City Council CRA First Budget Public Hearing — Sep 10, 2025

Erik Anderson: present · Jennifer Andreu: present · Timothy J. Fadgen: present · Denise Horland: present · Louis Reinstein: present · Nick Sortal: present

Do I have a second? Second. We have a motion and we have a second.

Erik Anderson: yes · Jennifer Andreu: yes · Timothy J. Fadgen: yes · Denise Horland: yes · Louis Reinstein: yes

But we're going to go right into the CRA budget meeting at 622. So that is called to order at 622. Ms. Beggarrow, please call the roll for the CRA budget portion.

Commissioner Anderson.

Here.

Commissioner Andreu.

Here.

Commissioner Fadgen. Here. Commissioner Horland. Here. Commissioner Reinstein. Here. Commissioner Sortel. Here. City Attorney Ezra. Here. Thank you.

Administration, is there any presentation on the CRA budget item? No. So I'm just going to ask the public, if you're leaving, if you can just leave quietly, since we still have business to conduct. Seeing that there is not a presentation from the administration for the Plantation Community Redevelopment Agency budget, we will take public comments regarding the CRA. Mr. Conklin, followed by Ms. Sword.

Thank you. Dennis Conklin, 4581 Northwest Sixth Court. In regards to CRA, again, just to reinforce what I was mentioning, if people go on to the city's website, plantation.org, and go to the government section and click on the finances, you can get all the annual reports and all of the budgets. And the Consolidated Annual Financial Report reveals an awful lot. It reveals a mountain of money. It reveals where that money is distributed. And, as I mentioned, as of last September 30th, not this year, it was $350 million in cash and investments. It's in banks. It's in treasury items and so forth and so on. A bunch of that is unrestricted. And the main definition of unrestricted is that it's to be used to pay debts. And the greatest debt that the city has, although it says it's got two debts in the presentation, it's actually their pensions because it's over $100 million unfunded between the general employees and the police officers. And you could not get around the police officers' contract, but you could satisfy the debt and bring everybody up to current full value in their general employees' pensions with the unrestricted monies. And I would recommend getting rid of the treasuries because nobody is buying them except our government is buying its debt back. They're worthless. So the CRA, again, it's sitting on $4 million. It's going to bring in the TIF again, probably another $4 million. And the overlying Gateway 7 is sitting on $3 million. And I have to say, the businesses pay not just what everybody else pays that owns property. They pay extra in that district. They don't need to. There's all kinds of money there. And with the CAFR, with the CRA TIF funds exceeding the millage rate after three years, so by 2003 they already exceeded the millage rate fee. It should have been repealed or replaced or whatnot. So, again, you're sitting on $7 million for that district. And I have to say that with our director that we have now, he's done a fantastic job because for 20 years nothing was really done. And I'll yield back.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Conklin. There's no yielding back. Ms. Sword, you do not wish to be called on? Okay. I see you waving it off. And Mr. McIntosh, did you wish to be called on? He's already left. Okay. Some people, when filling out the form, seem to mark both areas. So I just want to make sure. Councilmember Andrea, you wish to be recognized?

Thank you. Just because I can't speak to my colleagues outside of this meeting and the healthy discussion that we had based on the comments that Councilmember Horland made with the businesses, it seems like an overwhelming task. And I'm overdue for my meeting with Mr. Montefusco. But through AI, I really feel strongly that we could leverage that to kind of do, I think you were saying, like a cross comparison of what we have in our records versus, you know, what the state is reporting in terms of people who file with the state. And even, I think, one of our community representatives stated looking also at just Broward County as a whole. So doing that kind of three-point check, it could come up very easily for us. So I will be scheduling that meeting with Mr. Montefusco because that's a conversation I've been meaning to have for some time as to how, as a city, how are we leveraging AI and utilizing it to, and this is the perfect, I think, pilot project if we haven't been doing so already.

Makes perfect sense. Thank you for bringing that up again and following up on that. Go ahead, Mayor. Thank you.

We've had a couple meetings and discussions regarding AI through many different elements of this, including AI in building and permitting, too, because we could use that as ways to coach people up and eliminate mistakes that applicants make as they apply for permits and speed things up. So it's all on the table. I didn't have it for BTRs, though, so we'll look at it. Thanks.

Thank you, Mayor. Seeing no further discussion, do I have a motion on Item 1 of the CRA? So moved. Do I have a second?

Second.

We have a motion and we have a second. Seeing no further discussion, Ms. Bedgrove, please call the roll.

Commissioner Anderson. Yes. Commissioner Andreu. Yes. Commissioner Fajan. Yes. Commissioner Horland. Yes. Commissioner Reinstein. Yes. Commissioner Sortel.

Just for the record, since we have two separate meetings, the final budget hearing is going to be scheduled for next Wednesday at 5.01 p.m.

Thank you very much. The budget meeting and the CRA meeting is adjourned at 6.29.