Council - Regular Meeting

You ready?

Good evening. Today is Tuesday, December 16th, 2025 for City Council of Willist meeting 6 p.m. We're going to call to order. And at this time, we're going to read the procedures for members of the public. All cell phones are to be turned off when entering the council chambers. Once the audience has taken their seat and the meeting begins, there will be no talking between audience members during the course of the council meeting. If anyone continues to talk within the audience and is called down three times during the course of the meeting, on the third time, that person will be escorted out of the council meeting. The audience must be recognized by the president before being allowed to address the council. The member of the member of the audience that is recognized will proceed to the podium. state their name for the benefit of the city clerk prior to offering comments on a given matter. The audience member will be limited to no more than 5 minutes to speak based on the resolution 2020-28. There will be no personal attacks made by any member in the audience towards a sitting council member and no personal attacks made by any council member towards a member of the audience. There will be no conversation between a member of the audience that has been recognized and any other member of the audience when speaking while at the podium. If any audience member wants to speak more than the allotted five minutes allowed, then that person should make a request to the city hall so that the items may be placed on the agenda. Minutes of the city council meeting would be obtained from the city clerk's office. The minutes are recorded but not transcribed verbatim. Persons requiring

verbal transcripts may be make arrangements with city clerk to duplicate the recordings of the arrangements to have a court reporter presented at the meeting and there is a cause for this. That being said, um going forward when there is conversation from the council, we will do it one person at a time and everyone will have a chance to speak once before someone another before the other person can speak again. Um and we will move forward. So, Miss Latricia, right, can we get the roll call? Mayor Goodman,

I am here. Council President Hines here. Vice President Cox here. Council member Jones here. Council member Martin here. Council member Rikio here. City Manager Sue Bodette here. Attorney Kirsten Baloo here. City Clerk Latricia Wright I am here. And all other staff present. Thank you. Thank you. Now we will have the opening prayer and pledge of allegiance to the flag by Mayor Charles Goodman.

Thank you, Madame President. If you choose to please join me with prayer. [snorts] Lord, we come to you tonight. a city like all small cities in our state and probably in our country. We're struggling one day at a time to move forward to continue to do things for citizens and to do the very best that we can with the resources that are available. Lord, I ask you to be with this council. give them the wisdom to make the choices necessary to accomplish what we want to do. I believe every member of this council wants what's best for the city. They may not agree, but they all want what's best for the city. And I ask you to be with my police department, Lord, as they are exploring new avenues of enforcement and keeping the peace. And Lord, please be with the fire department. I see how many calls they go out on and I happen to know that some of them they're not pleasant. They're difficult. So I ask you to be with all of us, each and every person who took the time out of their life to come here and to do the thing that our constitutional forefathers wanted and that is to participate in their local government so that we can be a government of the people and by the people. In your name I ask. Amen. 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 will have additions, deletions, changes, and approval of the agenda.

Seeing no changes or additions uh from staff, I move we approve the agenda as presented. A second. We have a motion and a second. All those in favor say I. I. All those opposed say nay. Motion passes 5 to zero. Presentation of certificate to Nate Roberts. HR director Kim Troy. You saw me looking.

Push and hold till it turns. Good evening everybody. Tonight we are going to present Nate Roberts here a certificate of appreciation because uh if you weren't here I'm going to reread the letter. There was a letter sent to Miss Sue about Mr. Roberts. It says, "Good morning, Miss Bodet. My name is R. John Joseph Hatton and my wife's name is Cecilia W. King. We are new to Williston except for a brief stay in 2008 through 2009. We retired in 1995 to Cedar Key, Florida or Cedar Key, Florida and because of the storms from the Gulf of Mexico, we moved to the property in Willist then relocated to Penllis County to care for an elderly relative. After her passing, we relocated to wonderful Williston once again in June of this year. Forward to today when I was about to enter city hall to inquire about a stuck water shut off valve at St. Barnabas.

Yes, church. My wife is a volunteer administrator there. I parked beside a city truck. The young man and I exited our vehicles at the same time and he smiled at me and said, "What are you up to this morning, sir?" [snorts] I informed him what I was attempting to accomplish. He then replied, "No need to go in, sir. I know where you're talking about and I'll meet you there." I was immediately surprised. He got in his truck and I followed him to the church property. We had enlisted the service of the Sexton to repair some leaky water valves. He removed a tool from the back of his truck and attempted to open the water valve to no avail. He then sourced a larger tool and was quickly able to open and close the valve for future access. I thanked him and his social skills were unsurpassed to any municipal employee I encountered for some time. His actions, politeness and delightful courteousness were unprecedented in any similar former transactions with any former municipal exchanges. We are al we are so pleased to be part of Wilston and proud to call this our hometown. Folks like Nate with his sincere mannerisms are a tremendous asset to any municipality. Hopefully you may consider acknowledging his values in some way and re relate our appreciation for his kind and considerate mannerisms. Sincerely, Joseph Hatton and Cecilia King. [applause] And not just that, every time Nate comes in, it's a yes sir, yes ma'am, no thank you. He has got really, really good manners. Every encounter I had I have had with him has been extremely pleasant. I'm not sure if it's because I'm human resources. [laughter] There's always that. No, no, he's always polite.

Definitely not. Uh so the city would like to present him a certificate of appreciation. This certificate is proudly awarded to Nate Roberts. Congratulations on a great job. Thank you for all your hard work. Amen. Way to go, NATE. [applause] SPEECH.

Thank you. Right. At this time, we'll have public participation. This will be the first of two um times that you can participate. Um you will have 5 minutes to speak on anything that is not on the agenda. Please state your name and where you live.

Yes. My name is Timmy Ecker 225. Um, I was kind of curious on the last meeting. I asked a question uh about a citizens charter initiative amendment. I never I didn't stay to get the answer, but if I could get it on record what it means and what I have to do or say to get one, um, I'm sure myself and other citizens would like to know if I could get that. Please,

city attorney I'll take it. Is there something in particular that you're looking to do? Like a change you're looking to make in the charter that Kirstson and I can address?

Um, yes. I don't want to speak of it right now, but it's for the citizens to vote on. and uh I didn't know what to do or say. That way whenever I get it get it presented I can I can get my 10% of the the 182 people that vote in Willist or registered. I called Tammy Jones and got the information yesterday cuz I would really like to uh to do that. I'm sure I can get 200 200 signatures and then uh then we can move from there. But I really like to know what to do and for the citizens to know also too because it's it's all for them. We need to take Wilson back and for us. We we we shouldn't we shouldn't be working for for y'all and the and the 130 something employees. We should be we shouldn't be saddled by all the burdens. And that just keeps happening more and more and more. And things are not getting better for the for the public sector. It's getting worse. And if we have to downsize to make things work, the city should too. So, thank you.

Thank you, sir. Um, Miss Sue, if you can get with Mr. Eert. And Madam President, I can I can send over It's governed by Florida statute. There's Florida statute on it. So, I can send over that statute um for them to reference.

Okay. Thank you. And then follow up with him. Thank you. I appreciate it. Is there anyone else? Uh yes, my name is Joel Penny. I live at 43 Northwest Floor Street. Uh I brought up last meeting uh about Jonathan and Donald about Donald get if Donald's going to get demoted or anything and nobody gave me no answer or anything. I mean, I just want to know. I don't think it's fair for one person to get demoted and the other one not to. I mean, I just really honestly think a person should do their job and do it right. I mean,

Madam President, can I address that? Yes, ma'am. You can. Thank you. So, we're going to be discussing that under my um my agenda item on here. We're going to be discussing it today. There's two staffing plans that have been brought before the council. We're going to discuss those tonight. Okay. And then there's another thing over there that's uh the sewage plant by my house. I just want to know why y'all put a like $800 uh thing off of Amazon like what is it? Some kind of

canopy thing over something that's commercial and why didn't y'all spend the money and put it towards a commercial grade carport or something? I just want to know why y'all wasting our money on little dumb stuff like that. I mean, I just really want to know because that belongs in a backyard, not over a a gas a diesel powered pump. I mean I mean, who's in charge of the way y'all spend all the money?

Madam President, can I take that one as well? Is it a shed? Can you tell me exactly what it is? It is a $600 canopy that you buy off of Amazon and it's used over a $45,000 pump. Okay. Why are we wasting our tax dollars on stuff like that? It should be commercial grade. Is it temporary? I don't know. I mean, it should be all commercial grade. Yeah. I I I I need to take that, but I want to double check with I'm not sure if Jonathan knows off the top of his head that he could address that tonight, but I believe that was something that Donald worked on. He's not here tonight, so I can certainly get an answer to you. Can you just give me a day or so?

Yes. And another thing is I have brought up in the meeting for six, seven, eight times months about having a fence brought put around the pit where the kids go and play in it and everything. Y'all have done nothing about it. Nothing. I've had a park recreation person come and talk to me about it and said they're going to do something about it. Nothing's been done. It's a revolving door of your staff around here. I don't understand. I mean, the people of the city of Willis is tired of the promises and everything. Nothing gets done.

Thank you. Is there anyone else? Pardon me.

Laura Jones, CRA director. Good evening, everybody. I'm gonna uh talk about some promises that we've made. Our parking lot is um definitely been delayed a little bit. We've had some serious issues out there which aren't as serious as we thought they were going to be. So, we have been delayed a couple months. I've given the council the new schedule, the wise and the how's the minutes for the last meeting that our um engineers had last week, right Pierce with the contractors across the street. And if you have any questions, you can let me know or you can let Walt know. But I wanted to make sure you guys were up to date so you knew you know how to answer everybody. Yes, sir. Yes, you may, Mayor.

Thank you. I was not stealing it, but I found your name plate and it's sitting right there and I am returning it after staying in my office for months. Thank you, sir. I appreciate it. Actually, if we could just put it on the table because I have three meetings a month that I use. I've handled it enough. It's sitting right there. Yes, sir. Thank you very much. Any questions for the CRA? All right. Miss James. Okay. Great holiday season. Thank you. You as well.

Good evening. My name is Wet Rosado. I live in 570 Northwest Fifth Lane in the LAR project, the new LAR housing. Um, so, uh, I'm interested in knowing a little bit more about the parking lot and the businesses across the street. I work as a volunteer in the quilt shop and we get a lot of our customers um that complain about the dangers of getting out of their cars when they park in front of the area and of course the danger of trying to park parallel. Um, the other day I tried to park and uh I had a person behind me just honk their horn like a crazy person because I put I put my signal and everything to get in and the person just had you know they wanted to I guess express themselves. But um my boss told me to come and ask about the the situation because apparently there's been changes in the in the dates. I think it it was for January and then they changed for February and now they changed to March. And um I know she has this big activity going on in the m in the May of in the month of March and we were hoping that the parking lot was going to be there because we're going to have a lot of people coming to Williston. There's um this big activity called um Shop Hop and all the quilt shops in Florida are going to be visited by all of these women and men that like to quilt and sew. And we really wanted us to be able to take advantage of that um activity. But if we're not going to have a parking space for all these people, we're going to have a lot of people coming into Willist to our shop. Um, and we're advertising it and whatnot. And we were thinking that we would have the parking available. And we I just heard that it was going to be in March now. And that happens the first week of March. So, I just wanted to know the status [clears throat] on the parking lot.

Yes. Miss Jones, will you come back up? I think you answered the question, but Um, President Hines, I cannot guarantee that parking lot will be ready for people to be parking the first week of March. Um, it's hard to guarantee any construction project. There are some things that planners like to do to help these kinds of situations. We have what are called pop-up areas where we could move this quilt events somewhere where there is parking maybe that we could um donate to them. There are things that we could do, but I can't make any guarantees for a contractor when a project will be done. Okay. Thank you. Appreciate it. Miss Meredith,

I have a question. If there's any way that we could they could utilize the city hall parking lot over here and just cross by the over the crosswalk, which would put them not terribly far away. If would it be possible to put signs for them to park here? I don't know what the legality of that is, but is that something that would help with the parking? Just make it obvious that they could park, right?

Oh, yeah. Abs. No, absolutely. like they could park there and we could also do a popup there instead of having it at their place. We could work with them to have a popup either in the building or at one of our other we have the leave the old Levy County visitor center now. Maybe we could offer it to them. But there are this does happen quite often to businesses that are in the middle of a construction area and usually the city will help in some way. So, okay. So, if we do need the city to to help us out with that, who do I need to speak to or who do I need to tell my boss to speak to? City manager. City manager. Yep. Okay. Awesome. Thank you so much. Thank you. Let me ask a question. What's your question, Miss Jones?

Is it on a weekend or a week day? That was my question. I can I can give you that doesn't answer the question. Okay. I I don't I don't You're fine. Okay. on the contract. When did the deadline? Deadline for what contract? When did the deadline in the contract? Miss Jones, would you like to come back up? I'm so glad to. Me, too. Yeah, me. We're always glad you come.

Uh the the deadline um wasn't very specific. There was no deadline for us. In fact, it's been it's been some problems with the city also that have pushed this back. So, right now, nobody's getting fined. Um, the city's not getting fined. The contractor's not getting fined. We're trying to work this out amicably. Just a lot of unknowns. I mean, it started the first day when we found that fuel tank. It we didn't know it was going to be there. And unfortunately, it wasn't just a fuel tank, but it had spilled. So, that was almost 20 days or 25 days that we lost right off the bat. So, it just hasn't been easy. The utilities, well, we didn't know where they were. And we kind of knew we didn't know where they were, but we didn't know that they went the way they did for sure. And it was it was very bizarre. But everybody across the street's been working with us really well. And we're trying real hard. We want it more than anybody. The CRA's very excited, and we can't wait to get this parking lot done because it'll it'll help businesses, and the quilt shop is such a cool business. We're very excited to have them in our downtown.

Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. All right. Any other public participation or comments? Seeing none, we will move forward to the consent agenda. Council me minutes from December 2nd, 2025.

I move approval of the consent agenda. Second. I have a motion and a second. For what? Thank you. All those in favor say I. I.

I. All those opposed, nay. Motion passes 5 to zero. Now we'll have updates from staff and staff board and council. We'll start with city manager subday. Thank you, Madam President. Okay. Before you today, we um Kim and I provided you with two staffing plans. um staffing plan A and staffing plan B which we have been working on for several weeks now. Uh let me explain the difference between the two of them. Um and let me back up before obviously you guys know that we have been advertising for a utility director for about four weeks now. Uh we got about a dozen candidates. They were not all qualified but we did receive about a dozen um applicants. Uh we interviewed three applicants last week, two internal, one external. On Friday, we made a uh an offer to the external candidate, Marvin Ayala. You have his resume in your packet here. He is currently a project manager um for Service Electric Company out of Leburg. He is looking to get um back into a leadership position. We actually had an over two and a half hour interview with him. It was a very very good interview. We would love to hire him. We are having some difficulties with the salary unfortunately. um mostly because a we believe he makes more money. Who won't tell us exactly what he makes currently, but more importantly in his current role he has his wife and his daughter who's I think she's at FSU if I'm not mistaken um on his plan and pays very little for a family plan whereas with our plan we would cover him 100% and he'd have to pay for his family. So that is kind of our where we're kind of stuck at the moment. Um we originally when we offered him the position on Friday, we gave him till Monday to make a decision. We spoke with him yesterday. He asked for an additional two days. So by tomorrow we will know whether or not we are moving forward with him or we're going to um

the second plan B. Um under both of these plans Oh, sorry. Go ahead, Kim. Um before we interviewed this candidate, I did call him and tell him the salary range was between 70 and 80 and we could not budge and he still a he said he understood. So that's kind of like part of the problem too. We were under the assumption he was willing to take what was advertised. What was 70,000 to 80,000 sir? Range. Yes sir.

Yes sir. Right. So we've offered him um 86 which is uh a little less than 15% above what the current utility director makes. Um that is in the employee handbook that we can go up to that with the right you know qualifications. He does have an MBA. Um he has been in uh the electric utilities for pretty much his entire life. He started as a underground in underground utilities in Manhattan. That's actually his original background back when he was like in his 20s. Um very wellqualified. Like I said, the the interview was was fabulous. It was a very very good interview with him. Um, under both of the staffing plans, we are recommending, and I put this in in bold because this is bold and underlined because this would be something that we are requesting from the city council tonight, uh, putting Alex Rodriguez, who is our current field operations supervisor, as the assistant utilities director. We're recommending that for several reasons. Um, right now, Alex works under Donald. Um he is the field operations supervisor for just water, sewer, gas, storm water currently, but we would like to have somebody who is over the field operations for all of the so electric and parks, streets, um roads, everything. Um so in both of those staffing plans, we're recommending that currently, Alex makes 83,000. Um he recently received a $4 an hour increase [clears throat] due to his Florida Rural Water Association training. Um, so those were four certificates that he recently received. He is asking for no additional money to go from the field operations supervisor to the assistant utilities director position. Um, in addition, this would set the city up for a succession plan in the event that whoever we hire doesn't stay for a long period of time. Um, we would have somebody that, you know, could be set to go into that utilities director position. So that is the first part of plan A. The public works administrator, current

administrator is Donald Barber. We are recommending to go back from his current title of public works administrator to public works supervisor. The reason that we're recommending that is because then all three people in those supervisory roles would be a supervisor. So Donald's position again would be public works supervisor. Mike's Mike Miller's would be electric supervisor and then Jonathan's would be supervisor of parks, roads and facilities all in the same supervisor role. Um we are recommending his salary be decreased from a current he currently makes 86378. We are recommending a decrease from his current title at public works administrator to public works supervisor of $11,378 thou which would take him down to 75 even. His responsibilities would go from water, sewer, gas, storm water, and fiber. I'm recommending taking fiber off of Donald and giving it entirely to Aaron. Aaron has been pretty much handling fiber pretty much 100% anyway. I don't really understand why Donald had that. He pretty much handles everything that's regulated by the state. So, I'm recommending giving that over to Aaron. That would be something that that Donald would no longer be responsible for. So, in this position, Donald really would not be responsible for staff. that would now fall to the utilities director and the assistant utilities director keeping Donald for the things that Donald's really good at in terms of, you know, writing ordinances and doing research and and that sort of thing. And then Jonathan would go from his current role of utilities director to the supervisor of parks, roads, and facilities. Ralph Curry's salary when he left here last month was 54,000. We are recommending Jonathan go to 65,000. So again, that would be a change that would need to be approved by the council. So that's roughly $11,461 more than what Ralph was making. So what we're trying to do here is offset the increase in Jonathan's salary and decreasing it by Donald salary. So it's

pretty much a wash with this staffing plan. A the net increase to the city is $9,162. And that's because again Marvin would be making more money than than Jonathan is currently making as the utilities director. So again, with staffing plan A, we would need approval from the council to get the assistant utilities director positioned in place, changing Donald's title from the public works administrator to the public works supervisor, and increasing the salary of the supervisor for parks, roads, and facilities from the current 54 to 65. So three total changes on that staffing plan. If for some reason Marvin comes back tomorrow and says that he is not interested again probably due to the salary. Our plan B is to offer the position to Rob Kian. He is our current lineman A who has been with the city for approximately six or seven weeks now. Um his current salary is 91,000 which is $14,540 above the current utilities director. Like Alex, he is not asking for any additional money. Both of them are willing to take the position with no additional increase in pay. Same thing, we're asking for Alex Rodriguez to change from the field operations supervisor to the assistant utilities director. Everything else remains the same for him. Everything else remains the same for Donald and everything else remains the same for Jonathan. The net increase to the city here would be $14,623 only because Rob is making more as the current lineman than what we're offering to Marvin as our external candidate. So, a little more money for staffing plan B than for staffing plan A. But again, both of these would require the city council to allow us to put a assistant utilities director position in place, changing the public works administrator position to public works supervisor, and increasing the supervisor of parks, roads, and facilities from the 54 to the 65. So, both of those would require three changes from the council. And we

would be eliminating the uh field operations supervisor, that title that Alex currently holds. Madame President. Yes, Mayor. Could is the person that you're talking about in plan B Rob? Is it Rob? Ro. Rob. He is here. Is he present? Yes. Could he please stand up so we Hi, how are you, sir? Um, well, I just would like to put a face to the name. Yes, sir. All right. Thank you. Alex, can you stand up as well? And Alex, you've been with us for four and a half years. And I know his face. Okay. [laughter]

Is that it, Miss Sue? Yes, I will entertain questions. All right. So, we're going to start with Miss Alexa. Do you have any questions? I don't have any questions. I think that I I would have no problem voting uh for the three changes listed. Um, and I think that it's a good solution and I have no questions. Mr. Cox, Mr. Mr. Rob, could you give us a little bit of your background because you used to work here. Yes, correct. I was here 11 years ago.

[laughter] All right. Can you hear me now?

All right. So, I was here 11 years ago. Uh, worked for the electric department as their class A lineman. Uh, decided to leave when Hurricane Maria happened in Puerto Rico. Went over to Puerto Rico as their operations manager for Southern Electric Corporation. Um, was in charge of roughly 650 individuals. uh budgeting, directing, so on and so forth. Safety, quite a role. Uh prior to starting with with the city, I worked for with Luchi River Electric. That's where I started my career as a as a journeyman lineman. Came through their apprenticeship program. Worked my way up to Journeyman lineman. Jump ship from them, went to Florida Power, uh which in turn became Progress Energy Duke, and that's when I left to go to Puerto Rico, uh when when Hurricane Maria happened. When that was over, I uh came back was with Southern Electric Corporation, stayed with them and uh got offered a position with utility lines construction services as an operations manager. Went over to ULCS as operations manager and been there for 10 years.

Okay. Yeah. I knew that you had worked with us before. Yes, sir. So, just wanting everybody else to hear that. Yes, sir. Miss Jones. Any questions?

Um, I'm good with the increases, whichever plan we end up with. Uh, I will comment that I know Mr. Kellian and I like him a lot. He's jumped right in when he came back. Uh, every place that I've run into him, he's been a great asset. Um, and I would have be happy to have him as I don't know the other gentleman, but I'd be very happy to have him if it turns out that way. And I would like to personally say that um, Rob was instrumental in making sure that light up Willist happened. I I will tell you that.

So he really stepped up to the plate and and made sure that everything went off without a hitch. So I really appreciate his leadership during that time. Miss Meredith.

Um, I also am am comfortable with either staffing plan. I just had a question on staffing plan B. Uh, if if Mr. Killian becomes our utility director and I mean it's a net increase because of his current salary, but assuming we hire another lineman A, would Mr. Killian had a lot of experience, would that number possibly decrease depending on the next candidate for lineman A's potential salary? And we did talk about that today of you know the possibility of bringing in another lineman a at a lesser salary to kind of make up for some of this. I mean we really the goal of Kim and I mean we've been working on this for weeks is to try to try to get this as close as we could to net zero. We were not looking to spend a lot more money. Um and again I really appreciate Rob and Alex both stepping up to the plate and saying that they would take these positions for their current salary. That's pretty rare in today's world. Um Kim and I had a really great meeting with both of them today, you know, to discuss things they would like to see. Again, Bob presented me several weeks ago before he inter even interviewed with a 30, 60, 90day plan, um, which was very well thought out. So, I agree with you. Either one of these would be fabulous choices for the city. I absolutely agree,

Miss Jones. I would also comment that I'm happy to see Alex here as well. Uh, I remember the first time I ever met him and he was waist high in water. um and he has been a wonderful asset ever since and and grown in his knowledge and his leadership abilities. So happy to see him there as well. Okay. So the questions I have um so with Donald Barber, you changed a word, right? His duties are still the same. So he truly has not been demoted minus fiber. Um,

we're taking fiber away from him and giving that entirely to Aaron, but he hasn't truly been demoted. Um, but we are taking money from him. Correct. Is that a liability at all, Miss Kirsten? Yeah. When there's nothing in your HR manual that requires or or prohibits you one way or the other. So, okay. It just says in the HR manual that uh if they are demoted um depending on the circumstances that um they get paid the highest in the uh classification which I am currently almost done with.

Right. I'm very very close to it. So um but he he it doesn't appear that he was demoted. It just appears as though a name was changed even though you may have taken a department away. I I am referring to his position has not changed. When we gave him the title of administrator, it was because he was doing a lot of paperwork. Am I wrong?

Hold on a second. Because he was doing a lot of paperwork. He's not going to stop doing any of that. He's still going to do those same things. The only thing that's changed is a word that says supervisor. So where really is truly the demotion? in finances. Yes, I get that. Yes, Miss Kim.

He's doing pretty much the same job for $11,000 less. Um, also with that, uh, somebody who he was over would now be over him, but that's a promotion for him. That's not still not a demotion. So, I mean, I don't you don't you don't have to. I'm just I'm just saying if we're going to call it a demotion, it probably should represent a demotion.

But doing less for the same or doing the same job for a lot less money on a penalty that that is a disciplinary action, but that is not a demotion. When you demote somebody, you remove them from the role that they are in and put them in a different role. That is a demotion. Yes, mayor. Thank you madame president. I have thought about this too

and to me if your title has changed because when he was moved to that position he was very big on the title and his title has changed from administrator to supervisor. That to me appears to be a demotion. Regardless of the duties, you can you can the city manager can assign whatever duty she wants to whatever position, but the position is what I was looking at. And I said he was a supervisor. I mean, he was an administrator. Now he is just a supervisor. And I thought that that created a demotion. I could be wrong.

Was he still not a supervisor when he was called an administrator? I mean, he was a supervisor. For me, the most important part here was that number one, we wanted to make all three of those a supervisor that nobody had any say over somebody else, right? That was the most important thing. And of course, we wanted to make sure that this looked fair in terms of Donald and Jonathan and their role in the investigation and all that sort of thing. So, again, we tried to make the salary decrease roughly the same. I mean, I I can tell you that I had a very long conversation with Donald about this on Friday evening. He's he is viewing it as a demotion. I I'm calling it a restructuring. I feel like that's a better word to use here. But for all intents and purposes, yes, he is not going to I what I'm trying to do is keep the best parts of Donald because I still think that Donald has things to bring to the city. But we all know what his weaknesses are. So, we're trying to remove the things that he's weakened, which is dealing with staff and dealing with contractors, dealing with residents, and having that now fall more on on Rob or Marvin and and Alex, trying to really highlight people's strengths and not highlight their weaknesses, however you want to say it.

Okay. Um All right. Anything? Oh, Miss Meredith and and so Miss Troy, can you just remind me? So when there is a position change by any staff member for any reason, then they're on a probationary period. Yes, ma'am. For 6 months. For 6 months. Yes, ma'am. Okay. Just wanted to clarify that. So, let's just So, let's just remember that when we say that because if we're looking at that change in from supervisor to administrator, that was a probationary. Yes. They will both be under a six-month probationary period. Was he was he in that probationary period when everything transpired?

No, because Terry made the move and by the time everything was finalized. No, no. I'm talking about when we changed his title from administrative to that happened during Terry. Yeah. Yeah. That was Terry's thing. So, I I can't even answer you on that one because there's no record of it. Okay. But he did not get a pay raise for that title change. So are we had it had a dollar I think I sent you guys that it had a dollar because of something that happened at the same time. I think he got a C or something at the same time if I'm not mistaken. So there was a raise but not directly associated with the title change.

Right. It was because of theert. Correct. Yes ma'am. So then are we still within reason to remove money from him if he was never given a pay raise increase? Yes, cuz his title is now a public works supervisor and that actually existed prior to um when he was the assistant utility director directly below was the public works supervisor. And if you look back at that pay grade that it from 2012, you know that when the original the only compensation plan we have, the pay grade that he was uh that was associated with that is the same pay grade that he is falling into now. Okay. Madame President. Yes, sir.

Thank you very much, Madam President. uh those that were here when the process started for Mr. Barber to take the position of administrator might well remember that he said he didn't care about the money. He wanted the title. That was what it was all about to him. So it is in my mind which is why I said you taking that title from him and you putting him as a supervisor that is a demotion in his heart in my mind and in his mind. So you can choose not to say it is a demotion, but if it feels like a demotion and it sounds like a demotion, in my mind, it is a demotion. So it it doesn't really matter. The main thing the the uh city manager wants to know is can I do this? And the attorney, as I understand it, has said yes, you can. Thank you. And if I could point out one more thing that that Kim and I wanted to highlight with both of these is I know that the city council has had some contention about the fact that Donald made more than the utilities director p previously. So with either of these plans, you're going to have the utilities director making the most amount of money, the assistant utilities dire director making slightly less, public works supervisor slightly less, and then supervisor of parks, roads, and facilities slightly less. So it kind of goes in more of a, you know, hierarchical, you know, we don't somebody making more than their boss with this kind of a plan. So

yeah, but we still may have that happen when it has to do with certifications. So if some things don't change in that realm, we're going to still be in the same location. Same location. I agree with that. We're going to have to renegotiate that. uh should be sometime this April cuz it expires on September 30th of uh this coming year. Okay. Thank you. Do you have anything else, Miss B?

No, ma'am. Anything else from the council? All right. So, we'll move to Chief Rolls at public participation. Just real quick before we move off that, I do think that your city manager needed a vote on those three items that she doesn't have authorization on. Okay. Thank you. Thanks. Appreciate that. So, you just you just want a vote to whichever way you choose as far as the director. Okay. Permission.

Can I get a motion? I make a motion that we approve either staffing plan A or staffing plan B as presented tonight. Second. Second. I have a motion and a second. May I hear the motion restated, please? Closer to the mic. Oh, sorry. I make a motion that we approve either staffing plan A or staffing plan B as presented tonight. So you're making a motion that you can approve both of them either or which one whatever one the city manager chooses. Correct. I think that's what I'm hearing there. Yes. And correct and ba based on the response from the applicant.

Understood. Thank you. We have a motion and a second. All those in favor say I. I. I. All those opposed say nay. Just I we do have to take comment and comment on a motion. Oh, we do. Okay. Can I get com any comments from the public? No. Now you may

uh Yes. My name is Joel Penny. Uh when y'all demoted Mr. Donald, I mean Mr. Bishop, uh it was more of like a really, you know, demotion. I don't think Donald got a demotion at all. I'm really stuck with Miss Hines on that. I mean, I'm really stuck with Miss Hines on that. I don't think that's fair, y'all. Anything else? I'm just saying this. It's not fair. Okay. Thank you, Madam President. Yes, sir. May I comment? No, sir. No.

Okay. You can come to the podium, please. My name is Hector Rosal. I just have a question. I work with the federal government for about 40 years. And my policy always as a uh boss was try to get people from within to be promoted given, you know, those breaks that people can look up that can get promoted. Uh what I'm saying you're interview some candidates. You want to get a guy that because he worked in Manhattan who's the best yet you have somebody within the I don't know who was the one that applied from within the Sir. Sir, excuse me. Okay, I'm sorry.

If you would address me, please.

Okay, so Bob, I just heard that Bob is a superman, smart, intelligent, and he's from the internal group. And you're not selecting him. you selected somebody that you you don't even know because he worked in Manhattan. Manhattan is a big island. I was there a couple weeks ago. This is not a big island or a big city. I think I'm going on the record that I think Bob should have got gotten that position. And I don't know Bob. I just tonight I I met him. But I think that's the city is not doing its employees uh a favor or I'm not given an incentive to look up, you know, to a promotion uh by selecting somebody that we don't even know. And then we have Bob that everybody knows is a Superman. I just want to go down the record that I would have chosen Bob. M

Mr. Cox, you have something to say? Miss Troy, how long are we going to give um this gentleman time before we just move on and go with the next candidate? Uh he was notified that Wednesday is COB is the deadline. Wednesday is the deadline. Yes, sir. Okay. Thank you. tomorrow, Wednesday. Yes, sir. Any other comment from the public or the council?

Oh, we have a motion. Thank you, D. [gasps] Oh, well, we got to vote again cuz we didn't we didn't Can we uh Yeah. All right. So, we have a motion and a second. All those in favor say I. I. All those opposed say nay. Motion passes 5 to zero. [clears throat] All right. So, do we have anything from Chief Ro?

Sure. Oh gosh. Uh in the last meeting I spoke about um the city looking into moving forward with annexation uh outside the four walls of the city of Willist. I think it was the last meeting of the meeting before. Um, I think we're at that point that, you know, it's time to start annexing some property into the city, uh, help our city grow to also help offset some of the costs on our current citizens, uh, who's been putting the bill for quite some time now. And the new people come into the city and get to enjoy the services that the older citizens are left paying for. So before you and I can't take all credit for this uh I gave you a booklet uh that was put together by Sue city manager Donald Bober some of my input on ways the the the pros and cons of annexation into the city. Uh, I just ask that you take the book, take some time, read it. Any update, any suggestions, any additions that you would like to have to it, if you would just please let me know so we can add it. But I think as you go through the book, you will see that it's pretty well detailed of uh of of things that would be a plus to a citizen if they were to come into the city. But on the also on the other side there is some substantial numbers and changes that uh will be required of a citizen if they decide to do this annexation. So I would just request that the council take just a some time reading time and look over it and let me know if you have any ideas or any suggestions to add to it. I'm moving.

You don't want us to do that tonight. No ma'am. No, ma'am. No, ma'am. No, ma'am. Yeah. No. I guess if the counselor doesn't have to give your permission to speak, I guess I'm allowed to speak also. [laughter] Uh, Madame President. Yes, sir. Go ahead. Speak on this issue. You can, ma'am.

Thank you very much, Chief. Has there been any thought process toward looking at the properties that are in the area that are adjacent to the city and actually sending [snorts] this information to the property owners of that property or is that beyond where you have got to this point? No, the plan is uh once the council reviews the booklet and if they have any additions or deletions that they want to add to the book or take out of the book, uh we will send it to Kirstston, have her look at it. Once it is approved, myself along with Donald Barber are going to do boots on the grounds and hit those areas and present this information to the citizens in that community. If I may ask, when you say present it, do you mean give them a written copy so that they can absorb it? The whole book.

The whole book. I wonder how much that's cost us. Okay. It's in my budget, mayor. Who said that? Who did say that? Kim, I thank you for clarifying that. So, okay, never mind. I'll ask you later. Sure. [sighs] [gasps] Anybody [laughter] on the council have any questions for Mr. Rolls?

Great idea. Great idea. Okay. All right. So, at you can speak at public participation cuz we're not voting on this. Are we voting on this? No, ma'am. I'm I'm I'm not done yet. Oh, jeez. That was a lot for me, [laughter] but Okay, go ahead. That's why I gave it gave it to you and say take your time and read it. You couldn't do that last. Okay, go ahead.

Okay. Um, so back some time ago, I did a video on on Facebook on um a topic that I hate to really talk about, but unfortunately throughout [clears throat] the world, this is a problem. Um, and that problem is drugs uh that are moving up and down our streets uh that are in our communities that our guys and girls as law enforcement officers [cough and clears throat] have been doing a great job of catching uh as many people as they can that are pushing these poisons up and down our roads. Today I had an opportunity, I still have an opportunity from an agency who has a certified K9 drug detection dog that is willing to donate the dog to the city of Wilston for free of costs. They purchased the dog uh maybe a year or two ago for $19,000 and they're willing to give the dog to us uh to help us cartel uh the drugs and stuff that's running up and down our our roadways. I'm not saying that Wilston has a drug problem. Uh but we have made significant amount of arrest uh for drugs and uh this dog will greatly enhance our opportunity of catching um drug dealers and drugs move moving up and down our streets for example. Uh, and this does not include the December numbers for this month, but amount of drugs that has been seized or got from an arrest. Just meth, we've got 140 g cocaine seized or obtained from an arrest, 16 g, 202.1 g of prescription drugs,

107.6 6 g of marijuana and the most dangerous one of all, 13.9 g of fentanyl. Enough fentanyl to take out the city of Willist. So, um, I wanted to bring that to the council because I am very interested in obtaining this K9 dog. Um, like all animals, it will take some training and some work to get it uh where we would like for it to be. Uh the mayor was part of the conversation as well and I think the mayor is on board. Is that right, mayor? That is correct, Chief.

Okay. So, I just wanted to bring it before the council and uh I'll give you an update on it as we move forward. The dog will be here Thursday at 12:00 for us to see the dog. Uh I actually have a certified K9 trainer who's going to come and evaluate the dog to make sure that the dog will meet the standards that we need. And uh at that point if we decide we want it, we have a free K9 dog that's been partially trained on five different drugs already. All of which I mentioned and uh at free at no cost. [applause] Anything else?

Oh yeah, hold on. No, I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. I just want to make sure cuz I kind of like moved forward earlier and you were like, I'm not done. All right. I have a question, Miss Jones. So, we would have to send an officer to school to learn how to work with the dog. Okay. So, I didn't know we was going to go that deep in it, but Well, I mean, that's part of it, right? Uh, yes. But we have uh reached out to another county who has said that they will allow our officer to train with them to become certified at no cost. Wonderful. That's what our need. The chief is on top of it. Well, that's what I knew cost money, so I had to ask that question.

And as far as the vehicle goes, we have one vehicle, but it's not outfitted for a K9. But I made a call today. I have an agency that will swap me a K9 cage for a person transport cage. So, no cost. Cool. NICE. [applause] All right. Anything else, Chief?

Miss Wright, do you have anything for us? Anyone in the back have anything for us? Any staff? No comments, no questions, no updates from staff. All right. Any updates from Alexa? Uh, it's not really an update, but I just wanted to shout out Willist Fiber for fixing my internet in 20 minutes on Friday night. Uh, the my fiber to my house was cut by the contractor that was installing the new fiber and Michael from the Williston fiber came out in the dark at 700 p.m. and fixed it. And I'm very thankful. So, I wanted to shout out Michael from Willis P. [applause] Mr. Cox. Yes. I would like to give a big thank you and shout out to Rob Jonathan and all the Mike Miller, the electrical department for everybody busting their butts to make Light Up Willist happen. So, I went out a couple different times and they were they were going at it to make it happen. They were bound and determined. Um, this past Friday we did painting with Santa and um first time doing it. something a little different um to take place after light up Williston and we had roughly about 20 kids more than what we anticipated. Um we made some notes on things to improve for next year with it but Latricia and myself

um Tom Wolf was there to help get set up and everything and it was a win-win. Kids loved it. I think the parents enjoyed it just as much as the kids. So, we look forward to doing that for next year. Um, question. When Lumen takes out our internet, do we put on Facebook or the city, you know, the city of Willis thing to say why cow is down? because reading after this last outage, there were some pretty negative comments and that they're blaming. Wow. When I do this, I notify basically the current Cow Link customers. Okay.

Um that every customer I got, they get an email updates every time Lumen updates me. And that's that's kind of the unfortunate part that we have in this whole deal is that we are at Lumen's mercy. And this last outage was literally a lumen technician somewhere unplugged the fiber and plugged it back in backwards. Okay?

And it took them, you know, an hour or 2 hours or whatever it was to find the problem and fix it. So beyond that, it's just the nature of the beast. We can't control underground construction. Lord knows we cut enough foam cables ourself. Um, but it happens and and it's the more we do underground fiber, the more it's going to happen. Um, but we don't really I didn't really see the need to have to notify the world as more so as just the customers themselves cuz they're the ones that's affected. It's just people get on there and they want to bash cow. They're they're going to bash no matter what we do.

Okay, cool beans. Now, we also do, as most of you know that our customers are the council, you see the emails that we do have a limited backup option that we basically switch everybody over to as much as possible, as quick as possible. So, we do do our best to keep people up with internet. Um, it may not be the best in the world, but it's what we got.

All right. Thank you, sir. And the last thing, hopefully next year when we do a painting with Santa, um it' be nice to see city manager, more council people to to go out and do this cuz I think we last year I brought it up. Latricia and I talked about it. So it's kind of a council. Y'all did painting with Sam last year? No. Oh, it came across after Christmas. it came about.

Gotcha. Miss Jones, my only comments are to back up what Mr. Mr. Mills has said about Cow Link. Um, I am a customer at home and where I work and we get regular updates when it's out. If he knows what the reason is, he tells us. Um, and I am very thankful for the backup. I think that's a brilliant thing. I don't know if we're going to have that once we change over to Willis and Fiverr, but I'm thrilled to have it now. So, I just I really don't have anything else other than that. Miss Meredith, nothing for me this week. Thanks.

Oh, that that leaves me. Okay. So, um can I get an update on what's going on with the fiber on zone A or zone one? I they're still building every day. They're out there seven days a week. Um again, like I I updated you before, we don't have any set zones or priority other than what we've given them, and they're they're working to their ability to get it done. Okay? But if we come before the council and the public and say that we're going to do a specific zone at this time and a specific zone at that time, then we should do our best to make sure that those zones are getting done as opposed to

But we didn't tell anybody that. Uh but we did. No, we need to go back and and take a look at it. No, we started construction in those zones like we said we would. That's where it began was in those zones. the entire town has to be finished. It it before we can do anything. So it it's it doesn't matter what zone or what section of town is not done yet. It will be done and it has to be done. I get it. But we are making a priority to make sure that the the arbor's what's the Harvey crossing the crossing is is getting there.

They're not getting any priority above anyone else. They're all being built at the same time. So why are we doing them all at the same time instead of bisections? Because nature of the beast of building this network, it has to be completed. It it's a ring infrastructure and everything has to start here, go around town, come back to here, and then from there it branches out like that. So everything has to be done before we turn it on. Okay.

All right. That's my question. Yes, ma'am. Can I just because I met with Aaron um on LA last week to to I had a lot of questions as well and one of the things that he said that was informed that helped me feel a little better about I think I had some of the exact same concerns you just expressed was that the people that have pre-registered

will get hooked up first in the sense that their boxes will correct me if I'm wrong Aaron their boxes will get installed they will like the the infrastructure will go in for the whole city but then the people who pre-registered in the crossings, they will get the technicians to their house to hook up the boxes and make sure their internet is turned on ASAP. Whereas the people who haven't registered, they get they're down, you know, as soon as they register, they go on the list. But there the people who haven't registered will not be prioritized over people who have already committed. Does that make sense? Erin, if you can help me say it better. I don't

It does. I mean, yeah, it did. when they asked for a list. Makes sense. But when depending on how we have um we have advertised for it in order for people to know that they need to register, you know, I mean everybody need know that they need to register then people can't register unless they know about it. air. Well, the pre-registration was just to drive interest in numbers to evaluate the feasibility of it

and the priority the list that we gave the contractors when they asked for the installs for the I'm sorry, not the installs. They're they're doing the drops, which is what they call it, from the street to the house and putting the nit on the side of the house. That's in effect to make our installations when Michael and these guys go out to do an actual installation, it's going to make that go faster because that part of it already completed. The priority list we gave them was first on the priority list was current Calink customers. They've been with us the longest. They're paying customers. We need to get Calink shut off because it's really costing us money. So, it needs to go away quickly. So, sooner as I can get those people migrated over, the better. After that, we went down the pre-registration list and gave them the first 500 and we sorted it by date. So, the early pre-registration people, they were at the top of the list. That's all it was. It was nothing sep and and they took the list and separated it by zone or section of town. So, they could send a crew here, a crew here, a crew here, a crew here at the same time. So, they were working all over town at the same time. So, they didn't just concentrate on one specific area. They were all over town.

Okay. Thank you. Miss Sue, do you have anything else? I was just going to add that I think Hector's going to give a little bit of an update during our public hearing today as well. Um, but we are also going to start sending out some notifications in the utility bills starting this month. Just drum up the interest, but we wanted to get through our second public hearing today first. So after tight guns are blazing. Oh [laughter] yeah, we can go all out. So I have a really serious stupid question. Then we don't want to hear it. Yeah, please [laughter] go ahead.

The the people that came to do those boxes put all the little blue and yellow flags in the yard. Now that they're installed, can we take those out of the yard? Those people didn't put the blue and yellow flags in. Those are the locators that when you call I realize they put them there, but can we remove them now? If the construction's done, I don't see why you can't remove it cuz they've been there for weeks and weeks, probably months. I would. Who put the flags there? Was it our people?

No, ma'am. The locators. When you call 811, some of it's our people, some of it's Lumen, Centry Link, whoever they send out to locate those utilities in the event that you hope not to hurt those utilities when you're doing underground construction. And in my case, they marked the gas line and they marked the water line and then they went all the way around instead to avoid it. Okay. So, I hope I could pull them up now. I would say, who do I need to ask that of? You can go to city hall and ask the ask the um city manager. I would assume it's safe. Andy's looking at me for your art anyway. I can't vouch for anybody else.

She's going to she she's going to come to city hall and ask the manager. I mean, they're the ones I would ask. I came to city hall. We We'll let you know. How about that? Thank you. The little wells that they put in, you know, the little that are in the ground, those are there, too. So, everything seems to be where it needs to I will just say with a crevat that should be safe to remove at this point. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. U mayor, you have anything? Yes, ma'am. I do.

It has been well documented from the beginning of this fiber project that I was not on board with it. There's I think that's a fair statement to say and I I have told the council that you have voted for it and I will try to my best to support you in the agenda for this week. I once again saw these numbers. These are not my numbers and I cannot state that they're correct, but they're on the agenda and perhaps Hector can address it. This says that the total capital for owner operated model, which is what we're doing, is going to cost $6.1 million. And the potential revenue is $22.7 million over 20 years. I have I have real questions about that second one, but my first concern I looked at the 6.1 and it is my understanding that we borrowed $4.6 million. Is that accurate, city manager?

100% accurate.

Okay. So, we have borrowed $4.6 $6 million for a $6.1 million project and move forward with it with no understanding of how we were going to pay for it. And I think that is a bad business decision. So this is your bailick. It's up to the council what the council chooses to do. But I have serious questions and frankly about the potential revenue streams. Uh and I'm sure Hector can re can can address this. Uh we're not talking about electricity which we're going to need in 20 years. We're talking about technology. look back 20 years and tell me that the technology from 20 years ago would be applicable today. And we're spending all of this money for technology that in 20 years may be obsolete. So, we're here. I'm with you. But it is my responsibility to put this out there and let you know I have grave concerns. And that's all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you. All right. So, we're going to move on to new business. [sighs] We're going to open our public hearing and we're going to let Miss Kristen Deloo do our resolution.

Thank you, Madam President. This is resolution 2025-128, a resolution of the city council of the city of Willist, Florida, authorizing the providing of communication services by the city of Willist, Florida, making certain findings of fact regarding factors considered by the city council related to providing communication services. Making certain findings regarding notice provided of hearing. Adopting findings and other information included in the business plan attached here too. Adopting findings and other information included in the presentation attached here too. Recognizing authority to issue bonds under certain circumstances. Making certain findings regarding allowable pricing. Making certain findings regarding accounting, budgeting, and cost allocation plan requirements. Acknowledging restrictions on use of eminent domain. Requiring annual review and certain actions in four years if certain requirements are not met. Acknowledging other statutory requirements. Providing for conflict severability and effective date. Council, this is your second of two public hearings that we're required to hold before we pull the trigger and start providing services um for your internet. Um this is the same resolution that was presented to you at the last meeting. This is my understanding, and Hector correct me if I'm wrong, the same presentation um that was presented at the last meeting. Um so we're happy to answer any questions for you, but we are very excited. this is your sort of final step uh prior to uh rolling this out.

Thank you, Kirsten. Is this on? Yes, sir.

Good evening, Madam President, Vice President, mayor, council members, uh madame manager, and thank you for this. And uh May, Mayor, I'll be addressing your 6.1 number here in just a minute. Uh as Kirstson said, this is just some of the factors that you need that have to be considered as part of this resolution to move forward. So, I'm going to be touching on those. Second slide. Um, just a little bit of background. Lit communities was hired back in February of 2023. And the intent of them was to provide direction to help the city defi define figure out what direction they should take in providing uh adequate fast fiber to the to the community. Not just to the resident to the business, but really identify what's the best route to get there. And that's what uh lick communities did. took them about a year or so to do that work. And part of what they considered, next slide, and again, this is just for your information. They looked at a lot of the data on the next slide, they looked at the uh Federal Communications Commission data. Uh you can go to the next slide also. That was an important part in them figuring out what make what made sense for the city of Willist. And you go on to the next slide. some of their findings you know who who was providing services at the time and you see there there were four Century Hughes T-Mobile and then the the l the satellite one Husenet but um you can look at the speeds there at the bot only T-Mobile offered broadband speeds equal to 10 m megabytes download and 20 megabytes upload that was the best you could get you know two years ago or a year ago so that's what was available next slide and because of that that speed because of the price there was you can see at the bottom I highlighted these numbers 45.5 said no question I would pay more for faster more reliable service another 43%

said yeah we would probably likely pay more for a better service you're talking about almost 90% of the folks here businesses and residents in in Willist said yeah we we need better we need faster we we need more reliable fiber. Again, this is just the findings from that lit community study. Next, next slide. The other important thing I wanted to point out that came out of that lit community study and again I highlighted this number speed test in Williston. 81% just over 81% were below the FCC uh speed requirements. So again, these are all part data points that were found by lit communities. Next slide. Now, we're going to get into the numbers that uh the mayor just talked about, but but one one of the things I wanted to point out is that there just different tiers and different studies that were included in this thing, the different tiers, tier three and tier four. One is basically the last mile, which it takes you to the home, middle mile, which is more the regional level. But all of these things were considered when lick communities did their their research. Next slide. and and they took a look at various models and I just highlighted these two and I wanted to point out that obviously green is good. So when you're looking at this if you could read it one of the things I wanted to point out is that only the city provided fiber to the home model allowed you to control the rates. Any other model you know you might get it you I don't know if you for different reasons you you just never know what what your residents or businesses were going to pay and we looked at some of those models. I say we but there were some of them that that were existing today they were going to pay more than what your residents are going to be paying with the model that you that you landed on. So the next next slide and this is what the mayor talked about. I just wanted to point out that uh in that lit community study they they mentioned several models and they said you know

6.1 7.4 four and 6.1 those were the models when they identified these models what the prices would be and and again same same thing he mentioned the 22.7 mil over 20 years this is their model but the model that you landed on and the project that we that you are moving forward with is much less next slide so they the one back one so this is what they said they uh back one please this is the most important thing that they came back and said based on all of their research, based the surveys, based on the data, based on existing models, they said they said that you ought to pursue exactly what you're pursuing now. And that's an owner operator model. That's you own it, you operate, you control it. He says you're already doing electric, gas, water, su sewage. You're already primed for providing services. This is just going to be one more service that you can be provided. You've already got technicians already out in the field doing a lot of these services. you've already got a customer service department. So they they said this is just the best model for you and this is what they recommended and this is the model that you are pursuing. Next slide. Now just as another consideration that you there were other models that were presented. This was one that was presented by Fiverr by Central Florida and they offered a 50-50 split about $3 million contribution by the city versus three 3 million on their part. those numbers, you know, fluctuated. But bottom line is even at those models and you asked me to run some models last year and I compared the owner operator, city owned and operated versus that model and there was just no comparison. I mean I again I ran those those numbers and when you looked at the revenue you would generate off of that $3 million investment or $2 half million investment and just it's nothing it on a personal level you would never do that and so I think it was the right move to not not accept that model and move to the model that you're currently moving towards. Next slide.

So this is your project. It's at six it's $4.6 $.6 million that the mayor mentioned and this is what you're getting out of that project. And again, at the end of this, I'll be happy to answer questions about your existing project. These again, these are just the factors for for consideration uh in this resolution. And you can move to the next slide. One of the considerations on this next slide is that you have to consider your your annual operating cost. And you see that on column nine. This is your this is your cash flow cash flow for the project. And column nine is your again what your existing costs are going to be first year moving forward and that is incorporated having to purchase some fiber and also uh the two technicians that you've already hired. So, the cash flow long-term on the next slide, it's not the 22 mil, nor is it the 6.1 mil, but it is uh does provide uh $9 million 9.7 I believe it is net over 20 years, not 22, but again, it's a cheaper cost and it's just different model. Different ways to break this out. Um, but anyway, this is the cash flows for the project. Next slide. And this is the last slide. Just the the overall benefits, jobs, keeping job. I mean, you have your own team. You've already hired two people. This is, you know, owned and operated by by Willist. I think that is wonderful. You know, that this is it's personal. You know, providing that personal touch that uh Council Member Alexa just mentioned. I mean, Aaron was there and he fixed it. This is what makes this to me probably one of the best best parts of this project is personal ownership. They're going to make sure your your crew and your your your staff is going to make sure this thing continues to operate and it's going to be it's not intended to be a money maker for outside, you know, fiber companies would want to make money on it. You're just trying you you want to break even. You want to cover your cost and that's what allows you to keep your costs much lower, your rates much lower than than

might otherwise than they might otherwise be. Tax growth. Um, sure. When you've got 81% of your of your constituents who are unhappy with the speed and willing to just who are below the the the FCC speed limits, you're not going to attract a lot of people. People may not want to move here, but businesses may not want to move here. Now, you're going to now you're going to have symmetrical one gig, which is huge. And by symmetrical, Aaron could talk about this all day long. I'm just going to throw the word out there like I know what I'm talking about. But it's up and down. You get one gig up and down speed, which is unheard of, which is absolutely wonderful. And then the other part is just on the education and public health and we talked about this before you know you've got you the education component whether it's being able to stream you know educational videos whether it's teleaalth things that you might not be able to do otherwise but this fiber uh it's just going to allow you to do that uh even better if you're you know if you're not able to do that now and that concludes the presentation on the uh resolution. Madame President, I know I mentioned this last time, but I can't mention it enough. There are so few municipalities who are able to do this kind of work because you're required to meet such stringent requirements as a municipality providing uh communication services. So, you have to be profitable within four years. You have to have certain requirements. You can't, you know, you don't have the same access to capital that you would have with a different uh infrastructure project. So the fact that you meet all of the requirements of Florida statute to do this is just is is incredible is is very few municipalities have done that.

Yes. Can I get a motion? I move approval of resolution 2025-128. I'll second. Have a motion and a second. Any discussion from the council? Miss Meredith,

I just want to say that one of the things that I like the most about this project is that when we when I pay my internet bill to Centry Link, I don't know where Centry Link's headquarters are, but somebody's making a lot of money and it's not here in Willist. And by doing this project, even though, you know, we will be offering very low rates, there'll be some return for the city obviously on its investment, but that money gets invested directly back into the city. It doesn't go in the pocket of a CEO someplace way often a different state or someplace else in this state. It comes back to the residents and to the infrastructure and to depending on what our state legislature decides about our utility fund and how much we can but at a minimum it comes back to keep improving our utilities which we desperately need to keep doing that. So I'm all I'm all in. Excellent point,

Miss Deborra. Just saying. Excellent point. Mr. Fox, good.

Miss Alexa, anything from the public? Mr. Eert, don't go far. [laughter] Yes, sir. Tim, um, I got a question. world. If y'all took a loan out and the taxpayers are paying for it, if you're a citizen in the in the in Wilson, why would you pay a $100 hookup fee when we're already paying to have it put in? I mean, just a question. Why would you as a citizen that you paying for it on the loan? Why would we have to pay $100 to have it hooked up whenever you pay a monthly service when you get it hooked up? Thank you, Mr. Edard. Um, miss Aaron's got an I got him.

I'm sorry. Aaron, you need to get not giving me time to get him. Okay. There [laughter] there is no hookup fee. There's zero hookup fee. There's zero charges. There's zero contract. There's no commitment.

That's in the lit proposal. That's not uh I think our current plan. That was the model. I think it was the model. It was the model, but that's not what we're pursuing. Joelby.

Uh, I'm Joel Penny. So, how do we know this is just going next two years? This is going to be legit and work because like with dialup, I mean, it took what 5 years and dialup was gone to DSL. It was exist don't exist anymore. How are we going to know this is not going to exist in the future like 2 years from now? I mean like what if we know if Elon Musk makes a satellite where it's global internet for everybody or I mean like and then we're stuck carrying this bill. But I mean y'all really got to think about stuff like that. I mean and are we going to if say we have Century Link are we still going to have to pay for y'all too? It's not going to be forced on us. Like the gas bill, like if people uh for example, I have gas at my house. I don't use it. I still have to have I still pay for it.

I still have to pay for the gas. I still get charged for it every month on my bill and I don't even use gas. If you don't want the service, you simply don't pay for it. Well, I don't want the service and I still got to pay for gas. That's different. Gas regulations, not my What's the difference? The difference is gas is regulated. Internet is not okay.

Thank you. Anyone else? Yes, ma'am. If you'll go to the podium. It's not related to the internet. I just wanted to acknowledge that um what I spoke about earlier about the parking lot and the quilt store. Well, my boss is here now and I would like her to ma'am. So at public participation then you can get back up and talk about that. Oh I thought it was public participation because public was Oh no related to the internet. You still have some time. Okay. [laughter] Okay. All right. If there is no one else

uh you have to come to the mic and speak and then Okay. Yeah. Cuz nobody heard [snorts] Good. Just one other question. Have I know I brought up to Miss Sue about sending a flyer to businesses. Where are we at on that? I know what Kirstson's about to say. We couldn't do anything until after this. Okay.

Like I said, after this now we can [clears throat] finally start advertising and doing everything we need to do, but we needed to get past this second time first. And then at that point when you send flyers and things, you'll have calculations as to how much it's going to cost and things of that nature. Okay. Thank you. All right. So, no other questions or comments from the the public or council. We're going to move to vote. All those in favor say I. I. All those opposed say nay. [laughter] Motion [clears throat] passes five to zero. All right. Now, we're going to go to public participation. This is your second opportunity for you to speak on anything that was not on the agenda. You have five minutes.

Okay. Again, Wet Hos, I just wanted u because I have to acknowledge my boss is here and I wanted um someone to at least uh let her know what was told earlier about I spoke about the shop hop and about the problem of not having the parking. um available for March. The parking lady is gone, so she's not here to to to say what she said, but um I just wanted someone from the council to acknowledge what was told to me and let her know what was going on and what was offered so that she can at least hear it from someone that was present earlier. [cough] City manager. So, um before Laura Jones, who's our CRA director, was here. So, this is a CRA um project, not actually from the city. Um which doesn't mean a lot to you, I understand. But one of the things that Laura had mentioned is that we could do some sort of a um designation here at the parking at city hall to try and help you guys out in the event that the parking lot is not 100% done by your um by the time of your event. Do you know what date your event is being held? That would be helpful for us to know. Um, it's March 1st through the end of April, but

it's very expensive to participate in this and it brings a lot of business to town. Um,

I know that people don't understand how much business we're actually bringing in over there, but we have three or four different draws that we're bringing in ladies from all over. They come from Gainesville and Ocala and now of course it's winter so from all over the place. And so, um, I'm really kind of upset that it's not going to be done by March 1st. We paid a lot of money to participate in this, um, event. And it it's very frustrating cuz we're working really hard. I feel like the city has kind of let me down because we, okay, or the CRA, [laughter] whoever, but we have that awful looking awning in the front. We have um, and I apologize. I'm not a complainer, but this this stuff is starting to really add up. Um I don't understand why that has not been repaired. It's been like that for almost 2 years when before we even leased the building, before we even went into and it's not the it's not the business I mean the building owner's issue at all. He was under the understanding that it was going to be repaired. I was told that it was going to be repaired. This was before we even opened our business. We opened on May 17th. Nothing's been done. This is almost another year. I mean, it's almost gone by. I called in. I'm actually an insurance adjuster by trade. Um, it's very frustrating because I called over and I was like, you know, have you guys run the claim? Have you done anything? And I just kept getting different answers from different people. Um, not trying to throw anybody under the bus, but it's really aggravating. Can somebody fix the awning? like do you guys know?

Madam President, can I take that? Yes, ma'am. Okay. So, again, um and I'm also an insurance, so we'll kind of speak language for a second here. Thank you. So, um this happened before I was here, but somebody obviously hit the awning. Um that person only had $10,000 on their auto policy. So, that's the most that we could get from that particular individual. It is going to cost somewhere in the neighborhood of 80 to 90,000 to fix the awning. I know, not my I'm not in construction, but why I that is the

No, I mean, honestly, like I'm not even being ugly. I'm just saying why. There's two main poles that are damaged and then the awning above the the top. And then when I called, they said, "Well, there's electrical." I don't know any electrician who's going to charge you like 50 grand to run the electrical through there for LED wiring. I can climb up there and do it myself. Honestly, it also has to do with FOT permitting. There's a lot of things kind of behind the scenes that have to be done to get this repaired. So, are they not ever going to repair it?

No, no, no. So, what we're doing now is again, this is a the CRA has taken on this project. We actually are out to bid right now. The bids are due on January 3rd, and the hope is that if somebody bids, as of I think Friday, nobody had bid, but if and when somebody does bid, we're hoping to have it done by the end of March. That's what we had in the anticipated um construction. So, this is going to be a real problem if they shut the front of my store and there's no back to my store. So, we're going to have an issue. Understand? Um, so, so what I would like to do is we actually, um, we meet on block 12, the the parking lot every Friday. So, I'm definitely going to bring your concerns to our, our meeting on Friday and see if there's anything that we can do against, you know, fast.

I know that this is not the top on everybody else's list, but it's damn sure the top of mine. Um, I have What did I say? Damn sure. Oh, sorry. Sorry. I'm in Texas, [laughter]

so dang sure. How about that? Okay. We're we're just it's really affecting our business a lot. Um I know that it's affecting him. I know that it's affecting Main Street Hair Salon. They're to the point that they don't know if they're going to be able to stay in that spot. And I feel the same way. Um not because of the awning, but the combination of things. And and I wish that one of you would just come perch over there during the day cuz you can hear all the nasty comments about I think the cute one that I heard day before yesterday was, "Well, what is wrong with the city of Wilson? I don't know what plants are. you don't have any planter boxes out here. And I thought, I don't run the city of Olston. I'm sorry that we don't have planter boxes. So, people are complaining about the aesthetics, the safety issues, the traffic is going to Sorry, chief, [laughter] but they complain about the traffic. Um, [clears throat] apparently the I don't walk across the street over there during the day cuz it's not safe.

But I have customers that are my customer base is over 60 and now I've got them trying to book it across the street with a sewing machine. It's not good. I mean, it's just not safe. It makes me a nervous wreck. Um, okay. I'm going to interrupt you here for a second. Your time is up. If you'll just follow up with city minutes. Yes, ma'am. if you'll follow up with the city manager um and let her help you out with that. Appreciate it. One more question really quick cuz I missed it. When is the parking lot? You said when will it be done? End of March. Right now is end of March. End of March. Correct. Both of those projects would be end of March. Yes.

Thank you. Anyone else? Yes, sir. the contractor that put that up the awning over there when that was hit and I made him out front when he was looking at the blueprints to give y'all a bid and it was 37,000. Now I don't worry that where [laughter] she keeps coming up with that 80 90,000 but he told me $37,000 it would cost to repair that. That's a big difference. It's a big cost difference. That's that's the company that put it up. So, I'm just I'm just saying this what he told me. That's all I'm saying.

Okay. Thank you. Is there anyone else? Yeah, Tim. Um, on the question asked earlier about the amendments, got thinking I might as well just say it like it is. I'm sorry, Mr. Eker. about the about the uh citizens initiative amendment. Okay.

Uh I want the amendments to be about two four year terms and you can't run consecutive even if there's an empty seat. And the other is to put the fire assessment on the vote for the citizens because it should have been for the citizens by the citizens and not not by y'all. So that's what I want. Thank you. Anyone else in the public? None. Okay, we'll move on to announcements. We'll start with uh city manager. Do you have anything any announcements? [sighs and gasps]

I do not. [laughter] City attorney Kirstston. Yes, as you know. Hope everyone's getting excited. our ethics presentation Thursday begins at 4. Um, we're excited to see you all. We've ordered foods, cowboys, going to be delicious barbecue. I I really anticipate everyone having a good time. We've got updated content for you all um updated ethics um both information um and and sort of anecdotes. So, we hope everyone will have a good time and please come out and see us. Thank you, Miss Latricia. Yes, the chief has a announcement.

Uh, we were going to him, [laughter] Chief O. That was your plug. That was your plug. You know what? I was going to sit over here quiet, but I think we got another 30 minutes. No, ma'am. No, sir. We don't. Oh. Oh, I didn't mean to say ma'am, but yeah, we don't. Um, well, Santa Claus is coming to town on the 18th. Awesome. Starting at 5:00. Yay. I can tell you I'm very excited about Santa, but I'm going to miss Santa because I got to go to some ethics training. Me, too. [laughter] Me, too. So, I'm going to miss Santa. Me, too. And I'm going to be on the naughty list. Uh-oh. Well, join Santa. We [laughter] promise again.

All right. Um, any announcement from staff in the back? Mr. Jonathan. [snorts] Mr. [cough] I would just like to bring up the hot cocoa trailer and the what 9h hour event that was. Uh so I'd like to say thank you to the vice president Cox, Miss Debert, and Latricia for a really long hard day and I really appreciate it. That's it. Thank you. Now, what did you just bring up? The hot cocoa trailer. I'm sorry. Oh, hot cocoa trailer. I'm sorry about that. It was the bomb, was it? Oh, yeah. It was It was raining and we were in there.

Oh. Oh, you were in the trailer. Okay, Miss Latricia, I'm sorry to re reiterate what Jonathan said. Thank you all to the council members that did participate and to the city manager that gave out cookies for me. It was a very good event. And thank you for all the residents that came by our trailer. And when was the hot cocoa chocolate? It was light up trail mix. Light upon. Okay. A lot of hot chocolate. Was it? They always have pretty good hot chocolate though. Let me do four or five five gallons. We're sitting here talking about hot chocolate. All right. Is there any?

Wow. Nice. Any other announcement from staff? Any announcement from the council? Miss Rickio, Mr. Cox, Miss Jones, Miss Meredith? There is none. All right. Mr. for mayor. Anything from you? [laughter] I almost forgot to She would love to just submit me. However, I do have something to say. Thank you, Madam President. [laughter]

I heard the city planner, Laura Jones, talking about the uh building that the county is going to be turning back over to the city. Uh the city manager and I also had a meeting. I think it was today. It's been a long day. Was it today, Sue? Oh, are we are we talking about Habitat or a different meeting? Habitat was uh yesterday.

Oh, yesterday. Okay. Well, my days have run together. At any rate, before you decide on what you're going to do with that building, I would like you to at least con consent to hearing what they are trying to do and seeing if you're interested in it. If you're not, there's nothing I can do about it. But I was I was impressed by the woman who is doing it. She is currently doing it in Citrus County. And uh I'm getting two people mixed up. No, Habitat. Yes. Citrus County. Uh they've got 176 acre 176 houses that Habitat is building in Citrus County and they want to move to this county and they're

You want me to finish? Okay. Thank you. Uh and and the other thing is there is another lady that is trying to find a place to give a new direction to females. I want to be very clear that have run a foul of the judicial system and gotten incarcerated and they're looking they just want to start over and the the presentation that she brought which I think you should hear before cuz this has got to do with that building. uh the presentation that she brought and the stringent requirements for doing this I thought was impressive and I think that this is what I was talking about when I said I hope that the council would at least consider hearing her before you choose to do something else with that building. Uh I went over to the building with her. The county was not there. They didn't answer the door, but they they clearly have not vacated it. And my information is they don't intend to vacate it until after the first of the year, which is fine. This lady is not going to move anywhere that soon. She's looking for space and a place that she can do good. And I think that my city of Willist is a place that wants to do good. So, I just would encourage you to at least hear her when that building is available. Thank you.

Does she plan on coming and speaking to us? Yes, she does. Okay.

When she is finds out that she has a building possible. Uh there's no point in her coming in for things that may just not possible. If she can't find a place that she can put this facility, which that building would be very good for, uh then she's not going to come before the council unless she finds a place, a house, a office, something. Uh, obviously I would like to see the old uh school and I keep getting mixed up. Deborah, you could probably tell. Is it was it a middle school over there that

that uh that would be a great place because it has more area. Yeah. For them to I don't know how many acres is on there. And frankly, and I we also talked about I think uh Sue and I talked about it would be nice to get rid of the hospital. I was just saying I got a hospital we can show her.

Um so, but she she needs some kind of guidance. She doesn't want to just appear and waste your time. So, we're starting out looking at that building. And if you decide you want to do something with it, then she'll go start a different search. But at this point, that's what she's looking at is that building. So once it is vacated, I will be contacting her. I have my number in the office and getting her to come before the council. And now all I'm asking is that you consider not doing something with the building before you have heard what she would like to try to do. That's all I'm asking. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. All right. Um, excuse me, Madam President. [clears throat] I'm sorry. You've already spoke three times.

Three times. If I wasn't distracted by Chief Rose over here, I would have had my items together. I cannot forget to thank my cocoa makers and testers. That is BJ Bishop, Jason Fox, and Tom Wolf. Those three helped me very much make a total of what 30 50 some gallons of hot cocoa. and thank the ladies up front that bagged up the cookies for the event as well. I couldn't leave them out because they were here with me during that time as well. Anything else, Miss Miss Wright? All right. So, it's time for adjournment. And we have a motion.

I second. We have a second. All those in favor of adjourning, say I. I. I. All those opposed, nay. Motion passes 5 to zero. You guys have a great night at 7:48 p.m. Happy holidays.