City Commission - Regular Meeting

it today is wednesday august 12th 2026. it is now 6 0 5 pm and this is a regular city commission meeting of the city of west miami this meeting is called to order please rise from the vocation and the pledge of allegiance good evening i invite you to bow your heads with me

Heavenly Father, we thank you for a wonderful new day. Lord, as we sit on the eve of starting of a new school year, Lord, we see all the things that will happen tomorrow, old routines, traffic comes back. Lord, we ask for protection for everyone. Lord, we ask for our teachers, we ask for our students, for their families, for everyone, just starting a new routine and going into the fall. Lord, we pray for this evening. Lord, thank you for our mayor, commissioners, our city officials, our police. Lord, guide us and keep us, Lord, in this room as we discuss the important matters of our community. Guide us in everything we do in and outside of these quarters. In your name we pray, amen.

Roll call, please.

Okay. Mayor Diaz Padron here. Vice mayor Chavez jr.

Here.

Commissioner Ceballos here. Commissioner Blanes here. Commissioner De La Torre Gans here. Mayor, you have full quorum.

Thank you. Next item.

Next item. Item four presentation of minutes for approval. This is a four a July 15th, 2026 regular commission meeting.

Motion. Motion. Second. We have a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any against? Hearing none, item passes. Next item, please.

Next item, item five, public comments.

Anyone for public comments not related to any of the order in the public hearings? Going once, going twice. Next item, please.

Item six, report of the city manager.

Mr. Manager. Good evening mayor, uh, commissioners and guests. I'm, I have tonight along with our finance director, a report of the, uh, budget upcoming budget. But before we do that, Mary, would you want to see if somebody's here for in the audience and maybe move something forward? You just want me to go through this.

Let's do, let's, let's do this. Let's take budget right after we get through the, um, Items 10A. Hold on. 10A, 11A. Let's just get everyone out of the room.

Mayor Seth's going to ask for a deferral on 10A.

We're getting a deferral on 10A? Yes, sir. Okay. Let's get that out of the way. Read item 10A, please, so we can defer it.

Okay item 10 unfinished business 10 a resolution of the man City Commission of the city was Miami authorizing the city manager to accept the mitigation often the amount of to be determined for code enforcement needs for code violations at the property located at 6, 4, 3, 7, Southwest 16th Street West Miami Florida, providing conditions for compliance, providing that failure to comply will result in reinstatement of the original lean about and preventing for an effective team.

And a motion to the 1st of next meeting motion motion. Second, I'll first say aye. Aye. Let it be deferred. All right, aye.

Item passes.

Yes, aye. Can you read out all of the numbers, please, of the items where we have residents or affected parties here, applicants here? I think it's IJK. Item I, item A. J, item K. All right, let's just start off with item, if it's okay with the board, let's just start off with item, we'll go I, J, K, we'll skip down to A, and then we'll go back to manager for the budget presentation, and we'll take care of the ordinances following that. So let's, we're gonna skip around a little bit today, but let's go to item.

11 I.

Aye.

Item 11, aye. A resolution of the Mayor and City Commission of the City of West Miami authorizing the City Manager to accept a mitigation offer in the amount of to be determined for code enforcement liens for code violations at the property located at 1025 Sylvania Boulevard, West Miami, Florida, providing conditions for compliance, providing that failure to comply will result in reinstatement of the original lien amount and providing for an effective date.

You guys come forward. Can you say your name and address, director, please? Hello, Michael Alonzo.

Michelle Alonzo.

And address? 1025 Sylvani Boulevard. Thank you. Can we get an update on what we're dealing with today so that we know we have contacts?

Yvonne, if you can come up to the microphone and have the discussion. The amount of lien is $4,550. It's for a vehicle nuisance. It was an inoperative automobile that was sitting there and just... It was out there for 92 days, but if you have any questions, Yvonne can answer them as well.

Is there any other context?

Really, this one's pretty cut and dry. It was an inoperable vehicle that was parked there. They've already come before the Code Enforcement Board, and they have requested to come before you.

Okay. Is there a recommendation from staff before we hear from the applicant? Okay. Go ahead.

Well, the reason I'm here is I came before the board before and they lowered it to $600 from the original amount. I feel, I mean, I complied as it passed time on the time that he gave me, but I passed a week over the time that I had, I kept coming and explaining what was going on. I got rid of the car. There was two cars. It was my truck, which had low air and a tire and the other car, which, wasn't an operable it's just had a blown tire and i was i had it sold already so it was going to be removed by a tow truck and i was just waiting for the tow truck it was going out of state so i was waiting for the tow truck to be able to schedule a time these were in your driveway uh this is on my approach in front of the driveway okay and this is not a business you run this is these were your personal vehicles yeah my personal vehicle all right uh questions from the board any

From the time that you contacted the tow truck company and the time that they gave you the notice, how long was it in between?

So I had a notice for 30 days, then after those 30 days I came, or within those 30 days I came and I spoke here with the office, and they gave me another period of time, which I believe it was another 30 days. I know after those 30 days it took another week, but I made them aware of what was going on. um once i came again then it was already set for a hearing and then after that hearing like they lowered to 600 i didn't think i had to pay that since i was trying to comply and that's why they put a lien on the property and that's why i'm here so so it's it's defined as six hundred dollars It was lower to 600. It was lower to 600. At my last meeting, at least.

Yeah, can we have context there? Because we're getting different numbers.

So the Code Enforcement Board has the ability to reduce to a certain amount, and they were willing to reduce it to the 600, but he chose to want to come before you because he didn't feel he should pay anything. So there was never a motion made to reduce it at all. So the lien was set for the full amount of $4,651 with $25,000. That is what his lien is right now, not 600.

Right, and let me ask you, just procedural, if the Code Enforcement Board had actually gone through the motion of reducing it to $600, could he have still appealed to this board?

He could have. After the $600- Was he told that?

At the meeting?

He didn't want to pay anything. So there was no reduction made because he requested to come here and didn't want what was being offered at that moment.

Yeah, so my understanding was either one or the other. Not that I could have.

You can speak into the mic, please, just for the record. It's not my preference. I can hear you.

Yeah, so my understanding was that it was one or the other at the moment. Either I come here and discuss it or accept the 600 and never come here.

Right, understood. I think my main question was just that, the discrepancy between the two numbers. The 4550, how does that number get calculated? Just so I know, is that a certain amount of days?

Yes.

It was 92 days.

Yes, at $50 a day. And there's an initial fee that's always added at the beginning. So it was 92 days that the fine ran at $50 a day.

And there was a period for compliance before the $50 are running.

This was actually cited back in November 4th of 2025 was the original citation and compliance was April 28th, 2026. So the fine didn't start until January 27th, 2026.

Just to confirm, sir, you had the car sold but just parked there for six months? No, no.

So once I came to the city and to the office and we spoke, it was a matter of another 30 days and then a week after those 30 days. But it's what I extended. But it had been already sold for two weeks. But it wasn't six months. I mean, at least I wasn't aware of it for six months.

Vice Mayor, go ahead.

How long have you guys lived here?

Since 2015. 2015. I looked up your address just out of curiosity to see where the house was. A beautiful house. You guys obviously take care of it. Your hedges look nice. I mean, not that that goes into my thought process of mitigating a lien, but you guys have been here for over 10 years. I've never seen you guys before up here with any issues. It's a vehicle that was parked in front of your house. I understand that what we try to accomplish with violations is anything has to do with safety, with nuisances for your neighbors, things like that. I never got a single call about your car being in your front yard looking derelict, et cetera. I don't know if anyone here did. I understand that our staff has a job to do and there's cost to that job. There's cost to the processing, the paperwork. Mr. Manager, do we know how much cost that is for our city?

In terms of recording fees and penalties, that's $101.25. That doesn't include staff time or anything else. That's just recording fees.

For me, there are times that we have to be hard on residents, unfortunately. For me, at least right now, I don't think this is one of those times. You guys have lived here for a long time. Things happen. I mean there was maybe those miscommunication. I know our staff is very diligent. They do a great job Code enforcement they volunteer their time to come out here as well and they ran you through that process and it was it seems to be a little bit of a Miscommunication there as well. I sat on that board before there's times that we can only mitigate down to I think 15% there's times that we want to mitigate it down even lower and we can't and then the person would have to come you folks have to come before the Commission and Then we can mitigate it further as as of right now i mean to me i feel that at least if we can cover the penalties and recording fees 101 that's what i would motion for and and see what the rest of my colleagues feel but you guys have been here for a long time and we don't want to be you know so hard on residents especially for a vehicle and your house is well taken care of it's not something it's an eyesore so that's where i stand

Thank you. I just to make a point. I mean, for the years that we've been here, we've done quite a few things to the house. And I always got permits, I do everything by book. Unfortunately, this was something that it wasn't. It was out of my hands. I didn't really think it was an issue. But it became an issue.

Right? Look, I'm on the same boat. You know, This is not a process meant to punish you, but obviously you have to go to government meetings, which I don't think anyone likes to do. So that's punishment enough. So I think I'm in the same boat. I mean, look, if you were running an improper business out of your house, selling cars, flipping cars, and you had this derelict issue, it's a different story. I mean, I agree. I think let's cover the costs and let these people have dinner.

Go ahead.

All right, we have a motion.

Motion to set the lien amount at $101.

Second. We have a motion and a second. Call the roll, please.

Okay, Commissioner De La Torreganza, do you vote? Commissioner. So I use, how do you vote? Yes. Commissioner Bland is how do you vote commissioner advice? I'm sorry. Vice mayor Chavez jr. Yes. And mayor DS for Joe. Yes. Five zero item passes.

Thank you. Okay. Thank you very much. All good. Thank you. Have a good night. Next item, please. I'm James. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

Next item 11 J a resolution of the mayor and city commission of the city of West Miami, Florida, authorizing the city manager to accept a mitigation offer. and the amount of to be determined to satisfy certain code enforcement means recorded against a property located at 6, 1, 6, 6, 6, 1, 9, 0, Southwest HG, West Miami, Florida, authorizing the release of said liens upon payment of the approved mitigation amount, providing for an effective date.

Hello.

Good evening, mayor commissioners. Name and address. Well, sorry. Yanina Shankerman on behalf of the tenant at 6, 1, 6, 6 Southwest a street.

Thank you. Can we do the same? Let's just run the same process for all these. Yvonne, please. just give some context and, uh, give some context recommendation and then we'll have the applicant, uh, give, give their, whatever they need to say. Go ahead.

Okay. So this one is specific to the surgery clinic at that address. Um, it was cited for construction without a permit failure to obtain a certificate of occupancy and failure to obtain an occupational license. This was actually brought to us by the fire department themselves who did an inspection. and brought all of this to our attention. So we cited it upon their inspection. The courtesy notice started on November 7th, 2024, and the fine ran from January 24th, 2025 till July 28th, 2025. That was for construction without a permit. They all have the same, like citation date of November 7th, 2024. Um, the construction without a permit was brought into compliance. Um, we have the fine stopping at July 28th, 2025. The certificate of occupancy came into compliance March 5th, 2026, and same with the occupational license.

Okay.

So currently they all have different liens amounts. Um, I don't have it totaled in front of me for all.

The total is $37,826. $37,826. For all three of them. Okay. All right.

Thank you. Yes. Good evening again.

Yes, we are asking the commission in their discretion to further reduce these liens. Uh, we believe that it's punitive, uh, relative to the underlying violations. We are in full compliance. We have moved heaven and earth to be in full compliance at this time. Uh, this tenant has no history of prior violations. They're a long standing tenant at this Plaza. since I believe it's 2015 as well. So based on the commission's discretion, we are asking for a reduction in the amount of 85%. Yeah.

Was there any time in the process where, where the clinic wasn't operating due to construction or, or lack of anything? Was it, was it, was it operational the entire time or?

It, I believe that the operations had to cease for a period of time and that is already a penalty to the operation. Right. The clinic.

Okay. And we're, my understanding is it's fully compliance.

Yes, ma'am.

This is, this is, this is more about documentation than anything else. Right. Mr. Manager.

It was documentation. It was a fire department. They needed to pass a fire department inspection. It took them quite some time to pass. So they were really operating it without any of the proper licenses. The biggest one was fire safety. Right. Okay. Go ahead. Vice Mayor and then Commissioner.

What was the construction that was taking place? Was it electrical? What were you guys doing in there exactly?

I cannot cite to that because I was not the attorney of record at the time. I can provide the board with all that information if necessary.

I think that's important information. Cause as I mentioned to the last guest, when we talk about code enforcement has to do with life safety, the fire department, that's what they're interested in as well. And considering that there was work being done without a permit, if it was electrical, for example, we have families living near this facility. If it would have caught fire overnight. I mean, Any number of things could have happened and there's a reason we have this process to make sure that our staff fire Department's aware of the work being done to make sure it's being done correctly This is something that if the work was let's say it was electrical again they put the drywall up and it's out of sight out of mind and I don't know if that was the goal of this Establishment trying to save money of permit fees etc. I understand it there's tough times but There's a process that has to be followed for a reason, so I think this is a different case than other cases that we've heard. I know that it's a $37,000 amount. Code enforcement, I'm assuming, didn't want to mitigate it down to that 15%. That's why you're asking for the 85% reduction?

The code enforcement did reduce it substantially by 85%. We're asking for a further reduction.

So $37,000 is 15%.

Right, because it was more of a long-running fine. Let me ask you a question again, because this is about a CO which had to do with the fire inspection, right?

CO and local business tax.

Right, which had to do with the fire inspection, right? Correct. Were you in compliance with our permits? I'm sorry? Was the business in compliance with our permits? I'm sorry? With our permits, for any permits that was needed for construction from the City of West Miami? Was the business in compliance with our permits?

I believe we were.

We have a violation for construction with no permit as well.

We never were granted access to the business to be able to really inspect it.

And then we gave them a violation retroactively, I'm assuming, after we got notice.

We gave them a violation based on the fire department bringing it to us, and we waited until the fire department gave them their final before we closed out ours. Frankly, we've never been granted access to the business.

but it was a violation for no permit or because you weren't granted access.

It was, there was a violation for no permit pulled. There was a violation for no CO and no certificate of use and a violation based on the fact that the fire department also tagged them, but they filed a permit after the fact.

No, no, I'm saying, but was there, was there a permit filed after the fact?

So actually what he's trying to say is that when the fire department came to us and told us about it, we cited it based on that. And then our main thing was let us access the unit so that we can determine what it was that the fire department was saying. And if it was true that a permit was even needed and access was never granted to us. So we were never able to see what it was that the fire department was claiming as no permit.

And that info is not being given to us today either.

So eventually the fire department passed them. So in return we pass them, but we still have not given, we were never given access to the unit.

No, I understand that. But the citation is for construction with no permit.

There's three, there's three citations.

I understand, but there's a, there's a citation for construction for no permit.

Correct.

What is the permit they needed to file?

They didn't let me... They might have not even needed one. The fire department said they were doing work without a permit. They issued us an email and a citation on that.

Mayor, we went off of what the fire department gave us and told us. As you know, the fire department does spot inspections of businesses all the time. They walked in. They noticed some sort of life safety issue, and that's when they contacted us. And based on what they saw, we issued that one. But you understand where the disconnect is there, right? We really don't know if it's really.

We're mitigating something for construction, no permit.

And I agree with you on that one. But the certificate of occupancy and the occupational license, those still are legit ones that were never done.

My concern is this is a surgery clinic. Yes, ma'am. Yes.

So I see. And there is no ongoing construction.

So we were not allowed access to the property.

I don't, I'm not aware of access. Are you the attorney? Yes, I am.

And don't you know, don't you know why there was no access allowed to us?

No, I do not.

So we're trying to act in good faith, but we can't act in good faith if you don't act in good faith.

I understand.

Okay, so I think that the Code Enforcement Board was very lenient. You know, you did not allow access, which you should have. That way we would have been able to see and determine what kind of permits you needed. So there's been no permits pulled, right?

I do not believe there was ongoing construction at the time. I do not believe that.

But it was an issue and you denied access to us to determine what the issue is.

So my understanding is once I stepped into this role that it was a scheduling issue rather than a denial of access.

I think you should have informed yourself a little better.

Understood.

I think, I think the court enforcement board was lenient enough.

Um, well, I mean, I, I go back to, to this thing where, how are we, how are we citing for no permit if there's no, and then mitigating it, if there's no permit that was required, how are you closing that out? How are you closing that out?

Based on the information, you shouldn't be mitigating anything that if you don't know, I'm not allowing us to determine that they shouldn't have mitigated this.

So they're not acting in good faith. based on the information from the fire department, they went in for, I guess, a life safety inspection and realized that there was some sort of construction going on that the city followed up on and cannot gain access to verify what kind of permit was required.

I think we should do this. I think, I think we should do this because I think, Can we please defer this item and, and, and, and, and have some more context brought? Yes.

Yes.

If that's okay with the board, I, I, I like to defer so we can get some more context with the condition that they allow the city to go in the premise and determine what kind of work was done. Okay.

Yes.

With that condition.

Is that an issue?

I do not believe so. I will contact the owner.

Because then it reverts back to this.

I understand.

Point of clarity, just for future reference, when you come back, the certificate of occupancy, occupational license, this has been open since 2015, right? So those licenses had been issued in the past and they expire. Is that the case?

Yes. And we're in full compliance. We do have those licenses currently. Yes. And we did pass the fire.

So I think at least from what I'm gathering, the sticking point here is this construction, no permit. The other two items maybe have a little more leeway, you know, it was up to me, but yes.

All right. I think that's best that we have all the facts before.

Do we need to vote on this? Yes. Yes. With the condition that the city is allowed access to determine exactly what was done or not done and what kind of permits you need. Once you pull those permits and you pay for the fee, then maybe we'll consider mitigating the fine. I'm sorry, commissioner twice.

Yes. Um, so I have a couple of questions really mostly for staff. Go for it. Um, what is the total amount that was originally mitigated or is this just simply represent 15% of the total amount?

This represents 15% of the total amount.

Okay. If we can, for the next meeting, I'd like, if this item is deferred, the total amount of lanes, um, for each one, just so that I understand what is before us. And additionally, whatever information was provided by the fire department, I'd like to understand that just so that I have a better understanding what the nature of the violation and I'll, and I'm, I'm not gonna pull any punches. My motion today would be to reinstate the full amount. If this was gonna be voted on today, not 37,000. just me personally, I'm not speaking for the rest of the commission, but a medical facility without licenses operating and construction without a permit is to me as about as egregious as you can get. Um, so I look forward to the additional information and take it up in the next meeting.

If we defer, I agree.

Yeah. Motion to defer motion to defer. second all authority aye aye aye okay okay five zero item passes for deferral well yeah we'll we'll get more context and that way we can properly assess the understanding thank you next item item

Item 11 K, a resolution of the man city commission of the city of West Miami, Florida, authorizing the city manager to accept a mitigation offer in the amount of, to be determined to settle code enforcement liens. We go recorded against the property located at 1600 Southwest 16th street. I believe there's an error there. 62 Avenue, West Miami, Florida providing conditions for payment, providing for providing for reinstatement of the original lien and accrued fines upon default and providing for an effective date.

Yeah. If you could just give your name and address for the record, we'll have her give some context and then we'll go back to you for.

Hi, good evening mayor. Thank you for having us tonight. Um, my name is Mike diploma and I'm representing my mom, Sylvia Cuervo, who lives in the property, 1600 Southwest 62 Avenue context.

Thank you.

I'm sorry to interrupt. The previous item, also the resolution, it states that the current total amount is 37,000. Can we get a whereas clause that says what happened exactly specifically, what the amounts would do, when it went to code board, and what code board's holding was? Thank you. Sorry. Yes.

Thank you.

So for this case, I don't have a lot of information other than facts in a file. Uh, this goes back to 2016. I can tell you that it went before the board several times, the board motion to place a lien on the property in the amount of 15,000. And it had a daily accruing five of $500 until the violation was corrected. It was cited as a multifamily single family residence has been converted to a multifamily house in our one district. but this is way before me.

I've never gone into this house from what, from what you do know, just if you can answer the, is this a, or is it, is a claim that is a, an efficiency or detached structure? What's what's the claim that it's been converted?

I believe my understanding from reading the file, is that inside the home it's been converted.

Is there pictures in the file? Okay. Okay. No, no, no. Yeah.

Let's hear from the applicant and then we'll go back.

If there's any, I understand this is a 2016 matter with, I don't even know who the code enforcement officer was at the time and what documentation. So go ahead.

Okay, so 2014 the house was purchased. It came with a, I'm sure everybody's seen it, it's a corner of 62 Avenue and 16th Street, so White House.

And the city's not claiming that they didn't take any permits out on this? There's nothing, okay.

We didn't build it.

I would just say, I mean, it's hard for us to put any blame on them after such a long time. Nobody in this room was on the days. A lot of folks weren't even working in the city. But I would say moving forward, if we're going to continue to give violations to folks, if we can set up a better system. You guys have a ton of work already that you're doing, but I want to add a little bit more to your plate. Just a system that we can make sure that at least if this happens again, the city can say, look, we've noticed them. These are all the notices.

No, listen, we have a bunch of I mean, let's be frank, we have a bunch of very old violations that we have limited information on file for because of, you know, the way the administration was set up prior. And a lot of residents that don't know they have liens on their properties because of that. And a lot of word of mouth kind of like this is taken care of. Um, situations, this is not the first time this has happened. It won't be the last time that we, we, we have, uh, you know, 10, 15 year old, uh, claim beauty is because residents here live here so long that it sometimes don't realize it until they're getting ready to sell their house after living there 30 years or whatever it is.

But that's exactly what would have happened.

I mean, we don't have, we don't have in our, in, in, in, in current administration's time, we don't have any claims that they've, they've been renting this as multifamily.

No, sir. And the only reason why we don't have here is because there was a lien right on the property. Honestly, right now, if we don't have pictures and we don't have pictures and we don't take it to we don't take it to the code board. So and we don't have any evidence in this file at all. But the only reason why we're here is because there was a lien that was placed in the property. They came to light recently.

Yeah, I mean, so just to confirm. Back when this went to the board, it went to the board multiple times. And in 2017, the board obviously found them guilty of something, but we have no record of what that was or any evidence to support that finding.

I just want to make sure I'm understanding the records are very spotty in the past at best.

I believe it.

And did this go to the code board for mitigation?

No, they're appealing the lien, sir.

No, because the code board had put the lien back already from 2017, so they can't go back over there. I mean, it's a 10-year difference in mitigation time, which is obviously... you know, absurd on its face, but you know, it's, it's not surprising. I've seen enough, uh, I seen enough of, you know, record keeping sometimes in the city. So, um, pardon me.

Didn't they have some sort of like a karate studio or something in that back area?

They did. Yeah.

Yeah, I remember that. That was part of the whole issue. Yeah, so I don't know.

That was something that I thought. Like, what if this violation was for the previous owner, and then it just kind of carried over. But there was a full, like, gym. When we got it, they painted it white, and it was gone. Like, when we got it, it was cleaned out. The pictures you have, you can see, like, underneath what it looked like when we received it. But there was a full-blown business there before us.

The photo you showed us today with the storage of all the stuff, that's a today. Is there a kitchen in that room?

no there was there was something there but there's nothing now like that you can't you can't connect you can't anything there and so it was a karate studio previous owner previous owner 15 years ago well whenever i mean when was that a while ago a while ago yeah um look i don't know i mean this doesn't seem to be honest with you like a pressing issue in the city today um You know, I don't know who was impacted here right now. Like who was the victim here?

We're impacted.

So.

I mean, being that we don't have a lot of information, it's already been 10 years, it doesn't seem that the city's been accruing any costs with staff, et cetera. I would motion to absolve these folks of any payment whatsoever.

I mean, just the fact that we don't have any, any evidence in our file. I mean, I don't, that's my issue. Yeah. We don't have any evidence in our file. So what are we doing? I mean, it's not, that's not the current administration's fault. That's just, we don't have any evidence of the file. So even if you, even if you, you, you were running a hotel back there, I don't know. I don't know how we would sit here today and, and, and, and say anything. So I, I agree with the vice mayor, you know, whoever wants to make a motion, I second the motion. All right.

So I'm gonna make a motion first and then motion to set the lien amount to $0.

Waved.

Thank you.

Second? Second. Second. Call the roll, please.

Okay. Commissioner De La Torregan, how do you vote? Yes. Commissioner Ceballos, how do you vote?

Thank you. Yes.

Commissioner Blanes, how do you vote? Yes. Vice Mayor Chavez, Jr.? Yes. Mayor Diaz-Pedron?

Yes.

5-0. Item passes. Waving the fee.

Thank you. Please don't reopen the karate studio. Thank you. All right, let's go 11A. 11A is here? Yes, okay. Let's do 11A, and then we'll go back to the agenda, and we'll power through this. Good evening, board members.

Item 11A, so I can read it into the record. New business agenda item 11A, second reading and public hearing. An ordinance of the City of West Miami, Florida approving a waiver of plot for the property located at 6051 Southwest 15th Street, West Miami, Florida to allow the subdivision of one existing parcel into two separate single family residential lots providing for conditions of approval, providing for recreation, providing for conflicts, providing for severability and providing for an effective date.

Now your turn.

Hi, board members. So we are asking for a waiver of blood. I think we already went through a first reading. The person that was at last reading did not make it today. I was aware of this 30 minutes ago. So thank God our office is only five minutes away. But we're planning to build two beautiful homes in what used to be a house that I think was causing a lot of issues for the city. And we're here to answer any questions.

Beautiful you know that the last the last person knows here. Committed to a lot of things which are in the fall yet you want to you want to make aware of what you committed to that way. Coming straight out of it.

I think that there was a condition that we did not want both homes to be could yes, yes, we already make that we're making the modification and even the color palette like scheme is going to be different and wearing some eyebrows and so.

There was two things actually. One was that Commissioner Ceballos was insistent, which I agreed on, making sure that the site plan was... Let me make sure it's in here. What was your covenant on the... It was something with the site plan. I just want to make sure that it's in here, that it was tied to the approval. Do you not remember? Do I remember? You don't remember?

I do not remember the specifics because it is not here. But I believe it's just, it was tying the proposed site plan, which is, I believe, single-family, one-story buildings. Correct. Tying that to the approval.

Yes. That's what we're proposing. And my understanding is we also, she did tell me that she agreed to two different elevations, that the elevations had to be a little different. Yes. Yeah, we have no issues with that.

great is is uh this is a hold on you almost caught me here this is a public hearing this public hearing is now open on this item is anyone here to speak on this public hearing going once going twice Look here, it's not closed. Okay, back to the board. Any questions for the applicant? I know we went through this. We all know it was there before. Obviously, the neighborhood is not super against building new homes and having new families move into that neighborhood. Anything that we want to, last chance, take a stab at the applicant to make sure we get a good neighborhood feel in there.

Go ahead.

one of you got to go to make the homes distinct sure you know we talked about different colors different you know not so cookie cutter so they look the same so

Yes, we did agree to that. We have no issues with that. We'll make a different color scheme and add different touches to have the elevations different so that they don't look like. We do a lot of production homes, but we'll make sure these would be looking different.

Oh, we get the special ones. Go ahead, Commissioner.

That would also help from a selling point. Of course, absolutely. You have two distinct products.

Yes, 100%, yeah, absolutely.

I just wanted to commend you. I did a little homework on your company, and I know that you build these homes to make home ownership affordable for those that can't, so thank you. Thank you so much. And thank you for picking our beautiful city.

Thank you. I wish there was more land, you know, bigger parcels, but...

Yes, thank you for all the money you're making. Thank you so much. Or bringing to us. Thank you so much. Does anyone have anything else? I think we've kind of vetted out this proposal on first reading, so... You know, uh, questions, concerns, motions, anything motion. All right. Motion. We got a motion. Second. We got a second. Call the roll, please.

Okay. Commissioner. Yes. Commissioner. Yes. Commissioner. Yes. Vice mayor Chavez jr. Yes. Mayor. Yes. Five zero item passes.

Thank you so much. Thank you. Have a good day.

All right, let's go. There's no other items that require. Volunteers, right? Nothing, right? All right, let's go back to the order agenda. Mr. Manager, you're up.

If they could put up the slides in the back, please. All right, Mayor, Commission, residents, this is a little brief discussion and quite a few slides on our upcoming budget and where we are and where we're going we're going to start off with some kps some key performance indicators for the year um that that matters because this is one of the few times that we're actually showing something that we've been tracking but this is a little bit more official where we're tracking now what we're doing and what our performances are across the city operations As an example, our, the executive department pretty much completes 98% of the priorities of the commission. And we usually answer, we answer residents requests within three days. The majority of the time, the one of the things I'm more successful, more proud of is that our grant success is that 50% over the three years we've been here, 44% last year. The national average is less than 20%. It's actually 14. So we're doing substantially better than a national average and being able to obtain grants. Um, this is our, our transportation system. Our transportation system year to date has had a 22% increase in ridership. Um, Going down to parks and recs, parks and recs, we have very strong after school and summer programs. Our after school attendance is averaging 115 people, and that's a testament to our parks director, John Michael Lopez. Again, another thing that I'm very proud of is the fact that the West Miami parks and rec system recovers roughly 40% of their expenses, which is a good eight, 9% higher than what the national average is. and that's a recurring theme that you'll be hearing all night long here. Our summer camp has progressively been growing little by little year in and year out, and we offer a fantastic summer camp at an extremely reasonable cost point. Our community center also, after we've opened up the multi-purpose room, has seen an increase of over 12% year to year. Our park system, which is something that the mayor challenged us on in one of the state of the cities, was to grow our park area and our green areas by 50%. We're just about there. We've grown 43.6%. We're a little bit under, but we should be getting there in the next year or two. Public services. which is public works and everything else, they have a completion rate of all the calls that come in of over 96.5%. The ones that are pending responses, 15 of them are from Miami-Dade County. Our response rate and our completion rate is better than our cities around us. The only ones close to us is the Gables and Doral. In terms of passports, We've exceeded our goals. We exceeded our goals in terms of passport applications and in terms of photographs, and they're doing extremely well there. In fact, they were recognized by the United States government on that. Permitting has gone up a little bit more than last year. It's holding pretty steady, but We now offer inspections on just about a daily basis. And for the first time ever, we're now offering same-day inspections, same-day permitting processing on certain categories. Here's something that we should all be very proud of is our police department. Our response time of 75 seconds is substantially better than any one of the cities we looked at. And that is an amazing stat. From the finance department, we've grown our reserves. We are now compliant with all our financial reports for the first time in our history. We're looking forward to continuing to grow our reserve budget and all the key metrics in finance are being met. In terms of social media and communication growth, year to year, Facebook's gone up 100%, Instagram, 107%. Across the board, you'll see that we are exceeding everything that we've done year to year. In terms of community events, this is just a snapshot of everything that we've done in the last year. We've had 11 major events. Over 3,500 residents easily have gone to these events, and we continue to reach out to our residents and make this a resident central thing. Again, this is an overall on the executive agenda. on the KPI, and as you can see, we exceed everything, and that's something that I'm very proud of our staff on. That answers the KPI. I'm now gonna turn it over for our finance director to do the next group of slides, and we'll continue to go back and forth that way.

Good evening, Mayor and Commissioner. Okay, can we go to the next slide, please?

There we go.

Okay. One of the important parts of evaluating this budget is really looking at ourselves and looking how we're doing compared to other cities. We're doing really well. So this gives you a breakdown of our population, where we are. We're one of the smallest populations in Miami-Dade County. Here, it's a little bit of the same information presented a different way. Then here's just some of our rankings from some of our peers can see here that we're doing really well especially in terms of our village compared to other cities.

So it's a little hard to read so maybe could you grab some of the highlights for sure.

SO THIS ONE RIGHT HERE IS A REALLY GOOD EXAMPLE. THIS IS KIND OF THE CORE OF SOME OF THE THINGS THAT WE'LL TALK ABOUT TONIGHT IS THE HOMESTEAD PROPERTY. SO THE MAJORITY OF A LOT OF OUR PARCELS COME FROM HOMESTEADS. SO THE 1,149, THAT JUST SIGNIFICANTLY MEANS THAT A LOT OF PEOPLE ARE CHOOSING TO MAKE WEST MIAMI THEIR HOME. IT'S NOT AN INVESTMENT. PEOPLE ARE INVESTING IN THE COMMUNITY AS A HOME, NOT JUST A RENTAL PROPERTY. And so that means that a lot of the properties qualify for a homestead exemption because they're owners. And so that's something that we'll get into a lot more in some of our topics, but it just means that we have a really high percentage of homestead exemptions within the city of West Miami.

And I'm going to step in here in a second. We operate a full-service city. We're only one of four or five that do that in the whole city. County we do it with less employees less money and we provide better services than I think any other city out there as an example our millage rate is the second lowest out of the out of our peer competitors our operating cost is the second lowest yet our taxable value is actually one of the higher ones but I The most of those big the biggest key takeaway here is we do more with less. And that's something that our residents should be very proud of. We rank extremely favorable across across the board against our peers. As an example, Cody, I'm going to stop step in and Cody as an example on this on this slide right here. This is a comparison of all the millage rates is a comparison of our average tax bill. and our population. And you'll see that we are favorable compared to most of our competitors. They're not competitors, just most of the other cities. We we've done some meaningful tax relief for the city. We've lowered our millage rate from a high of, of 6.88 to what we are now currently at 5.77. We've dropped our millage rates, 16.2% in that period. Um, and how does that impact impact us? Well, every 0.1 millage rate is $106,000 difference. That's almost an officer. So every 0.1 that you drop is an officer, or it could be used for parks, or it could be used for special events. So that money is particularly important. In terms of public safety, I kind of already touched on it. Our operating our operating budget as a whole is 35.8%. Our police expenditures is $560 for residents, which means that we again do more with less. And yet our average response dispatch time is better. This is the this is some more of the operating benchmarks. So what does the comparison tell us? That we're one of the few full services cities, we have a very competitive tax rate, we have extremely efficient operations, we have extremely strong public safety, and we have financial discipline. Some of the pressures that are coming above. And then one of the things that we look at year in and year out is inflation rising costs. We look at, uh, county utility and disposal rates, which unfortunately go up year after year. And this year they've already announced that some of the rates are some of the bulk rates to us are going to go up 5% on water and 15% on sewer. We have infrastructure pressures. all the time. We have a very aging water system that we've been very lucky to get grants and been able to start fixing most of that. We always have capital and equipment needs, which we'll be talking about in a little while. And then we have other external pressures like a certain vote that's coming up in November on homestead. These are some of the assumptions. I'm not gonna go over some of these things. This is some of the stuff that we're gonna talk about deeper in budget season in September. um let me get to the next let's get to the next one can i get the next one up Cody, if I need you, I'll call you. I'm just going to try to get through this. All right. Let's talk about the homestead exemption. There's a, there's obviously we all know that there's a There's a referendum vote coming up on whether to increase the homestead exception proposal. As of right now, the public perspective is 74% positive, so it seems like it's gonna be passing. What it means is that we currently have a homestead exception of $50,000. In 2027, there'll be another $100,000 added to that, and then, The year after, another $100,000. So at the end, by 2028, the homestead exception will be $250,000. That means that for an average household in where we live, the average assessed home in the city of West Miami will not be paying taxes, but they will not be paying taxes to the city part and the city part is but 28% of every single dollar that you pay. You'll still be paying taxes to the school board, you'll still be paying taxes to municipal services, the state fees, Miami and the Children's Trust Fund. The estimated net impact after two years is $1.6 million that we will lose in revenue as a city And the biggest question that we have, and that's what a lot of these slides are is how do we overcome that? That hits. And the way to do that is simple. We need to look at organization. We need to look at who we are, what we are and how we produce it without affecting our residences. Um, service levels that they have come to grown to love and do without raising our millage rate, which is something that's very simple for some other municipalities that they're doing correctly right now, and just making sure that we do not have an issue down the road. which we shouldn't do, provided that we do some of the stuff that's here, which is diverse, have diverse revenue streams. We're looking at, right now, we have a lease revenue on one of our properties. We're looking at increasing permit fees. These are the user fees that we're looking at. We're looking at making sure that our parks and rec fees are rightly sized so that we continue being a very viable alternative to everybody else. However, we understand that we need to make sure that we can recapture more of the expenses out of there. We're looking at certain new fees that are going to have to take, uh, some legal review, uh, uh, uh, uh, tree fund tree, uh, tree fund fee, a public safety fee, a rental registration program, and a transportation fee. We're also looking at renegotiating some of our billboard revenues that are out there. The more we can diversify the revenues, the better off we are. Okay, on this slide here, this pretty much shows you what we are. Most of these are going to be in the prepare rank right now that we're going to have to look at them at legal and then bring them back to the commission so that the commission can have a discussion on what we want to move forward with and what we don't want to move forward with. Um, we have keyed all our different things into either high priority items, something to manage, manage something to adapt and prepare or something to optimize again. The average homestead property pays $1,295. If it drops, they'll pay about 20 bucks a year to us. That's what's going on with the homestead, next. Just haven't put up the general. Just haven't put up general. We've also gone through and done a compensation study. And again, going back to what I've been saying over and over again that we do less, we do more with less. Our average compensation is 28 to 29 percent less than our peer cities. So we're paying substantially less for our employees. And yet we are doing better services than most other municipalities. Why does the why does the budget matter? It protects our essential services and invests in our people and infrastructure, and it preserves our affordability. Total budget that we're going to be presenting this year right now is at twenty point eight twenty eight point eight million dollars. We're proposing the same millage rate as this year. We're not increasing it. Our general fund is $12.47 million. Again, that's how many residents we have. That's how many full-time employees we have. And we're looking at about $6.5 million in capital investment. Our expenditures, even though that our revenue is 12 point, whatever that number was, I forgot already. I'm sorry. Even though that our general fund is going to be $12.47 million, our expenditures are at 11.85, which is slightly higher than this year, but it's about a 2% increase from where our expenditure level was this year. We're looking at an operating surplus of between $600,000 to $800,000 for the year. with this current budget that we will be bringing forth to you. One of the things that we have to do for the state, we've already done it, but we're not going to, but we're refining it right now. The state passed a state law that we have to look at our budget and do a hard look at it as if we lost 10% of our revenues and what that would do to our services. We've gone through that and we can absorb that. It won't be easy, but there is ways that we can do it. And we were ready to put, we need to publish that 14 days before our final budget. And we're pretty much ready for it. That would reduce our budget to $10,700,000. Where does every revenue come from? Nearly three quarters of our revenues come from property taxes and or fines and forfeitures. 10% comes from the state and the rest are smaller little pies. That's why revenue diversification is important. We passed the billion dollar mark this year. Our valuation is 1.065. It grew up 2.9%. Um, a little bit over $30 million new construction was very, very little. What does that say? We have a very stable community that everybody wants to live in and nobody wants to move out of the fact, the fact that our assessed values are, are around $250,000, but our property sell for on average for 600,000 plus. Again, talks to the fact that we've had people here that have been homesteaded for quite some time. In fact, our single family homes, 81% of them have homestead. That's what we're proposing to do with the millage at 5.77. The rollback is 5.5261. Just have to disclose that number. We have one of the, for a full service city, we had the second lowest millage rate and we compare very favorably with all those cities. Um, again, I talked about what 1.1 mil does is approximately $106,000. Again, going through a few other departments, public safety is 34.3% of our budget. Non-departmental, which is general government, that's for our insurance, our benefits, our liability. It's a catch-all for all the things that don't work out of a department. Between those two departments, that's 70% of our budget. If you look below that, finance is 5%. Public works is 6.5%. The executive branch is 6% facilities is 3.2. And then all of the other departments, some of the things that we're doing is obviously we haven't used a collective bargaining agreement with the, with the police department. We needed it. They were way severely underpaid. And that is that, that did add around $350,000 to our budget this year. And then the other ones that are up there are pretty self-explanatory explanatory. Again, talking about our staffing summary, we have, we are going to go into this year with 92 full-time a total of 108. If you car, if you count part-time, um, public safety, again, has got 37 positions with a response time of 75%. This is going again through some of the key KPIs again for every department, which I'm not going to do. And I'm going to talk about capital projects in a minute. So if we could put up capital, the capital projects, the enterprise zones and then capital projects, please. And I'm trying to go through this quickly, guys, because I know this is not exactly the most exciting subject, but it's a very important one for us in the administration side. We did a deep dive this year into the enterprise funds. We really wanted to look at them and explain them. Enterprise funds are funds that you pay for that they're not covered by your taxes. There are five of them, water and sewer, stormwater, community development and sanitation. Our total enterprise fund this year is going to be $6.61 million. We have 1,736 utility accounts. Out of that, water is 41%, sewer is 32, sanitation is 14, then you have community development and stormwater. As you can see here, the revenues have gone up in the last couple years because we righted a wrong for many years. The city was taking general funds, taxpayer money to subsidize enterprise funds. which is something that's not allowed by state nor is it allowed by our ordinances, yet it was being done. That is something that really hampered the ability of the city to do stuff. We've righted that. Our enterprise funds now run the way they're supposed to, and that's why you see the increase in the amount of money that's coming into those things. We do have a strategic, plan in place where we're paying back some of the money that we took out of the general fund, and we're going to start by proposing it this year where we're going to pay back $240,000. As of today, June 30th, the enterprise funds owe general government $6.88 million. That is many, many, many years of where the enterprise fund was being subsidized by general, which this commission and this administration righted that wrong a couple years ago. Yes, sir. No? So the water department, the water department, again, is going to repay us back $100,000. It has three full-time employees. This is going through it. Now, let me explain another thing that Miami-Dade County does to all municipalities. They have a thing that's called TRULIP. They estimate the cost of water at the beginning of the year. If they're short on their estimation and it costs them more, they charge us for it the year after. This year, that charge is almost a little bit over $250,000. However, this commission has a, has an ordinance that true up is divided by the commercial side and not by the residents. So the residents will not bear that cost, but it is something that we have to pay attention to because Miami day water is historically, uh, providing a water rate that they have to adjust year in and year out. And they've already said that they're going to be doing this for at least two more years. Again, our bills are at the low end. We have the lowest water rate in all the county. That's something that we should be very, very proud of. We are proposing a small, minor change to our water and sewer rates, but the net effect is on the next page. If you're a senior household, your bill's gonna be going down $16 a month. If you're a regular residential household, your bill's going down $11 a quarter. We are going to We're working on our water rates so that the big users and the commercial side pick up more of the burden than our residents. And that should go a long way because that means that you're going to have a little bit more savings included in your water bill starting soon. One of the bigger issues that we've had in this city, and I want to get to it, is in sanitation. The biggest complaint that we get in sanitation day in and day out is on bulk pickups. Why are we being charged with bulk pickups? We don't have the pictures are wrong. We didn't put it out there. We just looked at this very closely, staff and my office, and what we're proposing is a slight increase in the sanitation rate to the seniors and to the residents. but we will have unlimited bulk pickup throughout the year. We will not charge you for bulk pickup. It'll be included in the bill. We will not, we're going to have twice a year where you can take, we'll have a container out there. You can take the stuff that you usually would take to one of the way stations that the County has take it to us and we'll take care of it. So in effect, what we're doing is giving you more services for a very small upcharge and in doing so, even with that we still have the second lowest sanitation fees in the county and we're giving you substantially better service and i you know i'm i'm proud of our staff so i'll say it's essentially better service than the rest of the county we're also going to be looking at something else we're going to be looking at some new fee proposals most of these commercial sites have a sanitation company that picks them up that they've never been charged most cities charge up to uh i saw one today that charges up to 25 percent of whatever they charge gross on their pickups city of west miami has never done that that is something that will be coming in front of you guys to for your review we think that's an easy way for us to collect some money and help us offset some of the costs there's a city that's directly south of us about the same size of us that their sanitation departments uh Expenditures level is more than two times ours. So again, that's a direct correlation on how we do more with less. Stormwater, we're looking at doing a slight increase in stormwater. And the reason for that is we have drainage issues that we have to resolve and we have to undertake. But even with the increase that we're doing in stormwater, I remind you back to that typical bill, you will still be paying less quarterly, even though we're adjusting our stormwater fee. This is an important one. There has been a series of delinquent accounts that are out there in water and sewer. We have really closed the gap on that. The one area that we still need to look at and try to close a gap on gap on is outstanding sanitation, uh, bills. It's a little bit over $400,000 right now. And that's something that we have to take care of. Like I said, in stormwater, we're looking at a slight increase, but it won't show up in your bill. You'll be paying less quarterly. And the reason for that is that we're looking at buying our own street sweeper. One of the biggest issues that we have is a way to be able to clean up the leaves, clean up the streets. That helps in numerous ways. It helps with the drainage when it rains because the drains are not clogged. And if we have our own system and being able to do so, we will be able to take care of our streets and our roads in a substantially better fashion. That stormwater, that's the stormwater fund. The last thing we have is community development and like I said in community development, one of the biggest issues we have now is we have same day service. We just quietly unveiled that last week and we look forward to expanding those services as we go forward. That pretty much covers the enterprise funds. If I can get the capitals up and then I promise I won't keep boring my commission.

Well, when you see it five times, it gets boring.

Capital. These are some of the things that we've talked about during the year. Obviously, this is something that I'm going to have a conversation with each one of you all individually. So between now and when we come back for the budget meeting in September, we can adjust these. or add or subtract or do what we need to do to get some of these things going. What's a capital project? A capital project is something that creates, replaces, or improves our city. It provides long-lasting benefits for our residents, and it is an investment in our future and in our community. We are looking at a total capital investment this year of a little bit over $6.9 million. One of the first things we're looking at is a new police, remodeling our old senior center and turning that into our police station, which needs a severe, they need space, they need to really have their places upgraded and fixed. We're waiting on an equitable share fund, which we were hoping we would have it by today, but it doesn't seem like it came through, but it should be coming shortly. And that's money that we're going to be earmarking, obviously with the blessing of the commission, into remodeling next door into our police station. This is something that, that, that the commission's very, very aware of. We've been working on a veterans Memorial. This is a rendering of what the veterans group wants to do going forward. We think that's going to be a very nice added feature in our city. I think it'll look great. The poppies represent fallen soldiers. There's one for each branch of the, of the armed forces. And we think this will look very nicely in Leon park. We are looking at a slight, upgrade to our vehicle some of our public works trucks are more than 12 14 years old and they're not great shape we have a price that we will be bringing back to the Commission on it to be able to bring upgrade some of the some of that fleet again we talked about the street sweeper here's a good one as well we have been talking to FPNL we are going to fix all the poles that are in bad shape, change all the lights to LED. And although the price is there, that price is really something that's paid through the electrical bill at about $1,500 a month to $2,000 a month. And this will allow us to add an additional 20 to 30 streetlights throughout our city to try to attack some of the streets that have a lighting issue.

Is this a change to the FPL tariff system?

They, they, they, it's a, it's the same thing, but they're, they charge us through the bill that they give us. It's in it's bill. It's baked into the bill.

Um, I'm sorry, but they give, they give us or no, no, no, we pay for it.

They take, they take that cost and they, They build it out over a 25-year period, and then you have to pay, it's added on. That's the way we paid the ones we have now.

But us?

Yes, the city pays.

The cities, okay.

The city pays, but it's not a one-time payment.

No, no, so it's basically like a long-term financing. It's like a long-term financing.

It's the same thing we did with the ones we have up now. Understood. We have a grant for the baseball field, and we're going to be able to start that soon. This is a little mini circle on 11th Street. Whether it has an art piece or not, that's... uh that's that'll be the that'll be decided later on but this is a traffic circle that dead ends into a little mini park that we're doing there and and we think it'll be a nice little addition to the thing unfortunately city hall has its issues one of the issues that we're going to have to address and quickly is the roof this roof has outlived its usefulness many years ago. So we're going to have to replace it and then we're going to have to make a decision as to whether we want to do anything else or not with City Hall. We are continuing with our water mainline replacement projects that'll continue for the next phase and then we have the other one that's being worked on right now on the civil engineering side. We're adding an additional $50,000 into street curb replacement. That's something that we'll discuss and mark and designate those streets that are the worst ones so that we can do it. Tonight you have in front of you the approval for a grant for a stone water master plan which has been put into this project. We also have had an approval on grants for the stone water pumps. This is something that We're working forward on, which is the roof over the pickleball courts at the rec center. That will be coming in front of you guys probably September, October at the latest. We're proposing putting artificial turf over the many soccer fields. And this is a grant that we got about a year ago, year and a half ago, for us to start looking at and planning safe streets to our schools on Southwest 16th Street. We also have a dog park that we got to do a Cooper park. It's a linear dog park plan for that, for that area, which we need to put some money aside for a couple of the commissioners have talked to me about doing a little kiosk corner somewhere at Cooper so that our residents have a place that they can go have a coffee and ice cream. Um, and this is a proposal to be able to do so. And one of the things that I really want to get done is fixing the bathrooms. it's we only have a single saw bathroom it's time that our our our parks had the right size bathrooms for the usage that we have there and lastly obviously you guys approved the last time the lights but we will be coming back because two of the poles have got to be replaced and we're going to ask for approval on that so we can do it all at once and get it done with and with that my report's done any questions

This is the budget presentation. Any questions for the manager? We will be hearing this again and again as required by statute. So get used to it.

Just out of curiosity and for clarification, November, ballots go out, say this property tax amendment passes. When does it go into effect?

The year after. Not this upcoming budget season.

We have a new budget cycle to prepare for. It won't impact this budget. I just wanted to put that out there.

It won't impact, yes, the mayor is correct. It will not impact this budget. It will impact... The next budget, it'll be a hundred thousand dollars addition, which is a little bit over $650,000 less than revenue for the city.

I think it's fair to say though, that while we're planning projects, the projects, the live, the few projects that we have that aren't grant funded, um, we'll obviously be monitoring the November ballot to see what adjustments we have to make, um, or cutbacks in, in terms of the capital projects and improvements you want to make. Right. So, that that obviously plays a role, but I think, you know, we, we obviously plan, uh, business as usual and, um, and await that. And of course we're always looking to cut costs wherever. So that's not really, um, you know, anything new for, for our city. So,

And these are allocations that always have got to come back anyway to the commission. And by then, by the time we would bring them back, we will know what would have happened with November and what we have to do inclusive. Some of the fees that we just talked about, it's going to be something that I'm going to have to turn over to legal for the legal justification and make sure that we dot our eyes and cross our T's and we don't get challenged in any of these fees. And a lot of this stuff is all really dependent on what happens in November.

Yeah. And, and look, and we're gonna be the same boat as every other city in Florida. So, you know, we're, we're all gonna be going through that process together and that is what it is. So, uh, any other questions for the manager? No. Okay. Thank you. Uh, next item, please.

Item seven reported the city attorney.

Nothing unique or special. I should indicate I appreciate that nice posting, if any of you saw that picture of me that referred to Purple Heart. And maybe I can use that occasion to say what maybe I should have said a long time ago, which is when I look like I'm going the typical you're going to sleep thing, I have an issue with the eye, which is no problem. But for 55 years, I've had to just keep making sure my eye is... lubricated. So, uh, uh, I've never fallen asleep doing that yet, but I would, I appreciate the fact that after having seen me do that for two years, you never asked me why I do that.

Honestly, haven't noticed, but, uh, never say never. I'm falling asleep because I think, you know, depending on how long the managed presentation is, I mean, we'll, we won't put it past you, but, uh, I, we appreciate your service, sir. Thank you. And next item, please.

Item 8, Report of the City Engineer.

Good evening, Mr. Mayor, commissioners. My only report is regarding the water projects that we have ongoing right now. We kicked off the extension of our phase two project a couple weeks ago, and we've been cranking pretty quickly on that. Got through 14th Street just before school started. So we will not be working the next couple days, kind of get things smooth and going, and then we'll be shifting over to 15th Street next week. And again kind of working around the school schedule for the starting dates over at Somerset so we're cognizant of that and trying to work with our contractor to make sure that School is not interrupted particularly for these first few weeks And then we should be kind of wrapped up with that within the next month and a half two months or so. I right about the time that we'll be starting the phase three project which we're about to finalize an award this coming month and then we'll kick that off again like in maybe a month and a half two months from now we'll be breaking ground on phase three I think the managers covered most of the projects that we have in the pipeline. But if right now, I think the only one that we're really cranking on design is for the 11th Street traffic circle and the closure of 10th. So if you guys have any questions on any other ongoing projects.

Questions for the engineer? All right. All right. You got lucky you got you got late into the meeting. Thank you. Next item.

Item nine committee reports, anything for committee reports, the parks and rec board. We've met a couple of times since the last commission meeting, the manager already went over most of what it was that I would have presented, but I just want to put out there for anyone that didn't watch that meeting is watching this one, September 12th, Mr. Manager, 10 AM the charrette.

That's correct. We're going to have a planning charrette where the residents are invited to come to it. What it is is we'll sit there and we'll be discussing what our vision as a city is for Cooper Park.

So September 12th, 10 a.m., come on out. Let your voices be heard on the future of Cooper Park.

Yeah, I love a good charrette. I'll take this opportunity to just report. I've been working with Miami Realtors Association. I'm sure you're all familiar with the letters that they do, that they often, you know, they'll give to cities where they put a big, I want to call it a sculpture, but big letters of the city that residents actually end up taking pictures with and whatever. so that they, they donate install, um, as part of a partnership. So we were awarded, um, the letters this year, um, they'll be coming in. We're finalizing location. I think administration is proposing, um, Cooper park, um, and one of the corners. Um, and, uh, we're looking to set up a ribbon cutting and, and, um, and do a partnership event with my marital association, uh, hopefully in our rooftop of our rec center soon. So, we'll be setting around dates and seeing what, uh, what, what works. Um, but I want to thank my realtor association and Senator Anna Marie Rodriguez in her private capacity, uh, Jonathan Alfonso, everyone involved in there. So I very much appreciate their, their support of our city and, and I look forward to them showcasing our city at that event that they're going to be hosting. Um, anything else for committee reports? Um, Anything else for committee reports?

Mr. Manager, can you update us on Sylvania? I know you said in the rec meeting, but just to update us on when that potentially is going to be open for the residents.

I don't have an official date yet, Vice Mayor, but they have finished their part of the work. We need to get together with them and see how the turnover is, how we will use that space and commingle usually using that space. And that's another thing that I'll have to take in front of the parks and rec board to see what the uses are, what the hours are, what are we going to, what activities we'll be doing at that park.

Okay. Um, yeah, let's, let's coordinate with our score members to do a ribbon cutting as soon as it may.

I'm sorry. Don't forget that we have an add on that. We need to.

Yes. You all have a resolution in front of you. Can we just motion to put on the agenda?

Motion to add this to our agenda.

Do we have a second? Second. Do we have a second? All in favor say aye. Aye. It's been added. Thank you. If nothing else for committee reports, next item.

Okay, next.

We are on item, I think that's B.

Item 11B, second reading and public hearing and ordinance of the Mayor and City Commission of the City of West Miami, Florida, amending Chapter 5, Article 9 of the Code of Ordinances relating to certificates of use, repealing and replacing ordinance number 93-04, establishing definitions, updating certificate of use application, issuance, inspection, renewal, enforcement and appeal procedures, revising certificate of use and residential accessory use, certificate fees providing for repealer, codification, severability, repeal of conflict ordinances, and an effective date.

So public hearing. Public hearing on the housekeeping is now open. Anyone wish to speak on this item? Public hearing is now closed. Back to the board. Anyone have any comments, questions, concerns, motions, anything on this item?

Just, this is only for commercial, correct?

Certificate of uses for business is a commercial. If you run a business out of your house, you would have one as well.

I'll make a motion.

You have a motion? Sorry, hold your motion.

And you guys reviewed the fees and made sure that we were competitive, that we were actually increasing.

Our planning director reviewed the fees, and we made sure that we were fair across the board in the way we did it. This is something that has not been looked at or increased in over three decades.

Thank you for that.

Motion.

We have a motion. Do we have a second? Second. Second. All right. Oh, uh, call, call the roll, please.

Commissioner. Yes. Commissioner.

Yes.

Commissioner. Yes. Vice mayor Chavez jr.

Yes.

Mayor Diaz. Yes. Five zero item passes.

Thank you. Next item, please.

Next item, 11C, second reading public hearing and ordinance of the Mayor and City Commission of the City of West Miami, Florida, creating regulations for mobile food service vendors, providing for purpose and intent, providing for definitions, establishing permit requirements and fees, providing for regulations for mobile food service vendors, establishing classification of vehicle types, regulating safety, operational standards, documentation, location, hours, and enforcement, providing for servability and an effective date.

is a public hearing public areas are open. Anyone wish to speak on this item? Seeing none public area is now closed back to the board questions. I think we all love food trucks motion. Well, there's a, if you can hold the, hold the motion there, there's a reason we're doing this. Correct. It's, it's, it's comply with state law.

That's correct. That is to apply with state law and to make sure that we have the regulations in place so that we don't have them. so that we have them not in the swales. This is something the planning board looked at. We wanted to make sure that we had them in the right place at the right time and set up the rules so that we're in compliance with state law.

Motion. Sorry, one question.

So the fees also include if somebody's having a food truck at their property for an event, this is included in the fee schedule?

If the food truck is going to be located in a commercial corridor, they will have to obtain a local business tax with the city and provide that documentation. In terms of a children's party at the house, Mark, correct me if I'm wrong, no permit will be required for those four hours. And any city event, they are exempt.

Um, I think I recommended last meeting that we do just because think about when we're hauling the dumpsters for any type of, uh, work construction work that we also put a deposit in case I walks are broken or things like that. I think it would behoove us to kind of make sure that there's no destruction of the property while, while the food trucks are present.

I apologize. Just to clarify, are you talking about for private parties or you're talking about for city events?

yeah for private parties or parties at people's homes yeah because they're more likely than not going to be parked on the swale or they're going to be parked on they have to be parked within their property on their driveway within their property and if it's not then how would you yeah they it requires them to prop completely park on the property so they have to fit in the driveway they cannot be on the soil they cannot be on the sidewalk they cannot be on the street

so just there is no permit there's no cost but is there a notification to the city that they're going to have this on their driveway because it's for four hours so are we going to be notified in some form of fashion

What is it? What is a notice? I mean, I'm also trying to be practical here because everyone is throwing a party at their house too, right? I mean, let's face it, if you're having a party at your house, I don't think the person's first thought is going to be to go to the city to register their food truck, right? Like, you know, being real. I think what we're trying to prevent, if I'm correct or wrong, you drafted this, right? So I think what we're trying to correct is, prevent is that we don't have a business parking on swells or, or, um, or on streets using the city sort of like an ice cream, you know, like ice cream truck almost just parking in neighborhoods and, and, um, which they, you know, already exists, right? That's what the construction food trucks are pretty much. Right. But they go house to house, but that that's been done for generations, very forever. Right. So what is the, we're trying to prevent and what is the solution that we've implemented, I guess is, and then I'll go back to the commission commissioner and try to see what what her specific concern was so that we can try to mend it. Go ahead. What is it that we were trying to prevent and what is it that we installed?

The food truck, the road and food truck for the construction is our type two. We actually don't allow them at all in the residential areas. Sure. So we can stop them. So obviously enforcement is the issue.

They do show up at construction, but we would be able to. If I may, Mayor, what we're trying to avoid is having these commercial food trucks or a thing out on a swale parked in front of somebody's house, parked in front of somebody's trailer. We weren't really looking at a residential use other than the fact that if they had an ice cream truck or something like that, it would have to be parked. on their property in their driveway. Sure. It cannot be in the public right away. Sure.

What is the damage or harm that you were trying to that you were alluding to to prevent?

It's that it's just being forward thinking that now we're opening up a use that wasn't allowed before, and that we're not getting taken advantage of if somebody has multiple and it's not on their property, how do we enforce it? If it's not part of the ordinance. So I just wanted to make sure that we have some language in there to protect us later on. If it does happen.

Sure. Was I'm curious, actually, was, was it not allowed before? I mean, I know we didn't contemplate it at all, really. Right. We were silent. What does that mean for us? I mean, how do we...

So for the residential, we only allow twice per year for the four hours. It's not something that can be continuous. We were trying to be careful not to be over-restrictive on that. We were trying to balance it out. So I don't think we have a requirement that would have code compliance give fines for that. We don't have that set up.

to have a deposit we would have to have something like that and I think it was a matter of balancing it I mean in my opinion we should be a little proactive with that just because someone could park it in front of someone's house and say oh we're here for a party and then they do that the next month and then they're getting their fees waived and we just want to make sure that if somebody is utilizing our space that they're

paying for it that they're doing it correctly that they're abiding by all the ordinances and make sure that they're structured to protect that well the the the art the ordinance right now only contemplates on private property right so they would be they'll be taking advantage of private property space right and then we would have to much like we monitor for example let's say let's compare it to like a garage sale ordinance that we have right which actually our garage sale ordinance says that we can jail people, which is crazy. But the garage sale ordinance has a limit to how many times you can, like most garage sales ordinances have, how many times you can have a garage sale a year. I think I would compare it to that, right, where it's really a protection. It's not something that we really want to be like, you know, looking for and enforcing. It's really when it prevents it so that when you do have a problem, you do have a legal basis for rectifying it, right? I don't want to necessarily start creating headaches for people who just want to have a children's party and then didn't realize that they had to go get their deposit down on a food truck that was going to be on their property. Just being realistic, I just know that I don't think even anyone on this board, even the first thought would be to go get a, go get my food truck for my party, my private party on my, on my private property. Um, you know, get it, get it registered in the pot, you know, put a deposit on it. Right. And I, I, I, I do believe laws should be written to be realistic. Right. Um, to, to what people actually can comply with. Um, but, you know i don't know what i don't know what the board feels on this this is obviously not like a super pressing issue but i'll i'm i'm happy to to come to go along with whatever so get this item pass if you comply with state statute and and uh move along it brings in the code compliance i mean in compliance with state statute and if for whatever reason we find that something's not working we bring it back and modify it right

All right.

We have a motion.

So I can, we have a second, um, call the roll, please. Yes. Yes.

Commissioner. So how do you vote? Yes. Vice mayor, Travis jr. How do you vote? Yes. Mayor DS Padron. Five zero item passes.

Thank you. Next item, please.

Okay. Item 11 D in ordinance of the city of West Miami, Florida, amending the code of ordinances of the city of West Miami to establish the city of West Miami master fee schedule as is as the controlling source for the city imposed rates, fees, charges, deposits, permit fees, license fees, registration fees, inspection fees, service fees, utility charges, and other cost recovery amounts. Amending specific code sections relating to water, sewer, garbage, and trash, stormwater parks and recreation, building zoning, permits, licensing, and administrative service charges to remove specific dollar amounts and replace such amounts with a reference to the City of West Miami Master Fee Schedule, providing that the Master Fee Schedule may be adopted and revised from time to time, authorizing the city manager or the city manager's designee to recommend and administer updates to the Master Fee Schedule to ensure cost recovery for city services, providing for conflicts, codification, severability, and an effective date.

This is the first reading of this item. Does anyone have anything specific they want to call out before this item potentially moves second reading? Motion. Second. Motion and a second. Call the roll, please.

I'm sorry, who made the motion?

We have a motion, Commissioner Blana, second by Vice Mayor Chavez.

Commissioner De La Torre Gans, how do you vote?

Yes.

Commissioner Ceballos, how do you vote?

Yes.

Commissioner Blanes, how do you vote? Yes. Vice Mayor Chavez Jr., how do you vote? Yes. Mayor Díaz-Perdón, how do you vote? Yes. 5-0, item passes. And second reading is scheduled for September 8th, 2026 at 6 p.m.

Thank you. Next item.

and will be duly advertised.

Oh, sorry.

Item 11 E a resolution of the man city commission of the city of West Miami, Florida, authorizing city manager to renew the agreement with Sage intact Inc for financial software services for a three year period at a first year cost of $48,000 with the annual cost in the second and third years subject to increase by no more than 7% per year, providing for an effective date.

Any questions for the manager on this?

Motion.

Hold on. Can we just do things by calculator in hand? I think we should go back to that. Can we just start? Can we just do calculator and pencil? Would that be?

I don't think so, Mayor.

No? Okay. I tried. Do you have a motion? Second. We have a second motion by Vice Mayor Chavez, second by Commissioner Blanis. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any against? Hearing none, item passes. Next item, please.

Item 11F, a resolution of the Mayor and City Commission of the City of West Miami, Florida, establishing the City of West Miami Auditor Selection Committee in accordance with Section 218.391 Florida Statutes, providing for implementation, providing for incorporation of recitals, and providing for an effective date.

I think we had previously voluntold commissioner again, um, as part of this committee, correct?

Yes.

You were, you were involved and told you can't, you can't take it. You can't, uh, no take backs. So you are on there. What was the, the other, who are the other members of this committee or is that up to us?

Yeah, it was up to us to select.

Do we have, do we have names?

I thought it was going to be a public discussion amongst us.

Well, let's just pick names. What do you respect?

I mean, this can be anyone, people on boards.

How long is it? This is just to select a, this is just to vet out the auditors, correct the auditors.

They will make a presentation and they will select one of the firms and give it as your first rank.

A time commitment, one meeting potentially? It's one meeting.

Yep, so it could be anyone.

If no one has a name, I think I see a young lady in the back with her glasses on that wants to be on it.

I have a name I have to ask.

How many members do we need from, uh, besides from the commissioner, a minimum of three, a minimum of three additional names. No, no. Three in total, three total. So two additional names. All right. I'll nominate, uh, Mr. Antonio Chavez. Um, who else do we have? You had a name, Carmen Pujol, any other names? Any other names? I think those are fine choices. I mean, do we have any?

I'm not going to say a name unless I speak to them first.

Well, I mean, we're all going from the hip here, so you might as well just find out how committed they are to their community. It has to be a woman, though. It has to be a woman so far.

Just keep it going.

All right, I think at least three members. Oh, you're saying it could be more. You're saying it could be more. It's a minimum of three. It's a minimum of three. Would you like to say your name? I mean, they're not required for quorum anymore. No. So, okay. Well, they lose out. We're losing out on talent because you don't want to embarrass them. All right, I think we're good to go there. Can we get a motion to? Motion. Second?

Second.

Motion or second, all in favor say aye. Aye. Aye.

five zero item passes all right move it along item 11g a resolution of the man city commission of city west miami florida retroactively to july 28 2026 approving the execution of the first amendment to the urban qualification corporation agreement between miami-dade county and the city of west miami amending the fiscal year 2023 to 2026 agreement this amendment allows the city during fiscal year 2027 through 2029 to receive an allocation under the community development block grant CDBG and the home investment partnerships program home and eligible to apply for the emergency solutions grant ESG, which are federal assistance programs administered by the department of housing and urban development HUD, providing that the city meets the eligibility criteria defined under each program and providing for an effective date.

Does anyone in the commission require context on this item? Okay. Motion. We have a motion.

Second.

We have a second all in favor. Say aye. Aye. Any against hearing? None. I had to pass this next item please.

item 11h a resolution of the mayan city commission of the city of west miami florida relating to grants approving the agreement between the city of west miami and miami-dade county through its parks recreation and open spaces department groups growing roots for environmentally equitable neighborhoods green matching grant program accepting the grant amount of thirty three thousand five hundred and $55 to plant trees throughout the city, authorizing the city manager to execute said agreement and other related documents to complete the project and providing for an effective date.

This is a matching grant. Anyone have any questions on contacts on this item?

Just a comment, Mr. Mayor, uh, last time, I mean, everybody loves trees. We want to keep improving our canopy, but if I know there's a process, but at least to speak to the residents prior to planting them on their soils, because that way we don't get the calls afterwards that I parked my car there, et cetera.

We will do so. In fact, I'm going to actually ask them to sign something. So we have a record of it.

Yep. That'd be great. All right. Anything else?

A motion.

There we go. Motion.

Second.

We have a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any against? Hearing none, item passes. Item L, please.

Item L, a resolution of the Maine City Commission of the City of West Miami, Florida, relating to grants approving the agreement number H1465. between the City of West Miami and Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA, through the Florida Division of Emergency Management, FDEM, for the development of the West Miami Stormwater Master Plan, accepting the grant amount of $112,500, authorizing the city manager to execute said agreement and other project-related documents, and providing for an effective date.

Could we reject it? Motion. We have a motion. Second. We have a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any against? Hearing none, item passes. Pocket item, I believe, M. If I'm good with the alphabet? Is my alphabet correct?

Item M, added resolution. I'll read the caption off of the resolution. For record, a resolution of the Man City Commission of the City of West Miami authorizing the city manager to support and approve the naming of that portion of Southwest 9th Street between Southwest 57th Avenue to Southwest 58th Avenue as Inter-American Bank Street, providing for an effective date.

This is their 50th anniversary operating in Miami, many years at that location. questions, concerns, motions, or otherwise just a public thank you.

Every event they were looking for partnerships. I mean, they're the first one in line 50 years here in our city. I mean, incredible example of community partner.

Yes. They get more mad at me when I don't ask them to sponsor things.

So agreed fully support this motion motion.

Second. You got it first. So motion second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any against? Hearing none. Anyone need to pull anything for consent?

Motion to approve consent agenda.

Okay. We have a motion to approve the consent agenda. If anyone needs any time to review them before making a second, that's fine.

Second.

Or not. Okay. So we have a second. All in favor say aye. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any against? Hearing none. Items 12A, B, C are approved. Go to the order.

Sorry, I just wanted to make a comment. Going back to that lien mitigation, honestly, to echo what you said, that was egregious. I think it was a little bit concerning that our code enforcement team wasn't allowed on the premises, it being a surgical center and the fact that the fire.

I'm going to stop you. I'm going to stop you right here because that is a public hearing and the applicant's not here. So I don't want you to put it in the record that without them having the ability to rebut, Um, what we're, what we're saying.

So I, I will stop you, but my concern is more on how it went. So more on our team, our administration, how it was the fire department that flagged it. Um, and I just more concerns on the housekeeping portion of it.

Yep.

On our, on our own team.

I want to know, you know, I'm going to respond not in, in general on co-compliance. A co-compliance officer, and I think Mr. Stavaios will know this as well, is only allowed inside a property, whatever it is, if they're granted access. If they're not, all alternative would be to take them to court, and we'd have to have a good reason as to why we would enter it. This may have been a candidate to have done so, but since the fire department already has shut them down, we didn't pursue that, because the fire department was doing their job. we can't go onto somebody's property without authorization. It's just private property.

A general question on liens like that or just general mitigations to that amount and to the fact that there has been pushback. Is there a way that it could come before us before mitigations are made so that it could be reviewed? Is there something that we could do with just generally asking? Cause it was something I was asking our city attorney before the meeting about proper process procedures.

We had a meeting. What was it? Two weeks ago now, Selena. What we discussed earlier, what we're discussing on revamping and rewriting that whole section. It needs to be rewritten. there needs to be proper process put in place. Don't really quite have it there. Um, and we'll be bringing that shortly in front of the commission. But yeah, we've, I've given the city attorney some, some feed, some feedback and some things that I want to see in terms of how we process these cases. Um, and then that'll be coming in front of the commission shortly.

I would make the request and obviously we can discuss it here. I think that the mitigation process is not something that should come to us. Um, I think it should be streamlined, maybe create a high threshold. Let's say, you know, mitigations of over a million dollars or a hundred thousand dollars, whatever it may be, and give authority to the city attorney's office and the, uh, city manager or designee in order to mitigate in circumstance. So they don't have to come to this commission. I'll be honest.

Look, I, I was actually in, in favor of that previously and commissioner blindness. I think you were probably the only person serving me at that time. Maybe vice mayor. I don't, I don't even think so that, that when, when, when this has come up before, uh, the streamline in this process, um, I took, I was actually in favor of what you're, what you're talking about. Um, You know, the time there was the debate on the commission to the center was debate was about the opportunity for residents to basically go directly to, to their elected officials. I agree with you. A lot of these things don't. I mean, I think the one we waived for the most part could have been solved administratively. I mean, uh, for example, like if, if that process allowed. Um, and I think a lot of them probably could have been solved administratively. We probably shouldn't be taking, you know, uh, court TV type, uh, you know, interrogations on random matters that can be solved without residents having to come in. on a Wednesday night and tell a story again to a whole new body. So I agree with you. I think it's something we should look at. I tried to look at it years ago. So maybe we can get something done now with fresh eyes on it. So definitely work on that, if you will, administration. I'd be generally supportive of looking at that myself personally. All right. Anything else to go to the order? There's nothing left on this agenda. All orders of business have been completed. This meeting is adjourned.