Rules Committee - Nov 02, 2026

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the Monday, November 2nd, 9 a.m. Rules Committee meeting. I call the meeting to order, and we'll start with introductions to my left with Mr. Garrett Dennis. Good morning, Garrett Dennis Administration. Colleen Hampsey, Council Research. Carla Schell, Office of General Counsel. Krista Carraher, Council Auditor's Office. Ron Salem, Group 2 at Large. Hannah Morris, City Council, District 1. Mike Gay, District 2. Will Aden, District 3. Good morning, Tyrone Clark-Murray, District 9. Good morning, Michael Boylan, District 6. Good morning, Nick Howland at Large, Group 3. Randy White, District 12, just visiting. All right, welcome, Council President Howland and former Council President White to the Rules Committee meeting. We've got a pretty full agenda, so I'm going to try to move through it as quickly as we can. We'll start with public comment, and then we'll go to a presentation by the Kids Hope Alliance. So with that, our first public comment will be from Cornell Oliver, then William Hoff, Blake Harper, and then Terry Caldwell. So, Mr. Oliver, come on down. You'll be given two minutes and speak specifically to a bill on our agenda, sir. Yes, my name is Cardinal Oliver. Address is on file. I want to speak to 2026-0806. I'm asking for a deferral, because dealing with a piece of legislation like this, it's the disposal of historic property so that it can be rehabilitated to create some kind of affordable housing. But instead of isolating this situation, why don't we turn this into a big package approach where we can bring planning in, housing division, and we try to attack this through a holistic perspective and try to stabilize the housing market. The number one population that I'm really focused on is heritage black Americans. And the thing about it is, is that before a piece of property goes in the hands of a nonprofit or you put a piece of property up for sale, I would rather the people who have an entitlement, and when I say an entitlement, foundational black Americans have an entitlement to this country. Everybody else falls underneath the privilege class. And when I speak about this, I'm asking for a deferral until we bring everybody to the table. I'm asking for either the council president or the chairman of this board to work with me on trying to attack this housing situation. Because I'm going to be honest, these evictions are going through the roof. I spend a lot of great deal of time at the law library, and I'm seeing evictions either for people tearing up people's properties or, number two, not paying their rent. I understand these issues. So we have to find a way how do we stabilize this situation, and it's got to be done from a holistic perspective. And I'm asking for a deferral. All right, thank you, sir. Our next speaker will be Mr. William Hoff. If you would come on down and give your name and address or say it's on record, and you'll be given two minutes to speak to a specific bill. William Hoff, 1402 North Laura Street. Good morning. I'm here to speak on 2026-08-06 as well. Just wanted to express my support and say that I would be available for any questions that you may have. All right. Thank you, sir. The next speaker is Blake Harper. Come on down, sir, and give your name and address for the record, and you'll be given two minutes to speak directly to a bill on our agenda. Blake Harper, information on file. I have circulated enough of these for everybody, including the visiting council members. I am going to use the fullness of the First Amendment. Everything I say here is going to be protected my First Amendment rights. I will first start by telling you that I have always stood to protect children. When they had the drag queen story hour that they were going to do at the public libraries, I stood against it. So we're talking about the same type of information. What are we presenting to our children? What are our children getting access to on an unfettered basis? The title of this article is Parents Can No Longer Trust Librarians. Here's who's to blame. And by the way, I stand against the two existing members who are up for renewal because there's an existing problem in the libraries, and they need to fix it. So that's where I'm standing. If you go down to the bottom of the corner there, it references a very last sentence, sexually inappropriate for minors and promote them as diverse material. So basically, we've talked about the American Library Association. The American Library Association has looked at the libraries as a way to go after our children, established that from 2019 National Convention. In 2003, they lost a case at the Supreme Court that the Supreme Court said, no, you cannot have pornography, online pornography, in the libraries. The important part about that is that established libraries is a limited public forum. In other words, you have the right, we have the right to determine what goes into those books. This whole notion of freedom to read is a false notion. It's put by a private organization that is looking to push its own political agenda, which is attacking children. The reality is we need to fix our libraries, and we need to protect our children. Please vote these two people down or get their commitment to fix it. Thank you. All right. Thank you, sir. Next, Mr. Terry Caldwell. Come on down and give your name and address for the record or say it's on file, and you'll be given two minutes to speak to an item on our agenda, sir. Yes, my name is Terry Caldwell, 3628 Hermitage Road East, Jacksonville, Florida, 32277. This is about an ongoing issue regarding Mr. Alejo and essential heating and air conditioner. Y'all had given, the council had given him 30 days to complete the job. It's still not done. And basically, he's abandoned the job again, stating it's under warranty now, and I can bring in another company. I tried to avoid this situation because our Freon chase lines went underneath the garage and were sitting for 18 months or so that they weren't working on it. Water and Freon cause a corrosive acid, and I tried to avoid that. I bought new Freon lines and was ready to install them, but Mr. Alejo didn't want my interference, so I didn't find out until the day that they came to install that they were coming there. They had told my sister-in-law that they would take care of it when she told them I bought the Freon lines. Well, they didn't use them because they thought they were the wrong size because the installation said half-inch on it, but the pipe was seven-eighths inch. Anyway, besides that, I tried to avoid the situation. Even at the last meeting, I tried to tell them. But then when they ran the system, they now corrupted the whole entire system with corrosive acids, and their installers can't figure out what's going on with it. It's going to only run for a minute or two. I'm asking the council and the code enforcement to immediately escalate this to the Jacksonville Construction Trades Qualifying Board to pull their license and issue an immediate emergency order for full restitution and a completely new system. And for Mr. Dennis on the end, what makes a bad customer is an informed customer. Thank you. All right. Thank you. I'd like to recognize Councilmember Pittman has joined us. Now we'll go into our Kids Hope Alliance presentation. Good morning. My name is Penny Zuber. I'm the chief executive officer for Kids Hope Alliance. Section 77.115 requires that Kids Hope Alliance present an annual report to the Rules Committee regarding the efficacy of our partnerships with certain city agencies. And we have informed and invited our liaisons, and some of them are in attendance in support of our report. And presenting the report to you all is Kenneth Darity, chief administrative officer for Kids Hope Alliance. He's working on it. Yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. That's a good one. All right. Good morning, everyone. I'm Kenneth Darity, chief administrative officer with Kids Hope Alliance. Thank you for the opportunity to present. As Ms. Zuber stated earlier, this is the first time for us presenting this. And so we became aware that this was in our ordinance, and we wanted to make sure we were fulfilling that requirement. So what you will see on this presentation is, one, the ordinance requires that there are three required presentations for liaison interagency relationships. One is parks and recreation, two is neighborhoods, and three is the public library. But we also wanted to identify some other key liaison relationships and partnerships that we have and that we utilize throughout the year for children's services. And so you'll see those on the screen as well. To the bottom, I see the, I'm not sure if you can see it, but this also includes early learning coalition of Duval County, of Duval as well as Duval County public schools. Many times when we're presenting or we're speaking to key stakeholders, there's a question regarding our funding and how providers receive the funding. Wanted to make sure we're able to explain for those who may not be aware of how majority of our funding is given out. It starts with, one, our board defining the needs through our essential service categories. They, from that point, identify the scope and the evaluation that we put out through a competitive bid. We advertise that through the city's procurement office. Then those providers who apply compete. We fund, the dollars go to providers starting with the highest scoring applicant, and we go all the way down until we run out of funding for those who beat the minimum score. So it is a competitive process. Those applications are reviewed and scored. And then at that point, we contract with those providers. And then we deploy and measure those contracts through compliance and reimbursement approvals and site visits. Next, this is where, this section is where I'll get into the liaison relationships, who we've identified as liaison contacts, and some of the examples of our partnership for the last year. Starting with parks and recreation and neighborhoods, wanted to mention from parks and recreation that this has been a relationship, actually, we've had for a long time, even back through Jacksonville Children's Commission, we sponsor and fund to help them give out vouchers to their summer camps. And so this was a strategic way for us to spread out to reach different sides of town as well. And so we fund 10 locations, partially, as well as for $105,000, roughly, which created about 150 summer slots. So that's always been a strategic relationship. In addition to that, many of our providers utilize city spaces to activate empty buildings. A good example of that is Don't Miss a Beat, if you're familiar with that agency. They are in a parks and recs facility. They provide after-school and summer programming, do an amazing job with Broadway junior-style plays for youth. So that's just one example. In addition to that, we've also tried to coordinate activities to address teen takeovers. We try to advertise on our social media networks anything that parks and recs is doing. We also helped out recently with funding for their Hoops Tonight program. And then from there, I wanted to transition to neighborhoods. This is also another required relationship that we have according to the ordinance. I would say neighborhoods is probably the interagency where there's more opportunity for us to partner in the future. But as far as 2026, the biggest effort of partnership is our staff have attended CPAC meetings across the city. At those CPAC meetings, what we've done is we've made sure that the community knows about our summer camps, understands our process for programming. We pass out flyers. We advertise opportunities for scholarships and job opportunities, anything that we fund. We try to take advantage of those CPAC meetings, again, to spread out across the city to share the work that's taking place through the funding. Next, under the title of Learning Partnerships, this is where I wanted to talk about Public Library and Early Learning Coalition of Duval together. For the library, again, a longstanding partnership. We've, again, backed through Jacksonville Children's Commission as an agency. Always over the summer, great opportunity where the library staff have actually gone into our camps to provide additional literacy supports. This last summer, they had visited 44 camps and reached 12,504 youth and gave out 2,328 prize books to campers from those summer camps. So a great partnership. In addition to that, we partnered with Family Reading Day. In April, 2026, that event was held at the main library where almost 2,000 participants attended. And for Early Learning Coalition, what I wanted to highlight there, which is extremely important for the $3.5 million that we give the agency, that is a dollar-for-dollar match that they're able to receive from the state, which means that vouchers, family supports, as well as quality coaching can take place in, as well as scholarships in the early learning centers. Next, under the category of Prevention Through Partnership, this is where I will cover Journey Forward, JSO, and DCPS. What you'll see on the screen is a couple of quotes. Part of our ordinance requires five additional liaisons that we already have connected to the Kids Hope Alliance, and two of those are the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office in Duval County Public Schools. So you'll see quotes there from a board meeting from Commander Ford, as well as Dr. Bernier. I did want to elaborate on Dr. Bernier's quote. He really kind of combined and stated that this was a three-tiered process from our agency, Duval County Public Schools, and law enforcement to keep children safe. So I wanted to highlight that partnership, as well as Jack's journey. I didn't mention this on the previous slides, but I did try to put the liaisons that we have contact with. And so you'll see for Jacksonville Journey Forward, Mr. Griggs is our liaison. He attends our board meetings regularly. We attend Journey Forward meetings regularly. We were assigned a staff, a director who attends those meetings, and have met regularly as far as the 2026 programming. Also, we're working with Journey to produce a teen RFP in response to the teen takeovers. Rounding out the presentation, talking about teen takeovers. Is that my time? Am I on? Go ahead. We held you back there to begin with. Okay. I only have about two slides, so I'm wrapping up. In regards to teen takeovers, I wanted to talk to you how our programming and our providers actually start this process before the teen takeovers happen. And so these partnerships that we have with those listed and others, really we started listening early. We offer additional alternatives, not only from our funded programs, but through some of our partners, like with the libraries, Parks and Recreation. We have tons of connections and links for providers and families. On our website, we have an entire program page where you can search for an after-school and a summer camp program. And then, as I mentioned earlier, just coordinating safety, even having JSO representative on our Kids Hope Alliance board as a liaison partnership. There was one more slide. There we go. And then, lastly, effective partnerships show their results. Simply want to state from this slide that as we've confirmed these contacts, this isn't something that we just started once we found out about this presentation. We've been doing this for years, since I've been with the Jacksonville Children's Commission. And just, we truly are just stronger together. These partnerships have produced great results for kids and families. And just wanted to thank this council for your support over the years. And just thank you for this opportunity to present. All right. Thank you. So do we have any questions from the committee members? Councilor Bolton, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Through the tracks, probably this is for Ms. Zuber, if you wouldn't mind. We had a great conversation the other day, and we talked a little bit about the prospect of getting into the development business. Obviously, with or without Amendment 3, we're going to probably invariably see some leveling off of funding for KHA. Can you share with the committee any thoughts you and the board may have with respect to seeing how do we generate revenue out of the private sector to support this operation? Sure. This is my first month as the CEO of Kids Hope Alliance. And so I have spent a lot of my time talking to community stakeholders, some of whom are foundations and entities that traditionally support children's programming. Some of them have expressed interest in funding KHA directly. And we are looking at ways to be able to do that, to supplement not only any shortfall that might happen if Amendment 3 passes, but just in general to support the work of Kids Hope Alliance. Perhaps, if I may, Mr. Chair, a question, Ms. Stephop, or Carla and Michelle. The prospect of some kind of infrastructure change or ordinances need to be passed in order for them to create a foundation or some element of a fundraising instrument as part of KHA? Through the Chair to Council Member Boylan, are you asking if that's a possibility or are you asking a specific possibility? What is the path to do it? We could pursue some type of public-private 501c3 type situation if that's one potential avenue. I think we may give some serious thought to that process. As I said, with or without Amendment 3, you're going to probably invariably see some leveling and funding going forward. And having a vehicle to do that kind of fundraising probably is appropriate. Right. Thank you. I don't see any other speakers in the queue. Appreciate y'all coming and doing your presentation this morning. All right. With that, we'll go ahead into our appointment agenda. The first action item we'll go to is item number 5 on page 4, 2026-0517. Can we get a motion on the amendment? I second. I've got a motion and a second on the amendment. Ms. Carraher. Through the Chairs of the Committee, the amendment will remove the appointment for the partial term ending September 30, 2026, since that date has now passed, and will also clarify that the seat is currently vacant. All right. No speakers on the amendment. All in favor of the amendment, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Likewise, none. The amendment carries. Get a motion and a second on the bill as amended. I've got a motion and a second on the bill as amended. Mr. Alero, if you want to come on down and kind of give us an update, name and address for the record, sir. Good morning, everybody. Julio Leo, 3756, Colina Cove Trail. I'm here to give an update for, you know, the ongoing issues with the Caldwell residency. So, Mr. Caldwell was sharing, I heard, like, what he was sharing about, you know, like, the issue is still not resolved. That is very correct. The issue has not been resolved. There's more issues that actually have surfaced. It wasn't just a compressor now. We're moving into a lot more different issues as we ran the new copper line set for the system. Even though I know he was saying that he was going to do it himself, there was no information shared to me or my company about such a possibility that he was going to do so. I've been in communication with Ms. Cammie and Rob Caldwell. That is the other side of the Caldwell family, and those are the ones that we are communicating with. I hope you understand why we don't have direct communication with Mr. Terry Caldwell. But, you know, we're still responsive. We're still in communication constantly. It seems like they're having some internal issues within the residency. They're actually in a current some type of court case. Due to this particular situation, I have shared with Ms. Cammie and Rob Caldwell that we're going to be – we would like to keep pursuing it, pursuing whatever it is that we can do to resolve the issue. It looks like there's some duct work that needs to be resolved. It looks like there's some acidity in the refrigerant lines. There's some things that still needs to be done, but we need to have access to the house. Due to, you know, obviously we try having access to the house. We have had the door closed on us to be able to pursue it. So I did share with the other side of the Caldwell residency, like, we're more than happy to keep doing whatever it is that we can do about it, but we need some cooperation. And then due to their current situation, I honestly don't know what to do, but I told her that I'm more than happy to. Just, you know, kind of my legs are – my hands are kind of tied up on this one. Besides that, that's kind of the update that I have for you guys on that current residency. All right. Thank you, sir. Let me go to the queue. I've got Dr. Salem. Thank you, Chair. Through the chair to Mr. Leia, two questions. Yes, sir. One, have you been paid at all for this repair? For the repair, no, sir. No. So all the work you've done – I haven't – I'm not asking for any retribution either. When you say retribution, what do you mean by that? I'm not asking for any money. Okay. So from the very beginning when you started coming here for this repair, you've not been paid a dime? No, sir. I haven't asked for a dime either. Oh, one of my colleagues indicated this was warranty work. Is that the reason you've not been paid? No, sir. It's not warranty work. No. The warranty only relies on a manufacturer. Usually on any trade, there is a one-year warranty of craftsmanship. The craftsmanship was approved and authorized when the city came in and inspected the installation. There was no issues with the installation. That was the scope of work that we were paid and hired to do so by the home warranty that hired us for this residency. Any repair that happens – I mean, I'm sure you guys have ACs in your homes. Even though your equipment is under manufacturer warranty, you still have to pay some type of labor or some sort of fee when it comes down to any repair. We are not – obviously, we're not asking for any. The reason why is because I wanted to make sure that we're doing something in the right way, in the right manner. I don't – I'm not asking for any money when it comes to this stuff. Okay. Let me follow up. I think you said something that I want to clarify. They had a home warranty policy, and you were chosen from this company to come in and make this repair. Yes, sir. Could have been any company, but they picked you. Yes, sir. Okay. Second question is, if you had full access to this house, if they just disappeared and you could come in, are you comfortable that you could make all the repairs and get this thing resolved? Yes. No question? No questions. Okay. Thank you, Chair. All right. Let me go to Councilman Amaro. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I believe that you're – I have no reason to believe that you're a bad company. I have not seen any evidence of that. But – and I thank you for putting yourself forward and having this desire to serve and for so far being apparently very transparent about what's taking place. But your appointment is still problematic to me because in my previous life, I dealt a lot with the Construction Trades Qualifying Board, and Mr. Richard Hickok was the executive director at the time. And I relied on the integrity of every member and that board to deal with issues that were brought forth. I just feel that if you should go through with this hanging over your head, it becomes problematic. And so that's where my struggle is. I know that in the customer service area, sometimes you can give your customer gold bricks and they're not satisfied. But moving forward with this still unresolved, to me, that is a challenge. And so I just want to share that with you. Thank you, sir. All right. There are no other speakers in the queue. Thank you, Mr. Lara, one quick question before you sit down. The warranty company hired you. Has the warranty company paid you for the initial installation? There was a fee of $2,000 that was issued not by the home warranty, but it was issued to the Caldwells directly. And that was, I guess, that was their, what is this called? Kind of like a, what am I trying to say? Kind of like the fee that you pay. Because the home warranty is the one that provided the equipment, but did not buy the equipment. Okay. So you have been compensated. $2,000 for an installation. For the original repair, but the warranty. For the installation, not the repair. Okay. All right. Back to Dr. Salem. Thank you, Chair. I'm really out of my league here. And I'm really relying on you to at least advise me on what you think we should do here. This is an industry that you're in. Hopefully, if this was a pharmacy, you would rely on me. But I'm out of my league here. I've heard about these companies in terms of these home warranties, and they drive the process because, obviously, they're in it to make money. And it sounds like they provided him the parts, and he went in and made that original installation. And there have been problems ever since. It's not clear to me how much of this is on him and how much of this is the situation he's in. I'm hesitant to punish someone that I'm not sure deserves that. So, if you can provide some guidance, at least to me, that would be helpful. Thank you. Thank you. Let me go to Council Member Bowling. Thank you, Mr. Chair. In the seven years I've served on the Rules Committee, never once have we had a situation quite like this one. Through the Chair to Michelle, or Mr. Dennis, if you prefer, does he meet the qualifications to serve on this board? Through the Chair to Council Member Bowling, he does. He meets the qualifications to serve on this board. So, I think our focus, and I do appreciate Council Member Mero and Chair Gay's concern with respect to that. But we're using a different metrics here, or metrics, to judge this person's ability to serve on this committee. That's not fair to him. It's not fair to the board overall. He meets the requirements. Lord knows we put him through the paces to get to this point. I think he deserves the opportunity to serve on that board and find out how well he can contribute and establish and be a part of the credibility that Mr. Mero recommended or suggested as being so very much important in this process. I'm comfortable in moving him forward. We were here last time. We had a doctor come up here to get approved, and I turned to Ms. Tyrone Clark-Murray, and I said, maybe we should have asked him if he's had any dissatisfied patients in the course of his practice. It's not where we need to be going in this process, and it's a road I don't think we want to go down in the future. So, I will be supporting him today. All right. Thank you, sir. So, I've passed a handout out to the committee, and I just want to dial this in to the Construction Trade Qualifying Board, which is this handout here. And to illustrate and to show the importance of the nature of this board and the makeup of it, the board is acting under Chapters 62 and 342. It is charged with the responsibility of protecting the citizens of the city of Jacksonville from unscrupulous and incompetent members of the construction industry. The board ensures that the members of the construction industry is working the fields of general building, residential roofing, pools, sheet metal, electrical heating and air conditioning, refrigeration, plumbing, irrigation, all the way through to carpentry. Subcontractors meet the competency, financial responsibility, credit, and insurance threshold of qualifications established under the city ordinance. There's a lot more information that provides there, but I just want to turn the page there. Under 342.101, the purpose of this chapter and the area of enforcement, A, in order to protect the public health, safety, and welfare. It is declared necessary to establish regulations to assure that persons engaged in contracting for the performance of certain trades, construction, equipment, installation around building structures, goes on to list that. B, the council is acting herein and in Chapter 62, the Construction Trade Qualifying Board as a governing body for Duval County, Florida. So with that, this is not just, this board is a quasi-judicial board that regulates the applicants that come in to perform work here in the city to make sure that we are protecting our citizens. We all know the issues that we've had and seen with boards out there that we have to do everything that we can within our power to make sure we get the right applicants. We're not putting the company on the board. We're not putting what they do or what they don't do. This goes back to the original, when code enforcement reached out to me, it was about work being done without a license. I mean, excuse me, without a permit. And that's on the qualifying agent and that's on the individual that we're voting on today. So I want to dial it all back in what we're talking about. We're not talking about the company. We're talking about the individual that, what code enforcement brought to me and their concerns. So I just, I'll pause right here. I've got some speakers in the queue. Let me go back to Councilman Dr. Salem. Thank you, Chair. Through the chair to OGC or somebody over here. Do we have any other boards within the city other than this one that actually are responsible, as this board is, it sounds like, as a governing body? I mean, for example, I served on the board of pharmacy for eight years. That was a statewide board. And we regulated the profession of pharmacy. And I would, I don't think there was anybody on that board that it had discipline through the board of pharmacy. It'd be kind of embarrassing if you were regulating the profession and you had had discipline yourself. So I'm trying to understand, is this our only one? Or do we have others that regulate their profession like this one does within the city? Through the chair and Councilmember Salem. So we have many quasi-judicial boards. We have another regulatory board that I can think of. Ms. Carraher and I were just discussing. The Environmental Protection Board assesses fines and things like that as well. So we have some similar types of boards. But yes, this is a regulatory type board. But does the Environmental Protection Board regulate individuals or simply activities? I mean, this board, my point is, this board appears to regulate individuals versus activities. Yeah, through the chair, it does regulate individuals. Absolutely. I can't think of another example that regulates individual licensees and has licensees and has such powers. Ms. Hampsey said Civil Service Board is another example. And I'm aware of what the Civil Service Board does in terms of, but various different entities come in front of the Civil Service Board. It's not for a particular profession, though, is it? I mean, you've got all sorts of union people that come in front of them. Yeah, through the chair, I would say that's a different example, a slightly different board for sure. This one is unique in that they have the ability to suspend or revoke licenses, order a period of probation, issue letters of reprimand or guidance, and order payment of fines and restitution. So this one is a bit different. And these people that they regulate and permit, these people, they don't get a permit from anybody else statewide or anywhere else other than through this particular board. Through the chair, there is still state licensing requirements for the different professions, the plumbing profession, the electrical contractor professions. And those are regulated at the state level by Department of Business and Professional Regulation. But these people have to come through this board locally. Do other cities have a similar board to this? Through the chair, I would assume so. I would have to do the research to confirm that. If I may, what we have here is our Duval County registered license. So there's registered license that's county related, and then there's state license. So this is basically where you can get a local license to operate in different trades, and then you can pass more exams to get the stating license. But this is for our local construction board for contractors in our county. To the chair, if I can. Yes. If you have a state license, you can't practice in Duval County without this license. Is that correct? No, no, sir. The state license is statewide. Statewide. So the Duval County has to recognize a state license. To have a registered license that's with Duval County only, to go to Clay County, you've got to get it to reciprocate for a local license. I mean, this is very similar to what I have dealt with before. I mean, in my own profession. Okay. You've answered my questions. Thank you. All right. Let me go to Mr. Dennis. Through the chair, to the committee. Thank you for allowing me to speak. I just want to point to your attention that, you know, what you're going through, this process that you're going through with Mr. Alejo, you're going to be going through this process with other nominees on this board, because there was one appointment that was supposed to come before you today that the chairman deferred. And so there's been an onslaught of negative information. There was an anonymous letter sent in about another appointee. And so there seemed to be a coordinated effort to not have people, new people, placed on this construction trade qualifying board. And so, again, this anonymous letter just came in about this appointee. And I will be making a copy and making it available to you all. But there's beginning to be an onslaught of negative activity to our appointees. And so I just want to bring to your attention, you know, this is not an anomaly. This is something that, again, a coordinated effort of a group of people not wanting new people to be placed on this construction trade qualifying board. So I just wanted to put that on the record to let you all know that there's something more, you know, to all of this negative information coming for all of the appointees on this particular board. No other board, but this particular board. So thank you, Chairman, for allowing me to put that on the record. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Council Member Clark Murray. Thank you, Chair. I didn't realize Construction Trades Board was so cutthroat. Man, this is hardcore stuff right here. So I don't necessarily have any questions, but to the nominee, but to the chair, how egregious is not filing the appropriate, you used the term earlier, for the permit? How egregious is that in terms of the profession that Mr. Alejo is in? How egregious is, like, how, is that a minor offense? Is it a major offense? What would it be, just? Well, it, to Council Member Clark Murray, permitted work is a pretty serious requirement for the construction trade industry. It's part of the testing information that we go through to make sure you are permitting your work. It's public safety. So if we have a, just let anybody willy-nilly go out and do work without permitting and no oversight, then we're setting ourselves up for failure. The last thing that we want to do is allow this trend to start. It's serious enough that code enforcement reached out to me, not an anonymous letter. It was code enforcement that reached out to me and said, we've got concerns. And so that's where I'm looking at this letter that we're talking about. I haven't even seen it. So I don't take, I don't appreciate that being presented like that's why I'm saying what I'm saying and presenting nothing but the facts. That's all I've laid out right here to everybody, nothing but the facts. Here's what the requirements are. Here's what we're tested. We're, as a, in the construction industry, we're supposed to be professionals and we're supposed to conduct ourselves professionally. And the concern is having someone at this level that's a governing of other candidates. That's concerning. Okay. Thank you so much for that. So I will conclude my statements with, I can understand having dissatisfied customers and I understand that and appreciate the efforts that you're making to satisfy that customer. I know in some cases you just, there are circumstances that are like that. In fact, in my opinion, I think that would make you a more qualified to sit on one of these boards because you have been through that particular type of situation. However, one thing that is weighing heavily in my mind is the aspect of the permit because that is like the initial aspect before you do the work. And I know in many cases it allows that work to be inspected and to have that certification saying that, hey, this is quality work, that's been done. And I think it also has to do with whether or not, say, for example, a homeowner is able to do certain, ask certain things with that home. So I am still weighing the circumstances. I did read the qualifications. Well, it seemed like we've been on this for like weeks and weeks, maybe if not a month. So I read the qualifications. Clearly you meet the qualifications, but actions do matter as well. So I will leave it at that. Thank you, Chair. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Council Member Pittman for the first time. May I have a quick moment? I'm so sorry. Just really quick. I just wanted to also put it out there that it was my first time installing a unit through a home warranty. I don't know if you guys are familiar with home warranties or how they work, but at that time I did not know that I was going to be the one pulling the permit. I was in the expectation that they were pulling the permit. This is why things kind of got out of control with the permitting part of it. As soon as permitting came about, I took care of it right away. I didn't prolong it. I didn't sit on it. I took care of it right away. And even before the appointment, I even reached out to code enforcement to make sure that everything was settled and online. All right. Thank you. Yeah, go ahead. And actually my question is for you, Chair. Did code enforcement state that this is the only, that was the only instance in which he did not pull a permit for a job? In the notice meeting, that's where it was identified that that was the only one that he had not pulled a permit for. But he had referenced that he had done hundreds of permitted projects where I went back and looked and there was no other permits that were pulled here in Duval County. So, I'm sorry, to make sure I'm to the Chair. So, he has had hundreds of jobs and code enforcement brought only this one issue to you in regards to not pulling a permit, but you had never seen any other permits pulled for Duval County. So, I'll let him address the number of projects that he's permitted in Duval County. Through all my companies, yes, that has been the only issue we have had with permitting. Yes, I do understand that through the Chair. But the question now is that you've had, you've pulled hundreds of permits, but very few in Duval County? Yes. How many in Duval County? I will have to pull my records and stuff and be able to see it. I mean, currently, there are so many companies here in Jacksonville alone. We travel a lot. We do, we are registered in Santa Rosa County. We've done work in PACE. Right, but what about in Duval County? Can you give me a round number, a round estimate? I will probably say 14, 15. 14, 15. Out of hundreds? Out of work, yes. Through all the companies, yes. And you're, I'm sorry, through the Chair, in Jacksonville is your home base? Yes. Yes, it is. Right, thank you. Thank you, Chair. All right, let me go to Council Member Pittman. And to the Chair, this question is to Mr. Dennett. Is this the first time that this process has been done like this? You mentioned, I want to know that. And secondly, what's the terms of serving on that board? Through the Chair to Councilwoman Pittman, we have advanced probably three or four members since we've been in this administration. This is the first time that we had one to where it has been issues and a quasi-investigation by code enforcement, and I really appreciate Councilman Gay saying it's code enforcement because the anonymous letter, there are some detailed things to where it had to be someone in code enforcement to have written this letter. But the issue, if I can be quite frank with you, the issue with Mr. Alejo, Mr. Alejo, we nominated him to be an HVAC contractor in that seat. That was the current Chair who had been sitting in that seat since Mayor Brown. And that's where the discontent and the issue started to brew because the Chair did not want to leave that particular seat. And so then it became a smear campaign to Mr. Alejo. And I feel pretty bad for Mr. Alejo because, you know, he's a small businessman in Jacksonville. And so he's been here month, month, month. And there's been an onslaught of, again, negative information about his company and about him. And so I feel really bad. Our conversation this morning was, you know, let the committee either vote me up or vote me down. But, you know, he is trying to do the best and, you know, to resolve this issue. You know, and just to close it out, again, you know, getting an anonymous letter. And when you all see the letter, you will see that it is very detailed and very granular that there is an attempt for this other person not to be seated on the board. It is an open seat for architects. It's Solomon Olapati, who has been through this committee. And you all voted him unanimously to serve on the subdivision standards committee. But all of a sudden now, there is an attack on Mr. Olapati not to serve on the construction trade qualifying board. So to answer your question, this is not the first time we've advanced individuals. But this is the first time we've had this situation. And, again, if you, you know, peel back the onions, the layer of the onions, it's because of the chair did not want to leave the board. Thank you. But the terms for the person that is currently serving in that seat, how many years has he served in that seat? He is no longer there because he doesn't live in the county, but he had been there since 2011. So what's that, 15 years? Okay, so are there not term limits? Because it could not be him. It could be somebody else. It doesn't mean that he gets to stay. So I guess my concern is, is there a term limit for, or either rotating, is it one, two, three years? You know, after you serve, that's your term. That's it. So I'm not understanding just because the chair wants the person to stay. Hey, we should look at the documents of the terms. It's just like, if you didn't want us to leave, he can say, well, I don't want y'all to leave, but we already know after four years or eight years, it's time to get up out of here. So I'm just trying to find out, is the chair the one that's holding it up, or what's the real deal? Because it could not be him. It could not be Mr. Otapotti. I don't understand. Through the chair to Councilwoman Pittman, it is a two-term, four years, so a maximum of eight years for this particular board. Oh, three years. I'm sorry, three years. Two terms, three years. So a maximum of six years. Did you say he served 11? He's been there. He's no longer there because he moved out of county, and that seat became vacated. But you're right. If you don't confirm him, there will probably be someone else that we put up with an HVAC license that will probably go through the same type of scrutiny because of that seat. And the chair has requested several meetings with the administration. We've set up several meetings. The former chair set up several meetings with the former chair. He has not shown up after, again, multiple meeting appointments. But to answer your question, there are term limits, and we're trying to fill the seats with individuals that meet the requirements. Okay. But he's not in that seat right now, or is he still in the seat? He is not as of, what day was that, a couple weeks ago, when we discovered that he no longer lived in Duval County. Okay. And is he the only one that's on the committee? And how many people are on that committee? 15, I think. 14. 14. And how many vacancies do we have? Give me one second to look it up. Because, you know, my concern is if we're supposed to have term limits, I'd like for us to make sure that we follow the term limits. And then if there are vacancies, we do like we're doing, but it appears not everybody should have issues. You know, or maybe we should have three or four people to interview before we even bring somebody up for approval. I mean, I think it's unfair, number one. I hadn't said anything today, because to have this gentleman come here two and three times, and when he come here, it's always the same thing. It's another issue. So we either vet them before they get here, and we vet them. I think it's really unfair to do what we're doing. And maybe have more than one candidate that we are interviewing, and then bring the best candidate up. I don't know how that works, you know, but everybody has made a misstep, you know, starting out. Somebody has to give us a chance. And to me, it appears that he has tried to make it work. And at this point, it just appears it doesn't matter what he says or what he do, it's not going to work. So now the ball is in our hands, and we have to humiliate this young man and his business. This is our third time. And I don't like, I wouldn't want nobody to do me like that. So I want to know what's behind it, what's pushing this, and why don't they want him or anybody, because it might be the next person. And just because somebody wants to stay there doesn't mean that they can stay. If I want to stay on council, that means I can't stay. I might want to stay, but I can't. I'm sorry. That's all I wanted to say. All right. Thank you. With that, no other speakers in the queue, and I'll just close with this. There's another handout in front of you that shows three separate emails from Mr. Laro to Mr. Dennis that his strong interest is a plumbing contractor position. And three different times is what he asked for. And then the last email, I guess, is when concerns started coming in, and from the mayor's, even asked Garrett to please review the attachment complaint. So it shows that, you know, the concern wasn't just ours. It was everybody's about this situation. In regards to the board chair pushing back and trying to have this, whatever you want to call it, it was addressed in the notice meeting. And the board chair and Mr. Dennis admitted in that meeting that there was no attempt by the board chair to block anybody coming in. So to come back and say that there is this underlying, it's getting all off track of what we're talking about. We're talking about the one individual, the issues that was brought to us, and so that's where we're at. So we've had, I feel, enough discussions on this. I've got a motion and a second on the bill as amended. So I'll open a ballot and record your vote. Three yays, three nays. All right, Michelle. To the chair. I'm sorry, Mr. Pointerwater, if I might. Could we table a vote until Mr. Landon, Council Member Landon is back? I think it's only fair that we have the full complement of the committee here to vote on this item. I would, Michelle, I would entertain that. So let's, we'll table this and come back to it. I guess I need to move to reconsider and then table. I've got a motion. Hold on, one moment. So to the chair. So a vote of 3-3. You've already taken a vote and disposed of the item, but for lack of four votes in other directions means it's automatically deferred. So my suggestion to you is to, if you expect Council Member Landon to return, perhaps at that point someone could move to reconsider. Okay, right. So when he comes back, we'll move that to reconsider. All right, thank you all. All right, let's go to our second item. Page 13, item 16. Item number 16, 2026-0812. Can you have a motion on the bill? I've got a motion and a second on the bill. Those speakers in the queue, Mr. Blake Brandon, come on down and give us a little bit of your desire to serve on the Construction Trade Qualifying Board. Yes, sir. Brandon Blake. I don't know if I need to say my name and my address. Yes, sir. If you would say your name and address. Thank you. Brandon Blake, 8751 Atlantic Boulevard, Jacksonville, Florida, 3211. And I am a small electrical contracting business in Jacksonville, Florida. And I see that, you know, my main thing is workforce development and safety practices in the electrical industry. And I think that I could bring my expertise and my experience to do a great job at it. All right. Thank you. Before I go to the queue, Mr. Dennis, this being required as a citizen, not associated with construction industry, can you address that? Through the chair to the committee. Yeah. So we're asking for a waiver. He is in the construction industry. However, we had someone else slated for the electrical, which we're asking for a withdrawal. So we could definitely put Mr. Blake in the electrical. At the time, we had two individuals with the electrical, you know, very excited, you know, wanted to serve. So we moved forward with a waiver. But since we're withdrawing the electrical contractor today, we could definitely put him in the electrical slot. All right. Ms. Schell, being that this bill is specifically addressed as a citizen, not associated with construction industry, how do we need to, do we need to amend this? Please give us direction. To the chair, my recommendation is that you withdraw this and refile it as a resolution. It does not require a waiver, from what I can understand that Mr. Dennis is describing. Mr. Dennis, you okay with that? So I'm fine with that. So we're going to look at withdrawing this, and then he'll come back under another slot that we'll see a withdrawal on here a little bit later. So can I get a motion in a second on a withdrawal? I've got a motion in a second to withdraw bill 2026-0812. All in favor of the, Michelle, is that a verbal vote that we do on the withdrawal ballot vote? So let's open the ballot and record your vote on a withdrawal. Six yays, zero nays. Okay, by your action, you've withdrawn 2026-0812. And just, Mr. Brandon, just get with Mr. Dennis to get this refiled, and then we'll get you back through the system here. Thank you. Let me go to Councilman Amaro. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Through the chair to Mr. Dennis, why couldn't this have been resolved before now? Mr. Blake obviously has put himself forward, and I believe he'll be okay going forward. But it just seems amateur hour, to be honest, that, you know, number one, you put him up for a position that he was technically not supposed to be in, with the anticipation of trying to get a waiver, and then knowing that you're going to pull someone out, you can now move him. All that should have been done before today, in my humble opinion. Just a thought. All right. Thank you. So let's get moving on here. Let's go to page 15, and we'll go to item number 16. I'm sorry, page 15, item number 18, 2026-0815. Can I get a motion on the bill? I've got a motion and a second on the bill. Is Alexandra Field here? Come on down and give your name and address for the record and your desire to serve on the Opioid, Sumpfers, and Abuse Disorder Grants Committee. Absolutely. My name is Alexandra Field, 7445 Lawn Tennis Lane, Jacksonville, Florida, 32277. I am, I have been honored to be nominated for this appointment. I am a licensed clinical social worker and the clinic director of the Stephen A. Cohen Military Family Clinic at Centerstone. I work with veterans with mental health and substance abuse issues. We partner with a number of veteran organizations like the Firewatch, Wounded Warrior Project, Operation Uniform to address the needs of veterans, and frequently we have to address substance use issues for those folks. So that is why my interest came up for the committee. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Let's go to Dr. Salem as I want to lean on him for his direction on this. Thank you, Chair. Through the Chair, I had a chance to meet with Ms. Field for a committee very important to me, and she's immensely qualified and I urge a yes vote. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Council Member Pittman. Good morning. Thank you so much for putting yourself forward. I just want to make sure going forward that when you all are looking at applications that we not only look at larger organizations. Based on your background and what you just mentioned that you did, I want to make sure that some of the smaller nonprofits and organizations in midsize get an opportunity and really pay attention to the work that they're doing. Because a lot of them may not have all the bells and whistles as larger organizations, but they're doing the work, and so they need an opportunity. So that would be my request of you and the committee, as well as to make sure that it's diversified in terms of the needs of the community and where the organizations are. Okay. Thank you. All right. Thank you. No other speakers in the queue. I've got a motion to second on the bill. Open a ballot. Record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. By your action, you're approved. 2026-0815. And you're welcome to come Tuesday night. It's not mandatory, but you're welcome to come at the next council meeting. We'll announce your name after the final vote, and thank you for your service. Thank you. All right. Our next item is on page 17, item number 21, item number 21, 2026-0818. Thank you. I've got a motion to second on the bill. Is Cameron Frazier here? Mr. Rogers. Tim Rogers, Chief Librarian at Jacksonville Public Library. Mr. Frazier is not here today. Unfortunately, I had given him the advice he did not have to be here. I thought he was over the 75% threshold. I see from the agenda that he is at 74%. I can tell the committee that since the information was passed to the committee of his re-nomination, he has passed the 75% threshold. And I can also say that the majority of the absences that he had were in the beginning of his term. That is primarily because at the same time that he was starting on the library board, he was starting a charter school. He is the head of school for becoming collegiate. And as such, there was a lot of conflicting scheduling, unfortunately. Since the first year and a half of his tenure, his attendance has been very good. And we certainly would welcome him back as an active board member. He is not someone who simply shows up and doesn't contribute. He's very active in our committees as well as the full board. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Council Member Bolin. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Not to go off the rails, but a little bit. Mr. Rogers, as you know, I served on the search committee that brought you to Jacksonville. Can you speak a little bit to some of the concerns raised by the public with respect to the role of the governing body or board as it relates to events, book selection, et cetera? Do they play a role in any of that kind of activity? Through the chair to Mr. Bolin. The library board sets the policy for the library. The library policy is what we use as professional librarians to administer the book selection, program identification, all of the activities that we provide. The library board also is the organization that is the last group. So if someone doesn't like a book that we have in the collection, if they don't like a program we've presented, if they don't like an art exhibit that has been exhibited at the library, they submit a request to evaluate, that's not what it's called, a request to review. And then I will take a look at that. We have our staff do a full administrative breakdown and determine did it meet our policy. That's the only thing we look at. Did it meet our policy? If it did meet our policy, then we communicate that to the individual and say, thank you for bringing this to our attention. It does meet our policy. However, if you as an individual do not agree with this summation and if you would like to take it to the board, there is always that opportunity. And the board then hears that as the final adjudication. And the policy presently, does it speak to safeguarding children in terms of protecting them as it relates to events and programs and books? Yeah, through the chair to Mr. Boylan. The safeguarding children and providing open access to information are always debated in society. What I would say is we, as a public institution, it is in our best interest as an institution, as a community, to provide people with the access to the information that they need. At the same time, we recognize that there is some material that is for adults and some material that is for children. That is why we have the children's library and why we have the adult section of the library. Having said that, anyone can go to any section of the library. It is a public forum. It is an open space that anyone can visit. We do not, as the library, we do not act in loco parentes. We do not act as the parents when the parents are not there. Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to have this. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Chair, I'd like to suggest we go ahead and move forward, Mr. Frazier, based upon the comments offered by Mr. Rogers. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Dr. Salem. Thank you, Chair. Through the chair to Mr. Rogers, how many times in the last year has someone said, this book is not appropriate or this activity or whatever, and it's been brought to your staff to evaluate? Through the chair to Mr. Salem, the exact numbers I'd have to look up, but I would say three or four at the most. Three or four in the last 12 months. In the last 12 months. Correct. And how many of those escalated to go to the library board? Zero. You were able to resolve them? We were. To the satisfaction of the individual? What I would say is we sent the, as we do, as part of our process and policy, we sent the letter giving them the decision that I had made based on the information provided by my staff and my own evaluation, and we never heard back. Part of that documentation that we send them is, if you wish, you can always bring this to the library board, and here's the process for doing that. And no one, and I would add, since I've been here in Jacksonville almost nine years, we have never had anybody take it to the library board. Okay. Okay. Just a comment. If I were on the library board or in your position and there was some 50-50 decision whether this was an appropriate piece of material that should be in the library, where children might be exposed to it, I would always rule on not putting it in the library and letting the parents or whoever get that from some other source. That's my own opinion. I think that's the safe thing to do. But I understand people may disagree with that. Thank you, Chair. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Mr. Dennis. Through the Chair, I'm sorry. I was having a sidebar conversation about this legislation. What was the question? You were in the queue. Oh, sorry. Okay. So no comments from Mr. Dennis. So I appreciate, Mr. Rogers, you coming and representing the appointment. I'm not comfortable with moving forward with it without him being here and hearing what some of the passionate cries are. So I'm going to defer this and have him come or have the nominee come just so we can keep the same protocol. And so I don't want to deviate from that. So with that, I will go ahead and defer 2026-0818. Next item is item number 22, 2026-0819. I've got a motion and a second. On the bill is Robert Hickson here. Come on down, Mr. Hickson, and tell us about your desire to be the Chief of Fire Operations. All right. Good morning to the Chair, members of the committee. My name is Robert Hickson, JFRD, Jacksonville Fire and Rescue Department. I just want to thank you for this opportunity to speak to you today. It's an honor to be considered for the role of the Chief of Operations. I was born right here in Jacksonville, Florida, 4229 Monfrey Road West, apartment 14. This city has invested in me. It's placed role models in my life, which some are here today, who taught me value, services. I graduated Terry Parker High School in 1997, where I served as the Command Master Chief with our NJRTC program. My senior year, I was the commander of the NJRTC program. My fire service began at the age of 15 as a fire explorer, but my professional career started logistical support. From there, I became a dispatcher, where I gained firsthand experience coordinating emergency response, supporting firefighters in the field. That experience gave me a unique understanding of the operations behind the scenes before, ultimately, I became a full-time firefighter with Jacksonville Fire and Rescue. Having served in multiple roles throughout the organization has given me a deep appreciation for every member of our department and each critical role played in our mission. Today, I serve as the Acting Division Chief of Operations at the Fire Department. But before stepping in this role, I served as a fire captain and spent decades with the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office as the leading SWAT tactical medic for Jacksonville Sheriff's Office. During that time, I participated in hundreds of missions, making decisions, leadership, and rapid analysis, impacting officer safety and mission with success. I also reached the highest level of paramedicine, where I flew with UF Health on trauma one. Throughout my career, I've had the privilege of working alongside with a federal USAR team, which is based out of Miami-Dade County, which is only 28 federal teams in the United States. I've deployed all over the United States, also Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. Those experiences have allowed me to collaborate with my professional from across the country and around the world, reinforcing the importance of preparation, adaptability, and mission to focus leadership. They also brought my perspective on emergency management, strengthened my ability to lead diverse teams throughout complex and rapid evolving situations. If confirmed, my commitment to you and the citizens of Jacksonville is clear. I will continue to strengthen our operational readiness, improving coordination across the divisions, investing in developing our personnel and leading with accountability, transparency, and respect. Jacksonville deserves excellence from the Fire Department, and I will work every day to ensure I will deliver that. To all my brothers in the audience, all I am, I will thank you for your time, your consideration, and your continued support. I will look forward to any questions you have for me. All right. Thank you. I don't have anybody. There we go. Now I've got them all in the queue. Let me go to Dr. Salem first. Thank you, Chair. I had the opportunity to meet with Acting Chief Hickson, enjoyed our discussion. I think he's immensely qualified, and I would urge you to vote yes. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Councilmember Pittman. Would like to be added as a co-sponsor. Thank you. Mr. Councilmember Bolin. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I enjoyed our conversation, Chief. I appreciate the fact you've been outside the box, working with JSO and other opportunities in South Florida, et cetera. Please add me as a co-sponsor. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Chief White. Yes, sir, to direct question, then I'll decide if I want to be a co-sponsor. If I put in an application and Chief hires me, will you put me at Engine 32? Yes, sir. Add me as a co-sponsor. All right. Thank you, sir. So, yes, add me as a co-sponsor as well. The only little issue I see here is this Terry Parker thing. Me and James Edwards, we know how to deal with that. Being a Jackson alone here. All right. With that, I've got a motion and a second on the bill. Open the ballot and record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. All right. By your action, you approve 2026-0819. And, Chief, you come Tuesday night. You don't have to. We'll recognize you after the final vote. And thank you for your service. Thank you. All right. That takes us to item number 23, 2026-0820. I've got a motion and a second on the bill. Mr. Jordan Dowling, come on down. Give us a little bit of your desire to be the Chief of Homeland Security. Yes, sir. Good morning. Through the chair of the committee. My name is Jordan Dowling. I'm born and raised here in Jacksonville, Florida. I'm a third-generation police officer. I started my career with JSO in 2013. Since that time, I served as a patrol officer in District 1. As an officer, I made a lateral transfer to the narcotics unit as an undercover detective. I promoted to the rank of sergeant in 2019. I served in the narcotics unit overseeing a team of undercover detectives. Before making rank as a lieutenant in 2022, I started my lieutenant journey in Patrol District 6. I then transferred to oversee several investigative units to include the burglary unit, the violent crime unit. I oversaw our day-to-day operations in the gang unit and the crime gun intelligence center. I oversaw our missing persons unit as a lieutenant and our cold case unit. And the last position that I held as lieutenant was the integrity unit. The sheriff appointed me to assistant chief in September of 2024. I started as the commander of the narcotics and vice section. In January of this year, I transferred to the specialized investigations section, where I oversaw the crime gun intelligence center, the gang unit, our community problem response unit, the cold case unit, and our missing persons unit. In September of this year, the sheriff appointed me to acting chief of Homeland Security, where I've been serving for the last month. I look forward to this next role. I am honored by the sheriff's commitment and his confidence in me to hold this role. I understand the capabilities of the special operations section, the narcotics vice section, and the role that they play in ensuring the public's safety and continuing to drive down the violent crime in the city. So I look forward to your support. Thank you very much for your time. All right. Thank you, sir. I don't have any speakers in the queue. Please add me as a co-sponsor. A whole bunch of me-toos. I think that's the whole committee. All right. I've got a motion and a second on the bill. Let's open the ballot and record your vote. Seven yays, zero nays. By your action, you're approved. 2026-0820. And Mr. Dowling, we'll recognize you after the final vote on Tuesday night. You're welcome to come, and thank you for your service, sir. Thank you, sir. All right. That takes us to item number 24 on page 18, 2026-0821. I've got a motion and a second on the bill. Now, Michael Schell, come on down and give us your desire to be the director of police services. Yes, sir. Good morning. Mike Schell, acting director of police services. Born and raised here in Jacksonville. Graduated from Stanton. I just learned this morning there's another Stanton alumni on the committee. So honored to be here with you, sir. Graduated UNF. Been with JSO, like I said, about 22 and a half years. Most recently served as the chief of homeland security and honored that the sheriff saw fit to appoint me as the director of police services. I'm looking forward to taking on that responsibility and opening any questions from the committee. All right. Let me go to another Stanton grid. Councilman Lennon. Thank you, Chair. Yes, I think that's a total of five stars from the Stanton class of 2000 now, if you're out of between you and Director Brown as well. Please add me as a co-sponsor. I did work with Director Schell during the budget process this year, and I believe this role you will be over the budgeting as well. I believe that falls under your responsibility with Mr. Clement out there. So I look forward to working with you more on budgeting matters as well as all the other responsibility that you're about to have under you. Congratulations. Yes, sir. Thank you, sir. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Dr. Salem. Chair, through the chair, does your position require a college degree, just out of curiosity? I believe in the ordinance it's a college degree or a five-year experience, but I do have a college degree. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Council Member Pittman. Thank you so much for your services over the years, and I just want to be added as a co-sponsor as well. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Please add me as a co-sponsor as well. I've got a motion and a second on the bill. Let's open the ballot and record your vote. Seven yays, zero nays. All right. By your action, you're approved. Twenty-two-two-six-zero-eight-two-one, and Mr. Shell, if you come Tuesday night, we'll announce your name after the final vote, and thank you for your service, sir. Sure. All right. That takes us to the next item, twenty-five-twenty-six-zero-eight-two-two. I will be deferring this, and this is one of the ones that Mr. Dennis was referencing. I have received information from the Department of Business and Professional Regulations from the state. I want to go through that before we even put it on the floor to have any conversation. I know the candidate, Mr. Olipade, so like I say, before we start dissecting it and going through it, I want to get all my facts and figures that I received from the state and just to make sure everything is good as well. So we'll bring that back at the next meeting. So item number twenty-five is deferred. So that brings us back to the, oh, Mr. Bolton, you recognize, I'm sorry. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Given Councilmember Lane and his graces with his presence, I'd like to move that we reconsider twenty-twenty-six-five-one-seven. All right. I've got a motion and a second to reconsider. That would be twenty-twenty-six-zero-five-one-seven. Is that a verbal vote? Good boy. Okay. All in favor of reconsidering, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Likewise, none. The motion carries. So that takes us back to item number five, twenty-twenty-six-zero-five-one-seven. Move it. Need to do the amendment. So I need to... I've got a motion and a second on the amendment. Mr. Kerr, you want to go through the amendment or everybody good? So everybody's good on the amendment. All in favor of the amendment, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Likewise, none. The amendment carries. We have a motion and a second on the bill as amended. I've got a motion and a second on the bill as amended. Council Member Lanning, you're recognized. Thank you, Chair. So my understanding is that it went three to three while I stepped out. Thank you for letting me go attend that Veterans Day kickoff that I had. So three to three, so it's deferred. So we did a motion to reconsider so it can move out of committee, essentially. So I do not know how much of the debate I missed. I will watch it when it comes online. I will vote yes so it does come out of committee at this time. But like you always say, Chair, I will hold my right to reconsider my vote upon watching whatever I missed in the last couple of minutes of that. But at least this way, it will not be held up in committee. All right. Thank you. I've got a motion and a second on the bill as amended. Let's open the ballot and record your vote. Four yays, three nays. By your action, you're approved, 2026-0517. And as it is now, Mr. Alero, if you come Tuesday night, we'll announce your name after the final vote. And thank you for your efforts in this service, sir. All right. That takes us to the next items that we need to go ahead and go to. Let's go to page six, item number eight for council, past council president White. Item number eight, 2026-0779. Get a motion on the bill. I've got a motion and a second on the bill. No speakers in the... You're good? Item number... Okay. Ms. Clark-Murray, you're recognized. Thank you, Chair. Erin, Abney. Okay. Good morning. So my question is really simple. I'm just wondering, what was the impetus for the change in regards to the parking spaces for industrial, wholesale, warehouse, storage, and similar uses? Yes. Erin Abney, Chief of Current Planning through the Chair to Councilwoman Clark-Murray. So this bill is before you to address parking regulations for industrial uses. You might remember back in 2025, we did a code update to address parking to reduce the requirement from one per 2,000 square feet down to one per 5,000 square feet, which did help one area of industrial uses. However, it created an issue for other industrial uses that do need a bit more parking requirements, more in, like, distribution centers. So this bill is just creating a range, so we'll keep the one per 5,000, but we're also going to introduce parking that could go up to three per 1,000 square feet. We worked with our transportation division to look at parking studies across all different types of industrial uses and found that this range is going to satisfy the majority of those businesses. And if it doesn't, we still have an administrative deviation process that they can seek an increase or a decrease outside of that range. Right. Thank you so much for that, Ms. Ammon. So basically, you're just solving a problem. Thank you. Correct. Thank you, too. All right. No other speakers in the queue. Let's open the ballot and record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. By your action, you're approved, 2026-0779. Thank you. I'd like to recognize Councilman Peluso and Councilman Miller. Welcome to the committee. All right. That takes us to our next item. It'll be on page 8, item number 11. Item number 11, 2026-0805. Okay. A motion on the bill. Second. I've got a motion and a second on the bill. I have no speakers in the queue. Let's open the ballot and record your vote. Seven yays, zero nays. By your action, you're approved, 2026-0805. Next item will be on page 12. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It's page 9, item 12. I'm a little dyslexic there for a second. The amendment. Second. The amendment. Second. Item number 12, 2026-0806. I've got a motion and a second on the amendment. Ms. Garrett. Through the chair to the committee, this is a technical amendment. Just clarifying, within the bill, there is a provision that waives, not waives, exempts preservation priority properties from the requirements of section 122-401-F. So we'll just clarify that that would apply whether they are sold through auction or donated and also correct some scrivener's errors. All right, let me go to the bill introducer, Mr. Palusa. After an amendment. Okay. Ms. Clark-Murray, is it on the amendment? Okay. Just my English background while I'm trying to understand. So thank you. Through the chair to Ms. Michelle. So first of all, the bullets that follow the first and second amendment, are those just notes for us or are those actual parts of the amendment? Because if it isn't, then I'll wait for the bill. Through the chair to Council Member Clark-Murray, those are about the bill itself. The only things on the amendment are numbered one and two. Okay. Thank you. So chair, it's on the bill. All right. Thank you. But let me, we've got a motion to second on the amendment. All in favor of the amendment, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Likewise, none. The amendment carries. You get a motion to second on the bill as amended. Second. I've got a motion to second on the bill as amended. Dr. Salem, you're recognized. Thank you, Chair. And this is either to Council Member Peluso or staff. I attended, as I recall, the notice meeting that you had, seems like two or three months ago. And there was some debate there about the not-for-profit entities versus the private sector being able to obtain these properties. And it was important to me at that time that the private sector have the ability, and there were several private sector people that were in the audience. Is that in this bill? Can the private sector obtain these properties just like a Springfield Preservation or anyone else? I'll ask to go to OGC if I can. Through the Chair to Council Member Salem, that is possible in some parts of it. How it's structured in the new Section 122.462 is that it will first be offered for donation to a not-for-profit entity with a mission of historic preservation. And if no such entities are found, then it will be offered through a special bid qualification process where the private entities would have an opportunity to bid on it. Through the Chair, so the first one that you mentioned where it's simply donated goes to a not-for-profit only? Through the Chair, that's correct. If the City's going to donate real property, it needs to go to a not-for-profit entity, yes. Through the Chair, if they're not able to handle the property or don't have the resources, what would happen then to that City parcel? Well, through the Chair to Council Member Salem and the Committee, we built in some criteria that that not-for-profit entity would need to establish first. And that's evidence of adequate financial resources, considering what the property, the specific property is that they're looking to receive, as well as experience in preservation, restoration, rehabilitation. So there are some qualifying criteria they must meet to receive that donated property. And we've also built in covenants and restrictions that should they not rehabilitate it within three years that the City can take the property back. And at that point, through the Chair, the private sector would be able to participate then? Yes. Through the Chair, yes. Okay. Council Member Peluso, can you, through the Chair, can you add anything to that to get me comfortable? Through the Chair, yes. To Council Member Salem, I believe I can. So, to the point of what Michelle was saying, in the scenario that she gave, the property, okay, let's step back. We can only donate property to a non-profit. We cannot donate to a for-profit entity. We're not allowed to do it. State statute won't allow us. City code won't allow us to. So, unfortunately, because of that, I wanted to make sure that there was some competitive process for the for-profit sector to be involved in this process, as you've asked, and as we intend it to be, frankly. So, we have RAP, SPAR, Historical Society, they all have good funding. They have the backing to be able to handle a property or two. Right now, SPAR has taken on the Drew Mansion or the Drew Cottage, for instance. So, they would not have the financial ability to take on any more properties. So, any property that the city, through this very lengthy process, because keep in mind, this process goes through Historic Preservation Commission, they work with OGC and with our Code Compliance Group to get a list of properties. They then select a bunch of properties that have a bunch of liens and fines on them, and then they are given over to the mayor's office. And if the mayor's office chooses to foreclose on the property, then it goes into this process. So, even then, there's a bunch of layers before it even gets to the point of potentially the property being taken, liens and fines wiped, and it going out to the bid process. So, non-profits do have the first go of it because we cannot donate to a for-profit entity. If they don't have the financial ability, which, frankly, none of them probably do right now, it goes straight to the bid process. So, we built that in. And the bid process, based on what we're about to vote on, the starting bid is $10,000. So, very, very low, manageable for a for-profit entity to go after. And that was by design. When I talked to our real estate folks, they said, oh, we usually go by what the real property is. So, it's way too high. Because I don't want us to have property get sold to a for-profit entity, and then for them just to come back to this body saying, hey, give me a $50,000 or $100,000 grant. Well, no, you're getting that property for a significant discount. But, by the way, you've got to work on it in the next two years. So, hopefully, that makes you a little bit more comfortable. But, to the point of impracticality, I highly doubt that any of these non-profits, unless they spur up a massive operation that can take on a bunch of properties and fix them up to the standard that we want in a very short amount of time, no non-profit is going to be able to take a bunch of these properties day one. So, through the chair, you would anticipate that some of these properties will be going to the for-profit sector because just of the... Guarantee it. Because of the financial ability they may have versus a not-for-profit. Guarantee it. And, again, those for-profit entities also need to have experience in historic preservation, which, luckily, in Northeast Florida, we've got, say, in Augustine, we've got a bunch of historic areas. So, we have a few private sector folks who already know that trade. But you have to get certified by the city, which is our planning department. They just kind of give you a checkmark. And then you also have to take a two-hour course on our COA process. Because we do want to make sure, if you are from Amelia Island or from St. Augustine, you may not know our COA process. So, you take that course, and now you're eligible to bid on those properties. That way, it's not just, you know, Jimmy's, you know, home repair program. Because I may not know how to do historic preservation. So, not only does it encourage the for-profit sector to be involved, we now know that it's going to be people who know how to do that work. Based on that, Chair, I'll be supporting the bill. Thank you. All right. Thank you. If you'll allow me to say, Chair, thank you, Council Member Sandlin. I'm very grateful to you, sir. All right. Let's go to Council Member Clark-Murray. Thank you, Chair. First of all, this is an excellent bill. I appreciate it greatly because I think that our historical structures need the protections and the procedures that are required and the listing in regards to the property qualifications, establishing a revenue fund, the historical properties, and, like, the surplus properties. So, I appreciate the introducer of this bill tremendously. You did answer my first question, which was about the $10,000, why that was the ceiling in regards to the non-profits because I was wondering if the property has a much larger value, then why would we just allow the $10,000? But I understood. You explained it, so I understand that. My question may be for you, and it may be for Mr. Artemis, so he might want to make his way to the podium, in looking at the Section 122.462, page 14, if you have the bill in front of you, there are specific historical preservation non-profits that are listed, and they have first dibs, basically. Are there any other historical preservation entities in the city that we need to add to this list so that it is, just like I asked Mr. Artemis or Mr. Peluso, if you're able to answer the question? Because I know we have the history, and I don't, I did some research, but I don't know, didn't research as to whether or not these historical societies actually still exist, so there's also historical Springfield Society, maybe they changed their name. We also have Old Arlington, Inc., the Beaches Area Historical Society, and the Preservation SOS Save Our Springfield, so can we add them to the list if they are still existing, and if they, if we can't, please explain to me why. Through the chair, if I may answer. We just put a few recommended names. It is not exclusive to that list. We know that there will be, you know, there will be new ones as the years go on. Some of those organizations do not have preservation and revitalization as a part of their mission. Some of them are just about celebrating our history, so we did want to have ones that specifically believe in revitalization and preservation of properties as a part of their main mission, but that's all. We just, we just named them because they were the big ones, and we had a few folks in the room that said, do you mind putting us in as a, it's just by name, but we expect that there are going to be more and will be more, and my hope is that as the years go on, other neighborhoods start to get more into this space too. Okay. Thank you so much for that. So my concern is that in between now and when we vote on this, if any other preservation societies come forward, if they're able to, we can amend your bill. Through the chair, I have no problem with that. Just keep in mind it's not exclusive to these groups. Anyone that has that as a part of their mission, and the financial filings to prove that they have money, right? That's the big one, is we know that there's been a number of nonprofits in the years in the past that just did not have any financial backing. That's been something that a lot of these historic preservation groups have been burned by, and I think the city in general. So we just want to make sure that anyone who takes on these properties has the funding necessary to do the fix. Yes, and through the chair to Councilmember Peluso, I do hear you, and I do understand you, but I believe what I read much better than what people say. So then in the bill, it says specifically. So I'm looking at that word specifically to include Riverside, Avondale Preservation, Springfield Preservation, Revitalization, Inc., San Marco Preservation Society, the Jacksonville Historical Society, or their successor organization. So that's why I'm saying that if we want to add others. Okay. All right. And then through the chair to Ms. Shell. My only concern, and there are so many protections in here, just like I said, I appreciate this bill tremendously, and I am not trying to be critical. Just thinking out of the box, Ms. Shell, there are so many errors in regards to the protections and in regard to the enforcement, say, for example, for unpaid code enforcement violations, that type of thing. Could, if a nonprofit wanted to, or a for-profit wanted to purchase or bid for any of the properties, and we had a bill, could any of these things, and I know, I kind of know the answer to it, but I just want to bring it, put it on the record. What about waivers? Could any of these items that are listed here to protect historic properties, could they be waived? Could they be waived through the chair? Through the chair to Council Member Clark-Marie, I'm going to restate your question and make sure I understand what you're saying. You're asking, if a private entity is going through the public auction disposition process, could housing or somebody, could it be waived, like, could they go through it without meeting those criteria? Yes. The answer is no. Okay, good. Good. That's a good answer. All right. Thank you. Please add me as a co-sponsor if I did not state that earlier. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Let me go to Council Member Bolin. Mr. Wells, I suspect I need to speak to you through the chair. All right, Mr. Wells, the Council Members, and I was one of them, received an email from Mr. Sterling to express a lot of concerns about history with respect to the success or lack thereof in properly managing historical preservation homes that have already been awarded to a number of different entities. Can you speak to where we are and how this bill helps you in addressing that lapse in responsibilities by those who have been awarded parcels? Good morning. Good morning. Ermus Wells, Manager for Historic Preservation Section. So just to understand your question, you're asking how that helps our department with- According to Mr. Sterling, and maybe he's not factually correct, he mentions that 59 of the 62 recipients received homes back of the 174 parcels that 95 percent of them failed to quote-unquote deliver the required affordable housing within the established deadline. He goes on to say that 23 recipients violated deed restrictions by selling 66 undeveloped lots to third parties. So I, I'm, I'm, is, first of all, are those correct statements? Through the chair, I'm not familiar with that, that language or anything. I'll have to defer to Ms. Schell or Council Member Paluso. Mr. or Council Member Paluso, if you don't mind, through the vice chair. Through, through the vice chair to Council Member Boylan. First off, so that's the disposition through the affordable housing route. This is a different disposition method entirely. So this is under historic preservation and planning. That, that is all under housing. So, just keep in mind any of those properties was, was under, a program that we do have in code, but it is not, it is not at all involved with this, with this program. But we could, we could, through the chair, we could, our vice chair, we could affect the same issues, however, if it's not properly managed. To, to, to the, to the, to the, to the vice chair, it's quite literally why we added in all of the different steps. So, we made sure that if any entity that gets these properties not only has financial support, beforehand, like has real money beforehand, which they must prove to, to us before they even get to the bid process. And then two, they've gone through the COA training, so they know exactly how to fix up a COA property. And then we have a reverter in two years. You can get a third year if HPC, the commission, agrees on it. Specifically, like we, I try to do everything possible to make sure that these properties get in the hands of good, reputable individuals that can actually fix them up and get them into the market because of the issues with dispositions in the past. Through the chair to Mr. Wells, I apologize for bringing that to your attention. I think it's obviously, I was a different department, a different function, we might want to take a look at thereafter. But so, but I understand through the chair to Council Member Peluso, to your point, you recognize challenges in the past in a similar program or an adjacent program, and you've attempted to address them in this particular bill. Through the, through the vice, through the chair to Council Member Bolton, that's exactly right. We've done everything in our power. We've been working on this for, what, nine, 10 months, specifically to make sure it became as ironclad as possible. And, and we have a demolition by neglect task force that had been working specifically on this to make sure that they had a path forward. And by the way, I do have to give credit at this point to Mr. Bill Hoff, who ran that task force and has done incredible work and you all know him quite well. So, but any further questions on that? I just, a compliment to the bill, it's a big gulp. So, it's a lot to swallow. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Council Member Amaro. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Through the chair to Mr. Peluso, very quickly. I appreciate the effort for our preservation of some of these structures and, and trying to get them into the hands of those who have a sincere interest. My question is, and I was scanning the legislation, I did not see anything as far as repair construction timelines, if you will. And what I'm afraid of is that those who have the ability acquire these properties and they just sit there and, and, and nothing happens. I, I think that's potentially a problem. And so, as far as timeline, once they have this property, uh, to be able to do something to salvage, rebuild, restore, or whatever. Through the chair to Council Member Amaro. So, they have two years. That is in the bill. And I believe Michelle can kind of jump in on that. They have the ability to, to extend it to a third year because of economic reasons or maybe the project's really tough, but that still needs to get approval. But they have two years to, to fix the property. And, and Michelle, if you want to kind of clarify. Sure. Through the chair to Council Member Amaro. So, the deed transferring title to any of these properties shall include a covenant that requires rehabilitation of the structure within two years. And that's as evidenced by a certificate of occupancy. It is subject to reversionary interest in favor of the city. So, we can get the property back if they don't fulfill their end of the bargain. And it can be extended up to one year by the Housing and Community Development Division and their sole discretion. Thank you. All right. You good. Okay. Let me go to Neighborhoods Chair, Colonel Miller. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Is, I guess to the earlier point that was made about some of the challenges in the affordable housing realm. Is there specific language in here that does address the resale of the property? Through the chair to Council Member Miller. We do not address the resale of this property because the, the goal, and I'll defer to Council Member Pelluso if he wants to see more on this. But the, the goal of it is to rehabilitate the homes and get them back into usable housing product, which then could be resold, of course. But to, to preserve the historic structure and make it, put it into a usable state is the main goal, not necessarily to prevent sale. Okay. Through the chair. Thank you for that. But I just want to make sure any of the things that I think it was Mr. Sterling had brought up and we, I think we all received that email that Councilman Boylan brought up. I just want to make sure if there are legitimate things that were addressed there, even though it sounds like he was referencing another program, if those possibilities pertain here, I just want to make sure we've, we've addressed those in any language that's here. And I don't know what, I don't know if Councilman Boylan, it sounds like he's probably studied this more, but I just want to make sure we don't, we don't do as someone just earlier mentioned, um, set up another concern, um, by addressing these concerns and, and getting these properties back into, um, you know, a much better place, um, rather than just sitting there in their, in their state. All right. Let me first go to, uh, Councilmember Clark Murray. Thank you, chair. So prior to the properties being, um, allocated to a non-profit or, uh, auctioned to a for-profit, they have been deemed historical buildings. Correct? It could be, okay. So, so with that being said, then they already have additional protections on them. Mr. Wells, if you would come for him, I'm trying to help answer, um, Colonel Miller's question. So even if an entity wanted to sell a historical property, there would be additional protections on the historical property to make sure that it maintains its historical-ness. Mr. Wells. To the chair, to Councilmember Clark Murray. Yes, that is correct. So the, the, the, the way the, the bill is crafted, it, it, it only allows for structures that have been locally designated. So either they have to be a contributing structure within a local historic district or they have to be locally landmarked. So that's a protection that's, uh, precedes a disposition process. Yeah. Thank you so much for that. So through the chair to count to Councilmember Miller, that, does that help to satisfy your concern? Well, my, my concern is that we don't have a flipping situation here, that, that we truly are bringing back the property into a place where we would want it to be. Um, that, I, I think that's what the gentleman was talking about in the other program. So, um, that's all. I'm, I'm just asking us to make sure we don't create some type of situation where somebody is, just ends up flipping a historic property for profit, profit versus really fully restoring it, uh, to the state that, that we would want it to be. Thank you. I still have the floor. So thank you. Through the chair, Mr. Jeffries, if you wanted to address the same question, you're welcome to do so. Thank you. Thank you, chair. Uh, good morning. Travis Jeffery, housing, community development division. Through the chair to Councilwoman Clark Murray. So once these properties are donated to the, uh, non-profit, there's going to be a donation agreement signed. And the previous, the email, I guess, that came in about the properties from 2019, there were no donation agreements assigned to each one of those properties. Once, uh, the non-profit, like I said, once the property gets it, or once the non-profit gets the property, the donation agreement in there will state that they can't, uh, convey the property until it is rehabbed, have a CO, and at that point in time, then they can sell it. Right. Councilman, uh, Peluso, did you want to speak? No, not anymore. I think that, I think that probably satisfies it unless Councilmember Miller has additional questions. All right. All right. Thank you. No other speakers in the queue. I've got a motion and a second on the bill as amended. Open the ballot and record your vote. Seven yays, zero nays. By your action, you're approved 2026-0806. The next item is on page 14, item number 17. All right. Can I get a motion and a second on 2026-0813 on the amendment? I've got a motion and a second on the amendment. Ms. Carraher. Through the chair to the committee, the amendment will attach a revised Exhibit 1, which is the term sheet and budget for this program, to reflect the fiscal year 26-27 public service grant funding of $125,000. All right. No speakers in the queue on the amendment. All in favor of the amendment, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Likewise, none. Amendment carries. Got a motion and a second on the bill as amended. All right. I've got a motion and a second on the bill as amended. No speakers in the queue. Open the ballot and record your vote. Seven yays, zero nays. By your action, you're approved 2026-0813. Our next item is on page 16, item number 20, 2026-0817. Get a motion on the bill. I've got a motion and a second on the bill. No speakers in the queue. Councilmember Lennon. Thank you, Chair. Through the chair to Dr. Salem, this covers Jacksonville Port Authority. And Jacksonville Aviation Authority. Is that because... Oh, am I on the wrong one? Well, at least Dr. Salem knows what I'm going to ask here in a minute. Let me correct that. So we're on item 20, 2026-0817. I've got a motion and a second on that. No speakers in the queue. Open the ballot and record your vote. Six yays, one nay. By your action, you're approved 2026-0817. Now, I don't have item 19 yet on the agenda. We're still going through Councilmember Peluso's items. Item number 19, or page 19, item number 29. Item number 29, 2026-0832. Can I get a motion on the bill? Bill second. I've got a motion and a second on the bill. No speakers in the queue. Open the ballot and record your vote. Seven yays, zero nays. By your action, you're approved 2026-0832. Our next item will be on page 22. Item number 36, 2026-0867. Can I get a motion on the emergency? I've got a motion and a second on the emergency. Ms. Reaver. The nature of the emergency is to ensure funds are available as soon as possible to assist households in need. All right. I've got a motion and a second on the emergency. All in favor of the emergency, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Likewise. None. Dr. Salem, are you on the... I'm on the bill. Okay. Okay. All right. So, I've got a motion and a second on the bill as an emergency. Do we need to go ahead and get the auditor's concerns? Through the chair to the committee, our auditor concern is based on the waiver of Chapter 118, which is going to allow 25% advance fund of $475,000. The code only allows for 10%. Yeah. We voted on the emergency. All right. Let me get a motion and a second on the bill as an emergency. I've got a motion and a second on the bill as an emergency, so let me go through the queue here. Dr. Salem. Thank you, Chair. And if I could have representatives of JEA come forward. I've made some phone calls over the last several days trying to determine the need in this situation. We all want to help people. Tough times out there. And I understand that JEA has a process where they review bills once they get into that 120-day bucket and further. But question number one is, to Ms. Goode, are the times we're having now much different than what we see on a normal basis with people unable to pay their bills? Through the Chair to Council Member Salem, I'll just address this as five years ago when we had COVID. We had some challenges with our customers paying their bills. We have seen the decrease over the past five years of customers having challenges on paying their bills. And I have Dr. Moreland here just to make sure that I don't say anything incorrectly. Okay, Dr. Moreland, through the Chair, what is the amount that we have in the 120-plus bucket today at the end of September, end of October, if you have that data? Which would indicate these are people, I assume, then are struggling to pay their bill. Yes, sir. Good morning, through the Chair, Mr. Gay, to Dr. Salem. So I had my team to go back. Give your name and address. That's correct. My apology. Charles Moreland, JEA Chief Customer Experience Officer. Dr. Salem, I had my team to go back five years and take a look at it and provide me that data this morning. And FY26, the net write-off is running around $3.5 million. That is in combination with the commercial side as well as the residential side. If I break that out, it's $3.2 million for residential. The commercial is around $325,000 and some change. So that gets you to that $3.5 million number. Residential is $25,164. Accounts that would have to be written off. As it relates to commercial, it's around $534,000 that gets you to that $25,164 write-offs, to that 120-day mark that you're speaking about. But that's, through the Chair, that's over the last five years. That's FY26. Okay. I went all the way from $21,000, $22,000, $23,000, $24,000, $25,000, and $26,000. So you're averaging roughly close to $3 million in write-offs per year on residential customers. Total of residential and commercial because the numbers are combined. In fact, I think it will be better, if it's okay, through the Chair, that I provide you with the information. I made copies so that you would have it, you can see it, if you would like. So how much of that, through the Chair, you said roughly $2.5 million is residential? It's $3.2 million is residential. Out of that total of $3.5 million, $3.2 million is residential. Residential. And that's on a total revenue of what? Oh, wow. That's a good question. I have to get that answer for you. On the revenue side of the house, total revenue for JEA of all of our customers. I have to get that for you. Okay. I'm trying to determine. I understand the desire to help, but I'm trying to determine how big the problem is, and is it any different than what you've seen in the past? So through the Chair to Dr. Salem, just so that I can frame it all right for everyone, the information that you have in front of you is a combination of residential and commercial. The net write-off is the number that I've been quoting, the $3.53 million, and the total of 25,164 accounts written off. Those numbers, the net write-off, and the total account write-off are residential and commercial combined. When you break it out, residential is around $3.2 million. Commercial is around $325,000 and some change, which gets you to that 3.5 number for FY26. The key to this is that the net write-off is around 0.17. That number is significant. I had my team to provide me with benchmarks. Tell me, in the utility industry as a whole, what number is, I don't want to say acceptable, but is expected in some aspects. Can I interrupt you right there just for a second? Yep. The 0.17%, is that what I heard you to say? That's correct. So you're writing off 0.17% of your customers' bills. That is correct. Okay. Having run a business for 40 years, if I could write off 0.17% of my revenue, I'd be jumping for joy. That's a very, very, very low percentage of the revenue that JEA is generating. And how it compares to other utilities might be interesting, but if you have that. Yes, sir. Through the chair to Dr. Salem, preliminary benchmarking shows an average write-off is between 0.5% and 1%. So as it relates to write-offs, since I knew this was going to be a conversation that we would have, I wanted to put some perspective around it as it relates to the write-off number. Well, that would indicate your revenue from customer bills are several hundred million dollars, from retail customer bills. I don't have a calculator with me. Maybe Mr. Lane can help me here. But if $3 million is 0.17, what is the total revenue? Can you? It's in the column. Oh, I don't have it in front of me. Is it up here? I'm sorry. I apologize. So that is? 2.1. 2.1. 2.1 what? Billion. Billion. Billion. Would it be? $2.1 billion in revenue, and they're writing off $3.2 million. So with that information, I don't think we have a problem. I mean, they have the ability to try to work with customers. There are other agencies out there. But to appropriate $2 million out of our reserves for this, I can't support that based on the numbers that we've just been provided. And that's the first time I've gotten these numbers. I've been trying to get these, and Renee and I have communicated late last week, over the weekend, we exchanged a couple of emails. But that's, I guess, you got the data this morning. Through the chair to Dr. Salem. Renee reached out to me on Friday, and I had my team work on it, and they provided all the information to me this morning. So I will not support any dollars coming out of the general fund based on this, and I'll leave it at that. Thank you, Chair. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Council Member Lannan. Thank you, Chair. And good information request, Dr. Salem. So my first question and concern is when JEA presented their through June 30th quarterly summary, which is given at Finance every quarter, they were projecting $119 million current year surplus. So that's one of my questions. And, Mr. Peluso, I'm going to ask all my questions, and then I'll give you time to respond. But, again, $119 million surplus JEA is projecting for just this year. But, yeah, we're talking about potentially taking $2 million out of our own city's reserves. Second of all, in general, I've supported using our reserves if we know it's for a one-time use. I think the latest example was we did it for some very specific capital projects to support JSO and JFRD a few weeks ago. When I look at the bill summary here, it doesn't look one-time. It looks like we're setting up a new program. It's adding people and other resources. And if I do the quick math, it looks like we're starting off the bat with about 12% of an overhead cost with that. So I just want to kind of get, Council Member Peluso, your take on is this truly one-time or is this just the beginning of a multi-year program? JEA has 541,000 electric customers. So if I did the math here real quick, it would really be 1.7 million, not 1.9, potentially going to help out people that are behind in their bills with a max of 1,200 each. If I do the math, that's helping out about 1,400 potential addresses, which would be about 0.25% of all households in Jacksonville. So 1 out of 400 households is potentially who could get helped here. My concern with that is I probably think 1 out of 400 is a very low number of people who are stretched to be able to meet their full utility bills right now. So I don't think you're necessarily, you're going to be helping a very small percent of the population. And then switching to the document that Dr. Salem requested, it looks like the story is that we're doing better than we were in fiscal year 23 and 24, not quite as good as we were in fiscal year 21 and 22. But I do think that net write-off number is probably the best indicator of the, I call it the struggle factor, if you will, the people that are truly behind. It's definitely showing we're better than we were two years ago. So I know that was a lot of Council Member Proluso, but those were my concerns when I got into the details on this. Go ahead. Thank you. Through the chair to Council Member Landon and to the body. All this is good information and it's good feedback and conversation to have. I think we're to the point of, is that enough homes? I mean, sure, we'd love to do more if possible. But keep in mind, there are other resources available, right? So this is meant to be an emergency program for an emergency amount of time, right? It's quite literally why it is an emergency. If you go on to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, year over year, one year ago, the cost of energy has gone up 20.4%, including gasoline, which is up 34.2%, right? That is outside of just JEA. Food items is 2.5%. All items less than food and energy is up 2.6% in one year. We know that we are in a time of extremis, right? On top of that, the JEA increase has been met with some utility fee increase for water and electrical, has been met with some mixed feedback from the community. We are seeing people that are coming to us consistently, and I think I can lean on maybe some of my other colleagues who have areas that have a high ALIS threshold right now, who probably have seen this from their constituencies as well. We have a couple programs that the city is very helpful with. We also have Elder Source, which runs the eHeap program, which provides energy assistance to senior citizens. Right now, that pot of money is completely dried up because the federal government has not negotiated with the Commerce Department of the state of Florida. So that means seniors right now, as we're about to go into the winter months, do not have a source of funds available to them that they would normally have. And we do not know when the Commerce Department is going to work with the feds to make sure that those dollars can go to Elder Source to the point of FTEs that are going to be brought in. These are FTEs that we are helping to support within the United Way Catholic Charities, the organizations that currently run the Neighbor to Neighbor program. Neighbor to Neighbor is a JEA program that has been written in a code, I think, since 1987, and it's basically allowing for neighbors and people that are JEA users to put money voluntarily into a fund. JEA then gives those dollars through the United Way. If people call 2-1-1, they're able to get access to those funds for utility assistance. This is a one-year program called City to Neighbor where we would be able to use this general fund money to help create a different fund just for the year. Other than that, we do have parks and recreation and social services. They have their own utility assistance program, but it's not usually super robust. If we had Daryl in here, he would tell you they stretch the dollars as best as possible, but they can't go all that far. So they use 2-1-1 in the utility assistance program that they're able to provide. So we are going to be putting more money into parks and rec and social services at no additional overhead costs. So those dollars will go in immediately. It's going to be $200,000 this year, and they'll immediately be able to spend those dollars right now without any new FTEs. But it was United Way that said, listen, if we're going to take on more of these dollars, we absolutely need additional support. And if you had heard from one of our council colleagues, co-introducer of this, Council Member Gaffney, his biggest concern, and one that I think many of us have heard, is when I call, they don't pick up. Or when I call, they say you can only do something on Tuesday. And so you do see a number of residents and a number of utility users who lose faith in the ability to get things done, and so they give up. Last year, United Way helped 5,600 households. They were unable to help about 1,500, meaning they said, we were out of the funds necessary in our neighbor to neighbor to be able to help you, but here's a few other programs that may have something that can help you. But United Way cannot get confirmation if those households were helped. So that's 1,500 households that maybe didn't get the help they needed and lost their electricity last year. We don't fully know. In a year where I think inflation has gone up, gas prices have gone up, cost of living has gone up, and now utility rates have gone up, I deem it as not only an elected official but a policymaker, and I think someone like you has heard from our constituency, that we are in a time that we can do something to support these households in our community for a year. Until we hope that the conflict in Iran is over, inflation goes down, all the other things. We saw inflation go up 0.3% in the last month. That was unexpected. Things are in a tough state, and I am just concerned that our constituencies consistently say, what are you doing up there in City Hall? You're not working for me. And I'm grateful that we've had such great assistance from JEA and our nonprofit community, but this is just something that I think, based on what we saw on budget night, and based on, I think, some commitment that we as council members made at that evening, hey, we'll work with you, Council Member Gaffney, to try to make something happen. So, yes, there will be FTEs. Yes, there will be initial support, 25% immediately, but these are organizations that we have a longstanding relationship with and that we know knows how to do the Neighbor-to-Neighborhood program, and now they'll be doing this City-to-Neighbor program just for the year. I commit to that. I cannot promise you what the economy looks like in a year, but I commit to you that there will not be another time, as your council colleague, that I would imagine that we're going to be re-upping this program. It's not meant to be a longstanding program. It's meant to be this year to get us through a really tough time. Hopefully that answers some of your questions. All right, let me go to Council Member Bolin. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Dr. Morin, why don't you come on up for a quick second. I hearken back to the COVID times. I was one of the council members who introduced a couple of bills, and it took us a long time to get our head around the urgency of that situation. But it was clearer than this one is, and I do appreciate Council Member Peluso's comments. On the write-off, I think Dr. Morin, to the chair, I believe you mentioned $3.2 million of that was residential? Through the chair to Mr. Boylan, that's correct. Of that, how many residents, number one, I assume by writing them off, that means their services were shut off and we just wrote off what they owed? That is correct, sir. Do we have any sense as to how many homes that represents? Yes, sir. Through the chair, the residential ones were $25,164, and the commercial was $534. This is for FY26 that I'm referencing. Yes, sir? So those 25,000 homes lost services, JEA services as a result. That is correct. And keep in mind, there is a process, a lengthy runway for them to get to that point. And I wanted to talk about that a second because I appreciate the other side of the ledger that Council Member Salem brought up that, you know, as a business, writing off that relatively small number to the larger revenue package, but the impact on those 25,000 families who lost JEA services because they couldn't afford to pay the bill. But I do want to talk a little bit more about and help a little better understand what JEA does, as you mentioned, the long process of trying to keep people on the service. Can you speak to that and how that is playing out? Are you finding the same situation that United Way and others are, that they're running out of money, running out of opportunity to provide those alternative support? Through the chair to Councilman Boylan, we provide our community, our customers, with many options, payment arrangements, payment extensions, to my budgeting, to levelize their budget, their bill, so it can be consistent over the 12 months. We do quite a bit of that. We refer them through our 211 United Way to many different resources to help them because sometimes it's not just the utility part of it that they need. They need some of the wraparound services that are also available through the many connections that our nonprofit organizations support. So we provide that information to our customers. We also provide our customers with LIHEAP dollars, low-income home energy assistance program dollars that comes from the federal government down. They get a voucher. It gets put onto their bill. And so when their bill pops up, however much that voucher is, it deducts the dollar amount from that voucher so we can help the customer stay within their homes. Still we have 25,000 families. I'm sure many of those had opportunities or took advantage of that, but at some point in time it just ran out for them. I would also say through the chair to Councilman Boylan that it's important to know that the 0.17% of write-offs, no write-off is what we want. We don't want to write off anything. We prefer to collect. It's important for me to say that. Yeah, at face value, Mr. Chair, I have a hard time, and I appreciate Councilman Lehnen's concerns with respect to this, but this, as Councilmember Peluso says, is an extraordinary situation. And I think I'm struggling with supporting it, but I want to support it. I want to think about those 25,000 families who probably went through, Alice families who invariably tried to make it work and still couldn't. That's a big number, 25,000 families who lost JEA services because they couldn't pay their bill. This doesn't solve that problem in a big way, but it solves it for some. And through the chair to Councilmember Peluso, anticipating how would this translate into how many of those residences would we be serving with additional funds? Through the chair to Councilmember Boylan, it depends on what the situation is for each household, right? It also depends on the size of each household. And I think that is something that we need to remember, too, is a lot of these households are not very large, right? We still have a good amount of shotgun homes in the districts that myself and Councilwoman Pittman and Councilmember Tamara Fleck-Murray represent. These aren't very large properties. However, in many cases, because of when they were built, I mean, their utility bills run higher than you would expect. I think we had heard, what is the median dollar number, Doctor? If you can give it to us, I think it was 650. I think it was the median number for most households that are in arrears. Through the chair, it's around that number, around the 600 number. Yes, sir. Yeah. We can do the math on that. All right. Well, again, I appreciate this being put forward. I think your comments were compelling in terms of understanding the impact. I don't want to see this become a habit, as Councilman Layden suggested it might, but it certainly warrants the consideration we're giving it today. Thank you. Through the chair, Mr. Gakin, I need to make one additional comment. For just clarity, I wouldn't want to leave here without saying this. The write-offs could be very well associated with people who decided to move away and just not pay their bills. I want to make sure we have some context around that. It may not always be people just are not in the dark. Then the other part of it, just kind of run through that we have payment extensions, payment arrangements, guest pay, my budget, our neighbor-to-neighbor program. We do do utility assistance, referrals, and then we offer ways to save on people's bills all the time. All right. Thank you. All right. Let me go to Councilmember Clark-Murray. All right. Thank you, Chair. Good morning. Well, good afternoon, Dr. Westmoreland. So, sorry, Dr. Moreland. So, just looking at the number of accounts that are written off, you said that you don't really know whether or not those account holders just decided to no longer pay or if they're in a certain situation where they paid and then maybe they just weren't able to access any more of the city-served programs to continue their services. Through the Chair to Councilwoman Clark-Murray, it's hard to say on what, if they've ran out of options as far as utility assistance or whether they potentially moved away and they just chose not to pay their bill. But, again, the different services that we offer to try to get people kind of aligned to help them stay in their homes, we do a really good job with that. I do want to make this point, and this may be some clarity as well. Eighty-five percent of our residential customers pay their bill within zero to 30 days. Twelve percent pay before they hit day 60 of the past due amount, and 97 percent of our customers have paid by day 60 on average. So, that number becomes smaller as we go. And those are the individuals that Councilman Peluso and others we talked about are the ones that end up receiving some support through our processes. Yes, so, through the Chair. So, the $25,000, that includes commercial properties as well? Yes, ma'am. It's $500,000. So, I separated it out on my paper here, but I can certainly separate it out in another Excel for you as well. But it comes out to around 534 commercial accounts. The commercial is going to be much smaller than the residential. Thank you for that. Yes. Thank you so much for that. So, if we think about it, though, I know you, I know my colleagues, you're looking at the numbers. You're looking at serving, like, based on the data that's before you, that's one out of 400 households. And it does seem like a lot. But if you think about what it is, and I don't know about y'all, but I know what it feels like to sit in the dark and to not have electricity, to not have water. I know what it feels like. I don't know if any of you know what that feels like. And if we can help, we need to help. And I know with the amount that we're asking, the $2.3 million, and you divide it by $650,000, that's the average bill. How much we're helping those who are contributing to back to JEA. So, we're just basically paying ourselves, if you think about it, because it's our utility. And once again, stop thinking in terms of just, well, I can't tell you to stop because that's who you all are. Some of you are, you know, your calculators, your tin men. You just don't necessarily see the heart of things. But it's tough. It's tough to have babies and children sitting in the dark when we can help. And this is, and I think Council Member Peluso will agree, this is not something we're going to continue. This is something we're doing now. We have extraordinary circumstances in this country where the decisions that are made at the top, the federal level, are having huge impacts at the local level. And we don't know how long fuel is going to continue to go up. And people are making some hard choices. And let me tell you, the people that I grew up with, they tell me, hey, let me tell you, let me tell you what's important to Arona. If you have to choose between your lights and a place to stay, you pay your mortgage and you sit in the dark. Because eventually you can get your lights cut on. But it's going to be hard to find another place to stay. So this is, we have people who are making tough decisions. Remember, people are choosing between whether or not they're going to pay whatever they need to pay as far as gas, car note, to be able to get to work. And whether or not what they need to do in order to buy food. These are some hard times. And I'm glad that Ms. Good compared it to COVID. COVID was very extraordinary. Something that unprecedented was, I take that back, 1919 we had similar circumstances. None of us were alive, however. But once again, think about it, think about the human aspect. Think about the human aspect. We will get those dollars back because we're going, these dollars will go back to JEA. Not to some unknown entity back to us. And the JEA dollars come back to us as a city. And Council Member Palooza has done a great job in talking about those different programs that the city has, that people are taking advantage of. Some of those programs, they can only take advantage of for so long. And if you do the math, you multiply, and in one program, the families, the household can only borrow up to $5,000 or get $5,000 in their lifetime. Not for a year, their lifetime. So if you do the math, if your electric bill is $650 a month and you multiply that times 12, that's more than $5,000. And that, once again, that's $5,000 over their lifetime. Elder Source, like Council Member Palooza mentioned, they're in a contract dispute. So that is a program where seniors were able to go and get their, they could qualify for funding for their electric bill. They're in a contract dispute. So that's one source that was dried up. And it was dried up as of June 30th of this year. So yes, let's have a heart. And I know, should we always think with our hearts? No, we should think with our heads and our hearts. But we should help. Thank you, Chair. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Council Member Morrow. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I don't know where to begin. To be honest, I would be first to acknowledge there is an affordability crisis that has gone across the board. Y'all should have been in my house when my wife opened the electric bill. But I've got a problem here. And my problem is that approximately 10%, if my math is right, I'm not the math guy, is now going to hire folks in administrative costs. If I'm going to give some folks money to help folks, I don't want to give money. I want all of that to be used by those who have a need. And that's problematic to me. There are some inherent problems in the systems that had been revealed in these notice meetings that giving them money is not going to improve that. It's not going to improve the distribution of the funds. It's not going to improve how quickly people can get help. And that's a problem to me. And so we're off to a bad start, as far as I'm concerned, in addressing those. And for that reason, I'm not sure I'm ready to go and support this. That doesn't make me cold-hearted. That doesn't mean I'm not empathetic. It just means I'm being factual about what I see before me. Yeah, there are folks hurting. I know that. But if we're going to take $2 million and take about 10% and make somebody create a job and file some paperwork and then distribute that to these agencies that have difficulties right now, you know, I remember the point that Mr. Gaffney brought up in the notice meeting. I've had that experience where folks knew that they had to call an agency at 9 o'clock. They're sitting there with their fingers on the button. 9 o'clock they call. They get a busy line. They get through at 930. And the agency, well, we're not helping anyone else today. There are some problems before you throw money at problems in order to help folks that need help. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Dr. Salem for a second time. Thank you, Chair. Let me begin by saying I resent the 10-man comments. It's grossly inappropriate. We all care, and we're trying to solve a problem. It started two or three weeks ago. I laughed about it then, but I'm tired of it now. I think I deserve an apology. And anyone else up here that's trying to reason through this and do the right thing. Charles, can you come back up? That 25,000 that you quoted, is that any different than the last four or five years that you cut off looking at 21, 22, 23? Are we dealing with similar numbers of cutoffs? Through the chair to Dr. Salem, the number's pretty consistent between the residential and the commercial side of it. There was a point, and I want to bring this out to you on this Excel that you see in 23, since we're talking about a little bit of COVID, and you saw that 0.25, that was a moratorium that was placed on the billing at the time by JEA. That's the reason why that percentage is a little bit higher. But you start to see it flatten out as we move along. The point I'm trying to make is the numbers we're looking at right now are similar to numbers we've seen in past years. That's correct, sir. Okay. And we did nothing special of appropriating dollars out of the reserves to solve that problem? Through the chair to Dr. Salem, not that I'm aware of. Okay. I just wanted to make that point. Do you have a feel, and I'm sure this happens, of this 25,000 that we're quoting, how many of those may get it turned off in a week or so, it's back on through some other, they realize you're serious about your collection efforts and come back and pay you and get back on? Do you have any numbers there? So, through the chair to Dr. Salem, and that's the reason I was quoting the 85% of people that pay within that zero to 30 days and the number changes. When you get down to the 61-day mark, 61 to 90, the number is around 9,300 folks that haven't paid. But when you get to 91 to 120-day, being the 120-day is the day to cut off, it's down to 3,387. And that's as of October the 15th. Okay. So, the numbers are similar to what they have. In fact, some past years, they were worse, as you mentioned, during COVID and such compared to today. That's correct, sir. Let me make my last point. And I said this at the council meeting Tuesday night, right at the end of the meeting. JEA gives us $140-plus million a year to our general fund. We are one month into this budget. If you're serious about this, go to the administration and say, we want to rebate some of our customers some money to help pay their electric bills. Let them cut something. I can cut it for sure, but I'll let them provide the dollars. Maybe they take 1% out of their departments. I don't know what it is. But if you really want to do this, let's rebate some money that JEA has already given us and do it that way. And as I recall, Councilman Gaffney started at $100,000. I was sitting two chairs from him when he first mentioned this. We've gone from $100,000 to over $2 million for a situation that is no different than past years. I care. I don't want people to be sitting in a home, cold outside, not having electricity. No one wants that. But we control the purse strings up here, and we need to be responsible and make sure we're doing it correctly. I don't want to pay any administrative expenses either. I'm just not convinced that this is any different than any other times over the last several years. I share Councilmember Layden's concern. This will become an every-year thing. I'm just telling you. I won't be here. Mark my word. This will become an every-year thing. But if you take it out of the budget, then it becomes more of a thought process, and you think hard. Do you want to cut something out of the budget to help people do this? That's where we should be. Thank you. All right. Thank you. All right. Let me go to Councilmember Pittman for the first time. To the chair. You know, I've sat here and listened to both sides. But I'm sure you all are aware that a lot of programs are being cut federally and state and even locally. People are trying to make it. There are some folks who are living in apartments that if you don't have any lights, your contract is terminated. I don't know if y'all knew that or not. But a lot of residents who get vouchers, who live in low income. But the thing is, this is not just for low income. Everybody is struggling. Hours are being cut by employers. And, yeah, this year is probably quite different than it was last year. Businesses, nonprofits. I will tell you, a lot of folks won't come up front and tell you because they are prideful. But I think, you know, we can't compare this to five years ago. Okay. We can't compare it to last year because things are different. And we don't know what it's going to be in the upcoming year. So we have to prepare. So, you know, I'm sitting here thinking like, okay, how many people is actually going to help in reality? Because it may even be more. I know that we have several programs with JEA. But we got to pay to play. You got to have someone to manage the money. You know, and most of these organizations, you don't, they're reputable organizations. That's number one. Number two, you don't want to give it to anybody that we don't work with. You got to start all over again. You might as well work with an organization who does this well, and you don't have to worry about it. So, you know, I support it because of what I do. You know, I have a heart for people. A lot of times, if you haven't experienced anything, you don't understand. That's like going to jail and you ain't never been to jail before. You know what I mean? So, you know, I am for the people I always want to help. And that's why we have different personalities and different things on this council. Because if y'all hadn't been there, done that, you know, I heard my sister talk about, how many of y'all had y'all's lights cut off before? Or you just totally forgot. But some folks just don't have no money to pay. So, I just want you all to think about what you heard here today, what you're willing to do. That's why people vote for all of us in our positions because we're going to have different opinions about things. But, you know, when you ain't got no lights, you can't feed your children. Right. Thank you. All right. Let me go to Councilmember Clark Murray for the second, third time. I think it's the second. Thank you, Chair. So, just thinking about what Councilmember, well, not what Councilmember Lane has said, but in regards to the proposal by Councilmember Gaffney on budget night, he did propose $100,000. But if you take that, the amount that Dr. Moreland said in regards to the 650 as the average, that's just 153 people. And we just kept it at $100,000. So, I think the amount is warranted. And then we do have various programs throughout the city that we can use and spend that money to. I think the, I think as a co-introducer, we would be willing to look at how we could change that 10% for administration. I don't, we have to, that's something I definitely think we can do. And then we may have, I think it's beyond the time frame that we have now in terms of helping people, but to look at those programs and why there are certain cutoff times. That's one thing I got out of our notice meetings, too, that there is a disconnect between when people need the help and when they're able to get the help. So, those things I am, I'm definitely willing to look at and what we can do in regards to this particular legislation. And then the lastly, I'll say, I do, I don't know, I don't know if I should say that. I always think about my elders. I was raised by a lot of, a lot of older people who they just, you know, you say what you need to say and you, you know, you just take it or either you don't take it. But what I will say is this, is that I am to, through the chair to Council Member Salem, I am sorry that you were offended by what I stated. But, yeah, I'm going to just leave it at that. All right. Thank you, Chair. All right. Thank you. I've got two more in the queue. But before I go back to you, Council Member Peluso and to Council Member Miller, I would, I would just like to say that listening to all this and seeing the, the 1.9 million, 1.19 million, I think you referenced that the J, was in the JEA budget that's coming back to the city. That there's, there's, there's a funding source right there. And to use that wisely, there's no one better that understands the electricity bill and to be able to implement it in a program than JEA. And I would like to see that really not taking this to different agencies that JEA has programs that we can take money that's right there and go ahead and implement it right, they can do it the quickest of anybody and they understand it better than anybody. That that's, that's, that's what I would definitely, go ahead and get. Thank you. Through the chair, to the chair. So we, JEA does not administer any of the funds that we get through our Neighbor to Neighbor program. We try to keep all of that separated so no one thinks that someone is doing a favor for a friend, a colleague, or a neighbor, and all of that. So it goes through a third party, which is our Catholic Charities organization. So even when our employees donate to Neighbor to Neighbor, or any of us donate to Neighbor to Neighbor through our, our bill, those funds go to Catholic Charities for them to administer to our, our, our customers. All right, thank you, I missed that earlier. So that charity's already set up with JEA. So I, I think that's a, a, a avenue that we, we've got potentially $1.19 million right there to where, or $119 million right there to where, that's what we should be looking at. So not trying to, and I appreciate the work that's going on here, getting creative, but I think there's a simple route. And, and I'd like to see that before we move forward with this. That's just my, my perspective on this. So with that, Mr. Council Member Pittman, I'll, I'll come back to you. Go ahead. I'd like to say that, and, and I don't know how Catholic Charities feel about it, um, because one is not going to take that loan to spend that amount of money at all. Um, but if we already have something in place, which they're already getting paid, and I, I know the Neighbor to Neighbor program works, I've, you know, um, over the years. And I like that idea is just bringing it back in, in, in, and ensuring that it's already set up. Like, I think that's the main thing, um, and maybe we can even talk to them, um, about how many more people will it take, or are you going to do X amount of, um, customers a day? Um, how do you feel, um, how do you feel, is there any way that we can have a conversation with them so 100% of this money would go to help people? Through the chair to Councilwoman Pittman, um, Catholic Charities has done a wonderful job managing, or, or administering usually between $150,000 to $190,000 that our customers, our, um, our employees give to award the Neighbor to Neighbor, uh, program yearly. The, um, the, the key to all of this is that, um, they've been doing that without taking an administrative fee from us. They do not take an administrative fee, um, to administer those funds. And so if we're going to infuse them with additional dollars, uh, in order to expand their scope in the work of helping additional customers, um, they very well would, would want to, um, I don't want to put words in their mouth, but I would assume they would want to have some additional funding to help with that, even maybe have a couple of people to support that work. I don't know that, so I don't want to put anything out in the atmosphere that is, um, that is not their words, but they do not cost us anything to administer our Neighbor to Neighbor funds. Well, if, if, if they are able to do it at, at, at less than 10%, I mean, that, that would be a better way. I would like to see that done, if possible, because it has worked for not just during this time, but for many, many years, even when I worked with United Way, um, they were doing that. And so, um, I can support that if, if you're okay with that, and if, if Catholic charities agree, we have to have a meeting to, to make sure that they agree with that. Right, thank, thank, thank you. So, with this, uh, dialogue, uh, Councilmember Peluso, uh, do you want to defer this from now to go back and look at other avenues with the Catholic charities? Uh, so, uh, I'll let you, uh, get in the queue or speak for three minutes. Oh, thank you. Thank you, Chair. Uh, the first thing I want to say is, Councilmember Salem, I do apologize. Uh, I don't want you to feel slighted by this process at all, or you, Councilmember Landon. I actually feel like the Tin Man comment was more, Councilmember Landon, and I don't think he is offended by that. But, but I know that it does offend you, Council President Salem, because you do have a good heart. Um, I've seen you do it in this body over the past three years. I think many of you do. So, I just want to make sure that everyone knows that. Nobody here does want to see folks on the street. Uh, we've seen it through a number of our actions over the past three years, and it's why I'm, I'm, I'm hoping and expecting us to see action on this. Um, to, to the, to the comments that were made or, or, or questions that were brought up, so that basically is what this bill is already doing. So, so United Way administers the Neighbor to Neighbor program through Catholic Charities. It's been that way since 1987. So, that's why this process is, this is just creating a different funding source. So, the Neighbor to Neighbor is through, uh, people actively giving money through their, their bills, right? They're, they're putting money voluntarily into this program. This just creates another funding source that United Way and Catholic Charities will administer. So, that's already what the intent of this bill is. So, that's done. Through that end, through, through the multiple notice meetings that we've had, we have heard from United Way and Catholic Charities, and now you've just heard it from JEA, you cannot continue this pro, you cannot have this program without additional FTEs. You are asking to put more money into a clinic or a hospital, and then expecting no more doctors or nurses to show up and administer the, the needed care. That's, that's essentially what this is. They, if we expect them to spend those dollars and to account for them and give us that report, a thing that we want to ensure they do, they're going to need additional people to service the, the large swath of people that I believe are going to be showing up. And, and to the, to the purpose of this entire bill, it really is, this is an emergency. I think if we are negating that fact or ignoring that we are really in a very unique economic time, e-heap is not available for seniors. So, you're going to start seeing a lot of calls. I'm assuming once weather really gets cold, you'll hear from a lot of seniors about this issue. And the funding source that they were supposed to have from the federal government is not coming. We are, we at the local level are kind of screwed here because we're not getting the help that we need from above. And so it's up to us to support and provide life-saving assistance for some of these communities. In terms of the 10%, I think I, like many others, are not super comfortable or psyched to be giving dollars for the purpose of FTEs. However, it's better to go to a non-profit than the city. Like, if we want the parks department to do this, that's great. But now that really would be recurring funding over the years, over the years, because to hire someone just for a year would be inappropriate. However, they can handle up to 400,000 without having to hire someone new. The non-profit side cannot do that. I don't want to defer this bill. In neighborhoods, we will have United Way. In finance, we will have United Way that can answer even more questions about, about administering this program and why the, the, the numbers come out to the way they do. If that makes you feel a little more comfortable, Chair. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Colonel Miller. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Through the Chair, I just want to ask a couple of questions to the JTA reps. JEA, excuse me, JEA. I have it this afternoon on my mind already. JEA, representatives Dr. Moreland, or to Renee. If this money is available, this 2.3 million and works its way through, do you have a good feel for how long it would take through the process before these individuals would get assistance? I know we don't have the stakeholders, not the stakeholders, but the partners represented here, but I've been going back and forth asking questions. You guys have been very helpful to help answer my questions, but I do remember a conversation, and I can't remember where it was, about the delay there would be anyhow in being able to get this money to the intended purposes. Do either one of you have any feel for that, the timeline? Well, but you're not administering it. I appreciate it, but please. Yes, sir. Through the Chair to Councilman Miller. That is a great question for our partners that would be administering the funds. I'm assuming if it did pass and the dollars were provided to them going through the administrative process of getting it there and then them being able to vet the different constituents or customers that would be reaching out for the support. It's not a blanket where you call or you get. There are criteria in which all agencies, nonprofit organizations, go through to administer funds. So I could not tell you how long that process would take. That's a very good question for our partners. Okay, and I will, through the Chair, I will get into that more here shortly in neighborhoods. So I won't take up your all time. I will only add this is, we all care. And anybody implying they know we haven't been there, we don't know, be careful to my colleagues because you don't know each one of our paths. You don't know what we've been through, what we've experienced. We all care. We all have a heart. We all want to help. What's the right way to do that? This number would be approximately 5% of the people who have been said need help or had their electric shut off. 5%. So when do we help the other 95%? Do we have another bill next month? The month after? The month after? Where does the funding come from? Do we keep pulling out of reserve? Because if we really care, we're going to go after $25,164, not after $1,400. So where are we going with this? That's what I would like to know, really. Where are we going with this? This won't be a one-time thing. Anybody who suggests that, I'm sorry. This need is much greater than that, and it has been for the last four years. And it's actually gone down over the last four years, the need at JEA. But we're saying it's an emergency. I get the times are really tough. They are, inflation-wise, even though all inflation is lower under this administration than it was the previous one. So we all want to make our own assessment and give our own picture of how things are. But these numbers do mean something. And so my concern is, if we're going to do this, why did we do it one month after we just approved a budget, and now we're saying, forget the budget, let's take it out of reserves. And then if we have another thing we really want, next month, if we have the numbers for the votes, let's take it out of reserves again. And let's keep doing that for whatever it is we feel we have the numbers for. That's my concern here. And so if the administration, as was suggested, would like to reprioritize the budget that we approved, and if they agree this is an emergency, then maybe that's a route to go. Let's reprioritize. What was it that was kind of a low priority and still got approved in that budget that maybe we want to realign funds for to cover this if the administration agrees with this being an emergency? But I just have a rough time, right? One month after we approved a budget, it was a strong, deliberative, collaborative effort of now saying, let's take $2.3 million out of the reserves outside of that budget process. So just wanted to give that input. Thank you very much. Thank you, Colonel Miller. So I've got Dr. Salem and Council Member Amaro in the queue. So I'll go back to y'all briefly. Council Member Pittman, you were in the queue. Okay. So I'm going to go to y'all too. And after that, we're going to go to a vote. Thank you, Chair. I appreciate that. Through the chair to Council Member Amaro. I don't see anybody from the administration running to the podium over my suggestion of going into the budget. So I think that speaks volumes of where they are. That's number one. Number two, here's another thought. We own JEA. I think we've been through that. Why not challenge JEA to say, what's magic about 120 days? Maybe it should be 150 days. Or challenge them to look at their whole collection process and see what can be done to keep people from having their electricity cut off. What's wrong with that idea versus putting money into this program or $2.3 million into this program? I don't think this is ready today, personally. I'm going to vote no. I think there are other options to explore, and I would ask JEA to take a look at that and to see what can be done. And I'd also like to know how many of those people that do get cut off are off for a week and then they're back on or a matter of days so that those numbers aren't nearly as bad as they look. But I don't think this is ready. We all want to help, but this is not the time to vote on this today. Thank you. And I will vote no because of that. All right. Thank you. Let me go to Council Member Morrow. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am so very uncomfortable with the administrative portion. I mean, you pay a portion of the monies to hire folks and cover operating costs, and when the funds are depleted, then it's one of two things. You get rid of the folks you hired, or you come back and ask for more. I think more pragmatic would have been trying to capture $400,000 to go through a system that we know works, through Parks and Rec. But because of the administrative piece, when I believe in my heart that if I'm going to give someone a dollar so they can get a meal, I don't want to take back 25 cents to cover the cost of me giving them the dollar. All right. I said we'd go to a vote, but I'll go ahead and let Mr. Bowling speak. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the indulgence. I will support it today, but I would look for the introducers to take a look at offering an amendment to either tomorrow in finance that speaks to that this is a one-time initiative, that we take a look at some of the ideas that Councilman Salem raised, that we take a look at the prospect of the administration stepping back and taking some dollars out of, and so that we have a standing scenario whereby we take JEA dollars each and every year in the JEA contribution or a portion thereof to support families through the process we're developing today. I can support it as a one-time initiative. I agree with the prospect that this could be recurring, and let's bake into the bill an opportunity to say this is one time and this is what we're looking to do or will do in the future to avoid and to support these kind of initiatives. Thank you. All right. Thank you. With that, I've got a motion and a second on the bill as an emergency. Open the ballot and record your vote. Three a's, four nays. By your action, 2026-0867 has failed. So that takes us to drop back to page 19, item number 28, 2026-0826. Can I have a motion on the bill? Move the bill. Can I get a second? I've got a motion and a second on the bill. No speakers in the queue. Let's open the ballot and record your vote. Seven yays, zero nays. All right. By your action, you've approved 2026-0826. Now, this takes us back to the beginning of our agenda, finally. All right. Item number one, 2024-0966 is deferred at the request of Council Member Carrico. Item number two, 2026-0192 is deferred at the request of Council President Howland. Item number three, 2026-0227 is deferred at the request of Council Member Diamond. Item number four, 2026-0320 is deferred at the request of Council Member White. Item number five, we've already taken action. Item number six, 2026-0677 is deferred at the request of Council Member Carrico. Item number seven, 2026-0756. Can I have a motion on the amendment? I've got a motion and a second on the amendment. Ms. Carriher. Through the chair to the committee, the amendment will clarify that the new prohibition will not apply if the purchase of a vehicle is authorized elsewhere in the code, for example, under the driver's education program, and we'll correct some Scrivener's errors. All right. No speakers in the queue on the amendment. All in favor of the amendment, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Likewise. None. Amendment carries. Can I have a motion and a second on the bill as amended? I've got a motion and a second on the bill as amended. No speakers in the queue. Open the ballot and record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. By your action, you approve, 2026-0756. We've got a hard stop at 1240, so we're going to get moving on here. Item number eight, we've already taken action. Item number nine, 2026-0803 is deferred. We've got a request for the city charter. Item number 10, 2026-0804. Got a motion on the withdrawal. I've got a motion and a second on the withdrawal. Open the ballot and record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. By your action, you approve the withdrawal of 2026-0804. Item number 11, we've taken action. 12, we've taken action. That takes us to item number 13, 2026-0807 is deferred due to the planning commission. Item number 14, 2026-0809 is deferred at the request of Council Member Diamond. Item number 15, 2026-0810 is deferred at the request of Council Member Diamond. Item number 11, item 16, and we've taken action. 17, we've taken action. Item number 18, we've taken action. That takes us to item number 19, 2026-0816. Get a motion on the bill. I've got a motion and a second on the bill. There is an amendment, Mr. Chair. All right, Dr. Salem. And I'll let Mary explain the amendment. Thank you. Through the chair to the committee. So the amendment, you each have a copy of it that's been handed out to you, which is a red line of the J-Bill itself, which is an exhibit to this resolution. What the J-Bill is accomplishing is adding an additional transparency factor to the board meetings for the Port Authority and the JAA to require that all meetings, for JAA, all meetings of the board, including workshops, subcommittees, committee meetings, et cetera, must be live streamed or televised. And then the audiovisual recording of the meeting posted to their website in a conspicuous location within three business days of the conclusion of the board meeting. Similarly, for the Port Authority, it requires the same, that all meetings of the board be televised or live streamed and then posted to the webpage. However, the initial draft included an exception for workshops of the board that would be formal or informal. And that exception was included at the request of the Port Authority. However, upon further review and discussion of these items with Dr. Salem, we thought it would be appropriate just to make sure it is clear from the intent of the J-Bill that adding this language of the charter would not require board meetings of the authorities that are subject to an exemption from the Sunshine Law. For instance, shade meetings and similar types of meetings under the Sunshine Law or applicable federal regulation, that those would not be required to be recorded or televised or live streamed and then posted, just so it's clear that the intention was not to conflict with those exemptions under state and federal law. So the language that's highlighted here are the changes that are being proposed to include that additional exemption. All other items that were originally proposed would remain the same. Can I add something real quick? Yeah, this is just a transparency bill. You saw we passed over item 16, which is, I'm sorry, it's not 16, but I have a similar bill going through on JEA, but that's something we can handle locally. The airport has not, they're now very much on board. They will be televising all their meetings and all their subcommittee meetings. People should not have to drive to the airport or to the port to see a board meeting. They ought to be able to do it from home, and this will allow that. So it's that simple. Thank you, Chair. Oh, I'm sorry, the amendment. So I move the amendment. I've got a motion and a second on the Salem amendment. Council Member Clark-Murray, are you on the amendment? All right, so I have no speakers on the amendment. All in favor of the amendment, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Likewise, none. The amendment carries. I get a motion and a second on the bill as amended. I get a motion and a second on the bill as amended. Ms. Clark-Murray, you're recognized. Thank you, Chair. Through the chair to Council Member Salem, is there going to be an additional cost? Is there a cost that's associated with this for JAA? They have the equipment. I'm told the room was kind of small. They are moving into a larger room, but we'll accommodate the smaller room until they move into a larger room with the renovations that they're doing. All right, thank you. Thank you, Chair. All right. No other speakers in the queue. Let's open the ballot and record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. By your action, you're approved 2026-0816 as amended. Item number 20, we've already taken action. Item 21, 22, 23, we've taken action. Item number 24, 25, we've taken action. And that takes us to item number 26, 2026-0823. Again, a motion on the bill. I've got a motion and a second on the bill. No speakers in the queue. This is a 75% attendance, so they're not required to attend. All right. No other speakers in the queue. Open the ballot and record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. By your action, you're approved 2026-0823. Item number, next item number 27 has been, we've taken action. 28, we've taken action. 29, we've taken action. The next items are on second. Item number 30, 2026-0845. Item number 31, 2026-0846. Item 32, 2026-0848. Item number 33, 2026-0849. 2026-0853. 2026-0858. Item number 36, we've taken action. Item number 37, 2026-0868. Item number 38, 2026-0870. 2026-0871. 2026-0872. 2026-0873. 2026-0874. 2026-0875. And that takes us to item number 44, 2026-0879. I can get a motion. I've got a motion, a second, on the bill. Mr. Dennis, are you on? Okay. All right. Ms. Pittman. Chair, I'd just like to be added. All right. Thank you. No other speakers in the queue. Open a ballot. Record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. By your action, you're approved. 2026-0879. Item number 45, 2026-0880. Get a motion on the bill. I've got a motion, a second, on the bill. No speakers in the queue. Open a ballot. Record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. By your action, you're approved. 2026-0880. Item number 46, 2026-0881. Get a motion on the bill. I've got a motion, a second, on the bill. No speakers in the queue. Open a ballot. Record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. by your action approved 2026 0881 item number 47 2026 0882 can get a motion on the bill i've got a motion second on the bill no speakers in the queue open a ballot record your vote six yes zero nays by your action approved 2026 0882 item number 48 2026 0883 can get a motion on the bill i've got a motion second on the bill no speakers in the queue open a ballot record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. By your action approved, 2026-0883. Item number 49, 2026-0884. Can I motion on the bill? I've got a motion and a second on the bill. I've got Mr. Bowling in the queue. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Please add me as a co-sponsor. All right. Thank you, sir. All right. With that, no speakers in the queues. I've got a motion and a second on the bill. Open the ballot and record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. All right. By your action approved, 2026-0884. Item number 50 is on second, and that takes to the end of our agenda, and we'd like to wish Council Member Bowling a happy birthday. Mr. Chair, item 27, you did not officially say you were deferring, and I believe Mr. Dennis sent you an email before the meeting asking you to withdraw it. Could you either go back to that item and declare it's deferred or allow him to request that withdrawal? Which item was that? It was item number 27. 27. The administration withdrew that, so we didn't take an action on that? No, Mr. Chair, we did not vote. You did not vote on that withdrawal. No one moved it. All right. Right before the birthday wishes, we'll go ahead and go back to item number 27. 2026-0824. I've got a motion and a second on the withdrawal. No speakers in the queue. Open the ballot and record your vote. Six yays, zero nays. All right. By your action, you have withdrawn 2026-0824. And now that takes us to the end of our agenda, and happy birthday, Council Member Bowling, and we are adjourned. Thank you.