City Commission on 2025-02-17 6:30 PM - Feb 17, 2025

As they come up and take a seat, we're going to go ahead and call this meeting to order. If I can please have the city clerk call the roll. Commissioner Vila-Vasquez? Here. Commissioner Caldwell? Here. Commissioner Howington? Here. Commissioner Lully? Here. Commissioner Santiago? Here. Vice Mayor Harriet? Present. Mayor Vila? Here. This time we're going to do the invocation and the pledge to the flag by District 4 Commissioner Howington. Please rise. 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. Next, I'd like to take a moment of silence. Thank you. And then if the commission can join me on the floor, I'd like to honor or give a certificate of recognition to Lauren King, if he could join me at the podium. Lauren, I'd like to thank you for your service to our country. You serve as U.S. Navy U.S. Navy, both teams. Thank you. Thank you for your service. From 1970 to 1977, U.S. Navy, 2nd to 10 to 10 to 10. He graduated from Florida Military School in 1967 and joined the U.S. Navy in the 1970s. He was awarded the American Sierra Honor Medal as a top graduating recruit. He attended Radio Mountain Day School in Winiford, Maryland, graduated in 1971 and was assigned to underwater demolition team 21 out of Little Creek, Virginia. In 1973, his balloon deployed to the Mediterranean Sea. With tensions building in the attack of Israel, initiating the Yom Kippur War, the platoon was tasked with supporting the extraction of American citizens from Israel. He returned to UDT-21 from deployment in December 1973 and continued to serve at UDT-21 and Naval Surface Weapons Center, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, until his discharge in September of 1977. He served the community and its veterans as commander of the Sergeant David Ledgerwood American Legion Post 255 and a member of the American Legion Writers Chapter 255, Veterans Community Educational Partnership, VCEP, and currently is chaplain for the American Legion Post 255. Sons of the American Legion, American Legion Writers, and Department of Florida American Legion Writers. Your dedication to our community is making a positive impact within our city. And as somebody who served up here, I thank you for that as well. Thank you. Thank you very much. Why not? Absolutely. I'll try not to sing. Please, yeah. Thank you so much, Commission, Mayor, Vice Mayor, for this award. I certainly appreciate the recognition. But I have to say that I received this, keeping in mind the fact that there are 7,500 veterans who live in this city. And it is our intent as part of the American Legion to, in the near future, have a home for those 7,500 veterans to go to. In this city, there is no place for them to go right now. They have to leave the city and go to Orange City, DeLand, Lake Helen, or Newsom Erna, or someplace over on the east side of Volusia County. So we have a great group of men and women serving in the American Legion and in the Veterans Community Educational Partnership, and we continue to serve the community in both of those organizations. Thank you so much, again, for this recognition. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor and Commissioners. So here I am again, up at the microphone, want to call up our famous bikers in the city of Deltona, Vima. So last year, first Saturday of December, we had a fundraiser for PTSD here on the Deltona Plaza. It was not as much well attended as we wanted to, but it was well attended. And because of that fundraiser, I want to bring up the president of the Vima Bikers. He also received recognition of being a veteran at the last meeting, Ray Combs, so that he wants to also present some of the funds that they raised at the PTS meeting to the Fire Department Foundation for their PTS program that they're running. Ray? Thank you. Good evening. My name is Ray Combs. I'm the commander of Vima Deltona Chapter. It is my true honor to stand before you today to present this check of $3,856 to the Deltona Firefighter Foundation. This donation comes from the success of our car and bike show, an event dedicated raising awareness and support for those battling PTSD. The funds we are donating today will go directly towards expanding the mental health program that the Deltona Firefighter Foundation is working to grow. Not just for first responders, but for every citizen in our community. Mental health is a critical issue, and we are proud to support this foundation as they work to provide essential resources to those in need. Moving forward, we are also, we also want to invite the community to a special meet and greet organized by the Veterans Museum and Veteran Memorial Park on El Cam Boulevard on March 21st, 1 to 5 p.m. This is a great opportunity to learn more about Veteran Enforces Motorcycle Association and the work we do to support veterans and first responders. We encourage everyone to come out, meet the team, and see how you can get involved. But our mission doesn't stop there. We are excited to announce the second annual Memorial Day Ride event on May 24th, an event dedicated to benefiting three disabled veterans in need. We are actively seeking nominations, and we need your help. If you know a veteran who could use support, please visit deltonamemorialride.com to submit their bio for consideration. This event is open to all motorcycle riders, and we are also welcoming sponsorship and donations to help make a meaningful impact. If you like to ride, sponsor, or donate, please visit deltonamemorialride.com. Together, we can continue making a real difference in the lives of our first responders, our veterans, and those facing mental health challenges. Thank you to everyone who made the donation possible, and we look forward to seeing you on March 21st at the meet and greet and on May 24th for the second annual Memorial Day Ride. Thank you. Good evening, everybody. My name is Abraham Espinosa. I'm the Deltona Firefighters Foundation Vice President. I'd like to take a moment to sincerely thank you guys for your support. Everything you're doing is helping us provide aid to our first responders and veterans, as we—as you are well aware, we have in our—in our community. We do have veterans that have served prior to the fire service. So, in our case, help with mental health, and for organizations like yours, it's possible. So, thank you. We're good? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. City Manager, while everybody's getting back up here, could we get the information for that event at the end of March as well, so we can show it on the community events on our agenda and get that word out to the community. In addition to sharing information about Veeam, I think it's a great opportunity to share the information about the American Legion to anybody in the city that doesn't already know about them. We will do. Thank you. This time, we're going to go ahead and—do we have any Deltona community events? I—addition—a request for an addition. I don't— Okay, let's—we can do it right after. We can't hear you. We have several events right now. We still can't hear you. There we go. There. We have several events that we're planning for this spring, but I want to focus tonight on a couple that are going on this weekend. First, we have our movie in the park. It's this Friday night. It's the Fall Guy. It's at Dewey O'Boster. Movie starts at 7 o'clock. It's free. And there's even movie snacks. We have free popcorn and lemonade while supplies last. And then on Saturday morning, also at Dewey, is the Love Your Heart 5K. So that's—that's a really fun—it's timed. It's competitive 5K. So if you'd like to do 5Ks, you could also walk should you want. That's not a problem. But you could—there's still time to register. So register now for that event. That race starts at 8 a.m. So those are the two events going on this weekend. And we do know about those—the veterans' events, so we'll talk about that more in the future as well. Thank you. Do you have something else to add? Okay. All right. Commissioner Santiago, do you wanted to add something under additions and deletions? Yes, I do. We kind of skipped kind of over that, so. It's okay. I know you weren't here in the last meeting, and I wanted to add the ratification of the mayor's Washington, D.C. trip before the consent agenda for discussion. It's to allow you to explain to us the why and if about the travel policy. Um, you were not here the last time, and I would do the same for each of you, give you an opportunity to give us your—what had happened. We need consent on this? Or consensus? It's a motion, so we'll need a second, and a majority of it will be added. I'll second it. This is for discussion on the topic. Ratification of the mayor's Washington, D.C. trip before the consent agenda for discussion. Okay. And this, uh, in addition to our discussion, I think this will give everybody also an additional, uh, time for public comment on it as well, so. Okay. There's a motion and a second on the—on the floor. Excuse me, Commissioner Cole, can you turn on your—we can't hear you. When Dory tried—Ms. Hullington tried to motion to have some added to the agenda at the last meeting, it was denied. It said it'd be—had it needed to be forwarded to the next meeting. Is that not the same? So, um, Commissioner Hullington's motion failed for lack of a second, so you all may add to the meeting at any point with, um, a motion, a second, and a majority vote. So at the last meeting, she made a motion, but it died for lack of a second, so it did not get to a vote. And then I requested a motion, and we had to move it to the following meeting. Is that not correct? Your motion is—was under, um, a specific section—under your comments, under a specific section regarding, um, charter violations. So that's—it's different. That requires a quasi-judicial hearing, and under the Code of Ordinances, it does require that it be at another meeting, not at that meeting. So, um, you know, we've talked a lot about due process. So when an accusation is made, or an allegation is made, the person who's being accused must have notice and an opportunity to be heard. There's more meat than that, but that's the—the basic requirements for due process. So, um, at the last meeting, we did talk about the Code of Ordinances, which does require that it be moved to another meeting, theoretically, to comply with due process, to ensure that the person who has received the allegation has notice and an opportunity to be heard. All right. Thank you for the clarification. I have a question for the attorneys as well. Adding the word ratify, would that mean that we are accepting the travel and approving it? I did not make the motion. Um, I believe the motion was to ratify the Washington, D.C. trip. Commissioner Santiago, is that accurate? Yes, that is accurate. So at the last meeting, um, I did advise that this is an option. Um, an action that is taken can be ratified after the fact, so approved after the fact. So just for clarity, this is asking us to approve the travel, retroactively. That's what this would do. I did not make the motion, but I do believe that is the intent of this motion, although I believe Commissioner Santiago advised that it would be a discussion to discuss the ratification of the trip. This is not my motion, so I'm going to— If I can, just a quick point of order, and respectfully, I'm the one that's going through this. I don't want to put any of the commissioners in a situation where we already know this is very political, right? So I rather respectfully, Commissioner Santiago, um, while I appreciate it that at least some on this dais are giving me the right to my 14th Amendment to due process, let's just go with the quasi-judicial, and let's do it that way. I—I—I—listen, I'm not—I'm here, I'm not afraid of this. I'm—I'm okay, I did nothing wrong. Um, whatever personal vendettas there are, that's neither here nor there. Let's just get through the meeting, let's get to the end, and I'll be happy to do whatever this commission decides to do, but I am at peace with the quasi-judicial meeting. There's not—there's—I'm okay with it. So if you would like to withdraw your motion and your second, I say we get through the meeting, and, uh, we go to the end. As moved, I will go ahead and remove that motion. I'll withdraw the second. All right, let's go ahead and get started with, uh, the important items on this agenda. So we're going to go ahead and, uh, approval of meeting minutes of the regular commission meeting of February 3rd, 2025, as presented. Sorry? Uh, yeah. Yes, under the consent agenda. I'll make a motion to approve the consent agenda. I second. Sorry. A to— Sorry, it's A through—A through D, correct. Second. There's a motion by Vice Mayor, uh, Harriet, and a second by Commissioner Avila Vasquez. No. No, that's okay. I heard over here. Okay. I'm a little deaf from one of my ears. I'm sorry. I need to get one. I know, I know. I gotta get one, yeah. Um, so there's a—did my motion come out correctly? There's a motion by Vice Mayor? To approve. To approve. To approve and, uh, second by, uh, Commissioner Avila Vasquez? Santiago. Or Commissioner Santiago. I'm sorry. All right. Let's go ahead and keep—keep going. The agendas are a lot more organized. They just—we just gotta get used to them. That's all. Motion passes. All right. All right. This time we're going to go into ordinances and public hearings. All right. Public hearing resolution number 2025-26, requesting the acceptance for the Aloha State's final plan to facilitate a means of ingress and egress through the 2982 Howland Boulevard Zone C2 General Commercial to 1000 Aloha State's Road Zone RM1 Multifamily Residential Dwelling District for the development of 536 apartments and a plan. And this is just the plan, correct? Jordan, go ahead. Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Commissioners, City Manager, Jordan Smith, Director of Planning. So before you is resolution number 2025-26 for the acceptance of the Aloha State's final plan. Mr. Bellick, you—we're trying to conduct business in this city, and I understand that's a little difficult for you to understand. If you keep interrupting us, I will have you pulled out of the commission meeting. You understand? Thank you. Go ahead, Mr. Smith. The applicant is requesting acceptance of the final plan for Aloha State's to facilitate a means of ingress and egress through 2983 Howland Boulevard, which is on C2 General Commercial to 1000 Aloha State's Road, which is zoned multiple family residential for 536 apartments on approximately 46.7 acres of land. The subject property is located at 2982 Howland Boulevard and 1000 Aloha State's Road. The zoning for 2982 Howland is C2 General Commercial. The future land use is commercial. The zoning for 1000 Aloha State's Road is multiple family residential, and the future land use is medium-density residential, which permits up to 6.1 to 12 units per acre. This project is approximately 11.4. Final site plan application was submitted in 2020. Staff advised the applicant a final plaque would be required due to the C2 parcel needing to be used for ingress. And this is consistent with Florida Statutes, Chapter 177, and Land Development Code, Section 106-31. It has been reviewed by city surveyor, consultant, and city attorney. It is recommended that the city commission approve resolution number 2526, accepting the Aloha State's final plaque, facilitating a means of ingress and egress for the development of 536 apartments, subject to the conditions as noted in the staff report. Is there any questions by the commission? It's Joyce. I'm having an issue with my iPad. I'm not—I don't see who's—I can't see who wants to speak or not. So, as of right now, I only know that Commissioner Vila-Vasquez has put in to speak, if any would— I would like to speak as well. Okay, so we'll go to Commissioner Vila-Vasquez, then Commissioner Colwell, and then Commissioner Santiago. So, for—until this gets fixed, if you can just put up your name badge, that would be great. Thank you, Mayor. I have a question, and I know we went through this before, but for the record, so residents know that I did ask a question on this. My definition, or my understanding of the definition of final plot, is when a project has been approved, it has gone through all the procedures, the process and everything, the land is cleared, the lots are divided, where they're going to build the houses or whatever, pipes, electric, everything is down. Final plot for us to vote on is now so that developer can sell that plot to build the house. To build the apartment. Build the property. This particular property has nothing on it but trees, so I'm a little bit confused as to why it's called the final plot. Why are we voting for a final plot if it hasn't even been started? That is—the applicant desire to go through this process instead of rezoning the commercial portion to multifamily. If they had rezoned the property, then it would have just gone to the final site plan. And Commissioner Vasquez, if I may, just as an additional point of clarification, so a final plot establishes the legal meets and bounds of a parcel where buildings are going to be laid out, where rights of way and easements are going to be laid out. Normally, you do see site clearing and other development activities occurring prior to a final plot. That is not legally necessary. That is not always the case. Many developers choose to embark on an initial site clearing or initial installation or extension of infrastructure in order to reduce their cost of infrastructure bond down the road. In this case, the developer has not opted to do that. They have decided to move forward with the final plot process prior to commencing any development activities. So what we're voting on right now is that little piece of—I don't know if you can bring it up, but that little piece to go in and out of the property, right? So if we vote and approve that little piece, that means that we're approving the whole project in the back without it being started or anything? So you are voting tonight on both parcels. You're plotting two parcels with this approval, the multifamily parcel and the commercial access parcel. What the—this project is in as-of-right development as far as the number of units. They have not asked for a re-zone or any concessions requests under the code. So there's—you're not necessarily improving entitlement tonight. With this action, you're approving the—the plat, the layout of the parcels tonight. And so if we approve that little piece, which will be entrance and exit, that's the one that is a zone commercial. Am I right? Yes, that is correct. That is a commercially zoned parcel. Thank you for now. Commissioner Colwell, then Commissioner Santiago. Yes, I have a question for the applicant. Good evening. Hi, how are you? Yes, sir. To move forward on this, the agreement on the plot, or the plot, are you willing to enter to an agreement? Yes, sir. To finish the other project? Yes, sir. I'm good. That's all I have. Yes, sir. Commissioner Santiago. Excuse me. Can you restate the agreement? I'm asking if he's willing to enter into an agreement to finish the other project that they have currently in the city of Deltona. Yes, sir. All right. So if I can clarify— If I— Just some clarity, because I think we're mixing two different projects together. Could you go ahead and clarify that? Yeah, so just for clarity, I want to confirm that the applicant you're stipulating that one of your conditions of approval would be entering into an agreement to finish the Aloha Estates project prior to recording this final plot? Different project. A— Enrico Ridge. The which project? The Enrico Ridge. Not finishing— Oh, I'm sorry. Enrico Ridge. Yes. But committing to finish the project, but not finishing prior to this approval, or prior to the record of the plot. Okay. Understood. Yeah. So prior to recording the plot, you'll enter into an agreement to finish the Enrico? Correct. Okay. That's all I have. Thank you, Commissioner Santiago. Yeah, I'd just like to make a motion to move to approve Resolution 2025-26, accepting the Aloha State final plot, with the conditions stated in the development order. There's a motion. Sorry, Commissioner. Would you—would your motion also include the additional stipulation that the applicant just made? Yes. And what about the performance bond? Say it again. That microphone, we—we need to get that microphone fixed or use the other microphone there, but can you repeat that? So, an additional condition, performance bond within five days—five to seven days. Okay. I'll add it to my motion. Okay. There's currently a motion by Commissioner Santiago. Is there a second? Okay. There's—there's not a second. We'll go ahead and finish with Commissioner Lully, Vice Mayor Harriet, and then we'll see what comes up next. So, Commissioner Lully, go ahead. Thank you, Mayor. Going off of what Commissioner Kawa said, we need to take a step back, because we're talking about other projects. Let's explain to the folks out there, explain to us, what are these other projects that we're talking about? I mean, I have an idea, but I want to make sure for everyone's education that we're on the same page. Sure. We have another project that's been stalled due to some issues with financing with our banking, and with its approval, we get to sell this parcel and finish the other project that we have. And so, I made a commitment to the city and to the residents that that's exactly what we would do, and that's what we're going to do. So, can you tell me, where is that located? So, everyone's... Yeah. 2911 Alatka Link. And there's just... Where is... Can you give me more... You know, the Publix and the... Howland and Elkhom. Yes. Area. Okay, great. Yes, sir. Like Link, Howland, Elkhom. Correct. Is that the only... That's the only... We have a second one, but it's 99% completed. It's Toluda Terrace, across from the post office. Okay. Now, you're saying you've got to sell this in order to finish the other one? Is that what you were saying? I'm saying that it will help. Yes. Okay. This may be for planning. The subdivision that I'm seeing on this aerial is off to the... What would that be? Off to the east? Holland. Off to the north? I see subdivided lots. What is that? I mean, I see there's trees there. I'm not sure what that is. So, you see how there's lots that are drawn on the aerial? That's for... That's not in existence. Those are pre-plotted. Yeah, those are... The homes at the bottom right are the homes at the corner of Catalina and Howland. I believe he's speaking about the left-hand side. Yeah, I got that. I mean, I just see... I'm wondering, is there a future plan? Why are there lots subdivided out with a sandpine forest? I'm just wondering if there's a plan there. That's actually unincorporated... Unincorporated in Volusia County. Not our thing. Correct. You mentioned, Jordan, that there, and you brought up there is another mechanism in order to get this. You said that if this was not approved this way, there'd be a rezone that was needed for that particular parcel. If they rezone the commercial parcel to multifamily, then they can combine the lots and go straight to final site plan. Okay. And why would that process not be used instead of this one? The applicant... I was not here at the city at the time. The applicant decided to go for final plot instead of rezone. Was this the big parcel where the actual apartment's going to be, was that originally entitled using a rezone process, or was that always zoned for... From what I understand, it's always been zoned MR2, multifamily. All right. Vice Mayor Harriot? Thank you, Mayor. I've got a couple questions. May I add something on that, too? That front entrance there, it wasn't our intention to do that. We were, at the time, told that we had to, by the way, do the plat, because that's a commercial parcel. We were planning to do a commercial development there, but we were told that we had to leave it open for you guys. So that's how this whole thing started, by the way. I believe it was Mr. Paradise, I want to say. Oh, God. That was a long time ago. Go ahead. One more, just to follow up on that. How does it work that there's this large parcel for multifamily and there's no existing access to it? Maybe that's a planning question. Well, there is. That's my... It's all our parcel. Right. That's why it's just zoned commercially. One commercial, one parcel, one parcel with two different zoning designations. That's what I'm just trying to figure out where, where, how is there multifamily zoned in the middle of, I don't know what that is, sand pines or sand live oaks, and there's no way to access it from a major road as it is. You got to take your canoe when you have all the flooding, because that water eventually floods over Catalina. Right. Pretty much. And I know we were... I'm just saying that because I'm seeing it. There's a pond there off Howland. Some, I guess we were, because our city limits are the closest, someone was pumping into that after Milton. That was us. Yeah. Okay. So that's normally dry, and it was full after Milton. So, I mean, it seems that that's the natural place that, you know, water's going to go in that area. So, just a comment. Thank you. Thank you. I'll elaborate further on that. We're leaving about 15 acres untouched for drainage as well, and our fluctuation of the topography is significant from 70 to 100, so there's a lot of opportunities there. So, untouched as in, like, what I see on the satellite now stays? Correct. Okay. Great. Thank you. Vice Mayor Harriet. Commissioner Lally, those are all excellent questions. I really do. Seriously, I appreciate those. So, to continue on, this is, this project, Jordan, not so fast. This project's being pursued as straight zoning, correct? That is correct. Okay. No, no PUD, no entitlements, no, no opportunity to deal? None. Okay. And is your intent to sell the commercial first before completing the residential component? They're not selling the commercial. They're using the commercial portion for the ingress, egress to access the site. Okay. So, there's no commercial on this? No commercial portion. So, we're taking commercial, little commercial zoning we have in the city, and we are using it for ingress and egress to a residential community. This was at you guys' request. Understand. Thank you. Vice Mayor, if I may, through the mayor. Yep. Mayor? Mayor, there was an opportunity, and Commissioner Caldwell worked with the applicant to ensure that the other stalled project, Enrico Ridge, which has been giving us trouble, would be able to be completed, and that it would be tied to this, because that, so that was the opportunity, and that, so that opportunity has been successfully landed. Obviously, we'll need to paper it, but that was the, that was the deal, for lack of a better word. Thank you for that. So, my next question is, with the zoning and progress that we currently have for stormwater requirements, the stormwater chapter, chapter of our land development code, any changes that we make to make stormwater requirements more stringent, would they apply to any development that happens if we approve the final plot tonight? This application is already in, so it would not fall under the zoning in progress. Thank you. Commissioner Caldwell, you're on the— I'd like to make a motion to table this until the next meeting. Penning, pending the conversation, outcome of the— Presidents, please, there's a motion on the floor by Commissioner Caldwell to table this, and there was a second. I'd like to ask that there's one more thing. And there were comments made about there's going to be 15 acres of this project left aside. There's significant topography from changes in elevation from one side to the other. I'd like to ask, if you don't mind, if we could include in that, when it comes back, some sort of site development, some sort of outline or plan where the space is going to be left, you know, where things are going to be laid out so we can see. Because this impacts all the flooding that happens into Lake Sixma and subsequently down to Lake DuPont, Lake Louise, Lake Angela, all the way through the Teresa Basin. I'll agree to that. Thank you. Okay. City Attorney, before we go, still second? Still amended, all second. Yes. There is an existing motion on the floor made by Commissioner Santiago. That was the basis under which this discussion occurred. It died due to a lack of a second. Okay. Very good. Okay. Commissioner Santiago. Yes, this is for Jordan. Jordan, this particular agenda item, is this something that's procedural? Yes, it is procedural, yes. Did the applicant developer meet all the requirements? Yes. Okay. So the next step is just to, all we're doing is giving him access to his property? That is correct, Commissioner. Okay. Thank you. There's a motion on the floor with a second. If we can please, if there's any, actually, if there's any public comment. Any powers, please? Hi, how are you doing? Is the mic on? Yeah. I'm a resident for 25 years. I stayed right off of Foxboro. Right there, I'm going to give you my address, 3043, right there. And the reason we bought our property was because the state had all the forest behind us for the scrub jays. It was stated that it was a safety place for the—this is my first time speaking, so I'm nervous. It's okay. Don't worry. We don't bite that hard. Yeah. But it was the state had domain that for the scrub jays, the state-protected bird and all of the tortoises and all—that's why we moved there. We have a lot of flooding down off of Catalina, and when you're pumping from Catalina, you pump right behind my house, you know, to the pond. So, it's a lot of flooding in that area. An impact of 530-something apartments is a great impact in that area. I mean, it floods, you know, we deal with it, but when that comes in, we're going to have a lot of more flooding. We're homeowners. You know, I can say this, not to go off-scale, that a property that made that big in 500-and-something apartments, you put four people in each apartment, you got over a thousand. That's like a little city. Crime comes with that. No matter what the owners that are trying to build there say, they can't control their lease—the people that hold leases there, who come in and out. And we're trying to keep that from being developed. I wish Deltona will look at it. We have the center across the street. We have a fire department across the street. Why not Deltona put a park that will bring in more communities, more people in the community? Bigger homes, you know, you get more tax revenue that way. Property has—if it's by a company, they have a bigger say-so. Once that apartment comes there, then we're looking at another apartment. Once you open that up, we're going to the next thing. We still want a shopping center up there, the other apartment place, off of Graves in Normandy. We've been waiting on a—by the movie theater. We've been waiting on a shopping center. We haven't got a shopping center here. And we're going to put a big impact that impacts the schools, that impacts the roadway. We already have bad traffic right there on Catalina, Providence, and Howland right there, in front of the fire station. People coming in from work, leaving from work. It's already busy there. The place they're talking about coming out of there, that's right across from the fire department. You know, we need the fire department. If the city was saying the right-of-way for the city, then I'll agree with some of that. But we need a park there. We need something that helps the families, the community come together, not an apartment place. And that's my bid. I don't want to see that there. Apartment place brings more crime. It's like a little city. You can't control the people that's in there. Thank you. Thank you. Dana McCool, please. Thank you very much. I would like for the community and the commission to make sure that they're familiar with who is bringing in this development. I would encourage you to look up D32 Invest LLC because they are in breach of contract on multiple accounts for communities that they've come into under the guise of investment. We have an investment there falling apart that's been an eyesore in our community that's not been addressed. And while it be financial issues that has been stated, I would dare say it is because it's bad Ponzi scheme development. So I'd like our community to get into that. I'd also like to make sure that no one in our commission is involved personally with this, that they have a personal investment or anyone of their family have a personal investment with this or Enrique Ridge. So Enrique Ridge is very important because, you know, what this is is I'm going to get rid of this to take care of this. And that's been made, that promise has been made to other communities, other investments, and no matter how you slice it, the end product is poor. So do your research. It's not a good development pattern. You know, there's been bad checks passed to our city by these investors, which is public records, is knowledge. And this is not the type of developers that we want in our city. We want good investment. This city has been damaged by poor development. We have great developers that have come to our community and vested. This is not one of them. So I'm just, you know, buyer beware. You have knowledge that we've had issues with this type of development or these type of promises before. We've been promised one type of development. It's passed by the commission. And then what happens? We change plans. And oftentimes under the guise of a minor amendment. It's been shoved down our throats. It's been pushed before. So I'm asking every commissioner to make sure there's no personal investment by anybody on the commission or family. Second of all, I'm asking you to do your due diligence. I asked the city attorney to look into D32 Invest LLC to see what other pending litigation is going on before we allow that to continue in our city. We've already had a failed project before under the promise of development. Those apartments stood, ran, go by, look at it. For a long time. Time after time, what we do, we try to foreclose. We try to get our money back. It is not fair to our community to ask us to swallow this type of investment. This is not local investment, but it has local ramifications. So I know that there have been eight maybe cases, breach of contract, in less than four years. There's other pending litigation going on right now with this investment company. And I want us to do our due diligence here, because staff is legally bound to say what staff is legally bound to say. There's a set of laws that dictate what they have to do, and they have to report back to us. Commissioners also, you have to follow the letter of the law. I'm not a commissioner anymore, but I have seen the records on this. I have done my looking into this. There is more than meets the eye to this. And I'm asking that our community demand of you to do your due diligence. Demand it of the commission. You demand it of our legal, of our city manager, and anybody that would have the key to let this type come into our community and continue this with the promise to make something better, because it ain't going to happen. If it was going to happen, it would have happened before. So, please look out for your constituency and their investments. As you've heard, people have concerns about this, and it's not without reason that they do. Thank you. I'll ask the residents to please keep their paws down. I know this is all very emotional, but we need to get through the meeting. Kathy Bryan, please. Good evening. Kathy Bryan, Deltona. I'm going to ask this, but I'm going to still take my minutes. I thought when we tabled something or continued something that we didn't do public comment on it. I know we didn't used to, so I don't want an answer now. It seems that multifamily residential areas seem to be all the hot trend. And my question is why, unless you're making them affordable, because, number one, where are these people going to work? What jobs do we have for them here in this city? So, that means, you know, what traffic studies have been done? Have there been any recently? I have a lot of concerns, because you're looking at one here and one across the road. That area of Howland is horrible. Mr. Lully said it himself when he went to Starbucks. Thank you. Welcome to our world. Welcome to our end of the world. It's accident-prone. You're adding more traffic. You're adding more to schools that they can't afford. You guys know this. Every single time we talk about it. But now we're not talking about just single-family homes. And you can't estimate how many people are in single-family homes, because I can tell you now, in my neighborhood alone, I have single-family homes. You know how many cars are parked there? Two, three, four, five, six, seven. People are moving in together to make the mortgage easier. So when you build these places, you're going to have more than is expected living there and then driving on our roads. So not only is it stormwater, but it's a whole lot of other things. And since Howland's a county road, has our county been brought in? Are they going to help do anything with Howland? Because it's going to be too late. You've also got the high school there. That's another concern. Have we ever considered maybe moving that high school if we're going to develop all this area? I don't know where you would move it to, but, you know, it's becoming an increase in danger for the kids, the ones that have to cross the street because they don't qualify for the bus. So I want you guys to think about all that, too. I understand. I know people have a right to do what they want with their property. But when is their right to do what they want with their property going to stop affecting other people's property? They have rights, too. Thank you. Courtney Crossburgos, please. Hello again, Courtney Crossburgos. I don't know much about that side of Deltona. Can you speak a little louder? Sure. Thank you. She's a little shorter than me. There we go. I don't know much about that side of Deltona, but I do know that, as far as I think I know, that that's the same developer that has left those apartments over there behind Publix. And then on that corner, and then from the article that I read in the paper, they have something in the land and in Bay, I think. If they have left a trail of unfinished apartments and developments, why are we letting them do another one? And I think I heard something about one of the checks that they gave us already didn't clear. I don't get it. Why would we even consider this if they have not followed through on their other commitments to us and other communities? Thank you. Richard Bellick, please. Just ladies and gentlemen, now I'm going to ask a question. You're not going to try and put parking meters there, too, are you, Mayor? I mean, your last attempt went out the window. You're not going to try and put him there, are you? That ends public comment. Okay. Let's go ahead and—there's a motion on the floor and a second. So— Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor. Table it. The motion was to table it. Commissioner Lilley, you're on the board. Did you want to say something? Go ahead, Mr. Judge. I can wait until Commissioner Lilley's comments. I do want, before the vote, if we could get some clarity on what it is that the commission wants to see. I was going to get to that in a minute and get a timeline as well, because we're not doing any more tabling without getting a timeline. Go ahead, Commissioner Lilley. I've been thinking as I listen to—and I, by the way, understand the gentleman to my right's point. So—but I've been thinking as I've listened to everything and sitting here thinking on it. I don't—I don't know that—that, you know, two apartments for the price of one is a—is a good deal for—for us. So, um, for me, I think I'm going to vote no on tabling it, pending the further information I might hear, just because I would have voted no on the original motion made by Commissioner Santiago. Commissioner Vila-Vasquez. Thank you, Mayor. Um, I second, uh, Commissioner Lilley's. I think that's what I was going to tell you before, that I was going to vote no, but not on tabling it, but note on the, um, project. So there—there isn't a second or a motion right now. We're going to get clarification from Commissioner Colwell on his motion to table. Okay. I have a motion to table this agenda item until we get clarity on the agreement to complete the other apartment complex. Um, I'm looking to enter into an agreement, a tri-party agreement between the developer, um, the purchase—the person that's purchasing the development and the city, um, to get a confirmation that this, uh, Arunbrico Ridge will be completed. Okay. And include a final site plan. And including a final site plan. Or a draft site plan, excuse me. A draft site plan. All right. So the—so the motion is further clarified. Did one of the attorneys want to repeat the motion, um, so we can—go ahead. So, um, what I have is—this is a motion to defer the, uh, final site, the final plat of the Aloha States project until such time as there is an agreement negotiated to finish the project. Uh, it's—it could take the form of a tri-party agreement, uh, between the developer, uh, the purchaser and the city or another form, um, such as will accomplish the goal. That's correct. Okay. And include a final—or include a site plan draft. And the—and the—and so that the, um, agenda item can include a draft site plan as well. Okay. The person made the motion—the second still wants to second this motion. Does this still include the bonds? Yes. So the bonds within seven days. Okay. So we still have a second. Let's go ahead and vote. I need to switch the presentation. The motion carried four to three. Okay. So, uh, so it's tabled. Four to three. Got it. Okay. All right. So we're going to go ahead and move on to the next—to the next agenda item, which is public clearing resolution number— Excuse me, Mayor. I want to order—can—can—can we see the—how to vote? Yeah. Well, they're trying to get the— There we go. Sorry. Do we have the list of commissioners? Yeah. Or you can read it out if it makes it—quick. Uh, Mayor Villa, yes. Vice Mayor Harriet, no. Commissioner Villa-Vasquez, no. Commissioner Caldwell, yes. Commissioner Howlington, yes. Commissioner Lully, no. Commissioner Santiago, yes. Thank you. Thank you. All right. We're going to go ahead and go into public hearing resolution number 2025-07, accepting the final plat for Howland Marketplace, granting a replat of approximately 4.68 acres of land located at 3260, 3270, 3280 Howland Boulevard to create three commercial lots and two tracks of land within the Howland Marketplace business plan unit development. And, go ahead, Mr. Smith. Before you, it was resolution number 2025-27, acceptance of Howland Marketplace final plat. The applicant is requesting the acceptance of the final plat for Howland Marketplace to replat approximately 4.68 acres of land located at 3260, 3270, and 3280 Howland Boulevard to create three commercial lots and two tracks of land. The B-plat was adopted by the Commission on November 7, 2022. The preliminary plat was approved by DRC on September 19, 2024. And the final plat was approved by DRC on February 13, 2025. The property is located on the north side of Howland Boulevard at the corner of Howland and Forest Edge Drive. It is consistent with Florida Statutes Chapter 177 and Land Development Code Section 106-31. It has been reviewed by the city's surveyors, consultant, and city attorney, and all documents are sufficient for approval. The recommendation is for City Commission to approve resolution number 2025-27, accepting the final plat for Howland Marketplace for a replat of approximately 4.68 acres of land to create three commercial parcels and two tracks of land subject to the conditions in the staff report. Thank you. We've got a question from Commissioner Vila. Thank you, Vice Mayor. How many businesses are already confirmed to be built there? As of right now, one, Chipotle. I'm sorry? Chipotle, one. So it's just one? Correct. And then how many more are coming in there? At least two or three. Two or three more? Correct. So that Chipotle is confirmed, is signed, sealed, and delivered? They're ready to go. Okay. Thank you. Mayor, I'd like to—Vice, may I like to make a motion? Go ahead. I'm losing here. I hear Bible— Excuse me. Sorry, Commissioner. We've got—actually, go ahead and make your motion, and then we'll do during the discussion. Sure. Commissioner Lowley. I hereby move to approve Resolution No. 2025-07 and accept the final plot for Howland Marketplace BPUD, with the condition stated within the development order. I'll second that. Second. There is a motion by Commissioner Vila-Vasquez, a second by Commissioner Lully. Commissioner Lully, you're also on the board. Thank you. Do we know the categories of the other— Of the other retail? Thank you. At this time, we do not know. Okay. I'm just curious. And then— That's what I got. Thanks. Is there any public comment? No? All right. If I can get it repeated by the city attorney, and then we're going to go ahead and vote. Yes, Mr. Mayor, this is a resolution of the City of Deltona, Florida, accepting the final plat for Howland Marketplace, granting a replat of approximately 4.68 acres of land located at 3260, 3270, and 3280 Howland Boulevard to create three commercial lots and two tracts of land within the Howland Marketplace Business Plan Unit Development Zoning District within the city of Deltona, providing for conditions, conflicts, severability, and an effective date. The motion passes 7 to 0. This time, we're going to go into public hearing resolution number 2025-22, hearing an appeal to permit the Howland Station within the General Commercial District C2, located at 1600, 1620, 1625, 1630, and 1635 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, and 3015 Howland Boulevard within the city of Deltona, providing conditions, conflicts, severability, and an effective date. Mr. Smith, are you doing the presentation? I applaud. Let's go ahead. Good evening. Lyman Reynolds, outside counsel on behalf of the city. With regard to this resolution, the applicant is Howard Station Condo Developers, LLC. The Director of Planning and Development Services, Jordan Smith, denied the application for final site plan approval and required the applicant to resubmit under Ordinance 02-2025. This is the applicant's appeal of that staff decision. The basis for the staff's decision is the project did not meet the intent of Chapter 76, Land Development Code, in terms of being a mixed-use project. It is a single-use residential project only. The project did not include or provide for horizontal integration that would qualify as a mixed-use development, and the commercial portion did not have an end-user and has the potential to remain vacant, which would not qualify the project as a mixed-use. The intent of the Live Local Act in Chapter 76, Land Development Code, is for residential and commercial to be constructed and occupied at the same time. There was no unity of title. There has been no request to the city commission, and therefore there cannot be unity of title regarding the church lot being sold, mortgaged, or developed without commission approval, per the property agreement between the City of Deltona and Faith Bible Church of the Christian and Missionary Alliance, Inc. The provision is, quote, once combined, lots may not be separately sold, mortgaged, or developed without the prior approval of the city. That has not been done. On December 23, 2024, the Director of Planning and Development Services sent the applicant attorney a letter reiterating the fact that the Howland was deemed incomplete and required an updated submittal to include, A, a traffic study, and B, approval by the city commission for the inclusion of the church property. It is staff's position the application remains incomplete and respectfully requests the commission to deny the applicant's appeal. Thank you. All right. I'm going to take a quick point of privilege because I have some questions for our attorney. So just really quick, I want to clarify something, which is a question I had, and I think you went over it already, but the plat didn't get proper permission to be sold, correct, to unify the lots? Correct. Per the deed restriction? Yes, sir. Correct. Okay. I got a question for the developer, if they're here, or the developer's attorney, whichever. Mayor, before we go there, can we get the city attorneys to clarify that this item is specifically related only to the appeal, not to the project? Okay. Yes, that is correct. This item tonight is hearing the appeal of the Planning and Development Service director's decision that the application was incomplete and therefore must abide by the new zoning regulations that came into effect in December. However, this is not a determination in any way, shape, or form on the merits of the project itself. Perfect. Thank you. And thank you for that clarification. With that said, since this is based on the appeal, I am retracting my other questions, with the exception of the first one I made, because it is pertinent to this. So, Commissioner Howington, you're on the board. I believe I saw a letter that came through from Mark Watts previously, where he outlined the timeline, and I'm curious, we did zoning in progress October 21st, and if I read the deed correctly, the purchase of the church property took place on October 25th. Is that correct? Yes, ma'am. Just for the record, my name is Rebecca Wilson. I don't reside, but my office is at 215 North Eola Drive in Orlando, and if you don't mind, I believe that we could answer a lot of the questions that may come from the mayor and council members with our brief presentation, because we do include a timeline, and very similarly, we have worked with a couple different folks in your planning department, and we were specifically told to file for a final plat, just like the two that you all considered before us, and we did that back in August. Okay. But at that time, there wasn't a unified ownership, correct? We applied for the plat in August. We then closed in the end of October. Okay. But we were trying to line up the plat so that those would come together at the same time. The allegation that, in the staff report, that staff had no idea that we were purchasing this land just doesn't ring true when you look at the timeline and the meetings that we had with staff. Okay. At what point did that purchase come before the commission for approval, as required by the special deed? So, the special deed, we worked with your staff and with the attorney on how to address the—it's not a deed issue, it's a separate agreement to deal with that, and we were told to move forward with the plat, and had the plat moved forward through the process, it would have come at the same time, because there is a chicken and egg there. We can't purchase the land without asking your permission to do so, right? But then we couldn't ask for the plat, because it wouldn't be under unified ownership if we didn't purchase the land. And so, that's why we had open conversations with your staff for many months on how to resolve that issue. And that plat is still pending before the city. It hasn't been moved forward by staff to any hearing. But that's not a conversation with the commission. You never came before the commission and asked for a vote of the commission to approve the transfer of that land. We asked your attorney and your staff how to get that in front of you, and we were told to file a plat, and that that plat would be your approval. City attorneys, is that your recollection? I would say, by whom, who stated that to you? We've not seen any correspondence or documents to that effect. Happy to. For the record, Mark Watts with the law firm of Cobb Coal, 231 North Woodland Boulevard, DeLand. We started having meetings about this property and the configuration of the property, gosh, back in February of 2024, looking at how the property could be configured. Actually, in late 2023 was when we had the first meetings about it. With regard to the specific question about how to deal with the agreement that was previously done when the lots were combined for the church, staff, we met—this actually predates this was back when Marsha was still the city attorney. We met with Marsha. We met with the planning staff that was here at the time. We met with your—consistently, the route to address the ownership issue and the lot configuration issue was to process the final plat. So we filed that final plat in August of this past year, August of 2024. And I think you can get some more of that in the timeline that's going to be presented as part of the presentation. But that is the way that the commission can then address the reconfiguration of the lots. It's not necessarily that you have to seek permission for the transfer to occur. You have to seek permission for the lots to be configured in the way that they're proposed to be configured. And that final plat is the mechanism that does that. The verbiage here does say prior approval of the city of Deltona. Correct. So it does not say after the transfer takes place. Correct. And typically that would be the case. But we filed an application that hasn't been brought forward to the commission. So by the way, I'm really fascinated— Ma'am. Sure. I'd like to just ask the commission if we could give them the opportunity to give us their presentation so that we can hear them out before we ask questions. Thank you. Sure. I wanted to introduce my client, Scott Culp, and he'll be very, very brief. And we'll come back to you, Commissioner Howington. And then we do have Commissioner Lully on the board. So if you can just click on your thing. If I could just ask for your staff's assistance in how we progress the slideshow forward. Just want to make sure I'm not as tech-savvy as they are. So if they could just help me for just one second so we can proceed expeditiously through the presentation. I don't know how to proceed to the next slide. In whichever way it is. I can do either one. Does this one go forward? See if it's not moving or anything. So there we go. So I can go back now. Sorry for the delay. For the record, I'm Scott Culp. I'm the principal with Atlantic Housing Partners. And I appreciate, as I heard in some of the other comments before you tonight, you need to know who is one to develop in your city. Atlantic Housing has been developing multifamily residential communities for about 40 years. We've developed a little over 50,000 apartments. We own and operate our apartment communities that we developed for a minimum of 15 years. We still own about 15,000 apartments here in Central Florida. And a number of those in Volusia County and close to land, Orange City, City of Daytona close by. We develop primarily affordable apartment communities. And in this particular location, we were looking at developing and we're focusing on affordable seniors, seniors independent living. We saw this location, which you're seeing on the map here. If I can figure out how to just do this still doesn't seem to move. And I'm not quite sure. So we're looking at property to develop for independent seniors living under the Live Local Act. As you're well aware, the Live Local Act gave you opportunity throughout the state to develop affordable housing on property that was zoned for commercial. We saw this as what we thought would be a great opportunity in a location that was contiguous to the Deltona Center, which houses the Council on Aging, across the street from what is currently a medical office building and adjacent to the city's fire station. We saw it as a great opportunity for what could be a seniors independent living community. We recognize that baby boomers like myself are continuing to move into that age where they become seniors that need independent living facilities and that oftentimes they have fixed incomes. And if they're not cost burdened by the market rate rents, they're able then to be a positive contributor in your community and thereby spending money on the movies, the hair salon, the barbershop, and the restaurants in your community. And we think that's important for the growth of the community. And so we were excited as we brought this forward to the city. And I actually met with our engineers and our professionals with your staff in June of 2023. And we originally proposed development that had the apartments up on Howland. And your staff was concerned about the taking the commercial from the corner of Howland. And they were concerned about how we were proposing the mixed-use development. And we redid the plan. And we came back with the plan that we're currently showing, show on the zoning map, but it is zone C2. This was our previous concept plan that had the apartments up on Howland Boulevard and the commercial behind them. This is our current site plan, but you can't really see that from this, so, but that's what's been submitted. This is a rendering of that plan. And you'll see at the top the existing conditions. Back in 2009, developed this commercial subdivision, put in the infrastructure. The commercial parcels have been sitting there vacant since 2009. On the bottom part of it, you'll see we're proposing to put the 125 seniors independent living affordable housing community there and retain the commercial parcel in accordance with the Live Local Act and in accordance with all the provisions of your Chapter 76 affordable housing under the Live Local Act. We actually, Mark Watts and myself, met with your staff on numerous occasions to go through exactly how we would proceed with this development, to provide the much-needed seniors' housing, consistent with Chapter 76, which you were actually implementing while we were with you. We were in process. We started in June of 23. January of 24, you adopted that. We were involved. We came to the table with your city attorney at the time, with your planners at the time, talked about how we would do this. That's how we proceeded. We proceeded down to actually purchase the property. We owned the property. We proceeded with all of our construction plans, because those plans under the Live Local Act don't come back to the Commission for final site plan approval. They go through administrative review. So we spent all the money on the construction documents, proceeded in the manner in which your staff represented to us was the appropriate place to process for this approval. We were in process, had numerous meetings with staff, and were being told about different things, about intent that was not in the public record, intent that was nowhere in the Live Local Act at the state level. And we were being told things that would make it impossible for us to develop under the ordinance that you had actually adopted. That ordinance, we are 100% in compliance with. We have since been told, as of December 23rd, you adopted a new ordinance. We were the only applicant in process at the time, and nobody chose to tell us that there was a new ordinance being considered that was going to make it impossible. I've been doing this for 40 years. I can guarantee you that nobody is going to develop affordable housing under your new ordinance that was adopted in January. I apologize for a negative statement such as that, because I really, you know, think we have something positive here for you in the city. But that ordinance is not going to get any affordable housing. Maybe that's what you want. Maybe that's what you want. And if that's what you want, you have the right to decide that and proceed with that. But our development was brought in through a process with an ordinance that was in place that we actually worked with you on the process. I want to take just a minute to have our council address the issues with regard to our appeal. I've presented a little bit about the project, but you're right, it's not about the project. It's about how do we do what's best for the city? How do we do what's best for the residents and for the seniors that are in this community that need this affordable, independent living? How do we do what's best under the ordinance that we applied with, under the ordinance that we spent four and a half million dollars closing on the property and proceeding with our construction documents? I can go through a lot of our presentation. I won't take your time up about the affordability, the rental rates, the investment we have. We're owners. We're long-term owners. We're not build, fill, sell. This will be 30 years. We've never not finished a project. I've been doing this for 40 years. We don't have any multifamily projects that we have not completed. We've completed them throughout 10 different states and most of those in Central Florida. To expedite and not take up more of your time, I'd like to have our council address the appeal. Thank you, Scott. These are the rental rates, if anyone had questions about those. With regard to the timeline. So, in 2023, that's when the first pre-apps occurred with the city, and the city was aware of which property we were requesting as part of those pre-apps, along with the Live Local Act. It was at that time that your city let us know that if we were going to use the Live Local Act, that the city is one of the municipalities that has 20 percent or less of its property in commercial or industrial. So, under the Live Local Act, the local government can then require that we provide a mixed-use residential project. And basically, the legislature acknowledged that there may be a reason for a municipality to not want to let all of its commercial property go to a Live Local Act project. So, during that time, going back and forth with the different site plans that Scott showed you, it was negotiated with your staff that we would move the apartments to the rear of the property out on Howland. We would keep that as a parcel that could be a great commercial, standalone commercial parcel. And that is consistent with the ordinance that was adopted in January of 2024. We had several follow-up meetings. And then in August, as mentioned, we submitted our final plat, which, if approved and brought forward, would have been the approval of the new lot configuration. And we also included our final site plan. Florida Statute 166.033 requires a local government within 30 days to grant a sufficiency letter, either telling you you're sufficient or you're not sufficient and what you're missing. We received a sufficiency letter for both the final plat and the final site plan. So, when we got that sufficiency letter, we were officially before the city. We had a pending application in. Now, there continued to be discussions about the nature of the mixed use and the commercial that we were providing. And as you can see, we continued to meet with your staff to work these out. My client, as mentioned, purchased the property at the end of October. And that is when, after we purchased it, the city adopted a zoning in progress. The zoning in progress said, if you haven't already applied, beware, we're going to change this zoning. First, your staff never let us know that they were adopting this zoning in progress. Now, I'm not saying that their notice was insufficient. What I am saying is that we had been working in good faith for, at this point, almost a year in getting this project to be consistent with the ordinance that was in place. And nobody gave us a heads up. That's fine. We didn't—we don't believe that legally it should apply to us. We then had a meeting after the zoning in progress resolution was adopted. Again, city staff didn't mention it. We then closed on our tax-exempt private activity bonds. As you can see, these were issued by Housing Finance Authority of Volusia County from an allocation of federal tax-exempt bonds provided through Florida Division of Bond Finance. These are the things that other local governments are trying to get this type of funding allocated to projects in their cities so that affordable housing can be built for their residents. And then, as you all know, on the 23rd of December, the city passed an ordinance which amends Chapter 76 with regard to the implementation of the Live Local Act and created a—or put in place requirements that our project would not be able to meet. And as Scott mentioned, we don't believe any other projects that are affordable would be able to meet. On the same day, we got a letter from the city stating that our pending applications were incomplete. Again, a reversal of the letter that we received in August. And thus, we are now subject to the new regulations. And that's when we filed this appeal. What we're asking is simply to play by the rules that were in place when we filed our applications and when we purchased the property. And so, I can go through—I'm sure you all, you know, enjoy it when lawyers get up here and debate. But my point is, the zoning in progress did not apply to our application because we did have a pending application. In fact, I believe your city staff stated it in just this evening in a meeting when one of you all asked, hey, we have a stormwater zoning in progress, does it apply to this application? And the answer was no, because they've already applied. The zoning in progress is not applicable to them. Same for us. We had already applied. Certainly, equitable estoppel, your attorneys can speak to this. But we relied on the laws that were in place at the time, the application we submitted, the letter stating that we were sufficient. And we relied on those things. And my client continued to spend a tremendous amount of money both purchasing the property and creating the plans consistent with the ordinance in place and then closing on the bond financing. Again, our request is really simple. We're just asking to follow the rules that are set forward under the state live local act, under your ordinance that was in place when we submitted our application and closed on the property. As Scott mentioned, some of what was going back and forth with the staff is staff believed there was an intent that the mixed use be required vertically. That is not what the ordinance states. That is not what the state law requires. And we instead would appreciate being able to continue with our site plan as proposed that meets the Ordinance 02-2024. Happy to answer any other questions that you all may have. Thank you, Commissioner Howington. Would you like to finish? So then we can go to Commissioner Lully. Sure. Question for our attorneys. Are we under any obligation to contact everyone when we have a publicly noticed meeting? Was it our obligation to notify them that Zoning in Progress could potentially be placed on October 21st? No, by adoption of the resolution at a publicly noticed meeting that had been duly advertised and adopted, that is notification to the public. And it is, frankly, the obligation of any developer or investor to stay apprised of the ongoing developments of the city. So they would have had time to come back and make a request to come before the commission, before they purchased the property on October 25th, knowing that Zoning in Progress went in place? That's really a question for the applicant. Just to be clear, we purchased the property before the city adopted a Zoning in Progress. So is the deed not dated October 25th, 2024? We were—we had already—we were already required to close. We had waived all of our contingencies and were required to close. And my point simply is not that I have not stated that your staff did not do the minimum that is required to notice. I am sure that they put the notice in the newspaper. Was there no title search done? Because I would assume that at some point during a title search, it would have been discovered that this commission has to approve the transfer of that land. It was, which is why, you see, in August, we submitted the final plat. And the final plat, as Mark testified, is how your staff directed us to make that request. We'd been waiting for this final plat to move forward. And you didn't think to reach out any time between the 21st and the 25th before that purchase was completed? We did. I've got volumes of emails, and you can see all of these meetings that we had with your staff on that, trying to get this to move forward. But you just said that you didn't know that we didn't tell you we were changing and adding this Zoning in Progress, correct? Your staff did not tell us that at any of these meetings. I'm talking about the period between October 21st and October 25th. So you had a lot of communication between that time period? Yes, and your staff never mentioned that. Oh, by the way— Are they required to by law? They are not required to by law, but they are likely required to by common law. Okay. We're going to go ahead to Commissioner Lully. I move to deny the appeal the decision of the Director of Planning and Development Services. Second. There's a motion by—we'll get to your question. We've got a motion by Commissioner Lully and a second by Commissioner Ewington. Commissioner Avila Vasquez, you're on the table, and then we'll go to public comments. Thank you, Mayor. I would like to ask, sorry, Jordan, a question? Jordan, are you aware of the church coming to the city to request permission or a write-off to sell that piece of land to anybody? I am not aware of—staff sent many emails to Mr. Watts saying that this is a requirement per the property deed. And to this date, we have not received anything from the church itself? No. Okay. Can you explain to—give me a little explanation, because I know there was a lot of mixed-use and live-local thrown around. What is the difference? Because I know there is a difference of mixed-use and live-local. There are different requirements. Am I correct? So, point of order. Yeah. Give me a minute. There's a point of order. What is your point of order? I'd like to ask the city attorney to clarify if that question's relevant to the appeal. That is not necessarily relevant to this appeal. Again, this appeal is on whether the application was complete or not. To answer the question, live-local refers specifically to the live-local act and the requirements of the live-local statute, whereas mixed-use is a more general term. Well, my question leads to my second—this question leads to my second question, which was, so if we're taking this application on the live-local, were the full plans submitted to the city of Deltona? Because to me, live-local means residential and businesses. So, if we're doing this on the live-local, were the full plans for this project submitted to the city? Plans were submitted to the city. However, after staff review, we deem the plans to be incomplete based on our review of the ordinance. Thank you. Mr. Nye, public comment? Kathy Bryan, please. Good evening. Kathy Bryan, Deltona. I am curious as to what is considered affordable, because I heard the applicant say that, you know, it's going to be affordable, but what's affordable to one person may not be affordable to somebody else. I'm just curious about what that's considered. If we're talking about an independent living community for seniors, is there any plans for any kind of transportation to help them out? A lot of times when you've got independent living, it's because they need—they still need some medical care, but they can get along on their own. But, you know, for those that can't or can't drive, et cetera, any plans on that? I also noticed that when—well, this one, this slide right here, where it says October 2024, the applicant purchased the property. Why isn't there a date there? I'm going to say all the other things I said before. You know, again, we're talking about putting in multiple families in there. I would—I'd rather have this than—than a lot of other options, et cetera. But again, that area, getting in and out, getting into Howland, and that's from either side, you know, and when you have to cross the road, what are their plans for that? Is that to drive everybody through the center? There's just a lot of—when we talk about these areas, I'm not hearing as much about the surrounding areas. And while I may not be considered to legally have standing, because I'm not 300 yards away or whatever it is, citizen that's affected by any of these developments, I think, has standing. Because we have to do—we have to deal with the aftermath, and that's not really the right word that I want, but in other words, we're subject to the higher traffic. We're subject to, you know, the storm—extra stormwater runoff, because every time you build something that is impermeable, water has to go somewhere, right? You guys know that. So, I also heard them talking about—we had talked about vertical building, and I think if we don't start doing that more often, because it's going to take—it may be more expensive, but it's going to leave more permeable land. And hopefully the applicant will consider, if all this goes through, in putting in the landscaping that is tolerable to Florida and doesn't require a lot of our potable water, which we cannot afford. Thank you. Tara Diarco, please. Hey, good evening, everyone. Tara Diarco. My understanding is that this is currently zoned as mixed-use, yet all we're hearing about is and discussing are the residential areas. So, where's the—and all I'm seeing is a reference to future commercial construction. So, where's the commercial to go along with the mixed-use? Because if it's not coming, then it's just residential. We've heard comments like how to do what's best for the city and please for our city to play by the rules, so then we should expect the same of the developers, which is to make a commitment as to when the commercial will be developed and occupied, because unfortunately—and I don't need to tell you all sitting in front of me—our city has been in a position before the residential development to happen, with the understanding that the commercial will come sometime, maybe, possibly, maybe next month, next year, five years from now, and the commercial never comes, so now we just have residential, only for the commercial to come back up for a rezone, because now we can't develop it, we can't sell it, we don't have a buyer, so we're asked to rezone it to more residential. So, I would just ask that we take that into consideration as well. Otherwise, thank you all. Have a great evening. That is public comment. All right. If the city attorney can reread the motion, and we're going to go ahead and vote. This is a resolution of the city of Deltona, Florida, hearing an appeal to permit a multifamily project Howland Station within the General Commercial District, located at 1600, 1620, 1625, 1630, and 1635, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, and 3015 Howland Boulevard within the city of Deltona, providing for conditions, providing for conflicts, and providing for an effective date, and the motion on the floor is for denial. The motion to deny passes seven to zero. Mayor. I'd like to ask that we get like a five-minute recess to go to the bathroom to get something to drink before we start the next agenda item. Sure. We'll go ahead and take a five-minute recess. Thank you. Started with 10 items, A, 9A, quasi-judicial hearing regarding whether mayor had knowledge of travel policy before date of travel, and that mayor violated travel policy. Turn over the time to the city attorneys. Thank you very much. This is a quasi-judicial public hearing. Please be advised that this item is quasi-judicial in nature. Will be an opportunity for persons to speak on each item, and I will go through that now. A quasi-judicial hearing does require—it is a different type of hearing than a normal public hearing, more similar to the quasi-judicial hearings that we often hear in land use. There are some distinctions. This hearing, the mayor, vice mayor, and commissioners will be presenting evidence, and they have the option to call witnesses as well. The mayor, vice mayor, and commissioners will then sit as the finders of fact and will provide a ruling on this matter. As always in quasi-judicial hearings, it is important to carefully weigh all evidence presented and host open deliberations prior to reaching a conclusion. In this quasi-judicial hearing, mayor, vice mayor, and commissioners must disclose any ex parte communications on this topic. This will include emails, phone calls, and social media messages. After there is full disclosure of ex parte communications, there will need to be an opportunity for public comment. Public comment will be limited to one minute per person and be on the topic of the ex parte communications. Specifically, our code requires that once ex parte disclosures are made, and just so everyone knows, this is section 2-2-A, I'm sorry, B-4. Once disclosure is made, before a vote is to be taken on the matters, so that persons who have opinions contrary to those expressed in the ex parte communications are given a reasonable opportunity to refute or respond to the communications. The public, in a quasi-judicial proceeding, there will be a swearing in. However, the public will have an opportunity to choose to be sworn or unsworn. If they choose to be sworn, you should give what they say more weight than if they choose to be unsworn. Then you should give it its due weight as an unsworn statement. Once that is complete, the rest of the hearing, the quasi-judicial hearing, will be turned over to you all. This is your hearing. You all are the commission, and you have the opportunity to regulate the commission. And so, this will be your hearing to run. Certainly, we're here to answer some questions as they come up. But, generally, questions with respect to the procedure, once it is turned over to you all, will be up to you all to decide by a simple majority. An opportunity for persons to speak on each item—I'm sorry, on this item—will be made available after the mayor, vice mayor, and commissioners have their opportunity to speak. So, there will be a second opportunity for public comment after the mayor, vice mayor, and commissioners speak and present evidence. Those public comments will be limited, as well, to one minute per person. And, again, it is the same standard. They can be sworn or unsworn. And if they are sworn, you should give their testimony due weight, as it is sworn testimony. And if they are unsworn, you should give their testimony due weight, as it is unsworn. Other testimony, other than public comment, will be made under oath or affirmation. Any person who gives testimony—not public comment, but testimony in the hearing—may be subject to cross-examination by any of the other members of the mayor, vice mayor, or commission. The public will not be permitted to cross-examine witnesses, but the public may request the commission to ask questions on their behalf. As we have discussed before, the mayor will have an opportunity to speak, and his council will have an opportunity to speak and present evidence. Once all of the testimony has been entered into the record, the commission as a body may discuss the evidence that has been presented to them in order to make your final determination. This is the appropriate time for a motion and a second to occur. However, the standard of proof that is required in this matter is clear and convincing evidence, which requires that evidence be highly probable and substantially more likely to be true than not. When we get to that portion of the hearing, if you would like me to again discuss the definition of clear and convincing evidence, you can ask at that time, and I'm happy to discuss it again and explain it again. You must have a firm belief or conviction that, based on the evidence presented, the conclusion that you draw is true. As required by our City Code of Ordinances, Section 2-380, this is the final sentence of that section, finding of guilt shall only be upon the affirmative vote of a supermajority of the entire city commission. That means five—are there any questions at this time regarding the quasi-judicial nature of this hearing? If there are not, we will proceed to swear any—you all, and then anyone else will be giving testimony in. Okay. And at this time, I would ask all persons who will be testifying to please stand and raise your right hand. That includes the commission, if you will be testifying. If you're not planning on offering testimony, then please stand and raise your right hand. Do you hereby swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, to help you God? I do. Yes. You may be seated. So at this time, the explanation regarding the quasi-judicial nature is complete. The swearing has been completed. At this time, we would ask that ex parte communications be disclosed. You may—at this time, the mayor—this is your meeting, so you may handle it how you wish. Okay. So we'll go—I'll disclose my ex parte communication, then we'll go down numerical order. So we maintain order on this. And then after that, if I am correct, then we do public comment on the ex parte communication, correct? So I'll start, and then I'll go down the numerical order. Full disclosure, I'm not in a lot of these Facebook groups, so the people I'm ex parte are phone calls, emails, whether I responded to those emails or not, and messages. Prior to this meeting, I've been getting—my phone's been going off the hook, so I don't know if any of that is related to this. So I'll go ahead and get started. It's a lengthy list, so— Mayor, point of order, are you intending on listing all emails that you received on this matter, or only the emails that you've responded back to? All emails, which is what I was told to, correct? Anything related to this matter? Yes, all communication, so that would include your emails that you've received. And the point of these disclosures is to cure any prejudicial nature of those communications that may have occurred, so it is better to disclose communications that you think may qualify rather than to omit them. I did. Thank you. Okay. I got—so Mayor Diesel DePue from Edgewater, Mayor Jason Leslie of Ormond Beach, Mayor Paul Tenhacken from South Falls, South Dakota, obviously Attorney Anthony Sabatini, the both city attorneys, Gemma Trusiva and Zach Good, Jeffrey Stuck, Terry Ellis, Pat Northey, Luis Lell, Luis Montero, Victor Montalvo, Ray Waters, Courtney Cross-Burgos, Amanda Rogers, Carlos Arturo, and I'm sorry if I butcher some of these names, Gavalanis Jr., William Rodriguez, Jonathan Medina, George Monzon, Gianna Monzon, Jeanette—again, I'm sorry—Hivia, Fran Darms, Councilwoman Fran Darms, Levy, Witten, Connolly, Michael Angel Rivera, Adam Vasquez, Allison Bordeaux-Jones, Alvin Lopez, Larry French, Christian De La Torre, Michael Bowman, Tina Swift, Abraham Lopez, Matthew Shaw, Michael Castaldi, obviously Doc, Tom Burbank, Joyce, Lisa Chavez, Albert Bryan, Debbie James, Terry Haynes, Tara Lau, Ellen Coven, Wendy Durval, Edward LeBron, Nancy—Mary Nancy Miller, Volusia County Councilman Danny Robbins, Volusia County Councilman David Santiago, State Senator Jason Broder, Adam Rivera, Tara Diargo, Karen Nair, obviously family members, some churches that have called to offer prayer, and the last one I checked before coming down here was Peter Vivaldi. We'll go to District 1. So I did not write down everybody that I received an email from. That's—that was a—there was a long list of folks that were sent emails. That's all public record. I did—did list those emails that I replied to. I've got Terry Ellis, Virgil Ford, Tara Diargo, David Santiago, Dana McCool, Pat Northey, Linda White, Lauren King, David Sosa, Jim Pesha, Ellen Coven, Marie E., Tina Swift, and then I exchanged emails, responded to Elbert Bryan, Lisa Chavez, Stephanie Cox, Doc Docherty, Gemma Torcivia, Zach Good, and then I also consulted the dogs at the house, and they expressed only love for our city and did not understand why this is going on. District 2. Thank you, Mayor. City Manager, Doc, our city attorneys, Zach and Gemma, Tara, Diargo, and David Santiago. District 3. Thank you, Mayor. Mr. Rico, Mr. Trombetta, cell phone calls, cell and in-person city clerk Joyce, cell and in-person city attorneys, both Gemma and Zach, in-person city manager, in-person Mr. LaSanta, residents who stopped me in Publix and Walmart, which I didn't know who they were, so I can't give you a name, and an email, I responded to Ms. Carol McPherson requesting time, date of the meeting. District 4, Commissioner. Okay. It's going to be kind of a long list because I do follow social media, and so I went all encompassing. Anybody who could potentially have had something said that could come up, I've included everybody under the sun, Anthony Sabatini, Jamison Jessup, Doc Docherty, Zach Good, Gemma Torsiva, the commissioners that were at the Monday meeting, as well as anybody who was on an email that I was sent, so Commissioner Caldwell, Commissioner Avila-Vasquez, Commissioner Santiago, Vice Mayor Harriet, Commissioner Lully, the mayor, Joyce Rafferty, Sandy Jackson, Bridget Ludwig, John Cox, Albert Bryan, Jody Lee Strozek, Dana McCool, Lisa Garcia, Michael Bowman, Terry Ellis, Dan Trojanowski, Catherine Wanamaker, Phil Giorni, Phil Nichols, Richard Bellick, Donald Freeman, Tara Lau, Selena Hildebrandt, Christina O'Brien, Jason Leslie, Elizabeth Chavez, Brooke Mendoza, Courtney Burgos, Mark Harper, Drew Howington, Blake Howington, Jacqueline Harreld, Spectrum Assignment Desk Team, Tammy Westfall, Suzanne Evans, Sarah Webb, Lisa Burke, Jeff Denon, Debbie Denon, Stephanie Galeski, John Spano, Tom Burbank, Bill Neuslich, sorry if I pronounce people's names wrong, Devin Martin, Hope George, Mitchell Zavallis, Marlene Mendoza, Adele Sachs, Ben Souther, Marie Edinger, Al Everson, Stephanie Cox, Coven, Terry Haynes, Chase Summerall, Wendy Dorival, Doreen Beauregard, Pamela Combe, Demi Johnson, Jenna Fisher, Lindsay Brionis, Bridget Elliott, Brandon Spencer, Gary Darling, unknown resident had a phone number that ended in 3829, unknown cameraman for Channel 2, 9, and 35, members of the following social media groups, Deltona News and Notes, Blowing Off Steam in Deltona, Deltona Everything You Need to Know, Volusia Issues, Deltona A City on the Move, Deltona The Place We Call Home, anybody who follows or views my Commissioner Dori Howington page as well as the Mayor's social media, all attendees of the February 3rd, 2025 regular commission meeting, the TNR group who was meeting at Boston Coffee next to me on February 2nd, I think we all saw that photo, viewers of Channel 2, 6, and 9, and Fox 35, both online and on TV, and apparently Fox ran it in Gainesville, so I'm including them as well. That's it. Go ahead, Commissioner. I have a question for the attorneys. The names that Commissioner Howington mentioned that, I just want to clarify, when you mentioned my name, was that something on an email? I was copying an email? Well, we had the meeting on February 3rd, where we all discussed it, so I included everything. Oh, okay. Yes. Just want to clarify, I didn't have any meetings, personal meetings with her. Sunshine included in that. I just wanted to make sure that I included it in my list so it was all inclusive. Commissioner of District 5. As I do not get on social media too much, I have noticed some posts on my Facebook page. I did see some emails come through the city emails, correspondence through the city commission. Other than communications we had here on the dais on the meeting of February 3rd, I spoke with Doc, our city attorneys, and Joyce in regards to the mayor's travel. That's all I have. Commissioner of District 6. Thank you very much. I respond to almost every email that I get, so there was a lot of people, Tom Burbank, Jacqueline Harold, Tammy Westfall, Lawrence Archer, Chase Sumrall, Wendy Darvill, sorry if I'm mispronouncing names, Ellen Coven, Tara Lau, Stephanie Cox, Terry Haynes, Debbie Mize, Albert Bryan, Maria Edinger, David Sosa, Linda White, Richard Bellick, Jeannie Greenwald, Jennifer Chastein, Troy Shimkus, Robert Trombetta. I sent a link to Virgil Ford, Lisa Chavez. I reviewed correspondence sent today to this commission by Anthony Sabatini, who is representing the mayor, the city attorney staff, the city manager, and it's very possible I mentioned it in passing, but don't recall a meaningful conversation with Lori Warnicke, Tina Swift, and Jeremy Tacey. Thank you. This time we'll go to the public comment on the quasi-judicial. Is there any public comment specifically on the quasi-judicial? This is limited to the ex parte disclosures only. I don't know that they knew that that—I would ask the audience at this time if they would like to just come up one at a time. Okay. Kathy Ryan, please. That's fine. I just want to let you know, you don't have to call that list. You could just say, does anyone in the public specifically want to speak on the ex parte disclosures that just occurred, and then just let them come up one at a time? I know that is not our normal practice, but just for this, since it's two separate topics. Does anyone wish to speak about the ex parte communications? Seen not. Okay. Point of— Donald Freeman, please. Okay. All these communications, do you have any fake profiles that you used previously, like Kevin Nicolai or anything like that, or any other fake profiles that you would surf the internet and have that secret communications back and forth? So are we answering questions on the— This is public comment. You are not obligated to respond. You don't have to answer anything. Okay. I'd like to forward that question on to the commission. Did any of the communication listed by each commissioner take place via a social media profile that was not obviously their own? And if I can further add to that, if you're okay, would the commission at any given moment be willing to give their phones so they can verify that, too? Sure. Does anybody use the fake profile to communicate on social media? I have not. Verified by the city attorney. I have not. I have not. I have not. I have not. I have not either. I have none. No. Okay. And I have a point of order. Gemma, I had sent an email earlier today. Would you mind speaking on that before we go further? Yes. Earlier today, Commissioner Howington sent an email with a few questions. I'm going to summarize that. And again, if I'm not summarizing it correctly, please tell me. So Commissioner Howington's questions were with regards to the ethical rules on when a city commissioner can vote and the regulation under state statute. The commissioner had a question regarding if a member that can gain or lose money is prohibited from voting. You also asked if it seems clear that the city commission can choose to ask for repayment of the money that was used for travel, which led to your two questions. How is the mayor allowed to vote on this matter, and how is the mayor allowed to preside over this matter? You provided some Florida state statutes and an opinion from the AGO 85-40, which was issued May 21st, 1985. So we received this this afternoon. We did look into this question. This is a complex area of law. Our charter is very clear on this topic. Our charter states that all city commissioners, including the commissioner charged with a violation, may take pardon and vote as to all matters relating in any way to the charge. The statute is a little more gray and a little more unclear. This afternoon, we reached out to the attorney general's office, as well as the Florida Commission on ethics, but neither one rendered an opinion on this topic. So as we reviewed and analyzed your questions, Commissioner Howington, we looked to our charter and our Code of Ordinances, which breaks this process down into two parts, which is Section 2-380 violations and then Section 2-381 sanctions. As to the first issue, which is under Section 2-380, I'm going to read the relevant portion. So we talked about the section I just read. All city commissioners, including the commissioner charged with a violation, may take pardon and vote as to all matters relating in any way to the charge. I'm going to skip to the end of it, which then says, burden of proof of the quasi-judicial hearing for consideration of the charge shall be clear in convincing evidence. A finding of guilt shall only be upon the affirmative vote of a supermajority of the entire city commission. It then goes down to 381 sanctions, which reads, possible sanctions under this article shall include one or more in any combination of the following as deemed appropriate by a simple majority of the commissioners present at the meeting when the charge is considered. There are a variety of possible sanctions. However, Section 2-381 does not arise unless a finding of guilt has been made by an affirmative vote of a supermajority of the entire city commission. So these items need to be looked at independently. As to the first item, which is a vote and participation under Section 2-380, our charter is clear that there is no prohibition on the mayor being involved in the meeting or voting. Again, the plain language of the charter states that all city commissioners, including the commissioner charged with a violation, may take pardon and vote as to all matters relating in any way to the charge. There is nothing in the charge which speaks to the Florida statutes with respect to financial gain or having a special financial interest. The charge is independent of anything related to do with a special financial gain or financial interest. If we get to the second issue, which is Section 2-381, I will render an opinion at that time. We're going to go ahead at this time and get started with—and I'm sorry, I'm going to keep asking questions. We haven't done this in the past. So, yes. And you may—again, this is your hearing, you all as a body. So, you can just proceed, but you could also decide at the outset how you're going to proceed. You all—someone could make a recommendation. I think this person should go first. I think this person should go second. You could vote on it. You don't have to do that, though. This is—this is your meeting. You all sit as—in a unique role in this quasi-judicial hearing. So, you can set a procedure for yourselves. You do not have to. Understood. Okay. Since the board is not lit up, I guess—go ahead, Commissioner—or, sorry, Vice Mayor. I'd like to suggest that we proceed with the party that made the initial motion at the last meeting, presenting first, and then give the mayor an opportunity to rebut, present anything, and then after that, Commissioner questions, Commission—the rest of us ask questions. Is that— You will need to vote. A voice vote would be fine. Do—do it—does that need a second? Is that—or just consensus? A consensus is fine. You all do a verbal vote. Joyce. Okay. We'll start seven to zero. Commissioner Howington, we'll start with you. I think, actually— Oh, it was you that—okay, I apologize. Commissioner Colwell. All right, my question starts out, on 11-27-24, we had a meeting, a city meeting. Were you in attendance of that meeting and preside over it? You're going to have to speak a little louder. I apologize. I said on 11-27-24, we had a city commission meeting, and were you in attendance, and did you preside over that meeting? Yes. Okay. During—we got a video played of that meeting? 2023. 2023. 2023, I'm sorry, for clarification. The question is for 11-27-2023? That's correct. Yes, I did preside over that meeting. To, uh, 1-105-41. Police say, seeing a vote every seven days for any .241. It says— Police ask .241. It says, tentative budget must be posted on the city website two days prior to vote. 48 hours. A tentative vote, or tentative budget. It's funny. The first one was a summary. It didn't have all the funds included. It made your vote illegal. Now, the second one actually had a proposed budget. Still, not all the funds were listed, which also makes that vote illegal. Did you sign that budget? Oh, that's right. The mayor did. I also have a policy here that I got two years ago because I was looking up other stuff, procedures and policies of this commission. And as I say commission, I mean the date actually says expenses. You're allowed three up there. And it says you have to come and get a vote, anything out of state. There seems to be a pattern here that we just can't seem to follow rules, statutes, and guidance here by other commissioners that have actually written this in to the actual, uh— I would like to submit that at that meeting we were informed that there was a travel policy, um, for the commissioners, and that you were made aware of it at that point. So I—I just want to clarify I was not aware of that for the simple fact that the person, um, that was speaking didn't specifically provide a policy number or say anything. And I—I actually watched that whole meeting due to all the public records requests that were coming in. And at no time did this commission specifically speak to me, uh, regarding the—the travel policy. As a mayor or a commissioner, if this was brought up in a meeting, would you not follow up, do some research? Commissioner Colwell, just for—for—for—just for clear transparency, this is how many policies commissioners in the city have. When we—when we—when we first come and get elected, we're sat down—and my attorney can get into this when it's my turn, but we're sat down and we're—we sign documents. Nowhere in the documents that any of us have signed is there a document specifically on a travel policy. Now, I—I will tell you, as many of you know, this is—I—I give it to you, it's a part-time job. I have not specifically gone through this book of policies and procedures, which, if any of you have done that, listen, more power to you, but I have not done that, so. Play another video, specifically the newscast on Channel 6. I believe it starts at 41 seconds. At what time? Uh, yeah. No, what time do you want me to go in? Oh, uh, 41, I think it is. People are just questioning whether you followed the travel policy and getting permission to leave the state. Did you go about that? This is why it's important to kind of look and modernize everything we have, right? So, um, there seems to be two different travel policies in our city, right? The one that they're talking about is from 2007. So, let's just pretend for a moment that we're going to follow that policy, which, full disclosure, I accept responsibility. I didn't know that policy existed. I was going off a different policy. I received copies of both the old 2007 and the updated policies. Both state commissioners and elected officials need to have the commission's approval for out-of-state travel. Avila Jr. admitted to not doing that, but says some city officials were aware. I spoke to the city manager. I told them, uh, you know, that... So, you stated in this statement here that you were aware there was a policy. So, I had just got from—back from Tallahassee, which, when I was made aware of the policy, I also realized that we had to make reports, which is here, and that'll come up. But, no, as a matter of fact, that policy that they're talking about—so, apparently now there's five travel policies, right? The policy that I was aware of, after I got back from Tallahassee, was the policy that was done November of 2024, if I'm not mistaken. And that does not speak about commissioners or anybody on the dais needing to get permission to go out-of-state. I will tell you, moving forward, that will not be an issue, as well as these reports, by the way. Do you have a copy of that policy? I have copies of the policy now. Okay. The policies are all the same. They're just resolutions that was changed over the years to implement the cost for travel. But it's all the same policy. So, the one from November of 2024 is exactly the same? It is not. That is not. I'm not sure where that policy is. That's why I'm asking you to produce that. That's—well, I have them all there, but that's the policy that I was talking about. Where did you get this policy from? The one from November of 2024 that you're referring to? Well, that's the one that the new city manager implemented. The new city manager implemented? I'm sorry? The city manager implemented? He came up with a brand-new city— He doesn't have the power to do that. Commissioner, I'll be happy to answer your questions. You have to let me finish. Okay. You know, we kind of give each—look, we're here because we're trying to come together, right? I agree. We don't need to be divisive with each other, all right? So, the question is, is that I know the travel policy. I believe even in your own evidence that you submitted, I actually said, full disclosure, I didn't know the travel policy. I believe I said that. And then when I said that I was going off the other travel policy, when I just got back from Tallahassee, I said, well, you know what? There's all these travel policies. I started making reports. I mean, if we all want to abide, and maybe I'm wrong, but I think everybody on this diet is in violation of either of those travel policies. I mean, why don't we install fax numbers or fax machines in our houses? I mean, has anybody on this diet submitted reports for anything that they go to do? Yes. I haven't got the reports. When I got back from Tallahassee, I put this report, and I sent it to the city manager. I believe he sends it to everybody. I have no further questions. City, the attorney wants to say yes. Good evening, Commission. I'm speaking on behalf of Mayor Santiago, my client. My name is Anthony Sabatini, local attorney. And I'm just going to give you sort of a broad overview of what we believe is expected of the commission as a whole, and then an overview of some of the evidence, and then we'll speak about the evidence as it comes along. So, first and foremost, as you very well know, you are constitutionally bound and oath-bound under the U.S. and state constitutions and the city charter to base your decision on the facts. Not your feelings, not your expectations, not your wishes, not your desires. The actual facts, what you can discover and discuss here today, what you can get out in testimony or cross-examination or some of the documents that you'll be viewing here tonight, that has to be the basis of your decision. If it's based on anything but the facts, then you have purposely violated the Constitution. I trust that no one on this commission will do that. Plainly put, and I'll start sort of bottom line up front, there exists no facts at all to establish as a threshold a specific violation of this policy, much less will you find a knowing violation of this policy. Under the due process clause of our state and U.S. Constitution, you have to prove before you discipline or sanction any member of this body that they had specific knowledge of the travel policy, that they had specific knowledge of the requirements contained within the travel policy. Now, I would submit to you that most people in this commission recognize the number of requirements that are associated with this policy, and we're going to talk about that here tonight. So, as your city attorney outlined, the statement of proof here is clear and convincing evidence. That is not more likely than not. That is not I have a feeling. That is not probable cause. That is clear and convincing, substantially true. As your city attorney staff very eloquently put, says you must have a firm belief or conviction that the evidence presented in the conclusion of a violation is true. Firm conviction. Firm conviction. And very little of the evidence you're going to see here tonight is going to prove anything like that. In fact, it's going to prove the opposite. We're going to prove a negative. We're going to prove the absence of knowledge on behalf of Mayor Avila of this specific policy. He signed no documents. Okay? You will see no signature of documents indicating knowledge of a certain policy. You go across America, every agency, every institution, from the Army to small businesses, have employees checking boxes, signing off, usually at a quarterly basis, specific knowledge of policies. That did occur in this case, but guess what? As you'll see from the evidence, only three policies were shown to this mayor when he came into this very important role. Three. They're attached as Exhibit 2. We'll get there in just a moment. But lacking from that list is this policy. Not to get too far ahead of myself, I will tell you, as a commission, you could easily change that and fix this whole situation by requiring staff to attach a renewal of this policy, an acknowledgement of the policy at every travel disbursement or request going forward. But you cannot do that retroactively, which, of course, is what's sort of in play here. There is no signature of a document. There is no specific knowledge of a travel policy. The two pieces of evidence that were elicited by the commissioner moments ago are of one moment far before this instance of behavior and one afterwards. So we'll take them in order. The first comment from a gentleman who came to this dais or this podium to speak to the dais, at the very tail end of one of your very long, very elongated, very detailed meetings in which you guys are working very hard, a reference to a travel policy with no name, no number, no specific requirement other than a reference that it needed to be signed at some point. And no reference of who it was on the dais was purportedly violating the policy is quite literally the single most robust piece of evidence you're ever going to see here for proof that Mayor Avila had knowledge of a travel policy. I would remind you that that was almost 18 months ago of the dozens and dozens of official meetings, the hundreds and hundreds of unofficial meetings with the thousands of pages of documents that you've reviewed with all of the conversations you've had in the community concerning your job here. I would submit to you that it's probably going to be very difficult, even with a great memory, to remember one instance of a comment from a resident 18 months ago. In addition to that, you'll find, if you watch the entirety of that tape, no commissioner specifically talking about the requirements of the travel policy. No acknowledgement of Mr. The Mayor of having read it or talked about it. It was simply one throwaway statement from the crowd at probably dozens of public commenters that day. Again, there is a way to fix this situation. There is a way to fix the situation. Like I mentioned earlier, you can always improve your policies. As a commission, you always should be looking to improve your policies and coming up with ways of creating more notification of policies. Mr. Mayor, would you mind picking up the policy set again? This is how many policies you abide by. You have a very difficult job here. A lot of people don't realize that the average city in the state of Florida is about 7,000 people. There's 411 cities. You serve a city of almost 100,000 people. You have a much more difficult job than the average city commissioner in Florida. Much more difficult. I would argue probably 15 or 20 times more difficult. And so keeping up with these policies is not something that's easy to do. It's not like you have 5 or 10 or 15. Even in that case, I think you would have to prove through evidence substantial knowledge of the policies. But it would be much harder, much easier to do if you weren't dealing with so many at a time. Second of all, the tribal policy as it stands currently is at best, at best, abided by the commission wholly, occasionally. I think I saw two hands from this commission out of seven say that they gave reports. Two, and that's currently, how many of the commissioners who just came off who were reimbursed in the tribal policy gave no reports. In fact, I would say in the 30-year history of the city of Deltona, probably something like single digits actually abided fully by the policy by giving these reports. Most people didn't even really know about that. Mayor Avila, in his testimony today, is going to admit to you that he did not know about that strict requirement about giving reports. And I'll read it to you. It says it's a very strict requirement. We'll present an informal report to the city commission during commission comments regarding the benefits of the said conference. So it's very strictly defined. If you didn't do that, you would certainly be in violation of this policy. Of course, I would strongly prefer, as your taxpayers here would, that you don't go through an expensive quasi-judicial hearing every time somebody falls a bit short of a policy inadvertently or accidentally, because the proportion of benefit to the taxpayer is very, very thin in that case. With that said, all of these policies, I doubt this commission could really name more than five or ten policies in which they have intimate knowledge of. It's very difficult. I'm not saying it's easy, but what I'm saying is it's very hard to prove that somebody had specific knowledge of a violation. There's no rebuttal evidence. We talked about the first meeting, about the gentleman who came here in August or October of 2023 and spoke about one of the policies, which he himself admitted in the testimony, stumbled upon randomly. It's not like it's on the first page of the website. He said he was digging and digging and digging. Apparently, he's an archivist, and he found this policy. Okay, the second instance of evidence that was presented to you through the commissioner earlier, through cross-examination, was Mayor Avila's comments post-February 3rd. So, let's look at the timeline here. February 3rd rolls around. People on the commission are concerned about the policy. They're looking. They're learning about the policy. They're bringing up comments. Of course, he finds out through the 9 o'clock news about this policy, and he goes and reads the policy. So, the comments that he gave in that interview about the policies were based on knowledge that he gained post-February 3rd. Again, there's no evidence that we presented to you during this meeting tonight to show that he had knowledge previous of the January 3rd meeting. And then, thirdly—and I think this is a minor note. I don't think you really need to go down this road and consider it as the basis for your decision here tonight. But I think in one policy, there is several policies, even if they just have numbers, even if you admit that they're substantially similar, whether it be for staff or commission, the existence of more than one policy certainly plays a factor in the mind of a person who's looking through dozens at a time. They're not going to know the specifics of each one. They see a whole bunch. A couple things that are not based on the legal analysis here tonight, but I think are very important to understand the situation as a whole. Mayor Avila, if you look at the numbers of the trip, took the cheapest possible route to this meeting. He took the cheapest possible route back. He spent what I would say is the minimal amount of time there and certainly did not dwell or hang out or try to use the city funds for his reimbursement in any unlawful manner. And with that said, I believe that the lack of evidence here tonight, especially when you look at this very strong standard of review, the clear and convincing evidence review that your city attorneys have outlined, that any finding of guilt here would be automatically overturned on appeal. If this quasi-judicial hearing was appealed, I don't believe there's a single court in the state of Florida that would find simple hearsay or the random guy, archivist, from a year and a half ago talking in public comment along with a few dozen people as the basis of a finding of knowledge of a policy and a willfulness to violate it. And with that, I would close open comment and go into calling our first witness, which, of course, is Mayor Avila. Okay, so you've already sworn in, so we'll skip that part. You don't need to state your name like we're in a normal courtroom. I think everybody knows who you are here. And so I'll start with just a few questions, which is when was the first time you read the current commission travel policy? Right after the February newscast. And were you surprised by any of the requirements in there? Well, yeah, because we've never had to do any of that in the past. As a matter of fact, I believe that most of the commissioners didn't know about it until after January something, late January. And are you in receipt of the black folder with the exhibits that were distributed to the commission earlier? I am. And would you mind opening that up? Okay. And so the first piece of paper that's marked as Proposed Exhibit 1, are you familiar with that document at all? I am. What is it, in your words? It's a records request, a PRR, that was done. And what was it requesting? It says, Mayor, commission, the attached records are in response to the PRR done by the mayor. Request, my request was, I would like all paperwork that I signed or refused to sign island policy when I got elected, when I first got elected, related to HR. I do not need any financial forms that was submitted to HR. I would move to admit that document as Exhibit 1 for the purpose of this proceeding. And then secondly, what is the second exhibit, and do you have knowledge of that? So the first document, is that what you're asking, the document? Second now, yes. Yeah, well, the next set of documents, the three-page document. Ah, it says, document packet signed by mayor upon taking office. And what's in there? It says, key issuance form and a request for exemption of personal information. Is there a travel policy or reference travel policy in any way? Committee of Deltona ID badge form. I would move to admit that second document is Exhibit 2 for the purpose of this proceeding. When you do your travel reimbursements, have you ever looked at a policy before? Honestly, I've not. What's the general protocol? What's the general way you go about doing a travel reimbursement for the city? So I personally, if I'm traveling within Deltona, I don't put any mileage at all. If I have to go to Deland, it's not only for conferences, it's for whatever, right? I put in how many miles I did from the city of Deltona, City Hall, to that location. I can give the city of Deland as an example when the state reps and state senators came. And then that's how we do it from there and then from the point of location back. If it's going to be something where it would take a lot more time, I've figured, like, for example, when the governor has invited me to go to the governor's mansion representing the city, I have asked to go in the city vehicle because it would be cheaper to reimburse, to pay the gas with the CMAX than it is to pay my mileage back. That includes, by the way, when we go to Tallahassee to lobby for funds to come back as well. With that said, do you have any personal knowledge or opinion about how your predecessor or any other city commissioner does their travel reimbursements? I have some knowledge, but I don't ask because, you know, I know a lot of us up here, we try to do the best we can for the city. You know, and to sit here and try to figure out, well, if this commissioner took his spouse or his or her husband, and we're going to try to gauge what the difference in weight was and then calculate how much that spouse's weight affected, I'm not going to go into that. It's just petty. When you—do you recall traveling to Mississippi for an out-of-state conference? Was the method you used for travel reimbursement any different than you've always done, or was it different in any—some sense? So, it wasn't any different. I will tell you that for that trip, I did take my own car. And that is the reason why, for this D.C. trip, I asked to take the city vehicle because it would be very different in cost to the city. Will you pull out and take a look at Exhibit 3 in your packet? Okay. Describe—what is that document? That is a PRR by one of the commissioners. What is it requesting? It is, uh, please provide a copy of the official vote by the commission to approve Mayor Avila's out-of-state October 2023. So, was there, in fact, any vote on that travel? And the response is, I received a below public record request from Commissioner Howington, and there are no responsive records. So, with that said, was there any vote on that travel? There was none. Did anybody bring that concern to you at the point—at that time? No, not that I was— City manager, city attorney, nobody? No. Fellow commissioners? Not—not a single commissioner. And I would move to admit that document is Exhibit 3 for the purpose of the proceeding. Um, no further questions. And so, I would reserve time for rebuttal and for cross-examination of future witnesses, but, uh, I'm finished for now. You're—you're— I see Commissioner Villalbascos is on the table—on the board. Sorry. Thank you, Mayor. I'm not gonna, um, point a finger at anybody. Whether they knew about the policy or not, it's our responsibility to find out. As elected officials, we took an oath right underneath this symbol up here to say, um, to abide and respect the policies of the city, the state. Excuse me. I think that includes all our policies, and it includes all of our, um, anything that's written down. I have two of them in my hand. One is the original, which is the Commissioned Policy and Procedure. Commissioned Policy and Procedure. The last one says, City of Deltona Travel Policy and Procedure. This procedure was put together for employees, appointed committees and boards, or elected officials and staff. We are not staff. We are elected officials. Under this policy, it should be brought to us commissioners to review and approve. It never was. So, as far as I'm concerned, I still follow my original policy and procedure. And I'm not going to be bashing anybody, but I just want to clarify some things. Because not all commissioners or elected officials, um, follow rules or do the same thing. So, I don't file any travel reports, other than my mileage reports, because I've never traveled outside of the state of Florida. My travels have always been within Volusia County, and I can tell you the first four years of my election, my being an elected official, I filed none, because I didn't even know that I was able to get reimbursed. So, as an elected official, it is everyone's responsibility to follow and ask questions as to things that they're going to be doing, representing the city of Deltona as an elected official, elected by the residents of the city of Deltona. Um, again, as I'm not going to be blaming anybody, I don't know if the mayor did know or did not know, but it was his responsibility to find out about traveling outside of the city or the state. Um, as far as a plus one traveling local policy states, you can take your spouse and or a friend with you to a local event. The policy states traveling outside of the state of Florida, you cannot take your spouse. The city will not pay for a plus one. Again, um, I'm going to wait to see what the other commissioners will, uh, share their opinions or, or whatever else they want to throw in there. But as elected officials, we need to research, we need to ask questions. We have a great clerk sitting over there and you can ask her anything you want and within minutes, you'll have it at your desk. Regardless, you can ask her for minutes of a meeting 20 years ago and she'll have it for you. Was it a, I want to say, um, an error, um, you know, not, uh, I don't even know how to, the words I want to use. Was it unintentional? Could have been. Yes, we all make mistakes, but we have to own up to our mistakes. If it was a mistake, own up to it. It wouldn't have gotten this far. And that's all I have to say for now. Thank you. Guys, we're going to please keep the applause down to our finish. Since that was, in fact, testimony, um, request for, for cross-examination. You've read all of the city policies. No, sorry, I have not read all. I read what I have, what I have to know about at the moment that I'm going to take action on. Commissioner Howington is on the board and then Vice Mayor Harriet. Thank you, Mayor. Uh, Joyce, do we have a current elected official travel policy that is in effect today? Correct, from 2013. So the 2013 policy is in effect today and has been for the entire time the mayor has been in his seat? Correct. There was no other policy voted on by the commission. Okay. Did the commission vote on this travel? The 2013 policy and every policy prior to, yes. Every version. I meant, did they vote on the Washington, D.C.? But thank you for the better commission. Oh, not on that trip. Okay, so they did not. The mayor traveled to Washington, D.C.? No, he didn't vote on that. But the mayor traveled to Washington, D.C. subsequently. Okay. So with that, we know that we have a 2013 policy. I'd like to ask for a video to be played. I'm sorry, there's going to be some redundancy here. The mayor's statement. Commissioner, if you don't mind, I've got a couple questions in response to what Commissioner Vila-Vasquez mentioned. Do you mind if I ask those two questions prior to you? Sure. That's fine. Thank you. The first question is, there was, you mentioned that the city only covers or reimburses for costs of a family, a friend, a spouse locally. I just want to clarify. I think that that only applies to the Volusia League of Cities meetings. I don't think it's even, it's beyond that. According to the policy, any events that we go to that we are members of, that's what it applies to. Okay. And then the follow-up to that is, I don't, the city didn't bear any additional costs, which I think is the intent of the policy, that the city's not going to pay for any additional costs for an extra travel companion. And so did the city, mayor, did the city cover any costs for the travel that your wife attending with you? She, so my wife came in the same car that I came up in, and she stayed in the same hotel I did, so the answer's no. So we would, yeah, we would have had to pay for the hotel anyways and covered the gas anyways. And, and against the, the popular, I won't say popular, I guess against the, what's being said out there. I want to stick to facts, not rumors. Okay, I just wanted to clarify, because that might come up, is that the city did not pay for any of our meals. There was no order. As a matter of fact, when I was there in D.C., I took Lyft rides. Which came out of my pocket, not the city, and I have not, I will not ask the city to reimburse me for that. Thank you for the clarification. The other question that I have is related to the policy. Commissioner Villavasquez write out a policy that was dated November 2024. And it mentions in there, right, wrong, and different at this point, that it applies to staff, appointed boards, and elected officials. I understand that, that, that just makes things even more confusing, because we went from two policies, now we've got a third one. So, my point in bringing this up was that if we're going to be discussing the travel of an elected official as a mayor, this is the policy I'm looking at, and this is the policy I'm making my decisions, because to me this policy was never brought to us, we never approved it, and we are elected officials, we are not staff. And this policy was written for employees and appointed committee boards. And? And elected officials. So, this policy, it doesn't— I understand. The point that I'm trying to—the clarification that I'm trying to make is that the biggest issue we have here is that we've got multiple policies adopted all the way back from 2000. And, I mean, we're talking—I think the crux of our issue here is that the lack of policy, the lack of clarification. Which policy do you follow? That one, that one's from 2009. I agree with you that that, that is not the policy that should be followed. We know that that didn't—now we know that that didn't get approved by the commission. We know that there was a policy now from 2013 that did get approved by the commission. And I just have a hard time, and I think this is the same issue that—that plagues a lot of our—our issues going on in the city, is that we don't have clear, updated policy. So, that's—those are the only two comments I had. Thank you for that, Commissioner Howington. You're welcome. Okay. Yes, please. Yeah, the mayor's statements. City. I think some people are just questioning whether you followed the travel policy and getting permission to leave the state, did you go about that? This is why it's important to kind of look and modernize everything we have, right? So, there seems to be two different travel policies in our city, right? The one that they're talking about is from 2007. So, we're going to follow that policy, which, full disclosure, I accept responsibility. I didn't know that policy existed. I was going off a different policy. I received copies of both the old 2007 and the updated policies. Both state commissioners and elected officials need to have the commission's approval for out-of-state travel. Havila Jr. admitted to not doing that, but says some city officials were aware. I spoke to the city manager. I told them, you know, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, and then I told them, hey, look, I got a really cool email from Senator Scott's office. They gave me a personal invitation to be at the inauguration. The next one is an article from Demi Johnson from WFTV, and she stated that they asked the mayor if he was aware of the travel policy, and he said he was aware of one from 2013, but that the commissioners were going off of one from 2007. They looked at both policies, and each says elected officials must get commission approval before traveling out-of-state. Mr. Mayor, did she lie about that? I'm not saying she lied about that. I'm just saying that's not, that's, that's not the travel policy I was looking at. So which travel policy were you looking at? The 2024 one. The 2024 that we did not vote on? That is correct. So the— Excuse me. Guys, this is—we're in the middle of a serious, you know, quasi-judicial meeting. I get emotions are high. Excuse me. I get emotions are high, but let's be mindful and respectful. All right? Go ahead, Commissioner Harrington. Do you believe that we report to Doc, our city manager, that the commission reports to the city manager? No. So then why would you think that he has the authority to authorize your travel? That's a good question. Well, I honestly believe that he was redoing all of the city policies. Without commission approval, correct? Which would be required. Anything that applies to us on the dais would need— Well, Commissioner Harrington, I'm extremely happy that you're a lot more versed than I am. And, you know, maybe you can give us a little lesson, which apparently you're trying to give me now, on how to do that. And then maybe we can talk about a little bit more about unity as well while we're at that. So I'll be more than happy, you know, continue to give me that lesson. And I'll own up to it, and I'll accept it. You know, I think I accepted it on video. You've played it now twice that I said I own up to not knowing. I mean, I don't know how much more you want me to admit that I did not know about it. So, I mean, I'm saying I'm owning up to it, but yet you're literally reiterating the same exact thing Commissioner Caldwell actually displayed, so. Have you ever applied for travel reimbursements? Of course. Why would you think that there would be travel reimbursements if we didn't have a travel policy? I really don't understand that question. I mean, in the past, when I've gone to different locations, I'm being told, don't forget to just report your mileage. At no time does anybody say, hey, per policy, don't forget to report your mileage. That isn't said to us. I think everybody has a copy of a travel report that he has submitted previously. And if you look just above his signature, it says that it conforms in every respect with the requirements of the City of Deltona travel regulations. So you signed this, did you not? I did. So now we have a regulation and not a policy? I mean, we can play with words all day, Commissioner Howington. Rules are rules. Are they not? Well. Is it not? But what are we calling it? Are we calling it a travel policy or a travel regulation? That's what I'm not understanding. Like, if it's clear and cut, I'll accept it. I can admit when I'm wrong. But when we, when we're dabbling into different things, like, I don't understand. Do you remember traveling with me in November of 2023 to Tallahassee? When it was convenient for you, yes, I do remember very well. Okay. And you remember, excuse me, guys. No, please. I don't remember. I recall long hours we spent going to each and every one of those state reps and state senators. So when it was convenient, yes, I do remember. And do you recall a conversation where we were discussing the meal reimbursement costs? And how much, how little you were receiving? Yeah, I do remember that. Because it was per policy. No, we're talking about per diem. Per diem is part of the policy. Yeah, but I didn't, that's what I was told. So when we talked about meal reimbursements, and look, I commend you for trying to have that gotcha moment not working. When I'm submitting my reimbursements, I do them by email. You know, the girls put, the secretaries, they put them in the, in this actual form, and then they go over it, hey, this is what you're allowed it for breakfast, for dinner, for whatever it was. As a matter of fact, I think I even had that conversation with Doc as well. But at no time did I ever tell you anything about a policy. I remember you mentioning the policy specifically. I don't recall that. Joyce, I would like to ask, is the per diem covered in the elected official travel policy from 2013? Yes. Thank you. So, it was your belief that you had the right to apply for reimbursement for travel-related expenses, for the city to pay for hotel rooms, to pay for your food, but there was no policy in effect that governed that? I don't know what to tell you, Commissioner Herrington. What do you want to hear? Did you literally not know that there was a policy that governed what you got paid? I did not. I've said that now multiple times, that I did not know there was a policy. I don't know how many other—I mean, I can say it in Spanish if you need another language, but I told you in English, plain English, that I don't—I did not know. So, you're claiming ignorance? No comment to that. If you're finished with your direct testimony, just a couple questions on cross-examination. I know this is sort of an awkward posture, but I'm asking if I can cross-examine you. If Commissioner Howington is finished? If she's finished. If the—were the comments you made—I apologize. I didn't mean to cut you off. The comments you made to the reporter indicating I was following this policy or the other policy, isn't it true that all the policies you reviewed, despite your understanding or lack of understanding, the first time you actually viewed any of the policies was after February 3rd? That is correct. So, you never actually saw paper copies or even a digitized copy— That is correct. —of any of the policies before. And then, secondly, just as a follow-up, more specifically, did anybody ever hand you a hard paper copy of the policy that you know of? And the per diem understanding and observation, that part of the policy, did you get that through hearsay? Did a staff member talk to you about it, or did you see a— It was a staff member that spoke to me. Okay, so you were going off oral memory. Correct. No further questions. Okay. I'm not finished. I have a couple more questions. Sure. Joyce, where is that policy available to us? On teams currently. Does everybody on the commission have access to that? Yes. It's also where your agendas are held. Is that the only place our agendas are held? Other than the website and paper copies that you get. Do all commissioners—is there a record of all commissioners accessing teams? The point I'm trying to make is— I don't— You're Microsoft as well? Sorry. The point that I'm trying to make is that I don't know that I've actually ever accessed teams. In fact, there have been many times where I've asked staff to email me copies of documents or email me things because I, quite frankly, don't understand how the teams is laid out or to access the different documents within them. I'd like to make a procedural point of order. How are we supposed to be running this? Because now I have another commissioner who's interjecting on top of another—I'm just trying to figure it out for when I come up. I want to make sure we're running this smoothly. Can I get some guidance on that? So this is your meeting, your procedure. Certainly, if it is the will of the presiding officer and the will of the body, that each commissioner gets their time and there's not interjection unless consented to by another commissioner, that is an acceptable procedure. If you want to allow a more, I guess, give-and-take style where there's more dialogue, you can allow that. This is, again, your procedure to run as you wish. It would be my preference to go one by one so I can follow it a little bit better. We need to re-vote on that. We'll do it. No, I think— We're good? That's fair. Thank you. So if we can have other commissioners not interrupt, please. I would like to call Albert Bryan. Would you mind stating your name? Albert Bryan. Deltona. So we just— The statement has been for the last 10 years. Okay. So we just watched a video of you from November 27, 2023, correct? Correct. What policy were you referring to when you were speaking at that meeting? Depends on which part of the conversation you're referring to. I'm referring to the travel piece where you mentioned the three— I was referring to this travel policy, the one that was originally done in 2006, redone and then redone again in 2013. But in all of them, it states the same thing for owl travel. You must have a commission vote. You must come before the commission and give a dialogue to it as well as after it. That's what it states. Oh, and for your information, before you slander me, maybe you should talk to me. All right. Anything else? Ken, why did you bring that up during the meeting? Why did I bring that up? Because we had just found out he had gone to Mississippi and asked for an $1,100 reimbursement. And at the time, I had been doing research on other commissioners who are no longer up there. And when his $1,100 came across my board, it made sense because at the same time, I was talking about the fact that he had just signed 46 emergency orders without a commission vote. And another one, 36 emergency orders without a commission vote. For each one of those emergency orders, he was supposed to have a commission vote for those. He never did. And if you saw on the video, I had a rather thick page of how many travels that you're supposed to get reimbursed for. The policy actually states you can be reimbursed for three in state. And you have to bring any out-of-state to the commission. You have to give a dialogue of what you're actually going to do out-of-state. And then when you get back, you're supposed to give a report. I've never heard a report yet. So it's your testimony that when you spoke at the meeting on November 27th, it was in regards to the elected official travel policy from 2013? Yes, I stated that. Okay. Thank you. I guess— If you don't mind, we're going to share the mic if you don't mind. Excuse me. Ten years you've been counting the meetings, correct? Point of order. I haven't missed one yet. Point of order. What is your point of order? We've got a comment from the city attorney. I just wanted to advise prior to commencing this cross-examination that all of the commissioners may also cross-examine, even though it is Commissioner Howington's turn on direct. Okay. So if you want to cross-examine Commissioner—or, sorry, Mr. Albert Bryant, just put your name on the board, and I'll make sure to call you. I'm just going to reiterate the question. So you've been coming to the meetings for 10 years, correct? I haven't missed a meeting in 10 years. How many meetings, roughly, do you think that is? We'll see here. Roughly two meetings—two regular meetings a month, times 12, times 10, the math. Mr. Sabatini, if you'd like, you can use our mic. That's fine. I'm almost finished. And so out of eight and a half years of going, the first time you ever saw this travel policy was about eight and a half years into your meetings, correct? No. Actually, I'd known about it prior to that, but we had been actually researching other commissioners, as I just stated. That's my word, sir. What city commissioner or city commission meeting was the topic of the travel policy ever discussed in your 10 years, aside from the one in which you brought it to? Actually, in 2015. Were any of these commissioners on the commission in 2015? Of course not. No further questions. You've got to remember, the only last four years— Vice Mayor, Harriet. We've established at this point that Mr. Bryan's been coming to these commission meetings for roughly 10 years now, attending every single one of them, as you stated. How many, roughly—and I think the math works out— Could you speak up a little bit? I think the math works out to, like—we'll just do it real quick. Folks, please, no more outbursts from the public. Over 200 meetings? That doesn't include the actual workshops I've done, too. Sometimes all by myself with y'all. Probably closer to 300 meetings. Probably closer to 400. Okay. How many of those did you speak at, do you think? Probably at least three-fourths of them. Do any of the commissioners remember what he said at the last commission meeting? I don't. Well, that's because you don't pay attention. I do. I do. I wasn't present. Point of order. But you can see that the rest of the commission can't state exactly what— But your dog and pony reference earlier tells me how serious you actually take this. Thank you, Mayor. I just want to make one quick point of—just for clarification. I did not receive a reimbursement for $1,170. What's on here, if you read above, as you can see that I'm not the only one that probably misses these things, it says miles driven, $1,170. That's what that was. And it says expenses claimed, $453.26. Just that clarification. All right. Is there any other commissioner that would like to— Commissioner Howie, were you finished? I think you said you had concluded. Go ahead. Yeah. Let me collect my thoughts. Sure. So we've just heard from Mr. Bryan that he was referring to the policy. Now, shortly thereafter, the Mississippi trip, after the November meeting, after we went to Tallahassee, which you have not stayed within professionalism with regard to, D.C., in, I believe, early 2024? I did. February timeframe, I believe, January, February? I did. Who paid for that trip? I did. Why? Why didn't you charge it to the city if your belief was that the city would pay for it? Because at that time, there was a lot of people really upset, specifically because they said that I was spending taxpayer money unnecessarily. So that's why I did that. But you obviously would have thought that it would have been okay. Commissioner Hangwington, I would appreciate that I keep my thoughts as me and not you thinking for me. So the answer is no, I did not think—the reason why I went on my dime was to prevent some of the folks that are here today to get more upset regarding that travel that I did. And it had nothing to do with the fact that there was a policy that would require you to come before the commission and get approval? Well, since I've already repeated that multiple times, I'm going to leave that up to your speculation, since I guess I'm not being understood. So after— Okay, if you're finished with your direct—I'm going to cross, but I'll wait. I was just going to reiterate. So you had the Mississippi trip. People got upset. Why did people get upset? Over the reimbursements. You mean the reimbursements where you signed acknowledging that there is travel requirements? Well, apparently it says travel regulations. I'm sorry, regulations, since we're getting into semantics. Okay. I believe I will go ahead and let you cross. Hold on. Yes, thank you, Mr. Bryan. So to reiterate, your decision not to request a reimbursement for yourself in your previous trip to D.C. was based just on appeasing political expectations that you travel less, that you publicly travel less in your official capacity, correct? That is correct. It wasn't based on whether you thought you would be successful or not successful getting reimbursement from the city, but based on trying to quell criticism of those in the public who wanted you to travel less and do less. That is correct. Thank you. That 100 percent. Okay. And I have one comment for myself, adding to testimony. In November of 2023, the mayor did state to me that he was aware of the travel policy. Would you like to cross? That is—okay. In a normal form, I would object. But honestly, you know, you have the right to—it says First Amendment protected speech, so no objection. If that's it, then I'm done. Is there a—Commissioner Lully, you indicated you wanted to— Yeah. Yep, sorry. So I'm going to introduce a couple segments here just so we're clear for the record. So I am going to—I did swear—I'm going to testify that I did not approve any travel for anyone on the dais for this year. That never—I also would like to testify that I was not a commissioner in 2023, so I did not have an opportunity then to approve a travel just simply because I wasn't here. I would now like to question the mayor, if that would be possible. We've heard about this particular form. It's called the City of Deltono Local Mileage Reimbursement Form. Is that your signature? Have you reviewed it? Yes, sir. Is that your signature on it? You testified that you had some confusion about the difference between City of Deltono Travel Regulation and maybe another word like policy. What did you think City of Deltono Travel Regulation—like, what did you think that was referring to? Did you have any knowledge or understanding of that? Full disclosure, I signed this because it was a travel reimbursement. Again, I did not read—again, full disclosure, I did not read the small print. So I accept responsibility for that. When you traveled to Washington, D.C. in January of this year, what was the purpose of your travel? So there was multiple purposes, obviously, for the U.S. Conference of Mayors. I did get the invitation from Senator Scott's office regarding the inauguration and a couple other after-hours, gallows, balls, but none of that cost the city any money. What is the U.S. Conference of Mayors, to your knowledge? It's the mayors from all over the country that come together, and, you know, they try to work on different policies, procedures. They talk about things that affect their cities. Is there a fee for—to attend that or be part of that, to your knowledge? I believe there is, yes. Did you or did the city of Deltona pay a fee for you to attend that? We did not—we did not pay the fee. When you made the travel, which—or let me ask, did you ask the commission for approval to travel to Washington, D.C. in January of 2025? I did not. When you elected to make that travel, which you have testified several times, that you did not know that you had to ask for, how did you plan to attend the U.S. Conference of Mayors if you had not paid for admittance to it? Did you have an arrangement with someone or—okay. That may be all my questions. Thank you. Vice Mayor Harriott, you're on the board. I withdraw my request at the moment. What would be appropriate now is a public comment, correct? Yes, if all of the commissioners who desire to testify or examine at this point, that would be appropriate. When he made his testimony. You stated that the mayor didn't veer off track. He went straight to— Technically, I didn't testify. I only argued as an attorney. But I'm willing to call testimony and answer your question more fully. Okay. When did you return to Deltona? So I returned—I got here pretty late Monday night. And when did you return the city car? That same night. That same night. So you got gas in St. Augustine on the 20th at 8 o'clock, and you didn't return the car until the 22nd? That's the same night? Well, I got here at midnight. If I'm not mistaken. I mean, I haven't seen, but I got here that same night. But you didn't return it on the 21st the following day? Well, I mean, it's a 14-hour drive, so I'm sorry if I did—if I—so technically, I guess, because it was midnight, it was the very next day. But I came straight from D.C. to City Hall. On the 20th. And returned the car on the 22nd. That's two days. I returned the car the same day. And you signed it back in on the 22nd from when I read. That's not true? Do you have a copy of it? Yeah. Do you have a copy? I do not have a copy of it, no. I have no other questions. Because I did the same thing for Tallahassee, I left, it was a four-hour trip, and I came straight to here, and I had my wife pick me up. Do we have a copy of the sign-in log, sign-in log, anywhere here? I have one right here. Please bring that forward. Can we give that to the clerk so she can verify its accuracy? I have no policies. Did you have a fax machine when you were a commissioner? I sure did. Awesome. I'd like to testify one more thing. When I can. May I do that now? Thank you. It came up. And I'm going to address it in a different way at the end of this meeting. But I did want to testify that on the, well, first I'm going to testify, I have never submitted for reimbursement of travel expenses. That's fact A. I was appointed by this commission to represent the city on the river to see TPO, now known simply as Volusia Flagler TPO. I did actually provide a report that I had asked to be included in tonight's meeting on January 26th, even though I was not requesting reimbursement for driving to Daytona Beach International Airport. I did submit a report because, again, the question came up. It didn't make it in tonight's meeting, but I did provide a report, and I just wanted to testify that. And I was aware that, thank you. Thanks. I was aware of the policy that I could submit to that because it was in the Microsoft team. Thank you. Okay. I see the call. I see the car log here. I honestly don't recall the 22nd. I can't hear you, Commissioner Colwell. An extra what? The extra day. Can you repeat it? I didn't get it. So what was the purpose of you keeping the car for an additional day? I don't know if it was that I kept the car, maybe the book, but I'm not going to, I honestly don't recall. Because I did the same thing for Tallahassee. I came directly and I leave the car here because I remember Joyce specifically told me we're not allowed to park cars. At this time, we're going to go ahead and move to public comment. If all testimony is complete and all evidence has been presented, I'd like to just ensure that Mr. Sabatini has no further comments. We would just, at the time of the board discussion, speaking on the mayor's behalf, I would make a few conclusory remarks. That's all. No evidence. No more evidence. Thank you. Then public comment is open at the mayor's discretion. So you want me to open public comment? Is that what you said? Correct? Okay. Public comment, please. Kathy Bryan, please. Albert Bryan, please. Ms. Bryan is right there. Good evening, Kathy Bryan. I think the issue that you guys are being asked to look at is, did the mayor know of the travel policy? If you think you have a lot of policies, try hospital policies. Nobody knows all the policies by heart, but they are there for reference. And the fact that you didn't—sorry, I'm a bit out of breath. But the fact that you didn't think to ask for one. Anytime you guys do something, is there a policy on it? What if I did something to you in the hospital and it wasn't by policy? What do you think happens to me? I also think it's funny that you're splitting hairs about the travel policy versus the travel regulations, but you don't find to split the hairs over what day it was. Oh, I returned at midnight. But I think that you knew, and I think that going forward, this commission, the dais, needs to do better. D-is, dais, dais. It's all the same thing, and you know it. Brian, please. Commissioners, if you don't mind, can we ask the clerk to call up the next two or three names so that we can get people moving? Richard Bellick and Carolyn Hickerson? Let's think about this for just a minute. In the operating guidelines, it states, City Commission is responsible for setting all policies. Another thing is, is ignorance of the law isn't a defense. You either know why you're there and what you're doing, or you don't. And you can't say that you didn't because I killed somebody, and I didn't know murder was, you know, a capital punishment. That's not—that's ignorance of the law. You can't use that as a defense. He should know that, of all people. Having here is a problem of policy. We have a policy. You didn't follow it. Even after I said something about it in 2013, this has been an ongoing issue with you. You don't follow policies, period. The attorney here made a thing about her stumbling on some records. Columbus stumbled on America, too. They ruined Zifra. Now, here's the deal. You all know he's guilty. You know he violated the policy. He's telling you, oh, well, the tripper. If he didn't bring his wife, he would have got cheaper accommodations, wouldn't he? That's common sense. He wouldn't get cheaper accommodations? No. No, he wouldn't? No. I don't know where you people stay, but when I stay in hotels, that's the way I do it. Now, he's come up here with all these excuses. He don't remember. He don't this. He don't that. Come on. You know exactly what you got here. How can he afford this lawyer when he's on welfare? He's getting welfare checks. Mr. Bellick, the personal attacks need to really stop. Oh, I didn't have a personal attack. Your time's up, Mr. Bellick. Have a good day. Have a good day, Mr. Bellick. Mr. Bellick, can we please remove Mr. Bellick? Your time is up, Mr. Bellick. I have great respect for all of you for serving our community. I do. What I've noticed in our community is we are really great on conspiracy theories. We're really great on social media lighting fires. We're really good at that. We're really good at setting brush fires and forest fires in the community, getting people stirred up. This, to me, is political vendettas. This, to me, is political posturing. This, to me, is not that our mayor did or didn't know. This is a, I'm going to get you. I'm sorry, mayor, and I'm sorry, doc, that we're not putting our big girl panties on today and our big boy panties on today. Catherine Gallagher, then Doug McDonald, then Ray Waters. Hello. You seem to think that your position is a game. Do you think that it's okay to pick and choose which policies to follow? Just because you have a poor orientation of the job and the policies that are given to you, they're all relevant. They're all for all of y'all, not just for the little people. I think it's a shame that you've, your actions put another smudge on the reputation of the city. And also, this is clearly why people don't trust you. You just continue to play games. So, your actions illuminate your character flaws. Thank you. And I think the best thing, okay. Doug McDonald, Deltona, Florida. Do not rush to judgment on this man. Let him speak in defense of what he did or what he didn't do. Please, the only thing I have to go on is what I read in the paper, News Journal and Allen Iverson's comment and the beacon. I want to give congratulations to Santiago, Howington, and Maritza. They were the three who were mentioned in the News Journal article as to their opinions. It's not clear and convincing evidence, as this man is suggesting, but it was their opinion that you either did or you didn't do it. So, I give them credit for educating and informing the public so that we have a better idea of what happened. God bless all of you. Make the right decision. Ray Waters. All right. So, Donald Freeman, Janet Dayette, and Courtney Cross-Burkos. Hello. I know that each and every one of you guys, I know each and every one of you guys were never in law enforcement, and how to deal with that stuff that we have to deal with in law enforcement. When you're underneath a policy violation, you get into an internal affairs investigation. I'm sure each and every one of you have not been through an internal affairs investigation before. Okay. So, you have a violation of policy of he did not follow policy on travel. Okay. You start looking into that, and they're investigating that. They find another violation, and another violation, and another violation. Now that initial policy violation turns into a plethora of, now you're charged with four different things of different policy violations. Okay. You only got a minute, so I got nothing to say. I can't say this in five seconds, so this is what it is. Mayor, we need a motion to continue the meeting. I'll make a motion to continue the meeting for 30 minutes. Second. It's a motion by Commissioner Lully, second by Commissioner Howington. Just go down the dais. Do you want to just vote or just, there you go. Thank you, Commissioner Vila Vasquez. Motion passes. Janet Dayette, and then Courtney Crossbergos. One lousy minute. Janet Dayette, former commissioner from 2005 to 2012. When you took your oath, that was the job, to know the policies. You're the commission. You're the ones who set policy and the ordinances. And when he was hired, he needed to go through and learn it, too. You don't get your permission from him. He works for you. We used to travel every year. So every year, we consulted the travel policy. You don't wait until after you come back. And you don't claim ignorance. I didn't know. It's your job. It's your job to do that. You should have studied and known it. Also, I've heard you mention that you think this is a political issue. It's not a political issue. It's a policy issue. And that was the job you took on. And that was the job you should have done right and paid attention to your policy. Thank you. Hello again. This is only my opinion. But I think that the mayor and Doc should have looked it up first. But do I think it's all this? No, I don't. I think this has gotten blown way out of proportion. I definitely think it's political. All the people that don't like the mayor, instead of just making it right or wrong— He made a mistake. Okay, let's sanction that. But all the rest of this is just a bunch of hoopla. David Sosa, then Gail Barr, then David Markle. Okay, I have a minute, so let's stick to the fact. Established trip. Hotel bill, $1,687. Gas receipts, $171. Used on a city credit card. Mileage log, which you guys all now have a copy of. Email, stating why you were going. On mayor's conference, which we have no bill for, but you were going as a guest. My question is, guest of who? And where's the documentation on it? Because I asked for it. All right. Next, it says, confer with Volusia County mayors. They live right across the road. You can just take a car here from there. You don't have to go to D.C. to talk to them. Travel policy, right here. These are facts, not opinions. It says, elected officials will seek approval for attendance at out-of-state conferences, seminars, and it needs to be done by a majority vote of the commission. You failed policy. So, if somebody breaks policy and code, they don't get a break. Gail Barr again. As part of the travel policy, I have a question. I don't know who can answer it. But if a person is going out of state in a city car, is a non-city employee allowed to be in that car? And also, because if a non-city employee, what happens if there was an accident? The city is responsible for that person because it's the city's car, it's the city's insurance. And so, it would have cost the city a lot of money. God forbid they were in an accident. Thank you. But I would like to know if they're allowed to be in the car. David Markle, Hanley Street, Deltona. Mr. Mayor, as a leader of our city, I hope you are a smarter man than you are portrayed. As a registered nurse and a licensed health care professional, much like an elected official, we are held to a higher standard among our peers. With that being said, as professionals held to higher standards, it is our responsibility to know policies and procedures which we are held accountable. As a nurse, if I make a mistake, whether I know the policy or not, Dan Lulon is going to find another client to hold me accountable. I'm asking you to man up, put on your big boy britches like the other ladies have mentioned, accept your mistake and the consequences. I also ask this commission to hold the manager accountable for creating a policy without the commission's approval. I also beheave you all to get your HR in line so this doesn't happen again in the future. Thank you. Rose, then Rob Trombetta, then Lindsay Briones. I've worked jobs where I've had to build a piece constantly. Many of them were very, very thick. I had to not only write them down in crayon, but I had to highlight and bold and all that other fun stuff to make sure that even the most insane monkey could be able to understand it. If you don't understand the policies, if you don't understand your job, why are you here? You're supposed to research your job. If you don't know, talk to someone. Figure out what it is you're—if you do anything that costs money, yours, the business, someone else's, find out what you're supposed to do to make sure that you are held in the proper accountability, and so that way you don't have this issue. It's simple business ethics. Rob Trombetta, Daltona. Anthony, I don't understand. Every time I go and I sign, I read, at the bottom it says, you attest that you've read this and you sign your name. That must mean that that doesn't mean anything, that I can just sign it and everybody—then I just get away and I say, oh, I didn't really read it, I didn't really know. Unfortunately, when you sign your name, you attest that you've understood what you're signing. I'm sorry, Mayor, if you signed the document and you didn't read it, that's not anybody's fault. So I think you're—I think you're guilty of this event. I would just hope that after this is done, Doc, please, solve the two frickin' problem, major problems, the Lakeshore Drive and flooding, and let's put this aside and let's get some problems done in this city. And, Mayor, you are the most political person on that dais, bar none. Thank you. Lindsey Brionis. Can't hear you. Thank you. My name is Lindsey Brionis. So you claim that you read the policy to where you're not allowed to park your vehicle here or in a driveway, wherever you parked the vehicle, but you don't read policies for travel. Common sense says that you read things or search for them before you do it. If I did it, I'd get in trouble. I have another question. I also would like a records request. In January of 2024, did you take the city vehicle to my job trying to get me fired? And did you ask for a reimbursement on that as well? I'm a Republican, and I can't stand you. Judith Fernandez, then Jeff Dynan, then Jason Volz, and then Gianna Monzen. Hello, everybody, and thank you for your time. My name is Judith Fernandez, and in proportion to the benefit of the city that this council has in this meeting right now, and with respect to trying to do best for the city, what's best for our city, what benefits us is accountability. So thank you for taking the time to have this conversation in the first place, but also the confidence that our leadership will invest the time to educate themselves and collaborate with others prior to action. So you cannot be weaponizing incompetence and then upset when we call it into question. This is not a gotcha moment, but a chance to be edified, and your attitude is more indicative of your respect to the position than your trip actually was. I actually have no dog in that horse race. What can we expect moving forward? That's what I hope we will get out of this conversation, and I hope that I will get to meet you as a new resident in a better light in the future. Thank you. I'm Jeff Dinan, Daltona. I'm really sorry, Mayor. This is totally political. And I'll tell you, I'm a Republican, so it's a common-sense thing these days. Maritza, you mentioned, I didn't even know I can get reimbursed. So obviously, you weren't aware of the policy. This gentleman here, all he talks about was the 22nd. He went to the inauguration. That was January 20th. A couple of gays that night, leave on the 21st, get back around midnight. That is the 22nd. Please, you're wasting our time. There's so many more serious problems in this city that we need to take care of. I wish you all could tell me you were aware of regulations. You're not with FEMA, that's for sure, which you will find out real soon. But I apologize for the residents for wasting your time. I don't know how many times you can admit you made a mistake and you're willing to live up to it. Thank you. Jason Volz, Deltona. All I've heard is policy, policy, policy, policy. Sounds like you're going to hold him accountable. I want—can you show the policies? Show me in there where it is city policy where you pay out on unauthorized expenses. You guys paid him. Now he's the bad guy. Makes no sense. Makes no sense. That's all I've got. Hello, everyone. My name is Giannina Monzon, and I just want to say that I want to thank you, Mayor Avila, for all the good that you've done for our city. Thank you for taking initiative to connect with other elected officials to help move our city forward. Thank you for being out there and taking initiative. And I want you to know that there are more for you than against you, and this is completely political, and we don't agree with what people are saying. Social media is nothing. Thank you for your sacrifice, and thank you for the rest of the commissioners who are doing to take an initiative, and I'm disappointed in how political it's become, disappointed in how you could have changed the narrative when you were asked, right, by the media and you didn't, those of you that spoke, because that brought shame, and that brought negative press to our city that we love. We want to be on the map, but not by this. This could have been resolved here. Give them some respect. It's just really sad to see how people's agendas have been exposed to this. But, Mayor, we support you. Thank you for all you do. That ends public comment. At this time, it's appropriate to call for a motion. I'd like to make a motion. It's a motion by Commissioner Howington. I'd like to motion that the mayor violated the elected official travel policy. It's a motion by Commissioner Howington. Point of order. That's not what the item that we're here to vote on is. It's the second part of the poll. It's the second part. I dropped the first. How can you drop? Can we get a legal opinion? Can we get clarification? Can you clarify your proposed motion? Sure. There were two sections. Initially, Commissioner Caldwell had asked for that he had knowledge, and then I had asked him if he would revise and amend his request to include that he violated the policy. Okay. So, we have a transcript from the last meeting that we're reviewing. I just want to clarify. Commissioner Howington, your position is that the allegations—I'm sorry, can you just clarify? I'm making a motion for the second half, so there's the first portion here, and then the last half where it says, and that the mayor violated travel policy. I'm making a motion that he violated the travel policy, which was part of the notification. I would object—I don't want to interrupt the city attorney staff before they proffer an opinion, but I would object to the lack of due process notification, because they're severing—they're severing a paragraph into two pieces, when really they're intricately linked and they're not severable. It's not like there's a severance clause here. It's had knowledge and violated. And I would also argue that the violation has a mens rea of knowingly—he has to have knowingly violated the policy. Otherwise, finding him in violation would be a violation of his due process rights, because there's been no evidence to know he had knowledge of the policy. Okay, so I have one question. When a code or an ordinance goes out and they fined somebody, do we expect that they have all of our policies and procedures known at the time that they get fined for something? I mean, I don't— I'm not prepared to opine on that. At this time, we're happy to research that and come back to you with an answer. If I may, we'll address—so we have the transcript of the discussion regarding the motion. So, at the meeting, Vice Mayor Harriet stated, consistent with the policy, can you summarize the alleged violation as to—as that's what I'm hearing? Commissioner Caldwell said that he was fully aware of the policies and procedures of the City of Deltona when he went on this trip, as this is the second time he has done it. Vice Mayor Harriet. Okay. Does the seconder—agrees. Seconder agrees, question mark. Commissioner Howington, can I add something to it if you're okay with it? Commissioner Caldwell, please. Commissioner Howington, all out of state was to be approved by majority vote of the commission. We are all held accountable to each other, and we're held accountable to our residents. So, I want to make sure we add that as part of the violation, the travel policy was not adhered to. This is a policy issue. Commissioner Caldwell then stated, unintelligible—yes, agreed. Commissioner Howington, I'll second. So, the revised motion is, as that—by Commissioner Caldwell, that he was fully aware of the policies and procedures of the City of Deltona when he went on this trip, as this is the second time he has done it, with the addition—can I add something if you're okay with it, please? And then the addition is, all out of state was to be approved by majority vote of the commission. We are all held accountable to each other, and we're held accountable to our residents. So, I want to make sure we add that as part of the violation. The travel policy was not adhered to. This is a policy issue. And that was not an add, correct? Or an and. That was actually an addition to the other one. Not that both had to be met. The allegation, as required under the code, has to be clearly enumerated. So, I'll refer back to that. So, under Section 2-380, which is the section that's operative tonight, requires this, a violation—and this is the third line in, this is the second sentence—a violation may be brought forward by either a city commissioner or a charter officer of the city. A charge of violation shall be initiated by motion of a member of the city commission who shall summarize the alleged violation in the motion, period. So, the alleged violation is required to have been summarized in the motion. That is required for due process. And again, we did provide—come with this transcript. So, I'll just read it again. So, the motion is, by Commissioner Caldwell, that he was fully aware of the policies and procedures of the city of Deltona when he went on this trip, as this is the second time he has done it. Then, Commissioner Howington, can I add something to it if you're okay with it? Commissioner Caldwell, please. Commissioner Howington, all out of state was to be approved by a majority vote of the commission. We are all held accountable to each other, and we're held accountable to our residents. So, I want to make sure we add that as part of the violation. The travel policy was not adhered to. This is a policy issue. And then there was a, yes, an agreement by the original movement, Commissioner Caldwell. The—Commissioner Howington seconded the revised motion. So, the motion is that he was aware of the policies when he went on this trip, that all out-of-state travel was to be approved by a majority vote, and that that is added as part of the violation. And that's what's in this agenda item as well. So, it is summarized in the agenda item, which is that the quasi-judicial hearing regarding whether the mayor had knowledge of travel policy before date of travel and that my—and that mayor violated travel policy. But that's the exact motion that—that was made by this commission. So, there was no knowledge that we are here for the mayor violating travel policy? Then, is that what's not been noticed at all? You made one charge. You made one motion with an alleged violation. You—you did not say there are two violations. You violated X and Y. The motion was aware and—and then—and then that it was to be approved by a majority vote, that that is added as part of the violation, full stop, not as a second violation. So, it is important that that motion that was made was for one violation. He was not accused of two violations. He was accused of one violation. Had knowledge and violated travel policy with that knowledge. Is that helpful? Sure. I'll go ahead and make the motion that the mayor had knowledge of the travel policy before the date of travel and that the mayor violated the travel policy. Okay, there's a motion by Commissioner Howington, who made the second. Commissioner Colwell, if we could please vote. The motion fails, four to three. Motion—motion does fail. This motion, as indicated at the beginning of the hearing, I want to clarify that this was not indicated by any of the clerk is—the motion fails. This motion requires a supermajority of the entire commission. This motion would require five, as we indicated at the beginning of the hearing. Mr. Bellic, I've asked you multiple times. We need to get Mr. Bellic out of the audience, please. Mr. Bellic, have a good night. Mr. Bellic, have a good night. This time, we're going to go to city attorney comments. No comments at this time. Thank you. Is there any city manager comments? Just real quick, Mayor, I just wanted to thank my old mayor, Randy Walker, from coming in, Garden City, Michigan, longest-serving mayor in the history of the city up there. Six months ago, when he decided to come down here, six months ago, he wanted to come see a meeting. He had no idea this would be the meeting he would come to, so I'm sure the mayor enjoyed this one this evening. Thank you very much. Nothing else. Okay. Is there any commissioner comments, requests, or reports? Commissioner Colwell? I would like to request a workshop on the TNR program. Do we need a— Okay. I do have a report to submit, and I gave—oh, go ahead, Vice Mayor. In light of the last agenda item, I think that in order to move our city forward and to prevent this from happening again, it's only right that we ask that this policy be brought back to the commission for updates, clarification. So, with the consensus of the commissioners, I'd like to ask the city manager to bring this up for review, revisions. Time frame? I'd like to see this done very quickly. Which policy are you referring to? All of the travel policies related to staff and elected officials, everybody. I think that if we're going to—we need to put this to bed and be done with it, and I think that's only going to happen if we—if we bring it all up to the commission for a vote. Do you need consensus on that? Yes. In the past, we've gotten consensus on action items. Okay. Do you mind making a minor amendment to that? That we have all travel—sorry. That we have all policies that are older than two years be brought up to be renewed and some type of a ticker be put in place so they can be renewed every so often. Can we make that a second one? I think it's important that the travel be brought up within the next 30 days. That's fine. That's a very relevant issue. Sure. I have no issue. So, we got a—so, Vice Mayor Harriet wants to bring this up. Could we please have a verbal vote? Joyce? Commissioner Villalbazquez? I have a question on that. Are any of our policies and procedures part of the charter? I think that would be fleshed out under legal review of any changes that we make. I don't think so. I mean, we can't just make charter changes without— Oh, I agree fully. But the fact that we have multiple travel policies is specifically what I want to eliminate. Okay. I'm going to agree to it, but I also want to make sure that whatever you're giving us are not part of the charter. Thank you. Commissioner Caldwell? Yes. Commissioner Harington? Yes. Commissioner Lowley? Yes. Commissioner Santiago? Yes. Vice Mayor Harriet? Yes. Mayor Avila? Yes. Thank you, Commissioners. I appreciate that. And Commissioner Avila, Basquez, I couldn't agree more. I want to make sure that any and all policies that come before this commission do not conflict with the charter. To the mayor's second request, though, I would actually also like to request that there be a full review of all commissioner policies. I'd like to see a full index of all the policies with the date that they were active. And then anything over two years come back for review. Maybe we can get a presentation on an index of all the commission policies. I have another question on that. Absolutely. Joyce, don't we have a manual? Wasn't every commissioner, at least when I was elected, I received a manual with all these policies and procedures. Do we not do that anymore? No, I did not receive one. Yeah, I have not been part of the commission orientation for many, many years. But yes, you did when you came on specifically. There was a huge three-ring binder where you had all the commission policies and all of the admin policies, board lists, statutes, all kinds of things were included in that. But that hasn't happened for some time, to my knowledge anyway. Well, thank you. So, to restate, my request is that an index of all commission policies be brought back to the commission for presentation, be presented to the commissioners for presentation. And that needs to include the date that they were active, they went into effect. Commissioner Villalbazquez? I say yes. Commissioner Colwell? Yes. Commissioner Howington? Yes. Commissioner Lully? Yes. Commissioner Santiago? Yes. Vice Mayor Harriot? Yes. Mayor Vila? Yes. Thank you, Madam Clerk. I think that those two actions single-handedly will move the city forward tonight. And I look forward to clear and concise policy moving forward. With that, I don't have any additional comments. Thank you, guys. Commissioner Lully and then Commissioner Howington. Thank you. This is like my commissioner comments. Okay. Yeah. I'm just doing it a little differently. Sometimes some commissioners don't have anything. Okay. Thank you. I just try to be, yeah, on my best behavior. So, I had asked for a report to be part of tonight's agenda, but it didn't make it. So, I'm going to read it now because I don't, I would like this, and I'll get to the action items after this, but I'd like this distributed to the commission because I don't feel like I can unilaterally distribute this outside of a meeting. So, this is in regards to my attendance at the Volusia-Flago TPO board meeting on January 22nd. So, I thank the commission for having appointed me to that. I wanted to provide these updates that FDOT reported that the I-4 widening project through our city limits has moved up a little bit sooner. So, the project's right-of-way phase is now funded for the fiscal year 2029-2030. So, that runs through Commissioner Villal-Vasquez and Commissioner Santiago's districts. So, I just wanted to let you know that. Also, very important, the TPO is now accepting applications for projects to be added to the list of priority projects. These applications will be used by the TPO to qualify and prioritize proposed transportation related projects for feasibility study and or implementation using federal and or state transportation funding. So, I forward that on to the city and certainly as part of my role in that can be the liaison for us. But I wanted everyone to be able to provide input. The deadline is March 30th. So, we can discuss that here soon. There's very specific eligibility guidelines that are very specific. So, it only potentially applies to a limited number of our city streets. And I attached to that report the January 22nd, 2025 board meeting summary, as well as that 2025 call for projects memorandum. So, I'd like to get commission consensus. I would like that provided to the whole body so that everyone can have an opportunity to weigh in on that. I don't feel like I can do that directly. So, can I get a consensus on that? If I may make a comment, Commissioner, you can send it to our administrators and they can forward them to us. I did. So, that's why I'm like this. Commissioner Velasquez. You're always first. Yes. Commissioner Colwell. Yes. Commissioner Howington. Yes. Commissioner Lully. Yes. Commissioner Santiago. Yes. Vice Mayor Harriet. Yes. Mayor Vila. Yes. Okay. Then also out of this, I would like to, this is not for the actual action. So, this is asking to be brought back before us, before to vote on. So, this is just, I'm asking for consensus to provide direction, to bring it back to us, to, I'm going to say, do whatever we need to do. So, modify our operating guidelines for the commission or whatever we need to do to create an area where our special representatives, so that's TPO and Team Volusia, right? Those are the two, where we can have these reports so that we can submit to it, it can be linked there on the agenda, and then we can move forward with it, because that's the only way I feel comfortable in the sunshine, providing that information to you all. I don't want to do anything behind the scenes. I think it should be, people should come in it, et cetera, et cetera. So, I would like consensus to provide direction to the city manager's office to bring back a revised operating guidelines that includes, including a section for our, what do we call them, special appointments? Can we call it, our special appointment reports. Board reports. Board reports. Thank you. Just so we have a formal place to put this, because we're talking about reporting what we're doing, travel for the city, I personally don't submit, I never submitted an expense report, not judging anyone who does, but, so it's not even tied to that. I just want to be providing, because you guys have appointed me, put your trust in me, appointed me to that role, I want to make sure I'm providing you guys what you need. So, if I can get consensus on bringing back those for us to look at and vote on. Approving, let me make it clear. Do, you get, is, would that not fall under the city commission comments, requests, and reports? I don't, I don't know. It's not in the agenda, so that's what I'm, I don't know. Commission, we'll probably put that on our consent agenda, as reports out, just kind of like minutes from past meetings. Normally, on prior commission, it was, it was not on the reports. Let's give us a copy, a written copy. Yes, and I would like it linked, because others, I don't want to have to do what I just did, which is read through a whole report, if you guys don't have any questions, I'm not trying to drag out the meeting, but, so, if I can just get consensus for that. Commissioner Villal-Vasquez? Yes. Commissioner Colwell? Yes. Commissioner Howington? Yes. Commissioner Lully? Yes. Commissioner Santiago? Yes. Vice Mayor Harriet? Yes. Mayor Vila? Yes. Final comment, I heard a lot about, I'm almost done. I didn't want to do it. Native landscaping, love that idea, and I'll look at some of the other public comments from tonight and respond accordingly due time. Thanks. Commissioner Howington? I attended the Team Volusia Executive Committee meeting this past week. We covered the President's report, voted on the 2025 officers, discussed the Team Volusia succession plan. Point of order, Commissioner Howington, excuse me, I'd like to make a motion that we extend the meeting for another 12 minutes so that we can finish this up. Second. Since another policy that we didn't follow tonight. Thank you guys. We'll follow. No, we're not. It's past the 10-minute mark. Do you want to go ahead and do the quick— Commissioner Villal-Vasquez? We're voting. Have a good night, everyone. No, no. We're voting to extend 12 minutes. I agree with that. And let me tell you, I am gone right now. Um, what am I voting for? Just 12 minutes. Yes. Commissioner Colwell? Yes. Commissioner Howington? Yes. Commissioner Lully? Yes, yes. Commissioner Santiago? Yes. Commissioner Harriet? Yes. Mayor Vila? Yes. Sorry, Commissioner Howington. Okay. We also approved the 2025 Compensation Committee report. And then at this point in time, because of the fact that new commissioners actually use public comments as part of their evidence, I would like to make a request that if we do not bring it back during the meeting, that we look at recording public comment and putting it in the archives if it's not going to be televised. So that way there is a record that can be accessed in the future if needed. And I would like the commission to consider a symbolic vote of no confidence in absence of the official— Can't let it go. Hey, you know? I think that— Okay. But I'm not here right now, so— So, Ms. Commissioner Howington wants a symbolic vote for no confidence, so if you can please— Based on the policy violation. Can you make a vote of no confidence in who? In the mayor. In the mayor for policy violations? Yes. Okay. The city attorneys, can we—is that something that can be done? Um, so the—a symbolic vote is just that symbolic. Um, it should not include an allegation of policy violation. We just terminated those proceedings. Um, yeah. So, can we do a symbolic vote? No. You can do a symbolic vote as long as it is not related to the proceeding that just ended. Um, so you—you could do a symbolic vote if you would like. If it's related to the proceeding—if it's not related to the proceeding, so it would have to be on a different matter. Sorry. So, if it's—in order for it to not be related to the proceeding item, then it would have to be on a different matter. Okay. So, the motion was for a vote of no confidence. Oh, I didn't know. Sorry. Yes. Was that a motion? It was a motion for a vote of no confidence. You—you do not specify—you can restate your motion, but you could just make a general vote of—a motion for a vote of no confidence that is symbolic, that is unrelated to the previous uh, quasi-judicial hearing, if you would like. I would like to make a motion for a—for a symbolic vote of no confidence in the mayor that is not— I'll second it. Can—discussion? What is that? Is—was there a second? Second by Commissioner Colwell? For—discussion. There's a discussion, Vice Mayor Herriot. All right. We just went through an hour and a half, two hours of this. The mayor's acknowledged that it happened. He's owned up to it. We've now made a motion to bring not just the travel policy back, but all of the policies back so that this doesn't happen again. Can we move forward? Yes. Thank you. Can we just move forward? After tonight? Yes. This is—this is continuing to—to put our city in a negative spotlight and give us even more of a black eye. This is not moving us forward. This is—this is kangaroo. So I want to say that I feel like I'm double dipping. We just made a motion on something. So how can we judge somebody guilty twice for the same thing? So I just don't agree with it. Like Commissioner—Vice Mayor said, everything is said. We spoke what we wanted to speak. We made our comments. Some of us—I know my comments were not positive. I know for that fact, but I have to go with what I believe and I have to go with what my residents believe was done wrong. But I just can't double dip on something. So there is a motion on the floor and there's a second. So we'll just have to vote how we want to proceed. And I—and motion fails three to four. I have some stuff, but given the time— Mayor, I do have one quick thing. Sure. I think I had my—just really quick. Can we please move forward? Can we please move forward? Let it go. We—let's progress—get progress in our city, work on our infrastructure, work on our stormwater issues, landscaping, um, development code, let's update that, let's go with the green. I know somebody here earlier said something how we need to have native plants, um, work on getting our commercial, our downtown. We have so many things that we need to do. Let's get them done. Let's stop the politics and move forward. That's all I need to say. All right, guys. How much time do we have left? Two minutes? Okay, I'll be—so I'm not going to—so I submitted this report to the city and maybe we can put it into the next commission meeting, if possible, please. But I do need to have this request from the dais because this is important. I got a commitment from the insurance commissioner of the state of Florida to come and speak to all the residents as a town hall sort of ordeal. So I want to get permission from the dais to, uh, allow the insurance commissioner to help talk to residents how to lower their home insurance, because obviously we don't have, uh, ability of that. And, uh, I want to see if the commission would be okay with the insurance commissioner of Florida using the center, um, to be able to do a town hall, obviously, and so the city can advertise it. But we have a date. Is it a government agency? It is a government agency, yes. And if it's your town hall, you don't need permission for that? Just in case. I'd like to make a motion. I'm sure there's a policy. I'd like to make a motion to allow, to allow the state insurance commissioner to come to the city to present and host a town hall on the insurance topics for Deltona residents at the center at no cost to the state agency. I'll second. There's a motion by, uh, vice mayor and a second by commissioner Howington. Could we do a very quick vote, please? I'll take her stay off. Motion passed seven to zero. Joyce has a copy of this for you. The meeting's adjourned. Thank you. Thank you, mayor. Thank you, guys. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.