moves forward, we need that same group to help educate and get people to participate because it's a voluntary program. We wanna get as many of our employee base based to participate, and we want to make sure they're fully educated. And ultimately, whatever menu that you choose, it's a personal decision that's between them and their doctor to make the appropriate decision for their own medical.

No, I get the issue of false negatives. The bigger issue is false positives, right? All of a sudden, it sets off a cascade of interventions. some of which may be quite invasive and others not so much. That's really up to the discussion with their own physicians on that, and you take that risk with some of this technology.

The idea is that overall that a false positive is worth it to make sure you're catching as much as possible. I get that.

With respect to the timetable, we have a window that opens, but we have an evolving turnover of employees. There's going to be just a cutoff at some point, right? I mean, whatever the window is, it might be May 1st or whatever it is, and somebody could get hired on May 2nd. Have you thought through that kind of issue as well?

We did not have that conversation, but we would have the – it would be open to all full-time and regular part-time employees as long as the funds were still available during this time.

So if someone was hired mid-year – Are you saying it's first come, first serve?

In essence, yes.

Okay.