Good evening and welcome. The City of Plantation final budget hearing for Wednesday, September 20th, 2023 is now called to order. Ms. Biggerow, please call the roll. Councilmember Anderson. Here. Councilmember Andreu. Here. Councilmember Fajan. Here. Councilmember Horland. Here. Councilmember Reinstein. Here. Mayor Sortel. Here. City Attorney Ezra. Here. Thank you. Ms. Otteniano, we have item number one, the fiscal year 2024 final millage resolution for the City of Plantation consolidated. I'm going to ask Attorney Ezra to read the resolution first, please. Oh, you would like to make sure. Can I just identify the proposed millage rates and the increase above the rollback rates before we do that? Yes. Go ahead. Okay. So, the City of Plantation fiscal year 2024 proposed budget is based on the general fund operating millage of 5.8000 mills. This is an increase of 8.21% from the rollback millage rate of 5.3600 mills. The voter debt millage rate for fiscal year 2024 is 0.2813 mills. This is the millage rate required to fund the voter-approved debt service. The Plantation Gateway Development District fiscal year 2024 proposed budget is based on the operating millage of 1.815 mills. This is an increase of 2.84% from the rollback millage rate of 1.7615 mills. The Plantation Midtown Development District fiscal year 2024 proposed budget is based on the operating millage of 0.9707 mills. This is an increase of 5.26% from the rollback millage rate of 0.9222 mills. The City of Plantation aggregate fiscal year proposed budget is based on the aggregate millage of 6.0235 mills. This is an increase of 8.22% from the aggregate rollback millage rate of 5.5660 mills. The increase in ad valorem revenues in fiscal year 2024 are for the specific purpose of funding increases in operating costs, increases in personnel costs, and to fund operating capital needs. Thank you, Ms. Otteniano. Attorney Ezra? Yes, Council President. Resolution adopting the final operating millage rate for the City of Plantation of 5.8 mills and voted debt millage rate of 0.2813 mills for fiscal year October 1, 2023 through September 30, 2024. Identifying the City-only rollback rate, the aggregate millage rate, and aggregate rollback rate, and the percentage increase from the aggregate rollback rate, providing findings, a savings clause, and an effective date. Thank you. Council, any further discussion regarding item number one? Council Member Fadgen? Thank you. I'm just going to comment on all three, and I'm not going to go into as much detail as I went into last week. I'm just going to reiterate some of my points I made last week. The 5.8 millage rate, keeping it the same, constitutes a 9.7% increase in revenue. Midtown, keeping the millage the same as last year. This year constitutes a 16.7% increase in revenue. And then we, in my mind, hopefully we have Gateway settled. I really believe that this is an opportunity to reduce the general millage from 5.8, to give our residents and our businesses that are doing a great job in our city, creating these property values, to give them a break. Times are getting tough out there. So that's really as far as I'm going to go with it. You all heard my argument last week. I really would like us to consider the general millage reduction this week. And then the last thing is, Anna, thank you for your hard work. Thank you to your department, all the department heads. Thank you for your hard work. I have no doubt that all the decisions made in the budget were made thoughtfully and responsibly. And I want everybody to know that I appreciate everything that everyone does because it's not lost on me how big of an endeavor this is every year. And I know there's a lot of hard decisions made. So that's all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Fajon. I'll just add to that. I understand, too, and I want to say I am empathetic to the residents and what everybody is going through in terms of all the increases in everything, gas, groceries, everything. But I'm also weighing that with the greater benefit to the city and the updates that we need to all of our various projects that we're working on. You know, the ADA, the hardening of our buildings, the safety concerns that we have and getting new vehicles. So when I look at the cost savings to the average cost savings to a homeowner, anywhere from maybe $7 to $15, and then I look at the impact that we'll have on the city from half a million to a few million dollars, I'm just not sure if reducing the millage is going to really even make a dent to the average homeowner. I appreciate your comments, Council Member Fajon, and those that we heard from from the residents. I just not I'm not sure if if the savings of $7.50 would really, really make a huge impact. Again, I don't want to be, you know, I'm empathetic to the hurt that everybody is going through with rising costs, but I don't think it weighs heavily enough to really change that millage rate. Those are my comments. Council Member Weinstein. Yeah, thank you very much. I'll just add that while I would love to see us reduce this, I think that there is always a need to reduce when it's possible. I also know that I've spent time, just like every one of us has spent time analyzing this budget, and I haven't heard any real concrete, you know, suggestions or numbers of let's that this shouldn't be in here or we should cut this out. This doesn't belong here in in working with the administration and in looking at what's been proposed. It seems that it's for the betterment of our city. And for that reason, I'll support this. Council Member Anderson. Right along the same lines, I applaud Council Member Fadgen for being a fiscal hawk like that. I am too. But you have my promise. If we're in a deep recession and it's time that the citizens, you know, a wide swath of the citizens need relief, it will be on my radar to push to lower. But this is a time when we're at close to full employment. And for the same reasons the other two Council Members stated, we have the city's costs have gone up, our chlorine for our water, our gas for our vehicles, our vehicles we purchase, our fire equipment we purchase, our salaries, because our city employees that we value very much for getting us where we are, we are under par for some of our neighboring areas in Broward, and we want to bring them up. Those all cost money. Honestly, to me, when I talk to constituents and myself, citizens don't necessarily hate taxes. They hate waste of taxes. They hate waste of, when we're not good fiscal stewards. And I am very confident that the city of Plantation is good fiscal stewards. From our department heads, we keep our vehicles very long. We really stretch things out. But we get our dollars' worth and do very well. So I also fall in the camp of Council Member Ryan Steed and Andreu, I was going to say first name, that while I'm sympathetic to it, it's a very negligible amount difference depending on the amount of the property. Yes, the overall amount brought in is a lot of millions, but we also have a lot of property that's brought online that have come in new that adds to the tax base and adds to the taxes. So the actual homeowner increase actually is not that great. So I am standing to stick with the proposed amount, but I'm open for future budgets. If we are in tough times, that's when I'll look to lower. That's it. Thank you, Council Member Anderson. Any further discussion? I guess my only response to that is $7, if that's the number. It's not a big deal unless it's your last $7, and there's a lot of people on fixed incomes. And, you know, what's inconsequential to us or many of the people that we know might not be inconsequential to many people. And then I would tell you, if we do get in hard times, it would be even more difficult to give relief or to relieve the millage because then we're really going to be pressed to get revenues from every source. So, I mean, that's really my only response. I respect both of everyone's opinions, but I just wanted to have that response to it. So, thank you. We do have some public speakers signed up. Ms. Sward. Plantation is made up of several communities, and, of course, the City Council represents all of those communities. As a resident of Lauderdale West, my new tax will only increase by $16. But I feel the pain of all of the other plantation residents who are going to pay more. I have a new neighbor on my block who will be paying $128 more. I have another neighbor, again on my block, who will be paying $133 more. A resident in the Acres will be paying $203 more. These are not negligible amounts. We are all suffering from inflation, and I don't know anyone who is going to pay only $7.50 more. Again, a vote to keep the millage the same is a vote to increase our property tax. Thank you. Thank you. We also have Mr. Conklin online. Mr. Conklin, can you hear us? Yes, I think I just become unmuted. We hear you. Go ahead, please. Okay. Dennis Conklin, 4581 Northwest Swiss Court. I sent an email message to you and the other members of the council, the mayor, and administration. I'm going to recommend, because the people didn't hear this, that you pick your scripture and turn to Genesis chapter 41, Joseph's interpretation of Pharaoh's dreams. That's the seven years of great abundance for the government and seven years of famine for the people. And it enabled Pharaoh to have full granaries for Joseph to give food to the people. I attached several pages from seven years of the CAFR, the Consolidated Annual Financial Report, and it shows, particularly in the, quote, unrestricted net position, which may be used to meet the government's ongoing obligations to citizens and creditors, end quote. And it has increased every year from 2016 from $32 million right up every year for seven years to $141,327,230. And what I'm recommending to you is to either take the $6.4 million that that 5.36 Wilbeck is going to represent, take it from the unrestricted position, or start cutting 6.4 from the budget. And I recommend that you just continue the Herbert Marcuse Frankfurt School of Derivative Marxist Critical Theory, now known as Critical Race Theory, and Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, or the CRT and DEI compliance training from MarCom Video On Demand, and also to cancel any electric vehicle purchases. And that also includes another hit on the taxpayer for $7,500 that comes from the feds. Also to cancel the city's planned solar projects, which can provide electricity for about 19% of the day, if it's a sunny day, and it provides plenty of landfill for the use of the discarded solar panels. So I recommend that you keep the budget the way it is, to take the money and use it from the unrestricted funds. There's plenty there. It's only a fraction of the budget. It's 2.5% of the budget, and it can come from that $141 million. Now, I don't have a time clock. I can't see what I've got left. That's one of the problems we do. That's it, Mr. Conklin. Thank you very much. Are there any other public speakers? Hearing none, I would entertain a motion. Motion to approve item one. Second. Any further discussion? Ms. Bigelow, please call the roll. Council Member Anderson? Yes. Council Member Vagin? No. Council Member Horland? Yes. Council Member Reinstein? Yes. Council Member Andrew? Yes. Thank you. Item number two is the fiscal year 2024 final millage resolution for the Plantation Midtown Development District. Attorney Ezra, if you can read that, please. A resolution adopting the final millage rate for Plantation Midtown Development District of .9707 mills for the operating fiscal year October 1, 2023, through September 30, 2024. Identifying the computed rollback millage rate, providing findings, a savings clause, and an effective date. Thank you. Any discussion regarding the millage rate for Plantation Midtown? Motion to approve item two. Second. Any discussion from the public? Hearing none. Ms. Bigelow, please call the roll. Council Member Anderson? Yes. Council Member Fagin? No. Council Member Horland? Yes. Council Member Reinstein? Yes. Council Member Andrew? Yes. Thank you. Item number three is the final millage resolution for the Plantation Gateway Development District. Attorney Ezra, if you can please read the resolution. A resolution adopting the final millage rate for Plantation Gateway Development District of 1.8115 mills for the operating fiscal year October 1, 2023, through September 30, 2024. Identifying the computed rollback millage rate, providing findings, a savings clause, and an effective date. I need discussion from the Council regarding item number three in the Plantation Gateway Development District. Council Member Anderson? Just real quick. Is this, just remind me, it was a long meeting a week ago. Didn't we get three votes to lower it? Yes. It was a reduction. Right. So this is the reduction. Mm-hmm. 1.8. I want to make sure before, yeah. Motion to approve item three. Second. Any further discussion regarding the millage rate in the Plantation Gateway Development District? Any comments from the public? I've got Mr. Conklin. Sorry? You've got Mr. Conklin. Oh, Mr. Conklin. Please, go ahead, sir. Thank you. Dennis Conklin, 458 on Northwest 6th Court. Once again, I would like to present to you the idea that the city discontinued the extra millage for the gateway because they're already paying the regular millage for property tax that the whole rest of the city is paying. And since 2000, they have been blessed with a CRA, Community Redevelopment Agency, of which you are the directors of. Since that time, within a two-year period, the TIF, the tax increment fund, exceeded the millage rate for the gateway. And each year since then, I've been asking to allow the businesses in that district to just pay the regular real estate tax and to dissolve the gateway millage tax in favor of the use and employment of the CIA TIF. Now the TIF is up to over $2.5 million, and the gateway tax is raising about $800,000. So you can see it's greatly exceeded, and it has for years. Basically, we have about six or seven years left in the CRA, and I recommend that no millage rate be passed. I am thankful that you saw fit last week to lower it. However, I'm in favor of the dissolving of it completely and going with just the TIF rate. Thank you. I'll go back. Thank you. Any other discussion? Hearing none, Ms. Beggerel, please call the roll. Council Member Anderson? Yes. Council Member Pageant? Yes. Council Member Horland? Yes. Council Member Reinstein? Yes. Council Member Andreu? Yes. Thank you. Item number four is the fiscal year 2024 final budget resolution for the City of Plantation Consolidated. Attorney Ezra, please read the resolution. Resolution providing for the adoption and approval of the final consolidated revenue and appropriation budget of the City of Plantation for the operating fiscal year October 1, 2023 through September 30, 2024, providing findings, budgeted compensation of elected officials, providing a savings clause, and an effective date. Thank you. Any discussion regarding the final budget resolution for the City of Plantation Consolidated? Council Member Horland? Thank you, Madam President. While it doesn't affect the overall budget, I know that we had a discussion last week about the funds that were in administration and removing community engagement. I just want to see if there's been a discussion about moving those perhaps to leadership training. But are those funds being moved out of administration's budget? Yeah. The discussion we had internally was maybe to split them 50-50, putting 50 percent of the funds in PZ for the engagement there, and the other half in HR for leadership training. Great. Just wanted to make sure. Thank you. Yes, ma'am. And while I have the mic, I just want to echo what my colleague said. Thank you to administration, first of all, for acknowledging some of the challenges some of my colleagues and I felt during the process this year and your willingness to make adjustments for next year. We appreciate being heard on that. And, again, to finance, outstanding job on the budget to Anna and her team, and congratulations to Nancy, who's getting her 20-year pin tonight, and for working with the directors. It just gives us a lot of comfort that our funds are managed so well, and I hope that the residents feel that as well. We appreciate the feedback. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Horland. Mayor Sordell? Mr. Noonemaker, just so everybody knows, can you sound out what we talked about in terms of next year regarding council and communication? Oh, sure. Look, obviously, we've got a very engaged group, and that's deeply appreciated. And one of the things that was clear at the first budget hearing is that, you know, we ran into the subsequent council meeting, and we don't want you all to feel pressured. I know there were some students here for the pledge. So the discussion we had was to, for at least that first budget hearing, let's set it on a separate night, give you all the space you need to take comment, to deliberate, to hear the public. Also, one of the things that staff noticed is while we were meeting one-on-one, some of those sessions were a little cramped. So we just want to provide more opportunity. We'd rather have more time than less. And also, you all gave some feedback on attendance. We take that seriously, so we'll impress upon staff at the next staff meeting that issue. So, as always, we really do appreciate your candid feedback. Thank you. Thank you. Any further discussion? Hearing none. Oh, sorry. Mr. Coughlin, please. Thank you. Mr. Coughlin, 4581, Northwest Sixth Court. I'm going to address this budget and refer back to the email that I did send you. And at the beginning of each year's CAPRA, Consolidated Annual Financial Report, it gives the financial highlights. And through the years since I discovered the existence of these CAPRAs, which is 1992, I guess, I've been following this. And I've been following particularly the amount of money that the city has been building up year over year over year. And you're looking for maintenance of last year's millage rate of 5.8 for $6.4 million. And just as what happened in biblical times when they were laying up grain and stores and stuff like that during bountiful years when there was profits made by the government, by Pharaoh. What is the point of the city sitting on $141 million and growing when, as has been discussed before, people are hurting, not myself, but my neighbors. I can give you three names of women, single women now because of the passing of family and whatnot and everything. They are not making it. And Mrs. Sword, she has mentioned that she has neighbors in a similar boat. What is the purpose of the city growing this mountain of money from less than $100 million in seven years, from $32 million to $141 million, if you can't use 6.4 to save people in this year of, you can call it drought. So I've never received a good explanation. I know you don't like to hear the word mountain of money, but that's what you're sitting on. And this is a perfect time to use a small, minuscule amount of that. You would still have $134,927,230 in your mountain of money if you had gone with the rollback rate. Thank you. I yield back my time. Thank you. Any further discussion? Hearing none, was there a motion? Motion to approve. Second. Ms. Beggarro, please call the roll. Council Member Anderson? Yes. Council Member Fadgen? Yes. Council Member Horland? Yes. Council Member Reinstein? Yes. Council Member Andreu? Yes. Thank you. Item number five is the fiscal year 2024 final budget resolution for the Plantation Midtown Development District. Attorney Ezra, please read the resolution. A resolution providing for the adoption and approval of the final revenue and appropriation budgets of the dependent taxing district of Plantation Midtown Development District for the operating fiscal year October 1, 2023 through September 30, 2024, providing findings, a savings clause, and an effective date. Thank you, sir. Any discussion regarding the Plantation Midtown Development District? Motion to approve. Item five. Second. Any comments from the public? Hearing none, Ms. Beggarro, please call the roll. Council Member Anderson? Yes. Council Member Fadgen? Yes. Council Member Horland? Yes. Council Member Reinstein? Yes. Council Member Andreu? Yes. Thank you. That takes us to item number six, the fiscal year 2024 final budget resolution for the Plantation Gateway Development District. A resolution providing for the adoption and approval of the final revenue and appropriation budgets of the dependent taxing district of Plantation Gateway Development District for the operating fiscal year October 1, 2023 through September 30, 2024, providing findings, a savings clause, and an effective date. Thank you. Thank you. Any further discussion regarding the final budget resolution for the Plantation Gateway Development District? Motion to approve. Second. We'll do a second by Council Member Horland. Mr. Conklin, you haven't signed up for this one. Did you want to speak to item number six, sir? Yes. I think I'm unmuted now. Am I unmuted? Yes, you are. We hear you. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Dennis Conklin, 4581 Northwest Sixth Court. I want to be sure to thank the Council for the partial rollback on this millage rate. I'll take a slice of the pie and stir the whole pie if you're not going to dump the whole millage rate. But I do want to thank the Council's consideration and the reduction. Thank you. I yield back. Thank you, Mr. Conklin. Any further discussion? Ms. Ford? Carol Seward, 1621 Northwest 82nd Avenue. I would also like to thank the City Council for at least providing a partial rollback. I just wish you could have done the same for the residents and their property taxes. Thank you. Thank you. Any further discussion regarding item number six? Hearing none. I think we do, what was that at number five? Yes. Ms. Kim, can we have a motion for item number six? Roll call. Oh, you did do it. Okay, sorry. You made the motion. Roll call, please, for item number six, Ms. Beggar. Good deal. Council Member Anderson? Yes. Council Member Fadgen? Yes. Council Member Horland? Yes. Council Member Reinstein? Yes. Council Member Andreu? Yes. Thank you. That exhausts the agenda for our final budget hearing. We will take a brief recess, and we will adjourn this portion of the final budget hearing meeting and begin our CRA meeting at 7 p.m. Now we'll do this. Okay. Okay.