At this time, I'll call the order of the March 30, 2026 meeting of the Clearwater City Council. If you wish to address the council tonight, please complete a comment card. Comment cards are located by the clerk, seated to the right of the dais. When called to speak, please hand your card to the clerk. At this time, we'll move to item two on the agenda, and that's for our invocation. I ask for everyone to please stand for the invocation tonight. It will be given by Rabbi Michael Bernholz of the Tip of B'nai, Israel, and remain standing afterwards for the Pledge of Allegiance.
What an honor it is to come before the Clearwater City Council to offer an invocation. And this is in the midst of a significant week. It is both Holy Week and the Christian calendar, but it is also as we are approaching Passover on our Jewish calendar, one of our three major pilgrimage festivals when the community of Israel would gather in Israel to remember 4,000 years ago when the people of Israel were slaves in the land of Egypt, and they were led through miracles and marvels through the sea and after all those plagues. And so later this week, on Wednesday night, Jewish families, and then Thursday night too, Jewish families will be gathering, and the youngest child of every family is required to ask a question. And the whole goal of the holiday is for the parents to teach their children the questions so the kids ask the questions, so then the parents have to answer, why is this night different from all other nights? And then, of course, with that prompting, you then have to tell the story. And we do all kinds of things during the Passover Seder, this meal we do in a particular order, in order to make our kids curious. We play hide-and-seek. We sing silly songs. We force them to ask questions. We dip things once, not once, but twice, where you take parsley into salt water, and then you take an apple compote, and you put it with bitter herbs. We do all sorts of stuff just to get our kids to ask that question so we can say, here is this moment where the people of Israel were in slavery, where they were in degradation, where they were suffering miserably, and yet connecting with the divine, they were able to go to freedom. We have to ourselves remember that we were slaves in the land of Egypt, and so as we appreciate freedom in our day and age, how do we make sure that we take care and help everyone find that kind of freedom? It's an incredible holiday. It's a powerful holiday. And earlier this week, I was doing an act of teaching, or last week I was doing a teaching, of the four questions we have the kids to ask, and I was asking, and there's this, as I said, a question, why do we dip not once? Some nights we never dip anything, but tonight we don't just dip once, we dip twice. We dip parsley into salt water, and I was asking the kids, and I was asking this community of what were those two acts of dipping. And one of the people made a response that was really surprising to me, remembering another part of the Seder. And so he was remembering a place in the Seder where we actually take wine out of our wine glass to reduce the amount of wine we have. And I started thinking about these two acts that are part of the Seder and so different. One is taking, and we call it charosit, and there's all sorts of different charosit. If you're from Eastern Europe, it's apples and nuts, and then wine is added to it. And it gets mixed with bitter herb. In our day and age, so many people use horseradish. And it's a beautiful way of combining the sweet and the bitter, because in Jewish life, what do we do? We realize that there is the bitterness of slavery of ancestors, but also the bitterness of the challenges we experience. And what do we want to do? We want to feel and understand the bitterness that's real, and we also then want to follow it with sweetness, with the joy and with the celebration. And so we have this bitterness and sweetness that goes together. And on the other hand, here is this person talking about the removing of the wine that is part of this other ritual with the Kiddush. And I'm like, why is it different? And then as I stand before you, think about taking a Kiddush cup, taking a wine glass, and we are removing each drop of wine to be one of the ten plagues. That we have in the story of the Exodus. You have this moment where you have the people of Egypt won't let the people of Israel go to freedom. And you have to have these plagues that are brought to the people of Egypt, and there's all this damage and destruction. But the last thing you want to do is celebrate, even if you need to stand up to someone, in order to find your freedom, the last thing you want to do is celebrate the destruction of somebody else, even if it leads to freedom. And so we decrease the wine, we decrease our sweetness, we decrease our joy, acknowledging that there is pain even coming with our freedom. Two completely different rituals, one of adding wine to something to make it sweeter, one to decrease the wine to take away some of the sweetness, all part of that same ritual. And so as you hear from this community, as you debate and discuss what is how to build this city and this community into a place of shalom, wholeness, completeness, and peace, it is my hope that you think about both of those things. What are the things that we add? What are the things we take away? How do we balance those moments of challenge, those moments of conflict, also with those moments of sweetness? And there's a very simple text that I offer, Olam Chesed Yivaneh. May we all find this way to build this world with love. May each of us as individuals find that way to build this world with chen, with love. May all of us as a community find a way to build this world with chesed, with love. And may we feel as something greater than ourselves bound together and find a way, Olam Chesed Yivaneh, to build this world with love. Amen.
Thank you, Rabbi. Please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Before we go further in tonight's agenda, I'd like to introduce our dais for tonight. To my far left is our deputy city clerk, Nicole Sprague. To her right is our city clerk, Rosemarie Kohl. To her right is our interim city attorney, Owen Kohler.
Good evening.
To his right is city council member, Ryan Cotton.
Good evening.
To my left is city council member, Mike Menino.
Good evening.
Council member David Albritton is not able to attend tonight. To my right is Vice Marilena Tichera.
Good evening.
To her right is city manager, Jennifer Poirier.
Good evening.
To her right is assistant city manager, Dan Slaughter. And to his right is assistant city manager, Al Battle. With that, we move to item 4.1 on the agenda. I'd like to call forward Eric Harris from the CYF program. He's the program manager for CFY. And I believe Paul Hamilton. And we've got other board members here tonight as well.
Thank you. Glad to be here this evening. We have our board members here. We also are here to celebrate the recipients from the city of Clearwater for their acknowledgement for their scholarships. I want to pass it over to one of our board members here, Ms. Dawn Daugher.
Oh, hi. Good evening. And thank you so much for allowing us here tonight. And to introduce you to our next investment into our community. So we're here tonight to honor these students and introduce them to you. They've all received scholarships from local sponsors that have been put together by Clearwater for Youth. We had over 500 applicants. And we ended up with 57 recipients. And that is the generosity of businesses and families in our community who wanted to sponsor these young people. We kind of an interesting note. So we had 16 Pinellas County High Schools participate this year and receive awards. And tonight, we are representing Clearwater. And we had 16 recipients from Clearwater Schools. So if you would allow me to introduce. And why don't I, as I call your name, if you'll just step forward so that we can acknowledge who you guys are. So first, it's Dylan Zarl. And Dylan comes to us from Calvary Christian. And he has a very interesting background. And he has a 3.4 GPA. And he'll be going to the Fire Academy as well as St. Pete College. And he played football for four years. He was a football captain. He was a homecoming king. His list goes on. So, Dylan, congratulations to you. He'll be receiving a scholarship from the Crawford Kerr Foundation. Next, from Clearwater Central Catholic, we have Marianne Marzenek. And Marianne is receiving a $10,000 scholarship as well. And she's sponsored by the Clearwater Phillies. I know we're all familiar with them. She is going to go to the University of Florida. Yes, committed. And she plays softball. She was a student ambassador. She's an international thespian honor society. And she actually served on the Supreme Court Justice in cases that she was collaborating with her peers for the practice of constitutional law. So, congratulations to you. Then next we have from Clearwater High School, we have Sitlali Buzahi. So, Sitlali comes to us from Clearwater High. And she'll be going to St. Pete College. She has a 3.7 GPA, and she currently is in cross-country, the Key Club, the History Club. She has received a Certificate of Excellence for Math and Certificate of Excellence in Keyboarding. So, we're very excited to award her with a scholarship to St. Pete College. Congratulations. And on a side note, so the St. Pete College Scholarships, they are a three-year program where they are covered for books and tuition, which is pretty amazing. It gives them three years to get their AA degree. The next we have Alexander Kiff. And Alexander comes to us from Clearwater High School. And Alexander has a 4.46 GPA, and he is going to St. Pete College. He played football for three years, and his senior year he did miss an injury, but he's back healthy and running strong. And he was on the National Honor Society and the Science National Honor Society, the English Honor Society. It keeps going. You get the idea here. So, congratulations to you, and we're happy to have you. Next, from Clearwater High, we have Melissa Teterovic-Pelek and her – oh, you know, I should have said who you're – I apologize. Go back here. Ragnar Events, and I'm sure you guys are all familiar with Ragnar Events. They do a lot of promotions here in our area. We're fortunate to have them. Melissa comes to us from Clearwater High, and she is going to St. Pete College as well, and I happen to be the fortunate one that is sponsoring Melissa. She is involved in the Drama Club, the National Honor Society, National English Society, Quilt and Scroll, Leadership on Campus. She has quite a list as well, and we're very proud of her. She also works on the Teen Advisory Board, and if I read to you all her awards, we'd be here all night. But we're so happy to have you, and she'll be attending St. Pete. Congratulations. Celia Flick. Celia comes to us from – this is a very interesting and emotional and touching – She comes to us from Clearwater High through the ROTC program, and her scholarship is in honor of a student that was hit by a car and killed. But the interesting thing was Clearwater High and also Backwaters and Clearwater for Youth felt the need to co-sponsor this scholarship. So we're so thrilled to be able to give it to Celia. She is a member of the Marine Corps Junior ROTC for all four years, and she's also the commanding officer for the entire Clearwater High ROTC program. Congratulations to you. And Countryside High School, Emily Rivera. She's receiving a $10,000 scholarship, and she's being sponsored by Clearwater Gas Systems. She'll be going to FSU, yeah? Yeah. And she was a cheerleading captain and a part of the Black Student Union and vice president of the Spanish Honor Society. She also has received the Dr. Vilma Fernandez-Zalupski Award. Congratulations to you. We're thrilled to have you. And that concludes – I think you've got two more coming. Oh, do we have some late entries? Yeah. These students are so busy this time of year, it's hard to get all of them. Oh, Freddie. Great. Excuse us. Are you sure? Here we go. Okay. Freddie Lewis, come on up. Freddie comes to us. He's receiving, and I know you all have eaten here at Capona's Dugout. We've all partaken there. He is from Countryside High School. And where did you decide – where did you commit for school? FAMU. FAMU. Good for you. And his leadership's role is he's taking care of his three siblings in his house, and that has been a huge responsibility for him while he has maintained a 3.1 GPA. So we're really excited to have him as a part of our program, and it doesn't stop him from being on the principal's list year over year. Congratulations to you. Christopher Castro. Christopher is being sponsored by – and this is a familiar name to all of us, George and Carolyn Criticos. So they have been very giving and are excited about our program here. Christopher is going to go to St. Pete College, correct? Yeah. And he currently has a 4.0 GPA. He plays varsity soccer, high school lacrosse. He's on the Abbott Club, and he even plays baseball. There's not much you're not doing right now, right? Is there anything else that he can do other than the Dr. Vilma Fernandez-Velevsky? So congratulations to you. One more. A lot of these students, they've had obligations. They've had their senior trips, and so they've been a little busy, and RSVPing has not been on their mind. So I'm just going to leave it at that. All right. So from Clearwater High, Yasmin Franco-Cruz. And Yasmin is going to go to the vocational school. And which one are you going to? P-TECH. That's great. She was actually sponsored by Spencer and Associates. And her extracurricular activities are she's in youth groups, student government soccer, and she participates in the Girlfriends Club. Yeah. Who knew? Her leadership roles are she was very involved in the mural for the Spanish Heritage Month, and she worked on that to help create the school mural. And we're just happy to have you. Congratulations. Thanks for coming tonight. Am I missing anybody with my back, everybody? I don't know what's going on behind me. So thank you so much for having us tonight. We really appreciate being here and respect the community.
Yeah, and we got a chance to meet with many of you. Some of you we didn't get a chance to talk to prior to the meeting. And we understand we've got folks who aren't here tonight from Clearwater who are practicing or playing games. They're involved in spring sports. One of the great things, CFY, it's not only athletes, but you recognize a lot of athletes for their well-rounded performance through high school, and so we appreciate that as well.
On and off the field. Yeah. We want them to be good citizens of our community.
One of the points was made in our meeting. I think City Manager Slaughter made it that, you know, you're being recognized for the scholarship not just because you're good students or good athletes. You're being recognized because you've been really good human beings. You've learned those things about being involved in your community, involved in organizations, and caring about your community, and caring about others. That is a demonstration of not just your past success, but what we hope will be your future success. Because you're important to this city. We need folks like you who are here tonight to go off, some of you, away. I heard FSU. I heard some institutions out of town, which we hope you get a good education there, and then we hope you come back. Because it's really important that we retain talented young people like you because you are the future of this city. And so congratulations to you, and thank you, CFY. For all those out there that stands for Clearwater for Youth, they changed their name a bit to encompass the wider Pinellas County that they serve, but it all started as Clearwater for Youth. And thank you to the board and the folks who are here tonight, the staff, for keeping this great program going and growing it over the years to become to the point it is it's touching so many young people throughout our county. So thank you for being here tonight, and I think we want to get a picture, and let's give these folks a round of applause.
Thank you, Mayor Rekker.
Congratulations. Congratulations. Good job. Congratulations. Thank you. Congratulations.
You thought they were going to forget about you, didn't they? Good to have you here. Thanks for joining us. Congratulations. Yeah.
Congratulations.
Did I skip through the? I'm sorry. I'm here. I appreciate you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Next, we move to item 4.2 on the agenda. I'd like to call forward Major Ted Morris and Major Pamela Morris from the Salvation Army. And anyone else here tonight from the Salvation Army is welcome to come. First, I'd like to read the Centennial Day Proclamation, and then I'll invite you to make some comments here. Whereas the Salvation Army of Clearwater in Upper Pinellas County was first established on March 16, 1926, and has served hundreds of thousands of local residents during this time. And whereas the Salvation Army of Clearwater in Upper Pinellas County provides supportive housing for homeless mothers and their children for up to two years with the goal of lifting the burden of rent while they obtain a professional certification or degree. And whereas the Salvation Army Clearwater Citadel Corps continues to be a place of worship and fellowship for hundreds of all ages with a wide variety of activities throughout each week, including a free school of music for children. And whereas the Salvation Army is on call to respond to local and regional disasters, whether natural or man-made, by serving food to those directly involved as well as first responders. And whereas on March 16, 2026, the Salvation Army of Clearwater in Upper Pinellas County commemorated 100 years of faithful service in the local community. Now, therefore, I, Bruce Rector, Mayor of the City of Clearwater, Florida, on behalf of the Clearwater City Council, to hereby proclaim March 16, 2026, to be the Salvation Army Centennial Day in Clearwater. 100 years of touching so many lives in this city. Congratulations to you and thank you for the work you've done. Major Ted, would you like to say a few words?
Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council, for this recognition. Majors Pam and I are the co-pastors and co-directors of the Salvation Army in Clearwater, Upper Pinellas. Our assistant officer is Lieutenant Sadie Glick, working alongside with us. And Paula Bridges is the chairperson of our Centennial Committee. So she put a lot of things together to celebrate our Centennial. The uniforms, by the way, simply indicate that we are members of the Salvation Army Church, the three pastors and then lay leaders here among us. On behalf of us, on behalf of our volunteers, on behalf of our staff, some of who are here tonight, we want to thank you for this recognition. And on behalf of those who come through our doors, the hundreds of thousands who've come to us for spiritual support, emotional support, financial health, and the blessing from the Salvation Army, we could not do it without the partnership with the city. And so we thank you for that. And we pledge to you, on behalf of all those who follow us, continue to work with the city and work to help our community better through the Salvation Army. So, Mayor, thank you so much for the recognition. And thank you for those of you who've been a part of our activities. Some of you have come to our various events, and we're grateful for that because you know you're busy people. So thank you very much, and God bless you.
Thank you for coming. Thank you for coming tonight.
Thank you.
I think we'll want to get a picture here. David's back there, so we're going to get you in front with a picture.
Very good.
Thank you for coming. Let's move to Item 4.3 Agenda, and I'd like to call for Sonia Piat from Lifelink. I'll read the proclamation, and then we invite you to make a few comments. Whereas one of the most meaningful gifts that a human can bestow upon another is the gift of life, and whereas over 105,000 men, women, and children are currently on the national waiting list for organ transplantation, of which nearly 6,000 of them reside in Florida, and whereas 49,065, a historic number of organ transplants occurred in the calendar year 2025 in the United States, thanks to the generosity of 23,787 deceased and living donors, of which Lifelink of Florida honored more donors than ever before, serving 360 organ donors who provided 995 life-saving transplants to patients in need. And whereas Lifelink of Florida, the nonprofit organization dedicated to the recovery of organs and tissue for transplantation therapy in Florida with a mission to honor donors and save lives through organ and tissue donation, now, therefore, I, Bruce Rector, Mayor of the City of Clearwater, Florida, on behalf of the Clearwater City Council, do hereby proclaim April 2026 to be Donate Life Month in the City of Clearwater and encourage all residents to consider giving life through organ donation and to sign up in Florida's organ and tissue donor registry by visiting www.donatelifeflorida.org or when renewing their driver's license or state identification card. Thank you for coming tonight.
Thank you.
Bringing to attention this very important issue.
Yes, I thank you. I have a little speech I would like to say. Please. And this is my husband, Daniel Pyatt. I wear this crown because March 7th I reached 10 years double organ transplanted, kidney and pancreas. So receiving the Donate Life proclamation here in Clearwater is a profound honor, one that I accept with deep gratitude and humility. As a double organ transplant recipient of both a pancreas and kidney, I stand here today as a living testament to the power of organ donation. This journey has truly been a gift. While transplantation is not a cure, it has given me something incredibly meaningful, a better quality of life. This year marks a special milestone for me. Ten years of living with these precious gifts. Ten years that I would not have had without the selfless decision of my donor. Before my transplant, I endured dialysis seven days a week, eight hours at night at home. It was one of the most challenging seasons of my life. But through it all, my faith in God gave me the strength to persevere, to keep going, and to believe that brighter days were ahead. Because of that gift, I have been blessed to witness life's most precious moments. My daughter's weddings, the birth of my four grandchildren, countless birthdays and holidays, and celebrating my recent wedding anniversary with my husband of 36 years. These are not small moments. They are everything. They are what life is made of. Like many transplant recipients, my journey has not been without challenges. There have been mountains to climb. But every step, every challenge has been worth it because of the second chance I was given. Today, I do not stand here just for myself. I stand in honor of my donor. For those who have given the life, the gift of life, for those who are still waiting for a transplant, and for those who are now living a life renewed because of that extraordinary generosity, I represent a community bound by hope, resilience, and gratitude. This is what joy looks like. This is what giving looks like. Organ donation is not just a decision. It's the gift of a second chance of life. Thank you to the city of Clearwater for recognizing the importance of Donate Life, Life Link, and for helping create a space where awareness, education, and hope can continue to grow in this wonderful community. Hope lives where giving begins. Give the gift of hope to another precious soul. Thank you, City of Clearwater.
I just want to thank you for sharing that powerful story. I can't tell you how much that just touched me, and completely unexpected, and I'm sure others feel the same way. I took courage to do that, and thank you for sharing that.
Yes, thank you so much. Thank you for coming tonight. Thank you.
Would you like to get a photo?
Yeah. You have someone here who wants to take a photo? Yeah.
Come on.
Come on. Come on.
I can do this. You want to do this? You want to do this?
You want to do this? You want to do this?
You want to do this? I definitely did it for the first time.
Go ahead, Dan. So much.
Thank you. Congratulations. That will move to item 4.4, the Fair Housing Month Proclamation. I'd like to call forward Dylan Mayhew from our City of Clearwater Economic Development. Whereas this year marks the 58th anniversary of the signing of Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968, also known as the Fair Housing Act, acts amended, and Florida laws have affirmed the right of every American to have access to housing free of barriers based on race, color, religion, sex, family status, disability, or national origin. And whereas by supporting and promoting and enforcing fair housing laws and equal opportunities strengthens the quality of life in our city, state, and nation. And whereas the City of Clearwater is proud of its efforts to further fair housing and recognizes that this can only be accomplished through forging partnerships with other government agencies, corporations, for-profit, and nonprofit organizations, entrepreneurs, and all persons interested in furthering fair housing. And whereas Fair Housing Month is observed during the month of April to remind citizens of the responsibility to encourage fair housing and fight discrimination, as well as the benefits of unrestricted access to housing. Now, therefore, I, Bruce Rector, Mayor of the City of Clearwater, Florida, on behalf of the Clearwater City Council, do hereby proclaim April 2026 to be Fair Housing Month, with the recognition that continued vigilance against discrimination in all its forms will encourage all citizens and community organizations to celebrate the value of harmonious and diverse communities of neighbors and support the goal of equal housing opportunity for all people. Housing is a very important issue throughout Clearwater and all of Tampa Bay, so would you like to say a few words about our housing?
Mayor, Council, Dylan Mayhew. I'm the housing manager. I'm actually here to introduce Christopher Edwards here. He is our new director for Economic Development and Housing.
Good evening, Mr. Mayor, and to Honorable Council Members as well, Honorable Mayor, and also to Madam City Manager, Assistant City Manager Slaughter, and Assistant City Manager Battle, and other respective city officials on the dais. It is my privilege tonight for my first presentation to the council regarding Fair Housing Proclamation. Tonight, Fair Housing Month is an important opportunity to reaffirm our commitment to the principles established under the Fair Housing Act, ensuring every resident has equal access to safe, decent, and affordable housing. In collaboration with our community partners, our department remains committed to this work through ongoing education, outreach, and administration of programs that expand housing access and remove barriers for those that we serve. We also continue to collaborate with community to make sure that we are aware of the rights and resources available to them. And while we have made meaningful progress, we also acknowledge there is more work to be done. So on behalf of our entire housing department, Dylan and our team in housing, we take this time to thank you, Mayor, Council Members, and to our city management for your continued leadership and also to our community partners and our community to supporting fair housing efforts throughout the year. Thank you so much.
I appreciate it. So move to item 4.5. That's the Earth Month Proclamation. And I'd like to call forward Cassie Cordova from Public Works for this presentation. Whereas Earth Month is an annual reminder of the constant need for environmental advocacy, stewardship commitments, and sustainability efforts, and whereas all life forms on Earth have a right to a healthy, sustainable environment, and as caretakers of the planet, we all have an obligation to change human behaviors that contribute to environmental degradation to preserve the Earth's beauty and natural resources. And whereas the City of Clearwater reaffirms its commitment to protecting our natural resources and promoting a healthier, greener future by making every day Earth Day and celebrating our planet year-round. And whereas the City of Clearwater continues to take steps to protect our residents, our city, and our planet, including educating about environmental awareness, inspiring us to reimagine our community by taking up the challenge of making it more equitable, sustainable, and resilient. Now, therefore, I, Bruce Rector, Mayor of the City of Clearwater, Florida, on behalf of the Clearwater City Council, to hereby proclaim April 2026 to be Earth Month in Clearwater. And we certainly have one of the most beautiful places in the world to preserve and protect, and our natural beauty is so important to not just the millions of visitors that come here, but to our residents. So thank you for reminding us of that importance and reminding us all of the obligation and responsibility to take care of it. So, Cassie, would you or one of you like to say something?
Sure. We just want to say thank you to Mayor and Council for your support on this initiative and everything that we do. We'll keep it short and sweet. We have a website, myclearwater.com slash Earth Month. We have several events organized by several of our other departments within the city as well as some community organizations, so feel free to check that out. Pretty much every weekend in April, we've got something going on. We'll be at the Countryside events this weekend. She'll be at the Sea Turtle at North Greenwood, or Ross Norton, and then we'll be at the big one at Moxon Lake later this month. But there are many, many other events. The libraries do a great job of putting together a lot of events as well. So we hope to see everybody there.
Thank you. Okay, we'll move to item 5.1 on the agenda.
Approve the amendments of the March 5, 2026 City Council meeting. So moved.
Second.
All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Unanimous. Move to item 6.1.
Approve amendments to the Clearwater Comprehensive Plan to establish a new planned redevelopment district, PRD, overlay future land use category with associated bonuses, incorporate policies for a new North Greenwood community overlay district, and add comprehensive plan policy support for existing nonconformity procedures in the Community Development Code and pass ordinance 9860-26 on first reading.
Good evening. Lauren Matzke, Planning and Development Department. Very excited to be here this evening to take the first of several steps to move into the implementation of the North Greenwood CRA plan as it relates to all of the land use and zoning efforts that we've had going on. After a bit of a delay due to storms and other situations, we're getting back on track. So there are several pieces that are required. All four of them are listed here on the screen. But tonight, I'll specifically be presenting the details for the first two pieces, which is amendments to Clearwater 2045 to establish a new overlay and some density and intensity bonuses. And then applying that overlay, assuming that City Council approves it, the next agenda item would be to apply that to the City's future land use map. Later this year, we'll return with amendments to the Community Development Code that would bring the zoning standards for the area and also to apply that to the zoning atlas. As noted in the agenda memo, these first pieces require review by various state and local agencies. So we're able to bring these forward and start them through the process while we continue to work on the backside on the Community Development Code and other pieces. So each builds upon each other, as you'll see as we go through it. So first, I thought, for the benefit of everyone, just a real quick, what is a comprehensive plan? So it's required. It's required by the state. Florida has every single municipality has to have one. And we're required to update it from time to time. But it's used to guide growth and development via its many policies that cover a variety of topics like land use, transportation, recreation, coastal zones, public utilities, and things of that nature. It's the highest level, though. It's the policy direction for the city as it grows. So when communities amend their plan, it's really our opportunity for us to have those honest conversations about what we want for the future and how we want to achieve it. In this instance, we completed the visioning exercises with the North Greenwood community, unfortunately, back in 2024. But we've been keeping in touch with the community. And we also had a very lengthy outreach process with the community as part of the establishment of the CRA. So while we've had these breaks, we've had continued touch points with them. So through this process, we're really reaffirming the CRA vision and moving it forward. So this ordinance covers four main topics, as shown on the screen, three of which are pertaining to North Greenwood. And the last one, since we're amending the comprehensive plan, staff had identified something to bring forward. So just quickly, this is the broader North Greenwood CRA boundary. And then this shows the mix of future land use designations that are within the broader area. There's four different residential categories designated on properties. There's six either non-residential or mixed-use categories. And there's three that are more of the natural resources or conservation areas. There's a lot more detail in the next or in the companion case. So we've taken several different approaches when planning for specific or unique areas. So some of you may recall when we did US-19, we chose to develop brand new future land use categories and do full designations on those properties. So we amended, you know, 4,000-plus properties and 1,600 acres of land to brand new categories. In North Greenwood, we're recommending a different approach, which is to utilize an overlay over the existing categories. In part, this is in response to one of the legislative changes that took place in the past legislative session, Senate Bill 180. Unfortunately, the glitch bill did not go through this year. So we're prohibited from enacting things that are more cumbersome or burdensome to existing properties. That required us to pivot while working on the project. That happens sometimes. And an overlay will help us accomplish pretty much what we want to by making it an opt-in. You know, if a property owner wants to take advantage of the density bonus that's proposed, they can. If they choose not to, they can utilize their current entitlements and abide by the current code that's already in place. So there would be no changes to them otherwise. We chose the path of a planned redevelopment district. This is a category that is available through the countywide rules used to depict areas that are developed with a mix of residential and non-residential, which North Greenwood is, and within neighborhoods that are distinct areas. Again, that's North Greenwood, essentially. So it permits cities to plan for these areas, and it makes available more development potential, but not as much as would be for an activity center or a multi-mobile corridor. So not as much as we could utilize in US-19 or downtown. It's not appropriate in these neighborhood settings, but it recognizes that there's something unique and cohesive about it. And if cities do all of the planning efforts, then they get the benefits of that. So you'll see in this ordinance that we're proposing the overlay to allow up to 40 units per acre, as well as a floor area ratio bonus, impervious surface ratio, and a bonus for mixed use. I was asked a few questions, so I added a few things to my notes, and I would say sometimes there's an advantage to not being first in a community because we can see some of the growth and development that have happened in our neighboring areas, Tampa, for example, and we can see the unintended consequences of some of their zoning overlay choices. So this is allowing us to go back and tinker with our code before we bring it forward, because what could be developed if we just kept it very straightforward might not be compatible with the vision of the community. But the 40 units per acre is kind of an industry standard that helps properties like the small lots that are prevalent in the North Greenland community add that extra one or two units, maybe three or four units. There's a phrase that gets used a lot. It's missing middle housing. When we did all the visioning exercises, the community really gravitated towards that because really the shape of it, in most instances, could be very compatible to a single-family home. It just happens to have more dwelling units within it. And if there's more information, I have some other notes and graphics and things like that that I could share if you wish. But there's a big difference between a 3,000-square-foot townhouse that is one unit on a property versus maybe a stacked duplex on that same property but is more consistent with the houses next door. And that's the stuff that we're going to bring forward eventually in the code. This just sets the entitlement so we can actually achieve that. Oh, I should also – so consistent with the other future – oops, one more note. Sorry on this. So this is very consistent to everything else that's in the comprehensive plan. And we maintain a table that shows all of our different categories, and it shows what are the consistent zoning districts and everything else in there. So you'll see through this we use a footnote and we use a footnote elsewhere to kind of tie these two pieces together. So one other thing is, you know, I'm speaking about the planned redevelopment district overlay in relation to this whole project for North Greenwood. But by establishing this category in our comprehensive plan, we could use this same tool and do the special planning and code work for other neighborhoods in the city. So it's really a tool that can be used in many different ways as we focus on different areas of the city. So the maximum bonus is established in the overlay, and then it's also carried into the different future land use categories that were shown on the map. The map had all the different colors. Those are symbolic of all the different categories. And so this just carries it all forward into that. When we originally prepared the ordinance, and I think I covered this in the cover memo as well, we had included Industrial Limited. I'll cover that in a few different places, but it's still shown on the slide because in the original ordinance, we were including Industrial Limited, but I will be requesting an amendment on first reading from city council. With that, the next grouping of the proposed amendments really sets the stage for North Greenwood because Clearwater 2045 already had an objective and policies related to this work. So there are several minor changes to the existing policies, and the proposed amendments on pages 3 and 4 start to introduce what will become the code amendment. So that's the North Greenwood Community Overlay District. So, again, it's policy direction for that next step. It also reinforces that the portion of the property that's in North Greenwood CRA but also in downtown and is designated as Central Business District would remain to be governed by the downtown plan. Taking a similar approach to what we did for U.S. 19 because there are properties that are in unincorporated Pinellas County within the CRA, we hope to one day have them join the city of Clearwater. To make it a more streamlined approach, we include policy direction that when those annex, the overlay would be assigned at the time of annexation instead of having to follow up with a land use plan amendment rezoning. So that worked out really well for U.S. 19, and so we're carrying that through. And just to clarify for the public, and when I'm talking about annexations, we're not actively going out and doing anything. As you all know, we still rely on voluntary annexations, but when we start talking about people's properties, I want to make sure they know kind of where our limits are right now.
Well, we'd love to have them.
We would absolutely love to have them, though.
Make it easier on everybody if we could.
So we'll soon have great incentives for them.
Well taken.
So this is the slide that addresses the staff identified amendments, and it's not really a change. Our community development code has a full section on what's called a termination of status of nonconformity. So if you wanted to name something more bureaucratically, I would challenge you to do so, because that one I always stumble over. But we've long provided property owners the ability to terminate a nonconformity if they have one. There's a process. It's a level two. The community development board has to approve it. And there's certain criteria that have to be met. But we realized there was nothing actually setting that policy direction in the comprehensive plan, and so we're taking the opportunity to do that. The proposed policy QP 5.1.5, so in the quality places element, addresses residential properties. Sometimes there's going to be a property that might be too small when you do the math to actually end up with one dwelling unit. We already allow you to still build a dwelling unit if it's a residential property, but this formalizes that. And then the second policy addresses those structures that might be nonconforming in other ways. It might be nonconforming to height or setbacks or something else that the property owner would like to request a termination of so they can continue to expand, because otherwise you're not allowed to expand existing nonconformities. So, again, there's a process already established in the code that sets that policy to support what we're already doing. And then, as I mentioned, there were a couple of changes that I'd like to request City Council make at this time. We're seeking approval for a limited number of changes. The first is to remove reference of the overlay under industrial limited. Kind of covered that in the memo, but at this point, we're not – there's no code changes that we would be proposing that would actually affect that property, so it's cleaner just to remove it. And that's shown on page 12 of the redlined version of the ordinance. And then the second would be to remove the IRT zoning, of course, the consistent zoning district since industrial would not be included. Basically, as we've been working through the code, it's really focusing on the commercial and residential areas specifically. And for this one, that is all I have.
We need a reading here. Ordinance number 9860-26. An ordinance of the City of Clearwater, Florida, making amendments to the Clearwater Comprehensive Plan, by amending the Quality Places Chapter to establish a new plan redevelopment district, overlay future land use category, which sets worth residential, non-residential, mixed-use, and impervious surface ratio bonuses, amend the residential low, residential urban, residential low-medium, residential high, residential office general, commercial general, and institutional. Future land use categories to incorporate bonuses for qualifying development in the planned redevelopment district overlay. At policies requiring the portions of the North Greenwood community redevelopment area, be designated with planned redevelopment district overlay on the future land use map, and referring to a new North Greenwood district on the zoning atlas. Add policies addressing non-conforming structures and uses and provide for termination of non-conformities. The process established in the Community Development Code, update existing policies for consistency with changes, certifying consistency with the City's Comprehensive Plan, and proper advertisement, providing for severability and providing an effective date.
Okay, that was a lot. Does anyone want to hear from the public tonight desire to speak to Agenda Item 6.1?
Good evening. My name is Barbara Sori-Love, and I am President of the Clearwater African American Foundation, Inc. Our mission is to preserve and interpret the African American history of Clearwater Pinellas County. We are committed to continuously engaging a diverse audience through meaningful programs, exhibitions, and community initiatives. By fostering understanding and respect for diversity, we strive to promote social justice, cultural pride, and unity within our community. First, we say thank you, Mayor Rector and Clearwater City Council, for your collective conversations, initiatives, and plans to improve the North Greenwood community. Our concern today is how many of the estimated 7,000 citizens living in the North Greenwood CRA are aware of the move today of 6.1, which is to approve amendments to the Clearwater Comprehensive Plan, to establish a new planned development district, overlay future land use category with associate bonuses, incorporate policies for a new North Greenwood community overlay district, and add comprehensive plan policy support for existing nonconformity procedures in the Community Development Code, and pass Ordinance 9860.26 on first reading. And these board members are members of the North Greenwood community. So what we're asking today is to postpone the first reading until after the June 3rd meeting in the community with the coalition and the city of Clearwater, and that is our suggestion.
My name is LaDrella Jenkins. I was born and raised in the North Greenwood community. You all call it North Greenwood. I call it the Grove. The lady that went before us, she had a historical landmark there, which was the Park Theater. Next to it was Larkin's funeral home. So I have a problem with it because I still reside in that community. I'm seeing my community vanish. Other people who don't have a connection, never had a connection until now, it's coming in there and removing my history. I don't have a problem with progression, us moving forward, unification. I come from working with people of all backgrounds, culture, the diversity. I can understand everybody. I respect everybody. But don't erase my history. It's like you leaving your house this morning and you go back to put the key in the door and it don't fit. Help us to restore or let us restore and let the community have some say about what happens in the Grove. The way to get it out is we all need to connect and communicate through the churches. They have church announcements. Send it out. Some of the older residents, they're not computer savvy. They don't have the iPhone where it can get text messages or know how to go to a website. Send it out in their utility bills so that they can know what is going on and what is happening in our community. It's going away. Spring break, I took my two 16-year-olds. They know where Nana grew up. They knew what Nana was as a four-year-old, a teenager. You're removing a lot of the history. Let's put some of the street names of the people that came from that community and built from that community. We had lawyers and doctors and teachers that came out of that community. That's where I got my footing to be an educator. Because someone invested in me. The same grounds that now I knew as a first grader, I knew that that was Rose Cemetery. When we played on the playground or we were digging to make a garden, we found people's gold teeth and parts of the body. That is now, my father told me it was called Rose Cemetery. I remember these things as a child. The hikes over there. I had relatives that had a supper club. I remember that. Well, housing was supposed to come over there. There's no, it's not there. I'm done.
Thank you, Ms. Jenkins. Ms. Jenkins. Ms. Jenkins, appreciate your comments. Would you mind filling out a comment card for us? Thank you. Thank you. Well, no, appreciate your comments. Just, you know, thank you. Anyone else from the group?
Yeah.
Okay.
Bring me a call. But I just wanted to speak. I am 80 years old come October. I was born on Ewing Street, E-W-I-N-G, right where the Courtyard Hotel is. It's a street right there. And I was like the fourth house down on that street, born in the home by a mid-mother. And the Grove was also a home at one time because at one point the hikes went away. They were redeveloping to bring the downtown up to, all the way up to where Missouri is. It never happened. But the people mostly was gone away. I had three uncles and a father that, grandfather, I'm sorry, that had homes. And within that block from Cleveland Street to Court Street were mostly family with their own homes. I grew up there. I went away because my father was in the military. So for like five years I was not there and came back in fifth grade. And I went to school over in the hikes. And I went on to Pinellas High School and I graduated. I got married and I moved away to the Washington, D.C. area. Forty-one years, returned back home. Only to find now, I bought a place, North Greenwood area. But only to find out now that it's happening again where most of the people that live in my community both times is about to be maybe gone because I built new. And my taxes went up tremendously. The cost of the house, first of all, because of COVID and because of the real estate crisis during that period, it went up. But I took a chance of doing it. But then the taxes went up. I'm retired. I'm making it because I learned to budget. I stayed in D.C. area. It's not cheap. So I learned to budget. But at the same token, to come back home because I thought D.C. was too expensive for me to stay up there. And I most likely would have to continue to work. But I get back home and it's almost like I might have to start back to work at 80. I don't think I can do that. But what I'm saying is to see your community both times disappear. And when I came back and most of the historical theme has disappeared and just recently D.L.F., which is historical, is gone.
And thank you for filling out a comment card for us. Thank you, ma'am. Is there anyone else here tonight that would like to speak this to you tonight? It's not already spoken. Okay. Okay. With that, we'll move to council discussion.
Yeah. I have a couple questions. Thank you so much for coming in, Ms. Barbara, sorry, love in your group. We have a lot of excitement internally about the abilities that we have for helping our North Greenwood community and what many of them would say finally and helping them grow and helping them beautify and be more resilient and survive. It's definitely important that we find ways to not just do all those things while erasing history. So I have a twofold question kind of for us internally to think about is what are we doing to make sure that we are really opening those doors of community engagement and education and bringing that community in for buy-in as we continue to move forward if this truly is for the benefit of their good? And number two, do we have plans in place in identifying certain historical markers and directions that we want to make sure we're preserving in those processes?
If I may. Yeah. Regarding the engagement, I know we had such good momentum going with the community coming to all of our meetings pre-storms and some staff turnover and other issues. I don't want to sound defensive at first, just to keep that in mind. I mean, we have the advisory committee for the North Greenwood CRE advisory committee, and I've made several presentations there, at least in an effort to get out to a group of people and kind of bring them, you know, tell them where we were with everything. But we have a robust engagement to come with the code piece itself because that will provide many more answers than where we are at this stage, which is, you know, the policy piece. I would emphasize that this is an opt-in piece, right? Nothing changes for a property owner unless they want to do something different. I would reinforce that one of the biggest things that we heard during the CRA plan adoption was how, or one of those biggest challenges or questions that was posed to us was how to deal with the potential of gentrification. And that's why the plan itself has a wide variety of social policies as well as other policies and programs called out for the CRA. So certainly planning and development is working side by side with CRA through all of this. So I think this is a good reminder that we need to have those conversations. This was very helpful as a reminder also of different ways to know how the community gets their news or information. We have a variety of things that we do, but a couple of things that were mentioned were not necessarily on my list, so I've jotted them down and we'll be adding them to our checklist for when we are ready to have those meetings. You know, again, in the Community Development Code, what we have, we think, matches the vision. Some of you were able to make it out when we did what we called Game of Zones, the activities where we actually had little mini buildings and placed them on sites and worked through. And that was our goal was to affirm that vision, right? And that vision was within the majority of the residential area and along North Rainwood being revising, revitalizing, making it possible again to have that thriving main street, where now our current Community Development Code makes it a little more challenging to do that type of development, that more traditional development. And in the residential areas, really making those incremental improvements. And what that means, at least to me, is, you know, one parcel at a time as opposed to it being necessary to aggregate and build at a block scale. The community wants, you know, one or two more units here, four units there, not brand new major apartment complexes. They recognize that the CRA broadly has that growth already planned for within the Old Bay community area that's part of the downtown redevelopment plan. It's very odd to have something that's in, you know, that's governed by a plan but is part of this CRA. But that redevelopment, that large growth, that more intense area is over by the marina and everything there. But with that growth benefits then the rest of the neighborhood and the programs and everything that the CRA has in there, at least would be bringing forward to the trustees for consideration as different programs are developed. That was a longer answer probably. Oh, as to the historic preservation, that has come up at the advisory committee meetings. I've not been part of any additional conversations, but I know it's been brought up, so I'm sure staff have had at least some initial conversations perhaps. But I couldn't speak to those.
Councilmember Cotton? No, go ahead. Do you have a follow-up, please?
No, I was just going to say I appreciate the answer. Our Greenwood community worked hard for a number of years on establishing that CRA. Yes, they did. And that wasn't an internal push. That was an external community push. One of our biggest challenges in that push was the building of trust and trust within our community and with our elected officials in our city. We have to continue to build on that. And I think the biggest measure of doing that is through communication and identifying how we communicate and getting that message out. We've always known from the beginning of building this that displacement was going to be a fear. And fear of changes, especially when we start talking words of comprehensive changes in overlay districts, that allows fears to creep in and to break down trust. I think it's vitally important that we do exactly what they're suggesting and reach out to our leadership and in our churches and in the Urban League Coalition and to Barbara Story Love, who's engaged in just about everything through the community. But I think we need to treat this one a little differently than we do in some of our other communities because it's designed differently and it is unique and beautiful in its own way. So I appreciate the response. I am supportive of it for the reason of what you said of this isn't changing anything, right? This is giving an overlay and giving an option for things to happen in the future. And they don't have to make any adjustment and changes to fall into code. It's not making changes to it. So I am supportive of it for that.
Sorry. If I may add to that just briefly, the other advantage of this process, the way it works with the comprehensive plans, it goes to the state for review and all of that. But if, you know, as a consensus, if we thought that additional changes were made, we're able to make amendments on second reading because we transmit again to the state. And it's all built into the process. So as we continue working on these next pieces, you know, if anything, if we identify anything, we would bring it forward to city council for your consideration. That's for recovery.
Yes, thank you. Thank you for the presentation. Thank you all for coming and voicing your concerns. I greatly appreciate that. It's very important to hear from the members that live directly within the community. And I'm kind of piggybacking on what your question was, and that is this. How does this overly ensure that existing residents can benefit and not be displaced? Because the CRA vision emphasizes reinvestment and aging in place, but that implementation matters. So as we can see, you know, we have some of the members that have already come out. I know that you've reached out to the, or already spoken to the advisory board that's been active. And also the place of the buildings exercise you've done. But maybe you can speak a little bit more to that while answering that, making sure that these members aren't going to be displaced.
Sure. So, I mean, if you have the ability to do a little bit more with your property, right, then maybe, you know, through an amendment like this, as I mentioned, like a lot of the parcels are pretty small in North Greenwood, and this might enable that, you know, one additional unit. What does that mean? Someone could add a second unit, make it a duplex, live in one side, rent out the other half. Or, you know, you could move in with a family member. It's a different approach than what we already enable through the accessory dwelling units. I have, you know, if I can use the overhead. This is just a few examples of what missing middle housing could be. You know, these are things that are not easily built today. We could, but it would be a process. So I don't want to sugarcoat it there. But, you know, there's cottage courts. These were much more traditional, you know, long before our zoning code was established, right? So you could take a slightly larger parcel in the area, and you could, what we would like to enable is that you could build multiple smaller units that would allow people to stay in the community. We've talked about, you know, the traditional Main Street, and a lot of that comes with doing more of a live-work set. So these are all from the website for the missing middle book and organization that does it. So you can see on this, you know, it's taking a 25-foot wide by 120-foot parcel, and creating that Main Street downstairs with mixed-use upstairs. And something, this additional bonus would make it possible with the code amendments that come. It's hard to get it all stacked at the same time. I did look just to see, and this is a lot, but this is really just a map of right around where the container village is planned, on Tangerine and Martin Luther King, and just glancing at it on the east side of Martin Luther King in this area, a lot of the lots are what we would call substandard per the regular code, because they're only 40 feet by 90 feet. They could have one dwelling unit now. With this change, it's not dramatic, but it would allow up to three units. On the west side, I saw there were a number of properties that were a little bit bigger, so they might be more appropriate for that cottage court or something like that. But as an example, currently, under the residential medium category that's designated now, which allows 15 units per acre, they could get two units. They could have six. And, again, it's that entitlement that will be coupled with the zoning district, and it's really important, and the onus is on us at staff and with our consultant team to craft that code to get the form using that. You know, what Tampa gets is the 3,000-square-foot townhouses. What we want is something much more compatible with the existing character of the neighborhood. They have a great, you know, in planning we use the word, like, fabric and things, but they have a great community, and no substantial change is desired. But as a property owner, you might want to do something a little different. Or, you know, there might be a little bit more housing and thus enabling people to stay because there's other wider variety of housing choices. I did – oh, sorry. I was pulling graphics. I got a little crazy. But these are some more graphics. In this instance, the gray buildings are kind of what would have been considered the existing, and then the gold kind of shows how, you know, you can fit these into the existing fabric. Like, that's the whole philosophy behind it. And, again, really the onus is on us for the code. And this is a comparable where, you know, some of it might be more appropriate closer to the Main Street, which if you could envision this is what we've heard and seen, you know, Martin Luther King Avenue could look like what it wants. We have some sample projects. Throughout the coding effort, the devils in the details, as they say, and we're picking properties and testing it. And if we're not getting what we want, then we're tweaking numbers and really digging in on it. So we've had the benefit of – for Pinellas, they have been helping us using ESRI, so some GIS tools to test everything as well. So we are treating this one much differently. It deserves to be it. It's a very different case, but it also really helps us learn and grow for future projects in the city.
Awesome. I appreciate that articulation because I think it matters, right? Because, I mean, we have this group here that's obviously listening intently and that others will be watching because it's their community, right? It's their portion of Clearwater, the Grove, that they've mentioned that they don't call it North Greenwood because it's home to them, right?
Right.
So that's why I want to make sure that we're hitting these things and articulating it and showing exactly that, hey, we are taking community input as well as listening to our residents to ensure that what the community would like to see happens. So I'm going to press you with this one, too. In regards to staff's vision, what does this overlay district, if it gets passed, look like in five years? What's success?
I would say success is we have several projects that the CRA has, I believe it was the CRA, sometimes I get, you know, there's a few entities involved, that we have interest in on Martin Luther King for some mixed use. Success would be that that is able to be constructed with minimal process because that would be aligned with the vision. Success for me just in the near term would be a very good turnout, again, at our community engagement when we're ready to ask those questions. We're using that time. Again, there's a couple different paths we can take. We don't want to choose. That's the community's decision, so we want to run those past them. Success would be, you know, more housing types, hopefully some of these unique ones. We find a way to find the development partners. We're getting that with the container village already stretching our limits. We're using the avenues that we have available now. But it's really pulling all staff together from all the different departments to find a way to make it happen. I'd like it to be easier for people. You know, this is what was traditionally built in areas, and it's kind of returning back to that, which is appropriate in this area and not necessarily throughout the city. So, awesome.
Thank you for that. I greatly appreciate it, you know, and pointing back to the CRA, and that's where, you know, a lot of this comes from. And those members that grew up in that community and know it and can see and feel the heartbeat of that specific area, I think it's really important. I think Kennard, you know, the president of the North Greenwood CRA, does a great job, too. And I think this is exciting. I'm also supportive, but I think asking those questions so that you can articulate it to those in attendance and to those that will watch in the future and go through there is really important. Just because, you know, we've got the presentation, and there's a lot of, as you would say, devils in the details that don't get articulated. So, you know, I'm not trying to, you know, put you on the spot, but at least get to those things that people might want. This is a perfect graphic, and I think your explanations have been fantastic. So thank you very much.
Ms. Martin.
So in my mind, what makes the CRA unique and beautiful was that it was initiated and championed from beginning to end by the community, and we value that. We've had several interactive exercises where I can say I learned a lot, and I felt that the community had a voice, and I learned what they wanted. And that's why I know for myself, I think the advisory board has a very important role. And I know that I fought for those roles to be opened up to renters versus just property owners, right? So we have equal representation. That advisory board has continued to be connected and stay connected. Your voice is important. You did bring up a good point, which is we have to improve our communications, maybe by adding different formats. But I am in support of this because this is an opt-in option that will increase flexibility and facilitate what we all want, right, which is a successful CRA, and not think of it as this unknown. It's just look at it as a tool for us to get to the end, and the community will be continuing and will continue to communicate and exchange ideas and make sure that your voice is heard.
Mr. Mayor, just a couple of comments. Lauren has been, since she's taken over the role, has been the director. And also, as she mentioned, staff has left. We've lost our main consultant who we used on this. She has really taken this personally, and she's been the advocate in this to the forum and the way that it is today. So I want to appreciate her and share that with you. The second thing I want to say is that she mentioned that she's been before the North Greenwood CRA Advisory Board on several occasions to talk about these various parts of the project, as well as provide some details similar to what she's sharing with you this evening. And that group has been very supportive, almost to the point of asking, what's taking so long, right? When is this going to come forward? So, as she mentioned, this is kind of a first step to really trying to fine-tune what the framework is going to be of what it looks like eventually. But there are steps to get there, and this is that first step, vital first step. And I think from a regulatory standpoint, it's a first step that I think for a lot of you is a long time coming. So I just want to say that on the record to let you know I think she has done this the right way. And going forward, we'll do whatever we need to do to make sure no leave, no rock is unturned, no leaf is turned over. And I'm familiar with this process. We've got to do it differently. That's fine. You know, we'll do that, too. But I want you to understand and be comfortable that Lauren has definitely done a great job here in this space. Thanks.
Okay. I just want to say a couple things before we start. I heard everything that you ladies came to say tonight. I appreciate all of it. It's consistent with some of what I've heard. I did go to one or two of the forums, and I heard particularly on maintaining the makeup of the community, not gentrifying. I heard that loud and clear the early tonight, but also the community forum, and that's certainly not what we want to do. We want to improve that neighborhood for all. And so, ma'am, Mr. Jenkins, you came up and talked about, you know, different things that were important to you. And then, ma'am, the, you know, 80 years old, and we're glad to have you back here in Clearwater. We want to keep you back here in Clearwater. But maintaining that historical significance, that's what we want to do. And maintaining the community, the makeup of the community as it is, that's what we want to do. This overlay is just, I think, and hopefully they've shared some things tonight that maybe you heard or heard differently tonight than maybe you understood it coming in. But hopefully this overlay creates some opportunities for us to be better able to do that because we'll be better able to do those things if we get some economic interest in the neighborhood that will allow us to, you know, and to partner with folks who can maintain those historic places and partner with this because, you know, we're limited on tax revenues and what we can do and can't do right now. But if we had partners interested in coming in and preserving those things, and you talked about affordability, we all hear from all of our residents. I think every elected official in the state of Florida hears from residents about affordability, very important to us, very important to you. But the ability maybe to add a dwelling to your property to generate some extra income for you or to somehow offset some of your expenses may or may not be enough. So hopefully you've heard some things here tonight, but what I've heard is that we're just doing an overlay tonight. It's not making anyone do anything. And hopefully we can continue to work together as a community to come up with these ideas on how to help everyone in the community succeed and maintain these goals that you all come up here tonight and share with us. So I didn't know any of that, anything what you've shared, any concerns about this until you came tonight. I may have missed an email somewhere. I don't think I missed a phone call, but maybe I missed it somewhere. But thank you for coming tonight to share that. Because those things just reaffirm what I'd already heard from some of your neighbors, because those things are very important to you. And at least I and I think the others heard those loud and clear. And we'll keep those in mind as we go forward. But I think tonight, I appreciate the work of the staff. It's a lot of work to support the CRA and appreciate all that work, too. And tonight, I'm in favor of moving forward. You know, we have a beautiful amphitheater down here that's been very successful over two years. And I told somebody the other day, who's visiting from Tennessee, so successful that another, some elected officials from Tennessee wanted to see it. And I told them, the only thing we did wrong here is we waited too long to do it. And we talked and talked and talked about what we would do. And then we finally did it. It turned out great. So I want to move forward with this so that we can have that same success in North Greenwood, the CRA, tonight. So with that, is there any other council discussion? If not, is there a motion?
Move to approve agenda item 6.1 with the red line changes. Second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Anonymous. Thank you. Thank you for coming tonight. Agenda item 6.2.
Approve a city initiate future land use map amendment to apply the planned redevelopment district PRD overlay within the North Greenwood community redevelopment area CRA, excluding areas designated central business district CBD and parcels designated industrial limited IL, transportation utility TU, water preservation P, and recreation open space R-OS, and pass ordinance 9861-26 on first reading.
So good evening. Again, Lauren Matzke, planning and development. This is – oh, I'll wait for my slides.
It's okay.
They're going to look familiar. So this is the second part. This is the future land use map amendment. And I went through a good amount of it in the earlier item. So, you know, as I mentioned, there will be two additional items that will come later this year. But similar to the comprehensive plan amendment, the future land use map amendment has to go to outside agencies. So this sets that, you know, 45- to 60-day process going while we continue with everything else. This is what was just approved. And this is the current future land use map for the area. So I'm going to walk through a series of slides, mostly as to show what's actually being excluded from this because it's difficult with this many colors. If I threw lines over it, it wouldn't really be legible. So you'll see that over 51% of the properties are residential with another almost 40% being non-residential and that environmental recreational component comprising the rest of it. The first piece that is being excluded is the central business district. This is primarily designated as part of the Old Bay character district and is governed by the downtown redevelopment plan. And as I mentioned before, it was always envisioned as the CRA was established that this would be one of the main TIF generators for the rest of the community. So since the downtown plan was already in place and had that vision, it remained in that and will do so going forward. Water also excluded from this amendment. Preservation, there's a little over 11 acres of land that's designated as preservation that will also be excluded. No overlay applied. We have over 27 acres of parkland in the North Greenwood area. This is also excluded from the overlay. So no changes proposed at all. And similar to the other one, I'm respectfully requesting a couple of additional changes at this time. As mentioned, Industrial Limited. We would like to remove that because we're not actually doing any coding changes for that portion of land that's on that southern boundary. But additionally, there's a portion of land that's designated as transportation utility. I didn't even think about it on the last amendment. So on this one, it was shown on the map incorrectly. This is where the Marshall Street plant is. There is obviously a lifespan for that. And if when that changes, we would go through a process to amend the future land use map to change it from transportation utility to some other district or category at the time. And if additional planning efforts were needed, we could do that. So then, well, what does that leave? Well, I have an error on this slide I discovered today because there is nothing actually designated residential low-medium. But there are four residential categories remaining, residential low, residential urban, residential medium, and residential high. And then we have the mixed-use category of residential office general. We have commercial general, which is primarily along Martin Luther King. But not to forget, there's a whole portion designated commercial general to the west, just north of the downtown, so in between Garden and – or Fort Harrison and Myrtle Avenue headed north. And then there's pockets of institutional kind of scattered throughout. So if council approves ordinance 9861 with the proposed changes, just under 500 acres would have this overlay established, and that would mean that they'd be eligible for the previously mentioned density, intensity, or mixed-use bonuses if they choose to. Because this amendment establishes new entitlements for the properties, there was a much more detailed staff analysis included within the agenda package that reviewed for all the different criteria that the Community Development Code establishes for future land use map amendments. At a big scale like this, it makes it just a little bit more difficult because, obviously, not all properties are expected to redevelop. Very few would actually reach that maximum potential for various reasons. So you'll note that staff – we rely a lot on the analysis that we had done just in the last couple of years within the CRA. So since this was a continuation of that, there was – mostly relied on that analysis, and then we found that the proposal was consistent with all of these criteria in the code. And with that, I can answer questions specific to the map amendment.
Does anyone want to hear – let's go right in first. Ordinance number 9861-26. Ordinance of the City of Clearwater, Florida, amending the future land use element of the comprehensive plan of the city. To apply the planned redevelopment district overlay as an overlay category in addition to the existing residential low, residential urban, residential medium, residential high, commercial general, institutional, and residential office general. Future land use categories for certain real property located within the boundaries of land known as the North Greenwood Community Redevelopment Area. And excluding those portions of the North Greenwood CRA, which are designated with the Central Business District, Recreational Open Space, Preservation, and Water Future Land Use Categories. As more specifically, I did find an attached Exhibit A and as depicted in attached Exhibit B, all within the City of Clearwater and providing an effective date.
Is there anyone in front of the public desire to speak to this again? Could we have that child feel out of comment? Seeing none, is there any council discussion? If there is none, is there a motion?
Motion to approve agenda item 6.2.
Second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Unanimous. Gen item 6.3.
Amend the City's fiscal year 2025-26 operating and capital improvement budgets at first quarter and pass ordinances 9901-26 and 9902-26 on first reading.
Good evening, Mayor and Council, Kayleen Castle, Budget Director. This is the first quarter budget review for the fiscal year 2025-26 budget. This report reflects three months of activity, October through December, and also includes council action to date. In the general fund, revenues and expenditures are increased by $214,262. This represents an allocation of reserves to fund the leave payout of the former city attorney. Adjusted for that only agenda item that we cover for the general fund, reserves are approximately $74.9 million, or 33.4% of fiscal year 2025-26 general fund expenditure budget. This exceeds our minimum reserve requirement by $55.8 million at first quarter. In the water and sewer fund, amendments reflect an allocation of $19.3 million. This is recognized as a transfer from reserves to the capital fund for the sanitary sewer R&R project. And in the parking fund, expenditures are increased by $38,712, and this is for a previously approved amendment to the spring break Jolly Trolley contract. And budgeted revenues in the parking fund are sufficient to cover this expenditure increase. In the capital improvement fund, a net increase of $26,120,786 is reflected at first quarter, and this is primarily related to the following amendments, all of which were previously approved by the council. $949,500 is recognized in grant revenues from the U.S. Department of Energy in the Solar North Greenwood Recreation and Countryside Library Project. $3,366,540 in grant revenues are recognized from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and the Sanitary Sewer Extension Project. Just mentioned, the $19.3 million is transferred from the Water and Sewer Fund Reserves to the Sanitary Sewer R&R Project. And we are recognizing $880,000 in grant revenue from FDOT and the match of $220,000 in reimbursement revenue for the Aviation Operations Center Project. Other significant amendments to capital projects in this report include an increase of $36,417 in elective pay rebates that we received in the Green Print Implementation Project, an increase of $246,320 for reimbursements received in the police CAD replacement project. We've received $185,442 of property owner share revenues in the Pasco Line Relocation and Pinellas New Mates Projects, both of those are gas projects. And we're recognizing a decrease of $56,000 in governmental revenues that were budgeted in the facilities upgrade and improvement projects, a water sewer project. Also, an increase of $321,672 in grant revenues received in the pump station replacement project, an increase of $164,200 in reimbursements received in the reclaimed water distribution project, and an increase of $405,700 in the arts and cultural affairs project, and this represents the 1% art funding that we've transferred from other capital projects, and an increase of $86,518 in FEMA reimbursements received in the South Basin Attenuator Project. In this special program fund, an increase of $3,816,102 is reflected at first quarter. Significant amendments in that fund include $160,000 allocated from fund reserves for increased costs of the feasibility study, $213,448 in public safety grant and governmental revenues, $885,467 in contractual service revenues received for police extra duty, an increase of $904,391 from the juvenile welfare board for $25,26 after school and summer programs, and this also includes the addition of 5.2 new full-time equivalent positions that were approved by you in that new contract. We have an increase of $249,934 in fines and court proceeds. This is received in public safety programs and in the tree replacement program over the last quarter, an increase of $470,911 for the Brownfield Revolving Loan Fund Grant Program. And in the last quarter, we've received $296,133 in special event revenues from the Turkey Trot, Mama Duck's visit, and the Sea Blues Festival. We have received $66,114 of donations in police and library programs, and there are various amendments to special programs which total $89,692, and this reflects revenues received over the last few months from applications, reimbursements, and interest earnings. And finally, a total of $475,613 has been transferred between special programs. I'd be happy to answer any questions that you have.
Does anyone want to hear from the public tonight desire to speak to this agenda? Hearing, seeing none, is there any council discussion? If there's none, is there a motion?
Motion to approve agenda item 6.3.
So, ordinance number 9901-26, ordinance of the City of Clearwater, Florida, amending the operating budget for the fiscal year ending September the 30th, 2026, to reflect increases to revenues and expenditures for the general fund, water and sewer fund, parking fund, and special program fund, as provided here in providing an effective date. Ordinance number 9902-26, ordinance of the City of Clearwater, Florida, amending the capital improvement budget for the fiscal year ending September the 30th, 2026, to reflect a budget increase of $26,120,786, providing an effective date.
Now, did that change anyone's mind on the public who wants to speak? So, seeing, hearing, and any council discussion? Now, is there a motion?
Motion to approve agenda item 6.3 again.
Second. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Unanimous. To an item 6.4.
Approve an annual general permit in the amount of $4,000 with Pinellas County to construct and maintain natural gas facilities and authorize the approved officials to execute saying.
Good evening. I'm Jeff Elliott, the gas manager in engineering, and I just wanted to ask for this purpose of this item is just for an annual general permit. It's $4,000. It has some identification language for the council, but a standard permit, so light activity, light maintenance that we would do as far as extending facilities, running service lines, maintaining cloud protection, that's what it is. So we just respectfully ask for approval for that agenda item.
Okay. So anyone here from the public tonight desires to speak for this agenda? You're seeing none. Is there any council discussion? If there's none, is there a motion?
Move to approve agenda item 6.4. Second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Do you know this? Thank you. Do you know item 6.5?
Authorized purchase orders to multiple vendors listed for purchase of fleet parts in the annual not-to-exceed amounts of $3 million for a one-year term with three one-year renewal options pursuant to ITB 10-26 and Clearwater Code of Orange's sections 2.563 per n1a, single source, and 2.563 per n1c, piggyback, and authorized to appropriate officials to execute same.
Good evening, Mayor, City Council, City Leadership, Randy Clandreia, Director of General Services. Before you is a request to approve a purchase order to multiple vendors for an invitation to bid 10-26 for fleet parts contract. This item replaces contract number 902523, which was previously approved by City Council on October 15, 2025. This contract, 902523, relied heavily on multiple piggybacks to meet the needs of our diverse fleet. The invitation to bid 10-26 is a competitively solicited award written specifically to support the City of Clearwater's fleet operations. The annual not-to-exceed amount is $3 million for one year with three one-year renewals for a total potential value of $12 million. This award consolidates vendors, stabilizes pricing, and strengthens our ability to maintain city vehicles and equipment. And I'm available should you have any questions or concerns.
To anyone in the public, then I desire to speak at this agenda. Hearing, seeing none, is there any council discussion? If not, is there a motion?
Motion to approve, agenda item 6.5.
Second.
All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Inanimous. Thank you. And item 6.6.
Authorize the purchase order of Jeffrey Allen, Inc. of Tampa, Florida, for the purchase of 11-2026 club car carry-all carts in the amount of $248,439.84. Pursuant to clear water code of warranties section 2.563-1-C, piggyback authorized lease purchase under the City's master lease purchase agreement or internal financing via an inter-fund loan from the capital improvement fund, whichever is deemed to be in the City's best interest. Declare G5-263, G5-264, G5-265, G5-266, G5-267, G5-268, G5-269, G5-270, G5-271, G5-272, and G5-273 surplus. And authorize disposal by auction or trade and in pursuant to clear code sections 2.63-6 and 7, whichever is deemed to be in the City's best interest and authorized appropriate officials execute same.
Good job.
Good evening, Mayor, City Council, City Leadership. Again, Brandi Cullendaria, Director of General Services. Before you is an item to replace 11 club carts for the Parks and Rec Department, the beach operations. These are being replaced. We're asking to replace. They should have been replaced in 2027. We purchased them in 2022. However, due to the corrosion from the salt water and the heavy usage along the beach, we're going to have to replace them slightly ahead of schedule. So we are asking to support this purchase, and we're available. Should you have any questions or concerns?
Casey, I want to hear from the public, and I desire to speak to this tonight. Any council discussion? Councilor McCartney.
I do want to say thank you for the last agenda item. When, you know, I talk about making sure that we're streamlining things, I know he's looking for more competitive bids for some reason that escaped me before going into, you know, doing the motion. So thank you very much for the diligence in getting that contract going.
Thank you. It was a team effort. Procurement played a big part in that, too, so I would like to say thank you to the procurement team.
Awesome. Yeah. Thank you, everybody.
And I just want to comment on this agenda item, too, the carts. These things get heavy, heavy use. I mean, they're used every day. They're out there seven days a week, 365 days a year, keeping the beach clean, keeping our tourists and bringing in all that revenue that helps all of our taxpayers. So I appreciate the need here because these are very important carts and vehicles.
Thank you. We're happy to support. Okay.
That is any other discussion. We'll turn it through a motion.
Motion to approve it in item 6.6.
Second.
All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you. To an item 6.7.
Approve a purchase order of universal protection services, LLC, doing business as allied universal security services for security services in the annual not to exceed amounts of $300,000, which includes additional added services throughout the term of contract, including special events for a one-year term with four one-year renewal options pursuant to RFP 01-26 security services and authorize the appropriate officials to execute same.
Good evening again. Mayor, city council, city leadership, Brandy Calendria, director of general services. Before you is the request to approve a purchase order to a newly awarded vendor, the universal protection services, doing business as allied universal security services. For citywide security services. This resort, uh, this award is a result of RFP request for proposal 01-26, which is a competitive solicitation issue to obtain trained, licensed, uniformed securities officers for city facilities and special events. Allied universal was the highest ranked proposer following the evaluation process. The contract will replace the prior agreement with century event services, contract number 901-449. This coverage is awarded to include city hall, municipal services building, the municipal service parking garage, the, uh, station square parking garage, and the garden Avenue parking garage, along with additional support for special events. The annual not-to-exceed amount is $300,000 with a one-year term and four one-year renewals with a possible contract value of $1.5 million contingent upon, um, annual budget appropriations. And I'm happy to address any questions or concerns you may have on this contract.
Yeah. So I want to hear from the public that I desire to speak to this agenda. I'm saying none is there any council discussion, okay? None is there a motion.
Move to approve agenda item 6.7. Copy. I mean, second. I don't know where that came from. Just, uh, we're in a fire department mode there, so you got some fire service talking.
We may need to take a recess after this motion. We should. Copy. We're on board. We got this. Let's move on. All right. Yep. Lock in. All those in favor? All right. Opposed? Unanimous.
Thank you very much.
We will take a recess eventually. That's great. But I think we'll move on for now. Unanimous 6.8.
Authorized a purchase order to PowerNet, Inc., Cincinnati, Ohio, for software licensing, maintenance, voice trunking, long-distance services, hardware backup services, and professional services supporting the city's Microsoft Teams Telephony and Genesis Call Center. Originally implemented under RFP number 06-23 for an 11-month term from April 9, 2026 through March 9, 2027, and not to exceed amounts of $167,600.10 pursuant to Clearwater Code of Ordinances, Section 2.563, paren 1, paren D, non-competitive purchase, and authorize the approved official sex casing.
Mayor, Council, Dan Mayer, IT Director. This really has two parts. This is licensing for our call center software that manages customer service, and the second part is the network operations center that hosts our telecommunications, which is in Cincinnati. It's 11 months because we have a credit. Unlike most vendors, they didn't start our licensing until we were live on their product, which is quite generous. So this is 11 months. We will go out to bid or piggyback because there are state providers now that were not there at 11 months. So probably March of next year we'll be bringing a new provider or potentially powering that back to you for renewal. I'll take any questions.
Does anyone here from the public tonight desire to speak to this agenda? I'm seeing none. Is there any council discussion?
I just have a quick question. I'm fully supportive. My question is, in reading some of this language, it kind of highlights our reliance and pretty deep reliance on PowerNet. Do we have any plans of redundancy if this cost became exorbitant or if we lost this provider?
I mean, yeah, there are others, and that's what I was saying. They do have two data centers. We're primarily in Cincinnati. Lumen and Carousel are now available for the same service, and they support Genesis. So that's what's unique about PowerNet is they were both a Genesis reseller, and they provided the NOC services. So we will be looking at the marketplace. But all of them have redundancy. Lumen is the big one. They have a dozen data centers across the country, so we would be looking hard at them. It's not too costly.
Yeah.
Any other discussion?
If not, is there a motion? Motion to approve. Agenda item 6.8.
Roger that. All those in favor?
All right.
Opposed?
Yes. Thank you. Good one.
Good one. Well, I think it's a good time for us to take a recess. I can't do it anyway, so we'll recess for about five minutes.
We're having so much fun.
Call the meeting back to order, and we'll now move to item 6.9 on the agenda.
Approved a construction contract and purchase order to abandon us construction company for the new Air Park Terminal Project in the amounts of $13,659,750 per invitation to bid 23-0015-AP and authorize the appropriate officials to execute it.
Good evening, Council Mayor Mike McDonald, Marine and Aviation Director. This project includes three key components, construction of a new 17,800-square-foot, two-story terminal building to support FBO operations, flight training, and corporate aviation, development of a 200-space parking lot and associated roadway and apron improvements, and airfield upgrades, including mill and overlay of taxiways, stormwater improvements, and pavement rehabilitation to meet FAA and FDOT standards. This project is heavily supported by the Florida Department of Transportation, aviation grant funding, and private investment through our FBO partner, FlyUSA, significantly reducing the financial impact to this city. Under the lease agreement, FlyUSA will reimburse the majority of the local match associated with the terminal and parking components, while the city's primary financial responsibility is limited to specific airfield improvements. The department is continuing to work with FDOT partners to secure more grant funding for these projects. Overall, this project will modernize the airport, enhance safety and operational efficiency, and support continued economic development in our region. Also present today is Barry Shevlin with FlyUSA, who can answer any questions regarding FBO operations or partnership contributions. And also with us is Kyle Hawley with American, with AID, who designed this project. He's also here to answer questions on that bid and the process and any technical questions that you guys might have. Staff respectfully request approval and would be happy to answer any questions.
Does anyone here tonight from the public desire to speak for this agenda item? Hearing, seeing none, is there any council discussion? Councilman Menino?
Thank you. I first just wanted to commend staff on the accumulation of grant money. It's greatly appreciated. I know the taxpayers at Clearwater greatly appreciate that, as well as the partnership with FlyUSA in helping us. I see they also are covering all overages on the project, and that's important to us as a government, giving us that certainty and stability moving forward. I'm excited for the project and the safety enhancements and upgrades and stormwater and everything out there. So thank you for bringing us forward.
We were just driving past Saturday, and I was asking about how this was progressing and moving along. So, you know, executive airports throughout Tampa Bay are incredibly important, and it's upgrading our airports overdue. And it's increasing safety, which is important to all of us. I know the neighborhoods that surround this airport, too. So very great development and partnership with FlyUSA. Mr. Shevlin's here. I know it really takes quite a load off the taxpayers by working this public-private partnership. So thank you for your good partnership on this project. With that, if there's no further council discussion, is there a motion? No.
You got something to say? I was going to say this is exciting, as well. You know, not only is this important to our city, but I think that this is something that maybe people often overlook, but it's important to our county. You know, I mean, that is when storms hit, like big storms that we have, and hopefully we don't have any in the future, one of the only ways that we can get resources into this county will be through that Clearwater Executive Airport. So to see it being revitalized, brought up to better standards, and going to be utilized for the future is a monumental point in our city, and I'm looking forward to it. So thank you for all the work you've done. Thank you for the FlyUSA. Thank you to the state and all the other contractual funds that are going into this, because it will really benefit, really, all of Penn Ellis County. So thank you.
Anybody else? Notice there are a motion.
Motion to approve it as item 6.9.
Second. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Unanimous. Chair and I have 6.10.
Accept for a Department of Transportation grant agreement amendment in the amount of $2.4 million for the construction of terminal and FBO building at Clearwater Executive Airport and authorize the appropriate officials to execute same.
Good evening, Mayor, Council, Mike McDonald, Marine and Aviation Director. This item requests approval of an amendment to an existing FDOT grant for the Clearwater Executive Airport terminal project. The amendment provides an additional $2.4 million in funding, bringing FDOT's total contribution to $3.9 million, or 50% of the project. This increased the total project funding to $7.8 million and reflects updated construction costs identified through the bidding process. The local match will continue to be funded through Penny for Pinellas and reimbursed by FlyUSA, consistent with the approved lease agreement. This amendment does not change the project scope, only ensures sufficient funding to move forward as planned while maximizing state participation. I'll be happy to answer any questions.
Does anyone here from the public, then I desire to speak to this agenda. If not, is there any council discussion? We would like to take the money from the state. Is there any consensus on that? I appreciate, again, as Council Member Cotton said, all of the partners in the state and everyone that's meeting for this. It's really important to our citizens. And thank you for all the partners for this. Absolutely. So is there a motion?
Move to approve agenda item 6.10. Second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you.
Thank you.
To your item 6.11.
Award a construction contract to Creative Contractors, Inc. of Clearwater, Florida, for BayCare Ballpark Firm Wall Repair in the amounts of $1,626,534, pursuant to invitation to bid 26-0002-PR and authorize to appropriate official sex kissing.
Good evening, Mayor, Council Members. I'm Mark Cater, Parks and Recreation Director. Adam for you tonight is to award a contract to Creative Contractors to repair the earthen berm wall that is in the outfield of BayCare Ballpark for an estimated cost of $1.6 million. A typical earthen berm wall will last you 20 to 30 years, and our berm wall just had its 22nd birthday, so we didn't quite make the 30, but our Pannoni Associates, who is our engineer, they have watched this burn for the last 10 years and evaluated it, and they have come to the conclusion that it is time that we replace that wall and fix the wall. So this contract will provide for the construction of a new soil nail shotcrete wall. A small portion of the wall, if you've been behind it, has actually been repaired. It was actually repaired because of the new school board that they just installed. So this will complete the rest of the burn. The repairs will be on the exterior of the ballpark. Therefore, it's not going to interfere with the thresher's game or anything else and can be done without any problem there, nor this work would interfere with any future plans or work that might be done at the stadium. Therefore, I'm available to answer any questions you might have.
Anyone here from the public, and I desire to speak for this agenda item. Hearing and seeing none, is there any council discussion? If not, is there a motion?
Motion to approve agenda item 6.11. Second.
All those in favor? All right. Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you, Mr. Cater. agenda item 6.12.
Approve a construction manager at-risk agreement and pre-construction phase proposal from PJ Hayes, Inc., doing business as tandem construction for Eddie Seymour complex renovations project in the amounts of $93,882 pursuant to RFQ 13-26 and authorize appropriate officials to execute same. All right.
Good evening, Mayor, members of the council. My name is Kelly Petrich. I'm the engineering division manager in the public works department here at Clearwater. Today, I'm bringing forth the overall contract and also the GMP portion for the pre-construction services for tandem construction. This is for the Eddie Seymour press box project. The overall purpose of the press box project is, of course, to replace the existing outdated press box. This will also improve the overall functionality, safety, and aesthetics of the building. This will also support an increased sports tourism with some of our partners like ESPN that have several broadcasts throughout the year at this facility. We're also going to improve the field and site improvements. This is for fields one through four and also the multi-purpose east-west fields. The project actually is currently in 30% design phase, which is actually really a great time to bring on a Seymour. Some of the overall benefits you're going to see from bringing on a Seymour at this phase is usually a more accurate overall project budget at the 60% and 90% phases as well. You're going to see cost savings. You're going to see from a value engineering bringing on the Seymour at this phase. They're going to also provide constructability reviews and an overall improvement of our project schedule. I mean, this is going to be a very tight scheduling project to work around the different seasons for baseball, for softball, I'm sorry. So our overall project timeline for this, the design duration will actually be 10 months for design, which will be a very quick process. And also for the construction duration, we're looking for about 12 months after the notice of receipt process. And the next steps then would be for the GMP, the construction GMP, and we'll return to council. We're hoping around late 2026 this year. Anybody have any questions today on this project?
Okay. Does anyone here from the public today desire to speak to the agenda item 6.12? Hearing, seeing none, is there any council discussion? Just for the public, this is at a Seymour complex. This is in the press box we're talking about. It's where we have the Clearwater Invitational every year. It generates close to 2 million viewers each year on all the ESPN platform of networks. It's been a very successful event. I think we made some commitments to them several years ago to make improvements to the complex, and we're a little bit behind on meeting our commitments on that. But it's just part of the process of keeping the facility nice for that event, but also youth and amateur sports, which are played there all year long. With that, I'll entertain a motion.
Motion to approve. Agenda item 6.12.
Second.
All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you. Unanimous 6.13.
Authorize an agreement between the City of Clearwater and the Carwell Yacht Club, located at 1091 El Dorado Avenue, authorizing the limited use of certain vehicles on public beaches by permit pursuant to recent amendments to Florida Statute 161.58, and authorize the appropriate officials to execute same.
Dan Slatter says the City Manager. Mayor, this one item is almost a companion item to one that was presented to Council a few weeks ago at a previous meeting. I mentioned to you that we had some agreements that were coming later. This particular one with the Yacht Club came back behind it. We'll make them compliant with the new revisions of State Statute 161.5A with regard to vehicles on the beach. We won't have to answer any questions.
You want to hear it tonight from the public? Desire to speak to this agenda item. Hearing same, none. Is there any council discussion? Council Member Menino.
Thank you. Assistant City Manager, have we set an end date of when our vendors need to be in compliance by?
Well, we did inform them that that date has since passed. This was the last meeting that we were going to try to play. We have one more that's still looming. I'm not opposed to bringing it back at a later time individually. We're just trying not to customize agreements for multiple different people and keep it kind of standard, fair, equitable for everybody. But we are actually in pretty good compliance at this point. We just have one outstanding that we're trying to work through some insurance concerns.
Very nice. Thank you.
Okay. Any further discussion? No, is there a motion?
Move to approve agenda item 6.13. Second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you. Agenda item 6.14.
Award a construction contract to Razorback LLC for the Marshall Street Water Reclamation Facility. Clarifier improvements in the amounts of $689,700 pursuant to invitation to bid 24-0066-UT and authorize the appropriate official sex to keep same.
Good evening, Mayor and Council. I'm Mike Planning Public Utilities Director. The item before you is for an award for a construction contract to Razorback LLC for installing density current baffles. Essentially, the currents flow to the outside of these clarifiers, creating the solids to go over the weir, which is where we intend for them exactly to not go. So as they go that way, these baffles will help prevent those currents from flowing in that direction, allow them to settle out as intended. So with Razorback LLC, for the amount of $689,700, it would take 240 days to complete, and this will help us allot in storms. I'm happy to respond to any questions you may have.
Anyone here denied from the public desire to speak to this agenda item? I'm seeing none. Is there any council discussion? If there's none, is there a motion?
Motion to approve. Agenda item 6.14.
Second. Who is in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Unanimous. Agenda item 6.15.
Ratify and confirm a purchase order with Gulf to Bay TLC. Gulf to Bay Boulevard TLC Diversified Inc. A current construction manager at risk for the city for an emergency procurement to repair a 10-inch water main at the intersection of South Keystone Avenue and Gulf to Bay Boulevard in the estimated amounts of $199,402 pursuant to City Code 2.563-1.K emergency and authorized to approve it. Officials execute same.
Good evening. Mayor and Council, my planning public utilities director again. So this, we had a critical water main break at the intersection of South Keystone Ave and Gulf to Bay. We utilized TLC Diversified through a CMAR contract. Actually, TLC Diversified had had the contract. It had lapsed. Now, TLC Diversified has the contract again. So this was that period in between. The amount was $199,402. And they also installed concrete thrust blocks and teams valves to help us maintain service and to keep that reliability as we went through. It's tied to high-performing government. And I'm happy to respond to any questions that you may have.
Anyone here at the knife and the pelvic desire to speak to this agenda? Hearing and seeing none, is there any council discussion? If there's none, is there a motion?
Motion to approve. Agenda item 6.15. Second.
All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Humananimous. Thank you. Agenda item 6.16.
Authorized a purchase order to ACF Standby Systems LLC of Tampa, Florida for the purchase of three mobile diesel engine-driven generator sets in the amounts of $223,285.56 pursuant to clear water code of warrants and sections 2.563.1. Paren C, piggyback, declare G3053, G3062, and G3063, surplus effective upon completion of new generators and authorized disposal at auction or trade-in, whichever is deemed to be in the best interest of the city pursuant to sections 2.623, Paren 7, and Paren 8, and authorize the approved officials to execute same.
Good evening, Mayor, Councilmembers. My name is Wayne LaFleur, Public Utilities Infrastructure Maintenance Manager. I bring to you a – excuse me, Pauline, right? Authorized to purchase three standby generators, very crucial during the hurricane season, for backup on our lift stations and water wells. Three of them were lost in the last hurricane season, and we are looking to replace them before the next hurricane season. So I'm happy to answer any questions.
Does anyone here from the public tonight desire to speak to this agenda? Hearing and seeing none, is there any council discussion? Just a quick question. Councilman Menino.
I see we're replacing these because we lost them during the storms. Have we changed any procedures on how we place them, where we place them, at what elevation we do? If we see this again, how do we protect them so we're not purchasing new again?
So we are updating and amending some of our emergency operation procedures to choose where the generators are being staged, as well as when to remove the generators from that area that could be flooded just in case of high surge, and so this doesn't happen again. Perfect. Thank you. Thank you.
Can I have the assistant city manager?
Let me add a little bit to that, too. Dan Slaughter, assistant city manager. There's also a project, it's not going to necessarily be widely popular, but to elevate the mechanicals on some of the lift stations, such as North Beach, right, so that they don't be subjected to flooding. In some environments, they may not even have the option to remove them, right, because the moment you remove them, you essentially commit yourself to a sewage spill. So until we actually elevate some of these lift station mechanicals, which is a project that's ongoing, we do have the risk of potentially having to deal with this again, but we're certainly mindful in trying to move forward and make these elevated mechanicals as less displeasurable as possible. That makes sense? Yep.
I'm all for as displeasurable as possible. I think we all. That's the best way of saying it. We need further discussion. Awesome.
Okay, is there a motion?
Move to approve agenda item 6.16. I will second that.
All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Humanities. Thank you. To the item 6.17.
Award a purchase order Odyssey Manufacturing Company of Tampa, Florida, for purchase and delivery of liquid sodium hypochloride for water and wastewater treatment facilities in the not-to-exceed annual amounts of $2 million for a one-year term with two one-year renewal options pursuant to invitation to bid number 12-26 and authorize the appropriate officials to execute soon.
Good evening, Mayor and Council. My name is Fred Hemrick, Public Utilities Manager, Water Production Laboratory. So we're asking for your approval to award a purchase order and a contract to Odyssey Manufacturing in Tampa, Florida, for liquid sodium hypochlorite, also known as bleach. This was all pursuant to invitation to bid 12-26, and Odyssey is the lowest, most responsive. The amount of the contract is $2 million annual, not to exceed. We'd like to renew it for up to three years, and I'd like to know if you all have any questions about this chemical, its applications, or the contract.
Does anyone here from the public tonight desire to speak to this agenda item? Hearing saying none, is there any council discussion? There's none, is there a motion?
Motion to approve agenda item 6.17.
Second. All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Unanimous. Sounds very interesting, but I think we're in item 6.18.
Approve a professional service agreement with CHA Consulting, Inc. of Tampa, Florida, to serve as the water-reclaimed water and well-programmed consultant in the not-to-exceed amount of $9 million for a five-year term pursuant to a request for qualifications 39-25 and authorize the appropriate officials to execute the same.
Good evening, Mayor and Council. Mike Lannigan, Public Utilities Director. This item is for water-reclaimed water and well-program consultant 26-007-UT. Asking for your approval for those professional services, which does program management, design, construction, inspection, or CEI. For potable reclaimed water systems, 44 row water wells are also included as part of this. The amount is $9 million, with the vendor being CHA, for a timeline of five years. It's tied to higher-performing government and environmental stewardship, and I'm happy to respond to any questions that you may have.
Does anyone here from the public tonight desire to speak to this agenda? Hearing and seeing none, is there any council discussion? There's none. Is there a motion?
Motion to approve agenda item 6.18.
Second. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you. Agenda item 6.19.
Approve a construction contract amendment between the City of Clearwater and TLC Diversified, Inc. for the Lyft Station 16 Pierce Street project to revise the contract completion date to January 14, 2026 and finalize project closeout. Approve Stantec Supplemental Work Order No. 6 in the amount of $13,200 for additional engineering services associated with the extended project duration and authorize the appropriate officials to execute same.
Good evening, Mayor, Council City Leadership. Again, this is Mike Flanning, Public Utilities Director. This is for the approval of the contract amendment with TLC Diversified and the supplemental work order with Stantec. The project faced significant delays beyond the original 2024 deadline due to supply chain issues involving a water patrol center, actually with a subcontractor of TLC. As part of the final closeout, the contractor has agreed to a $166,390 reduction in their final payment to compensate the city for additional engineering and management costs. This also provides $13,200 for additional engineering of record to finalize the record drawings with Stantec. I'm happy to respond to any questions you may have.
Anyone here from the public tonight desire to speak with this agenda? Hearing, seeing none, is there any council discussion? If there's none, is there a motion?
Move to approve agenda item 6.19. Second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you. Agenda item 6.20.
Approve six individual work orders with Advanced Engineering Design, Inc. of Pinellas Park, Florida, to provide design, bidding services, and construction administration services associated with the FEMA-funded slope stabilization annual contract totaling $347,923.01 pursuant to RFQ 34-23, Professional Services Continuing Contract, and authorized appropriate officials to execute same.
Good evening, Mayor, members of Council. My name, again, is Kelly Petrich. I'm the Engineering Division Manager here in the Public Works Department. Today I'll be presenting a work order for AED, Inc. Just a little background on what happened here. They do the high velocities from Hurricane Helene and Milton. It's stabilized the bank in six separate locations along Elligator Creek, resulting in large washouts, endangering both private and public infrastructure. As a result of this, these damages were both inspected and submitted for FEMA reimbursement. An AED will basically be providing six separate design packages for six individual sites, and this will require slope stabilization. This was separated out in that order of six separate work orders, and this was to hopefully ensure that FEMA will grant us funding for this project. Due to code compliance and the extent of the damage to the embankments pursuing to the installation of sheet pile, and we're really hoping with the FEMA funds, this will provide a more resilient solution for future storms, and we're really hoping that this will protect the slopes in the future. So now the next steps after this will be we're going to set up an annual contract to carry out the construction, and this low bidder will then come to the next council agenda meeting after we get that in place. This annual contract will, of course, comply with all FEMA requirements and regulations, providing the city with the capacity to respond to large emergency construction projects quickly and efficiently. Any questions on this side?
Anyone here from the public that I desire to speak to this agenda? You can see none in the council discussion. I might add that not only do we hope FEMA will grant the funds, but they will distribute the funds. Of course. It seems to take them a while to disperse. So if no further council discussion, is there a motion?
Motion to approve agenda item 6.20.
Second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you. Agenda item 6.21.
Approve the standard grant agreement in the amount of $3 million between the state of Florida Department of Environmental Protection and the city of Clearwater for the design and construction of four living seawalls, associated shoreline elevation improvements, pursuant to the Clearwater living seawall project, providing state funding with no required match, and authorize the appropriate officials to execute same.
Thank you. Yes, today we're very happy to announce that we were able to reserve this grant, the FTP grant, in the amount of $3 million. There's also no local match required with this grant, which is great. The overall purpose, what we're looking to complete here, is to strengthen the shoreline infrastructure, reduce tidal flooding risk, enhance the marine habitat, and also the water quality. And this will, of course, support our coastal resiliency strategy. The overall project scope here will be design and construct multiple living seawalls throughout the city, and also the bigger part is to elevate existing seawall elevations to reverse wave overtopping, and this will help us meet our code of actually the 5.12 NAVD code that we have. Any questions on this side?
Anyone here from the public tonight desire to speak to this, Jim? Hearing, seeing none. Is there any council discussion? Council Member Cotton?
Yeah, I'd just like to say thank you for working on this and obtaining that grant, especially with no match. That's fantastic, especially to work on something that's, you know, going to be great for our environment and sustain our intercoastal waterways or intracoastal waterways and make us a little bit more resilient. So I'm really looking forward to the implementation of this and seeing, you know, in the next few years how she's working out, because it seems really fantastic. So thank you. Thank you.
Mayor Menino?
Yeah, Mayor, thank you. Very similar. Thank you. Thank you to the team for securing that grant. Anytime it doesn't have to be matched, that's nice. We welcome those, especially the disbursement of it, as the mayor said. Completely supportive of our living seawalls. I think this is a great direction to go. It's not just protecting our most precious asset of our natural resource of our beaches and coastline, but protecting against erosion, enhancing our marine life, and improving water quality in our community, which is vitally important. And as these living seawalls continue to grow and enlarge themselves, they become more stable and more effective. And this is a great route to go, not just human engineering of concrete and rebar, but shifting into that hybrid approach of including natural resources and processes to it. I love that we're going in that direction. I look to see more of it. Thank you.
I just want to add to thank our elected officials through here locally, our legislative delegation, and for appropriating this money through this grant program to allow us to have this project. So with that, is there any further discussion? Motion.
Motion to approve agenda item 6.21.
Second. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you. Jen, item 6.22.
Approve our work order and design professional agreement with WSP USA, Inc. for the Pier 60 repair project to assist in developing rehabilitation plans to repair and harden the existing Pier 60 in the amounts of $708,277 per RFQ 55-25 and authorize the appropriate officials to execute same.
Good evening, Mayor, Councilmembers, Marcus Williamson, Public Works Director. Kelly will go into some of the technical details, but I just want to take a quick moment to thank the legal team. This contract that you're going to see is our new contract agreement, and dealing in the marine environment has some additional challenges, so we're really excited because this one gives us some additional capabilities. So I just want to thank the legal team for all those efforts.
Yeah, today we're here to approve the work order with WSP USA, Inc. This is, of course, for the Pier 60 upcoming project. The overall purpose of this is to repair and harden the Pier 60 following the hurricane damage that occurred last year. This will restore the structural integrity and also improve the resilience of the Pier. And also engineering is looking to do a deep dive analysis to look to alternative methods to protect the Pier from future storms as well. Some of the background with this project, the Pier 60 T section, of course, was damaged by Hurricanes Adalia, Helene, and Milton, so it has taken a lot of damage over the years. The last council direction was actually in June 2nd of 2025, which was to replace the T section in kind. So how we came about actually getting the contract with WSP was we actually went through the RFQ process, and they were selected through five overall firms. They are a great firm that will provide a full service, a multidisciplinary team, a team of actually engineering, marine engineering, architectural, environmental, and also MAP. So they are really a good firm, and we're very excited to move forward with them. Some of the scope of services that we're looking to procure as part of this contract is also a more detailed site investigation and condition assessment. That will be the first part of this process. Based on that, we'll get a summer report with the findings and also alternative analysis. We're going to get preliminary construction cost estimates as well, some of the architectural concepts for some of the peer updates, and also part of today's agenda item is also development up to the 60% design plans. And this is, of course, as the last council approval was to replace the T section. We're also going to have coordination of inspections and repair prioritization for the overall construction process. Some of the overall cost notes, for the public works department, we're very happy to announce that through the fees were actually reduced through our negotiation of this contract, through some of the senior staff rates, and also for the overall project timeline, we're working on an investigation and report. That will be a three-month process. And then we're looking to actually go through the 60% design phase for about four months. So some of our future phases that we're looking on this will, like I stated earlier, engineering will actually do an additional design analysis. And at a future date, if we find any additional design analysis facts, we're actually going to bring that forward for more resilient options to the council on a future date. And then also we'll bring forth a supplemental work order to actually complete this final design, permitting, and construction administration. Any questions on this?
You want to hear from the public tonight, desire to speak the message. So the last time we considered this item, it was kind of like, you know, repairing, put it back together, and then there was another, is this the second phase of that where we're thinking long-term things, or is this part of the first phase, just putting it back together, or where? I ask that because I hear a growing community interest in, you know, not thinking crazy big, but thinking a little bit bigger, thinking about the pier as an iconic, it's in every picture. I was on the, I told the story about being on Virgin Airlines on the London Heathrow Airport tarmac, and there's a picture on Virgin flying to South Africa of our pier. It's just an iconic piece of Clearwater that I hear more and more community interest in. Maybe it's time to rethink, reimagine it. So with the work that's being done here, would it be wasted if the community came up with, you know, came together to do something more dynamic there?
No, sirs. I think we're getting to the same piece of part of the effort and the conversations that have been going on are, you know, how do you make this a little bit more resilient? What are some of those options vice kind of the, you know, let's just put it back to status quo. So there's conversations. Can we help create wave breaks that might also become a fishing attraction to help with the fishing pier? So some of those conversations are starting to happen. Can we spend this money more wisely? And with that, what are those grant opportunities? Because if we can bring in TDC dollars, if we can bring in fishery dollars, what are some of those that we help augment? So that's what we're going. Our strategy, we didn't want to get too far down the road, which is why Kelly said we were purposely halting it at the 60 percent because we wanted to make sure that we're coming back in front of everybody. So the intent is come back in sooner. We probably come in at like the 30 percent as we get some of those concepts, bring them back in. But that way we don't have to halt work at that point. We're still funded for a little bit farther out. So I think we're getting to what you're looking for, sir.
So I guess, you know, some of the, like you talked about, the analysis of, you know, the surface under the water and what it would hold, not hold, and, you know, what's existing out there that could be preserved, whatever we do to repair or make it more resilient. It could be used for a number of different types of projects that might go on to, you know, modify it and make it better. Okay. That's from Menino.
Yeah, Mayor, thank you for bringing that up. I think it is a valid point. I know we had those discussions before, and it was about what the T was going to look like, how extravagant we were going to get. I mean, at one point, we were like, wow, $10 million is a big number for our peer, which it is, especially at the time when we were putting as much resources towards our iconic marina, right? But I'm with you, Mayor, on a sense of there's not a professional hockey game, football game, collegiate, NCAAs. We're just in downtown Tampa. Every single picture on a commercial break shows not only our white sand beach, but a sunset and our beautiful pier, and it's all over the place. I hope we can continue to have some discussions with some of our other community and regional partners and recognize the importance of that, see if we can get some other help in collaborating. But I'm with you on opening up that train of thought on what it could be and could look like, because it is iconic.
Vice Mayor?
Yeah, I'm very pleased, and I actually look forward to looking at those options. The idea of whatever is going to make it more resilient also has a dual use, and it's actually going to add to the pier. I think that's great. It's also very cost-effective, right? We're making it resilient, but it's adding to the use in some way. I really look forward to seeing what those options might be.
That's my record.
No doubt.
Okay. Okay. Any further discussion? None? Then do we have a motion?
Move to approve agenda item 6.22. Second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you. Agenda item 6.23.
Approve a work order to WSP USA, Inc. for the Living Seawall Project to provide Living Seawall Design Services converting four existing seawalls into living seawall shorelines in the amount of $405,533 pursuant to request for qualifications 34-23, Engineer of Record Consulting Services, and authorize the appropriate officials to execute same.
Good evening again, Mayor, Member of the Council. Again, I'm Kelly Petrich, Engineering Division Manager, Public Board. So today I'd like to bring forth a work order again for WSP, Inc. This is pertaining to the Living Seawall Project, the funding I mentioned earlier. The purpose of this is to advance the Clearwater's coastal resiliency strategy to strengthen the shoreline infrastructure, reduce the tidal flooding, enhance the overall habitat. Some of the scope of services we're looking to get from WSP during this process is the field investigation, a bathymetric survey, and a topographic survey as well limited on some of the locations. We're also going to get an engineering analysis and a design development. As far as, as long, also the permitting process will be taken care of during this work order, would also bid support, and then we'll go out for construction overall phase services as well. Some of the suggested project locations, we have actually four locations we're hoping to complete this work at. One of them will be the Coachman Park location. This is actually about 240 feet of seawall. We're looking to place it. This is near the Pierce 100 condominiums. It's currently in really bad shape and needs a total repair. Also, the north side of Sand Key Bridge, and then another location will be the east side of the Mandalay Channel, and a finer location will be the Tampa Bay at the South Bayview Amp Avenue. Now, obviously, we don't, we have about $3 million in funding, so we're going to do as much as we can out of these four locations, and so that's kind of the overall scope of this work order. Do you have any questions on this item today?
You want to hear from the public, sorry, to speak to this agenda. If you want to speak, unfortunately, you need to come in. Yeah, you have to come to me.
No, you have to have to. Ma'am, we must, you have to be on the record.
We have to record. And then if you could complete a comment card for us. If you're going to do this. If you give us your name and where you're from.
My name is Ursula Snow, and I just wanted to ask this gentleman a question about the living seawall. So if you are going to be doing this, can you apply for grants? That seems like a very attractive project, and there should be a lot of grant-issuing organizations that would be interested in it, especially because Clearwater is such an iconic beach.
This is the time for public comment, so if it's for you to make a statement, I guess you just made a statement. So we'll have staff get with you afterwards to talk about opportunities. Thank you. Anyone else from the public want to comment on this agenda? If not, then is there any council discussion? If not, is there a motion?
Motion to approve agenda item 6.23.
Second. All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed, unanimous. Thank you. Thank you. Ten item 6.24.
Approved an increase to the palm pruning contract with Riggan Enterprises of Safety Harbor, Florida, Superior Landscaping and Lawn Service of Miami, Florida, and Wright Tree Service of Des Moines, Iowa, for palm tree pruning services on a unit price basis, increasing the initial cumulative amounts of $250,000, for a revised not-to-exceed amount of $300,000, for the initial term and approved two one-year renewal options in the annual cumulative not-to-exceed amounts of $300,000, pursuant to request for proposal 11-26 and authorize the appropriate officials to execute statement.
Good evening, Mayor, Council of City Leadership. My name is Ali Zamoloski. I'm the right-of-way division manager for Public Works. The item before you is a palm maintenance contract, excuse me, covering the palm pruning of various locations across the city for a not-to-exceed amount of $200,000. And I would be happy answering your questions.
Anyone here for the public desire to speak to this agenda item? Hearing saying none, is there any council discussion? If not, is there a motion?
Motion to approve agenda item 6.24.
Second.
All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you, sir. Move to agenda item 6.25.
I'd like to council member to serve as vice mayor. Council members, as required by charter, the first meeting in April, which technically, I know it's March 30th, but it was the first meeting in April being held today, the council must elect a vice mayor to serve as vice mayor for one year. And according to Rule 5, the rotation would be for council member Cotton to serve as vice mayor. You can continue with the rotation or make a motion for someone else.
Okay. Discussion?
I would be honored to accept the role of vice mayor for the following year, if that appeases the rest of the council.
Copy. Oh, I can't make a second. So is there a motion?
Yeah. Make a motion, mayor, to approve council member Cotton to serve for the next calendar year as vice mayor.
Second. Okay. All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Unanimous.
Thank you all. Appreciate it.
Welcome, Mr. Vice Mayor.
Thank you, sir.
Gem item 6.26.
Appoint individuals to the Public Art and Design Board as listed council members. We've had to play a little switcheroo with the members and the categories that we're currently serving because we were having some difficulty finding individuals in the proper categories. And so I'm going to read the agenda item to identify what the request is. So the request is to appoint Sherry Aguilar as the Clearwater Arts Alliance representative with a term expiring March 30, 2030. Appoint Maggie Duffy as a Clearwater Pinellas representative with a term expiring February 29, 2030. Now these two individuals are representing their respective organizations. Appoint Mark Lutz as the architect with a term expiring January 15, 2030. Mr. Lutz is currently filling the citizen category, but he's actually an architect, so we're just switching him around but not changing the length of his term. Reappoint Brian Ballatin as the active professional artist with a term expiring March 30, 2030. Reappoint Jonathan Barnes and Gregory Bird as citizens knowledgeable in the fields of public art, education, or community affairs with terms expiring March 31, 2030. And then here's where I need a council direction. Appoint an individual to serve as a citizen knowledgeable in fields of public art, education, or community affairs to an unexpired term through May 1, 2029. And the following individuals have submitted applications for your consideration. David Lingenfelter, he is with Dunn-Write Metal Fabricators. He's the owner and designer. Judy Morton, she is with Pinellas Community Foundation. She is a donor advisor and writer. Alina Rivera-Zayeta is a muralist. Michaela Sorensen, she is with Theta Creative, and she's the vice president and visual artist. And Valerie Vogel, an independent visual artist.
Well, first, does anyone here from the public decide to speak to this year? Hearing the same none, it's there in the council. Vice mayor.
So I was reading all the resumes, and I was so impressed and grateful for all these talented and highly qualified people coming forward. So very excited about that. But when looking over who's already in there and assuming that everybody was equally qualified, which pretty much they were, I then started looking at the skill sets that would be an addition to what's already there, which makes the team stronger. And one that has really popped out was Judy Morton, because she's already sat on art selection committees, like Creative Pinellas. And so maybe that experience would be an additional skill that the team would benefit from. So for me, Judy Morton would be a great addition with her experience in selection committees, arts selection committees.
Okay.
All right. Council Member Cotter.
I feel like Vice Mayor Tosheda read my notes, because I completely agree. My top here, after going through all the applicants, I got Ms. Morton as the top as well, because she brings strong community affairs and arts governance experience to her nonprofit leadership and participation on regional public arts selection committees. So, I mean, I wholeheartedly agree. And you get that different, a unique perspective where they're all qualified in this extra oomph to it. And so I agree with Ms. Morton.
You obviously read my notes as well, because Ms. Morton is the only name I wrote down. I think the diversity she brings, being a donor and a writer, diversifying the expertise of that board fills a skills gap and can only enhance that board. I, too, was impressed by the names on the list. It's hard to say no to any of these, because they're all exceptional professionals. But I just happened to pick out Judy Morton myself.
Well, then I'd be reading my notes, because I don't have any notes. But I know Ms. Morton and community, Nell's Community Foundation is fantastic. They do lots of great work throughout our community, so I'd support Ms. Morton, too. So, with that, you have it unanimous on Ms. Morton, and then the others are. So, I just need a motion to approve the ones that were suggested by the city clerk, and then for Ms. Morton.
So, I'll make a motion to include all the names accounted for by the city clerk for the board, as well as appointing Ms. Judy Morton to the board.
Second. Okay. All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Unanimous. Move to item 6.27.
I'll appoint Karen Cunningham to the Pinellas Opportunity Council, which is a regional board, to fill as an unexpired term through February 2, 2028. She will actually serve as a city's representative on this regional board. Unfortunately, Ms. Donato was serving in that capacity, and because of work schedules, she is no longer to serve. But, I think Ms. Cunningham would be a perfect fit for that.
Does anyone from the public here tonight that desire to speak to this agenda? If not, is there any council discussion? If not, is there a motion?
Motion to approve it in that item 6.27, and have Karen Cunningham go to the Pinellas Opportunity Council.
Second.
Okay.
All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? It's three in favor. Am I opposed? If I opposed, then it's unanimous. Okay. Jenna, I'm 6.28.
Oh, I'm sorry. Approve an agreement with Brian Miller Olive, PA, for legal services and representation to the City of Clearwater Community Development Board, and authorize the appropriate officials to execute same.
So, council, that is a city attorney item. The Community Development Board rules a procedure state that outside council is to represent the Community Development Board. City Attorney's Office continues to represent staff. In February of this year, the board's attorney resigned from representing the board, so there was a vacancy. The city attorney's office is recommending Brian Miller Olive. Now, this is exempt from bidding. I did reach out to two different law firms. However, I'm recommending that the city go with Brian Miller Olive. They're an excellent law firm. They have offices all over Florida. They specialize in local government work. Jennifer Cohen is going to be the lead. And her office in Tampa represents PSTA, the City of Largo, the City of Safety Harbor, and Nadeen. So, with that, I'm certainly open for questions.
Okay. Does anyone here from the public tonight desire to speak to this agenda? Okay. Hearing none, any council discussion? No council discussion. Is there a motion?
Move to approve agenda item 6.28. Second.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you. Move to item 7 on the agenda, and that is for citizens to be heard on topics pertaining to city business that are not on tonight's agenda. Is there anyone here from the public? I don't know if you got a comment card earlier, but if you can complete. Fantastic. Thank you. Way ahead of me.
Again, my name is Hercel Snow, and I represent a fairly large neighborhood in and around the Landings Golf Course. And the neighborhood on all sides is pretty concerned about what is going to happen, what is happening. We haven't gotten a lot of information. And it's very recently now. Alfred's coming out to talk next week, so that's good. But it would be good if we got updates periodically because people are getting very concerned about rumors they're hearing that there won't be a referendum because it's going from recreation to recreation. Things like this cause people to get upset, and I don't want to get into a situation like we just heard from the Greenwood people that apparently we missed something. You know, we just missed it because we didn't go out and talk to the people. So the first thing they asked me to say tonight was that in our city charter, Section 2.01, if you drill down, it goes to Section V or 5. No municipally owned real property, which was identified as recreation open space on the city's comprehensive land use plan map on November 16, 1989, or at any time thereafter, may be sold, donated, leased for a new use, or otherwise transferred without prior approval at referendum. We're hoping that means something to you because we feel that the changes that you're going to do there are drastic, okay? You're going to go from a tree-lined, grass-covered golf course, which is very resilient, to a multi-sport complex, which is approximately 80% artificial turf. And the rest of it is going to be concrete and asphalt. So if that's not a major change or a change of use, we're kind of saying, that's amazing, you know? We really believe it should be a change of use. This urban, this is creating an urban heat island, and you all are familiar with that. You know what's going on in the world today, and we're trying to reduce heat. Our resiliency program talks about it. Many people talk about it. But today, actually, that little landings golf course, it cools the area by 2 to 5 degrees, and with the addition of all these artificial materials in concrete, it's going to raise the temperature in that area by 7 to 12 degrees. That's going to increase use of our grid for cooling. It's going to make that whole neighborhood very, very hot. People are not – oh, there goes my three minutes. Unfortunately.
Thank you for coming.
Thank you. We'll be hearing more.
Anyone else from the public tonight to hear that I speak to something that's not on tonight's agenda? Well, thank you for coming. That will move to item 8 on the agenda, city management.
Thank you, Mayor. I just wanted to thank everybody for participating in Neighborhoods Day. I want to thank our communications director and her team for putting on a really incredible day. I know that there's a lot of effort that goes into that, and a lot of departments that help pull that off. So I just wanted to say thank you to the teams. Thank you to the communities. It was great being out there and meeting you where you're at and celebrating your individual communities. It was really, truly a great day. And thank you to council for your continued support of that program and participating in the day. That's all I have.
Move to item 9, city attorney reports. No, sir. Okay. Move to item 10.1.
Provide direction regarding scheduling special council meetings on September 15, 2026, and September 21, 2026 as budget hearings and scheduling a special work session to review the proposed budget. Council members, as requested at the last council meeting, I did confirm with staff regarding the September 15 meeting. But in order to schedule that meeting would mean we would have to reschedule the proposed second hearing. So that's why you see 15 and the 21st as the meetings. And then the budget director requested that we hold a special work session to review the proposed budget on August 10, 2026 at 1.30 p.m. or Tuesday, August 11, 2026 at 1.30 p.m.
Okay.
I'm sorry. Sure. It's okay.
So the budget meetings, the first hearing will be September 15 at 6 p.m., September 21 at 6 p.m. And then a budget work session, both would start at 1.30 on Monday, August 10, or Tuesday, August 11. Neither of those two dates work. We've got time on that to schedule since it's a budget work session.
It's good for me. So anybody else? I don't know why they're both clear.
The 11th is better for me.
The 11th is better for me. So the 11th is better for me.
Okay. Just an app as a joke.
Roger that. I'm good.
Direction you need. Okay. That will move to item 11. That's closing comments by council members. Councilman McCutty.
Yes, sir. I have to agree. Neighborhoods Day was a great success. You know, I know that we divided and conquered, but the neighborhoods that I was able to hit, majority of them were very thriving. So thank you to our communications team put together great routes and got us going, as well as all the employees across all of our different departments that were working to be out there, show their equipment, give out information to the public. It was fantastic. Next, we, you know, this past Sunday, have Palm Sunday, and we're going into Easter weekend. And I just want to say, you know, for those in the Christian faith, you know, Friday is good when Christ was crucified because Sunday's coming when he was resurrected, and today he's alive. And as Romans 10, 9 states, if you can, because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. And because we can rest in that as Christians, I think as we go into this season, just recognizing that, meditating on it, and looking to the glorification of him and the wonderful things he's provided. So, again, great job to all staff for Saturday. Looking forward to serving as your vice mayor to come and assisting the mayor. And I want to say that I think Vice Mayor Tashada did a wonderful job in this past year, so got some big shoes to fill, but looking forward to it.
I'm not going to wear the heels. I won't wear the heels.
Don't wear her shoes. That would not be a good look for you.
So, with that, thank you, sir, and I hope everybody does have a happy and safe Easter.
Justice Member Menino.
Mayor, thank you. If you don't mind, I just want to take maybe 30 seconds just to address, I know Ursula walked out, but for the residents out there, there's a lot of communications and going on probably far in advance regarding the landings. I think it's important to identify that, again, this was an unsolicited proposal that came in to our staff. Staff now has a statutory responsibility to take a 90-day window and fully review, come up with a total of findings and recommendations, and then sit with us and have discussions and then move forward with those discussions and include the community and, obviously, in that process and what our decisions are. And we're still within that 90-day period. We haven't had any of those discussions, even us as a dais, in closed doors or on the dais. So, I don't want our citizens out there to think that we're not listening to them, that we don't care. We truly do, and we are respecting that process, which we have to. Outside of that, I want to say Neighborhoods Day was amazing. I know 37 neighborhood parties across the whole community. I think we all managed to speed around and catch 12 of them. One of my favorite parts of the year, that's for sure, getting to connect on an intimate level with our residents and have great conversations and depth and laughter. It was awesome. I commend our residents and our neighborhood leaders for pulling it together, and I also really want to commend staff. The time that put in the care and the concern showed, not to mention I showed up to some parties, and there was 30 to 50 staff members at the party. It was amazing to see the involvement and the care and consideration that staff took in that. So, thank you, city manager and your team, for wrapping your arms around that. I also want to identify, I'm sure the mayor will touch on it, but I'll beat him to it. It is officially Sugar Sand Festival has kicked off. I know Lisa Chandler and her team had a successful kickoff. They run an amazing festival that goes through April 12th. So, make sure you get out there, bring the kids, bring the families. Daytime, afternoons, evenings, there's something out there for everybody. This year's theme is United in Sand, surrounding sports, sports themed with the Olympics and everything else coming up. So, it should be a great time. But that's it. Thank you.
Okay. Vice Mayor.
Thank you, Mayor. This past week, sadly, I believe Clearwater lost a value member of our community, Mr. Kenny Hamilton. Although I've only known him for a few years, it became quite clear, especially at his memorial, how many lives Kenny has touched, quietly, through his service and generosity. One of the most moving moments was when his son sang, I Can Only Imagine. It was a beautiful tribute and spoke volumes about the man Kenny was. And in that spirit of community, I also want to thank all the staff and all the neighborhoods for this neighborhood's day. I truly enjoyed spending time with all, including staff and the residents, hearing your thoughts, sharing conversations, and seeing the pride in everyone, which makes our city really special. Thank you.
Yes, I want to also recognize Kenny Hamilton. You know, I posted on one of the social media platforms just an incredible celebration of life because you saw, I mean, the first United Methodist church here in Clearwater was completely packed. And what impressed me the most was how, you know, one of my favorite movies is It's a Wonderful Life because it teaches, through George Bailey, how important each life is because it touches so many others. And that's what I felt at Kenny's Celebration of Life. It wasn't just the number of people there. It was the number of different parts of our community. Ours. It was the Phillies. It was he touched so many different parts of our community and was very proud, and his whole family is, but certainly he was very proud of growing up here, going to Clearwater High School, and all those things that those folks who have been there their entire lives that have just made this city so great. So, deep of his sympathies to Kenny and his family for their loss. Certainly, it's a community and city loss, and we were all, you know, heartbroken to see him go and are so thankful for all the contributions he made to our great city over the years. Second thing, everyone's talked about Neighborhoods Day. Today, it's just, it's become, I forget how many years we've done this, but we've done it for a number of years. It dates way back. It keeps growing every year. Joelle's telling me she's, I guess that's 2-0 or whatever. I used to play, I used to be a baseball third base coach, and we did all this, but I'm not sure what that just meant. I don't understand sign language. I think you just said 20. But it's been going, and it feels like, just because of our staff, who's really organized it, I know we've got one of the Chandlers is organizing that for us now. And it is just so well organized and so well promoted, and so we're excited to see everyone come out to support that. But I just want, and I try to remind some folks, that, you know, it really should be Neighborhoods Day in Clearwater every day of the year. And by that, I mean it was so important for the residents to connect with our team members, different departments that are there. I appreciate, as was said, all the staff members coming out. But the other half of that, it's important that neighbors connect with each other, because if they can connect with each other, if we, instead of the neighborhood talking about, we don't know what's going on behind that door on that street down, on that house down the street. But, boy, you know, to actually meet those folks and talk to them, engage them, and maybe offer an elderly person who doesn't have any family members around some help. So that's the important part for me of Neighborhoods Day. It's a lot of important parts of it, but it's getting neighbors to talk to one another, because if they can help one another, then we all know, and we saw this through the hurricanes, it makes our community so much better when neighbors help one another, and they know their neighbors, they love their neighbors, and they're there for them when they need help. And then the Sugar Sand Festival, as mentioned, is going on. That's something that's grown every year, and it really becomes a festival. I remember when Lisa Chandler came to them, I guess it's been seven or eight years ago now, and said, You know, I think we're going to try something different, and not just the sculptures this year. We're going to have rides and music, and I'm not sure if it'll work or not, but we're going to try it. Well, it worked, and now it's become a really robust thing. Live music, they had a Latin band out there last night, and the beach was full. It's really become a successful event, and so I hope everyone comes out to enjoy that each year. And then, I do love people, I love our residents, but I love our canine residents a lot. And I love seeing a lot of our canine residents this past weekend at Neighborhoods Day, but one of my favorite events of the year is coming up April 11th here, and that's the Purina Incredible Dog Challenge. It's the same day as the Market Marie. It's going to be a huge day out there and a chance for those who like the market anyway to come out and see some of the most athletic and incredible dogs in the United States. They're competing in the Eastern Regionals. It'll be taped and broadcast live on NBC Sports sometime this summer. It really is a, quote, incredible event, and so I encourage the community to come out and enjoy that. Free admission. You might even get to see yourself on television. Last year, they have one event where dogs jump into the water and grab the thing, and somebody brought their dog and set their dog in their lap right there behind the camera, and so there's their dog watching the other dogs jump all the way over. One of the cutest things you've ever seen, but it's really a wonderful event, and certainly families would really enjoy that. So that's April 11th in Coachman Park, just another one of our amazing events that are taking place in Coachman Park all year round. So with that, if there's nothing else to come before the council, we will adjourn the Clearwater City Council meeting of March 30, 2026. Thank you. Thank you.