Good morning. It is February 10th, 1130, and before we get started, I would like to welcome Bishop James Dixon from the Greater Faith Christian Center, who is going to be doing the invocation. There you are. Yeah. Welcome. If everybody will please stand while we have the invocation. And then if you'll join me for a Pledge of Allegiance after the invocation, that'd be great. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Good morning. It is an honor to be here and to offer this prayer in my faith tradition. May we pray. Eternal God, our Father, we thank you for every seat that has been filled here today, for each mind and heart that fills the presence of this room. We thank you. Only you truly know what we are setting out to accomplish today. We have an idea, a vision, hints, and daily instructions. We have talents, abilities, and time to work. However, only you can see in perfect detail the end of every beginning, every project, every season, every life. Nothing is ever in vain, for even mistakes and missteps are used for good. Your righteousness transcends all our efforts and understanding. Forgive us for our pride, the pride that puffs us up and the pride that threatens to unqualify us. Strengthen our confidence in who you have made us to be. Set us free from comparison in order to work together efficiently. Bless this meeting today, all those present, as well as the lives of those we will encounter afterward. Ready us to make every moment count. And it's in Jesus' name that we all pray and say, amen. Amen. Thank you, Bishop. And now we'll go ahead and call the meeting to order. And the first item is the approval of the regular and consent agenda. So moved. Madam Andrew, are there any questions? No, there are not. So moved. Second. And might I just say, I just want to acknowledge the Parker Road extension that's on the consent agenda and thank everyone who's worked so hard on that project for I don't even know how long. I mean, that's just been one of those things that everyone deserves a big hooray, hooray for because there's a lot of work between all the rights of way and the engineering and the relationships that had to be negotiated with DOT. I just really appreciate the hard work that's gone into that. And it feels anticlimactic to have it on consent. So I just wanted to say thank you. And also to acknowledge we have a royalty in our midst today, Queen Mother Manier is here with us today. Queen Mother, thank you for being here. I wanted to honor her, honor her. Yeah. Commissioner, so we have a motion in a second. Could I just ask for one minor change? Tonight we're going to have a late night. And at the end, after the quasi, we have county attorney, manager, and commission comment. And if we could move that to the end of our morning session. Absolutely. Then when we're done with that meeting, the meeting will return. Is that okay? Yeah, sure. Great. Yeah, that's absolutely great. I've been here when we've had people and we're trying to ask and it's just going to be late tonight. So thank you. So, Mr. Clerk, you got that change? Yes. All right. So we've got a motion and a second to adopt the agenda with that minor change. Is there any comments from the public to the motion on the floor? Seeing none, let's bring it back to the board. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion is unanimous. Okay. Thank you. So, Mr. Clerk, first item. Mr. Chair, up next is the announcements and communications director Mark Sexton is here to present those. Mr. Sexton, you're recognized. Welcome. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mark Sexton, communications director. Hey, Alan, could you put the computer back up on the screen, please? The computer image. So we're going to pause for just a second so everyone can pull out their cell phone and put it on that QR code on the screen. That will give you the My Alachua County app, and it is an incredibly useful tool. We have 650 residents who have signed up for this since we rolled it out a little over a week ago. Mark, is that microphone working? I just want to make sure. Testing. One, two, three. There we go. Okay. Thank you. Sorry. I was a little under the weather, and my voice is a little still affected by it. But anyway, the app is great. Not only can you get a shortcut to the most important sites on our website, like adopting animals, employment opportunities, and things like that, but also you will automatically receive important notifications that we feel like rise to the level of wanting to push out. So we encourage everyone to sign up for this. Alan and Josh, our extraordinary videographers, have come up with this. And if I knew how to work the computer, you could actually see this incredible video that you're now hearing. Meetings, events, services, road projects, weather updates. It's only 30 seconds. I'm going to turn it over. Introducing the My Alachua County app. This new mobile app delivers important notifications and information on county services straight to your phone. It also provides a centralized, easy-to-use platform to stay informed about county news, meetings, events, services, road projects, weather updates, adoptable animals, employment opportunities, and much more. Scan the code to download the app from the App Store or Google Play today. We are pushing this out all over social media and through the media, so we're very excited about this app. Also, speaking of video and speaking of things that we're excited about, I will lead in to the next topic with a video, and then I'll have something to say about it. So, Mr. Chair, this app was brought to our attention by Commissioner Prizia, and we've been working with her intern, Kathleen. And the more we look into it, the more impressed we are with this tool. It augments some great tools that are out there, like 211. It helps push out our own services as well as county nonprofits that provide services countywide. This effort to promote Find Help is a collaboration between the Children's Trust, UF Health, and the Safety Net Collaborative, along with Alachua County. We've aligned to help push this out, and we want to do two things, in effect. We want to let citizens know, go to this site. It is as easy as putting in your zip code, and you will see every resource available to you, every nonprofit that provides services, as well as governmental services. There are, we have a press release. So, a great way to find out more detail about this is to go to the website. It's highlighted on the homepage. It takes you to this page, which includes links to how to claim your organization, tutorials on how to use it. It is a really intuitive, user-friendly site. We're asking folks to do two things. If you are interested in finding out about services, go and enter your zip code. You'll get a great deal of information. But also, equally as important, we're asking nonprofits to go and do what they call claim your site. Now, this site scours the Internet and finds you. But if you claim your site, you get to go in and edit your material to communicate exactly what you want to communicate, your hours, the services you provide. So, we are encouraging all nonprofits to go online and do that. And we encourage our residents and our nonprofits to go to our website to get more information. And this is part of a campaign that we're going to be pushing out all over our social media and our website. So, we're very excited about that. And then, finally, a few months ago, the county manager, in response to some very confusing information that has been circulating around our state, she instructed and challenged communications and Tommy Crosby's shop, budget and finance, to come up with an easy-to-understand. The tagline is, you shouldn't have to have a finance degree to understand the county's finances. And we took that challenge. And with the manager's guidance throughout, we put together Sense and Sensibility, which you've been hearing about. We're kind of excited now, though, because now we have put it together into one publication. We will be pushing this out by press release a little bit later today and on social media. And we've done it in such a way that it opens like a book. The table of contents is all interactive. You can click on the chapter, and it will forward to that point. This is about 40 pages long. A recent report that came out from the state was about 70 pages long. This one is much easier to understand. And if the public would invest reading 40 pages, you will have an understanding of county budgets that very few people have. It is bite-sized chapters, how to influence the budget, what the general fund is, what property taxes are and how they work. A particularly important chapter is Chapter 4, Unfunded Mandates from the State of Florida. It explains how since the 70s there have been hundreds of unfunded mandates that directly affect how you budget every year, why budgets grow over time, how reserves work, the total budget, much more than just property taxes, and then a look forward at where you're going that is based on the three pillars of your recent strategic guide. So we urge people to go through the chapters and take a look. It's really an amazing and simple way to understand our budget. And I wanted to just take a second and acknowledge Andrew Kaplan and Brett Bostock in my office, who did an enormous amount of work on this. Also, Tommy Crosby and Maureen Ricciatelli, who also did enormous work on this. So we're very proud of this, and we think it's going to be a very useful tool for our residents. And, Mr. Chair, those are the announcements. Okay. Don't leave. We've got some lights. Commissioner Chestnut, Commissioner Wheeler, and then Commissioner. Oh, no? Okay. Commissioner Wheeler. I just want to say it's visually beautiful, you know, very pleasing, aesthetically pleasing. And the idea of having it short and sweet, I think, is exactly right on. I would like to see this maybe even used in some of our high school classrooms. You know, I don't know if that's something that we could offer, you know, our civics classes. But it seems to me that this is just exactly what they could do. And thank you for pointing out the aesthetics, because I was remiss. This Takumi Sullivan was very involved with how this looks. She's our extraordinary graphic designer. Very classy. And I don't know, you know, even how you would go about, I guess, by putting it out there, you're publishing it. But it's something that I don't know that even we could take and share back another thing, you know, that we've done from our county in terms of educating the public. I just think it's brilliant. So thank you for that. Thank you. And, Mr. Chair, we've gotten great feedback from FAC on the initial chapters, and we're getting ready to send them the entire book. Wonderful. Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Commissioner. Commissioner Priscian. Yeah, I also wanted to say great work. I've been sharing this on social media and passing it along to people when they ask me a question about our budget. And it's so refreshing to have an easy-to-read, really easy-to-search-through tool for folks. I love this graphic, the one of the dollar. I think it's a great way for people to kind of just get a snapshot of what we spend and how we spend it. And just the whole document is such an easy read. I do highly recommend it. And I just want to say thank you to our graphics department and all of you for putting this together, and a big thanks to our finance department. Because I think when I look around the state, we're one of the most transparent counties that I've found when it comes to our budget. Between what we have in searchability online regarding our budget to having documents like this that explain how it works, I'm really proud of the fact that our county is so transparent about how we spend taxpayer dollars. So thank you for that. And, Mr. Chair, if I may, budget and finance, every time they would give us a new draft, Michelle and I would say we still don't understand the math. And they would simplify it. I think Michelle knows even more math than I do. But, you know, the goal was to make sure that it was understandable. Mr. Offer? Yeah. I think not only is it understandable, it's approachable. And I think that, to me, is the most important thing. Because so many people look at budgets and look at numbers and anything to do with that. And they think, not only do they, you know, are they a little bit afraid of it sometimes, they just don't want to look at it. And you've created a document that is very, it's kind of funny and it's approachable and it sort of takes it to a place where people feel comfortable picking it up. And that, to me, was really important. And I know there's been snarky comments about it online. But I've heard more good than bad for sure. I didn't see any of those. You didn't see any. Thank you, Commissioner. Yeah, Mark, this is a great report. I've got some things to say when we get to the impact of the property tax reflections about the DOGE report. I've been in touch with FAC. And a lot of this was AI generated based on politics, not really based on budgets. But I'll save that for that agenda item. I see Commissioner Prizzi's lights back on. Can you tell us about Find Help? Yeah. I just also want to say thank you to our communications department, my intern Kathleen, and our community support services department for all the work they've been doing to point people towards Find Help. I think it is for our nonprofits and our government institutions, but it's also for for-profit businesses that provide services, like our health care clinics. You know, if you're a dialysis clinic, if you're doing something that provides a social service, a health care service, to individuals in our community, we really encourage you to create a profile and keep it up to date. Make sure you can put in eligibility so that people know if they qualify for your services, your zip codes, where you serve so that people can find you easily, your hours, your contact information. And the nice thing about this service over time is the hope that it will help us with warm referrals, being able to hand people off and then track how those referrals happen over time so that we can, as local government and as community as a whole, be able to prioritize areas where we see gaps in services or where, you know, referrals are falling off, and also be able to support individuals in finding the resources that they need. So really excited about this resource and coordinating it with 2-1-1 and all of the other community partners who are working so hard to navigate people to the resources that they need. Okay. Thank you, Commissioner. Mark, great job. You're here, so we can't make fun of you when you're out. You know, we had fun at your expense last two weeks ago, but great job on the announcements. I got reports right away when you did that. Okay. All right. We appreciate you, Mark. Okay, Mr. Clerk, approval of recognitions. Next item. Well, we don't actually have any proclamations on this agenda, so I don't think we need to have a motion for that. But up next is recognition of the Alachia County Fire Rescue Department for their recertification by the Commission on Accreditation of Ambulance Services. Chief Theus, our chief, welcome. Thank you for having me. Could I have a point of privilege? Could I ask the commissioners and the county manager to come down? 100%. Celebrate this recognition with us? Happy to do it. Thank you. It's up to Takumi. Out in here. All right. So we were just recently reaccredited through the Commission of Accreditation of Ambulance Services. We had a team that came in November 13th and 14th that evaluated over 107 standards of our EMS agency, and those standards include administration, financial management, community relations, leadership, medical oversight, patient care standards, personnel records, training, vehicles, equipment, medical supplies, communications, and technology. The accreditation firm is a nationally recognized accreditation firm that is really the gold standard of emergency medical services. We're really proud to say this is our second time being accredited. We get accredited every three years, and so this reaccreditation process that we went through was lengthy and time-consuming. We're one of less than 200 ambulance services in the United States that have received this accreditation, and one of 24 in the state of Florida. So we're very proud of it. The gold standard of EMS agencies is really an important accreditation to have. It shows that you are doing the best for your community, and really it's a commitment from the commissioners to the county manager and to all of our staff that we're able to achieve this very high mark. Really proud to say that I have 107 standards. Alachua County Fire Rescue had zero deficiencies. In fact, the accreditation standard in 2026 is rolling out CAS accreditation 4.0, where there's over 140 standards. The team that came that viewed us said we have already met those 140 standards, and so I have no doubt that in three years we'll be able to be reaccredited again. It's a team effort to achieve this accreditation from county commissioners and county manager for their commitment to public safety to our line personnel who are randomly interviewed and assessed by this evaluation team. It is a large group that's involved, from our medical billing manager, Melinda Hart, Assistant Director of Administrative Services, Cheryl Ellis, who put together a lot of research and data for us. Also, our Assistant Chief of Training, Karim Scott-Kupa, is heavily involved in that. Medical Director, Dr. Jones, is involved also. But I want to give a special thanks to a couple of individuals. Assistant Chief Misty Woods, who leads our EMS division, who's here with us today. Battalion Chief Jacob Fall, who leads our EMS team and really has been the spearhead behind this accreditation process. And also Rescue Lieutenant Glenn Glasgow, who worked 101 with the team as they were here for their visit. So to celebrate this accomplishment, we have our framed accreditation certificate that will be proudly displayed in our headquarters building. And also, every Alachua County Fire Rescue employee is going to receive a commemorative Challenge Coins. And Fire Rescue Challenge Coins are a really big deal for us. It has the Alachua County Fire Rescue emblem on the front. And on the back, it has the Commission on Accreditation of Ambulance Services, CAS accredited, sealed in the year of 2025. And I have a coin for the County Manager and for all of you, Commissioners, for your support and your continued dedication to public safety. And so thank you very much for all that you have done in supporting us. And thank you for the community for being such great supporters of Alachua County Fire Rescue. Okay. So thank you, Chief. Let's go ahead and move to the next item. Mr. Chair, up next is the Health Facilities Authority Advisory Board appointments. We have three applicants, two vacancies, Mr. Timothy Gwynn, Samantha Newworth, and Renee Aurora are your three applicants. I'm not sure if any of them are here to... Are any of the applicants here and like to address the Commission? Okay. So should we give our top two? Yeah, I think that would be best if we just... All right. Let's proceed. Fix our top two. Commissioner Chestnut, if we could start with you. Your top two nominees, please. Newworth and Gwynn. Commissioner Wheeler, your two nominees, please. Gwynn and Newworth. Commissioner Alford, your two nominees, please. Gwynn and Aurora. Commissioner Prizzi, your two nominees. Gwynn and Newworth. I'll appoint Gwynn and Newworth. Move to approve Gwynn and Newworth for the Health Facilities Authority Board. Second. Got a motion, a couple seconds. Any discussion? Any public discussion? Back to the board. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion is unanimous. Thank you, Commissars. All right, Mr. Chair, next item. I mean, Mr. Clerk, next item. Mr. Chair, that takes us. It's the Arts Council of Alachua County Advisory Board Appointments. We have three applicants. We have one vacancy, and then if Mr. Hamilton is picked, then we need to pick an alternate. So if we could have your one nominee, and I guess we'll ask is Mr. Jay Rosen, Mr. Alexander Sanchez-Hamilton, or Shanae Vincent here, and wish to speak in- Do we have any of the applicants? Yeah, any of the applicants here and would like to address the board? All right. I'll see you. All right. Let's do it. We'll follow in for Commissioner for your one nominee. If we can start with Commissioner Alford, your one nominee, please. Jay Rosen. Commissioner Wheeler, your nominee, please. It's okay. Alexander Sanchez-Hamilton. Commissioner Parizia, your nominee. Sanchez-Hamilton. I'm sorry? Sanchez-Hamilton. Okay. Commissioner Chestnut, your nominee. Sanchez-Hamilton. And Commissioner Cornell. Sanchez-Hamilton. I would move Sanchez-Hamilton for the position and Jay Rosen for the alternate for the Arts Council of Alachua County. Second. Second. Got a motion and a couple seconds. That's a good way to do that. Any discussion? I just wanted to acknowledge Jay Rosen was one of the applicants for the Sankofa sculpture. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. So I think it's a good motion. Okay. Back to the board. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? That too is unanimous. Okay. Let's go ahead. So the Arts Council update. Let's go ahead and do that presentation and then we'll see where we are at noon. We may have to pause for public comment, but let's go ahead and you are recognized. Welcome. Thank you for being here. Good morning, Chair, Vice Chair, Commissioners. I'm Carol Velazquez Richardson, Chair of the Arts Council of Alachua County. Over the past year, the Arts Council has maintained consistent engagement by holding nine meetings between October 24th through September 2025 to ensure continuity, transparency, and progress across our arts initiatives. During this time, we successfully completed two significant public art installations, Bunker Gear at Fire Station 21, which is located in Alachua, and Burning Bush, which is a beautiful mural at the Fire Training Facility, which is off of 34th Street. We also finalized the call to artists for both the Court Complex and Poet Laureate, broadening access and participation within our arts community. In April, we hosted the 4th Annual Arts Conference at the Alachua County Extension Auditorium, which featured 10 arts-related presentations focused on arts education and professional growth. We were pleased again to receive $10,000 in funding from Visit Gainesville, Alachua County, and this helps to support our arts grants program. In addition, we recommended art loans with Laura Pretney and Tara Lynn Legale. You may be familiar with that. If you look around your chamber, they're artists that we put their beautiful art up. You see those over there. And later, I'm going to tell you about something else that we're going to be doing. We also recommended updates to our arts code to clarify future calls, to make them more transparent, to enhance more of our local artists, to be able to look at youth, and also those with special needs. Looking ahead, our goals include finalizing the installation of public art at the New Court Complex with a sculptor, and the Pleasant Street Mosaic, which is also on a county building, and it's a joint project with the city of Gainesville, completing calls to artists for the new animal shelter, the armory, and the parking garage. And we're going to be finalizing the fifth annual artist conference, which will be held at the beautiful Historic Thomas Center April 24th. Finally, with your support, we just expanded our art loan program to allow artists working in a variety of mediums to submit their paintings, photography, sculpture, ceramics, digital art, mixed media, and other visual art forms for three months display here inside the county administration building. So if you come inside on the first floor, you notice the beautiful glass case is still kind of wrapped. So we're really looking forward to that. We have some beautiful, wonderful artists that are on the Arts Council that will be helping that. And I'm really excited that Alexander and Ms. J. Rosen has been appointed. So I think it's going to be some really great stuff happening here in the county building. So together with you, the Arts Council is committed to strengthening public art, supporting artists, and enhancing cultural engagement throughout Alachua County. If you have any questions, I'm happy to answer them. What a wonderful report. Thank you, Madam Chair. And I see our esteemed Poet Laureate in the back. Mr. Stanley, did you want to make any comments? Or are you just here in support? This is late. Okay, very good. All right. We're almost there. Commissioner Prezio. I just wanted to say thank you for this committee's leadership. I've really watched you all sort of morph from just being somebody who approved art that comes through for our 1% art program to really thinking about how you all can advance arts as a whole in our community. And I just really appreciate that dedication and that vision to expand the work that you do and to help us really bring arts and culture to the forefront in Alachua County. So thank you. And really meet our mission, right, where nature and culture meet. So thank you so much. Yes. Commissioner Wheeler. I just want to say the same. Thank you so much for expanding to include some of our crafts people, too, our craftsmen and women who are out there producing beautiful artwork and don't always have a place to display it. So thank you very much for expanding to make that happen. Yeah. Madam Chair, your leadership has really been noticed, and we really appreciate it over here at the county. Thank you. Okay. Thank you so much. Okay, Commissioner. So it is high noon, which is our time for public comment. And so if you are here and would like to address anything not on the agenda, now is a great time to do that. If you are here and you want to address anything on the agenda, including the thing that we're doing tonight, you can't make it back, feel free to address that. Just tell us what you're talking about as far as something on the agenda and for those that are calling in. Also, if you'd like to address something that's on the agenda, if you'll let us know that you're addressing that. So you will not be able to speak on that item again, but you will have that opportunity to speak right now at noon. And so with that, let's go ahead and start public comment. We've got two microphones. And let's come forward. Introduce yourself. We've got a light system. Green means go. Yellow means 30 minutes. Red means. 30 minutes. I'm sorry, 30 seconds. I'm thinking about 30 minutes tonight. 30 seconds and then red means wrap up your comments. Okay. And with that, we've – go ahead. You're welcome. You're recognized. Good evening, Mr. Chair, Vice Chair, members of the Commission. It is my honor to be here tonight to speak on an issue. I want to talk about the – give support to the wildfire that will come up on your agenda later today. And that, of course, is something that I support very much. So I want to say that I support this wildfire festival of music and dance and the vision of a nature park that funds land stewardships through a community festival. Please approve the temporary use permit with reasonable conditions at your meeting today. Like the project I have been involved with in Alachie County, this one will strengthen the social fabric in our countywide community. In these times, it's very important to foster opportunities to bring people together for positive experiences. I believe the board of the not-for-profit that's doing this has worked very hard to put it together, and they deserve a chance to succeed. And I know that you all know, as I do, the person who's over this, Hutch Hutchison, and his hard work to not only preserve the beauty of Alachie County, but to keep all those sacred places that we love intact. So I don't believe Hutch would put together anything that would be against that. So, you know, my love for heritage and preserving it and preserving our nature, so I want to support Hutch and this project. I ask you to give him that consideration. Thank you very much. Okay, Mother, Ms. Fyler, thank you for your comments. Okay, next speaker, please. Good afternoon, Chair and Commissioners. I am Stan Richardson. I'm here in my capacity as citizen. And I'm here to ask for funding for the Bard and Broadside, the North Central Florida Poetry Festival. Back in, I believe, October, Art Speaks GNV, Inc., which is the organization that we produce all of our poetry events, three major poetry events every year. The Bard and Broadside, which is the largest one. It is the only festival in Alachua County, Gainesville, North Church of Florida, that's dedicated to poetry. It is a month-long celebration of poetry with partners throughout the city of Gainesville, beginning at the Horn Museum on April 9th and concluding at the Library District on April 26th. We bring in featured poets. We have poets come from all over the country for our signature Swamp Berry Jam Poetry Slam, which is a poetry slam event that brings in national slam poets from all over the country. And back in October, I believe, we applied for funding through the Arts Council. We were granted funding in the amount of $3,000, and following, we got an email, we were approved, we were granted funding. And the following month, due to a technicality, I think it was not, they didn't have a quorum. So then we were told that we, it was void. And so during that time, we didn't pursue other grant funding, and that window had closed. So we did not pursue other funding, so we were kind of like in a pickle. So I'm here to ask you to move forward and grant the $3,000 funding that we were all originally approved through the Arts Council Board. Okay. So, and that's it. And also, one more thing, Commissioner Frizzier, kind of like when she mentioned nature and culture, it took me back to the poem Eden that I composed for you several years ago. Well, since then, through some assistance through Mr. Sexton and connecting me with Evans Hale, who connected me with Stella Sung, who is an internationally known composer, she wrote a score to Eden. We will perform that on this month, I think it's a 20, two performances. One is going to be the 20, February 27th, that morning at the Phillips Center. I think they bring out a lot of the kids throughout the community from the schools, from the public schools, maybe like 1,500 kids come out. And the next performance is going to be the following day, that evening, Friday, 2, and the 7th, at the Jackson Sasser Performing Arts Center at Santa Fe College. So if you can, come out, and it will be the premiere for that. So I'm excited to perform that with the Gainesville Orchestra. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Richard. We'll address comments after all the public comment is done. All right, next speaker, please. Mark, welcome. Hi. Hi. Mark Van Suisbergen, hi. I've heard the word wildflowers. So yeah, so loss of, it's about little flying things. It's loss of habitats. So if you Google it or if you look at a publication, the number one reason is loss of habitat. It's the reason why pollinators and various other forms. And I remember that because, you know, where I live, when I was a kid, you know, it was kind of like on the outskirts of town, and now there's like a traffic jam. And so all those people go somewhere, and wherever they are, they cut down whatever there was, and now it looks kind of like you're in a Lowe's commercial, you know. And if something pops out of the ground that's not in the commercial, then they start throwing stuff at it. So little by little, that's basically what's impacted the habitat. And it's just a, you know, and most people are so busy with their everyday lives, it's not that they're anti. They just follow the norm. They follow whatever is out there. They don't necessarily have an opinion of what it really should look like. They're just following what it looks like on the picture. And so I think it is possible to actually change the herd direction a little bit if we just show them what it could look like and why, and then actually it helps our ecosystem, and it helps our food supply. It helps our farmers. It helps our economy. So we talk about things people can relate to. And then, you know, things like springs and things about healthy animals and, you know, people that people can relate to various different sides of it. But the loss of habitat is not necessarily reversible, but definitely we can amend it. And people's backyards, man, I have people. I know people, the people next door, they got a couple acres, they pay these guys $2.50 every month, and they show up, and they're done in two hours. They got little things on them, and they cut. There's nothing there. There's absolutely nothing there. They just mow. They mow and go. And I'm like, how about a peaty? I mean, there's like two and a half acres of nothing, and it's just mowing, you know. It's just sad. But they're just doing what they think is expected of them. And so it's social norms. And social norms can be influenced, and you have to explain what you're doing. You can show them how to do it. There's all these examples. We're not the first, you know, whatever, municipality or whatever. What are we, municipality? No. What jurisdiction? We're not the first in this country to actually come across this at all. And, in fact, some parts around the world, they've been dealing with this for over a decade now, and they've just changed their ways. So it's doable, totally doable. I've got to lead by example. You've got to start. And there's lots of examples already out there. That's what I was going to say. All right. Thank you, Mark. Wellflowers are cool, by the way. Thank you for your comments. Glazer, welcome. Good afternoon, commissioners. Commissioner Cornell, thank you for the 30 minutes. You looked over at me and said 30 minutes. Yeah. And then I definitely misspoke. I'll be as brief as I can. First and foremost, I do want to thank all of you for your leadership. You are the frontline stewards of this county, and you're doing a marvelous job, and I appreciate your time and effort that all of you put forward. Some of you know I speak before city commissions frequently, and this is the first time in front of the county commission actually in years. And I thought it would be nice collectively to speak to all of you at one time. I know that I have conversations with you. Individually. But I wanted to just go over a couple relative things that are going on. I don't know if I introduced myself, but Mitch Glazer, sorry. And so I wanted to kind of talk through a few items. One is the fire station donation is going very well. That should be forthcoming shortly, and we're excited about really partnering and trying to create the most eco-friendly fire station in the country. And that leans into what we do at San Flasco Tech City. And we say these words as if they're easy to say and not taken to heart. But Tech City is actually the most sustainable community in the world. We produce over a third of a million more kilowatts than we actually used on campus. So we produce a lot of energy that goes out into the grid, and so we're very, very proud of that. It's also, and that's in your county, that's in our county, and I think that's something we should be exceptionally proud of when you think about the entire globe and what we're doing. Also, it's the fastest-growing tech community in the state of Florida. We have over 65 companies. We're right at six years old, and we have over 65 companies that call San Flasco Tech City home. Those companies are changing the globe as we know it through a lot of different technologies, and it's very exciting to see what's going on out there. We actually have the Urban Land Institute coming to tour Tech City in about a month as well. So we're very proud of the tours we give. Last six years, I've toured over 5,000 people from all over the world, and I won't go through all the countries. I should be hanging flags out there to really represent the folks who have come to see what is going on there. And there are countries around the world that are actually wanting to emulate San Flasco Tech City as well, and we're working very closely with them to kind of steward and show the pathway forward on that. A couple other things, the farmer's market. The farmer's market's been out there for six weeks now. I know there was some concern about that originally, but we're averaging over 2,300 people a week. We've had as low as 1,900 and as high as 2,900. We have sophisticated accounting mechanisms at Tech City as well. So that's very exciting to see. We love that. We know that you're moving forward very swiftly with some other ideas throughout the county, and so I will play a part of that however you want me to do that. But they were seeing 600 people, and now they're seeing four times that. So it's pretty impressive in what's being done out there. And so anyways, I'll leave it there. My time is up, but I do appreciate sincerely all that you do and hope you have a wonderful day. Thanks for being here. Yeah. Thanks for that update. Great update. I was out there this weekend, and it was quite a great weekend. All right. Next speaker, please. From the chambers, before we go to the phones. Okay. We'll go ahead and close public comment in the chambers. Mark, you want to take us to the phones? Is there anyone on the phones? No one on the phones. Okay. We'll go ahead and close public comment, and we've got Commissioner Response. We've got Commissioner Wheeler. Is that an old light? No. It's a new light. Okay. Commissioner Wheeler and then Commissioner Prizia. Thank you. You're welcome. No. Is Stan still here? Did he leave? I think he walked out. Well, heck, because I had just wanted to say that we had at one time talked about poetry and theater festivals at times during the year that we don't have a lot of activity in town to kind of support tourism. Yeah. And I just wanted to comment that one of the things that was really helpful for me in teaching reading in the middle school was using poetry and then relating it to the arts, just like he's doing, you know. And I just wanted to say that I really appreciated that transition from the written word to the musical word, but also then maybe use his work as a way to be an impetus for artwork and inspiration for visual art as well, you know, to continue that out. Because at one time we talked about in this community expanding what he's talking about with the poetry festival and going in different sites is using our venues like the Gainesville Community Playhouse, the Crosstown Rec Theater, you know, so that we have different or even the Bo Diddley where we have those things going on simultaneously. And that's what I was trying to share with him to, since he's already got this expansion going, you know, to keep going with it so that we could use it as a tourist destination in times when, in the summer when we're not playing ball. So that's, that's all I wanted to say was to encourage him to keep that, keep that going up, going on. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner. Commissioner Prizia and then Commissioner Chester. Yeah. I guess I just wanted to touch base with, and find out if we can reinstate that 3K grant for the Barden Broadside Poetry Festival, if it really was a quorum issue on the vote, then I would believe that we could just ratify the vote at the next meeting. But I guess I'm interested to understand what actually happened with regards to that situation and hope that we could rectify that and reinstate the funding that was allocated to that festival. I hopefully we can get some information on that during manager comment. And next up, I just wanted to say, I hope we can also spread the word about the Eden performance. That's very exciting. I didn't know about it, but I hope it'll get on my calendar. And I'm looking forward to seeing our beautiful poem about our county put to music. That's very exciting. And then I did want, I don't know if Mr. Van Sospergen is still here, but I did want him to know that our environmental protection department does in fact do a lot of work around alternative landscaping techniques. We actually created some stickers, Weeds Feed Bees, and we use that tagline Weeds Feed Bees in social media campaigns and on stickers that we give out at events and programming and also work with the Florida Fenley landscaping naturals program and have a landscape conversion program for high water users. So our environmental protection department is very active with the idea of trying to reduce lawn-based landscapes and encourage natives and pollinator landscaping that's low water and low input. And I just wanted to let him know that we have those programs and that I agree with him. We should continue to expand them. And I thank you to Mitch Glazer for all that he's doing to support the county's efforts around sustainability and local food systems. Thank you, Commissioner. Michelle, do you want to talk about that at manager comment or do you have an answer on the arts council? Let me go ahead and bring that back to you, a manager comment if I could. I was just briefly discussing with Gina. We had one member that had to recuse themselves. I see. Okay. Well, yeah, if you can bring that back. We got Commissioner Alford and then Commissioner Wheeler. I just wanted to talk a little bit about the pollinator thing, which I really appreciate Mark continuing to bring up. You know, I bought seven acres of land, you know, out in Archer and I have a whole acre of that that's a field that I've planted fruit trees on. And when I first moved out there, I stopped mowing it except for two or three times a year. Interestingly, within six months, I had a code enforcement violation because they wanted me to cut my lawn. I haven't had another one because now I have I have a last count. I keep sort of a running count through the year. I've counted 56 different flowering plants that have come up over time in that space. But in order to help other people go through that process of converting a mowed field into a meadow, I really hope that we can move forward with some sort of signage from the county to just say that this is a pollinator space, something else that EPD can maybe help us with. I think that would be, you know, not just on our roadsides where we're promoting pollinators, but in people's yards where they are, you know, not growing weeds, but trying to create a meadow. And it's a lot of work to create a meadow. Was it code enforcement from the city of Archer? It was. And then you talk to them and then they. They. Well, they don't really have a lot going on right now in terms of that kind of thing. But if that makes any sense. But I think it was the previous owner was upset that I wasn't mowing. But that's to make the complaint. But anyway, several of my neighbors have said they appreciated the change in the space. But it's it's not an easy thing to do. And I think when people go to that effort, there should be a way to to say, hey, that's what this this space is and that it's important. So very good. OK, Commissioner Wheeler and then back to just very quickly. I was sorry that Mr. Glaser left, too, because I was really interested in what is happening out there in terms of the different programs and the innovations that he's talking about. A lot. I'd really like to hear that. And that might be, you know, when I had asked for a policy meeting with trying to get together some of our folks who could share with us what's happening in the community in terms of innovative technologies. Or if we could get him even to come in or some of these people from the community that are doing these things that we don't know about. Yeah, he would be a good one from my discussions with him this weekend. OK, great. Well, just saying maybe we could have him come in and introduce us to some of the things that are happening out there down the road when they're asking for us for topics for policy meetings. Perhaps we'll throw that one out there again. OK, that's different than what you brought up last time. I'm all for that. Well, it's very it's the same kind of. OK, sounds good. OK, thank you. I guess I just wanted to say I'm with you on the signage, and I think there are some really great national and state level programming with Xerxes and Florida Yards and Neighborhoods Naturals and some others that have some of that signage we might be able to borrow from or connect with and then just promote rather than having to create our own. So I just wanted to put that out there for our staff as they start exploring those ideas. I think there are a few that we might be able to like link arms with also the city USA, which the city has signed on to. It could be just, you know, a part of that or this is obesity lawn or something like that. I'm not sure if they have that part of their program, but just wanted to put all those things out there for our team. Thank you. Mary and I have some homework for NACO. Yeah. Yeah. Because I think I think to your point, we could probably bring some ideas back from that. Absolutely. Okay. Okay. I think that. Mr. Chair. Yeah, Madam Manager. Go ahead. Yeah. I just wanted to say that we are working on the signage for the right-of-ways at the wildflower location. Oh, great. As you requested. Thank you. Great. And are we adding wildflowers, pollinators, food? Like, are we, I mean, that was the point I think he made three weeks ago and it kind of goes into our whole. I will ask exactly what's on the signage. Okay. Well, got some folks up here that have more expertise in flowers than I do, but I know that was the point he was making was changing the ideas. It's not just flowers. It's pollinators. It's local food. It's everything. Or like connecting the dots between what those pollinators do for us as a sort of an ecosystem service and helping use that as a moment. I would also say I know Ramon's coming back to us in the not-too-distant future, and I would love it when he does if he's able to share how we make a determination of when we use wildflower seeding in our rights of ways and when we don't and how those determinations are made and how we might expand that program. Okay. Great. All right. Thank you. All right. So that is public comment. We got done in record time. Thank you, commissioners. We now move to our action items. Mr. Clerk. Next up is the Transportation Disadvantaged Services discussion. Okay. And Mr. Hayes, I see you coming up. So this was, you drew the short straw, I see. Congratulations. You're recognized. Mr. Chair, Jeff Hayes, Growth Management Director. As you know, over the last several months, there's been changes afoot in the Transportation Disadvantaged Service. We've been, you know, working through the MTPO process. We've been in discussions with the City of Gainesville. And obviously the current provider, MB Transportation, who is our private provider. And it's the Community Transportation Coordinator for our area. So the dominoes have started to fall to an extent. The City of Gainesville did give MB Transportation notice that they were going to start insourcing their ADA service, their paratransit service, starting on March 1st. And so that, and MB is here in the room. And if you have any questions directly for them, they can be there to answer that. You know, that causes some issues for MB and their current contracts with the State of Florida, Transportation Disadvantaged Commission, and with Alachua County. And one thing I do want to make clear, as we've been having this conversation, and I know we've had lots of the public and citizens come to these chambers or to MTPO meetings to discuss the issue. One thing that is really important for us to kind of keep front of mind is it still is in transportation disadvantage service in the community. The county really is a junior partner. There is a process set up in state statute and state rule that prescribes this service and prescribes the whole function of the community transportation coordinator, the TD, the local TD board, the local planning agency for transportation disadvantage, which in our case is the regional planning council still. And then ultimately, there's the state commission for the transportation disadvantage. But having said that, we know we have a responsibility and, you know, we have a current contract with MB to provide a little over $200,000 worth of trips for transportation disadvantage. And those are going to very medically necessary trips, people on dialysis going to medical appointments by and large. So we've continued to discuss options with MB, with all of us staff, Claudia, the manager, the attorney's office, and Missy as well in terms of trying to come up with solutions. We have some options, we think, moving forward. And I do have a motion which is a little bit more detailed than the motion that was in your backup. Essentially, it's the same. It's to enter into some short-term contract amendments with MB to continue service and then essentially look towards the future. One of the key elements that we've discovered in diving into this process at the state level is for transportation disadvantage service, we are very much tied into the state process. And so it's not that we, unless we are starting our own service and then we can have those conversations and that's one of the alternatives that we will look at along with using RTS or along with using a private provider such as MB or another private provider, we are still in the state process. And the state process has to play out and we have to be a party to that but not necessarily jump outside of it. So having said that, what staff would ask of you today is so that we can maintain service for at least several months is to authorize the manager to be able to sign an amendment to one of our existing MB contracts that would allow up to $120,000 of additional payment towards those contracts, not to exceed 120 days. Those amendments or that amendment would allow or would require MB to take action with the state to either terminate their role as the CTC, which is their ability, so the state could begin the true procurement process for a longer-term provider, which may still end up being MB, but under the rates that are established now would not be, is not sustainable for MB. And then also would reduce any costs to the county if MB, I know MB is trying desperately to come up with additional users, whether it be UF, Santa Fe, or other users, but would reduce those costs to the county by any amount those additional contracts obtained would allow. So that's the direction it would authorize the manager's signature on contract amendments. So it's staff's recommendation plus authorize the manager to enter into an amendment of up to $120,000, not to exceed 120 days, which is basically four months and half of what was in the recommendation from MB's recommendation. If you can read our writing. Yes. Half of the $61,000. So as I understand it, MB has said our additional cost is $61,000 per month. Correct. And we're basically saying we're authorizing half of that $30,000 for four months. No. They have not agreed to reduce that below $56,000 at this point. This may not last the entire 120 days. We realize that. We are hopeful, and that's as of today. We are hopeful that one of two, well, actually one of three things will occur within that 120-day time period before that money runs out. Either they reduce that further to help until we can get through the full process because we don't totally control what the state is doing with the procurement. They obtain those contracts that they are hopeful to get, that they are in negotiation for currently, which would reduce that down to a rate that would make that go, that full 120 days. Or that the state would get through the procurement process before the money runs out. I mean, that's really the three that we're at at this point. Okay. We've got a couple of questions, and then we'll see if we can get a motion. Commissioner Prizia and Commissioner Alford, and I've got two questions. Okay, I have two questions, or, yeah, I guess there are two questions. One is, I'm not sure that I understand the state does the procurement for our Transportation Disadvantaged program, or we can run our own, or we can contract with another institutional agency, the government agency that's providing the service. Am I, is that correct? Let me, I'll give the example of MV terminating their contract and saying they would walk away. Our understanding, and they're going to look into this, I don't think they were ready to speak to it today, our understanding is that MV has a 30-day notice period for their state contract. Okay. What would happen in the event of that is that the State Transportation Disadvantaged Commission would then be authorized to appoint an emergency CTC. My understanding is that could potentially be one of our surrounding communities if they were willing to or able to do it. It could potentially be a public agency if they were willing or able to do it. And that emergency then would lead to the full procurement process, which in that procurement process, there's two options. There's either the public agency option, so that could be us, Elatoral County, demonstrating that we would be able to run the service. We're going to spin up our own service. It could potentially be RTS, City of Gainesville, saying that they would take on that role. And so in those two cases, it would not need to be a competitive procurement. It would be an interlocal agreement, essentially. But if neither one of those options was available, then they would go out to a full competitive procurement. And that's the way MV was selected, as they are now, was through a competitive procurement in the state contract. So the state, through statute and through rule, establishes the Community Transportation Coordinator. And if we are purchasing, specifically purchasing, transportation disadvantaged services as a local funding agency, we have to do it through the auspices and the rates established and the plan established in that plan and in those documents. Okay. So that leads to my, I guess, two subsequent questions. One is, is the contract with the state or with us? The, we have a separate contract with MV. If you look at our contract, it flows directly from the procurement that happens, whereas they were selected as the CPC for Alachua County. And our rates are tied exactly to them and actually allow them to escalate when they escalate in July every year. Okay. Are we able to add criteria data collection requests to that contract? We have those requirements now, as does the state, depending on what you're asking for. But all of the data that is established and collected by MV is supposed to be publicly available. Okay. I guess I'm interested in understanding, like, more detailed information that we could use for the procurement moving forward and to understand what our level, you know, we have this general number, 10 to 15,000 we keep throwing around. But, like, that's a big swing, right? I'm interested in understanding, like, the detailed number of rides we're providing, the types of people we're providing it to, like, how many of those people are wheelchair-bound, how many of those people require special equipment, how many of those people require special vehicles and special assistance. Like, having a better understanding and breakdown of what it is that we're providing to our community and how often and, like, where the trips are going. So, if we have hot spots, if they're, like, 90% of the rides are going to two places, then maybe there's much easier ways to solve this challenge than if they're going all over the place all the time, right? So, having better data on which to understand the services that are being provided such that we can work with the state to write a procurement or to explore the services with us, RTS, or a contractor, rather that's Envy or somebody else in the future. And, Mr. Chair, we have been presented with some of that data to that level of detail by Envy. We're hopeful to get some more. We have a few months of it, but we do want to see more of that and establish going forward. Well, I would just, I guess, I'm happy to make the motion. Hold on. Yeah, it's okay. Yeah, go for it. Okay. Commissioner Alford. Yeah, my concern with that data collection is, you know, medical things can rise and fall and can be all over the county. We would need data for, like, years, I think, to really make it useful, you know, to figure out. But, so, the state is, has designated what the rates are. Does that include the rate that is, there's a small copay for the folks that use the system? Do they specify that as well? I believe that is in the contract, yes. Because I have had a couple of folks ask me if it would be possible, and not that they want to pay more, they just are so worried about the system going away that they were like, well, what if our, you know, copay was $8 instead of $3, and, you know, would that help save the system, so to speak? So, but you're saying that's part of the contract with the state. And I can't say specifically, I know that there is the ability to charge that copay, but I believe it is limited. We can look into that more. I think that would be worth looking into. And if it would make a difference, a few extra dollars probably isn't going to make a huge amount of difference, you know, with, you know, services here in the county. But that was, that was my question. I was, I promised a commissioner and the archer last night that I would ask it. But I just wanted to reiterate to the community that, you know, this, this county is, is very committed to making sure that everyone can get their appointments. 100%. Thank you, commissioner. Jeff, I really just have one question. Who provides the state's transportation disadvantage service for each of the following counties? I'm going to just name them. Marion, Putnam, Bradford, Union, Columbia, Gilchrist, and Levy. I can look all of those up. I know Marion has Marion Transit. I'm just dealing with them. I'll have to look up the others. Does MB provide it? I don't believe so. No. Is MB here? Yes. They can speak to that if they do. Yeah. That's interesting. Hey, welcome. How are you? Good. To answer your question, sir, no, we do not provide service in those counties. So you don't provide any transportation disadvantage services outside of north central Florida other than in Alachua? I can't speak to the whole state, but I'm not familiar with any of those counties. I'll just go through them real slow. Putnam? I don't know. Bradford? No. Union? No. Columbia? No, sir. Gilchrist? Levy? What about Clay? I don't believe so. Okay. All right. Thank you. All right. Thank you so much. Did you have anything that you wanted to add before we put this motion on the floor? Well, you know, we're very appreciative of the collaboration that we have with the county staff in particular. We're proud of the service we provide to very important members of the community, and we look forward to finding a solution and to continue to provide that care. Yeah. I'll just say as the chair, I'm looking forward to providing a solution, too. It's February 10th. We knew about this four months ago, so I guess we need another 120 days to find it. Thank you. Commissioner Chesson. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I guess, you know, my concern all along in this whole process has been the level of services to the folks that it serves, and I think that that's important. Just having some historical knowledges of the transportation disadvantage in Alachua County, I can recall where there was a time services were really, really bad, really, really bad. People were missing their doctor's appointments, being left at the dialysis clinic, can't get home. That kind of stuff was going on, and I remember when MB came in, they came and straightened out the whole thing, made everything run on time. All before the provider before that, I think it was CTS, they could never get the schedule right. They could never run on time to pick folks up or to take them home. So I'm just talking from experience that with MB and currently serving on the Transportation Disadvantage Board, in terms of every month, we get a report telling us how they're on time or not on time, looking at all of the situations and all of the folks. And everything has been excellent, so it's just unfortunate that the city of Gainesville decided to take it on upon themselves. But I think that the service to our folks, I believe in the county, has gotten a very good service from MB. So I just want to make that comment. So, I mean, if there's any way we could kind of work this out, I'd be glad to do that, because I'm just worried about whoever we get, I don't think that the level of service is going to be any – won't be good. I just have that feeling. I just don't want to go backwards. That's all I'm saying. And we know the city won't even be in a position until October, and we know we don't do this. No. So I agree with you. Okay. Do you want to put a motion on the floor? Sure. I guess I was going to move staff's recommendation with the addition that we ask MB Transport to provide us historical data and up-to-date data regarding ridership, drop-off addresses, distance trips, wait lengths, which sounds like they already have, equipment needed, special assistance needed for the riders, so that we could have better data in terms of planning the long-term strategy for our TD service. Absolutely. I agree, second. Are you a second? Mm-hmm. Got a second? Okay. All right. So we've got staff's recommendation with that addition. Jeff, do you understand the motion? You good? Sure. Yep. So it's that. It's what was in staff's recommendation plus your addition. Mm-hmm. Okay. All right. Any further comments from the board? Any comments from the public? Don't all come up at once. All right. Thank you. We'll go ahead and close that. Back to the board. Mr. Chair, I do have one quick comment. I think we need to get this information out as quickly as we can because there is so much confusion in the community about who's getting what, and people are really fearful. Yeah, I mean, what? Especially the folks in the county. Yeah. Yeah. So Mark will handle that with our communications department, but essentially we're hoping to at least continue the service for 120 days or 120,000, and if something's different, you'll be coming back to us. Thank you. That's what the motion is. Okay. Great. Everybody understand the motion? Yes. All right. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion is unanimous. Okay. Thank you, commissioners. Thank you, MV. Thanks, Jeff. All right. Mr. Clerk, next item. Chair, that takes to the presentations, and it's the impact of potential property tax reductions to future budgets. Okay. And I see the manager has gotten up from her chair. Hi there. And it reappeared in front of us. So, Manager Lieberman, welcome. You're recognized. Thank you. It is easier to present to you from down here, plus the fact I have Tommy over here to save me when, if I get something wrong. So, okay. So, this presentation, we've been talking about this for a little while now, and for everybody in the public who doesn't know, Michelle Lieberman, your Alaska County Manager. I'm sorry to interrupt you, but do we have copies of this? No, we'll make sure to provide you copies when we're done with the presentation. Oh, great. Okay. We've been working on this for several weeks with lots of modifications. This presentation provides an educational overview of how property taxes work in Alachua County and why they matter. It demonstrates key factors that influence county revenue and services residents rely on, and it also highlights potential future impacts from pending state legislation. So, what we're going to cover is how Alachua County compares to other Florida counties, how property taxes are calculated, the millage rate, assessed, and taxable value, what property taxes fund in county government, the long-term pressures, such as inflation mandates and growing service demands, and state proposals that could reduce local revenue. So, since fiscal year 18, Alachua County has reduced the general fund, or the general county millage rate, yeah, no, we're not to the next one yet, has reduced the general county millage rate by .8648 mills, which is a 10.22% decrease, while the MSTU law enforcement millage rate has remained unchanged for the past six years. Over the same period, general county property valuation increased 72%, while ad valorem taxes increased 54%. The county's budget is supported by a mix of recurring and non-recurring revenues, including one-time or restricted funding sources, such as grants, reimbursements, and dedicated allocations that can only be used for specific purposes. The county also received more than $52 million in one-time federal funding through ARPA, state, and local fiscal recovery funds, which helped replace pandemic-related revenue loss and support recovery initiatives. In addition, we served as the conduit for $46.9 million in CARES funding and $8.1 million in emergency rental assistance funds, providing direct aid to residents, businesses, and landlords, as well as supporting PPE and COVID-19 response efforts. In addition, during that time, we have been committed to providing a living wage, and since FY18, our minimum wage has increased from $13 to $18.50 in fiscal year 26. These efforts support workforce retention and help the county remain competitive in tight labor markets. Because major revenue and cost drivers, such as grant cycles, interest earnings, wage and inflation pressures, and rising costs for materials and services can fluctuate significantly, year-to-year budget comparisons are not always directly comparable, even when service levels remain consistent. So taking these together, these trends show why property tax, understanding the property tax, is essential to understanding how we sustain core service and plans for the future. Property taxes remain the county's most stable local revenue source, but are influenced by market conditions, policy decisions, and long-term cost pressures that affect both residents and county operations. So the following presentation walks through how the system works, how the county compares, and what current and proposed changes will mean. So let's start first with our Alachua County millage rate rankings. And this is overall in the state of Florida. So Alachua County's aggregate millage is 9.0768, which is 51st out of 67 counties. So the aggregate millage is a calculation that it divides the total county taxes levied by the countywide taxable value. So even though if you were to add up the countywide millage and the law enforcement MSTU millage, it exceeds that number, that 9.07 mills, the aggregate millage is what is counted. So because that three, that over, just over three mill is not, that three and a half mills is only in the unincorporated area. It gets divided across the whole to determine that aggregate millage. And then as far as the general fund millage itself, 7.6180 is 41st out of 67 counties. And Tommy's going to jump up if he thinks I forgot something when I'm going through here. Okay. So property taxes per capita, this is where the real story is because you can look at our number in a vacuum, but we have counties with more population, counties with less population. So when you talk about the property taxes per capita, in fiscal year 25, the Alachua County resident paid $714 per person in county ad valorem tax. The state average is $942 per person. So, for example, Leon is at $762.07. Pasco County is at $867.95. There are 19 counties above the statewide average. So we remain below the statewide average when you look at county taxes paid per resident. We also need to talk about taxable value versus assessed value. So assessed value is what the property appraiser says a property is worth for taxes. Taxable value is the portion the county is legally allowed to tax. So in Alachua County, only 67.36% of assessed value is actually taxable. 32.64% is non-taxable. So this means we start with a smaller tax base than most counties to begin with. So property tax revenue is based on the taxable value, not the assessed value. So what creates that gap? So we have things like the Save Our Homes cap, which limits the increase in value to homestead of property. We have homestead exemptions. So 33% of assessed value, governmental exemptions, counts for 67% of the total exemptions that we have out there. So institutional exemptions, 8% of our total exemptions. Conservation lands and historic property, 0.02% of total exemptions. And then other exemptions is 3%. So essentially, you know, having things like the University of Florida Santa Fe College here, they are a wonderful asset to our community. And I don't want to send the wrong message about that because they do create an economic development benefit, both direct and indirect, to our community in many ways and provide a very large number of jobs, both direct and indirect. But they also start us at a different taxable rate, which is, you know, that's one thing that we as citizens in our county taxes, essentially we're paying for that benefit in a different form because we still provide services and programs that are beneficial to those institutions. So if our taxable percentage matched the statewide average, the county would have 6.2% billion more in taxable value, and we could generate the same revenue with a lower millage. We could actually generate this. If we had the statewide average and taxable value, we could generate the same revenue with 6.104 mil, 4.5 mils instead of 7.6. That's a considerably lower millage rate. We don't bring in less money because homes are worth less. That's because of a lot of property value can't be taxed. Okay. So on this next slide, this shows the property taxable value versus taxes assessed. So you can see in the middle line here is our property tax collections, our general fund revenue growth. So you can see the dark blue represents the homestead, and the light blue is new construction. So taxable values in the dark blue and new constructions in the light blue to show the difference when you add that together. And then you can see the increase in that value, yet our property tax increase went up considerably less to that value. Now, this is what would happen over the period of time, and what we've typically looked at because those were the years that we know were being reviewed by the state, was fiscal year 20, which is October 2019 through September of 2020, that five-year period through fiscal year 25. So if you took our millage rate in fiscal year 20, if you had a $250,000 value home and it only went up the maximum amount in value, which is the 3% under Save Our Homes, your property taxes went from, your general county tax went from $2,489.17 to $2,875.36. So that year-over-year increase remains modest. It's generally under a percent a year. For an inflation comparison, if the fiscal year 20 tax amount had kept pace with inflation, then the FY26 tax would be $3,130.54 this year. It is actually $255.18 less than what inflation actually was. Can you explain the numbers on this chart just really quickly? Like, the top line is this, the yellow is this, the green is this, and the MTS. Right. So the green is the general county millage rate. You're over seven mills. The yellow-ish is your law enforcement MSTU millage rate. Okay. So together, that is your total on the bottom. I see. That's the total of the millage. I see. Thank you. Yeah. And the red is what is paid on the home. But the total you were talking about, the potential total, is not on. Correct. Correct. Okay. So what drives the cost escalations? So drivers that affect year-to-year budgets, minimum wage, and labor market pressure, so higher wages to recruit and retain staff, and we have compression issues. We have health insurance and benefit cost increases, not unlike the private sector. Inflation across operating costs, so fuel, utilities, contracted services, and materials. We have supply chain disruptions, so availability issues, longer lead times, higher prices. As you know, we're doing things like paying today to order a fire engine that we won't see for three years, but we know in three years we're going to replace it. So we're having to pay that cost today. Construction and capital project cost escalation for materials and labor. Vendor pricing and contract renewals have higher rates. So what this slide demonstrates is the impacts of county government purchases with real numbers that we know. So, for example, if you look at the cost of construction, in 2021 we were paying about $421 per square foot. But today that is $680 per square foot. An ambulance cost us $227,000 in 2021. Today we are paying $372,462 for that same ambulance with the same, you know, set up the same way. Fire truck has gone from $554,000 to almost a million dollars for a fire truck. We do a lot of, you know, roads is a very important thing to the community. Our cost per lane mile has gone from $239,000 to $446,000. It's gone up 87.2% in this period of time. And that's just resurfacing, right? That is just resurfacing, correct. I see Ramon in the back nodding vigorously. Right. Waste hauling has gone from $11 ton to $15 a ton. So even when revenues rise modestly, county service costs often rise much faster than the CPI. And so one thing that I have learned delving into this process deeply is, you know, we all talk about the CPI, the Consumer Price Index. But the Consumer Price Index does not reflect the cost that we pay as a local government. And there's actually the MCI, the Municipal Cost Index, which is a more recognized number of inflation because it tracks the cost to things that local government pays for. Asphalt, concrete, capital construction, waste hauling, those types of things that are not included. A Consumer Price Index is just that. What are you as a consumer? What are you buying? You're buying a car or you're buying eggs. So that's a more accurate reflection for us of inflation. And you'll see here that the total cost of inflation over that period of time was more in the MCI than your traditional operational inflation. And that is also something that's not being taken into account. And I think it's important that inflation is not a static number. As you can see here, we have varying rates of inflation depending on what it is that we're purchasing. I'm actually going to let Tommy come up and explain slide eight. Mr. Chair, Tommy Crosby, Budget and Fiscal Services. So one thing before I explain this, there were a couple of numbers that flashed across the screen that I put in that didn't come across correctly. And there's a dollar sign instead of a five percent. There's things that pop loose in the patient that are not consistent with what the manager said. So this is basically the picture. This is the doge report of what they said the growth was. And from 20 to 2025, the story changed from things of inflation and population to just talking about population. So there are a couple of key points that we thought were relevant to understand why the growth in the budget has happened the way it has and what has happened. So one is we align with inflation as well as population. And this growth number is more aligned with what we're seeing in terms of true economic growth. So over that same period of time, we were seeing almost 30 percent growth in the economy and between inflation plus the population. Over that period of time, we had a 25 percent CPI. One of the things they noted was concern over the raises we had provided. We actually provided colos of 23 percent over that six-year window, which is less than the cost of inflation. So I don't think there's any apologies needed for trying to recruit and retain and retain good employees. But that's a key point, that we were actually under the CPI for the same period of time. And note all university payments were properly – the clerk's office, you can believe, was very concerned about the statement that we did not document appropriately university payments to the University of Florida. The clerk has verified that any payment made had an appropriate invoice included with the payment and supported. Consulting contracts listed – it recommended we review them. It did not tell us what consulting contracts to review. So as far as we understand, all of our consulting contracts are appropriately approved by the board and have defined scopes and are in alignment with what the board has asked us to complete. Terminal payouts – it listed some people of payouts that were quite large. I would like to remind the state that it's consistent with Florida law and how they pay terminal payouts as well. We haven't done anything differently, so we follow the standard of annual pay. We do cap it at 500 hours for annual pay when people retire. And we pay 50 percent of sick leave, again, consistent. And we have caps on that after 2011. All those are in alignment with Florida statute and what the state does as well. And then, again, the overall growth is not just a factor of population. That is how many people we serve, but it is also a factor of inflation, and we've discussed that quite at length. So when you look at the growth we have, it is actually, with a reduction in millage, we have not kept pace with the actual inflationary costs. But we thought it was important to reflect that with the actual numbers that the state is pushing out. Thank you. And as a reminder, Board, and some of you all may not be aware of this, but there was a time period during the recession years that for seven consecutive years our employees received no increase, not cost of living, not merit, no wage increases in that manner at the time. And that was before my time here, but, or at least most of that was, and before that time, you know, during that, that's how we did not lay off any employees during the recession, right? That's how we maintained the employees we had and kept government going at a service rate that the public expected. But our employees bore the brunt of that. And also, with the terminal payouts, the 500 hours is actually what is the allowable hours under the FRS system, which, to Tommy's point, is what the state permits. And Florida law requires us to pay out those terminal payouts. Okay. All right. So here is what your MSTU for law enforcement and general fund revenues look like. We have a general, the general fund, we've combined these because the general fund is more than just property tax. It includes some other sources. It does not include the MSTU for law enforcement, but because that's property tax, we wanted to include that in here. So this is a combination, but you can see where those revenues are. So the total revenue between the MSTU for law enforcement and general fund revenues is $344 million, almost $344.5 million. Ad valorem taxes, the actual general fund, general property tax accounts for 63% of that. That's also the MSTU. So tax altogether that comes from your property is only 63% of that. And then you have rollover funds. So when you're talking about how much money and how much increase your budget from year to year, we have funds that are committed to projects and programs that have not been expended. And so a percentage of the pie is your rollover money for prior year projects. We have ambulance fees and charges for service that are rolled into the general fund revenue. We have sales tax, public service tax, which is on your utility, sorry, and then the communication service tax, which is the phone. I just know PST, CSD. The state shared funding is 3% of that. And then you have interest and miscellaneous is another 3%. And then you have permits, fines, and fees, which are less than a percent of what goes into that. So MSTU is in the 63% and it's stormwater. Assessments are not included in here. Those are not taxes and they have separate funds with restrictions on what they can be used for. Okay, so here is where essentially your money goes that is in the general fund and the corresponding millage rate. So you have over $186 million for protecting the community. And then you have two, which equates to 4.9 mils, $64 million in serving the community, 2.6 mils. And then improving the community is $39 million, 1.6 mils. And then general governance and facilities operation is over $40 million, which is 1.6 mils. So you will see that that adds up to more than the millage rate that we actually collect. We wanted to equate what that is in a millage rate. It adds up to more than the millage rate we collect because we do use other sources where available than property tax to fund these services, which is why things such as CST, PST, sales tax are all included in the general fund to supplement that. So a majority of county spending supports direct service delivery out of these funds, especially the protection and community serving functions. So here are the state services that are mandated to the county. Now there are other things that these are the major ones that I think it's important to look at, and they're corresponding mils. Because right now today, if the state took these responsibilities back, we could reduce our property tax millage by almost three-quarters of a mil. So just in the court system, we pay for Alachua County Court Administrations. And to remind the public, this is the Eighth Circuit. So we say Alachua County Court Administrations, but this is a circuit function that serves multiple counties, not just our county. So Alachua County Court Administrations, the state attorney, who again serves multiple counties, the public defender, same, and guardian ad litem is also something that we are required to fund by the state. So those court operation pieces, court facilities, is over $4 million. And then we have state-required services, which is $12 million, that a lot of people don't realize that we are obligated and mandated by the state to pay. Juvenile detention is $3.4 million. And when I say juvenile detention, what the public needs to understand is this is the funding of the State Department of Juvenile Justice. Every county in the state of Florida has to submit funding, which is the operation of the Florida State Department of Juvenile Justice. So just like Florida has the Department of Corrections that operates the state prisons, this is the state juvenile justice system. And their funding is funded by the 67 counties, not the state. Medicaid, we are required to pay our community's share of Medicaid dollars, which this year is $4.7 million. The medical examiner, again, a district-wide service to multiple counties, our share of that is almost $2.5 million. And then the county's health department, which is, again, a state agency, that we are obligated to fund a portion of is $1.6 million. And what's important about these operations, state-required services, we have no say, control, or input over these. We are told annually, this is what you pay this year, and we have to pay those amounts. So now let's talk about the impact because I think this is the really important point. So there are several proposals right now, House joint resolutions, that have made it through committee that are set to go to the floor. We do not yet have a Senate proposal, so we don't know what that's going to be. But these could reduce or even eliminate property tax, and they include expanded exemptions. The decisions haven't been finalized, but if approved, they could significantly reduce local county revenue. And, of course, we don't control these proposals as well, and they are looking at potentially going on the tax ballot. So here is what that would look like based on today's numbers. A total elimination of property tax revenue on homestead properties would reduce our general fund by $85 million. That would leave us $141 million. And then there is a 10-year option, which, if you looked at our revenue just today, we would still lose that $141 million. It would just be over time. It would be $40 million in the first year. Year four, we would lose $76, and then year 10, all of the funds. The senior exemption would still cost us $18.5 million, and we would have $208.5 million left. The 25% homestead exemption would, again, cost us $2.5 million, and then the $200,000 homestead exemption for those that are insured would cost us approximately $42 million. Quick question about this side. Go ahead. On the senior exemption, for instance, you're projecting things just as they are now, but one of the concerns is these changes would change the makeup of who moves to our state and who invests in our state, and that would change over time, correct? Correct. And so we can only estimate these based on static numbers of what we know today, who lives in Alachua County, who's paying property tax, what the values on those homes are. How do we talk to the public about that, though? Because I think that's really important to recognize that, you know, if we change the way that seniors are required to pay property taxes and that they don't have to maintain residency in our state, that that could really change investment here. I was going to say, there's a couple things here to look at. One is for every new individual that comes into our community, that's more service we have to provide in some way. So the more people you're bringing in that don't pay taxes, that has to be subsidized somewhere by somebody. And to that point, you're also potentially some of these homesteads, they may be million-dollar properties, you know. Yeah, Commissioner Alford, I will tell you that in the discussions I've had at the legislature with some of the senators, they're getting polling now from the boomer generation that is terrified of a reduction of services, and they don't think that this would pass. And so they're trying to – That's helpful. I mean, that's what – well, that's what they're telling me. Yeah. I've also heard from many representatives who were really in favor of this that are also getting those same calls, that ultimately FACT's doing a really good job of explaining kind of what many of these proposals are. And I think when we see what comes out of – what Tom reported to the Children's Trust yesterday is he doesn't think anything's going to come out of session. It's going to come out of a special session. Right. It's all supposed to happen this summer. Yeah, and so I think when we understand where the state's coming from with regards to their calling it tax reform, I think then we'll know what the impact is. These are – this is incredible data to just show what it is for us locally. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. I'm just – you know, I've had a lot of people talk to me about it, and I don't really – you know, I'm trying to figure out the best way to – Yeah, I mean, FACT is saying this is not Avalor reform. This is tax shift and service reduction reform. Yeah, absolutely. Anyway, sorry for the interruption. No, that's okay. I just was curious. And I think there's some important points there because we are trying – listen, when we put the budget to bed for you guys, we get maybe 30 to 60 days where everybody, you know, gets a reprieve, but we're already thinking about your next year, and we, in fact, have already started your budget that we're, you know, for October 1 of 26. Right. We're already working with departments now. But to your point, Mr. Chair, we may not know until summer what's even on the ballot, and then we won't know the impact of that until potentially – After November. After November. And so we're trying to, you know, be responsible in what we're presenting to you, but we're coming from a point of not exactly knowing. Let's pause. I got Commissioner Prizia. I guess I just want to understand – and maybe you have this on a future slide. If you do, you can just say I'm going to cover that in a minute. But my understanding is that part of these proposals is also to hold harmless public safety. Yes. Which I believe includes both the sheriff and fire rescue. Correct. Our fire rescue and sheriff's numbers are higher than the 141, 965. So I'm about to show you that one. Okay. So I'm like, we won't even have enough to cover the sheriff and public safety held harmless if some of these cuts happen. Right. And so it's important to note, and I know you all are very well aware of this, but, you know, the line that, well, you have this much in your budget, so reducing it by this much won't impact anything. But, you know, that's scare tactics. The reality is if you go get a loan to buy your house, you can't use that money to go buy your groceries. You can't go get – you know, if you can't get – so our funds are restricted. We have pots of money in reality. We have grant funds. We have debt funds for construction, for example. We have fees that we collect for permits, you know, building – I can't use building permit fees to go fix a pothole. And I can't use, you know, the special assessment, you know, I can't use tipping fees to go, you know, for law enforcement. So we have restricted funds. And so there are many things that we do, that we fund, that can't come from any other source but this pot of money. And that's what's crucial for the public to understand is no matter what that line is publicly throughout the state, there are things we can't fund with any other pot of money than this one. And so here is the financial impact, okay? So if we only had – if property tax went away today and we only had about $142 million, let's start with what we have to pay. We have to pay state-required services for the courts. We have to pay state-required services for that $12 million, your Medicaid, your DJJ, the things that were obligated, the medical examiner that the state has required us to fund. Now we have to hold harmless public safety. So the hold harmless in this fund for fire is the ambulance subsidy. So because we have a fire assessment, not everything comes out of this pot. But what does come out of this pot is the subsidy to our rescue units. Those can't be paid for with assessment. They are paid for with fees. We could certainly increase our fees to the point where we collect this, but that comes off of our citizens who have to pay those ambulance fees. So that is the home harmless on fire safety. And when you talk about hold harmless for law enforcement, that is over $134 million that goes to the services that are provided by the sheriff, which is patrol, it's the jail. It's things that have to be provided, right? Court security, the communications or combined communications center. So that is all of that piece is the largest chunk of what property tax pays for. Where does that put us? That puts us at a loss, a negative, of $24 million, and that's where we start from. That's where our budget, everything that comes out of this has to start from. And I could make a list of things that come out of these funds that can't come out of other places. We have departments that are almost wholly funded out of the general fund. We have animal services, court services, all of our CRA efforts for every municipality in the county come out of this fund. Community sports services. Parks is a general fund. And so those are all, as you see, we start from a negative $24 million deficit that we have to figure out. So either somewhere something has to give, and I'm not sure where that is. And I neglected to say publicly, and I have to remind everybody, the other thing that comes out of this funding that does not come from, cannot come from any other source is the other four constitutionals. So the supervisor of election is wholly funded through this, through general fund. And property appraiser, tax collector, it's fees based on this, and then, of course, the portion of the clerks that we fund, the clerk's office. So we also would have to figure out how to pay for that without making any change to services. All right. So here are some resources that we have for you. And let me just add to that a reminder that we are not the only entity that needs ad valorem taxes to provide services to the community. What we can even start larger, water management district is funded wholly by property tax. How they move forward with any kind of how they would continue is unknown. And when we come down to more of the local level, children's trust, 100% property tax. You know what else is 100% property tax? The library. In some communities, libraries are part of the county. Here, it is an independent district, which means if there is no property tax, there is no more library system for this county. Schools are being held harmless. Their taxes aren't impacted. People will still pay school taxes under all these proposals. So basically, your assessed value, if there was a total elimination, the first bill, you would still pay property tax. You would just pay it only for schools. Okay. Do you conclude? I conclude. So if you have questions, I have Tommy. Okay. Excellent. Yeah. So I don't have any questions. I got a short statement that I'll probably share with each of you all because I've been working with FAC, obviously, on a lot of this. And they've spent a lot of time on that. But let's hear from the commission first, the commissioners, before you hear from me. Commissioner Alford. Yeah. The thing that I've been telling folks is that, you know, what's gone up faster than property taxes is insurance. And I feel like property insurance reform was a lot harder for our, you know, folks in Tallahassee to deal with. And that's really, you know, what's hurting people's pocketbooks a lot more than this. It's just that it's a lot easier to fuss at county government and blame county government. But I think that's something that I mentioned in Tallahassee also. And I just feel like we need to, you know, recognize the pain that people are in because a lot of things have gone up for them as well. But it's, you know, coming after us is, I think, a fool's errand, really. I do. Thank you, Commissioner. Commissioner Wheeler. Just a quick question about these unfunded mandates. If they cut out the property taxes, will they also cut out these mandates? Will they not? They won't. They'll still make your requirements. No. Okay. I didn't know if anybody had addressed that up there. The state over the years has reduced its burden by placing that burden on local government. And as a reminder, and I mentioned this last night at our joint meeting, that the elimination of property tax also hits every municipality. And there's a very real recognition at the state level that many municipalities may not survive the elimination of property tax, which means that the county becomes responsible if those become unincorporated. So we become responsible for the municipalities who can't survive on less money by which to provide more citizens' services. You're our former state representative, so I always love to hear your perspective. Well, what the state has been doing to cities and counties over the years hasn't been fair. We all know that. But the problem, I mean, from my experience, the problem is you having people who have never served in a local capacity as a city commissioner or a county commissioner who are going to the legislature, making those decisions when they have not served in that capacity at all, which makes it very difficult. Some of them understand it. Some of them don't understand it. And then you've got politics. They're playing politics. They're playing to their leaders. They're playing to the speaker or the senator playing to their president, the senate president. And it makes it very, very difficult to get anything done in Tallahassee, just like it is federally. But what they're doing locally now to cities and counties, in my opinion, is not fair. I mean, if you're going to judge us, okay, let us judge you also in terms of how you're spending and what you're doing with your funding and how you're spending it. But we're not in that position to do that. But they are. And I think that that's the unfair part for us. This is outrageous. If we have to start at $24 million deficit to develop our budget, I mean, that is horrible. And I wonder how many citizens are actually paying attention to that, because that is very, very important to figure out, as a county government, how do we come up with that funding to make things in our services continue the level of services that we're providing to our citizens. So it becomes very, very difficult, and this charade that they're playing right now is not fair, and they're using DEI as an example for this foolishness that they're doing, which has nothing to do with it. When you really look at the DEI stuff that's being spent across the state, it's not that very much. So, I mean, come on, guys. Let's get real as a legislature, and let's do what's right and do your jobs. But the problem, I stated earlier, is that they don't have the experience to be a legislator. They came from just running for office in their local community with no experience, and they come to Tallahassee, and they're making weird state kind of crazy judgments. That's what's going on with government, and that we're too fat, and that's not true. We're doing the best we can with the little money we do receive. So, you know, it's just frustrating to me. I just don't think that people are really paying attention, and I think that they're more so worried about their local, how they can pay bills and make things neat at the end of the day. And I think that's more important to them, and they're not really paying attention because they're trying to make sure that their kids have recreational programs to go to after school to pay for and stuff. So, you know, it's just hard. It makes it hard on families and hard on everyone. And when you're doing this type of exercise, it doesn't mean anything to the average citizen. It just doesn't. They're not paying attention. So that's the horrible part of it. So, you know, I'm just frustrated with the whole process and to eliminate property taxes, which is stupid to me, but, hey, that's the way it is. You know, so we leave it at that, and we hope that this doesn't go far at all. I hope that the citizens wake up and start paying attention. So that's all I'm going to add, my editorial. Thank you, Representative. I mean, thank you, Commissioner Chessler. Yeah, very good. Commissioner Prizia. Yeah, I mean, I guess I want to say a couple of quick things. First is thank you for putting this together. I think it's a really important, relatively objective look at how we handle our budget and what the impacts of decisions that are being made that are out of our control would have on our everyday citizens. And I think it's very clear, looking at this, that things that people rely on every day, rather that's just road repaving or an ambulance showing up, could have really detrimental effects if some of these property tax proposals make their way through the legislature. But I do want to say two other things, and that is, one, schools have not been held harmless because doing the voucher system gutted our schools' funding systems already. So the only reason that the schools are, quote, held harmless is because they've already been gutted by school choice vouchers. But secondarily, I'm also really frustrated with the hold harmless for law enforcement. While 100% public safety and law enforcement are one of our most important duties in government, holding law enforcement harmless is saying that somehow they don't also have over-expenditures, or they don't also have fat they could cut, or they don't also have places where maybe they could be thoughtful about the way in which they're expending funds. And, you know, to Commissioner Chestnut's point, you know, if you're asking us all to take a hard look at our budgets and a hard look at the way in which we expend public dollars, then I think the largest expenditure of our budget should be the very first place that we look. Thank you, Commissioner. You know, I owe you guys an apology, first of all, because, you know, I'm a CPA. I'm an ex-Ernst & Young auditor. When I heard we're being audited, I got really excited. Like, I was like, this is going to be great, you know? And you all were like, you're a nut. What do you mean this is going to be great? So, first of all, I apologize for that. I mean, I'm actually kind of embarrassed for the state, to be honest. You know, FAC put out a statement, and FAC said, and these are FAC's words, there are serious concerns about the accuracy of the data and the conclusions drawn from it. It relies on selective snapshots, one-size-fits-all formulas that do not reflect the full and correct range of services local governments are required to deliver. Our staff has done an amazing job of kind of laying this out, and FAC went farther. They actually loaded this report into AI, and they said, you know, how was this report written? So, they asked the question, was this report written with AI? And here's what AI said about its report. Why this report was likely relied heavily on AI takeaways. So, basically what they did is they fed into AI what they wanted to say. And here's the evidence that AI kicked back out from what the report said. So, from AI, it says, there was a formulaic argument flow. Nearly every section follows the same sequence. Data, moral judgment, political framing, conclusion. That consistency, let's see, across unrelated topics and jurisdictions strongly suggests automated narrative generation from structured inputs. AI further went on to say that it was likely production model was human-directed themes and priorities, minimal human editing for tone and messaging, and it reused templates across cities and counties. We have 67 counties. They're all different. We have over 400 cities. They're all different. To Commissioner Prizia's point, our county's budget are transparent. They're fiscally responsible. Up on the board, Mark has provided us with the Sense and Sensibility report on how they're generated, how we take input from our local communities. And so, despite what the appointed CFO from Florida says, which, by the way, he's not a CPA, and he used to be the head of the Republican Party for the state. In my opinion, the Doge report was an AI-generated political hit job, primarily on blue and purple counties and cities and certain red counties. There's some red counties in there. And all I would like to say is that I am grateful for the work that our staff has done, for the input that our citizens give us as we set our budget. And I'm sorry that the rest of the counties are going through kind of this pain of, you know, how do you fund the local services that your community desperately needs? I will tell you that we're doing it at 67 percent of what's on tax rolls instead of 84. I mean, there's so many things that you just presented to us that we can inform our local community. Many of the counties around the state are in a lot worse financial condition. And whatever gets ultimately put on the ballot, they're going to have some really, really tough decisions about what to do if it ultimately passes. I don't think it's going to pass. Certainly, we will do the will of our citizens. We'll do the best that we can. We've got a great starting point now to see what those impacts are based on what bills get passed out, if any. And I just want to thank Tommy, Michelle, all the department heads. I know, Mark, this was an all-hands-on-deck effort because, like you said, we're doing zero-based budgeting this budget cycle, and we're thinking about the next budget cycle, presuming the worst-case scenario. So thank you all for that. And if I could just close with one thing that I think is important. So, you know, local government really is the government that's closest to the people. And one of the things that I heard at the state level during these committee discussions is we need to put this on the ballot because the people need to have a say. People have a say when they go to our elections here in the community for their county and city leadership. And as a reminder, the way the percentages work on constitutional amendments, because of where the population centers are, approximately eight-ish counties could pass a constitutional amendment, those largest counties, for the other 59. So if it is important to keep your decisions on that local level, it's important not to vote for this on a statewide level. Okay. All right. Commissioner, anything else on this item? I think we're kind of set for our beginning of our budget cycle, and this was great. Yeah. All right. Mr. Clerk, then we'll move on to our next item. Mr. Chair, that takes us to the quasi-judicial zoning public hearing for this afternoon, and the county attorney has some procedures of how the public hearing will be conducted to announce this. Sounds good. Michelle, before we get to this next item, can you make sure we all have copies of that? And I've got a meeting with the chamber tomorrow, and I'd like to give them a copy. So, Mr. Chair, this is a quasi-judicial item. All persons wishing to testify or present evidence during this hearing will be sworn in prior to speaking during this proceeding. All persons have the right through the chair to ask questions of staff and other speakers, seek clarification of comments, and respond to comments or presentations. All persons who present written materials to commissioners for consideration must ensure that a copy of such materials is provided to the clerk for inclusion in the board's record of proceedings and official minutes. While we welcome comments from all persons with an interest in this proceeding, Florida law requires that the county commission's decisions in a quasi-judicial action be supported by competent, substantial evidence presented to the board during the hearing on the application. Competent, substantial evidence is such evidence as a reasonable mind would accept as adequate to support a conclusion. It must be a factual basis in the record to support opinion testimony. Persons presenting testimony may rely on any factual information in the record to support their testimony. In a moment, the clerk will call for people who may want to be recognized as parties. I don't believe we have any parties other than the applicant. The clerk will call for that in case there's anyone here who wants to be considered by the board. All right. Do we have any parties? At this time, is there anybody seeking party status to this item, which is the revised preliminary development plan for the 75th Street self-storage? You can inquire of each commissioner if you've received any ex-parte communications, and if so, please disclose those. No. No. None. Then anybody wishing to address this item, if you will please stand and be sworn at this time? Do you swear or affirm any testimony you're about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? Good afternoon, commissioners, Mr. Chair. Leslie McClendon, Alachua County Growth Management. I have been sworn in, and my resume is on file, and this item has been properly advertised. This is a revised preliminary development plan for the 75th Street self-storage. So this is adding two parcels and some additional square footage to a previously approved site. You saw this in 2024. So it's going to be approximately 128,000 square feet of self-storage. That's a combination of climate-controlled and non-climate-controlled. It's at 606 Northwest 75th Street on just over three acres. It's a commercial feature land use in the Oaksville Activity Center and the Business Highway Zoning District. See the location here on the commercial land use? So previously it was just these far two western parcels, and then they added these two parcels as well to the site now. So it's just west of Northwest 75th Street and south of Newberry Road. And this is the aerial view. So again, previously we've looked at a three-story climate-controlled facility on these two parcels to the west. They are now adding these two parcels into the site. The access is here from 75th. So a majority of our review as well was looking at the existing impacts and some of this existing tree area to the south. And we reviewed this with the new tree code. And so just some of the existing conditions. This is looking north. There's that drive. This building will remain. And then everything west will get redeveloped. This is further into the site. This is that far western parcel. This is the former Napolitano's restaurant. So there are two landmark live oaks on this site. And I'll show you the site plan in just a moment. So this is the 90-inch landmark live oak. There's also a 54-inch live oak as well. And there's a 60-inch oak. It's a little hard to see. It's behind some stuff. This is on the very southern portion of the property. And it's in an entirely preserved area. And this is some of the existing, that 90-inch tree, there's an existing basin. So you can see it's a very shallow basin. There's a lot of just debris in it at this time and the existing flume to that basin. So this is the proposed preliminary development plan. Again, everything on these two parcels is pretty much the same as what you saw before. They did go through final development plan, but now they are redoing the entire site to add these two parcels and redoing some of the grading. The plan you saw before had some underground vaults for some of the stormwater. So they're redoing some of those configurations. So again, we looked at a lot of these existing impacts. So there's nothing, there's no new impacts in this area. The red indicates existing impacts. So there's some existing impacts. And blue is proposed new ones. So the new tree code does preserve, so they're still preserving all of these trees in this area. They are allowed to, when you could stipulate, they can go up to impact up to 50% with like a protective measures that we'll look at more with final. They are showing the appropriate, this is the root protection zone in the green, and they are showing the tree protection zone as well for these trees, which for the landmark live oaks is a radius of one foot for every one inch of diameter at breast height. So again, there is the existing pavement in this area, as you saw from the photos. There's this existing basin here. It's a very shallow basin that you saw in the photos. They are proposing to enlarge that slightly. In this blue area, there's an existing height here. That's the red. So we do have a lot of discussion that they cannot enlarge this existing portion that's within the root plate of the tree. They can go in and clean it up and remove the sediment, but they can't deepen it or excavate it any deeper. And we'll look at all those details with the final. They do want to add some additional capacity in this area, just a little bit of capacity. And they are adding these two buildings. These will be one story, non-climate controlled, just kind of roll up doors. And a new, brand new basin in this area here. And so then just an overall plan, again, showing the tree area here. This kind of shows some of the existing basin a little bit better. Kind of the same building as what you saw before. There is a 40-foot buffer required to the west that they'll be providing, and that'll be landscaped. And we'll review that with the final development plan. The buildings meet all of the setbacks. They are also providing pedestrian access here. So, and then if this site ever redevelops to the east, this will eventually, the pedestrian access will go all the way out to Tower Road there. So with that, the revised preliminary development plan is consistent with the Alachua County comprehensive plan and the Unified Land Development Code. A staff recommends approval of the revised preliminary development plan for 75th Street storage and resolution DR-2601. That concludes my presentation. The applicant is also here and has a presentation as well. Michelle Bach with 1784 Holdings from Scottsdale, Arizona. So this has Leslie introduced the site. I'm going to kind of briefly skip over the first half of our presentation. It is an application that we were here for original final approval for land development, and now we're coming back for an expansion of the site. And I do have our project team here with us, Jesse Ray from Nimble Consulting, and actually Nicholas from Kimley Horne is here with us today. They are civil engineers, so if there is any additional engineering questions, he's here to help answer them. So 1784 was established back in 2013. We are a class site self-storage developer. We develop across the entire nation as well as in the U.K., and we are really committed to just providing a neighborhood amenity and working with our neighbors, providing Class A security-driven storage. Again, this is the subject property where we originally had the two western parcels, and we're adding the middle adjacent parcels to the east to expand. For the site plan, briefly, as Leslie had said, we are coming in off of the shared 75th drive, and you can see the two additional single-story buildings that are added on those eastern parcels. Each of them are just over 6,000 square feet for a total of 12, and then the three-story building does have a slight modification to it because we have decided to add a caretaker's unit to the main three-story building, so it will be an on-site manager living there. So that was added to the first floor, so in the lower southeast corner, the building used to have a jog in it, and we've now bumped that out, and even those elevation walls out to account for the manager's unit right on the hard corner, so that has been added. So in totality, the three-story building grew also by an initial 6,000 square feet for the whole corner volume. This is the landscape plan. Again, seeing the 40-foot buffer on the western side that is filled with landscaping, the landscaping around the new retention base in the southeast corner, and then all the preserved southern tree protection. For the design, we are keeping the three-story building in the original approved state, other than, again, popping that corner tower out to account for the manager's unit and the extra volume above it. But overall, the request of the three-story building was increased by 6,840 square feet, and then the additional 12,096 square feet for the two exterior roll-up buildings. The building height for the three-story building, even with the request, was actually reduced from 42 feet down to 40 feet, and the two single-story buildings are capped out at 12 feet. And this is just some interior photos of the facilities. These are open and operating facilities by 1784, so images of our office and our restroom, kind of the quality, our interior loading areas that is located within the three-story building. And then customer access, this is all from the original approvals on the site, keypad entry at all of our access hours. The facility is not 24 hours, so tenants do have an option between 5 a.m. and 10 p.m., with the actual office hours being 8 a.m. to 6, and then obviously an on-site manager, and 24-hour security in and out. These are just flat, full-scale elevations of the three-story buildings and the single-story building. Any other questions? I'm happy to answer them. Move approval of staff's recommendation to approve the revised pulmonary development. Second. Any further discussion? I just, it's a beautiful building. It would be really nice if we could house people in something. I'm just, all I could think of is what those units would cost and, you know, people would slip in there and sleep at night because it's really a beautiful facility. Yeah, we don't want that, but okay. No, no, I know. Well, you know, we're all, we're desperate for housing. Mr. Alford. I just had to add, it says a lot about our society that in the, you know, vicinity of Newberry Road and Power Road that we are getting a self-storage facility for people to store all the crap that they buy. That's big, yeah. You know, that says a lot about our society that that's the highest and best use of that piece of property based on economics, but whatever. Makes me sad, but okay. Okay. Is there any public discussion to the motion, not to the comment about people living there, but actually to the motion? Okay. Let's bring it back to the board. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion is unanimous. Thank you all. We appreciate it. Okay. Commissioners, I, I made a joke, so I don't think it will go like that tonight, but thank you all for getting to do that. Okay. Let's move to, I guess, Mr. Clerk, we have county attorney comment next? Yes, sir. Mr. Chair, I do not have anything today. Thank you. County manager comment? Mr. Chair, I did not, but now I do. Okay. What you got? The arts festival. So on the arts thing, um, so, um, we had a, they had originally looked at this as he referred to, we have one of our members that has to recuse herself due to the relationship. So, um, with one of the applicants, we did not have a quorum. So, uh, and we have not had a quorum. So with that recusal, they are slated to, so none of the applicants essentially have been funded, not just the, um, not just the, the event that Mr. Richardson came to about, uh, March 2nd, um, is it's on their March 2nd agenda to do this. Um, we have two new members. We have two new members. We have an alternate who could stand in, right? And an alternate. Um, so we believe that on the March 2nd agenda, we will be able to, um, have that quorum absent the, you know, the person who asked to recuse to be able to move forward with this. Um, we do know that there was funding received for that particular event or awarded, I don't know about received, um, through one of the city's programs. So there is some funding there that has been provided. I don't, you know, I can't speak to the total amount they need or any of that information, but this will be back on March 2nd, um, for the arts council to, to go through. Okay. Uh, yeah, my question is, is, uh, I mean, if I was promoting that big of an event, I might need funding in advance of March 2nd for advertising or for, you know, whatever materials ordering. Are you thinking that the money that the city has provided will be adequate for that? I think, and I can't speak for how the city operates. I mean, our grants are reimbursement. Okay. So they have, they have to front all that anyway. Okay. Yeah. They're, they're typically all reimbursement grants. Um, very small percentage. Do we ever advance in it? It's only in certain circumstances. So. Okay. Yeah. I don't know how this works though. I was just, he, he just seemed very nervous though. I think it'll be okay. I think it'll be okay. All right. Yeah. I guess I would just ask that you all give us an update after that meeting and for some reason it doesn't go through. And the other is if we could follow up with Mr. Richardson regarding our tourism development grant program and send him the information for that in case it sounded like there's lots of people coming in from out of town. So he may qualify for some of that funding as well that may support some of the marketing components that you were talking about and what commissioner Wheeler was talking about with regards to trying to get the word outside of our county about this festival, which I think could draw a crowd with more promotion. So thank you. Good suggestion. Okay. Uh, anything else, Michelle? All right. Let's get to commissioner comments. Um, yes, just, uh, let's see. I've got three, um, zoning meetings tomorrow, uh, and, uh, Eastside High School, if anybody can get over there, I think it helps to have, have one of us or some of us at these school, uh, meetings where they're talking about zoning. Can I chime in on that? I actually, one of my comments and I'll just say it now is to request that the school board come and do a presentation for us on their rezoning, um, situation. I think it's going to have implications for growth. It's going to have implications for the way in which, you know, things begin to play out in our community. I think it's really important for us to have a understanding of what it is that they're planning and to be able to ask questions when we're not taking up the public's time to ask those questions. So I was going to request that the school board, um, staff come and do a presentation for us regarding their rezoning, if everyone's okay with that. I like that. But we had our joint meeting too with the electives the other day, the electives, and, and what I was trying to point out to them, you know, that it was important that we be included in the conversation because where those schools are solid, that's where the growth is going to happen. And we've got the east side of Gainesville and the county that we're trying to promote. And so it's important that we have schools out there that we can actually count on. Commissioner Wheeler, hold on. I won't come back to you, but we have a motion and a second that we request that the school board give a presentation back to us. Is that okay? Yes. Any discussion? Any public discussion? Back to the board. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion is unanimous. Okay. Commissioner Wheeler, go ahead. I think it's helpful to the superintendent to have us there, you know, for support. At the public meeting. That's right. For support. Sorry. And what time is that, Mary Helen? Um, 530. Okay. 530. And because it, you know, it, it got, it got a little heated in, in Hawthorne. And when I could be there to share what we were trying to do with the school board in Hawthorne, you know, it, it helped, it helped, especially the school crossings, the MTPO that we're dealing with, you know, in terms of 301 crossings, that was an issue and concern, but anyway. Um, um, and also I don't know if we're following at all what's happening in Bradford County and Stark. Um, the Stark commission over there, uh, voted three, two, to engage with federal government to sell a warehouse. So, so I, yes. So I just, it's close enough to our vicinity that I think we need to be aware and to watch. Um, so, um, because I'm, I'm concerned with our students that are here, uh, families that have come in because we've been a welcoming city that we need to be aware, you know, the proximity of those folks coming in. If indeed it happens, they voted to engage. If they have not been approached, they, and I think, from what I understand of approach, the federal government. Okay. I think that's it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, this weekend, um, a group of citizens, um, from across the county, uh, went to, uh, EJI, uh, for the weekend and it was a wonderful, wonderful event, but it was cold, but it was wonderful. Um, I didn't ride the bus, but there were a group of citizens who did, but I, I kind of liked to drive them to be stuck in a bus for eight hours. So, I mean, it's, uh, so, but anyway, it was a, a, a real nice event, event. Latoya did an excellent job in terms of scheduling everything. Uh, but I think one of the disappointing things to me was that I thought, sure, someone from EJI in terms of staff would have met us there, but they did not, and that was sort of disappointing. And also, we had had five jars here left from the soil collection, so I brought those up. I took those up to Montgomery, uh, to give to the museum, uh, so they can be displayed, uh, because the other jars that we have, uh, done were in the exhibit hall of the museum, uh, so you can see those now from Alachua County, Newlandsville, and all that stuff. You can see those there. Uh, so it was a wonderful event. It seems like all of the citizens, uh, enjoyed it. And so, um, coming soon, we're going to have a follow-up meeting with all of them to talk about the experience and what we saw. But, um, they had created the sculpture park. I mean, it is a beautiful park, what they have done. Um, there's a boat ride to it, or you can drive the bus, ride the bus there. And so, but I took the boat route and to get on the Alabama River. And, um, so, so, so they told the history of the slave trade from the Alabama River and, and all of that while you're riding on the bus, they're giving you the history of it. And, uh, so, but it, it, it was a great event and a lot of citizens, I think, were very, very happy that they, they came. So, um, that was one of the things. But again, we have not, we have heard from them, but they're not, as Ken said earlier, they're not going to give us that bronze marker. So, uh, that sounds like a done deal that they're not going to do that, but they will do, uh, the historical markers. They will complete that. But other than that, they're not going to go any further in reference to the bronze marker. So, uh, that was kind of disappointing too. So, but, but other than that, I, I was really hoping that we would have been able to meet with staff to share our concerns and, you know, because they already owe us two markers. Now they owe us for last year and now this year, and we still haven't heard anything. So that's, what's very disappointing to me. So, but other than that, it was a great trip. Uh, we had a great time. We all, uh, fellowship and had dinner together. So it was a great event. So I just wanted to share that with you guys. Right up there. All right. Thank you. Mr. Chair, we've submitted back to this program, haven't we? So that's been submitted. So cool. Very good. Yeah, yeah. Um, Anna, you got anything? Yeah. Uh, yes, I have a couple things. Um, school board was one of them. Um, the second is, I would also like to request that, um, both the, um, oh my goodness, the nonprofit center of excellence and peak literacy come to give us a presentation around the six month mark for the literacy work that's being done. So March, April, probably April timeframe, I'm imagining, um, they could come and present to us about what their accomplishments are to date. And so we can start here kind of how it's going. And I think going into budget season, it'll be good to hear from them about where they see it going, um, for the future. I spoke to, um, just to respond. I spoke to Leah yesterday at the children's trust meeting and, um, it's going better than expected. I think it's a great suggestion. So does anybody object to that request? Michelle, can you take care of that? Um, and then my last is, I just want to say, uh, thank you to Scorpio construction. Um, we have a community organization that does a lot of mentorship of at-risk youth and, um, for youth that have been incarcerated, come out of incarceration called Strong-Minded Mentoring. It's an amazing organization if you don't know of it. Um, but they've been doing some work with youth in the communities to have them clean up their own neighborhoods so they can sort of see the results of that clean up and feel some pride in their neighborhoods and their communities. And, um, in one of the neighborhoods, there was a derelict basketball court that, um, the students spent a lot or the, the youth spent a lot of time cleaning up and making beautiful again, but it was so torn up from just years of neglect that it wasn't really usable, um, even after they cleaned it up. So, um, Scorpio construction has stepped up to help with that and to re resurface it so that they can utilize it. And I just wanted to say thank you to them. It's really gratifying to have businesses in our community that step up to help, um, you know, in ways that I think make a bigger difference to individuals and to communities than we can ever imagine. Those small things, um, for, for maybe a construction company are really, really big things for the community. So I just wanted to say thank you to them for that. Let me add to that then. Dominic, um, Scorpio, great, great, great guy. He also donated a thousand dollars to the Children's Trust and that was announced yesterday. Um, some similar kind of story, not as specific as yours, but that's, uh, really nice to hear. Yeah. Yeah. Great work. Okay. Is that it? You conclude? I do. Okay. Mary? Uh, yeah. So, um, I sit on the Healthy Counties Innovation Council for NACO, and we got an invitation to participate in the Public Health Leadership Academy, and I've been talking to Claudia about this. Um, the Academy will, they're, they will select 12 different counties to participate, and it will be a team of a county commissioner and a, um, a county health department, and that would make the team. And so, um, uh, she's spoken with Paul Paul out of the county health department. He's very interested in participating. What I'm asking for is a motion designating me as the county official that would be participating. I hear a motion. So moved. So moved. Moved twice and the second. So I think you got a good shot at that. Thank you, Mary, for doing that. Any discussion? Any public discussion? Back to the board. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion is unanimous. Thank you, Mary. And, uh, secondly, um, I, we got an email during the, um, meeting today about some more changes at Animal Services. Michelle, do we have an update on what's going on there? Apparently we lost a couple more employees. Do you know anything about that? Mr. Chair, I believe that Ms. Peebles had sent you all, um, a message responding to that. Okay. Um, one followed a significant other, um, who had moved and the other one got recruited away from us by another, um, organization, agency. I believe it might be Marion County. Yeah. That, um, apparently she couldn't refuse. Right. Right. Which is, which is understandable, but we, we, we're not, we're, we're managing that, correct? We're. Yes. We'll, we'll go back out and we will, we will hire for those positions. Unfortunately, both came right about the same time, but you know, we, we had one person that was recruited away from us and the other one, like I said, is. Oh, it's just, we're already short folks. So there's. Understood. So I just wanted to bring it up, but thank you. So we'll look for that email. Okay. Okay. And Mr. Chair, if I could, the, um, the Peak Literacy and Nonprofit Center for Excellence, um, actually are already slated to present to the joint, uh, city county meeting in March, if that is okay, as opposed to bringing them here or doing both. Okay. I'm sure you're okay with that. Yep. Yes. Okay. So I don't have anything other than, so tonight, um, we have an overflow room downstairs and we have Grace Knight. We've got, um, uh, four from the sheriff that'll be here. We've got 10 parties. So, uh, what, what I have asked is that staff communicate with them. Hopefully if there are, um, presentations that can be combined, they will seek to combine those. We're asking that they try not to be repetitive. Um, so I'll lay that out. We'll have here from staff. We'll do the ex parte. Then we'll do the, or the attorney will do the, the quasi like we did earlier today. We'll, uh, ask staff to give their report. I've been told it's about 30 minutes. We'll ask the applicant, and then we'll do questions. We'll ask the applicant to give his report. I told it's about 30 minutes. Then we'll do questions. And then each of the parties will have up to 15 minutes. There's 10. I'm hoping that they consolidate. Um, and I'm also hoping that it's, there is someone who hasn't asked to be a party and they asked to be a party tonight, that there's a justifiable reason that otherwise we've got 10. Um, and so we have those presentations after they give their presentations. Um, I'm going to ask for, uh, any direct and cross direct by, I guess the, uh, applicant or the parties, at which point, um, you know, we'll be, we can listen to that, at which point I'll then ask for a motion. Once I get a motion on the table, then we'll see what time it is. Uh, we may need to take a little break. We may not, but that would be a time for a little break, uh, at which point then we'll reconvene and we'll open up public comment. I've asked that, um, staff provide public comment cards. So we know how many people want to speak to us on public comment and what county they're from. And then from there, we can determine how much time we have. Hopefully, um, we will conclude by midnight because our rules say we have to be done by midnight unless we waive them. Uh, if we don't conclude tonight, then we've got the 17th, which I really don't want to continue, but we have that, uh, on the calendar. Does that make sense? Is there any questions or anybody want to make any changes to that? No, I guess I would just ask that if, if we know how many speakers we have, we can do the math that we may need to condense the time. I mean, we have to consider the, what's presented during the hearing as our prime, you know, the evidence to make our decision anyway. I mean, I am interested in hearing the public and we've gotten lots of emails and commentary already about this project before and again. So I guess I would just ask that we, we do our very best to condense public comment in a fashion that will allow us to hear the public and still conclude this hearing today. 100% and I, and I'll do the math for y'all and then I'll ask you all like if it's 10 30 and we have 30 people that want to speak, maybe two minutes, that's an hour that would give us to 11 30, but I will ask you all for, does that make sense? And if you all agree with that, then, you know, I can make that decision. I have a question and maybe a suggestion. So I, I feel like the conditions that staff is recommending are addressing many of the concerns that we've heard from the residents, but that's the first thing they're going to talk. That's the first thing I, I know that's what they're going to present. My concern is, is that having sat through lots of public comment is that people come and they don't hear the presentation and they still speak to their concerns. Would it make sense for us to have some sort of a, um, printout of the slide showing the conditions or something like that to sort of have as a handout so that people can reiterate? I don't know that we're going to know what, yeah, I don't know what we know they're going to be. I mean, we might add conditions. We might, but I mean, that would be what staff's recommendations are. I just thought that might be as useful. I think it's a good idea. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, so staffs, you're hearing your commissioner talk to you now, so maybe prepare for that. My thought is, is once we get a motion on the floor and we take a recess, then we can have staff make copies with those conditions of that motion. If that motion includes conditions, we pass that out and we get, and we can post it up during public comment. Yeah. But you hear me though, right? Yeah. People just don't, don't hear the presentation. They just assume the worst when they come up here. And I thought having something in hand that says, you know, you look at your paper right there. It says, this is what we're proposing. Yeah. And again, this is a hearing for a one-time special event for four days. Yeah. Right. Okay. And Chuck? I just had a question. So if there are a lot of public comments, are you going to reduce it to two minutes instead of three in case it all depends on the crowd size? Or, I mean, it depends on crowd size and numbers. I mean, I, I, we could reduce it to one, you know, three minutes, two minutes, one minute. It's really a math problem and the will of the board, but I'm, I'm, you know, in the, at the, you know, how the legislature works, you know, they, they like to conclude. And so what I'm going to ask folks is to please try not to be repetitive in their comments, try to make sure it's applicable to what we're, what we're having. And, um, you know, I'm going to ask them to use your hands if you like it and thumbs up or thumbs down, but no clapping. So we're going to try to get through this tonight. I doubt they won't be here until today either. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's, you know, that does what our rules say. So I think I've only been on a couple of meetings when we've gone past midnight, so we'll get to it. That's like the old, good old days. COVID days. COVID days. Just so you know, the, the timing system we have has a two, three, five, 15 minute button. We do not have a one minute button. So if you wanted to do that, we'd have to. Two is good. Call it out and say time. We'll see what the math is. Yeah, we may. We may need to do that. Just to let you know. Yeah. So the 15 minute one will be good for the parties. Correct. And what do we have? 15? Two, three, and five. And then 15. We don't need five. Yeah. Two, three. Okay. And you can't program one between now and tonight? I have no idea. This is Mr. Sexton's equipment. So I don't know how difficult that is. If the state can do it, I bet we can do it. We're a subdivision in the state. All right. So with that. I have a phone that can do it. Yeah. We, uh, we will reconvene at 501.