agency status update yes and this is my item i added this item to the agenda and i uh i just and i had a i had a discussion with the administration yesterday and i i mentioned to them that i'd be bringing this up there's certainly yes commissioner okay i mean i guess you could call her up on a specific item if anything so look i've i'll recognize those colleagues of mine that wish to speak especially the two i think two maybe three but the two commissioners that that have a more of an interest we all have a vested interest but more more of an interest of as they represent some of these districts uh here in a minute i'm sure they both may want to opine but my concerns are more we did this we we took over the cra as the board of county commissioners back in february to date really till yesterday no one has reached out to me as the chair of the board so i had a conversation with the administration they had been doing they they said to me they had been doing what they were asked to do per the the item or the motion that uh that reverted the item that reverted the cra uh back to this board uh of county commissioners uh but i'm just in awe that as a chair of the board up until just last week that you guys saw an item on the agenda is when you all finally reached out to my team to brief us it's been three months i find issue with that my question to the director if you can approach the well is and i may have a few but i i may hold back just to allow the the district commissioners to to air out their concerns my question is i have concerns with the fact that two different entities have not reached out to me in three months one is the administration but we spoke about that and i won't get back into it today more than what i've just said the other one is is there still an executive director or is that now has that been taken over automatically by the administration sure good morning mr chair ray baker director office of management and budget uh to your one of the questions there is still an executive director for the former naranja lake cra that is still under contract the former what do you mean by the former naranja lake isn't it the same cra it's the naranja lake cra now being governed by this board of county commissioners previously governed by a citizen director yeah simplify it for me naranja lake director outside of you or is there not yes there is currently an executive director under contract okay and i i forget her name i know it's the young lady or lady that has come here before i don't know if she's in the room today is she here today she is i i don't know if you i mean my answer is the same that i just asked the administration and i won't i won't uh you know dive deep into it just you know for three months i have been the chair of this cra and as the executive director you've not reached out to me you've not informed me of i mean you report up to this body now you report up to me as the chair of the board is there a reason you haven't reached out i mean isn't it kind of your job to keep us informed with the day-to-day operations or anything that we need to know yeah absolutely and i'm speaking to the executive director now of this of the cra because you said there's still an executive director and i and i won't like this isn't going to be a line of questioning for you i'm not looking i just i want to know like is it that you just thought the administration was handling it like what i mean whatever it is i just i don't understand how as a new chair of the board of the cra board uh for three months no one has reached out to me to inform me as to what is going on with the cra not the director of omb not you as the executive director of the cra so what what is going on i mean mr chairman important information uh i i yes you may yes i don't think we have a chair of the cra board currently well we have we have i chair the meeting so no i do maybe we can check through the county attorney's office but the way i understand when you having a board you have to determine who the chair and the vice chair of the board will be you do chair the the um miami dade county board of county commissioners but when you create a new cra leadership i understand you have to select the board i understand commissioner but no one has reached out to me to even put anything on the agenda for the cra in three months and i don't have any cra's in my district you all are more familiar with cra's but the folks that have reached out to me uh regarding cra's in fact some from from this very cra they've had pending applications that they've been acquiring grants for i mean who is the administration handling this the administration and or the executive director cannot go silent uh i don't know who they've reached out to to your point if i'm not the official chair of the cra then have they reached out to any other commissioner have they reached out to as any commissioner here been reached out to by the cra or is the administration handling the day-to-day stuff is we need clarity it's been three months like what's what is happening in the cra and you could shed some light on that madam executive director sure thank you mr chairman um i actually reached out to the attorney's office immediately after the meeting and asked for a meeting to discuss what the what the direction was i personally also was not clear on what the intent was um there was language that spoke to the county administration so i have been secondary and assisting the omb's office maintaining the day-to-day operations and working in second in second position so and to your point i i was also told that there was a request to do a report and that things were essentially on a standstill until that was done so i understand your concerns i respect what you're saying and i too have been in a bit of a state of confusion in terms of what was appropriate at this point so i guess my question to you and thank you for that clarification which is is even more concerning that that you've been in communication with both the attorneys and the administration and and they've not communicated with me my question for you is is there anything outside of what's on this agenda uh which again as whether i'm the chair or not i set the agenda uh is there anything on this agenda that you want to see on there that we that that needs to happen in the cra that's been pending or is that stuff that you've been able to handle administratively like what's what's happened in the last three months and we don't need like a 30 minute report right now but just and we did receive a report but that's a different type of report that we got from the administration uh we i don't know that the report from the administration i read it thoroughly uh speaks to a lot of the pending items unless that's all that's happening right i know that there was some properties on there that we're trying to be disposed of uh another thing i don't know if that's all that's going on or if again if we have pending applications like what what is is there anything that we need to take action while we're convened in this meeting uh to the extent that we have to thank you chairman no i don't think that there's anything that is um that requires immediate attention um everything that is ongoing have action has already been taken permitting the um the operation to continue so at this time there's nothing pending unless there should be something that comes of this meeting today but by way of what's already been um what's by way of what's already been addressed by the prior board we're good all right thank you thank you for clarifying that appreciate it director i have other questions and i'm going to probably still ask them but i want to hear from my colleagues and see what what they may have uh but again you know to hardiman's point though whether whether there's a chair of the cra board or not at this time like i i think we all need communication uh and certainly as the person that again places items on the agenda i think you all should continue communicating with with me on that so uh again i'll reserve to to call you back up commissioner hardiman thank you i don't know if you all have done this research speaking to the county attorney's office but i think this is something we have to be vocal about because the line of demarcation is important when it comes to the community redevelopment agency and its leadership versus the miami county board of county commissioners for instance there will be there will be times when we act as the miami county board of county commissioners and then at times when we act as the cra board not all not all of our interests are aligned many times they're actually misaligned which is why you have sometimes fights between cra's and county commissions i'm bringing this up because it's important that we need to understand who actually sets the agenda for the redevelopment agency because i've heard a couple times on the record although the chair has acquiesced that he may not be sure but he said he sets the agenda but this agenda i would think will be set by the chair of the cra which may or may not be the chairman of miami day county board of county commissioners so in fact when i think about a chairman of a cra i will look to the district commissioners in this sense there's more than one um or the the district commission who has the greatest representation however we decided to be to to be the one pushing an agenda all of us have an opportunity to have items to be heard on a cra agenda because we sit as the board but certainly the leadership usually is led by someone who is more aligned with what's happening in that particular area because the cra is generated because of the area and the area's needs and then another thing i'll say um once you give us some of your feedback because i don't know if you all have done this research yet or we've in fact set that sort of criteria but it's very difficult it's very difficult to have a cra that is created to eliminate slum and blight where many a times especially if it deals with residents unlike those who are created just for commercial purposes it's very difficult to have the voice of the people heard when you're so far away from where the cra is and so we took on this task now and i would dare to say that it's probably more appropriate to have the cra meetings and i think it changes your attitude and tone about what it is to leave the cra but we should be having that cra meeting in naranja now whoever the chairman is can decide wherever he or she likes to have their meetings but i will i will tell you that in my time serving as chairman of cra's only my very first which this is the very first so i'll say that was held in city hall even though city hall was still you know one bus away from from where um from where the cra district was it didn't matter once we had that initial meeting we then had every subsequent meeting in the cra one time we even had it on the streets to ensure that the people understood what we're trying to do in certain areas and so it's important that we really really start to think about this thing as what it is which is an opportunity to change a particular area and the people who are most affected many times will not be able to make it to this place in the middle of the day on the weekend um we tend we would tend to have those meetings for instance after five in the cra area and so it gave residents an opportunity to be heard and an opportunity for everyone to really and truly be a part in the in the area that they were trying to affect the most thank you thank you commissioner commissioner bermudis you recognize i'll be brief but uh i voted no on this precisely because of and i agree with commissioner hardiman in the sense that we the commissioner of the district in this case there's two commissioners really should be the ones that uh i believe know what's going on in their districts i'm not a big supporter of cra's as you've heard me say before and i think our role should be that of oversight to set the rules so the money is spent correctly and the right way and not spending correctly having said that i agree with commissioner hardiman that these cra's are you should be and are for the benefit of the people in that district and i think the commissioners of those district which is what districts which is why i did not vote for this the first time for us to take it over but i would like some clarity because if this is going to be the case then we need to know what our role is going to be so from the county attorney's office i think for many reasons uh we all need some clarity on how this is going to occur uh you know i'm not you know against all cra's but i i don't necessarily you know i've said my piece on what i think should happen with them as far as our role is concerned okay and i see my colleague who i'm not for city cra's either so just so but i know there's one and and rightly so probably in miami gardens but having said that uh i do think we need to all understand what the rules are going to be with this role that is this the first and i don't even know this the first time this body has taken the role of being the cra uh board uh i think it is right maybe i'm mistaken but if that's the case then just explain to all of us what the rules are going to be so we understand what we got to do commissioner gilbert you recognize yeah thank you mr chairman so just so we're clear today we're going to elect the chairman what what because we can it's not on the agenda but we certainly i certainly don't want to be the chairman of the cra well no so but but hardeman's hardeman's point is is well taken we actually do have to formally put somebody in as the chair of the cra so that they can actually so yeah it it it has to be there has to be someone it doesn't necessarily automatically and and quite frankly we should have thought about these things when we actually we probably should have planned this out just a just a bit better um and we need to know um the executive director she is still there in the contract with the cra is my understanding and so how that workflow works with the county attorney and the office of budget like management all of those things need to be determined by the cra board which is now us um so this just seems like maybe we shouldn't do this in middle of our county commission meeting sometime though like i don't know that i want to do do this like like this again commissioner regalata thank you um i i think once the cra was dissolved we should have had a meeting to name the chair and the vice chair and what the transition process would be i think that's why we find ourselves in this situation um i have a ton of questions like until when is the executive director's um contract like how how does this how is the transition going to work because we never flushed out the the transition um i'm with jc i wasn't for this uh but here we find ourselves right so now we have to figure it out um i i do think that hardeman brings up a very good point about the location and the time um you know and and that's why this is a precedent that we should be very careful about i i don't think these types of meetings should happen at this time and definitely not here at a minimum if we're if we're not going to have it in naranja you know maybe we can talk to our attorneys about some sort of virtual option so that people could at least comment virtually there's you got to figure something out because how is someone someone's we're going to ask someone to miss work to be here uh who knows at what time to deal with this cra um so i think a we need to establish like what the transition parameters are and what that looks like um and then we need to set the time and notice it and um they we have to do outreach you have to tell people where we're going to meet how we're going to meet what are the pending issues there's there's a lot to unpack here in terms of this this transition and we're setting a precedent so i think we have to be very thoughtful in how we do that and how we provide this service and we do need some direction i think there is a direct conflict um like uh commissioner hardeman said between um us as county commissioners and us as members of the cra and that is something that we have to navigate very carefully um so i think we also have to have a conversation about that and how we're going to deal with it moving forward um look i i i'll recognize you now in a second and again i i have no desire to be the chair of the cra uh but i'm gonna i'm gonna say two things that i disagree with because we we have to be we have to be like realistic and honest is there there's one thing that's not a lie it's been it's been debated here publicly on the microphone is the two district commissioners that have the cra don't see eye to eye on this matter on other matters they do but when it comes to the cra they've disagreed more often than not so to imply in theory that that should be it but to imply that in this case one of them should be the chair i think is just putting us back to where we were to begin with uh but i mean whatever you all want to do i i just don't want to be the chair but set but but but secondly is i i don't subscribe to the fact of doing the meetings in naranja uh because we don't have that same thought process for the other 2.8 million residents of miami county for our meetings so we we should start our bcc meetings at five we should rotate our meetings have them in west kendall sometimes in miami gardens others we should just start having our meetings throughout different areas of the county so different folks have opportunity so i i it all sounds right but it's it's it's not it's not comparable it's it's it's not the right thing in this case uh commissioner con Higgins then bastian uh thank you mr chair and thank you to my colleagues um as we figure out how best to navigate um our very first uh cra meeting and i thank uh our colleagues for reading over the agenda and seeing the items i think i've made my intention clear when i brought this motion it's simply to move and expedite um the you know the elimination of the settlement blight in the area and i think you can see from the agenda items and i believe my colleague from district 9 has some motions um that i agree with uh and so i look forward to continuing to working with my my colleague from district 9 and everyone else on the naranja lake cra regarding the transition our administration released a i don't know eight page back in front report on may 1st um that outlines pretty comprehensively the full status of the naranja lake cra all pending projects all contracts when they start when they expire the financial situation of the naranja lake cra so um if you haven't had a chance to review that memo uh please do regarding the leadership structure terrence you can keep me honest but it's my understanding that it's entirely elective and upon us if we want to keep the leadership structure that we currently have as the board of county commissioners we can travel under that lane if we want to elect a new leadership structure we can travel under that lane is that correct that's correct okay so i i think it would be prudent for us to make a decision on leadership of the naranja lake cra um i think it's easier the vice chairman of our board is the district 9 commissioner he's the vice chair of the board i don't know if anybody has a preference here i i think it's easier to keep the leadership structure exactly the way that it is under our current board of county commissioners just for continuity of service but if everyone else has a different opinion i'm okay with that i have no desire of serving as the chair i don't know if commissioner gilbert wants to be the chair of the cra i just don't want us to get bogged down in that because i do think that the agenda items that are before us and the motions that i have from my colleague from district 9 are great motions that i'd like for us to focus on as opposed to who the chair is and who is the vice chair i think that's inconsequential i mean i would like to hear from my colleagues i don't know how the district 9 commissioner feels about it but again i think it makes sense for continuity as we have these cra meetings that are going to be in the middle of our board of county commissioner meetings that the leadership structure stay exactly the same and i don't think it's either a coincidence that the only items that are on the cra agenda are the ones that are sponsored by the district 8 and district 9 commissioner which i think it's going to continue being so our voices are going to be reflective on these agendas so um that would be my motion at the appropriate time but i'm happy to hear from my colleagues thank you mr chair commissioner bastian you're recognized thank you mr chair um i think the question we need to um think about and answer is why are the cra's in existence in the first place why they exist because there are areas in my immediate county that have either been neglected either been disinvested either either been under resourced to the point that they are blighted if if i if i talking about district 2 they are blighted areas are dirty with encampments all kind of encampments crime that is why the cra's exist in the first place and there is a community structure and i have five different series in my district because there is no way for you to fix it unless the residents partake in that change who knows best what's going on in their neighborhoods who they are the people who live there days in and days out they are the people who come to my district and commissioner we need to bump on these streets commissioner people fly in a in a 20 25 miles uh school zone commissioner i have trucks in my district where people are living dumpings in my neighborhoods who knows best how to fix this so um that's why i voted against this um because i realized that there could have been a way and then my suggestion was if the two commissioners had had issues with each other then divide it divide it but now we are in a predicament where we're gonna create a third structure and then meetings will be held during the day and commissioner regalado i think i don't think virtual meetings would work with for a lot of folks commissioner regalado i don't think so i think mr chair we whatever the process we create it has to be a way where residents can partake and have a say so in what's going on and in which that wouldn't tell having the meetings where they live and since we are talking about district eight and nine then these meetings have to be held there where the people are where they can come after work and and even the time matters guys even the time matters if you do it too early mr chair if you do it 4 p.m a lot of people are at work a lot of people are at work so either we are serious about we just seem blight either we or we're not so so that's my that's my that's my two cents on this i think we have to be mindful of why the crs were created in the first place mr chair thank you i have a question for the attorneys how would it work and is it possible like i don't have a committee like that but i don't know how to work for a cra if there were co-chairs of the cra uh seeing that there's two district commissioners that overlap the cra is it one month one wheelchair the next month the other chair will chair which is how the committee happens like what can there be co-chairs that's entirely up to the board as to how everyone's to structure it and the answer there's no prohibition from you um having co-chairs a chair having your current structure um with the bcc structure uh there's uh the statute is silent on that issue all right so it's it's a board decision hold on commissioner because i'm trying to do round ones and then i'm going to go back to round two vice chair uh thank you mr chairman and thank you to everyone who've been paying attention to this um my intention has always been and will always remain the same instead of keeping this within the naranja lakes area it's better for the people especially down south who would have to travel at least two hours to get here in the mornings i can tell you this morning i left home it was 6 30 a.m just to ensure that we were here to participate in the early part of our presentations because i didn't want to get stuck in traffic even though i have assistance getting here so i can only imagine what the great folk of south dade have to go through in order to get to uh down downtown also um secondly look i'm not quite sure how the agenda worked in this process uh mr chairman the first time i saw the agenda it already had items there and i was kind of perplexed because i hadn't gotten a call to notify me that hey there's going to be a cra meeting are there items you would like for us to prepare to ensure that it makes the agenda knowing that i did reach out to our county attorney terrence who's one of the best in the business um and understanding the code and i asked him give me some parameters as to how are we going to set this new quote unquote first impression of taking back a cra to the board and how are we going to set those parameters and maybe terrence we can go on the record to find out and make sure we're on the same page you you told me that the bcc rules will be the same as the cra board rules here yes unless uh this body uh which is the cra's body decides to set up separate rules but currently you're operating under your the bcc rules thank you so everything including the four day rule applies uh as it relates to items that are coming on to the cra agenda that is correct now in a normal cra the four day rule situation then and other situation as to getting things onto the agenda they don't apply is that accurate to say i it would be up to each cra to determine what its rules of procedures would be right so so here in last issue mr chairman and it's not a bad issue actually it's a it's it's a work in progress right we don't know when the next meeting is going to be i don't know how to prepare my items for that particular meeting um but what i can tell you is i am okay with co-chairing um this the cra where we switch out every other month uh to ensure continuity and also to make sure that the slum and blight issues uh that we face um are dealt with appropriately and lastly mr chairman i can just also say this um there are some items that are still outstanding um that are the community has actually voiced its opinion for and um at the appropriate time i know the items are on the agenda that was placed on by district eight um i did file some motions once i found out about the items that were on to help enhance um those items so i'm simply saying at this moment i just need to know when we're going to have our next meeting so i can properly prepare to have items on the agenda um i need to know the full process and the parameters so we know exactly what to do and what not to do um also need to know exactly um you know what are we going to do with some of the outstanding issues mr chairman that are not going to come before um the cra board but need to come before the bcc board such as items dealing with um disposition bond uh and extension so that we can appropriately deal with those issues so those are the only concerns i have thank you vice chair and thank you for sharing my same sentiment as to i was just as surprised as you were when i got an item to put this on and no one had spoken to me about this in three months hence why i started uh this area meeting by saying that uh but you know of course as district commissioners or any member of this body could have of course approached the lawyers i think they should have probably approached us with what next steps were uh and the administration as well but uh you know the process is today and it could be changed uh is just the same as as any other item that you all want to submit you just submit what you want on the agenda i guess we decide when the meetings are this body decides when the meetings are um and i'm and i and i know you said like you know every other month and you're good with that i don't even think you have to have a meeting every other month right is that is there a rule to that or is it like whenever you know it could be every other meeting but do you have to have a meeting every month or i mean whoever knows the legal answer yeah it's a legal question that is entirely up to the board so the board kind of approves like the agenda i mean you could do it every month i suppose but um but no you're right you're right i was just as surprised as you seem so i'm glad we share that uh because i wish somebody would have you know kind of approached me much earlier uh but all right so i've gone through first rounds right uh and then i have commissioner hardiman and gilbert you know for those of you who've never sat on a board that is a cra board um not not even describing chairing one but if you've never sat on one you misunderstand the nuances that occur uh when it comes to those boards and so when commissioner bastion and i talk about what representation looks like and why why we go to where they are versus sitting as a county commission having meetings in county hall just the fact that that's that's the second hat right that's the that's the difference so for instance yes it makes no sense for us to have county commission meetings in other places because the county is so vast and everything we do on a county board affects different areas within my day county and so we have one central place that we meet but i will tell you there is not going to be any issue that you do in the naranja cra area that's going to affect dorale not not one thing that you're going to be doing on a board is going to affect other areas like liberty city or the upper east side or whatever your furthest north city northern city it may be even miami gardens right it's just just not going to affect those areas and so it's important that you understand that when we talk about the level of detail and the level of attention you have to have to those particular areas you must show up to those spaces it's not it really is bad bad policy for you to even be having those meetings and i'll tell you this right now the miami cra southeast overtime part where cra meets at miami city hall and it's been doing that ever since i left and that's bad policy and guess what happens during that time the level of activity decreases the people who participate in the meetings decrease people don't show up and so what happens is you then get the backlash of it if this board the cra new board wants to backlash what happens in in places like naranja you are setting yourself for that to happen and so this is why you know when we describe these things we will say you have a cra board and not everybody shows up to the meetings because i'll be frank with you all mr chairman if you don't support cra's don't come to my meeting commissioner bermudez if you don't support cra's don't come to my meeting i only want commissioners who come into cra board meetings who support the mission of cra's particularly that cra because if you've never been berated by a constituency that's suffering through homelessness that's suffering through slum and blight that's suffering through um lack of affordable housing that's suffering in ways that you cannot imagine and the two minutes that they have here before this board with all these different people with committees and such you don't understand it and so what the cra's do in a very small way is it literally puts you in the shoes of those commissioners who have a lot more to do than vote yes or no on certain issues this is not something to toy with i think if we're going to be serious we've now become the board of this cra we have to seriously decide what the leadership looks like how you want to do it but i'm telling you if you think you're going to be able to govern narangela's cra from this crystal palace you're mistaken it's not going to work we must in just a matter of good policy find our ways to that area we have to do it at a different time this is the way that you service the needs of a very small particular group of people where this thing was created to actually cause change for um i mean if many of us most of us have never even set foot meaning put your actual shoe on the ground in the naranja lake cra i remember the first time that i had an opportunity to visit naranja and i called um my fellow uh commissioner and told him i said brother i thought that when i picked up over town it was bad this is another level people really need help and you don't know what that feels like until you go to that space and so it is a it is a disruption of our time yes it makes everything much more difficult yes um but it is just the truth this board the naranja lake cra board if it meets in naranja it probably will it probably will get seven eight nine members present and that's all you need to do good in a place like naranja we don't need everybody's participation we just need those that truly care enough about areas that have this tremendous need to participate and make things happen this is not this is not the miami dade county board of county commissioners and i won't pretend that it is if we're going to participate as a cra board then put your board hat on this is a different ball game we don't care about your politics when it comes to taxes going up and taxes going down this is about making change in an area and sometimes it's going to cost us money and we're going to spend a lot of it and whenever the cra generates that's what we're going to spend and we're going to cause the cra to generate more money but if this is about purpose driven work and in purpose driven work you throw all your politics to the side to make it happen for this community and so if you're not about that don't come to the meetings we don't care to hear what you have to say thank you yes commissioner gilbert and cohen higgins uh commissioner harman respectfully though man i um as a member of the board like i decided if i go to the meetings like not just respectfully you you're not the only one that knows about this stuff i realize that if you don't care brother if you don't care i've never i i wasn't the one that said i don't care i didn't say i didn't care someone else said they didn't care about syria i didn't say that i didn't say you didn't care i said if you don't care but you called out bermudas in the chair but you called out bermudas in the chair it's just not true man it's just not true so like don't don't say things that you know aren't true i mean we're all elected officials don't argue with the work we have we have different constituency not in the cra boy we don't no no but we have different constituency in general as as politicians as elected officials but it's not about bringing the politics to the cra board it's not that you don't care about me you may not care about the politics i don't care about the politics either but i care about my principles i'm still going to vote my principles and my values it's not about politics for me it is for many others on this board it ain't for me i'll go i'll go right to you bermudas i got gilbert uh cohen higgins and then bermudas thank you mr chairman just by way of clarification i think when the commissioner hardman called out names he wasn't specifying people he was giving examples of people who if they don't want to come they shouldn't come but i don't think he was actually talking to you directly saying you didn't care he just said their names so he could very easily said gilbert's name and i i take no offense to it i understand the passion surrounding this issue just to you know bring it down a little i'd like us to consider some some a couple of motions the first one is i want to and well let me just say to the vice chairman you asked a question about the four-day rule and the county attorney answered it i think they're wrong i don't think that the actual default is naturally the county commission's rules of procedure i think that that is that's the arrogance of a county and it's the arrogance of a county we offer we offer things from our perspective and i appreciate that but when you're a new entity that's essentially created by the board but sanctioned by florida statute i think you get to decide what your rules are and what your bylaws are and it'll be incumbent on us to adopt bylaws for cra that we sit as the the the board of and so i think that i think that while that is one perspective that it automatically defaults to the county commission rules i do not believe that there to be a four-day rule in effect for any item before this board right now as we sit as the naranja lake cra board and so i i would disagree with that there are certain things that we probably need to take care of first i tend to agree with commissioner bastian and let me say i voted for this item and i still support this item but commissioner bastian and commissioner hartman's points are well taken we don't sit as county commissioners as county commissioners we think about the whole as naranja lake cra board members we just think about them that's it these meetings need to be in naranja lakes and they need to be at a time when they the residents of the area the businesses in the area can attend that's just something that's a sacrifice we all have to take and make because i voted for this and so for me to say now that i don't want to go to naranja lakes no i i'm driving through naranja lakes that is what it is um i also don't think it takes necessarily uh 13 of us to do this every time so one of the motions i'd like us to entertain is changing the quorum number to five change the quorum number to five because i would hate for us to have a quorum number of seven and we stop doing business at some point because people don't actually come to naranja lakes for the meetings change the quorum number to five i think that would probably be most appropriate because i think that we can always get five of us to actually show up and whenever the meeting is i also think that probably the chair's suggestion of every other week i mean every other month is probably appropriate i don't think we need to meet every month on this but a quorum of five every other month in naranja lakes whatever facilities we can we can go with down there i mean staff have to figure that out or the executive director wherever they were meeting uh we can we can meet where they were meeting i'm also on the item of chairman you know we're in this particular predicament because the the commissioners who share this area have a division and vision with regard to this i don't think either one of them should be chairperson um i i would i would suggest you know commissioner hardman is going to be upset at me i can already feel it um but i would suggest you know making commission hardman a chairperson of the naranja lake cra he's done a lot of work with cra and he feels it more passionately than a lot of folks do and so and he's done a good job with cra's developing areas like overtown like what we see happening in this area was in large part his vision through the as implemented through the cra so all of the redevelopment all the economic development that you see is stuff that his imagination created us when he was steering those cra's and so i think that he'd be good to do that and you know i think that at some point mr chairman once we have a chairperson we need to have the attorneys and that chairperson craft and bring us back some bylaws and rules of procedure until now i think the default should generally be whatever roberts rules of procedure are not necessarily purely the county whatever roberts rules are that's what roberts rules are unless because every new board that i've had they always defaulted to roberts rules yeah yeah so default to roberts rules until we get our rules of procedure and then at that first meeting we adopt those things and we just move on that that those would be my ideas mr chairman thank you i'm going to do wow okay i'm going to do a few more of you guys but i'm going to start entertaining motions soon so that we can actually get some work done i have the vice chair for a response and then i had said actually bermudis after but i'm skipping bermudis because the vice chair wants to speak specifically to thank you mr chairman and and look commissioner harterman and hands down is in my opinion one of the greatest cra experts on this dais and if not the expert of dais on the cra's but i cannot in good faith sit here and support a motion to put a district a district commissioner in a cra where it has two commissioners i i that that's like that's like asking me to set aside everything i know and bring in someone else to understand and appreciate and to push forward the great folk in an orange area right this is why i said it before and i was against removing the board of the cra my proposal was simply to say let's allow the two commissioners to join a community board and go that route that would actually contain uh the issues that were um you know created by slum and blight in that area lastly let me just say this i think the quorum count uh should be about five but again the easiest thing for us to do right now is to have the naranja lake cra reinstitute it where it is controlled by community members chosen by the two commissioners and the two commissioners from the district actually sit on that board i do believe there's a number uh that the fra requires uh as a threshold for the amount of folk that actually sit on the board um and i think we've heard it before here this morning that a quorum i believe the number is somewhere terrence is it seven and seven to nine or something that can be on the board is that the number or is it you recognize sorry about that so sorry sorry i'm just getting this statute all right um oh terrence are we waiting on a response from terrence or yeah are you talking about a citizen board the quorum for a citizen board or the fra the fra gave us some direction on how many members should be uh on the board or under 163 how many members the total number of members for a citizen board is uh nine nine members and pursuant to 163.356 quorum is uh made up of the majority of the members of that agency for purposes of this board which operates under a different statute the quorum you can you could decide what the quorum would be because obviously there's more than nine members on this board so i guess i guess my motion now is um commissioner corn higgins i think so that we can take this issue off the hands of our commissioners and asking them to be part of what's happening in the range of lakes i think maybe we should entertain um reinstituting the community board we choose the members and the two of us sit on those board sit on that board as two commissioners on that board so that's that's the motion i'll make at appropriate time and just wanted to see if that's something you would entertain because otherwise we're going to be back here this is an issue of first impression i do know there are some ramifications to each decision we make and again i look to terrence for guidance as it relates to the cra so if he tells me it's a it's a and i have to be abound by that particular position commissioner corn higgins uh thank you mr chair again i appreciate um all of the comments of my colleagues and i i do want to start with commissioner hardiman and your passion for cras is certainly recognizable recognizable and admirable um but i also think that you um i think you should know that when this item passed i received a ton of comments from residents thanking me for removing the cra from the previous leadership because nothing had been done in so long so while i value your experience i'm sharing with you my experience and it is also not lost on me that we've spent a considerable amount of time dealing with squarely the politics of the cra and have done zero business for the people i.e addressing the items on the agenda that will actually eliminate slum and blight so the focus for me is very clear as illustrated by all of the comments that are being made i have i did not think that we would spend so much time on who the leadership is of the naranja lakes cra i also think that it's inherently contradictory to suggest that the meetings should be in naranja lakes because that's where the people are and we need to bring it closer to the people and simultaneously that the chair of that board should be a commissioner that represents the opposite end of the county that's inherently contradictory and simply doesn't make sense and so i i think that considering the amount of comments and feedback on this item i do think that the district commissioner from district nine and i should potentially serve as co-chairs of this board where we alternate i think that that's a suggestion that our chairman made i'm happy to move forward in that direction and then clearly the district nine commissioner and i need to sunshine organize calendars organize protocols bring it back to the board in an in a unified fashion so that we can eliminate this back and forth and so much very very spirited input from commissioners that have very different cre experiences from very different parts of our county so as far as moving forward i think it makes sense for us to decide who the chair or co-chair is deal with the items on the agenda and then if the district nine commissioner agrees we can have a sunshine meeting and bring back a comprehensive kind of protocol and plan at our next uh bcc and our cra meeting where all of these issues are vetted and addressed that's actually a question directly to our vice chairman if he agrees with that sort of a moving forward let me begin by saying this and and thank you very much commissioner corn higgins when the naranja lake cra board was dismantled i received countless countless countless countless calls stopped in the stores saying why did you do that why did they do that so yes on one hand you may have gotten calls and yes on the other hand i've gotten calls but this goes to exactly to show what the importance of the cra board and why it was so important to keep it in the community so i'm okay with having a sunshine i'm okay with doing all of that but at the same time i'm not okay with pushing this out further we need to have a dedicated a date and time actually set today for the next agenda meeting so that we know exactly what we're doing how we're doing so at least we can get folk to participate and lastly i don't know how we get over this issue these meetings need to be held in naranja it's it's that's it's almost as if it's non-negotiable you cannot negotiate the participation of the people who are already living in a slum and black community that says it all they are living in a slum and black community so now you're going to add an additional burden for them to get to this particular meeting it's it's just doesn't make any sense so again i don't mind having the sunshine right i do mind having this meeting in the area that's being impacted and i do mind having the folk who are impacted to have a say so into what the agenda looks like and what they want to see for that community all right you you're done for right now all right i got uh gonzalez for the first bite at the apple so i i've been i've been listening attentively to the entire discussion and i i agree with a lot of the sentiment from commissioner gilbert i i concur a lot of the statements that were made by commissioner hardiman i've actually been to naranja i used to live like the first apartment i ever had was in the um in the silver palms area and i love naranja um it does need a lot of help and something that commissioner hardiman said really touched me and that's that i think everybody up here cares about naranja i think every single commissioner up here wants to make sure that naranja has everything that they need in order to elevate but i do think that it would be in naranja's best interest and in miami-dade county's best interest for folks that live there or live close to there to be part of the decision making process for a cra because that is the function of the cra with that being said i actually like commissioner gilbert's proposal to have commissioner hardiman on the cra because i don't want to put more on your play brother but i don't think anybody else up here has the expertise and the track record with cra's so i would propose after hearing the commissioner from district eight and the commissioner from district nine speaking i would propose and i'm happy to make a motion actually i'd like for one of them to make the motion but i'm i would propose that they both co-chair i believe the county attorney's office said that you need a minimum of nine members if it's a a a public member board is that correct the nine membership requirement applies to the citizen board there's a different composition for one that's governed by the governing body so in this case each of you are members already of the cra by your own action so terrence my question is if we were to make it a citizen board that is led and co-chaired by two commissioners do they have to have nine members sir you would if you well first of all this body as the uh the cra does not have the authority to create another cra only the board of county commission as the governing body can do that by ordinance if it was to decide to go back and create a citizen board to answer your question um pursuant to the interlocal agreements that we have with the uh with the uh the cra and there is an uh there's an interlocal with this uh particular cra the representatives of the governing body can serve as a representative on the agency's board without uh triggering a constitutional violation got it so you you could have a representative and there could be more than one representative of the taxing authority that could serve on a citizen board or in the alternative you'd have to create an ordinance that's that's under both um both uh sections of the statute that apply to a citizen board or one that's governed by a governing body as long as it's you have an interlocal agreement where a taxing authority representative can um can sit uh it allows for taxing authority representative to sit then you can have a member of your governing body i'm talking about the bcc's governing body to sit on that cra in this case you already are members of the governing body by your action of uh creating the cra under 163.357 which is the governing body that is um acting today got it so i would propose that vis-a-vis an ordinance between the district commissioner of district 9 and district 8 i would propose that perhaps the best course of action would be for both of you folks to co-chair that cra and both of you folks to identify the citizen membership there i would propose that if you have seven members it would be perhaps three picked by district 8 three picked by district 9 that's six members plus you two seven and eight i would respectfully propose that perhaps commissioner hardiman could be the ninth and then you'd have then you'd have i'm sorry brother i apologize but then you would have three three from three from commissioner three from commissioner mcgee three from commissioner cohen higgins both of you as co-chair and the voice of wisdom also on the board that's what i would propose commissioner bermuda is you recognized first of all let me just say that you know we don't operate under i agree with by the way commissioner gilbert but the county rules are not robert's rules of order it's just to be clear it's that other rule from kentucky just to be clear but we'll leave it at that because everybody thinks it's robert's rules and nobody realizes that so i'm just telling you guys so you realize it but anyways the bottom the bottom line is i and again i want to be clear on what i said and i'm kind of you know based on what i was on commissioner hardiman's side uh because he made 90 percent sense except he misquoted me he misquoted me and i didn't say i said that this body i believe has to look at the cra's that was our responsibility i've made my comments before on the transparency etc any cra by the way i did not vote for this precisely because of what's happening now sorry i'm not going to rub it in all of our problems but this is why i knew that this was going to happen okay uh but i will attend and i do believe if there's going to be a cra it should be in naranja and i will be there and it's not a matter of politics or purpose because it should be only purpose not politics for any of us i ran for purpose not for politics there's a lot of better things i could be doing with my life than debating cra's in the midday on tuesday on may 5th cinco de mayo for those of you who appreciate it uh then sitting here when i philosophically felt that we should play our role with the cra's but i also agreed with commissioner hardiman in the fact that those people from the district the commissioners from those districts know their commissioners best having said that i believe that wherever there is slum and blight in date county it doesn't matter if it's when one of the five cities i represent or the unincorporated part or in any of your areas we all have purpose and a responsibility to be concerned about that because slum and blight anywhere in date county impacts the quality of life for everyone in date county and anybody that thinks that that's not the case you are sadly mistaken so i don't like being so now guess what i'd like it to be in naranja and i have no problem and i've been in naranja many times i'll be back i'll be happy to go so if that's you know i the two commissioners of the district i think have uh good intents and that's why i voted to i didn't vote for it but it's my purpose and i my purpose is to care about everybody in date county not just the people in my district because it impacts me impacts everybody in date county and what happens in aventura impacts florida city and what happens in florida city impacts aventura so i want to be clear my purpose is an elected official i will fulfill my role as commissioner gilbert said and if this is the will of this body that that is our role i will do it and i have no problem and now i my purpose i will be there and i'll be there in person and i will drive to naranja that's not that big an issue i've been there many times it doesn't bother me i think it should be there because those are the people are impacted but i think i also should have a say there's no reason that i should not have a say on anything that impacts anything miami-dade county nor should there be any reason that you all of you shouldn't have an opinion on something that impacts all of my miami-dade county in my district so uh i just want to be clear you know uh there's a difference between but the last thing i'll say is i would like from the attorneys to please give us all explain to us what our roles are when we deal with created cra's that exist and we still come up here and we have to vote on it and we pass some rules reference those cra's which is what i was talking about because transparency it doesn't matter whether it's in aventura doesn't matter whether it's in florida city transparency should exist across the board so i what i would like is to have those rules now we're sitting now this moment and correct me if i'm wrong we're sitting as the cra the naranja lake cra that's it right so you know i'll be there i don't have a problem i agree with the commissioner gilbert once you create something then we have to fill our role that simple as that and again you know um i take every vote based on purpose not on politics thank you commissioner bermudez all right so for future speakers i'm going to recognize now uh regalado just we've we've we don't have to rehash that if it could be done in naranja we all agree that and by the way guys we all have access to sergeants so it's not like we're driving our our behinds there we all got access to sergeants we can get there that's not need to be discussed it could be done in naranja kumbaya commissioner regalado thank you um so i i appreciate the entire discussion about like unwinding the item but i feel like we're so past that i mean we are currently sitting here as the cra so um the idea of like unwinding it i think that that ship has sailed and we need to figure out what we're going to do at the moment since we are sitting as at as the cra i think we need to deal with the quorum issue and i think um commissioner gilbert is right we need to just vote on that and deal with the quorum issue i don't know if where we're going to be meeting we have the ability for people to appear virtually or if it's like recorded because there are going to be questions about commissioners that can't make it and if they can appear virtually maybe they can't vote those are all decisions that we get to make as a cra right so there's all that then i think we need to decide um as to the co-chair situation i think we're in this we're in this situation because of the issue so at least to begin i i agree um with commissioner gilbert to have keon lead it and then we'll figure it out because a the whole purpose of having a chair is to have accountability and if you keep changing the chairs then you don't have accountability because people um it was me it was you it was me it was you and i think what we need is some um just to set this thing up and get this thing moving and figure out what is the path forward because that we got into this position because people have a disagreement and that disagreement isn't going to disappear from one day to another maybe through a series of meetings of the cra will pass items and maybe that disagreement will appear will disappear and then we can vote again we can vote on we can vote on a chair at any point we can vote on the chair of the county commission at any point you know we we can we can deal with that later but i think keon is a perfect person to like lead this thing into um the setup and start dealing with the resolution and the agenda and the outreach you know and making sure that um the first ever miami-dade county commission led cra is not a disaster because again we we broke the rules i still don't agree with it the way that we did it but here we are and i think we just need to make sure that the precedent that we're establishing is one that is legally viable and is in the best interest of naranja like commissioner bermudis i will be there i commit to be one of the five i will physically be there um so i think we just need to decide on a path forward right now start with the quorum and with the chair um of that so i'm happy to support um commissioner gilbert's motion all right commissioner gilbert you're recognized and for a potential motion as well um mr chairman i would move that we make the quorum for the naranja lake cra five members of the board of county commissioners uh additionally as part of this motion i move that we make we have meetings at naranja lakes uh every other month um and on the mr chairman on the issue of chair i'm sympathetic to what commissioner cohen higgins says this is the challenge that i have so i've been chair of the county commission before and i know what the power of the chair is generally if we alternate meetings there is no continuity in division of the cra and so what happens is folks who want to do something and can't get it on one agenda they'll just wait until the next meeting and get it on another it that that becomes democracy yeah that that becomes more problematic and that's not a democracy i mean that is that is forum shopping that's forum shopping so if you all don't want to have a non because i think both of you are very capable of doing it but i think the conflict envisions the same conflict envision that exists now would be magnified if you alternated as chair if you don't want to have a non-county commissioner non-district commissioner as the chairperson then i would suggest you all maybe doing it every two years whoever district 8 is this district 8 for this two years and then district 9 for this two years and like you all work it out that way and then when we get to redistricting and we have to redraw the district maps i think it's incumbent on this board to remember all of this conversation the pain that we have having this conversation and to try to incorporate naranja lakes into one county commission district commissioner gilbert i can so the two of the quorum commissioner gilbert though can we a suggestion for your motion and you could finish your motion now to to commissioner regalato's point like this could be changed at any time right so for purposes of just kind of like getting somewhere today do you want to just add to your motion that they do co-chair one alternating months until we figure something else out because we're not really and they could such we're just not getting anywhere like so well and i know that some of my colleagues i i for the purpose of the board i i can add it to my motion but i will tell you it's an epically bad idea but it is not a good idea but we can do it because you're right we can just undo it the next time but the conflicts won't disappear because we have make them have a sunshine they could have sunshine meetings before we actually um incorporate reincorporated the cra and we bring ourselves to the board so that i don't know this but i don't have a problem with that i just want the next chair to bring us back some bylaws and i want us for now also as a part of my motion i like the default to the bylaws and the operations like they have an operations manual and the bylaws for the naranja lake cra now so we're their cra board we have whatever their bylaws were we should be defaulting to them so default to those documents i move we default to those documents and make quorum five we meet in naranja lakes and if it's the will of this board that they alternate the district commissioners alternate chairmanship or they co-chair um they co-chair and the agenda is to be set by both of them in sunshine meeting co-chair so both of them have to sit together in a sunshine meeting and determine what the agenda is so that at least there's some continuity in the things that are brought before the cra every time so that we don't have to as a county commission sitting as an the naranja lake cra board have this type of prolonged discussion so we have a motion on the table i second second by commissioner gilbert to the attorneys is there any unreadiness or clarifications needed on the motion now okay oh great all right all those in favor signify by saying commissioner hardiman the the in your motion the only thing i object to because i fundamentally just disagree with it is reducing quorum requirements i understand what the what we're trying to go but what i found is that when boards don't meet because of quorum and we reduce the quorum requirement we are essentially lowering the threshold to pass items that for instance may not pass if you had an actual quorum and then second it absolves us from our responsibility we are the board and so we need to show up so it should be at least seven of us showing up in the city of miami for instance five is the membership routinely three people will show up and then there were commissioners that decided that they didn't didn't want to show up to other cra's and because those cra's didn't have quorum they didn't meet but then you take on the responsibility of the meetings not have being held because you didn't show up so that's the only thing so because of that in this i will vote no if you put it out singularly i will vote for what you're asking for to continue this thing moving forward but then against the reduction in the quorum requirements yeah i think i'm hearing whispers that the commissioners of the district are okay with five i actually agree with what commissioner hardeman said it makes sense uh but i mean again they're i commissioner the reason why i went with five and i'm going to go ahead i respectfully anybody wants to disagree and you can vote again and if it fails then you all can make another motion but i foresee a circumstance where this cra if we're actually if we were going to remove the quorum requirement i probably would remove the the meeting requirement being located there because i don't want a situation where the work is stalled in that area because we can't make the two-hour track down i just i i see that as in a compact area what you're saying makes a lot more sense but in the vastness of miami-dade county you're asking for instance commissioner steinberg and myself to come from essentially county line road and i'm going to go we're going to try to make this track but in the vastness of the county you run a risk of stalling the efforts of the cra and and i too have actually set foot in naranja lakes no they they need the work to keep going they need the work to keep going so i i want to leave the the quorum level at five please all right so all in favor signify by saying i all oppose nay show the item passed now to get to the rest of our agenda items to the attorneys we now have co-chairs who can i pass this agenda to to continue running this meeting or shall i finish this one meeting until you you guys want me to finish all right i thought i was going to get away with just passing it on but all right so if you can read the next item mr attorney your next item is special item number two which is a resolution of the board of commissioners of the naranja lakes community redevelopment agency requesting the county mayor or county mayor's desk need to cause all potholes on county owned or maintained roadways within the geographical boundaries of the redevelopment area to be identified prioritized and repaired utilizing applicable county procedures commissioner cohen higgins you're recognized as the prime sponsor this item i do have a question or just a thought but go ahead thank you mr chair the item is pretty straightforward and speaks to immediately accessing dollars to improve the slum and light in the naranja lakes um cra and i i believe that the district nine commissioner has a motion on this item i could be wrong but again the item is simply to start having the dollars invested because the roadways in that area are extremely problematic and and to the district nine commissioner i believe that this is the motion that you have regarding a different entity handling the work is that correct yes that is correct and i believe if at the appropriate time we can get the county attorney to read the motion okay so i don't believe that the district nine commissioner has any opposition to special item number two um and again i'm happy to answer any questions but it is like i said to have dollars immediately invested as quickly as possible to bring up the roadways in the area thank you mr chair so my only question and i i'm sorry if you just addressed this i i got distracted for 2.5 seconds but my my only thing uh commissioner uh and now i guess to the two district commissioners is just not sure if it's a funding thing but why keep it to just like why not expand it to sidewalk repairs as well and just anything that kind of falls in that same neighborhood so i guess you're such just as potholes uh but what about it it it adds it yeah okay all right so i missed that that's when i said i zoned out for 2.5 seconds all right uh so it's there's a motion on special item number two so what's this motion an amendment like what's the yes an amendment to the uh to the item all right so as amended yes and um we're going to ask the county attorney to read the amendment actually uh vice chair uh your amendment is to special item number four uh not to special item number two no okay no we do have this is the infrastructure one right that's that's a separate motion i believe that you want me to read into the record i'm happy to read that if you would like me to do that now no actually i actually what i wanted to do is have this added on as an amendment and to two to special item number two okay as in the form of an okay so which is adding sidewalks or whatnot yeah yeah when you heat when you read the motion it makes sense under special item number two okay all right so would you want to read the motion slash now it's an amendment to special item number two sure uh the vice vice chairman uh mcgee moves to request that the county mayor county mayor's uh designate develop an implant implementation plan utilizing a portion of the funds allocated for infrastructure improvements in the fiscal year 2025-2026 naranja lakes community redevelopment agency's annual budget for infrastructure improvements to provide lighting is is that the one we're talking about yes sir okay lighting tree trimming pavements pavement of road septic to sewer funding for families and senior senior citizens making less than 60 percent of area median income and the addition of dedicated bicycle lanes within the naranja lakes community redevelopment area i vice chairman mcgee further moves that the board requests that prior to taking actions identified herein the county mayor of the county mayor's designee provide an initial implementation plan to the agency within 30 days of the effective date of this motion unless extended by the agency which includes at a minimum the anticipated timelines for the actions identified herein the estimated cost to complete each of the activities and confirmation of the availability of funds within the agency's budget to successfully complete the activities can you also add in there sidewalk repairs please all right so we got sidewalks included there as amended um we have a motion as amended do we have a second on the motion as amended okay second by commissioner gilbert i have commissioner hardiman special item number two as amended thank you um sitting with my cra cap on i just want to make something very plain the uh one i appreciate the amendment that you made to the motion on the floor uh because the amendment goes above and beyond general responsibilities of government in this area and so for instance potholes to be very clear potholes in that area should be paid for by miami day county i mean that that is exactly what you all do potholes the cra should be spinning the book of its funds trying to go above and beyond to create an economic incentive for that area or to improve it in a way that's unlike or unfunded from miami day county so for instance if you're talking about we're talking about roads and i i if you're talking about roads if cr if naranja needs infrastructure in its roads water sewer things like that that's beyond what we can typically do in miami day county we have to plan it out in the budget cycle things of that nature and if you want to have an immediate impact then it looks great for naranja lake cra to create that that that is part of what it does and even just like we wouldn't have red rooster had not the cra improved the water infrastructure there on on the avenue so it's something we must do but uh we cannot as a cra board allow miami day county to say oh you got some money you pay for it that is not how this thing works the money that's there should be used to make enhancements so when you look at the lighting improve sidewalks meaning if you're making them not not not a what is it four foot not a four foot sidewalk but you want to make sidewalks you know 10 feet pedestrian friendly like really planning an area planting trees to make it beautiful that's what the cra can can certainly do and i appreciate the amendment because it allows that type of uh action to occur thank you commissioner regalato thank you um and in line with what commissioner harteman is saying um my concern is we're not dealing with water and sewer infrastructure and whenever you have streets that have a series of potholes and the county comes in or a contractor comes in and fills the potholes we don't fix the real issue there may be situations in which it makes more sense to mill and resurface the street and i think we need to know what the infrastructure needs are for those streets so while i get it that we want to like get going at the same time i don't want um to do something temporary when we could do something much better and address the infrastructure situation so my question is is this gonna come back to us you know obviously we need to deal with the budgetary piece of it but can we also work on an assessment of some of the streets that need the most amount of work and also have information if they need water and sewer infrastructure or stormwater infrastructure and then we can decide we either afford it or we don't afford it but at least we know as we're as we're fixing those streets and those sidewalks so i would i would like an assessment of the stormwater and the water and sewer infrastructure as before we kind of make a decision on on these areas all right uh chief denise um through the chair thank you so much i really appreciate the comments of the commissioners and i've asked our director to step up um to address the concern so that what we do produce meets the needs and the expectations of this board i don't think 30 days would be enough time so i'd like director miller to address the two things that were raised by uh commissioner hardiman and commissioner regalato we'll get to the director in just a second here uh commissioner cohen higgins you recognize oh thank you mr chair i just wanted to um i think it's an amendment that commissioner uh regalato is making i'm happy to accept that amendment to the item as well i think an assessment will only add value and i i couldn't agree more with commissioner hardiman's comment regarding this is the work that we should be doing as a county but again if you've visited the area once versus um frequented you recognize that this area unfortunately is unfunded in our budget they're level four roads and they're just so far down the list of having these repairs done our goal and i believe commissioner mcgee will agree is to bring up this area aesthetically as quickly as possible so that that investment that you are talking about that is so necessary and bringing these big development projects to the area will become that much more attractive including obviously improving the quality of lives of the residents in naranja lakes because potholes are a huge huge huge issue um and and and i would like to see some of the money obviously not the lion's share of it but some of the money needs to go into these immediate aesthetic um upgrades so that we and our residents can see those improvements and see that their tax dollars are working for them as quickly as possible so i'm happy to accept commissioner regalado's amendment for the assessment and i'm happy to accept commissioner mcgee's amendment that adds additional infrastructure um items to to special item number two thank you mr chair so we have a motion on special item number two as amended as amended uh with a second and are you all comfortable with that now through the chair our concern is 30 days is not enough time to do an adequate assessment and implementation plan we would like to request at more time okay additional time for the assessment or additional time to implement the pothole repair because i'm not interested in additional time for the pothole repair and having that triggered the assessment i think if you need more time that's certainly reasonable so are you asking for additional time just on the assessment go ahead stacy stacy miller for the record department of transportation and public works for the record i'll recognize stacy because they've still had me chair this meeting i'm not sure why but but go ahead director thank you chair we would uh just to clarify to do an assessment this would be more than dtpw this would involve the water and sewer parks who deals with landscape and and that sort of maintenance so an assessment would take much longer than 30 days we would need 90 to 120 days to do that assessment between multiple offices regarding potholes the and i i just i would need a clarification obviously we have very few pothole teams that are available countywide if we are talking about trying to acquire a contractor to be able to do pothole filling in that area we obviously know that takes a much longer amount of time if it's being funded by the cra we would need to work through that process so that would take longer than 30 days to get started i don't believe the team that we have available to be able to do that as well as all of the concentration in this cra area as well as concentrate on all of our other pothole areas so we would want to contract that out so that we could fully engage in the goal that concerns me yeah yeah that concerns me right i mean this is why the item is before us so and that's why i wanted the clarification regarding the assessment versus pulling the trigger to actually get the work done um and frankly the request exacerbates the issue because the the the issue is that the potholes remain and so there's the assessment which is separate the cra is funding the actual work we just need to coordinate scheduling to get the teams out there as quickly as possible to get the roadways as traversable as quickly as possible so i don't know why that would take 60 to 120 that wouldn't take 60 to 120 days what i want to make sure is that i have team members either available who can do that work or contract that work out through our existing contracted processes available contracts that we may have to do it okay i think i think you're going to need to contract this out i think we all can agree that you're going to need to contract this out let's not even explore the option of doing it in-house hence they haven't been done and we have polls throughout the county so the question so that we can maybe take a vote on this item is do you all legally need anything from us to waive rules to call it a non-emergency contract like let's just get the potholes fixed how do we get it how do you call someone today and tell them we need you out tomorrow how do you what do you need anything from us do you need an authorization from us i believe i may have the contracting mechanisms already it will take me longer than a day to contract that out through our existing contracting methods but i don't think i need any additional authority to use the contracts that we already have perfect that's great all right i will recognize you commissioner arteman i'll be brief but i'm trying to call a vote i'll be brief first i know it's hard but we got to keep keep our mind on who's meeting so this board can't tell them to do anything one right two um domino's pizza fills potholes y'all remember the domino's pizza commercial they fill potholes like we should be able to fill a pothole today right now that's that's the second thing this is to me that sounds preposterous that miami-dade county that entity can't fill a pothole in your neighborhood so that's another thing and then three um if for instance we are going to as a board be filling potholes cra board then most likely if the government is not going to do the job then we need to contract cra board with an entity to fill potholes not miami-dade county contracting because remember we're operating as a cra board just a few cents that's all thank you makes sense to me mr chair uh no no love you jimmy we're going to call a vote here all in favor of special item number two as amended as amended with all the comments on the record signify by saying aye all opposed nay all right show special item number two passed as amended as amended special item number three commissioner cohen higgins you're recognized on your item uh thank you mr chair and to the attorneys do we have to take these up individually like we or can we take them up as a as a body the way that we do a committee hearings is there any rule that requires us to take this up individually no okay um i don't know if my colleagues have questions on special item number three and number four i do know that our lieutenants from the southern district are here and want to speak on special item number three um they they were they stepped out while the public hearing opened on the naranja lakes cra um so if our lieutenant is here i'd welcome him to the podium to share him or hurt him to share a few um remarks on special item number three this is lieutenant ferguson first of all good morning everyone to the board um regarding the special item number three um i have been a working with the um excuse me for a second amount of breath i literally try to run to the restroom and run back um so currently i work with the miami obviously work with the miami-dade sheriff's office i'm a part of the neighborhood south district neighborhood resource unit which is a part of um the uh lorange lake cra uh my job pretty much consists of being the liaison between the uh the community the commercial businesses clergy and a host of other things um so originally i've been trying to uh reach out to the naranja lake cra we have been in contact throughout their previous year since i've been in this assignment regarding their community policing innovation program and trying to see what can we do as a sheriff office and how can we um better better that that program for for the cra thank you lieutenant so in in summary are you in support of this item um yes i am yes i am 100 okay thank you i move special item number three mr chair commissioner uh the vice chair has an amendment to that item um i mean i was about to recognize him but you're all right guys i'll say it again i don't want to show this meeting like i don't need to show this meeting but like if i am we're going to kind of go through the chair as long as you all want me to chair uh vice chairman you're recognized but thank you terrence for jumping in and chairing as well uh thank you mr chairman and uh thank you ferg we we affectionately call you ferg down south um because you've always been on the front line ensuring that the community is safe and sound um mr chairman at this time we'd like to recognize um county attorney to read the motion that i have uh for this particular item sure uh vice vice chairman uh mcgee moves to amend special item number three to require the community policing policy include a plan to install more shot spotter gunfire detection systems a plan to increase neighborhood resource officers and the utilization of illegal dumping response teams accordingly section two of the uh the resolution would be amended to add uh two subsections f and g f would be include a plan to install more spot shot or spot shot spotter gunfire detection systems in the redevelopment area and g include a plan to increase the number of neighborhood resource officers and the utilization of illegal dumping response team um so i i will say this that as far as the shot spotter is concerned we currently already have shot spotted in that in that neighborhood and within south district um regarding the second item that will be something that will have to be deferred to the sheriff herself um regarding the transfers and additional personnel to the south district so i wouldn't be able to answer that question thank you um so we'll just keep it there but as it relates to the shot spot if i know we do have how many we have like one or two i think it was last time i checked uh let me defer to my major major i think we have yeah yeah yeah so so i'll keep the motion as it is and then if there's any issues then we'll just deal with it later but more shot spotters are needed in that area um because naranja is growing and it's vast um and we do need more neighborhood resource officers there and we have a huge issue with illegal dumping um and that is pretty much taking up a lot of issues there so uh just keep the motion where it is thank you all right so we have a motion we got it all second commissioner harteman um you know um i have a great deal of experience with the um with community policing initiatives or we call them innovations and what i found is that many times the police departments advocate to cras to fund these things in southeast old town we funded it defunded it and then after i left they were advocating again and they refunded it uh one of the things that i know terrence is probably keenly aware of this is that we have to be very careful of because remember the police departments are separate entities than the cra board is that the statute is very um um is is is this the florida state statute is is clear about supplanting the uh responsibility of other departments such as monroe day county the government and or for instance the sheriff's department in this case and so for instance the reason we created the community policing initiative initially was because particularly in the areas of 14th street 20th street um um third avenue etc we had a great deal of second avenue first avenue homelessness drug sales prostitution and if you remember i mean there was one case where a kid picked up some fentanyl and died in the middle of overtime that big case i mean all of this was going on because we had a proliferation of tents and other things like that and so we wanted to create an opportunity for us to have police presence to discourage that and what we learned over time was that um the police just didn't do what they said they were going to do so when they they didn't so you have to understand two ways how this goes when the when the when the uh the officer says i need to report to the chief that is remember this is an organization like the military he's not going to be able to commit to anything chief has to make that assignment assessment so for instance typically in those in those areas if we wanted more police presence from our police department the chief would assign more officers there so already what you've said is we will pay for more officers to be there right so therein lies your first question about how does it work in in in the overtown area they created a whole nother thing to sort of create they created a an actual thing of officers that was different from the the the regular police department's officers to kind of differentiate between the two those people for instance we were in contract with as a CRA board we didn't allow them to even leave the district for lunch they had a requirement of being there for lunch they broke those rules sometimes i saw my with my own eyes but that's neither here nor there um um the the we bought for instance segways you know those things that you stand on we bought a whole bunch of things for presence never have i ever in my life seen an officer ride a segway in overtime just you should know that but it had the they had to have another seal on their clothing to denote that they were actual CRA during that time that i was there um which kind of and so then when we asked for the accountability of it all they told us about certain arrests that they did etc but the the point is is that when you create the police initiative or innovation what you're hoping for is interaction with the police and the people in a way that's conducive to making a neighborhood a better place and so all i say and i follow the chairman the chairman's the chairman's in this i will follow your lead but i always say i approach with caution where you can create you can spend a lot of money it usually i mean it's going to cost you no less than seven hundred thousand dollars a year probably to do something like this you can spend a lot of money on police and don't get the effect that you want you may be better off spending elsewhere and allowing the police department to do what it naturally does naranja is one of those places where they spend resources already i'm sure to be present and you have 20 in our roles and things of that nature i mean we have the ability to make it happen but remember as this board that we're sitting on as a CRA board we have no authority whatsoever to direct uh miami-dade county we have no authority to direct the sheriff's office they will do what they want to do in fact they will just tell us whether or not they want to participate in the policing innovation they make that decision and so um you know number number three is a hard one but you know if that's something that you want to explore because you've never done it maybe there's a way you can get it done i would say explore it but don't be surprised if it doesn't happen in the way as quickly or the way that you would like it to be all right all in favor signify by saying aye all opposed nay all right item passes special item number four special we still have a bcc meeting we got to go back just fyi guys everybody's committing to all these CRA meetings in naranja and y'all can't even get through a bcc meeting all right special item number four commissioner cohen higgins is recognized i move it mr chair all right it's been moved by commissioner cohen higgins seconded by by the okay there's a second by the vice chair and an amendment to it or a motion thereafter uh it's an amendment uh ask the county attorney to read the amendment please read the amendment vice chairman mcgee moves to amend special item number four so request that the county mayor of the county mayor's destiny utilize greater miami services corp rather than existing county employees and or contracts to provide roadside cleanup and landscaping services and to make conforming changes to the title that would uh then amend uh section two uh to strike towards existing county employees and or contracts and insert the words greater miami services corps okay so there's a motion there's a second on the item there's an amendment commissioner cohen higgins you recognize on the amendment thank you uh mr chair can they do this work um commissioner from district nine i mean do they have the the vehicles do they have the materials i think it's a great idea i love the idea i just want to make sure that they have the infrastructure yeah that they have what they need in order to effectuate this work so i know this is an organization you're very close to you're very familiar with we passed very important legislation supporting it in the last year um my my question is is simply that do they have the infrastructure to do this work that's it mr chairman vice chair or well coach i don't even just commissioner just just go just just say whatever you want to say um short answer is uh absolutely they do have the capacity this is what they do in part uh to be on the safe side what we would do terrence just go ahead and amend my amendment um to add the words and or and slash or uh that way we can ensure that the capacity is there and if there's a shortfall we can always fulfill it with the county side of the employment just for clarification is the and or um after the words existing county employees cut or contracts or and or greater miami services corp that would be affirmative yes okay all right um so with that all in favor sig uh commissioner gilbert recognize i'll support these and i'll vote for these but like as the erangelates cra board can't ask we can't tell the county do anything so we're operating it's not just the sheriff that we can't tell the sheriff we can't tell the county we can pass an urging as the erangelates board to the board of county commissioners the city and county commissioners we can tell the county and so i just want us to be mindful that we're considering these items but to the extent that our items require us to direct the county to do something or yeah we just have to be mindful of how we do that and so i would feel comfortable and this is going to sound crazy but as an erangelates board i might feel comfortable actually that's just hiring people to do the stuff we want done commissioner gilbert i don't know and this is a question to i guess the attorneys or the administration like so the the county is serving you're right in in theory but the county is also serving now as our like management company right like aren't you all serving as i mean that's how it was explained to me yesterday by both the lawyers jerry you were in the room and when on our zoom call like you all are in fact i mean i don't want to delay this any further but you all told me the administration said you don't even have a need for all the existing contracts that the cra has right now because you're doing those services now so i mean so we don't direct the county in the capacity of the county but aren't they our management company like aren't they running the cra now so mr chairman they are the people we've essentially appointed to be the executive director administration of the cra but this is where the inherent conflict comes in that we'll have to manage because the county's responsibility existed prior to the incorporation of the cra so you're asking the person the people for instance who wasn't actually filling the potholes to fill the potholes and so you're asking them to do that what when cra is coming to existence what they typically do is pay somebody else to fill the potholes that wasn't being done burst based on the existing obligation of the county in that area and so they wanted services that were above that in the sheriff's instance you you're asking the people who are responsible providing law enforcement in an area anyway to do something more so it's when commissioner hartman spoke about how we have to adjust our mindset i think this is what he was trying to get at we are very accustomed to sitting as a county commission and so when we say something our expectation is they do something unless the mayor veto so but but commissioner gilbert i agree i agree with what you're saying i just i need clarification from them because i'm just seeing it different right i own a property management company and i manage associations the board decides everything so we are the cra board we decide who we want to contract with we could contract with a and a landscaping we don't need to go through the county's vendor pool list or your procurement stuff we don't need that that's why i was asking those questions of the director we don't but we're not in the business of saying you know my cousin's a landscaper uh i've seen his work before like let's let's hire a and a a landscaping so i i'd look to unless we change that and we can as a cra board like i look to the administrators that are current that now we've whether we voted for it or not like bermuda said he didn't vote for it whether we voted for it or not we we brought it back to the management of the county is that wrong like maybe i'm looking at it wrong and i have to adjust that as well but so i'm not asking the the county to do it as the county i'm asking the county to do it because they're now the cra's like not board but administrators yeah so they're the board the cra's administrators but the administration executive director of the cra doesn't innately have the authority to actually fill the potholes they would as the administrators they would still have to hire somebody so for instance when we say use the county to do this the county as a contract agency we have to contract with could in theory just say no yes to us they could say no but so they have the actual ability to say no to the cra board now as the county commission it will be perilous to tell us no yeah so it would be perilous to tell us no but we're not sitting as a county commission and so what you're saying is right but think about it in terms of in your when you're managing the associations you said you all can hire people but the people you hire always have the opportunity to engage in the contract or not they are an arm's length provider of services now the administration of the cra as an old office of management and budget it's one thing they're the executive director but unless they're going to be the people out there actually filling the potholes then we're going to have to contract with the county to do that so that that's it's it's just a it's a subtle mind shift that we have to adjust ourselves to yeah mr chairman uh hardiman you know and unless i didn't read something that was provided to me for this particular cra i mean i would dare to say that the administration for the cra is the executive director that's sitting down there her and her staff if she has the staff will be the administrators of it now we will contract for instance like in most cra's and in some cra's you can hire a lawyer that works for that cra that helps draft items and things of that nature to put it before that board they don't use the county attorney's office like for instance in southeast overtown and omni they don't use this board or this county attorney's office to draft resolutions they have their own attorneys that draft it um they hire outside counsel sometimes to even draft certain things or represent them on certain issues and sometimes they can contract also with the city so in this case if we have a if that naranja has his own attorney i don't know i don't think so but they would draft it right or the um the the the executive team would tell this organization the county attorney's office what they like and they would draft it but usually there's a cost to that because you're you're unless we decide as a as accounting commission that we're supposed to be providing services to the cra at no cost to them right so you have those little nuances but the administration the whole the idea of the administration has absolutely nothing to do as i would take it unless i've something was printed that i didn't see with this cra board because the administration is his own thing that's that's our mayor's office and the 28 000 employees or so that she has but the particularly the person that the person that we are concerned about in this circumstance would be the county attorney's office because who's drafting these resolutions who's signing that this thing meets the legal sufficiency that it needs in order to have items put on and and those are the things and that's why i think there's this confusion here because when i read this particular item you know it's this is not something that a cra board attorney would have probably signed to legal sufficiency for because it has conflicts in how and what it's the board is directing and so you know mr chairman you said something that i thought was pretty interesting um you said that you know you manage agencies when you manage some some other agencies and you you were questioning whether or not if for instance a cra board can just hire who they would like to hire well it depends it depends on how the cra boards are set up how they contract through their procurement etc so it does not necessarily have to be it's not necessarily the same as momaday county it could be something that's a little different and so because it's something a little different it may move faster and that's the part of the reason that you have the cra boards and why when there's a problem like what commissioner daniel corin higgins wants to address you will hire outside people like for instance the um this organization that our vice chairman wants to propose to do those things so but you know we just have to decouple the thinking that we have about momaday county administrators versus the cra executive team that's who we're contracted with in order to move this board forward thank you okay commissioner cohen higgins thank you thank you so much mr i just wanted to comment that i agree completely with um the comments made by commissioner gilbert and commissioner hardiman um and i want to be clear this is the first naranja lake cra meeting and these items are intended to bring immediate relief as quickly as possible if at subsequent meetings we decide to engage in long-term contracts with different vendors that may be able to provide the services at a lower rate and more efficiently i'm happy to do it the point of the items however is this work had not been previously done and the residents in the area desperately need this work to be done so i accept the amendments proffered by the commissioner from district nine uh and again hopefully we can carry this final item thank you mr chair all right we have a motion we have a second all in favor signify by say an aye aye all opposed nay show the item passed as amended all right do i have a motion to adjourn can i can i ask one more thing please um it's brief every it's always everybody says super brief just no one on this board has ever said it's it's going to be long terence give us the rules moving forward for all of us like we requested before just as as the cra can he just give us the rules as we move forward that's all i ask all right uh uh commissioner bermuda is on that moves to adjourn uh seconded by commissioner vice chair co-chair chairs um all in favor of a journey signify by say an aye all opposed nay show us back on our regular bcc meeting that was very fun i mean it could have been a lot funner no more fun more fun fun funner is not a word so it could have been more fun but i think it was it was good good time spent on what we needed to get done so uh madam attorney can we get into second reading items at this time yes