It's nice to see you, even if it might be your last meeting. I cannot even believe historically when I found out yesterday that this was your last meeting. I was crushed. Cleve, you really are about to be the next oldest member of this board. And I don't mean in age, just in service. That would be wonderful. We can do that after we do Reasonable Opportunity to be heard. The floor is open for Reasonable Opportunity to be heard. There are two individuals in the back part of the room that we are going off script on, going to give them a microphone. Name, address, please, if you would. And welcome to your couple of minutes of Reasonable Opportunity to be heard. Please, sir, go ahead. And anybody else looking to be heard under Reasonable Opportunity to be heard on items on this agenda, please plan to come forward after the two individuals in the back speak. Go ahead, sir. My name is Willie, and me and my fiancé, we've been on the street for about three years. She was only your fiancé until this morning. She's now mine. And so, you know, we put in for housing and stuff, and they keep telling us that every three months I have to run to the doctor and get my paper, my print out and stuff with me and her income, and then the lady messes up. She quit. And then every time we go to the library and ask them, oh, y'all say we ain't have to come back to the library, y'all going to call. Nobody called. And then the police keep asking me, what's up about the shelter? I said, well, they said they ain't put in the shelter. They're going to get her housing with me and her income. But then nobody don't tell us nothing. Every time we ask them, I want to get off the street. Okay. Today is your lucky day. Where is Manny? Catherine, where are you? I don't see you. Please, thank you very much. Like I said, sir, you just won the lottery. Ma'am, you're recognized. Please name an address if you could, even if it's street address. Street address on what? Good morning. My name is Jane Tola, and I am an activist for the Homeless Trust and help the homeless get off the street. As different service, as shelter, or anything that they need. My issue is here is the gang stalking that we go through as homeless. Not only that we need a shelter or a housing that we're waiting for, but until that happens, we have several individuals as homeless have been experiencing gang stalking, people harassing us, and all type of things. It's not a lie. We have evidence. We are doing other things, too. But until meanwhile, until we wait into shelter, housing, I don't think any of the homeless needs to go through all that stuff that we go through to harass people just because they're homeless. Yes. That's my issue. Well, we certainly agree that nobody on the street should be harassed in any way, shape, or form by anybody in our community, whether or not those are regular citizens or there are others in the community with law enforcement. Nobody should be harassing folks on the streets. I'm sorry. I want to add one thing, too. Three times I've been hit, beaten, harassed, but I have defended myself. One was with a woman and two with a man. I have done several police reports, but I just want you guys to know that as homeless people, we do not go through anything easy, and we should help and have more opportunities for people to help them get out the streets or shelter or housing. It should be more faster, and everything we go through, people sometimes tell them, oh, they're crazy, or they don't believe what's going on. So we ask, because I have experienced that before, but not because I've been there all the time, homeless people go through a lot of things. We've got to go out there with the cold, the hot, everything that we go through, especially the harassment that we go through with different individuals, just because sometimes some of them have power, and they try to bother people, and I'm always helping other people to get out that issue sometimes. We hear you, and Ms. Martinez will visit with you as well, see what else we might be able to do to be helpful to you in facilitating opportunities to be sheltered in-house. Anybody else wanting to be heard, unreasonable opportunity to be heard? Mr. Peary, you are recognized. Please name and address for the record. Good to see you, sir. It's good to see you, too. Thank you. So I'm David Peary. I'm the executive director of the Florida Coalition of Advanced Racial Equity. We advocate for the civil and human rights of unsheltered Miamis and homeless. Our headquarters are located at 65, excuse me, I moved. Our headquarters are located at 721 Northeast, 121st Street. That's in North Miami, Florida. Two things I just wanted to talk about that's on the agenda here. This is a comparison here of the important time counts over the last year, comparison of July, excuse me, August 21st, 2026, to August of 2025. And what this is showing is that even though there has been a minus 25% decrease in the city of Miami Beach's homeless population, there is an overall 2% increase in the county of homelessness and a 125% increase in the county in the South Dade areas. The reason why this is significant is because the city of Miami Beach has had an incredibly cruel and inhumane policy of mass arrests of its homeless population. Nearly half of all arrests in the city of Miami Beach over the last two years have been of the homeless for nonviolent, non-property loss-related offenses. And this is horrific. This is cruel. You cannot arrest your way out of homelessness. So I just wanted to put on the record that Miami Beach is simply dumping its homeless crisis onto other areas, other jurisdictions within the county. And I would urge the Miami-Dade homeless trust to do what it can to advocate against Miami Beach to change its very cruel policies of criminalization. Mr. Perry, I would simply say to you that I've been so loud, vociferous, aggressive, that I lost my contract with the city of Miami Beach over my advocacy for the homeless and my direct, clear, and loud opposition to attempts to arrest your way out of homelessness. I repeat, I lost a contract, money right out of my pocket, because I feel that strong. So I don't ever want you to think that this board or the chairman of this board has ever wavered on the issue of arresting our way out of homelessness. While some may or may not have agreed with the way I participated on 1365, and you and I have certainly had back and forth, I will never support arresting our way out of homelessness, whether it's 1365 or it's efforts by Miami Beach to simply transport individuals to the mainland. And that's exactly what it is. And if you think it doesn't, or it is not reflected in our pit count, I can't tell you that I can take my iPad and tell you that 47 people that were last identified in the last pit count, whether it was the August of 25 account or the January 26 account, we're on the beach, and now we're on the mainland. But we certainly know, based on the shifts of population, that our transient population is moving around, around, and the beach believes, and they can articulate it themselves, if you transport people enough times across the bridge, they're eventually going to stay across the bridge. I believe it is incumbent upon the other municipalities to have that dialogue with Miami Beach. Clearly, my dialogue has been ineffective and not necessarily given a tremendous amount of credence on the beach. So for that matter, I just simply want to respond. I don't normally respond to reasonable opportunity to be heard. I felt it was important to respond to you on that. So thank you. One other real quick comment, brief comment here. And I know it's too late for the August point-in-time count, but in anticipation of the January point-in-time count, which, in my opinion, is notoriously undercounted because it's usually taken around the coldest time of the year when it's very difficult to locate people. I know it would be impossible to locate me when I was homeless because I'd be on a bus or in an airport or something like that, which is not normally sought out. What I urge you to do is please work with the folks with lived experience. The lived experience working group, for instance, talk with them and work with people with an actual lived experience of homelessness to find out where the homeless generally reside during times of cold weather to get a much more accurate PIT count. In response to that, I can tell you I addressed that issue yesterday and you used the airport as an example. We know we have people in our airport. I can tell you that on the point-in-time count in August, there were seven people identified inside and or around airport. Whether that was in the terminals, whether that was at the Greyhound station, the intermodal rental car station, the tree area, we know that there were. We know that the gentleman that had an incident at the airport three days ago was not necessarily always being counted because he was in the garages. But I can assure you that when we do our point-in-time, we count everywhere at the airport, number one. Number two, you couldn't be more right. We do consult with those with lived experience and the committee, period. Paragraph, as it relates to the winter count, I don't set that count other than to pick a day the last 10 days of January. You've got to pick that date blindly. HUD requires you to pick a day the last 10 days of January. They're not changing their rule because of me. They're not changing their rule because of New York City or any other cold-weather place. You and I both know the transient population moves around, which is why they give you that short period of time so that we get the most accurate count. I do believe that starting with our January 26th count carried forth to our August 26th count that the protocol changes that Vicki and Manny made as we move to those counts, we believe our count is the last two counts. And remember, we don't count January over August or August over January. We count January over January, August over August. You cannot mix them because there are different variables, as we both know, in those counts. What I can tell you is that we're sensitive to the issue. I think the new protocols are providing us with 26 very focused teams that go out. And I believe the way we're deploying them, the way we're recording the data in, is giving us a better count. Do we know every place everybody is? You and I both know we don't. We're pretty aggressive at it. We've got our outreach folks out there, whether those are folks from New Hope or Hermanos or the Green Church or any of the various members of our team and our staff that are out there and law enforcement. We know generally where most are. We're always going to miss some. I wish we didn't. We got rid of the multiplier, David, many, many years ago because it was an arbitrary and capricious multiplier that meant nothing, and it didn't give us any level of accuracy. I think our team has worked aggressively to perfect our point-in-time count to the point where I think we are getting far better data that allow us to respond. So thank you. Thank you. I'm going to quickly take a motion. No, I can't. Anybody else on reasonable opportunity to be heard? See, nobody else coming forth. The floor is closed to reasonable opportunity to be heard. I'm going to take a quick motion on the minutes of both the June 26th board meeting, the July 13th meeting, and then I've got a special presentation. I've got a motion, got a motion, got a second, and a third. Any questions, any comments, any scrivener error corrections? Seeing none, all in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed. Motion's adopted. I am going to ask the entire board to join us in the well. Gilda, we'd appreciate it if you would join us in particular, not just all the board. Shannon, that includes you two, but it's not there, but it's not there. Thank you. No problem, sir. We never knew this. It's the first time we've ever done it. How about that? You know, you don't always speak up. You don't always speak out. But you're one constant that watches out for children and families. In the 20 years you've served, and I want everybody to hear that, 20 years started in 2006. I don't think there's ever been a time, any of us have called you, Vicki, or anybody else from our staff or team, where you didn't respond. And not just respond, respond with a smile, with compassion, with a care level that all of us wish all state employees, and in particular those at the Department of Children and Families, adhered to. If I could take your personality, your intelligence, your commitment, and your care for children and families, and that's not intended as the Department of Children and Families. That's intended to be what it is said and spoken in its most literal terms, children and families. It would be you. I didn't know until yesterday, this was your last meeting. And I said, somehow they're letting her retire? I got to speak to those two gubernatorial candidates. It is with happiness, joy, excitement that you're going to go on and do the things that some people like to do when they're not working anymore. I hope you find a way back here. I hope you find a way back to our board. He left the board at one point for a half a second, found a way back. I believe that we're fortunate, the community has been fortunate, that children of this community, the families of this community are fortunate to call you their friends. You know, a lot of people don't know what the real definition of humanitarian is. And I think a lot of people think that the definition of humanitarian belongs to the male population. It does not. It belongs to all people. And it belongs to all people that meet a criteria of caring more about others than they care about themselves. You're a credit to your family. You're a credit to this community. You're an unbelievable asset to the state of Florida and the Department of Children and Families. We're fortunate to have had you for 20 years. I hope we get to get you back. There are lots of other places you can get an appointment to this board, not just through your role at the Department of Children and Families. I know that the rest of our board joins us in saying thank you. The flowers are but a small token of our appreciation, but of our respect for you. And we're going to be calling you to come back to another meeting again real soon as a non-board member, but maybe a non-board member in transition to a new board member of our board. So, Vicki, if you would, please. And Vicki, if you want to add anything. You want to add anything. And for the record, there are never any easy issues. Hilda, there's never an easy issue that you call Hilda about ever. Because if there were easy issues, there wouldn't be a need for a humanitarian to head of the table. Thank you. Thank you for your service. Thank you for your care. Again, thank you for your compassion for other people. Move up a little bit, ma'am. Move up, move up, move up. Everybody follow her. Move up. We're going to layer it in the back. So, move up. Keep going. Yeah, keep going. All right, now. Now, scoot over this way. All right. Everyone else is following the back. Short people to the front, please. Sorry. Be careful. Don't fall for me. It's not a vertically challenge. It's not short. It's a vertically challenge. No, I'm short. I know that. Okay, so I have more people on this side, so let's squeeze up. Y'all love each other. Come on. All right, big smiles. One, two. Oh, you're not smiling. I've had enough macaroni in. One more for good luck. Thank you so very much. She's going to hold you to it, ma'am. At one point, a lawsuit may be in. Yeah, we did identify some plaintiffs. Yeah. Not really good. Yeah, it's good for everybody. You call the city of Miami. If you find a couple people, call me. I'll put them in touch with somebody. I'll find that. Let me leave your accurate email. Here. Here. I can always try to. I'm sorry. Yeah. Here's the QR code. All right. Thank you. You're welcome. Wait. What did you guys know? Probably about six months. Wait after he ate some crab claws. No. He'll never outlive it, nor should he. When my grandchildren, who are all 12 or under, tell me about crab claws and Jameis Winston, you know he's never going to live it down. Okay. Okay. Unfortunately, Congresswoman Wilson, last minute, had a reason she couldn't attend this morning. We will have her at another meeting soon. Hang on a second. Okay. Vicki, you're recognized on the summer census count. Mr. Peary, I want you to protect particularly, not just, Vicki is going to hit high points. But before you leave, ask somebody on the dais to give you the backup on the census so you can take a look at what I was talking about on the trends. That works for me, too. I like that. Okay. Summer census, Vicki. Thank you, Mr. Chair. We conducted our enumeration of people experiencing homelessness on August 27th. We counted 1,089 people unsheltered. That was up by 21 individuals from the prior year, where we counted 1068. Some of the largest increases were in the southern area, not in a particular city. We saw an uptick of 58 people from 47 to 105, largely in unincorporated areas. As far as municipalities, the city of Miami saw a decrease of 11 people. Miami Beach saw a decrease of 33 people. Our largest increases were in... Excuse me, will you repeat that, please? Decrease in the city of Miami by 11 people. Decrease in Miami Beach of 33 people. How many? 33. That's what I've reiterated a third time. That's all. Keep going. We did see increases in Aventura. I did it for David Gilbert. David Peary thought I did it for him. I did it for you, Mr. Gilbert. Thank you, sir. We did see increases in Aventura, plus 31. And the largest increase was in the city of Hialeah, plus 91. We are working actively with both of those communities to, you know, see what we can do to further support them. Hialeah and Aventura. Which, by the way, in the spirit of... And Vicki and I have had some of this conversation. We know that in Aventura, Judge, we've had some challenges. The bus depot, if you will, is a challenge. We have been working with them all. We have been working with the city now for the better part of probably 12 to 18 months in a targeted way to try to address it. I do believe that this is an example probably of our improved protocols, if you will, in approach to counting that probably yields some explanation on that piece. On the other piece, Mr. Peary, where you look at those increases, in particular looking at Hialeah and looking down south, I don't think you can simply look at the geographic boundaries, David Gilbert, of the city of Miami, where there are increases or slight decreases that might have shown greater decreases had we not had the mass deportation of individuals. It's not just ICE that deports people, but I think you begin to see what I'm talking about on the trends of pushing people across to the mainland. That's all. Vicki, you want to add anything further? Go ahead. Sorry. No, Mr. Chair, that's an information-only item. All right. Moving on, let's go to the continuum of care. On the HUD stuff, do we have conflicts of who? We do, Mr. Chair. We do, Carrefour, and I don't think Carlos is here. Is there another representative on the dais of Chapman? I think not. So it's just Carrefour that needs to leave the room, unless they're not on the dais. She is. Go ahead. You're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. A bit of a history lesson. So on June 1, HUD released the NOFO. The Homeless Trust subsequently issued its request for applications, as were the collaborative applicant, with a due date of August 26th. On August 7th, the federal courts vacated the NOFO, and work came to a halt. HUD appealed that, and on September 16th, the appeals court overturned the lower court ruling, allowing the administration to proceed with the NOFO. HUD reissued the NOFO on September 18th, giving us through September 30th to submit the application. Advocates have, again, filed a motion with the appeals court on a number of grounds within the NOFO that they believe are not legal. HUD failed to use – one of their arguments is HUD failed to use the mandatory notice and comment period before implementing large changes, including a big push for transitional housing and supportive services only. Also, the NOFO forces compliance with executive orders around DEI, public camping, and cooperation with ICE. Now to the actual recommendations before you. Our annual renewal demand with HUD is approximately $66 million. As you know, the application is competitive. In Tier 1, HUD wants us to place 60 percent of our total ARD. That's $39.6 million. These projects are theoretically safe. In Tier 2, HUD asked that we replace the remainder of the projects. We received 70 applications in total, 26 renewal applications, 44 new applications. All 26 renewals were approved for Tier 1. Tier 1 is largely permanent supportive housing. I believe there's one rapid rehousing project. We used Tier 1 to try to protect as much PSH as we potentially could. There's also DV projects in here, youth homelessness demonstration projects, and bonus projects. For full points in this NOFO, you had to have one unit of transitional housing for every two people experiencing chronic substance abuse. So, we needed 310 units of transitional housing in this portfolio. The proposals before you yields 1,122 units of transitional housing, plus a number of supportive services only programs. We did take this stacking to the executive committee on August 11th, and it was approved. And the providers were present for that approval, but I will read off the providers that are included in the tiering. Tiering, CARFOR, Supportive Housing, Better Way of Miami, Citrus Health Network, New Hope Corps, Volunteers of America, Camilla's House, Fellowship House, New Horizons, Douglas Gardens, Miami-Dade County Community Services Department, the Resource Room, Advocate Program, Hermanos de la Calle, Salvation Army, Health Council of South Florida, Educate Tomorrow, Chapman Partnership, City of Miami Beach, City of Miami, Miami Recovery Project, Vita Pathways, and Ladies of Hope Ministry. Mr. Chair, we had no appeals. We're seeking the Board's ratification of the issuance of the RFA, approval of the or ratification of the tiering and the projects selected by the selection committee and approval to enter into grant and sub-grant agreements if awarded. Obviously, all of that is contingent upon HUD's award to us. Okay. Let's get into proper posture first. Do I get a motion? I got a motion. I got a motion and a second. You got to my first question very smartly, very wisely by simply saying there were no protests. What I'm going to let slide for the moment, and actually I'm not. Can you tell me if, without going back to a roll call, is every provider that's recommended present without doing a roll call? Is there anybody that's not here that you? The providers were present for the executive committee. I know, but they should have been present here, too. Well, then that's on me, Mr. Chair. I did not call them all back. Let me be clear to every provider in the room and every provider that hears this meeting, the rule is you show up at committee and you show up at the board. It has been that way for two decades. It will never change as long as I'm sitting here. You got to be present to win, period. It's disrespectful to 26 other people on this board. I'm going to let you take the hit. It's whatever. And I hear you. So with that, having excused those that aren't present, we will move forward with the item. Are there any questions or comments? You've already heard there were no protests. So that means that everybody that might have been an interested party, a party that lost an opportunity, chose not to advance. And it means that nobody finds any arbitrariness or capriciousness in the selection committee process. So with that, are there any questions, comments or debate? We'll take them in whatever order you have them. Seeing none, all in favor, signify by saying aye. Opposed? Motion is adopted. Is there anything else you want to add to any part of that? We have 12 days to put together a $66 million application, and we're doing it. Nobody call our staff for the next 12 days. Okay. We're moving on to prohibition of use of continuum of care funds. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So as you heard me allude to, the treatment first is the new direction of the federal government rather than housing first. And what we considered harm reduction models, that was models to minimize substance abuse without necessarily requiring abstinence. Harm reduction was part of housing first. And housing first is we're moving away from that at the direction of the federal government, although we support. We're adjusting related to federal funding of housing first. Yes. The trust has not moved away from utilizing non-HUD resources for housing first, which is not prohibited, nor is it necessarily discouraged by any, if you will, warnings or any missives that have been sent from D.C. So with that, keep going, please. So the President had issued an executive order that sought to strip funding from safe consumption sites. I want to make it clear that the COC application requires applicants to certify they will not operate drug injection sites or safe consumption sites or distribute drug paraphernalia or permit illicit drug use on COC program-funded properties or projects. Our COC has never funded safe consumption sites or needle exchange programs, but to further reinforce our adherence to the federal and state laws, the COC has developed the attached policy ensuring that no COC funded, and when I say COC in this context, the entire continuum federal, state, local funding activity, support, operate, facilitate, permit, or knowingly allow drug consumption sites. Okay. Do I get a motion? I got a motion. I got a second. Second, conversation, comments, questions, debate, discussion, say none. All in favor, signify by saying aye. Motion is adopted. Opposed? Motion is adopted. Go ahead with Right at Home, please. This is a retro. Another ratification. Yeah, it's a retro. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So as you know, we have been in planning with Right at Home, a national initiative that has chosen 10 communities to do targeted homeless prevention work. Right at Home is now positioned to award the trust $7 million. We have that commitment, and we're working through the grant agreement, and we are matching that with the approved 2627 budget with $3 million in food and beverage revenues for homeless prevention that will be studied as part of a randomized control trial with the University of Notre Dame. We issued an RFA as part of the development work on June 1 and received 21 applications in that RFA to administer four components, access points, supportive services, legal services, and fiscal agent. We named two access points, Hermanos de la calle and Miami-Dade Community Action Agency, or community services department, and there are no-wrong-door centers, supportive services with Chapman Partnership and the no-wrong-door centers, legal services of greater Miami for the legal services, and MDG as the fiscal agent to rapidly deploy funds in this initiative. The selection committee approved the recommendations that are before you, and we are seeking, and they approved to receive funds from Right at Home. This was voted on at the September executive committee meeting, and we are seeking ratification from this body and the ability to enter into grant and sub-grant agreements. Got a motion, got a motion, got a motion, got a second, got a third, and a fourth. I'm not going to reiterate or repeat the comments I've made over the last many months about the significance of Right at Home or where it falls within what will be known as the history of this body and how we ultimately, when we reach an end to homelessness, are able to sustain that. I think this program, this effort by Right at Home is all about keeping people housed and keeping people where they are, which has always been part of what our continuum has been about. This, I believe, is long-term going to be defined as a godsend for us. It's really that much of a meaningful change, or I should say addition to what it is we do. Are there any questions or comments, any discussion whatsoever? Ma'am, I'm sorry. You got your opportunity to be heard under reasonable opportunity. We heard. We don't hear folks in the middle of our meeting like that, so I apologize to you up front. Yes, ma'am. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have a question on the data that's being collected from the University of Notre Dame. When is the timeline to present that data? Like six months out, 12 months out, 24 months out, just out of curiosity. So is it, I'm sorry, it's through the chair. It's a three-year study that we hope to begin and serve the first person before the end of this calendar year. It's a three-year study. I don't know if they do intermittent reporting on what they're finding, but it's three years. Follow-up? We had them before our board, Mr. Chair, if you recall, and they intend to continue to keep us abreast of not only where our continuum is, but all continuum. So we'll hear more directly from the right-at-home folks, too, and that might shed some light. Thank you. Okay. Anything else? Comments? Questions? See none. All in favor. Six five and say aye. Opposed? Motion is adopted. Camillus, restructuring update. And if you would, I would appreciate it on this, if after the meeting, whether it's today or it's Monday, Tuesday, if you would pick up the phone and call board member Carlos Fernandez-Guzman and provide him with the update, you will recall he has asked for this update on a regular basis, and just because he's not present today, it doesn't mean we shouldn't give him an update. Please, thank you. Yes, sir. Go ahead. Thank you. Camillus had a number of findings in their audits, 11 findings in total, I believe. Ninety percent of those recommendations they are reporting have been met. There are some question costs that are related to a couple of our state programs. They are moving to cloud-based accounting software. They did that in mid-August, and they're progressing to address sufficiently those audit findings. As far as the Homeless Trust and its projects, we are finalizing the transition of two projects, Brother Richard and Rafael, to the Advocate Program. Those are COC-funded projects. A food and beverage match program called St. John's. We have moved those clients to the payment of those rents to our fiscal agent. There is a project called PSH reconciliation that's sort of up in the air right now. This is a project that if the NOFO moves forward and a HUD announces new projects prior to the congressional deadline of December 1, this project will end on the 31st. It serves 110 people. We have reallocated this program in part within the NOFO, preserving some of it. If HUD doesn't meet the federal deadline of December 1st with new award announcements, then this could theoretically be renewed for one additional year. So we continue to work with Camillus. Right now, we are working to understand how we are going to best transition a good portion of this program and move people out of the COC federally funded PSH. The ESG state funding and the match have been moved to Chapman Partnership. St. Michael's, which is a transitional housing program together with Rapid Rehousing, is fully transitioning to New Hope by October 1. The Lazarus Project, which is a specialized outreach where they Medicaid on the street, is fully transitioning to Camillus Health Concern on October 1. And the homeless prevention in the item that was just approved is moving from Camillus to Hermanos. We continue to operate together with Camillus, Verde Gardens, 145 units of permanent supportive housing for families with minors, Mother Seton, and other 39 units of permanent supportive housing for families. And on the Camillus proper property, there is a Shepherd's Court Samaritan. We have 65 COC-supported units. We are working with internal compliance and querying staff. We've been queried by internal compliance on our processes of monitoring and reimbursing. They are contributing to a financial monitoring tool, which will come before this body for approval. We have also moved a contract officer position into compliance, and we are seeking to fill that position in the near future. And we are actively beginning a monitoring together with internal compliance of both Verde Gardens and Mother Seton. And that is my report. This is an information-only item. Do you have any new concerns? No. Any questions? Okay. I'm going to interject in an off-item report before we start with our reports. And, Lisa, you will be next. If you want to go to the microphone, well, you're welcome to. But I want to leave this to the executive director. And, frankly, I think all of you were probably due some type of a report a couple of days ago on the issues that I assume most of you have read about as it relates to the unfortunate incident involving Tommy Jordan and his arrest two days ago. And as it relates to our ongoing relationship with Citrus Health and our relationship with their leadership team, starting with both Mario and Maria. And I don't think Olga is here, but let's just simply give you the short, brief report. And Vicki and I are happy to answer questions. If we know the answer, we'll answer it. If we don't, we won't. So many months back, our staff uncovered some discrepancies. So for anybody who thinks our staff doesn't scrub invoices, purchase orders, contracts, Terrell, would you stand up, please? Just stay standing, please. If anybody ever says our team isn't thorough, our team isn't complete, If anybody wonders, Chief Burgos, why it is that when we did do an audit recently, that there were no findings, it is because we have staff people like Terrell. Terrell uncovered something that just didn't look right, didn't smell right. She put it in her mouth and chewed up the paper. It didn't taste right. So she spit it in the garbage can, waited for her spit to dry. She dried it off and she sent it to Citrus to say, what is this? We didn't know. And without getting into detail, because we don't need to get into detail because there's a criminal prosecution going on. And, you know, sometimes the less you know, you can't testify to, whether it's second or third hand information. You just don't need to know. Just know that for anyone to ever question whether we do our jobs over the history of this body, anytime we have ever found Cleve, anything, David, anything, as you know, we have never been hesitant to send it to the OIG. We have never been hesitant to send it to the state attorney's office. And we will never waver from that. We are in a fiduciary relationship with this Board of County Commission, with the mayor's office, with the departments of this county. And we are fiduciary to the homeless folks that we serve. And more, not more importantly, but equally important, we're fiduciary to the taxpayers, to the limited funds that are provided to us to carry out our mission and to homelessness in our community. I can think of nothing lower, nothing more obnoxious, nothing more nauseating and disgusting than stealing money from the least, the last, the lost, and the forgotten. When Citrus did their investigation, and Terrell keeps standing, when, didn't want her to think because I turned to the right, she could sit down. When Citrus finished its internal review, they promptly fired their son, and they promptly reported, self-reported, to Kathy, to the Sheriff's Department, to the OIG, what they uncovered related to one of their own family members. An investigation began. That investigation went on for many, many months. This, your leadership team, Vicky, Terrell, Manny, Paul, myself, were very familiar with what was going on, but we stayed out of it. Our job was to cooperate. Our job was to be supportive. Our job was to be forthcoming on any questions that came, and to assist the authorities in their efforts. That resulted in an indictment this week of Mr. Jordan, and exposing his very elaborate scheme of stealing from us. What you should know is there is nothing that the state attorney, the sheriff's office, or the OIG found related to any other individual in leadership at Citrus, having cooperated with Tommy in his scheme to embezzle, fraudulently steal money from us, and from the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, and more importantly, to the people we serve. I think it is important to understand that there were others involved with Mr. Jordan. He created, just trying to choose my words carefully, he created this elaborate scheme of phony employees, phony contracts, phony everything, and what jumped out at Terrell was when she saw a repeated dress with related to furniture that set off her bells and whistles. For that, I simply say thank you, not just for doing your job, but for doing your job in a way at which it's thorough, it's complete, and it's with a level of passion that has helped us, not only in this case, but in other instances, uncover things that just weren't right. And for that, I want to personally thank you, and for all other 26 members of this board to thank you for the almost 3 million people that live in this community, and for the 2,460 individuals still in shelters seeking housing, and it's related to housing, and there are just over 1,000 people left unhoused on our streets on their behalf. Thank you. I think that I am remiss in not double applauding our state attorney, Catherine Fernandez-Rundle, her investigators, her assistant state attorneys, Rosie Cordero-Stutz, the sheriff's team, and Felix at the OIG as well for the completeness, but the aggressiveness of which they did their investigation. For the record, the leadership at Citrus, meaning their board chair, their CEO, and their counsel, met with Vicki and myself, Manny, on a number of occasions over the last month and a half. I'm happy to tell you that the little over $1.2 million that was stolen has all been returned to us. That money will go back to HUD, unfortunately, squandered, lost, because of the devious criminal behavior of Mr. Jordan. I repeat again, there is no indication of anybody else in leadership at Citrus having been involved in any way, shape, or form, and I have said repeatedly this week to folks, nothing has shaken our confidence and our trust in what Citrus brings to us as a provider. Nothing. Nothing. And I will defend them, and I will speak up for them, because not because I did due diligence, not because Vicki, Manny, Terrell did due diligence, but because authorities independent of us cleared them and applauded their cooperation and their participation in bringing the individual to justice. With that, I think that's about as much as needs to be said. I'm happy to answer any questions. I want to thank Vicki. I want to thank Manny. I want to thank our entire team for the cooperation that they provided authorities over the last many months. I am not yet certain, and Citrus is aware of this. I am not yet certain that we have sought all of the remuneration we are entitled to as a board. My position to their CEO, their board chair, and their counsel is we are not going to eat one penny, one nickel, one dime related to this criminal activity and what occurred. Not one nickel, one dime. So if staff time is calculated and there's cost to that, and there is, we will seek remuneration from Citrus on that. They have not in any way, shape, or form pushed back on the chair's position or Vicki's position on being, if you will, reimbursed for any costs that were involved here. Shannon, Vicki, anything that you might want to add, either of you? With that, M Network, you are recognized, and I thank you for your help and Tom's help this week in preparing our, if you will, disclosures to the media. My pleasure. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll be giving the marketing report this morning, and today, actually, you're going to see two reports. Unfortunately, I was not able to be at the last board meeting, but I wanted to report the results of our work, and I do want to point out that as I looked at both reports, I noticed over the last quarter such strong media coverage. This is not a press release being reprinted here or there, but this is original content being covered from WLRN, Miami Herald, Associated Press, Coconut Grove Spotlight, Miami Times, Community News, South Dade News Leader, and Telemundo WTVJ. So I'll let you look through some of that information in the report, but I did want to make that overall comment that we continue to have strong media coverage of the hard work that our teams are doing. Now, rewinding back to the start of the summer, we did a one-year anniversary for Hideaway Bay and handled the event itself with New Hope and also the media outreach, and I wanted to share something that was significant, and that is that the publisher of Community News, Grant Miller, came to our event. And the reason this is significant is because several years ago when we were trying to get this project passed, he was very vocal and on the record not supporting the plan that we had in place. So I wanted to show to you the video that he did covering Hideaway Bay. He was very excited about being there. He invited everyone to come on in. I don't know if you're able to rewind it. Opportunity to celebrate not only the 123 individuals that now live. Today's a great day. It's the anniversary of the opening of one of the greatest. Oh no. It's a partnership with Dade County and Homeless Trust. Hey, come inside. Let's check this thing out. Today's a great day. It's the anniversary of the opening of one of the greatest, if you will, permanent supportive housing ventures that the Homeless Trust has done in its 35 years. What a great opportunity to celebrate not only the 123 individuals that now live here, but the welcoming of the community after such a long effort to try to bring this to fruition. This is what we can do when we all put our minds to making a difference in the community, the village we live, Miami-Dade County, a better place for those formerly homeless individuals getting a better life. You know, let's acquire and stand up our own housing. We need to bring housing to scale in this community, particularly people for people experiencing homelessness. And this is a proof of concept that we can do it and do it well. I can say that Mayor Levine Cava has been so supportive since day one, infusing us with $10 million in homes funding that's helped us do a number of projects across the community. We could not have done it without her. Mayor Levine Cava was bound and to the great success for so, so many, so many who can claim success. And I want to thank especially Ron Book, his Tireless Advocacy, and Jimmy Millet right by his side. And of course, the people and the leadership in Cover Bay, because it did take a lot of conversation. It took a lot of working together to find a path that would be suitable. So, for those of you who have not been to the property, you might also have a feel for what it looked like and what the event looked like. And I share that with you because the ultra hyper-local media covering the things that we're doing is really important because communities are following those. When we shared this post, we had nearly 7,000 people watch it. So, we like that kind of impact. Another hyper-local story I want to share, show your attention to, is the Coconut Grove Spotlight. A former Sun-Sentinel reporter spent six months reporting on a woman, a chronically homeless woman named Sheila Dixon, who is in Coconut Grove. Please take a look at the story. It's incredibly moving, but also illustrates the challenges that we have in our community in trying to house people. Then they followed up, the Coconut Grove Spotlight followed up that story with a ride-along of our teams from the city of Miami, Catherine Martinez, Felix Mohip. I want to thank them. They were the ones who escorted the reporter for that evening for the count, and that was another really great story. Speaking of the point-in-time count, Telemundo joined us that night, as well as the Miami Herald. And also, the M Network extended an invitation to the Miami Foundation to join us on the count. And the CEO of the Miami Foundation, Rebecca Fishman Lipsy, and several of our team members joined us for several hours that night. It was such a moving experience for them. At the last stop of the night, they chose not to get out of the car, out of the van. It was very overwhelming. And so, the result of that is that she went back and wrote a LinkedIn post for her 11,000 followers to read. And I included that in your packet. It's on page 13. I would encourage you to read about her experience. Not only did her followers get to see it, but more than 300 people liked it, and more than 65 people commented on what she wrote, which to me, that's amazing engagement. They expressed support for what the Homeless Trust is doing. She mentioned our our penny program that we have, which many people were not familiar with. They commented on that and the value of the one penny tax. So, it had so many layers of impact, which is why I've spent time sharing that with you and wanted you to see the article. I encourage you that if you go to LinkedIn, find her, read her article, write a note, and thank her for being part of communicating what our community is doing. Moving on to social media. On this month's report, I took a look at year-over-year numbers since our contract is about to roll over into the next year. And I wanted to point out that in one year, we started with 6,800 followers. At the end of the year, we have over 8,100, which is an 18 percent increase. And the public sector standard, the industry standard for public sector social media increase over a year is 2.3 to 5 percent. So, we kind of blew that one out of the water. So, we're going to keep doing good work this year. All right. Now, you know, I can't leave without talking about Homeless Awareness Day. Coming up on November 6th, I will remind everyone with this flyer that you should have in front of you. Actually, I got ahead of myself. Let me just mention for a second that we're having great follow-up with our schools. And thanks to Ms. Gutierrez with Project Upstart and their team that's super supportive of us. We expect to have 18 and 19 public and charter schools at St. Thomas this year, where we have an opportunity to talk to students about homelessness, because they're the future, right? They're the ones that will be taking your places in the future. And I would just like to make a mention that there are two students here today from Hialeah Gardens Senior High School. And they came on their own accord. They called. They asked some questions. I said, come. And so, imagine a thousand students like this at our St. Thomas rally. Mark it on your calendar. It's at 10 o'clock on that same day as the bedrace. Come and see what we're doing. See what we're teaching these students and how we're empowering them to go out into the community and have and have an impact. All right. So back to the bedrace. Channel 10 WPLG is running a PSA for us. And I know that many of you have seen this commercial, but for the sake of those who have not, for the sake of those who are watching on television or in this audience, I would like to show you the PSA that Channel 10 is going to be running and we also are running on social media. So let's see if we have sound. So we already have 10 teams, 10 teams registered. David Gilbert, be my guest, because we're going to beat his ass. No response. But we really would really, really appreciate everybody coming to the race, encouraging others to come to the race. But sponsor a bed or find someone to sponsor a bed. It really is a fun time. And we really do get an opportunity to really, if you will, with an exclamation point and neon sign, tell our community what we're doing, not only for all homeless folks, but with an emphasis on our senior population. So please, please go ahead. I think. Oh, what you got to say? The city of Miami is in high profession. Jealous, jealous of the former track guy's level of relationship with other runners, who have to be on my payroll. One of them won a silver medal in Barcelona. So we have 10 about, I'll just add, because this is sort of fun, but we do have a senior pole vaulting team that is going to be running a bed. We have the Jeep club that is going to be running a bed. So there's going to be some really great competition. So I'll leave it at that. I just got reprimanded, had to put money in the cookie jar. Chapman is excused, and the report will be on file. Economic indicator report and executive director's report all in one. And it should not go unnoticed that my son has entered the room in an attempt to disrupt this meeting. Go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Chair. The unemployment rate at the national level is 4.1. At the state level, 4.6. And locally, it's 2.5%. Total unemployed in Dade County, 35,636. The helpline stats from May to June, 11,615 calls. Facing eviction was number one with 5,400 of those calls. Homelessness anywhere but the beach was 3,200. And the third most highest volume was fleeing domestic violence with 356 calls. And I do not have anything under my ED report today. With that, any other comments, thoughts or questions? Sir, you're recognized. Good morning. Good morning. Good morning. Eight minutes. Good morning, everyone. Happy Friday. Excited for the better race. Regarding the economic indicator report, you know, obviously, it's good that we see that unemployment is relatively low and below the national average. Just to contextualize that Miami-Dade County does have a 14% poverty rate. And then 54% of our residents are presently struggling with the cost of living, right? And so I know my commissioner has worked very closely with Vicki to just build the infrastructure, particularly with the navigation center that should be coming online. Hopefully soon, I would appreciate an update on the timeline of that. But yeah, people are hurting under this cost of living crisis. So I hope, and Commissioner hopes, because she's been so passionate about this, that we can continue to work closely together to address that cost of living crisis, but also building that infrastructure. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Other than Navy property, there has been greater the obstacles that have been put in our way. The challenges that we've had to meet in turning an industrial property into a residential property have been great. It really should have been open 180 days ago. We thought we were on target to be open 180 days ago. I encourage every one of you to take an opportunity to schedule time to go and see what it looks like today. We took what is otherwise unquestionably defined as slum and blight, and we have turned it into a first-class property. It is out of character now for the rest of the neighborhood, but it is really a special place people will be able to go. What has us held up now, requirement to install two fricking fire hydrants. Oh, well that's a pain in the neck. Across a double lane highway and a median, and ultimately shut streets, do it. It's not only driven our costs outside beyond where I had already been driven that didn't like going. Remember, I'm into free, cheap, and frugal. It has really made the chairman batshit crazy. And Vicki can find me again for using a foul word, but I must tell you that it is beyond frustrating to the chair that we don't have this 80 bed navigation center open. Chief Burgos, I don't know that there's anything further that you, the mayor team, can do to help us expedite. I'm going to ask Vicki to again visit with you to see if there's anything. I don't care if I buy an extra week, two weeks, whatever, that we get open that much sooner. This is 80 beds. 80 beds. She's got plenty of time to open up the mental health facility. They need an opera. She's got time on her hands. Got the least done. The first thing is, of course, we're always at the table to really help, right, to establish a continuum of care. So Vicki, we can talk offline. I know some of the, all the moving pieces, right, that we will have to work on. And to your point, Ron, although we love the mental health facility, that time period is an interesting comment. But I have my, one of my best friends here, Judge Leifman. So I do understand how these projects are, right? You have a lot of folks at the table. But absolutely, Vicki, you know, we're always solution focused. And our mayor is serious about this work. So let's talk. Anything I can do to help, I'm here. Mr. Chair, I'm sorry for your frustration, but I appreciate all your efforts. I do want to particularly thank the chair and Chief Burgos for the tremendous work that has been done recently to get us over the last hurdle we had to get the building, the Miami Center for Mental Health and Recovery open. Contracts were signed on Monday. Staff is being hired. In fact, we have hired a director for the facility. Furniture has been ordered. And I cannot thank my dear friend enough for the tremendous efforts that are being made. We still don't have an actual date. I've been telling people for three years it will open in six months, so I have no credibility. But it'll probably be about six months. So thank you all and Vicki as well for all the tremendous support. But we are really close to actually getting it open. And 180 days is nothing. It's been at least three years behind for us. So you're in good shape. Thank you all very, very much. Absolutely. If I may, through the chair. Judge, thank you so much for always celebrating our work. I think it's really important to emphasize the fact that, yes, it has been your vision, but I cannot celebrate our mayor enough, as well as the department that we run, our community services department. Because when I tell you, and our Chief Palmer, all hands on deck. We're talking about more than 300 pieces of furniture. Um, it's our PIOD, um, department through the work that Raymundo Delgado, as well as Nomina Opa, um, with our strategic procurement, um, um, department. You cannot imagine how many people are involved because we all believe in serving the most vulnerable individuals in Miami-Dade County. So my staff and I, our mayor, our chief, we have not lost, right, what the true mission is of this work. So we are honored to be at the table with you, Judge. Ron, I know you do a lot of work, um, as a partner to us. So I just want to let you know that we completely appreciate you. Amen.