Board of County Commissioners on 2024-01-23 9:00 AM - Jan 23, 2024

Okay, let's bring this January 23rd, 2024, Board of County Commission meeting to order. Let's please all stand for Pastor Ted Andrada, and followed by the Pledge of Allegiance led by Bernie Lawson. I don't think we have the pastor, so we'll just do a moment of silence. Mr. Lawson. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, and liberty, and justice for all. Good morning. I got this down in three minutes. You can have as long as you like. Good morning, Commissioners. My name is Bernie Lawson, and it's a great honor to briefly share with you my story, journey, and most importantly, celebrate you as the Commission's sustaining commitment to veterans, specifically the Office of Veterans Services, composed of its gifted and passionate professional staff, dedicated to providing veterans access to benefits, rightly due, as their advocate. I've been a resident of Martin County for 35 years. My children were educated here and graduated as bright scholars. Mr. Lawson, can you move closer to the mic? Oh. Thank you. I watch this on TV, yeah? Is that better? Yes, it is. I've been a resident of Martin County for 35 years. My children were educated here as bright scholars. Fifty-six years ago, I served in a variety of duties in the United States Navy, all in Southeast Asia, and I would not see America for five years. Of importance to me in Forever Radiant was my service with 25 shipmates on a shallow, draft, wooden-hulled coastal minesweeper on the Mekon River and Delta. Over a two-year period, specifically 1967 and 68, we were charged with the interdiction and engagement of enemy troops and supplies, along with special ops. We boarded sandpans and provided shore bombardment and combat support to Army and Marine forces, which included the Tet Offensive. Most engagements were at night, never forgotten on those precious moments we shipmates spent side by side as the terror of the night subsided at the hint of dawn. When I returned to the States, the GI Bill paid for my law school, as I drove yellow cabs at night. My legal and executive career would take me around the world, including a backdoor visit to Vietnam to walk the river and villages again. In closing, over the years, VA hospital doctors and nurses have kept me pretty much patched up related to my war service. But better yet, now at my age of 77, the Board of County Commission's Office of Veterans Services has successfully assessed a range of disability benefits I never knew I was entitled to, which will carry me for years to come. Grateful I am for you, to the veteran services, Maggie here today, and my devoted daughter in Austin, who's made me a grandfather twice over. Godspeed. As we say in the Navy, bravo, Zulu. Well done. Thank you. Okay. Let's end the meeting. Yep. We're done. That was great. So we have preset 905 public comment and 505. We have a very short agenda, so we will not make what will be more earlier than 505. We have no agenda polls, and at this time I will take a motion to accept proclamations. Oh. Okay. Let's do that first. Proclamations. Oh, you want proclamations for you? No. Just do the agenda. Go ahead. I move approval of the agenda, Mr. Chair, with no consent polls and no additional items. I will second the agenda. Okay. We have a motion by Commissioner Smith, seconded by Commissioner Hetherington. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously. We have three proclamations that will be presented by. Yeah, she looks like. She's nervous. There's Sokiye representing the Office of Communication. Well, our first one is Human Trafficking Awareness Prevention Month. I'd like to present a proclamation recognizing Human Traffic Awareness and Prevention Month in Martin County. For over two decades, Place of Hope has made tireless efforts in combating the erogenous crime of human trafficking in our communities by providing high-quality, targeted therapeutic programs and tailored case management for adult and minor survivors, as well as at-rith use. At-risk youth. Not only does Place of Hope provide intervention and prevention, but also education and awareness throughout the community outreach, human trafficking presentations, social events, and their documentary, Invisible. In observation of January as Human Trafficking Awareness and Prevention Month, the Board urges residents to learn more about human trafficking and the role we can all play in preventing and responding to this worldwide crisis. Here to accept this proclamation is Charles Bender, Place of Hope, founding CEO and board member. Good morning, sir. Good morning. Thank you so much, commissioners and staff and team. Thank you for shining a light on this. It's taking place everywhere. But my most exciting thing to say to you is that your staff issued our development order on our Stewart campus. I think we're picking it up physically today. So we're pumped. And it's actually going to help us and you help more survivors over time. Because these are people that are just normal citizens in our community. And they just need our help. And they need a transition to healthy adulthood. And so we just thank you guys for being a part of it, always being supportive of what we're doing. And thank you, again, for this today to shine the light on what's happening. Because a lot of people are just kind of hiding, acting like they don't know it's taking place in every county in our state and throughout this nation. So thank you so much for what you do. Can you just for two seconds, for those who don't know what Place of Hope is and where you are, just explain, like, what is the permit you're picking up today and why is it so cool? Sure. So we were founded just over 22 years ago in Palm Beach County. And then we take care of the neediest in our community. Those are the young people that have had to be removed for abuse, neglect, abandonment, endangerment by the state. So we partner with the state. We have a family-based, faith-based model that's been heralded throughout the nation for how we do what we do. We have tremendous outcomes. You can go on our website and check that out from the stories from our kids, placeofhope.com. And a few years back, we came up into this area. As you know, a different judicial circuit, big area. It takes in other counties as well. It had some tremendous impacts and stories. Now, as we were changing things up, we received, through a donation, the campus that was here for almost 60 years operating a Samaritan's Home for Boys. And so we immediately started the renovation process, the permitting process, and the expansion process. And so it's going to completely change what's taking place at that campus and take it to a whole new level. And people have been generous. And we're off to the races now. So we're excited about it. So thank you, guys. Business. Business. They're both years ago. We voted on it. Wonderful job. Thank you so much. There were some kids in Palm City who went there. Yeah. Um, the neighborhood, they were able to. Yeah. Do they have borders? I got my exercise this morning. Okay. Next, we have Literacy Week. We have to present a proclamation declaring January 22nd through 26th, 2024, celebrate Literacy Week in Martin County, Florida. Martin Reads seeks to increase awareness and community engagement surrounding literacy in Martin County. Children who are unable to read by third grade are more likely to drop out of high school, engage in criminal activities, and experience poverty as adults. Currently, less than 50% of our children are able to read by the third grade. And without rigorous, intentional efforts, these numbers will continue to worsen. To celebrate Literacy Week, the board encourages all citizens to join in the effort to increase literacy and support the youth of our community with action and advocacy. Here to accept is Kiana Kelly, Martin Reads coordinator. Good morning. Thank you for having me. On behalf of Executive Director David Heaton for Children's Services Council, as well as my Program Director, Laura, we want to just thank you for making this proclamation. And I just want to give you a little information about why this is important and what exactly it is that I'm asking of you. So, Martin Reads, I'm the new coordinator, and my vision for how this will look is that we will become a culture of literacy. We will become a culture where children understand and seek literacy as a tool, as a life skill, and not just as something to, you know, pass a test. So, my idea is that we will spread that information, get everyone reading all the time. I'd like to see every child reading at least one book a day or 20 minutes a day. And this is important because we have so many of our readers that are struggling. They just don't have the skills. And the only way they're going to get those skills is with practice and with the access. We have the resources. We are an excellent grade A school district. We are a grade A community. We have all of the resources. So, what we have to do is employ those resources and make sure that they're trickling down to the people that need them. I just want to share with you what Martin Reads believes the value of a child is. And this is important because I think that when we look at in just relationship to the proclamation that was given before, which is human trafficking, and understanding the value of a child as a child, not just when they grow up and are able to give us something back. So, Martin Reads has identified the value of a child as children being the foundational members of the genealogy of society. As such, they are important and valuable in their childhood. A child's ability to learn, their capacity for knowledge, and the ways in which that knowledge will be applied are indelible to the progression of humanity. In this regard, a child's value as a child is priceless, and we have to cover them. We have to protect them. And Children's Services does an amazing job, and I'm so proud to be a part of such a great team. All my people that came out, I have such a phenomenal group of people that I work with, and we just want to keep on pushing this agenda of literacy and getting our children reading. The book approved by the DOE is The Little Butterfly That Could. And this is such a powerful, engaging story of resilience, about a little butterfly that gets separated from the rest of his crew, and he has to figure out how to fly 200 miles, and he doesn't feel confident that he's able to do it. So, this promotes growth mindset. It promotes resilience. It's critical thinking. It's figuring things out. Because how is he going to get to get reconnected with his friends that are 200 miles away? So, it's a really cute story. And I hope you guys will read it. And I'm going to actually leave this copy with you guys. Okay? Thank you. Yeah, get the whole team in there. You got a team going. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. You got a whole squad. Oh, too. Hey, Arisa. Yeah, bring your team up. Do it. Do it all to that. I'll put her in the middle. Thank you. Okay. Our next proclamation we need to adopt first, and it is Declaration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day in Martin County, Florida. Second. Okay. We have a motion by Commissioner Smith, seconded by Commissioner Campy. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously. Okay. Before the board presents this, I spoke to the chair earlier, and we would like to take a moment and acknowledge and send our condolences to the King family. Dexter Scott King died yesterday at the age of 62. He was Dr. Martin Luther King's third child, and he was the chairman of the King Center in Atlanta. He was seven years old when Dr. King was assassinated. So, the board would just like to take a moment and send our condolences and acknowledge the passing of Dexter Scott King. And with that, we are going to present the proclamation declaring January 15, 2024, Martin Luther King Jr. Day in Martin County. Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King was a visionary whose courage and determination to balance the scales of social justice changed the world forever. Dr. King's peaceful crusade against segregation and discrimination has inspired hope in the hearts of men and women throughout our country and around the world. January 15th is the federally recognized Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday. When we reflect upon Dr. King's legacy and actively serve others, on Sunday, January 14th, the Abundance of Love Ministries and the Hope Sound Community United hosted a commemorative event that honored and celebrated the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Here to accept this proclamation is Geraldine Harrell, and she's the director of Abundance of Love Ministries. And what I want to add to that is Geraldine, I am proudly call her every day my sister. We grew up underneath the same influence of her mother, which I believe shaped my life. And Maddie Washington is a good woman. Thank you. Tell your mother thank you for doing that. Thank you. It worked out okay. She beat me constantly. Tell her thank you twice. Yes. First of all, I'd like to say thank you. Thank you for your support and an acknowledgment of our annual Martin Luther King event here in Hope Sound throughout the community. We have collaborated with many organizations. We love what we do. We're always with a hand out, pulling people up. We, again, want to thank you and thank Commissioner Jenkins for his contributions and all that he do for our community. Our condolence goes to the family. Again, we will continue to drive to make our county a better county, that our county will shine like a light that's helping all mankind and all people. Thank you again for this proclamation. God bless you. Who would have thought as children the two of you would be standing next to each other right now? Keep working on them. Yeah. He's pulling his back. Yes. Okay. Okay, and with that, we're going to move on to public comment. For those that have never done that before, you have three minutes. At two minutes and 45 seconds, you'll hear a tone. That doesn't mean to stop. That means it's there to remind you to wrap up your comments. So we're going to start with Barbara Shaw, followed by. So, Mr. Chair, just before we start the first comment, I just want to remind the public speakers that since we are in an election season, politicking is prohibited, which is defined as advocating the election or defeat of a candidate for public office, either partisan or nonpartisan. This includes the use of words, dates, signs, props, and or wearing apparel that convey a message of support for a person or groups of persons, Mr. Chair. Okay, and Ms. Shaw will be followed by Linda Emelson. Hi, I'm Barbara Shaw. I wanted to come to you guys because I figured this was an incident that happened on Friday. I know who's responsible for part of it, but their lack of dealing with it affects the public. So I live at Martin Downs, and I was coming back home, and the line of people coming from the guard gate was so long, and it went. It went in the residence line, and then it curled out on Martin Highway towards Walgreens, and it was stopped. Now, there's a yellow light that's over there that blinks when it's a stoplight, and you know to slow down. These are people coming around a curve, and stopped vehicles are there, which I think makes it more of a community problem. It is the failure of Martin Downs to handle the problem, but it's affecting somebody's going to get hurt, and I just, rather than call Martin Downs and have them say, as they constantly say to me, it's not our problem. I've thought I would let you guys know you can file it away in the file cabinet of your brain under, oh, yeah, I knew that. And if it comes up later, you know that it's a problem. The answer, I don't know. I mean, there's no good answer. I just feel better letting you guys know because I've been stressed about this since Friday, worried, and I hear the accidents when they're out there. I always think it's something that fell in my house, and then I hear the siren, like, oh, yeah. And so I'm just letting you know, and thank you for letting me do that. Thank you, ma'am. Okay, Ms. Emelson will be followed by Cherise Stevens. Good morning. My name is Linda Emelson, and I live in Winstone in Palm City. I've been a resident of Martin County since 1987. Speak more. Oh, okay. I've been a resident of Martin County since 1987. And I'm going to read those because there's a lot of information. In 2017, I was the president of the Winstone POA. We were interested in finding out if we could possibly get county water. I was directed to Phil Keithley from the Solid Waste and Utilities Department. Phil told me that he was working with Evergreen and that we could combine our water project with Evergreen, and the cost would be much less. We set up a meeting in November of 2017 with Winstone residents for a question-answer session. We then had another meeting on March 22, 2018, as there were more questions. Phil Keithley, Dan Killeen from the Fire Department, and Greg Oddio, former president of Orchid Bay, who spoke to us about the process that Orchid Bay went through. Our final meeting with Phil Keithley was on April 9, 2019, which was a combination of Winstone and Evergreen residents. Phil gave a proposed water main assessment workshop. The PowerPoint included the anticipated benefits of county water and examples of the most recent water assessment. The official ballots were taken, and Winstone and Evergreen voted in favor of county water. There were a total of 385 votes out of 404 homes, so it was a huge majority of voters. We had been told that the cost would be between $8,000 and $10,000, and approximately $600 to $1,500 to connect to the house. Phil's PowerPoint showed us other communities and what they had paid. Crane Creek, September of 2016, $7,565. Hibiscus Paramount, September 2018, $6,238. Orchid Bay, July 2017, $6,494. And James Villa, September 2018, $7,499. That was the last we heard from Phil. The whole time from June 2019 to December of 2023, the district said that the project was in design for Evergreen and Winstone. Many residents called Phil. The date kept getting pushed back. But your time is out. Stay for when they're done. Sharice is going to follow. Okay. Wait a minute. That's Sharice. That's the next name you called. Oh, it is. Okay. I'm sorry. Good morning. My name is Sharice Stevens, and I am a president of Winstone. And so a little bit of this is more about accountability as to who oversees some of what happens at the Martin County Utilities Department. For five years, this project has been on the website as, you know, it's been officially approved. Some of us residents have held off on getting, you know, treatments for our home, whether we're looking in an RO system or something of that nature based on, you know, when we call, it's been look at the website. We look at the website, and it says the start date and the end date. And every so often, it's delayed. It's like, okay, it's delayed and delayed. But there's no communication from anyone. And I believe, you know, with Commissioner Campy, you're our District 5. I don't know. You know, a question would be, do you oversee some of that? Do you have communication with what's happening in our district for all these projects? And so five years later, which seems to be a little long on some things, I think there needs to be some, like, where is this project stand? Why is the delay? So, you know, yesterday, Linda and I did meet with Phil. You know, and it was just a little bit of a, I think there's just a lapse of time. No one was following through on some things. So I just kind of want to bring that to your attention because apparently that hasn't been brought to the board yet. Five years later, there's been no actual bids on the project, and it hasn't even been brought to you. I assumed this project was brought to your attention. So that's a little bit of my concern. And then, you know, following through with what Linda had to say, again, you know, why the delay? You know, why has our project been on hold for so long when other projects in our district have moved forward that were started way later than our project was approved? So those are just some questions to follow up on as to where it stands now and when will we get answers for what's happening with that. You know, our community is still looking to see, you know, is this official ballot still? We just need some answers as to what's happening with it, and I think that probably falls on your district, Commissioner Campy. If you stay after the public comment, I'm going to use that in my commissioner comments. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Okay, next up is Mr. Michael Serkis, followed by Sharon McGinnis. Good morning. I'm Mike Serkis. I'm a resident of Palm City. Some of you all may recall a little over a year ago or about a year ago, I came in front of this board with a proposal that was actually for state legislation, taking a look at the Save Our Homes Act as a way to encourage generational homeownership in Martin County and address the affordability crisis we're having in the community. Unfortunately, when the Live Local Act was dropped, absolutely everything else in the realm of affordability was put on the back burner, and a lot of the momentum we had in the state House and state Senate kind of got dropped off to the side. Earlier this month, I presented that proposal to the Affordable Housing Committee, and I was very humbled to have a unanimous support from the Affordable Housing Committee to bring it back to you guys and request that the Save Our Homes extension into next to kin who would receive a home from their mother or father after passing to have that included into Martin County's legislative priorities for the 2025 legislative session. I have talked to one of our three delegation members who has said that this is something they are interested in putting into their proposals for the 2025 legislative session as well. You can be following up with other representatives and senators from our area. But the idea is very simple. If we can't leave a house to our kids without them getting hit to the wall with property taxes, then there's nothing the government will ever do to have affordable housing. So if we can get this put into our priorities list to be able to give your kids, have a title change, where an adult child can keep that 3% Save Our Homes cap, that would be absolutely a game-changer for generational housing in our community. Thank you. Agreed. Ms. Sharon McGinnis is going to be followed by Michael Bell. Good morning. Sharon McGinnis, Rocky Point. I want to start off my presentation with the Treasure Coast Regional Planning District, or Council. And I'm sure that everyone there is dedicated and does a fine job, but if Martin County is paying them for a survey, then we've got a problem. I think you need to change your contract with them that says they pay for performance because they are handing you information having sampled 664 residents of Martin County. So you need to demand a performance that they do a better job of actually taking the bellwether of our county to provide you with useful information. The second part of my comments has to do with the rural lifestyle changes that we are proposing. The proposed changes to the rural lifestyle and the comprehensive plans have elements that I believe can be and should be changed in order to protect our lifestyle. The applicant is asking for the rural lifestyle change does not need the wording of freestanding urban service boundary to move forward with this project. Allowing that wordage of freestanding urban service boundary puts a pin in Martin County at the north end, adjacent to St. Lucie Boulevard and Becker Boulevard. I do not understand how we would allow ourselves to become exposed to the growth in the area of St. Lucie County. One of the protections within the current rural lifestyle limited the utilities to the PUD designation. Now we are proposing that the boundary definition change to rural lifestyle. The developer did not request this change. I can see this as a way to start a daisy chain of development across our agricultural lands. This does not give me confidence that we are limiting the scope of changes on our comprehensive plan that provide the best protections for the quality of life in Martin County. One of the other protections in there is that they don't have to be close to, or we can use weak language of reasonable cost as a way to exclude, to connect to city services and allow them to have sewer. I don't think you are dedicated to our clean water protection initiative if you allow these changes to become part of rural lifestyle. This is a big step in the wrong direction. There should be no easy out for any developer to put sewer and septic on a large planned unit development. No reason whatsoever. And we have weak language in there that says if the developer finds it's reasonably un-cost effective, he can opt out of it. I can't believe that you would not challenge your staff to give you a more supportive information on why this is important. I think this weak language in here is just allowing daisy chaining of development and growth within Martin County. So please make considerations of excluding those from the new rural lifestyle amendment in the future. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Michael Bell will be followed by Mr. Tom Pine. Good morning, commissioners. I was here a little at your last meeting, and I'm trying to address your noise ordinance. I have included from the sheriff here a copy of an incident report where I have a neighbor that continually runs air compressors at night from 1 a.m. to 6 a.m. The police have been out. The air compressors are hidden behind plastic. They can't be seen, and the property is walled and gated with no trespassing on it. The officers that came out said that we can't go on the property. We can't disconnect these air compressors. I've also included the names of the people that own the property as well as the business that they work at in Montana. They're not even here. Given the benefit of the doubt, I've asked code enforcement or somebody to at least call them and ask them that maybe they had workers over there that have left these running during the a.m. from 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. without any success so far. There is such a lack of transparency on the part of the police's ability, the officers here, to enforce any of the noise ordinances. They specifically have said to me, you need to address it with code enforcement. Well, code enforcement has told me that we don't work at 1 a.m. Well, maybe Martin County needs to hire a code enforcement agent that is willing to work in hours where their citizens are needing them to work. This has gone on for us and our neighbors to the south of us since January the 5th. I hope you will address this in your ordinances to include other things that I've left you last time I was here. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Bell, I mean, Mr. Pine will be followed by Robin Cartwright. Before I start, it appears the speakers in the back of this room have not worked in either of these first two meetings in 2024. My name is Tom Pine. I live in Martin County in Jensen Beach area. In today's consent agenda, totals are $15,073,871.77 spent between December 25, 2023 through January 7, 2024 without identifying the payees or the purpose of the payments. This is one way our county government circumvents Florida's open sunshine laws. At our last county commission meeting, a public speaker, Mr. Skikas, spoke about the spending habits of our county commissioners over the past seven years and pointed out that our taxes over that period of time went up 144 percent. Many times, many items hidden in the consent agenda added to this total, such as the millions of our tax dollars and cost overruns at the county golf course, all hidden in the consent agenda. This past Wednesday, a friend was upset about all the rain from the day before because every time it rains, the water runs through her house. It got much worse several years ago when the county repaved Savannah Road. It used to flood the house once in a while. Now it's on a regular basis. Even some of my neighbors' homes are flooding when it rains hard because of the repaving of Savannah Road. I asked, why don't you count the county? The look she gave me was everything. I called multiple times to no avail. Just like me, I said, when I talk at county commission meetings, I might as well be talking to the wall. Is the real reason we are dumping millions of our tax dollars in the ocean at Bathtub Beach is to save Sailfish Point from becoming an island of itself? We will never beat Mother Nature. Never. I don't care how much of our tax dollars you dump in the ocean. It's a losing battle. Please stop the insanity. I attended the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council meeting last week where they are revealing our Montanconi Growth Management Plan, which is mandated by state law to be upgraded every seven years. But in reality, it's a waste of time and money since our county government has their senior staff find or create any exception any developer wants. In reality, it's just another government con job on the taxpayers since there is no enforcement of any of the decisions made, as is evidenced over the past few years as this majority of county commissioners continue destroying our current comp plan. What you permit, you promote. What you allow, you encourage. What you condone, you own. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Mr. Cartwright will be followed by Nick Blunt. Good morning, Commissioners. Good morning. Thank you for the opportunity to speak, as I cannot stay for the meeting. I'd like to address the issue that you're going to discuss for affordable housing. One commissioner gave a presentation on June 2nd, 2022, and then nothing substantial happened. Senate Bill 102 is intentionally vague and doesn't truly address affordable housing like it says it does or that it should. And for those who aren't aware, the City of Stored Housing Authority has a waiting list. In April of 2023, there were 1,340 applicants with one person moving out and one person moving in. In July of 2023, 1,526 applicants, one out, one in. September of 2023, 1,648 applicants, one moving out, one moving in. Or excuse me, zero moving out, zero moving in. In November of 2023, 1,733 applicants, one moving out and one moving in. And granted, this is truly subsidized housing. This does not include people who are on the Alice population who are considered the working poor, living paycheck to paycheck. But this shows a definitive need in our community. So a developer says to you that they will include residences or units that are quote-unquote workforce housing. And it sounds good. And you all nod, as does the City of Stored, and you approve it. But that's not the reality of what's happening. Because even before Senate Bill 102, a developer just had to say that they were going to make it available, and then the commissions approve it. But they don't have to submit any reports to the county or to the city. There is no city staff or county staff that checks on it. And so what ends up happening is that a developer basically can say that nobody applied or nobody qualified, and then they put everything back at market rate. And the bigger issue is that that's assuming that somebody from the city or county actually follows up. And as with the city and county, there's no state accountability. There is nobody at the state monitoring what's being built under the red herring of affordable housing. It's been proven that more units do not make anything more affordable, and if anything, it's the opposite. As more units are posted at higher rates and prices, existing units increase to be more in line with that existing market rate. And that includes rentals as well as developer-declared quote-unquote affordable townhomes and the like. You have a chance, a responsibility, and a privilege to help your constituents. And saying that it's basically not needed or that the land is not appropriate for use is simply not acceptable. It takes political will, and there are some great examples of it being done. I encourage you to look to the city of Jacksonville, to their corner lot project, where they are doing exactly this. They are a great example of how to accomplish a reasonable, feasible, successful private-public partnership. Thank you. Thank you. And Mr. Blunt? Oh, okay. I'm sorry I missed that. And that is my last speaker form. Is there anybody else that would like to address us at this time? Seeing none, we'll move on to Commissioner Comments. Commissioner Smith? Mr. Chair, one of our speakers this morning touched on an item that had been brought up last year on Save Our Homes. And last year, and if it's not working, it's not me. Well, then somebody in the back needs to figure out what we're doing, George, because I'm speaking pretty much into the mic. Last year, can you hear that? Now I'm yelling. Last year it was brought up and raised the idea of making the homestead provision portable or at least generationally portable. I took that idea to our Association of Counties. We adopted that language in our language last year. There was some discussion relative to the constitutionality of it. Would it have to be a constitutional item to change the requirements because of the homestead's provisions with Constitution and the voters' right to do so? So I will look back into that to see what analysis ended up happening because it really didn't go much further, as the speaker suggested that it didn't. But to let everybody know, we did introduce that at the Association of Counties and made that language part of our platform of last year. And usually those ideas roll over into this coming year and our legislation. Other than that, all is good. Commissioner Hetherington. Okay. Let's try this. So I wanted to give a brief update. Last week we were in many of us, many from Martin County Business and a couple of us here from the county were in Tallahassee advocating for Treasure Coast Legislative Days. And I just want to give a brief overview on some of the things that were discussed during these times. We have a chance to meet with both our delegation, with Senator Harrell, Representative Snyder, and Representative Overdorf, as well as many representatives from across the state. So I always find that it's a great place to be an advocate for both our legislative priorities, which we've outlined here on the dais, as well as some of the other things that are important. It was noted by several of the legislators that there should be some minor tweaks to Live Local, one of which I hasn't gone through yet, but I suspect will be, and they indicated, removing the industrial component from the Live Local. A couple of the meetings we had was Don and myself, Sarah Powers, our legislative coordinator, met with the director of DEP, Adam Blaylock. As you all know, subject to sewers, one of our high priorities, and the state had allocated about $300 million last year. And we have some, you know, very, very, very high priority, and we had asked for some additional funding for Port Salerno and New Monrovia. We weren't as successful as we hoped with that August allocation. But the great news in the meeting with Adam was that they anticipate this year, again, they will get the full $100 million for Indian River Lagoon. And it is, they're very hopeful that they will get an additional $100 million in that pot of money for the IRL. And then we'll still get the $200 million for the water quality. So the state is really doubling down and providing funding so counties, particularly counties like Martin County, that are designed and ready to build these projects can apply and get the funds needed. So I was, I thought the meeting with Adam Blaylock was very, very positive. We are going to apply to both pots of money, the Indian River Lagoon Council and their water quality to get additional funding for septic to sewer and some of the other projects. So, and we're appreciative that they continue to put that funding in so we can meet our goals. And then I know there was a meeting advocating DOT, widening of 710 is a high priority. And I know representatives from Indiantown and DOT and our staff was able to meet with DOT to advocate for that. It's been one of our priorities on MPO and it's a very, very important, and of this board, and it's a very important safety issue. So that's some of the recap of what happened last week during our visit to Tallahassee. And there, there's so much and we'll continue and our, our wonderful legislative coordinator is up there every single week, Sarah Powers. And Mr. Chair, do you mind if I go over really briefly just my priorities since I had the flu bug last year, last week? So unfortunately I had that bug that was going around last week. So I just wanted to, my colleagues outline their priorities and briefly outline what my priorities for the coming year will be. And of course we've been working on a project in my district in Golden Gate, the El Camino Trail Project. And like most projects, it's come in over budget. We've been able to phase it out and have some grant money. I want to be able to apply for additional grant money for a phase two, but already put shovels in the ground and get that project underway this year in Golden Gate. All my priorities also were partly completed with Sands Britt Park, but we're all, I think, ready to see that come to the finish line. We've got a few things that we had to finish with the boat ramps. And for my constituency, we would really like to see the realigning of the crosswalk into the park and adding a sidewalk on the side for safety reasons. And my third was on there last year. Septic to sewer is one of our highest priorities. So because of the costs have risen every single year, as the funding has, as I just explained from Tallahassee, I think we're going to continue as a board and utilities have to be very creative with their procurement measures, whether that means finding ways to allow additional contractors to bid, whatever we can do to be more creative, to make sure that because all these contractors are busy because all over the state they're building these projects. So I just put in the goals for us to kind of look outside the box so we can figure out how to do these things in a timely and costly manner. Of course, we had these conversations during budget session, and I think, you know, some of my colleagues were looking to me to put that out there in the beginning of the year versus during budget season, that my goal and I think our constituents had said, you know, we want to reduce or maintain our current tax rate. Our property values have risen, so I had added that in my priority to work through our process at CIP and the process along the way so that we will not have to propose any increased taxes. And finally, one of my priorities for many years has been to the enforcement and advocating for some of these shops who target underage youth for vaping. We've seen that, you know, and now there's the fentanyl, which kind of goes hand in hand because, you know, how many of these both in our county and across the state have we seen young adults being taken to the emergency room because of a simple vape that now has got fentanyl laced throughout it. So many years ago, I prioritized it. We put an ordinance in place, and it was specifically to look at keeping these out of the hands of underage. If you're above 21 and you want to vape, then no problem. But shops are targeting our youth, and we, Martin County, had some of the highest rates of vaping, smoking, and drugs in the region. So we adopted that ordinance. It was preempted by the state. We're looking at other ways that we can still have these things enforced. If you drive up US-1, you see there's a new vape shop, smoke shop, you know, every time you drive up and down. And some of these vape shops are not licensed like some of the very reputable tobacco shops. And by and large, those are the ones following the rules. And so we're looking at ways that we can just enforce and keep the sales from our underage kids. So I'll be continuing. We're preempted. Our hands are tied on many ways. But I'm going to continue to work with legal and look for ways that we can do this both in our county and out. And then that kind of played right into this just happens. We do this every year. And I think Tina McSully, we got together last year, and we started this Vaping Chat, the Commissioner's Vaping Challenge video contest. So any, and I encourage any, and it started because peers are more likely to influence other peers rather than us as adults saying no, no, no. So the video challenge is if you're ages 13 to 18, you can put together a video, enter it. This is all on our website until January 31st. And there are great prizes from $250 down to $50. You enter the, there's, there's certain guidelines. But I want to thank the library as well for helping promote it and put together the prizes and Tykes and Teens. And it's just a way that peers can work together to kind of attack this, which if you talk to some of these young people, I, and if you go to this community dialogue thing, I know Ed's been to this. You'll hear other, other teens say it's a, it's a major problem. So anyway, this is on our website, and thank you for letting me review my priorities. Commissioner Smith. Just a quick follow-on, and because of sunshine, Stacey and I don't get to talk to each other, but there is some new legislation moving this year that I asked one of the individuals to reach out to you with that so that you would know at least what the effort was that was going on to see if we couldn't combat it in a different way. So anyway, there is some movement relative to teenage vaping. So hopefully that will get some ground this year with the legislature. I hope so, and thank you for passing that along. Mr. Campy. Thank you. Two things. One, I'd like to address what the women this morning had mentioned. I did receive your email. Actually, the timing was unique because I was invited yesterday. I had a meeting in Evergreen with a group of homeowners to get that rolling again. But in regards to the history of how it's been progressing over the last, you know, the interesting thing about Evergreen and Windstone, first off, it does make sense to collaborate instead of just being a Windstone project or just being an Evergreen to work together. It creates, obviously, an economy of scale. The tricky part, and I mentioned it yesterday to the folks, is you want to make sure if you have a very strong desire in Windstone to do it and they're on the fence in Evergreen that you're not pulled down into a negative position because of that. But from what I can tell, it doesn't look like that's the case. Mr. Stokas and I had a conversation yesterday about this. He's going to give an update on, you might have heard it from Phil Keithley, but for everyone else, on what the progression of timing had been for your specific project. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I had discussions with our utilities director as well as our assistant kind of minister, Matt Graham, in regards to what was the timing. It was a four- to five-year span, and most of the timing for the delay was we were trying to incorporate a design that involved something along with the Army Corps drainage canal and working with them. And ultimately, we just couldn't get to the same level of understanding, so we had to redesign that project around there. And with that being said, you know, we had four or five years pass, so what utilities would like to do and move forward with is they want to re-ballot both neighborhoods because it's been five years and there's been a transition. Plus, because of the cost incurred, we've seen costs probably almost double from what we were doing in 2019. Really, both of that is because of the design or what we're required to design as well as just the cost of materials and labor has gone up that much. And utilities has provided me a cost. Now they're looking at about $14,000 to $16,000, and this is just for water. And they feel that that definitely changes the game when it comes to what they were saying to folks in 2019, which was about $8,000 to $10,000. So they would like to go back and do an official ballot. That's where we send – we mail those ballots to the residents, and then Vicki Davis, our supervisor of election, collects those, counts those, so that everyone will have a fresh, accurate picture when it comes to the budget. And then probably the timeline is you do the balloting, and then we go through the normal process, so probably another year. And then that's if the official ballot does go through. So that's really my update, Mr. Commissioner. Thank you. One second, please. To fill in some of what Mr. Stokas just said, he breezed over the fact with the Army Corps of Engineers. When I had spoken to our utility folks, the goal there by using a sort of a right-of-way involving the Army Corps would have made that project much less expensive. It's all a matter of how far and how long you're running pipe. So at the time, that was a clever and creative way to keep the costs of the project lower than they would have been otherwise. Going through the process with the Army Corps of Engineers at the federal level, you can imagine, is a process, a timely process. And at the end of that process, they denied it, thus forcing us to review. Now, in terms of going back out, the numbers that you had mentioned are very encouraging to have that level. I don't think any of us have ever heard that level of support for something like this. Now, I know in Evergreen, I don't know if at the time it was both Winstone and Evergreen, but we had to change our complete voting policy based on a situation that happened in the neighborhood because we used to have the ballots handled internally, and one resident that lived in Evergreen made a public records request of the ballots and saw how every one of his neighbors voted and then went around and browbeat, allegedly from what I had gotten feedback, went around and browbeated the people that voted in the different that he wanted them to, and people were very upset. So I know it's, at least in Evergreen, it's a somewhat contentious issue. We've switched it now where all of the ballots go to Vicki Davis, our supervisor, and are no longer able to be requested to see how people voted. You think that's the American way? So my meeting yesterday, and with your permission, I'd like to forward you the information of the contact information in Evergreen. We've done this many times. I was involved in the Orchid Bay that you had mentioned, and that was very contentious. It made, there were boards, board members that wiped out the whole board of volunteers that were trying to do those things, and people are passionate about it. I personally believe that there are tremendous benefits of having water in the neighborhood, even when we did Rustic Hills, which is not that far from you. So they, you know, there's always people that are concerned. They don't have the financial wherewithal to do it, but there are a lot of different mechanisms in place that make the benefits, both financially and just, you know, logistically benefits of having the water, outweigh the potential costs, but we can't count everyone's individual money. Once it's in place, I mentioned last night, I don't think I've ever had a neighborhood come back to us and say, we didn't think that was worth it. But everyone, once they get it, it's appropriate. I mentioned that, you know, I will personally be involved. We have a, you know, a county staff. We'll create a meeting probably at the Cummings Library to allow folks, because the concept of going door to door, a lot of people don't like that. They don't want to be necessarily divided in their own neighborhoods. And, you know, you could have a great friend who has a different position on whether they want to do that or not, and it shouldn't necessarily turn into an ugly situation. The folks that I met with are looking to start as quickly as next week. They have a very, what I thought was a very unique strategy on how to inform, educate, and even just notify a lot of people in the last ballot. I know it passed in Winstone and did not pass the straw poll this round in Evergreen, but a lot of people felt that they were not made aware necessarily, or the timing, the annual timing of the ballot was such that they weren't there. The challenge in your neighborhood and Evergreen is the fact that there are large parcels, and so there's not a tremendous amount of homes. There's still hundreds of homes, but when the neighborhoods are smaller and more compact, the distance of the utilities is less, bringing the cost down, but also bringing in more people to vote. Your neighborhood and Evergreen, the houses are beautiful, and the neighborhood is awesome, but they're far apart. So to head down, like, you know, obviously having been there last night, to head down to get from the big open, the front of the neighborhood to the back, is quite a distance, which in any other circumstance is fantastic, except if you're running pipe. So we have several neighborhoods that are all in the mix, our utility department, all over the county, but even in District 5, we have Four Rivers is interested, all through by Cornell and the numbered streets interested. As you head south on Map Road, most of those neighborhoods, especially on the left side, on the river side, don't have water, but are interested. I've been working with our utility department and those neighborhoods. It's more than my pleasure to work with you all, because I think that the, when laid out very fairly and informatively, most residents, not everyone, but most residents realize the huge value, even just from the discount of your homeowner's insurance by having fire hydrants. If you don't live within 1,000 feet of the fire hydrants, in Rustic Hills, that was the tipping point for them. Because if you're going to spend $1,000, and there's ways that they can put it into, obviously you already know, put it in where it's spread out over 10 years or 15 years, and it stays with the home, not with the homeowner. So if someone sold in three or four years, that's a huge benefit. Ask any real estate agent. Some people won't look in neighborhoods, and I know you know this, won't look in neighborhoods that don't have at least water. So it's something that I feel confident we'll get to. In terms of the dollar amounts changing so dramatically, your specific situation changed more, because our original calculations were based on an agreement with the Army Corps of Engineers and making the project much more scalable, and they just did not want to. Now, times, years have passed, so maybe another approach to the Army Corps of Engineers is an appropriate angle. I don't want to waste time doing that, but if it saves thousands of dollars per homeowner, it's probably worth at least another conversation with them. And so it's something that we are absolutely working on. It has been happening within the neighborhoods before it even came to my attention again, but I think you'll be very pleased when I introduce you or at least make the connection for you all with the folks in Evergreen. They have a very unique strategy in place that I thought was perfect, so I feel confident that we will get it. You know, I have used in frustration in my own world, sometimes we move at the speed of government, but there's four other commissioners that have water neighborhoods that are looking, and they're also ringing the doorbell of the same group of individuals, professionals, that are—Phil Keeley is probably a statewide expert on how to do this, but there's 160,000 residents and five commissioners that all know his phone number. So, but it's an issue in District 5, and we'll work on it. So I appreciate that you came. So, because as Commissioner Smith said, we're not allowed to speak to each other about any of these things outside of this exact meeting, and there's always an agenda of things that we're going to discuss. So the two of you coming this morning, and I got your email, you said you were coming, and I'm glad that you did, because plenty of people say, I'm going to come to the meeting, and then don't. So I feel that we'll—I will schedule the meeting at Cummings Library. We'll bring our staff, and quite—some people will never be convinced to do it, but you need a majority, and it sounds like you are well on your way to keeping a majority. So thank you. The other point that I wanted to make is a little more of a serious—not that that wasn't serious, a little more tragic, if you will—this Saturday, January 27th at 9 a.m., we will be meeting in Jock Layton Park to have a—not a competitive run, like a 5K, but a walk to help raise funds for a beautiful three-year-old named Brooklyn, and I'm allowed by her parents to mention this—Brooklyn Gonzalez suffering from a very aggressive form of cancer. They found out in—right before the holidays, she's going through a series of very aggressive chemo treatments through Christmas, has lost all her hair, three years old. The parents also have a baby in the house. The mother and father have been really remarkable members of our community, volunteering and donating their time for so many charities. So the young—I call her the princess. The princess's name is Brooklyn. So how appropriate that we will have a walk over our Veterans Memorial Bridge, but ceremonially that day we will rename it the Brooklyn Bridge. And it's a $20, all of the money going directly to the family. The Palm City Chamber has been lending a hand. It's not a chamber event, but they've been lending a hand to organize it because the dad is a member of the board. And also Healthy Start has also been assisting because this cancer situation for a three-year-old falls into their sort of their wheelhouse as well. So I would just encourage anybody that didn't have anything to do—it's not a competitive running race. If anybody would like to join us this Saturday morning at Jock Layton Park, which is diagonally from the Palm City Post Office, just a nice walk over the bridge and back. It's a $20 minimum donation. If you'd want to support more, you can imagine she's having these treatments out of town. So the traveling and the missing of work for the parents, as well as the fact that they had been tragically hit earlier than this, where they were having a home built, and they gave the developer tens of thousands of dollars, and he ran off with the money. So they've had a really difficult time. So I have heard from lots of people after the fact when we have these kind of events, they're like, I just wish I would have known about it. We didn't hear about it. If you do it exclusively on social media, sometimes you don't hear. So if you could, those of you that are here, those of you that are listening, please come, or if not, think about making a donation. Her name is Brooklyn Gonzalez. You can contact the Palm City Chamber. The financial burden is completely also just crippling the family on top of the horrible emotional burden of doing chemo on a three-year-old. Thank you very much. That's all. Commissioner Hurd. I'm set. Harold. I know. I had two other things. Okay. Because always when you hear the conversation, it jogs your memory to the people you speak up. Last Friday at our Regional Planning Council meeting, we had a presentation from the director of the Central Florida Regional Planning Council. They were contracted to do a study on the Florida Wildlife Corridor Program, which is something I brought up in my priorities. Once again, and this is not to the fault of the Regional Planning Council, it's the information, it's the data set that has been made available for some unknown reason. There was one of the screens in the presentation that showed the gaps in the Wildlife Corridor Program, and they were all on the west side of the lake. There was nothing that appeared on the east side of Lake Okeechobee. And so I brought that to the presenter's attention. The information, the data set came from UF. I don't know why they've left the east coast out of the conversation, but they have. We are going to go back to UF. We are also, per my ask of the Regional Planning Council, we will hold a wildlife corridor summit this year sometime that will address the east coast for the lack of anybody addressing the wildlife corridor program, including both Indian River, St. Lucie, Okeechobee, Martin, and Palm Beach. So it was a little disappointing, honestly, that all that work has gone into it, and for some reason we have been left out. But we will work to do our own wildlife corridor with or without the other folks that are doing it, and hopefully we'll be able to come back to both the commission but also our delegation at some point in time with some additional recognition that whatever comes from that work that we embody into state language or certainly into our own codes here in Martin County. Secondly, there is another issue that has popped up this year with the legislature along with the vaping issue, and I forgot all about this. It just triggered it when you started talking about it. There is an idea, and I asked the folks that are sponsoring the item to reach out to our sheriff before they really brought it to us as a formal ask, but that there is a discussion statewide about having speeding red light cameras in school zones. It seems to make sense. Ed has had issues for a long time out in Palm City. All of our districts probably have issues, but this is a way perhaps to address a more narrowly defined camera light technology. Apparently, since they tried doing red light technology 10, 12 years ago, the technology has significantly improved, and they are going to be coming back to us and asking us for our support. I said, look, first and foremost, go stop at the sheriff's department and see what the sheriff has to say about whether or not it's something that if legislation is passed, are they going to be able to support it, which I would imagine he would probably say yes, but it's always the enforcement side of everything that comes before us on legislation. So, anyway, just to thank you for popping the memory thought. Thanks for the time. Appreciate it. Okay. And with that, we have our... Are you allowed to ask questions of the commissioner? Just call me in my office, and I'll meet with you. We don't allow it once you make the public comment. Okay. Everybody should probably note that Mr. Donaldson is not here. He's not feeling well, so Mr. Stokas is standing in. Thank you very much. It's an honor and privilege. Good. God help us. Go ahead. Your comment, you have any comments? That was my comment. Okay. All right. With that, moving on to Park and Rec Advisory Board appointments, followed by Community Development Bock Grant Citizen Advisory Task Force appointments, followed by Historic Preservation Board appointments. Donna Gordon from Administration. You all give me your voting sheets. Lean in on the mic, Ms. Gordon. And Michael Bochino received five votes. Mr. Gary Clough received three votes. And Lawrence Sofield will represent Commission District 4. Move approval of Mr. Bochino, Mr. Claw, and Mr. Sofield to the Parks and Rec Advisory Board. We have a motion by Commissioner Hurd, seconded by Commissioner Smith. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously. Community Development Block Grant Citizen Advisory Task Force. It was for five votes for Julie Priest. Ms. Priest. We have a motion by Commissioner Smith, seconded by Commissioner Hetherington. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously. Historic Preservation Board. You all added two new at-large positions to the board. The two people that received the most votes, Dr. Jackie May and Mr. William Weiss. Weiss. Weiss. Move approval of Ms. May and Mr. Weiss. Okay. We have a motion by Commissioner Hurd, seconded by Commissioner Smith. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously. That was easier than I thought it was going to be. Thank you. Okay. Next up, public hearing number one, public hearing on the proposed Martin County Trico Settlement, Jared Pinero versus Martin County Board of County Commissioners, Carolyn Brady. Good morning, Commissioners. For the record, Heather Dayen, Director of HR Risk. Today, I'm here before you to conduct a public hearing on a proposed Trico Settlement, Jared Pinero versus Martin County, in accordance with the procedure for Trico Settlements established by the Board of County Commissioners. Any member of the public and any member of the board may comment on the proposed settlement. The case arose from a bicycle traffic signal accident where the plaintiff alleged personal injury. A negotiated settlement was reached, and Trico is paying $49,900 on behalf of Martin County. It's the recommendation of Trico and our outside counsel, Gary Dundas, that this settlement is in the best interest of the county. The recommendation is, one, that the move that the board conduct the public hearing and receive public comment on the proposed settlement by any member of the public and any member of the Board of County Commissioners. Two, move that the board direct staff to notify Trico that the settlement procedures have been completed and the settlement should be finalized. This concludes my presentation. Mr. Chair, motion to accept staffs after public comment. Oh, we don't do that? We're just hearing it? Okay. Do we have any public comment on this item? And with that? Didn't she just say, I serve on the Trico Board as your representative. You don't need us to make a, we're not voting on this, we're just hearing it. Okay. I guess we're done then. You're all set? Okay. Thank you. Okay. Next up, somebody remind me we have a public card up here. A public hearing adopting a resolution considering county-owned properties that may be appropriate for affordable housing as required by Section 125.379, Florida Statute. Ms. Segura, welcome. Hi. Good morning. Carla Segura, Real Property Manager. Florida Statute 125.379 requires that the county provide an inventory list of county-owned property that is appropriate for housing every three years. With a published notice of public hearing, list to be reviewed by the Board of County Commissioners at the public hearing, adoption of a resolution that includes either the approved inventory or states that there are currently no county-owned properties identified for affordable housing. The final approved list will be publicly available on the county website. Staff obtained a list of county-owned properties within the Urban Service District. Based on this research, there's currently only one property that the county owns that currently doesn't have a specified use that could possibly be identified for affordable housing. Staff feels that this parcel would probably be best suited for future community land trust efforts, which would be brought back to the Board at a future date. The parcel is located at 5703 Southeast 47th Avenue in New Monrovia and was acquired in 2010 as part of a failed SHIP program agreement. Should the Board approve placing this parcel on the list, the property could be sold and the funds return to the SHIP program. The property could be donated to a non-profit housing organization for construction of affordable housing or made available for use for production and presentation of permanent affording housing at a later date. We ask that the Board adopt a resolution that either includes this parcel or states there are no properties identified for affordable housing as required by the Florida statutes. Or move that the Board adopt a resolution and provide staff direction on an implementation process authorizing the chairman to execute any documents necessary to complete this transaction. If there's any questions, I'd be happy to answer. Take public comment for us, please. So, Mr. Chair, I hit the light because I think there's, with the new Live Local Act and the requirement for us to put this on the website, we really wanted, as staff, we really wanted to go back and look at what is effectively working to create affordable housing. And in the past, this body has put pieces of property on the docket for sale through auction. And what has failed is those properties, because of the fair market value, they sell very high. And then the houses, rather than coming in at, say, the $200,000 level, they are coming in at the $500,000-plus level, which a lot of people do not consider that affordable when they discuss that with me. So what we're trying to do as a staff, and that being your duly representative staffer for affordable housing, is we want to go through this list. And property by property, we want to work with the community land trust to effectuate, I call it kind of the Habitat for Humanity model, where it's folded into the neighborhood. It's not just we're selling a property, you build an expensive house, or the county's trying to procure and determine architectural style, what type of house is there, and so on and so forth. So the reason why this item doesn't have really only one property listed is because we're still trying to process and work through the new language of the law, as well as the CLT was just newly formed. So we want to work with that entity who works with other entities to provide a – the county's perspective is we're providing the land, which will then provide a good product or home for the community that's at an affordable rate. And that's kind of, I think, the best way to explain it. I don't think we did a really good job in the item because it's very complex, but that's the direction we're going to – if you guys direct us to, that's the direction we would like to move forward with. So just to give you an update on the Martin County Community Land Trust that I chair, we are at the very end of noodling through all of our legal documents. I think the land lease is being reviewed by the trust attorney that's located in West Palm that specializes in land trusts. Once that happens and is adopted by the board, Martin County Community Land Trust will be in business. We still have not got our 501 – no, I'm sorry, we got our – our tax deductible thing from the IRS yet. Brian Mast and Steve Layton are trying as best they can to help push that through. But we have United Way and Elizabeth Barbello's organization, which – Community Trust of Martin and St. Lucie. Right, that can actually put the money through those organizations until such time as we get our tax deductible thing through the IRS. So, you know, again, I've stated we have some properties that are owned by the Banner Lake Club that are going to be very soon transferred into the land trust. We have four acres of county-owned property that needs a little – it's got a lot of easements that go nowhere that need to be abandoned and stuff before it's – and I'm going to come and ask for that to be transferred into the land trust. But I'm very excited, and me and others are putting quite a bit of time in it. So – oh, Mr. Campy. I'll go after the public speaker. Oh, Mr. Blunt. Good morning, Commissioners. Nick Blunt, I chair the Housing Solutions Council. And as you know, we advocate for affordable housing. And, you know, when we look at the formula to determine whether any kind of housing could truly end up being affordable, land is a big part of that formula. So we're interested in any land that becomes available. Mr. Stokas answered some of my concerns. I'd assume that these 500-plus parcels had already been looked at individually. And I was going to be asking – I'm a numbers person and a graph person, and I wanted to see why those 500 weren't available for housing, for affordable housing. You know, what percent of them do you have them planned for lift stations in the future, or are they wetlands, or what are they? So we wanted to understand that. I commend Commissioner Jenkins on his effort with the Community Land Trust. I think that's a good model to use when you're looking at individual single-family homes. So I just – we'll be following that closely. Our organization will be following it closely to see how we could be a part of ensuring that we take advantage of any available property. So thanks a lot. Commissioner Campy. Thank you. While Mr. Blunt is walking away, I'd like to congratulate him and thank him, because he and his team have been speaking on this topic without fail, like have not wavered or given up. It's a tough challenge. This morning there was a speaker saying that since the presentation at the joint meeting there hasn't been much happening, which is actually not valid. I get her point that she is not aware of what's happening, but plenty of what's happening, including the Community Land Trust and other organizations that are meeting are happening behind the scenes. We also have put Mr. Stokas in charge and has given many updates on exactly what's going on. It's a very challenging process. I also was concerned when I heard that there were so many, and Mr. Gore has done a remarkable job. Mr. Blunt, having sort of an inside baseball approach, knows that there are parcels that would look perfectly suitable for something like this until you find out that there's some rationale that it couldn't be. That being said, I think it's appropriate, and you also, Mr. Stokas, calmed some of my concerns about this process as well. I think we need to have some type of a meeting, an event where we allow, basically, Ms. Segura to do her process, but in a public forum where, not here, but somewhere, where we put these up and give examples to the public, invite all of the, there's, we're very fortunate. There's several stakeholder groups, some working in collaboration, some independent, but there's a lot of stakeholders involved that would like to know if there's that many properties that the county has. Some should be given at no cost. Some could be given to the community land trust. Some could be given to not-for-profits. If you put them out for, as Mr. Stokas said, if you put them out at auction and they sell for fair market value, which is the American way, they automatically, right out of the starting gate, won't be affordable housing opportunities. So I think what we could do, Ms. Segura, is you and I and Mr. Stokas can create that event, invite all of the stakeholders to come in. We can either run through quickly, you know, just putting the properties up and allowing you to say, okay, this is a yes, this could go into this category, this is a no, because it's, you know, it's landlocked, it's got no driveway. I remember many years ago when, in the recession, we were looking at every opportunity for the county to increase revenue when we looked at those surplus properties and sold off some of them that had values. There was an old fire station up in, on the way to Jensen on the traffic circle there. It seemed like a great opportunity until you realized there was a lot going on there. So what we'll do is anyone who's interested in hearing that process, and I believe there's plenty of people that are, will plan it for an evening at the Blake Library or something, and let's do that hopefully in Q1 or Q2 of this year so that we're ready to go when the Community Land Trust, and not just Habitat for Humanity, who does a remarkable job, but there are some other interested parties in the community that might like to participate as well. Thank you. Okay, and I just realized that I didn't ask for, if there was any other public comment after Mr. Blunt was done. Any other public comment? Commissioner Smith. Sure. So while we have Ms. Woods in the room and we have Mr. Schilling in the room, in our development order process when we do affordable housing that we have done at least in the past that I recall, we put requirements in place that hold the developer accountable by our approval in what we do. Can you just explain a little bit of what's involved so that the public really does understand that it's not just an open book that says, we've done our approval, see you later, have a nice day, and let us know what happens? Sure thing. Good morning, Commissioners. Paul Schilling, Growth Management Director. So we have one that I'm aware of that has successfully completed the development review process, which is known as Tradewinds. It's located in Hope Sound on US-1. There are several buildings under construction currently, and I forget the total number. But as part of that approval, there was a requirement to set aside the affordability component. That is documented in the development order. It is also documented with the process of Michelle Miller's folks at the housing coalition or housing department, that they are the responsible agency for processing leases, verifying incomes, creating reports, and then documenting all that information as far as income, eligibility, jobs, things of that nature. So basically what a mortgage company would do, they are doing to some extent. And then those reports in the future will be part of that document, the overall approval. So there is a mechanism in place. That was the first one that I'm aware of. But it has been successful thus far. And from what I remember, we did an assisted living years ago down in Hope Sound that had a component to it for affordability that X amount of units had to be put into a more affordable program. It never got built. I don't think the project ever got built. But in that approval process, we set aside X amount of units in that process that had to be considered affordable for that senior solutions or whatever program that was. Yes, sir. The name escapes me of the project, but it was never constructed. It is located in Hope Sound on the west side around the Catfish House restaurant in that vicinity. Those approvals for one of the projects that was revised a couple times that are still under the state legislative extensions. However, there's been no activity on the property. Thank you. Reindeer grass on it. So, Mr. Chair. To bring you to another point is that that project is a complete ice. You know, they tore all that down and then just walked away from it. And there's no code enforcement thing. No, the Catfish House is now Taste. Taste moved to Catfish, and they are doing an awesome job. So, Mr. Chair. There's a new restaurant coming that they're remodeling that building right now. And I can't think of the name or I'd give them a plug. But, yeah. So, we're looking forward to another restaurant in Hope Sound. So, Mr. Chair, just to apply on what Mr. Schilling had to say, I think we had a public speaker that might have been confused or was incorrect in what she was saying. And we know for a fact that depending on which granting agency gives you the money for affordable housing, we have those mechanisms in place. Because your program, as you remember, we had Mr. Dooley come up, I believe it was two meetings ago. And that was because our staff was reading his PUD order and as it relates to the tables. I'm very happy to say thanks to the hard work of Ms. Elder and Ms. Miller and the legal and human services staff, they were able to come up with some program that Mr. Dooley appreciated and liked. And we were going to bring that back to you at a later date about the affordable housing component. Because it's relatively new for us as an organization. But that brought, I think, 44 units at a much lower price than what they, I mean, when you look at what he's offering it to rent it, yeah, that number seems astronomical. But then when you put it in comparison to what fair market value would have been, there is an affordability part built in there. And it's difficult to get that. But I think the growth management also helped as well in that meeting. So, we are working together on that. And there are checks and balances that do occur. Okay. I think we've got to do something else. Yeah. I'll move staff's recommendation. You had three recommendations. Yeah. So, one is either adopt it with that property that we designated or adopt it without any designation of available houses that the county currently owns. I mean, property that the county currently owns. And then the other one was to implement the process for utilization of an identified property but also adopt the resolution with no items on this. I'd like C. Yes, sir. George, in order to further your comments relative to the entire program, which is the direction you'd like to see this go in to achieve where you're trying to take this? I believe, Mr. Chair, I believe item recommended action C most aligns with what Commissioner can't be intended. It's my understanding we want to have an event at the Blake Library sometime in the evening between calendar quarter one and calendar quarter two. And then we would want the board to put no properties on the list, and then we'll move forward that process. I would make that a motion if that's okay. Did you already make a motion? Or are you going to receive your motion? Or I would second Commissioner Hetherington's motion if it's that. I would move staff's recommendation C, move that boards provide staff direction on implementation process. No properties would be on the list. And in addition to that, we would have the presentation at the library. Thank you. Second. Okay. We have a motion by Commissioner Hetherington, seconded by Commissioner Campy. And Commissioner Hurd. Just a question. When do you hope that the Community Land Trust comes before us? By March. Okay. Mid-March. Okay. I'd actually like to, in marketing, I would like to be able to have our act together and be able to make it public with some marketing things so we can get some philanthropic activities before the end of season. So that's the board's goal at this point. So it's taken a long time and, you know, anyway, like any legal lawyer dragging things out. But anyway. All right. No reflection on our charge. No. No. Never. Never. Anyway. So we have a, I will restate it. A motion by Commissioner Hetherington, seconded by Commissioner Campy. All in favor? Aye. Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously. And we are now going to take our 10-minute closed captioning break. And we'll be back. But they live in one. You're doing it ahead. Okay. Next up, public hearing quasi-judicial number one. Public hearing to consider a request for zoning approval for the Plan Unit Development Zoning Agreement, PUD, for the preserve at Port Salerno project, including a master final site plan, M215-005, presented by Mr. Peter Walden. It is quasi-judicial. And I'm working on it. And so with that, everybody that is planning to testify in this hearing, please stand to be sworn in. Layla? Raise your right hands. Do you swear or affirm the evidence you're about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? With that, have all the proper documentation in your resume been turned in? Will there's ex parte communication? Was I supposed to do that first? No. You just have to do it. You can. It's on my list. Okay. Turn it in. It's in. Stab you in the neck. Sorry. Okay. And with that, will we have any ex parte communications? Commissioner Smith? If any, they've been filed. If any, they've been filed. I don't have any. It's been filed. If I have any, they've been filed. Okay. Did I miss anything? Mr. Walton, what else would you like him to do? I would like to state that the notices have been turned in at the LPA. Perfect. And there are no interveners. Ah, the intervener thing. That's what I forgot. Okay. I'm sorry. I'll get it. You know, about eight or ten more years. I'll have it down. There you go. We're not going to take our frustration out on the applicant, just on you. That's fine. Go for it. Prefer it that way. Go ahead. Okay. Good morning. Thank you, Chairman. I'm Pete Walton with the Growth Management Department, and this is the Preserve at Port Salerno Plan Unit Development Application. It's requested by Rare Capital Partners, LLC. The current zoning on the property is RM10, which is High Density Residential District, and land use is also high density. A brief synopsis of the development, it's approximately 8.8 acres. They're proposing 79 townhouse units. That gives a proposed density of approximately nine units per acre. There is a 2.33-acre preserve on the property, which is a bit more than is required. There's a clubhouse and pool community amenities. There's two access points to the community, and it is not proposed to be gated. And the public benefits include improvements to Southeast Hydrangea Street, which is the link to the property from U.S. 1. So this is the full site plan for the property. I'm going to zoom in a little bit so you can see it better. So you can see the townhouse units in 10 buildings around the circular drive, the pretty substantial preserve area bordering the east side, which creates a buffer to the mobile home community to the east. There's a detention area out in the existing abandoned to be abandoned right away, and you can see where that is for the improvements to the road to Hydrangea. Hydrangea, and this is the landscape plan for the project. The entire dry detention area in the center of the project is planted with native plant material. There's a substantial buffer to the west, which will provide some buffering to the future development. And I know that the applicant has a substantial presentation, so I won't take long. But this is a picture of the current Hydrangea Street. This is the unimproved area that will be built for the access into the community. This is the proposed drive. It will have sidewalks built on both sides of the road, which will provide pedestrian access to U.S. 1, where there is a school bus stop. There will also be lighting provided as part of the PUD agreement. So development review staff have reviewed the application and find it in compliance, and I do want to go back to one point in the staff report to show a little discrepancy that came up. In Section F of the staff report and the findings of compliance, it relates to a proposed rural lifestyle land use, which, of course, is erroneous, and that will be struck from the final plans. So I just wanted to point that out. That was a mistake. Can you say that again? Because we did receive some communication on that, and I also was wondering how this had affected with rural life. This is a finding of compliance, and at one point had used this staff report template for a rural lifestyle project and left that phrase in there, Errone. So just totally a mistake, has nothing to do with this. Totally a mistake, nothing to do with rural lifestyle. Thank you very much. So with that, development review staff have reviewed the application and find it in compliance with all applicable regulations and a comprehensive growth management plan. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you. Any questions? Any questions for staff? Seeing none. Applicant. Good morning, everybody. Dina Freeman with Quazzo Planning Solutions. We've got Mr. Quazzo behind. We've also got the applicant team, which is the Rear Capital Partners LLC in the back with Mr. Woods. So I'm happy, thankful to staff for their presentation and their thorough reviews and recommendations. So the Preserve at Port Salono. As was just mentioned, it's a request to rezone from RM10 to PUD zoning. It's very quiet. I'm quite loud. So I'll test it right now. Are you ready? So, yes, I know. I heard. So rezone from RM10 to PUD, which is consistent with a high-density land use designation and approval of the PUD master and final site plan, which will be an attachment to the PUD zoning agreement. We have the site location adjacent to South, off of Southeast Hydrangeas Street and off of Southeast Federal, and we have Southeast Cove Road further south. It's an 8.73-acre property. It's currently vacant, and it's a residential lot. Just to give you a perspective in relation to Martin County, it is identified on the infill map layer of a Martin County property appraisers as an infill lot, as depicted with all the green area. So it's in an urban area. It's within the primary urban service district boundary, and the land use, as was confirmed by staff, is high-density residential, and as you can see with the other adjacent to the north and the south is high-density. And we've got the CRA neighborhood to the east and to the west, Commercial Limited. And there's the zoning map that confirms the existing zoning is RM10 in green, and then shows to the north and south. We have R3, and then we've got B1 to the west, and then we've got the Port Salerno CRA zoning districts further east. Just to – I brought up the permitted use table to confirm that townhouses are a permitted development under the current RM10 zoning. They're also a permitted development as per the request is rezoned to PUD. The reason we're here, and we were asked this at the LPA, the PUD zoning is required because the project has been designed to comply with the RM10 standards, but cannot – a townhouse is not able to comply with the development setbacks in the code as such. And so it triggers a non-mandatory zoning change if you want to accommodate a townhouse development. So that's why we're here today. Just to show you in context, there's the Port Salerno CRA community redevelopment area map, hatched in blue, which is adjacent to southeast First Street. And there's the Port Salerno's regulating plan that shows mobile home immediately to the east. And then we've got some detached and some general, with a general density maximum of around 10 units per acre on most of those properties. So the PUD master and final site plan, there's the rezone to PUD, and then it's a two-storey townhouse development with 79 single-family units, an ancillary pool and community building. It's a proposed density of 9.04 units where it is allowed up to 10 units per acre as per the land use and the zoning. The impervious area proposed is 40 percent, 3.19 acres. We have a proposed open space of 60 percent or 4.82 acres where 50 percent is required by the comp plan and the LDRs. We have a proposed preserve area of 2.33 acres along the eastern edge of the property, which equates to 29 percent of upland preserve where a minimum of 25 percent is required. There is a proposed right-of-way dedication, as was discussed by staff. Southeast Hydrangea Street equates to 0.72 acres. And just in terms of parking, which is often a contentious issue in any townhouse and multifamily, the proposed parking numbers we're providing is 172, which includes eight clubhouse and six guest parking spaces where 158 are required by code. So just to give you some context in relation to the site, we show you that the areas around the property, there is Salerno rental apartments, there's the Corowind Cove mobile home co-op village to the east, there's vacant residential further south, and further south of Southeast Cove Road is the Cove Center, which includes the public's shopping center and banks, retail. To the west is vacant commercial property, which is adjacent to US-1, and to the north west is vacant commercial. And then across the road from Southeast Federal is single-family residential. And there's also a proposed 48-unit proposed residential site plan in with review with staff off of Cove Road to the southeast of the property. There's a site plan that was discussed in quite a lot of detail with staff that described the townhouse developments in Blocks of 10 with the community facilities, including the clubhouse and the pool, and obviously a lot of dry retention. And the preserve area is attached to the Preserve Area Management Plan, which is an exhibit to the PED zoning agreement, which commits this entire hatched area to upland preserve and is protected as part of the Preserve Area Management Plan, or PAMP. This is the site data just to confirm that all of the information provided on the site plan that was reviewed by staff is in compliance and consistent with the LDRs and the comp plan. It includes the maximum density proposed and the number of units, open space, etc. And there's another exhibit that was required by staff as part of the review. It's page three of the site plan, and it shows the lot configurations, with it being a townhouse development, with the applicant potentially going to plat the project. That is a requirement that demonstrates ahead of plat submittal that it's consistent with Martin County codes. And there's a landscape plan that was discussed where staff have reviewed a landscape plan with substantial landscaping that demonstrated compliance with the LDRs. There's an image that breaks up the slideshow and shows you what it's going to look like. And then there's the elevations that confirm the two-story. And then the next slide shows approximately 28 foot four inches for the height of the roof, just to show you that it is a two-story development. Although the applicant had the opportunity to go up to 40 feet or four stories as part of the land use and the zoning. So PED master and final site plan public benefits. The six-foot sidewalks can be constructed on both sides of southeast hydrangea street, which will help existing students that are walking down that road to get to that bus stop in the morning, as will the lighting that's proposed. And we'll be working with public works to make sure it meets the requirements of lighting. And that will be reviewed in the building permit. And then the provision of 29% of upland preserve, where 25% was required. Third-party questions were raised at the local planning meeting that was held last week. They talked to a member of the public who lives in the project to the east in the mobile home park, asked about access through the existing mobile home park. We were able to confirm that it's not a plan to open up and access through to the mobile home park. So we're not encouraging people to jump the fence and go to the bus stop, but we can't control that. And then there was another stormwater question about potential runoff into their development. I've been able to reach out. We discussed it during the LPA, and then we reached out via email and phone call, copied in Pete Walden, to confirm, and I also spoke with our engineer of record, that there'll be no runoff in the easterly direction. It's all designed to run off and be cleaned up within the site and then run off-site in the opposite direction onto US-1. And we're not allowed to fight by South Florida Water Management District and by county codes and review by public works to have runoff onto their property. So we were able to confirm that with the lady yesterday, last night, and this morning as well. So conclusion, the proposal is consistent with the comp plan and the land development regulations. Staff has made a positive recommendation. It's been correctly noticed in accordance with Article 10 LDRs. It's also had a recommendation unanimously for approval from the LPA last Thursday, so we respectfully request recommendation of approval from the board. That's the end of my presentation. We're here to answer any questions. Thank you. Any questions for the applicant? Okay. We have one public comment. It is Casey Cass. Hello, everybody. I want to take a moment. Commissioner Campy, thank you for bringing an element of humanity to this meeting by bringing up that family. That's very nice. Keeps us, reminds us that we're a small community, you know, so representing SOS, as most of you know me, shockingly, we kind of agree with this plan. My one question is the runoff on the road, the runoff to US-1, is that going to be contained in catch basins or how much water is going to run there? I apologize. So that's one question. And the only other thing that on the positive side, you know, it was going to a PUD, we're going from 10 to what we interpreted as 9, but she said 9.4. I don't think that that's a bone to contend with. I mean, we recognize the need for affordable housing, and I just wanted to let you know that we spent some time looking at this, watched the LPA proceedings, and do not find a lot of fault with this. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner Smith. Public. Is there any other public comment on this? I'm seeing none. Commissioner Smith. Peter, can we, Peter, can you bring back up the landscaping plan? I guess it's probably the best one to talk about. Let's see. I think she had it in here, too. Yeah. Thanks. And so I think what's important to make note of the difference between what the county does and what the city does is very much representative, I think, in this plan. First and foremost, and this is something we commented on, I commented on at one of our joint meetings a couple years ago relative to the units that the city was proposing, or not only at that time proposing to build, but ended up building. These are two-story units, and they're two-story units adjacent to unincorporated Martin County. Great. Fantastic. The comment I raised back with the city years ago with what they were proposing is how interesting it was to me that all of the four-story units, or basically most of them, if not all of them, were adjacent to unincorporated Martin County. Their two-story units that they were presenting to us at that time were within the city and adjacent to city voters, which I always thought was kind of interesting that they didn't really particularly care about the residents that were adjacent to their projects that weren't in the city. And this project is adjacent to its unincorporated neighborhoods to the north and to the east, but it absolutely embodies, I think, what's more Martin County than not. Certainly, all of the upland reserve area, the 60% number of open space. I think the interesting thing, too, in the presentation, when you look at the landscaping plan, is you have that center area between all the units in the dry retention area that's really well landscaped. And for the people that are going to live there, they'll actually have a place to use as common area, which we had a project a couple of years ago come before us, which I questioned had very little, if any, open space in terms of a common area space for kids to play in. Because I assume this will have families and younger folks in it, and it's just really nice to know that contained within at least the neighborhood, there'll be someplace for the kids to go and enjoy a place to run around without having to worry about going out into the street area to do so. So, well done on the project. Don and others, I just, Dana, you know, great job. And this does, I just, I really do think that it's a perfect project to say this is a Martin County project versus what the city built over the last couple of years is dramatically different. And that, if there's no further discussion or whatever, I would make a motion to approve staff's recommendation. Second. Mr. Campy. Sort of to piggyback on some of Commissioner Smith's comments, this is exactly the type of project. There's not a room full of people here fighting it because you took some of your neighbors into consideration with the large buffer. It's not built four stories directly on the sidewalk. It is, you've taken beyond just what is the legal requirement for parking. And took a more of a lifestyle approach to the parking calculations. You didn't skimp on landscaping. You didn't try to squeeze in a couple of additional units at the sake of a, as Commissioner Smith said, a community area of the pool or the open space. And when people are concerned, you know, it's a tightrope of building quality units where residents can live, but not really damaging the flavor and character of our community. And you've done that very well today. So, I appreciate that. And I offer my second. Okay. Anything else? With that, we have a motion by Commissioner Smith, seconded by Commissioner Campy. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously. Unanimously. You got a unanimous vote on that. Unanimous. Is that happening in your life, Dawn? Yeah. He's old and deaf. He can't hear you. Yeah. All right. Department number one, Office of Management and Budget Items that Require Board Approval. Happy birthday to your daughter. Stephanie Murley. Stephanie Murley, Director of OMB. We only have three items today. The first item is permission to apply for the Indian River Lagoon Council Water Quality Restoration Grant. The Utilities and Solid Waste Department is requesting $200,000 to reduce the homeowner connection costs for nine existing Connect to Protect Community Grinder Sewer Service Areas. The match is $800,000, which is already budgeted within the Utilities and Solid Waste Division Capital Improvement Plan. The second item is a permission to accept the Section 319 Golden Gate North Outfall Best Management Practice Grant. The grant award is for $400,000 to fund the construction and installation of an upflow filtration box and elevated weir. The match is $100,000, which is already budgeted within the Ecosystems Golden Gate BMP Capital Improvement Plan. And that is all I have to say about that one. And then the last item is a permission to accept the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission Artificial Reef Construction Grant. This is to accept $60,000 to construct three artificial reefs in the Donaldson-permitted area using recycled concrete. It requires a match of $30,000, which is already budgeted within our artificial reef CIP. And that is all I have for you today. Commissioner Smith. Just back to, I think, Stephanie, the first one was the grants for septic sewer. Correct. Just, again, to emphasize, and to our legislative delegation, the absolute importance and need for them to work language into whatever is going to happen this year with any changes of putting affordable or affordable-challenged neighborhoods into language that we can apply for neighborhoods that would otherwise not qualify and the ability for us to stack grants on top of each other that we ran into last year when we couldn't do that. So I just use it as a platform to keep pushing that hopefully our delegation can get something done this year that will help us. And even to Ed's neighborhood discussion this morning to help us with the overall cost of what it's costing now to put services into our neighborhoods that are doubling, if just nothing else, for the PVC cost. And a lot of that had to do, you know, I forgot about this this morning, Ed, when we were talking about that, but that plant that was destroyed in Texas that was, like, the sole producer of material for PVC piping, that really changed the game a lot, which seems kind of silly that you'd have a sole supplier, but nonetheless. Thank you. With that, I'd move approval of Stephanie's presentation. We have a motion by Commissioner Smith, seconded by Commissioner Hetherington. All in favor? Aye. Aye. And that passes unanimously. And that's all we have to say about that. That's it. Department number two, contracts that meet the threshold for board approval, $1 million or greater. And you are not, Christy Brett. Tasha Sapp, procurement supervisor. Commissioners, I have two items for your approval today. The first one is landscape maintenance for county facilities. With a maximum not to exceed value of $4 million. Maximum not to exceed term of five years. And the recommended action is that the move the board award the contract to, nope, that's the wrong page, sorry. The lowest responsive and responsible bidder, Sunshine Land Design, Inc. And move that the board authorize the county administrator or designee to execute all documents related to this request. And our second one is resilient Martin engineering and planning. With a maximum not to exceed value of $5 million. And a maximum not to exceed term of five years. Move that the board award the contract to Applied Sciences Consulting and Michael Baker International, Inc. Move that the board authorize the county administrator or designee to execute all documents related to this request. Thank you for your presentation and understudy. Motion to accept. Second and comment anyway. Go ahead. Just a little shout out to Sunshine Land Design. They do some amazing work for us and continue to do it. And I know that they've had some challenging issues that they're dealing with in their sort of family of employees, if you will, this year. So just a little short call out that thanks for all the cool work that you guys do for us. Palm City based. Sorry? Palm City based. Well, okay. Okay. I did make a motion, I think. No, I did. You did? Yeah. Did I second it? Okay. Let's go with that. For discussion. You did. Okay. We have a motion by Commissioner Campy, seconded by Commissioner Smith. I was wondering if public comment. Anyway. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? No. So we are passed unanimously. Thank you. All right. At this time, we are end of our agenda. So we are going to take our 505 public comment. Anybody? Going once. Going twice. Okay. When's the next meeting? I'm going to ask for Commissioner comments, if you don't mind. I'm just asking you, when is the next meeting? It's about six months. Yeah. I'm not trying to tell you to say it. I was asking you, when is the next meeting? Okay. It is January 6th, 2024. No, it's not. No, it's not. February 6th, 2024. Okay. I'm having a little classes problem. Anyway. Commissioner Smith. Commissioner Hetherington. I'm good. Commissioner Campy. I'm fine. Thank you. Two observations. One is that I marched in the Martin Luther King parade on Martin Luther King Day, which was really nice. It's really grown to be a very participatory parade. One thing that I noticed on that walk was the Boys and Girls Club is going up. My goodness. That's going to be the most awesome building in Martin County. And thank you to our very, very generous residents, mostly from down south, for donating the funds to build that facility. It is going to be spectacular. Another spectacular thing is if you live in my part of the county or Commissioner Jenkins' part of the county, you've been going through, driving along Dixie Highway in Port Salerno, wondering what on earth is going on with the property that's just north of the boat ramp and across from Whistle Stop Cafe. And it's a new restaurant. It's a building gut that's happening, and that's going to be the new home of the Port Salerno Cafe. It looks like it's really going to be great outside seating, waterfront seating. It looks great, so I'm really excited for that project. It's a wonderful thing to happen in the CRA is another restaurant. We need many more of them. I also had a good time at the parade. My five-and-a-half-year-old grandson got to ring the bell all the way through. He had an absolute blast. Commissioner Smith and I and Don were on the antique fire truck, and Commissioner Hurd almost had to run up. She's not going to be able to keep up with us. We lost you about halfway through. So anyway. Yes, go ahead. I don't know if you all got yesterday, but we got a questionnaire probably from Joe Flanagan on what went right, what didn't go right. And I asked Kathy to respond back to him and said, I thought everything went perfect. I don't know that I would change anything from the parade that they did. The timing was great. The route was great. Joe had it, as Joe does, perfectly well organized. And so congratulations to them for a really well-done event. They did. It was. Joe works very hard. Okay. With that, our next meeting, as stated prior, is February 6, 2024. I'm sorry I didn't ask you whether you all had anything. And with that. Mr. Stokas, you did a remarkable job. He was awesome today. And deserved the standing ovation, but we won't give it to him. He did really great. All right. With all that, we are adjourned. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.