City Council - Regular Meeting

Six, if you would, please call the roll.

Mayor Ryan.

Present.

Deputy Mayor Guzman.

Here.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark. Here. Commissioner Scudo.

Present.

Commissioner Kirch, not present. City Manager Mark Lubelski. Present. City Attorney Thomas Moss. Present. Administrative Services Manager Lourdes Lawrence. Present. Deputy City Clerk Lena Zapata. Present.

All right, 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 code 368-262. 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 has 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. We've maintained that list, and I'll call upon 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 on an item. 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 are 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 to mute your phones until you wish to speak. Also, please do not place this call on hold as it could cause an unintended interruption to the meeting due to background music. If you're experiencing technical difficulties, you may call 954-578-4792 at any time, and our staff is available to assist you. As we do before each meeting and before the Pledge of Allegiance, take an opportunity for a moment of silence. It's an opportunity for us to reflect individually and collectively, perhaps on the issues that we're facing or people in our lives are facing. It's an opportunity for us to reflect on the grace that we have to be here tonight, in some part to address issues that are so important to our world and our community. We certainly are blessed to be able to do that. It's also an opportunity for us, particularly this time, the history of what we face is to recognize that as we sit here tonight, as we stand up for issues that are important, there are so many that are serving our nation all across the world. So many of them are in harm's way and many more in ready support. As we've seen over the past weeks and months, that line of demarcation between being ready and being in harm's way has evaporated. So we're grateful for those who are serving, try to protect our country and around the world. And we also recognize the strain that it puts on families, families of those who are serving. Because if you've ever had anybody serving your family, you worry about these things, particularly where you know where they are in the world, and sometimes you don't even know where they are. And so we remember those folks and we take into account how blessed we are and we hope that they all come home safe. Anyone we need to remember since the last time we were together?

Last week, my church suffered a loss. My church has been in the city of Sunrise for like 20-something years.

Make sure your mic's on. It is. Okay.

Yeah, so my church suffered a great loss. Our international bishop was killed in a car accident along with his wife.

It was caused by a drunk driver.

So it just has four parties for the organization.

All right.

We'll be sure to gather tonight in our collective moment of silence to Make sure our thoughts and prayers are with your family. Deputy Mayor.

I also wanted to share. I'm sorry for your loss, Commissioner Clark. My grandmother, excuse me, had a stroke last week. If you guys know, a couple years ago, she actually was in a head-on collision on University, and she survived that. She survived this stroke as well. With therapy, I want to thank our fire department for acting fast, but in her 90s, she's still kicking, and I'm thankful that she made it through.

Our thoughts and prayers are for her recovery. She's been through so much. And she's an example of strength against some long odds. All right, so if you would please stand for a moment of silence before the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance. All right, before we get to our presentations, we have the consent agenda 4A through 4K. Can I have a motion? Move it. Motion by Commissioner Skouda, seconded by Deputy Mayor. Any polls from 4A, 4K from my colleagues? Yes. Any polls from staff?

No polls from staff, Mayor.

Anybody in the public wish to have any items removed from the consent agenda and handled as a full public hearing? If so, please raise your hand or press five star on the phone. All right. Can you confirm no hands raised?

I confirm no hands are raised.

All right. Go ahead and call the question for A through E and G through K. Commissioner Kirch, absent.

Commissioner Scudo?

Yes.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark?

Yes.

Deputy Mayor Guzman? Yes. Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Those items pass four to zero. All right. The quasi-judicial consent agenda can have a motion on 5A. Motion by Commissioner Skudo, seconded by the Deputy Mayor. Is the applicant here for luck solve? All right. Well, let's hold this one until we make sure the applicant weighs a full quasi-judicial hearing on this. Mr. Moss, do you advise that?

I do, Mayor. That's a good idea.

All right. We'll come back to this one. All right. We have a special proclamation tonight. Deputy Mayor, if you would.

Yes. Proclamation proclaiming March 24th, 2026 is anti-hate day in the city of Sunrise. Mayor Michael J. Ryan, Deputy Mayor Jacqueline Guzman, Assistant Deputy Mayor Latoya Clark, Commissioner Neal Kirch, and Commissioner Joseph Scudo.

So what I'd like to do is invite up the folks from the interfaith community that have come to join us tonight to take a stand against hate. And we have a number of representatives from throughout our community. I'd ask you all to come up and then we'll introduce and we'll talk about while we're here. So if you're here in support of anti-hate and you're with the interfaith community or you're just here in support of it, please come forward. So as we experience the world events that are happening, it is incumbent on us as a local community to never be defined by what may be happening 100 miles away or 1,000 miles away, even 5,000 miles away. And we're blessed to be in a community where We value the ability to practice faith or not to practice faith to be able to do so in peace and without judgment and to do so without discrimination or threats of violence or rhetoric that hurts And tonight we're standing against hate. And this is inspired by a lot of work that's been going on in the interfaith community. And I want to take just a moment so that you can get a sense of the folks that are able to be here and the fact that there are so many others that were not able to be here tonight but stand alongside everybody. So I'll just ask a very brief introduction, just who you are as we go around, so that the community can really understand the scope of this. I'll start with you, Jennifer.

My name is Jennifer Ensline and I'm here with a representation of the End Jew Hatred Movement.

Thank you.

Everton Jackson, I'm here as pastor for First Baptist Church of Sunrise, as well as in my capacity as Director of Integral Mission for the Baptist World Alliance.

Good afternoon, my name is Luis Treveen from Vertical Church. Located in Sunrise, and I'm the head of finance, HR, and operations for the church.

Frank Dawoskin, one of the rabbis at Temple Beth Emmett, as well as a representative of the Broward Board of Rabbis.

Evan Goldman here with my colleague, Scott Rothenberg. We represent the Jewish Federation of Broward County, and honored to be here at such an important time. Thank you.

My name is Veronica Walker. I am the Hate Crimes Prosecutor for Broward County. I work at the Broward State Attorney's Office. I'm bringing greetings from your State Attorney, Harold Pryor. I'm happy to be here.

Fallon Johnson, I am here on behalf of the Urban League of Broward County and the Broward County Hate Crimes Task Force.

Good evening. My name is Muqtadir Naeem. I'm a board member of Islamic Foundation of South Florida. I'm also a member of Barber County Hate Crime Task Force. Thank you so much.

Why don't you come up for a second?

What you see is a cross-section here of our community that are standing literally and figuratively shoulder to shoulder. We are seeing just an incredible rise in anti-Semitism, anti-Muslim behavior. hate in general based on ethnicity and backgrounds that we as a community just reject. And I want you to share what the State Attorney's Office has been doing to take a stand in defense of the ability that folks have and should have and the right to be able to practice in peace and to do so without discrimination and hate.

Yes, thank you for that question. So the state attorney's office has been very aggressive with our approach when it comes to hate crimes. It's something that we completely reject. Since Harold Pryor has taken office as the state attorney for Broward County, we have established the first hate crimes unit. We also established the first Broward County Hate Crimes Task Force. We also create a hate crimes hotline. So if you are a victim of a hate crime or you suspect when it's happening or you see something, you could call our office at 954-831-8052. That's the hate crimes hotline where we would listen to what happened, direct you to the right police agency, and start the investigations. This is something that is near and dear to us. We see the rise in the trending up of hate crimes when it come to anti-Semitism, racism, Islamophobia, even homophobia. It has been something that has been consistent for the past two to three years. And it's something that we are aggressively and visionally fighting against. You can also go to BrowerSAO.com, and you can report anonymously, and that email will come to me, and I will investigate that. I'm also the prosecutor of the case, so I will be your prosecutor if you are a victim of a crime.

Come on.

Let's give her a round of applause. Don't go anywhere. And I want to thank Mr. Pryor, but I want to thank you personally. because at every interfaith opportunity, you're there to spread this message. And it is a message of hope, but it's also a message of protection. And it's clear to me you take this seriously. The community understands that. I'm so excited. In your busy schedule, you took the time to come here and stand together with everyone. But I know you do this all the time, so it's personal. One more time, please give her a big round of applause for that. Thank you. We also have our chief here. If you would, chief, if you could just stand. You can stay right here. Stay right here. Because I think it's really important to show this, that it's not just downtown or at the state attorney's office. It's our police department that works hand in hand in battling hate and being there to take those reports. So, chief, I'll just turn it briefly.

Well, we are very fortunate here in the City of Sunrise to have a relationship with all of our organizations and the State Attorney's Office. It's nice to see everybody here at one time. I know we have occasion to meet from time to time. I'm lucky to be your chief here in the City of Sunrise and to have this relationship and also with the State Attorney's Office. We thank you for everything you do. Thank you.

And I want to take a moment to some may realize this, some may not. While I said at the outset that we can't be defined by events that happen around our country, our state, our world. I want to thank the police department because whenever we see these acts of violence, of hate that are either anti-Semitic, anti-Muslim or attacking anyone, The department reaches out to our community, to our places of worship to say, we hear what happened. If you have any issues, we'll be there. And we've seen it time and again in the response. That type of proactive engagement, the development of relationship means so much to the faith community that even though you don't have to do it, chief, and you're here. Your command staff knows this and right down to the road knows that when something happens wherever it is in the country There's going to be a response to just reach out and say we know this probably hurts Let us know if there's something so please give the chief a big round of applause on that. Thank you So before I do the proclamation, I'm going to hand it over, and I'd like you to just go around just very briefly, and we'll finish with you, and then you'll hand it back. But to go around and explain the role that you are playing in combating hate and transcending differences of faith, of ethnicity, of background, and how you build those bridges within the community. So I'll start at this end, and we'll work our way around.

I'd like to speak about hate crime in our community and Our community is stressed. They would like to hear their voice. They would like to come out with this kind of event. Please invite them. Come with us. Come to our community and meet them. I'm not a great speaker, but I'm trying to make my point clear. We always welcome you guys to come. trying to meet us, especially in South Florida, especially my community, Islamic Foundation, South Florida. They are very open. Please try to come. And we have a lot of other issues. When you come over, we can address all of those. Thank you so much.

Sure. So the Broad County Hate Crimes Task Force, we have quarterly meetings and we talk about policy changes and things like that that's happening in the community. A lot of times we don't know what's happening until we have those meetings. So we take that back to our communities and our organizations. I also recently started a youth hate crimes leadership program at the Urban League of Broad County. And it's basically teaching the youth about how bullying can easily turn into a hate crime. and just opening them up to other perspectives in the world.

Thank you, Mayor. Evan Goldman with the Jewish Federation of Broward County, where we understand that anti-Semitism, anti-Black racism, and Islamophobia are not one, not two, but three sides of the same coin. Is there a three-sided coin? I'm not sure. But all kidding aside, and this is a serious and sober topic, an attack on all marginalized communities should be interpreted as an attack on all of us. And that's something that the Broward County Hate Crime Task Force stands for. And that's why I'm so proud to be a founding member with my colleagues on both sides. I can tell you that Ms. Walker, Ms. Johnson, Mr. Naim have all been honored for their advocacy by the Jewish Federation of Broward County with a stand with Shine a Light, Shine a Light Award. And that's what makes Broward County special. What makes our municipalities like Sunrise special is that we can stand here today as sisters and brothers. And to borrow a metaphor from you, Mayor Ryan, while they're playing checkers, we are playing chess.

I'll be brief. But what I wanted to say is that it starts with us changing the conversation. When we're at our dinner tables with our family and someone says something that is hateful, I think we all are responsible to correct them. Because if we don't, then the hate spreads. So I think it's very important when we're fighting hate and we're trying to transcend the issues, that we first start at home, we start at our friend's table, whether it's their brunch in our organizations, because a lot of it comes from ignorance and people not understanding other cultures. So education and calling it out when you first hear it. Amen.

Again, Rabbi Frank Dawoskin, it's all about the individual. It's all about how we remain open to hope and optimism and the actions that we take. It's the conversations that we have with each individual. And it's that positivity and the fact that we can learn something from everyone. And it's those interactions that we have with people that makes a difference. And in Judaism, there's a concept of... I can't even think of the English word, sinat chinam, baseless hatred. And we talk about the importance of baseless love. And there's enough love in the world to go around. And how can we overcome that hatred? And it's unfortunate that this hatred exists through ignorance, through lack of interaction with people. And how can we overcome that to realize that we don't need to put people down to lift ourselves up, that we actually lift ourselves up higher when we lift up other people around us?

Thank you. Again, my name is Luis Trivin from Vertical Church. We are a Christian church. Everything that we do, we do it in English and Spanish. And so I prepared a couple of paragraphs, but I just want to say that at Vertical Church, We believe that we were created not to hate but to love each other. That is the plan of God. And so I encourage everybody today to choose to listen, choose to respect, choose to be part of a world where differences don't divide us but enrich us. Thank you. God bless.

As I said earlier, Everton Jackson. I'm from the Baptist community, communion. And we place a lot of emphasis on awareness building, ensuring that those within our church community understand that we all share a common humanity. So we begin there, that we share a common humanity. And also, we also recognize that because we share a common humanity, that there's no place for hatred, In fact, from a theological standpoint, we believe that hatred is theologically indefensible, and so that is not a part of our teaching at all. So as we come together to advocate for peace, for love, for equality, for equity, let us do so recognizing that we share a common humanity.

I have some prepared words, if it's okay with everyone. My name is Jennifer Ensline, and I'm here together today with a group representing the End Jew Hatred organization. We're here to express our gratitude to Mayor Mike Ryan and the City of Sunrise and all the commissioners for issuing a proclamation recognizing End Jew Hatred Day on April 29th. This is more than just a proclamation. It is a powerful statement that hatred has no place in our communities. By taking this stand, the City of Sunrise shows leadership and follows the example of so many cities across America. Now more than ever in these challenging times, we must come together in the spirit of bipartisanship to confront and eradicate Jew hatred. This is not a political issue. It is a moral obligation. Recognizing and fighting Jew hatred is essential in preserving the values of justice, equality, and freedom that define our great nation. Today, the city of Sunrise sends a clear message. Jewish civil rights matter, and our communities must be safe for all. Next month, on April 13th, Jews around the world will celebrate Yom HaShoah. It is the Jewish Memorial Day for the Holocaust. It is a time to reflect and to try to understand and honor the promise of never forget. We honor their memory by reaffirming our commitment to never again.

Sadly, 80 plus years later,

We're still living those times again and experiencing anti-Semitic atrocities. Also celebrated next month, April 21st, is Yom Ha'atzmaut, Israel's Independence Day, 78 years since the establishment of the modern state of Israel. May, the month of May, by presidential proclamation, is Jewish American Heritage Month, in recognition of the indelible contributions American Jews have made and continue to make to our nation's history, culture, and society. Since October 7, 2023, and now with the current Iran war, Israel faces continued multi-threats from Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Judea, Samaria, and Iran. As ADL CEO Jonathan Grimland shared in his state of hate address, and I quote, we are facing the most concentrated, most dangerous search of antisemitism in living memory. And it is not just coming from the right or from the left, from Islamist extremists or Christian nationalists or white supremacists or radical anti-Sionists. It's everything, everywhere, all at once. Mayor Ryan, commissioners, thank you for standing on the right side of history. Let's continue this fight together and Jew hatred. Thank you.

And in the gathering today and the words that have been spoken and preached, if you will, this has become a holy center all of a sudden, right? The transcendent values of recognizing that no matter what book one reads on the day of celebration, they all have a common thread of love, of peace, of justice. And what we have seen traditionally is that When one community is under assault, as it was said, all communities are under assault. Because there's a fine line, as Evan said, these are three sides of a coin. These are the same values of hatred that will come for the next. And the power is not just to proclaim end against one, it's to say end against all, because that is really our only hope. For as we remain divided in our proclamation of unity, we undermine the real power of what our community is. And so on behalf of my colleagues who I'll invite down to join me for this, it is our honor to declare today standing against hate and promoting unity, anti-hate day in the city of Sunrise. And if I could ask everyone to come closer, because I think that's the most important thing. We're spread out in the well of this, but if we could all stand together. Even if you don't like to speak, you have to come to the center.

Oh, yeah, yeah. Sir, I'm going to just make sure everybody's ready.

All right. Whereas the City of Sunrise prides itself on being a vibrant and diverse community where residents of all backgrounds, faiths, and ethnicities should feel safe and respected and valued. whereas we recognize that a strength of our community lies in our diversity, and that the contributions of our Jewish and Muslim and Christian and Hindu and Sikh neighbors, as well as our neighbors from throughout the world, including the Caribbean, Asian and Southeast Asian American communities, are essential to a tight-knit fabric that we see in our neighborhoods and our businesses and our overall economy. Whereas these communities have a long and storied history of participating in the struggle against discrimination and bigotry in all forms, often leading the charge for justice when others remain silent. And whereas we honor the courage of those from these diverse faiths and backgrounds who have consistently fought for the civil rights of all Americans, recognizing that an injustice against one group is a threat to liberty for all. And whereas we acknowledge with grave concern the troubling surge in anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim hateful rhetoric and acts of violence too often with deadly consequences that are directed at these communities. And whereas the state of Florida has recognized the severity of this issue through the 2026 legislative creation of the Anti-Semitism Task Force to monitor and report and combat rising threats. And we as a commission stand in full alignment with these efforts to protect all our residents. Whereas hate has no home in the City of Sunrise, and any act of prejudice, discrimination, or violence against any individual based on their religion, race, or national origin expressed in word or in deed is an affront to the values of justice and equality that we uphold in the City of Sunrise. And whereas the act of hate or violence directed at one group based upon their faith or ethnicity is actually an act of hate or violence against all. And when those who've been targeted and those who are targets of discrimination or violence stand together with others who are also the targets of discrimination and violence, we strengthen not only our community, but the magnitude of our call for unity to end hatred in all forms. Now, therefore, be it resolved that I, Michael J. Ryan, Mayor of the City of Sunrise, along with all of the city commissioners, do hereby proclaim March 24th, 2026 as Anti-Hate Day in the City of Sunrise. And we proclaim our unwavering commitment to condemn in the strongest possible terms all acts of violence and discrimination and reject the rising tide of anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim rhetoric and acts of violence. We support our residents of all faiths and backgrounds and their right to live and worship in peace and without fear of harassment or intimidation or violence. And we call upon all our residents and our entire community to remain vigilant to report any hate crimes, any bias-motivated incidents, or threats of violence, and please report those to the Sunrise Police Department or the State Attorney's Office immediately, ensuring that justice is upheld and our community remains secure and peaceful. I'm so proud of you all for standing here tonight. Thank you. We'll squeeze in. We're going to have to squeeze in for everybody. Actually, if I could do one thing before we do that.

Ask these out if you can. We have proclamation. Maybe you can open it up so that when we show the picture, everybody will realize that we're all standing against it.

Thank you. And before you leave, before everybody leaves, please take a moment. Take a moment to connect with everybody who's up here. Shake their hand. Thank them for being here. And thank you for standing against hate. All right, 5A. We already had a motion on that. Is the applicant here for Lux Golf? If you would, please come on down. Thank you so much. Hi, thanks for being here. If you could just lift the mic up a little bit, give us your name and who you represent.

Christine Yee and Lux Golf.

One more time, your name?

Christine Yee.

All right, thank you for being here. Do you waive a full quasi-judicial hearing on this matter?

Uh...

I think that's a smart move. There you go. All right. Does anybody wish to have this item pulled for the purposes of a full quasi-judicial hearing? Staff? No effect to parties, Mayor. Thank you. From my colleagues? All right. Go ahead and call the question on 5A.

Deputy Mayor Guzman. Yes. Commissioner Kirch, not present. Commissioner Scudo.

Yes.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark. Yes. Mayor Ryan.

Yes. So you're all set. Awesome. Thank you for being here. We wish you good luck.

We heard a lot of good things from your friends in that area.

We will. I need help on my swing. That's for darn sure. Um, okay. I, we have some folks here on 17 C if we could just move that up. It's not an item to vote on tonight. It's an item for commission discussion. Could have a motion to move that up and move it up motion by commissioner Scooter, seconded by assistant deputy mayor. All in favor say aye. All right. Commission discussion and or action regarding residential composting. Mayor Michael J. Ryan, um, through the process of the communities working together, both at the Broward league and the SWA, We've identified a whole host of communities that have already begun community composting programs, and we have some representatives here today to talk a little bit about what's happening. I'd start with Dustin from Filthy Organics. If you could just give us a brief outline of the programs that are in the communities and your role in that. Sure.

I'll try and make it brief. Good afternoon. Dustin Du Bois with Filthy Organics. We've been at this now for about six years, various programs with different municipalities. The first that we started off with was Coral Springs. We started off with a five-gallon bucket in their office. They eventually moved to a drop-off location that they have at their recycling center that's open to residents. On the weekends only, they actually bring their containers to our site, and we compost it for them. City of Deerfield Beach, they host a drop-off center, a drop-off location at the recycling center. That's open seven days a week. It's manned. It's a very simple thing. That's open to all residents, and we service that as well. Now, City of Deerfield, we also were awarded a grant with them a couple years back from USDA. We did a full residential program where there's 100 residential subscribers. They all get five-gallon buckets. They fill it with compost, and once a week we service that. In addition to that servicing those residential subscribers get a five gallon bucket of finished compost back twice a year in that program. That's your field station plantation plantation just kicked off so they're hosting a drop off location at Jim Ward one of their Community centers. that's open full time to residents and that one's in a simple it's a it's an access control box that our trash can goes into basically so they're. utilizing there's a keypad on it you can also do it with an app but they've opened it up to only 50 residents they've provided those 50 residents with countertop composting containers so that they can collect it and bring it to that center on their own right now i think that's limited to 50 residents but they've got a substantial waiting list so they're looking to expand that as well where else lighthouse point is starting a very similar program to city plantation that's it's imminent happening there Oh, Lord, where else? Southwest Ranches has done its own program as well, is that right? Yeah, Southwest Ranches is a little unique. They have a drop-off location at their farmer's market that's available to them, but they fully subsidized a residential program for 100 residents. Instead of weekly collection, it's every other week that we collect. I was kind of on the fence with how that was going to work, but frankly, it's actually been really successful, and it's going really well there as well.

And Coconut Creek?

coconut Creek so we started out with them just on a drop-off location they've expanded it outside they're actually with another composter right now on that but so we did their residential drop-off but also special events

So the way the programs, and what we're not talking about really for most of them, is a full community hauling collection off the curb. The communities that have begun this really, for the most part, almost without exception, very few unless there was a grant, focus on some form of drop off by the residents who sign up, a workshop that's provided to them, and then reinforced education. The issue of whether you staff the location or not Both whether it's staffed or whether you're using technology is to prevent contamination more than anything else for the for the greater good. Denise Horland from the council in plantation president of the league was trying to be here tonight to talk about plantation. She was unable to make it, but she's reported to me that. That's been wildly successful so far. As you said, they've already got a lengthy wait list. She participates in it, and it's a very simple process. They may change the location provided in the backup, and we're not going to make decisions tonight, but I wanted the commission to get a sense that there's technology that can be utilized that's relatively cheap to protect from contamination, allow drop-off at any time, so that you're not necessarily having to staff or have a particular date for folks to do it. Again, you're trying to make it as easy as possible for folks to encourage them. And then in terms of what happens, let's just use plantation for an example, the box they have, which is accessed by the residents who've signed up for it and committed to this and are using the process, what do you do with that?

It's real simple. We have a 64-gallon trash can that we put in there. We've got a little mulch in the bottom to help absorb moisture, and it's it's in there the residents can drop their food off and then on their collection day i think it's mondays for them we swap that that trash can out so we we don't empty it and put it back in there we take it with us we empty it we clean it and then you know we provide a full clean one back as well and what are the residents utilizing at home are they using a bucket or a bag so uh plantation they gave them all a little tabletop they're like you know one two gallon buckets that they gave them they're branded for you know the city which is nice but you can do it in anything you want. You can do it in a bucket. A lot of folks put some of their food waste in the freezer to make sure it doesn't smell while they're doing it, but as far as we're concerned, we don't have any issues with it.

So the box itself, are there issues of smell with respect to, for instance, like the plantation? No.

At a weekly collection, we've not had any issues with smell. Putting the mulch in the bottom is helpful because, again, it's the wetness ultimately that creates smells when you have that stuff, but We've not had any issues with once a week service.

All right, so then once it's collected, you take it to your facility for composting? Correct. And then the output of that, I know you were telling me earlier that there's at least one city where you've said, look, we have 15 yards of this you could use for topsoil if you wanted.

Yeah, so we do givebacks, right? So for everybody that participates on commercial, residential, it doesn't matter, right? There's some form of giveback of finished compost. Whether they want it sometimes, you know, people don't want it and they want me to donate it somewhere else, right? Um, so city of Deerfield, we've done a lot of donations to Deerfield public schools, um, as well. So, um, yeah, so with coconut, excuse me. Yeah. Coral Springs. We'll do a couple yards twice a year. We're, we're getting ready next week to give them a, I think four or five yards. And so they'll host it at their center and people can bring whatever they want to collect it and they can get their compost for free.

Basically you put it in an area and then people just collect it. Okay. But I've also seen you at events, give it out to folks. And I know people grab that pretty quick and these are not people contributing. They just see that you're there. Talk to me about the high schools. We know at South Plantation, because they were out last week, she was unable to be here, but Sophia Bush, who is Cynthia Bush's daughter, is heading up the South Plantation program where they've committed to this composting program, and they're working with you on this? Correct, yeah. All right. How does that work at the high school level?

So, I mean, very similar. So they have... We start off with our culinary program only, and that was funded through actually a Broward County grant. So that's just two 64-gallon cans that we service once a week there. They're expanding into it. Now they're going to start collecting at the cafeteria, the back of the house. And so, I mean, it's the same thing. It's once-a-week service. They put it out, you know, they keep it outside, and we'll swap it out once a week.

We got a report from the Panthers last week on their composting program that they've been doing, again, back of the house, not part of the, the fan base and they reported to me about 6,700 pounds that they feel they've come. Is that about accurate? That's about right. How does that program work?

It's, it's all the same. So they keep their cans in one location downstairs. Um, and they actually, they've got staff that brings it in small, like slim gyms and they'll dump it into there. Um, but you know, I mean, it's, it's pretty, pretty consistent process. Once it gets going, it always takes, you know, a month, maybe two, sometimes, especially with a commercial and the large generators, we call them a lot of handholding that has to be done. Right. We do initial training. but then there's constant feedback and working with them to make sure they're getting it right. There's a lot of people working there, and you've got to get people on board with it. But once they got it, they got it.

Yeah, it's kind of historic at this point. We haven't seen this level of momentum in composting in Broward, frankly, in South Florida. And we know that the landfill is going to stop accepting organics. They're going to have to separately compost that in 2027 or 2028. With respect to the programs, as I understand it, some of the programs began as voluntary residential, and then they started charging some of the residents. And some of the reporting I heard is that it kind of fell off a little bit when folks were having to pay anything. But in terms of the programs like plantation or others that have not been charging, just you have the access to it,

They've had good input from the residents on that yeah, I mean when you're setting it over there You got people that they want to do it right so they're gonna take the time to do it right to drive over there It's it's a challenge I mean because it's expensive at the volume that we've got right now on the residential side to bring those costs down

Right. I mean, the idea of driving around neighborhoods, it can be done, right? We see communities around the country, but it's a big step, right? One of the things we saw, for instance, in New York City, when they started their composting and it was voluntary and they were driving trucks around, they eventually figured out by GISing it that there was probably – carbon footprint was probably worse. in the sense that there weren't enough participants and they were driving the five boroughs to collect, and then they kind of changed the program so it has to be tweaked. In this particular sense, this is at least the most basic model that's spreading around the county right now, is residents or businesses for that matter dropping off at these locations, not driving trucks around, not hauling, you're just picking up from wherever the city designates for that. Is that fair to say? Yep. Okay. There's going to be some questions, and I know some folks also want to talk from the virus group. Please don't go anywhere. All right, Commissioner Scooter.

How you doing? Good, and you? So we got a lot of mutual friends. Really? So John Pierre and a lot of people in the business know of you and know exactly what it is that you're doing, which is a really good thing. The mayor brought it up. New York started red light cameras probably 25 years ago. New York started speed cameras about 20 years ago. Florida then started, New York has been doing composting, but like the mayor said, my brother-in-law is in New York sanitation. And that was one of the things, he just left. And I was telling him, the mayor put on the agenda about composting. And he's like, another one of these guys. No, I mean, New York started it. It's a huge amount. And in New York, it's a lot different because in the commercial side and where all the multifamily apartment buildings are, people are just throwing massive amounts of garbage bags, literally piled 30, 40 feet long and 10 feet high. It's just that's the nature of the business. There's not enough cans, so they just throw bags. to be very confusing and very messy for New York. So that's why they started to try to figure out about these drop-offs. I spoke to Republic regarding if anybody out there in the county is doing anything with trucks. So it's not to that point. Other states are doing it in the Midwest and out that way. Boise, that area, there's a couple of places that are doing it out there. So look, obviously we want to do something. So we do the household hazardous waste. The residents don't know what to do with their paint. They don't know what to do with their insecticides. They don't know what to do if the husband changed the oil and got it in buckets. So we do this quarterly. We partner with plantations sometimes. So if we could add this to the household hazardous waste, I'm just saying, right off the bat, we could already start this. I said to Republic, to Jean-Pierre and to Austin, is there a third party? Are you the third party? Are you going to be doing the switch? I'm just saying. someone like you is going to switch out containers if we partner with somebody. Or are we just going to go to a program where we're going to just do a basic drop-off? The city manager is going to get what public works and say, hey, we're going to drop it off over here at our water treatment plant, not at the water treatment plant, to the one that's on hiatus and commercial. Right now we're using it to dump our own little... Yard debris and rock and whatever vegetation that we pick up, are we going to designate a spot like that for residents and do it once a week, twice a month? So, yeah, I mean... Obviously, we want to get involved in doing something, whether we do it with Republic, whether we do it with like a third party like yourself or start doing it. But I mean, we've got to put this on an agenda where we do a full discussion about. Is it a five-gallon bucket? Is it a 96-gallon cart? Then people are starting to worry that a 96-gallon cart at their house, are we going to start getting animals and raccoons and whatnot? I'm just saying. So let's have this discussion where all these questions and answers are going to get absorbed. You've been doing this. You already have the answers. But we're going to be getting hit with these questions that maybe we don't know all the answers right now.

Well, we don't have all the answers. We've been figuring this out. But you know what I'm saying. It's been a fun process.

Right. You're doing a good job. Thank you. We know where you are. We know what you do. It's just a matter of now getting it to the masses and little by little. Is everybody going to jump on it? No. Does anybody want to mostly don't want to be bothered with it? But here, Publix jumped on it. Because Publix, Aldi, all these people are huge, huge end users of rotten fruit, rotten vegetables, rotten meat, rotten chicken, rotten fish. So they've been doing this for years. Put it in their, not their trucks, but a third party that takes it up to all these farms and, you know, people that could use it for their composting to get a better product. The arena, you know, the same thing. They figured I got a huge bill to pay for unloading garbage. You know what I'm saying? They're paying by the yard. They're paying by the ton. They're paying for their compaction, for their cardboard. So they're getting very smart about this because they're like telling the people, before you even bring it to my building, okay? If your stuff is not tin or it's not a metal, if it's not whatever, don't even bother. We don't even want to talk to you. We're not going to accept it. So if you're going to sell us beer, you're going to sell it to us in a can so that we're going to have, you know, they're not taking the bottles like any stadium around the country because there's no way to go with it. And like the mayor said, once you put a green glass, a brown glass, and a clear glass, and the same thing, it's contaminated, nobody wants it, then it's going to a landfill. So unless you get the people to put brown glass, green glass, clear glass, even for businesses, even for like myself. So I would say, let's really hit the business people You know what I'm saying? Let's not leave them out. Right. Because, you know, you have big generators in the city that have restaurants. And if you give them an opportunity to save money, especially in this time, you know what I mean? Right. We have a behind my shop and center. I have, you know, for garbage and I have for recycling. But it's not the same as if I could separate my food waste. and my vegetable waste from whatever else, then this could be something where the owner of the shopping center could then, out of my common area maintenance, I'm saying, would drop my price. But it has to be beneficial for him to go from an eight yarder that he's paying for, but then we pay back to drop down to a four yarder. That's a huge savings for us. So I'd rather go to a four-yard garbage and an eight-yard recycling than the reverse. So whatever it is that you could probably help us with commercial, I think could be huge. We have a lot of restaurants in the city that would love to figure out how to save that way. Because in the end, at the common area maintenance drops, Because our garbage bill went from $1,000 a month to $500 a month. You would hope that the shopping center would give you that benefit. But if you could get these programs in front of the shopping centers, it gives the tenants a better shot. you know, to get a reduction somewhere. So I support it, but I definitely want to see, you know, a business component to this and whatever, how you want to start it off with residential, whether we started as a, whatever pilot program, I have no problem. I'm growing like four or 500 palm trees at my house. So when I do my clippings, I could load up that garbage pail really fast. I'm just saying. For yard waste, you know what I'm saying? So, I mean, when you start throwing other stuff inside of that, it just makes a better product for that end user.

It's a really good point. You know, what we saw is on commercial TV, right, there were all these advertisements for tabletop composters, right? Not collection. Collection. composters right it was trying to feed that concept that people want to do it and they want to then use it in their garden but most folks don't have a garden let's just be honest right i mean even had some questions this saturday when i was speaking at a group was uh retirement area in their condo and they're like we don't need to plant we just want to get rid of the organics right so the brilliance of this pilot program is beginning to get people to get in the habit of separating that whether it's at home or otherwise that's the brilliance and as Chris Scoot is absolutely spot on. When you look at the Panthers or you look at a city furniture, their ability, because they're a closed environment, to control everything that comes in, and at least at the back of the house, control how everything's managed. They've reported they've reduced their hauling costs. They've been able to build into the circular economy so that the tin that you're talking about and the aluminum that's being reproduced into cups to come back. And from this composting, they're eliminating the organics from their hauling with an idea towards doing what a lot of arenas are doing, which is to have their own gardens as well eventually. And they've already pulled in 6,700 pounds of composting, and their recycling has been just wildly successful. The important part here is, right, it's not just they're trying to do the right thing. The bean counters have figured out, as Commissioner Skouda is pointing out, it's money. And the reality is by eliminating contamination as well and creating the behavior, We can lay the groundwork for a bigger program later. And it's just amazing to see what's going on around the county in each of these cities and see what plantation. And if Commissioner Horland or Councilwoman Horland could have been here tonight, she's so passionate about how many times she goes to the drop-off. The big thing is just trying to find the right location. And at least with the bins that they use, which is app and you don't have to staff it, they're just a couple of anchor bolts that can be easily moved. If you find one park's been better than another park or you want to change it around. And then on the commercial side, obviously there's big producers, and there's great pilot projects, and it would be fantastic. Commissioner Scudo is volunteering to be the first commercial in Sunrise. And I think that the point of that is it can be done. The myths of it stinks and it's going to attract, you know, you guys are changing it out, you're moving it, and there's strategies to that.

Just separating your food waste doesn't make more of it. You've already got it going in a trash can. I was just in a different one. That's it.

I'd say Plantation has been using their clippings from their trees and grinding them and using them in mulch for all of their landscaping for their existence. They're probably one of the only cities that uses every single thing that they trim and put right back into their property. So they have no disposal when it comes to yard waste.

That's amazing.

The only bad thing that Plantation has is they're still in plastic bags.

Yeah, they're... on the recycling, the plastic, clear plastic.

And it's not good at root is when it comes to the bag, where they have to chop the bag first and then start separating.

They seem to... One thing they say is that the neighbors can finger wag at each other if they put a banana peel in the recycling because you can see it, I guess, is the idea. I don't know. All right. Well, I really appreciate it. I know some other folks here. I think we've probably, if you wanted to state who you're with and just real quick, I think we're not going to vote on anything tonight. We're going to bring this back for the commission to look at the pilot projects. I want to thank Carrie, and I know the Sustainability Board has been looking at this very aggressively and putting together some plans on that. I know we'll be really well prepared. to introduce yourself to the millions at home.

Hello, my name's Julie Long. I'm a resident of the city of Plantation 972 West Tropical Way. I'm also on their sustainability board and I do know a little bit about their composting program. I'm not going to speak much about composting in general because you all are well informed, but it is a resource. It's not a nuisance. Composting is a resource and by recycling it and returning it to the environment, we're improving soil health. Even for people that are not gardeners, we know that we're losing topsoil. In the plantation program, one of the things that they identified was initially putting this bin on public property made adoption easier and so putting it in a central location that there's a the the garden is in a residential neighborhood so they opened up the program to residents right in that neighborhood so they didn't have to they don't even have to drive to take their compost there so and there is big very big buy-in now there this has been so successful they're looking at what others are sites they can use. The other issue or the other thing that's been very good in plantation is South Plantation High School environmental magnet program and they have a strong recycling program and one of their students sits on our board and got a grant from the county for her composting project so I would encourage you when you look at this to look at your schools as a resource the kids need to learn how to garden they will compost they will take it home I personally have been doing backyard composting for years. None of my neighbors complain. When I had a big household, I still had the least trash of anybody in the neighborhood. People say that composting smells. No, composting, food waste mixed with your trash that doesn't get collected as frequently smells but you compost in your backyard it doesn't smell so key points would be look at where you locate it educate your public you'll get even for people that are not gardeners there's excitement and even for people that are not gardeners they like landscaping and if you use compost rather than fertilizer you are decreasing harmful chemicals in the environment so there's lots and lots of benefits and there is you know, you are a leader also in having a good sustainability department, and I think they'll be a good resource for you.

Thank you. Thank you, Julie. On the schools issue, I want to let everyone know that Piper High School reached out. It just happened to be parallel with some of the discussions that were happening. Mr. Lewis reached out because they wanted to start a composting program. Their motivation is because they have so much practice field knowledge That is not well covered with ground cover. And they don't know what to do about it. And we know that traditionally Piper's had this problem with the fields. So he had been reaching out and they've already designated a staff member to start on this. And then what we did is we connected Piper with South Plantation. Sophia gave Piper today their PowerPoint about how to get it started and what to do. And Piper's really wanting to engage with our sustainability board to see whether or not rather than trying to stand up a site for them. They don't want to compost necessarily, but they want to collect because that's the first instance, right? That's the easiest thing to collect. So they're not managing the composting pile and contamination and other risks that may come with that. And so they're going to be coming forward probably at the start of the new year with a plan that probably looks a lot like south plantations working back of the house to the front of the house. And we're really fortunate South plantation being an environmental magnet has really worked out a lot of the kinks, including making sure you have a champion and continued education and focused on contamination and working with the right provider or processor and then evaluating continuously how that works.

Well, I've seen from other meetings how much this municipality supports their schools, but there's also some other organizations that are offering some grants to schools for things like this. So if you wanted to have somebody from Piper reach out to me, Sierra Club and the Farm Bureau have offered grants to help people get started. Perfect. Carrie's in the back shaking her head already. The kids understand that the planet they're inheriting needs help.

Well done. Thank you. Let's give her a round of applause. Thank you, Julie, for that. Yeah, sure. If you wish, come on up.

uh... my name is monica elliott i live at one seven three zero one southwest sixty-eighth court in southwest ranches so i'm embarrassed to say that uh... i should have voluntarily composted but didn't uh... one we're afraid of smell raccoons etcetera etcetera and then the town decided to use filthy organics uh... to do a trial and so i signed up and got this nice five gallon bucket that is I put at the end of my driveway every two weeks it just magically disappears and in comes the bucket with a new liner etc. My husband has got the pickiest nose and can smell everything. I keep it in our laundry room right off the kitchen. The door is always open. It doesn't smell. It doesn't attract rodents. It doesn't attract insects. The only time it smells is when you open it up to put more in it. And so you can learn quickly. You do it quickly. But otherwise it has worked very well and we got our first compost back about a month or so ago and it's beautiful. I was with the University of Florida. I'm kind of a soil microbiologist, plant pathologist by training and what I did research wise. It truly is remarkable compost because I've seen the worst where compost is supposed to look like soil and that's the way it comes. When compost comes and you can still see what everything is, that's not compost. And that's the problem we've run into in the past in Broward County and has caused problems. That is not what we are getting out of filthy organics. So if you have any questions, happy to answer. We've been using this now, I don't know, about six months or so. And I would say we haven't had any problems. I get a notice the night before, remember to put it out. And then I get a notice again that they've taken the bucket away or, you know, changed out, so.

Mayor Bright-Cruz in Southwest Ranches has been really a leader on this and pushing it, and it's been amazing to see him create that program that's gotten so much attention at Southwest Ranches, so thank you for that.

Thank you.

Assistant Deputy Mayor.

So I do backyard composting for years, so I'm not opposed to composting, and I have the tabletop that everybody talks about because I'm big on it. My husband is a vegetarian, so we have tons of waste all day long. However, I wanted to talk about the schools and gardening because they are really interested in gardening at the schools. There's a lot of funding out there for that. However, one of the things that we found was that they didn't have beds to put it in. So when we are putting our project together, if we can consider that area as well, that's all I have to say about that.

That's a really good point. One of the things that the schools, and even in talking to South Plantation and to Piper, is the interest in doing it, if they compost on site, it's a bigger risk management issue because it has to be done correctly, avoid contamination and all the other things. But part of the output discussion, once we get started, has to be what is the most beneficial use? Is it topsoil at at Piper's, at the elementary schools that want to do. And I think the great thing about what's happening is, at least from the reports I'm hearing, is that the folks that are participating are not always even interested in the output. They're just interested in getting it done because they're not really gardening. but they know that this is the right thing, and they just want to know where it's going. So part of the metrics on the outside of this, as we do with any program, has got to be to show what the beneficial use, what difference it's made for them. To your point, if some of the output is going to an elementary school and there's plants and there's things that have been harvested or whatever, make sure that we're promoting that at the farmer's market and at our events, that this is what's happening. It's not like a lot of people just think they put their garbage at the end of the street and it disappears and they don't have anything. This is an opportunity to show beneficial use, and get them best, and I think that's an excellent point in measuring the output. Sorry, go ahead.

No, that's fine. Introduce yourself to the millions at home, please. Stephanie Joffe. I actually have 5880 Southwest 37 Terrace in J.D. Beach, and I compost. Composting transforms your kitchen scraps and yard waste into rich, nutrient dense soil. Nearly a third of what we throw away could be composted instead of being sent to a landfill. I mean, that is a huge amount of our waste. It not only extends the life of our landfills, it cuts down on methane emissions, a potent greenhouse gas released when organic waste decomposes in our landfills. It's one of the simplest things we can do to mitigate climate change. And composting, I've said this before, it's the gateway drug to sustainability. It opens our eyes to the real impact of our individual choices. Every time I drop food scraps into the small sealed container on my kitchen counter, I feel great. It's such a good feeling knowing that there's just something I can do, a little old me can do to contribute to mitigating climate change. It's a really good feeling. And it sparked a deeper curiosity about solid waste and the fact that our trash doesn't simply vanish when we bring it to the curb. which is something I never thought about before I started composting. I also discovered firsthand how easy and how odor-free composting can be. In fact, the very little bit of trash I generate now barely smells at all because anything with odor goes straight into my covered compost container. Little container sits right on my countertops. Pretty. In addition, the composting itself, as people have said, is tremendously valuable. It reduces... stormwater runoff. It absorbs a lot of water. It improves soil quality and serves as a natural fertilizer and pesticide, reducing the chemicals we put into the earth and ultimately into our bodies. In Broward County, we are really lucky. The infrastructure to compost all our organic waste already exists. Several communities we've talked about, including Hollywood, Coral Springs, Deerfield, Southwest Ranches, Plantation, have already launched composting pilots. They differ. Hollywood has a program where they subsidize curbside pickup. They give people a few free months to get started, and then they subsidize half of it. Some of the cities have drop-offs. There's a variety of plans available. But in all these plans, there's a long waiting list of people who want to do it. So I think that says something. And Sunrise's own Florida Panthers have begun composting their food waste. Hard Rock does it. Over the past few years, my small synagogue alone has diverted more than seven tons of organic waste from landfills. I mean, we're just a tiny synagogue. It's, like, amazing to me. So imagine the impact when we scale that countywide. And the plan is eventually... I mean, me or Ryan could speak more about doing this. You know, we've decided... when we discuss having a master plan for the whole county to put off food composting for a while before we do yard trash because that seems easier and we don't want to try to teach people too much all at once. We already have to teach them how to recycle properly. If we can get pilot composting programs started in a number of the cities, then people will start thinking about it and talking about it, and it won't be such a big deal when we ultimately add food waste composting to yard waste composting. So I think that's a real big advantage. I mean, it's a third of our waste. We just really need to do it. And so I urge you to support a pilot composting program here in Sunrise.

Thank you. Thank you very much, Steph. what one last thing i know that uh... southwest ranchers reported recently public meeting they held an event for students and uh... some sort of graduation and there were a hundred participants at the end of the event They had served food and everything else. At the end of the event, there wasn't one garbage bag that was going to the landfill. Everything was going to recycling or composting. I mean, everything. And they had zero garbage. And when you put that in the context of deliberate behavior, it gives you hope. But I think the first step is really, we always want to crawl before we walk on some of these things. And I think that's where the benefit of the programs. And so we're not going to vote on tonight, but what I'd ask staff to do is assuming it's the will of the commission to provide the surveys that we know exist out there as to what the communities are doing, how they're managing it, what the differences are, and then maybe even develop some recommendations for the commission to consider in doing this. You've heard the comments of including, you know, commercial and otherwise and I think that's that's something that none of the cities are doing right now and I think that's a really interesting component is to to figure out you know how do we bring in some businesses to spotlight them as to what they can do particularly business like like Commissioner Skudo said that no they can source separate easily enough where they're controlling the garbage where it's going so if that's the will of the Commission to direct staff to to come back with some information is there a consensus and gardening, of course. Okay. Yes, Mayor, thank you. Anything further? No, Mayor, thank you. All right, I want to thank everybody that's been here on this and continue to keep us updated on what you hear about these programs. Thank you, Dustin, for being here. We look forward to eventually getting this. Okay. All right, so let's go back to the agenda. Item 7A, motion accepting the city's annual comprehensive financial report for the year ended September 30th, 2025. City Manager Mark Lebelski, Susan Nabors, Director of Finance and Administrative Services. Motion by Deputy Mayor, seconded by? Second. Commissioner Scudo, 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. Any hands raised?

I confirm no hands are raised.

All right, any discussion from my colleagues? Call the question.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Deputy Mayor Guzman?

Yes.

Commissioner Kirch? Yes. Here, Commissioner Skouda?

Yes.

Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Item passes 4-0. All right, open discussion. Anybody wishing to speak on any matters before the city, please come forward or press 5-star on your phone. All right, do we have a hand raised on line?

Yes. Okay. 8100, you're unmuted.

All right, 8100, please go ahead and give us your name and what you're here to speak about.

Hi, can you hear me?

Yes, perfectly.

Hi, this is Sheila Alou, Sunrise City resident, former Sunrise City Commissioner. Good evening, Commissioners.

Good evening. The floor is yours.

I'm calling in tonight due to medical issues. I'm unable to attend the meeting. I was in the hospital when Mayor Ryan brought up, I haven't heard it, but when Mayor Ryan brought up the 501C's, And I would just like to add my input or if you didn't discuss it, I'd like to talk about it. I personally feel strongly that you guys have apparently selected certain 501 s and if you solicit them, you don't have to do an accounting, you don't have to do an expenditure. And I just feel for transparency, if any commissioner is doing a fundraiser, which like we never did, this is kind of new to me. I never went into the community and asked neighborhoods, Sawgrass Mills Mall for money for anything. I did reach out to lawyers when I obviously was raising money for campaigns, but never anything related to the city. I feel strongly that if a commissioner using their power as a commissioner is out in the community raising money for probably a very good cause, that there should be a listing of the money that was collected, the expenditures, so that residents have transparency and can see where the money went who got the money, what was spent, who gave the money, and I would hope that it could be placed on the agenda and you guys can discuss it. If not, God willing, that I am okay and don't have to go through chemo again, we'll make it an issue. It's important. You guys need to let the public know who you're soliciting, who you're soliciting for, what you're doing with the money, where the money is going. And I appreciate the opportunity just to be able to call in and express my concerns. And right now, that's really it.

Thank you, Commissioner Liu, for your patience tonight in waiting for open discussion. And I hope that everything's OK. I know I speak for my colleagues in hoping.

Well, that's another issue. That's another issue, Mayor. You know, that was really important to me when I became a commissioner, that open discussion was like the very first thing on the agenda. And there was a couple of meetings before that I sat on hold for an hour and 45 minutes. And I think the public should be first. I know you like the proclamations to be first, but I would hope that you guys at some point would think about, you know, these people have families. They can't wait all night. That public comment should be your number one priority. And I honestly, Mayor, I really think you should really take a hold of this issue. And that's my dog. I think you should make it an issue, and I really think we need transparency. Not that I'm saying anything is wrong, but I want to know where the money is going, what it's going for. And if there is a 501 event, I think the entire commission should vote on it, and the entire commission should be a part of it. It's my personal feeling. I think you should have a whole diet there, I guess. Commissioner Kirsch has been there tonight, but I really think it's an important issue, and I hope that you will contemplate it a little bit further.

All right, thank you very much, Commissioner Liu.

All right, anybody else with hands raised? Good night. Good night, and best of luck. Any other hands raised?

No, sir.

Anybody else for our open discussion tonight? All right, I'll go ahead and close open discussion. All right, let's want to move up 12A and 12B. Motion by Commissioner Skudo, seconded by Deputy Mayor. All in favor say aye. all right all right commission discussion our action rate second reading of nords of the city of sunrise florida amending fiscal year 2025 2026 budget ordinance number 720 amending the general fund 001 the spring tree golf fund 420 the water and wastewater fund 401 in the water and wastewater system reserve fund 464 providing for conflict providing for several billion providing for an effective day city manager mark lebelski susan neighbors director of finance administrative services first reading city commission meeting 310 2026 past five zero do i have a motion motion by commissioner scudo seconded by Assistant Deputy Mayor, this is a public hearing. Anyone wishing to be heard on this matter, please come forward or press five star on your phone. I see no one come forward. Any hands raised on line? Lourdes? Sorry.

No, sir.

All right. I'll close public discussion. Any discussion from my colleagues? Go ahead and call the question.

Commissioner Scudo?

Yes.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Deputy Mayor Guzman? Yes. Commissioner Kirch? Not present. Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Item passes 4-0B. Commission discussion on our actionary first reading of an order to the City of Sunrise, Florida, amending Chapter 2, Administration, Article 2, City Commission, Division 2 meetings by amending Section 2-33, Agenda Preparation Format Procedure to revise the procedures for consideration of rezoning to conform to state law, providing for conflict, providing for stability, providing for inclusion in the City Code, and providing an effective date. City Manager Mark Lovalsky. Thomas P. Moss, City Attorney. Do I have a motion? Move it. Motion by Deputy, sorry, by Commissioner Skidlow, seconded by the Deputy Mayor. This is a public hearing. Anyone wishing to be heard on this matter, please come forward or press 5-star on your phone. Does anyone want to come forward? Can you confirm no hands are raised? I confirm no hands are raised. All right, I'll close public discussion. Assistant Deputy Mayor.

For the purpose of this amendment, I would like that it doesn't specifically state which meeting one is going to be and what meeting two is going to be. And so I think we should have meeting one be the reading and meeting two be the actual voting.

Yeah, I agree. I think that certainly was when I spoke to Mr. Moss, I think that was the intent. The first one would always be reading. Mr. Moss, to that comment, which I think is the most productive way of doing two things. One, providing additional notice, and two, not putting the cart before the horse, so to speak.

I agree, and that's what I wrote in the background of the agenda item. Now, the amendment to the ordinance itself does not codify that process, but it certainly allows the city to follow that process.

All right, so if we pass this tonight, between first and second reading, is that something you'd be willing to codify at the request of the Assistant Deputy Mayor so that we could do it? Because I think it's important to lay this out. It's not just about us and remembering it, right? It's to make sure it's codified going forward.

Correct. I can make that amendment between first and second readings.

Okay. Any further? You okay with that, Mr. Lebelski, from your perspective in development? Okay. Any further discussion on that? Then call the question on first reading, understanding second reading. We'll have some amendments.

Commissioner Kirch, not present. Commissioner Scudo?

Yes.

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

Yes. Item passed 4-0. All right, let's go back to consent agenda items. Poll F, resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida to award bid number 26-29-12-MS for the Municipal Campus Parking Lot Expansion Project. the so-called Shaker Plates and Construction Site Services, LLC, DBA, National General Construction, approving contract number C-26-29-12-MS, and providing an effective date. City Manager Mark Lebelski, Rodrigo DeCastro, Director of Utilities. Do I have a motion? Move it. Motion by Commissioner Escudo. Seconded by? Second. Deputy Mayor, this is a public hearing. Anyone wishing to be heard on this matter, please come forward or press 5-star on your phone. Anyone come forward? Can you confirm no hands are raised?

I confirm no hands are raised.

All right. Closed public discussion. Commissioner Escudo, floor is yours.

Yeah, I just wanted to make sure that with this bid being such a much lower price than what, and I know the city went even further to sit down with them, but when we first started this with West Construction, it was the first project that we did. It was the smallest project, and it ended up being the worst project. So I'm just saying... It's a huge percentage less. I just don't want now them to come in because, you know, they're named the LLC doing business as I just wanted to make sure that it's viable to do what it's going to do. But. It's not going to tell us that there was pre-existing or whatever and come up with some ridiculous change orders and now make this be more than being the lowest bidder. I know you guys are on it. I know you guys sat with them again, but it doesn't mean that... Mr. West came here and made some beautiful presentations in his nice sport jacket and stuff and put us through the wringer for how many years. So I just don't want to see another one like this coming forward where it's two things to the municipal campus. It's the end part, but I don't want it to be like the drag out in front of the senior center and the drag out on the back part. So I know you sat with them, but... I'm telling you right now, come back with a change order and it's gonna be, so.

Mr. Lebowski. Thank you, Mayor. Just as Commissioner Escudo said, staff had some concerns. We met with the contractor, brought them in, reviewed the bid, checked their references, and we believe that staff supports the award of this. This is not a complicated project. It is a standard civil project, so we believe this is a good project for the first their first project here in the city. And hopefully if they do well, it could be gateway for future. Yeah.

Just like the rebar sighting of the pool for 150,000. Nice, quick, easy job turned out to be 2.8 million. So don't say a little job. That's nice and easy. Just like the other guys doing the golf course, hit a gas pipe, hit a main electrical line. Yeah. I mean, so I just don't want it to be another, uh, Just be on them from day one. That's all I'm saying. I mean, no sense of not bringing it up when we know we've had our fair share when it comes to the senior center and the parking.

Thank you. And Mr. Belsky, in addition, I raised a similar points with you. In addition to that, I wanted to make sure that staff had evaluated whether or not they had a large number of municipal projects. One of the problems we had with West, right, was that they were overextended. And they had too many municipal projects. I'm not denigrating. I'm just saying you could conceive of a situation where one's robbing Peter to pay Paul, so to speak, in terms of what has to be done. And have you looked at that issue as well?

Yes, Mayor. We are comfortable with their workload.

Okay. All right. Just be mindful and send them a message that you need to do this one right for sure. All right. Any further discussion on this item? Go ahead and call the question.

Deputy Mayor Guzman? Yes. Commissioner Kirch, not present. Commissioner Scudo?

Yes.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark. Mayor Ryan.

Yes, item passes 4-0. All right, motion to move up old business, 16A and 16B. Motion by Commissioner Escudo, seconded by Assistant Deputy Mayor. All in favor say aye. Aye. All right, 16A, resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida, endorsing the recommendation of the C-13 Greenway concept and supporting the efforts of the Broward Metropolitan Planning Organizations to prepare the recommended capital improvements for federal funding, providing for conflicts, providing for severability, and providing for an effective date. City Manager Mark Lebelski, Rodrigo DeCastro, Director of Utilities. Come to motion. Move it. Motion by Commissioner Escudo, seconded by Deputy Mayor. 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 forward. Can you confirm no hands are raised?

I confirm no hands are raised.

All right. Mr. Lebelski, this is, just to be clear, we had a meeting on this. We went over what the consensus of the commission was on the north-south exchange on this, and this resolution is consistent with what the direction from The commission was correct.

Yes, Mayor. In addition, the commissioner asked us to reach back out again to Sunrise Lakes to confirm there was any issues, and staff has done that and received no concerns from them. Who did you speak to? We sent letters to each of the phases, and I think we also followed up with a phone call and with no concerns.

So you sent the letter, got no response. You called and got no response. Did you speak with somebody?

Good evening, Mayor, Commissioner Rodriguez from the Director of Utilities. So we confirm all contact information from both property manager and HOA presidents for all the different phases. We send them letters and we also follow up with phone calls just to make sure that we had all the contact information. We did not receive any negative feedback.

But you had dialogue?

We had phone calls with all the associations.

But you had dialogue to tell them.

My team reached out to all of them and there were no concerns brought up to our attention.

Okay, and who from your department did these calls?

My engineering manager.

And I'm just saying, so if they have information of a contact that they want to call, who are they going to call?

They're going to call our office. So our engineering manager was the primary point of contact that reached out to all of them. Who? His name is Casey Graham.

Casey Graham?

Yeah. And what's his number so they could call him? 954-888-6066.

880?

No, 888-6066. Okay, thank you. All right.

All right. Any further discussion from the commission? Go ahead and call the question.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark. Deputy Mayor Guzman. Yes. Commissioner Kirch, not present. Commissioner Scudo.

Yes.

Mayor Ryan.

Yes, item passes 4-0. On B, this was really just supposed to be a commission discussion item. Mr. Moss, this doesn't need to be heard as a resolution tonight. I can read it and table it, but I don't really think that this should have been a resolution. It was supposed to be just a commission discussion item. And without Commissioner Kirch here, it doesn't make sense to do it.

Okay, we can simply pull the item and handle it as a commission discussion.

Okay. All right, that's fine. So I don't need to read it and get a second and all the others, right? No, sir. Okay. We'll hold that to reports later. All right, I have a motion to move up 17A through C. We've already handled C. 17A through B. Move it. Motion by Commissioner Scudo, seconded by Assistant Deputy Mayor. All in favor say aye. Aye. All right. 17A, resolution of the City of Sunrise, Florida, approving an interlocal agreement between Broward County and the City of Sunrise to fund the design of a regional biosolids solution facility and provide an effective day city manager Mark Lebelski, Rodrigo Del Castro, director of utilities. A motion by Commissioner Escudo, seconded by Assistant Deputy Mayor. This is a public hearing. Anyone wishing to be heard on this matter, please come forward and press five star on your phone. See no one come forward. Confirm no hands raised.

I confirm no hands are raised.

All right. Mr. Lebelski.

Thank you, Mayor. This is the ILA following the discussion from the previous city commission meeting where Rodrigo provided an update PFAS and biosolids and the cybersecurity for SCADA. During that discussion, there was a number of questions raised by the commission related to the ILA and especially with the parallel discussion with the SWA. I did reach out to county administration. In fact, I sent them an email kind of outlining some of the commission's questions and staff questions. Primarily the the issues related to the questions raised the county's position is those are those will be addressed in the design. I'm sorry in the construction and maintenance agreement, which will come later on. So this agreement is purely for design. In terms of, I can provide you at least their initial response and to general some of the questions you had mentioned. One was regarding the ownership of the facility and whether each of the municipalities would have ownership in the biosolids facility. And the answer is no, that the cities will just be reserving capacity as part of these agreements moving forward. The second major issue that was- Is that similar to C-51? Yes, yes, yes. the second major issue was of any revenue generated through resale of the biosolids material the answer is yes we would share in those costs and share in those revenues they would be deducted from any of the operational cost and then it would be spread out equally amongst each of the participants and there was also up so there was also discussion regarding if someone would be a late player into the game and whether those costs would be spread out equally. And the answer is yes, they're also from the county's perspective. From staff's perspective, we're comfortable with those premises. The concern that we have not having ownership in it is that it's gonna be critical when we negotiate that construction and maintenance agreement regarding the termination provisions. and making sure that there is not unilateral termination from the county or a termination for convenience that doesn't provide the city a recapture of their funds, and more importantly, an opportunity to provide enough time for us to have our own system in place, which would take years for us to do something like that. The county understands our position. Rodrigo is actually talking directly with our other municipal partners. So we expect that this will be a unified concern that will be raised not just by Sunrise, but everyone else participating in the ILA. At this time, I understand that with none of those components are fully negotiated. I do have in writing from the county their intent that I can forward to the commission individually, separately. At this time, we are recommending to proceed with this when under the premise that these items will be negotiated in the final construction and maintenance agreement.

All right. So just I know there'll be some comments on this, but the First step is this is really just a design phase. Is that fair to say?

That is correct.

And the alternative for, I think we covered this last time, but the alternative for Sunrise, if we weren't to participate in this, are you able to quantify, you know, would it be more than the $5 million investment?

Much more. We actually evaluated this several years ago, and it's more than double than what it would cost us to participate in a regional basis. And I'd also want to assure the commission that how this is set up is this is the county is pre funding the design services. And it's not a situation we're giving them a check up front. And then if they cancel the design, they're sitting with money. It's the county's pre funding it. And then they're with their invoicing the cities as the project moves forward on benchmark parts of the design. Correct.

And I will say it is fair to say that the county commission has already voted on this to move forward with the design. They're not necessarily waiting because they know they have to do this and they're going to have uptake of capacity if we don't participate.

Correct. And I would say that it has been a collaborative discussion amongst the utilities and the county. Then even at the last minute when I reached out to the administration regarding some of these concerns, because I wanted to have some assurance before I put this on the agenda, they responded very quickly to staff. So I expect there to be further collaboration moving forward on this.

Irrespective of perhaps of how other projects with the county may have gone in the past and the sharp elbows even more recently, I think there seems to be a recognition, which is why this has been driven at the staff level, that we really don't have any alternative. This is a really, really bad situation based on the unfunded mandates, the inability to do it, the lack of disposal opportunities, and the fact that if we don't do this, the disposal sites will know that we have no other alternative, in which case, assuming they have capacity, the price will go up enormously as we try to figure out the years that it's going to take to design and build this. Is that a fair outline of it? They already went up. Yeah, they already went up a lot, and it's going to only get worse. For the communities that have not yet faced the PFAS issues and all the problems they're going to have and haven't woken up to this, they're going to have to do something like this, and for any one city to do it on its own is just not financially viable. That's the assessment of staff, correct?

That's correct, yes.

All right, well, listen, I think the staff and communicating with our municipal partners, particularly, again, in a positive way, I wanted to keep this moving forward with the county, but be aware. I mean, you've heard the commission discussion comments previously about how this looks in the ILA next go around. It'll be a lot of work, Mr. Moss, with staff and the city attorneys to make sure that cities are as best as possible protected on utilizing the capacity of this so that we don't invest in it and not be able to use the capacity. The intent is to make this a success. We need to do that because it's obviously not only good for Sunrise, it's good for all the participating communities. We just need to make sure that that happens. And if not, the municipal partners will do what they do best, and that's raise their voices, I'm sure. All right. Any further comments on that? Go ahead and call the question.

Commissioner Scudo?

Yes.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Clark? Yes. Deputy Mayor Guzman? Yes. Commissioner Kirch, not present. Mayor Ryan?

Yes. Passes 4-0. Thank you to staff for working on this for so long. the work with the county and i'm not a show for the county but i do appreciate that they've taken the leadership on this to bring us together to make sure we can we can tackle this all right 17b resolution of the city of sunrise florida awarding bid number 26-38-01-v-h for the spring tree golf club cart barn roof replacement project gemstone builders llc approving contract c-26-38-01-v-h and providing effective date city manager mark lebelski rodrigo de castro director of utilities can have a motion Motion by Commissioner Skudo, seconded by Assistant Deputy Mayor. This is a public hearing. Anyone wishing to be heard on this matter, please come forward or press five star on your phone. I see no one come forward. Confirm no hands raised.

I confirm no hands are raised.

All right, I'll close public discussion. Any discussion from my colleagues?

Yeah, again, with this one. I mean, now the first person, that was the lowest bidder that didn't want to put up insurance. And now we're going to the second bidder. lowest bidder again, someone who is way under, even though it's a 303,000. But I mean, we're at where we are because of just please, I mean, going forward, whatever building that it is that we either have a third party inspector or a city, someone going after and looking at all of our stuff to really go deep. This was a big hit. This is taking a lot longer than than a normal thing. This has been, you know, this is like a year now. And now we finally get to give an award and a contract and the guy doesn't want to provide liability insurance or workman's comp insurance I mean, why wouldn't... I'm just saying, that doesn't even make sense. You're bidding on a city bid. Why wouldn't you not want to provide workers' compensation? I mean, that doesn't even make sense. Wouldn't that have to have been in the bid? I'm just saying. I mean, it's just... And now we got this guy who didn't even put his insurance up yet or didn't even secure a bond yet. So we don't even know if this guy is going to be the right... I'm just... From what it says in the backup. So hopefully this person's going to work out. But I mean... It's to a point now where, I mean, yeah, I know it's COVID, but it's limited in its scope. So I'm just saying, and we still have stuff underneath there. I mean, we invested a good amount of money of stuff that's underneath there right now. that we don't have anywhere else to store it. So those trusses, I mean, this is like really gotta like move forward now. I mean, hopefully, or if this is not gonna go, then I would say go to somebody that's always been reliable to like a MBR or somebody that could have jumped on this to get us past this. But this is just getting, I mean, do we feel that this guy is gonna provide what it is or we're just going to the second bit of praying that he's gonna put up?

Mr. Lebowski.

No, we feel comfortable with the second low bidder. The first low bidder, the price was well below, and we probably wouldn't have felt comfortable even if they were able to provide.

But this guy's low, too.

If you look at the grouping, we received a number of bids for this project, and the grouping that you have 309 for this award, 303, and the next one is 319, then you have 329, 339. So the grouping is relatively close. So we're comfortable with the pricing that's been submitted, and we checked references. We're comfortable with the contractor. We recommend award.

I mean, I'm going to support you, but I'm just again, it seems like two people on this agenda are way below and I could just only hope that we're. I mean, I know it's a bid process and we have to follow whatever it is. It's just when somebody substantially low, I just.

in this route too many times well fortunately the grouping at least i mean some of these we've looked at is where you know it's 20 or 25 or 30 percent uh below then you really start to get worried right it's it's close but nonetheless this is one it should not be a complicated project the roof only lasted 20 and i mean not just the roof i mean trusses i mean that's just not acceptable so the initial build on this may have had some issues so let's just make sure that we're inspecting as closely as possible on this Any further discussion? Call the question.

Commissioner Kirch, not present. Commissioner Scudo?

Yes.

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

Yes, item passes 4-0. City Clerk's report?

No report, sir.

City Attorney's report?

No report, thank you.

City Manager's report? No report, Mayor. All right, Deputy Mayor.

Thank you. I have two items I'd like to discuss.

Make sure your mic's on.

It's on.

Okay, just I want to make sure that's all.

No problem. I believe Lourdes put on everyone's desk the proclamation survey, and I just wanted to see if this is something we could move forward in highlighting or recognizing whoever does put a proclamation forward to possibly say who sponsored it or at least list the names of the individuals. on the proclamation rather than it just saying mayor and commission like it currently does and There are several samples as to what it could look like So just wanted to get your feedback for instance today. We had the hate crime day proclamation Which mayor was a great thing to put on? Commission since we all support it, but I want to thank you for bringing everyone in together And that was really important and speaks volume for the entire community to be on the same page religiously So yes, I'd like your feedback Makes no difference to me.

I mean, I just so everyone's clear when I first came on it only said City Commission I felt that that was and then it said only mayor and I thought that was inappropriate I thought it had to be clear that the City Commission was behind it. I would say that in looking at the survey there's a All sorts of mix, right? Some are mayor only, some are commission only, some are only those who sponsored. Not a big deal. I don't really care. It's not a lot of space. I would note that it could potentially create some rub. We've had a handful of occasions when a sitting commissioner did not want to get behind a proclamation. And that's fine with me too. I don't mind folks being pointed out for that. But whatever the will of the commission is, it literally makes no difference to me.

Are you asking that everybody's name be on the proclamation when it's being given out? Well, either the name must be listed, yes, and or to highlight who sponsored it. I mean, there's quite a few that we all sponsor together, so it kind of defeats the purpose. But if there's a special item that we are recognizing someone as a whole, but if someone invited someone in particular, you know, just maybe highlight that.

Yeah, I don't know about how I feel about the sponsor side of this because there's sometimes where, you know, I'll ask for a proclamation and somebody else has already asked for it as well. And I want to get into that kind of riff as to who sponsored or co-sponsored. And then staff's got to call around and say, are you also sponsoring? And eventually what happens is everybody's co-sponsoring because they want to be on it. And I don't want to, you know, dust up. But in terms of having everybody's names listed, it makes literally no difference to me.

Everybody's name is on the agenda. as the sponsor, so it's, and it's read. But it's read into the record when the proclamation is read. It's just the mayor reads the proclamation and it's.

But not even so much about being read into.

No, no, no, I'm just saying, in general, when the proclamation is being read, whatever it is, every person's name is read to the audience, everybody hears every person.

I know, but it's not about that. It's about having it documented on the actual proclamation. So when individuals go back home with it and they present it and want to share, it shows everyone. But it's from the city.

I'm saying it shouldn't be from an individual.

I've had a few people that have reached out asking why the names aren't all on there. Oh, that's fine. Just in general.

But it's normally from the City of Sunrise. It's signed by the mayor. It says mayor and commission.

For too long, it only said mayor, and that was one of the first things I changed.

We had times where people wanted just their name on something. Right, we had that. And like you said, it wasn't added, like you said, commission at the bottom. It was only mayor. So, I mean, I don't... I mean, everybody does it a different way. I just feel... We're all read as a sponsor on it in front of every single person that's in here. It's in the agenda. So anybody who gets an agenda, but it's up to the will of the commission, whatever.

Maybe Commissioner Kirch might have some view on this as well. So I could certainly bring it up again. It's an easy fix. I don't really care either way. Whatever you all want. You know, I signed my signature thousands of times.

You get sued more than us. Do you want to rebound that too?

Yeah, by the way. Let's hear that.

Can you guys join the caption? You get sued how many times a day? Should all of our names be on the docket that all of us are being sued? I'm just saying.

I would invite everybody to the party. No, I'm saying, right.

Well, that's what it is. You either want to be on everything or you want to be on select.

Another thing I'd like to bring up aside from that is I know we talked about this previously regarding the nativity set or display rather for the holidays. And so I've discussed with Tom and I don't know if you'd like to share the information, Lena, but it has a list of all the cities and how they do it. And we can decide about moving forward. I know we've had this conversation, but I don't know how you would like staff to move forward.

But I didn't get any of the info. If she wants to give it to us, we'd want to bring it back up. Yeah, just share it with us and... Well, here's the thing.

No, thank you. I understand that. But we keep going back and forth when I bring up discussions.

But you didn't give us any. You have the information.

We don't. I couldn't share it until it was publicly discussed. So that's why I was asking her to share this in a link. I don't think that's the case.

I think if a survey is done by staff. It can be shared. It's not a problem. Tom knows to...

I wish it was shared prior to this meeting then because I've been talking about this with staff for quite some time, so they should have known to have sent it to you prior.

Either way, nobody's killing this.

I just hate to keep bringing it up on discussion rather than just moving forward with making a decision. That's all. All right, so staff, please put this on for the next agenda as a formal item. Thank you.

And circulate the information. Okay. Thank you, Deputy Mayor.

So I was at the Civic Center the other day. I went to book a room for an event and the elevator was still not working. So my question is where are we with the elevator in that particular area?

I know we recently awarded a contract for the repairs. I need to get with staff and report back on the status of the elevator in the time frame.

Okay, perfect. Commissioner Scooter. Just to staff the Toons and Trucks, good event. It was just weird being so early and still light out. That was pretty cool. The Comic-Con... Most that I've ever seen so far. I mean, hands down, crowded all day from beginning to end. A lot more vendors, a lot more people. Adding the wrestling was a pretty cool thing. I didn't know what was going on out there until I actually walked out there. And Caitlin was hysterical laughing when Caitlin throws her feet straight out like this. You know, she's either hysterical laughing at somebody or their costume or whatever. And I had a wheeler right up to the front so that she could actually see the guys jumping on the rope. So it was pretty cool. You know, a good twist. I don't know what we could do with that. Down the road, I don't know. I mean, that could be something that you guys could think about.

You could be a guest wrestler. Hey, why not? Remember the dunk tanks we used to play?

I wanted to do the guest with Michael Moore, the fighting. But he's training some people now in Pittsburgh. I don't even have a chance to fight him now. So two great events, you know, sponsored with the Leisure Services. I just, to Mr. Lebowski. You know, going to the amphitheater and it's such a beautiful spot. And then to see still the ropes and the nets. I know staff is working on it. Could you just please, not tonight, but get something to us what it is that you're looking at. Then, you know, standing on the side, you know, talking with everybody, but then actually going out to where the tent is. I don't know. It's just annoying. The tent is annoying. It's just no one, like the whole middle is like empty up the whole back. So I don't know what we could do to figure out how to get rid of this tent. So what I'm saying is if you're looking to add the stairs or whatever, then I know you want to do the cement on one of the things for accessibility, for handicap accessibility, for fire and police, for emergency egress and whatever. Either look at burying where they are or figure out how you can move it to the side. But it's just a white tent in the middle of this whole $15, $20 million complex just doesn't look good. I know for whatever reason they have to be there, whatever visual, but can we bury it or can we move it to the side? It's just taken up a huge portion on the back part of the lawn for whatever it is. I know they have people behind stage. I know they have to have people in the front of the stage, but I mean, for whatever reason, we just got to figure out a better solution. I mean, either bury it or try to figure out how we could, you know, move it to the side or something. The last thing is the spring tree golf course. I had some discussion with the city manager. When you go to each hole, there's only a four by four beige piece of wood. There's no signage to say this is hole one, to do a map out of what the course is. And it's not inexpensive. It doesn't have to be an expensive sign. It could just be, I said as a for instance, the entrance signs that we have that say welcome to Sunrise, they're those metal with the sunrise in the middle, but not the whole sign. Just one of those metal columns with a little thing like a real estate sign, like a piece that would come out, and then something that would hang down, that would have hole number one with a picture on it, what the course is, it says how many yards, if we wanted to go something that route. And if there's a hurricane, you take that thing off,

And we don't have to worry about it blowing in the wind.

Or if Sean or Kevin or whoever could just come up with something. So, I mean, we have a beautiful course. I mean, now that we did a metal roof, I mean, our clubhouse is gorgeous. I mean, it literally is. Now we're repainting all the fencing, all the metal. I mean, it's just that when somebody goes to the hole, you know, they take out their goggle, they're looking how many yards, and it would just have the layout of the course. You understand what I'm saying. I mean, it's not an expensive sign. It just would be something to say, this is hole one, this is how many yards it is, it's a par, whatever, and a little, that's it. So... I just wanted to bring that up that I did mention it to a staff so that it's not like I'm trying to ask for something. That's why I'm bringing it up tonight.

Perfect.

And if you could come up with a few renderings. But let's not wait a long period. It's 18 little signs. And then the only other thing about the golf course is on 80 84th. the road is raised as the carts go across the road. But on Springtree, it's not raised. So when people come off of University Drive, they tend to speed right there. And that's exactly where they're coming across the street. So that was another thing. for staff to look into.

Yeah, we should definitely look at that. That's always harrowing.

But our people have done the raise, so it's not like we have to go outside. It's something that we could do in-house if we're eligible to do it.

Okay. Thank you, Commissioner Skudo. Deputy Mayor, your light's back on.

Yeah, I'm sorry. I have three more quick things if I can just share. Two questions for staff regarding the water meters that are being changed out. I know quite a few residents have reached out saying that their water was still turned off even after hours, and I've had to reach out to make sure someone goes out there to put it back on, and it's happened more than one time. So have we spoken to the contractor? What's going on with that?

Yes. Yes, we've had a couple instances, as the mayor has mentioned, where the contractor swapped out the water meter and inadvertently did not turn back on the water for those residents. We have since initiated a new procedure between the contractor and staff, so we're hopeful that will not happen again.

Okay, and then we've had this conversation regarding contractors and them leaving a crappy job behind, if you will, but particularly there was a situation this past week where there was a hole in the middle of 115th and it wasn't really properly secured, but this has happened often. So at what point, you know, when Like, how are they, I guess, vetted, or do they not know how to safely close up before they leave for the day? You know, kids, dogs, whatever the case may be, like, it's truly a hazard. It was a big hole that was left behind. But it's not the first time.

Yeah, unfortunately the ones you're referring to many times are the challenging, the telecom ones which we've had issues with in the communities and neighborhoods. I know that Shannon and her team has been working very diligently to, to oversee and manage them, but they're all over the city, so it is a challenge. She's actually gotten to the point where I think she was not issuing permits for many months until they cleaned up some of those areas. It's a challenge, we're doing our best to manage them.

Okay, and last thing regarding the Teen Summit, I just wanted to highlight again, this was the second year we had it. Kudos to staff for putting it together. I just wanted to get some feedback with the amount of students this year versus last year, if there was anything that changed, something better, maybe what we'll do differently next year, but I just kind of wanted to get some feedback, whether it's tonight or maybe in an email with some information.

Yeah, I think a report would be good. I know it was at 60 this year, which was amazing.

All right, thank you.

Yep.

Get that to the commission, please. All right, just... On top of the other things that were said, I want to thank staff for hosting the Sun Sentinels Prime Conference at our Civic Center. It was really well attended, and it was attended by folks from all over the county. And we know that in part because some took the pledge for recycle rights, so they would write their name, put what city they were from, and everything else. So it was really well received, the opportunity for us to spotlight what's going on there. Parking was fine. Everybody enjoyed it and and I know that the sponsors were very very happy with that So great job on it really great layout and I think we're really hitting our stride now back with the Civic Center All right. That's all I got any further business a motion to adjourn motion motion by Commissioner Skudo seconded by it's this deputy mayor all in favor say aye aye we are adjourned All right the make sure we let Commissioner Kirch know that we only do early meetings when he's not here