Board of County Commissioners on 2024-04-02 9:00 AM

Good morning, everybody. Welcome to our April 2nd meeting. If you would stand, please, for the invocation and remain standing for the pledge. Good morning. Please pray with me. Heavenly Father, as the events of our day continue to unfold, we seek your clarity and your peace. As we gather here today and as we make decisions for the good of our county, we know that you are with us and for us as we seek your counsel. Scripture reminds us the more we seek you, the more we will find you. Lead our surrendered hearts to the path of your peace today, and I ask this prayer in Jesus' name. Amen. First thing up is a request from the general public to speak. I believe everybody here that wants to speak that I have in my hand wants to speak in reference to item P1 on the agenda. That would be the appropriate time. It has to do with Greenleaf. But if there's anyone who wants to speak about something else, now's your time. Please come forward. I need your name and address. Yes, sir. Chris Peterson, 800 Waterford Way, Miami, Florida. Good morning, Commissioners. Chris Peterson for Fortify Financial. It's been several months since I was here asking this commission for a curative ILA to help our customers, your constituents, complete their home improvement projects with PACE and get their contractors paid and their assessments placed on the tax roll so they could make their payments in the fashion they voluntarily selected. As you know, there was litigation between several counties and tax collectors against the FPFA. However, it was recently concluded, and the judge has ruled, that FPFA had the legal right to originate PACE assessments statewide and that the tax collector is without discretion with regards to placing them on the tax roll. Home rule seems to be at the heart of that litigation, but fortunately that issue was solved with the PACE legislation that passed the House and the Senate this session and is on the governor's desk waiting for a signature. Fortify publicly supported SB 770 from the beginning and was present in Tallahassee during the session to help ensure its passage. State legislation does take precedence over the judge's ruling, so moving forward, ILA's will be required, and we support that. The court ruling is now only relevant in clarifying the legality of the assessments re-originated in Polk County. We were operating in good faith based on the bond validation, and those assessments belong on the tax roll. So Fortify is here again asking for your help in resolving these issues for Polk County's homeowners. These folks have wind mitigation projects on hold, contractors seeking reimbursement for their work and materials, and these homeowners have a need to pay for completed projects via the annual tax roll as originally desired. We are not here representing the FPFA. We are representing Fortify in our continual efforts to resolve these issues for your constituents. It's time to resolve these outstanding issues and move forward with a clear set of rules and regulations that everyone agrees upon. That's outlined all in the legislation. Homeowners and contractors are desperate for you to take action so they can move on with their lives. Thank you for your time, and I look forward to resolving this issue. Thank you, and we will have Mr. Mink get with Mr. Tetter and find out the status of where all that is with Polk County. And if I may, Mr. Chair, negotiations would go through their attorney. Fortify is represented in the litigation, and we would speak through their attorney for any type of settlement. And I have asked our outside counsel to reach out to Fortify. Okay, thanks. Neil, did you have something? Can you give us a break now, not now, but on SB77? Yes, sir, I can. That's the bill that passed, the PACE bill that passed, that basically says you've got to have it. He refers to an ILA interlocal agreement before they can actually provide the program here. That has not been signed by, it has not even been sent to the governor yet, so we're waiting for it to be sent to the governor to see if he signs the bill. Thank you. All right, thanks. Anyone else? Okay, moving on. Consent agenda. So moved. Motion and a second for approval. Any discussion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed, like, sign. Ms. Butterfield. Good morning. Good morning. Today we have for you to approve and ratify payroll checks number 02702 through 02771 in the amount of $75,167.48. We have 2,830 direct deposits in the amount of $4,102,432.59, and those are dated March 22nd of 2024. We have wire and electronic fund transfers of $31,244,622.99, dated March 19th through April 1st, 2024, and invoice checks numbered 455974 through 456871, totaling $13,353,412.57, dated March 19th, 2024 through April 1st, 2024. For you to approve and ratify, please. Approval disbursement. Second. We got a motion and a second for approval. Any discussion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed, like, sign. Motion carries. We have the board minutes from your regular board meeting that was held on March the 19th of 2024 for you to approve, please. Move approval. Second. Motion and a second for approval. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed, like, sign. Motion carries. Anything else? Yes, sir. Just one item. The clerk's office is holding a vet that is coming up in April, and it's called Operation Greenlight. If you want to ask me about it. During this special initiative out, we have customers that have driver's license that are suspended. There are many, many suspensions on driver's license. And during this event, we can waive the outside collection fees. And that can be up to 40%, because when you do not pay your outstanding fines by law, the clerk has to turn it over to a collection agency, and it gets marked up anywhere from 25% to 40%. So during this one-week special initiative, you can come in to the clerk's office, any one of our three locations. It's in-person only. And we will waive that collection fee, and you can pay your outstanding fines or work with us on payment plans and get to a position where your license can be reinstated and you can be back on the road driving. It's the week of April the 15th, Monday, April 15th, tax day, through April 19th, Friday, Monday through Friday, regular business hours, 8 to 430. And then on Tuesday and Thursday of that week, we will be open until 6 p.m. for customers to accommodate them. As you know, it's serious driving around with a suspended license. You could be stopped. You could be actually- What do you look at me when you say that? So it can lead to additional financial burdens as well as potentially law enforcement taking you to jail, possibly. So it's a great way people need their license to where they can work and take care of all their normal activities. So we hope everyone takes advantage of this. Of course, you can go on my website, www.polkcountyclerk.net, to find out more or call our office. Well, given the direction this county is headed, pretty soon you'll have to change the name from Operation Greenlight to Operation Roundabout. Well, I know you like that. If you know something about you, we don't know, though. Yeah, apparently. But thank you. We'll drop that right here. All right. Next up, we've got an update regarding the Polk Regional Water Cooperative. Good morning, commissioners. My name is Eric DeHaven. I'm the executive director of the Polk Regional Water Quality. And yes, I'd like to give you a quick overview and update of the Polk Regional Water Cooperative. Today, I'd like to give you more of a refresher. You're all very familiar with the PRWC, so I'll give a bit of a refresher. Then talk some specifics about the southeast and west Polk Lower Florida Aquifer Wellfield projects. And then talk a little bit about how we're funding and financing the program. So the first question is, why did the PRWC get created in the first place? Well, as we all know, overuse of the Upper Florida Aquifer can cause environmental harm. And that's reflected in things like our lakes and streams and rivers, especially when the Water Management District sets minimum flows and levels, and we have lakes and rivers that are not making those levels. So in 2021, the Central Florida Water Initiative rule was adopted by the legislature and essentially restricts the use of the Upper Florida Aquifer, which is our principal water supply aquifer, here in Polk County. And what the rule essentially did was limit use of the Upper Florida Aquifer to our 2025 demonstrated demands. And the graphic on the right shows those as about 88 million gallons per day of actual demonstrated demands that we anticipate occurring by 2025. The region, Polk County region, will need another 32 million gallons per day by 2045 to be able to meet the needs of the county as it continues to grow. And that's about 32 million gallons per day more of water that would be needed. That will need to come from alternative water supply under the CFWI rule. Now here in Polk County, our alternative water supply options are somewhat limited. We're landlocked. We do not have access to the bay, to the Gulf or seawater desalination. And we are located at the upper reaches of the rivers rather than the lower reaches, which is the best place to take water for surface water supplies. So we have to come up with some unique solutions. So as you all know, the PRWC is a regional agency of Polk County and 50 municipal governments. Again, the PRWC was created to try and solve some of the issues that we see with long-term water supply. What our goals are is to, first of all, identify AWS supplies and projects, ensure we have sustainable water sources, meet our future demands, and determine the infrastructure needs to do all those things. So the PRWC has identified that water supply challenge. We've formed the countywide cooperative. We've selected and studied four alternative water supply projects. And this was a real winnowing process where we started with over 200 projects and brought it down to the four that I'll talk about a little bit today. We're actually initiating our final design and construction of two alternative water supply projects. And the time has flown. We're at the point now where we're going to be very close to starting construction on one of those early next year. We have $51 million in investments so far, and our funding and financing package is largely in place. As you all know, the PRWC executed a formation agreement in 2016. This was really that charter legal agreement that created us as a legal entity to sort of serve the regional purposes and develop the projects. The PRWC operates on a subscription service. So basically, members sign up for the projects that are necessary to move forward. And in 2017, the combined projects implementation agreement was executed. And this allowed us to basically do all the feasibility investigations of those four alternative water supply projects that I've listed here. Those include two lower Florida and aquifer projects and two surface water projects, one on the Peace Creek and one on the Peace River. We then executed member agreements for the southeast lower Florida and aquifer wellfield project in 2022. And this allows for the final design and construction of a phased southeast lower Florida and aquifer wellfield project. The first phase of the project will bring 7.5 million gallons per day of groundwater online to be able to distribute to members. We have a full member demand associated with this project of 16.3 million gallons. And you can see on the graphic what members have signed up for in terms of water from this project. These are all project members that are paying members, contributing money towards the project. We also have four project associates. These members are keeping an eye on the project. And they can sign up for water quantity if it's available at a later date. So they're involved, but not directly financially. We also signed our West Polk lower Florida and aquifer wellfield implementation agreement in 2022. The first phase of that project will bring 2.5 million gallons per day of water online. Again, you can see the members that are involved. Ultimately, we think this project will provide 7.88 million gallons per day. Our water use permit with the district actually allows for 10 million gallons. So there's future expansion available here. And again, you can see our project associates who are watching the project but have not yet signed up for any water associated with the project. So where we're at with Southeast. I'll go through the two wellfield projects and give you a sense of where we're at. The estimated cost of the Southeast wellfield project is $464 million. And this includes costs for design and construction of the treatment facility, plus the transmission pipelines, the land acquisition largely for easements, and the injection wells necessary to return the reject water to the Cretaceous units below the lower Florida and aquifer. So we anticipate providing 7.5 MGD of drinking water in 2028, a total of 16.3 by 2045. The water treatment process will be reverse osmosis. The project does include 61 miles of finished water transmission lane, basically running from the location of the Southeast project east of Lake Wales, all the way up to the Haines City area, and then westward to the Bartow area. We also have six miles of raw water transmission main where the raw water wells will be tapped to be able to feed to the water treatment facility. And we have five lower Florida and aquifer raw water wells in the first phase and one or two deep injection wells. Here are the estimated costs broken down a little bit more. And as you can see, the Southeast Wellfield Phase 1 treatment is about $205 million, and the transmission system, the 61 miles of transmission, is about $175 million. So that project is really broken up into two large projects. The other big project cost associated with this is down under land and contingency, land acquisition. For our easements, we're budgeting about $25 million for land, and we are well on our way to acquiring easements. We've spent about $5 million so far on easement acquisition. Now here's our schedule for the Southeast project. We have already achieved significant milestones in November of 2022. We brought on our construction manager at risk. This is the actual contractor that will construct the project. In April of 2023, we brought on our third-party operator. So this will be the operator who will operate the project once it's constructed. And it was important to bring them on early in the process so we can make sure we're designing and building a very operable plant. So we have the full team looking at design before we go to construction, before we go to operation. Just last month, we completed our test production well number three. This was a well required by the Water Management District as a part of their cooperative funding program. And it will turn into a test production well. So it's the first production well that we've completed for the project. In September of this year, we anticipate the final design of the project will be completed. And then December, our injection well construction is completed. They're out there constructing right now. There's a very large drill rig located east of Lake Wales on Boy Scout Camp Road, constructing that injection well. And then really in January of next year, we really anticipate commencing that major plant and pipeline construction. So this project goes to construction early next year. It will be substantially complete by January of 2028. Now moving to the West Polk project, this project is anticipated to cost $181 million. It's a smaller project, less water, so the costs are a little bit lower. But the same project elements as the southeast project. We envision bringing on 2.5 million gallons per day of drinking water in 2029 in a total of 7.88. Again, expandable to 10 MGD based upon our permit. And we will do, again, desal by reverse osmosis. We anticipate only about a mile of transmission line, so a much smaller transmission system associated with this project. And we have four raw water wells and one deep injection well. The project is about roughly a year behind the southeast, maybe about 18 months behind. And so we anticipate beginning construction in 2026 and completing construction sometime in 2029. And again, here's the cost broken down a little bit more into project management, design, and permitting construction. Obviously, the construction costs are the biggest costs associated with these projects. And there are no other large costs associated with this. There's no big transmission system. There's not a lot of land acquisition for easements needed. So the majority of the cost on this project is in the construction itself. Now giving you a funding summary overall, between these two projects, we're looking at a program total of about $650 million. And you can see, basically, how we've set up to fund the projects right here. Basically, on the pie chart, everything in blue is grant funding. So that's money coming in from outside, essentially, the Polk area. And everything in green is then our loans that we'll be taking. The biggest chunk of the grant side is the Southwest Florida Water Management District grant, $227 million worth of grant we've obtained. The biggest portion of the green side of the pie chart is the $305 million WIFIA loan. That's a low-interest federal loan that comes through the EPA. Our interest rate is just over 4%. And we also have the option to refinance that, hopefully, if interest rates break in our favor. You can also see in this chart we've received Heartland grants totaling $26 million, state appropriations almost to $20 million, and federal grants about $2 million. And we anticipate all of those numbers growing. Our whole intent with this is to try and maximize the grants as much as possible to reduce the impact on Polk County and all the members of PRWC and the taxpayers. The last thing I'll talk about is the PRWC business plan. This business plan is very important to the PRWC. It provides anticipated costs of the program to the members. And we update this thing each year. It's inclusive of all the costs, and it's required of our master bond resolution. And each year we incorporate new planning assumptions. So if we get new construction cost estimates from our construction manager at risk, we can incorporate those in there to provide each member an idea of how much they need to pay each year. So, for example, we've gone to our board. We've provided each member what they should be budgeting for the next fiscal year. And then there's estimated payments on out into the future is what we think this program will cost. This provides the members the ability to plan for those costs so they can do things like updated rate studies and determine member revenue options, of which there are many that we've talked about. Some of the revenue options we've talked about include member special assessments, capital connection fees, alternative water supply surcharges, which I think many of the members are taking advantage of, and then obviously the typical monthly user fees where it comes on the water user's bill. So that's really what I have for you today. I'd be happy to take any questions, and I appreciate your time. I would like to thank Commissioner Lindsey for his dedicated service as chairman to the PRWC. He's provided great guidance to the group, and we really appreciate all that he's done for the PRWC, especially the time I've been executive director there. So thank you again, Commissioner Lindsey, and happy to take any questions. Questions. George, you got something to say? Eric was the right guy for the job. He's done a great job picking up where Ryan started when we first went on this endeavor. It's been a challenge early on working with all the municipalities and all the angst associated with that, but it's a great working team now. Everybody's pulling in the same direction. It is a regional problem with a regional solution, and it's moving forward. One question. Yeah, Neil. Eric, what is the logic behind the third-party operator? Yeah, really the PRWC is a very small governmental entity. We're all contract, I'm a contract employee. The concern was, especially amongst the member, was if we were to hire our own operators, typical to what utilities common do, you have your own operators, we might very well be pulling from all the operators that are working on four municipalities in Polk County. So, and also, the complications associated with operating a reverse osmosis facility are a little beyond what's typical for the region. So we thought it would be good to get the expertise from someone that is very familiar with reverse osmosis systems and also not tap on the county's resources and the members' resources for operators. You talked about, you know, the additional charges and how municipalities in the county are trying to figure out how that's going to work. When do you guess that people would start seeing additional charges on their water bills? George, you get the answer? Each of the municipalities are going through a rate study now, as we are. So there will come a time when each municipality will have a different calculation of how much, the coin of phrase, old water versus new water. So those systems that haven't updated their rates recently and have little old water and will require more new water, that blended average is going to be higher for them. Their connection fees will also increase. I expect our connection fees will increase also. But those systems that have a lot of old water and depend on little new water over time will have less rate impact. So no two systems fall in exactly the same category, but I think every system, every member system, even those who are just associate members now, need to stay ahead of their rate curve and not get behind so that if and when there is a necessity for an increase or connection fees, it's not so dramatic. But all of them are going through rate studies currently, as we are. And the rate studies will take a year or six months? I would expect we'll have something on the county level before the end of the year. Actually, Mr. Chair, the board will, on our April 12th agenda review work session, you are set to see a very comprehensive overview of our completed rate study and the adjustments being proposed, therefore. So most places will see some rate adjustment within the next year? I think so. What we will present to the board, I think we'll probably recommend effective October 1. Okay, all right, thanks. Anybody else? Thanks, Eric. Appreciate it. Thank you all. Good presentation. Mr. Chair, I have two items. G1, and these items normally will be on the consent agenda but placed under me for allowing a commission to abstain from voting. G1, approve the release of a surety in the amount of $380,375.54 in the form of a performance bond number GM-226202 for one college place. And it's recommended for approval. Chairman, item G1 and G2, I'll be recusing as I have a business relationship with the applicant. All right. Move approval. Second. Motion is second. Any questions? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Those like sign, motion carries. Mr. Chair, next item is G2. Approve the release of a warranty and surety in the amount of $243,409.46 in the form of a maintenance bond number GM-204417 for Estonia North and is recommended for approval. Motion for approval. Thank you. Got a motion and a second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Opposed? Like sign, motion carries. Anything else? Thank you, Mr. Chair, that's it. Everything I have under me. Mr. Beasley. Good morning, Mr. Chair, members of the board, members of the viewing audience. The manager's office will have seven items for board consideration this morning. Item number H1 is to request the board to approve a 10-year baseball sponsorship and host agreement with the Russ Matt organization. This is beginning current fiscal year FY23-24 to extend through fiscal year 32-33. This is a 10-year estimated investment of about $2,093,000. The Polk County Tourism and Sports Marketing Group recruits, partners, and manages special events to enhance the economic climate in Polk County. The proposed agreement is Polk's effort to partner with the Russ Matt organization to act as a community host for 10 annual baseball events, each lasting nine weeks, taking place in Polk County, beginning the current fiscal year 23-24 spring season, through the FY32-33 spring baseball season. Polk County Tourism and Sports Marketing Group will pay for all facility costs and for appropriate national marketing expenses, which are based upon each out-of-county team per competition day with set annual expenses such that the 10-year total facility cost is estimated not to exceed $1,468,000. The 10-year not to exceed promotional expenses are estimated at $625,000, where the total 10-year investment is estimated at $2,093,000. An estimated economic impact of over $435,000,000 will be generated by hosting these events in Polk County. Russ Matt is the world's largest collegiate baseball event and is larger than all other events of its kind combined. Russ Matt's annual spring training has brought hundreds of thousands of people to Polk County through its past 15 years' existence. The initial economic impact of this event does not include the added or repeated visitation by participants and fans that continue to travel here, making this event even more financially impactful to Polk County. Funds are available in the Tourism Tax Fund within the current fiscal year 23-24 budget and will be included as part of the annual budgeting process for the remaining term of the agreement. So, Mr. Chair, members of the Board, given the Board's, I think, commitment to local tourism, sports marketing, and economic development throughout Polk County, I would request that the Board approve the proposed agreement with the Russ Matt organization to extend these spring baseball activities in Polk County for another 10 years. For approval. Second. Got a motion and a second for approval. Any comments or questions? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed, like, signed, motion carries. Mr. Chair, members of the Board, item number H-2 is to request the Board approve a contract with the Peace River Center to help address and offset uncompensated expenses in connection with inpatient psychiatric services. This is a not-to-exceed annual amount of $1,492,262. The Peace River Center for Personal Development operates two crisis stabilization units, one located in Lakeland and one located in Bartow, with a total of 50 beds available each day. Patients admitted to these facilities for services have access to counseling, behavioral health, and crisis support services. The proposed funding provides financial support to the Peace River Center for uncompensated inpatient psychiatric services that they provide. Services eligible for reimbursement under this contract are for Polk County residents whose income is at or below 200 percent of the federal poverty guidelines and who are uninsured or are underinsured. Currently, the actual cost for a bed day at either of the crisis stabilization units is about $876. Peace River Center has funding sources for some unfunded clients. However, that source reimburses the Peace River Center at a rate of about $493 per bed day. The Peace River Center is attempting to cover the shortfall so that these critical, important services can continue to be provided. To assist the Peace River Center with covering some of that shortfall through our indigent health care program, a fee schedule has been established to reimburse the Peace River Center an additional $350 per patient per diem. This contract will be effective, effective January 1, 20 of this year, 2024, and conclude through September 30th of 2025. This item was presented to and is recommended to this board by the Citizens Health Care Oversight Committee. Funds are available and budgeted in the indigent health care fund for this designated initiative. So, Mr. Chair, members of the board, in keeping with the board's commitment to public health, I would request that the board approve the proposed contract with the Peace River Center for those uncompensated inpatient psychiatric services in the amounts that I've noted, not to exceed $1,492,262 annually. Motion for approval. Got a motion in a second. Larry, you want to come up and give us a little explanation of how this works? Yes, sir. Good morning, Mr. Chair. I'm Larry Williams, the CEO of Peace River Center. First of all, thank you for having me today and for voting on this very important topic. This commission in particular, and Polk County as a whole, has seen indigent health care, especially when it relates to mental illness, as a very important topic, and I appreciate each of you for that. We receive state funding in the amount, as Mr. Beasley said, of about $493. We average about 13 or 14 patients each month, or each day, sorry, that do not have any funds or any insurance or underinsured that would fall into this category, that would fall up under indigent health care, and we are asking for the county through its COC and indigent health care fund to support the folks that are being involuntarily Baker Acted into our facilities. I have two inpatient facilities, 50 beds, and like I said, 13 to 14 of those folks per day are unfunded or underfunded. So I would ask that you support this $350 per diem per person. Larry, how many Baker Acts come into you a day? For the year, I have the year. It's just under $3,500 a year. To me, we have two other receiving facilities. Lakeland Regional is a receiving facility at the hospital. They have the Harrells Behavioral Health Center. And then BayCare with Winter Haven has a receiving facility, much smaller than Lakeland Regional or myself, but they do have, I believe it's 8 to 12 beds, Winter Haven. And I guess the takeaway, at least for me for this, is the fact that the citizens of the county voted in an indigent care tax has allowed us to provide these services without feeling a whole lot of pain in the county. Anything else? No, sir. Yes, sir. Thanks each and every one of you for your passion for mental illness and indigent health care as a whole. $3,500, if I do my math correctly, is like almost $300 a month. Yeah, $10 a day. Is Marchman Act also a part of this or just Becker? Brack County. Brack County? Yes, sir. Thank you, Larry. Mr. Chair, I just also want to say that I'm glad that the monies that we are raising in taxes for the indigent health care is going to the right use. So kudos to your program and what you do. Also, Joy Johnson, thank you for leading the committee to invest money in our community and the health of our people. So thank you. Mr. Chairman, all are not Baker Act, though, right? Lakeland. All that don't have insurance are not Baker Act. I mean, is everything that you have there as a result of Baker Act? Everything in these two facilities we're talking about are a result of a Baker Act. Yes, sir. Thank you. Lakeland has about 88 beds that's strictly used for Baker Acts. I have 50. Winter Haven has 12, we'll say. I guess. Do we do anything for people who are uninsured and have no money but say, hey, I'm in need of some psychiatric help? Do we have options for them? Yes, sir. We have walk-ins that come in every day. So whether they come in and then we get either an APRN or a licensed mental health therapist to talk to them, if they meet the criteria for Baker Act, they're Baker Acted on a voluntary basis and come into our facility as well, whether they have money to pay or not. Okay. Well, you just helped me out. So you can Baker Act somebody voluntarily and it's not always involuntary. Correct. Thank you. Larry, just remember next time, bring that big check. Yes, sir. All right. Got a motion and a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Those like, aye. Motion carries. Thanks. Thank you, Larry. Mr. Chair, members of the board, item number H3 is to request the board approve a Florida Department of Environmental Protection grant agreement with Polk County to co-fund the Lake Lulu Wetland Restoration Project. This action will secure a one-time state revenue of $375,000 with a county matching commitment of $375,000. In 2021, Polk County was awarded a cooperative funding initiative grant from the Southwest Florida Water Management District to complete a Lake Lulu watershed assessment and plan. This project assessed the main causes of nutrient impairment within the lake and provided prioritized project concepts that would improve the natural systems and water quality. One of the top three projects was the acquisition and restoration of the south wetland on the shoreline of that lake. This area of the lake has remained unmanaged for many years, and as a result, this area contains extensive, excessive nuisance and invasive plant species. In 2023, Polk County acquired 120 acres on the southwest side of Lake Lulu in order to protect and restore these wetlands closer to their native ecological states. The restoration design includes the removal of invasives by mechanical and herbicide means and extensive planning of native wetland and aquatic species. Overall, this project will benefit the ecological communities and natural systems in and around the lake by providing restored wetland habitats along the southern shoreline. Additionally, the restored wetland area will help reduce nutrient pollution and provide new recreational opportunities. Collectively, this project will demonstrate local actions needed to address the state's degraded and impaired categorization of Lake Lulu. Funding from this state grant agreement will go directly towards the implementation of the already completed restoration design. This project comes to the board with the endorsement of the county's Stormwater Technical Advisory Committee. The project's matching funds are included in the current FY23-24 adopted community investment program by way of having assigned federal American Rescue Plan funds. The FY23-24 proposed community investment program will reflect the planned receipt of those state FDEP funds. So, Mr. Chair, members of the board, in keeping with what I believe is the board's commitment to the environmental stewardship, I would request that the board approve agreement number WRP08 with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection in the total amount of $750,000, all in connection with the Lake Lulu Wetland Restoration Project. So moved. Got a motion and a second for approval. Any questions, discussion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Those like, sign, motion carries. Mr. Chair, members of the board, item number H-4 is to request the board approve an agreement with Dream Tracks, LLC to design and build a world-class motocross track at Polk's Bone Valley ATV Park. This is a one-time expense not to exceed $240,075. In July of 2018, the county manager's office approved agreement number 18041 with Dream Tracks, whose services were acquired through a sole source solicitation in order to design and build an all-terrain vehicle open riding track on 12 acres located on the west end of the Bone Valley ATV Park. That agreement was for five years, which expired in July of 2023. As a result of the growing popularity of the Bone Valley ATV Park, Polk County issued a public notice of intent to sole source an agreement with Dream Tracks for the purpose of designing and construction of a 25-acre motocross track on the northern portion of the park property to create a venue for dirt bike practices and race events. No other vendors indicated they could provide such services, and as a result, Polk County has negotiated a five-year agreement in the amount of $240,075. That agreement provides for the design and development of additional track to be located on that northern section of the park. It is estimated that that motocross track will be complete and operational within 90 days of a notice to proceed. Any anticipated additional amendments to this agreement would be brought back to this board for approval that will request the vendor to design and develop further trails along with, one, providing for maintenance and repairs of the current tracks, two, providing training to county staff in the maintenance and repairs of tracks and trails, three, providing consultation services for the planning and execution of special events. Dream Tracks LLC is a Winter Haven company with a tremendous worldwide reputation within the off-road vehicle community. Having them continue to assist the county with development of the Bone Valley ATV Park, we believe, will greatly benefit the visitors and patrons of the park. Funds are available in the Special Revenue Grant Fund for this specific project. So, Mr. Chair, members of the board, in keeping with the board's commitment to the growing popularity of off-highway recreation, I would request that the board approve the proposed agreement with Dream Tracks LLC for those professional and construction support services in building the motocross facilities at the Bone Valley ATV Park in an amount not to exceed $240,075. Second. Got a motion and a second for approval. I got one question. I remember Friday when you were talking about it, you said that this company, Bill Strax, that they do some Red Bull events. Yes, sir. Could we assume that there's a potential there for Red Bull-sanctioned events to come to Polk County? I would think there's a pretty good opportunity. Yes, sir. Okay. All right. That'd be pretty cool. All right. Yes, sir. Who decides what world-class is, Gary? Oh, God. Oh. I do. More than local. Yeah. More than local. Yeah. I think to understand that, you have to understand Dream Tracks' place in the motocross environment. Again, they build everything for Red Bull, so the highest level riders in the world are riding those facilities. He also has a track facility in North Florida that probably the top ten riders in the world train at on a weekly basis. So he is at the upper level of doing this, and we're very lucky to have that resource in Polk County. We can legitimately say this will be a world-class facility. Absolutely. Compared to everything else in the world that we're aware of. Yes, sir. Got you. When they have that first Red Bull event, I think they need to open it. I don't know if you've seen the guy. He jumps out of an airplane without a parachute, and two guys jump out next to him, and he comes down drinking a Red Bull, throws the can out, and they jump on him and strap a parachute. That's impressive. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I want to see it. I just want to see it. So I attended a Red Bull event a few weeks ago, and that gentleman, Mr. Pastrana, was there at the event. Yes, sir. He's crazy. All right. All in favor, say aye. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed, like, sign, motion carries. Thank you, Derek. Mr. Chair, members of the board, item number H5, H6, and H7 are all directly related. They are connected to potential sites for expansion of the Polk Environmental Lands Program. Pursuant to a recommendation from the Conservation Land Acquisition Selection Advisory Committee, the Classic, item number H5 is to request the board consider property number EL-116-24 for acquisition as part of the future Polk Environmental Lands Program. As established through Resolution number 2023-009, dated February 7th of 2023, the Classic was created to assist and advise the board in determining the merits of land acquisition in accordance with Ordinance 22050. That ordinance provides that each potential site undergo a preliminary site assessment performed by the county to ensure the property meets the basic criteria of environmental lands that includes, one, water resources, two, natural communities and landscapes, three, plants and animals, four, human values, and five, management. Ordinance number 22050 authorizes the Classic to create a technical advisory group to assist in the site review and technical criteria review of candidate sites consistent with the criteria established by the governing ordinance. Site number EL-116-24, also known as the B-Bar J-Ranch site, has been reviewed by the technical advisory group where it has received a summary score of 72 out of a possible 118. The Classic has recommended this site for further acquisition considerations by the board. Today's decision has no current fiscal impacts. So, Mr. Chair, members of the board, before I make a recommendation, I'd like Ms. Tabitha Beal, if she would quickly just kind of run through the location, the characteristics of the site and the scoring of the site. Good morning, Commissioners. Just a review from Friday. This site is a two-parcel site just outside of the Lake Buffum area at the corner. I added a couple extra slides so you could see the characteristics of the site a little bit better from our tag evaluation. This is the conservation corridor map and how it matches up to other existing conservation areas. And the green are existing conservation areas and the red are the subject parcels. I reorganized this slide based on feedback from the commission. So, we do have our technical assessment group score. It's really to help, TAG's role is really to help put feet on the ground, take a look at the site, to evaluate and highlight any important water and natural resources that may be on the site. We do a summary score because it's the only way to summarize however many people are out on the site into one potential score. But I've also added the discussion from Classic and what they review. So, this site is already on the list for the Rural and Family Lands Program at the state level. So, the state could be a funding partner. And by putting this on our county, project lists can expedite that process at the state level. The corridor connection was pointed out for Lake Buffum conservation property to the county's Crooked Lake West property. And the water resources by protecting the headwaters of Bow Lakes Creek and the St. Cole Branch. And that led to classic recommendation to the board to pursue acquisition. I did want to take a chance to help with the score as well because I think that we do get focused and we're so used to looking at it as a grade score. I remind you from the previous program that we had, Circle B received a score of 44 out of 100. Our Samica site received a score of 56 out of 100. And our Lakeland Highland scrub received a 44 out of 100. And while there are similar criteria, we have changed the criteria a little bit. But it really, the tag levels to give you those on-the-ground resources to highlight what are special about the property from those experts that are on the field. And I'll turn it back over to Mr. Beasley. Mr. Chair, staff and the manager's office is consistent with the classic recommendations. I would request that the board accept or reject site number EL-116-24, also known as the B-Bar J-Ranch property, for further acquisition considerations. Move approval. Second. Got a motion and a second for approval. One question, Tabitha. Yes, sir. Does the tag group, if somebody picks up the phone and calls you and says, I want to put this in the protected lands, does the tag group respond to every one of those requests? I mean, or there's got to be land you can just look at and go, that doesn't stand a chance. We're not going to waste our time. At this point, we've put everything in. And we will, there are cases where if it is designated green space, a part of a development that there's no way and no reason, then we'll have those conversations with the landowner as those site nomination forms come in. But at this point, we have pushed everything forward. Okay. All right. Thanks. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. If the previous matrix scored Circle B at 42. 44. Sorry, sir. Okay. 44. Then I think the matrix needs to be revisited. We're giving participation ribbons to anything that comes in front of us. And from my standpoint, based on these scorings, I wouldn't be inclined to approve anything that had less than a 70%. So if the matrix needs to be revisited, then that's something that the committee and the staff ought to revisit. But right now, there's little or nothing that's turned away. So that's just my thought there. Yes, sir. And so I will say that we did modify the criteria from the first 20 years to this current set that we're in. But we do have a lot of the similarities. So I hear what you're saying. Neil? Related to Commissioner Lindsey's point, you said previous criteria. Is that from the original program versus the program today? Yes, sir. Well, we'd have to know what kind of differences and what the changes were from the old to the new, maybe to really understand what 44 would mean today. It was still out of 100, so I can tell you that much. So we're just going based on grade level. I think where we get stuck is that, as Mr. Beasley mentioned, is that we have a water resource criteria, and then we have a plants and animals criteria, and we have a natural landscape criteria, and human dimensions, which we talked about as more recreation. Those aren't equally weighted kind of things. So those are just to highlight sort of for each property what stands out. So if they score high in one area, the water resources stands out. If they score high in connectivity, the natural landscape. So I think that breakdown is useful, but I'm at the pleasure of the board. Further on Commissioner Lindsey's point, is it too late to change? Have we got some kind of set in stone, chiseled by the voters on the metrics? Because, you know, when you get down, start getting involved in stuff, you realize sometimes that adjustments can or should be made, and that's one thing that I was talking about, the human value. I didn't really understand what human – I don't think I approved that. I must admit I wouldn't get to the boys' room that day or something because, you know, my interest is in access, public access, and recreational opportunities. I mean, that, to me, needs to be high up on the list, but is it too late to make any changes based on what we approved? And I see Rainey's got his hand up on this one. Mr. Chair, those are within the ordinance that was approved by the citizens. That's not what we created through resolution. Those were actually the criteria that was in the ordinance itself that was approved by the voters. And if I may mention also to the boards may not be familiar with, but not the same people show up at each one of these properties. So you have different individuals who are grading these properties at different levels and so forth. So that's something to keep in mind. And not only at least it gives the board discretion, it gives them guidance, but this board only has discretion to make that determination whether or not to move forward with a – to pursue acquisition or not at all times. And it can be based on the score or based on your overview of the whole program itself. Mr. Chairman, you know, as everyone knows, I sit on the chair of this. And I think it's a little early to be looking at changing scoring. You know, at this time and point, you know, probably half of these ones that we have on our list that we have approved won't never go anywhere. You know, everybody's sitting here and saying, well, man, y'all have approved this one, that one, you only disapproved two or three. How do you pay for that? We're so early into this deal, it's unbelievable. But this is the deal. I go out to a lot of these and look at them. I'm not a scientist by no means. I'm not a water person by no means to the degrees. But I've lived in Poe County and I've about been on every piece of these grounds that we've been on in my life. And I know what happens there. So we look at what I think is a positive situation for, you know, these lands for the county. Now, if I, you know, in our – in the classic meetings, if we see where – I think everybody gets so intense on these numbers. I mean, it's – I mean, it's a good – if you don't know anything about it, maybe you can. And do we need to change it for somebody to understand the numbers? Well, one person might and the other person might not understand the new way. But at the end of the day, you know, these properties have got a long ways to go before we get to a point where they're going to be acquired either way by easements or purchase. And, you know, we have got some to work with now. Now, we can move on. Yeah, we can get a little stronger on turning some down. But, you know, they've got to be the right piece of land. And I don't really go with numbers that much. I appreciate all the people that look at the scientists and everybody. But, you know, we look at most of the people on this board, on the classic board, looks at the – they do look at those numbers. And they – we take it seriously. But at the end of the day, we've been out there walking on it, looking at it. And I think it's something – you know, we all think it's something to consider. So this board can do what we want to. But I think we just need to – let's move down the road here a little bit and see what's happening. Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chair. One of the things that I requested – yeah, you're right. Just looking at the numbers is so deceiving. And it comes from many people providing their expertise in this area. But, you know, when I see a 72 out of 100, I automatically think about a D or an F. And I've said this on Friday. School teacher. That's right. I know my education background. But I am glad, and I'm glad to see it today, that we requested some input or some comments from the committee to tell us why they chose this in spite of the high number or the low number. I know the committee has also recommended not to approve certain – they have had high scores and not to approve them for the different reasons. So I appreciate the comments coming from the discussion because that gives me a better or a clearer picture as to why this is being recommended. To the commissioner's point, it's – 72 is not out of 100. It's 72 out of 118. That is true. So that pulls the percentage passing grade down. I think part of the deliberation needs to also be considered that you can't always quantify. If we don't acquire this property, or what? If we don't, and it's – I think we got one later on the list – unreclaimed mine land that's landlocked, I wouldn't put that very high on our list. So I think there's an or what factor that needs to take into consideration where we spend our limited resources. My take is just take the number off and do like every other recommendation that we get for every other project and everything we do in this business. If we look at the staff, either they recommend we approve it or they don't, you know, and we just go with that. But, I mean, that's a real simple way of doing it. Anything else? Do we have a motion and a second? I can't remember. It's been so long. Is there any fish in that pond? Well, actually, Commissioner Comby did make a motion. Do we have a motion and a second already? Yeah. Okay. We got a motion and a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Aye. Okay. Motion carries next. Mr. Chair, again, pursuant to a recommendation from the classic item number H-6 is to request the board to consider property designated as number EL-117-24 for acquisition as part of the Future Environmental Lands Program. Site EL-117-24, also known as the OM Holdings property, has been reviewed by the TAG where it received a summary score of 64 out of a possible 118. The classic has recommended the site for further acquisition considerations by the board. Today's decision has no current fiscal impacts, and before I make a recommendation to the board, I'd let Tabitha kind of quickly walk through where the location is, the characteristics of the site, and the scoring of the site. This property is located just on the northwest corner of Bartow off of E.F. Griffin Road. Again, added some more photos for you guys to see, but a little bit of the landscape that is on this piece of property. This property's conservation corridor also provides a recreation corridor from the Lake Hancock properties over to Lakeland Highlands Scrub, Seven Wetlands, and Loyce E. Hart Park. The OM Holdings tag score was a 64, but the classic comment, and it had several comments on this, the project does have potential for federal appropriations. It's identified as a Florida Communities Trust project, making both state and federal government funding partners. Also, the funding for this project is available from the non-mandatory mine land funds at the state for restoration. It was identified as a water resource protection of surface and groundwater and potential water quality project. It provides potential for Phyllis Branch and Bear Creek restoration that leads to lower Saddle Creek and Peace River, as well as on-site restoration. And then the property is a crucial corridor in connection for a regional recreation trail and wildlife corridor from Lake Hancock, from the Panther Point Trail over to Lakeland Highlands Scrub. And this led to the classic recommendation to pursue acquisition. Any questions? I would move approval of the recommendation. Second. Okay, you got a motion and a second. All in favor, say aye. Discussion. I'm sorry, yeah, discussion. I just want to say, initially, when I looked at this and saw that we were looking at a piece of formerly mined property, my initial reaction was, nah, this is a good idea. But then, after listening to Tabitha and Gay talk and the opportunities that, you know, could be created between Lake Hancock and South Lakeland, and I don't think that there are too many diamonds left in Polk County, unfortunately, that aren't already in public ownership. The idea here is to preserve land, to conserve land, to set it aside. And my issue, and maybe it gets more important to me every day when I see what's going on in the county, is public access, recreational opportunities for people. I have to believe when people voted for this, that's what a lot of people had in mind. And they thought that this would provide a place for them and their kids to go. So my emphasis, personally, wants to be on situations and properties where we can create better access and any kind of public access. But the more the merrier, as far as I'm concerned, to the extent, you know, we can do it. And I think this would be, I think back to Saddle Creek and the people who have fished out there. Now, back in the old days, a lot of people fished out there because they needed to get something to eat. You know, they fished with cane poles and buckets, but it created a lot of opportunities for kids, people who didn't have a boat. And I'm thinking, hey, maybe this is a place where we can do that. And we make that connection between Phyllis Branch and Bear Branch and the Highland Scrub and Panther Point. So, and I think, again, and Commissioner Lindsay is as smart as I am or smarter, and I would, I think, and I think if we think about it, when you have a property that scores low, whether it's a 72 or a 64 or a 49, the price that maybe we are ultimately willing to pay for that will be reflected by that score and will be part of consideration on what ultimately is offered, if any offer is made at all. So, so that's where I am, Mr. Chairman. Anybody else? Yeah, I would, I would just like to say that I'm, I'm, I'm going to agree with you, Mr. Chair, what you just stated earlier about leaving the tag score out and just put the classic comments and, and then either the classic committee approves it or, or recommends it or not, because I think that, that score just throws everything off. It confuses us. Yeah, I had to step out for a minute, but, you know, just on this piece right here, you know, just, you know, one thing sticks out in my mind and cause it, it affects me also. So, uh, when the water, water coming from there comes down, hooks into Bear Creek there and comes into Peace River right there on, on our place. And, uh, you know, and that's, Tabitha, that was some of the worst water coming anywhere, wasn't it? Yes, sir. And the Bear Creek branches. Yeah. And so, I mean, looking at all the other things that we talk about, but that's one thing there that we need to, you know, that we will be able to affect and, and try to help. And, uh, that's something we always need to do. So, I mean, it might not score high, but there's a lot of, a lot of things on there that can be worked with. And, and again, like I said earlier, this might not ever get there down the road, but we'll give it our best shot and see what happens. All right. I already forgot again. Did we get a motion in a second? All right. Motion in a second. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed. Aye. Okay. Motion carries. Mr. Chair, final, final item. Uh, again, pursuant to a recommendation from the classic, item number H7, is to request the board consider property identified as E number EL-118-24 for acquisition as part of the future Polk Environmental Lands Program. Site EL-118, uh, EL-118-24, also known as the Davenport Lots property, has been reviewed by the TAG, where it received a summary score of 88 out of 118 possible. The classic has recommended this site for further acquisition considerations by the board, and today's decisions, uh, will not have a financial impact to the county. Uh, and again, prior to the board's decisions, I'd like Tabitha to kind of walk the board through location, characteristics, and scoring. So this property is located just behind the Posner Park and just south of I-4, um, in an area where there's not a lot of green space, which was noted by classic as we move forward. Um, and just some typical pictures of the site, um, good diversity of habitats, a lot of water is stored in this location. Not really much of a conservation corridor connection, it's just truly protecting green space in an area that doesn't have green space. Um, that was, uh, the technical assessment group scored it as an 88. I mean, classic made some, a lot of comments on this project. It was a mega, it's a mega parcel project, so to describe that, it's broken up an acre and quarter lots, um, which can be difficult for acquisition, but it is doable. We are working on other mega parcel acquisitions in the county as well. This area of the county has little green space remaining, and the project provides a great area for green space for the region. The project may be isolated, but it does adjoin the green space from the Posner Park project itself. Um, classic pointed that out. The property is holding a lot of water. The water from the marsh system forms horse creek that leads towards the Lake Marion system. And management of the site should be fairly easy once acquired. The habitats are in good condition and could allow for passive outdoor recreation. And those things are what led to classic making the recommendation to pursued acquisition of this piece. Motion for approval. Second. Motion and second. Any discussion? Yeah. Uh, land sales subdivisions are a curse on this county. Uh, you know, I tried to get the county interested in this back, uh, back in the nineties because of, uh, the fact that it really wasn't much of an opportunity for anybody to develop because of the ownership was, uh, so wide and varied and you would never get them to agree. So somebody was able to put something together here and I think it's great. My question, and this may be an uncomfortable question and maybe one that you haven't considered yet, uh, and you'll cross the bridge when we get to it. But, uh, right now somebody's got livestock on it. Obviously, uh, they're running over the entire property. I assume. Will there come a time when we say, okay, we're going to, let's just say we make a, a, a, a deal. We get this ball. Will we go in and fence it, uh, just to incorporate the public's land and, uh, and give up on the other. I mean, what, what's the thought on that? Because at some point that's got to be talked about. I can help you on that. Okay. You know, at this point in time, it's going to be all in negotiations with the owner. It depends on what they want. I mean, they can say they want to, they were steadfast about running cattle on it. If that's what you're asking. No, no, no. I'm saying I'm beyond that. We've, we've made a deal. We're going to buy the property, but now we, we have to secure the taxpayer's property. And there's a lot of zigs and zags and jigs and jogs. And that's the guy who's got the cattle. Show me the lease and the property that's covered by the lease. Well, I'm talking about, are we going to secure our property? We're going to fence it and say, this is ours. This is somebody else. You're talking about, we got a piece over here and it's surrounded by unsecured pieces. How are we going to secure our piece? Yeah. Well, will we say, okay, we're not, we're not pursuing anymore. We're going to secure the taxpayer's property. And then we're going to try to provide public use. Right. I think that is in the, the, you know, the future globe kind of thing. And what we look for in these mega parcels is to secure big chunks. And if we are successful in getting a large area that does seem appropriate, we could take those actions to fence at that time. But that would take a lot. I mean, that's way future to discuss those options. Any more bad questions? Just kidding. All right. You got a motion to say all in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed, like sign. Thank you, everyone. That's it, Mr. Chair. George. Nothing. Right. Nope. Martha. Yes, thank you. It's been a busy week, but a very, a very nice one for, for the citizens of Polk County. We, we were able to thank and celebrate many volunteers that we have for Polk County. And that was a very good celebration for them. We also went and attended the Avello announcement. That's our, our new airlines that is coming into Lakeland. And their new first destination they announced is for Connecticut. And which one? New Haven. New Haven. Thank you. And then we also went to a Polk Parkway opening ceremony. And last we was in the, um, uh, history center for the legacy in Polk County recognition where we recognized the first, uh, woman, uh, County commissioner and the first African American County commissioner. So it was a good week. Thank you for the invitations and for allowing me to be part of that. All right. That's it. Neil. Uh, yes, sir. Uh, I would like to reappoint Stephen Calagridis to serve as a member of the housing finance authority for the four year term, March 1st, 2024 to February 29th, 2028. Got a motion and a second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. Nothing else. Nothing else. Um, I got a couple of things. John Bodie, can you come forward while I make a couple of comments? Uh, Polk Parkway exit 14 is closed. Uh, the Turnpike authority said there would, uh, be about 200 and something, uh, cars per hour at peak time affected. Uh, I was behind all 224 of those cars at highway 98 this morning. So I think it's probably going to have a bigger effect than, than what anybody imagined. Um, Braddock road interchange opened up, uh, for those of you in North Auburndale, maybe bulk city, that's kind of a big deal for us. So, uh, that's great. John, the question I have, I, I'm, I'm watching the news a couple of nights ago and I don't think this could happen in Polk County, but I want to make sure it can. It was either Manatee or Sarasota. That County has allowed a developer to go in there with hundreds of homes before the roads were finished. So they've got dirt roads and all these new homes. And now the developer has said, sayonara, I'm out of here. Can that even happen in Polk County? Is there a potential for that? So, uh, for the record, John Bodie, uh, you can get a building permit for model homes without all the infrastructure being completed yet. You have to put up a bond for that to, to complete that. We do not issue a CEO. So nobody could move in, but you could issue building permits while the infrastructure is being completed, but we would not issue a CEO until that work is completed. Well, yeah. And, and a CEO obviously was issued because these people are living there and it's happened. This has been going on for several years. And what's happened now is the, the roads are washing out and of course, who's going to pay for it. So I just, that's all I want to know. Could it happen here? Obviously it can't. So we're good. It would not. And we would have a, like I said, we would have a surety or some sort of performance bond. If the local government had to go in and finish that, there's something that we could pull from to do that. Usually it's at 120% that we can able to do that. In fact, the law just changed. The governor signs a particular bill. It goes up to 130% that they would put up as, as far as performance, uh, before to, to be able to plat. So where was this taking place? It was Manatee or Sarasota County. George, are you familiar with it? Nope. Not Pasco. Was it Pasco? It was Pasco. Maybe it was. I thought it was south of here, but it was a real cluster. I'll tell you that. It could be. And, and John's right when you, before that planning process goes through, the staff visit the sites, have a, uh, make a list of the items that are unfinished. And the, between the, uh, developers engineer and the county staff, they agree on a value of what's not done. And then 20, 25 or 30% is added to that number. In fact, I think on our agenda here this morning, we, we refunded some bonds that were posted for that purpose or partly for this one. I'm not sure if it was a completion bond or, or a warranty bond. I'm not. Same, same thing. Right. So you, you have money in the bank to cover the shortfall with, with, uh, a premium added to that. Yeah. And, and, and I don't know whether they neglected the bond part of it or not because the, and of course it's on TV. So it, who knows if it's right or not, you know? Um, but the bottom line was the county was looking at something like an MSBU on the residents to pay for it. And we're talking, that would be a huge hit on a resident. I mean, but the holdup here, the holdup here, of course, is a certificate of occupancy. Yeah. So, and we have a mechanism. So good job, John. I saw it. Yeah. It was not a pretty site. I don't know which county it was in. Yeah. I designed it now, but I saw it, uh, potholes and. Yeah. Three foot. Well, we don't want that here. New homes. All right. All right. That's all I got, um, two, two, two, two, two, two, two, two, two, two, two, two, two, public hearings. Public hearings. Yep. It's time. All right. Mr. Chair, before we go into the public hearings, I will go over the public hearing general procedures. We ask that you please turn off your cell phones or 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. Individuals speaking during public comment section of a matter will be strictly limited three minutes. The board is experiencing these matters is able to discern what is legally relevant to an issue and what is not information is irrelevant and 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 of terms, shouting out from the audience, disrespectful 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 the proceedings and that for such purposes, you may need to assure that a verbatim record of the proceedings is made, which the record includes as 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 and present testimony today must be sworn in. 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 the following questions. Anyone who's going to speak today, please stand. Do you swear or affirm the testimony or evidence you provide to the commission today is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? All right, thank you. Mr. Chair, at this time, the first matter that we have is expedited hearings. I will go over the expedited hearing procedures at this time. Expedited hearings are held pursuant to Resolution No. 2022-089. Expedited hearings are used when no opposition was present at the Planning Commission hearing. The applicant agrees to the expedited hearing, and 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 Gen 9 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 Gen 9 are deemed experts for the purpose of the land use case. Now at this time, I'll turn it over to Mr. Zisco to present the expedited cases. Thank you, Mr. Mink. Good morning, Chairman, members of the board. For the record, Ben Zisco, Land Development Director. We have one item on your expedited public hearing portion of the agenda today. Item number 01 is an expedited public hearing for case LDCT 2024-2, Townhomes LDC Text Amendment to consider the adoption of a county-initiated request to clarify the approval process and development standards for multifamily townhome developments. Specifically, this amendment will provide that townhomes, whether platted or unplatted, whether for sale or for rent, are considered multifamily with regards to the land development code. This is a continuing effort by land development staff to provide clarity and consistency in applying the land development regulations within the county. At our agenda review on Friday, Commissioner Lindsay expressed concern that townhomes be on an even playing field, regardless of whether they are platted or unplatted. And staff has reviewed the language and confirms that this amendment does that, that by adopting this ordinance, all townhomes, whether they are owner or renter, will have the same development standards and the same approval processes. This is the first reading of a text amendment, so following any comments or questions today, no action is required by the board. Anybody? Questions? I got a question. After Friday, I got to thinking about this. So you can actually plot a, you can plot townhomes where the property line is that shared wall between townhomes? Yes. Wow. I never knew that. All right. Anybody else? No action? Required? Moving on. Second, Mr. Chair. If we may, we still need to open a public hearing. Oh, I'm sorry. Yep. I'll open a public hearing. Anyone wanting to speak on this matter, please come forward. Seeing nobody, I'll close the public hearing, and we'll move on to the next item. Thanks, Randy. Thank you, Mr. Chair. The next item is the Greenleaf CDD. As Mr. Pearson walks up, if I may, Mr. Chair, I'd like to go over a couple items. Mr. Chair, for the benefit of the public that is here to speak on this matter, it may help guide the public comment if they are aware of the limited review which the board has in reviewing applications of CDDs. First, it's important to point out that the board is reviewing a CDD, is not reviewing a land use change. By approving a CDD, the board is not approving a development. The development occurring in the CDD will occur through its entitlements allowed under land use regulations. The board's review is governed by statute and is limited to six specific items provided by the statute, which the planner will go over during the presentation. The state law governing CDD goes as far as stating that any matter of concern, permitting or planning of the development is not material or relevant. relevant, contrary to what was reported in the media, the board will be voting on the matter today. Thank you. Eric? Good morning, Commissioners. Eric Peterson for the Land Development Division. LDCDD-2024-1 was advertised per Florida statutes in the Lakeland Ledger on March 5th, March 12th, March 19th, and March 26th. Staffers received 10 emails in opposition. I believe they're attached to your packet. The CDD is not a change in land uses. It's not a change in density or intensity. It does not go by the same advertising requirements as a standard land use case, which we would post and things of that nature. So I just want to make that clear that this went by what statutes calls for advertisement. The request is for a CDD for 423 single-family detached residential units, the location of which is on Lake Marion Road right at the bend. This is south of Haynes City, north of Dundee, east of Lake Hamilton. It is next to the Greenleaf as we know it today. It is not any part of the developed portion of Greenleaf. This is not included in today's CDD request. The CDD request is just for an undeveloped area at the bend here south of Lake Marion Road. Property is residential low X. This is vested for five units to the acre, and there is currently a development request in review. This property is part of the Greenleaf utility enclave area. It carries different standards than the rest of the county. The development is LDRES-2024-7. It lays out like this on the property. This is the proposed capital improvements budget and operation maintenance entities for the parts of the CDD. There are wastewater connections. You have in your packet a report on the wastewater and water treatment plants. There is enough capacity to serve these 423 units in the CDD. There are six criteria the board decides upon when adopting a community development district. First off, that all statements in the petition are correct. Staff has confirmed that all statements provided in the petition are correct. It is consistent with the comprehensive plan. As I mentioned before, it is vested for five units to the acre. They're developing at about 4.12. The CDD is of sufficient size. It's compact and it's contiguous. The CDD offers an alternative source of funding to the developer, and it also protects the county from future obligations by its residents. The CDD is compatible with services and facilities. It is in the staff report listed every needed source of infrastructure is available to the site. Authorization is provided by the property owners this time. There's only four parcels, and we have the owner's authorization from all of them. So with that, I'll state that this CDD meets the state requirements for adoption, and I'll stand for questions. So, Aaron, it's vested for five per acre right now? Yes, yes. Back in 2008, there was a comprehensive plan amendment to expand the utility enclave area to include this parcel. It was also, there was a text amendment that went through in the land development code specifically for the utility enclave area. That was adopted in 2009. There was a plan development adopted. They are not building out to the same intensity as that plan development. They're actually going less. This property entitlements that were under the previous plan development allowed them to have townhouses. They're not opting for that. The current request is just for single-family detached lots 50 through 70 feet wide. Will they need to come to us for approval for these 423 homes? No, sir. They could build that. It's under review. I'm trying to make that point. There's going to be 423 homes built here regardless of what this board decides. The CDD today is just to approve a funding mechanism to do that. And if we don't approve it, they'll just go somewhere else and borrow money. I mean, it's just that simple. Mr. Chairman, that can't be true. I believe it is. There's no site plan that would come before this board? It's just go do what you want to do? The site plan has been approved? Yes. By who? By the board back in 2009. When you make a comp plan. How long is it good for? Residential projects and mixed-use projects once adopted are good for their entirety of their build-out. Well, it never even started. It's been 9, 15 years. So in 15 years, it's still legitimate as it was in 2009. Yes. Our residential developments and our mixed-use developments do not expire once approved. The other question was, you said they're going less here under the site plan, but I heard something when we met with residents, you and I and others on Friday, that they had to back down because they're limited by water and sewer or limited by something, by the ability to bond or through the CDD? Well, currently, going back to the future land-use map, the developer owns more of Greenleaf and has the intention to develop that further. However, the land uses are not consistent with their petition that was submitted, so they scaled it back to be consistent with the land-use provisions in this one. If they not have changed the site plan if it was approved in 2009 and now it's being scaled back for reasons because of limitations from external stuff, how can it be approved then? A more intensive approval can always be scaled back to a lesser intensive approval. Is that in writing somewhere? Yes, that's in the land development code under the minor modification criteria. So it just says? 906E. So it just says you can do this. You don't need to come talk to us about it. But if you're going less, you've got the green light. Yes, sir. And they know it's less because they say it's less. Yes. If they want to increase the density or they want to increase the land area, that would prompt it to come back in for review. Well, it sounds like the only interest we have in it would be the density. You can't get any more density. But is there any other limitations that occur through that site plan that was approved in 2009 that they can change and you don't have to? I mean, I don't know if there's any kind of open space, if there's any kind of, you know, any playground stuff. Is there any of that stuff in here? Yes, our standards are actually better than they were back then. So we do require the open space today. They have to meet those requirements. They'll have, of course, have sidewalks on both sides of the street, though I think they might have been planning for it back then. The recreation amenities are also a portion. The stormwater retention ponds, in order to be counted for open space, have to be of, you know, a curve or linear or incorporated into the recreation. These are standards that are better. They also have to meet the 25-foot setback for garages. Mr. Chairman, one thing you said, Eric, was you said that the CDD protects the county from financial liability. Yes, yes, because when the CDD, when the infrastructure within the development that might be accepted by the county otherwise is under the CDD, then improvements in maintenance fall to the taxpayers within the CDD and not upon the general fund. So it can be substantial. It can be minor, like the street lighting, for instance. They won't be part of a street lighting district. The CDD will operate the street lighting in this development. A CDD becomes like a government entity, right? Yes, it's close to being a city. The police powers just fall short of that which a city would have. But they can – they will be elected. The members of the CDD board will be elected by the property owners. They will – it will – you know, we will run the elections through them. It's like a HOA on steroids. Yeah, yeah. And you'll have a CDD and HOA on top of that probably. Yes. And this has been my – the only problem I have with CDDs. I know individuals personally who they buy into these homes in CDDs and they think the CDD assessment is a one-time fee. It's their property taxes for the rest of their life. No, no. There's a payoff. Well, yeah, but 20, 30 years, but yeah. And they have the right to pay it off early if they choose to. Right, right. So it's not in perpetuity like property taxes. It has a sunset. 20 or 30 years. Correct. Yeah. But, I mean, they're going in there thinking it's one. And I know that's their fault for not knowing, but it's like so many other things at the closing on a piece of property. There's easy ways to not know. So any CDD language has to be in all caps and bold type on any contract. Martha. So for clarification, today we're looking at the CDD, which is a funding mechanism, but are you saying since 2009 the 423 units for that area has been approved? Yes, ma'am. Actually more. And that is not coming before us again, unless they want to do a, increase the units. Yes. If they wanted to turn this into multifamily, they'd probably have to come in for a land use amendment. Land use. Yeah. But the single family was what was approved. Okay. You got a comment? Anybody else? Well, I don't have a comment. No, I just, I'll, I'll wait. Okay. Okay. Now you have all heard what, what we're discussing here. First of all, is the applicant here? We do have the applicant here. We'll open up a public hearing and have the applicant start us off. Good morning. My name is Jarrett Earlywine. I'm with QTAC Rock here on behalf of the petitioner. We have with us also Jonathan Hall and Dave Truxton from the applicant. And we've got Daniel Kovacs from Tracked Engineering and Craig Rothell from Rothell Hunt & Associates. In support of our petition, we filed not just our petition, but also some pre-filed testimony from two expert witnesses. That includes Mr. Rothell and Mr. Kovacs. Mr. Kovacs is a longtime engineer, has a planning background as well. And Mr. Rothell is a longtime assessment consultant and district manager for almost 200 CDDs in Florida. Based on that record evidence that you have, we've established all six of the criteria for you all to make a decision today in favor of the CDD. And I think that's probably the first point that I would make. I've also reviewed the questions and comments that we've gotten from the residents and also some of the questions and comments we heard up here. I think there's probably two things worth saying. One is, and I think a lot of you all have already been saying this, the project is already approved and it's moving forward. So the question is, are you going to have just an HOA maintain it or are you going to have a CDD help finance and manage that project? And by comparison, the CDD is a much more robust and powerful entity for taking care of these assets. In fact, this project with over $16 million in infrastructure, over 400 homes, is sort of in the sweet spot for when you'd want to have a CDD. It allows us to bring forward less expensive infrastructure, right, on the front end, which the residents can go back when they've got to refurbish their stormwater ponds and other infrastructure later on. They can access that tax-exempt bond market, save themselves some money later on. But it's also a much more robust operations and maintenance entity. We're able to collect on the tax roll. So when Mr. Peterson is talking about it not being a headache for the county to take care of assets in the community, you know, during the Great Recession, after the Great Recession, a lot of cities and counties around the state had trouble with HOAs. They would come to the county or city and say, we can't take care of our stormwater ponds. We can't take care of our roads. Would y'all take these from us? Because they had to put liens on houses in order to collect their revenues. CD doesn't have to do that. They can collect on the tax roll. They also have FEMA funding, which HOAs can't necessarily get. They have sovereign immunity protection. So if you compare HOA liability and CD liability, the CD is a much more protected entity from that kind of thing. And it's a more transparent entity as well. It's disclosed in the closing documents. It's on the closing statement itself. There's numerous recordable documents about the CD. And it also has to meet certain governmental requirements, Sunshine Laws and Public Records Laws. And other forms of disclosure. So it's a very transparent entity. It makes it a really robust management entity as compared to an HOA. So the first point is, as you all have said, this has nothing to do with the entitlements. The project is moving forward. The question is, do you want a CD or do you want an HOA to manage this stuff? The CD is a much better entity. In fact, if you look at the top 50 master plan communities in the nation, the top 50 in the nation, 17 of those are actually in Florida. And aside from two Margaritavilles and one other property, all the rest of them are CDD communities. So they sell really well. People like them. And once they get in, they can actually work on the board. They like them because they can do more things with them in terms of taking care of their property and maintaining their property values. So the other question that we got, aside from sort of the project-related components, is will we be burdened with the cost of this? Absolutely not. Existing residents who already live around the neighboring communities and whatnot, they're not subject to the CDD assessments at all. The CDD can only impose assessments within its own boundaries. Growth will pay for itself. It doesn't impose any obligation on anybody else. In fact, I just did a re-development project in another jurisdiction, and the neighboring residents came forward and said they actually submitted a letter in support of our petition. And the reason was it's for stormwater purposes. They like the idea that our stormwater system wouldn't flood theirs or would be less likely to flood theirs because we were able to get FEMA funding. We could like to go on the tax roll and better take care of that infrastructure. So it really is a great structure. I'm happy to answer any questions. And if I could just reserve some time to respond to any further questions, we really appreciate it. You said that people like them because they can do more with them versus an HOA. Well, I think Commissioner or Chairman has said you're going to have a CDD and an HOA, so you're still going to have an HOA there, right? The HOA typically does architectural control for something like this, so the CDD can't manage individual property homes, so you have both entities. That's correct. Give me some examples of what they could do beyond, you know, what you all plan to do on day one. What else can you do with a CDD? Well, so one thing that happens and has happened with CDDs is we have hurricanes in Florida, right? And they come through. They tear up landscaping. They tear up stormwater facilities. And so CDDs have been able to apply for FEMA funding. They can also, because they can collect on the tax roll, they can better restore that property to the condition it's supposed to be in, and they can apply for FEMA funding. That's something that an HOA can't do. Also, if there's an accident on the property, on the, you know, we're going to take care of the roundabout, for example, and there's a lawsuit because a car runs in the roundabout and there's an accident there. We get sued, maybe it's frivolous, maybe it's not, but the CDD's liability would be capped by sovereign immunity protection, and their insurance is better, too. Just to understand, though, the CDD can, down the road, if it's necessary, need be, they can impose additional taxes on to fix problems? Just on the residents within their community. That's correct. Right. Just like a, I mean, an HOA would have to do the same thing. If you had an HOA that was taking care of all this stuff, they would have to manage the assets as well. The problem is, it's really hard for an HOA to get a loan, so if there's a major repair project or something, going out and getting a loan from a bank from an HOA is a problem. Thank you. Yes, sir. Anybody else? All right, I've got, I'll open up the remainder of the public hearing to, I've got nine people here. Greg Lawhorn, if you'll come up, I believe you want to introduce yourself and the people. But, again, I just want to point out, this deal's done. It's going through. There's nothing this board's going to do to stop it or change it. This is just approval of a CDD. Go ahead. All right, good morning. Glenn Lawhorn, 11,000 Jim Edwards Road, Haynes City. I just wanted to first come and introduce everybody that came, took their day off work, to come and show their opposition to this. We don't want this CDD in our neighborhood, so if everybody from the opposition would stand up. Okay. We've got a lot of people. A lot of people aren't really happy about this. I just wanted to make a few points. CDDs as a whole are bad. I've had many conversations with Anthony Deal, who's the city manager from Seminole, past city manager for Haynes City, and she explained how a lot of these CDDs work. The more I learned about them, the more I don't like them, and you shouldn't like them either because they impose an awful lot of ill will on the people that move into these homes. Like you were discussing a minute ago, almost $39,000 in fees to the person that's going to buy one of these lots right out of the gate, and that money never ends. They say it does, but there's always an HOA fee, an impact fee, something that comes down the line that gets these folks. The other thing that I want to say is what they're trying to do, there's a lot more to this story than meets the eye. I think Commissioner Cumbie kind of understands where that's coming from back in 2009 when that land use change was done. I thought it had a sunset date as well for that kind of density that they put out there. Let me get at the point. CDDs are bad, and what that's going to do is you're going to take this whole area, all this, all around here. This is all ARR properties, all down this side of Lake Marion. This is all ARR properties, every bit of this, all the way down here. All of this property is ARR, one home per five acres, and you're going to allow this guy to drop 423 houses on 100 acres or less right in the middle of our urban society. I mean, our suburban, what do you call it, rural area. We're ruralized. We intend on staying that way. I understand that land use change is already done. I get that. But I believe if you deny this CDD to this guy, you're going to stop him, I do believe, because the funding mechanism that he has is not there. If he's such a good developer, he needs to go to the bank and get a loan from the bank, not from the backs of people that are going to hold the bond on this, because if the CDD fails, the county ultimately will end up taking care of it. The other point I wanted to make on the screen, if I can get back to that, where it showed ultimately who's responsible for the maintenance of this place, the county is still going to be on the hook for the roads, all the fire, EMS, and services that goes along with it, and ultimately can be responsible for the water and sewer. So thank you. Appreciate you. Randy, what he said, can we be on the hook for water and sewer? I'll have to look at the, if you can bring that up, Eric, see what was included in it. The Greenleaf water and wastewater system is a private system, and it's under control by the same company as the developer, I believe. Yes, I'm trying to figure out how we would be responsible for it. It's a private, yes, we're not responsible at all. So if it fails, the residents? Yeah, unless it goes into receivership, he may be referring to that. Only if something went into receivership, it could end up in our hands like any other utility. Everything ends up in our hands in receivership. George? If it defaulted any matter, the bondholders would step in and take over, just like a foreclosure in a bank. All right, my next question to Randy, if we deny the CDD, we have had this conversation several times publicly at this board, what's going to happen? Well, they would challenge it, I believe, over, I believe it would go to circuit court. I think I said DOA last at the agenda review, but that was mixing that up with when it goes through the FLAWA process. But ultimately, the courts don't look at those six items and see where did they not meet those six items. Not whether, not like a land use change, consistency or compatibility and stuff, but whether or not, which one of those six items did they not meet. That's what the boards won't look at. Okay, all right, thanks. I mean, the court. Yeah. Jeffrey Colburn? Morning, commissioners. Jeffrey Colburn. I live at 8337 West Lake Marion Road, right across the street from the development. I got some notes here, so I stay on track. I'm here today before you as a concerned citizen of the Greenleaf area. I realize the growth within the county is inevitable. I've worked for Polk County Fire Rescue for going on 20 years, lived in the county since I was born. My mom worked as a nurse at Winter Haven Hospital, 30-plus years, now retired, and my father also spent 25 years in law enforcement at Polk County Sheriff's Office. My roots in the county run deep, and I'd love to keep my family growing in this area for many years to come. My Greenleaf family have learned about this development that has been passed, approved nearly a decade ago, and is moving forward. The developer is applying for the CDD and has proposed many new additions on the property that has sat untouched for many years. We'd like to encourage you to deny this CDD and any further land use changes in the area to future benefit the county and the surrounding communities. With this new development that has since been approved, the utilities in the area will be maxed with no room for error, which has already stunted the plan to develop more than proposed area. Along with this concern, we as a community also have the concern of the lack of commerce in this area. This community, the Greenleaf community, was built in the past as a destination for retreat and pleasure, offering no amenities nearby to support long-term residents of this capacity. The problems that this presents brings me to the last major obstacle that we face, and that's the congestion this causes. Residents in this area will have a longer commute for schools, groceries, and other luxuries, which means more traffic in the area that is already dealing with the growth from Point Sienna and Marigold area. This area that I'm speaking of serves as a backdoor into Haines City, Winterhaven, and other highways that invite traffic to bypass main roads, which transition Greenleaf's area's traffic patterns from leisure country roads to commuter traffic, trying to cut travel times. By denying the CDC, we're causing the developer to accrue more costs and possibly make it more difficult to produce future funding for the rest of the changes in the area. We all know that the greater something costs, the more likely we are to treat it with great care. That's what the citizens of Greenleaf are after. They're looking for someone to brighten the area without destroying its country living charm. Thank you, guys, for your bended ear. Thank you. Kent Buchanan. My name is Kent Buchanan. I live at 153 Stratford Court, Haines City. In addition to the folks that are here, I spoke with several folks in my area, and 22 other people stand with us in opposition to this. I've got their names and addresses. There were others that said they would probably be able to come that I'm sure weren't able to come. So there's that. Also, the previous speaker mentioned the land being untouched. That's not true. The map that was up there before that showed the site, I live very near there. I walked my dog out in that area. And I don't know if it's the whole site, but a lot of it, a lot of land there has been torn up, been dug up, and there are huge piles of trees and other plants out there. And one of the concerns I have about this is I've got a list here of four pages of threatened and endangered species of animals and plants in Polk County. I don't know if there are some out there or not. Chances are there are. I would like to just leave this list. I know I don't have much time. I would like to be able to read these names, but I'll be able to give them to you if you'd like. But there is a concern about endangered and threatened species of plants and animals that I hope you'll consider. Okay. Thank you. You can just give it to him. Pablo Levano. Got pressed the green button? No. No. Just talk. All right. Good morning, commissioners. I came out here not necessarily that I'm against the development, so to speak, but the infrastructure is crazy to think that they can build another 400-something houses when we in Greenleaf area are out of water at least once every three or four months. Am I right? Yeah. And that's their utility company. We have boil notices at least once or twice a month. Like, infrastructure-wise, it's not there. They can say whatever they want, but it's not there. As far as the CDD is concerned, I've been living in the area for 15 years. I am your local neighborhood mortgage broker. I help people get into houses that are new construction. CDDs are never a good thing for these new people, especially the people that live in Polk County. They can't afford them. You guys are letting them add on to the tax bill $2,000, $3,000. Tax bill comes out. It's another $2,000, $3,000. Now it's $6,000 for a townhouse that isn't worth whatever they're building it for. In this case, it's not a townhouse, but a single-family residence. I'm the one that gets the phone calls every other month from somebody that bought a house last year that now their tax bill goes up, and they've got to sell. So I'm just asking you guys to reconsider on that portion. If they want to build it, make it for them to pay the CDD. Don't just give them the money to hurt other people in the future. Can I ask you a question? Absolutely. What's the source of your water? Who provides it? The county? No, no, no. It's Greenleaf Utilities. It's their company. They bought it. They bought it and didn't even know they owned it. Okay. Thank you. John Stewart. Thank you. My name is John Stewart. I've been living out at Greenleaf for 20 years now, and I don't have a slide, so I'm like to pass these pictures along. Can I get your address? 121 Coventry Lane. I'm actually in the picture on one of those red roofs you can see in the picture. I used to have your job back in California. I know how difficult this is. You've got to count on your county council. You've got to count on your staff. But the bottom line is you make the decisions, and it's yours. And I'm seeing something going wrong here and not a way to stop it. And what I'm talking about is the sewage treatment plant that they're hooking on to, which is number five. The wastewater plant was built in 1970s, and it's 50 years old, and it's been operating at one-third capacity, or 150,000 gallons. That's in your own report. Water used to be processed and sprayed on the golf course, but now it's being absorbed into the ground in a rapid infiltration basin. And the solid mass, of course, is just trucked away to a field. The road on both sides of the sewer pond, on a good day, stinks, and on a bad day, it takes in houses, 10 or 12 houses, both directions. Because it's restricted, I can't go in there. I couldn't get any pictures. But I just gave them pictures of what it looks like from the outside, with the fences falling in and the buildings. It obviously has not been maintained very well, and these pictures do not inspire confidence. That being said, 2021 U.S. water system said it appeared to be in fair to good condition, except lift stations 1, 4, and 5 had two of their pumps inoperative. Also, treatment trains 1 and 2 had been taken out of service, only leaving treatment train 3. And two of the 20-horsepower centrifugal blowers were out of service. U.S. water recommends that train 1 and 2 and the clarifiers be repaired, and the skimmers also repaired to avoid pop-ups. The conclusion was, ultimately, the plant operating at its current level should function until the end of its permitting cycle, three years away. I pulled an article from Fair Graham Engineering and Environmental that claims a wastewater treatment plant has a life expectancy of 40 to 50 years. Greenleaf plant is over 50 years old. Given its age, it's really not surprising that so many things are out of service and that it gives off this horrible stench. What is surprising, or would be surprising, is that the Florida Department of Environmental Protection believes this existing plant will function properly at double or triple its existing facilities. Thank you. Okay. Michael McConaughey. Morning, Commissioners. Michael McConaughey, 125 Arrowhead Lane, Arrowhead Estates. So my main concern, one, is the infrastructure, like the gentleman before me, the water supply, the sewage. As you see, the treatment plant is dilapidated. And the water supply, if you had all three, four, five pumps working, you might hit those capacities at the recording, but if you already have two or three pumps down, you're not going to hit any of those capacities. So the other thing, too, is not only do you have the construction in this site under review, but right down the road on Kokomo, we have another construction site of I don't know how many homes, maybe 1,000, maybe 2,000 homes. I don't know because nobody really puts this information up. So I work in Kissimmee. I drive to Kissimmee. I try and use Point Siena. I try and use 17. I try and use 27. Anytime you have one accident on those roads, it is backed up more than your 220 cars you hit this morning, and it is ungodly. It takes – I live 27 miles from work, and it takes me an hour sometimes to an hour and a half just to get to work. Because of the traffic, the infrastructure is not there for any of the roads to support it. These people won't be coming south for the majority of their jobs. They'll be going north for their jobs. So I think the commission needs to overlook the whole county as far as that goes. Thank you. Thank you. Mike Lane. Hi, my name is Mike Lane. I live at 150 Stratford Court. I, like most of the folks here, have concerns with the infrastructure. We know we can't stop the development. I don't even really have a major concern with the CDD. I do have a concern that in the future that he could expand that to include our existing properties, which they said this morning won't happen. But the infrastructure is my main concern moving forward. If in your report that I read from last week that you've determined that the capacity of the water treatment center is near, maxed out, with these 423 homes, the developer plans on 1,900 homes in the area. So I don't know if there's any plans for the expansion of that water treatment facility. And if there is, I don't know where that's going to be. Our community in the Club of States area of Greenleaf is right next to that treatment facility. If it's going to be larger, it's going to have more capacity. Some of the folks here complain about the smell. I don't know where it's going to go. So that's a major concern. Another concern is the traffic volume. Understanding West Lake Marion Road at the entrance to that new development is a traffic problem, and they want to build a roundabout. School buses, traffic, your report says 81 cars per hour at peak traffic. 81 cars per hour coming through there having to go through a 10- or 15-mile-an-hour roundabout is going to back traffic up for half a mile. Anything going the other direction with schools and everything in that area, all that traffic is going to be flowing through Lake Marion Road. The roads coming out of Greenleaf on the north side, it's going to be a nightmare trying to get out of the property. Kokomo Road, which goes to the north and butts into Lake Marion Road, there's no traffic lights. And these roads are two-lane roads. One gentleman mentioned if there's an accident, they're two-lane roads. You can't get by. All those folks that are going to be coming into the area, they're going to be frustrated. There's going to be people cutting in front of other people who are going to lead to traffic problems, accidents. So in the future, I'd like to see if there's any kind of plans for either adding road width, putting traffic lights, or helping with that congestion that's inevitable in that particular area. But my main concern is the water treatment because if we're near capacity now, what are we going to do in the future? Thank you. Thank you. Chris Peterson. Paul Gerton. All right. I'm in practice. My name is Paul Gerton from 8346 West Lake Marion Road. And I do not want to be redundant, but everything that I said today, I fully agree with, and I hope I can confirm it. The infrastructure is the main key thing. I live almost directly across the street from the treatment plant on the lakeside of West Lake Marion, and we can smell the problems areas in that area. You know, and I've talked to the different law enforcements. I wasn't in the banking world as far as bank security and awareness, so my relationship with law enforcement and fire and rescue is pretty close. And they tell me, as it stands right now, that they need additional monies for additional employees, which they don't even have available to them. So that's part of all the infrastructure. The roadway is really one of the major issues that we have. I've been there 20 years now, and when I was there at the beginning, it would take five minutes for a car to actually go back and forth on Lake Marion Road. And I could wait five minutes to see another car. As of right now, sometimes it takes me 30 seconds to a minute before I could even get out of my own driveway because of the backflow of traffic. This development that they're talking about is just going to increase the traffic flow. And there are supposedly additional 1,500 homes potentially in the Greenleaf Resort that's being proposed at some point in time down in the future. And that is directly across the street from most of us here that live on Wayslake Marion Road. We just lived here and came here 20 years ago, and most of us have been there at least 15, 20 years. We came here to a quiet and peaceful area. And slowly but surely over all the years, it's changed from being quiet and peaceful to being very traffic-oriented, and the crime rate goes up. And that's one of the concerns that I have or that we all have, I should say. The property values could be affected by it. The water and sewage area, we all have our own well and septic system, so we don't need to be involved with somebody else's problem with the water systems. The crime rate, since I've been there, has gone up drastically. So please understand, the law enforcement and fine rescue are doing a great job. I would never criticize them at all because they are doing a good job. But it doesn't stop because they don't have enough people going out there to, when I do call, and I'm one of those citizens that if I see an issue, I call right away, and they respond. By their response time, not to do their problems. Well, I thank you much for your time. Please consider everything that these folks have said. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else wishing to speak? Go ahead. Did you get sworn in? Swear him. Quick points. We've talked about 400. You've got to tell him. Name and address, please. Sorry. Dennis Leszinski, 18 Robin Lane, Hange City. We've talked about 400 and some homes being built on this site. An additional 1,900 condos are proposed within another portion of the Greenleaf area. What we haven't talked about is the 2,500 single-family homes that are to be built on the west course of Greenleaf. I think it's reasonable to assume we'll get about 5,000 extra vehicles out of that one. On two-lane roads with a roundabout that people will probably spin around on three or four times before they're able to even get off it. So I just wanted to make that point with regard to wildlife. We do have wildlife. Most of it's gone in the 10 years that we've been here. We don't see it anymore. We do have protected animals on that within the golf courses of Greenleaf that will need to be looked at. And from my studies, it's going to show that that's going to be time-consuming and expensive for the developer to do that. But I just wanted to really talk more about those numbers so we get an idea of the depth and traffic that we're going to see when this whole development is over. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Come forward if you want to speak. Good morning, Commissioners. Tommy Addison, 9905, West Lake Marion Road. And Mr. Mink, I don't think it's inappropriate that I speak on this matter since it didn't come before the Planning Commission. Would you agree? All right. Thank you. Yeah. All right. My concerns are, to your point, Commissioner Cumbie, there have been well over 300 CDDs that have gone bankrupt in the state of Florida. And when that happens, you know where it's coming back to. Aside from that, as I have quite a few friends that live over in the Arrowhead Lakes section, so I cut through Greenleaf quite often. And I also ride my bike through Greenleaf, about a 13-mile circuit. So I pass by the sewer plant quite often. And more times than not, when you go past that sewer plant, they have broadcast lime all over the ground because they've had an overflow situation. So you have rapid infiltration base, one rapid infiltration basin. And then they also still spray some on what was the golf course. But the other thing I'll say is, is when the developer was buying Greenleaf, former Commissioner John Hall solicited Haynes City to buy the utilities in Greenleaf. And so the city of Haynes City did a study on those utilities. And as some of the residents have said, about every six months you'll see signs come up because there's a boil water notice for the Greenleaf residents. And I will disagree with one point that Mr. Peterson had in his presentation. Page 266 of your agenda packet is the DEP permit for the Greenleaf utilities. And on there, it says, it states on there that it's a 0.68 million gallon, three-month row on average plant. But DEP has it limited to 0.34 MGD, which tells me it's not even capable, it has not been maintained in a manner to even handle the load that it's already got. So now you're talking about adding more to that. And aside from that, when the sewer plant was built, it was built in the worst possible place it could have been, which is as close to Lake Marion as you can get. So it's only going to get worse going forward. Thank you. Anybody else? I'll tell you what, anybody else wishing to speak after this lady, if you'd form a line over here, we can move through this a little quicker. Just get up against the wall. Hi, my name is Teresa Souls, and I live at 9365 West Lake Marion Road in Haines City, just east of the proposed 423-lot subdivision that's going to be located on 102 acres of land, which Eric's already explained to you. One thing he talked about was traffic, the nearly eight vehicle trips per home each day. That equates to about 3,300 vehicles entering and exiting the sole point of access to the subdivision, which they've anticipated to be a roundabout, located in one of the curves of our small two-lane Lake Marion Road. The planning division has already deemed this roundabout idea as precarious, just another word for dangerous or hazardous. And then the last thing is, just to the west of this property, is 102 acres of wetland called Cowpin Bay, and it's home to naturally occurring springs that float eastward through a creek out to Lake Marion on into the Kissimmee River. They're home to wildlife such as deer, turkey, hogs, eagles, and other endangered species that someone's already mentioned. And that's all I have to add. Thank you. Next. Jeremy Knowles, 355 West Lake Marion Road, Haines City, Florida. I just wanted to point out real quick, on the staff report, on page 3, section 5, they had it on the slideshow earlier, talking about being compatible or incompatible with the facilities. I just wanted to point out for educational facilities, the graph that's used, these are old numbers. We had the same issue with the Creek Ranch deal back last year. Hank City High School is saying 88%, these numbers are old, this is way over capacity. So I just wanted to point that out, that as far as school facilities go, it's over capacity at this point. Thank you. Thank you. Next. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Ashley Swanson. I live at 113 Coventry. All of this talk today is reminding me of the story of the Lorax. If you're not familiar with it, it's a story about how a creature named the Oncelor came in and tore down all of the Truffula trees. In this, this brought down houses, smog, and congestion, running all of the native wildlife out of their homes. This is what will happen if we let this go through. More housing is only going to bring more problems. It is a strain on our national resources, schools, roads, and emergency responders. How much more of a strain is 1,900 units going to be? Might I add that Polk County had more people move here last year than any other in the nation? 1,29,906, to be exact. My mother has always said, you can't stand in the way of progress. And obviously, this development is going to go through, whether we like it or not. But I do implore you to realize the future impact that this development is going to bring on our schools, natural resources, and our emergency responders. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Last call. Will the applicant please come forward and respond? Thank you all so much. Again, Jared Earlywan with QTAC Rock. I think there's a couple things that are worth saying. One is, most of the comments that I heard were about the infrastructure. And the whole reason that you establish a CDD is to take care of the infrastructure, because it's a better entity to take care of infrastructure than a traditional HOA, because its ability to collect on the tax roll, its ability to get FEMA funding, its sovereign immunity protection, its transparency. In fact, and there's certain jurisdictions in Florida, certain counties, where if you have a project of a certain size, of size like this, you have to have a CDD or an MSBU, because the counties and cities got tired of HOAs coming back to them and asked them to help them out. So all those other concerns, the traffic and the endangered species and all that, that's all part of your development approval process that's already occurred, right? That has nothing to do with what we're talking about today. We're talking about just the CDD. There was some comments about the utilities and the private utility. That utility has been around. It's been, it's periodically inspected, I think, every five years. We submitted a capacity report, I think it was done a couple years ago. We got an updated letter from a licensed engineer going back and just certifying that we have capacity. The truth is, there's actually, we're about half capacity. There's a lot of capacity in that plant, and it hasn't been used. So that plant, and you can take a look at the letter and look at the report, and that information is in the record as well. Although, again, it's not relevant to what we're talking about today. Today, we're talking about the CDD. The final point that I would make is there were some comments about what happens in a default scenario. Part one, there have not been 300 bankrupt CDDs. We represent probably 400 of the 1,000 or so CDDs in Florida. There's never been a CDD, to my knowledge, that's ever declared bankruptcy. There are projects that default, and they can be CDD projects or they can be HOA projects. But, again, part of the reason that the Florida legislature created the CDD concept and structure is because it's better, actually, than an HOA project in a default scenario. The reason is, part one, you're foreclosing a first priority assessment lien as opposed to a mortgage loan, and so it's an easier foreclosure process. To the extent that there were a small number of CDDs that went through a foreclosure process from the developer, those actually came out faster out of the foreclosure process than their traditional HOA counterparts. Usually, they're out in about six months or a year and back into productive use, and it's because of that first priority governmental assessment lien. The second piece of it is, there's actually money set aside in a CDD deal in this reserve account that's part of your bonds. The bondholders, during the Great Recession, when there were some projects that defaulted, they used that money to keep the amenity center open, to keep the landscaping watered. If that money hadn't been there, if you didn't have that CDD bond reserve account, there would be no money. It would be a mortgage or just a bankrupt developer, but that helps keep the project going as well. And so, yeah, you can have a project default, but you're better off with a CDD than an HOA. And then the last thing I would point out is that if there is a default scenario, the Florida statutes make it very clear that the county is never stuck with CDD assets, right? And what happens is the bondholders actually oversee it, oversee the foreclosure. They park the infrastructure in a special-purpose entity, and when the market recovers, they get the project going again and sell the property, and it worked great. We saw exactly what happened during the Great Recession. So I'm happy to answer any further questions and appreciate your all's consideration. Questions? Neil? How does the CDD tie into the existing plant? Yeah, so it's not really the CDD. The CDD doesn't have anything to do with the utilities. That's what I was thinking. So any development project is going to have to have utilities. For this particular one, there's an existing plant there, and that plant is going to provide the utilities. The CD really doesn't have anything to do with it. Okay. I thought it would be the answer, and I thought that was right. We don't have anybody from utilities here. Utilities. Okay. You'll answer it. Well, just for time, when the time comes. Okay. All right. Anybody else? Okay. We've already. We'll close the public hearing and bring it back to the board for comment and a motion. Mr. Chairman, you know, I guess up until this meeting started, I really didn't have much concern about the wastewater and sewer because I didn't know much about it. But I guess it's probably hard for me to hide. I don't like CDDs. I think they border on predatory lending practices because there's people that have no idea what they're getting into. We've heard it. You've got your stories that you've told, Mr. Chairman, and we've all heard them over the years. And the idea that they're somehow or another a better instrument than an HOA, they're not an HOA in any way. HOAs are HOAs and CDDs are CDDs. But I really have gotten, you know, more interested in this package plant, which I guess it's a package plant. I don't know what else you would call it. It was built 50 years ago to support the Greenleaf development because there was no water and wastewater out in that area. It happened all over the county many times. And as somebody pointed out here, they're not a problem until they're a problem. And then when they're a problem, we've seen them go into receivership, Skyview, what's the one down at Crooked Lake, one of the more recent ones. But, you know, the idea that a 50-year-old plant is with the issues that the one gentleman read from the DEP report. I guess it was a DEP report. It was pretty detailed about the pumps that did or didn't work and how they needed to be replaced. I think we're playing with fire here. But then, again, it goes back to that's not the issue we're deciding here. We're deciding whether or not we approve a CDD. And, again, I said that I don't like it. No more than I like PACE. And you all probably don't know what PACE is, but that was the first how we opened the meeting this morning was the board's opposition to PACE and unwillingness to cooperate with people who were getting loans from companies and putting improvements on and then getting it put on their tax bill. The rapid infiltration basin is also a concern. We had a report from our utilities a couple of weeks ago, Bill. And actually it was at our retreat, I believe, wasn't it, where our utilities director was talking about the failure of the rapid infiltration basin projects along 17 between there and 27. They didn't work and give up. It was supposed to do X and it only did A or B. We didn't get into the X, Y, and Z part, she said. Do you not recall that? I recall basically, Commissioner Cumbie, I mean, rapid infiltration basins on the ridge seemed to be successful in terms of recharging and what their original intent was. But there are some locations where recharging based on the use of the basins isn't performing the way they should. Yeah, I distinctly remember her saying that it wasn't provided only a fraction of the disposal capacity that was presented, represented, promised. But anyway, if we can do anything to slow it down, and I still don't understand this idea that the site plan was approved in 2009, and now we're reducing the number, but the site plan isn't changing. So we don't really approve a site plan if that's true. It's not a binding site plan because if it was a binding site plan and if it was modified, then somebody would have to approve it. And Eric said there is no approval needed beyond what was given in 2009. So that seems to be a little bit of a farce to say that, you know, we've got a site plan approval. You change it, but nobody has to approve the changes. So I'm just wondering, you know, how far you could change beyond what's being proposed now, which is limited by the capacity of the package plant, and maybe the answer is we don't know or whatever somebody decides is good as long as somebody says it's less intense than it was when it was approved in 2009. Anyway, I'm going to vote against it for a number of reasons. I don't know if anybody can answer that question about how much more modification can take place before it's changed. I'll go ahead. Thank you. I think Commissioner Cumbie, you bring up a good point, and that's probably something that we would have to talk a little bit further on, how something from 2009 approved 15 years ago. And were you on the board at that time? I just wanted to cue somebody because neither one of us was on the board. But anyway, regardless of my decision today, we know that the project that has been approved for 423 units approved in 2009 is going to move forward unless there's some other changes. And I'm surprised that at that time in 2009, the density of 423 existed, especially houses 50, 60, and 70 foot apart. But anyway, it is what it is. I agree with you. I'm not going to approve the CDD, especially Commissioner Lindsay, when you said that the CDD and an HOA residents will end up paying both of these fees. So, and I know they're different. I know what each one stands, but still, I think that would be a hardship on residents. And within the last six years that I've been commissioned, I've had more calls on problems with CDDs than I have had with HOAs. And that's an indication to me that this is not the route I want to go. Thank you. George. We've gotten off track here. I agree. There is a statutory requirement to be met to establish a CDD. Sure. And it's been met. And our role is to see that the statutory requirements are met. If there were five of the six requirements satisfied, but not the six, then we would be obliged to turn it down. But once that sixth one is satisfied, we are obliged to move it forward. This is a ministerial, not a discretionary action. Also, regarding the site plan, this is analogous to zoning. The zoning doesn't have an expiration, and if it's 433 or 435 and all of a sudden somebody says, I want to make it 200 or 100, that's a taking. That is a taking of a property right, and that's not what's before us today. Statutes also provide that you can deny a development order. This is not a development order in front of us, this CDD request. But a development order cannot be denied for lack of transportation capacity, but it can be denied for lack of water and sewer capacity. And that's a bridge they will have to cross as they start their site plan, their permitting process, and whatever shape that plan is in is for another agency to determine, DEP, not us. The water plan is reviewed by the health department. Those agencies still have to be satisfied. Now, as far as borrowing money through a CDD, that's not free money. What they're borrowing is they're taking off of the purchase price. So whether it's $5,000 per house or lot or $10,000 or $20,000, that comes off the purchase price what the buyer does not have to satisfy a mortgage on at current rates. Instead, they're borrowing money at tax-free rates, and it does have an expiration at such time. And, again, the individual can choose to pay that off any time during the ownership. There are plenty of protections and statute regarding CDDs. And what I always say, when all else fails, read the instructions. And the mortgage guy mentioned a while ago, there are disclosures required on the contract and the closing statements that clearly make – nobody takes the time to read it. That's their fault. But no one is forced to be a part of a CDD that does not choose to be. But that's anecdotal information. The question before us are the statutory requirements being met, and our ministerial act is to say yes or no. And nothing we've heard here today denies any of those standards have been met. I make a motion to approve. Go ahead. Go ahead. Yeah, I mean, we sit here and we've talked about a lot of things. I see where everybody's coming here on everything that's going on up there. But what this was about was a CDD. We got on water plants. We got on everything. And it all comes to play in my mind. You know, George, this isn't the first time that, you know, we say, okay, if it's A, B, C, then that's the way it's got to be. Well, I've never seen it that way. That's why I stay in trouble half the time. But I'll go ahead and say this, and I'll keep my mouth shut so we can all go home and have lunch. I will not be supporting a CDD. Pretty simple. So that's all I've got to say, so I reckon we're waiting on a second for George. If anybody's going to do it. I don't think I can. And I can also count. Chairman can second. Chairman can't make a motion. Chairman can second a motion. All right, I'll second it. All right. Is that correct, Randy? We're going to go with that. I think I'm going to vacate the chair. I think you do got to vacate your chair, too, Mr. Wilson. Just to get the record. You don't have to vote for it. Just somebody else make the second. Just to. All right. It can't go unanswered. For the purpose of this meeting, we have a motion and a second. So you're vacating your chair and your motion to Mr. Wilson. Before we vote, Mr. Chairman. Yep. Comment. Commissioner Lindsay said that this is zoning, and that was zoning that was approved in 2009, and you can't change that zoning. What I heard Eric say is they had a site plan, and that site plan. That's anecdotal to the CDD. Okay. Well, then it's either it's right or it's wrong. It's one or the other. Another forum. Okay. All right. Let's vote. Well, I got one comment. I think if we defeat this, all we've done is set the county up for a lawsuit, I think, which we'll ultimately lose because I think the state has made it clear once those six items are met that the deal is done. But, nonetheless, I'll clarify the motion again. Move approval of the. Okay. And at this time, Mr. Wilson is now acting as chair, so he will take the motion and a second. We have a motion and a second. Is that correct? We have a second? Okay. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? No. No. No. The motion fails. Okay. We have a motion to deny the request. I'll move. We deny the request to approve the CDD for this subject property. Second. Okay. We've got a motion and a second for denial. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Aye. Aye. Motion passes to deny. All right. That matter is. Yep. Go ahead. Thank you. If I may miss. Would you keep a track and report back to the board the cost of defending this position? Yes, sir. Okay. Motion is denied. Moving on to item P2. We'll give them a couple of minutes to get out. All right, everybody. Time to leave. Quickly. Quickly. Hmm? So leave quickly. Vamanos. All right. Next item. Good morning. For the record, I'm Amy Gregory, Traffic Manager for the Roads and Drainage Division. And before you this morning is a public hearing to consider adoption of a resolution to allow the placement of three traffic calming devices on Lichtenwalter Road in Winter Haven. Lichtenwalter has classified a local residential road, 20 feet in width, 1,210 feet in length, with a posted speed limit of 30 miles an hour. Upon receiving a request for traffic calming, staff collected speed and volume data and reviewed the crash history. And with an 85th percentile speed of 41 miles an hour and an average daily traffic of 510 vehicles, Lichtenwalter met the board's traffic calming policy criteria for speed and volume. Staff subsequently distributed ballots to the homeowners with property fronting Lichtenwalter and received the required 80% favorable response from yes votes and from non-votes for the board's policy. On March 19th, 2024, a hearing date of April 2nd, 2024 was set by consent agenda and staff posted on-site notices as well. And as much as the board's criteria for the installation of traffic calming devices have been met, staff recommends adoption of a resolution to install three speed humps along Lichtenwalter Road. And I'll stand for any questions. Questions? Seeing none, I'll open a public hearing. Anyone wishing to speak on this matter, please come forward. Seeing nobody, I'll close public hearing and bring it back to the board. Second. And a motion to second for approval. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed, like sign. Motion carries. Anything else? That's it, Mr. Chair. We're done.