Board of County Commissioners on 2024-07-09 9:00 AM - Jul 09, 2024

9th, 2024 BOCC meeting. Our invocation will be a moment of silence, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance, led by Harry Yates, 3rd Class Petty Officer, U.S. Navy. Please stand. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, to the true republic for which it stands, one nation and God, indivisible, with liberty and justice. Thank you. Can you spend some time and tell us a little bit about you? And we have a microphone for you. Oh, there you go. Oh, microphone. Oh, my gosh. Are you recording all this? Yes, we are. As a matter of fact, we are. I guess I better say some good words. Good, yes. Well, let me tell you about three years, ten months, eight days, and 45 minutes. I enlisted in St. Petersburg, Florida, and they flew me to Jacksonville, where I was given some mental and physical examinations. And there, I did the promise then. Hold on. Upheld the court. No, it's not on. It's got to be closer to it. Dead. Here we go. Here we go. And so I took the oath, promising to protect the Constitution. It was listed in the Navy. I had the first time, I had two choices. One was in the Navy. This was one of them. Where do you want to go to boot camp? I said, what are you going to do? Are you going to Chicago or San Diego? Well, I had October, November looking at me. So I said, San Diego. Ironically, they flew me to Chicago, caught a plane to go to San Diego. Well, I got in the boot camp. And the first day is always, you know, get your shots and get your clothes and stuff and get your barracks and so forth. Well, the Navy is somewhat different than the Army or Marines. Ours isn't physical. Ours is basically going to class. It's primarily all we do is go to class, learn about the Navy procedures, uniform code of military justice, and other things. And then we, one day we'd go to swim class. And we had a big boot pool. We had to show up how we could swim. And then they taught us how to use our uniforms, our clothes, if you go overboard, how to float, use them for floats. Okay, the next day we'd go to what I call terror training. One day they'd give you a mask, and you went into a house, and they filled it full of tear gas. And they wanted to see who was the last one out. I wasn't the last, I'll tell you that. I was just more in the middle. Then after that, we learned how to put out an oil fire on the ship. And a week later, we went out in the field and had a shooter rifle. And we were carrying an M1 all through this whole exercise, but it was a fake one. So we went out to the field, and they showed us how to fire an M1. And a week or two later, we went through another examination, an aptitude examination. And I'll tell you what the best thing you could do in the Navy. And I come to find out, my first choice, or first one, I could be an air controller. They go, but to go to air control school, because it's a long and dedicated service, you had to ship over. I said, what's my second choice? They said, go into radar. So that's what I did. I took my second choice. Second time I had a choice. Well, after boot camp, well, in boot camp, one thing all the services basically have is prating and review when you graduate. And you get out in the grinder, and you go past the general or the admiral and salute them. Well, my first, I was going to radar school, but there was such a delay that they sent me to a radar picket ship. And I was on there for six months. And all I did was go out off the coast, about 300 miles, and go in a circle and come back. It was part of the two-line district, distant or early warning. The thing I remember most about that was the first time I went out, I was going under the Golden Gate Bridge. I looked up, and all of a sudden, the boat started shimmy, shimmy, shimmy, shimmy. I said, oh, my God. The first time and only time I ever got seasick. After my duties there, I'm going to radar school. Radar school was on Treasure Island, which is an island between San Francisco and Oakland. And so on there, you know, it was two weeks of electronic training. The only thing I would stick out during that period was one time three of us were going to the exchange. And as we were walking up the exchange, this woman came towards us. And so we stepped off the sidewalk so she could pass the woman around. All of a sudden, we heard this word, gentlemen. We turned around, and there she was, a full officer wanting her salute. We forgot the salute of her coming down. We recognized her as a woman, but we didn't even recognize her as an officer. So we forgot that. So she could have written us up and sent us to a court martial or something, but she didn't. She just accepted our salute and went on. But it was the first time I ever declared a woman. And first time and only time I ever saw a female officer. Well, after boot camp, they assigned me to a destroyer down in San Diego. And it was a good duty because we'd go out to sea a little bit, do some ship exercises and all that. Then we went to Westpac, which is the Western Pacific. Went over there for about eight months. And first stop was Hawaii. Enjoyed that for about four o'clock. The only thing about Hawaii was every four o'clock in the afternoon, there'd be a little shower. You didn't even have to go inside. There'd be a little shower. After Hawaii, we went to the Philippines. Really enjoyed the Philippines, but we were only there to show support, the Navy support to the Philippines. After that, the place you may have seen in the news lately, that's a narrow piece of water between Big Week water. And it borders 96 miles wide. And our job was to cruise up and down for about a week and check the electronic missions that the radar, that the Red Communists were using. What kind of radar were they using? And we did that for a while. And we did all the normal things there. Then after that, we went to Japan. Had some leave there. And we took it. The thing I remember most about that first trip there was the fact that I took this tour. And we went to Hiroshima, the spot of the first atomic bomb. And I look around. I said, my gosh, I can't believe this. I mean, they're really doing some building up. I mean, you still can see some destruction at the time. But they were really trying to build up the city again. And then I went to the museum. And saw the pictures of all the destruction and the people after the war, after a bomb. So I went back, got out in the Navy, and we went back to San Diego. Okay, we're there, normal duty in San Diego, going out and doing different types of seat exercises. And one day, we got a word. Hey, we're going to sea. We weren't supposed to. There's no liberty today. We're going to sea. So we had to pull out to sea. We thought some rough exercises were coming up. And all of a sudden, here we are, escorting three support ships full of Marines and Army. And we took them down to the Panama Canal. They were going over to the east coast. This was doing the Cuban crisis. I said, oh, my gosh, these guys are going to Cuban crisis. But we didn't go. We didn't go anywhere. We just went back up to San Diego. And the next trip, we went out, going to Hawaii. All things were fine. And then from out of Hawaii, we were told, we were going to Venezuela. I mean, not Venezuela, Australia. So I was all excited about that. We all were. And they said, we're going to be at sea for two and a half days to get to the two and a half weeks to the Philippines. So they let us have a beard growing content. Well, at the time, the captain said he's going to view everybody. And I knew at the end of the two weeks, I could not, I wouldn't be the best one. So I went in and I shaved a little bit off each side. And so I had long sideburns, my goatee and mustache. And the captain went, he picked the best one. He said, also, I'd like to point out, I like that I'm at Harry Ate's is the most unusual beard. So I don't know what the awards were, but we had to have our pictures taken with the captain. One of the jobs you do when you're going overseas, you're usually taking a carrier with you. And we had carrier duty several times on the trip. And carrier duty was, we were about a mile behind the carrier. There was two reasons for this. First reason was planes coming in for landing. We used that spot as planes to turn to head for the carrier. The second reason was, if they ejected, we were there to pick them up, okay? So we did normal things, went to the Philippines, and they told us, no, you're not going to Australia. So we went to the Taiwan Straits again. Then we went to Honolulu. We were there for a couple days and went back to Japan. And all of a sudden, we got word of going back to Honolulu. We were going to be stationed in Honolulu for a whole month. That was probably a reward for not going to Australia. So we were in Hong Kong, and we had a station ship. We were liaison for the local government and any ships that came in. There was no port or anything. So Hong Kong was a terrific place to go. I mean, great food, great tourists, great shopping, great women. The whole nine years. So after that, we went out to South Korea. I don't think we were supposed to know that great women part. I don't think we were supposed to know about the great women part. Oh, okay. Anyway, after that, we went and did some ship exercises with South Korea. Then we went back to Japan. And we were all excited about that. But all of a sudden, one morning during Reveille, the captain comes on and says, I'm sad to report, but the president of the United States has been shot and killed. Oh, God. He says, there'd be no liberty today. We're on standby. So for three days, we're on standby in Japan during the whole crisis of the president being shot. After that, we came home, went back to San Diego. And a few months later, I was discharged. One little sideline I'd like to point out. On April 6th this year was my birthday. And Colleen and my other daughter and my wife threw me a surprise birthday party. And prior to that, a week prior, some lady asked me, how old are you going to be? And I said, I'm going to be 73. And all my kids and my wife said to me, no, you're going to be 83. Okay, okay. So at the birthday party, Colleen brings out a birthday cake. And on it was 84. So the question was, how am I, you know, my wish is to go to be 84. Anyway, I bring this up because it brought to mind 60 years earlier, coming from Japan, going back to the U.S. We crossed the international date line on my birthday. So I had two birthdays. And it was great. The question was, was I 40 or 21? I said, I'll take 21. That's my story, people. Thank you. Thank you. It's a pleasure having you. And for those that don't know, Mr. Yates is father to my commission aide, Colleen. And I was at that birthday party, you were referring to. Yeah, I look a lot alike. Yeah. Okay, neglects, regrets. Oh. Oh. No time for regrets. Do you briefly have, briefly, have any regrets? Yeah. The first two, a minor one and a major one. The first regret was I went to Hawaii twice and never went to the U.S. Arizona Memorial. For a Navy person, that was terrible. But my major regret was I retired several years ago. And I got pensions from a couple of places where I worked and Social Security. But I regretted not going into the Reserves. A major regret because, you know, with the current retirement I had, I could afford a nice Toyota Highlander. But had I had the Navy pension from them, I could afford a Lincoln Navigator. Well, that's the two regrets. Any other questions? Thank you, sir. All right. All right. So today we have 905 public comment. We have a 12 p.m. private attorney-client session, which is Department 4, 505 public comment. And additional items, consent number 10, request approval of First Amendment to lease agreement between Martin County and the Historic Society of Martin County, Incorporated, for the proposed Elliott Museum expansion. Consent polls, we have none. And we are going to now move on to proclamations. Oh, yeah. Let's do that first. I'm sorry. Let's approve the agenda. Commissioner Smith. All right, Mr. Chairman. Move approval of the agenda with the additional item of consent, item number 12. And there are no consent polls today. Second. All right. We have a motion by Commissioner Smith, seconded by Commissioner Hetherington. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously. Okay, now we're going to do proclamations. And let's do the one that we need to vote on first, which is how to – do you want to read that or – Do you want me to go ahead and do this first or you want to just – Well, okay. Do we want to adopt the presentation and proclamation recognizing global – Geoglastoma. Geoglastoma. Geoglastoma awareness in Martin County, Florida. I'll motion to adopt the proclamation. I will second it. Okay. We have a motion and we have a second. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously. And from here, Laura will take it and I'm going to move down. Glioblastoma, or GBM, is the most common malignant brain tumor accounting for approximately 50% of all primary malignant brain tumors. And it is the most aggressive, complex, difficult-to-treat, and deadly type of brain tumor for which there is no known cure. Approximately 14,490 new cases of GBM will be diagnosed in the U.S. this year, and it is estimated that more than 10,000 individuals will succumb to GBM each year. July 17, 2024, is Glioblastoma Awareness Day, a day to express support for the individuals who are battling brain tumors, as well as the families, friends, and caregivers of those individuals. And here to accept, we have Brianna Apostolopoulos, Vice President of Hope and Gray. Apostolopoulos. Does that mean you're Irish? Yeah, hardly. Good morning. First, we'd like to thank our Board of County Commissioners for their support recognizing Glioblastoma Awareness Day, which is July 17, 2024. We would also like to thank our community that is rallying behind us as we launch Hope and Gray, a nonprofit aimed at supporting the fighters, admiring the survivors, honoring the taken, and never, ever giving up hope. It's estimated that more than 10,000 Americans will succumb to their glioblastoma diagnosis every year. My mother was one of those individuals in 2020, and our president, Crystal, her mother was one of those individuals just last year. I'm sitting across from a doctor and hearing them tell your loved one that despite treatment, if you can get treatment, the disease will ultimately take your life is something that no one should ever have to encounter. Unfortunately, there are more mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, daughters that will make up that 10,000 that will receive that diagnosis this year. And leaving their families with questions as to how to navigate the next 15 to 18 months if they're lucky enough to have that time. Sometimes that diagnosis comes, and they have days, they have weeks. So it's up in the air, and it's a very aggressive disease. That's where we hope to come in, and so we invite you in bringing awareness to glioblastoma and supporting those currently fighting. Thank you. Thank you so much. I'll say, I'll get it back. Next, we have a proclamation declaring Treasure Coast Waterway Cleanup Week in Martin County, Florida. Treasure Coast Waterway Cleanup Week is being observed July 20th through the 28th, and residents are encouraged to participate in the 17th annual cleanup event scheduled for Saturday, July 27th. Over 1,200 volunteers will participate in cleaning up our precious waterways throughout Martin, St. Lucie, and Indian River counties. And the board commends the sponsors and volunteers whose contributions to this effort are so important to its success. And here to accept, we have Gail Bird, founder of the Treasure Coast Waterway Cleanup, along with some other folks. Come on up. Good morning to you all. Good morning. Thank you for having us here, and we are very excited about having another great year. I think it's the 17th year in Martin County and two other counties that the marine industry has brought into the fold, St. Lucie and Indian River County. FIND gives a grant to each county, which is very, very helpful. We have a support of many municipalities. Non-profits are in cooperation with environmental government agencies, and they participate as well. All ages, groups, individuals are invited to help us, and they need to go online and register at TCWaterwayCleanup.com. After registering and participating with any group or family or neighbors that they wish to participate with, they turn in their data online. That's the trash that they collect, and in that event, they are rewarded with entering raffles for all kinds of gift certificates, tickets, etc. Everything we can provide in a big-time way. We have 125 miles total that's included, 19 sites this year, seven in Martin County. And I'd like to introduce the new, newer president of the Marine Industries of the Treasure Coast, Dan Romance, with Indiantown Marine Center. Good morning. Good morning. My name is Dan Romance. I'm the president of the Marine Industries Association of the Treasure Coast, and I'm here representing the Treasure Coast Waterway Cleanup. Thank you for proclaiming July 20 to 27 Waterway Cleanup Week. The Marine Industries Association of the Treasure Coast and the Florida Inland Navigation District are happy to bring the Treasure Coast Waterway Cleanup to Martin County for the 17th year. Since 2008, we have removed 102 tons of trash from our waterways. Our group targets 125 miles of waterway from Hobes Sound to Sebastian, in addition to approximately 15 miles of beachfront and a dive cleanup at Peck Lake Park in Martin County. In 2023, there were 1,146 volunteers who collaboratively removed 3.47 tons of trash from the waterways. Our week-long self-reporting event will be July 20 to 28, and cleanup sites will be open on Saturday, July 27. As Gail said, please use tcwaterwaycleanup.com for more information to register and for the digital collection form link. The Martin County 2024 sites include Blowing Rocks Preserve, Indian Riverside Park Boat Ramp, the Jensen Beach Causeway Boat Ramp, the Layton Park Boat Ramp, the Ocean Boulevard Causeway Boat Ramp, Peck Lake Reef Dive, and Shepard Park. Thanks again. Thank you. Good morning, Commissioners. My name is Jim Moyer. I am the Indian River Keeper. This opportunity allows us to sort of sample the trash that is in the Indian River Lagoon and along our waterways. It's an ideal moment to understand what the human pollution in the Indian River Lagoon and the St. Lucie Estuary are. It gives us a chance to understand how we're affecting our environment personally and how we can do a better job of cleaning it up. As the Indian River Keeper, our site is the Jensen Beach Causeway, and we find great comfort in being able to clean up some of the unintentional garbage that gets there. One of the things that I've been doing recently is taking some of the discarded fishing gear off of the artificial reefs. Last year, I was able to get almost 200 pounds off Bullshark Barge itself in one day of cleanup. These are things that we don't do on a regular basis, but we take an opportunity in the late July to measure our success, and it is a profound success. And I, as the Indian River Keeper, appreciate Martin County's involvement in this, and thank you very much for proclaiming this week, Trash Cleanup Week, and we can do a better job. Thank you. Excuse me, Butch Olson. So, in conjunction with the Waterway Cleanup, we also still continue to hold the Pex Lake Reef Dive Cleanup, which we all know is very important because our reefs are dying. We have this coral disease. It's very terrible. So, just like Waterway Cleanup, our partners – well, again, the Pex Lake Reef Dive Cleanup is ran by the Portsmouth Commercial Fishing Dock Authority. Historically, we have many great partners over the years with us, including DEP, FWC, and NOAA. And, again, just like FWC – I'm sorry, just like the Waterway Cleanup, we have more – every year we have more volunteers, and we're finding less debris. So, last year we had 54 divers and found less than 200 pounds of debris and no anchors. So, I just want to give – we want to give a special thank you to Martin County's – to multiple departments, including Coastal, Public Works, Tourism, and Parks and Rec, because they have been amazing partners throughout this project since the beginning, and they are a huge reason why this event is so successful in Martin County. Thank you. Picture time. And our final proclamation today is a proclamation recognizing Martin Reeds in Martin County. The first years of a child's life, when the most rapid brain development occurs, lay the foundation for all future learning, which is dependent upon literacy, as children must first learn to read before they can read to learn. Statistics show that children who are not reading on grade level by the end of third grade have a greatly diminished chance of success, impacting not only individual well-being, but also the prosperity of the broader community. The board recognizes Martin Reeds and encourages all citizens to join in the efforts to increase literacy and support the youth of our community. And here to accept, we have Kiana Kelly, who is the Martin Reeds coordinator. And Cherie. Good morning. Good morning. On May 17th, the Children's Services Council and Martin Reeds was very blessed to have Indian River County's Learning Alliance founders, Barbara Hammond and Liz Woody Remington, as well as Marie O'Brien from Indian River County, come down and co-facilitate a reverse visioning. And during that reverse visioning, we envisioned 2028 as Martin County's year of literacy greatness, right? We were at 90% literacy for our grade level reading. And it was a phenomenal event. More than 40 people from our community came out and supported and engaged and figured out the different ways that we're all interconnected and getting our children on grade level reading. And we came away from that with such a charge and energy about how we can get our kids there. We're not there right now. We had a three-point increase and we're at 54% literacy for the county, but we can do 90%. Indian River County is our model. They're where we go to because they look like us. They have a lot of the same issues that we have and they have been extremely successful. And some of the things that have made them successful is their sense of community and everyone taking this up as their issue. And so they have gone from 38th in the state to 7th in the state to now most recently 5th in the state. And that 7th to 5th is within the last five years. So grade level reading has been a huge part of the Children's Services Council since 2014. And we're going to continue that effort. This proclamation is about really solidifying the day that we all came together at the table and we came up with real firm strategies on how we're going to do that. So Martin County School District was there. They're a huge supporter and they're a big part of this. And one of the things that we're going to do is have a lab school. And that school, we're going to pour all the resources into that one school and try to get the results out of that school. So this proclamation is about signifying the day that we're all sort of coming together, the village of Indiantown, the city of Stewart, the school board, and Martin County and propelling this forward. We would really love to see that 90% literacy by 2028. As you know, children who cannot read by the third grade are more likely to end up on welfare. They're more likely to end up in poverty. And we will be having a screening of a film that is going to really sort of bring that idea home. It's called Sentenced, and it is co-executive produced by the Children's Literacy Project, as well as four-time NBA champion Steph Curry. He also is narrating it. And we will be showing a screening of that film in September to really sort of broaden everyone's eyes to what illiteracy does to a community and what it looks like for adults as well as children. It's not just the children that are impacted when adults can't read, that homes suffer, and the levels of trauma that these children experience when there's not a literate parent in the home. So we really want to get everyone galvanized around this effort and capitalize off of the energy from the reverse visioning. We're very blessed and thankful. My entire team from the Children's Services Council is here, so I'm very excited. Our executive director, Dave Heaton, Laura Hasse, Cherie, everyone's here. And we're just really excited, and we want to make sure that we make literacy a priority in this community by setting the example and by every adult realizing what their part is. So one hour a week, one child. That's all it takes. If every adult gives one hour to a child, we can get there. So that's what I got. I'm just really excited about literacy. Yeah, bring the team up. Yeah. A team. Cherie, get in the picture. Come on out. Thank you. It's a great group. Okay. Now we're going to move off to public comment. Oh, yeah. That's right. Sorry. Got ahead of myself once again. Proclamation number three, acknowledgement of the citizens who are participated in class 65 of the Martin County CARES program. Martha Ann. Why don't you tell people what the CARES program is? Is that what you're going to do? Oh, do you want to tell it? No, I was going to stand for a picture, but I'm ready. All right. I need two minutes. Maybe a minute 30. Good morning, commissioners and members of the public. I'm here this morning, as Commissioner Jenkins said, to share that we've just completed our third session of Martin CARES this year. And that's our 65th class. So we're now well over 3,000 residents who have firsthand knowledge of the structure and function of our local county government. As you know, through Martin CARES, we provide residents an opportunity to meet the people who are working every day to make our community strong, resilient, beautiful, and accessible. And we're always excited to have a few employees in the class, and it gives them a chance to interact with the public and provides perspective. It strengthens connections and gives them the opportunity to see some of the projects and the people that they work with but maybe have not ever had a chance to meet face-to-face. So we have a few representatives of our class here this morning. I'm going to invite them up to join us for a photo. I'll read you guys' names, but you can come on up. We have Emily Castellanos, Juanita Dodd, Jamila Gully, Ildiko Haidacher, Sarah Johnson, Robert Johnson, Debbie Muir, Jeff Norwood. Sarah Powers, and Bill Wilkinson. Y'all want to come up? We can go in the well. Where do you guys want it? We'll go in here and then you can shake some hands. Oh, yeah. Yes. Shake some hands. Stay for a photo. Can I take a picture? Yes, ma'am. My daughter wants it. Yeah, of course. It's all set up. Okay. Where she's in the stage. Oh, yeah, then you guys can stay. We have to see you back in. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And then squeeze in for a photo. Yeah, Jeff, you can go back around the other side. Scoot in there. All right. We were here. Right? Yes. So we'll go back over. There we go. Yeah. All right. Everybody scoot this way. Oh, you guys went in. Perfect. Another can. They're like, no. Okay. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. All right. All right. Stay there. Got some more smiling. Looked like you had fun. We did. One, two, three. We're going to take a few. Thank you all very much. We used to use cats. We used to use cats. We used to use cats. We used to use cats. We used to use cats, I guess. We used to use cats. You guys, if you come out to the lobby, I have your seat. All right. 50 tickets. Good. Thank you. Thanks, you guys. It was a pleasure. Thank you. You're welcome. Hi. Seven. Okay. Oh, my bad. Now I can do public comment. Public comment, you have three minutes. After two minutes, 45 seconds, you'll hear a tone. That just tells you to wrap. You have 15 seconds to wrap it up. And Mr. Donaldson has a little spiel he would like to do. Yeah. Since we are in 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 group of persons. Thank you. All right. We're going to begin with Mr. Rob Ranieri, followed by Sam Maloney. Good morning, Commissioners. Rob Ranieri with House of Hope. Just wanted to address you today. I see that you'll be discussing the Camino Trail. I'm here to encourage you to take staff's recommendations and use the ARPA dollars to fund the completion of the trail. A big reason why Golden Gate, where the trail will run through, looks like really all of our lower-income communities, where we have significantly higher than normal levels of diabetes, obesity, heart disease, hypertension, all chronic conditions that can greatly diminish with exercise. The trail will provide a great resource for the neighborhood and for the county. There'll be, obviously, it's a walking trail. There'll be learning opportunities, vegetable gardens, exercise areas, all things that will hopefully change and encourage positive lifestyles for the residents of Golden Gate, all ages, from kids to adults. What we've seen at House of Hope is quite often when we can get a household healthy, a lot of other things will fall into place. So health is definitely an anchor around families that keeps them in generational poverty. You have an opportunity today to fix that for the Golden Gate community. So hopefully you'll all support the trail, and we look forward to its construction. Thanks. Thank you, sir. Mr. Mahoney is going to be followed by Mr. Serkis. I'm here again for my three minutes. I'm going to tell you how grateful I am for all I heard today. There's incredible work going on by you all. The high risk was removed from the lifeguards requirement for job positions because they said they couldn't get employees. Lifeguards have been hard to find since the beginning. In 1992, we were required to be lifeguards with EMT certification, with EMT certification in 1992. And ever since then, we have always had that EMT certification requirement. And it has enabled us to have professionals come to the job. I've met so many young men and women and girls and boys from high school that said, oh, I want to be a lifeguard. I said, you'd make a great lifeguard, but you've got to get your EMT. And they said, oh, well, I am not doing that. They just want to come. So just to make a short story long, it is an incredible asset to have this EMT requirement. In 2005, the state and Martin County Fire Rescue was designated high risk because all EMTs require that they get paid high risk. Another great asset for the lifeguards. They check all of those boxes, longevity, blood-borne pathogens, and risking their lives. So they came in and said, fire rescue the day before I spoke, that they're going to train the lifeguards to that level as an EMT. But nothing will get an employee that comes out and applies for a lifeguard job that EMT certificate. You work the hospital to get that certificate. You go to classroom time, and you work the ambulance, and you learn a lot of high-risk treatment and stabilization of patients. And we've been doing that since 1992. So to get more employees, they took away that EMT certification and promised you that they would train them. As an example, the jet skis that they have are no longer being taken care of, so we're not getting jet ski training. There's two people that passed away at Marriott last week that had six children. The lifeguards gave CPR while bringing the victims in. They were down there, found the bodies, gave them CPR in the water while making a rescue. Now, that's the kind of training that they're not going to be getting. So short story even longer, lifeguarding is very unique in that quality. We don't need people coming out because they want to surf, they want to sit in that tower, they want to be a lifeguard. It's a professional, and you would never take away anything from the fire department. Let's say one of your guys on your rig, they don't need EMT anymore. Oh, you would never do that. And it's been a real blow to the lifeguard division to say you no longer have to be that professional on this job and have that EMT certificate. You renew that every two years, you rehearse it, and you train. I have a wealth of nothing but factual information. Please reach out to me if you don't, like the rest of these great causes, get on board with what I'm talking about. I can give you some good information. Thank you for your time, and if I don't hear from you, I'll see you in two weeks. Thank you, sir. Have a good day. Okay, Mr. Michael Serkis, followed by Mr. Tom Pine. Good morning, Michael Serkis from Palm City. Later on this afternoon in the Office of Management Budget Department 2, you guys are going to be having a discussion about the Western Land Studies for Western Martin County, which I think is a fantastic idea. A Western Land Study is long overdue for our community. I do have a question, though, why it is that we would commission the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council at $100,000 and then have a $200-an-hour option after that for follow-up to do the Western Land Studies. When I looked in our growth management department, we had somewhere between 25 to 28 full-time equivalents. These are professionals in our own staff who deal with this literally on a daily basis. This is the whole wheelhouse of growth management. I would assume that this is something, if we've done in-house, you have the expertise built in, you have the expertise that does this on a daily basis, why would we contract an outside source to come in and what I would presume turn around and go back to growth management and say, hey, we need this information, this information, this information. Why not keep it in-house to begin with and just stick with our own experts? Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Pine will be followed by Thomas Glass, and that is the last speaker form I have. Good morning. Good morning, Commissioners. My name is Tom Pine. I've been a resident of Martin County for over 50 years. Today in the consent agenda, this commission will approve $30,366,191, which was spent between June 3rd and June 23rd of 2024 without identifying the payees or the purpose of the payments. The consent agenda is supposed to be used for routine expenditures only. More and more secrets. That's not how democracy works, but that's how our Martin County commissioners are approving more items behind closed doors. They will approve non-ad valorem and solid waste assessment resolutions without any discussion. The price of garbage collection is going up. Why the secret? Also approved in the consent agenda at the beginning and meeting with no discussion was a resolution, is a resolution to adopt a special assessment for capital improvements in 10 different areas within Martin County. Doesn't anybody think the taxpayers deserve to know what's going on? On the final agenda of June 28th, 2024, consent number 10. Of course, it was never discussed. Request approval for a list of special events requiring load closures, July 1st, 2024 through June 30th, 2025. It's long past the time that road closures throughout Martin County for special events needs to be reassessed. We have beautiful large parks throughout the county that can and should be used when practical, such as craft shows, art shows, food truck gatherings. 23 years ago, we used to enjoy the craft shows that closed off the downtown areas. Today, they're a nightmare. There's nowhere near enough parking. Everything is crowded. Or we can just continue until something goes wrong and then point fingers as usual. I worked at the St. Lucie Nuclear Power Unit, number two. It's quite a few years ago, but I do remember early on that safety was paramount. On large jobs like that one, the insurance industry gives statistics on deaths and injuries. As I recall, the anticipated number of deaths was around seven or so. With the support of management and workers at the completion of the job, two men had died. A safe job just doesn't happen by chance. It takes a strong effort with no interference from the outs from the sidelines. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Mr. Glass. And if we have anybody else that would like to speak, please fill out a speaker form. Good morning, commissioners. I thought it was going to be talked about, but it's on number seven involving my case. It's gone before the magistrate from the $1.2 million to 10% of market value, which I think is $21,000. I don't know how it's moving forward with you guys, but if there was any way that that could be something that could be a little bit more affordable, you know, the $21,000, I mean, I think you give me 30 days to pay this, so, I mean, I don't need – it hasn't been spoke on. I don't know what's going on. I thought you guys were going to talk. I would know more what's going on. I didn't know I was going to be called up before it was discussed, so that's where I'm at. Thank you. Richard Campy. Ms. Woods, can you just explain how the – or Ms. Elders, whoever, would want – how that process of code violations and how they go through the magistrate so that – I'm sure Mr. Glass is aware, but so that folks that are wondering what he was speaking of could give us a better understanding of how the process works? Just Sarah Woods, county attorney, just to explain, I was under the impression that Mr. Glass had had numerous conversations with staff about what was going on. The code enforcement process is one that's been delegated to a special magistrate. The magistrate makes the recommendation, and we merely validate that. The board doesn't have a separate hearing. This is in accordance with county policy. We're also, per board direction, looking at adopting a formal policy on this, but there's a longstanding policy of reducing these fees to a certain percent, 10 percent of the fine that's accrued or 10 percent of the property value. So I don't think there's any surprises here, respectfully. So I guess my point is, is that the process through the hearing where – not specifically Mr. Glass, but anyone that has a code violation can go through a process – At the magistrate level. Evidence and testimony can be given, and the magistrate, separate from us, makes that determination. Quite often there are communities that don't give any – Correct. – where the amount is the amount. And so what we've done here, and sometimes to be criticized by, is we do allow, in this particular case, Mr. Glass, the opportunity to have 10 percent of what the official grand total of the fines – Or 10 percent of the property value, whatever's less. So now – This is, in fact, I believe, I'm looking at Ms. Elder, is the property value, not the fine. This is a longstanding code enforcement fine that had accrued a significant amount of fine. I believe so, yes. I guess my – So we went with the smaller amount. My final question would be that, based on whatever the amount is, is it a lump sum payment, or is there a possibility of making some kind of a structured payment? I'm not familiar with the details of it, but I'm just – There must be some member of our – I appreciate what you're saying. That's why I brought it up. Yeah. I can imagine that someone says, hey, you owe us $21,000. That's a big number to – Right. So whoever our staff member is who handles these things, if they can speak to Mr. Glass and find out if there's – you know, creating a number that he can't afford to pay just creates the next situation versus creating a situation where, if that's what's been determined is the number, but at least give them some opportunity to spread out the payments to make it actually payable. Correct. We can talk to code enforcement about that. There is a lien placed usually on the House, but once that's paid off, it will be released. So we can talk to code enforcement about a payment plan. So that in this particular case, Mr. Glass knows what his options are. I just want to make it clear so there's no misunderstanding. The lien won't be released until it's fully paid. I mean, there was – I mean, I was – I went to the magistrate. I was told that it was coming here. I would like to – you know, I haven't received a bill. I don't know how to move forward. So I saw where it was on – Rachel said it was on the agenda for today. So I'm here today just to see where it is, how I'm moving forward so that this can be resolved. I'm sure there's – you're not the first person that this has been a situation for. So I'm sure there's a process. Well, $2 million down to $20,000 – you know, over $20,000. And if I was under the understanding that I have 30 days to pay this, so, I mean, I just – Someone from our staff will reach out to us. Well, that's all I'm just trying to get to the – you know, I'm trying to just do my diligence, you know, as well as a citizen of Martin County. I respect that you came here to ask questions, and it was on the consent agenda. That's why I brought it up so you could have – Thank you very much for your time. I appreciate it. Elise Elder, Deputy County Attorney. Just to clarify, so the board approved the magistrate's recommended order today. So once that's approved by the board, then you will get it in the mail. So that's why there's been a delay. Commissioner Smith. And just a follow-up to all this last conversation we had with Mr. Glass when he came forward and talking to staff. My request of staff is that we do have an agenda item that comes forward that helps us clarify, codify whatever we need to policy-wise, that whether it was policy that was longstanding policy or not, there should be something that we can point to in every instance that says exactly how we do, what we do, what we do, and why we do it so that Ed's question or our questions are very clear and staff can point to an ordinance or to a section in our code that says this is how it's carried out. Thank you. Okay. All right. Seeing no other public comment, we're going to move off to Commissioner comments. Commissioner Smith. Thank you. I'm all set. I'm all set. Been out of town for a couple weeks. I'm a little disconnected. Apologize for that. Commissioner Campy. All set. And I have two requests. One is, I think it was about in 2010 that there was a shelter for homeless mothers and children built in Port Salerno. It's called Miss Butterfly. There's subsequently, there's one built in Port St. Lucie and a bigger facility in New Jersey. And it's really been a tremendous success in Martin County. And unfortunately, the need for a shelter has grown rather than reduced. So back in 2010, there was the proposal. It was probably a PUD. And there was a proposal for a future administration building on the same site. It was never built. And now it's become apparent that a greater need exists for additional housing and perhaps for the need to be expanded to homeless grandmothers. So at any rate, there's the same person who created the Miss Butterfly facility back in 2010 is now trying to get a federal grant to increase the size to do instead of making an administration building to make it to expand the size of the facility for homeless mothers, children and grandmothers. And I would just like to ask Commissioner's support for a letter of support for this grant application. I'm all in favor of that. Terrific. Another one is there's a request that I received via e-mail for property, seven buildable lots in Port Salerno. And they're behind the Wawa, east of U.S. 1, if you know where that is. And they're allegedly, the e-mail says that the land uses and the zoning on the properties are not consistent with what Habitat needs. Can we have staff look at that and determine, because we want to encourage Habitat. If there are seven properties that they can use to build houses on, we certainly want to encourage that. So I would just like to ask staff to look at these and determine whether or not it's in our best interest, in their best interest, to proceed with the comp plan necessary, comp plan amendment if necessary. Absolutely. I think the letter mentioned that they were hoping to have it be an internal comp plan application. I know. Yeah. So we, yeah. That's, as far as I'm concerned, that's the only way the government should get involved in affordable housing is leveling the playing field and taking down some of the barriers from not-for-profits that are trying to do it. So I'm not opposed to that at all. Terrific. Thanks. You're two for two. You got any others? All right. I'm going to stop right there. Mr. Donaldson. Oh. Ms. Woods? No. All right. So now I'm going to move off to Value Adjustment Board appointments. Ms. Donna Gordon. And because we've never done this before, I'm curious. Donna Gordon. I work in administration. Value Adjustment Board, I'm asking you to reappoint the one and only applicant, Ms. Diane Castellucci. And then per Florida statute, the board, the Value Adjustment Board is composed of two members of the county government board, you all. And one has to be elected as the chairperson of the VAB. So the current VAB members are Commissioner Smith and Commissioner Hurd. And the other three commissioners are considered alternates. I have a question for you, Ms. Gordon, if I may, Chair. Please. The chairman has to be a commissioner or it can be a board member? It has to be a commissioner. And it can either be decided right now by us or at the reorganization meeting of the Value Adjustment Board. Correct? Oh, right now? That's? It has to be chosen by the board, designated by the board, not by the Value Adjustment Board. Okay. Who's currently the chairman? I am. Everybody comfortable? I make a motion. I don't care. You want to be the chair? It doesn't matter other than. You're both on it. But not for now, but there is absolutely some effort that we need to put into the structure of how all that functions. I make a motion that Commissioner Smith become the chair. Second. And that the remaining, that Commissioner Hurd would stay on as our member and that Commissioner Hetherington, Jenkins, and Campy stay on as alternates. And Diane Castellucci, first off, we thank her for, she was rolling off and requested to stay on. She was the applicant, sole applicant. She's a terrific person. She's got an excellent background. So, I would thank her and motion that she stay, be re, excuse me, reappointed. Okay. So, we have a motion by Commissioner Campy, seconded by Commissioner Hurd. All in favor? Aye. Aye. All opposed? And, Commissioner Smith, I just noticed your light was on. That's fine. Just a general comment about the structure of how we operate, what our role is as a value adjustment board. There is continually a lot of confusion as to exactly what we do and what authority we have to change decisions or make different recommendations relative to what comes to us. And, we're working with the clerk's office and with the property appraiser's office to more clearly define for the public what exactly the role of the value adjustment board is by statute, but also by Martin County's rules. Okay. Okay. Duly noted. Motion passes unanimously. And, thanks again for the extra Independence Day holiday. Oh, well, thank you. Is that what that was? Yeah. Okay, public hearing number one, legislative public hearing to consider the adoption of a comprehensive plan amendment, CPA 2422, Hobestown Train Station, Mr. Clyde Doolin. This is one of my pet projects. Good morning, members of the board. My name is Clyde Doolin. I'm here presenting the public hearing one, Hobestown Train Station. This is a future land use map amendment to the comprehensive growth management plan. As you know, the board voted to abandon 5,400-odd square feet of right-of-way in order to use that land to make it developable. A future land use designation must be assigned. We have, and the recommendation is for a change to the CRA Center future land use designation. This has been reviewed by staff. Notice has been published in the newspaper. Surrounding property owners have been notified. It meets three of the four criteria that staff must use to consider any future land use map amendment. It meets all the sprawl criteria. The local planning agency considered this proposed future land use designation of CRA Center and recommended 4-0 in approval. So with that, I'll end staff presentation and say staff recommends assigning the CRA Center future land use designation to the 5,465 square feet of abandoned right-of-way. I'd like to pass the gavel, but before I do that, this is not a bright-line station. As ridiculous as that sounds, I get it all the time. This is the historic train station that was literally about 300 or 400 feet away. Originally, it was 300 or 400 feet away from where it's going today. So it's going back to its home. It's a historic structure. And with that, I will pass the gavel and note that there is a light on. Yes. Commissioner Smith, you have your light on. So did you pass the gavel? Did you make a motion? I would like to make a motion to accept staff's recommendation. Can I second that? You can. And can I have a conversation about it? Absolutely. So, you know, it's interesting at this time of year, there's a lot of conversation about comprehensive plan amendments and whether the county should do them or not do them, and is it in the best interest of our community. And when you try to explain the process of comprehensive planning and comprehensive plan amendments, sometimes there is the assumption that one size fits all for making these decisions. And here is a perfect example of a comprehensive plan amendment that is needed to rightfully put back what was traditionally in downtown Hope Sound, its historic train station, which a lot of us have been thinking about and working on. And thankfully, Commissioner Jenkins has put us in a position to make that happen. And I can't think of, in the world of historic preservation in Martin County, there have been a lot of challenges to some of the things we have been able to accomplish with historic preservation, but I truly can't think of a more special project than putting the historic Hope Sound train station back in its rightful place. And, Commissioner Jenkins, thank you for making all of that happen. And what a tremendous effort to save a piece of Martin County history, but more especially, can you say more especially? No. No. Whatever, for Hope Sound. Another little nugget when I was at Harry and the Natives the other morning for breakfast, Harry's sister has, I guess, taken a fond liking to train station. And I had forgot this part of history. And so for those of you who find all of this interesting one way or the other, when it was moved before or in the process of being moved, it was actually stolen. Like somebody tried to steal it, and they got as far as, like, Jupiter? County line. County line. I still find that fascinating that somebody, like, hijacked the train station on a truck and tried to steal it. So to those that were involved, too bad for you. It's back home. Hopefully. Not yet. Hopefully it cured well. True. I mean, it could still be stolen again, but we'll watch it this time and make sure that doesn't happen. But anyway, congratulations, Commissioner Jenkins. That's really special. Thank you. And thanks to the folks that donated it back because somebody rightfully owned it, the Hurley family. Absolutely. And in talking to the Hurley family, Mrs. Becker, which is that was her maiden name, has always envisioned that structure being brought back to its rightful place for decades. So they have been also motivated within their own family to accomplish that. I think also, too, from what I remember, and I thought it was 52, but I guess it might have been 57 or 58. It was the cover of Life Magazine. Was it? For Coca-Cola, it was a Coca-Cola ad. Really? Yeah. It was a really cool picture of the Hopesound train station and a Coca-Cola ad. Well, there's something I didn't know. In Life Magazine. You know, it was a little Harold Jenkins. That was before my time. Shorts and knee socks. I didn't show up until the 60s. Sitting there, drinking a Coke. Very well. Well, I think it's a great asset for Hopesound and Martin County in general, so congratulations on that. And there's a motion on the floor by Commissioner Jenkins, seconded by Commissioner Smith. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion carries unanimously. Okay. And why don't you just keep that? Yeah. There's another one. Next item is the same. Oh, okay. So we have PH number two, public hearing to consider adoption of an ordinance amending Division 5, Hopesound Article 12, Community Redevelopment Code, Land Development Regulations, and Martin County Code, LDR 24-4, Hopesound Train Station. Presented by Clyde Doolin. Commissioner Hetherington, Elise Elder, Deputy Commissioner. This is a quasi-judicial. I know it says public hearing, but because of the nature of the proposed ordinance, it's a quasi-judicial. So we need to ask for that. Great. Full tech expert, eh? Commissioner Smith? If I do, they're filed. If I have any that have been filed. I've got plenty that have been filed. I have none that have been filed. I have none, and they've been filed. Do we have any witnesses that have to be sworn in for this? Yes. Yes. We did have an intervener, but he has withdrawn his request to intervene, and with the agenda item and the notice, the certification of notices surrounding property owners, there's an email withdrawing the desire to intervene by the gentleman who did. But yes, witnesses need to be sworn, particularly Clyde. Okay, so any witnesses need to be sworn, and they will stand, and Layla will swear you in. Raise your right hand. If you swear or affirm the evidence you're about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. I do. Okay. Is there any kind of paperwork necessary? It's work history. Work history to be turned in? Yeah. Handed in just now. Okay. I think that completes everything, right? Okay. Take it away. Clyde? Thank you. This is the same piece of property as in public hearing number one. This is 5,465 square feet of abandoned right-of-way. In addition to the future land use designation, a CRA subdistrict must be assigned to the property. Staff recommends approval of the core subdistrict. It implements the future land use designation and provides a variety of uses and would easily provide and allow this, the proposed train station. I'm going to go to a map. As you can see on the map on the screen, the core subdistrict is already assigned to a piece of county-owned property, this triangular-shaped property, just to the west of Diske Highway, and this is the proposed, this is the abandoned right-of-way that staff recommends assigning the same sub-district, C-O-R-E, core, to it. It provides for a mixture of uses, as does the general sub-district on the properties to the west. And we can go into the details of the permitted uses and so on like that, but it's safe to say that it will be compatible with the properties north, south, east, and west. And with that, I'll end staff presentation and say staff recommends approval of the core subdistrict. Commissioner Jenkins. And with that, I would like to, staff's recommendation. Second. Public. Oh. So, pending public comment. Pending public comment. I second it, pending public comment. Okay. Do we have any public comment on this item? Seeing none. Oh, Commissioner Smith has his light on as well. That was to make a second, but there was a public number. No, you already got one. That's it. You get one. Okay. We have a motion by Commissioner Jenkins, seconded by Commissioner Campy. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries unanimously. Thank you very much. Do you have an update as to when? Thank you. Thank you. Nice job. So, the end of the month, the train station is, the contractor has prepared it for movable. I see it. It's up on top. It's been, the additional part has been cut off and the interior structure has been put in to rebuild the wall and all of that. So, it is literally waiting on the moving contractor, which is the beginning of August. Once it gets to the site, they can't really build the foundation because it's a peer type foundation until the structure is on site because they build it under it. So, it's all on schedule. Great. Fantastic. Get it? It's on schedule. Yep. So, with that, it's been noted to me that, oh, yeah. Would you like your gavel? Yeah, I have my... Can I have that, please? Thank you. All right. It's been noted that our next two items are going to take more than the 13 minutes before our closed captioning break. So, we're going to do that break now, and we'll see you back in, let's give us 13 minutes. Yeah. 1030. All right. Welcome back. Our next item is a department quasi-judicial number one request plat approval for Twin Oaks Project K05-0-002 will be presented by Brian Elam. And with that, anybody that is going to testify to this item, please stand to be sworn in. 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? Okay. Has all the proper paperwork and notices been in your resume been turned in? Copy my work history and the agenda item. Okay. Is there any interveners? No interveners. No interveners. And with that, Commissioner Smith, do you have any... If any, they've been filed. I don't believe I've got anybody. If they have, I've been filed. I don't have any. They've been filed. I don't have any, and they've been filed. Okay. All right. Thank you, Chairman. Commissioners, for the record, Brian Elam, Principal Planner with the Growth Management Department. This is a request by Engineering, Design, and Construction on behalf of D.R. Horton, Inc. for approval of the Twin Oaks, formerly known as Canter Oaks Platte. The platte is consistent with the final site plan, which contains a 28-lot single-family home subdivision, on approximately 16.86 acres, included with this application as a request for a certificate of public facilities exemption. The site is located at 8821 Southwest Canter Oaks Drive, on the west side of Southwest Canter Highway, north of Southwest Tropical Avenue, approximately .44 miles west of the Florida's Turnpike Overpass in Stewart. It's just the title page of the platte, it's five pages, and it is consistent with the final site plan. Review of this application is not required by the local planning agency. Development review staff have found the application to comply with all applicable regulations in the Comprehensive Growth Management Plan, as detailed in the attached staff report, and staff recommends approval of the Twin Oaks platte application. We move the board receive and file the agenda item and its attachments, including the staff report as Exhibit 1. We move the board approve the Twin Oaks platte and the contract for construction of required improvements in infrastructure. That concludes the presentation. Any questions for staff? Seeing none, do we have an applicant's presentation? I'm Kristen Spake of McCarthy Summers. On behalf of the applicant, thank you to staff for their work on this. We don't have anything to add, but there are representatives here in case you all have any questions for us. Okay. Any questions for the applicant? Seeing none, back to the board. Second. Okay, we have, oh yeah, do we have any public comment on this item? Seeing none, we have a motion by Commissioner Smith, seconded by Commissioner Hetherington. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously. Thank you. Next item, department quasi-judicial. We could have done that. We could have. I don't know. He told me that it was long drawn out. Anyway, request for approval for the final site plan for West Jensen PUD, Phase 1B, Parcel 6.6W038-108. And again, Mr. Elam, this is a quasi-judicial. If you're going to testify, please stand up and be sworn in. 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? Mr. Elam, has all the paperwork, your resume, and notices been turned in? Work history and the agenda item I've just turned in as Exhibit 1. Okay. And is there any interveners? No interveners in this. And Commissioner Smith, do you have any? I don't have any, and they've been filed. I don't believe I have any, and they've been filed if I do. I don't have any, and they've been filed. I don't have any, and they've been filed. They didn't want to talk to anybody. Mr. Elam. Thank you, Chairman, Commissioners. Again, for the record, Brian Elam, Principal Planner with the Growth Management Department. This is a request by Thomas Engineering Group on behalf of Booz Development Group, Incorporated, for approval of the proposed PUD final site plan to construct a 5,300-square-foot single-tunnel car wash and associated infrastructure on approximately 1.77 acres of vacant land, included as a request for a certificate of public facilities exemption. The parcel is located on Lot 6.6 of Phase 1B of the West Jensen PUD on the west side of Northwest Federal Highway, approximately 500 feet south of the northwest Goldenrod Road in Jensen Beach. The site is located within Phase 1B of the West Jensen Planned Unit Development, a regional impact, which was originally approved in 1989. The proposed development is accessed from the east side of the property by way of a private road, owned by the West Jensen PUD Commercial Property Owners Association. West Jensen PUD Phase 1B, which includes the subject site, consists of approximately 155 acres located along the U.S. 1 and Goldenrod Road corridor. The development has established concurrency pursuant to the approved DRI and does not result in any increase in square footage, area, or intensity of development. As previously proved, invested, and therefore qualifies for a certificate of public facilities exemption. The property is located within the primary urban service district and will have access to the full complement of public services. The site has a designated future land use of Commercial General and its own PUD WJ, West Jensen Planned Unit Development. Review of this application is not required by the local planning agency. The development review staff have found the BOOS Development Group Incorporated application to comply with all applicable regulations in the Comprehensive Growth Management Plan as detailed in the staff report. Staff recommends approval of this application. We move the board to receive and file the agenda item and its attachments, including the staff report as Exhibit 1, and move the board approve the PUD final site plan for Phase 1B Parcel 6.6 of the West Jensen PUD. That concludes the presentation. Okay, do we have any questions for staff? Is this parcel south of Wawa and north of Chick-fil-A? Yes. It's the most valuable piece of property in Martin County. I would guess success. Go to Wawa, get coffee, get your car washed and swing through and get chicken nuggets. Absolutely. Huh? Yes. All right. Interesting. Okay. Does the applicant have a presentation? Good morning, Mr. Chair, Commissioners. Chris Campbell with Mr. Car Wash. Nothing else to add. Just want to say we're excited about the opportunity to come to Martin County. My engineer and I are here to answer any questions that you might have. Thank you. Any questions for the applicant? I think you're the actual first car wash in Martin County. I think you're the only one. Right. Even though I've heard that that's an excellent business to go into. So good for you, Mr. Car Wash. There are currently at least three under construction. At least. I was listening to the radio and they said that the business, and no one's going to believe this, but the business to go into, the most lucrative, is car washes and storage facilities. So Mr. Storage as well or just Mr. Car Wash? A future expansion. Okay. Okay. Do we have any public comment on this item? Seeing none. Back to the board. Second. Okay. We have a motion by Commissioner Smith, seconded by Commissioner Hetherington. All in favor? Aye. Motion passes unanimously. And those two items together didn't end up being 13 minutes. Anyway. Okay. Okay. Next item. Martin County Employee Recruitment and Retention Update by Heather. Huh? Day in. Day in. Day in. Day in. Day in. I should know that by now. Like day in, day out. Exactly. So good morning, Commissioners. For the record, Heather Dayen, Director of HR Risk. With me this morning, I have Tim Buckley. He's the President of Resource Government Services. And the purpose of our presentation this morning is not to ask the board for anything, but just to give you a brief overview of some of the challenges that we've encountered with recruitment and retention since COVID and what we're doing as an organization to combat those challenges. And finally, Tim will give you a brief overview of some of the workforce trends that we're seeing for 2024. One of the biggest challenges that we've encountered since COVID has been with employee turnover. And turnover is simply when people leave the organization. And as you can see from our first slide, the increase in turnover since FY20. We saw some improvement in turnover in FY23, but we're still not back to those pre-COVID rates of less than 10%. The area we see the highest turnover is in our entry-level positions. And higher turnover in this area is normal. However, we've not experienced turnover rates this extreme. The other area we're struggling is to fill our professional-level positions. These positions are not high turnover. They're just more difficult for us to fill when we have a vacancy. An example of that would be with our public works department. We lost one of our very talented engineers to the private sector, and we've been recruiting for this position for over six months. And we're just now being able to fill it. And so as a result, public works has to pay consultants to fill the backlog. So why is this important? It's important because employee turnover is expensive, and it's disruptive to our operations. And when we consider turnover, we're looking at the cost of recruiting, of onboarding, of training new hires. But we also have to take into consideration the intangible costs. So the reduction in our service levels, the burnout of the employees who are picking up the slack, and also all of the knowledge that we lose when people leave our organization. So what has the county been doing, and what are we doing now to combat those challenges? So after COVID, we saw an unprecedented shift in the workforce, in recruitment, which has forced us to adapt. And so as part of our recruitment strategies, we had to come up with creative ways to attract and hire talent. And some of the things we've done to accomplish this include hosting our first hiring event in 2022. This gave job seekers the opportunity to come in and interview with our hiring managers and possibly be hired for the position on the spot. If that person was successful in the pre-employment process, they were paid a hiring bonus. We've also placed now hiring banners at locations throughout the county and placed the magnets on our pool vehicles. And with the help of our communications team, we've been able to enhance our social media presence. So an important recruitment strategy is important, but retention has become as crucial as recruitment. We had to shift our focus to not only hiring talent, but retaining them through engagement strategies, career development opportunities, and also competitive compensation. And some of the things we've done in this area include the use of career paths. And career paths give our employees the opportunity for professional growth, for skill development, and higher earning potentials. The other thing we've done is the use of milestone plans. And milestones give us the opportunity to hire individuals or promote individuals who may not have all the skills at the time, but we develop specific milestones for them to achieve to get them to the level needed. And as I mentioned, engagement and development are as crucial as recruitment. And some of the things we've done as part of our engagement efforts include the two employee recognition programs. One is safety on the spot, and the other is our spot on, which is the employee recognition program that we started last year. We have a comprehensive wellness program called Commit to be Fit. And this program focuses on four primary areas, employee health, fitness, mental, and financial health. We offer flexible work schedules, and we have recently enhanced our employee intranet. And I would like to take this opportunity just to thank the board and administration for all of your support with our engagement efforts. If you recognize the gentleman in the top of the slide, Terry William was our winner of our spot on employee of the year, and Jeff Hunter was our safety on the spot employee of the year, which the board recognized at a meeting a couple of months ago. Also, thank you for all of your support on that. Oh, that was Carlos. Everybody knows. The other one in the top pictures. Everyone knows Carlos. Oh, right, right. So Terry William and Jeff Hunter. Those were our winner. Oh, Don. Yes, and Don, of course, Don, of course. So as part of our development strategies, we have Sailfish Academy, which offers two tracks of coursework. One is for employees who are aspiring to be supervisors, and the other are for our current supervisors. We have the Pulse and Sailfish Bites, which are supervisory learning tools. And we recently increased our tuition reimbursement program. And earlier I mentioned the use of career paths. We've found those to be a very powerful recruitment and retention tool, giving our employees the opportunity for professional growth and us the opportunity to develop future leaders for succession planning. Again, I'm Tim Buckley with Resource Government Services. And I'm here just to kind of give you a lay of the land of the private sector, what is being seen in the workforce, wage trends, et cetera. And since I go off on tangents a lot, I've made detailed notes, so I don't. So the workforce in general, both public and private sector, is changing because the demographics are changing. Competitive wages are growing post-pandemic, and it is affecting the public sector more so than the private sector because the private sector is reacting quicker than the public sector is able to. Employees are experiencing severe financial stress across the board, public and private sector, and that is putting additional pressure on employers to try and meet those needs of employees, recruit, retain, and live. That doesn't look good. In early 2024, Gen Z, people born after 1997, will outnumber baby boomers joining Gen X and millennials in that category. By the end of next year, Gen Z will make up 75% of the workforce. Why does this matter? It matters for a number of different reasons, but the key couple of reasons are baby boomers created the norms that we all expect in the workplace. They grew up in an optimistic period of time. A booming economy was built on their backs. They found a job. It provided for them a comfortable living, and they stayed. That was, for most folks, that was the job that they retired from. As each new generation was added to the workforce, that norm changed dramatically in tenure. Baby boomers had an average of eight years. Each generation degraded that. We now have an average of four years total across all generations in the workforce, and Gen Z has almost two years, which means that they're taking a new job, and before they're proficient at the job, they're leaving. So that's an impact that they have to work on quite a bit. And I will go back to one of Heather's slides. You all deserve a lot of credit for giving Matt and your HR folks the support, the tools, and everything that they need to create one heck of a workforce in the county. Sorry. So one of the biggest norms now with the addition of Gen Z is what is known as job hopping. Driven by changing generational attitudes towards work, employers need not only deal with hiring to maintain headcount, to maintain operations, but also cater to the changing attitudes and the effort to retain the talent that's being brought in your front door. Gen X, Gen Z, millennials care less about the future. They're not as concerned with pensions and other benefits as much as they are pay and work-life balance. What that means to a Gen Xer, I'm not exactly sure, but what they want is to have pay and purpose in their work. Public sector employment is a great place to portray that, but getting them past the compensation barriers is your first hurdle. Florida's got another problem in the private sector is the shortage of employees or workers that are seeking employment. In Florida, at the end of 2023, for every 100 jobs that were available in the state, only 53 people were looking to fill that job. Almost twice as many jobs as there are workers in the state of Florida. Part of that occurred post-pandemic because one in five people that were laid off or furloughed or whatever during the pandemic, or even kept on working, have made a change to their livelihood. 17% have retired. 19% have transitioned to homemaker, whether they're male or female, not a traditional use of the word. 14% are now working part-time. 26% say it'll never be necessary to return to full-time employment. 26% and 50% say that they don't want to come back to work unless they can work remotely. What happened to that? Okay. So since Gen X began to dominate the workforce, work-life balance, flexible schedules, engagement aimed at well-being and career development have become necessary retention tools. Again, hats off to Heather and her team because they have implemented almost every single one of these items. Excuse me. Which brings me to the impact that we're all seeing and why it's difficult just to recruit. Washington, D.C. will tell you that over the past months, wage growth is outpacing inflation. But over the past three years, we've seen points where inflation was higher than we saw in 1982. The reality for employees is that the wage increases they've seen over the past decade have been completely wiped out by inflation. The cumulative inflation over the last three years is 22%, which means that it costs you, me, and every single one of your employees $1,100 more every single month to pay for the same things they bought in 2019. That's $13,000 a year, a ton of money, but the reality is the impact of inflation can be seen in these three categories. And these numbers are actually old and they're higher. Gasoline's up almost 60%. Food is actually 22%. Shelter is almost 13% now. So that's $1,100 more that they're paying every single month. Looking at the big picture of wage growth, tight labor markets, widespread turnover, and the popularization of quitting, mandates requiring minimum wage, and inflation concerns are driving wage growth. And, again, as I said at the beginning, the private sector adapted quickly coming out of COVID. They were able to, because they can make decisions a heck of a lot faster. A CFO memo to a CEO and it's done. The process is a little bit different for you folks. That being the case, early in 2022, the pay gap between public and private sector grew from about 12% nationally to 24%. What that created was an environment where the private sector, facing difficulties in recruiting, started poaching your people. And it was easy to do, because they could offer that 20%, 25% increase in pay instantly. Further, that's right, I got that. I'll leave that in there. So that pay gap and the reaction of the private sector brings me to this kind of stuff. Buc-ee's is an example of blowing up the norms in the private sector that screws up everybody. What they're paying is, what, $18 to $20 an hour. Some jobs at $42 an hour, where in the rest of the private sector, that job is paying $14.33. So they've just thrown it out the window. What that does is not just increase the pressures on pay, it increases the perception that you guys are not paying enough. Or whoever's not meeting these numbers is not concerned with future employees. I'll fire through a couple more of these. People are leaving because, number one, pay. Your wages are growing against inflation, but the percentage of increase in government-mandated minimum wage is you're not making much ground on. That's not a big deal other than in perception. People don't feel that the raise they're getting, any amount of money that they're getting from their employers is providing enough of an increase versus what they're experiencing in their day-to-day lives. And increases in minimum wage, whether it's $15 or $16 in Florida or $20 in California, perpetuate the perception that I'm just not making enough money, which creates the culture of quitting. So 47% is the average across the board in voluntary and involuntary turnover in the United States. 70% of that number is made up of voluntary separations. It's nearly $4 million workers that quit each and every month. And nearly 35% quit without another job. That's it. And I'll end with this. About 45% of the people that you hire today will start looking for another job within three weeks and will leave you within six months. Sorry to be so rosy. Well, thank you. That concludes our presentation. Happy to answer it. I know. I'm sorry. That's why I left Tim to answer that. What they're doing is being proactive. When the job market gets into a growth pattern again, that will be too late to be making the decisions that you guys have to make. So they're being proactive. Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play? I've got to un-hack you, Mike. Mr. Dawson. And I just wanted to say that, you know, that certainly reflects some of what's happening in our marketplace in terms of the challenges with employees. But I think things that we are doing well within our organization is the constant learning component. So I think some of our best staff, we have grown from within our tuition reimbursement. A number of them have graduated with bachelor's degrees from Indian River State College and have consistently moved up in the organization. And now our managers and department leaders who we've been able to promote within. Those folks have also helped to bring a culture of training their other staff. So I think we've, throughout the years, have always looked for how we organize our staff structure so that it allows somebody who, once they get in the door and see that there are opportunities for them to get a promotion, you know, if they learn some additional skills. And the other thing I think that we offer here compared to some other local governments is you all have allowed us to do cool stuff. I think a lot of the type of projects that Martin County engages in challenging is to do a lot of real meaningful work. So I just wanted to end it that, yes, the job marketplace is what it is. And I think it is changing. And our adaptation to remote work is we struggle with it just like everybody else. And it's how you limit it and verify it. And, you know, there's a lot of metrics to do it right. And I think we're doing that. And we'll continue. We're adaptable. I think Martin County is adaptable. And the last thing I'll say is that I think, you know, in general you'll find that our organization, compared to people per position or people per, you know, I'll use like signal technicians per number of streetlights, things like that, you'll find that our typical number of staff is much lower than other areas. And so I think what we've tried to do is have, you know, a smaller number of staff but have them well trained and have their work meaningful as opposed to throwing a lot of numbers with average people trying to do the job. And that's where I think governments have, in my opinion, have not done as well. And so that's been Taryn's focus before me and mine today continuing is to have a smaller, well-trained staff that can be nimble and flexible, while that may be some monoxy moron for government. But I think we do pretty well compared to our neighbors. So anyway, I think there is a lot of positive things that we're doing. Commissioner. If you're the right one to do it, can you go back to the slide where it showed the, all the generations and the age breakdowns? This one. This one. Was there one before this that showed? This one? No. Before that? Keep going. No, maybe not. I'm sorry. Go back to that other screen then. So the Gen Z is going to be the largest by far group. Seventy-five percent of the workforce within? Five years. Within the next year. Within the next year. And so their age right now is six to 24, or that's? Well, that's, they were born in the, uh. Ninety-seven, you said? Ninety-seven to yesterday. Yesterday. Twenty-twelve. So, yeah. And so it would be interesting in trying to understand this, because at the Association of Counties, we've been talking about this for years, and knowing this was coming, and what to do about it, how to, for us to think about how we deal with it, um, what would be interesting to know is when the various groups hit 30. Like, how many in the percentage category of the Gen Zs, at what year do they hit 30? A lot of friends that I have in Martin County that I've known since they were teenagers are now in their 30s. And what they thought as teenagers, and now that they're married, some have children, is a very different thought process. Um, I have a really good friend that lived in downtown Stewart, because that was the place to live, and when her two kids got old enough, they moved out to Palm City. That's what everybody does. To a gated community, because they were concerned that their neighborhood was wide open, and they wanted to be a little bit more safe, and a little bit more, and not that Stewart's not safe. It's just the idea that if I'm behind a gated community, it's a different perspective. And hence, also comes a much more awareness of your kids' education, what you're doing in life, your insurance, and you even start thinking about house payments and college for those kids that are eventually going to maybe reach that stage if they go. And so, it'd be interesting to know, if the Gen Z group is that big, if they're 75% of the workforce, at what, how many more years do we have till we kind of hit the apex of that age group at age 30-ish, somewhere around there? And, and, and like the Gen Xs and the Millennials, are they changing their way or thought process when that all starts to happen? And then how do we, how does the local government, how does business, period, react to that? One thing I've thought about for a long time is, and relative to all this, is that you all kind of touched on the opportunities you have if you were to get into Martin County government or into our workforce, how to progress and how to grow if you wanted to stay, right? What other incentives would want, would somebody want to stay in the workforce if we had it available to them? And it's something I've always thought about, and I've had this conversation with our folks that are planning on the health care facility. I've always thought for years, long before I had a three-and-a-half-year-old, that some kind of daycare system ought to be built into our structure. That if there was one thing that probably, when you mentioned like gas prices and food costs and everything else, I know what we're spending on daycare, sort of-ish, I mean, summer camp, whatever you want to call it, it's really expensive. And I've got to imagine if you were dealing with entry-level Gen Z employees that had just gotten married or just have kids or just starting that process, that one thing we could build into our system, like a lot of corporate structures did back in the 90s even, and I think Apple was like one of the really ahead of their time, is shouldn't we be thinking about what can we do to help our employees offer them something in our structure that takes some of the cost away of what they have to deal with as being employees? Like if they're working, then they're probably putting their kids in daycare. And if we had a daycare system built into our programmatic healthcare system, however you want to capture that, would that be helpful? And thinking about that Gen Z number? Well, so the answer, Commissioner, is, I mean, it's going to depend on how that's provided. 2027 starts the first year that Gen Z will be 30. So where that apex winds up being, I'm not sure off the top of my head, but, you know, childcare, not surprisingly, coming out of the pandemic, is one of the fastest-growing segments of the workforce. Their salary is skewing a lot of the rest of the marketplace. The number of jobs advertised and opportunities in that field have increased exponentially since we came out of the pandemic. So if there's, you know, if there's a desire to create a new way of enticing someone into the workforce, especially as they're starting a new family, childcare is certainly one of them because it ain't cheap. No, and I think of, you know, the practicality of it all. If a parent were working for us and on their lunch break they could stop in and see their kid's kid and get back into the workplace again and were part of the system, would that not be a benefit? Would that not be something that may not be being offered by many others, at least in our region that I know of, that are doing that? And that goes to work-life balance, which is, you know, one of the things that they're concerned about is, you know, how much of my life is here and how much of my life is with family. I mean, one of the things that my father worked, still had enough time to coach basketball, attend anything and everything that my brothers and sisters and I did. Most people in the middle class don't have that luxury anymore. They've got a second job, and they're doing all kinds of things. They're not spending... Assuming your father was a baby boomer. My dad was a baby boomer. Or is a baby boomer. No, he passed away, but he was a baby boomer. You have on his wall all sorts of his plaques of... Everything. Every service organization you could think of. And they don't exist anymore because we don't have time. I don't have time for Kiwanis. Okay, Commissioner Hetherington. I was just going to elaborate on the Gen Z, if that's going to make up 75%, and then your highest turnover positions are, say, equipment operator, park service specialist, field ops, and customer service. It seems like a really good idea to target our local young people that are coming out of our high schools. Project LIPS, and some of them have done a fabulous job training and placing some of these young people into trade positions. So if we could collaborate with the school district and create programs to pipeline those young students into exactly we know where we're going to have the highest rate of turnover, then that's great for our community. It's great for those that we know that some of them would like to stay here. And so I think if we could put more emphasis on developing pipelines directly into those areas that we know are going to have the highest turnovers, we might have more success. So I can assure you the private sector has challenges just as much. The private sector also has what the market will bear, where government maybe doesn't. In my small company of 100 folks, at this point we've accepted the fact of the bottom 20% being a revolving door, and it's just ridiculous. The lack of motivation, the lack of wanting to improve yourself, it's scary. Those that show some initiative, we're having success, and not only just me, my peer group, promoting within training, training is huge. And I think we're doing a great job of that at the county. But I still, it's almost comical. In my business, the hardest job to fill is one that is a truck driver that drives a truck basically like a Ryder 26-foot box truck to Homestead without killing anybody, count the amount of plants put on it, and drive it back home again without killing anybody. That's your whole job. And that's the hardest job in my company to fill. It's totally crazy. So, oh, yeah. We're going to get some applications now. Yeah. Actually, I'm good right at the moment. I actually have... He's stealing our thunder. Anyway, Commissioner Smith. Wrap it up. Along with Stacey's comment on the pipeline strategy, which is a great idea, and I think it's something we should focus on even more so, how, not that everybody in the world is going to watch this presentation, but for the purpose of who might be and who may talk to somebody out there in the community about, hey, did you hear what Martin County is doing? How does someone best get into the process of finding themselves in an application or in hiring? Where would you send them to? What's the best way for an individual that, say, their parent listened to this conversation and said, hey, I want my kid to go and do this. How is the best way for them to do that? So, they can visit our website. That would be the best way. So, they would be able to look at all of the different departments, and then they would be able to visit our jobs board, and then all of our available vacancies are there to apply online. Is there anybody to call if you're frustrated with the website and it doesn't seem direct enough? Is there, like, who would they reach out to physically if they could? So, they can reach out to our department or email HRDIV. And what would that be? HRDIV is our email, but there's HR contact. There's an RFS if you want to reach out and ask questions about the application process or where your application is in the process. They could go that route as well. We also do one or two job fairs a year? We do. So, our team actively participates in local job fairs, and that gives them the opportunity to get out into the community and engage with local job seekers. And I think Commissioner Huffington's comment is spot-on excellent. Do we work with Project Lift at all? So, we have some of our tradespeople going through a program. Is it plumbers, I think, for our utilities department? Is it the plumbers, I think? It's the electrician. Oh, the electrician, excuse me. So, they are working with Project Lift to get their license at this point. It might be great just for us to go make a presentation. To their program, just to show all the various. I mean, when we all probably talk to different groups, there's a Florida Taxpayers Association group that I speak to every year. I tell them that we do everything you could conceivably possibly imagine we do. Any kind of job, any kind of technical skill, anything we're involved in. And so, if you do business with that kind of work, we do that kind of business. And so, I think to those Project Lift kids, just exposing them to the full kind of spectrum of the various opportunities we have here and the high schools. Right. And we've had our utilities department. They did a program with local high schoolers to, you know, broaden their horizons and inform them about the utilities department. So, we've done that. If you give them jobs but they have nowhere to live affordably, they can't stay. They'll go to where the housing is and they'll work there. That is a huge problem. Yes. Another obstacle. Absolutely. Okay. Thank you so much. Thank you. Good job, by the way. Thank you. A lot of job seekers in the crowd. Okay. Department number one, contracts that meet the threshold for board approval, $1 million or greater. There are two items. Christy Brotherton will be doing this. And Commissioner Hetherington must abstain from A1. So, let's start with that one. Can I just read my statement? I will be abstaining from A1 as a consultant of a Ferrara. They bid on that project for our companies. And I have turned in my Form B and will abstain from that item. Thank you. Christy Brotherton, Chief Procurement Officer. The first item for your consideration is a continuing services agreement for marine services. This contract has a maximum not-to-exceed value of $5 million and a maximum not-to-exceed term of five years. Staff is recommending that the board award the contract to the three lowest responsive and responsible bidders, which are Brothers Construction, Custom-Built Marine Construction, and Ferrara Construction, and move that the board authorize the county administrator or designee to execute all documents related to this request. Mr. Chairman, I would move approval of item A1. Second. We have a motion by Commissioner Smith, seconded by Commissioner Campy. Yeah, that's his name. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion passes 4-0 with Commissioner Hetherington. Abstaining. Got it. Thank you. The next contract for your consideration was actually approved back in May. One of the awarded vendors was not able to provide the required insurance, so our purchasing manual allows that we can go to the next lowest qualified, responsive, and responsible bidder. So this request is to award the contract to the next responsible bidder. This is for the grinder station installation and septic conversion continuing services contract. Nothing is changing as far as the dollar amounts or terms. The next contractor has agreed to match the pricing that was approved previously. So with that being said, staff is recommending that the board award the contract to the Lazarus Group, Incorporated, which will replace the previously awarded contract to Meeks Plumbing, Incorporated, and move that the board authorize the county administrator or designee to execute all documents related to this request. So moved. Second. Second. Okay. Motion by Commissioner Campy, seconded by Commissioner Hurd. All in favor? Aye. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Next, Office of Management and Budget items which require board approval, and believe it or not, there is 16 of them. Ms. Stephanie Murley. Good morning, Commissioner. Stephanie Murley, Director of OMB, here to present to you 16 items for the OMB item today. Our first item is a permission to apply for the Indian River Lagoon Water Quality Improvement Grant from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, FDEP. We are requesting to apply for a grant award of $1.8 million for the Coral Garden Stormwater Treatment Area Expansion Project. This requires a grant match of $625,000, which is already budgeted within the Coral Garden Stormwater Treatment CIP. Our next item is a permission to apply for the FY23 Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant Program. The Human Services Department is requesting to apply for $75,991 from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to support lab expenses associated with mental health court. And there is no match required. The third item is permission to apply for the Bureau of Justice Assistance Grant for the FY24 State Criminal Alien Assistance Program. The Martin County Sheriff's Office is requesting to apply for an amount to be determined for funding to offset costs due to the incarceration of undocumented non-citizen migrants. And there is no match required. Item number four is permission to accept the FY23 State-Funded Appropriation for the Fire Rescue Training Facility. The State of Florida Department of Financial Services has awarded an appropriation of $1 million that will be used to complete the Byrne Building as part of Phase 2 of the Training Facility CIP Projects, which will then redirect budgeted funds toward the completion of Phase 3. There is no grant match required, but that's awesome. Item number five is permission to accept the Florida Statewide Response for Opioid Abatement Funds. The Human Services Division is awarded approximately $1.2 million to support opioid abatement and enables the county to assist qualified residents with support services of that use. And there is no cash match required on that. Item number six is a permission to accept the Substance Abuse Prevention Funding. The Human Services Division is awarded a state allocation of $30,000 to support substance abuse prevention efforts in Martin County, and there is no cash match required. Item number seven is permission to accept the FDEP Indian River Lagoon Water Quality Grant for MacArthur Stormwater Treatment Area. We are being awarded $400,000 to complete a pilot survey to see if water hyacinths can help to improve the function of underperforming STAs. There is no required match, but a local contribution of $100,000 toward the total project costs is budgeted in the total maximum daily load capital improvement plan budget. Item number eight is permission to accept the Community Service Block Grant. The Human Services Division is requesting to accept $100,584 in CSBG funding to provide services to targeted residents for rental assistance, emergency electric assistance, and utility assistance, and there is no grant match required. Number nine is permission to accept the interlocal agreement with the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council for the Western Land Study. The Growth Management Department is requesting $100,000 to approve this interlocal agreement to conduct a review of past planning studies and options identified for protecting the Western lands. Could you pause there? Yep. Commissioner Hurd. Yeah. How did this get on the agenda? Good morning, Commissioners. Paul Schilling, for the record. This was requested a number of months ago as far as the planning study. By whom? By the board. And this has made its way to you today. We've firmed up the contract as far as the scope of services and so forth. What's the purpose of the study? What are the parameters? They're outlined in Exhibit A. Why is the Growth Management Department not doing it? I presume that you will be supplying all of the information, so therefore you're going to be doing an awful lot of work, and we're going to be spending an awful lot of money to have someone, an outside consultant, synthesize that in some fashion. Commissioners, you know, there is a history of having a number of regional studies or studies of Martin County's Western lands going back to the 2020 plan and others. This was discussed about expanding and revisiting, looking at those and summarizing them and exploring, you know, what's the current trend in our Western lands and how does it compare to these other studies. You also know that our public works and our growth management staff have been under scrutiny on our time frames for delivering on development review projects and other items on their plate. So if this was to be a staff in-house only program, it would greatly extend the time for us to be able to deliver. The other piece is the Regional Planning Council has been an excellent partner with us, knowing us locally, to be able to, I think, quickly deliver this study in a timely manner that could meet the objectives that the board expressed an interest in. What's the purpose? It seems to me that we're just allowing the private sector to determine our future anyway. The purpose of the agreement, Commissioner, as outlined in Exhibit A, is to study the previous studies and come up with techniques and so forth that have been previously analyzed as far as identifying areas for conservation, perhaps, wildlife corridors, a GIS component for some mapping capabilities, as far as identifying those areas. So it's a... We know those things. We've already identified those things. We've already spent money identifying those things. There's also a public outreach component that involves our community in terms of where we've come from and where we'd like to be in the future and continuing in our progress towards... That's the most important aspect of that. I have no interest in supporting this, and so I would like for this item to be removed from voting with all the other items in this agenda item. Can Commissioner Smith, hold on a minute. No, I said burr. I thought Stephanie was about to move on. Go ahead. No, I just... Interesting comments about this whole idea. I've been involved, I think, in most of these efforts over the years I've been in office. They're usually met with a lot of different ideas and a lot of very differing opinions, but I truly can't think of a better organization that I've worked with my entire term of office in the Regional Planning Council. They are really good at what they do, and they are very good at pulling together the public's input. They are very good at pulling together the data and the information for us then to make the decision of whether we do something or we don't do something or we implement change or we don't implement change. The Regional Planning Council won't be doing that. They will be providing us and the staff with a full analysis of everything we've worked on in the past, and this board will make a decision on whether to adopt, not adopt, modify, change. But what I am most proud about what the Regional Planning Council does is their ability to impartially pull together everything you ever wanted to know about a subject matter that they are working on for us. They were involved in the, Tom, what was the thing called up in St. Lucie County that they did years ago? The T, the T, which? TVC? Yeah. It was a very, TVC was a very comprehensive study of western St. Lucie County, rural St. Lucie County, when they were confronted with significant changes that were going on in their community. And so I have the utmost confidence that our Regional Planning Council staff, which are part of us, they are part of our organization, we fund them, we work with them, I'm on their board, other members of this board are on their board, and I have the utmost confidence that they will produce an incredible body of work for us. Commissioner Campy. Every time the concept of a western land study or other studies come up about housing, development studies, we get into exactly what you're seeing here in a much smaller scale amongst the five commissioners, I have the utmost respect for the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council and think that they would be the appropriate folks to do this. However, I know some of my colleagues when the rural lifestyle came up that there was discussion of a western land study. I think studies like this just disrupt the community. They open up a Pandora's box of suggestions that half the population will think are terrific and the other half won't like. They create suggestions that will be very difficult for us to enact. They will fill the room up with people screaming on one side or the other. So for a different set of circumstances from what I've heard from the folks, I also won't be supporting this specific item. Not having anything to do with the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council, if I felt that doing this had a real bona fide benefit that we could actually have our staff do something with, I would be in favor of it. But I think it just creates more animosity in the community. If you like what the study says, you're going to think it's magnificent. And if you disagree with what the study says, you're going to think it's horrible. And I think our community is plenty divided enough. I think projects need to be, in my opinion, need to be determined based on the criteria that the project and its applicant and the staff believe benefits or doesn't the community. And with all due respect, I'm not in favor of a Western land study. Thank you. So, again, I will reiterate the most important aspect of this, the way I understood it, is the public outreach re-homogenizing every other study that we've done over millennia that's been shelved. And the public just simply does not understand, for one, how our wildlife corridors that Commissioner Smith works and our goals and the whole point of that is coming out. The fear is completely politically driven. And so I suggest we take this item out of the bundle and let's vote on it right now. You get to, you're the chair. Okay. I just did. Okay. So, with that, back to the board. Do you want to do it? Make a motion to accept it or not. Approve. Is it item nine? Item number nine, yes. Second. Okay. We have a motion by Commissioner Smith, seconded by Commissioner Hetherington. All in favor, aye. Aye. All opposed? Opposed. Motion carries three to two, Commissioner Campy, and heard dissenting. Moving on to number 10. Moving on. We have an OMB item, a budget resolution to accept insurance proceeds for revenues received. We had a mosquito fogger that was damaged by lightning and is not repairable. So these insurance proceeds have been received in the amount of $15,400 for a replacement mosquito fogger, which we all definitely want. Pause there for a second. Yes. I don't know about the rest of you, but it seems like it's prime time mosquito time. It is like going out in the yard at 5 o'clock or 6 o'clock. It's not a happy thing. We definitely want them to have their fogger. So if we can get our fogger sooner than later, that would be really good. In Hope Salem, we don't have that problem. I was going to say, I'm sorry, we don't have those. You don't allow them, no? We don't all have them. The next item is a budget resolution to accept the proceeds of a sale of surplus property purchased with grant funds for the Mosquito Control Division as well. They recently sold a vehicle with state grant funds, and per the grant requirements, we have to appropriate the sale proceeds of $1,500 to be accepted within the Mosquito Control Work Program grant. Item number 11 is a budget resolution to accept the renewal funding for the Housing and Urban Development or the HUD grants. These are annual grants we receive every year. The first one is for $153,120, and they provide rental assistance payments and prevent participants from facing consequences of landlords, and we're just accepting the funds for those. Same thing with item 12, it's the same type of grant, but in the amount of $111,360 for our Human Services Division. Item number 13 is a budget resolution to increase the Florida Opioid Settlement Funds. We are receiving another allocation of $364,548, which will be used to assist with opioid use and misuse intervention strategies in accordance with the guidelines set forth by the Attorney General's Office. Item number 14 is a budget transfer and CIP modification request from utilities. Utilities is requesting to transfer $125,000 from their Capital Facility Charges Fund for additional modifications needed to the Tropical Farms Clearwell regarding the CO2 system that has been placed into service. Item number 15 is a budget transfer and CIP modification request from utilities to modify the lift station's rehab and to transfer $150,000 from the Capital Reserves and the Consolidated Utilities Funds for additional lift station pumps. At three different lift stations and a fuel tank replacement. And the very last item is a request for a budget resolution to increase FY24 operating budget of the Airport Customs Facility. The Customs Facility has over-collected its revenues by approximately 12% than what was budgeted, and these revenues are required to cover unanticipated expenses incurred to the International Flight Operations at Witham Field. Year-to-date, just as an informational purpose, year-to-date, the collections have been $360,000 and expenses of $330,000, so they are operating in the net positive as well. And that's it for OMB today. Thank you so much. Commissioner? Excellent job. Yeah. Commissioner Smith. I guess customs was a good investment. Yes, it was. I would move approval of the remainder of the items left in Stephanie's presentation. Thank you. Okay, motion by Commissioner Smith, yeah, that's him, and seconded by Commissioner Campy. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously. Department number three, animal or animal? Animal. American. I'm sorry. Rescue Plan Act, ARPA, Reconciliation. Stephanie, you have 20 minutes. I can do this. All right. So, I'm not George Stokas, but I'll try to embody his presence as much as humanly possible for the American Rescue Plan item. It might be. It might be. I think George is beautiful. So, back in 2021, the American Rescue Plan funds were awarded to the county in the amount of $31 million. And I believe George has come a few times to give you updates and to try to tell everybody what we've been doing with those funds. And I will say, I've seen a question. I just wanted to put it out there. Today, the county has spent approximately $25.8 million of the American Rescue Plan funds that have been reinvested into the county. $12 million of that funding has been attributed to wastewater and stormwater projects to date. $8.2 million was available in community assistance and food programs for low to moderate income and disproportionately impacted populations. $500,000 has been given to the library for a bunch of virtual programming and at-home services for those who cannot make it to the library. Approximately $1.6 million has been reinvested into Wojcac Park. And then approximately $3.6 million has been invested in the economic program of the REACH Center. So, some projects have come offline and have completed with some funds available. And this item is to ask for permission to reallocate those funds so we may have them obligated before this December 2024 federal deadline. If they're not encumbered with a contract by December 2024, they are at risk of being clawed back. And there are some projects that have been identified by staff that will accommodate those federal guidelines and meet all of the requirements of the American Rescue Plan Act. So, the reallocation is as follows. You've got the American Rescue Plan Septic to Sewer, $1.5 million that will not be encumbered by the end of the year that we are proposing to reallocate to the Golden Gate El Camino Trail project in approximately $1.1 million. Various park structures at Langford Park, East Ridge Park, Lance Corporal Justin Wilson Park, and Tropical Farms for various outdoor activities that meet all the requirements of the American Rescue Plan Act. As well as economic development assistance for unforeseen conditions related to the REACH Center at the airport. There was funds left on the table from the community assistance program and food capital. And this item just asked for the reallocation of those funds so we may maximize the use of them in the community. Commissioner Smith. Approval of staff's reallocation. Second. Second. Okay. Any other comments? Seeing none. Commissioner Smith. I mean, motion by Commissioner Smith. Second by Commissioner Hetherington. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carries unanimously, and you did that in four minutes. Less flair than Mr. Stokes. Oh, yes, please. Just an appreciation for George and all those involved in the ARPA funds process. I think our county did an amazing job of doing that allocation, and I think the benefits to our community and what we were able to do were really outstanding. So, to all of you involved, and George, wherever you may be, thank you. And for George to be able to keep all of that at the tip of his tongue was absolutely amazing. He really is. He's an excellent member. He is. So, we are 15 minutes early, but can we do our tour? Yes, sir. The court reporter's in place, so we can begin. So, Department 4 is a 12 o'clock preset, which we're going to do at 1145. A request for a private attorney-client session concerning the case of a Be a Man by Land LLC versus South Florida Water Management District, case number 2023-CA-000052. Ms. Woods. Yes. Good morning, Commissioner. Sarah Woods, county attorney. Plaintiff Be a Man by Land filed a lawsuit in the circuit court of Martin County against the county South Florida Water Management District, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, and the board of trustees of the Internal Improvement Trust Fund of the state of Florida, seeking vehicular access to Be a Man by Land's properties located within Palmar, Palm Beach Heights. The case is before Judge Michael McNicholas. The lawsuit seeks vehicular access to the plaintiff's property through three easements recorded in the 60s but never accepted by the county. Plaintiff's complaint alleges inverse condemnation, injunctions, and declaration as to the easements and their validity. On June 23rd, 2023, the court granted plaintiff's emergency motion for a preliminary injunction, thereby preventing any of the defendants from restricting vehicular access through one of the alleged easement areas to the east section of Palmar. A mediation was held on June 20th, 2024, with all parties present, with settlement negotiations occurring. The mediation has been continued to a date yet to be determined. The issues are issues concerning settlement negotiation and litigation strategy related to litigation expenses will be discussed during the attorney-client session. My recommendation is that the board vote to agree to meet with Don Donaldson, county administrator, Sarah Woods, county attorney, Sebastian Poprowski, senior assistant county attorney, in a private attorney-client session for approximately one hour or less. This is all in accordance with Section 286.011, subparagraph 8, Florida statute for a strategy session regarding litigation expenses and strategies concerning the case of BMN by land, LLC, versus South Florida Water Management District et al., case number 2023-CA-000052. And my recommendation is to approve the recommended action. After you vote, I'll then read a script, and then we'll adjourn to the conference room behind chambers. I will move staff's recommendation for attorney-client session. Second. The motion by Commissioner Hetherington, seconded by Commissioner Hurd. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Motion carried. The board of county commissioners will now meet privately in an attorney-client session in accordance with Section 286.011, subparagraph 8, Florida statutes, in order to provide advice to the county attorney regarding pending litigation to which the county is presently a party before a court or administrative agency, specifically the case of BMN by land, LLC, versus South Florida Water Management District et al., case number 2023-CA-000052. This session is expected to last approximately one hour or less. The people attending this session will be Commissioners Harold Jenkins, Chairman, Ed Campy, Doug Smith, Sarah Hurd, and Stacey Hetherington, County Administrator Don Donaldson, Sebastian Poprowski, Senior Assistant County Attorney, and myself, Sarah Woods, County Attorney. We will now adjourn. Okay, we are back from our attorney-client session, and Ms. Woods. Chairman of the board, please announce that the meeting of the Board of County Commissioners is now reopened to the public, and the attorney-client session in the case of BMN by land, LLC, versus South Florida Water Management District et al., case number 2023-CA-000052 is now terminated. Okay, perfect. Thank you. We are back and done with our session, which leads us to the end of our meeting, which is a 505 public comment, and I see absolutely nobody in the room, so I assume we do not have any public comment. So we'll go to Commissioner comment, none. I'm all set? I'm all set. Set. Everybody's all set. Okay. Oh, I'm sorry, Don's not set. There's always one. Okay, and his light was even on. I'm sorry. Your mic's not on. Bright Line is going after some grants, you know, for the railroad crossing, which we've supported, and they've asked for us to perhaps participate in a fly-in to D.C. for one of their grant requests to help, I guess, get the final dollars in their mind for the railroad crossing over the St. Lucie, and that would be on July 30th would be those meetings. So I'm just asking if any of you all would be, I'd prefer one of you as opposed to multiple of you simply for sunshine issues. So I'm just, is there anybody here who would be available to fly out the 29th for meetings on the 30th? We'd also try to schedule some meetings that would benefit the county at the same time with our other duties. But, Juan, are any of you all able to or desire to participate? Otherwise, staff will participate. Huh? When does the summer recess begin for the Congress? I don't. Anybody know? I don't know. We have certain it's August 1. Yes. So we're not going to be able to meet? They're planning to meet with congressional members on that 30th. I don't know if they're going to be there. That's why I'm asking. That's the only reason to be going there is to meet with our senators and representatives. What was the date again? July 30th would be the day of the meetings. So it would be to fly up the 29th, have meetings on the 30th, and then return that afternoon or evening on the 30th. It's a Monday and Tuesday, I believe. I know I'm chair, but I'm also recognized I would be the least effective person doing this. And to be honest with you, what I have going on right now, I don't know. I would love to be able to commit to it. You know, I don't know that it's imperative that you all be there. I just think it was the invitation staff can, with your permission, will participate and represent you all fairly. How is that? Is that reasonable? Okay. Thank God. Okay. With that, our next meeting is Monday, July 22nd, and includes the 2024-25 budget workshop. And with that, we are adjourned. When is it? Monday? See?