Good morning, Commissioner Gilbert, Commissioner Hardiman, Commissioner Milian Orbis, Vice Chairman Gonzalez, Chairwoman Cohen-Hinges. Good morning, President. Three members present, we have a quorum. Good morning, everyone. Please welcome the commissioners and everyone that is in attendance to our airport and seaport committee. We're going to commence with a prayer led by Commissioner Gonzalez, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance, led by Commissioner Orbis. Thank you, Lord, for this day. Thank you for allowing us to be here. Lord, let your will be done in everything we do, and let every decision we make be for your glory and for the good of all. In your holy name we pray. Amen. Any attorneys, any edits or changes to this morning's agenda? No, Madam Chair. At this time, I'll open the reasonable opportunity for the public to be heard. We have no public hearing items on our agenda this morning. I don't have any speaker cards. Anyone wanting to address the body now is your opportunity. Seeing none, I will close the reasonable opportunity for the public to be heard. I'll entertain a motion to set the agenda. It's been moved by Commissioner Gonzalez, second by Commissioner Orbis. Oh, we are moving quickly. Hi, good morning. Welcome. Welcome. I do move quickly. Welcome. Are you here for public reasonable opportunity to be heard? Not only that, I was a 33-year veteran as a Security Enforcement Division officer for the Port of Miami. I'm Braswell, Eric H. Braswell. We welcome you and we thank you for your service. If you don't mind pausing for just one minute to the attorneys. We have a motion and a second on setting the agenda. All those in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. Anyone who wish to be recorded? No. Our agenda is set. I will reopen public hearing. Welcome to you, young man. Thank you for joining us at this committee. Can you please start with us? Listen, you want to use my glasses? I know. I can see you clearly. I can see you very clearly. Okay. All right. I'm Braswell. Eric H. Braswell. Allow me to finish, please. You'll have two minutes. No, it's okay. I think this may be your first time, but I'm just going to share with you how we operate here. You'll have two minutes to address the body and if you'll start by sharing your name and your address. Your two minutes commences now. Okay. I raised to Braswell, 11979 Southwest 92nd Lane, zip code 33186, Miami, Florida. Okay. I'm here to urge the board to continue to preserve the status of my former security enforcement unit, which was started by your predecessors in 1978, as a county entity. It was started under virtue of Chapter 28A, State Statute 311.11 and 311.12 to act as the eyes and ears of the port, much less to meet the requirements of insurance and inducible bond ratings. But we also worked hand-in-hand, hand-in-glove with the various local state and federal agencies. And this was done through training, intensive training that was started in 1981 under the blessing of our then-director, Carl Linetta, and operated and managed by a former soldier of the Colombian Armed Forces, Captain Herman Gomez, to train us in at least 35 different incidents, chemical spills, oil spills, shootings, civil disturbances, bond threats. We broke up a cocaine ring led by a brilliant woman who could have been a CFO. They disarmed a member of the posse. I did that helping a customs agent, and I started wearing the vest again, okay? And also events like providing security for King Olaf V of Norway, President Reagan, Siega, Jamaica. But the problem is what I found out from six officers at the port over a two-year period was that the functions of the training bureau was stopped 10 years ago for no reason. And it's to hone the skills of your security officer, your civil servants, for the last century, this century, and this coming century. And it was stopped. So I urged his body to conduct a survey, interview the officers who served more than 15 years and went through the process, the training. Thank you. Thank you for your public testimony. Your two minutes is up. I encourage you, we have our port director and our seaport director present here. Oh, yes. I knew him since he was a kid. Perfect. I encourage you to chat and connect with him, and my office is also happy to help you in any way that we can. Okay. By the way, I left a package with a staff member of Commissioner Higgins. That's me, yes. Thank you. That's right. And thank you for your testimony, Tate. And I hope you read it. Thank you. We did. Thank you so much. At this time, public hearing is now closed. Our agenda has been set. To my colleagues, any items that you would like to bifurcate and or discuss this morning? Commissioner Gonzalez, you were recognized. Madam Chair, I have one question to the department on 3F. Can the department approach to answer Commissioner Gonzalez's question on 3F? Yes, Commissioner. Good morning, Director. So I read through this item, and I certainly don't want to take too much of everybody's time, but I kind of want to understand what the function here is. So I understand that I guess we operate and own this hotel. Correct. We are contracting folks who are in the hotel business because we're not in the hotel business. That's correct. To operate the hotel. Yep. Do you know how many rooms are in this hotel, how successful this hotel is? Sure. The hotel has 259 rooms and several other suites, et cetera. We currently are running at a rate of approximately 80% occupancy. It was higher before, and it will probably get higher again because we were going through renovation. All the interior spaces have been renovated, et cetera. But it is very successful, and it's a very good revenue producer. This item will produce about $17 million of annual revenue for the airport in gross revenue, and then the company gets paid for their services to operate the hotel out of a management fee. Got it. And then as far as I do know that there's a new hotel that's being built. Yes. Once that hotel gets built, are we keeping this hotel? What are the plans for this hotel? The current plans are to keep this hotel for now, even after the new hotel is in place. So we're going to keep it in place for now. And then we still have not decided what we'll do with that space if we do indeed eliminate it. But for now, the current plans are to maintain this hotel. Got it. Has there ever been a conversation about what would happen if we did eliminate this hotel? There are several options in our capital plan of different things we can do with the space. No decision has been made yet. So I can get back to the report on that with specifics on what we're looking at. But obviously, when the new hotel is being built, we need to keep this one in place. And then after it's up and running, it will continue to operate. But we do have some alternatives that we can share with you offline or send you a report. Thank you, Director. No further questions, Madam Chair. Madam Chair. Thank you, Commissioner Gonzalez. Commissioner Emiliano Orbis, you are recognized. Thank you to the Director. How are you today? Great to see you. So I know this is a management agreement. Correct. You're updating the management agreement because it's... Correct. It was competitively bid out. The firm that won the RFP is the same firm, the incumbent, that is currently performing the services. They're doing a good job doing the work. So they ended up... Obviously, there's certain economies there. They won this RFP. And the current agreement expires very soon. So we want to make sure we're proactive and get the new contract in place before the current one expires. Okay. And that's a Hilton currently? Driftwood, but is it Hilton? No. No. It's not a... It's a what? Yeah, it's not a Hilton. It's an N-by-8 hotel. It's our hotel. It's not a branded hotel. Okay. Okay, so it's a management agreement, but are there any plans that the hotel has not been renovated in a while? Are there any renovate or update, any restorations going on in that property? Yes, as a matter of fact, so over the last couple of years, we have renovated all of the interior spaces in the hotel. So all the rooms, the interiors, furniture, carpeting, walls, et cetera, have been renovated. So that's one of the reasons, as I mentioned before, when Commissioner Gonzalez asked why the actual occupancy, because typically the occupancy is in the 90% range. It was in the 80s for a while because renovations were going on and not all the rooms could be occupied. But yes, we have done those renovations. And actually, it's been very successful. We've gotten a lot of good feedback on what the new spaces look like, what the new rooms look like. I've seen it myself. Much different than how they were before. Okay, thank you. I think it's important to make sure that we don't keep that property pristine because that is what our travelers and what folks coming into the city see. That's exactly why we did it because we knew it was going to take a little while longer for the new hotel. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Commissioner Miliano Orbis. I have a few questions, Director, on this item. And maybe I'm not understanding the item clearly, but I'm optimistic that you're going to help me clear this up. The current management contract that the hotel is operating under is what value for a five-and-a-half-year period? The current contract, I'll tell you right now, the management fee for the current contract is about $2.3 million annually for a 66-month term total. The new contract is, I think the management fee is $2.7.8 million for the five-year term. Okay, and that's what I'm trying to understand. Is it $2.3 million per year or $2.3 million for five-and-a-half years? No, no. The current management fee for the current contract is $2.3 million for the 66-month term of the current term. The new contract is $7.8 million for the 10-year term, correct? No, for five years. For the first five, I'm sorry. Okay, and that's what I'm reading, and that's what I'm trying to understand. It says the management fee under the current contract is $2.3 million for a 66-month term and expires in May of this year. And the contract that's before us is $7.8 million for five years. So the current contract that we're under is $2.3 million for five-and-a-half years, that's 66 months. But the new contract is $7.8 million for five years. Actually, the new contract, the estimated management fee for the initial five-year term is $2.8 million. And then if we exercise the five-year option to renew, then it bumps up to the 7.8. I see. So it's not 7.8 for five years. It's 7.8 for 10 years. For the 10. Assuming we exercise the five-year option to renew after the first five. Understood. That makes sense. And in that management fee, that is not inclusive of, obviously, that is not the operating expense of the hotel, correct? Correct. The hotel has its own operating expense. Correct. I see staff, cleaning company. Correct. So this is a fee that we are paying a company. Wages for employees are not included. Cleaning services are not included. This is for them to manage and operate the hotel? Yeah. The management fee pays for everything, if that answers your question. It does include the staff. Yes. The salaries of the staff. Correct. Understood. That makes more sense. Okay. So, and does it include the cleaning of the hotel? Yes. It does include the cleaning of the hotel. Okay. Thank you for clarifying that for me. I have no further questions. Anything else? Yes. Commissioner Gonzalez, you're recognized. So, under her line of questionings, I just want to understand something because the chair properly pointed out, and I think you clarified, that the first five years are at $2.8 million. Correct. So that's only a, you know, it's a low increase from the $2.3 to the $2.8. Correct. But then for the next five years, so to have the 10-year term, it would jump up to $7.8. $7.8, correct. But, so that would mean that should we exercise that option for five years, I mean, that's almost doubling the price. That would be, it would be, it would go from $2.8 for five years to $5 million for the next five years. And I don't know if you know this, but why such a big jump? Sure. That factors in projected CPI increases, increases in market rates, et cetera. We project those and estimate those into that. That's why the price is higher for the next five years. But I just want to make sure because this is, so this is just a projection because, because the, the last five years were at 2.3, we're at 2.8 five years later. Right. That's what I said. You know, going to $5 million, I don't know, maybe Namada wants to, wants to jump in. The 7.8 is accumulated, like we said, the 7.8 is accumulated for the five and five, so it's for the 10, for the, yes, but even under that premise, we're talking about a second five years, correct, at a double price, almost a double price of $5 million to get to the 7.8. If the first five years is 2.8 and 10 years is 7.8, then the second set of five years is $5 million. It's, well, yeah, it's higher, correct, correct. But, but it's a lot higher, and to your point, we just went from $2.3 million to $2.8 million. I can stomach that, but go, and so, but $2.8 million to $5 million, I don't know if this is a projection, but that's a lot of money. If I, the, the math, the math, to, to the chairwoman's point, the math just kind of doesn't math. Got it. I, I, I, through the chair, uh, Jimmy Morales, chief operating officer, I think it's an estimate. The, the actual management fee is a percentage of, of the revenues collected. Right. We are estimating that in the next five years, it could be that $5 million, but it will, in fact, just be this, uh, percentage of the actual revenue. So if we, we might overestimate, we might underestimate, but it, it, it is tied to a percentage of the revenue. So we're being conservative in overestimating. Our revenue projections. Um, right. Right. The possible cost, but that doesn't mean that should we exercise the five-year option that it will be $5 million. Is that, is that correct? It may or may not be because if we're making more revenue than the percentage, you're taking a percentage of a higher number, which means we're paying a higher management fee. Got it. So it's self-regulating because you're taking a percentage of the revenues for that five-year period. So that's, that's how the numbers, that's how the formula works. Understood. So, so the 2.8 is solid because we can look at the, we can look at the, the, um, the numbers for the past five years. Correct. Um, the five is merely a projection, but we are not contracting to pay the five. The, the, I would assume, and perhaps the attorneys can read the language back to me just so we could double check. Not, not that I don't trust you folks, but I would just like to hear the language for, from an, uh, for, from a legal standpoint. Um, but, but from what I'm hearing and from what the chief has also clarified is we're going to go off the percentage. That percentage could be 5 million. It could be 2.9. It could be three, et cetera. Is that correct folks? Yes. The good news is that if we're, if, if we're paying a higher management fees, it'd be because we're making more money. Got it. I think you want to read the language. Certainly. The, the management provision, uh, at 6.01 states that the county shall pay to management as consideration for managing, operating, maintaining the facilities, providing services required here, and a management fee of 3.2% of gross revenues or $15,000 per month, whichever is greater. So it is, it is in fact based on a percent of, of gross revenues. Gross revenues. Okay. Thank you so much. Thank you, Commissioner Gonzalez. And thank you for that line of questioning. I, uh, I, I wonder though, because we've had the airport and we've had that hotel for quite some time. I mean, looking back at our financials for beyond the last five years, looking into, I mean, is it likely, first of all, is it industry standard to tie operating and management contracts to the revenue generated at the hotel? Is that industry standard? Is that how this typically works? I mean, that, that, that's, that's how a lot of, of other airports do it. And again, because it always, it always ties you to that self-regulating where that, like I said before, if you're going to make more, then they make more. So it's, and it's a win-win all the way around. Thank you. Thank you for that explanation. Welcome, Commissioner Hardiman. Do you wish to be recognized on any items on our agenda? We were just discussing item 3F, but we have not yet moved any individual items on this morning's agenda. Welcome. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. Yes, I've been listening, um, on my commute here. You know, how much money have we spent on renovating this, this, uh, airport hotel now? I think $2 million, $2.3 million. And so you then have a plan to continue renovating because you haven't finished all the rooms. Is that correct? We've done, I think all the rooms are done. So all of the rooms are finished. And I heard you say, I haven't seen a new rooms. I mean, I know what the old rooms look like, uh, but have you, but have you replaced windows in that hotel? No, it's mainly been interior work. So it's not been any, any exterior features. It's been mainly, you know, furniture, interiors, carpeting, paint, uh, interior finishes. So a cosmetic. Correct. Correct. And in some businesses, they say sometimes you can put lipstick on a pig. Well, it has made a big difference because I've been in the rooms myself and I, I, I've actually used them during a hurricane when they were previously in their old condition. Big difference, uh, between now and then. I mean, then and now. The, um, you know, Commissioner Gonzalez, I heard you ask some questions about, you know, what the hotel is and what our future plans are for this particular hotel. But one of the, one of the, the thoughts that we had about this hotel was taking it out of service. Is that correct? That's, that is one of the options is ultimately taking out of service once the new hotel gets up and running. Um, but we have, that decision has not been made yet. But the, um, the, the new hotel, when was the groundbreaking or when was the initiation of at least its construction is supposed to have started? Okay. So we're still within the window for, you're talking about the new hotel now? The new hotel. Sure. So we are still within the window. We had, um, we first issued NTP to the, um, I think it was back in, if you give me a second. Yeah. Back in November of 2024, the developer presented the program, uh, to us and they were at 100% design development back in February of 25. If you recall, we, we, we ran into an issue with an FAA, um, the, the design was submitted back in August of last year to the, to the FAA. We received comments back from the FAA three or four months later where a radar blind spot was identified, three degree blind spot on our runway. We provided a solution, a proposed solution to the FAA to cover that blind spot by picking up radar signal from another airport from Homestead down South. That was rejected by the FAA. That entire process took several months. So we are now working with the developer. They're still within the milestones in their, in their contract. But they won't meet them though, right? I'm sorry. They won't meet their initial milestones, will they? They, well, we don't know that yet. We're working with them on the redesign, uh, because obviously because of these FAA restrictions, they had to re, um, revise the footprint of their proposal to the height, et cetera. So we're working through all those design issues with the developer, um, to try to get to a conclusion and get the, get the hotel going again. So we're in that process. But to answer your question, with the overall project schedule, we are still within that window to complete the project in time. Now, if something happens that they can't make it work, then we'll make a decision on where we go from there. Commissioners, one thing I want you to understand is that this is not, you're not trading apples for apples with this hotel and the new hotel, right? The new hotel is a, a luxury design. Is that correct? Weston holds a hotel, a lot more rooms. Uh, it's obviously a branded hotel. It's, it includes, um, a conference center, gym, other amenities that the current hotel does not offer. Right. And, and the current hotel that we're discussing, if you've never been inside of it, um, it leaves much to be desired. It is a place to lay your head, um, which is part of the reason why the, the board has had discussion and even as, especially though, uh, the department about taking that hotel out of service and doing something different with it. Either, you know, turning it down, building something new, or even using it or renovating it for other facilities. They have a lot more plans that they can describe to you all. But what's, what's important here is that we, we, we're, we're still here where we were a few years ago, which is needing great hotel space at MIA. And, you know, one of the things that had been happening on this board for some time is that there was a move before many of us joined the board to keep, you know, the Miami freedom. Stadium is being built right there, which initiated in, in, in Miami. But, you know, the county gave through the county gave the entities some difficulty in its development, especially because part of its development is hotel. Part of its development is commercial space. Part of its development is something that would, you know, take away from, from, from MIA, if you will, um, at least when people wanted to stay. Because if you had an opportunity, it depends. Some people would just rather stay right there on the airport, which is great, but you still want to have the good options, which is why we have the new luxury hotel. Some people would rather go across the way and have a different experience, which was what you'll be able to have at the, at the freedom park. But, but the reason I bring this up is because we're still lacking, you know, with hotel space. And so every dollar that we put into this space is a dollar that we could have used elsewhere. So you hear three, two point eight million dollars of renovations and you're talking about carpet paint and needed all those things. Um, but that's something that you would not have spent. Um, it's like taking, um, your, I'll use, I'll use, I'll use a Toyota, I'll use a Corolla for this or a Camry to that extent, taking a 250,000 mile Camry. Right. And giving it a new engine. Um, I don't know if this hotel deserves a new engine, but what I, what I will say is that we still have a need for hotel. And so, Madam Chairwoman, I think that this is, it's just an appropriate time for us to still like consider, and I don't know if people still have the appetite for it because at a time we had an option to have two hotels built brand new at the facility, one at a higher cost, one at a, at a lower cost, a more budget friendly hotel, right? They're not competitive to each other, but for some reason the board decided to go in a different direction. And so, I don't know if this is something that we should, you know, have the conversation about again, because maybe that path is a quicker path. Maybe we will already be building a new hotel. And so, just to say, as we built, um, a parking garage, we would have had hotel spaces that would be going in there. And then we could be having the discussion, because that's, that's the real discussion. If you take down the budget hotel, if you, if you build a budget-freeling hotel, you can certainly remove this hotel. I don't know if you all remove this hotel because we get the luxury hotel, because you'll still have a need. Unless you can afford a $500 a night room, I mean, that's what you want. You know, most people flying into Miami can't afford that or more, right? So, you know, um, I, I think that it's just a good time when we have new bodies on the board, new people who've never seen these issues, never had the major discussion, to really talk about what it is that was happening, that could happen, and what's the best use of our funded dollars, right? Because, um, if you built the new hotels, you would, you wouldn't have to pay a management fee anymore. Is that correct? And you stopped this. Well. What's the new, what's the structure on the luxury hotel? I know you're not paying the luxury hotelers a management fee. Yeah, it's, it's a, it's essentially like a concession. It's a development agreement with the new hotelier. Right, right, but then in that sort of structure, they're paying us. It's, it's, it's good to be the landlord. Right. Right? So, the higher, the more money they make, the more money we make. That's not this structure. Well, in this structure, it is because, I mean, they make more money on the management fee because it's a percentage of the gross revenue. So, the gross revenues, we get that, and then we pay them the management fee out of the gross revenue. So, it's a self-regulating percentage. So, the more they make, you know, obviously, the higher we get, the percentage being the same. So, we don't pay more. And what's the better deal for us financially? The new hotel that's being built or this hotel that we currently have that management fee for? I mean, I would, I would, I would venture to guess it's probably a new hotel because it's just bigger. It's going to offer more expensive rooms, et cetera. That'd be my guess. But, we can prepare a report for you and do that analysis. Do you know how many rooms will be in the new hotel? I'm sorry? Do you know how many rooms will be in the new hotel? Well, that is still to be determined because of this issue with the FAA. Originally, the RFP called for a minimum of 450 rooms. The proposal from the developer was closer to, like, the 500-plus room range. But because of this issue with the radar blind spot, the hotel had to be reconfigured, et cetera, which is what we're working through right now with the developer. So, now, they're back in the 400, more or less, range. So, we don't have that number finalized yet because we're still finalizing the issue with the FAA blind spot and the redesign. Through the chair, Commissioner, one of the interesting things is when you start going to higher hotel brands, the percentage they keep is much higher. And so, in the past, I remember when I used to sit in chairs like that, I asked the question, why don't we have a brand hotel take over this building? And they say, we'll make less money because we're going to have to pay them more. How it works with a new hotel, it's not clear, but a much higher brand, a Hyatt, you know, whatever, is going to charge you a lot more to provide those services. And it may or may not make you more money, but you will have more quality and things like that. Yeah, because they obviously want to control the brand, right? So, they have a reputation to uphold. When you come to our hotel, I don't know if we have a reputation in that hotel brand to uphold, but it's a very nice experience when you at least first walk up to the desk, right? And now it's changing because you'll have a different experience in the room, as I understand. Right. But in the management fee, what is the, what is just as quickly as possible, the magic in the formula that causes, as Commissioner Gonzalez put it, almost a doubling of the cost if you were to extend? Because the projection for the second five-year OTR period, we estimate with CPI, et cetera, that we're going to be making more money. So, we have estimates that we'll be making more in the second five-year period. The percentage is a percentage of a higher number of gross revenues that we take in. So, that's why it's a higher management fee for the second five-year period. So, we go from 2.8 to 7.8 because we're anticipating that we'll be bringing in more gross revenue during the second OTR, the second five-year period, and then the percentage taken from a higher number yields to a higher management fee to the operator. If you had an opportunity, if you could control, you, this hotel, would it be closed in five years and replaced? Would it be closed with the addition of a new luxury hotel? Or would you wait for another budget-friendly hotel before you decided to close it? You know, I don't think I can answer that question right now. Here's why. Because with our passenger numbers fluctuating, I mean, we continue to grow. I mean, we were at 56 million passengers back in 24. We've dropped down to 55.3 in 2025. But we anticipate those numbers to start bouncing back up. Now, with Venezuela opening up, last week, the federal government approved flights to Venezuela for Americans to fly to Venezuela. So, we expect that'll bump up our numbers. So, I mean, I would never want to hinder our capacity for providing service to our customers, especially with the growth that we're seeing in passengers. I mean, we're supposed to be at 77 million by the year 2040. So, I'm not sure. I would rather have our team do an analysis on that and get back to you and get you accurate numbers because what I don't want to do is cut off our nose to spite our face. So, I mean, for now, it gives us good flexibility once the new hotel is up and running that we have both. And then at some point, depending on what the numbers yield, then we will make that decision. But I don't know if we're ready to make that decision right now, and I wouldn't want to give you any accurate information. He's good, Madam Chairwoman. I'm just telling the truth. I know. He's pretty good. He's a Columbus guy. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Hardiman. Any further discussion on Item 3F or any other agenda items before the body this morning? Seeing none, I'll entertain a motion on the entire agenda. It's been moved by Commissioner Gonzalez, second by Commissioner Emiliano Orbis. All those in favor, signify by saying aye. Anyone wish to be recorded no. Our agenda carries. To the attorneys, any unreadiness or any further business for this committee this morning? No, Madam Chair. Thank you so much, everyone. We are adjourned.