Board of County Commissioners on 2023-08-08 9:00 AM

to the August 8, 2023 regular session of the Polk County Board of County Commissioners. I would invite Chaplain Handley to come forward to give us an invocation, ask you to rise and remain standing for the pledge. Good morning, please pray with me. Heavenly Father, in our hearts we plan our course, but we pray that you would establish our steps. As we seek your guidance today, let us not lean on our own understanding, but let us act based upon your wisdom. Father, we place our hearts and our minds in your hands today so that you may direct us. And I ask this prayer in Jesus' name, amen. Amen. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic which stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice. At this point of our agenda, I'd invite Dave Carter, chairman of our Stormwater Technical Advisory Committee, to come forward to give us an update on the committee's actions. Good morning, Mr. Carter. Mr. Chair, if I could just take a moment just to say a couple quick words about Dave personally and professionally. We don't want to hear anything about Nittany Lions now. No. Dave has been the chair of the Stormwater Technical Advisory Committee since its inception. And that was probably Dave 12, 13 years ago. Dave has stood in that role as a testament to his professionalism and his willingness to serve. And he and that committee have moved the needle in Polk County in terms of how we manage, how we view, and how we plan for stormwater issues. I'd also like to say I see Jeff Spence in the audience. Jeff is a 35-year retired employee who led our Parks and Natural Resources Division. And Jeff, too, is a member of that committee. So we've got a lot of good things going on behind the scenes in Polk County. And thank you, Dave. I don't think it's on. There we go. Okay, there we go. Push the button. Thank you. Your staff has done an excellent job. When you think of the size of the amount of work that was done four or five years ago versus today, it has ramped up unbelievably. And I just credit where credit due. Your staff's doing an excellent job in bringing these projects to fruition. There's a tremendous amount of work involved, both in getting grants, implementing the projects, doing the studies, dealing with state agencies. I mean, it's just mind-boggling what they're doing. So that's, I think, where the rubber hits the road, your staff. So I just wanted to mention that. But I'll go ahead and get started. Dave Carter, professional engineer, chairman of the Stormwater Technical Advisory Committee. Serving on that committee, as mentioned, Jeff Spence, Bob Collinger, Chris Kaye, and Ed Mirowski. And those guys, we've met about quarterly. And this last meeting, we reviewed your proposed capital improvement projects for the next year. And we reviewed and recommended that those projects be implemented. We'll go over those at the end of the presentation. But I just wanted to mention that we had done that in the last meeting. So, you know, engineers like charts and graphs. So this is a pie chart showing the percent of funding for the project. The lower left-hand corner is your MSTU. You'll see it's 20%. That's about a five-to-one ratio of outside dollars versus local dollars that are leveraged. And I think that's just a testament to your staff going after grants and funding from other local and state agencies. I would tell you for the upcoming year, that ratio is seven-to-one. And a lot of that's due to the ARP funding. But just, you know, your local dollars, I think are being well-leveraged against other sources of income. And I think this graph indicates that. So this is a three-year graph, by the way, of three years. It's, as I said, the next year's seven-to-one ratio. We've got some videos to show you here. This is a swift mud on Lake Hancock. And we'll go ahead and get this going for you here. Today we are out here on Lake Hancock for the Lake Hancock Natural Systems Enhancements Project. I'm Jamie Swindez. I'm an environmental scientist for the SWIM program, the Surface Water Improvement and Management Program for the Southwest Florida Water Management District. We are partnering with Polk County, installing native vegetation along the shoreline. There's a total of about 500,000 plants going into the lake. I'm Greg Canolfi. I work with Polk County Natural Resources. I am the Water Resources Project Manager. We're planting a minimum of 35 acres of emergent and submerged aquatic vegetation on the lake. The main species we're planting are pickerel weed, spatter dock, alligator flag, jointed spike rush, giant bull rush, and then we're testing some submerged aquatic vegetation, eelgrass. Some of the benefits of this project would be providing habitat for aquatic species as well as terrestrial species, fish and wildlife. The installation of these shoreline plants will help benefit the water quality of Lake Hancock by reducing sedimentation and resuspension of those sediments as well as uptaking nutrients. Lake Hancock is the headwaters to the Peace River which discharges to Charlotte Harbor. So ultimately, this project will benefit the Charlotte Harbor Estuary which is a swim priority water body. Also, some of the other benefits are providing a lot of surface area for the lake for bacteria, microbes, things to denitrify some of the nitrogen in the lake. We are seeing a lot more recreational users on the lake. This will improve the fishery by having this habitat as well as for other recreational users, you know, birders or kayakers and that type of thing. We're working with Florida Fish and Wildlife doing pre- and post-fish evaluation. We've been working with the Southwest Florida Water Management District on a lot of projects over the years. It's always a great partnership. It makes our funds go a lot further. This project will help improve water quality and natural systems which is a priority for the swim program. Just to give you, you know, why are we here? What are we doing with our lake water quality? With a lot of years of data and information, we've obviously determined that a healthy lake with a well-vegetated shoreline and submerged aquatic plants provides a more resilient and better quality water. Conversely, when those features are taken away from the lake, the water quality typically declines very quickly. And next slide. This video is from Lake Hancock and the water bubbles coming out of the Circle B treatment wetlands. So these projects typically, they maximize the natural function of wetlands. The engineering projects, it controls how much water can be treated and how much water flows through it. The native plants within the wetland absorb the nutrients in capturing excess phosphorus and nitrogen, which allows the water to exit through the system in a much cleaner fashion. Some examples, these projects, the Lake Gwynn restoration project that was completed, Peace Creek Canal, Peace River Corridor, the Lake Lena Run and the Lake Lulu project upcoming. Some of our stormwater structures, this structure you see is on 3rd Street. It's the 3rd Street Baffle Winter Haven on Lake Lulu. It catches the floatables before they enter the water. There's a lot of variety in what we can do there. We can use baffle boxes, downstream filters, bold and gold program, water goats and floating wetlands. To give you an idea, this water baffle captures 40,000 pounds of material that's removed every year. It has to be removed monthly. It's one of nine outfall structures in the Lake Lulu. We can't cover them all, but this is the main structure and the amount of material taken out of this is just amazing to me, the numbers. 20 tons. Yeah. Yeah, a year. You think about that over five or ten years. One. Yeah, that's one year. So you think about if you didn't do that. One of the nine, you get 20 tons at once. Right, right. It's unbelievable the amount of trash we are putting into our lakes every day. It's unbelievable. So, okay. Sediment treatments. These projects are funding through the Innovation Technology Grant and Lake Deason. But some of these projects after years of no treatment, they're dumping a wastewater in the lakes. The lake have developed the bottoms that have a muck layer and what happens is through wind and wave action that creates an internal loading. In other words, you've got lakes that have so much muck on the bottom that even if we didn't add any more, what's already in there causes water quality pollution because, again, boats driving on it, the wind and wave action just stirs that muck up and so at some point it almost doesn't matter whether you put distilled water in the lake. The internal system of the lake, the internal muck creates its own pollution factor and that's what some of the projects we're looking at there is the Lake Deason, Lake Smart and you might be familiar with Crystal Lake and Lakeland. It has a large muck layer on the bottom that we're working on. Okay, stormwater infrastructure and this is probably what you're thinking of mostly when you think about the work of the committee and your staff. As you can imagine, you know, Polk County is the headwaters of seven rivers and the pollution that comes out of here can impact the Everglades, Gulf of Mexico, Tampa Bay and even Charlotte Harbor so those regions are depending on us to provide water quality treatment and keep the water clean that's going out. As you know, some of that water is used as an alternate water supply so we're a very critical player in that process. Let me go ahead, let's do the, I think what they're, okay. This is a list, and again, this was approved and recommended for implementation by the committee. You'll notice $18 million and talking to Jeff earlier, you know, years ago they were looking for just a million or two, just something to keep the program going and so this coming year is really, really ramping up the dollars. The second year, I think we're looking at about half that or less but I think a lot of that's the ARP money but internally the non-ARP monies as you can see out of $28 million, 18 of it's non-ARP funding. Some of you, you know, okay, you say we're doing all this work, what are we accomplishing? What's, you know, are we doing any good? And staff indicated we did a little look-see. The state has what's called TMDL assignment and what that means is they figured out that a certain lake has got water declining parameters and that something needs to be done to improve that. They continually study new lakes and so there are more lakes added every year simply because we've studied it not so much just because they're deteriorating. Sometimes they're deteriorating on their own but to give you an idea the current tally is right now we've got 30 lakes that are improving water quality while only 15 are declining and we would hope that we would stop the decline. That to me would be a victory but certainly any lakes that we're improving the water quality I think is a good deal for us and I think it's showing a positive work effort and positive results from the staff and the counties working in this area. Dave, you said TMDL but most people probably don't know what total maximum daily limit loads yes. Load. Yeah. I'll stand for questions Mr. Chairman again I think looking at the amount of projects and the dollars that your staff is putting forward and putting through the system it's quite a ramping up that's occurred over the last couple years and looking in the future. I remember when we implemented this early on the first task was kind of do an inventory of what we have and what's the challenge and there was some lakes or water bodies that were determined no matter how much money you spend you're not going to make an appreciable difference so let's not concentrate on those let's concentrate on those that we can have a positive influence and I guess your follow up testing and water quality indicates that they're making progress on those yes sir and these lakes are tested regularly and so the staff has a pretty good beat on which lakes are improving which lakes aren't and I think part of the effort was at first we looked at and said let's just fix these lakes and make them better but then we started looking at well some lakes are very slowly declining they're in good shape today but they're slowly getting worse and so part of the effort is to keep them from getting worse and I think that it kind of goes unnoticed but I think that's equally critical well your staff and county staff and your team are to be commended for this effort and I think the unknown challenge of the chair was you can't resign until you have a replacement so you may be here a long time Mr. Chairman yes sir last night one of my grandsons crawled up in bed with me and wanted to watch alligators on YouTube and so I found one and you do not want these guys that are planting this stuff to see what we watched last night I mean are they getting hazardous pay seriously or at least have a look out I hope I was a member of the governing board when we approved the design and the funding for the Lake Hancock wetlands treatment system it was under construction or maybe it was about complete when I left the governing board so I really don't know if it's been a wild you know success or if it's been you know at least everything people hoped it would be because it was an expensive project and one that looks like it you know should work and I hope that it is working but is that one Lake Hancock I think is a pretty good success story as you know a larger lake and very polluted is one of the most polluted lakes in the county and it is getting better and so I know that was largely as you mentioned a swift mud effort but there's some projects we're doing on the lake coming up as well but I think that just shows that whether we do it the state does it DEP but I think these projects do have an effect and are improving water quality generally and each lake as you know has specific biology but yes Lake Hancock I think it can be considered a success story it's not clean I mean you go out there compared to any other lake it's still relatively dirty but it has improved Commissioner One other question that I do not know the answer to is the NPDES has that changed or are those standards static for years or are they still evolving It's an involved program we do have an NPDES permit that is done in association with the municipalities in Polk County and I just I failed to mention that but we are in compliance we're reviewed heavily on what we're doing and we are in compliance with that program and I think that was one of the initial concerns when the committee was formed was that project was just getting off the ground I think the commission at that time wanted to make sure that we were in compliance with those permit requirements Go Lions Yes sir Any other questions thank you to David this morning appreciate it very much good job at this point on our agenda we invite the general public to come forward and bring any matters to the attention of the board you wish I have several comment cards the first of which is Dr. Robert Whedon please come forward address the mic to your height give us your name and address you'll be afforded three minutes thank you my name is Bob Whedon and I'm a spay neuter surgeon who retired from the faculty of the University of Illinois College of Veterinary Medicine 2019 and moved to Polk County I decided I would rather spay cats than play golf in my retirement so I'm helping to address the animal overpopulation problem at the Humane Society of Polk County a voucher program to support animal sterilization in Polk County would be a huge help to pet owners who struggle with the cost and accessibility of veterinary care $250,000 would help sterilize 5,000 animals in Polk County this won't solve the problem of animal overpopulation but it is certainly a good start currently there is a lack of affordable accessible spay neuter services in our communities a significant shortage of veterinarians in our state has impacted spay neuter services severely and hinders Floridians from accessing affordable veterinary care spay neuter is an essential element of access to care so many animals that I sterilize have never been to a veterinarian prior to coming in for spay neuter seeing these pets for sterilization services gives us the opportunity to get them started on a lifetime of wellness and prevention we've done a great job of getting the have your pets fixed message out there the problem is now that owners are motivated to get their pets sterilized they lack access to affordable spay neuter options this has the unintended consequence of leading to unplanned litters and the pressures they put on animal control and local shelters and rescues and the cause of these unwanted litters has shifted from simply irresponsible pet owners to a lack of accessible affordable care enacting this voucher program for both cats and dogs will go a long way to addressing this lack of accessible affordable care apparently there is broad support for the county sponsored spay neuter voucher program within the private practice veterinary community I did an anonymous survey of private practice veterinarians who are members of our local veterinary association the ridge veterinary medical society asking about private practice support for county sponsored spay neuter voucher program I received nine responses all of which indicated they supported this program of those who offer sterilization services in their private practices only one veterinarian 12.5% indicated that they would not accept the vouchers people want to know that their county has their back and is committed to forward thinking proactive care for animals in our communities by enacting the spay neuter voucher program Polk County has the chance to choose this effective path forward thank you Mr. Chairman I want to go on record as telling Dr. Whedon and others that I support the concept and I don't know what dollar amount we could come up with if we can get an agreement on it but I do believe it's something we need to do I've heard the number one good healthy mama cat can have how many kittens in a year well cats can go in heat three times a year and if they average four to six kittens per litter then you know do the 12 to 18 kittens and then they within four to six months will start being reproductively active and so it snowballs that old compounding effect but I do and I certainly want to let the board know that I support it and maybe between now and budget time we can figure something out thank you Commissioner I appreciate that thank you Dr. Whedon also have Ms. Lisa Baker on the same subject good morning good morning I don't know that I can get all that I have to say in in three minutes but I'll do the best I can and I do have a copy of my words for you if you'd like to have them okay my name is Lisa Baker and I'm the executive director of the Humane Site at Polk County and I'm very proud of the strides made by Polk County Animal Control to reduce the numbers of animals euthanized each year however we still remain number one in the state of Florida for animals euthanized I am here therefore in full support of a spay neuter program albeit through the sheriff's office or the general fund most domestic cats tend to live 12 to 15 years if you do simple math the average statistics of kittens per litter you'll get the following result four kittens per litter three times per year for 15 years makes a total of 180 kittens over a lifetime we want to assist low income families the ability to provide their own cat population with affordable spay and neuter this is critical if we hope to make any sort impact most stray cats are products of unaltered owned cats going outside therefore it makes sense to put most of our resources into low-cost spay neuter services for owned cats who are let out daily and breed with stray cats the good news is that these cats are usually very easy to get spayed and neuters as their owners will bring them in for surgery feline overpopulation is a serious issue in reality spaying is a humane decision reducing the numbers of unwanted kittens being born and having the expense associated with them will ultimately save Polk County taxpayers money as well as save lives having recently resurrected our SNP program we are focusing our efforts on cats spays and neuters as they are the most animals being euthanized in Polk County and we want to concentrate our efforts to have the greatest impact on these numbers for example a spay neuter program of $65,000 at $65 per surgery would provide 1,000 surgeries potentially preventing the birth of 180,000 cats in a 15 year period as provided in the above reference example having just begun our SNP program we are working to increase our surgery capacity and with more funding and community support we will be able to meet this need with the loss of TLC pet SNP at this time this program is seriously needed to prevent the loss of all the hard work done by Polk County Animal Control and our community to reduce our euthanasia rate animal sheltering is very labor intensive and expensive yet it is a necessary program but it is a reactive one that exists as a result to our current overpopulation problem we can avoid much of this by being proactive in providing high quality high volume affordable spay neuter services for pet owners in our community the more we get spayed and neutered the fewer stray cats we will have at large in our community and the wild bird population will be grateful yes you did remarkably well with six seconds left well thank you we did do this in years past the spay neuter program at that time it was $50 that we were charging for that the county commission was providing us for the surgeries we did that for low income families only and at that time we also provided their first set of shots their rabies and their microchip implant so we would have track of where these animals were if they were becoming strays they would go back to their owners the prices have increased greatly over the last since that was in the 2018-19 year so prices are increasing at that time we did charge a $20 appointment fee because people when we were doing it for free did not show up but when we attached that charge to it they miraculously showed up and we weren't paying a vet to stay there to do nothing so that was our experience with the program thank you Ms. Baker thank you for your time we have Captain Horseman Polk County Sheriff's Office Animal Control Unit to share some thoughts on this subject good morning good morning so I have with me Animal Control Administrator Marie Herbster in the back she's the one that actually runs Animal Control one of the captains of the special operations at the Sheriff's Office so Animal Control falls under me among many other things so kind of fortuitous that we have the Humane Society here today to talk about spay neuter vouchers because last week Sheriff Judd Green lied at our own spay neuter program I'll give you a basic idea we are in the planning stages of this we plan on having this kicked off this year sooner than later it's going to be zero cost to the pet owner we're going to partner with surgical providers that Marie's working with right now we're currently working on getting a set price for dogs a set price for cats figuring out which surgical providers can do what surgery and we are also going to focus on disabled vets low income and we're going to make it as simplified as we can where they provide one piece of proof ideally the way this will work is we will advertise we'll have a website that the user can go to it will have a list of different vets or different providers that are doing surgeries it will say whether they do cats cats and dogs cats or dogs of certain size basically they can pick out the one close to them they can call and make an appointment when they arrive at their provider they'll give whatever copy of document they brought we'll provide them with a list they'll get their surgery and then at the end of the month we will reimburse each one of these providers for the surgeries they did during that month so that's kind of a nuts and bolts of what we're looking at doing I don't want to speak for Sheriff Judd but as of right now we're not asking for any additional funds from the county thank you captain horseman I also understand from your staff there's increased public awareness on the adoption process of those animals that are adoptable and more community engagement letting the folks know that there are opportunities for yes sir and Marie actually has a fantastic little daily blurb she puts on our website where she does little cute backgrounds and everything it's pretty fantastic but we've done more we've done more events in the last couple years adoption events than we ever have we do free weekend adoptions you come in pick out your animal free we're doing 25 to 40 you know every Saturday doing that so any little bit helps our plan with this spay neuter voucher once we get it set get all the prices agreed upon everything's ready to go we're going to do a big media blitz and on Facebook and everything else so Mr. Chairman yes sir you know channel 8 channel 13 I'm not sure which both I'm sure probably 10 28 all of them you know they have pretty much seems like on the weekends because my wife always like ooh that'd be a nice puppy there to go get you know they do a little feature and the dog runs around could we do that or do we do that on PGTV we do Jeff's going yes we do I'm going to watch PGTV more often now thank you thank you yes ma'am yes can you tell me when is the program starting or did you say when it was starting our goal is to get it started this year I'm kind of aiming at October 1st ish don't hold us to that there are a few things that we're trying to work out with it it's logistical items we have to make this simple on our fiscal folks we're trying to get a set price for dogs and set price for cats across all the providers and make sure it's something they can work with they can pay their vets so that and actually marie just found out this morning she has three more vets to contact so the bigger we get that list of providers the easier it is on the end user so that's kind of the goal the sheriff told us he wants it sooner than later and he's all about sense of urgency so we will be doing it is there any way that you guys can work with humane society since you have the same goals and saying absolutely we actually can communicate this information back and forth and that way you can kind of complement each other in the services that you provide the citizens yes we have reached out to them and we'll make them a partner as well any other questions yes have you guys thought about or considered a mobile surgical vehicle or whatever you can take around I saw one over in hillsborough county the other day and I guess they you know to really get good participation they take it to a neighborhood and it makes it easy for everybody and you know you're going to get more people that way right one of the providers and maybe more than one that Marie's looking at is a mobile facility and we're going to partner with these folks that are already doing surgeries because we are vets that we have in-house we're focusing on we're overwhelmed doing the surgeries for our own animals to get them out for adoption so we will our plan is to partner with these outside organizations that already do surgeries and reimburse them for their work very good thank you thank you Dr. Wheaton and Ms. Baker for being part of this I'll allow closing comments yes sir thank you this won't take long when I was on the faculty at the college of veterinary medicine University of Illinois we had a mobile unit and it worked very effectively for rural shelters a couple of things to consider it's not inexpensive to put one of those things together you're probably looking at somewhere close to $300,000 to adequately equip a mobile unit that said you know with a life expectancy of 10 years that might be a worthwhile investment the other thing to consider is you have to have a place to stage the animals we do this we did the surgeries on the mobile unit but we would partner with like tractor supply and they would give us a back room where clients could bring their animals in in crates and whatnot and they would be staged the surgery would be done on the mobile unit and then they would be returned to the facility so it's a nice public-private partnership if you're thinking about something like that I would be more than happy to meet with anybody in the county and give them all the information because we went through the whole design process and the grant application to fund it when I was on the faculty at Illinois no point in reinventing the wheel thank you you have Captain Horseman's contact information I'm sure they'll appreciate that insight maybe we can combine spay and neutering with a food truck next Mr. Eric Garcia is asked to speak Mr. Garcia as you approach Mr. Garcia please adjust the mic for your height and give us your name and address and you'll be given three minutes and behind him is Indy Ortiz Mr. Ortiz if you're ready after Mr. Garcia good morning yes my name is Eric Garcia and I'm at 2431 Harrison Place Boulevard in North Lakeland so we're here not just as a board member to North Lakeland Youth Soccer on the north side on Hunt Fountain Park but also as a father of my son that plays there so our fields have been are being worked on and it's about the ninth week they are not playable we have about almost 500 recreational signups as of right now not including being the competitive this is the second time it's happened back in 2018 it was the same thing our fields were not playable we had to maneuver and I was just asking you guys if you have seen any feedback from the county to who works those county parks as of right now it's in jeopardy of not happening right now the competitive side is practicing on corner lots the old football fields there and we want to we rather come to you guys than to be blasting or anything on Facebook social media that's not what we're about we're all we're in the same county we're here for the kids and for for them to have a successful season but right now it's in jeopardy and I'm not sure if any of you guys have seen pictures of the current field today or or anything like that to see what what we can do going forward thank you Mr. Garcia let's hear from Mr. Ortiz and we'll have a joint response to both of you good morning commissioners and chairman lindsey the theme of today's as for us as the board members of North Lakeland and also Paul County resident is change right I came here back in 2018 and the changes commissioner Wilson was being sworn in that day but the only two constant are yourself chairman lindsey and Mr. and commissioner Braswell the other two commissioner Santiago and commissioner Cumbia knew however change has not happened for us we're still back in the same situation as we were back in 2018 the unplayable feel and our community is growing from 2018 to 2023 our community or North Lakeland or the Lakeland itself has grown has grown from 320,000 residents to 364 that's a 13% growth that's the change but nothing on our side has done has been changed we still have the small park the small field and it's unplayable at this point the surgeon says something that I want to reiterate again people want to know that the county has their back that's what we want to know do you guys have our back because we feel that we are the stepchild we feel that you guys or whoever is managing our parks do not care for our kids my younger son is going to be starting his fall season hopefully I'm hopeful for that because it's his first season he's going to be three years old and I'm looking forward to it to coach him there and to commiserate with him and the other parents but if the fields are not unplayable I cannot put my son through that it's a risk it's a liability I'm hoping that you all consider either watching the videos that we have I actually took a video of about a minute yesterday while I was there practicing with some of the kids that I usually practice with and this is not good what we saw is not good so please consider making some changes because we need that space that area has grown tremendously in the last ten years thank you thank you Mr. Ortiz and Mr. Garcia I assure you that this board does have your back in this regard there was some scheduling conflicts between our maintenance staff and the leagues that I understand are being worked out Mr. Beasley and I think this board has also expressed an interest in expanding the field on that operation on a nearby piece of property to also allow more opportunities Mr. Beasley Yes sir Mr. Chairman and Mr. Board let me reiterate the chairman's comment we care about all the children in Polk County not just North Lakeland South Lakeland the Ridge all across Polk County we're well aware of the challenges that the Hunt Fountain Park poses to us Mr. Counter briefed the board recently about the types of length of the soccer seasons that seem to be existing across the state of Florida the need for some rest of the fields and some of the limitations we may have in assigning other areas of parks as available while we take those fields down I think there has been communication problems of recently with the league in terms of the duration of needing to rest those fields to rework those fields this may be a bigger issue in light of the multiple facets of the use of Hunt Fountain and the size of Hunt Fountain Mr. Callender mentioned to the board that Hunt Fountain was created 30-40 years ago as a kind of a combination of hit and miss activities I think Hunt Fountain probably will see more capital investment in the coming years I'm not sure whether I think our focus is going to be on that small park just down the road where we want to believe that is going to be a reliever to Hunt Fountain Park so I think capital wise we have some strategies it's really a matter of trying to identify some funding for those strategies and I'll make certainly make that a priority but I'd like to think that Mr. Taylor can come forward and give you a quick schedule I believe those fields are set to be up and running within a week let Mr. Taylor kind of comment on that good morning thank you sir as part of the update that we provided to the commission a couple of weeks ago there was some scheduling conflict between what the soccer league understood our request to be and what we actually scheduled with that followed up a meeting with the soccer league and there was discussion that we could have up to the 23rd of the month to complete restoration activities of the soccer fields themselves as part of that scheduled work we also moved activities to other locations to provide additional rest to the soccer playing area as you know my daughters play soccer with another affiliate but we do play soccer at Hunt Fountain Park so I'm more aware of those activities and the field conditions that are at Hunt Fountain Park but we are working to address those concerns but it takes the cooperation of the additional clubs and teams that play out there all year round to allow us that rest time to allow the grass to grow back on the field but as the commission has stated we are working at looking at a master plan another location that we can move additional activities to make a make it a more of a unique venue for a soccer maybe multipurpose fields all of that to come but we are working specifically to address the issues that are occurring out there Mr. Chairman yes sir when we were here two weeks ago there were some folks here talking about it and Derek Harp our Parks and Recreation director was here talking about the rebuilding of the fields and the need for some time you know it's difficult to grow grass on a busy playground that's been true for as long as I've been alive so the idea that you need some time for these things to grow in and get ready to play you know it's easily understood by me and probably you as well the problem is and you mentioned it you touched on it is the growth that we've experienced in this county in North Lakeland really all over the county when you look at the facilities we had which were adequate you know 10 or 15 years ago and now you have thousands of families moving here and we've not been able to you know really expand our facilities there's a piece of property that the county's owned since about 2005-2006 that Green Road and Daltrey Road it's been used as a spray field maybe I don't know how needed it is but it's a great piece of property and it would provide a lot of a lot of play in area for folks but we've got to have money to develop that and really we're going to be working on that you know going forward but all I can say is be patient because a lot of people are coming and a lot of people want to play and we just we've got to find a way to expand those facilities with all due respect patient is what we have been it's a virtue the Green Road spot I have seen a plan I saw a plan probably five or six years ago and it looks great and we have been told yes it's going to happen I've been here in the Paul County area for more than 12 years now nothing has happened and every time we hear the same thing is oh we don't have the money oh we don't have the money we are test payers and all that during COVID there was a lot of grants given to the counties to a lot of the areas I'm just wondering when is it that it's going to happen for us when is it that something is going to be happening either if we have to close for an entire season let's do it and that way those fields can be playable right now as I mentioned before it's a liability if you put the kids 600 500 kids to play there someone is going to get injured and it's a liability I personally don't want my kids to play in that field so when is it that it's going to something happen for us I'd invite you and Mr. Garcia to meet Ms. Sharp the lady over give her your contact information and we'll keep you posted on a schedule and a budget and a capital program going forward so you can and it's going to require more cooperation between the various leagues and the staff so Mr. Comby said you can't repair the facility while they're in use and so there needs to be some scheduling around that so I invite you to meet with Ms. Sharp in the back both of you and we'll stay in touch and hopefully next time you come through here we'll all be much happier and see a game plan thank you thank you sir thank you Mr. Garcia Mr. Wilson gentlemen stand by a minute I just want to say this Mr. Ortiz Mr. Ortiz Mr. Wilson had a comment I just want to say this you made a you know I understand greatly you know you said that you know the children you know they need these places and throughout the whole county we've got I just asked we hadn't counted them up but dozens and dozens and I'm sure you that you know our staff it might not be on your time frame because there has been some problems there with scheduling and downtime but you know we thank a lot of these parks and we want all these kids to have a good place to play but you're not the only one you know we've got them scattered all over this county that we're up against the same problem they have the same wear they have the same amount of people on I mean they're beating them down and we don't and there's so many people coming we can't get coordinated to be able to shut them down because we say okay we're going to shut your park down for you said a year oh lord there'd be more people up here raising heck about that than they would be about fixing so we're there and it's just it's not an easy easy fix yep you sit there and say well the money has been brought into Polk County correct but there is so much stuff going on here I promise you they will we've talked about this and we will get it took care of but we have to have the time to do it we have to have the weather to do it that's another problem so I just wanted to make you aware of that because I mean that's not the only park in Polk County and we want to make everybody happy and we try to but sometimes it gets kind of tough thank you on this subject meet with Ms. Sharp and we'll stay in touch with the progress Mr. Terry James is asked to speak Mr. James come forward please Mr. James knows the routine so I don't have to present it gentlemen Terry Jones Jones I'm sorry Jones not James 212 Your penmanship is worse than mine I just wanted to say I've already spoken with Mr. Taylor this morning and I'm just going to trust the process and we'll go forward from here Thank you sir Thank you Anyone else wishing to address the commission at this time We'll close that part of the agenda and move to the regular consent agenda So moved Second Motion and Seconding Discussion on the motion All those in favor say aye Aye Opposed like signed Motion carries At this time we will recess as the Board of County Commissioners and reconvene as the LOE CRA entertain a motion to approve that consent agenda Second Motion Second Any discussion on the motion All those in favor say aye Aye Opposed like signed Motion carries We will now recess as the LOE CRA and reconvene as the Hardin Parkway CRA and entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda Motion Second Any discussion on the motion All those in favor say aye Aye control remit Butterfield Good morning You did it Today we have for you to approve and ratify payroll checks number 2223 through 2260 in the amount of $55,496.36 We have 2,565 direct deposits in the amount of $3,752,346.43 dated July 28, 2023 We have wire and electronic fund transfers of $27,522,202 and 5 cents dated July 25th through August the 7th of 2023 We have invoice checks numbered 441823 through 442768 totaling $14,381,140 and 39 cents Those are dated July 25th through August 7th of 2023 for you to approve and ratify please So moved Second Motion A second Any discussion on the motion All those in favor say aye Opposed Like sign Motion carries We also request the approval of your minutes of your regular board meeting that was held on July the 25th of 2023 Motion for approval Motion and second Any discussion All those in favor say aye Opposed Like sign Anything else Just a reminder that the Lakeland branch clerk's office is open again as I mentioned last time as of August 1st for regular business normal business hours Monday through Friday Good Congratulations Thank you Mr. County Attorney We have two recusals for the record G1 and G2 I'll recuse as I have a business relationship with the parties Thank you Mr. Chair I have two items The first item G1 is to accept the proposed fiscal year 2023-2024 budgets for the Highland Metals and Highland Metals to community development districts as recommended for approval approval of acceptance So moved Second Motion and a second Any discussion on the motion All those in favor say aye Aye Opposed Like sign Motion carries Thank you Mr. Chair Next item is G2 Approve the release of the cash charity in the amount of $64,927.50 for Tremont Phase 2 and 3 and it's recommended for approval Second Motion and a second Any discussion All those in favor say aye Aye The manager's office will have two items for board consideration this morning Item number H1 is to request the board consider approving the sixth amendment to the existing Cypress Lakes Alternative Water Supply Agreement with the Water Cooperative of Central Florida relating to the Cypress Lakes Wellfield Alternative Water Supply Project This is a not to exceed amount of $1,998,855 In 2011 the Polk County Commission approved an interlocal agreement relating to the establishment of the Water Cooperative of Central Florida with memberships inclusive of the City of St. Cloud the Toho Water Authority and Polk County At that time each entity approved the initial candidate project list and authorized the cooperative members to assess and evaluate the Cypress Lake Wellfield site for potential implementation as a viable alternative water supply project Orange County subsequently became a member of the Central Water Cooperative while Reedy Creek's involvement was only as a Cypress Lake Wellfield Project participant and not as a cooperative organizational member Prior approved amendments one through five defined each participant's financial and administrative roles obligations and responsibilities relating to design permitting and construction of the Cypress Lake Wellfield Project This proposed sixth amendment will authorize additional consultant professional services work relating to planned construction of concentrate injection wells multiple monitoring wells raw water connective piping to planned construction of the treatment plant and assigned contingency fundings In addition the Reedy Creek responsibilities have ceased and that they have withdrawn from any future further project participation As stipulated in the original project participation agreements the remaining project participants seek to redistribute the one million gallon per day initial Reedy Creek allocation subject to the issuance of modified water use permits by the South Florida Water Management District As such Polk County is set to receive an additional project allocation of 0.1 million gallons per day bringing Polk's total to 3.1 million gallons per day at the project's final build out This additional allocation will increase Polk's cost share for the project from its current 10% rate to a 10.33% rate The Sixth Amendment will increase the authorized expenditures under the interlocal agreements by $19,350,000 of which Polk's share will be 10.33% Following approval of the Sixth Amendment by member governing boards the amendment will be considered by the Cooperative Board of Supervisors The amendment does not become effective unless and until all participating members have approved and executed the amendment funding for this alternative water supply initiative is currently included in the board's adopted five-year community investment program as part of the Cypress Lake project assignment Mr. Chair and members of the board given the long-term critical importance of future potable water supplies I would request the board approve proposed amendment number six to the existing Cypress Lake alternative water supply agreement between members of the Water Cooperative of Central Florida at a cost to Polk County not to exceed $1,998,855 move approval second we have a motion then a second any discussion on that motion all those in favor say aye aye opposed like signed motion carries Mr. Chair members of the board second final item from the manager's office item H2 is to request the board approve amendment number one to an existing professional services agreement with Kimberly Horn Associates in connection with phase two segment five of the Thompson Nursery Road project this will be a one-time expense not to exceed $1,092,555.64 Thompson Nursery Road is currently a two-lane undivided east-west urban collector road located in Central Polk County near the city of Winterhaven the corridor limits of the originally proposed roadway improvements included significant portions of new realigned roadway segments from US 17 at County Road 540A traversing east to the existing intersection of Thompson Nursery Road at West Lake Ruby Drive which is approximately 6.8 miles of roadway final design of those initially envisioned roadway segments was completed in 2008 by Pittman, Hartenstein and Associates however due to the economic climates of 2008-2009 downturn and the lack of sufficient funding to maintain the project all project efforts were discontinued at that time however as part of the county's FY21 budget the project priority was re-established and capital funding was restored in June of 2022 the county entered into a professional services agreement with Kimberly Horn to provide professional engineering services to update all prior design documents of segments 1, 3, and 4 to current roadway standards obtaining all the necessary federal and state permits providing project bidding support services right-of-way acquisition support and construction support services those efforts would also include roadway alignment studies for segment 2 of the proposed roadway improvements those negotiated fees were approved by the board totaling $5,088,870.83 as part of the county's FY23 current year budget the county has assigned funding for the final phase of the project identified as phase 2 segment 5 which is inclusive of the existing Thompson nursery road from West Lake Ruby Drive eastward to the intersection of US Highway 27 amendment number 1 to the existing professional services agreement is being proposed in order to add segment 5 to the overall final project segment 5 will be divided into two sub-tasks task 5A will complete the project development and environmental study for a new four-lane divided roadway and will include three conceptual alignments upon completion of the PD&E study and approval of the preferred alignment by the board task 5B negotiations will be finalized for subsequent board approval to include all final design environmental evaluations permitting construction document preparation right-of-way acquisition support services bidding support services and related construction support services proposed amendment number 1 for all related task 5A services has been negotiated in an amount not to exceed $1,092,555.64 funding for the Thompson nursery road segment 5 professional services is included in the transportation billage fund so Mr. Chair members of the board in the interest of expediting a major priority roadway project in Polk County I would request the board to approve amendment number 1 to the professional services agreement number 2022-041 in the total amount of $1,092,555.64 this is to provide roadway alignment alternatives task 5A in connection with the final phases of the Thompson nursery road roadway project move approval do we have questions we got second on this end and a motion on that end any questions of staff all those in favor the motion say aye opposed like sign motion carries thank you anything else mr. Wilson mr. Braswell nothing Santiago I'd like to nominate Mike Hickman as a member of the Polk or appoint Mike Hickman as a member of the Polk County Planning Commission for the three-year term September 1 2023 to August 31 2026 second motion and second in discussion all those in favor say aye aye opposed like sign motion carries anything else nothing else thank you mr. Cumby mr. chairman with the elections that are coming up and the fact that they're going to be partisan which is consistent with the supreme court ruling I ask Randy if he would look at how we amend our charter I guess it would be a question put before the voters and to look into that I'd like to make it consistent I don't know how they did it in Orange County or in other places but you know we've got 18 months 15 months whatever 16 months I guess to figure that out before we would have the opportunity to do that but I think it would be appropriate to get it in line with current law so that would require a referendum and I would have to bring back an ordinance for the board to approve to put it on the ballot to see if the voters vote for it as I think I mentioned before to a couple of you all in discussion we can't advocate for them to vote for it or anything so it would be up to the voters to vote for it and if they I guess didn't vote to change it the law still would be based on the Orange County case but we can move through the process to put a referendum forward Mr. Cummere and Mr. Mink would it be more expedient because as you suggest if they fail to pass it the invalidity is still on the books so in order to get in concert with the Orange County opinion which we believe that court of local jurisdiction will uphold that Orange County opinion that we seek an expedited judicial determination in order to conform the charter to the law basically the judge would strike that part that is in conflict or determined to be in conflict and then there won't be any ambiguity about an ordinance on the books a charter on the books and a process that is in conflict with those instructions the issue I always work through this is standing and whether or not we have standing to bring that I can always attempt to do it but the problem is the judge can't amend our charter no but the judge can rule an element of the charter invalid because of the Orange County position and just that section of the charter that is in doubt would be stricken by virtue of that finding and if we have a friendly plaintiff and a friendly defendant I think the plaintiff would have to be the Board of County Commissioners to defend or at least ask for declaratory finding not adversarial but a declaratory finding as to the validity of that provision the defendant I guess has to be the supervisor elections office and again it's not an adversary relationship it is seeking an advisory I don't know the legal phrase declaratory yes that asking the judge to look at the case law look at the charter render opinion on that section and then it would add a footnote to the remainder of the charter that pursuant to this finding that particular section is now void that seems to be a more finite resolution than going through putting it on the ballot in 2024 and it may or may not pass if it doesn't pass then we still have the same cloud for lack of a better word but I would be the most expeditious thing to do well I would agree with you if in fact the judge could change our charter but we all know sitting here the judge can't change our charter so it's a fool's Aaron to go out and spend time and money or have Randy and folks do it and maybe it wouldn't cost much or take much time but it's not going to change anything he can't change it he can strike an illegal part of the in fact there's language in all of our ordinances that says if any part of this is found to be unlawful or a conflict or whatever the remainder part of it remains intact and that same I would guess similar language in the ordinance that adopted the charter he's not changing it he is conforming it to the evolving law that has happened since this charter occurred in 2002 so he's not changing it he's conforming it if that's defined distinction and it reaches finality on that issue but can I ask a question here why do we need to do anything well we have a an ordinance on the books that is I understand that but we can put on blinders and move on down the road and not do anything that's what I'm for I mean we we're the state attorney the circuit court has spoken we've done Lori which is Lori Edwards that's in her world and she's done presumably what she's supposed to do I know we have a charter but I mean I don't see anybody in this room raising heck what's going on I'd say move down the road unless we got other things to do that's my opinion that's just my opinion well seeking a declaratory judgment on the validity of that limited section would close the issue once and for all I do have another question related to the charter and that is what authority do we have to place something on the ballot do we have to have a charter commission to review we can so if there's something that we need to do the board can propose it requires a four vote a majority plus one vote to place it on the referendum or place it on the ballot in the cutoff for that would be June yeah based on my discussions with surprise elections on previous items I believe they need language around June to get it done I have a question for Randy Randy if we decide to move forward with the referendum the outcome of the vote is not going to change what has already been said am I correct whether they approve it or not if they voted to remove it then of course it would not no longer be in the charter that would be the differences currently if they voted not to remove it then of course it would remain in the charter which means that Lori will continue to make the constitutional partisan am I correct based on her letter to the secretary of state she currently don't have a I agree with commissioner wilson I think let's just leave it Mr. Chairman yes she's helping me over here her brain and mine I don't know I'm not going to disagree with that but we could look and see what Orange County has done if they've done anything at all okay so what they've done both them and Wacola County have put place a note in the charter editor's note that basically stated pursuant to court order that that language is invalid or that's what they've done to both those charters is place editor's notes they have not removed it but there's a note that basically references it and if that's what the board authorizes I would like authorization for the board to place the editor's note that basically says pursuant to Orange County case along with the letter from the Secretary of State that the section is invalid Carson elections will be held and I will remind you even if I guess we don't do a referendum and we keep it in there if there's change in legislation or something then it will go back to its original form at that point in time which I don't think is going to happen anytime soon based on prior legislative actions I like that idea I do too So moved I vote I second motion Yes I would like a motion authorization The motion is to instruct the county attorney's office to put a note in the file in the charter in the something advising that this section of the charter is in conflict legal language to put them on notice that that part is no longer in force and viable That's the motion And the second Any further discussion All those in favor say aye Aye Opposed like sign No Thank you Mr. Chair Anything else Mr. Cumby That's all Mr. Truman I just wanted to comment on our Bradley community meeting last Saturday Mr. Wilson and I were in attendance ribbon cutting for the new playground which we used with some ARP money It was a nice facility for the community Our fire and rescue personnel were represented there and our code enforcement people were represented there and it was a great event Another recent event that Mr. Wilson and Mr. Beasley I attended was a poke fire and rescue ceremony I think in the last two ceremonies we had over 120 graduates come through to be promoted as firefighters and those who were given promotions from one rank to another that's a remarkable achievement in a very short amount of time and I commend Chief Smith and his staff for moving that forward and that's all I've got to say and now we move into public hearings and we'll start with the expedited 01 Thank you Mr. Chair before we move to the expedited hearings I'll go over the public hearing general procedures we ask that you please turn off your cell phones and other devices that may distract from the public hearings please adjust the microphone and state your full name and address for the record before you begin speaking on a topic individual speaking during the public comment section of a matter will be strictly limited to three minutes the board is experiencing these matters and they will discern what is legally relevant to an issue and what is not information is irrelevant or repetitive it only serves to frustrate and necessarily prolong the day's business the commission expects civility at all times during all public hearings speaking out turns shouting out from the audience despairful sounds or utterances while another is speaking are unacceptable and you will be asked to leave the chambers for the remainder of the day if any person decides to appeal any decision made by the board with respect to any matter considered here today you will need a record of proceedings and that for such purpose you may need to ensure a verbatum record of the proceedings is made which record includes the testimony and evidence upon which the appeal is to be based which you must gather at your own expense anyone in the audience who wishes to speak or present testimonies today must be sworn in and all testimony given during public hearings shall be deemed to be sworn at this time if you're going to address the commission or speak on any case today please stand raise your right hand and answer out loud to the following questions do you swear or affirm that testimony or evidence you provide to the commission today is the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth thank you now I will go over the expedited hearing procedures expedited hearings are held pursuant to resolution number 2022-089 expedited hearings are used when no opposition was present at the planning commission hearing the applicant agrees to expedited hearing and the recommendation of the development review committee is for approval expedited procedures are the following after staff briefly introduces the case the hearing will be open for public comment if anyone speaks during public comment the applicant will be given the opportunity to respond after public comment the board will consider the land use case at any time full presentation from staff can be requested from a commissioner the applicant or a member of the public all documents attached to the agenda item are deemed part of the record of the land use case unless removed from the list of experts by motion of the board all individuals on the list of experts attached to the agenda item will be deemed experts for the purpose of the land use case at this time I'll turn it over to Mr. Ziscoll to present the expedited hearings thank you Mr. Mink for the record Ben Ziscoll land development director before I begin I just want to reiterate a couple of things that Mr. Mink said today we do have a little bit of a unique situation with a couple of our expedited cases as you're aware the board adopted expedited procedures within this last year and there are three criteria for an item to appear before you in an expedited public hearing number one is that the applicant agrees to the expedited procedure number two is that the recommendation is for approval and number three is that there was no opposition at the planning commission hearing items 01 and 02 today do have opposition that opposition was not at the planning commission hearing that opposition staff became aware of via phone calls and emails yesterday and into this morning we have provided the opposition to you in your packet and the backup for the item as of five o'clock yesterday but we did receive some overnight into the morning and I'd like to introduce this to the record as well Mr. Mink then should we move the ones that are contested to the public hearing section and proceed with the expedited on the other uncontested the board still can hold expedited hearings the individuals still have the right to give public comment and so forth so that would be up to the board's prerogative whether or not they want to move it that way but ultimately the public still has the ability to come speak against for it or against the project so that doesn't take anything away from that okay just the link to the presentation proceed with 01 thank you Mr. Chair item number 01 is an expedited public hearing for case LDCPAL 2023-4 North U.S. 27 SAP CPA to consider adoption of a large scale comprehensive plan amendment to change the future land use designation on 12.86 acres from professional institutional to residential high the subject site is on the west side of U.S. Highway 27 north of Legacy Boulevard just south of the Cornerstone Church the subject site is surrounded by residential development this stretch of U.S. 27 consists mostly of residential development and staff and the planning commission have recommended approval today's hearing is a transmittal hearing and subject to any comments or questions staff recommends transmitting this item to the Department of Commerce this is one that the public has expressed interest in yes sir we have received opposition for case 01 we received eight emails opposed to the case we've also received 11 phone calls five of those have opposed the case Mr. Mink in a normal course of event we would hear from the applicant first and then the public in this expedited do we follow that same procedure or hear from the public first you can hear from the public then the applicant has a time to respond now if the applicant wants to give a full presentation that's their all that they have that ability to if they want to very good ladies and gentlemen this is a public hearing on the matter described if you wish to speak on this matter please come forward at this time give your name and address for the record and you'll be afforded three minutes morning commission Clay Matthews from Smoker Matthews our office address is 100 South Ashley Drive Tampa Florida 33602 our office our firm represents Sun Communities which is the owner of a residential community to the south and west of the subject site and our client is specifically concerned with potential access to the south of this site I understand that this site is applying for direct access to US-27 with the DOT but they need a secondary access which can either be done through the north or the south in the staff report the staff notes that there is potential or there is county right-of-way to the south west corner of the site but the staff report doesn't say anywhere in there that it would ultimately connect to that road or that the secondary access would be on that road and I'm only coming up here to note that the graphic up here does say that it will connect to the Northridge Trail which as I understand it from planner Jonathan Sims that the Northridge Trail is a road that the county intends to construct from approximately Cornerstone Boulevard all the way south to Sand Mine at some point in the future and I don't know if that is going to happen or if there's plans that have been approved for that to happen yet but if that does happen at some point my client obviously objects to that because that road would cut right through the middle of their property and so to the extent that this project proposes any access through the middle of my client's property my client respectfully objects to that and I'll just note again for the record that the staff report doesn't contain any statement that the site will have access to or connect to this Northridge Trail but yet it's on this graphic so to that I object and then also I understand that the applicant hasn't submitted any site plan that details their access secondary or primary or otherwise and so again the statements that it's going to be connecting to the Northridge Trail my client would object to that You have a graphic that's closer detail than the one shown there Mr. Chairman Yes sir when you Mr. Matthews when you say secondary that's not emergency access that is secondary right I've heard them reference that one in the same so I may be conflating that term but from my conversations with the planner Mr. Sims and with developers counsel I understand that this emergency access would be either to the North or to the South through that right of way or to the North by the South Secondary or is it emergency I don't know which is or is there a difference when we find out I'm assuming they're one in the same but I could I could be incorrect about that and I think we'll give the applicant an opportunity to respond or answer that I believe let's get all the concerns before we get the applicant but on my packet can you pull up exhibit number three which may be the one behind this one maybe I'm looking at the same one okay the that's better better yeah the what appears to be a right of way from Portris to North is that public right of way yes sir it is Shonda Bennett for the record with land development division this right of way goes back to the original adoption of the conference of plan there was a policy in the Northridge I'm sorry the North US 27 selected area plan that the county would obtain right of way all along as a parallel road to US 27 we used to call it the Green Swamp Parkway now we call it the Northridge Trail this development here Abimini Bay or Island Club Resort dedicated right of way here when they were platted when this project here platted they also donated right of way all the way through here it's been an issue over the last 20 years that citizens have had what's this right of way behind them and it was always intended for this right of way and this roadway so the idea is that they would have to dedicate enough to satisfy the requirements for urban collector they're not required to pave it we have tried to talk to the applicant about potentially going into an infrastructure agreement to help get that roadway paved all the way down to Poitras Road too that's always been part of our conference of plan the applicant is going to be required to dedicate an equal amount on their western boundary yes and Ms. Bennett conversation is then to I was going to say those are items that will be taken care of through the level two and so forth right because we're here for CPA and the access and stuff is something that will be addressed during that time so I think that's based on the objections the objections are things that would have to be addressed during the level two process that subject has been brought up with the applicant yes sir okay all right any other questions thank you Mr. Matthews anyone else wish to speak on this matter under the public hearing portion of this application if not then we will close the public hearing and before we bring it to the board we'll hear from the applicant good morning for the record my name is Shelton Rice I'm an attorney with the law firm of Peterson and Myers address 225 East Lemon Street Lakeland Florida today I'm here on behalf of Contravest I have with me in attendance Alfred Rimbowski representative from Contravest as well as our engineer Rodney Gadd to put it into context and I appreciate it Mr. Mink's comments this is a comprehensive plan map amendment so irrespective of ultimately what land use is assigned to this property that potential issue regarding the Northridge Trail extension on our western boundary will still exist our proposal is to change the PICS district which is really undeveloped in this area for a large part it's been problematic given some of the conditions and provisions required in the land development code on that land use designation particularly in this SAP the RHX is consistent with what's around it we believe we can develop this with something that's compatible in the RHX district with surrounding uses with that said we've been actively having conversations with the county working through the access issues working through the traffic studies we're working with DOT working as I mentioned with Polk County as recently as last week talking through where the accesses will be the intent as of right now which this is not set in stone is for their primary access to be on US Highway 27 and that there would be an emergency access elsewhere be it to the north or the south on the western side those are things we're actively discussing it's not set in stone it may be a little bit beyond the scope of the comp plan amendment that we're dealing with but just to add to the conversation having said that I'll be glad to stand for any questions respectfully request a favorable vote thank you sir any other comments on the matter entertain a motion from the board move for approval this is a transmittal hearing so motion to transmit LDC-PAL 2023-4 in any further discussion on the motion yes Mr. Chairman I really haven't got clarification and I know Randy's like hey we're going to deal with that later and will the same opportunity be available to all when we do the adoption it'll be public here and this stuff will be on there because my concern right now and I don't maybe this isn't the place to get it is you know are we talking secondary or are we talking emergency and we need to know that when it comes up I understand that we're trying to keep people off 27 staff is and I get it but if we're going with a residential high and apartment complex here it's going to be a big deal to me and the people that Mr. Matthews represents I can tell you if it's a you know multifamily situation coming through there so anyway just keep that in mind all right this is a transmittal we see what the wizards in Tallahassee come back with and we'll hear it again in a few weeks any further discussion all those in favor say aye aye those like sign nay yes ma'am I'm sorry nay nay all right four to one Ms. Santiago next item thank you Mr. Chairman item number 02 is an expedited public hearing for case LDC-PAL 2023-1 Holly Hill 3 RHX CPA for consideration of a comprehensive planned amendment to change the future land use designation on 14.48 acres from residential medium and employment center to residential high in the transit supportive development area and Northridge selected area plan subject site is also on the west side of U.S. 27 near Haines City's city boundaries just north of Holly Hill Grove Road this is an adoption hearing staff and the planning commission have recommended approval the item was transmitted to the Department of Commerce and no comments were received item number 02 also received opposition yesterday and this morning staff received 11 emails opposed to the project as well as six phone calls five of which opposed again following any public comments staff recommends approval of this adoption any questions of staff ladies and gentlemen this is a public hearing on the matter described if you wish to speak on this matter please come forward at this time seeing that we will close the public hearing and entertain a motion from the board I have a motion and a second any discussion on the motion yeah is there is there a similar issue with access on this or no about Northridge it's not going to make any okay thank you any further discussion all those in favor say aye aye those like sign nay order one motion passes Mr. Chair item number 03 is an expedited public hearing for case LDCPAL 2023-3 five acre rounding error CPA to consider a text amendment to the comprehensive plan to address minimum lot size calculations current code requires five acre as a minimum site development standard in a number of our land use categories and this amendment is a rounding error to accommodate parent sections that did not start with the standard 640 acres there are a number of sections that were designated and planned out within the county that due to technology or just mapping errors back when they were created fall short of the 640 acres so as properties are developed over time and subdivided once a property is subdivided to approximately five acres those properties fall somewhere within the 4.98 4.97 4.9 range this error allows flexibility within our comprehensive plan to allow those properties to designate as being close enough to five acres which is the intent of the comprehensive plan this is a transmittal hearing following any comments today staff recommends approval to transmit this item to the department of commerce any questions to staff ladies and gentlemen this is a public hearing on the matter described if you wish to speak on this matter please come forward at this time seeing that we will close the public hearing and entertain a motion motion for transmittal motion to second any discussion on the motion all those in favor say aye aye opposed like sign motion carries Mr. Chairman item 04 is an expedited public hearing for case LDCT 2023-5 five acre rounding error text amendment to consider an amendment to the land development code text to address the calculation of density in rural and suburb suburban development areas and minimum lot sizes this item is a companion item to item 03 to process a text amendment to resolve the same rounding error and same calculatory issues this is a text amendment first reading and no action is required by the board today first reading ladies and gentlemen this is a public hearing if you wish to speak on this matter please come forward at this time seeing none we will close the public hearing no action required move on to item the public P1 Mr. Chairman that concludes the expedited portion of your public hearings good morning chairman commissioners for the record my name is Shonda Bennett with the land development division this is another request for the board to consider the transmittal of a large scale comprehensive plan amendment LDCPA L 2022-15 US Highway 27 office center it's to change the future land use map on .94 acres from residential low to office center in the north US 27 selected area plan it's also in the overlay for our transit corridors and centers overlay as well as the green swamp area of critical state concern the green swamp critical area of critical state concern is what requires this small parcel to be a large scale the requirement for office center is to be at the intersection of two roads and this aerial shows that at the intersection of US 27 and Oglethorpe which is a local residential road as part of the Laurel Estates subdivision and then the triangle that you see right in front as you can see it's got frontage on US 27 and the triangle that you see in front the applicant has just recently as of last month received a full easement across that triangle for access purposes and I should mention in terms of the record the applicant has submitted an application impact assessment statement demonstration of need maps and easement information the parcel again is in the north part of the county northeast part of the county north of Ronald Reagan Parkway on the west side of US 27 here's an aerial photograph you can see the parcel in Laurel Estates is just north of where the warehouse district in the northeast starts and then of course on the east side of US 27 you can see where there's the multiple residential developments that are in that area this is an older aerial but the four corners development of regional impact has started to develop with subdivision and apartments in 7-11 slight history with this particular parcel it was part of the larger parcel for Laurel Estates in fact it even had an access off of US 27 but there was a planned development at one point that was approved and it expired and then another planned development came along which ended up in Laurel Estates subdivision but this parcel was kept out some of the issues with this parcel it was kept at its higher elevation and you'll see some photographs where there's quite a difference in terms of elevation of this parcel and the surrounding subdivision also the landscaping that you see here is on the Laurel Estates common area not on this particular parcel so before Laurel Estates was constructed this southbound right turn lane was not there so at this point it's now there due to the traffic impacts for this development property cannot access US 27 in addition there is a policy in the comprehensive plan that prohibits the access so it remains all of the responsibility of the access to the south on a local residential road and staff has been working with this site for about three years in terms of where's the best access point because in our opinion the issue is safety and you heard in an earlier case where some of these issues are a level two issue but when the smaller the parcel gets for a comprehensive plan amendment the more some of the site design issues are really critical in terms of compatibility and consistency with infrastructure and at one point the easement was just a little bit wider than this driveway and that was done before it was ever given I'm sorry before when it had a residential land use category I'm sure with the intent of having something different than residential but the concern is it doesn't quite meet it in terms of the type one intersection land development code so ensuring this wider easement allows us to work with the applicant at the level two fully engineered site plan stage to ensure this driveway can go east or west to ensure that safety and you will note that there is a full median opening on Oglethorpe Drive and that's helpful certainly with access management and then does that mean right in right out I'm sorry is that going to mean right in right out no theoretically they can come out of here turn left and go to US 27 oh I thought you said there was a median just so it's open there's nothing on Oglethorpe Drive it's a full median opening right because I'll show you another slide where you can see some medians on Oglethorpe Drive this shows you the surrounding land uses in the area this is Oglethorpe Drive here this is looking north these photographs were taken by the case planner Robert Bolton you can see the driveway here and you can see the medians in the landscape medians in Oglethorpe Drive and the median cut here and then US 27 to the right and you can begin to see the elevation change here and it gets more dramatic as you go west on the parcel and there's also sidewalks on Oglethorpe and US 27 this is standing on US 27 looking west you can see the landscaping that was in the aerial further back going on top of the property looking west into Laurel Estates you can see the landscaping and then the rooftops that gives you another idea of the elevation change this is standing on Williamson Drive which is on the west side of the property and again you can see the elevation change and again those trees are on the homeowners association property and so that's common area for the homeowners association there is no requirement that they leave that elevation or they reduce that elevation certainly that's something that I'm sure the applicant will address in their comments but certainly if they propose that they might probably have to work with the homeowners association again there's a variety of issues that could happen with this elevation at level two again why staff felt it was really important to get that easement across that frontage this is a good example of the elevation change of the parcel and the homes surrounding the subject site in terms of impact assessment statement it's not anticipated to have any impacts on schools won't generate any children there's the northeast regional park nearby sheriff fire ems certainly this is our urban area have reasonable response times there is available capacity for water and sewer as well as transportation capacity and staff does recommend approval and I will stand for any questions any questions of staff it's almost unrelated but what are the side yard setbacks on those homes that we were looking at right pull that back up I mean it's they they are detached right they are detached most likely they're look about five feet seven I don't know for sure two and a half feet on either side I didn't memorize that I would assume it's five feet from the property line so there'd be five feet between homes so two and a half ten feet between homes ten feet between homes okay the building code requirement to have ten feet between homes okay I'll take your word for it well I didn't I honestly didn't study that before I came here so I don't I'm guessing okay any other questions of staff invite the applicant to come forward while Bart's coming up is it that subdivision predominantly vacation or short-term rentals or is it I do know there are full-time residents there so I would imagine it's somewhat of a mix okay good morning commissioners for the record Bart Allen I'm a lean use attorney with the Peterson and Myers law firm my address is 225 East Lemon Street Lakeland Florida and I cannot find my power point one second I'm happy to be here this morning on behalf of the applicant DGTT Cypress LLC with me on behalf of the LLC I have Mr. Gary Ralston and Mr. Tyler Davis in the audience with me JSK Consulting has been our engineer on this project since the get-go and we are asking for a large-scale comprehensive plan amendment on less than one acre of land which is unique as this Bennett pointed out I commented I believe at one of the planning commission hearings that this is the smallest large-scale comprehensive plan amendment I've ever been a part of so that's pretty unique but that again is just by virtue of the green swamp the site does have frontage on US-27 and it does have direct access easement access to Oglethorpe Drive which is a public local road I went over this already Miss Bennett has gone through the alphabet soup of the different overlays that this is in and I'm going to move past some of that I think orienting the site again Miss Bennett did a really good job of going over the site we've worked long and hard with your staff to get to this point but I think looking at the overall areas is critical we are north of I-4 fronting on US-27 in an area that is probably one of the most urbanized areas of Polk County here you can see just again some of the major infrastructure improvements with Ronald Reagan Parkway Dean Still Road and we know what's going on at Dean Still the Northridge Trail which has been a major legislative priority of this board to get constructed and funding I believe is committed for much of those improvements moving north off Dean Still Road and again the site highlighted in red this is just an aerial with some of the existing development and some things that have happened in the recent future and or in the recent time you've got the industrial buildings to the south with along with a number of commercial out parcels professional offices that have developed immediately south of the site just to the east on the east side of US-27 there's going to be approximately 300 multifamily units as well as almost 200 single family for rent units going on on that parcel that currently shows is undeveloped and the permitting on that project is nearly complete and then as you move up and down the corridor you can see just the number of commercial and retail opportunities and professional services is a major user within this mix and that is what we are proposing on this site is again the office center the professional use going back in time just to kind of put a little bit of a finer point on some of Ms. Bennett's comments related to the history of the site prior to 2009 this property was entitled as a whole with what is Laurel Estates now it was part of the PD going back to 2004 that 2004 PD is and some of you will recall at one time our residential PDs had an automatic expiration provision contained within those PDs and that's that is exactly what happened to this PD this PD was approved for 272 single family dwelling units which was inclusive of the 0.94 acres that we're talking about today step back in 2007 however what was unique about this was the 0.94 acre 0.94 acres that we're talking about today was its own parcel ID it was a separate parcel ID because that's where the home was at the time that property was lost in a tax deed sale from the master ownership of the entire site so that 0.94 acre was transferred from the prior owners which would would have included all of Laurel Estates to a third party unrelated through a tax deed sale that tax deed sale was completed in 2011 and there was a quiet title action on that property in 2011 so that property was fully divested from the prior ownership where it would have been part of Laurel Estates so in 2014 when the new PD came through re-entitling the property very similarly it was actually approved for additional units up to 275 dwelling units this parcel was specifically excluded from the Laurel Estates PD at that time and this is just a great example just the best example on paper that I have to kind of show how it was excluded the red star here is the plat from the first phase where it on the plat notates not included separate you know parcel however what is also noted on that plat is the dedicated easement access to Oglethorpe Drive through a 40 foot access easement right here to the south and that is you know what Ms. Bennett talked about was the original access for the site it was not a part of the PD it remained in the original access for the existing home it was not the original access it was the original access after the development I apologize yes that was unclear I appreciate that original access was off US 27 but once the PD came in and the property was developed this became the new access for the property I went back and in some of my research and I found the Kimley Horn firm did the engineering plans for the original project I went back and talked to some of the original engineers that were involved in the project they did try to incorporate the .94 acres and at that time that property owner did not want to cooperate that's why you do see that today that distinction in the grading because this site was heavily graded when the residential project was brought into play just to highlight this is the phase one of the plat the red area is the .94 acres the black and yellow is the easement that was dedicated through a recorded document it was recorded at OR book and page 9506 page 2223 and incorporated as part of the plat so this was the access as it was to move forward and you can see that this is a you know 75 foot almost cross section here as you relates to the the access off of US-27 moving into the site and then as we move forward and bring the aerials forward you can see the development has occurred the Northridge Trail will run back along the west side there's actually dedicated right away for Northridge Trail similar to one of your earlier cases to provide this secondary north-south connection along the west side of the Laurel Estates site but you can also see that you know there is nearly 1.2 million square feet of industrial immediately adjacent to the south and then our out parcel on the east side there Mark what is the strip to the north looks awful wide going directly up 27 is that retention or that'd be up on the hill wouldn't it right here yeah that's part of the open space it's a common area tract it's got open space drainage it is part of the subdivision and that's incorporated within their boundaries of their plat it is so it's basically developed as a part of the that's correct it is part developed as part of the part of the residential project so the big conversation that really resulted was given the given the location of the property and the proximity to US 27 and everything that's going on developing it for a single family lot did not does not seem to be a real beneficial use particularly given its topography and different characteristics but how do we design the site because what Ms. Bennett pointed out is it related to sometimes having to get into what I would call an engineering analysis for a comprehensive plan amendment may feel like you are putting the cart before the horse however it's important to make sure that the land use that you put on the property is appropriate and that the proposed development can fit and can work so as we engaged JSK to prepare some initial site plans some concept plans and there was a bunch of them so there's a number of them floating around out there what we came to realize is the yellow area is the existing easement that's the that is a recorded easement when you tried to put a type one intersection within that easement area we needed about 10 square feet of a triangle right here just this little blue area in order to fit the radiuses that are required as part of a typical without any deviation from the design standards just standard type one intersection and that would allow if we were able to obtain that easement that would allow the access here and again the medians in the middle of Oglethorpe Drive that very specifically were left for the benefit of this property all of this would function however we did not have the easement over that little blue area so that that raised concerns with staff so what we did was we engaged in a fairly lengthy I think I would say being generous to it conversation with staff and with the HOA we were engaged with the HOA attorney the HOA managers the HOA board to obtain an easement over the entire trapezoidal area basically from that is basically the limits of their ownership as it moves forward east toward US 27 within this area to allow us the most flexibility when we come in with an engineering design to accommodate the topography of the site as we can contemplate regrading make sure that we can get cars off of Oglethorpe Drive as efficiently and quickly as possible and make this access function to the best of our ability and after some long negotiations with the HOA attorney their board and the management we did obtain that easement and that was recorded on January July sorry July 11th of this year and there's a number of critical aspects to this easement and I think they're extremely important there are a number of private covenants and I know Mr. Mink and he will tell you that this board does not enforce private covenants however these are documented they're executed and they are effective on this site and they are a part of the public record so they are enforceable we have restricted uses at the request of the HOA no alcohol sales no vape shops no medical marijuana dispensaries no 24 hour fitness facilities no 24 hour operations in their entirety we actually have a limitation on the hours of operation of what uses could potentially go within the proposed building and those limitation on hours is 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. we have a binding site plan that is incorporated into our easement that includes a three to four foot berm on the west and the north sides of the site closest to the residential building size 8,000 square feet sign locations where signage can go along US 27 so as not to be in conflict with residences but also not to be in conflict with where Oglethorpe Drive is as well as their signage we have committed to dark sky technology as it relates to lighting there are maintenance and repair obligations between the potential or from DGTT as in conjunction with the HOA and then there are HOA self-help provisions so if we're not doing if my developer does not do what they're supposed to do they have the ability to come on site and maintain either the HOA property that we have committed to maintaining and charge back those costs to the developer but they also have the ability to come on the developer's property if the buildings and the signage and the on-site landscaping is not maintained and then charge back those costs to the developer so there have been a tremendous amount of communication and obligations between the HOA and this developer and those are ongoing as it relates to permitting assuming optimistically that we get our land use in place we have ongoing obligations to communicate with them regarding permitting of stormwater ponds to the site to make sure that all of the stormwater systems that we are constructing on that will be wholly contained on the 0.94 acres will function properly and not have any adverse impacts on HOA stormwater ponds or any of the residents in the neighborhood just want to point out this is a boundary survey we actually went to the links of going out and getting a formal basically ALTA boundary survey of just the easement area this is just a graphical exhibit of what that looks like so again we have doubled more than doubled the frontage on Oglethorpe Drive where we have the ability to locate ingress and egress improvements another comment as it relates to this ingress and egress we've in conjunction with your staff we had a virtual meeting with FDOT to discuss whether or not this location of the access point would be of concern to FDOT for the particular use based on that conversation this was an acceptable location and FDOT would not have any issue with access being located here in the red box is again just you know my rough imaging of where maintenance obligations are on the potential developer here maintaining the landscaping maintaining the curving maintaining the landscaping and the median that is HOA landscaping would be on the obligation of the developer as there were concerns that increased traffic might result in damage to those areas so we agreed to maintain those areas in perpetuity this is referencing back to the landscaping berm three to four foot landscape berm again on the west side and the north side as you can see closest to the residential and the intent would be similar to how Laurel Estates developed would be to lower the grade to the extent we can as it relates to the site the topography of the site lends itself to being lowered there's some complications there we obviously cannot impact their existing landscaping along the west and the north side without getting their permission so that'll be an engineering challenge but I am certain that that can be accomplished and then as well on this exhibit showing where the signage can be shielded by the building along the north and east corner of the site away from the entrance and away from the HOA signage looking at the list of uses that are allowable in office center these are the types of things that assuming optimistically we have a favorable vote we're looking at child care centers medical office clinics things of that nature potentially a bank potentially a bank with a drive-thru but we would have to go through a planning commission approval for that and based on conversations with staff and the engineering I think you add a drive-thru out here and you have a real problem with getting the permits for access so while it's on the table while it's on the list I'm not I'm just want to point it out and say that that's not likely so the uses that you're really looking at are offices and personal service type uses but again no medical marijuana I've struck that from the list based on the on the private restrictions and no 24-hour gyms no 24-hour operations in their entirety traffic has been a concern by the residents based on the prior hearings this is an analysis of and I want to just so we can kind of compare some things this was the analysis when the PD was approved showing for 275 single-family dwelling units that you would get approximately 278 p.m. peak hour trips when you look at our analysis for office center with an 8,000 square foot building which is what's limited on our binding site plan we would be adding potentially 26 p.m. peak hour trips to that existing 278 so a nominal increase or one vehicle maybe every two minutes so with the limitations that are in place this would be a very nominal increase to traffic on Oglethorpe Drive office center from a compatibility perspective getting away from private restrictions office center this is just 0.75 miles to the north less than a mile to the north where you have office center immediately adjacent to residential also accessing a local a local road however the difference being that there is also a separate entrance for the residents there but again showing from a compatibility perspective that the two uses can coexist with each other sightline exhibits visual impacts want to touch on those first of all this is the closest residence here 75 feet potentially from our building that is in excess of what your land development code criteria are in chapter 220 section 220 related to non-residential uses adjacent to or near existing residential but also showing when you look at existing topography existing vegetation as well as what we building locations those folks either on you know from a from the south looking to the north will not see should not see the building and then from the west looking to the east again we'll be looking over top of the building and those are based on topography that exists today as really and based on a survey a topographic survey that was completed by my client what about the maturity of the trees does that matter those are the existing those are the HOA trees unless there's some agreement with the HOA we'll be taking them out we have no right to touch those trees they're hard to see on the aerial though I couldn't I couldn't pick it up they are a little bit difficult to see but another thing that's that I just want to point out from a physical separation from point A and point B particularly point B over 110 feet from any structures so you've got a massive physical separation between the 52 feet of the existing HOA property plus another 50 plus feet on the on our property and then as you look at again looking from the south to the north with open area of HOA stormwater ponds and then physical separation of the buildings you are looking at substantial separation from residences so with that I've got a number of other slides that I pulled out but I think I've hit the big issue here we would request a favorable vote on transmittal we believe that the OCX is compatible with the residential low adjacent to us the HOA easement alleviates the concerns raised by the HOA management HOA attorney and their board and that has been approved and is in place and enforceable and we would request a favorable vote on transmittal of LDC PAL 2022-50 and we'll stand for any questions and any rebuttal any questions of the applicant I do yes ma'am how many offices are you looking at having in this area we're looking at doing one building that's approximately 8,000 square feet so it potentially could be a couple but we're looking at doing one structure any other comments from the board ladies and gentlemen this is a public hearing on the matter described if you wish to speak on this matter please come forward at this time please give us your name and address for the record my name is Edward Milakowicz I live at 141 Williamson Drive Davenport Florida I live within 500 feet of the subject property this property is bounded on three sides by the development the only ingress and egress is on Oglethorpe Drive which is a 15 foot 3 inch wide road 5 inches from the intersection which is not compliant with chapter 7 of the Polk County Land Code also moving the driveway west chapter 2 says you need 35 feet between that and the edge of the driveway for offset so that driveway would not be compliant the two islands in the middle of the road is 7 feet wide the distance in between for egress off the driveway would give you a left turn going out onto Oglethorpe and out to 27 there is no objection to OCX on the boundary this is not on the boundary this is within the confines of the development the height is fine Mr. Adams stated you can't see it from Williamson you can't see it from Oglethorpe but you can see it looking from north to south the trees are not at the peak of the hill they are just below the hill the other thing excavating to put up a three foot berm on an acre of land is about 17,000 tons of dirt so you know you really got to take a look at what are they really doing I have no objection to commercial properties on the corridor this is not on the corridor this is where people live I am the only homeowner here right now objecting to this the homeowners association does not have any interest to the homeowners they were interested in only making sure that this property got developed so chapter seven is going to negate the problem with ingress and egress because that driveway cannot be placed 150 feet from the intersection it is less than a commercial driveway width commercial driveway width has to be 30 feet that is 19 feet 5 inches which is a residential driveway I ask that the commission take a look at this very very closely I had given paperwork on actual measurements I had taken out there I'm a retired engineer I was licensed in New Jersey there's no reciprocity in Florida my license has no bearing here and I haven't kept it up since I retired 10 years ago I was going to ask you if you were we don't change this leave it residential I was going to ask you if you were an engineer but you answered the question I did it for 38 years Mr. Chairman yes he mentioned chapter 7 and I guess there's in our codes there's got to be opportunities for variances where you've got special conditions and things can't get met is that I see Ben shake his head to obviously have those built in and I get it Shonda Bennett with the land development division there are accommodations in land development code for waivers to the distance between driveways of course this is a distance from an intersection not a driveway and the other factor is also waivers in the code to the type of intersection that's required in terms of the metrics for that so there's an opportunity but staff's met with DOT staff's met with our county engineer's office and the focus of driveways non-residential driveways is on local commercial roads rather than in the code specifically being a local residential road so there's some wiggle room in terms of safety but we feel this distance here provides enough opportunity that our county attorney is going and the planners are going to ensure the safety in terms of the driveway this is still a public hearing does anyone in the public wish to speak on this matter we will close the public hearing and bring this transmittal hearing process back to the board Mr. Chairman I would move transmittal of LDC PAL 2022-15 US Highway 27 OCX CPA we have a motion and a second any discussion on the motion yeah just let me say that obviously there's been an awful lot of work that went into this I know Gary I don't know if you were involved Bart who but needless to say you're halfway you know around the turn headed for home when you get this back I get it I would be concerned and I would agree with the gentleman that spoke if you weren't able to widen the driveway where people could get off in and out if one's coming out and somebody was there and you couldn't get in as long as that width is sufficient for the traffic to flow I don't see it as a problem it looks to me like Oglethorpe is one lane in two lanes out so I don't know if it's a practical matter if you can actually get around somebody if they were held up from trying to turn in but I think with the extra width it will allow people the traffic to flow there and it should not be a problem I think we're obligated to try to work with the applicant to find a solution for this site and obviously and I think it's a good thing that y'all were forced to work with the HOA to meet their concerns as well so I really think it's the best that we're going to be able to do on this site especially with the condition that you all have agreed to any further discussion I think Commissioner Cum is correct that the applicant will conform to the greatest extent possible any further discussion all those in favor of the transmittal indicate by saying aye aye opposed like sign motion carries good morning again Shonda Bennett with the land development division this is a item that did not go before the planning commission so it doesn't meet the terms in terms for expedited hearings that's why it's on the regular hearing schedule for you today it's a rescission for the Rita Champions Gate development of regional impact LDDRI 2023-2 the property is in both Osceola County and in Polk County in the northeast part of the county the part of this development in Polk County extends from I-4 to West Side Boulevard and is sandwiched between Ronald Reagan Parkway and the Osceola Polk County line with the Champions Gate Boulevard running through it the Osceola County development order for this project was adopted in 1998 and in the county jurisdiction it was adopted in 2006 earlier this year the board of county commissioners adopted a comprehensive plan amendment to mixed use for the subject site allowing some development and setting up for this particular request it also included text amendment to the comprehensive plan and a text amendment to the land development code to set development parameters as well as limitations on intensity also the applicant had to submit an analysis of the conditions of the development order what have been met and of those that are not met what are the documents in place if this is rescinded that would ensure concurrency and compatibility and with that really our concurrency management program is able to do that they've met all their transportation improvement requirements in terms of what has been approved in the development order and what has been constructed to date in our jurisdiction you can see on the table that there's about 160,000 square feet of office that's been approved 593 units 70,000 square feet of retail and some hotel units there is between champions gate boulevard and I4 there is where the major part of this development has occurred with residential units a 7-11 and an emergency center there is a isolated parcel that's got a portofino apartment and I'll show you that in a minute this shows you the land use classification for the DRI the undeveloped portion is mixed use portofino is in the middle with the employment center then all the other development 7-11 the apartments currently on the east side of the property and there's some preservation that's wetlands and then you can see the other part of development of champions gate in osceola county due north is the omni hotel and then you can see champions gate boulevard extending to I-4 on the right side of the screen there is an out parcel to the DRI small little sliver however since the DRI was adopted in our jurisdiction the developer applicant has acquired that property so it won't have the hole that it looks like today aerial photograph and a more zoomed in aerial photograph the recreation facilities here staff does anticipate some redevelopment there but they certainly are heavily used but you can see west side boulevard on the left extending north into Osceola county and then the other numerous residential developments surrounding the property standing on champions gate boulevard looking to the south to Ronald Radegan Parkway and you can see the 711 on the right I'm sorry the left and then what would be the edge of the recreation facilities on the right this is standing on Ronald Radegan Parkway looking west at the side boulevard looking south toward Ronald Radegan Parkway and this is standing at the intersection of west side and Ronald Radegan Parkway looking east sites on the left and then you can see new projects being constructed west side lakes vacation single family homes and townhomes in terms of infrastructure certainly this is our busiest part of our county in terms of transportation school capacity as well is a concern there is capacity in our water and wastewater plant from Polk County North East regional utility service area fire EMS services are certainly adequate for this part of our county I think it's important to point out that this project is going to develop as I'm sure you know in one year it's going to take a very long time but if we put all those trips today on the network there is some capacity for this development to occur even in one year but I wanted to point out a little bit of the differences between what they had with employment center what the vested DRI trips are and what could be accomplished potentially with the mixed-use project and you can see with employment center either at all non-residential development or partial residential and non-residential the trips here vehicle trips are well over what the vested DRI had and well over what the new mixed-use project land use could provide so overall this is a reduction the benefit to the applicant to proceed with the rescission is they don't report as much to us but the I think the difficulty or the what could make any developer nervous is DRIs protect developers from governments downzoning their property so by asking for this rescission that guarantee goes away not that we would downzone the property but it certainly is a concern of developers throughout the state I also wanted to point out in terms of transportation for anyone in the audience who are listening that how we pay attention to the transportation or at least one of the ways that we do this is a distribution map if you will on the bottom and what's in red is a percentage so as a vehicle leaves the property 72% go east 70% go west and as they further extend out from that property the percentages of the capacity of those trips on the network of what cars are already there keeps going down as it goes out further and again the transportation on this project isn't going to happen in one time it's going to happen over 10 to 15 years so as school capacity goes up and down as transportation capacity goes up and down we will address that according to our current rules and regulations for every level two that they come in to ask for approval a couple of arrow photographs this is looking to the northeast you can see the major development currently existing in our jurisdiction you can see the Omni Hotel on the left and then Champions Gate Boulevard extending to I-4 and this is looking to the west you can see the Portofino apartments it's currently in the DRI but it's not owned by the applicant anymore but by state law they do have the ability to ask for the rescission as the developer Champions Gate does and then you can see Westside Boulevard is the best way I could draw it out on this aerial photograph staff is recommending approval of the rescission and briefly talking you through the law in terms of Florida statute says if a development has received a DRI development order in this case but is no longer required to undergo a DRI review can be rescinded and under statutes to not go through a DRI review you have to either be in an urban service boundary or in a dense urban county which is a thousand persons per square mile and we don't have that situation except for the urban service boundary and it is in the transit supportive development area which is our urban service boundary Mr. Chairman Yes sir this plan and stuff has changed a lot it's hard to keep up with for me but what is a thresh up a little recreation fields not a DRI you see that one yeah you're good at picking up the spellings aren't you oh so that's that's a typo recreation fields not a DRI threshold I thought it was like a new acronym and like so what is that oh it's threshold right yes okay who owns those recreation fields Championsgate is there any chance they're going to be converted I mean can they at some point as a planner for the county I've seen much redevelopment in the county over the last 29 years so I would expect so but I'm sure the applicants here can address that that's okay I just wonder if it was a possibility down the road yes okay thanks that conclude the staff's presentation I guess that's a positive any questions of staff for the applicant wish to speak good morning commissioners my name is John Adams with RJ Witten and Associates we are land planners at 316 Church Street Kissimmee Florida 34741 we represent the applicant the developer Ms. Bennett did a fine job of trying to explain what a DRI rescission is but essentially it is just eliminating an antiquated development order the new land use and land development code that you adopted earlier in the year is much more sophisticated and much in the management of any new growth this eliminates the potential for conflicts between the documents and administratively it can be managed much better through your more sophisticated land use and zoning I'm available for any questions we certainly agree with staff's recommendation and I would reserve time to rebut any public hearing any questions of Mr. Adams ladies and gentlemen this is a public hearing if you wish to speak on this matter please come forward at this time seeing that we will close the public hearing and entertain a motion and adopt the resolution we have a motion and a second any discussion on the motion all those in favor say aye aye opposed like sign motion carries any other meeting of the board they changed that while we're sitting here staff anything else we're adjourned thank you