Council - Regular Meeting

You ready? Good evening. Today is Tuesday, September 8th, 2026 at 6.01 p.m. We're here for the City Council meeting and we have a call to order. Roll call, Ms. Wright.

Mayor Goodman. I am here. President Hines. Here. Vice President Jones.

Here.

Council Member Cox. Here. Council Member Martin.

Here.

Council Member Church?

Here.

Interim City Manager Terry Bovard? Here. Attorney Kirsten Ballou? Here. City Clerk Latricia Wright, I am here, and all other staff?

Here.

Thank you.

Thank you. Now we have the opening prayer and Pledge of Allegiance to the flag by Mayor Charles Goodman.

Thank you, Madam President. Join me if you choose. Lord, we come to you today, a group of people who have formed into a city, Lord, a municipality, and we are led by these people who we call our counsel. And Lord, I just ask you to be with each one of them, to give them the ability to discern all of the issues that come before them to the very best of their ability. And Lord, I thank you for each person that spent time out of their precious lives to come here tonight to see how their government works. And I ask you, Lord, now to be with my police officers wherever they are. Lord, they are in such danger. And I ask that you be with them in their training and get them all the help that they need to understand that their lives can be in jeopardy in a heartbeat. And Lord, I ask you to be with the fire department as they go out and try to save our homes. And I ask you to be with all of the workers of the city and help them to move forward as efficiently as possible and do everything that they can for our citizens. I ask all this in your name. Amen. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you very much.

At this time, we'll have additions, deletions, changes, and approval of the agenda.

Madam President, I would like to add an item. We can make an item two and then move all the others down to present an award to Ms. Sandra Wise.

You said item two?

Yes, let's make an item two and move the other numbers down, please.

I would move approval of the agenda with that correction, or addition, excuse me.

Madam President.

Yes, sir.

I just want it to be known that while this print is correct, in your computers it says it's the 18th, and for a matter of record, the agenda that I received says it's the 18th, and it is, in fact, the 8th. Does not anybody else say the 18th? I'm special. Thank you, Latricia.

You were on that list. Mine says the 8th. Mine says the 8th.

Got a computer eraser? I can make it today.

Just back it up. Oh, it's a PDF kit.

Now, when I opened up my computer, the 18th did pop up. It corrected itself? The 18th of August popped up on my computer. I might have had it open previously. Just wanted to make you feel good. Thank you. Okay, you're welcome. All right, so we need to vote. Who did the second? I second. Okay, so we have a first and a motion and a second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All those opposed say nay. Motion passes five to zero. At this time, we'll have a presentation to Miss Sandra Wise by Miss Deborah Jones.

And I'm here because Miss Wise and I have done the

And she has them all ready and sitting in the proper place and is ready to go. And then she makes sure that she finds me.

which is the hard part, through all the traffic that moves.

that moves from the parade route out to the horseman's park for the fireworks. She makes sure that I get the results in one way or another, which is really hard to do, like I said, in all that traffic. But in all those years, she has made sure that that has happened. Sometimes we don't even think about it, and she is there. This year, she gave it up, so we're awarding her tonight... It says, presented to Sandra Wise, judge and volunteer for 30 years. Thank you for your contributions. A 20. Yes, it does. What did I say? 30. It was probably really 30. It's been 30 for me. I know it has for you too. If you

I used to be on...

I served on the city council. I'm not even going to tell you the years. That's been a while back. I loved being on the city council. Made a lot of changes while we were there, but finally give it up to start a family. And I've thought about running again so many times, but I have just retired from Williston High School after 39 and a half years. And I've decided that I don't need to stress anymore. So I know what it's like. And we appreciate what they do.

We do appreciate your support. Thank you.

You're welcome. Thank you. Okay. Item number three is public participation. This is going to be one of two times that you'll have to speak on anything that is not on the agenda. You will have five minutes to speak. Please state your name and where you're from.

My name is Dan Kaufman. I reside at 32 Northwest 4th Street here in Willeton. Since the agenda is not on the list of items tonight, I can have a discussion about it. I've looked at this, and I'm going to be perfectly honest with you, I'm not a CPA. And sometimes I really believe that every citizen in this city would have to be a CPA to actually follow everything in this budget the way it's presented. It tells you the expenditures, but it doesn't tell you where they come from, how they receive them, or what they're doing with them. It tells you everything else about it. And it's really hard sometimes, I know, to put things in a categorical order. where there's income that comes in, expenses goes out, who gets what department gets what, what the budget's for, how much it's budgeted for, did they overrun their budget or did they not overrun their budget? That's standard operating procedure in my house. I don't know about anybody else's, but if my wife finds out I spent something I shouldn't have spent, trust me, I know it. And then I'm expected to figure out where it's gonna come from because she's not gonna let me have it as a house budget. So with that said, The employees that you were talking about on the 2% raise, the 2% raise, and I've made myself pretty clear on how I feel about that, not because none of the employees deserve it. I'm sure that every one of them does a great job and has proved itself. I mean, this is one of the few cities that I've actually seen that they have mosquito control come through actually at a regular time, which Where else are you going to find that? I've even seen them take a truck with a trailer and wash the traffic signs. So I can't say that this is a bad city to live in, nor can I say that they don't do the best that they can do. But when it comes to the budget, I go back to what I said the last time. It's just right now is a bad time to try to increase the budget or to give raises in order to do it. I've looked through the packet you sent out, one with the staff increases for the 2%. I looked at the previous proposal, too, that was done without the 2%. It appears to me that, in all honesty, it looks more like you eliminated planning and zoning almost completely because I've looked down the list of the money that was saved and what was incurred and what was discredited. And it's interesting because it's like the utilities putting $1,039,000 from their department to the general fund in order to cover the needs that was there that money wasn't going to be able to cover. without really hiking up the budget. I understand that too. But one of the things I have noticed is that any time that you take and eliminate a job, and that's with the benefits and everything else, which is a lot of money when you add it all together, it's a lot of money, that those jobs, especially if you use planning and zoning, and a director, and an assistant, and all that. That's quite a bit of savings, and that goes towards the desires of giving employees a raise if they deserve it. But the problem of it is, what I see, is that we can do that, we can eliminate jobs, but I don't think it's going to be a year before we're going to need a planning and zoning director back. And if we take the money out of the budget and not delete the job, but just remove the job, saying that it's not deleted, but it's there, but it's just not filled, sooner or later you're going to want to build it. And then what we're going to be doing is you're going to be robbing Peter to pay Paul in order to be able to find the money through this or that, hoping that something else will come in, or shuffling, as I call it, the shell game with money. And we've seen a lot of that in a lot of areas. I was told the other day that I needed to, if I really wanted to get a handle on what other people in the neighborhood besides just a few people that I talked to, I should go and look at Facebook and see what's been coming up. And what I've been seeing coming up is scarier than hell. There's a lot that people are doing. The writer that I know, I'll sum it up, the writer that I read was recommended to me was Cooper, Linda Cooper. I understand her reasoning and what she does. She's obviously a fairly good investigative writer. But I also feel that a lot of what she wrote was based in truth. But it was more not so much she was accusing anyone of anything is what I got out of it. She was saying that what I talked about right here in the very front was that there's not enough, the whole thing is there's not enough information here to go with the request and see the budget for what it really is and what's coming in and what's going out. Thank you. Thank you, sir.

I need to make a comment. I'm so sorry. Go ahead, Ms. Jones. All right. My turn first. The only comment that I would make is we did not do away with the planning director. What we did was contract it out. Where it used to be a position that we had, it's under contract services instead of a salary. And that should be the difference that you see there in that particular department.

All right. So in other words, just help me this. We eliminated the job technically, but we contracted it out to someone else. Now, what's the expense of contracting it out?

It'll be right there in the budget next to you. It should be right there in the same budget section.

We'll have a budget of number four proposal before we're done.

No, sir, it's already there. It's already there. I'd be glad to look at it with you.

Hello, I'm Joseph Malone, 1143 Northwest 4th Street. I'm reading this on behalf of Joe Appenni. who has a disability and is unable to read. My complaint is now closed, and I appreciate being able to move past that process. It was riddled with mistakes that we do not need to rehash tonight. Ultimately, though, my concerns were validated. The mayor agreed to assist with my complaint, and his final report acknowledged that the chief of police displayed conduct and judgment that a top law enforcement officer should avoid, including allowing emotions to affect a situation. I learned a lot through this process. Most importantly, I learned that I believe it is time for new leadership at Williston. I also want to make one thing very clear. I am a grown man, and if anyone in the city wants to discuss me, my complaint, or my business, I would prefer that you contact me directly. not members of my family who do not even live within the city limits. I have worked hard to keep this matter professional and focused on the actions of public officials. I have tried not to make it personal, and I respectfully expect others to extend me and my family the same courtesy. Many people have encouraged me to stop telling my side online and simply use the lawful process available to citizens, so this is what I have decided to do. discussing on the internet or whatever. So this is what I decided to do. Beginning tonight, I intend to move forward with my petition to recall the mayor of Charles Goodman. If you live in the city of Williston and want to participate, you may reach out to me. We have 30 days to collect the required signatures. From this point forward, I will work face-to-face with my neighbors and fellow citizens and allow the legal recall process to determine where this goes. Thank you. Joe Appeni.

Thank you. Anyone else?

Albert Fuller, 820 Northeast 3rd Avenue in Williston. I come to you tonight just basically to bring, I guess, a plea as chairperson for the Planning and Zoning Commission. We're working on a comprehensive plan, and this is probably the easiest opportunity rather than contact each of you all individually for an invitation and explain what we're trying to do. The first copy of the goals and objectives of the comprehensive plan through 2050 was brought before us last Tuesday of the month. and of course the concern was that there were no numbers there and somehow we need to be held to a higher standard such that departments need an opportunity to have projections as to where they're going because otherwise if there's no target there's nothing to hit and if we're going to move forward as a city there needs to be an opportunity for department head, every department, to be able to plan for change. And so we are having another workshop coming up the last Tuesday of this month. And in that workshop, now, the commission was tasked with coming up with numbers as projections for what could happen through the year 2050. And I'm saying that we're not equipped to do it alone. But we could put demands on specific departments, but they may not be realistic. And so when that workshop happens, the one thing we would like for you all to endorse is that those department heads be there And then anyone else that has anything to do with planning, including potentially, and I guess Kirsten can answer the question as to whether all of the council people could show up or any of the council people could show up. It is a workshop and it will be advertised. And so that question may need to be answered as to whether you all could show up. But if we're looking at how we move the city of Williston forward, then we need to have collaboration between the people that are involved in helping the city plan for the future. Because if we don't have a plan which includes numbers, we're planning to fail. And what that does is that makes departments just look at, well, what can we do today or what can we do this year or whatever. And if we're not moving in one direction, we're actually just chasing our tail. And that's not an effective way to plan. And that plan, when it goes in, actually needs to be a plan that commits this city and its employees to move in specific directions. You can even look at something so simple as, I guess it's not simple, but housing. We've always talked about affordable housing. Well, how do you get there? If you don't have a target, how do you ever hit that target? And we need affordable housing, for instance. And that's just one thing, but there are a number of elements in this plan. And we need to have an opportunity to be able to address it in an intelligible way. then rather than just someone putting numbers down and saying we're going to commit them to that, we can't commit people where they're not involved in the process. The proper planning process requires that the people who are actually going to be doing the work actually take part in that process so uh last tuesday this month i hope that you endorse it along with i i knew i knew that city manager would be here so rather than me going around and visiting all these people i'd like to justify the fact that i mean i like to come here and see if it can be justified for people to attend the meeting including the public Because the public also needs to be there to likewise hold our feet to the fire as well to make sure it's a plan that the public says is a worthwhile plan. And it looks like my time is gone, so thank you. Thank you, Mr. Fuller.

Just to clarify, Madam President, the question was asked and the answer is absolutely. You all are welcome to attend workshops. You're welcome to attend planning and zoning meetings. Just can't have any conversations amongst yourselves about anything that would come up before you. So you're welcome to attend and gather that information, please.

And you attend those meetings, right? I do. So you'll keep us straight.

I will make sure.

Thank you.

Anyone else? All right, seeing none, we'll move forward. Item number four, the consent agenda, will be on the next agenda. Item number five, updates. We will start with the interim city manager, Mr. Brevard.

Thank you, Madam President. I'll try to be brief. A couple things I want to bring you up to speed on is I laid a document on your dais before the meeting started, and there's a couple over there at the door leaving out, and if the public needs more, I'll be more than happy to make some more. But it kind of gives you a snapshot, more of a visual view of the power outages and responses we've had throughout the year. I'm a very visual person. I like things of pie charts and graphs. It kind of gives me a better understanding of what's going on. So when you get a chance, just kind of take a look at that. You can clearly understand. Even it breaks it down to who does the most work. In this particular case, you know, Kurt does because he lives in the city. He just calls out and does the thing to mine. And then most of our outages are actually due to animals. About 25% and the vegetation is 32%. And as one of the council members was speaking earlier with me, we actually used to take pictures of the dead animals. But we've stopped that. But we do capture that data, so when you get a chance, you're not busy, take a look at it. If you have any questions, give me a holler. We'll move on to something else real quick. I will tell you that Brad Pierce has put in for the Two and three of the septic to sewer grants planning and designing for $668,600. Walt is on vacation, so he's not here. He would be telling you this. And they just put that in. And then the wastewater treatment facility upgrade grant for planning and design for $2.284 million. So we'll probably know something towards the later part of this year. And just keep in mind that this is a stepping stone in the process of getting through the SRFs and all the stuff that we're trying to do. And it's like a falling of water. You take the next step, next whatever it is, and this is just part of that plan to get us where we need to be for future upgrades. I will tell you that today I received some bid sheets or quotes or hourly rates or whatever you want to call them for a company that we're looking at for helping us with the fiber internet installation. The numbers are looking really good. And hopefully with the next city council meeting, I'll be able to come back to you and present you with something a little more solid that you can look at and to give you an idea that we are definitely still moving forward on that. And unless you have any questions of me, that's kind of been my last two weeks.

I was saying the last two weeks.

Last week, two weeks. It's been busy.

Regarding the fiber, so you've got the

the numbers from one company once we like how quickly will they be able to start if we decide to go with them how quickly will they be able to start hooking helping us hook people up uh quickly um so you know i've had some discussions with the city attorney how to make that happen and and it will be actually if i do it the way we're talking about it will be a change work order to our current contract with uh performance services which will basically have nothing to do with it we'll run a show here locally The money we'll spend will obviously come from us. We'll do all the scheduling. But they're ready to go. If I told them tomorrow to get started, they'd be ready to go tomorrow. So it's pretty quick. Now it's just actually working out the paperwork as we move forward.

Thank you.

I have a follow-up question. Yes, ma'am. I know before when we were looking at the issue of scheduling, do they foresee us having that same issue, or do they do their scheduling a little different?

No, they actually do, and that's a very good question. They actually do change our scheduling process. They will have a scheduler that's brought on board, and that schedule will work directly with Alex. So most people will be calling Alex. their scheduler to start the scheduling process. Once the scheduling process is on the books, we'll obviously be working with who we have on the books already, ready to go. They'll be what's called a pre-installer. They'll work about a month, three weeks to a month ahead of the crews. And of course, it'll take us a few days to get up there. They'll actually go out to the sites and come up with a game plan of exactly what this place needs. So when the work crews get there that day, They understand what their problems are going to be. They're ready for it. They get it done. The stands right now, the numbers that we're looking at are six people, two to a truck, the pre-scheduler, the scheduler, and then there will be a manager on site that will work with us. And I will tell you, just to be honest with you, this is the exact same company that's working with Central Florida that's doing their.

Wonderful.

And so I suspect it would be a pretty easy process once we pull the trigger on it.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Good news.

Thank you. And also that Chief Stegall will not be here. He's over at, he won't be coming, but I forgot to tell you, he is at a county commissioner's meeting. So he'll be arriving hopefully shortly.

Thank you. Yes, ma'am. City Attorney Ballou, do you have anything, ma'am?

You'll hear more from me later tonight. Okay.

Ms. Wright, interim replacement chief. All right. Mr. Steak.

Yes, ma'am. I just wanted to give the council and the citizens some good news from the airport. The airport was awarded a $400,000 EDA grant. It's a Federal Economic Development Agency grant. This grant is going to be used to do a lot of studies out of the airport to help bring in potential infrastructure and see what needs are basically required to bring in some larger businesses to the industrial park. Along with that, we were also awarded a $65,000 CPTA grant, which is going to be along the same lines. Now, neither of those is the RIF grant that we discussed earlier in the year. We're still waiting to hear back on that, but we've received some pretty unconfirmed feedback that we're in finalist for that grant. So if that happens, that'll be really good for us too. But we're in a really good position. We just had one of the workforce studies completed for the airport. And if you don't have that and would like it, I can absolutely email it to you. There's a lot of good information that put, you know, puts the airport in a really good position to start lobbying a lot of this material and for a lot of these grants to really bolster our industrial park in the city.

I'm just going to pipe up because I've been able to kind of be part of this, if I may. I was not able to attend the meeting in Chiefland, but, I mean, this is really exciting for the airport. This is going to bring really good business, hopefully, to the city of Williston with high-paying jobs and industry that will – be long serving for the community and for the area. So it's fantastic that we are on the radar of the state at this moment and that we have the, all the eyes are not only on the airport, but are continuously impressed by the quality of our airport for this community. So it's very exciting.

I also want to add that Levy County has recognized us as well because they have a new economic development board and they have given the airport a permanent seat on that board, which is unbelievable. And I'm assuming Ben will hold that seat.

Yes, ma'am.

All right. Mr. Wallace. Gerald.

I have just a real quick update. So we definitely appreciate the efforts that Mr. Rivard is putting into getting us additional help. But even so, since July 31st, we have added another 100 users. We're up to 222. Awesome. Great job.

Great job. Thank you.

I owe it all to Santo and Tip. Santo has been really carrying a lot more lately, though.

Megan? No. All right. Anything from the council, Ms. Meredith? Ms. Jones?

I don't believe so. Probably later.

Ms. Shannon? I'm good. Thank you. Mr. Mayor, you have anything for us, sir? All right. Then we'll move on to new business. Item A, discussion with possible action request for a single event use of the Williston Regional Airport property to build and shoot aerial and ground effect power techniques. Mike Trickle.

Honorable Mayor. Venerable City Council and citizens all. I'm Mike Trickle, and I'm here representing the Florida Pyrotechnic Arts Guild. It's an organization here in the state of Florida. And to make a long story short, we manufacture our own fireworks, literally starting from the tree, making our own charcoal for black powder, and then going up to some really spectacular fireworks. probably better than most anything that you've seen in Williston before. I'll just read a short clip because it'll sound a lot more formal than me trying to wing it, and then we can move on to any questions you might have. The Florida Pyrotechnic Arts Guild is a 501 corporation, and we're a pyrotechnic club composed of professionals and enthusiasts. There's no specific qualification to join our club, and in fact, if anybody in the city of Williston was interested in joining us, uh we'd be happy to bring you out uh we do do a little bit of vetting so that we know you're not just going out to make m80s and sell them on the black market uh but uh it's as long as you're up standing and straight up it's a pretty easy task to get in and at that point in time you'll be taught mostly are based around safety and know-how of pyrotechnics in general that includes ground effects fireworks up to 24, 26 inches in diameter. So that being the case, we are licensed through the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. We do carry a license for that. We are always in touch with them. And in fact, their agents are invited to attend any of our events and any kind of build and shoot type of events that we're having. We stay in good terms with them because they could shut us down pretty quick if we don't do it right. We're composed of hobbyists, retailers, display operators, manufacturers, and among our members are even one who sits on the board of the National Fire Protection Association, which is the federal regulation for fireworks and where they are on the regulatory board for fireworks safety. We have one gentleman. My colleagues are here, the president of the club's here to field any questions you have. He drove up from Miami. We have one of our members at large that drove up from Ripsville and then a member that's across the river over in Ocklawaha area who has over 40 years of manufacturing experience in shooting, and he's been heavily courted to take over the pyrotechnics division of Universal Studios theme park. So there's a lot of pretty high-end people. We have people that tour with the rock bands and do stage pyrotechnics, and they've been all over the world with some named bands. One of our guys has actually been with people like Bon Jovi and people you would recognize, and also been on Dancing with the Stars pyrotechnics. America's Got Talent provides the pyrotechnics for those shows that are filmed. So it's not a ragtag bunch of people. It's a very professional group. Manufacturing and shooting fireworks comes with a unique set of safety protocols, regulatory requirements, and we're always looking for a safe place to build and shoot. Remote airport properties are often used and the reason being is they have a secured perimeter. They have the acreage that we need and they generally are big and flat and save a lot of fires complications because it's just basically big fields. The reason that we're looking for acreage, when we shoot a shell or build a shell to shoot it, the diameter of that shell determines what our fallout area has to be. So just a real quick explanation of that. If you take fire point at our shoot center where we're going to actually fire the shell from, and that shell is going to be a 16-inch shell, it has to go up 1,600 feet, okay, 100 feet per inch. And when it blows, okay, it has to have a fallout perimeter that ensures that if your tube was to tip sideways and it was to fire it straight at the crowd. it would hit the ground and blow up before it hit anything or anybody. So the circle has to have a radius of that same 1,600 feet. Now the laws are different, but we just use that for easy math. So you figure 1,600 foot radius on a circle, that's 3,200 feet total. You're getting towards 3 quarters of a mile to shoot a 16-inch shell. There's just not a lot of places that offer that kind of acreage to be able to do something like that. So we have shot in other airport localities before, and it seems to be a popular way to do it for those airports that have gotten involved with us. We work hand-in-hand with the fire departments. We have our insurance in place. We get all of our licenses in place so that permits, both through the local fire departments and the county fire departments. We will take them. They do what we call a walkthrough. When we set up a shoot site and we have everything in place, we walk through with the fire chief or his representative. We show them where our firefight equipment is, where we have it located on standby, how we plan our egress routes, and how to get in and out safely to a fire that may come up during a firework shoot. So it's all very well planned and mapped and given on an overhead paper to show exactly what's going to happen. We have our own fast vehicles with water tanks and whatnot so that we can deal with the ground fire immediately if something catches fire. Sometimes we have these big fire bombs and things that go off and they put the grass on fire and we have stuff that we can get in there right now, get it put out before it gets to be a problem and then back out and continue on with the show if that's what's required at the time. That having been said, I won't bore you with all of the stuff that I have written down. I actually did email every one of you a packet. I hope that they made the quarantine and you got to look at that. Most of this was for the citizens. And if you have any questions, I would be open to answering them. At the end of the day, we request that you might let us use your airport for exactly that. We want to do a one-time event where we would actually come in We set up pop-up tents, okay, and this is the areas where we'll actually be building, and they all set with cones around them so people can't approach the area because of fire hazards. We want to make sure you're not walking in with a cigarette in your hand, that type of thing, and we will actually construct fireworks, and then If we progress far enough in that day, we like to stick them in the guns and shoot them that night and see how we did. So we would like to request that we be able to plan that type of event, a one day type of thing so that you can get to know us and we can get to know you and we make sure we like each other. And if everything goes well, we actually do have events that go like four days where we'll have actual contests. building shells and sending them up now just to give you a rough idea of the type of fireworks that we build. The ones that you'll generally see behind the castle at Disney World are what we call an 8-inch ball shell. We're looking at possibly shooting 12s. You have the acreage that would allow us a fallout circle to shoot up the 12-inch shell, maybe even bigger, depending on how we shift the center. So you would see some stuff that most people will never get to see. Now, just so you know, our insurance... We'll only cover club members to be in the safety area. So as far as the shoot site and any place that we're doing construction, we could invite you in and escort you and be more than welcome to come see us working and see how the process works and see what's going on. And more than welcome to stay in our safety zone as long as you're a guest of ours for the shoot that night. But we can't invite the whole town to come into our safety zone because our insurance doesn't cover us out that far. We're looking into that because I know the first question is going to be, well, can we invite the whole town to come? The answer is not right now, but we're looking at being able to do that in the future if we did have a four-day event scheduled here. But for the build and shoot, it would be guess now. The way we tell everybody is we can't invite you to come in just willy-nilly anybody to come into our secure zone, both for security reasons, because a lot of people, believe it or not, after fireworks, you like to go around and see how much stuff didn't go off and pick it up off the ground and take it home. So it's a really strict part of our process. we can't stop you from watching them either so if you're outside of our fire zone our safety zone and like if people are stopping along the highway and stuff seeing what's going on we can't make them leave either we can't stop you from looking at them as long as you're not inside our safety and insured perimeter so that would be how it would have to be covered at least for the first time and we're looking into seeing how our insurance could be increased to do something a little more a little bigger so that if if we did a four-day event possibly we could get a lot more people in there to see it so i will uh leave the questions from there and my colleagues may field some of them because they they have a lot of technical know laws rules that kind of thing so depending on your question somebody may come up different than me than to answer it mr cox i would definitely be interested in coming out and learning so yeah you you too

We'd love to have you.

Yeah, we would. We're pretty accommodating. And I think you saw some videos and things and the guys holding their shells that they actually built that day. And the video you saw were the shells that they built that you see in those pictures. And it was all done on the Saturday straight through. So it's a lot of fun and it can happen. And they're respectable fireworks. It's not stuff you buy in the tents. Ms. Meredith.

Yes, sir.

Okay. Sir. Sir. Come to Mike. About the learning of the pyro, if you would like to do that, I live in Ocklawaha, which is 40 minutes away. So our next meeting is at my place in October. You come out. It's a two-day meeting. We're going to be building, and then we'll be shooting it at that night. So you can get a firsthand view of exactly what is going to happen here off the Wilson Airport.

Okay.

All right? Thank you.

Jim is our manufacturer. He's our four-year guy that they're trying to get about to –

thank you miss Jones of course I've got the questions that aren't any fun um you need that right mm-hmm I if I'm reading this correctly you have a $5,000 deductible on your insurance per per claimant Is that the way, anybody know about that? Yes. That's the way I read it.

If that happened, it would be on the list.

And I guess what I would ask is, do you have provision to pay that $5,000?

We have over $50,000 in our bank account.

That was my first question. My next question is to look back here at my airport manager or director and ask him if he's good with it, and if so, what particular area of the airport you would be using.

Yes, ma'am. That's a great question. Mike and I have talked several times about a few different locations based on the size of the shell. We've already taken some things into consideration as far as housing, businesses, airplanes in the area, on the ground. What their organization is looking for tonight is to see if we're open to the opportunity before we really start to plan the more finite details. But we do have three or four areas that will accommodate what they want to do. After you've made your decision, if it's in the affirmative, then I'm going to make my call to our FAA handler and see what provisions we would need to take care of on that front But I think it could be a really good thing for the city, you know, if we could partner with these guys and, you know, maybe get some free fireworks shows here or there. You know, I mean, I like watching things go boom.

Miss Meredith. You know I do.

As a spectator, well, first I want to say thank you very much for a very well put together packet with a lot of information and really almost all the information that we need to make this decision. That's wonderful. As a spectator, I love fireworks. As a dog and horse owner, I do not love fireworks. And Williston Animal Group, who actually is here for another reason, on our agenda is leases land from the airport and is located right by the entrance of the airport, as is our Williston Animal Shelter. So my question, both for them and for the public, those of us who have horses that don't love things going boom, and dogs, what... What amount of time do you usually, between when you set the date, like how much heads up will we have? What kind of advertising do you do? What are the hours? Because a lot of labor involved for those of us trying to protect our animals from getting injured or running away. And I know on Fourth of July that WAG, they take pretty much all the dogs. They put them in cars. They drive them around for the night. So just so we have an idea of what kind of... It will be a burden to some members of the community and a great excitement for other members of the community. But for those of us who it actually adds work as well as excitement to our day, what kind of heads up will we get? How many hours of the day do you go? Can you give me an idea of like the intervals between the fireworks? Is it all day or do you do it between like two and four? I'm assuming you do it at night too for the...

Normally speaking, when we come into a city, the fire marshal will write a permit, and he will give us his time parameters. You can't really shoot them until it gets dark anyway, and then you're between there and sometime around 11 o'clock at night. So that would be the determining factor on when we can shoot, and otherwise we don't shoot at all except in our window that we have permitted. Wonderful. And he will be very specific about when we have to shut them down. The rest of the time, like throughout the day, would all be construction and building. And you would see sometimes we might be making stars. Sometimes we might be building a whole shell. It just depends on what phase of the construction and what we need to do at the time. But we may have several different stations with several different things going on. But during the day, we're quiet. There's no reason to shut airports down. We're not sending anything up. We're not blowing anything up intentionally. And we try very hard not to blow anything up accidentally in those time periods. And then we're limited to that wherever our time bracket is.

Wonderful. So there would be the opportunity to advertise to the public and let people know so they can protect their animals. It would be in advance.

and uh as far as a day that we might do it generally we try to we try to plan for a whole year where what dates we're going to we have a meeting every month and we meet somewhere in the state every month and it's always a different spot so we may be down in tarpon springs this month we might be down in sebring the next month we might be over in palatka after that one at some point in time one of those we hope would be williston and so The only date that we have left this year that we're looking for a spot is December, sometime in December. But after that, we haven't even planned out January yet, so those dates would be wide open. But it would happen like tomorrow we need it. You'd be well informed.

Wonderful. Thank you. To elaborate on that, so we're well aware of the horse arena. And so we have to coordinate our schedules with them to make sure that there's no horse events going on. And also with the Humane Society or Animal Shelter or whatever it is as well. And so generally right now, you're looking at three to four months of notice once we have all our ducks in a row, possibly six months, but definitely not within 30 days or anything like that.

Wonderful. Thank you so much.

Just so you know, my wife and I had Clydesdale, the big hits of Clydesdale. So we're familiar with that. But you know what we did with them? We put them in the barn when we were hitching them up and grooming them up, and we had a CD with every kind of MP3 file on it you can imagine. It was cymbals, horns, cannon, jake brakes, motorcycles, and we would just turn it up as loud as we could the whole time we were hitching them up. And so mostly by the end of it, they'd just stand there going, would you please turn that off? But they were pretty good out on the road when it happened, so that was one of the things that we used to do.

Are you expecting to have fire and police there on standby the entire time?

In fact, and you see in the packet, we always have the fire department to come out if they want to. Now, sometimes they don't. If it's not a lot going on where it's going to be firing five or six shells, they're like, okay, don't worry about it. But if we've got something where we're going to be really cooking and putting some stuff up and putting some shows on, we invite the whole, all of the police force, EMTs, rescue, fire, everybody. And usually we have a whole lot of trucks sitting out there because it's like, oh, we can stand around and watch fireworks while we're being safe, you know. And so it usually is a popular event. And we encourage them to come out for sure.

Hi, my name's Charlie. I'm the president. We also do have our own firefighting equipment, tankers that we have on back with trucks, quads, and stuff like that. So unless things got out of hand, which we're very on top of things, they're firefighters, and they could sit back while we take care of everything.

Thank you.

I would add that we also are beyond clearing our own properties. We have equipment and have done it before where we bring in skid steers and brush cutters and whatnot and knock down the field and make it as fire safe as we can. And we do that just for our own safety. And you guys would get the benefit of that if we were called in for that.

So we have enough land and space that's away from our runway that the runway is not. potentially damaged if there is an issue?

The primary runways, yes, ma'am. A lot of it would depend on where they wanted to place, and we took that into consideration. We rode around a day as well as a couple other times, and we're trying to stay away from the paved runways as much as possible, but that would be part of the FAA's approval. is getting the permit from them as well. But, I mean, I don't know that anything that they could have would mess up our primary runway. It's concrete. So, I mean, being a white-topped runway, it's talkative. Okay.

Ms. Goodwin? I have all sorts of things written down here that are also not fun. We don't have to, it sounds like we're obviously just in the very preliminary stages, but just so that everyone is aware of things that I, as your attorney, will be asking as we get together what I imagine will be a contract on this. Verification of each shooter passing a safety course before they get onto the site. a timeline and a site plan, background checks, whatever you all do for your individuals who are going to be in your safety zones dealing with explosive materials. We'd like copies of those to verify you all to be in charge of the safety zone and the security for the safety zone, making sure that no one who is not covered is in the safety zone to the extent that our fire chief does determine that there are some fire services that will need to be there, compensation for our firefighters to be present for these activities. I want to look a little bit more into the insurance because it looks like right now what you've provided is for the setup and operations of a fireworks display. I'm not sure that I read that to include the manufacturing process of the fireworks. So you just want to make sure that we, you know, that might be a call with us and your insurance company just to make sure that everything is covered. And then we will want some kind of verification or security for the $5,000 deductible. And I think that that's everything that I have right in this exact moment, but I reserve the right to be annoying later as well.

If they add the city to their insurance, then are we now responsible and liable for that $5,000 as well?

No. So we're just an additional insurer. It's essentially someone who can receive a payout directly for that insurance. Again, all of those are very nitpicky little attorney things that will come up later, but I just wanted to give a sense of where my brain is at as we sort of... contemplate this so those are all be things that we'll all be thinking about and talking with the club and with Benton about but it seems like nothing that can't be surmounted I'm sure that if you've worked in other municipalities before you're well aware of all of these nitpicky little things that attorneys do and I saw two different amounts in there for compensation a maximum amount of compensation can you kind of like if you can or you can differentiate the

There was one $2 million.

There was one $1 million.

I'm sorry, go ahead.

Our insurance is $2 million aggregate and $1 million per event. Right. Per event. Okay.

I think what you're referring to, Madam President, is the nonprofit directors and officers limit. So to the extent that any of the officers or directors are sued individually, they have a personal coverage limit of $1 million.

Okay. Which is a separate policy.

Okay. Also, we do have blanket certificate of insurance, so that's easily provided with you additionally insured as a rider on that. I will say, to maybe ease some of your safety questions, nobody gets on the shooting range without both a club certificate and what they call PGI shooters certificates. Those are the international organizations for certifying fireworks shooters. They... In fact, we are also considering holding a PGI class here if we ever did a big event And then people would have the opportunity to take the shooter's courses and become certified themselves to go out on what we call it. We have ranges set up on it. We'll have a B range, which is where we shoot big fireworks. C range is where you shoot the fireworks you can buy in the tent. And nobody gets on the B range without proper certification. And they're issued a tag when they join the event. And without that tag, that identifies you as being certified. You don't get on the range.

Any other questions? Oh, Mr. Wallace.

Yes, we've done this in the past before. I believe you did it at Kirby Farms many years ago. And we worked with everybody out there. They're very professional. They provided training to our firefighters when we arrived. They took us out there, and we had a big understand. You know, we understood. When we would be needed, they would call us, and we'd go out there. So their safety plans are great. We've worked with them, and we had no issues. So we kind of stand back until they give us, hey, we need you. But they provided us all the training, what to look for, and they provided somebody to go with us at the time if we had to respond them to the field. We really had no issues. Thank you.

All right. That's pretty amazing.

Can't wait to get them. I make a motion that we consider and follow up with, oh my gosh, how am I going to do this, that we proceed forward with having our attorney review our liability and her concerns and Benton with the FAA and come back at a later date to approve moving forward or not, but hopefully approve.

I have a motion.

Second.

Have a second. Any further discussion from the public? Any further discussion from the council?

I think the attorney would be a good candidate to go out and see how it's done, too.

Yeah, we'll talk about that later. Seeing none, I move to vote. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. All those opposed, say nay. Motion passes 5-0.

Thank you.

All right. So...

Now we're going to go to item C. Madam President, before you read the resolution, if you'll just read from the copy that was placed in front of you. We had the preliminary resolution in your packets. We have your final resolution. The numbers remain the same. It's just updating that we already had a preliminary hearing, et cetera.

Okay. We're going to bypass it until Chief Stegall gets here. Okay. So we'll go to item C. I don't know. He said he was on his way.

Madam President, Danny's going to be handling.

Oh, you are?

Yes. Okay. Sounds good.

All right.

Belay that. Yes. All right. So it'll be... Resolution 2026, can I still use 53? Yes. Dash 53, a resolution of the City of Williston, Florida relating to the provision of fire services facilities and programs in the City of Williston, Florida, establishing the rate of assessment imposing fire services assessments against assessed property located within the city.

I'm full of sin for the fiscal year beginning October 1st 2026 approving the assessment role of providing for servability providing for conflict providing for an effective date mr. Danny Wallace okay we've gone through this twice now and it's we nothing has been changed you know for what we asked for and what you considered you know providing you know what you want the amount that you wanted to go with so

we're you know unless there's any changes or any anything that you want to change at this time I have a question do we is is the amount that we're talking about in addition to the fire assessment that we initiated initially

It's not added to it. It's, you know, what you moved it up to.

So it's not what it was previously. It's just that now it'll be this amount but not both together.

Right. It's not compounded. No, they're not added together. Okay, thanks.

And for the record, the council voted on 216.

That is correct.

I did not. I thought it was a big jump, but that's what the bunch already voted on. Was that the 35, 40 percent?

It went from 159 to 216, and I was much happier around 175.

Yeah. Just saying.

It was that big of a jump?

It was. 159 to 216.

Okay.

I had a question.

Yes, ma'am. Ms. Shannon.

Just wanted to make sure I understood when Chief Siegel was here last time, he said that the amount that he had gotten from the county was an additional 30, correct?

Yes.

So now we're looking at 60 as a total? Yes. I don't know the full amount tonight there okay that's what I was trying to figure out if that number was just going to be in addition to what we increase the fire assessment to or does it replace some of it so we don't have to go as high well at last meeting they agreed to

the amount of money that we get from the county. So tonight, they're having their final meeting, so I don't know if that's being pushed through or not. It was what they said they would like to do, but I can't answer that question at this moment.

Understandable. Thank you.

I do have an email here regarding that. I just have to find it. I don't know if anybody else got it or not.

Probably not.

Anybody else get a text from Lamar while we're sitting here?

I got a text. Yeah. But it doesn't talk about.

Oh, yeah, it does. It tells the dollar amounts that they approved in tonight's meeting.

Right. But is that per call?

No, that's per year. That's per year. And we don't pay the buyers as well for the county. Right. But that's the dollar amount they came up with. for theirs.

Should more zeros be added on to that or is that it? So their fire assessment is $250? Yes. And ours is? $216. $216. If you approve that it would be $216.

It's currently $159.

But we're wanting to see how much we're going to get from...

Right, because I remember when we were discussing the option of increasing the fire assessment, we did not know how much we would be getting back for the services that go out to the county. So in order to try to keep that number as low as possible while still meeting the needs that the fire department has, we were kind of in limbo, and it all depended on...

what we got from them.

Exactly, exactly. I know that's going to be one of the first questions from the general public that I've been seeing, so trying to keep that in mind. I don't think I had a chance to ask that question before, if it would just be, this is what we're going to get from the county, this is what we're going to get from the fire assessment, and so on and so forth, or if it was going to be, we need this much, so if we get this much additional from the county, it could replace a portion of what we're asking our citizens to pay.

what the cap this what what i have is an email here that shows that what the county is going to give to the city of williston if their budget is approved which i think they did that tonight is 446 281 which is a seven percent increase from last year okay and which includes the thirty thousand we just found out about at the last meeting Oh, I got another here. Jimmy's talking to me now. He must be listening. The increase was to offset the county calls.

Right.

He needs to increase the city assessment and increase from the county.

So now that we know that that has potentially increased, does that give us the option to kind of come down off of that number to provide a little bit of financial relief to our residents? Yes.

The money that they're giving us is to offset what we respond to the county. We respond to the county more than we do within the city limits. So this money that's coming in will help offset the cost for us responding into the county for the calls that we go to.

Tell me again the percentage of calls in the city versus the calls in the county.

Let's see here. I think you have it on your report that you probably received today, but I have it here. So far this year, this is fiscal year to date. We've responded to 2,071 calls, up 20.5%. City calls are 808 calls. County calls are 1,263. So the city calls is at 39%. The county calls are at 61%. Is that what you're? Yes.

And something else that I saw on the county page was that we have more calls out of our station into the county than their other highest county, or their other's highest station. So they're only doing 11% of the calls that we're doing, what, 37, I think you said, 67. Right. So we're doing way more than any of the other counties. fire stations are doing.

Right.

And wasn't, they were saying, more than Newberry?

We were? I don't know if it's more than Newberry, but it's more than Station 11, wherever Station 11 is.

Station 11 is out on 121. It's a manned station that they have with EMS and fire. They have two personnel on duty 24 hours a day.

121 toward? Towards.

Towards 19, out there in Morristown. Okay, okay. Right.

So on the other side of the county.

Out there by Harriet Downs. Okay, gotcha.

So I know that's going to be the one thing that we're going to hear from residents. And I know, like me, I'm a resident as well, is if, you know, let's say the county is utilizing Williston Fire Services more than the other services, and then they're also going to be asking Williston residents to pay more, it's a hard pill for them to swallow, not quite – knowing everything that plays into that role and if we are able to provide some relief with the fire assessment without bringing it to that maximum number i think that that might be worth looking into um just so we can kind of do our due diligence on that part. But we do definitely appreciate all the efforts going to the county and trying to get more to cover the amount of calls that they're asking Williston to provide while also making sure that Williston has everything they need to take care of Williston as well as the county.

And if our call load is continuing to rise within the city limits, we're at 39% now as it We continue to grow in the city our call load goes. Of course. So, you know, we keep growing and growing. So we're trying to set it to where we're not having to come back to you every single year.

Right.

And enough to help offset so we can provide the equipment that we need to provide the services that we do in the city and into the county.

And as we grow, there's more revenue that's coming in as well.

That is correct. We have the new townhouses that are going in at the end of 4th, and they're going to go and grow, and people are just going to be there, and calls are going to add up. So wintertime's here, so when it gets – well, it's not here. It's close. But we're getting close to it. But, you know, we get the – out here at Williston Crossings, they fill up, and our call load definitely increases because they come down, and they bring their medical problems with them.

right yeah I'm getting a text from Jimmy who is obviously listening he says we need both the increase from the county and the increase from the city fire assessment so let me ask this question so the fire assessment is only for the citizens who own houses correct

It houses and property.

Commercial and commercial. So when it comes to our apartment complexes, how do we bill them for our fire assessment?

They're billed and broke down by square footage.

And our square footage is what, .4 cents? Four cents a square foot, or non-residential. But that's non-residential.

That's non-residential. I don't have that in front of me right at the moment. But the, if Jimmy, if you're still listening, text him.

Non-residential would be commercial.

Yeah, commercial would be.

So it's nine cents per square foot.

Yeah, but we have.

Excuse me, four cents per square foot.

Right. So, you know, the businesses, the big businesses cover, you know, a big percentage of it. Right. between the money that we're getting from the county and with that 30,000 we're getting from them and what we're asking for now, it's to keep us basically online to where we need to be. If we get cut back $30,000, that's $30,000 we're gonna have to find to make up.

So is, I'm still on the apartment complexes, sorry. So that's considered non-residential? Even though it has people living there? How is it non-residential? Because it's a commercial venture.

It's based on whoever. Please explain. It's based on whoever owns it, right? Okay. So you're looking at, is it your residence or is it?

Oh, he's talking. I'm sorry.

Okay. Text. Excuse me. Excuse me. Danny. Danny.

Danny.

Danny. She's speaking. You're kind of interrupting.

It's just, it's billed by property owner in the same way that your taxes are billed by property owner. So to you, if you rent out something, it's not for your residential use necessarily.

And now the townhouses would be residential. Because they're purchased by someone. Okay. But the apartments are a commercial venture. He wants to talk on the microphone.

Okay. I have Chief Stegall on the phone.

Okay, just a moment. Go ahead. Who was talking? Oh, you were saying about residential?

I was saying if it's an apartment, it's non-residential. But if it's a townhouse that you purchased, it's residential.

How many townhouses are we looking at that we have right now?

I think 50 or so. You know, if we can make a point here, this budget that we have right now, our budget, Stephen has already figured this money into the budget. So, you know, if we go to change anything, start reducing, then we're going to have to go back to the budget and find this extra money.

And not to throw an additional wrench in, but you do need to make a decision tonight. I can't hear them.

Is there a way I can call in on Facebook?

We can hear you, but you can't hear us. Can you put a mic or something to...

I can't hear what's going on.

Tell him to call in to, what is it, Ring Central he has to call in to?

Tell him Latricia's going to send him the Ring Central.

Okay, Latricia's sending you a link so you can join in.

I think the other factor for this particular year that's really weighing heavy on a lot of people's minds is it's not just this rate that's going up. It's rates on everything. So when they're seeing rates going up, they're not just thinking about the fire assessment or the people who are going to be paying just the fire assessment. They're thinking about groceries and rent and everything that's just hiking up as much as possible where we don't really have control over those things because we don't vote on how much bread costs. But in these situations if there are ways that we can make it work With what we have and what we're because this number was supposed to be our highest and I'm not saying don't do the highest I'm not saying do the lowest I'm just saying we need to also have those things in the Consideration of how this year will play out because next year we could come in and gas could be half as cheap We have no idea what the future holds or it could be even more. I just think that that's something that's going to be weighing heavily on not just my mind as a resident, but other residents as well, is they're looking at the combination of all the things going up, their utility bills, everything. So as we make this decision tonight, I just ask that we kind of keep that in mind. If we're already trying to find space for the 2%, you know, really looking at this number and seeing what we can do to meet everyone's needs without gouging the pockets.

Madam President. Yes, sir. Just a word real quick, just to be mindful that regardless of which way you all decide tonight, if you decide to go either lower or not do it, just be mindful that if this number is already baked in and there are no other ways to cut money or funding for the fire department, it will require an additional transfer out of the utilities fund to make up for the money. Which is possible.

So then we have to look at, because we were given two different scenarios, one with raises, one without. if we do not do the raises and we may actually have to go back to the drawing board and look at that if of not doing raises and if we're going looking at offsetting so that residents aren't having to to pay a lot we always have options we just need to figure out what those options are going to be and kind of move forward that way. I know there also is in there for, like, we talk about our elderly residents, but there is something in there to kind of offset and help them if they are aware of it. So, it... It could potentially be a lot. And for some people it will be a lot. For some people it won't be as much. But, yeah, we just kind of have to make a decision tonight, like our city attorney said, because we definitely have to get that done because next week is our first budget hearing.

We have to turn this in for the term notice. We have to do it much tonight in order to do that because this is this is our fire assessment. workshop public hearing right yes at the same time we've got to do that yeah it just sort of was within our council meeting right and i was confused with that but i can't wait for it do i have to go early right are we gonna do it later what what's gonna happen this is a public hearing inside of your council meeting okay and based on the timeline that i have from your um

your consultants who you've hired to do your fire assessment study and your rate study and all of those things. Tonight is the night that you all have to make a decision so that we can get it to the tax office.

Ms. Meredith.

Sorry.

That's okay.

I, like Ms. Church, understood from the previous meeting when we discussed this that we were setting this at a high rate And then we were waiting to see what the county came back with and that there would be some wiggle room once we heard back. Correct. Now I'm hearing there's no wiggle room. We need both amounts of money. And I'm struggling with that because I feel like we made a decision to set this rate based on the idea that we could probably come down. And now we're being told that we can't come down unless we cut into... areas of the budget so I'm struggling with that and then secondly I guess I don't know how in our budget Stephen made the numbers add up if we didn't know what the county was going to give us so I would love an explanation of how we balanced that portion of the budget without knowing And maybe I just have my timeline wrong that we actually knew what the county was going to give us prior to tonight. It just wasn't confirmed until tonight. And if that's the case, I understand that. But I would like some clarification in that area.

I believe we had an idea. I believe he did say that they were talking about $30,000. Okay. So he had an, yeah, I believe he had an idea, and based on what potentially we would get, they put that into the budget.

Did somebody give that to Stephen? Yeah.

Yeah, we actually talked about it in a meeting. And that was the original $30,000.

Before the additional. I know we put the $330,000, but I didn't know we put the other. The additional. And then the increase, it was what, the $380,000-something budget.

My understanding was that he included the original $30,000 that was discussed, and then when Chief Stiegel was here at the last meeting, he said, I got you an additional $30,000. Yeah. So that's how I took it, because I do remember him saying.

As though it was $60,000. As though it was $60,000. I think it was only $30,000, though. Exactly.

Yeah, I think it was only $30,000. So these numbers are based off of $30,000, not $60,000. I don't know if anybody has let him know that he got an additional $30,000.

Okay.

Is he online yet?

No, he can't get in on the RingCentral. But right now, we're getting from the county, at this point, he just sent me, $446,282. Right. Okay. That is what we're getting from the county.

Right.

And the assessment that we put in is for the city of Williston, it's not to support the county. It's to support us here. The money that they give us from the county cannot be used to... Buy equipment. Well, it can buy certain equipment, but it's to provide fire protection to the county.

To the outside services, right?

For the outside services. So you want to change it. At this point, it will cut us in what we're needing to provide services to our city.

My question, does anybody over here, because I don't, I could probably go to an old agenda, though. Have the numbers of how it breaks down, if we should back it off a little bit. Does anybody remember? That's in here. Anybody know what were the dates that are?

We should have it on a previous agenda.

What's the question? How much money each little increment went down? How much money, if we backed it down to, say, 175 or even 200, how much money are we looking to make up? That's what I'm trying to figure out.

So do we know the current rate on the resolution? Do we know how much money that is?

Because even I don't have that figure. I don't think it's here. It would be in Mr. Kaufman's budget he's got on his hand out there. He seems to be the only one with a budget here tonight.

No, it's been on my notes since the last day. Oh. And I don't have it.

Oh, you don't have your budget. My budget's in the car. I can always go to the car and get it.

And, I mean, if we look at, maybe I'm looking at the wrong thing. I'm going to look at this. But it also says for the fiscal year beginning October 1st, 2026, the estimated fire assessment cost to be assessed at 319. Never mind. That's the total amount with the increase.

Here's the budget packet right here.

So 319, 138 is what we would get if we went through with the assessment?

Yes, but what we're doing is that in the past budgets when they came here and talked to us about our assessment rate and they gave us a high and a low, you know,

you y'all voted on bringing it down to 205. i believe if i'm not mistaken the the city attorney might correct me on this it's 216 in this resolution yeah 216 okay so the the last meeting that we had we had two resolutions for you if you'll recall when you all had to decide between each resolution the one that is the one that you chose was the 216. There was also a resolution for 200, and I am trying to find that to see if I can give you the numbers that were from that. Obviously, that's something that... That was a council meeting. Accenture. That is correct, and I think it was the 7th of July. How about the 8th?

We went to the table and we had that discussion about the numbers I was looking for. Yes, sir. The only thing I have with me that said you gave me a copy of this for the budget. Right. And you put a notation on it that says you had found an extra $30,000 and it was received today, meaning it would have been about the 17th, I guess.

Okay.

That's the staffing report for the fire department he's referring to.

Okay. I found the information that Accenture, which is the consultant who does your fire assessment work, so they sent over on June 17th to the chief and I a different rate scenarios breakdown. Currently, you're sitting at 159, and that results in net revenues of $235,880 if you kept it at 159. You voted to move to 216, which is $318,915 in net revenues. At 200, which is the only one that they calculated in between those two rates, it was $283,954 in estimated net realized revenue. I do not have any other iterations of numbers because that's the three that they ran within those two parameters.

They're gonna be here any minute. I don't know who they are.

Who's gonna be here? Isn't Lamar on the way? No, he's still in the meeting.

Oh. Oh, you think he's still in the meeting. Okay.

He said he's on the way. How far on the way? Hey! Hey, I hear you.

Where did that come from? You can hear me?

Yes, we can. Awesome. Okay.

Oh, boy, technology. It's a wonderful thing. Okay, questions. What questions did you have for me? I'm sorry. I was in the meeting trying to figure out what they were going to do with Kirby Farms. Hello? Yeah. We're here. Okay. What questions did you have? No questions?

Chief, I think generally the question from the council that's been raised is there was some discussion at the last meeting about the reason that we adopted $216 as our rate was that we were still contemplating we may receive additional money from the county. It seems that the county has provided some additional money, and the council's question is, does that alleviate the need to now go to the 216, as that was the understanding of the council at the last meeting? Does everyone feel like I've summarized that correctly? I'm seeing nods. Okay.

Okay. The county, the numbers I give Stephen to put in the budget, so this is going to be a Stephen question. I give him those numbers with a $30,000 increase. Remember the last meeting they said they were going to give us an increase of $30,000. So it went from 417 to like 446. Now, the question would be, like I said, this is a Steven question. Did he use that number or did he use the 417 number?

I don't know.

I think I'm going to the... My understanding was that it was with the original $30,000, so it should be $417,000.

I have the budget right here, and Stephen has... This is from the last, the third budget workshop, and he has $447,085 is in there. Yeah, the whole thing is in there. The whole thing is in there.

Okay, yeah, that would be... That was the number that I gave Stephen originally.

Yeah, that's for county fire services, not the assessment. County fire services, 447-085. That's it.

That sounds correct. Yes, ma'am. That's pretty much the number they just showed me tonight. And that's what I was talking about last week. We secured that $30,000.

And then for the fire assessment, Stephen has budgeted in $318,915, which is the 216. Okay. So he already included everything at the highest rate in order to get the fire budget as close to the fire budget as you guys, we could get the fire budget.

And I can tell you that if my math is correct, and I believe that it is because I use my little calculator, if we went from $216,000 to $200,000, that's $35,000. Yes, which means we would have to make up. Right. Just to tell you how much money that would be.

I had that also. But just like I said, we would have to make up that difference if y'all wanted to do that. And it would be the only place to come from, the utilities. is to increase the transfer. Yeah, increase the transfer. But when you're transferring 1.3 million, I don't know that 35,000 is that big of a deal, to be honest with you.

So how, because everybody wants to stay away from the raises. How much were the raises? $114,000. $114,000.

So that would more than enough cover us going down to $200,000. They could go less on that.

Do you have a point, Debra?

Huh?

Do you have a point?

Mr. Fuller.

Just a couple of questions that were texted to me. The one is that if we're paying, I mean, if 61% of the coals are out of the city, Why doesn't the county pay 61% of the budget? And there's something wrong with what we're doing if we're indeed subsidizing the county. I'm not sure Williston can afford to subsidize the county. And the other question that was asked was then we're saying that we know that the number of calls in the city will go up.

Well, isn't the county also increasing in population?

So we need to be careful, and this may be something that's addressed in a future time, but something is wrong with what we're doing. And particularly as we're already taxing the citizens inside the city at a very high level already.

I agree. I think the understanding that the council thought that they were entering into was that based on what we got from the county, then we would be able to go back and look

that amount but that amount was actually put into the budget before we even got the amount from the county if we can just make if I can make one other statement then maybe we need to look at if we're going to provide provide fire protection outside the county it needs to it needs to float with the amount of calls outside the county and that we need the county needs to pay its fair share and that's 100 of the calls that we make outside of the city limits and that's the concern may i comment just a second yes can you guys can you guys hear me yes yes

Okay, real quick, I'm going to go back in history just a minute. If y'all will remember, in probably, I don't know, the past five, six, seven meetings, I've given y'all updates on negotiations with a county that we're trying to get accomplished to come up with a new funding formula to make the county pay their full amount. We are working on that. Mr. Fuller is absolutely right. They need to pay their fair share, and we are working diligently to try to make that happen. The problem is during this budget process, we run out of time. You have to have a balanced budget by a certain date, and there was not enough time to get that formula implemented at this time. So we are working toward that. And you're right. I mean, we've looked at how the other counties do it, Lasso County being one of those, and we're working our best to come up with a fair funding formula for everybody involved.

That would be great.

Yes, sir, I totally agree, and I believe that is the best thing we can do.

Ms. Meredith? Yeah, I just want to respond. I met with the chief at the very beginning of August when the budget first came out, and he did tell me this. I mean, Chief Stegall. He did tell me this, and I believe, and correct me if I'm wrong, Chief Stegall, that they're actually forming a commission or a board to work on this. But again, the timing is just not right.

this fall the timing will be over the course of the next several months and so we have to budget for this year with the plan that by next year it will be rectified and balanced that is our plan 100 percent uh you know i i have i i have agreed to some things with with the county uh to to help ensure that all municipalities not just my hometown But all municipalities are treated fairly by the county in the future. Now, I will say this, and this is just a side note. Just a few years ago, for all involved, it was 70-75% were in the county on the calls. And if you'll notice, that margin is narrowing every year. Every year it's getting closer and closer and closer. And the reason that's happening is because the population inside the city limits will grow like the newer subdivisions or a newer apartment complex where you have the no sprawl laws out in the county. You can't build large subdivisions outside the city limits at this time. So we're going to continue to move in that direction of closer buildings and closer to the number of calls in the city versus the number of calls in the county. And you're absolutely correct. We just run out of time to come up with that funding formula this year.

I make a motion. Shall I jump in? Make a motion that we set the rate at $200 down from the $216 and find a way in the budget to... create that. Deborah has the exact number, but $34,961. $34,961. Whether we, this year, draw from the utility fund or discuss the raises again, and then next year, hopefully we will be able to have more accurate math that more accurately represents the actual cost of responding to calls in the city versus the heavier balance being in the county.

Then if we do that tonight are we going to have to discuss tonight or can we discuss on Tuesday?

This is what I would make a recommendation, just clarifying the motion. Would the motion be to adopt the resolution 2026-53 with a change of the rates to 200 for the dwelling unit? Of course, then if you go down on that, it's $0.03 per square foot for nonresidential would be the concomitant decrease, and then it would remain at $0.09. dollars an acre for the vacant land. Why do we have to decrease on the non-residential? Because it's across the board how you're allocating your funding. So you can't increase one category and not increase another category the same percentage. So if you're going to increase your fire assessment rate, it has to be an increase across the board, that same percentage rate for each of the categories. You can't increase. But we're not decreasing for the vacant land.

We're not decreasing for the vacant land. Because it was seven off like before.

It was seven. So what I'm basing those numbers that I just told you are off of the – rate scenarios that we received that i read to you before so in order to get to that 200 residential it's a 37.20 percent funding and so that same percent funding for your non-residential would be 0.03 so three cents square foot and then it's nine dollars an acre for your vacant land

But the math is still the same of the final number that you gave us.

The math is still the same for the 283, 954. You just have to reduce each category.

So I sort of redo the motion?

If you just say that, yes, that's what the intent was, I can.

Yes, that is what the intent, that we would reduce. As stated.

As stated by our lawyer. And adopt otherwise the resolution 26-53. Correct. Second motion.

I have a motion and a second. Any further discussion from the public?

I have a question. It's probably a stupid question. Why does our fire department cover more of the county than other departments?

I'm sorry, just one minute. I need you to state your name. Because they're really good.

Can you state your name? And can you pull the mic closer to you, please?

That and your address.

Sure. My name is Janine Hartley. I'm at 635 Northeast 2nd Street here in Williston. And so I just, you know, it doesn't make any sense to me that, you know, why does our department cover a lot of county when the other departments don't? Why do we cover so much of it?

It probably depends on where the call load is. If the call load is closer to the city of Williston and we're the closest to it, then we would be the ones to ask to go to that call. They wouldn't ask someone.

Right. Sure.

So let's try not to talk out of turn. Thank you. But you're right. But yeah, what she said.

So it's locale then? Yes. And I believe in... What district they're in. Right, the chief is here now, but I believe we're a district, not necessarily like just a fire hall. We're actually a district, and so they overlap to make sure that there's always coverage. Or not overlap, but they share the responsibilities to make sure there's always coverage. Okay.

Any other questions from the public?

Just to reiterate what Mr. Fuller said, counties should pay their fair share.

Chief, do you have anything else before we move on?

So where's Jimmy?

No. Because that's not what you wanted.

Or needed, rather, should I say. I won't say want. I think, you know, as long as we can make it up this year and we can get through this year, You know, I would love to say I'm going to guarantee we're going to get where we need to be in one swoop. I can't guarantee that. But I'm going to do my best to get us on a fair and equal footing. And I think we currently have the county commission over there that is willing to work with us to do that. Awesome.

That's great. Thank you.

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you. All right. So anything else from the council? Mr. Mayor, anything from you?

No.

Did I miss it or did you not vote? We have not voted. And I have nothing to say.

Okay. All right. So all those in favor say aye. Aye. All those opposed say nay. Motion passes 5-0.

And if I may.

So now, just a second. So now when we, do we have to discuss now or can we discuss on Tuesday related to where we're going to find the money?

Yeah, your next budget.

We will do it there. Okay, sounds good.

Just clarifying. So Stephen can amend it.

Interim or city attorney will. I'll handle that. Of course Terry has it. He's the man. All right. We'll move forward. Resolution 2026-54, a resolution of the City Council of the City of Williston for approving a lien reduction policy for code enforcement liens authorizing appropriate parties to sign any document required to effectuate same on behalf of the City of Williston and provide an effective date. Attorney Kirsten Ballou.

Okay, so this is the policy that you had, we have discussed previously, but we never have formally finalized. You'll note that it's section four that we really still have the questions about. Sections one through three talk about eligibility, they talk about the process. They talk about evaluation of the request. I did amend that since the last time we spoke. It previously said the code enforcement board and on appeal the city council while we don't have a code enforcement board. In the absence of that, it would come to you all is how I amended that just so that we're clear that obviously there has to be some entity for someone to make an application to. The Section 4, the penalty reduction, which I think was the big part for you all. There are two different ways that we can do it. The first is, I mean, there's infinite ways that you can do this, two that we've discussed. First is the chart, so you have a length of time that the violation remains noncompliant, and then a percentage reduction. We hadn't put any percentages in there, so I sort of took the liberty of filling in some suggested percentages. you can obviously amend anything and everything about this policy. The second option for the reductions is following this highlighted or section. And it has to do with three sort of criteria regarding the loans or the gravity of the violation. If it's minor, a 50% reduction. Significant, a 25% reduction. time taken to bring the property into compliance previous code violations on the property all of those have sub criteria that you would then evaluate and have a reduction of not to exceed a hundred percent obviously of the loan provided however that well I keep saying loan the lien and provided that all costs incurred by the city as a result of the violation, including costs to correct it, prosecution recording fees, legal costs, etc., will be recovered to the fullest extent permitted, regardless of the reduction. So, for instance, if we had to tear down a building, we would not be reducing that actual cost, so to the extent that it's cost us actual money out of the public coffers. Those are the two options that you've discussed before. Really, all you need to do is tell me if there's anything about this policy that you don't like, and then choose what you would like to do as far as Section 4.

What I don't like about it is... Everything. As given a full 100% reduction in lien. I think that's absolutely ridiculous. But that's just my feelings. I think the timeline, especially if we'll go back up to the chart,

I definitely like the chart better.

Yeah. I don't like the up to one year because somebody should be able to pay their lien up to a one year. So there really should be no reduction for that if it's only been a year.

A year is a long time.

A year is a long time, but a year is also a long time to do what you need to do to get your property back in order.

So maybe we need, oh, that's true. Yeah.

Exactly. Well, that's me. I'm sorry. I kind of feel like I'm really bothered by this.

I mean, we could put another category in there and break it to six months and a year.

I don't even like, no. How about we go from two years to one year? To me, that's just, I feel like. It should be doable.

I think the whole point of doing it this way is to give them incentive to do it and do it quickly.

The incentive to do it is to not get a fee in the first place.

Right, but if we want them to do it quick and not hang out for two years, it doesn't make any difference.

We just want them to do it.

We do. We've got to give them some incentive if they're an absentee owner, for example. Think about that. I mean, if somebody who's here and they see...

So if they're an absentee owner, their mail has to go somewhere for them to get the notice that there will incur fees if they do not make their property better, right?

I agree, but I want to give them some incentive.

Stop wanting to give people stuff. When we need to, you know, manage our... budgets and things like that. I think we have given a lot of money away and we're sitting here fighting, trying to make things work within our city. Stop giving stuff away. If I can keep my property up, which is difficult.

We're not actually giving them money because we're keeping all the cost and the administrative fees.

So my question is then what's the purpose of having fees? If we're going to go with just temp, that's not it. It's an incentive to get them to do it, and then we go and take it away and we give it back to them and say, okay, well, you don't have to pay this. So your incentive is for me to charge you a fee in order for you to do what you need to do with the property, keep it up and maintain. But yet, if you don't do it, then I'm going to give you another incentive by taking that money that you owe us just so you can do what you were supposed to be doing in the first place.

I mean, I'm good with leaving it up to a year and changing it to 90%. I'm not.

I have a question. Anybody else has anything to say? Because we kind of just monopolized that. It's okay. It's okay. Yeah. So who was first?

He was first.

Mr. Cox. So we abandoned going after a magistrate to handle all this?

I thought we were going with a magistrate. We have not abandoned that. I have to rewrite several sections of your code to accommodate for that. So it is taking me a little bit of time to do that.

This is until we get there. And here's the thing. If you get a magistrate, you may not like what they say, and they may not give anything.

leeway you're saying it then why is it not okay if you not give leeway i am giving leeway you're the one who don't want to give leeway so my question is about warnings how often and how how do they receive their warnings before they start to receive actual fines so this is an excellent question thank you i get 30 days right so typically the way that it has worked

always in the city of Wilson, as long as I've been here, is that I think you all provide the most amount of pre-code enforcement action assistance of any municipality, maybe combined, that I work with. Are you surprised? Wow. Your code enforcement officers are exceptional at working with your individuals before we even get to a code enforcement hearing. So the first thing that happens is code enforcement clocks, hey, something about this property is not up to code. Typically, the next step is that they go and they speak to the individual and they say, hey, no action formally has been taken, but just so that you know, this needs to be cleaned up. It's on my radar. And then they keep in contact with that person. Usually, for instance, when Laura was your code enforcement officer, she would be in contact with people for months and months and say, okay, you've made this progress, let's make this progress, let's make this progress. It often takes many months of discussion prior to it even getting to the first hearing. Then after the first hearing in front of code enforcement, they typically have 30 days to clean up the property. Then Laura goes, not Laura, your code enforcement officer goes, and it's been a while since it's been Laura, so I don't know why I'm still on that. Christy would then go and take a look at the property and say okay this is either not in compliance still at which point the fines would start or it actually is in compliance and then it comes back to the code enforcement board and they say you're all good to go and it is only after that very elongated process which I have never seen take less than six months that you would get to a fine on a property.

So then not only do they have six months, now they have six months plus one year. And then we eliminate their fine totally. That is absolutely crazy. Just saying. I know I'm looking at you. I'm not talking to you, but I'm just saying. I mean, to me, that's just absolutely... And I'm not trying to not be fair, but I think... We need to go up on the amount of years, especially when you're looking at 100% of them not paying. That's just to me asking that. Can I say that?

I'd leave it one year and change it to 90%.

Sorry. Okay.

Say that again? I'd leave it at one year and make it 90%.

Why are we going to give them 90% of a discount? Please tell me that.

Because they fixed it. And that's the whole point is we want them to clean it up. Mr. Cox.

Well, I'm going to agree with you, Dee. I think we should play hardball.

What? Not hardball.

The property right across the railroad. We came in here. It was a whole story told about what we were going to do. They had the attorney. She was going to sell it. This and that and so forth. And where is it at? It's not sold.

Has it been in bad shape again? It's addressed in here.

Right, but that's what I mean. I promise they didn't go through. But we gave in to let them be able to clean it because they were going to sell it. Good, it'll be in good hands. And it's not there. Were we used to make that point?

Yeah, we did. I don't think we forgave it.

Yeah, we did. We absolutely did. It went from $96,000 down to $15,000. If it sold, but it never sold.

I don't think there was a stipulation. We talked about it, but I don't think there was a stipulation.

We were told that we knew the contractor who was going to work on it, and the contractor was going to buy it, and he was going to go through with it, and then the contingency. Because yes, this lights my fire my hair on fire as well dar finesse the contingent that they had some contingency in the probate that they were not able to Clear the title in order to sell it unless these liens were reduced. So this council agreed I voted against it But this council agreed to reduce the liens from ninety six thousand dollars down to fifteen thousand dollars and then the property never Never sold so it's gone Disagree yeah so and that's how we ended up here because then the next week a gentleman came in and he also had code enforcement issues on his property and then you know we had to be fair and that's why this issue came out and i'm i just want to say while i'm still on the mic i completely agree with dar finesse and mr cox about making this a little bit more so what do you want it to be stringent i mean i i'd like to If you have, go ahead, yeah. Okay, sorry. I'd like to, I think after 15 years, there should be no reduction. I think we should shift everything, you know, everything down. And I guess my question is, this is not a guaranteed reduction. Up to. Up to. No more than. So we need to keep that in mind, that this does not guarantee somebody 80% or 60% or so forth. That is just the most that the council can decide.

I still think we should go down. Case by case. Yeah, 15 years, we shouldn't give them anything. I agree 100%.

I still think we need to go out on it. Can we just get rid of the up to one year and maybe do up to two years? I mean, or two years, start from two years. Once they hit two years, then before two years, they have to pay for everything. Once it hits two years, then we start looking at reduction.

That's not any incentive, I can tell you that.

Listen, what we could do to alleviate those two concerns and hold them both is we could move each of the categories up. So the first one can be up to two years if you wanted to. And then we could do... If we're getting rid of the 5% at the very bottom, instead of 100%, we could get rid of the 100% altogether. We could move 80%, so up to two years, 80%. Up to five years, 60%. Up to 10 years, 40%. Up to 15 years, 20%. And then after 15 years, nothing. Okay.

How about we do 60, 40, 20, 5. And then nothing.

I like Kirsten's better.

I like mine's better.

We've got to compromise here now.

We do. I can see the concern because if we've dealt with many times before where someone comes in, they plead their case, they get the, if you do this, we can do this, and then they don't do that, then we're out those fines that everyone else is being held accountable to. They should be held accountable to, especially if they stated, I would get it done if I sold the property or whichever, and then it doesn't happen.

there really is no incentive the only incentive is me not having to pay it

Well, you don't reduce it until they've got it cleaned up. That's what we've told, for example, Mr. Pesso. We've told them all along, we cannot do anything for you until you've got it in compliance.

That is a very important point. I know that I sort of skipped over sections 1 through 3 of this, but sections 1 through 3 do say you're not even eligible to ask until my code enforcement officer says you're cleaned up and you're in compliance with our code. So don't even ask until you're in compliance.

So they can't even ask for a reduction. Don't even ask. That's right. Can we put that in our stipulations?

She said it's there.

I guess I missed that part.

It is here. The other thing that's here that I just want to, and you're going to throw something at me, I know you are. I might. You are. Here, I'll even give it to you. You can throw it back at me. It does say in here that when you give them code enforcement, when you present them with a client, I won't call it a lien yet, but it's fine. You present this to them. Right. So they have knowledge of it. Right. So they have incentive to fix it. Right. As soon as they can to get the better deal. Because if you can wait forever, you're not going to get a deal at all. And let me just say that Mr. Pesso and those properties did not have the benefit of this before we passed it. You can throw something at me. But are you going to hold him?

I'm not going to throw anything at you. We are disagreeing.

We are.

And agreeing to disagree very happily.

And I like that. Yeah.

So it's okay. It's called debating. It should.

I mean, we should be able to have discussions about throwing things at each other, right?

So to clarify, just so everyone's on the same page, the eligibility criteria is in Section 1, just so that we're aware. The property has to be in full compliance with all provisions of the code. The lien has to be from a code and compliance violation, so no other kinds of liens, like an electric lien or anything like that. And then the owners of the property must not have any active code violations in the city, whether on the subject property or another property. that they hold in their name. So for instance, if I owned five properties and two of them are in violation and I fix one and I come to you and I ask for a reduction in that one, I'm not eligible until I've cleaned up the other property as well. Thank you for pointing that out.

And each one of those will be subject to the $500 fee? The same, yep. Can we go up on that fee to $1,000? I'm just being kind of irate now. Because Ms. Debra will have a heart attack.

I'm having a heart attack over here. We don't have any fee right now. So I think $500 is the plan. She's going to have a heart attack over here. I think $500 is a lot. Because think of the cases we have that come in here. And not the Pesso case, obviously, because they have the money to fix it up if they need to. But there are a lot of people who come in here who don't have the money, and that's why it's in disrepair. And I think $500 is a lot. I won't argue with it, though, because it is administrative. And we do need that to do all the things we have to do in order to.

But even at that, we're not even looking at the fact that somebody has gone back and forth and corresponded for six months.

We do have a $250 administrative. So once you get a lien on your property, a fine. You just said $500.

In addition, there's an administrative fee. Okay. The $500 is the application. Miss, miss, miss, miss, Baloo is talking.

When you go through the code enforcement process, if there's an order from the code enforcement board against you, it's a $250 admin fee for our code enforcement process along with your fine, a daily fine. The $500 that you see here is specifically for an application of the lien reduction. It contemplates that we're going to have to go through and look at not just this property, but other properties you may own that we're going to have to take a look at your eligibility. We're going to have to send our code enforcement officer out there again, et cetera. So that's what that is related to.

We currently have no application at all. Two separate things. An addition.

Miss Meredith, I just want to also point out that and we discussed this when this was in front of us before with the 2 options that there there is. A clause for exigent circumstances, because that was my concern that maybe somebody was sick or they were deployed or something like that. And they truly were unable to deal with it. And that is in here that but I think. you know, it has pretty clear wording about what exactly exigent circumstances. So for somebody, you know, who, excuse me, is...

I had to look that word up, by the way. Did you really? Oh, God.

So, you know, this is firm, and I agree, but there is room for that true hardship case for us to say this is a true hardship that could in no way, shape, or form have been avoided. And so I don't think we need to consider... being lenient because of hardship, that's already built into this.

I agree.

I said I wouldn't argue with the 500.

So please don't argue with the other. Because she just said it was built in. I liked what she did, though, not what you said. What did she do? What she did, the category is different. You went way down, way up. I didn't. I left the categories. We increased it to two years, more than two years. And then you said 60. And then, correct. So we moved it from. I like her 80 better. Why you don't like the 60? Because that's a lot.

It's not. It is. Why don't we make a motion and vote on it?

For two years.

Great idea.

We're talking about for two years. Can somebody make the motion for 60%, 60, 40, 25?

And then zero.

Was that a motion?

She can't make a motion.

Okay. I'm not taking it. I'll do it. I make a motion that we approve this ordinance, resolution, sorry, resolution to reflect that we will eliminate the initial category of up to one year. And then we will shift that for more than one year up to two years. It's a reduction of no more than 60. And the next category down, no more than 40. And the next category down, no more than 20. And the next category down, no more than five. And more than 15 years has a 0% reduction.

Second.

Hallelujah. Thank you, Jesus.

Amen. All right. So we have a motion and a second. Any further discussion from the public? No, no, no. You're good? Any further discussion from the council?

Isn't our code enforcement officer leaving as of next week?

We'll deal with that later. Okay. Okay.

Just want to make sure.

Okay. No further questions.

All right.

So no further questions from the council. Mr. Mayor, nothing?

I have nothing.

Oh, okay.

I would just love to hear this end.

All right.

So, you're going to have to live with it. Are you happy to live with it the way they just changed it? Did you hear how they changed it?

He said he had nothing to say, so we're good.

Thank you, Madam President.

Appreciate it, Mr. Mayor. All right, my move to vote. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. All those opposed, say nay. Nay.

Speak into the mic, please. I already did.

Motion passes 4-1. In favor?

Okay, we'll move on.

I hope you're happy.

I also want to go back to what I said before.

Okay, go ahead.

Is that the PESO property I believe is not covered by this because they were not given this particular resolution before we started talking to them. And I don't know how we'll do it with them. I think we'll have a discussion and we'll make that decision. I think you will.

And it may reflect this and it may not. And you know what?

We could do the discussion under another meeting.

That discussion is going to be this meeting, sir, because it is the next item on the agenda. Thank you.

At the last meeting when we spoke to Mr. Peso's son, Mr. Peso, we said that we would be using this as an outline. We did. Not necessarily set in stone, but as an outline for our decision making.

Correct. All right. So we will move forward. Anything else, Ms. Jones? Okay.

No, I'm just not happy about it. No, I'm sorry.

And I think y'all are going to regret it too.

Okay. You'll come back to it. I'm sorry.

All right. Item D. Discussion with possible action. Pay so properties. Attorney Kirsten Ballou.

Okay. You all. Latricia, do they have the document that I sent to you earlier today?

We do not. I've been looking for it. That's all right. I believe he's online, too, by the way.

Can you put it up with your computer? Or can you send it to her in an email?

Send it in an email.

And then she can put it up there as you talk? If you're able to. You want to take a break? Just while they're doing that. You want to take a five-minute break? Sure. Yes. All right, we're going to adjourn for approximately 10 minutes, so we'll be back at 8.20.

I'm so sorry. I'm okay. Wonderful.

I was telling my wife that Sherman, you know, as much as we care for him, even though he broke her hand and he fractured my spine, even so, we still care for him a great deal. He runs the house. We bow to whatever he wants.

We all.

Yes, and thankful for it. And I told her, I said, you know, I've got these two children. groups that have offered me, they said that they, Guardian Angels said they could not get a service for me after I waited a year and a half. And so these two groups said they could, but That was two years ago, and I got Sherman that. And I said, I can train Sherman. Sherman will never be a service guy. Sherman needs served.

He needs his own service.

Yeah.

You're his service. You're his service.

So when I told her that, she said, we're not letting Sherman go. You can let me go, but Sherman stays. But he's a wonderful dog, he really is. I'd love to bring him here into City Hall. I walk in the door of City Hall, out in the parking lot, I take him off the leash. And we walk in together and you can hear about five different people, oh Sherman's here! And after they had done it to me about five times, I said, hey, the mayor's here too. Yeah, but Sherman's here. Every one of them keeps treats for it. Thank you. City manager. Yes, sir. I just need one second of your time. Can I? Yes. Well, go ahead. Thank you. Pee for me too.

Hi. Hi, Mr. Mayor. How are you? I'm doing just fine.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I've got no idea. Oh, whoa.

I have no idea what they did. It's all you can do, Chief. Don't bring my phone in here.

It is. The millage rate was 8.25. I got that before I left. And the fire assessment they were talking about, that's when I had to go. And the amount is the same amount that the lady gave me. No, the... total budgeted amount. That's the same thing. But thank you for clearing up the fact that I'm looking at it, and I'm saying, well, the county's giving you this, the city's giving you this, and you said that the city's using the county's influence, and that makes a huge difference. That's the problem with data. Unless you understand it, it's meaningless.

I'm going to keep you in the loop. I would appreciate it.

I want to point out something that's very important.

What?

Outages, right?

Uh-huh. Yeah.

Pauses.

All right.

My squirrels cause less than vegetation.

I'll be careful. Why? I cut myself a cookie. You're the problem with squirrels, buddy. You're just throwing it out there. Yeah, well, I did it once. It was still there. It was still there. Actually, I said something about the fire department. I got bit.

Oh, I love your grass.

They were very helpful to me.

And I just want to point out that I know the first thing, that my squirrels cause less outages than vegetation or lightning.

And now I'm happy. I can go home and report to the girls that we're like number four on the list.

Do you believe it won't be a sick picture?

No. It wouldn't be pretty.

Yeah, you know what? I don't think we need to take those pictures anymore.

Good for you.

I'm not sure what Thank you.

Thank you.

Peso properties. Look right.

Yeah, listen, you got my old contact?

No business card?

Yeah, city.manager. I've got no... It always... If you've got a new city manager, get that new... Get the city.manager.wilson.com.

Appreciate it.

You got it?

Yeah, I got your card. Yeah, that's city.managerwilsonfl.org. Or call me.