City Council - Regular Meeting

It's a big crowd today. If I can get everybody to quiet down. Okay. We are gonna start by calling the meeting to order. We're gonna do a roll call, and then I'll do an invocation pledge. Madam So, Clerk, you'll start us with the roll call, please.

Mr. Engelke? Here. Mrs. Frank? Here. Mr. Howard?

Here.

Mr. Smith?

Here.

Mr. Weed?

Here.

Vice Mayor Bolt?

Here.

Mayor Pichota?

Here. Then we can all stand for the invocation and today's pledge will be led by Paul Joyce.

Lord father, we pray for our mayor, city council, and all who serve our community. Lord, strengthen us with wisdom and grace for the work that we do every day. May our duties be carried out with respect and care, keeping our hearts pure as we work towards the best interest of all of our residents. Amen. Amen.

Okay. Now for all the fun, we will start with proclaiming the week of May 16 through twenty second twenty twenty six as National Safe Boating Week. If I can all get all of my guests to come forward, anybody who's here for this proclamation and we'll meet up in the front, try to try to fit as many of you can as as we can up here.

We

started the handshake. We're not gonna

stop now. Now we're gonna do it.

I didn't wanna do that. Thank you. Appreciate you. Thank you, sir. Good to see you. Thanks for having us. Absolutely. Hey. You're good to be Glad you're here. Sir. Thank you. Thank you, man. Come on down. Oh, yeah. You coming

up? I

am. Okay. Oh, boy. I'm gonna I'm gonna just sneak over here and grab the stock of Masons. Okay.

We'll start with one per per representative per agency, and then we'll see what I have left. We'll just just hold these up, and we're gonna do a lot of proclaiming. We're gonna read each and every single one of these. No. We're not. We're not gonna do that. Oh, perfect, though. This is great. And then, Paul, you get your own special one. So Oh. Yeah. Just but but hold it that way.

Why is it not framed?

Oh, god. Yep. Alright. And I'll kind of stand off here to decide if you want to come up here and then I'll just kind of squeeze my big self in here. There we go.

Okay. Whereas water related recreational activities are vital elements in the lives of the citizens of the City Of Venice and whereas Florida's 8,400 miles of saltwater coastline, 3,000,000 acres of inland lakes and 11,000 miles of rivers and streams provide for many of the needed outlets for recreation and relaxation. And whereas recreational boating is one of Florida's leading outdoor activities with more than 4,000,000 residents participating in this past time. And whereas Florida is the fastest growing recreational boating state in the nation with over 1,000,000 registered vessels and increasing at over 10,000 vessels each year. And whereas every year lives are lost in boating accidents in spite of the educational efforts of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, U.

S. Coast Guard, U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary, U. S.

Power Squadrons, America's Boating Club and local agencies. And whereas the sponsors of these safety programs have addressed their efforts to the youth and general public of Florida, urging them to enhance boating pleasure and avoid possible loss of life and property damage. And whereas we the citizens of the City Of Venice affirm and support the goals of boating safety on a year round basis. Now therefore, I, Nick Pashoda, Mayor of the City Of Venice, on behalf of the Venice City Council, do hereby proclaim May 16 to 05/22/2026 as National Safe Boating Week in the City Of Venice and urge all citizens who use our waterways to join in learning and practicing safe boating and have their boats inspected for proper safety equipment. I will give the microphone to master patrolman, officer, commandant Joyce.

Forty five seconds. You've got forty five seconds.

First of all, thank you everybody for being here. For those of you that don't know, what we're doing, we're currently conducting a marine operations course with pursuit and stop. We're here with our instructors from NASBLA who's training us this week and will be out in The Gulf today. Biggest thing is all about safety. It's about your kill switches, it's about your life jackets, making sure you have all this proper equipment on board, your throwable, your fire extinguishers and also your sound producing devices. You gotta make sure you have all that stuff. Check all that stuff before you leave the dock, make sure you have, you know where everything's at, not just you, but all your passengers on board. At this moment, I wanna pass the mic over to Alex, wherever he's at,

because I know he's got something to say. Good job. You

do now. Yeah, I do now. Paul, thank

you very much for the hospitality.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for allowing us

to be here

in your wonderful city. It's a great opportunity to be here to train with everyone here. Again, you very much. Mister Mayor, thank you for the accommodations.

That's how you do it, Paul. That's exactly how you do it. Wow, that was fantastic.

Thank you guys very much. Alright,

then if I can get all my law enforcement officials to stay up and then any law enforcement officials out in the audience that want to come up, we're going to do police week next. Thank you guys so much, appreciate you. Give me one second here. One of these for you. Thank you for your service. Oh, those we can put those proclamations down. We're gonna do another one. We got, like, six to go. So Thank you, sir. It's gonna be a good morning.

Thank you, sir.

Absolutely. Absolutely. I don't wanna lose you in the back.

Thank you, sir.

Absolutely. Try not to skip anybody. Just double layer coining. I've I've never done this before. Thank you very much, Mayor. Appreciate you. Great. Thank you, buddy. Absolutely. Thank you for your service. Appreciate it. Thank you. You. Thank

Thank you, sir.

Thanks for being here. 246. Good job. Look at you, you can go places with me. This will be great.

Thank you, Mary. Absolutely. Did we go yet? We did. Okay.

Thank you, sir.

Usually, said no. No. I didn't get That would have been fine. Thank you for your service. Thank you for your Oh, well, I'm fine. Sure. That's good. Thank you. Alright. You're gonna hold this. You're gonna get the microphone. Yep. This one. Nope. Hold on. Nope. Nope. Nope. Good lord, man. There

it is. Perfect. Okay.

And then if you would just come a little front and center for me. We'll stand kind of and then squeeze in, and I'll let you hold that. It's not on yet. Okay. Don't let me block anybody.

I don't I don't like blocking people. You're the mayor. Recognize National Police Week twenty twenty six and to honor the service and sacrifice of those law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty while protecting our communities and safeguarding our democracy. Whereas there are more than 800,000 law enforcement officers serving in communities across The United States including the dedicated members of the City of Venice Police Department. And whereas since the first recorded death in 1786, there are currently 24,775 law enforcement officers in The United States that made the ultimate sacrifice and been killed in the line of duty.

And whereas the names of these dedicated public servants are engraved on the walls of the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in Washington DC. And whereas two thirty nine new names of fallen heroes are being added to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial this spring, including 111 officers killed in 2025 and one hundred and twenty officers killed in previous years. And whereas the service and sacrifice of all officers killed in the line of duty will be honored during the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund's thirty eighth Candlelight Vigil on the evening of 05/13/2026. And whereas the Candlelight Vigil is part of the National Police Week, which will be observed this year, May 11 to 05/17/2026. And whereas May 15 is designated as Peace Officers Memorial Day in honor of all fallen officers and their families and U.

Flags should be flown at half staff. Now therefore, I, Nick Pashoda, Mayor of the City Of Venice, on behalf of the Venice City Council, do hereby proclaim May 11 through 05/17/2026 as National Police Week in the City Of Venice and publicly salute the service of law enforcement officers in our community and in communities across the nation. Thank you all for your service.

Thank you mayor, thank you council for taking a moment to honor law enforcement. It's kind of fitting that we have all of you here with us today from all these different agencies because at the end of the day, it doesn't matter what the color of uniform is, we all have the same mission. And as you said, mayor, police week is just about honoring the sacrifice that law enforcement officers make every day and to remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice and lost their lives in the line of duty. So, on behalf of the Venice Police Department and all law enforcement officers, thank you for this honor.

Alright, gentlemen thank you so much. Enjoy your class this morning. Protect Paul because we're always a little worried about that one. No. Keep it.

Alright, now we're competing for size of group but I think you guys win. So if I can get all the public works and utilities and your directors to come down, Not all at once. We are celebrating you guys. Come on up. And if you guys just wanna stand up here and Mr.

Vice mayor, can you come down? Gonna sneak right behind you and grab this. I'm gonna give you this and the mic, and I'll let you be up here. I'm gonna go back over there. Okay. K? It's not on yet. Bob, you're gonna need to oh, that's it. You need a drone. Good to see you. To see you this morning. Good morning. Front and center. To my right, wherever.

I have had the pleasure of having this proclamation, I think, for the last couple of years, and I like it because there's a lot of people up here to protect me. I know how you guys know how to use shovels and things. Whereas public works professionals focus on infrastructure, facilities and services that are of vital importance to sustainable and resilient communities and to the public health, high quality of life and well-being of the people of the city of Venice. And whereas these infrastructure, facilities and services could not be provided without the dedicated efforts of public works professionals who are engineers, managers, and employees of all levels of government and the private sector, who are responsible for rebuilding, improving, and protecting our nation's transportation, water supply, water treatment, storm water and solid waste systems, public buildings and other structures and facilities essential for our citizens. And whereas, it is in the public interest for the citizens, civic leaders, and children in the city of Venice to gain knowledge of and to maintain an ongoing interest and understanding of the importance of public works and public works programs in their respective communities.

And whereas the year 2026 marks the sixty sixth annual National Public Works Week sponsored by the American Public Works Association. Now therefore, I, Jim Bolt, Vice Mayor of the City Of Venice, on behalf of the mayor and the city council, do hereby proclaim the week of May 17 to 05/23/2026 as Public Works Week in the City Of Venice and urge all citizens to join with representatives of the American Public Works Association and government agencies in activities, events and ceremonies designed to pay tribute to our public works professionals, engineers, managers, and employees, and to recognize the substantial contributions they make to protecting our national health, safety and quality of life. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. You get to go first.

Oh, fantastic. Thank you, vice mayor, mayor and council for this recognition today. We are very fortunate and blessed to have such a talented group of individuals across public works and utilities. I come to work and, you know, some days it's pretty tough. You know, we have quite an uphill battle. We got a battle coming this fall. But, know, I'm confident that we're gonna be able to take care of the city. Rob, could you step up here with me real quick?

There you go, buddy. Alright.

So everyone, this is Rob Bondurant. He's been with the city for thirty years and his last day is Friday. I wanted to take this time to recognize you Rob because when I first walked in the door of Public Works, you were one of the first smiling faces I got to see. Oh, yeah. And you of important things. Right. And you you literally have always been there for me. You've supported me and I appreciate that. And I know that we're gonna hang out after after your retirement and we'll catch a ball game sometime. So congratulations, buddy.

Right up here, sir.

Vice mayor, mayor, council members, thank you very much for inviting us over. It's a pleasure to be here. But this is about you guys. Every day, all the work that you do, all you have to do is drive around the city. It's beautiful, it's clean, it's well maintained, not only the facilities and parks, but all the infrastructure that is buried is underground. And all the people that are here twenty four seven working to provide the services that they do. So thank you very much and congratulations.

Alright. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you, Rick, Javier. This is a great day every year when we get to celebrate you guys because sometimes you guys are in the background. Sometimes you like to be in the background, right? So it's amazing that we get to kinda come publicly and say, this is how our city operates right here, these these men and women, and a lot of them that couldn't be here today because they're out in the field working. So thank you for what you do. You know, I've learned there's an ongoing debate between police and fire on who the real first responder is, Right? It it They joke with each other all the time about it. But I would propose this morning, nobody's responded to any calls if the streets are blocked.

Right? And they're definitely not responding to any calls if the utilities don't work at the fire station, the police station. So all joking aside, this is a team and I wanna highlight how you all work with other departments because this city only works when we function together and we support each other and every single one of you do that every day, and I can't tell you how appreciative we are of that. Thank you for keeping the city running so well, providing exceptional service to our residents, and as Rick said, we've been through a

lot of change, a lot of

emergencies and a lot of challenges, and it won't be our last, I'm very confident in you and our ability to navigate that. So thank you. I hope it's a great week for everybody and we appreciate you. Thanks.

Good to see you. Good to see you. Safe. Congratulations. Thank you. Know, best I think so. No. I think I'm good. Okay. I'll I think so.

I'll let you know. Okay. Next up, if I can get we're gonna do foster care month, so if I can get Nicole Britton team to come down. I was just saying, Diane was pretending like she was gonna sit there and take pictures. If you guys want to move so, mare pasciutto is center, so let's go right in the center of that.

Perfect. Okay. And then you guys can hold that. And then I'll just hang on to that real quick. Ready? Okay. Okay. Whereas May is recognized nationwide as National Foster Care Month, a time to raise awareness and support children and families impacted by foster care. And whereas there are 368,500 children in The U. S.

Foster system. And whereas children entering foster care often face uncertainty and arrive with few personal belongings, making community support critical to their stability and well-being. And whereas National Foster Care Month recognizes the vital role of caregivers, the needs of youth and encourages community involvement to support children and families. And whereas for the past ten years, the Twig Cares Inc. Has served the Venice community by providing a free boutique where children in foster care can access clothing, shoes, books and essential items with dignity.

The organization also supports youth aging out of care through programs that provide resources, life skills, and encouragement. Now, I, Nick Pachutta, Mayor of the City Of Venice, on behalf of the Venice City Council, do hereby proclaim May 2026 as National Foster Care Month in the City Of Venice and encourage the meaningful work and impact of all community partners to support children and families throughout our community.

Thank you. The TWIG is a local nonprofit that serves youth in foster care and we are honored to recognize this as National Foster Care Awareness Month. What a blessing, we get to be the face of the foster care community today to you in doing this recognition. I'm a foster mom, I'm the leader of a local non profit but I will tell you all the statistics you hear are true. Every two minutes a child enters foster care, often they're going to their home with nothing but the clothes on their back.

We know not everyone can be a foster parent and welcome those kids into your homes but we do believe our community is here to support these kids So there's lots of ways for you to do that. You can support the TWIG or other local nonprofits that are serving these youth every single day. So thank you for recognizing us and for this to be National Foster Care Awareness Month.

And thank you for everything you do. Thank you. Okay and then for my last one if I can get the Vice Mayor and the City Manager to come down and then Mr. Fobister and any of your colleagues that you want to bring down with you. It's the proclamation shuffle.

If you want to stand right up here in the front. And I'll let you hold that outward and then Mr. Vice Mayor, I'm going let you hold the microphone for me. Just hang on to that if you would. Whereas the Faith and Family Month twenty twenty six mission is to celebrate and strengthen all families by encouraging participants to be family centered throughout the entire month of June.

And whereas the objective of Faith and Family Month twenty twenty six is to invite churches, nonprofit organizations and businesses to support and strengthen families by creating events and programs that nurture caring and kind family relationships. And whereas we invite churches and businesses to organize and invite the community to come together with service days, celebration events and other activities which bring families together, create unity and mutual support. And whereas families who regularly practice their faith and worship together experience a stable, kind, nurturing home environment and whereas Faith and Family Month will help make the City Of Venice a stronger united community by encouraging, caring, kind and loving family households. And now, therefore, I, Nick Pashoda, Mayor of the City Of Venice, on behalf of the Venice City Council, do hereby proclaim June 2026 as Faith and Family Month in the City Of Venice and urge all residents to recognize and support the efforts of organizations, churches, businesses and volunteers who work to strengthen families and improve the quality of life in our community.

Thank you mayor, thank you city council, thank you people. I see I haven't lost my touch about clearing the room. What happened? No. So One Christ One City on May 5 last week, that was our seventeenth year And One Christ One City has always been about coming together in unity, in word and deed, and helping the community, and it's an honor here to be representing about 20 churches, and pastor Dave from Lakeside Lutheran is here, and it's just an example of how important families are.

Many things go on from our churches that help the community that you don't know about, and pastor Dave, the last three years, Lakeside Lutheran has served 31,000 meals to disaster relief. 31,000 meals. And this year, since October to April 1, 750,000 man hours have been centered out of his church and that's because of

No, not 700 man money, $750,000 of man hours.

Yeah, that's what I said. I tend to exaggerate but by now you know that. But really and truly, he's got about 20 people that have been housed there for eighteen months, two years?

Three years.

Three years. They live at Lakeside Lutheran. So that's just one example of what we do. But we celebrate because our famous Mission Venice is the June 1 where we get all the high school kids and middle school kids and they come and serve the community. This year could be the largest ever, 200, so that's a blessing that we have for the city.

And then baptism in the gulf is our fourth year, and that's June 7, just north of the Pier at 04:00. So we continue to serve the community, but we thank people for looking at the families. When you have Jesus in your family, you have a chance to explain to the kids properly about what's going on in the world, not to get distracted. So we are truly grateful for all the pastors, caring Christians, and leaders that focus on God and Jesus as we go forward. So thank you city, it's been great seventeen years, we look forward to the next seventeen, and just to see what we can do here in Venice.

Being a preacher, you don't want to give me the microphone, but I really want to thank the city council for their support in all they're doing, especially the long term recovery group of disaster responses for Venice and beyond, and we're so thankful. Just within a six mile radius of where we are right now, there's a 120,000 people, and they all have a family. And we want to not only take care of their mental health, but their spiritual health, and it takes all the people here this morning in every capacity to do that. So, thank the church council for their dedication to to people and not just to a

city. Thank you.

Thank you, guys.

Thank you, man. Alright.

All right. With that, we will return at 09:40. Okay. We are back and I've got one item before we go on to number two. So I would ask the council to allow me to amend the agenda and the amendment would be adding an item under council action and discussion regarding canceling the June 9 meeting.

That's my motion if I can get a second. Second. Seconded by Vice Mayor Bolt and let's have some discussion. Basically, we had only one thing on the schedule for that meeting and it was a presentation with no action. So I think that with budget week coming up that following week, would better serve the council to look at canceling that meeting. So we can discuss this under council action discussion unless there's any other discussion. Okay, seeing none, then Madam Clerk, we can just do an electronic vote real quick. And you can tally and display the vote. Okay. That passes unanimously and it will be added to the end of the agenda.

Okay. We are now on to audience participation, which will be limited to one hour. Madam Clerk, do you have anybody signed up to speak?

Yes, I do.

Okay. Let me read my preamble and then we'll get into the speakers. We're now at the audience participation portion of the agenda. Speakers are not to address council members individually. Any person making personal impertinent or slanderous remarks or who becomes disorderly may be barred from the meeting. This is an opportunity to provide the city council with your comments. City council will not respond to any questions or comments during this time per the city code. A member of city staff will follow-up with you if it's appropriate, and any documents showing during audience participation or part of the meeting must be given to the clerk for the official record. Madam Clerk, many speakers do we have? We have seven. Seven, okay. Let's start with our first one.

Our first speaker is Valerie Waters.

And how much time?

Five minutes.

Thank you. Ms. Waters, you're welcome to come up to the presentation area. Good morning and welcome.

Good morning, counsel. Thank you for letting me speak today. I'm here regarding my concerns for the airport expansion. First off, I want to start by requesting that the CAP and TAP meetings be recorded. It would be great to have some transparency here.

Not everyone can attend but put it on the record, I think that's important. I would request in regards to the airport expansion that a full environmental impact study is done in advance. While we're in full season to get true readings and impacts regarding that. This should include noise, water quality, air quality, wetlands, wildlife, vegetation, land use, socioeconomic impact, traffic, climate, and environmental justice communities. This is due to the 54% increase in aircraft operations from '22 to '24 as stated in the Air Aviation Activity Report representing airport operations baselines.

During this timeframe, jet operations have increased along with noise and potential pollution. From this baseline and almost 37% of airport operations growth is expected again is expected. Again, this has significant impact on the health and wellness of the residents and the wildlife and the land, tourists visiting the beaches and, all the endangered species. In addition, we are a historic town and we talk about John Nolan and trying to preserve that. However, it's ironic that the Recondo team knew nothing about John Nolan, why this wasn't shared with him so that he could the whole team could be aware of that.

So I'm requesting that time and money is spent to do the research to understand the impacts of the expansion for all of us. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Madam Clerk, next speaker.

The next speaker is Chris Waters and he has five minutes.

Okay. Mr. Waters, good morning and welcome.

Good morning, Mayor. Thank you. Thank you, counsel. Appreciate the time to speak today. I'm Chris Waters. I'm following up Valerie Waters. That's a tough task, let me tell you. But first and foremost, I want to kind of second what Valerie said with regard to the airport expansion. I too have concerns. And we own a property on the island at 320 Gulf Drive.

Our family has owned property there for over thirty years. So we've seen measured growth, and it's been wonderful in the city of Venice and especially in the island. We have always, always had a very high regard for what John Nolan's vision has and how he's carried it out and the community that it has developed here. And we cherish it. We truly believe it's what makes Venice Venice, you know, makes it so special.

Having been involved in development for quite a bit of my life, I'm growing more and more concerned about the airport expansion initiative as it exists today. I know it's in the early stages. I know it's got a long way to go, but what I see is a little different than what I'm used to. I've always been a proponent, I'll say it again, of measured growth. It's important in any community and I would never hold it back.

But it appears that this proposal is going a little bit beyond that in my opinion. And again, it's early. There's a lot to learn for everybody in the community, including yourselves. But what I'm accustomed to is some typical initial first steps that are always important in any development step. And the first and foremost is always the environmental impact study.

And it just doesn't feel like it's happening or maybe it's too happened, maybe it hasn't been funded, I've been there before. So I would say that sooner that can happen, the more important it is for the really important second step, which is the community outreach and support. You know, you can't have one without the other. And if you can't lead with the environmental, that's, you know, my historical basis, it's very difficult to, help the community understand what they're up against and how it has a positive or negative impact. So I would, continue on saying that, though it is in the early stages, I'm very familiar with that, it appears that the environmental impact studies, that first critical step have not been completed.

My question would be, again, is why and what is the status of that? And how can that be conveyed to the public? And we've all seen that jet craft traffic has increased. It's brought certain environmental impacts, albeit noise or particular matter or community disturbance, if you will, amongst others. And it's important that the community understand exactly what that means in the environmental sense.

I simply ask that the required environmental studies be completed, they be shared with the community in an open forum before any development plans advance or begin to come to fruition. It's the right thing to do for community, for the city, you know, for the measured growth, if you will. And I hope you can support that. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council. Certainly appreciate you having me today for your support and certainly for your service.

Thank you for your comments. Madam Clerk, next speaker?

The next speaker is Christine Davis.

She has five Ms. Davis, good morning and welcome.

Good morning, Mayor, City Council. I'm trying to understand why the city is holding these meetings, the CAP and the TAP meeting. Just last week I found out a draft airport master plan dated August 2025 has already been submitted to FDOT. And maybe you know that, but I can tell you that the people that attend the TAP meeting the TAP meeting probably don't. That information was not shared with them.

That a draft plan was already in place and the community input is coming afterwards. This planning process seems a lot like it has been done before without community input, without them being completely informed. Maybe you've already seen the draft master plan, I don't know. But the public sure doesn't know that it's available. Only in reaching out to FDOT were we able to find that out.

I've attended the first two community meetings where much concern from the public was expressed on what was planned and what was being asked to be funded by the airport manager. It was interesting how many different meetings you have to attend, little pieces of information you have to gather to try to figure out what's going on. The community has asked you to get a real environmental impact study or statement conducted, something comprehensive that looks at the impact of a much larger airport operation, to look at the effects that we're currently experiencing. I've asked myself, what exactly is the reason for these public meetings? Is it so that Mr.

Dumas can check a box on an environmental review, categorically excluded projects, and say that he has notified and involved the public? Yes, that's one of the questions on the categorically excluded document. Has the public been notified and involved? That's the only reason I can think of that you wouldn't record and know what's going on at the CAP meetings. And I know most of you probably, from what I understand, attended the last CAP meeting.

I applaud you for doing that because otherwise you wouldn't know what was being said. The airport manager is not elected. He knows nothing about our community, the history, the environment that surrounds that airport. And it was very obvious at the last CAP meeting that the consultant knows even less. After researching this, it seems apparent to me what he wants is a very much larger airport, one that brings in commercial aircraft, 31 passengers or more, both scheduled and unscheduled.

Everything that he has requested for the airport plan or in his budget is not required but is a want for him so that he can manage to get CFR 14 part 139 certified. I'm gonna repeat that, c f r 14 part one thirty nine. Look it up or query your phone. What's required for that? A tower, a fire station, changes to the taxiway, lighting, terminal building, inflated airport traffic counts, all those things.

And with that certification, we can see much larger commercial aircraft coming into this airport, scheduled and unscheduled. A massive expansion in commercial operations. Let's get a true environmental impact statement prepared. Pause the airport master plan until everybody, yourself, know exactly what is being planned and how it will impact our community, not just now, but in the next five and ten years. I appreciate that. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Madam Clerk, next speaker.

The next speaker is Madeline Zubik.

Ms. Zubik?

I'm going to be taking Madeline's spot if that's okay. I'm speaking on behalf of Madeline. Is that okay?

So each speaker should fill

out a speaker card and then speak for themselves.

Okay. Am I able to do that still?

Yeah, just go to the back of the room, fill out the speaker card and then we'll bring you up at the end.

Okay, thank you.

Madam Clerk, next speaker?

The next speaker is Emily Santana.

How many minutes?

She has five minutes.

Five minutes? Okay. Ms. Santana, good morning and welcome.

Good morning. Thank you for having me. Give me one second. For those of you who don't know, my name is Emily Santana. I'm the General Manager of Skyport Aviation at the Venice Municipal Airport. I want to begin by acknowledging the concerns many residents have regarding aircraft noise, emissions, and airport activity. We do understand these concerns and as members of this community ourselves, we do take them seriously. I also want to personally add that environmental responsibility matters to me. I would even describe myself as somewhat of a tree hugger. So these issues are not abstract to me.

They are things I genuinely care about improving wherever they are realistically possible. I also want to clarify and clearly define Skyport Aviation's role in the broader airport planning process. Skyport Aviation does not develop, control or approve the city's airport master plan. That process is led by the city and its consultants in coordination with the FAA. While we may provide operational input when requested as a tenant, we do not control the scope, direction or final decisions of that planning process.

Our responsibility is to operate safely and in compliance within the framework that is ultimately established by the city and the FAA. I also want to address a common concern regarding commercial airline service. Skyport Aviation does not operate commercial airline service at this airport and there are no current plans within the existing airport planning discussions to introduce those scheduled commercial passenger flights as part of the master plan. Our operation remains focused on general aviation, business aviation and related support services. Any changes of that nature would require a full public process and regulatory review through the FAA and you guys, the city.

Within the areas we do control, we are actively working to reduce our operational impact. One of the most effective steps we've taken is reducing unnecessary ground emissions and noise through the use of ground power units or GPUs. Wherever they are operationally feasible, we encourage aircraft operators to use external ground power units instead of running onboard APUs. This reduces fuel burn emissions and noise while aircraft are here on the ground with us. As part of our current construction project, we are equipping the new hangars with permanent wired and GPU infrastructure, allowing more aircraft to plug directly into ground power rather than relying on onboard auxiliary systems during ground operations.

We have also transitioned many of our ground operations to electric golf carts further reducing emissions and noise within the airport environment. We are also making operational adjustments during construction to lessen neighborhood impact where possible Due to temporary temporary construction, fencing, and safety requirements, some aircraft parking areas had to be modified because our jet blast could damage temporary structures or create unsafe conditions. Even with those limitations, we're actively orienting orienting aircraft nose in and directing exhaust away from residential areas whenever operationally feasible and safe. The new hangar construction itself may also provide some degree of physical sound buffering in certain portions of the airport once that's completed. In addition, I do want to address the environmental performance directly.

Skyport Aviation remains fully up to date with all FAA, EPA, city, and airport environmental requirements. We take environmental compliance extremely seriously, and I am proud to say we have not had any fuel spills or environmental incidents. We work diligently every day to maintain that standard. I also wanna note that our overall operations at Skyport have decreased compared to prior periods. While we continue to support base and transient aircraft, we are not experiencing operational growth at this time and actively and activity has in fact trended downward in certain areas.

Even so, we remain committed to reducing the impact of every operation that does occur. Regarding flight paths and noise abatement procedures, it is important to understand that Skyport Aviation does not direct aircraft routing or air traffic control procedures. We are not air traffic controllers. Those decisions are governed by the FAA, ATC, aircraft performance requirements, weather conditions, and safety considerations. However, we are supportive of FAA approved and voluntary noise abatement practices whenever they can be safely implemented.

Skyport Aviation operates in full compliance with all applicable FAA, EPA, airport, and city regulations. Within our operational control, we continue to invest in infrastructure and procedures that reduce noise and emissions wherever possible. Finally, I would respectfully note that the airport is also an important economic and transportation asset for the community, supporting jobs, emergency services, tourism, and local businesses, as well as generating revenue for the city. We understand there is a balance that must be maintained between airport operations and community impact, and we are committed to being part of that balance and part of the ongoing solution. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Madam Clerk, next speaker.

The next speaker is Tanya Willard.

Ms. Willard, good morning and welcome.

Good morning. Just five minutes.

Okay. I'm so glad to hear that you guys have fixed the GPUs. That is wonderful because that was a big issue I think that's been brought to everybody's attention quite a few times. The APUs running are dramatic environmental and health concern. Anyway, I'm going be brief today, but I think you guys all need to hear from all of your taxpayers and your citizens and what's important to us in keeping this the community that we choose to live in and spend all our money in.

And it's important because yes, it is a financial thing, your taxpayers and I eat probably in every restaurant on this island, I eat out seven days a week, I shop probably way more than my husband would like. But anyway, okay. So one thing that's interesting is that this year, our airport numbers have gone down dramatically, kind of good news in a way, but that's not reflected in our master plan process and I don't think they are required to. They go by the last several years. So I'm not sure if there is a way that you can encourage them to look at this year's numbers and it might be able to change a little bit of the trajectory because all this new hangers, new this, new that is based upon the expected demand and their projections.

One month this year is down 4,000 flights over the same month last year. That's dramatic. So I'd like that taken into consideration. I know Chris Davis mentioned this, but I feel it's very important to maintain Venice as a vibrant, charming historic community as you guys have as your vision by preventing us from becoming a Part 139 airfield. Part 139 enables us to have scheduled passenger flights.

In other words, starting to become a mini SRQ, more jets, more traffic, more congestion, more noise, more pollution. And I think Chris did detail what it takes to become Schedule 139, the tower, the fire station, the terminal, all the things that are happening. I know that the fire station is being promoted to you guys as, hey, we get more free fire station, we get a truck here to serve the community. We get a lot of things that aren't so good for the community and you know, we are the community, you guys, us, you know. I won't go on about the environmental studies but I will say that in looking at John Nolan's plan and looking at the environmental studies, the Deer Town Gully, which is I'm sure you all know, originates right in the airport in that northwest corner where there is a 201,000 square foot lot that I have written to each of you and asked you to put into green space.

That's where the Deer Town Gully originates. And in John Nolan's plan, if you look at the maps he had drawn, the Deer Town Gully is actually shown as a recreational walking area with a lagoon. The lagoon area is actually where the gully is fed with natural springs. It's pretty neat for us to have natural springs here on the island. Let's work to not let more pollution start in that head part there at the Deer Town going.

One interesting idea too as you guys probably remember, we moved here partially because of the dog beach, the downtown and the airport. We fly a lot, we have planes, we have hangars, we are busy there at the airport. So we go to a lot of other local airports and in Arcadia where many people go for Taco Tuesday which is a lot of fun, people like us in their little two seater, four seater, six seater planes. Anyway, they have a system and I won't call it a virtual tower but it's some sort of tower type structure, it's not FAA, it's city owned, airport owned. And it videos and records all flights so you can sit in there and watch the screens, clearly see their end numbers, hear their audio discussions.

It would be a nice way to be able to perhaps charge some landing fees and discourage a little bit of the excess traffic we're getting which is annoying, all the flight schools coming over here and doing 10 takeoff and landings in a row because other airports have fees or have restrictions or have towers. Towers. Let's see here, briefly there too, I know that Mr. Sewillo is moving on and I would like to request that the person who you all hire to replace him when he does leave is somebody that actually is more focused on the role we had initially requested you guys to give us, which is somebody who is there to listen to the residents, the citizens, the people impacted by the airport and to support us in having our lifestyles maintained. I guess that's about it.

Thank you

for your comments.

Please protect

the goose who lays the golden eggs. Don't ruin it.

Madam Clerk, next speaker.

The next speaker is Janice Reardon. She has five minutes.

Good morning and welcome.

Thank you for allowing me to come back. Okay, my name is Janice Reardon and I live on Sunset Drive in Gulf Shores by the airport. I support our airport, I want to make that clear, I'm not against the airport. But I ask the city to halt further expansion until the long term impacts are fully evaluated. We need a part 150 noise study, your citizens live lives and well-being are at stake here, this is really important.

We also need an EA environmental assessment, this is vital for our little island. And for the record the airport is surrounded by environmentally sensitive land and water. We are not a cat ex, a categorical exclusion. We need a full NEPA study because we have extraordinary circumstances. These studies could take one to two years and need to be ordered now.

We are well aware of the time and cost and you spent more on that hiring the recondo consultants. Not doing so lacks responsibility and is really just poor town planning for the future of Venice. Venice is not Tampa, Orlando or Naples. We are a small coastal city surrounded by neighborhoods, waterways, wetlands and environmentally sensitive land. Every incremental project whether widening runway safety areas, acquiring additional land or paving over open space moves us closer to permanent expansion.

Once green space is lost, it is rarely restored. The golf course and surrounding open land provide important storm water absorption, wildlife habitat and is a natural buffer between the airport, the environment and our homes. These areas help reduce flooding, protect water quality and preserve the character that makes Venice unique. Rather than continually expanding the airport footprint, the city should prioritize conserving remaining airspace and open space and exploring conservation grants and partnerships. Conservation grants we feel are the key.

This approach would better reflect John Nolan's original version of Venice as a garden city on the Gulf. A statue of John Nolan sits on a bench as we enter town. Please let's remember what that means. Responsible planning means asking not only what can be built but what should be preserved for future generations. We need to save all the land, and I think this is key here, South Of Runway 23.

And then you can actually do some of your expansion. Preferably as a municipal golf course in addition to all the land on the northwest corner of the airport bordering Harbor And Airport Road as green space as Tanya Willard had stated. Please pause any further expansion and planning, protect the green space that safeguards our community, our environment and our quality of life until all necessary studies have been completed. Start with a part 150 noise study and an EA environmental assessment, a full NEPA study. And then all of you who represent us can make an educated decision.

Do you want to be on record as to bastardize John Nolan's plan? I should hope not. Please let's do what's right. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Madam Clerk, next speaker.

The last speaker is Alex Amazan. He has two minutes.

Good morning and welcome.

My name is Alex Almasan. I am a volunteer for Homeless for Hope. We Vote. We are a nonprofit organization that is mostly underground that you've never heard of. That means we're doing our job.

What we do is we provide housing to section eight and church vouchers, and we also coach the homeless community to vote and pray. And if they want to work and they want a hand up, we're here for them. Only because of the beautiful teams of Cott and Hott. Cott BPD is community outreach team. The deputy sheriff's department has HOT homeless outreach team.

We coordinate with them. And we're here because, basically, city councilman Ron Smith has had the courage to come to two of our meetings at the library, and he knows who we are. And that's what we need, of everybody to address this epic epidemic that is going away. I'm not here to tell you lies. I'm here to tell you the truth.

Is working. I would love to have one more BPD and one more counselor if the funding is allowed because it is working. I know. Because if it wasn't for Tat or Hock, an ex veteran like myself would be a vigilante because I didn't come to retire in Venice to be retarded. I came here to enjoy my retirement. Keep up the good work and may God bless everybody.

Thank you for your comments. Madam Clerk, next speaker.

That was the last one.

Okay. Then with that, we will move on to the consent section of the agenda. All matters listed under the consent section are considered to be routine and will be enacted by one motion unless an item is removed by a council member. There will be no separate discussion of these items. If discussion is desired by a council member, the item or items will be considered and voted upon at the end of the consent section. With that, do I have any council members that would like to remove anything from consent? Okay. Seeing none, I'll entertain a motion.

Mr. Mayor. Mr. Vice Mayor. I move to approve items on the consent section.

I'll second.

Seconded by Mr. Engelke. All in favor say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Passes unanimously. All right. We will move on to public hearings, 20 six-03AP. And I believe did the applicant have something they needed for this?

Good morning Mr. Mayor and members of City Council. I appreciate being allowed to speak. For the record, my name is Jeff Boone, Jeffrey Boone. I'm the attorney for the site development plan applicant. The Planning Commission unanimous approval decision has been appealed, so we're here responding to the appeal. My client is MAH Venice or otherwise known as Ajax and I'll refer to him as Ajax. Mr. Mike O'Ran and Ms. Natalie Woody, Mrs.

Natalie Woody are here Ajax with us this morning. I've asked to speak first because we being Ajax would like to request a continuance of the public hearing to a date certain. We can talk about the date later or in a minute, but the basis, I wanted to get to the basis for the continuance request. So what you have before you on the overhead is the one page of the site and development plan, again that was unanimously approved by the Planning Commission, but has been challenged, been appealed by McLeod Industries. What this plant and the issue has to do with an easement that runs through here, at least that's what the appeal states has to do with an easement here, that McLeod Industries presently, I'm going say McLeod, presently uses to access our property.

I've got an aerial that I can show you in a minute, but the traffic that presently runs through the middle of the Ajax property here, the site development plan proposes to reroute it to this route here. So to show you on an aerial, just to help locate this. This is Gene Green Road. Hang on a second. I'm looking at it upside down and that always presents challenges.

Let me do it this way. This is Gene here's Knights Trail, this is Gene Green Road here, this is the McLeod property is back here and it's hard to see on this area, I've got another one probably a little better, but this is the present access easement that runs through the property and it goes back to McLeod's operations back in here. This is a little blown up, it's easier to see. So here's where Genie Green Road comes in. This is the Ajax operation and the access easement presently runs through here and then turns and continues up.

The reason why Ajax one of the reasons why Ajax and the main reason why they want to relocate this to run-in this manner here is because of safety concerns. They are going to be expanding their operations in buildings, new buildings, and they don't want people to be walking across this route. So we're requesting the continuance because Ajax would like additional time to work with McLeod Industries to see if something can be worked out that McLeod be agreeable to, that would work for Ajax as well to address these safety concerns and hopefully we could come to a resolution where Ajax would agree to whatever changes that McLeod would want to have to the plan and then enter into an agreement with them and then would, that agreement, they would dismiss the appeal, and we wouldn't have to go through the hearing with you all. There has been an attempt by Ajax to work something out with McLeod, it just hasn't succeeded yet. And we're still holding out hope that maybe something can be worked out.

We were even hoping maybe this morning we might have been able to work something out, but here we are in a situation where nothing has been agreed to yet. The delay of getting the site and development plan approved only hurts Ajax. McLeod can continue to use the access just the way it is today and will continue to be able to use it today until something is approved by the city, that would have some other sort of route and since McLeod has the appeal filed, we can't force them to dismiss their appeal. In other words, the only harm here is to Ajax and just a delay in being able to move forward with their redevelopment plans on their property.

What's the date you'd like Mr.

Boone? Well, we were going to ask for June 9, but you all earlier today canceled that meeting. So that leaves us due to availability of the folks we need to have here asking for the July 14 meeting.

Okay. Then I'll entertain a motion from a council member to.

Mr. Mayor before, just at least allow the appellant to speak to that, availability, Absolutely.

All right. Thank you, Mr. Boone.

Good morning, commissioners. Good morning, Madam Clerk, Mr. City Manager and, City Attorney. My name is Darren Parks. I'm an attorney with Grimes Galvano, and I represent the appellant here, is seven hundred Jane Green LLC. This is the first time hearing of the request for the continuance. For the record, we are not necessarily opposed to a continuance of this hearing, as long as everything is stayed pending any future hearing or reconsideration or rescheduling of this particular appeal. As for the date, I think that's what Ms. Fernandez was referring to, giving us an opportunity to come up here. The fourteenth is an impossibility.

I did not know we were going to be looking at these dates, but I'm out of the country. My kids are in school, so we're traveling for the summer. So it would have to be sometime after that or before if we could do it. I mean we're fine proceeding today. We're fine proceeding at any meeting between now and July or we can do it after the July 14 date.

Do both parties need a minute to figure out some dates? We can take a quick recess. We'll take a five minute recess. We'll be back at 10:25. I've got a okay. We are back, and I don't know if the both parties have agreed to a date.

Yes, sir, Mr. Mayor and counsel, thank you. For the record, Jeff Boone, we have discussed with the appellant's attorney. We are in agreement on the August 25, which we believe just want to confirm that that is your first council meeting after your break. It traditionally is. Yes. Okay, so August 25. And then the other thing that Mr. Parks, the appellant's lawyer, had asked me to make clear is that Ajax will do nothing with the current site and development plan until we have the appeal hearing. That's how it works here in the city anyway.

There's no way that staff would accept any kind of an application for anything, billing permit or anything at all anyway. But just to make it crystal clear, Ajax under the currently approved by the Planning Commission, but under appeal site and development plan, they will not do anything with respect to that, moving forward until we have the August 25 appeal hearing. Thank you.

You're good? Okay. All right. Then with that I'll entertain a motion from a council member.

Just continue. Mr. Mayor.

Mr. Vice Mayor.

I move that we continue item 26 dash zero three a p until the August 25 meeting.

I'll second.

Seconded by Mr. Engelke. Any council discussion? Seeing none, Madam Clerk, if you can get us ready for an electronic vote. Council members, when your lights are flashing, you can indicate your vote.

And madam clerk, you can tally and display. Passes unanimously. Okay. Onto ordinance number two zero two six dash one nine. Public hearing is now open. Madam clerk, when you're ready, you can go ahead and read this ordinance by title only, please.

An ordinance of the city of Venice, Florida amending the code of ordinances chapter 70 traffic and vehicles by amending section seven dash 10 school zone speed infractions adopting findings authorizing the placement installation and operation of a speed detection systems on specified roadways maintained as school zones for Venice Elementary that constitute a heightened risk providing for repeal of all ordinances and conflict here with providing for severability and providing an effective date.

And then do we have any written communication? No. Then we'll go ahead and entertain a presentation by staff if there is one.

If needed.

Any questions from council?

We do need a short presentation, chief, about so you all can make the determination of there being a heightened risk. It's a requirement of the statute so I just want to make sure we don't skip over something that could cause us harm in the future.

That's what we pay you the big bucks for.

And just just for this particular school zone that's being added on.

Chief Andy Leisnerring and Lieutenant Matt Sochnitz and I'll turn over to Lieutenant Sochnitz to fill in.

Yes. So we would be expanding the school zone to basically match the school zone, the frontage of Venice Elementary. Don't know if I can

Oh, you need the document?

Yep. Just kind of show you some statistics. Just to show you some statistics this is a two day study back in 2024. Again, this is the frontage. So this would be addressing the amendment to the ordinance to add the school zone cameras in front of Venice Elementary.

In that two day period, there is a recording of nine seventy two vehicles. Of that, two seventy violations. So this study looked at violations 11 miles above the speed limit in that school zone. So that is a risk. Further when you're talking about elementary school kids, you have unpredictable behavior with kids. We have more student walkers, more parent drop offs. Encompassing the frontage of the Venice Elementary School basically connects the both school zones and it creates consistency and broader compliance with the school zone speeding.

Okay. Any questions from counsel? Ms. Frank?

I don't know if it's related to the cameras but on that sheet it said the school zone operational hours were from 06:15 to 07:15 I believe. I know that Vanessa Elementary starts school at 08:30, so I didn't know if we could continue the school zone hours to when school actually starts?

Well, we're going to because essentially this is going to be just one long school zone to cover the high school and the elementary school. So we'll start it at the earliest time of the first school, which is the high school and we'll end it at the latest time.

Great. So it'll be extended past 07:15 in front of Venice Elementary or will it stop at 07:15 based on?

Yes, the start

time. For Venice L, I do not. I believe it would be 07:15

after. You

intending to run it through without stopping during the day when school is in operation too?

Yes, that's correct.

So then it would just start at the earliest time and then go all the way until the end time of the elementary school without ceasing?

Yes, that's correct. Sorry, misunderstood the question.

Great. So just to clarify though, it would start at 06:15 and end at 04:15 and there would be no interruption in between that?

Correct. It would be active that entire time.

Wonderful. Thanks.

Mr. Weed?

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Let me make sure I understand this. You say the violations that were noted, are those violations in excess of 25 miles per hour that were noted?

Yes. So that, I'm good and put you to another page. Excuse my chicken scratch up here. If you look at the bottom of the document, let's go through. Actually, you're gonna have your times of your violations. Yes. So the middle portion right here is gonna be excess of 26 miles per hour. There's a handful of them, you know, keeping it below. These these camera programs are designed to change behavior. So, once that behavior has changed, obviously you got a lower threshold of people traveling and it increases reactionary time, so it's it's it's does a lot for safety.

You want my opinion, these are very high. So 107 violations within two days is pretty high. So hopefully that's that will flatten the curve through the learned behavior of these cameras. But to answer your question, yes, there were three violations over 25 miles per hour.

And I guess my question is, mean with a speed limit of 15, but it only issues citations above 25. Is there a reason that 10 mile an hour buffer it seems like a large buffer to me. I don't know why it wouldn't be 21 versus 26. Essentially, we're just following

the state statute on it. And that way when we issue the citations, it's kind of hard to argue that when you're going 10 miles an hour plus over the speed limit through a school zone that a citation is not warranted.

Well, thank you very much. Appreciate that explanation.

Mr. Vice Mayer.

Thank you. One time we talked about doing something at Epiphany, this does not include Epiphany. What's the story here?

Epiphany is included. That was already part of the original ordinance. So this is just amending to extend from the high school to the elementary school that specific location. So Epiphany has not changed.

All right, thank you. Ms. Frank?

Yes, maybe not directly connected to this but I know previously when the issue came up we talked about increasing the signage with maybe even exact hours posted. So people driving through when they think okay it's not you know the beginning of school or the end of school but if it's going to be active that whole day I think making sure signage is clear and that the blinking light notifying vehicles that school zone is still active would be paramount before the cameras are implemented just to clear up any confusion.

Yeah, and this actually extending the space actually helps with that warning. Looking to add an additional flashing light. We'll make sure there's sufficient warning both directions but that way it's just one section so people aren't trying to figure out, am I in the school zone, am I not? It's just one area that's well designated by signage.

Extremely helpful. Thank you both for your work on this.

Okay. Seeing no one else, is there anybody signed up to speak Madam Clerk?

No. Okay.

Public hearing is now closed. I'll entertain a motion.

Mr. Mayor.

Mr. Engelke.

I move that ordinance number twenty twenty six-nineteen be approved on first reading and scheduled for final

reading. Seconded by Mr. Howard. Any council discussion? Seeing none, madam clerk, if you'll make us ready for an electronic vote. Council members, when your lights are flashing, you can indicate your vote. Madam clerk, you can tally and display. Passes unanimously. On to ordinance number two zero two six dash zero six. Public hearing is now open. Madam clerk when you're ready you can go ahead and read this ordinance by title only please.

An ordinance of the city of Venice Florida amending the city comprehensive plan and associated pages pursuant to petition number 25 dash 73 CP specifically to update data for each mixed use land use designation within each neighborhood area of the city as a result of new development through 11/01/2025 providing for repeal of all ordinances in conflict here with providing for severability and providing an effective date.

Okay.

Any communication since last hearing?

No.

Okay. And do we have a staff update? No? Okay. Then madam clerk, do you have anybody signed up to speak?

No. I don't.

Public hearing is now closed. I'll entertain a motion.

Mr. Mayor. Mr. Vice Mayor. I move the ordinance twenty twenty six dash service six be approved and adopted.

Second. Seconded by Mr. Ingelkie. Any council discussion? Seeing none, madam clerk, if you'll make us ready for an electronic vote. Council members, when your lights are flashing, you can indicate your vote. Madam clerk, you can tally and display. Passes unanimously. On to ordinance number two zero two six dash one eight. Public hearing is now open. And madam clerk, can read this ordinance by title only when you're ready.

An ordinance amending City Of Venice ordinance number twenty twenty five dash 32 as previously amended which adopted the official budget of the City Of Venice, Florida for the fiscal year beginning 10/01/2025 and ending 09/30/2026 by increasing the total revenue by $4,916,229 and total expenditures by $4,916,229 and providing an effective date.

And do you have any written communication since last hearing?

I don't.

All right. Is there an update from staff? All right. With that do we have anybody signed up to speak? No. Public hearing is now closed. I'll entertain a motion. Mr. Mayor. Mr. Engelke.

I move that ordinance number two zero two six dash 18 be approved and adopted.

Second. Seconded by vice mayor Bolt. Any council discussion? Seeing none, madam clerk, if you can make us ready for an electronic vote. Council members, when your lights are flashing, you can indicate your vote. And tally and display, madam clerk, passes unanimously. We'll go ahead and take a ten minute break and return at 10:50. Okay. We are back. We're on the new business.

Council action to discussion two six Dash0603 appoint a student member to the citizen advisory board to serve a term from 06/01/2020 '6 to 05/31/2027. Madam clerk, have anybody signed up to speak? No. Then with that, I would move to appoint Lily Smith to the student seat on the citizen advisory board to serve a term from 06/01/2026 to 05/31/2027. I'll second. Seconded by mister Engelke. Any council discussion? Alright. Seeing mister Weed.

Thank you mister mayor. I would just like to say I'm very impressed with the slate of applicants we've gotten. This is just such a fabulous community and I have great hope for the future and looking at the these young people that have been recommended to us and I know we can only choose one, but just I wish the very best for all these applicants. What a fine what a fine roster they've given us.

Thank you for those comments. Alright, Madam Clerk, if you'll ready us for an electronic vote. Council members, when your lights are flashing, you can indicate your vote. And you can tally and display Madam Clerk. Passes unanimously. Alright. We are on to two six dash zero six zero four and this is airport management policies put on by mister Howard. Mister Howard, if you'd like to introduce the topic.

Thanks, Mayor. As we're all aware, we've heard concerns from our residents related to the airport. My agenda item is to discuss airport management in terms of ground operations, ramp use, tenant and city responsibilities.

All right, thank you sir. Madam Clerk, you have anyone signed up to speak?

Yes.

Okay, how many?

Two.

All right, let's start with our first speaker.

Our first speaker is Christopher Durbach. He has five minutes.

Mr. Durback, good morning and welcome.

Good morning.

I'm moving as fast as I can here.

Oh, take your time. No rush.

Good morning, counsel. Didn't know I was gonna get the hot seat right off the bat. My name is Chris Derbek. I was asked to speak by quite a number of people in the community, both for and against the airport. But I want to give you a small little background.

I used to run an airport in Maryland, and I have gone through probably all this stuff once or twice before, and I do not envy the seven of you sitting up there. But that being said, I wanted to just give you some small comments on things that happened in Maryland when I was running my airport. Most notably, environmental. We had probably one of the largest fuel spills in the Chesapeake that had ever happened until apparently two weeks ago when Andrews Air Force Base beat us on that one. But these things came because environmental safeguards were not put in place before the expansion started.

And this is just something that I just would like to just kind of caution the council on to really dig into. I know you're going to hear everybody talk about noise pollution and this and this and this, but ultimately these things do over time cause problems. I would hate to see more red tide in The Gulf. I would hate to see anybody in the community really impacted negatively from things we could have just fixed from step one. Personally have been at the airport, I fly out of there, I'm a pilot, so I have best interest on all sides of this.

But it's also good to know that the community is heard. So one of the things I do want to say is that it's nice that you guys are at least having these meetings and listening to the community. Unfortunately, I was in the hot seat, we had farmers and farmers are very difficult to deal positive ways. So it's nice to see that the city is trying to do this in a positive way and listen to everybody's impact and input as we go along. The last thing I'd just like to kind of conclude with is that I know that ultimately this is a very hard decision to decide what is the right answer, what is the wrong answer.

I hear everything from businesses will thrive and people saying, No, businesses aren't thriving, etcetera, etcetera. But I would just implore the council to really dig in and look at both sides of argument before a decision is really truly made because all these impacts, how they have on the city and over the course of the next five years can be a huge, huge deal. Just in a five year period of working in the airport I was at, we saw impacts that were incredibly negative and it took me almost well, actually it's still ongoing to now. The new airport manager who took over for me is still dealing with that and it's going into the better part of ten years. So I would just like to just caution the council as you start making these decisions going forward.

And I'm more than happy to answer questions if the council was ever, hey, what happened? I'll show you all the lovely pictures of animals dying and marshlands being completely polluted, but also there's positives as well. So I'll show you the good pictures as well. Anyway, thank you very much.

Thank you for your comments. Madam Clerk, next The

next speaker is Tracy Kehoe.

Mrs. Kehoe, good morning and welcome. My

name is Tracy Kehoe and I'm speaking as a citizen and not in the position of being on the cap panel. Would first like to say I'm not against the airport and I am of the mindset that we need to work together to come up with solutions so that the airport and the citizens can be good neighbors to each other and live together in peace and harmony. I would like to request a few things. First I would like to request because I think communication is so important and I feel that if the counsel or Nick or James could communicate that this airport will not ever turn into a regularly scheduled carrier airport or a part 139, I think if you could say something to that effect, it would really calm the community. Because all the appearances, though it might not be intentional, and everyone says they do not want to be a part 139, to the lay person, the infrastructure that's being proposed, and again this is not me Tracy Kehoe saying it, this is the hundreds of neighbors that I talk to every day.

There is a big fear that this is going to be a regionally scheduled airport, a jet carrier airport. Right now we are already a non scheduled jet carrier airport is my understanding with net jets and exact jets and all the other jet companies that fly in here. So what the community is hearing is a tower. And I think the tower is completely understandable and very important from what I am told that the pilots will have safety, more safety with the tower. But beyond the tower, when you look at the other details such as the terminal, which is an office building but it's called a terminal, the fire department possibly having two trucks, I honestly think if you could say we are not going to pursue the fire truck and delete that from the master plan, it would give everyone a lot of relief.

Because you can't have a part 139 without fire truck. And we have the FAA requires that a fire truck be 10 within the airport and we have one like two to three minutes and then there is the 30,000 square foot firehouse I believe being built on Venice Avenue. And then in the master plan we heard they were redoing the taxiway for larger jets to be able to turn, having months of jet fuel on reserves but they didn't talk about low lead gasoline on reserve for piston aircraft. Recently hired a grant writer to pursue possibly more grants but they are managing the grants that are already there. But I think the fear is when you take more grants there are strings attached and the FAA will have more control.

So all these details being put at the community all at once without hearing from the first CAP meeting, the community spoke loud and clear that they would like some environmental mitigation strategies and tactics put in and then we just had the second CAP meeting and it was a two hour and twenty minute meeting with only one sentence about environmental impact. And the community would like to preserve the John Nolan vision for the island which is a big part of the island. Anyway I just think the community would be really grateful if the consultants could incorporate somehow the John Nolan vision especially on Harbor Drive and Airport Road. And I would just like to second what Janice said about we would really like to have all those environmental tests done and we can get a baseline. I think that would go a long way to calm the neighbors' concerns.

I think the airport will be a big part of everyone's legacy here and we just hope that you will just really understand what you're going to be approving and just help us preserve the open land and pursue grants to preserve the open land. Anyway that's all I have to say I just like to work together with you all so that we can all live harmoniously together. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Madam Clerk, next speaker.

The next speaker is Marty Dover.

Ms. Dover, good morning and welcome.

Mayor and counsel, I hadn't planned to speak but there's so much misinformation being spewed out here today that it's making me a little irritated. The last speaker, I want to appreciate her very much because she seems to understand that the problem is communication. I, as a thirty year resident of Venice and an honorary member of Vassy, which only one person remembers, and someone who lived a block from the airport for nine years, I understand their problems. The fumes from jets sitting at the airport were overwhelming when we had a south wind. I no longer live near the airport.

I live on Groveland Avenue which is off the island. But now I have the airport school students flying over my house every day one after the other, doing their turnaround right over my neighborhood. So I feel the effects of the airport. But what is bothering most of the people who are up here speaking today is fear. It's all fear based.

They fear that it's going to become a commercial airport. That is not going to happen. We cannot expand the footprint of the airport. It is what it is. You can't expand it into The Gulf or onto 41 or across the creek, it's not going anywhere. You can't make larger, longer runways that will accommodate commercial flights. It's not going to happen. They say, oh, it's gonna have a terminal. You know what that terminal is gonna be? It's gonna be an office.

The one we have there, that's a misnomer. It's going to be an office building, not an airport terminal. So by using the word terminal, you have caused these people all this fear. It's not going to be a airport terminal, it's going to be an office building. So call it what it is. Don't scare these people. You're talking about a tower. In their minds, they're seeing a tower at a commercial airport with air traffic controllers in it. That's not what it's gonna be. It's gonna be a 20 foot post with cameras on it being remotely monitored so that the planes that fly in here will follow, be forced to follow the fly friendly rules.

As it is now, there's no one monitoring them, they just come in and do as they damn please. So don't call it a tower, call it a pole. It's what it is. It's miscommunication. It's got these people all fired up, And people who don't like the airport fire them up even more. So what we need here is clear communication. I understand that there have already been multitude environmental studies done at that airport. If so, then tell us what the results were. Don't keep it a secret. What did they say?

Is there run off or isn't there? They think there is. Prove that there isn't or fix it, one or the other. But let's communicate. That's my that's my ask of you right now. Communicate clearly. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments. Alright. Keep it keep it down. Okay. Mr. Howard, did you have a motion?

Yes, Mayor, I do. I would like to direct staff to perform a legal review of the current lease and initiate discussions with FBO on ground operations. And I would like to review an update of the airport operating standards and report back to counsel as soon as possible, but no longer or later than sixty days.

Second. Seconded by Vice Mayor Bolt. Counsel discussion. Mr. Howard, did you have something you wanted to say?

I do. Thanks, Mayor. Okay. Before my first bite of the apple, as the mayor usually calls it, I'd like to acknowledge the gondolier on their May 9 article in the opinion section. The headline read, let's have a robust factual debate about Venice Airport.

It was very well written, fact based and touched on most, if not all of the misinformation and truths about our historic Venice Airport, the challenges we're facing today. Since Bob Mudge is sitting in the chambers, I would like to extend to you in the gondola a big thank you. It was well done. I'll tell Bob Vetter that you got a shout out. Over the past year or so, we've noticed a shift in activity at the Venice Airport.

Increased urban traffic, extended ground operations and more intensive use of ramp space have brought renewed concerns from surrounding neighborhoods. Residents are raising consistent issues around noise, prolonged APU use and air quality impacts as a result. At the same time, we recognize the airport's importance as a public asset supporting jobs, emergency services, flight training and economic activity. We also operate on the framework of the Federal Aviation Administration, which limits our ability to restrict aircraft types or access. So the question is whether we support the airport, I think we do.

The question is how we manage its growth response to being compatibly with our community. I attended both CAP meetings and I want to thank the residents, airport leadership, organizations, consultants and city staff for everyone's contribution. The information provided from all perspectives was invaluable and I know that was a concern by a lot of folks that we didn't have all the details as a council. Trust me, we do. While the complaints covered both in the sky and on the ground, three common complaints were heard consistently throughout the meetings, emails and phone calls by me.

Those complaints were number one, noise due to prolonged APU use number two, jet exhaust fumes due to prolonged APU use and number three, air quality as a result of the exhaust fumes from prolonged APU use. There's kind of a circle right. The city of Venice and Venice Airport have no control over the sky, but we do have control over the ground and where in my opinion, we can make the most substantial and timely impact in addressing these three core complaints. I'm not minimizing any of the other concerns noted by residents. I'm simply focusing on attention what we can control in a timeless manner that's most impactful.

My understanding that noise and environment is part of the plan. With the support of my colleagues, would like to make this motion so the topic is on the floor and open for discussion by all council members and in the sunshine. Thank you, mayor.

Alright. Madam Clerk, if you'll reorder Vice Mayor Bolt since he was the seconder by code, he's next.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Howard, for that motion. I think we've seen and heard very much from the community of what they're interested in. I think the one thing that is missing, unless I didn't understand the full motion, one of the things that's missing, and I think that it's begun based on what I've heard, but I'm very concerned that we stay out in front of the environmental study.

Having been in the chemical industry for a long time, I know these things take time. What you're really looking for as a community can be different from what we initially look at for an environmental study. We need to know what the FAA requires for the overall master plan etcetera, etcetera. And I think some of that's begun. We can ask the airport manager or the city manager. But that is a concern of mine that we stay out in front of that. That's something that we can do now, get started now and not wait until the end of the master plan program. So I don't know if we can if that actually falls in your motion or not.

I was going let the city manager speak to that but Okay.

Thank you, Vice Mayor. So talking about the environmental, we covered a lot of ground today. Environmental is top priority to us. Here at the city, we do a lot of environmentally sensitive operations. Our water plant, our wastewater plant, solid waste, the fire department, we deal with environmentally sensitive operations throughout the city. And it all comes down to the regulatory requirements and being absolutely certain we are meeting those requirements. I can tell you for the airport, we have done a thorough review. We are fully in compliance with every state federal regulation, environmentally speaking. There have not been any spills. There's thorough inspections done on a regular basis.

But despite all of that, the master plan will include an environmental environmental analysis, and that will be part of the discussions that are coming up. If additional environmental studies are needed, we are fully committed to doing those environmental studies. I will say a lot of the concerns are fear based, but there's not real evidence to support that and I think that's important. If there is real evidence, we will absolutely take that action. Also wanna add that the confusion about the master plan, a lot of it stems from the idea that this is authorizing some sort of development or expansion.

We heard the word expansion a lot today. That is not what a master plan is, that is not what a master plan does. And we are gonna keep saying that until I'm blue in the face, until we all get a good understanding of what that means. A master plan is just that, it is a plan. Similar to our comprehensive plan for the city. It's a long term plan on how we will address safety, aviation, and community concerns into the future. We already have a master plan on the airport. It's in place and active today. Unfortunately, it's old. We're supposed to update that plan every ten years and we're at fifteen years now.

Many of the concerns that we're dealing with now, environmental noise, expansion that's already happened, could be attributed to poor planning because we have an older plan. So bringing a plan up to date with the new concerns and the growth that has happened in operations or have been growth in operations is very important. But just to go back, this plan will not authorize any projects, will not authorize any construction. The only projects we have in the works right now is the Administration Terminal Building. To be very clear, it does house our administrative offices and it has a community room in the bottom, when that's the the terminal term comes from that community public space.

Those projects that project will require full environmental reviews, which have already happened to get all the permits required. We're also looking at expanding the T hangers, which is something that we talked about entering into a public private partnership to expand those tee hangers. That will have a whole another set of environmental reviews. So anytime we are going to actually execute a project, that will spur a next round of environmental reviews. Those are the only two projects the city has in progress right now.

That's it. The master plan will help lay the framework for the future. It's very important. I totally agree with all the comments today on the significance of it, but we got to be real clear on what it doesn't do. So finishing with the environmental closure here, the consultants have we heard at the CAT meeting from two of their aviation engineers. They have an entire environmental team that was not there. They will be coming back in November with their environmental team and I've told them personally that I want them to let us know if there's anything additional we need to do on the environmental front in addition to what they're already planning. Thank you.

Thank you. Can I just elaborate on some of I think what I have heard and correct me if I'm wrong, but for one thing, we're five years past when we should have had a master plan done? This terminal building or office building that we're building should have been done a number of years ago because it's in such bad shape. So the impact of all of this is that you as the public are seeing all this at one time whereas you should have seen it one piece at a time which is what it should have been because now it looks like we're trying to build a commercial airport and that's not the intent. I can tell you that if I'm around, that is not going to happen.

I'll vote against it every time. That's not what we need. But we need what we do need is a nice airport that is functional and I think that we are working at that, right now on a pace that may or may not be acceptable to the public but we do have bureaucracy involved here. But I give the new airport manager, I give the city manager a lot of props because they are taking this very, very seriously as are we up here. I'm getting daily notes and calls and we're trying to do something about it.

So please just bear that in mind. This all came together at one time. It has a bad look about it but the reality is these are all things that should have been done before. Thank you.

Mr. Smith.

Thank you, Mayor and thank you Councilman Howard for bringing this onto the agenda. I had been asking if we could have a workshop with the council to discuss it and I appreciate having a little time here this morning for us to do that. I want to say I am impressed with the public input that we have received and at that recent meeting especially, with a couple of 100 people and I think 42 people signed up to speak. I believe that their input has been respectful, reasonable and thoughtful. And what I hope today we can do in the limited time that we have is maybe help get them answers to some of their questions.

I am very grateful for the comments from the City Manager, especially on the environmental efforts that will be made and that are part of this study because that is paramount among my concerns and what I've heard from the public is having some sort of an environmental study done. And so that assurance allows me to go forward waiting for those things to happen naturally in this process. But there are numerous other questions that have been raised and great suggestions or questions that I'd like to get answered. If it's appropriate, Mayor, I'd like to ask some of those of our airport director today, again with just the goal of giving people answer to some of their questions. If we can't do that, I'll just make some comments of my own on those things.

The appropriate forum right now is there is a motion on the table, you get ten minutes total to talk, it's not really an opportunity to workshop this. You can put a request for a workshop on the agenda if that's something you want to do, but right now this is more so to discuss the motion that's in front of us by Mr. Howard. Okay.

And this motion that's in front of us is to have a report back in sixty days and will that be something that's workshopped?

I would yield to the city manager on the format in which you guys would bring it back. Would it be a presentation or would we do it as council action and discussion? I mean, I don't know what actionable items would come from your presentation, so.

Sure. So if I understand the motion, it's to do a legal review of our existing agreement lease agreement with Skyport Aviation. I would presume we will sit down with them and discuss the lease and talk about what sort of voluntary or legal changes need to be made to help address these concerns, very valid concerns that have come from the citizens. We also will be directed to update what's called our minimum commercial operating standards, which is how all of our tenants on the airfield operate. And we do have some control to some degree over the ground operations at the airport.

So if it pleases the Board, I would suggest we do bring that back as a presentation so that we can be prepared and present our findings.

Okay. So at that point, you'd be asking questions versus a workshop format. But I mean, I think you could still ask questions in the meantime, it's just not it's not formal up on the You can

ask them here

though or no? You you can you can voice your concerns for the next eight minutes and then, there wouldn't be any feedback to those questions right now because staff wouldn't traditionally be prepared to give answers to questions on the fly.

He's taking my time. Anyway, alright. I had six or eight questions I wanted to ask. Obviously, I haven't got time to do that with the limit that we have on individual inputs. So let me just see if I can make a couple of points.

One, I really appreciated some of the emails we got from people, one from Janice Reardon and another one from Tanya Willard and here's an idea which I've not heard discussed at all, wanted to ask our airport staff if it's feasible, if it's possible, if it's anything that's viable and that started with a letter from Janice Reardon saying that she'd like to see us seek a conservation grant to preserve the open space that is essentially the golf course and make it permanently open space, not developed because there is a fear now that that golf course lease expires and we are going to do a request for proposals that there will be proposals to build hotels and any other thing on that same space. And I think the city population at large wants that to stay open space, they might want it to be a golf course but if not a golf course, then open space. And then another letter from Tanya Willard said that the FAA supports green space being created and preserved. And again, Ms. Reardon was saying that there are grants that could be sought to make that what happens with the golf course property.

So I want to know if we have looked at that, if that is feasible, if that is viable, if that's something we can pursue. Soon. Okay. You'll give me a minute warning, won't you, Mayor?

I'll give you a minute warning. I also have some guidance for

you I'll give you at

the end too just so that you So let me just interrupt you and I won't take away from your time. All of these things that you want to address, just like Mr. Howard put it on the agenda, you can do the same. So we could actually have a full discussion on all of these items, You just got to put it on the agenda. So that way staff is prepared for whatever we're going to be directing them to do and whatever the council is, you know, they can research it up to. You can go ask staff questions I'm all

just looking for a consensus of the council that they want that before I make that kind of action. And so if I hear lots of support for that idea, I will definitely

Would that be like me waving my hands in the air saying go wrong go? I don't Uh-huh.

You'll second the motion when I make it? It's very possible. Possible. I need more than that. Okay. Down to five minutes. No, no, I didn't take away

from your time, you still got plenty of time, go ahead. Okay.

People have been asking for a noise study and so I tried to do a little research on that for myself, a part 150 study, what is it, what's required for it and the question I had for staff is there a lesser version of it because it's fairly expensive. But let me read real quick what I read on a Part 150 study. It's a voluntary federal process where the operator, us, works with the FAA to identify noise impacts and develops mitigation strategies such as soundproofing, land acquisition or operational changes. And then this, a Part 150 noise study is typically prepared by an airport interested in improving compatibility with local communities. Well that sounded like a no brainer as my friend, the Vice Mayor likes to say.

We are that community that is interested. So I look a little more and I asked our airport director and he said it is an expensive thing and it's less expensive if there are already established excesses of noise which we don't currently have. But we want that and so my question is, is there a lesser version of that that doesn't cost as much as I was told it could cost $1,000,000 and that we might not be able to afford that. And looking at Naples, not a peer airport but they did a noise abatement study, whatever that is, part 150 in 1997, they updated it in 2010 and they just did it again in 2024 and it's like they're very concerned about the noise problem there and why would we not be just as concerned with everything that we're hearing from airport neighbors. So that's my question on that point and maybe I have time for one more and we'll save the rest for when Mr.

Howard brings us back to a workshop. But I would like to encourage our airport staff, I'd like the whole council to encourage them to be more aggressive in following through on the fly friendly program. I had an understanding with the previous airport director that he was going to put in place a program that went like this, you violate those fly friendly procedures, you will get a letter because we know the tail number and it will tell you that you're violating our procedures, here are the procedures, please follow them. And if the same plane reported a second violation, he would call them personally and say, I'm the airport director, I sent you a letter, you're violating our procedures, do you need help understanding what it is we're asking you to do? Then, he said if they got a third violation, he would post it publicly.

And that would work. It's a very aggressive plan of letting people know you are continuously violating it. And just like when the newspaper prints a health violation at a restaurant, those restaurants are tremendously impacted and then they lose business and they improve their processes. If we did that plan, which the previous airport director told me he was going to do, we would have better compliance because if we posted the frequent violators, their neighbors would say, what are you doing? You're one of the problems and there aren't that many of these people.

Some of the violators are not from here, they're not gonna get to that third level. And we have Vassy and they're wonderful and they are trying to get their fellow pilots to follow the rules. So Vassy's not the problem, but the rogue pilots are and we need to communicate with them regularly, possibly with that three part plan. Now I was told when we had a new director and I certainly respect him, he didn't want to be that aggressive right away, he wanted to try some other things and we are trying some other things, we're trying to educate the flight school, we're trying to spread the word in other airports and we're trying to get the word out better, but we need a very aggressive approach, I believe, to the Fly Flandly procedures and make them, observe them. Can't make it mandatory, but you can certainly heavily encourage in an aggressive way that people honor our Fry Friendly Plan.

And I'm guessing that my time is up, and I'll save some things for another time, but thank you mayor for this and thank you Mr. Howard for getting it on the agenda.

Okay, we got a full board so we'll move on to Ms. Frank. No clapping.

Thank you. I wanted to just commend my colleague Mr. Howard for placing this on the agenda and agree with the motion that sits currently giving our City Manager direction to work with the FBO. I think Mr. Howard made it very clear and hopefully it will come out of conversations with staff just the prolonged APU use.

We've heard a myriad of concerns from residents and it's rewarding to see some of those concerns be addressed and mitigated as we continue the airport master plan. One example was we received an email saying the website form where you could issue a complaint wasn't actively being fed to the right person and so now it appears that that has been fixed. And so just from where I sit, I applaud the residents for continuing to bring us concerns as we are continuing through this process and then again thank you to my colleague Mr. Howard for stepping up and helping give our city manager and our staff direction to continue to mitigate some of these concerns we've heard. Thank you.

Mr. Weed?

Thank you Mr. Mayor. Ten minutes,

Total. Total.

First of all, I'd just like to say Marty welcome, but I have been a resident of the city of Venice since 1971, so I got fifty five years. And then these issues have existed since then. My mother, bless her heart, 89 years old now, and I mentioned to her the airport was coming up. She was the receptionist at the Venice airport FBO in 1972 and 1973, and she said, let me guess, they're calling and complaining about airport noise again. I'm like, yeah, well, there it goes.

So it's not new. I am also a history buff and I love the history of Venice. I just like to point out just as information, when John Nolan arrived in Venice to develop the City Of Venice plan for the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, there was an airport in Venice already. That airport was an area we now call Venice Elementary School and I think we can all agree that we are really glad it's not there anymore. And there is a lot of really interesting anecdotes on that.

Also, John Nolan never considered the Island Of Venice. The Island Of Venice did not exist until forty years after his plan, in the late nineteen sixties when the intercoastal waterway was dug. It was not an island. The airport that we know now today was established by the Army Air Corps in the nineteen forties and encompassed all the land South Of San Marco. That was undeveloped land.

Everything from San Marco South was developed by the Army Air Corps to fight World War II and I don't think that John Nolan saw that happening either. That all being said, have an airport. It's a fabulous airport. I support the airport very strongly. However, we have issues, we have problems. As I stated at our capital improvement plan workshop, when

I

saw that we had a comprehensive environmental study for the airport property that was scheduled for 2031, I stated publicly that I supported that but that was a five year plan out for an immediate concern. I think we need to address our residents environmental concerns immediately and I'll cover that in a minute. I would like to publicly say that I, as my colleague, Mr. Volta said, I will never support commercial scheduled airline traffic at Venice Airport. I do not think that is possible, I don't think it's a good idea and as long as I have a vote or a say, will be opposed to that type of a plan and I will publicly dedicate myself to that.

I would like to know if it would be appropriate to offer an amendment to the current motion, This has been made by my colleague, to include in this motion that within the next sixty days, the city staff, respond to the council, with an update in pursuit of a comprehensive environmental study of the airport and surrounding areas to include at least but not limited to air quality, water quality, and land to take soil test, water test, air test and at least come back to us if not with a proposal, I know it takes a long time in the government, an update on pursuing a proposal to do with that comprehensive study as soon as it's administratively possible. People say this is expensive but I can't think of a more appropriate expense for the city than to study the environmental impact on our air, our land, our water and our citizens. And I will offer that as a friendly amendment to the current motion if that is so. I would

second that.

Hold on. So what I'd like to do for the purposes of giving staff clear concise direction, let's take Mr. Howard's motion, let's take your additive to the motion, I think there's three key points here, adding the environmental piece and let's make that one solid motion so that we can repeat that and everybody know what they're voting on. So if you want to repeat your motion then you want to amend his motion with your additive of the environmental comprehensive environmental study or the feasibility of such study, I think that would be appropriate. Madam Attorney?

Yes, so you can have separate motion just on his addition. It is added on then we'll recap the entire.

I would propose we do this two separate motions.

Think that will make life a lot easier. We'll finish his and then we'll get to yours after that but I think I wouldn't have a problem with it.

Yes, did not know if a second motion would be entertained, that's why offered an amendment. Thank you.

So I'm going move forward with Mr. Howard's motion. So we'll go next to Mr. Ingleke, Madam Clerk reorder me after him and then Mr. Howard you can circle back after that.

So just for clarity, so we have amendment to the motion. So we need to take care of the amendment first before we got to Mr. Howard's motion.

Oh, we're sorry.

That's the

main motion. His amendment to the main motion.

I think he was offering a friendly amendment and we decided to do it in a second motion.

I will rescind my second.

Thank you.

There you go.

Okay. Mr. Ingleke.

Thank you. Mr. Howard, thank you for bringing this up. Obviously it's a very contentious time in the city with the airport. I am fully supportive of the airport. I will go on record by saying I am not supportive of any scheduled commercial flights. So, I think you heard that from three of us right now. So, I'm looking at this and some of this was already addressed, by the city manager. But this is a long term study. We're not making any decisions.

What we're doing, we're gathering information about decisions we might be making and we're getting a lot of input about what some types of the inputs we should be gathering. And the request for inputs I think excellent. I fully support environmental types of studies. With that, we have two different things going on here. We have a long term plan and then we have operational, issues.

And I think some of the operational issues can be addressed a little bit more immediately and this may be another amendment or another motion because if I recall the original motion talked about reviewing the legal contracts with the FBO. I'm not an expert on airport operations, but I think there's probably more than just the FBO involved here. There may be things that we as a city can do that are more operational that are not, long term. And I think my motion would be, if we were to talk about it a little bit further, would be to come back in sixty days and say what types of operational changes can we make immediately or within a reasonable amount of time that are not long term, that are we don't need $100,000 worth of studies or $1,000,000 worth of studies, but there's going to be certainly some things that I think we can do. We're talking about the, GPUs.

Is that something that we can do more operationally as opposed to long term? So I'd like to kind of separate some of that and say, let's understand that this is a long term and we're getting information right now. We're asking for information. We are considering all the information, and that's separate from maybe something we could do now. So in terms of the operational issues, I don't think it's just FBO.

There's more to it than that. And I'm not sure what they are, but I guess I would be saying, hey, Citi, can we identify a couple of those operational changes that can be put in relatively soon. And then secondly, we're going be doing a lot of, environmental studies and I do like the idea of all the studies, looking into the study of the studies that we're doing. But we're going to be required to meet a whole bunch of environmental standards. Maybe we can kind of outline and communicate to the public, hey, we have to do this anyway, one, two, three, four, five, and maybe put that out there and say, hey, we understand the concerns.

We're working towards it. We can't do certain things anyway unless we meet certain federal and state guidelines. And I think we'd be extremely remiss if we started putting something out there without, a complete study of the environmental and some of which is already mandated, by the FAA, EPA, state. So maybe list some of those, studies that we're going be doing and some of the other studies that we might have to undertake to communicate to everybody in the town. That's kind of where I am.

I don't know how we want to work the sixty day or ninety day review of some of the quick operational things that we could do that are outside of the long term plan.

Mr. Clinch?

Thank you. I was just going to suggest the more specificity the better for our team. They've got a lot going on with the master plan which is taking a comprehensive look at the entire airfield. So zooming in on specific concerns is going to be the most effective for us to bring you back detailed information. Thank you.

Okay. I just wanted to make a few comments. So I know that we have put out kind of a frequently asked question worksheet. Guess what I'm looking to address is we're starting to hear and I think even today I started to get the definition of some of these acronyms but part 150, part 139, all these different things. I think that it's important to know can the council put into the master plan that we want no future scheduled commercial aircraft traffic.

I don't think anybody on the council would disagree with committing to that for the future if we're allowed to do that. I don't know what the FAA's stance is on that, but I think that's part of what I'm getting as a question right now is there's a lot of these different pieces and I don't think stopping a fire station just so you never get there is the right way to do it. I don't think that protects us and provides for safe operations in the future. So I wanna make sure that we do this smartly, versus putting roadblocks in that may prevent us from other benefits. The other piece that I wanted to get clarity on is, so we've got this frequently asked question sheet, perhaps we can expand it to address some of these things.

I absolutely agree and we've had these discussions many times about the definition of a terminal and why you have to use the word because of funding and FAA and all these kind of things even though it's not really a terminal. So I mean, you know, I I think that a lot of that stuff should be addressed in a in a very easy to access area whether it's the website or front desk or whatever it is so that that this can be easily grabbed by people. The other the other piece of it is if we've done environmental studies, it's all public record. If the city has done anything, it's public record. So, instead of forcing people to go do a a public record request to get that document or those documents, maybe we could we could do a synopsis or provide just the the plain documents as they stand, again somewhere else on the website to abate some of these questions that we're getting.

So I I think that, that was it was probably one of the the best points that I've heard is that communication is everything. So if we can continue, we've done a great job. I'm I'm not saying that mean like the the workshop was well attended, I we've we've had some great feedback, but if we can further enhance how we're communicating with the public, I've always said sitting up here at the dais now for seven years that everyone thinks you have the voice of the people and that you can communicate. It is so incredibly difficult to communicate with 30,000 people. So, whatever we can do to continue to enhance that, and I know we're working on the website, I know there's a lot of moving parts inside of the city, but again, even clearly defining some of these what part one hundred thirty nine, one hundred fifty, you know, terminal versus what that really is, I think all of those things would be beneficial.

And then again, of forcing people to go do public records requests, providing those documents since we're saying they exist, you know, somewhere easy for people to access, I don't think is a bad idea. So those those were the key points I wanted to hit. There's so much to unravel and and we're still in the process of of getting through the master plan to to continue to unravel. So I I don't want to go any further with that. Mister mister city manager, you're still clicked. So are you

I just wanted to comment on your your statement here. So we actually have developed a fact sheet that answers a lot of the questions that we're talking about today and it has some key terms on the back. We may add a couple key terms after today's meeting. But right now we have virtual tower defined, terminal building, fly friendly based aircraft. Also has the history of the airport, which we've talked about today, talks a lot about our federal obligations. Federal government has invested hundreds of millions of dollars into this airport and we are obligated to meet all of those requirements including environment. So we will be putting that out after this meeting with pending any final modifications that we make. Thank you.

If we go further, might be putting on a book, I think one page is good for now. Okay. So that city manager is now on to were you up next? He was. Okay.

I just wanted to say I had a technical issue. It was I lost

Rick

Smith and then I lost you. So on your speaker order, that's the order.

I I was watching it, it was going all over the place. I So I just started to wing it. Nobody out there knew it until you just called me out on it. So Okay. Mister Howard, you're next.

I wish we wouldn't let the court reporter leave because I'm gonna need her to play back all this conversation to keep up with my own motion. If I followed my colleague, Mr. Ingleke's comments, that was the core of my motion was what can we do that's immediate and most impactful. It was for the staff to review and update as soon as possible but no longer than sixty days. So I think that answered your question or your comments unless you still want to do a third amendment to the motion.

Can you reread your motion because I heard legal with the FBO and that was about it.

I'd be happy to. I would like to direct staff to perform a legal review of the current lease and initiate discussions with the FBO on ground operations. And I would like a review and update of the airport operating standards and report back to counsel as soon as possible, but no longer than sixty days. Did I check a box?

Half. You're talking about operational standards, that's a little mushy if we can tie that down a little bit better, maybe think of certain things where we can or identify all the operational standards or some of them, some of the major ones and then check the box, we get this one done, we get this one done, this is already done type of thing. It's just an expansion, a little bit more tight. But I think the city manager understands what's going on, what we're looking for.

I'll ask that question. Do you need a tighter motion? Do you understand what's being asked of you and do you need us to tighten up the motion?

I think the motion is great.

If you're

asking to also bring back some operational improvements that we're working on that came directly from the community, I can tell you, we have a strong robust list of items that we are working on. We're happy to report on that at the same time.

That would be very acceptable. Thank you.

Okay. So now I'd like to say my piece. Mr. Reed, thanks for the history lesson. That was great, by the way. I think it's I'm hearing consensus, none of us want commercial flights into Venice Airport. Of conversation. None of us are going to vote for that, I think is what I heard. Thanks city manager for bringing up the plan. I did my own research on a lot of this stuff and shame on us that the plan was as dusty as it was.

That was horrible. Our new airport director, by the way, he's got six months under his belt in his role and not much more for our city manager. So I'd appreciate support of these individuals dusting this plan off and getting it right. Every department in the city has a plan, whether it's police, fire, EMS, public works, that's all we do is plan. Any organization or company has plans.

How you're gonna move forward without a plan? I mean, it's it's imperative. And if you didn't have a plan, we wouldn't be talking about Northeast Parks or seaboard development or the the Venice Theater fly I mean, none of that stuff would be happening if it all wasn't in a plan. Residents spoke about, not today, but I heard over the two city meetings, fairgrounds, green space, I heard from one of the airport groups a learning center for the children. How would you ever address any of those without a plan?

Because every one of those those things require process or permits or environmental study or or something, but it it all has to be in a plan. I'd like to comment on the FBO. I do believe, because I've seen signs of it, they are a community engaged organization. They've supported our airport day. That was 4,000 residents, friends and neighbors showed up at that.

The prior year was 1,200. They opened up their offices for these pilots to share their airplanes and expense to fly children. They even let us go in there and wait to get our seats in Tony's restaurant. I mean, Suncoast Cafe, Us locals call it Tony's, the chef that owns a joint, we used to have to stand in the parking lot and sweat to death and sneak in some side door. So I know the f p FBO's intentions are good. I know they're focused on our community, and I'm convinced they're gonna work with our staff to address these issues. And if I can make one more comment. I don't like that stare.

Stop them now. I was just saying, are you asking? Don't get sassy. You get munchie?

Fly Friendly was developed by VASI, and Fly Friendly is a volunteer program. And to mister Smith's comments, yes, I wish we could put handcuffs on them and and strap them to a tree when they don't abide by our Fly friendly rules. It's not the local guys and girls, it's the transient pilots that come and go, wherever they come from and wherever they go to. The Which didn't come up today, and I'm contradicting myself because my motion was addressing immediate impacts that we can make to the airport, which is ground, which is the only thing we control, we can't control the sky. And I'm not gonna use the t word, I'm gonna call it a controller.

But let me give you an example, it was a great example that I that I read or maybe I made it up, I don't remember which. Imagine you're coming over the Venice Avenue Bridge and you At the bottom of the bridge, you come up to the traffic light and you got four lanes of traffic coming and going off the island and 41 north and south and you got two lanes turning left, one going right and one going north, and one going into the seven eleven gas station. Imagine that intersection as a four way stop. Or imagine that intersection with a roundabout. Imagine that intersection with a traffic cop.

Where's Andy? We got one police officer in the back. Imagine this gentleman standing in the intersection of Venice Avenue and 41, and we've all been there where he points to you and looks at you in the eye, and he goes, he does this. Or he points to you, looks at you in the eye and he does that. He's a controller. To missus Dover's comment earlier, a controller controls the traffic. And people that don't like planes flying over their their houses, I don't I wouldn't like that either. You're not gonna control that without a controller. Controller, we're already saying, we don't want commercial airlines, controlling is doing exactly that. They're controlling the flight pass, they're controlling the active runways.

I mean, give me a break, jets can land and cross winds that'll probably blow our cars off the edge of the road. It doesn't always have to be on the North South Runway. So, you you gotta embrace that. I mean, if there was one ask for me to to embrace for the safety, the the the control of the of the aircraft, got nothing to do with commercial anything, it it would it would be the right thing to do for everybody's complaints and and and all the angst that's being caused by by this t word that I refuse to use again the rest of my life. Thank you, mayor.

Anyone else? Okay. Then we will, at this point, vote on mister Howard's motion. Madam clerk, if you'll make us ready for that vote. Council members, when your lights are flashing, we can go ahead and indicate that vote. And then tally and display. Okay. That passes unanimously. And now I will entertain mister Weed's motion if you'd like to make that.

Thank you Mr. Mayor. And I do have this in writing for the clerk if she doesn't get it all. I would like to direct the airport staff and city staff as soon as administratively possible to develop parameters to perform a comprehensive environmental assessment of the airport property and neighboring areas to include but not be limited to air quality, soil contamination, water quality and to pursue vendor quotes to perform such study. Second.

Okay, seconded by Mr. Smith. Any counsel discussion? Ms. Frank?

I just want to clarify I heard it correctly, think it was clarified at the end that we are soliciting quotes, we are not directing staff to go out and execute the studies? Because I assume that would include like a budget amendment.

Yes, with the motion was to pursue vendor quotes to perform such study not to do the hiring.

Thank you.

City Manager? I just

want to also clarify what you're asking for is a comprehensive study. So what you're asking us to come back with is not options for studies, but a study that looks at every airport property which includes the municipal mobile home park, the golf course, the festival grounds, areas that haven't changed in fifty years. If that's what you're looking for, we can certainly bring that back. It will be on the scale of $500,000 to $1,000,000 or I would propose we can bring you back some choices at the same time as we bring back the presentation for Mr. Howard.

My proposal actually is to include those areas and including the neighboring areas, Flamingo Ditch, the Deer Valley area, the surrounding residential areas to find out what the environmental quality is in those areas of the soil, of the water quality, of the air quality. So it be even more sensitive than that.

Let's see, I got Mr. Inglekey.

You. Fundamentally, I like the concept but I'm a little concerned with one study. I'd rather go with some options, choose door number one, number two, number three and maybe highlighting some of the immediate issues, immediate concerns and staying away from the mobile home park and that type of thing other than how it may be impacted generally. But sticking with I think some of the more immediate airport environmental and so forth issues.

Vice Mayor Bolt?

Yes, I think what we are really wanting versus what we're hearing is we're really wanting something, city manager, we're really wanting something that will explain whether we have an air problem, whether we have an effluent problem as it is viewed by the public. That's what we're really after. Don't know, personally, don't need to know what's going on at the mobile home park unless of course they're affected by noise and some air quality stuff based on everybody complaining about jets. So to me, I think that again, this is sort of commonsensical. We have the public worried about certain things, rightfully so, and we need to look for ways to prove or disprove, I guess is a bad way of putting it, but it's true.

Prove or disprove, we have a problem. So I don't wanna get too carried away with all of this, at least from my personal standpoint, but I certainly would like to get this done. And the bigger we make it, the longer and more expensive it's gonna be. That's not really what we're looking for in my personal opinion. Thank you.

Madam Clerk, I can't tell if my screen is all the past or if those are all new folks. Okay, so Vice Mayor Wentzold, Mr. Weed?

Yeah, I'm just wondering because the term comprehensive environmental assessment seems to have a high definition with it. And I'm wondering if possibly I can amend the motion to say to perform an environmental review of the airport property and neighboring areas include not limited to air quality, soil contamination, water quality, etcetera. But to get rid of the words comprehensive environmental assessment and change that instead to environmental review so that we know what we're dealing with and then we can make the decision on how far we pursue it.

Does that help me?

I think I may have got into a term that had more meaning than what I was perceiving.

Mr. City Manager, does that help you?

That's very helpful and again, we are open to do whatever type of study you all decide. Just I think you what you're looking for is some choices on what those studies are going to entail. And it can from a cost perspective, get exponentially expensive to study areas that nothing's happened on, right? We have areas that are vacant open space, there's not going to be any environmental impacts on those areas because they haven't changed in one hundred years. So we want to focus, I would imagine, on the areas where there's actually activities happening that could generate pollution.

Okay. So with that, I would entertain that as a friendly amendment to the motion. I mean, it's your motion, but mister Smith, did you have any objection to that amendment? I have that. Okay. Alright. So then I see no other speakers. Everybody's spoken their piece? Okay. Alright. Let's move on to the, vote on this. Madam Clerk, if you'll ready us for vote. Council members, when your lights are flashing, can indicate your vote. And Madam Clerk, can tally and display the vote. Alright. Passes unanimously. Alright. We got two more items before we get to reports and then we have an executive session at 01:00. So let's try to get through the next one. This is an item put on by Ms.

Frank. It is 205 and this is in person option for land use neighborhood workshops. Ms. Frank, you'd like to briefly introduce the topic.

Yes. I was watching the most recent Sarasota County Commission meeting which took place last Tuesday and it was brought up that they were considering making some tweaks to their neighborhood workshop resolution and so their staff presented kind of the history on neighborhood workshops as it relates to Sarasota County and then the commission gave them direction. One was to as I understood it to require in person neighborhood workshops again as it existed before the pandemic and then two was they were actually considering increasing the mileage in which notification took place. So something from like two miles to four miles in an effort of transparency. So that's kind of the history of where this originated and why I put it on the agenda.

So my motion would be to

Not there yet. Not yet. Alright, Madam Clerk, anybody signed up to speak? No. Miss Frank, if you'd like to make a motion.

Yes, I'd love to. No one else wants from the public would like to speak. Would be to direct staff to present the history of the City of Venice's neighborhood workshop policies for our consideration to tweaks moving forward.

Second by Mr. Smith. Any council discussion? Are you hitting your button? Okay, go ahead.

For Steph's further clarification, I would love some history too since the city has moved to making in person neighborhood workshops optional if any of the applicants have actually taken advantage of that optional choice because my assumption would be that they would prefer, the applicant would prefer online version. So I would just like some history on what's actually transpired.

Okay. Alright, any other discussion? Okay, then Madam Clerk if you make us ready for an electronic vote. Council members when your lights are flashing you can indicate your vote. And Madam Clerk you can tally and display the vote. Passes unanimously. Last item on the agenda was added earlier. This is to consider canceling the 06/09/2026 meeting. I'll just go ahead and make the motion. Move Madam Clerk, do have any sign up to speak on this one? No. Okay. I move to cancel the 06/09/2026 meeting. I'll second. Seconded by Mr. Engelke. Okay. Council discussion. I kind of briefly said this earlier, there was really nothing scheduled on the agenda. There was one presentation that could very easily be moved.

We have budget workshops following that. I think it's beneficial for us to focus on that and not show up just to show up for fun. Any other discussion? Mr. Vice Mayor?

Just a matter of note, I was going to be out of the country anyway and had intended to zoom into it. So, and I always prefer to do things in person.

Mr. Howard? It was my birthday, so it's still my birthday. I'm probably glad not to spend my birthday in here.

Happy early birthday. Thank you. Okay. Madam clerk, if you'll make us ready for that electronic vote. Council members, when your lights are flashing, you can indicate your vote. And you can tally and display. Alright, passes unanimously. We will move on to charter officer reports. Madam attorney.

Nothing to report today.

Madam clerk.

I have no report.

Mr. City manager. Nothing here, sir. Council reports. Mr. Engelke. Nothing. Mister Weed? Nothing. Mister Howard? Nothing. Mister Smith? No. Miss Frank?

Nothing today.

Mister vice mayor? Nothing. And I will go ahead and pass so that we can move on to our executive session at 01:00. Madam Clerk, anybody signed up to speak?

No.

Okay. Then can I adjourn Madam Attorney? Do I need to keep it open for us to do executive session? It's completely separate from this meeting. So you're It's been a long time.

I this meeting is concluded. Alright. I

I will go ahead and adjourn the meeting.