and followed by the Pledge of Allegiance, which will be led by Richard Volusheen. Good morning. Thank you for inviting me. Let's join together in heart, mind, and spirit. Creator of our universe, who breathes light and life and divine love into our lives, thank you for drawing us together. Thank you for uniting us as one people, your people, our people. We may come from different places and live in a variety of ways and exist in varying circumstances. But out of we who are many, you have made us one. Loving one, as we begin a new school year and as we enter a new season of governance for the people of our beloved Martin County, we ask for your wisdom, your grace, and your compassion for all your people in the decisions we face today. You have commissioned us to look after our future, that is, our children and our students. You call us to honor our seniors, those who have helped us to become who we are. And you have appointed us to serve, to protect, to defend, and to uphold the very values that bind our community together in the decisions we make today. May we do all these things to the very best of our abilities with the talents that you have blessed us. Amen. Mr. Volisham. My name is Richard Volisham. Good morning. Hi, thank you. Good morning. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. God bless America. And I see that you are a Vietnam veteran. Would you like to tell us a bit about your army service, sir? I was drafted into the army at the age of 22 years old if I finished my apprenticeship as a machinist. And, of course, being a machinist, they made me a military policeman. And I refused to be in office. I passed the OCS test. And so I made me a military policeman at Fort Riley, Kansas. And then when Vietnam broke out, I was transferred to the 1st Infantry Division at Fort Riley, Kansas. And I landed with the first troops. We went over by troop ship. And we got there in the very beginning of October. And I was at the Michelin Rubber Plantation at Lai K. That was our base camp, right next to the Cambodian border. I had been in a couple of major battles. And I came home June 30, 1966. I landed in San Francisco. And they asked me if I wanted to re-up. And I said no. And they gave me money to go back to Brooklyn, New York, where I came from. And I landed in Brooklyn. I went to get my job back at the New York Daily News. I was hired there two months before I was drafted. And they told me I didn't finish my probationary period. But the VA and my union had a little different to say. So anyway, I got a phone call. I reported to the New York Times. And I worked at the New York Times as a machinist and a machine shop foreman for 43 years. And I lived in Brooklyn. I lived in Long Island, Valley Stream. And then I went to Milford, Pennsylvania on the New York-New Jersey border because we did most of our printing in Jersey. And I didn't want to pay New York tax, Jersey tax, commuting. So I moved to Pennsylvania and I built a home there. And I was there for 40 years. And then my daughters live in Florida. And I moved down here to Palm City. And here I am at 83 years old now. And that's basically it. Here you are. Thank you for your service. Richard is a Purple Heart recipient. Oh, wow. And a Purple Heart recipient. Thank you. Thank you very much. Our agenda this morning will consist of an additional item. It's Consent 9, which is an adoptive proclamation commending Jacob Crosby and Parker Besad upon the achievement of Eagle Scout. There's one request to withdraw from the agenda, and that's Public Hearing Quasi-Judicial No. 2, which is a request for certification of an agricultural enclave pursuant to Sections 163.3162 and 163.3164 Florida statutes. There are no agenda polls. Is there a motion to approve the agenda, including the consent agenda? I move approval of the agenda and the consent agenda. Second. Any objections? The motion is approved. We will begin with proclamations. The first proclamation is a proclamation declaring Purple Heart Day. Good morning, Commissioners. The Purple Heart is the oldest military decoration in use today and evolved from the badge of military merit. Created by General George Washington in 1782. The Purple Heart is awarded to members of the United States Armed Forces who have been wounded or died in combat with the declared enemy of the United States of America. The board recognizes August 7th as Purple Heart Day in Martin County and appreciates the sacrifices our Purple Heart recipients and all veterans have made in defending our freedoms. And once again, here to accept we have Richard Voloshan, U.S. Army Vietnam veteran and Purple Heart recipient. I was wounded while we were going to an ambush. The Charlie, the Viet Cong, ambushed a bunch of men on Highway 13, which is nothing but a little blacktop two-lane road that went from Saigon all the way up next to Cambodia. They hit him, and we were going with the medical corps, and we were their escort. I was in a jeep on the right-hand side with an M14 rifle on my lap, and I was covering the right flank. And it was an explosion. Shrapnel went through the jeep, past the sandbags, and into my leg, and I was blown out of the jeep. I landed on my right shoulder where I have arthritis now, and basically that's it. Medic ran over to me, and he saw the wound. It was hot shrapnel. It was like being kicked in the shin with a burning poker. And he went to rip my pants, and the shrapnel popped out. And he called me the one luckiest SOB he ever met. And he threw a bandage on my leg. He says, can you wiggle your toes? I go, yep. And he says, can you get up? I go, yep. He says, give me a hand with the wounded. And we ran over. Well, I limped over. He ran over. And we started working on the wounded. I was a military policeman, so I had more medical training than any regular GI. And basically that was it. It was the beginning of June. And I was supposed to come home, what they call an early out. And then the early out was canceled. And in the meantime, I got signatures of all the men I served with. And that's on the Vietnamese, South Vietnamese flag. The men I served with, plus my brigade commander, Colonel William Broadback. He was the best military officer I have ever met. He cared about his men. And he was a World War II retread. Now, the one thing I could say about him, he was very smart. We used to bring, when we went out on a search and destroy, we would bring three 105 howitzers by Chinook helicopter out in the field and set up an artillery base. And this is long before they ever thought of doing little bases with artillery. And military police, we used to be bodyguards for all dignitaries and him. I was Anne Margaret's bodyguard in January of 66. I was Charles Corralt's bodyguard. And they had a Christmas special. The only time in Vietnam we had a truce. It was a Christmas truce from Christmas Eve to the end of Christmas Day. And he was there, and it was a TV special. If you ever want to see it, you go on the computer, and you put down Christmas in Vietnam, 1965. It would be Charles Corralt, and that's exactly where I was at the Michelin Rubber Plantation. And basically, that's it. I came home. I married my sweetheart. We were engaged before I went over. And we've been married this year, 60 years. Nice. I'm home 60 years, and I'm still above ground. That's right. That's basically it. Thank you, sir. When I came home, one other thing. When I came home from Vietnam, now, I got home, and when you looked at me, you didn't want to come near me. I had that, what they call the thousand-yard stare. And I got home, and that was it. I left Vietnam the morning of June 30th, 1966, at 4 in the morning. I landed in San Francisco, June 30th, 7 o'clock in the morning. By 2 o'clock in the afternoon, I was out of the Army. That's how fast everything went. I received this Purple Heart in the mail with a letter from Colonel William Broadback wanting to know where the hell I was. He says, I called your name three times, and I was getting ready to put you down as AWOL. And then they told me they sent me home. So that's my story, and I'm sticking to it. Great story. Our next proclamation is a proclamation congratulating the 50th anniversary of the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council in Martin County, Florida. The Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council, or TCRPC, was established on August 19, 1976 through an interlocal agreement among Indian River County, Martin County, Palm Beach County, and St. Lucie County to address issues of regional importance. TCRPC has supported sustainable growth, environmental stewardship, economic vitality, and regional resilience for the benefit of its member counties and municipalities. The year 2026 marks the 50th anniversary of the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council, representing five decades of dedicated service to the region, and the Board commends its longstanding service to the Treasure Coast region. And here to accept, we have Thomas Lanahan, who's the Executive Director of the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council. Thank you. Good morning. I don't know if I could say it a lot better than that proclamation, but it's absolutely been our pleasure to serve as your regional planning council and undertake all the various things that we get to do with you all, whether it's rewriting CRA codes to make them more effective, different technical support, first responder hazardous materials training that we do for your fire department, economic development activity, all those different things. It's absolutely been a pleasure to be part of all that, and we look forward to many more happy years together. So thank you so much. And our last proclamation is a proclamation declaring Florida Water Professionals Month in Martin County, Florida. Water industry professionals dedicate themselves to the production and distribution of safe drinking water, as well as the proper collection, treatment, reuse, and disposal of wastewater and stormwater. Water professionals are essential first responders, as defined by Florida statute, during storms and other catastrophic events, working to ensure safe drinking water and safe disposal of wastewater for our communities. The board recognizes August as Florida Water Professionals Month and asks residents to join us in thanking all water and wastewater professional staff for their hard work and dedication. And here to accept several folks, but David Voicene, who is Utilities and Solid Waste Chief Plant Operator. Good morning, Commissioners. Good morning. It's an honor to be here today, as we recognize the month of August as Florida Water Professionals Month. Much of the work performed by water professionals happens out of sight, but never should be out of mind. 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, our dedicated team provides safe drinking water and protect the public health and preserve our environment. Access to safe drinking water is fundamental to a healthy community. These essential services are often taken for granted because they are delivered seamlessly every day. Martin County Utilities has a long-standing commitment to operational excellence. Our two water and wastewater facilities have each earned the Florida Department Environmental Protection Operation Excellence Award on three occasions, recognizing outstanding operation, maintenance, and regulatory compliance. In addition, Martin County has won the American Water Works Association Region 8 Best Tasting Drinking Water competition 11 times, reflecting the dedication and expertise of our team. While we do not seek recognition for the work we do, our team quietly serves the community every day. Our water distribution wastewater collection crews respond to water main breaks. Wastewater collection sewer line maintains critical infrastructure and ensures reliable service, often without the public even knowing their efforts are required. This is a hallmark to public service. Our department demonstrates humility through the meaningful work we perform every day. Our greatest success is that our customers can turn on the tap, flush the toilet, and trust that these essential services are always there. And on behalf of our dedicated men and women of our department, I want to thank you for this proclamation, recognizing Florida Water Professionals Month. We sincerely appreciate your gratitude and thank you. For those who are making public comments, since we are in an election season, politicking is prohibited, which is defined as advocating the election or defeat of a candidate for public office, either partisan or nonpartisan. This includes the use of words, dates, signs, props, and or wearing apparel that convey a message of support for a person or group of persons. You'll have three minutes to speak, 15 seconds before your time is up, a buzzer will sound. We'll give you 15 seconds to wrap up. Thank you. The first request to speak form I have is from Angela Harrison. Ms. Harrison will be followed by Victoria Blake. Hello. Good morning. We're here again. I really don't have much to say today. I just want to follow up on what I've been saying. Angela Harrison from Tent City Helpers, thank you for always allowing us to speak and for hearing us and taking into consideration the things that we do speak about. My main concern is getting us the Dignity Bus. We are applying for a grant. I think it's Martin 100, if I'm not mistaken, grant. Gail actually told me, I thought that we were going to apply for the grant to try to contribute to the Dignity Bus, but what her idea was that if you guys could come together, if we could get the Dignity Bus on the agenda, or maybe one of you guys could go and take a look at it and see what a wonderful idea it is, she actually thought that it would be an amazing idea to contribute that $100,000 for salaries for the Dignity Bus because, of course, with the Dignity Bus, we'll need somewhere to park it, and we will also need, of course, people to take care of it at night when the people are there taking showers, I guess maintaining, you know, the pets and whatnot. I think that's really all I have for today. Once again, you guys can follow us on Facebook or come out with us on Mondays. We actually have a really good time. It's kind of sad how much fun we have. We had a few guys get jobs this week, and they were really, really proud of themselves. They were just, you know, I do have kind of a short story of one of our gentlemen that, you know, he did lose his job recently after being very proud that he did get a job, and he said to me, he's like, I'm sorry that I disappointed you guys. Oh, my gosh, and it absolutely broke my heart, and I just told him, I said, you could never disappoint us. We're just so proud of all of you guys for what you do. You know, they're such good people. They're so thankful. They're so kind. You know, they tell us to have a good week. They tell us, you know, they bless us, and they're just really amazing people, and Dignity Bus, guys, Dignity Bus, Dignity Bus, Dignity Bus. We need that for us, and as always, have a wonderful week. Looking forward to see you guys again with any decisions that you have for us. Thank you. Victoria Blake is next, followed by Larry Cohen. Good morning, everyone. I'm Victoria Blake, representing Tent City Helpers. I volunteer every Monday. We go to six different locations and feed a warm meal, essential supplies, sleeping bags, tents, et cetera, for the unhoused in Martin County. So we've come and asked to be on the agenda with no response to date, and Angie and I are going to talk about some ideas, like the Dignity Bus and some other ideas we have to raise funding for at least land and or a shelter. Some quick stats. Since January of this year, we have seen 290 individual unhoused. I've personally had over 13,000 views of when I've spoken here. Awesome. And we've had over 103,000 views of since when Angie and we have come to speak in front of the commissioners. So we're excited about that visibility. And we just reached 4,000 followers on Facebook. So we have a lot of constituents and residents in Martin County that do care about our unhoused. I'll start with some wonderful stories. She mentioned one. I'm going to change their name to protect their identity, but Ned finally got a job, and his demeanor completely changed. He went from being completely defeated to just proud. You could see the hope in his eyes. I mean, tears. We're just so proud of you. Bobby still feels blessed he has his job. Then he goes, he knows I give him crosses all the time. He goes, do you watch The Chosen? And we had this conversation about our favorite characters and disciples on The Chosen. I'm like, this is fantastic. Three unhoused thanked us for the Bibles we deliver that Calvary Community Church donated. One of our unhoused has been in a mobilized wheelchair for some time. And Roshana that works at Treasure Coast Homeless Service Council helped him get up and walk yesterday. There were tears. It was beautiful. She is an angel. So I'm going to just state some of this. I'm asking that people please send letters or call Governor DeSantis' office. House Bill 1365 passed the Florida Legislature and was signed into law by Governor DeSantis on March 20, 2024. The law went into effect October 2024. The Bill 1365 says it is illegal to sleep in public properties. The law mandates that counties and municipalities designate specific areas for public camping or sleeping. Yet Martin County has nowhere. We have nowhere for the unhoused to go. Governor DeSantis' address is 400 South Monroe Street in Tallahassee. His phone number is on his website. I'm personally going to be reaching out to some friends of mine at WPBJ and other news media for visibility, requesting action. Also, thank you, from our state, local grants, and local churches, residents, and more. I just pray that you will search your hearts for action, please action, to support tent city helpers and our unhoused. Thank you very much. Larry Cohen is next, followed by Mike, the armed fisherman. Fisherers, Larry Cohen here for the Woodlands Owners Association. I have an aerial, but I understand it's too late to present that and to submit this. The last time this aerial was in this room was 25 years ago this week, and our concerns are still concerning. I'd like to speak today about the Cove Road Project, a live local project that purports to build 198 apartments in four different buildings, each one three stories high. It presents serious concerns to our residents, which I'd like to highlight. The first one has to do with surface water runoff, especially during the 100-year, three-day storm events, which seem to be occurring about four to five times in the last 25 years since I've been here with this map. As all this water is routed through the main ditch of the Coral Gardens drainage basin, you have an alternative. You can route this water to the south through the improvements that you made 20 years ago, 20 to 25 years ago, up in the Summerfield area, and I'd like you to consider that because the flooding that has occurred downstream of the Coral Gardens drainage basin is tremendous, including culminating with five to six feet of water in Fisherman's Cove some 25 years ago. This aerial map has been all the way to Tallahassee and has been in the hands of the governor and his ombudsman 25 years ago. So as an alternative, I hope you will consider routing a lot of that water to the south and have your staff really look at drainage. We are also concerned this project is out of character by its three-story height and also by its tremendous density, which is in contrast to the single-family residential neighborhood that it's going to be placed in. We are also concerned about increased need for public safety, which now makes up 60 percent of the county's budget, if I'm correct. Traffic impact to Cove and Willoughby is going to be added, and these roads are already overcapacity. Another concern, especially three times a day on Willoughby, another concern is that the impact that this dense project presents to the schools. A project also raises concerns for seniors and handicapped about accessibility. Will this project have elevators to get to the third floor? And I'll try to stop right here except to point out that this offers major tax concessions all the way from sales tax to ad valorem tax that cannot be recouped and will only increase residents' existing residents' taxes. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Mike, the Armed Fisherman is next, followed by Justin Ducasse. Hi, friends. Hello. All right. I'm going to be as nice as possible. I have a huge problem with Martin County Sheriff's Office. Right now, currently, I'm under an injunction. I was out open-carrying, and I had just gotten my guns back. The court said, hey, you can have your guns. And they came, and they were ready to take me off to jail. They were ready. That's not the problem because they were lucky enough to, I got a hold of my attorney. He called whoever he had to call over here. I'm sure it's the attorney here. My name's Michael Taylor, by the way, whoever the attorney is. You got that phone call? Well, somebody got that phone call. Anyway, in a nutshell, they were taking me off. They got a phone call from the attorney or whoever my attorney talked to, and they drove me back around. But then I did a records request, a FOIA, public records request. Well, guess what? With the Martin County Sheriff's Office, right now, I'm number, as of Thursday of last week, I was number 85, and I put it in in July. I can see where they're at. There are people that have not received their records request from almost March. Here we are. My records request has been paid for and done with. And they're saying, oh, you know, we're, well, and I go by the armed fishermen, and I promise you, if you look at the next video that I put out, it's going to be showing you that I went to your sheriff's office and was like, hey, do you want me to work for you? Because I'm a YouTuber. I can edit videos all day long, every day, and whatever. I could probably do my job. I could probably do their job better than they can do their job. But hey, I'm sitting here waiting. Actually, it's probably been, at this point, it's been two and a half months since I paid for it. And they just say, oh, you're just in the queue. And then I keep asking for, all right, the last 10 records that you produced, turning, you probably know that anything that you already produced, and I asked for a copy of, I'm allowed to get it for free. But for some reason, they sit on their hands. I do not want to have to sue this city or this county over a records request. You know, under the 119 statutes, and that's exactly what's going to happen if I don't get these records. So look up Michael Taylor. Sir, your time is up. The armed fisherman. And you'll all be the next. Thanks, Mr. Taylor. Thank you. Justin Dukas is next, followed by Yamila. Good morning. Is the mic on? No, the microphone is. All right. All right. My name is case number 26CV14065SMM in the Southern District of Florida Federal Court. I now hold a Martin County record of committing a crime 678 nights in a row. What is that crime? That crime is sleeping. House Bill 1365 was passed 678 days ago and turned into Florida Statute 125.0231. And basically it says that you cannot sleep in public, but we all know that you cannot sleep in the woods because that's trespassing. The woods is owned by somebody. So it basically says that if you are houseless in Martin County, if you want to go to sleep, you cannot sleep in Martin County. That is a violation of the right to travel on top of a few other things. So for about four months in a row by 10 different people, we have came up here and spoke at this very podium and voiced our concerns and our needs. And you guys have talked about a lot of things. You've talked about train whistles. You've talked about RV parks. You've talked about a lot of things. But there has been no mentioning, no muttering, no syllable about this civil rights crisis that is going on right now. So the SHIP agenda was great and that was passed even though we didn't talk about it. It's great. Thank you for that because we need that. But that does not address the crisis in which is going on tonight in which I have to commit a crime tonight in order to sleep. So I called the senator two times and told them to amend the law, amend the law. And of course, they don't listen to me because I'm just a constituent. Who am I? And since I filed this lawsuit, I have been harassed and pulled over for three times by the Martin County Sheriff's Office for minor traffic, very minor traffic infractions, I believe for the sole purpose of harassing me. That is retaliation to my First Amendment right. And I want to let everybody know that everything is being held, accounted for. Now, the federal judge ordered me and the defendants to confer in court in person on August 18th. If you guys want to show up, it's open to the public. It's open to everybody. Spending so much money in legal fees instead of addressing the actual problem. Flock cameras, we don't want them. Take them down. And please address this during the public comments, please. Thank you. Yamila is next, followed by Candace Callahan. Good morning. Good morning, everyone. How are you this morning? Good morning. I just had the... Oh, Taylor, hold on. My doctor was on the phone at the same time. My name is Yamila Royan Escalona, Executive Director of Yaya Por Vida. You guys should know my face already. Let's chat about why I haven't been here since June. On June 18th, one day before Juneteenth, my participant, Tone Miller, was lynched in Miami. She was what we call motel homeless. The system failed her. And while we are still fighting for transparency, unhoused individuals in Martin County now have to worry about hate crimes compounded by mass surveillance, a.k.a. Flock. I want to publicly thank my friends at Tent City Helpers. They have shown up to speak to you consistently. No matter what, this shelter line item has been asked for for months without a single acknowledgement from the commission outside of a possible visit to La Jolla for land use, which I'm not sure if that was done or not. I would love to hear some comment on that. We have all invited you to our fireside chats, our outreaches. Still no response. It is election season, might I add. Remember that for later. Tent City Helpers has consistently provided evidence. Jailing unhoused individuals costs taxpayers more than housing them. A transitional housing facility with wraparound services, employment access, disability applications, veteran services, pathways to permanent housing is cheaper than raids and incarceration. And let's address the age-old argument. 40 to 60 percent of unhoused people in the U.S. do have jobs. The whole get-a-job excuse, that doesn't stand anymore. And I lost my place. Just give me one second. I'm going to lose some time here. The criminalization of not having a home is metastasizing cancer across our region. We just had to fight SR4 in Miami, a city ordinance that took away the lead time before police raids, allowing folks to move and service workers to connect with them. That model threatens the spread here. But here is what I saw today and what really breaks my heart. Human services are the lowest funded department in your entire budget. Yet on the Florida Opioid Abatement Fund website, there is yet another massive award to Martin County Sheriff's Office under the guise of prevention. Meanwhile, smaller nonprofits like ours are barely scraping by. The barriers to access these funds are so high that even when orgs of these type of grants can have, we barely cover peer support specialist salaries alone. The flock lease expires next year. Pensacola used opioid abatement funds to purchase those cameras, a violation of federal usage standards. I urge this board not to renew. I'm wondering if we're using those dollars here. We're going to find that out to Fueca. Commissioners, my tone deserved better. My tone deserved better. I hope that this is not happening here because we will find out. Thank you. Candace Callahan is next. And Ms. Callahan is the last request to speak for my hand. Good morning. Am I on? Am I good? Hello? Not yet. Are we good? Okay. Good morning, everyone. It's been some time since I've come before you. I'm Candace Callahan, the executive director for Stewart Main Street. Stewart Main Street is a nonprofit that has been partnering with the city of Stewart for 40 years to help revitalize and maintain, at this point, the historic downtown. We serve as a key economic vitality driver and also cultural preservation and community engagement throughout the historic downtown, functioning as a central economic hub for Martin County. There's been a lot of discussion recently about preservation amongst all of our communities, not just downtown Stewart. So I thought I'd come and share some initiatives that we have been doing and working on to help. Oh, and also some of our recent accomplishments as well. So we are proud to have recently helped our CRA receive the designation for the historic downtown, putting the district on the National Registry of Historic Places. And we have just applied for the historic marker to serve as a permanent symbol of community identity. We have just been awarded a $50,000 grant to help the city develop design guidelines to help preserve and protect our downtown charm that we've become so known for. We have also applied for a $25,000 grant to help enhance and develop a new user-friendly digital walking and art history tour to help better engage our youth and promote the importance of preservation and strengthen local tourism. A few weeks ago, we recently were recognized from the Secretary of the State and awarded in four categories amongst 70 other Main Street programs across the state. We received an award for Volunteer of the Year, Business Owner of the Year, Board Member of the Year, as well as recognition for our Saving Steward event, which some of you have participated in before and come and supported, so thank you for that. And that was in the category of Telling Main Street Story. We applied for the Great American Main Street Award in waiting their decision this week. We are long overdue for this almost 40 years of proven transformation, national recognition, and tourism attraction, but most importantly, our resilient public-private partnerships with the city of Stewart and the good folks like you. We will begin work on a large-scale art mural project for Flagler Park, where we host our Farmer's Market every week, and that should start, I think, next month. And just a friendly reminder that this is the slowest time of the year for our small business owners in our downtown. If we don't want to lose our charm, we need to support our small businesses, so whether you're grabbing an ice cream or a coffee or having dinner, coming to Rock and Riverwalk, it all helps. And we are happy to maintain our weekly events, Market on Main, our Farmer's Market, Rock and Riverwalk, and our Summer Car Show series to help boost foot traffic as well. And we appreciate your support and your partnership, and thank you all for your service. Thank you. Thank you. Next comes Commissioner Comments. Commissioner Vargas. Yes, I would like to send a special recognition to the teachers, administration, and all of the support professionals that support our schools, all the other professionals that support our schools and our students. When this gentleman, Mr. Volishan, was speaking, I remember being in Lao Cai, Vietnam, and near the Lao border in Cambodia, it's mountainous, and rice paddies tucked right into the mountainous range right there. I have a couple of questions. This Bill 1365, has Human Services looked into this? I'm sorry, I'm asking Mr. Donaldson, Ms. Elder. Yes, we are familiar with the bill in terms of its actions, and we are fully aware of all the restrictions it places on the county to provide, to not allow public property for the use of camping, sleeping, et cetera. Well, we've spoken about that before, so is there any remedy, any other pathway? The remedy requires, as the public stated, that in order for the county to provide a shelter, they also have to provide all of the accessory components that goes along with it. So it's not just about providing a facility. You have to provide adequate health care and a whole group of other things that go along with it. So essentially, the bill requires that if you're going to provide a place for the homeless, that you have to have a well-constructed, well-run operation that is not simply designating a campground with an arrow saying you can camp here, you have to provide multiple services in order to provide that. And so that is a significant expense, and I'm not aware of any county in the state that has yet to meet the requirements of the bill. Yeah, I'm going to look further into that with my fellow commissioners from other counties to see what they've done to get ideas there. The other thing is Mr. Taylor was here, and he was talking about the FOIA too slow. I've seen it very fast. Is there a problem in that department addressing his request? That would be the sheriff's department. We do not manage the sheriff. He's a separate elected constitutional officer, and so, no, we do not provide oversight to that. Okay, so he hasn't made an application here with this county? No. It's through the sheriff only. Okay, I needed to be sure about that. Thank you. Mr. Camps. There's been a lot of interest in helping the unhoused and a lot of comments made for many of our meetings, and I know there's a lot more that we could probably do, but something came to mind that doesn't really get mentioned, and that is what are we doing now? Well, and there are some things we're doing now. We have a category of spending in our budget called grants and aids, and I thought I would just mention that we do provide several of our grants and aids that bring benefits to the unhoused. I'm looking here at a list. One is called Veterans Homeless, $10,000. Another one is Treasure Coast Homeless Council, $25,000. Another one is called Food Bank, $20,000. And another one that I think is closely related to helping the unhoused is one called New Horizons, which is mental health. It's like a hospital over by Martin South. That is the one, right? Yeah, that's where it is, New Horizons. Am I getting them mixed up? That's the name of that one over there by Martin South, right? Yes. I took a tour of them. No, that's Coral Shores. Coral Shores. Yes. Anyway, we give $407,000 to New Horizons, which is closely related to helping the unhoused. I don't say that to say that that's all that we should do. I know that there's probably other things we can do, and we really appreciate people coming in to help us to come up with new ideas on how we can enhance services to the unhoused. But I wanted to mention that we do some things now. And then I wanted to mention another thing that I had the privilege to attend 10 or 12 days ago. I, along with numerous federal, state, and local leaders, had the privilege of attending the Indian River Lagoon South Milestone Celebration at the C-23, C-24 Reservoir and Stormwater Treatment Area up in Fort Pierce. And Indian River Lagoon South is a part of the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan. And sitting on a huge piece of land, it will have massive reservoirs of water containing runoff from the region that will filter through stormwater treatment areas that will clean the water before it goes into 10 Mile Creek and then into the North Fork of the St. Lucie River. There was a very impressive lineup of federal and state speakers at this event, and I would like to point out that Commissioner Hurd was the only local official who was asked to speak at this event because of her role in Everglades Restoration from the very beginning. And Commissioner Hurd, your comments were excellent. You represented us very well at this event, and I appreciate that very much. And as I learn more about Everglades Restoration, I become more grateful for the progress that has been made, and I want to put my own shoulder to the wheel and see what I can do to help because the issue of Everglades Restoration is very, very closely related to the health of our own local environment and our waterways. Another contribution that Martin County has made to the homeless is in, I think, about 2010, I was asked to contribute substantially to the construction of the Miss Butterfly facility in Port Salerno, New Monrovia. It's a facility for homeless mothers, and I thought it was a very worthy facility, and I did contribute substantially to the construction of this project. It's been a wonderful success since then, so, you know, we have made inroads. We have addressed homeless, and we haven't done enough, but we certainly keep moving in that direction to make sure that we provide the best quality of life for all the residents of Martin County. And also, I just wanted to mention the agenda item that's been withdrawn from the agenda today, and that's public hearing quasi-judicial number two. I just wanted to say that Jenna Nobby was the staff person who prepared the staff report, and I want to say that it's the best staff report I have ever read. The proofing that she did on this extremely complex, complicated issue was remarkable. It was so professional. It was a pleasure to see our staff solve this very, very complex challenge. So thank you, Ms. Nobby. Commissioner Canty. Thank you very much. A week from today will be Election Day. We have the election and the opportunity for voting has already begun. We are in our early voting window. It started on Saturday. Also, if you had requested a vote-by-mail ballot and have yet to turn it in, you still can. You can either drop it off at the Supervisor of Elections office or mail it in. I know I'm serving on the canvassing board with Commissioner Vargas, and that Supervisor of Elections, Vicki Davis, had said she sent out approximately 15,000 or 16,000 ballots, and only about 6,000 have returned, which is a pretty low percentage even in an off-year election. You can vote early in Hobe Sound, you can vote early in Indiantown, and you can vote early in Martin Luther King, on Martin Luther King and Stewart from 9 to 5, I think, until this weekend. So the 15th. And then, of course, a week from today, August 18th, is Election Day. This election for all of the local seats, the local positions, will be decided during this primary. A lot of folks that think that, hey, I will not vote during the August primary, I will wait and vote in November, the local positions will be decided during the primary. So I know that some people, after the fact, are frustrated. Who you vote for is obviously your prerogative, but it is important to vote. I would tell you I think this will be a historically low voter turnout. It is also an opportunity for people to vote for the positions that really, I think, have some of the most relevance to your day-to-day life. School board commissioners, city commissioners, village commissioners. So the opportunity to have a say in that is now. So I appreciate that. And let me add that all voters, regardless of your political affiliation, are eligible to vote in all of the local elections this year, which is kind of unusual. Yes, true. Sometimes if you are a one-party affiliation or another, the ballot would be specific. But all seats are available for every, as Commissioner Hurd said, every, whatever your political party affiliation is, you can vote for all of the seats. Except, of course, if you're in an unincorporated Martin County, you don't vote in the city of Stewart. You're not voting in Indiantown. But for all of the seats that are available for you to select, you can. In regards to the unhoused situation that's been discussed quite a bit, I had a conversation with the ladies that spoke this morning several weeks ago and was very intrigued by the Dignity bus and have reached out to the folks up north that have one and have planned to go and see it. Because I think to hear about it is one thing, but to see it and to understand how they are able to do it, I think, is an opportunity that might be the closest way that we can assist at a higher level without getting ourselves too much into a legal or logistical quagmire. It's being done, from what I understand successfully, just to our north. So I will tell you that I'm heading up to see it and to speak to the folks that are doing it. And when I do, I will come back and give you my impression. Okay, good. Commissioner Hetherington. I look forward to learning more about the Dignity bus. And then I just came back from American Water Resources Association meeting, which is one of my favorite meetings of the year. Several years ago at this meeting, on the way to the meeting, we were in our District 2, we were having an issue with Monterey subdivision and contaminated wells as cited by the Health Department. I remember Drew Bartlett was just moving from the Department, the DEP, over to Director of the South Florida Water Management. And I want to thank him again because of his actions in connecting District 2, our office, with DEP. We were able to mobilize within weeks, and those folks were getting bottled water. And he was able to connect us with the right people at DEP. And we were able to partner with the City of Stewart to get those folks onto sewer. We received, I want to say it was about a $1.8 million grant at the time. And it was almost 100% funded, moving those folks from contaminated wells to sewer. And it was a great partnership between DEP, the District 2 office, the City of Stewart. I want to say this was, again, five years ago. And it was a result of being at that AWRA meeting and talking with the right people at the right time. And they were on water within 18 months, which I would say, at the speed of government, it was a really good partnership. So that meeting always has a special place in my heart. And then as I sat there and listened, there were panels throughout the two days. We had Army Corps talking about, and South Florida Water Management talking about Everglades restoration. Colonel Bowman was there, Major Bell. We had Drew Bartlett and all five water management districts around the state. And there were panels on biosolids. And I sat there very proud representing Martin County because as they started to talk about biosolids and land application and emerging technology around the state that was really addressing how we manage biosolids, I wanted to raise my hand and say, yes, we're the poster child. And they did mention Martin County in the halls because we are a leading example in the state. Of how we manage our biosolids, how we partner with Everglades restoration, and even the example of the site where we're going to eventually store muck dredged out of the Indian River Lagoon is a very good example. I was very proud to represent Martin County and to listen to all the accomplishments and hear all these people from around the state of Florida, from the Panhandle all the way to the Keys. And the recognition that we get in Martin County for being leaders in water restoration, Everglades restoration, and water policy. So it was my pleasure to attend. And, again, I came back very proud of Martin County and the things that we've done over the past 10 years. Very nice. Thank you. Mr. Donaldson. Ms. Elder. Okay, in that case, let's proceed. We'll take up public hearing quasi-judicial number one, which is a public hearing to request approval of the major final site plan for Southwest 96th Street Monopine Wireless Telecommunications Facility Tower. This is quasi-judicial. Any ex parte disclosures? Mr. Vargas. I have none. The form has been filed. Zane Hetherington. Commissioner Capps. If I have any, they have been filed. I don't have any, and they've been filed. Commissioner Campy. I don't have any, and that's been filed. And Commissioner Hetherington. I don't have any, and they've been filed. Mr. Sinnott, have you filed all of your required things with the clerk? I'm turning a copy of my work history and the agenda item to be filed as Exhibit 1, and the applicant submitted their affidavit of mailers at this past Thursday's LPA hearing. Is the applicant here? Yes. Anyone who's going to be providing sworn testimony, please stand up, raise your right hand, and be sworn in. Do you swear or affirm the evidence you're about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God? Please proceed, Mr. Sinnott. Thank you, Madam Chair. Good morning, Commissioners. I'm John Sinnott, Principal Planner with Growth Management. This is a request by United Commercial Telecom on behalf of Mr. and Mrs. Fazlul and Zarna Ahmed for major final site plan approval to construct a 120-foot stealth-designed monopine wireless telecommunications facility and associated infrastructure. The subject site is a portion of an approximately 1.7-acre parcel located on the south side of SW 96th Street, approximately 230 feet west of the intersection of SW 96th Street and SW Canter Highway in Stewart. Included is a request for a Certificate of Public Facilities Exemption. There are no interveners for this application. The subject site is just west of the intersection of 96th and Canter. To the east of the site is an existing Sunoco gas station right at the corner. The subject site is located within the LC Limited Commercial Zoning District. The adjacent properties to the west and the south are also within the LC Zoning District. The gas station property to the east is within the R3A Zoning District with a covenant to GC. The future land use designation of the subject site is limited commercial. The adjacent properties to the west and south are also within the limited commercial future land use designation. The gas station property to the east is within the general commercial future land use. The closest existing cell tower is 1.5 miles to the east, located on the northern end of the South Fork High School property. The proposed 96th Street tower is a 120-foot stealth-designed monopine wireless telecommunications facility to accommodate four wireless carriers. It will be within a 1,600-square-foot lease area within an overall 1.7-acre parent parcel. A separate application has been approved for the development of a one-story, 9,472-square-foot convenience store retail building on the parent parcel. The tower relies on infrastructure that will be constructed as part of the development of the convenience store. The proposal complies with the requirements of Division 18, Article 4, Land Development Regulations, Martin County Code. There are no existing structures of sufficient height in the area, which could support co-location of antennas and provide equivalent improvements to service. Within a three-quarter mile search ring, the subject property owners were the only responsive landowners. Based on coordination with Information Technology Services, the Sheriff's Department, and Emergency Management, the proposed tower is not expected to interfere with existing public safety telecommunications facilities. As part of the application review process, Martin County retained an independent technical consultant, 4G Unwired. 4G Unwired confirmed that no existing tower within a reasonable distance can provide equivalent improvements due to spacing constraints, height limitations, and propagation characteristics. 4G Unwired verified the proposed tower would materially improve service quality and reliability for users in this area of the county. We do have present with us today Mr. Mark Seagren of 4G Unwired. He's available to answer any technical questions. This is the proposed final site plan. The tower is located east of the proposed convenience store on the parcel. The tower relies on a driveway, stormwater facilities, and landscaping that will be installed as part of the development of the convenience store. As part of the approved convenience store development order, there is also a preserve area established on the southern portion of the property. That area is shown in the hatching to the south of the convenience store. This is a profile view of the 120-foot monopine cell tower. This is a photo simulation of the proposed tower as viewed from the adjacent property to the west, just under 500 feet west of the tower. There is another photo simulation as viewed from Canter Highway, roughly 450 feet south of the tower. And there is a photo simulation as viewed from Pratt-Whitney Road, approaching the intersection of Canter Highway. This application was heard before the local planning agency this past Thursday, August 6th. The LPA voted 4-0, recommending approval, with one member being absent. Development review staff have found the United Commercial Telecom application to comply with all applicable regulations in the Comprehensive Growth Management Plan, as detailed in the staff report. Staff recommendation is to move that the board receive and file the agenda item and its attachments, including the staff report, as Exhibit 1, and move that the board adopt the resolution approving the final site plan for the southwest 96th Street monopine tower project. That concludes my presentation. Questions for Stan. Mr. Camps. How tall are these towers usually? Is this common, 120 feet? I'd have to defer to the applicant for common heights, but this one is 120, and that's permitted per Division 18 of our land development regulations. But I'm sure the applicant can address that as well. Thanks. Is this a major or minor development? The tower application is a major. How about the development order for the convenience store? That was a minor development, and that was approved in January of this year. So that was approved by staff? Yes. That was a separate application that did not include the scope of the tower. That is the convenience store, the preserve area, stormwater facilities, and parking and driveways. So if I'm not mistaken, there is an existing convenience store gas station that's next door? Next door on the adjacent property, yes, to the east. How on earth do we permit these things next to each other? Paul Schilling, growth management director for the record. Thank you, Commissioner. So there is a Sunoco fueling station on the corner. I believe that's the brand name that includes a smaller convenience store. This project, as I recall, which I approved, was potentially other commercial uses, meaning other retail, if I'm not mistaken. So it's not a wholly developed convenience store. There will be other retail uses, such as a dry cleaner, those types of uses, a mailbox place, something like that. And this application is the tower separation setbacks and fall zone criteria of our land development regulations shall not apply to any stealth tower. Why not? That's the criteria, as you indicated, within Division 18. So if it wasn't a stealth tower, the fall zone and setbacks and tower separations would apply? Correct. Can you explain why? I mean, just because it's disguised as a pine tree, why is it not subject to fall zone protections? As John indicated, Paul Schilling, for the record. So as John indicated, Division 18 guides this process of the land development regulations and has for many years. So the stealth tower is the appearance of it, the requirements for it to blend into the neighborhood, for lack of a better term, but also, more importantly, is the engineering involved. The towers are engineered to fall within their own footprint, so the footprint of that leased area or right around that area, as opposed to having guy wires and other components of a traditional radio antenna. So they are designed, I'm not aware of the research I've done of any of these ever failing, but they have at times had some issues maybe with a branch or two that need to be replaced from time to time, but they are engineered substantially, and I'm sure the applicant could talk about that. But that's the essence of the requirement. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Would the applicant like to make a presentation? Answer, please. Okay, sure. First to you. Tell us about the fall zone protections. My name's Kevin Wright. I'm director of operations for United Commercial Telecom, and thank you for having me. So fall zone, first and foremost, Paul is correct. In fact, the towers are designed typically to collapse on themselves. They design a break point, so towers don't fall like this. They fall like this on top of themselves, like he said. So that fall zone for this particular tower would fall within the footprint of our lease area. That's the way they're designed nowadays. I mean, maybe back in the day before my time they weren't, but most all towers are designed to collapse on themselves. Into a 1,600-square-foot lease. Correct. So it would have multiple break points on the tower that if a section were to fail, it would fold over onto the tower, not fall off to the side. Okay. And I see that there was a consultant who was hired to do the, I don't know what you call it, the, yes. So who paid for that consultant? Don sent it for the record, and that he is being reimbursed by the, yes. Have we been? I see that there's an outstanding balance. Yes, that is, we've been reimbursed for most of the balance. The outstanding balance is to have Mr. Segrin present with us today. That balance will be payable during the post-approval process for this. Okay. Thank you. Any further questions? I wish it was an American flag. I wish it was an American flag. I think the pine trees, you know, I get that it's stealth, but, I mean, they look like cheap, artificial Christmas trees. I guess a flag wouldn't be stealth. So then they'd have to comply with the fall zones. No, it's stealth as a cell phone tower. It's obviously, like, for instance, in Palm City, they, a long time ago, they put one on a church property, and it was a cross. Yes, sir. I like, you know, obviously, if you see a flag on a massive flagpole, you understand it's a cell phone tower. I just think, or even the one that we have that's right around the corner over here is just a monopole. That's not stealth, I guess. It's stealth, because it's all internal, correct? Yes. I just think that that sort of, you just, your eye erases that, whereas when you see these large artificial pine trees that are way taller, and I get why they have to be that tall, then the surrounding landscape, they just look sort of ridiculous. But I get that falls within the definition of stealth. I just like the concept of a really large American flag would be more appropriate than a cheesy, for lack of a better word. Pine tree. But that's just a personal opinion. It won't affect my decision-making. Mr. Capps. So the 120-foot height is a common height for such towers? It is, yes, sir. I mean, we build them much taller than that as well, 200-foot. Keeping it under the 200-foot threshold keeps, with the FAA, from having to light the tower. That's a requirement with the FAA. But also, if you're in a flight plan, we would light the tower. We're not in this particular area. But 120-foot is a standard height pole in Florida. I've built a lot of towers in Florida. I've built a lot of 120-foot poles in Florida. Yes, sir. Okay. And I have one question for our county attorney. This issue of towers in Martin County has been an issue in the past where people have wanted the county commission to intervene and perhaps prevent a tower from being located somewhere. I think there was one right in a neighborhood that created a stir. It was on the sidewalk. So those towers are a little bit different. Those are towers that are not even towers. Those are communications that are installed in our right-of-way by, like, AT&T, a company, and they have the right to do that. So we can't intervene in this. This is a different situation. This is on private property, and it's a 120-foot stealth tower. So it's a different situation. But when the utility companies want to install in our right-of-way, we don't have a say in that. That's the circumstance that came up with the sidewalk with the residents and their house. So it's a little bit of a different situation. So our level of discretion would just be the general principles of judicial decisions, competent, substantial evidence in the record. Correct. So we have land development regulations that govern these towers, and as long as, like any other site plan, if they meet the land development regulations, then ideally it would be approved based on the competent, substantial evidence proven that they met those land development regulations. Further questions? This is a public hearing. Would anyone from the public like to address us? I don't see any. Back to the board. Was there a recommendation? Move staff's recommendation. Second. There's a motion and a second. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? That motion passes unanimously. Thank you, commissioners. Thank you. We will now move on to Department Quasi-Judicial No. 1, which is an Article 10 appeal, consideration of an Article 10 appeal by Corey Beaton regarding denial of building permit number so-and-so for the construction of a single-family residence. This is Quasi-Judicial. Commissioners, Commissioner Vargas, any quasi-judicial disclosures? Let me start with Stan first. Ex-parte disclosures. I do not have any. That form has been filed. Commissioner Kapps? If I have any, they have been filed. I don't have any, and they've been filed. Commissioner Campy? I don't have any, and that's been filed. Commissioner Everington? If any, they've been filed. Let's see. So, commissioners, this is the procedure for this is unique. Follow along on page 335. We will now have the summary of an introduction of appeal by staff. So, commissioner, we need to have everybody sworn in first. I don't think that's happened, has it? No. So. I thought that we didn't have to have people sworn in because we're not accepting any new evidence. We're not accepting new evidence, but it would be ideal to just swear it in for this for the appeal. Okay. Just in the abundance of caution. Do you swear or affirm the evidence you're about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God. I do. So, commissioners, I'm Elise Elder, county attorney. I'm just going to give an overview of this process. It doesn't come before the board very often. This is an article 12, I mean, an article 10 appeal. What that means is Mr. Beaton filed for a building permit. It was denied by staff. He appealed that decision to the county administrator who held an administrative review meeting to go over the building permit. Mr. Beaton was given an opportunity to speak and present his case at the administrative review meeting. Mr. Donaldson issued an opinion or a ruling upholding the denial of the building permit. Mr. Beaton appealed that decision to this board. So, your view today or your role today is a little bit limited. As Commissioner Hurd said, that there are quasi-judicial procedures in the agenda item. So, what happens is I'm giving you this quick overview. Mr. Beaton will have 20 minutes to present his case. Once he is done, the board will have the opportunity to ask him questions. Once the questions are over, staff will have an opportunity to present their case. We will have 20 minutes. The board can ask questions of staff, and then you deliberate and make a ruling. So, just to point out that the standard for your review is limited. So, the three questions you need to decide is whether the county administrator accorded procedural due process, whether the county administrator adhered to the essential requirements of law, and whether the final action by the county administrator was based on competent substantial evidence. In the agenda item, those three different areas are defined. So, the procedural due process just means that the board must decide whether the county administrator's review of the building permit was conducted fairly and impartially according to all of our land development regulations and our procedures. To see if the essential requirements of law were filed, the board must decide whether Mr. Donaldson applied the correct provisions of the applicable law and code when making his decision, including state statute and the land development regulations and the county's code. And he did not abuse his legal authority in the process, and the final determination is whether the decision is based on competent substantial evidence that Mr. Donaldson received during the administrative review hearing. That's the board's standard. So, if you don't have any questions, we can have Mr. Beaton come up and give his initial side. Questions for Ms. Elder before we turn it over to Mr. Beaton? Please. I have a question. Okay. Ms. Elder, so based on what you just told us, we are deciding on those three criteria, not necessarily on whether or not we feel that it's a legitimate project. Correct. So, you're not supposed to substitute your decision for the county administrator. If he made his decision based on evidence presented at the review meeting, you should uphold it, even though there might be evidence on the other side to substantiate Mr. Beaton's side of the story, as long as Mr. Donaldson's was decided based on the competent substantial evidence, your role is to uphold that, not to substitute your judgment for his. So, that's the standard in an appeal. So, in other words, to decide if we felt that the technical process was followed correctly. Yes, and there was evidence to support his decision. Not if we agree that it was a good project or a bad project. Correct. Correct. Final question, what would the applicants, what could he do if he's unhappy? What's the recourse based on today's decision? What's the next step in the process for him? To probably file a lawsuit if he chose to, to appeal your decision, basically. Thank you. Commissioner Vargas. So, and I understand everything you've said, and I've looked at this before I came to this meeting and had a lot of questions. So, in the event that the applicant is unhappy, file a lawsuit against whom? The county. They would file a lawsuit challenging the denial of a building permit with the circuit court. Okay. It was my understanding that he can get a building permit, however, there's a little bit difference in so far as the land mass that he's going to be building on, and it has to do with something dealing with the regulations going back to the 1980s. Is this correct? So, he was denied a building permit, so he cannot build any house at this time, and that is what he's appealing. And he will provide you with his, his facts, and then we'll give you the county side. So, now we take what, the vote dealing with Mr. Donaldson's activity? At the end of this, at the end of this meeting, this agenda item, you'll vote. Mr. Beaton, you'll have 20 minutes to, to talk with us. All righty. Good morning. Good morning. Chair and commissioners, my name's Corey Beaton. I'm the appellant and the property owner at 1-8-2-5-0 Southeast Locks at River Road, Jupiter, Florida. I just want to thank you guys for your time and the opportunity to be heard today. What I'm asking is for the board to reverse the county administrator's decision and the denial of my building permit application. So, before I explain how we got here, I think it's critically important to identify and define what this case is and what it is not. This is not title action. I hold recorded title to the property contained within my legal description. If another party believes it has a competing ownership interest, there's a judicial process for resolving that dispute. This administrative appeal is not that process. The questions before this board are much narrower. Ms. Elder kind of explained them. It's whether I was afforded procedural due process, whether the county administrator observed the essential requirements of law, and was the decision supported by competent, substantial evidence contained in the record? And I respectfully submit that the answer to all three of those is no. So, I'd like to start with kind of how we got here. Before I purchased this property, I contacted the Martin County Zoning Department. My point of contact was Amy Offenbach. I had extensive conversations with Ms. Offenbach, and at the time, the property appraiser was showing the property to be 1.69 acres. The property boundary line had been moved to the mean high water line, contrary to what the legal description actually called for. The boundary of the property extends into the water. So, she explained that A-1 zoning required two acres, and that the acreage discrepancy needed to be addressed. She gave me a roadmap of everything that I would need to do before I purchased the property, and I performed extensive due diligence before I actually bought it. I hired a professional licensed surveyor. I retained legal counsel, and I researched the property's history and chain of title. I went through a lot of old documents and documentation on it and figured out exactly how it came to be and why it was what it was. So, I specifically asked her, if I'm able to get the property boundary, move it back out to its rightful location, and the property appraiser then reflects two acres, will that suffice? And she said yes. So, at the same time, I was closely watching a neighboring property who was going through the permitting process. His property was strikingly similar to mine. It was 1.7 acres of dry land, and it was two acres total. It was also a non-legal lot of record, and he had applied for a building permit. Ultimately, the county approved his permit. So, this was not an isolated incident. There was three other properties within the same neighborhood that the county staff had approved development on, one under the same exact circumstances. The first was in 1984, two years after the comp plan. The people that knew it better than anyone else. Then another in 2016. And then this one in 2023. The county staff has now attempted to dismiss all of those approvals by characterizing all of them as mistakes. But I feel that 40 years of county action does not erase those approvals. Those happened. These were separate properties, separate applications, separate county reviews, and separate growth management staff that reviewed these. Most importantly, the most recent and comparable property was actively being permitted while I was performing my due diligence on this property. So, from everything reasonably available to me, the county staff guidance, the surveying, the appraisal records, the historical county approvals, and a neighboring building permit actively being built, I had every reason to believe this property was buildable. I relied upon that information when I purchased this property, and after closing, I presented all of my evidence to the property appraiser and was able to get the boundary moved back out to its rightful location, which then reflected that the property was 2.01 acres. Exceeding the two-acre requirement, I contacted Ms. Offenbach. I contacted her back. I presented her with everything. She confirmed that, yes, the property on her end was now showing two acres. She confirmed that a single-family residence, that I was eligible to put a single-family residence on the property. And at my request, she followed up in writing, defining the applicable zoning and setback requirements, and did verify that a single-family residence was an allowable use for this property. So, as a landowner, that was it. I had everything that I needed to proceed with development. I relied upon that representation. I hired an architect. I hired engineers. I got environmental studies done, surveys, site plans, core borings, soil samples, testing, everything that was needed to prepare a building application. I spent tens of thousands of dollars. I sold a ton of assets off, a truck, tractor, buggies, farm equipment, vacant land, everything to make sure I would have enough funding to finance this build. Ultimately, I sold my home that my family had lived in for 15 years to make sure we would have enough money to build this house. Sacrifice. That's what I told my wife. It will all be worth it in the end. And, you know, we'll be able to build on this, and it's going to be all worth it. These were enormous decisions that I made, but I made them because I had done my due diligence. I relied upon the information that was available to me, including the information that Martin County staff gave me. So, fast forward several months, I submit my permit application. The review process was moving forward, and then a staff comment was added to my building file that said, lot size incorrect. Staff cited comp plan policy 4.14 and took the position that the submerged portion of the property could not be counted towards the two-acre requirement. I discussed this extensively with staff and with Senior Assistant County Attorney Sebastian Fox. Mr. Fox made it very clear. We're not disputing your property boundary. We're not disputing the fact that you have and you own a two-acre tract of land. We're just saying that because of this policy, you can't use the submerged land portions of it. So, the problem was is policy 4.14 does not say that I can't use my submerged lands. It specifically defines exactly the boundary line as where the submerged lands be excluded, and that's to stop people from being able to use riparian rights and try to claim land that's not theirs. That was the basis for the permit denial. That is consistent on the conditions report. That's precisely why I filed the Article 10 appeal, because I needed Mr. Donaldson to look at Policy 4.14, the actual reason the permit was denied, based upon the facts and the evidence that was available at the time of permit denial. Ms. Elder stated that it's based upon the evidence presented in the hearing. It is not. An Article 10 appeal is specific. It's the facts that were in the – the facts and the evidence established at the exact time of permit denial. His job is to put himself in the shoes of the decision-maker that had the information available to look at it and figure out if they made the right decision. But that, unfortunately, Policy 4.14, that question was never decided. Instead, the basis for the denial changed, and this transformed into that I hadn't conclusively established ownership of the submerged portion of my parcel. At that time, the record included my recorded legal description, an unbroken chain of title extending more than 60 years, two professional boundary surveys – not one, but two – professional license surveyors that are authorized to conduct boundary surveys in this state. A letter from my survey or written statement reiterating that this is my property, property appraiser records that are recognizing it as a 2.01-acre parcel, decades of taxation, and historical evidence concerning the property. Yet, the administrator's decision states, and I quote, Following the administrative review meeting, the county received confirmation from the state of Florida that it claims ownership of the submerged lands in question. Those five words are extremely important. Following the administrative review hearing, the administrator then relied upon that information to conclude that I did not own the submerged lands and declared the other issues are remaining – the other remaining issues moot. The administrator never decided the issue that I actually appealed. I was never given a meaningful opportunity to examine or respond to the new information upon which decision – upon which that decision was based. The basis for a governmental decision cannot become a moving target after a hearing is over. That is a due process problem. I had requested Ms. Amy Offenbach be present during the administrative review hearing. She was my point of contact at the county. She knew this better than anyone else. She's who I dealt with primarily. I was told by Ms. Elder that the administrative review process is limited to the county administrator, the county attorney, and the growth management director. And Ms. Amy Offenbach would not be present. And she wasn't. And instead, this county substituted and didn't abide by their own code and brought three extra people into the administrative review hearing that had no business being there, that all had input. And I was deprived of my procedural due process rights. Now, the essential requirements of law. The administrator was to review the facts established at the time of denial. I presented a recorded deed and a legal description, a chain of title, two boundary surveyors, a surveyor's written statement, property appraiser and tax records, and historical evidence concerning the property. So what legal authority authorized the administrator to disregard this evidence? I found nothing in Article 10 or Martin County Code or applicable law that authorizes the county administrator while reviewing a building permit denial to disregard those documents and substitute an unadjudicated ownership claim in his place. He is not authorized to disregard my recorded title and professional surveys, and he is not authorized to obtain new information after the administrative review meeting and use it against me without an opportunity to respond. So the essential requirements of law were not afforded to me. As far as DEP's claim, at some point, I just have to say this plainly, an administrative building permit appeal is not a quiet title action. I don't care what DEP claims to own. A claim is not title. A claim is not evidence of conveyance, and a claim is certainly not a court judgment. I hold the recorded title. I have the legal description. I have an unbroken chain of titles spanning more than 60 years. I have boundary surveys, and I have Martin County has assessed and taxed this property and treated it as buildable for decades. The county has collected $269,000 on this property in the last 25 years and are going to try to say that it's unbuildable. I don't think that that is fair. Yet somehow my entire interest in this property is supposed to just disappear because DEP is making a claim. I think everyone understands that sometimes government agencies can be wrong, and I think Jonathan Dickinson was a great example of that with DEP. Everyone remembers what happened there. DEP is not a court. Martin County is not a court, and this Article 10 proceeding is not quiet title action. If DEP believes it owns property contained within my recorded legal description, then they have every right to bring that claim into a proper judicial forum and prove it. There's a process for that. But until that happens, I'm not going to voluntarily surrender my property that I purchased. I physically purchased this property with my own money. I pay taxes on it, and it's been delineated by a surveyor to show his mind. And if they have an issue with that, then there's another avenue for that, but this proceeding is not that. So most importantly, the reason for today's appeal, this was not the reason that the permit was even denied. Mr. Donaldson violated the essential requirements of law by relying upon post-hearing information, disregarding my legal description and boundary survey, and attempting to adjudicate title to lands which is well beyond his legal authority in an administrative hearing. Finally, as far as competent substantial evidence, during the administrative review, there were references to state tiff deeds, leases, and other documents supposedly in the record or supposedly that have been recorded. Not a single document establishing that the state owns the property contained within my legal description was introduced for me to examine or rebut. Not a single document. The documentary evidence before the administrator supporting my position included my deed, legal description, chain of title, survey, surveyor statement, property appraiser records, tax records, historical evidence, and decades of county treatment of similar situated properties. That was the actual evidence. I was not presented with a single piece of evidence to say otherwise. I public record requested any emails or correspondence that Mr. Donaldson had with DEP following the administrative review process. There was none. He relied upon a verbal claim to make his decision. That is not substantial evidence whatsoever. In conclusion, I'm not asking for special treatment. I'm asking for the code to be interpreted and applied to my property the same way it's been applied for the last four decades in this county. The permit was denied based upon policy 4.14. The administrator never decided whether that interpretation was correct. The citizens must be able to rely upon the recorded deeds, legal descriptions, boundary surveys, property records, and decades of taxation unless a court of competent jurisdiction determines otherwise. Think about what an alternative means. If somebody can simply make a claim against property that a citizen holds recorded title to and has paid taxes on for decades, and the county can disregard that citizen's deed and surveys merely because of that claim, then what exactly does property ownership mean in Martin County? I'm asking to build a single-family home on my own property for my family, my property surrounded on three sides by four houses. I respectfully ask this board to reverse the county administrator's decision, reverse the permit, denial, and direct staff to process my building permit consistent with the property's recorded legal description and the applicable provisions of the Martin County Comp Plan and Land Development Regulations. Thank you. Any questions? Thank you. Questions for Mr. B. I thought to ask him. Yeah. Mr. Campy. Thank you, sir. Just as an aside, what do you do for a living? A firefighter. You did a nice presentation. Second question. Am I allowed to just generally ask questions just for background? Like, what did you pay for your property and when did you purchase it? I purchased it in 2023. I paid $1.3 million. $1.3 million. At the time, it was assessed at $1.1 million in the property appraiser role. It's a two-acre is the criteria for being allowed to have the building permit, correct? Correct. Two acres or more. And what is that? I'm just doing this for reiteration. And what is the county saying that you, what is their interpretation of the amount of property that you have? 1.7 of dry land, 2.01 acres total. 1.7. 2. 2.01. So that's, the little extra is what's in the water. Just that, yes, correct. Thank you. Mr. Vargas. You know, having been in real estate for many years, I really admire the lengths you went to. I would do the same thing as you. If I were planning on moving my family, my homestead, my last home, I think forever home, to this piece of property, you certainly have spent a lot of money looking into, is this the right move for my family? And then also to sell your homestead? Yeah. That's admirable to me. When I have been involved with the county, not this county, but another county, and looking at property, I too had to rely on what staff said, because that's the only way I can say, well, you know, this is a good avenue to take, or no, I really should do something else. But you've done the other something else. In addition to that, policies here should not be floating and should not, you know, be constructed as situations come up. We're talking about three other properties, 1984, 2016, 2023, which were labeled as mistakes. They could have been. However, you're basing your argument on the fact that these are similar properties, correct? Identical. Identical. So having said that, we're talking about submerged lands, riparian rights, and this is the key component, is that correct? Correct. To be able to allow you to go forward. Okay. But you certainly have the land mass without interfering with conservation areas that would be unbuildable, correct? So having said that, I understood that what you're looking for, I understand what you've done to spend $1.3 million is a chunk of change. And as I say, it's very hard to remake that again. Okay. I just wanted to clarify, I think a report was thorough, complete, was very understandable. We don't need to go through all the facts again. It's already recorded. Thank you. Thank you. Any further questions? So would staff like to give a presentation? Yes. Thank you, Chair. Pete Walden, Deputy Growth Management Director. And I do have a copy of the agenda with some exhibits, I through L, which did not make it into the formal agenda that is included. And I believe those were provided on the DS for the commissioners. So I'm going to go through a brief history of the events that led up and the timeline that led up to this. And then I'll give it back to the county attorney and administrator to follow through about process and the decisions made. So this is a synopsis of the property and the timeline that is the subject of the quasi-judicial appeal before you today. According to deeds shown on the property appraiser's website, in April of 2000, Lot 1, River's Edge, an unrecorded subdivision was divided and sold. This created the parcel that Mr. Beaton now owns. In January of 2016, a zoning letter was issued to Mr. McNicholas of McCarthy, Summers, Bobcoe, Wood, Norman, Bass, and Melby, PA regarding the subject site. The letter stated the zoning district of A1 Small Farms District, the land use of rural density, both required a minimum lot size of two acres and the development setbacks of the parcel. The letter also called into question the lot size, indicating that the property appraiser's website described the lot area as 1.69 acres, while the survey showed two acres, including submerged lands. In October of 2023, McCarthy Summers submitted an application for a future land use amendment and concurrent zoning district change for the subject property. The amendment was to change the existing land use of rural density to 1 unit per 2 acres to estate density, 1 unit per acre, and the concurrent A1 Small Farms District to RE-1A Residential Estate District. In December of 2023, the application was formally withdrawn. Of note, staff supported the land use change and was prepared to take it forward to the Board of County Commissioners. On August 7th of 2025, Mr. Beaton applied for a building permit to construct a single-family residence. On April 24th of 2026, the Martin County Building Official emailed a conditions report to Mr. Beaton, stating the building permit could not be issued due to the inability to meet zoning requirements. On May 14th, 2026, the County Administrator received a notice of appeal regarding the denial of building permit BLD 2025-080-317 for the construction of a single-family residence at 18250 Southeast Loxahatchee River Road, Mr. Beaton's property. On June 17th, 2026, Don Donaldson conducted an administrative review of the permit application. Mr. Beaton and county staff attended. On June 30th, 2026, Mr. Donaldson sent a determination to Mr. Beaton that the denial of the permit was appropriate. On July 10th, 2026, the County received a notice of appeal to the BCC for the subject parcel and building permit. Staff prepared the earliest appropriate hearing regarding the matter for today's agenda. And with that, I'll give it back to the county attorney and Mr. Donaldson to follow through with the process and the decisions made. So I'm just going to summarize some of the facts that Mr. Walden just told the board and that were discussed at the Article 10 appeal review meeting that Mr. Beaton neglected to tell the board. So in 2001, like Mr. Walden said, Mr. Beaton's property was created by an illegal lot split. This was told to the previous owner who hired Terry McCarthy's firm to do a land use and a zoning change because they needed that change in order to build a house on the property. Because the current zoning said you have to have two acre lots and they only had 1.74. So they went through the entire application process and it was teed up to come to the board for a land use and zoning change to change the land use and zoning for one acre parcels because the predecessor understood that Mr. Beaton's property did not qualify for a building permit as it was currently situated given it was an illegal lot split. Mr. Beaton bought the property and withdrew that application. It was Mr. Beaton who knew about the application. Staff explained the implications of it. He withdrew the application. So after he applied for the building permit, I was involved in that process as well. I spoke to Mr. Beaton. I've emailed Mr. Beaton. I've had meetings with Mr. Beaton. And I questioned the ownership of the submerged lands because it's very unique in Florida for anybody to own submerged lands. So I did some independent research during that time. I found tiff deeds that the DEP and the state had over his property and it might show he has ownership of that property. But if you have a tiff deed over that, the state is claiming an interest in it and it's not really your property. So I explained that to Mr. Beaton and I asked him, can you write to the state? You can write to DEP and you can get a letter from DEP that they're not claiming any ownership in the land. Mr. Beaton refused to do that through the process. So this was something that I raised throughout the process for Mr. Beaton to get this letter from DEP or some proof that he owned the land. He insisted he had a legal description and a boundary survey. So he owned the land and he didn't need to do anything further. The building permit was denied. We had the Article 10 appeal with Mr. Donaldson. During the Article 10 appeal, I raised the issue again. I told Mr. Donaldson that there was a question of ownership of the submerged lands, that DEP, that the state had some tiff deeds over these back from the 60s and it was in the whole area where his house was. So this issue was raised during the Article 10 appeal. The other issue is that even if Mr. Beaton owned the land in Martin County based on the comprehensive plan, you cannot use submerged lands towards your lot density. That is a strict policy in Martin County. Any applicant who's been before this board, including prior developments, have followed that. And I'm going to let Mr. Schilling talk about that for a second because that's an important aspect of this. Even if he owned the land, he wouldn't be able to have his building permit. Thank you. Paul Schilling, Growth Management Director, for the record. So, yes, so the 1967 zoning code, which is the A-1, requires two-acre lots. Fast forward to today, there's still that provision. That provision is in place with the Category C and the land use appropriate to this. That does not talk about submerged land. It talks about lot area. In fact, it's crystal clear. It says it shall not be less than two acres. That has been the case since 1967. This lot was carved out of a piece, as were multiple lots within this unrecorded subdivision. Some met the lot size. Some may not have. But this one in particular was created in the year 2000 or thereabouts. It does not qualify for any reduction in shoreline protection zones. So, it has a 75-foot shoreline protection zone, which, as you may recall, was a matter that was debated substantially. We've met with this gentleman multiple times throughout this whole process. The facts that he mentioned with a member of my staff are, I would argue, I would say that are not accurate. Certainly, he had his own opinion. He requested one of our members of staff withdraw that application vehemently for the land use change that Ms. Elder just mentioned. So, regardless of a lot of things, quite frankly, I, the board, no one in this agency has the jurisdiction to violate the comprehensive plan or the zoning district. And what I was getting at earlier, had this lot been created prior to the zoning code, then it may have been a different matter. But we have never allocated submerged land for creating a buildable lot in that manner. We do have a couple down the street, one in particular that Mr. Beaton mentioned. It was an application to redevelop that site. It had been a lot split. I think that was in 2023 or thereabouts. And a member of my staff and I missed that. That was a survey that indicated the water within the boundary, but also the upland, which clearly did not meet it. I missed it. But that does not give me jurisdiction or the ability to violate the comprehensive plan and the zoning code and continue to do that. So, have there been things that have happened throughout the county within the last 40 years? Certainly. We're not perfect. We do our best. Fast forward to 2023 and certainly the last 15 years, our processes have got much more refined. We have the tools to make decisions instantly. But the way that was characterized is not necessarily accurate. Any other questions? Maybe I'll extrapolate a little bit more on the comprehensive plan and what it says. It basically goes in 4.1E states that we count the upland areas from the mean high water line upland. No, it doesn't. So, it's been our policy, at least in the last 10 years that I've been working with development review, that all developments that get approved in any sites have to meet the density of the upland area. So, that's been what we do. We even have, when the development comes in, we have the DEP certified, the mean high water line. So, we make an accurate determination as to the upland area. So, that is something that the county has done thoroughly. And, yes, there have been some mistakes in the permit review process, like Paul said. But substantially throughout our history, we count the upland area for density purposes. So, the last thing I want to touch base is the administration review meeting and Mr. Donaldson's decision. Mr. Schilling was there. Mr. Walden was there but didn't speak. And Mr. Doherty was there. They're the department heads that were responsible for the denial. So, they were there. So, there was no other testimony except for me. And then, Mr., if you read the letter, which is part of the record, it says, After reviewing the record and considering the information presented during the administrative review meeting, I have determined that the denial of the above reference building permit was appropriate because you did not conclusively demonstrate that you own the submerged lands at issue. That was an issue raised during the hearing. It was an issue addressed by staff. And that's what Mr. Donaldson based his decision on. Down below, there's a sentence that says, In addition, D.E.B. told us they are claiming an interest to the land. That did not go into Mr. Donaldson's decision. As you can see the way the letter is written, that was just an FYI. We want to let you know that Mr. Donaldson found this, but we also found out from D.E.P. later after he made his decision, because Mr. Donaldson made his decision relatively quickly, that D.E.P. agreed. So, that was just for informational purposes. It had nothing to do with Mr. Donaldson's decision. He had no contact with D.E.P. So, I'm going to ask Mr. Donaldson to explain to you what he based his decision on. So, again, Mr. Beaton's issue was the two, as he's mentioned, about the interpretation of the code related to total land area. And then it was principally with his surveys and his legal descriptions, as he has, saying that that was evidence that he owned the land. And reading the surveyor's note, there is, it simply has a boundary survey of the legal description that was recorded in the courthouse or that he had from the lot split. And there was no testimony to assert that they actually owned submerged lands. I think it is a boundary survey. It is a survey of the legal description that he has. But there was no testimony or evidence to say that this boundary survey, meets and bound survey, had ownership of the submerged lands. And in the state of Florida, you know, when we became a state, and all of the submerged lands to the mean high water line are owned by the state, except for a few areas where prior kings of Spain or England donated or conveyed properties under that. So that portion of property is complicated. And I'm not testifying to be an expert on it, but we've come across it with county-owned property and various properties that we either own or have purchased. And it may have a boundary description that shows out into the water, but we actually don't own it. In some cases, we do. In Jensen Beach, there are some areas that we actually have TIF deeds. And so that, it is complicated. All I said was that looking at Mr. Beaton's survey that he presented, it was certainly a boundary survey in the surveyor's note, which is, I think, one of the exhibits in here. He simply surveyed the boundaries that were provided by Mr. Beaton and that what they found that were recorded. And you can record, as was done in this property, a lot split. You can go and split your property and create, divide it into pieces. The issue is when you divide it into pieces, you may be legally able to do that. And I think the term of art that we used as an illegal lot split doesn't mean it was done, you know. So, you know, when you do a lot split, it just means that it may not comply with the county codes for building purposes. So a lot split that would be considered under the zoning code as a lot split, like when Palm City Farms, you can play a 10-acre lot, could be split into two 5-acre lots. You can go and do that and record it without even talking to the county at all. Now, when it's provided as evidence to the staff for a building permit, then they check to see does it meet the zoning codes. So those are, you can do lots of things in recording in the courthouse of conveyance of properties. Farmers do it all the time to split out pieces of property, that they farm different pieces, but it doesn't mean it's eligible for a building permit. So in this particular case, I specifically looked at, there was a lot of discussion on, and as you can tell, about ownership of the entire parcel. I'm sure that's what Mr. Beaton was conveyed from the prior property owner. The surveyor simply plotted out as a boundary survey, but I didn't feel that there was any substantial confident evidence to actually affirm that the, and the surveyor did not state that. It just simply said that they did the boundary survey based upon what was recorded. So other than Mr. Beaton's testimony that it had been dredged from uplands in the past, and the assertion that that and other parcels of the property were actually privately owned based upon the sequence of events. Under his opinion, I didn't find any other substantial competent evidence from other experts to affirm his claim on the submerged land. And so that was basis of my decision. And then following that decision, Ms. Elder is correct, they did reach out to DEP to find out if there was any claim, because this is on the Loxahatchee River, a wild and scenic river, which has a lot of interest from the state, as well as our Indian River Lagoon and other areas. So it's a, that portion of the property rights is complicated, and given what I had received, that was the basis of my decision. I don't have any further questions. So under the board's rules, now is the time for the board to ask questions to staff. Right. And then it's board deliberation. Right. Commissioner Hetherington. I have a couple questions. I might have some more. So the lot was split prior to your ownership? Yes, ma'am. Okay, and then you started to go into this, Pete, and Paul, you mentioned the comprehensive plan. I think it was 4.1E. How do you define in that policy what is owned? That's where the two-acre requirement is. What defines in that policy substantiates lot ownership? Well, the policy, from a simplicity standpoint, from our regulatory role, is we're regulating what is from mean high water upland. So the comprehensive plan is talking about some other things, but generally it is the measurement of lot size from the mean high water line. So like I said earlier, for example, the shoreline protection zone, that is not taking from a boundary out in the Loxahatchee River. It is taking from the shoreline where the mangroves are and so forth. Can you pull that provision up so I could see how it reads? Sure. And then while you're doing that, Mr. Beaton, you said when Mr. Schilling had said reference 4.1E, you said it does not say that. What's your interpretation of what it says? 4.1E4 is very clear. It's very specific. It can be broken down in Webster's Dictionary. It has two legs to it. The first says the boundary must be delineated as per the state statutes, which is having a professional license boundary survey performed. It's based upon the legal description of the parcel of land. That's the first leg of the policy. The second says no submerged land areas, waterward of that boundary line can be used. So I keep hearing staffs talking about the mean high water line. There's nothing in there that references mean high water line whatsoever. It's the boundary line is what's specifically referenced. If no submerged land areas could be used towards density, the policy could be this clear. It could say no submerged land areas can be used towards density. Period. It doesn't say that. It says waterward of the boundary line. So when you're standing on the land looking out over the water, the boundary line for this parcel is unique. It's further out. You have to walk out to the boundary line, and no submerged lands, waterward, or outside of that boundary line can be used, which would stop me from using then riparian rights, which all waterfront properties have a right to go access onto the state lands at that point. And that's what this policy prevents. So if you turn around standing, now that's your landward direction. The policy does not exclude my privately owned submerged lands from being used towards my density. It's part of my legal description. I pay taxes on it. I'm assessed on it, and it's part of the lot area. He says he spoke about the lot area, that the lot area is only 1.7. That's wrong. The lot area is 2.1 acres, 2.01 acres. That is the lot area. It's uplands or submerged lands. It doesn't matter. I own the river bottom there. Ms. Elder speaks about tiff deeds. I keep hearing tiff deeds. Deeds. There is no deed that divests me or my predecessors in the chain of title from the ownership of this property. You never presented one deed. You didn't give me anything. I asked for it. Where? Where? You didn't ask for anything. Okay. Well, the decision is whether his decision was based upon substantial evidence. There was none. I did ask you for it. I did ask you for it. I said, where? Show me a deed. Give me something. There was nothing. Any further questions? Commissioner Henry. Are there tiff deeds that we presented? There are tiff deeds and declarations that exist that I have, but he didn't ask for them, so I did not give them to him, but they do exist. And I did bring them up to him and ask him to get a letter of the state because we found them during this process. So they exist, but he didn't ask me for them. I mean, I've had him at meetings with him, but I was never asked. And you're saying that specifically he's referencing the title to my property? Is that what you're saying? I'm saying they're referenced, they're deeds and declarations that reference the area of your property. The area around my property, correct. Including your submerged lands. Including mine. For the record, my submerged lands. That's what you're saying. That's what the, yes? All right, let's get back to the procedure here. Commissioner Vargas. Okay, just a couple of comments. Did a realtor sell this parcel to you, or was this a for sale by owner? I purchased it directly through the owner. Okay. Did you take title insurance out? I did. Okay. You may want to pull out that policy because there was some question about the ownership, and it was divided. Just a suggestion. You can consult an attorney about this, a real estate attorney. Pull the policy. Commissioner Campy. Thank you. Staff had made testimony, I guess, that there was an application from the previous owner to change this, and that you withdrew that application. Why? Yes, sir. So before I purchased the property, the error was evident in the future land use, in the flume. The error was evident. Everywhere, all over it. 1.69 acres. Conversion of a 1.69-acre parcel to a one unit per acre. They were only trying to rezone this because it wasn't two acres. That was it. The formal zoning verification letter that Pete Walden issued for this parcel, he made a mistake. Instead of owning the mistake, he tried to just – we're going down the rabbit hole still. Right now, we're still going down the rabbit hole. And he's trying to defend his position. He had a survey. The formal zoning inquiry letter is very clear. It says, property appraiser indicates the property is 1.69 acres, while a private survey shows two acres in submerged lands. Please verify that the lot complies. Do you have a copy of that letter? Yes, sir, I do. And I asked Ms. Amy Offenbach, I said, did the landowner ever just take the simple step of verifying that it was two acres? And she said, no, they didn't. Instead, they were going to go for the rezone because the rezone would have then allowed one unit per acre. And she wanted to split it anyways, but she couldn't split it again. They called it an illegal lot split. It wasn't illegal. The state allows a lot split on these parcels. But they wanted to further subdivide it into two parcels, an acre and an acre. That was the intention. Madam Chair, may I? Sure. Just to clarify. Throughout this entire last three years, this applicant could have, had he not agreed with the contents of that letter, he in and of himself could have, prior to purchasing this property, could have requested a zoning letter to answer all his questions and make certain assumptions. So I just wanted to. I spoke directly with staff. I'm asking questions. Thank you. Next question, I had heard testimony that said you could have contacted the DEP, yet you chose not to. Did you ever reach out to the state DEP or anybody at the state level? Absolutely not. Just a hypothetical scenario. If you own property, right, everyone here lives in Martin County, owns property. Let's say you wanted to put a mother-in-law suite or build a pool in your backyard. So you get a survey done. You put it on the site plan. You present it to the county. Your neighbor goes, you can't build that right there. That's my property. Okay. Thank you. What do you say to that? The applicant had said, this is to staff, the applicant had said that there have been other homes built in the same area. Were all of those lot sizes two acres or more? Or were any of them less? Actual homes that are currently existing there now. Are there homes on property that's less than two acres? Or are they utilizing water to get to two acres? The one in particular in which I don't recall the name of the property owner that was fairly recent that we missed that I acknowledged, in fact, took portions of a small tributary canal, if you will, certainly not the Loxahatchee River, but it did have a lot size less than two acres. Yes, sir. Now, I would point out a lot split is a private action. So, as Mr. Donelson indicated, there can be property scattered throughout the county that utilized that process, but when it comes for a building permit is when that comes in. There can also be certain, there are almost infinite variables with these properties, when they were made, what the particulars are, what the ownership. So, each one is unique in and of itself, but, yes, sir, there are at least one out there that does not meet the minimum lot size of two acres. At least one, potentially more? Mm-hmm. Correct. Yes. Three. Thank you. I heard testimony that said that there were approvals in 1984, 2016, 2023, and then now. Are those the approvals that you're speaking of, Mr. Schilling? Those are, I believe the applicant had mentioned those, I mean, we're talking about the period of almost 50 years or whatever, but as I indicated, certainly there are some things out there that probably don't. However, I have not done a deep analysis of those properties back from the 80s because, number one, I wasn't here, and number two, there may be limited records. Understand. I'm just trying to run through the points that I had heard from staff's presentation and the applicant's presentation. These are things that caused me to write a note down. I had heard that at the hearing that you conducted, Mr. Donaldson, that there were only supposed to be the administrator, the attorney, and the head of the growth management department with the three people that were supposed to participate in that. However, there were six people at the meeting. We heard that it was Mr. Walden. We heard that it was Mr. Doherty. Who was the other person? Mr. Doolin was also there at my request. He did have interactions with the applicant at some point in time. Now, when it's supposed to be only three, is that a... It's not only three. It's the department director. So we did have Mr. Schilling and Mr. Doherty, who was giving all the testimony to Mr. Donaldson. So they were both supposed to be there. And then Mr. Schilling, if he had questions, had Mr. Walden and Mr. Doolin, if Mr. Schilling. But he gave the presentation. Understood. But is there any requirement that it only be department heads? Is there any requirement that it only be three people? No. There's a requirement that the people who are participating, speaking during the review, are the department heads, the county attorney, and the administrator. However, we're hearing now that Mr. Doolin did speak. To Mr. No, no. He spoke... Just for the record, Mr. Doolin did, in fact, speak, I believe, with the applicant prior to his purchase regarding the withdrawal of the land. No, I'm talking only at the meeting. No, he did not. No, he did not. Just Mr. Schilling and then Mr. Did you speak? Clyde may have had a few words at the meeting. Yes, sir. All right. So, Mr. Walden, you did not participate? I was there. I might have spoken on one or two instances, but I don't recall. Some other questions. The roadmap that the applicant spoke of, that in the beginning of your presentation, sir, you said that during your due diligence, you did what most people, smart, savvy people that are about to make more than a million-dollar investment would do, due diligence. You said that you spoke to, and what I liked is a lot of people would tell the commissioners, I spoke to someone at the county. Who did you speak to? I don't know. Makes it much more challenging. You do know. You said during this testimony that you stood up and swore that you would tell us the truth, that you basically, in your word, was you received a roadmap on what you would need to do prior to you purchasing, closing on the property, correct? Correct. From Ms. Offenbach. Was that a verbal roadmap or a document? It started as a verbal, and it evolved into a written document from Ms. Offenbach. After getting everything fixed, she did confirm all the usage. I was very specific in the email chain with Ms. Offenbach. Okay, so were those email, that email chain or this, your words, roadmap, was that presented to staff and to Mr. Donaldson so that we'd have a better understanding of how you got to where you were? Yes. Yes, it was. I heard from our chair and from Ms. Elder what the procedure of today's agenda item is meant to be, that we weren't going to necessarily be hearing additional testimony, even though to me this sounds like testimony. That being said, why isn't Ms. Offenbach and Mr. Fox here? Are they not allowed to participate in this? She seems to be integral in the process that he decided to make this investment, and even post-closing would have been his, at least, guide through the process. It doesn't get to Mr. Schilling, it doesn't get to Ms. Elder, and it doesn't get to Mr. Donaldson. It goes through a process on the levels of employment. Why aren't they here? So, they didn't participate in the Article 10 appeal hearing, so that's why they're not at this meeting today. They weren't at the Article 10 meeting, because you only have higher-level management department directors that participate in that. Except for Mr. Walden. Well, they're division heads within the growth management department, so I think that's why they were there. But you usually don't have staff level in there for Article 10 appeals. It's just not what you do. I'm not asking why they were not at that meeting. I'm asking why they're not here. Because they didn't participate in the Administrative Review Meeting. But a lot of what we're discussing is hearsay from staff and from the applicant. Their names have been mentioned several times. So, the board shouldn't consider new evidence. It should only consider what was presented at the Administrative Review Meeting, which is what staff has been talking about. That's all that the board should consider in this. So, those people were not included. Believe it or not, I actually can differentiate and discern between the two. So, to me, there's really two conversations happening at the same time. And from the applicant's point of view, it's mostly about, hey, I looked at this property that would tell me that I could purchase and build a single-family home, not a neighborhood, one house on one piece of property, and it was a 1.7 with a two wet, 1.7 dry. To get them to the two, I can imagine the conversations. Any of us can put ourselves into that same circumstance and say, do we buy this, can we build a house on it? No one is buying a piece of property, you know, knowingly, that can't have a house on it. You're not buying parkland. You're not buying a lot. But that being said, if I can separate all of, like, hey, how did we get here to the process, Ms. Elder, to the process, this that was sitting on the dais this morning, these documents, BCC public hearing agenda item DPQJ1 exhibits I through L, attached documents were inadvertently left off the board item. Left off the board item by who? We did, yes, sir, our office with the rendering of the PDF. So we're only getting to see this right now, this morning. They were not part of the PDF, yes, sir. That's my fault. If I'm going to do a process of specifically did the process work itself out, this wasn't part of it. We did have an admission that mistakes had potentially been made in the past. Mr. Donaldson, who I obviously hold in very high regard, I was one of the people that voted to make him have the position that he had. When Commission Chair Hurd asked us if we had any ex parte communications, I said none, and that's been filed. Now, that's not just because I had not spoken with you ever or anyone that represented you. I hadn't spoken to staff either about this particular item. Now, the agendas come every two weeks, and there's lots, and there's certain things that I need to have assistance and hear more deeply on that I would reach out to staff and say, hey, I need to know more about this. And then there's times where staff will schedule and request to meet with me and say, hey, look, we have an agenda item that's coming up. It's going to have this and this and this and this. I didn't do that either. I didn't hear from them, and I didn't ask them. But now all of a sudden I'm here with a pretty complicated agenda item. And it's funny because when I read the item, the agenda, we all look and say, how many items are here? How many pages is it? How long is the day going to be? This looks like a short agenda. But there's no such thing because it could be a two agenda, two item agenda, and it could take all day. I am finding, and I've been up here a while, I'm finding this to be pretty complicated. I'm finding that the stakes are remarkably high for you, remarkably high, and for us. Because one of the first questions I asked, which I wasn't trying to foretell the future, is what would your next step be if you don't get a decision that you like today? And our attorney, who I hold in very high regard, because I also helped her get that job, is you would sue us. Now, as a commissioner, all five of us, we are not looking for lawsuits. A lot of people say, well, you shouldn't be afraid of a lawsuit. And I always tell people the same thing. I'm not afraid of a lawsuit. I'm afraid of losing a lawsuit. I'm afraid of entering into a legal battle where going in, I sort of feel nervous, like it might not go our way. Then I try to figure out that these are not only professional colleagues of mine. I'll be perfectly honest with you. They're friends. These are friends of mine. So while I'm listening to you speak, that's why I asked you, what do you do for a living? And you said firefighter. I thought for sure you were going to tell me attorney. Because that was, in my opinion, a very well-presented appeal. Very well done. You know, and I'm thinking, wow, this guy's sharp. He's got the details. He's not reading really from notes. He knows his topic. You've also afforded yourself of the process of what you could and could not do. Some people would have just taken the punch and said, oh, man, I'm screwed. Excuse my language. You haven't. So now I have to, I'm not going to guess that you would sue us. But, boy, the stakes are high for you. Because otherwise you own a piece of property that everyone will know will be nearly impossible for anyone else to do anything with. So it's not like you could sell it off. And I know I'm talking much longer than I chose to, but I really want to lay this out. And I know that I'm also speaking on the record. That my words could come up again in the future. So in my personal opinion, there's some gray areas here. This was not an absolutely you were wrong and staff was right. It's not an absolute that the staff was wrong and you were right. That's why this process, as far as I know, this third step, you appealed it and then you appealed it again to Mr. Donaldson and then you appealed it to us, is designed so that the five of us can use our opinions, our life experiences, to decide if we agree or not. I would never want to be known, for as much as I like Mr. Donaldson, to be his rubber stamp. I'm certainly not a rubber stamp. I don't believe any of the five of us up here are going to be rubber stamps. So in my particular opinion, enough has happened here that this is not an agreement with Mr. Donaldson's opinion. I don't know what the negotiated outcome could be versus it's just simply a yes or a no. But if that's the case, I think that you did what I would assume you should have done before you purchased the property, once you purchased the property. The two questions I had that Ms. Elder brought up, which I thought were very valid, is why did you withdraw the application when this would never have happened had you left? But you said that was a split to make it two one-acre buildable lots. So instead of having a single home on this property, it could have been two, and you didn't want to do that, okay? And then the other question was, why didn't you personally contact the DEP? And since I'm being as honest as possible, I didn't really love your answer that you just didn't want to. That could have been the end of it, potentially. But you weren't mandated to. So I'm giving you a pass on why didn't you contact the DEP. And then on our side, there's been a couple of things. I mean, these are very great professional people that have to deal with hundreds and hundreds of issues every year. And in this particular case, especially if I were you, when I hear that someone was able to do this, and I thought Mr. Schilling was very honest. That's his way. I mean, I think he's one of the greatest growth management professionals in the state of Florida. And he was honest. He could have sort of danced around and said, I don't know what happened. He was very honest. And he said, look, we made a mistake. In my mind, that means something to you. It has happened. Someone else got to do this. And I get that that mistake doesn't mean that we've just opened the floodgates and now it's a precedent. But in this particular case, I would make a motion to disagree with Mr. Donaldson's opinion. Mr. Hetherington. Yes, I echo much of what you said, and I won't repeat it, except for the fact that I don't think it was your responsibility to reach out to DEP to substantiate what your survey and everything claimed. And I think your title, your survey, actually was evidence enough. And I think there's enough reasonable doubt. Well, we have tremendous staff. There's enough reasonable doubt to me that at least one of the three criteria, one is due process, fairly applicable. I have questions about how the 4.1 E4 either was interpreted versus what it says on the document. And I think that you presented evidence, so I'm going to second the motion. Commissioners, I'm looking at the supplemental memo that was given to us this morning, and it's a copy of an email correspondence from Amy Offenbach to Corey Beaton. And among the things that it says is zoning A1, future land use, rural density. And I'll read from comprehensive plan, the minimum lot size for development required by the zoning and future land use is two acres. Furthermore, it says there's a 75-foot shoreline protection zone from mean high water line, wet side of seawall or backside of mangroves exceeds rear setback. So she's quoting the comprehensive plan and the development regulations and is saying you have to have two acres and you also have to provide for a 75-foot shoreline protection zone from mean high water line. And Mr. Beaton knew that he didn't have two acres and he also knew where the mean high water line was and also where the boundary. So I caution you in this motion that it is an admission that you don't have to have two acres in order to get a building permit. Are you asking me for my – I'm really, really nervous about proceeding with – because you then say it's okay to not comply with the comprehensive plan requirements. Well, I think the only difference, Madam Chair, respectfully, would be that you said he knew that he didn't have two acres. And I think his testimony today was – the argument here is that he believes that he does. That's the point. I'm not agreeing that, you know, it's two – roughly two acres to build. It's – he had 1.7 dry and 2.01 wet. The question is, is that portion that's wet able to be part of the calculation or not. He's not saying, hey, I thought I had 1.7 and that's what I want. He's – the argument that I'm hearing is that he believes that he does. So when you say he knew that he didn't, I don't believe that he knew that he didn't. I think even to this moment he believes that he does. Because I agree with you. I don't want people to think, well, it's two or thereabouts. It's two. But what we can't figure out right this moment is, is it legitimately two? But he's not saying 1.7. He's saying two. May I? But I disagree. He knew that his boundary was two and he knew that his dry land was 1.69. And he also knew, or he should have known, because Amy Offenbach wrote to him and said that you also have a shoreline protection zone from the mean high water line. And you knew that there was a difference between mean high water and boundary. You knew that that was a three-tenths of an acre difference. May I? No. Commissioner Vargas. Yeah, my question is, are we ready to take a vote? You had enough evidence? Commissioner Capps would like to make a comment. Commissioner Capps. So, there are two big issues at hand here. The first one is Policy 4.1E4, which basically, according to our staff and our county attorney, means that we do not count submerged lands in lot size. And then there's the issue of whether you own the submerged lands. And I heard the county attorney say earlier that even if it were determined that you did own the submerged lands at some future date, we still do not count submerged lands toward lot size. And I'm gathering that that is an important precedent and policy in our comprehensive plan. And I am satisfied with the county attorney's analysis and the county administrator's decision. And I'm going to make a substitute motion. We can. We have a motion and a second. Yeah. You've got to vote on it. Okay. We just have to vote on it. Yeah. Okay. Any further comments? There's a motion. So, just to be clear, are we going to issue the building permit or is the board not agreeing with Mr. Donaldson and requiring the administrative review hearing to be done again to analyze the different policies? What's the direction? So, we're clear because I'm unclear with the motion. I know you disagree with Mr. Donaldson, but what is the outcome that the board is looking for? So, we're clear. We can send it back to Mr. Donaldson for another administrative review meeting. You can say, based on the interpretation of the code, we can issue the building permit. So, we need to know what the ultimate decision is. Was that outline coming into this hearing? Mm-mm. It's just based on whether you agree with Mr. Donaldson, but we need to know what the next step would be. Thank you. Can we go to the agenda item and see what the recommendation was? Because from what I understood of the presentation introduction was that we were to decide if we felt that the process of those three criteria was met, not approving necessarily the building permit. Because what I'm hearing from my colleague, Commissioner Capps, what I'm hearing from staff, this gentleman is obviously very capable of making his – let me finish, please. He's capable of making his presentation. I was making my determination on not whether or not I think he should be allowed to build his house on his property. It's was he given a fair process through this. And I'm not saying it was a travesty. I'm just saying that there was enough that would tip it my way and then give him the opportunity to do it – look into it a little further. But on the other hand, just as a caution, this is not meant to just put him back to the starting line for the same outcome I want and I know our staff can do. Let's work with this applicant. Let's figure out a way if it can't be that it's the point whatever is wet and it can't be used in the calculation. Let's help this gentleman and his family build a house on his property because otherwise we're basically telling him it's worthless because no one's going to buy it from him if they can't build. I don't know if splitting it into two lots so that you'd put two houses – that probably is not really even the feel, the nature of the neighborhood. Let's help him out. So my motion is that I disagreed with Mr. Donaldson's decision based on the process and that he would have to go back and work with staff fairly and accurately to create an opportunity. So the alternative recommendation – I just wanted to clarify that because it was unclear. Okay. Mr. Walden, can you provide clarity? Yes, I just want to point out that a path forward was presented to the applicant to rezone and reclassify the land use on the property. Unfortunately, Mr. Beaton's made the assertion that that land use and zoning change was to make two lots. That's not the case. That was to make it whole and buildable. So you have a disagreement between staff and Mr. Beaton as to the intent of that land use change. We saw it from a competent land use attorney that they wanted to make the lot buildable. Staff complied with that and was going to take it forward. Understood, but now he's hitting the reset button. He thought that he had a different path forward. It ended up right here in front of us. I know that our staff will be professional and unbiased in helping him go forward. We can't tell him what to do. He might just as readily say, I'm hiring an attorney and suing us. I hope that's not the case, but he's hitting the reset button. So what I would recommend for all parties concerned is that whatever has happened in the past, remain in the past, and we take what you've heard from us today, and we don't even know what the decision will be, move forward. Because I'm assuming your ultimate goal for you, I'm sure for your wife, is to get this settled and build the house. Commissioner Hetherington. I've lost my train of thought, except I did want to chime in. I believe that private property rights are so very important to me, and I think there's enough doubt here that I lean into having this resolved and for you to be able to build your family's home. Maintain my second. What is the motion? There's an alternate recommendation in the agenda item, so I was just clarifying if that was the motion made by Commissioner Campy. So it just means that you are going to adopt a resolution reversing the county administrator's decision, remanding the building permit back to staff for further review. Correct. Does that mean that he's going to be receiving a building permit? It means staff will work with him, like we have, to see if there's an alternate way forward, with the goal of trying to work it out with him, but there's no guarantee. Okay. Commissioner Vargas. Okay. So I've heard everybody's comments here from the DAI and, of course, the department, and I've worked with them last year and a half, and I think they're wonderful. There are inconsistencies here. We have to do the right thing. I disagree with Mr. Donaldson. I want to follow along and go ahead and approve the motion that was made by Commissioner Campy and seconded by Commissioner Hetherington to move forward. We want to do the right thing with you. You've done a lot of homework. I understand. Mr. Donaldson. So following the remanding back to staff to review it, it comes back to the two, just to say what our decisions will be based upon, it comes back to the two fundamental questions that Mr. Beaton brought up, which is, one, do you include the entire lot boundary in the analysis for this zoning district? And number two, the evidence of whether or not the property owner owns that property could only be based upon what was submitted and not any post-evidentiary evidence that's been supplied. That's my understanding of what staff's job would be to do, right? No. It's just remanded back for further review. We're not limited. Yeah, I want to make sure that that's not the case. It's not just to review the information that has already been done. I want more of a robust review. Mr. Walden said that there was some possibilities to work something out that can have a house built on the property. I would also ask staff to go back and review the Pentelago approvals decision. Those were inland waters. It's not the same. I understand, but it was when we were counting. I remember the debate of whether or not those lot sizes would count water. I get that it's not the Loxahatchee, but I'm just trying to create a situation. Look, I'm trying to be very respectful of staff and not say that the board or three of the board would approve a building permit for this gentleman. That's not our job. That's not what we were even asked to do here today. I could make an alternative motion to just grant him a building permit, but I have always said that I value the professional experience and education of our staff. I'm asking that I trust our staff to work with this gentleman who's obviously capable to create an opportunity where he can build a house on his property. I know that if we brainstorm, and when I say we, I don't mean me. I mean you all brainstorm to give an opportunity to build a house here. If you need to come back and it needs to have some kind of decision made by staff for some change, the goal here is to help our residents and landowners build on their property. That's as simple as it could possibly be, and I know that our staff is trying to do that. Madam Chair, may I? Paul Schilling, for the record. So that very avenue or similar was presented about a year ago to the applicant of ensuing or taking that land use change. We've analyzed this property for many, many hours. And in fact, the only conclusion that I've come to personally is that a land use change and rezoning would be necessary, as did the previous owner. So that, in theory, would take out the ownership issue of the submerged land. Well, let me ask you a question on that then, because basically our decision is to agree with that or not at this point. What will that entitle for him? He's got to go all the way back to the drawing board? It depends on your definition of drawing board, but that would be the mechanism that would we already have. We've analyzed that application several years ago. We could reevaluate it and then bring it back to be a small-scale change, land use change. It would be decided by you? Decided by you. Okay, so it's still come back to us. Yes, sir. Sir, you heard that. What are you thinking about that? That was the proposal that staff gave me originally, is to do a land use change. The neighborhood is highly against the land use change. It's a very unique neighborhood. All the lots are two-acre lots. No one in that neighborhood, they were going to come with pitchforks to the meeting. They had said staff approved it, and they did. It was going through the process, and staff was going to recommend it to the board. But the neighborhood is extremely against a rezone. They're all two-acre tracts of land. And people like it the way that it is. They don't want to start seeing these lots get split into different densities. And it doesn't need to be. There does not need to be a land use change for it. The ownership issue keeps coming up. There is no ownership issue. This was something that was created by Mr. Donaldson. If DEP has an issue, they can take me to court. Okay, so let's do this, because I think we need to wrap this up. I hear your point about splitting it. And if I lived in that neighborhood, and it's a two-acre neighborhood, I don't know if I would want, because how many vacant lots are still there? There's a handful, and they're all less than two acres of dry land. So let that be somebody else's problem. You're going to try to figure out a way that says the two acres, your combined two acres, of what you've been paying taxes on all this time, that's the avenue you're going to have to take. But I'm just saying that my motion is that you and staff go back and try to work that out. I'm just fearful they're going to say the same thing. Well, you can't use your submerged lands, and you have to reason. I would reassure you that this is a group that they're not vindictive. The five of us will be watching. This is a professional group I have the highest regard for. They heard us. They sat right here. I'm looking at Mr. Doolin, Mr. Schilling, and Mr. Walden. You're going to be in good hands. They heard from us that we want you to be able to build a house on the property. So short of you being over at the courthouse, let's see if we can't work this out. Because it doesn't do any of us any good, you or the county taxpayers, to let this go to the next level of a lawsuit for a judge to figure it out. So try to work with DEP. Try to figure out if your scenario is accurate, then it's accurate. Mr. Donaldson. As you said, this is a difficult one. And the challenge by your – I believe I understand the direction you want us to do. So obviously – and, you know, certainly staff felt in their prior recommendations to the previous property owner and to Mr. Beaton that that was a process by which we could get to the end. And certainly we recognize that you can have disagreements by neighborhoods, but in this case we would – we still felt that it was appropriate. Next door, adjacent subdivision has a similar estate density. You would be matching that. Actually, more dense. So I think – and then your direction today is for an expedient review and work with Mr. Beaton so that he can actually get a building permit without having to come back to this board or through a lengthy process. Ultimately, they – you've heard the challenges here, and I just wanted you to understand that your motion, while it remits it back to a process, throws it back into the gray. So all I'm suggesting is we can take it like that or you can be more directive and end this today. Can you do the building permit? Okay. I make a motion that directs staff to create a building permit for this gentleman on his property. I will – Second. Amending my – oh, was that the original motion? Yeah, I was changing my motion, so you're a second. A building permit in violation of the LDRs and the Comprehensive Plan. Okay. Is there a second? Second. Any further discussion? No. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Opposed. That motion passes 3-2 with Commissioners Heard and Caps dissenting. Let's take a 10-minute break. Thank you. We are back, taking up Department 1, which is Office of Management and Budget items, which require board approval. Ms. Murley. Good afternoon, Commissioner. Stephanie Murley, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, here to present 10 items today. Yeah. Item number 1 is permission to apply for the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, or FDEP, for the Bathtub Beach – Sailfish Point Beach Joint Renourishment Project. Our public works is requesting a grant award of $1,575,380 for the construction and feasibility funds for the Bathtub Beach and Sailfish Point Beach Restoration Project. There is a grant match of approximately $2.6 million, which is budgeted within the FY27 Bathtub Beach CIP sheet. Item number 2 is a permission to apply for FDEP's St. Lucie Inlet Management Project. Public works is requesting application of $5.9 million for design costs for the bypassing south at the St. Lucie Inlet State Park. There is a grant match of $5.9 million, which is programmed in the FY27 St. Lucie Inlet Management Plan CIP sheet. This is the coastal show, by the way, today. Item number 3 is a permission to apply for the local government funding, or the LGFR, from FDEP for their shore protection project. Public works is requesting application for $206,865 for monitoring funds for the Martin County Hutchison Island Shore Protection Project. There is a grant match of $243,135, which is programmed with the FY27 Coastal Beach Management CIP. Item number 4 is a permission to apply for the FY27-28 FDEP LGFR for MacArthur Boulevard Dune Project. Our public works is requesting application of $2.2 million for design, construction, and immediate post-construction monitoring funds for the MacArthur Boulevard Dune Beach Project. There is a grant match of $2.2 million, which is programmed within the FY27 Coastal MacArthur Boulevard Project CIP sheet. Item number 5 is a permission to accept the Florida Department of State Division of Library and Information Services State Aid to Libraries grant funds. Our library is receiving $81,448 that helps fund a full-time library specialist with our Martin County Library System. There is no local grant match required on that one. Item number 6 is a permission to accept the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, Drug-Free Communities grant. Our Health and Human Services Department is requesting the acceptance of $125,000 for a year 6 of funding that helps expand and support local efforts that aim to reduce and prevent youth substance abuse. There is a grant match required of $125,000, but that is provided through in-kind match dollars through Martin County staff time and coalition member time. Item number 7 is a permission to accept the FDEP St. Lucie Inlet Management Plan Implementation Project grant. This is requesting acceptance of $3.4 million for permit-required sediment bypass monitoring cost. There is a $3.4 million match that is programmed with the current FY26 CIP St. Lucie Inlet Management budget. Item number 8 is a permission to accept amendment number 2 for the FDEP St. Lucie Inlet Management Plan Implementation Project. This is amendment number 2 that's increasing the FDEP share by $425,000 and will also be utilized for permit-required monitoring. There is additional grant match of $425,000, which is programmed with the FY27 St. Lucie Inlet Management Plan CIP sheet. Item number 9 is a permission to accept amendment number 3 for FDEP for the Martin County Shore Protection Project. This is the third amendment that will increase the FDEP share by $206,865 for permit-required monitoring. There is an additional match of $243,135 that is programmed within the FY27 Beach Management CIP budget. And item number 10 is adjustments to the FY26 budget. Our Martin County Fire Rescue Department is in receipt of additional grant funds from the Florida Department of Health Emergency Medical Services, or EMS, grant in the amount of $3,539, which is used for operating expenses and small non-capital equipment needs within the Fire Rescue Department. And this is just OMB requesting a budget resolution to accept those funds. Questions for Ms. Murley. Is there a motion to approve? So moved. Second. There's a motion and a second. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? That motion passes unanimously. We'll take up Department 2, which is contracts that meet the threshold for board approval of $1 million or greater. Ms. Brotherton. Good afternoon. Christy Brotherton, your Chief Procurement Officer. I have several contracts for your consideration. The first one is a prepositioned contract for disaster-related debris removal. And this contract has a maximum not-to-exceed value of $3 million with a maximum not-to-exceed term of five years. And staff is recommending that the board award the contract to the three highest-scoring ranked firms, which is Ceres Environmental Services, DRC Emergency Services, and Ashbritt, and move that the board authorize the county administrator or designee to execute all documents related to this request. Next, we have a contract for the Sailfish Sands Golf Course Pump Station Replacement Project. And staff is recommending that the board award the contract to the highest-scoring responsive and responsible proposer, Centroid Diversified, in the amount of $1,569,068.47, and move that the board authorize the county administrator or designee to execute all documents related to this request. Next, number three, we have another continuing services agreement for household hazardous waste collection, transportation, and disposal services. This contract has a maximum not-to-exceed value of $1 million and a maximum not-to-exceed term of five years. And staff is recommending that the board award the contract to the lowest responsive and responsible bidder, which is Republic Services, doing business as U.S. Ecology Tampa, and move that the board authorize the county administrator or designee to execute all documents related to this request. Number four is a continuing services agreement for landscape maintenance for utilities and solid waste facilities. This contract has a maximum not-to-exceed value of $1.5 million and a maximum not-to-exceed term of five years. And staff is recommending that the board award the contract to the lowest responsive and responsible bidder, which is Treasure Coast Lawn and Landscape, and move that the board authorize the county administrator or designee to execute all documents related to this request. And last, we have the Floridan Aquifer Supply Wells North Jensen R05 and Tropical Farms R08 project. And staff is recommending that the board award the contract to the lowest responsive and responsible bidder, which is AllWeb's Enterprises, in the amount of $7,492,300. This includes the base bid and alternates. Move that the board approve a budget transfer from the utility's capital reserves in the amount of $3,681,500 to the WELL TFRO-8 project and $1,910,800 for WELL NRO-5 project and $299,937 for the related construction phase engineering services for WELL TFRO-8. And move that the board authorize the county administrator or designee to execute all documents related to this request. Done. Thank you. Questions from Ms. Perlman? Very well presented. Motion to accept that beautiful work. Second. Mr. Vargas. Yes, I have a question. The, excuse me, $3,681,500, you're transferring from the capital reserves, so how is that going to be replenished? Let me pass that over. Mr. Donaldson, you want to? It was put there specifically for this project, so it's not to be replenished. You have capital reserves that the utility department is holding funds for these projects, and then we're pulling it out. So it's not a... Your microphone. So the funds in the capital reserve are, were specifically placed in there for these, for capital projects like this. So the point is, is that there isn't, the replenishment comes over time based upon the utilities department or putting in funds to, into the capital fund for future expenditures. So it is a reserve specifically for capital construction, and its replenishment is, is only needed for future capital projects as defined in the CIP or in the, in, in the department's budget. Okay. I was trying to clarify, this is not an additional expense to our taxpayers, correct, to replenish that account? No, it is not. So if you look at the fiscal impact, it says funding for this project will be provided through utilities, CFC funds, that's capital facilities charges. So that's their equivalent of impact fees. So every time a building permit is provided or a development is done, they, they provide capital facility charges. They go into the capital reserve budget of the utilities department, and it's earmarked. It can only stay for utilities. And then as the utilities needs to do plan expansions or other things, those monies get removed out of that capital facilities charge reserve fund and then moved into the CIP through actions like this. So the board has authorized the use of CFCs, which is a revenue. It goes into the, and you also recognize that a revenue in your budget, and then it can't be spent until it's moved out of a reserve fund into the project fund, as we're doing here. This is not something that we're borrowing funds for? I think you and I had a discussion about? Yeah, this is not a borrowing action. This is simply taking funds that have been built up over time. This is a pay-as-you-go project, if you will. If there is a borrowing action, one will have a larger audience of consultants and bond counsel here going through that, which the utilities department does on occasion for significant project upgrades. Just wanted to be certain about that, because you and I spoke about another matter, I think, that dealt with borrowing funds. There is nothing that's being borrowed on this particular project today. Uh-huh. Okay. Any further questions? There's a motion and a second. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? That motion passes unanimously. Thank you. We will now take up Department 3, which is adoption of a resolution updating the list of county-owned properties appropriate for affordable housing under Resolution No. 24-6.15, adopted on June 18, 2024, and authorizing the sale of such properties through public auction. Ms. Segura. Good afternoon. Carla Segura, Row Property Manager. As you discussed, this current resolution that we have directed staff to sell two county-owned surplus affordable housing properties through the request for proposal process to nonprofit organizations, affordable housing communities, or land trusts, and other associated facilities. The resolution also required that each property remain unsold until the completion of the related infrastructure improvements for each of their projects. The new Monrovia had the water and sewer project, and the Camino Trail had that project. The golden gate is what I meant to say. Sorry. The proposed resolution would instead authorize staff to market and sell these properties through the county's contracted public auction process. The public auctions have proven to be a more effective method for selling county-owned properties by expanding public participation and creating a more competitive sales process. The two properties are one is the parcel on 47th Avenue in New Monrovia, and the other one is in Golden Gate between Hawthorne and Irish Streets, where the Camino Trail is running through. Both properties have already been presented to their appropriate CRAs, and the agencies have received the required authorization to move forward with those. Staff is requesting that the board consider one of the following actions, rescind the resolution and adopt the proposed resolution updating the county's surplus affordable housing properties in accordance with Section 125.379 Florida statutes, and authorize staff to market and sell both properties through the county's contracted public auction process for affordable housing. Or we did a supplemental memo where we would sell the residential property in New Monrovia through the auction process and possibly just donate the property in Golden Gate to the community land trust. We also would like the board to authorize staff to revise the language within the proposed resolution to mirror the recommendation and authorize the chair to execute any documents necessary to complete the transaction. If there's any questions. Questions for staff. Would anyone from the public like to address this? First, Commissioner Vargas. Okay, so I'm understanding it's to sell both parcels via auction, or the other is sell one parcel and then donate it to a land trust. Is that correct? Correct. Mr. Ranieri, would you like to address this? Yes, thank you, Commissioner. Rob Ranieri, CEO for House of Hope, also a board member for the Martin County Community Land Trust, here today to ask you to act on the second request from staff to donate the Golden Gate parcels to the Martin County Land Trust. We have an opportunity, working jointly with House of Hope, the county staff, and the land trust to potentially develop some affordable transitional housing in the Golden Gate community to be used to help residents that are in challenging times to have an affordable roof over their head, while House of Hope provides wraparound services to those individuals or families to help them move forward. Commissioner Campy. Thank you. I think that that's a great idea for several reasons. One, we constantly speak about how we're trying to address affordable housing and transitional housing for our residents. This will be a concrete step to show that we're actually trying. It's not massive, but it's a step. It's like a sailfish. It's like a starfish. And then also, we went through a tremendous amount of effort, both on the private side and the county employees, to create the land trust. And if all we do is create it and then just let it wither on its own, then we haven't accomplished much. So this is a step in the right direction to show that we are legitimately interested in creating a robust land trust. So I would make a motion to accept the second recommendation. Commissioner Vargas. Yes. Mr. Ranieri, who would be building this housing? The Martin County Land Trust would be responsible for the construction, maintenance, property management of any facilities that are built on the parcels. So in perpetuity, we'd be responsible for this. How much money is in the land trust right now? So the land trust is in its early stages. It's a newer nonprofit to the community. We're waiting for some other land that the county had authorized previously to provide to the land trust down in Hope Sound. So we're beginning our fundraising and development efforts. We've built a pretty strong board to navigate the land trust. And now we're trying to move forward with some projects to actually utilize land for the common purpose of creating affordable housing in perpetuity across the community. Commissioner Hetherington. I think that this has been something that the Golden Gate community has looked at for years, and I would like to see it sometime in the near future. Because community, the land trust has been effective, it seems, in Hope Sound. I would love to have a presentation on sort of the status and the success, because I know Commissioner Jenkins and Commissioner Capps are very intricately involved in the land trust. But I will support this, but I would like to see the community land trust sort of a presentation in the near future on where they're at and where their vision is and where they hope to go. Sure. Thank you. Mr. Capps. Just by the way of review about what a land trust is, for those who may not know, the land trust owns the land, and the occupants of the housing own their house or their unit in the apartment building or condo building or whatever you want to call it. And this enables them to stabilize their housing costs and to build equity. Correct. Those are the purposes. Yes. So that would be the purpose for any parcel that the construction on it, the housing put on it, was going to be up for sale for residential, and that keeps the price affordable for the buyer, but also, again, keeps that unit in affordable housing in perpetuity. For these lots, we've been discussing the opportunity for transitional housing. So that housing would be maintained and owned by the land trust in addition to the land, and the land trust would charge a nominal rent to the person or persons that are living in the homes. And then, again, like I mentioned, it's a full transitional housing project that we want to develop, so the residents would be working with House of Hope in whatever areas of need they have. We want to do that career coaching, medical assistance, case management, family-centered coaching, all different programs and services available through House of Hope to help to elevate those residents to a higher plateau so that, by the end of the transitional period, they're either financially ready to purchase a home, potentially through the land trust or habitat or the general market, or they move on to another rental opportunity. And then that transitional home that they had lived in becomes available for the next person or family that may need that support. And also, this is just another example of a partnership that we're creating. And in order to protect Martin County's interests, we will, of course, have development agreements and contracts that will provide protection to the county for the contribution that the county is making in perpetuity. So these, we've done them, we've done them with Habitat, we've done them with Miss Butterfly, they're different. The legal department makes sure that our interests are protected. That guy right there is going to make sure. Those three. So there's a motion and a second, right? Yes. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? That motion passes unanimously. Wonderful. Thank you very much, commissioners. Appreciate it. Great. Have a great day. We are now at the end of our meeting. Mr. Erler, would you like to speak to us? This is the end of our meeting. Okay. I don't see anybody else who needs to speak to us. Commissioner Hetherington, any further comments? I'm all set today. How about you, Commissioner Campy? You talked out yet? No. That's what I was going to ask. No such thing. Oh, gosh. But I have nothing to add currently. Thank you. Commissioner Capps? I'm good. And Commissioner Vargas? Thank you so much. How about you, Mr. Donaldson? And Ms. Elder? Yeah, right. We are adjourned. Thank you. Thank you to all of you. You're welcome. Thanks, Miriam. Thank you, everybody. Great. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, . Mike. Mr. Edwin. I'm going to join them. We have to bring you back into this meeting. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Edwin. Thank you. I am Colleen. Thank you, Mr. Edwin.