City Council - Jan 15, 2026

Welcome to the City of St. Petersburg City Council Meeting. Your elected officials are Mayor Ken Welch, District 1, Hopely Gerdes, District 2, Brandy Gabbard, District 3, Mike Harding, District 4, and Council Chair, Lissette Panowitz, District 5, Deborah Figg Sanders, District 6, Gina Driscoll, District 7, Corey Givens Jr., and District 8 and Council Vice Chair, Ritchie Floyd. Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the January 15th City Council Meeting. Clerk, can you please have a roll call? Gerdes? Here. Gabbard? Here. Harding? Here. Hanowitz? Here. Nick Sanders? Here. Driscoll? Here. Givens? Here. Floyd? Here. Today we will have our invocation by the Reverend Leontay Tewks from New Jerusalem Missionary Baptist Church. Please stand, and then please remain standing for the Pledge of Allegiance. Our silent tears, thou who has brought us thus far along the way, we're grateful for your mighty acts to ingrain and maintain such a world and society. This month we've celebrated the founding of organizations to contribute to the uplifting of humanity and service and support of their communities and others. We additionally recognize the birth of such a prestigious voice in our history, whose impact was so vast, his voice and his message spread across America. Although today we offer that work, we're still troubled by political confusion, crisis in costs, and the labor of living in our communities. However, we know that God Almighty can fix this. So today we beckon, we invoke, and we invite his presence today amidst our city council members, our residents and city leaders in the city of St. Petersburg to have the same mind, their approach and approach, much like that of Dr. King, that the matters that affect us so much would one day be changed and most impactful for our future. May his wisdom and tender, loving hand guide the working decisions made today to build a greater city and essentially greater communities and societies. God, we need you, we thank you, and we welcome you. And I seal this prayer with the only name that matters, the name that is above every name, where the government shall be upon his shoulders, our Father, our God. Amen. Amen. I pledge allegiance to the republic, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty. Thank you, and please be seated. Thank you, Reverend Tewks, for that beautiful and timely invocation. Council members, we have an agenda before us. I'll entertain a motion for approval. I move a second. We have a motion and a second. Clerk, you'll please open the machine for voting. Council members, please enter your votes. Seeing that all present council members have voted, clerk, you please tally and announce a vote. Madam Chair, motion to approve the agenda passes unanimously, with Council Member Driscoll being absent. Thank you. We move to our open forum. Clerk, are there any speakers? Madam Chair. Okay. Do we have any on Zoom? Okay. Can you please read the rules? If you wish to address city council on subjects other than public hearing or quasi-judicial items listed on the agenda, please sign up with the clerk. Only the individual wishing to speak may sign the open forum sheet. Only citizen, city residents, owners of property, business owners in the city, or their employees may speak. All issues discussed under open forum must be eliminated to issues related to the city of St. Petersburg government. If you are speaking to an item on the agenda, you may only speak once during the open forum or when the item comes up on the agenda. In order to provide an opportunity for all citizens to address council, each individual will be given three minutes to speak and after which the microphone will be muted. If you wish to address city council through the Zoom meeting, you must use the raise hand feature button in the Zoom app or enter star 9 on your phone at the time the agenda item is addressed. When is your turn to speak, you will be unmuted and asked to state your name and address at the conclusion of your comments or when you reach the three-minute time limit, you will be muted. All raised hands will be lowered after each agenda item. Regardless of the method of participation used, normal rules apply, including the three-minute time limit on comments, the requirement that any presentation materials must be submitted in advance of the meeting, and the rules of decorum. If live public comment is disrupted by violations of the rules of decorum, the chair is authorized to accept public comment by alternate means, including by email only, and we do have the one speaker in Zoom. Lima, once you enter the meeting space, please unmute yourself, state your name and address. You'll have three minutes to address city council. Hello? We can hear you. Sorry. I am not able to hear the room, so I'm going to speak. Apologies if something has already been said around this or anything, but I'm going to go ahead and get started. Excuse me. Can you give your name and address, please? There we go. Okay. Now I'm able to hear you all. Thank you. My name is Lema. I live by Gandy and Martin Luther King Jr. Street in the Enclave Apartments, a part of the Bay Area Dream Defenders, and I'm here to advocate that all council members include the Save Our Streets campaign as part of their budget priorities that they are submitting at the end of the month. As y'all are familiar, because we've had conversations with all council members, the Save Our Streets campaign came out of talking to people about what they need to address gun violence. And the thing that we heard from folks was they need youth programming. And over the years, we've had a proposal and we've adjusted it from a holistic approach, which we think it does really deserve to be that way, to a whittled down version that does have some priorities from the original. Our priority, our proposal actually is only $2 million at this point from the original one that we had over a five-year period. We are really behind in supporting the youth and actually putting forward solutions to address gun violence, which is disinvestment. And so even though we are looking to have a holistic approach to reduce gun violence where youth need roof over their heads, nourishing food, the programs themselves, knowing that they exist, being able to access them and get to them, removing any financial barriers, to name a few, we right now within our proposal are asking for a minuscule part of that. We know that there is enough money. For example, last year alone with the St. Pete police budget was increased by $10 million. And so we're asking that you show the same intensity and investment in the youth for this upcoming fiscal year by having Save Our Streets as part of your budget for this upcoming fiscal year. As also, we ask that you continue to have conversations with community and take action, whatever action is able to make it truly a more inclusive initiative to meet the dire needs of the youth today. Because we believe that every single child deserves joy and to live in a safe and secure place. And we believe that we can actually achieve that together. And so we do really want to make that a reality. So thank you for the consideration. And please consider putting Save Our Streets as part of your budget priorities for this year. Thank you. No more speakers, Madam Chair. Thank you, Clerk. We now move on to awards and presentations, one of our favorite parts of the month. And we have D1 with the City of St. Petersburg Trailtown designation. I believe this was requested by Councilmember Gerdes. At least that was what it says on my paper. Maybe? I'm still getting a little used to coming back over here. Thank you, Madam Chair. And yeah, I'm just super excited for this presentation. I got to be a small part of the conversation on becoming a Trailtown designee. And there's just been work across the city that has helped with this, including lots of staff time. And so a big, big thank you to Cheryl Stacks and Evan Morey and their team. And then a whole bunch of others that have been a part of this as well. Just super excited for this and very thankful to our team and some of the stakeholders for letting me be a small part of it. But I think the presentation will speak for itself. Thanks, Madam Chair. Thank you. Good afternoon, Cheryl. Thank you. Cheryl Stacks and Transportation and Parking Management. I'm very excited and honored to bring you this information today. But first, I would really like to acknowledge the recent passing of the former county administrator, Mr. Fred Marcus. He was critical to the development of the Pinellas Trail. And so I wanted to be able to thank him for his service, especially in this regard. Thank you, Mr. Marcus. So Trail Towns. The Trail Town program was developed and is administered by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection's Office of Greenways and Trails to recognize communities with significant trail investments and promote a meet of ecotourism across the state. And the map on the right includes all 23 designated communities and illustrates the regional trail network that is connecting these different communities. The city proceeded to seek designation last year to attain recognition for our investments in the Pinellas Trail and have an opportunity to work more closely with FDEP and other trail towns to boost ecotourism in St. Pete. We also see that this could assist us in several grant pursuits, especially at the state level, which would allow us to continue to make significant investments in trails here in St. Pete. A few details about the process that we followed to receive the designation. It was a bit of an iterative process with the FDEP staff to identify the section of trail within the city that would be most in keeping with the Trail Town designation. For larger cities, they generally require that a district is identified for the designation. So it took a while to kind of home in on the section that made sense locally and was also within the bounds of the Trail Towns program. In the end, we decided to pursue designation for the Greater Arts District, which includes the Pinellas Trail from 31st Street to the waterfront, and then we completed a self-assessment accordingly. And then in late November, FDEP staff visited us here locally, and we were able to give him a great tour of the trail. We used Lime Bikes to accomplish that from our bike share program, so we're grateful to Lime for helping us facilitate that really positive tour. And finally, in mid-December, I was able to make a presentation to the Florida Greenways and Trails Council about St. Petersburg and our Greater Arts District, and they voted unanimously to approve the designation. Yes, thank you. Some of the things that we highlighted for the group, because it's important criteria for the designation, were the various trail amenities that are available to users when they're visiting the trail. We noted our signage, our 911 emergency markers, the trail courtesy reminders, and adjacent services like restaurants, retails, bike shops, bike parking, et cetera. We did note that there are limited public restrooms and Wi-Fi, but that's where the partnerships with the adjacent businesses really kind of comes into play and boosting the amenities that are provided by the city. So while we do have a lot of great trails throughout St. Petersburg, again, for the purpose of the Trail Town designation, we identified the Greater Arts District, and that includes four sub-districts that I hope that you're familiar with. There's a map that's shown on the right of those four different districts within the Greater Arts District. And one key factor in using this kind of composite of sub-districts for the designation is that each of these sub-districts is very, very unique, but also really important to contributing to a great experience for trail users as they're in St. Petersburg. And we honed in on identifying arts districts because there really is this kind of symbiotic relationship that exists between the arts and the trails. It's this three-mile section with the Trail Town designation, and there are arts and cultural experiences kind of sprinkled throughout. And the trail really facilitates kind of a human-scale means by which you could visit each one of these art and cultural experiences. I'd like to show you a quick representation of the highlights from each of those sub-districts that we highlighted for the Greenways and Trails Council. In the Warehouse Arts District, this area is very much influenced by the former rail corridor that has become the Pinellas Trail. The area lends itself to large spaces for art to be made at a large scale. The buildings are also very large, so they become great canvases for murals. So it's a really wonderful place to visit. The video here comes from Visit St. Pete Clearwater, and it does a really good job of showcasing the scale and the variety of art that exists within the Warehouse Arts District. The Edge District is characterized by a great variety of wonderful small businesses and a burgeoning number of residential properties, making it a true live-work-play destination. It's home to great local events like Halloween on Central that you see featured in the video, and home to many of our certified bike-friendly businesses. There's bike parking throughout the area. It's just a great place for folks to visit, and it's one block away from the bikeway on First Avenue South. The Central Arts District moves people into the downtown core, where arts and urban experiences are found throughout the sub-district. There are notable galleries and small performance spaces that exist that are adjacent to or nearby the First Avenue South bikeway, which is actually a part of the Pinellas Trail. And Florida Craft Art even offers weekly walking tours and a monthly bike tour of murals, including those that are accessible and located along the Pinellas Trail. And the waterfront serves as our spectacular anchor for the Greater Arts District, with many world-class museums and large performance venues, especially at the Center for the Arts. The waterfront also serves as a current terminus at Demons Landing of the Florida Coast-to-Coast Trail and the Florida Gulf Coast Trail, both of which are regionally significant and included on the FDEP's network of statewide trails. So they were very happy to see that connection. Here are some pictures, just reminders of just the variety of art that users can see and experience along the Pinellas Trail or adjacent to it. Again, the medium can vary from murals to glass, more murals, and then large pieces of art. These are over in the Warehouse Arts District. These are metalwork and sculptures. The Pinellas Trail is also used for transportation purposes to link different iconic local events, including Localtopia, that you'll recognize later in the meeting. But we often offer bike parking at the entrances to these big events and encourage residents and visitors to visit these iconic local events on bike. The Shine Mural Festival, this is the map that their organizers put together. And you can see that the Pinellas Trail is located, is featured pretty prominently on their map as a means of getting to and from the different locations associated with the Shine Mural Festival. And the second Saturday Art Walk, similarly, they use the trail as a means of connecting the different districts that are active during the second Saturday Art Walk. The Saturday Morning Market is directly adjacent to the Pinellas Trail. We can't possibly have enough bike parking that serves that event. And we also have easy access to such events like Localtopia, where arriving by bike is so popular that we sometimes operate a bike valet for visitors to encourage people to walk and bike there. And the St. Pete Pier is also easily accessible from the Pinellas Trail, just a couple blocks north of First Avenue South, offering many attractions that would be attractive to residents and visitors and people arriving via the trail. And during the trail council meeting in December, they suggested moving the official terminus for the Gulf Coast Trail to the pier. So we're already starting to make headway in that regard to try and get it recognized as the terminus and the anchor and just have an opportunity for people to celebrate getting to the end of the statewide trail. I'm convinced that we wouldn't have been successful on this designation without the support from our business community. They've been strong and vocally supportive of us, as has the various neighborhoods and trail advocates who've partnered with us on the application. One key one was the Sunline Organization, their community-led group that's working to improve the trail's connectivity, enhance the green space, and generally activate community spaces along the trail and kind of push forward a concept for trail-oriented development, much like we see on the underline in Miami and the Atlanta Beltline. So they've been a great partner to us and participated on the tour. We're really lockstep with us every step of the way. We had great support from the St. Pete Chamber and adjacent neighborhood associations, especially Palmetto Park, Historic Kenwood, and Campbell Park. They've all been engaged with us throughout the process. We did receive incredible support from the businesses located immediately adjacent to the Pinellas Trail. We used the form that the FDEP provided to us for this Trail Town Pledge so that these adjacent businesses can say what they're offering to trail users, like bathroom access, Wi-Fi, the ability to charge your phone, discounts for trail users, and informing their own staff members about the Trail Town designation so that we can kind of spread the word a little bit better. And this is the list of those businesses that have provided the pledges. Here's what those look like. And I just really love that Daddy Cool Records printed theirs and sent theirs in on pink paper. Yeah. So next step is really for us to promote the Trail Town designation. They provided us with visitor passports. The stickers are en route to us, so we don't have those yet, but we should have those soon, and we have the ability to make our own stamp for the passport, too. So we'll partner also with the tourism agencies. Everywhere we put our bike map, we'll provide these passports and stickers, excuse me, so that people have an opportunity to travel between the different Trail Towns, and that's what our sticker's going to look like there on the right. They host Trail Town quarterly alliance meetings of the different Trail Towns. I attended our first one this week. It was very, very productive, great networking opportunities. And I'm very excited to say that the Florida Greenways and Trails Council agree that they want to have their next meeting in St. Pete in April. So they're coming to visit us, the whole group of, like, there's about 30 of them. So it would be nice to host that group and that organization as a direct result of getting this designation. Additional steps in trail development, we are continuing to work on an extension to the historic Booker Creek Trail north of the historic gas plant with an acquisition of a portion of the CSX line that would allow us to continue the trail further to the north. We work on our trails crossing master plan for the area going generally just west of the edge district, where it crosses underneath I-275. We have engagement scheduled for that in late January. We are also working on a trail access permit that would allow for more accesses from private property onto the Pinellas Trail. Most of our accesses right now are at the intersections or from public rights-of-way, so this would allow for an opportunity to build a connection onto the Pinellas Trail from private property in the section that the city owns east of 34th Street. We have a grant from FDOT for some neighborhood trail connections from public rights-of-way onto the Pinellas Trail. This extends throughout St. Petersburg and Jungle Terrace, Child's Park, Palmetto Park, a couple other areas. And then, finally, the last one is what I mentioned before is working with four Pinellas in the state to kind of officially designate the St. Pete Pier as the terminus for both the Florida Coast-to-Coast Trail and the Florida Gulf Coast Trail, so that those are recognized as the terminus. And so with that, I just want to celebrate that we are now an official trail town. Great. Council Member Fig Sanders. Thank you. Thank you for that, Ms. Sherhill. I do appreciate the presentation, and St. Pete, we know how to do it, don't we? Thank you. I do have one question for you, though. I was going through the presentation, and I am so encouraged by all the small businesses that are taking place, especially the ones along the trail. But I have a question in regards to, like, Saturday Market. They're a part of it. But Saturday Shops is always also on the trail. So when are they going to get them engaged, and what does that process look like? I would love to make outreach to them and make them aware of the trail town program and help us support it. I just don't know we've made that linkage yet, so let's connect. And as soon as we do that, we'll make outreach. We'd love to have more partners. Saturday Shops, Saturday Shops, Cheryl Sacks. We'll go ahead and make that introduce. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member. Council Member Givens. Thank you very much, Chair, and thank you, Cheryl. Thank you, Evan, to the administration, and to each and all of you for your hard work on this. I look at you, Chair, and I know I can remember this is one of the first projects that I was approached with once I got elected to Council. So I'm happy that I was able to help champion this. You know, when I think about trail towns, I think about businesses, Chris. You know, and to the Council Member's point, you know, how we can strengthen and support local businesses, especially minority businesses. And I look at the Warehouse Arts District, which is in my district, District 7, and I think about how many people are going to benefit from this. Not just tourists, right? But local folks, people who own businesses, and then those people who do not necessarily want to take a vehicle. But we want to try to help become more of a multimodal community. This is one step in the right direction. And so I'm so happy that we have championed this, that we're doing this. I think about the economic benefits. I think about the benefits for health and wellness. And then also the transportation benefits. It's an overall public health win. So thank you so much to each of you for your hard work. And I'm happy to see this move forward. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Well, Chair, great job. You and your team, Evan Morey, and everyone else in transportation, you not only connect people with roads, sidewalks, but trails. And it's nice to see that we have all of that in our city. And you mentioned something that really struck with me, which is it's a symbiotic relation between the arts and the trail. And they connect, but they also connect people. And that relationship is really evident in the work that you do and what you showed here today. What I have in terms of a question is how are we doing in the outreach, sharing this great news. I know it was touched upon by Council Member Faye Sanders. But I would like to see, you know, with business associations and the neighborhood groups and getting everyone involved and how we can kind of get that word out. Because this is fantastic work. Well, thank you. So I think we're kind of in the starting phases of that now that we're officially designated. So I think we have a media release going out today. We have initiated conversation with the Chamber, who, again, have been partners all the way. But initiating on next steps as far as getting the passports and getting those in the hands of the Chamber Visitor Center, what can we do to kind of help promote this within the local communities and then starting kind of an outreach tour to head to, like, the Downtown Business Association, for example, or Warehouse Arts. So we've been in communications, obviously, with the Edge District Director and leadership there, too. So we'll be making the rounds to be as vocal as we can about this designation so that we can support the program. Great. Great. Well, thank you to everyone involved in this, all the trail advocates, all the business districts, the arts districts, the neighborhood associations, the chamber administration, and then everyone else that was involved in bringing this forward. Great work. Thank you. Okay. And now we have next up D2, Locotopia Day Proclamation. And we have our own Mayor, Ken Welch, she is here. Good afternoon. Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of Council, our St. Pete team, and members of our community. It's great to be here on a little bit of a chilly day, but we could be in New York or somewhere else, so we're not that bad off. I do want to thank Cheryl for recognizing Fred Marcus, who was really the brains behind the Pinellas Trail. I never served with him, but he helped get the penny from Pinellas started, so thank you for recognizing him. He also was a veteran as well. And we're really known for the trail in St. Pete and in Pinellas County. We're also known for a long tradition of supporting all businesses, but especially our small businesses. And that love is demonstrated in our programming and our participation in the St. Pete Area Chamber of Commerce. Good to see you back, Chris. Saturday Shops and like organizations. Our city organization celebrates them, provides support and funding for them through our greenhouse and its staff and services, provides grants and quality programs, and purchases goods and services from them. Local Topia gives our residents an opportunity to sample some of what makes our city special, and adding to my weight as well when I walk through there, while sampling what our small business owners have to offer. I'm pleased to read a proclamation in promotion of this annual event. I want to ask the brains behind Local Topia, Olga. Olga. Howdy. You hiding back there? And members of our greenhouse team, if you would join us as well. Good to see you again. And the proclamation reads, whereas our city's locally owned, independent businesses are integral to the unique flavor of St. Petersburg and make it the place we want to live, work, and play. And whereas the health of St. Petersburg's economy depends on our support of businesses owned by our families, friends, and neighbors. And whereas our St. Pete-grown businesses need our support now more than ever to survive. And whereas the independent business alliance, Keep St. Pete Local, works to build a thriving local economy and a unique community. And whereas Keep St. Pete, St. Petersburg Local will commemorate its 14th anniversary by presenting the 13th annual Local Topia at Williams Park, our city's first park, purposely selected as the venue for the festival. And whereas Local Topia will be held from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, February 14th in Williams Park, and is a, quote, community celebration of all things local, end quote. Now, therefore, I, Kenneth T. Welch, mayor of the city of St. Petersburg, do hereby proclaim Saturday, February 14th, 2026, as Local Topia Day in St. Petersburg, and encourage all of our residents to attend the celebration, savor our local flavor, support our participants, and continue to support all of our locally owned, independent businesses year-round. Thank you so much for your leadership. I want to start by thanking all of you, especially the city and all its departments, in that incredible support, that continued support that we've had. So this is year 13 of the festival. And as you can probably appreciate, festivals of this size are not actually continuing. A lot of them have folded. But this is such a special day. And the city's support means everything to us. Because it is such a special day for the city. The fact that it actually falls on Valentine's Day this year. It wasn't our original date, by the way. Just a little aside. We had originally chosen the last day, the last Saturday in February. But that's Grand Prix weekend. So we obviously can't go the same day. And last year, we sweated that our rain date was actually Grand Prix weekend. So this year, we kind of worked backwards from that and went, it's Valentine's Day, of course. So now we're saying that it is going to be the greatest outpouring of local love ever seen in the city of St. Pete. And we really hope that our community comes out and supports each other, really. Because it's not just the vendors that day. The fact that it is Valentine's Day, and we've all been through so much, not just this past year, but, you know, for several years now, we want to kind of, like, inject these moments of joy and obviously love into that day. So even by the engaging activities that we'll have for the community, you know, anything from, like, the fact that we'll have a photo booth that they can, like, you know, whether it's a Valentine's or Galentine's Day moment, but we're popping up some mirrors that will say things like, you are beautiful, you are loved. And I think that those are the moments that Locotopia provides that probably is very different to any other event in the city. So I encourage everyone to please, please, please come out. Our local businesses are what make the city so very special, and they are in dire straits. So they really, really need our support, not just that day. So, again, thank you very much, city, all departments, and mayor, for your unwavering support. Thank you. Thank you. Olga, I just want to congratulate you again, and just thank you, Olga, for the support that you show small businesses throughout the year. And I've known you for so many years. And you do amazing work. And I just want to reiterate what Olga said on Valentine's Day, just to show your love for small businesses. I know it's a busy day for all of us, but if we can just carve out just a couple hours to pop in on Locotopia and show your love and support for St. Pete's small businesses, that would be amazing. So thank you, Olga, for all that you do. Really appreciate you. Thank you. Thank you. Because St. Pete is so amazing, we obviously have several events going on that day, and it's also colored green fest day. So we're going to have to share our time amongst a few little things that day and kind of support all of the events that are supporting the community. So thank you. Well, I can't think. Is someone else speaking? No, that's it. Oh, okay. I wasn't sure. Thank you very much. Thank you. I can't think of a better day to celebrate Locotopia than, honestly, Valentine's Day. And like it was said, it's the best way to show love to our small businesses. And for those who are picking up last-minute gifts, you can go to Locotopia and pick up a gift. If you want to take your loved one or whoever you want to spend the day with to Locotopia, that's another option. And the Collard Green Festival. So it's lots of things that you could do if you haven't made plans yet. So thank you so much for what you do. And it's the 13th year, and we're going to keep it going. Okay. The next up we have is Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Proclamation that is also going to be given by our mayor. Thank you, Madam Chair. And for the record, I will be at Locotopia with Mrs. Welch. And then to the Collard Green Festival. So I'll be spending a lot of cash that day. Maybe one more. Okay. Madam Chair, I take great pride in presenting this proclamation in honor of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. We are celebrating the legacy of Dr. King in partnership with the community, including the annual MLK Breakfast hosted by the National Conference of Negro Women, an outstanding parade, educational, and community events, and many grants for service projects from our own Office of Community Impact. It's an exciting time in our city. I'd like to invite our Chief Impact Officer, George Smith, and our community representatives to join me at the podium for the reading of the proclamation. Please. Thank you all for joining us. And it reads, whereas Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. dedicated his life to the pursuit of justice, equality, and human dignity for all people, becoming one of the most influential moral leaders in American history, and whereas Dr. King's leadership in the civil rights movement inspired a nation to confront racial injustice through nonviolence, courage, and collective action, and whereas the city of St. Petersburg recognizes the profound impact of Dr. King's message on our own community, where residents, activists, and leaders have long worked to advance fairness, opportunity, and unity for every individual, and whereas Dr. King's legacy continues to guide our city's commitment to inclusive progress, community empowerment, and the belief that all people deserve the chance to thrive, and whereas the 39th annual St. Pete MLK Parade will take place on January 19th, celebrating Dr. King's enduring legacy with the theme, the power of a dream, bringing together residents, organizations, youth groups, and leaders, and leaders in a vibrant display of unity, culture, and civic pride, and whereas the annual celebration of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day in St. Petersburg includes parades, service projects, educational events, and community gatherings, and reflects our shared dedication to service, reflection, and civic responsibility. Now, therefore, I, Kenneth T. Welch, Mayor of the City of St. Petersburg, Florida, do hereby proclaim Monday, January 19th, 2026, as Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day in St. Petersburg, and I encourage all citizens to join in remembering Dr. King's extraordinary contributions, and in continuing the work of building a just and equitable society. Thank you all for making it. Thank you, Mayor, Madam Chair, Councilmembers. Thank you for this opportunity to honor the life, legacy, and leadership of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. This message of justice, service, and unity continues to guide us, not just in words, but in action. Dr. King reminded us that everybody can be great because everybody can serve. We celebrate and recognize that spirit of service through the work happening right here in our own community. One of the most meaningful ways that we keep Dr. King's dream alive is by investing in the people and organizations doing the work, uplifting neighborhoods, creating opportunity, strengthening education, supporting youth, and building bridges across the city. That is why we are also very proud to celebrate 27 recipients of this year's ML King Communities in Action Mini Grants, a group of leaders and change makers whose projects reflect the values Dr. King lived and died for, compassion, fairness, and progress. Their acts of service will take place in various locations throughout the city, starting as early as last week, and continuing until the Collard Green Festival on February 14th. I'd like to recognize those that are standing with me, and in particular, I'd like to bring up Mr. Boizel Jose and Ms. Samantha Harris of the Tampa Bay Collard Green Festival, the operators of the 2026 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day Parade. Thank you. Well, on behalf of the Tampa Bay Collard Green Festival Incorporated, first of all, we want to thank the city for being with us from the very beginning. I have to go back to that, because it was that opportunity back in 2018 that allows us to be here today. So thank you for your continued support. We are so excited about this year's parade, and that's really all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, George. Thank you, City Council. I mirror what Samantha said. The support that we've received from the city has been incredible. As you know, we started planning for the parade in September, so it's been a short runway, so we've been sprinting ever since, but we've assembled a great team. We feel like we're in great position to pull off an excellent parade, and it is about service. And, you know, we thought about what a task this would be, and it didn't dawn on me how important it was. I was at a community event. It was the gathering of women. They were having a fundraiser. They were selling dinners. So I went by to pick up a dinner, and the word had started circulating that the Collard Green Festival had received the contract to administer to organize the annual St. Pete MLK Day Parade. I walked in, and one of the ladies said, there he is, Dr. MLK. And it stunned me. It just stunned me. And I went home, and I told my wife, I said, wow, this is really an important thing for the city and the area, and what a tremendous responsibility and opportunity. So I just want to say thank you to everybody. You know, we need your support, and we hope to see you on Monday and for the Valentine's Day edition of the 9th Annual Tampa Bay Collard Green Festival. Perfect. Thank you all. Council Member Givens. Thank you so much, and thanks to each and every one of you for being here representing your respective organizations. You know, this is bigger than a parade, as each of you know. Even though this is the biggest parade in the Southeast United States, it's amazing to know that the legacy is continued. Dr. King said that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. And I think we can all agree that in this day and age, in this political climate, justice is under attack. So I am grateful for the good work and the good trouble that's being done here in St. Pete. So thank you all for championing the causes, and thank you all for representing your organizations from the Woodson Museum to Asala to the NCNW to the Interfaith organizations. We're grateful for the work that you do. So on this 97th birthday of Dr. King, we remember, we recommit, and we march on. So thank you. Thank you, Chair. I just want to say 39 years celebrating Dr. King's legacy here in St. Petersburg, and the parade gets better and better every year. And I can't finish this without telling everyone that's watching. The parade starts at 11 a.m. So that's when celebrations begin. You got to get there early, because you got to get parking. So make sure you get there, and it's going to be a fun time. So thank you all for everything you do. Thank you. Next up, we have Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Founders Day So today is a great day, not only in the city of St. Petersburg, throughout our nation and internationally, as the ladies of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority celebrate our 100th and 18th Founders Day. And as I prepare to read the proclamation, I want every member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority to please stand. I need y'all to find somebody that's going to say something. And the proclamation reads, Whereas in 1908, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated was founded for and by college-educated African-American women at Howard University to serve others through the arts, education, health, family, and scholarships. And whereas for 118 years and with 390,000 members in 100 and 1,105 chapters, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated blazes new trails with the theme soaring to greater heights of service and sisterhood and maintains a progressive interest in serving all my serving to all mankind through a nucleus of committed and service-minded women in the United States, the Caribbean, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. And whereas Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated was established by the nine visionary women known as the original nine who are committed to high scholastic and ethical standards, strengthening bonds of sisterhood and rendering service to all mankind. And whereas January 15th is observed annually as Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated Founders Day, a time for members and communities around the world to honor the legacy, leadership, and enduring contributions of the sorority and its founders. And whereas the city of St. Petersburg takes great pride in recognizing Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated's efforts to make a lasting impact in the lives of women, children, and families in our community. Therefore, I, Councilmember Deborah Fig Sanders, on behalf of our Mayor Kenneth T. Welch, the Mayor of the City of St. Petersburg, do hereby proclaim Thursday, January 15th, 2026, as Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated Founders Day, and encourage all citizens to join in recognizing and celebrating the sorority's historic legacy, honoring our founders, and applauding its members, especially those of our local chapter, Zeta Upsilon Omega, for their continued dedication to service, excellence, and the betterment of humanity. Mayor Welch, City Council members, the Zeta Upsilon Omega chapter here in St. Petersburg would like to thank the City of St. Petersburg for this special recognition. It is a true honor to be recognized for such a significant milestone. Being founded today in 1908, our organization stands as a testament to vision and endurance. Having navigated through more than a century of global change, we are very proud and stand on the shoulder of giants. It is again an honor to accept today's proclamation. So I, Janae Skipper, the president of our local chapter, along with our members locally and internationally, we thank you. We thank the council members. We thank the City of St. Petersburg for your continued support. Have a great day. Thank you. So ladies, again, and I failed to introduce our Madam President, Madam President Janae Skipper, but again, as you see these ladies, and I want you all to please recognize the importance and the value. We're getting ready to acknowledge another sorority. We work hard, y'all, and I am so honored to be a part of the ladies wearing salmon pink and apple green. But I do want you all to stay for the other proclamation, if you all don't mind, because we want to make sure that they get that acknowledgement as well. Thank you so much. Thank you, ladies. So the next proclamation, um, also given by Council Member Fig Sanders for Zeta Phi Beta Sorority Founders Day Proclamation. So this is what we do, everyone. When we think of service, when we think of giving to our community, there are so many different capacities in which we can do that. And joining me now are the ladies of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, wearing the blue and white, who has joined the journey in providing service and education, mentoring, and advancing the economic advancement of our community. And it is my honor to read this proclamation on their behalf. Whereas Zeta Phi Beta Sorority Incorporated is an international community service focused organization founded on January 16th, 1920 in Washington, D.C. on the campus of Howard University by five visionary collegiate women. And whereas Arizona Cleaver Stimmons, Pearl Anna Neal, Myrtle Tyler Faithfull, Viola Tyler Goings, and Fanny Patty Watts, that is, I said that right, Fanny Patty Watts, known as the Five Pearls, established the sorority on the timeless principles of scholarship, service, sisterhood, and finer womanhood, values that continue to guide and distinguish the organization today. And whereas the women of Zeta Phi Beta have worked tirelessly for more than a century to uplift communities through meaningful programs, educational advancement, social justice advocacy, and impactful service initiatives locally, nationally, and across the globe. And whereas the annual observance of Founders Day serves as the time to honor the enduring legacy of the Five Pearls, celebrate the sorority's remarkable contributions, and recognize the profound influence that Zeta women continue to have within our community. And whereas members of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority Incorporated Incorporated have demonstrated leadership and civic engagement, contributing to the positive social change and fostering opportunities that strengthen families, neighborhoods, and institutions. Now, therefore, I, Councilmember Deborah Figg Sanders, on behalf of Kenneth T. Welch, the mayor of the city of St. Petersburg, Florida, do hereby proclaim Friday, January 16th, 2026, as Zeta Phi Beta Sorority Incorporated Founders Day in St. Petersburg, and encourage all residents to recognize and celebrate the contributions of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority Incorporated to our city, state, nation, and the world. It is an honor to share the stage with you, Zeta Phi Beta Sorority. Good afternoon to everyone, to Mayor Welch and city council, and all who are gathered here today. We are honored and humbled to be here on this, what we consider an auspicious occasion, the founding of an organization that has been in communities doing work since 1920. I also want to point out that our chapter was chartered here in St. Petersburg in April of 1955. So we are entering our 71st year of service. And so we are thankful to be able to do it all over the world. We have chapters all over the United States, in Europe and in Africa, but we're most thankful. Our chapter is to be doing it right here in St. Petersburg, Florida. So again, we thank you. And when you see the ladies in blue and white, just know that we're doing some good in a lot of neighborhoods. We want to say congratulations to our brothers, Phi Beta Sigma, and congratulations to our sisters in Divine Nine. We might wear different colors, but we share the same heart for service to our communities. Thank you again. And our last proclamation of the day is the Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity Founders Day Proclamation. It's going to be given by Chris Lampley from Enoch Davis Recreation. This was requested by Council Member Givens, and he originally was not slated to be here, but plans change and things happen. So he is here. But Chris Lampley is going to, he had been prepared for this to give this, and he will read the proclamation for his fraternity's Founders Day. Appreciate the opportunity. Thank you to the mayor, thank you to city council. Now, I know if I was prepared. I'm here to do the job I was asked to do. And it's a very, very valued opportunity for myself to read this proclamation, also to recognize ourselves with here, within the city of St. Petersburg. Our chapter, our local chapter, of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity Incorporated, Delta Omicron Sigma, has been in existence here in St. Peter since 1963, November the 14th, 1963. I have with me our President, Brother Joel Cedric, and Brother Chris Davis, one of our newest members that just joined a month ago, two months ago, two months ago, and Brother Walter Brown. And we also have Brother Corey Gibbons, who's there, as our city council, and also Brother Shan, who's the city clerk, and others that are within the city. So with that being said, proclamation, whereas Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity Incorporated, founded in 1914, at Howard University, has for more than 111 years, uplifted communities worldwide, through a steadfast commitment to the principles of brotherhood, scholarship, and service. And, whereas, inspired by the motto, culture for service and service to humanity, the fraternity has made significant contributions in the areas of education, business, social action, and civic engagement, positively impacting countless individuals and families. And, whereas, for more than a century, the distinguished men of Phi Beta Sigma have demonstrated unwavering leadership and service through our signature programs, emphasizing bigger and better business, education, social action, and enriching communities, locally, nationally, and globally. And, whereas, members of Phi Beta Sigma have demonstrated leadership in addressing social injustice, promoting educational equity, supporting economic advancement, and building strong community partnerships across the globe. And, whereas, the annual observance of the Founder's Day on January 19th provides opportunity, honor the enduring legacy of the fraternity founders, celebrate its profound achievements, and recognize the continued contributions of its members to the community, uplift, and public service. Now, therefore, I'm not Mayor Welch, but I, Welch, Mayor of the City of St. St. Petersburg, do hereby declare January 9th, 2026 as Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity Incorporated Founder's Day in St. Petersburg, and encourage all residents to encourage and celebrate the contributions of Phi Beta Sigma in our city, state, nation, and the world. Appreciate this opportunity. As you see, we are blue, two sets of blue and white are here. We are the only, well, we love everyone, but we are the only constitutionally bound brother and sister fraternity and sorority around the world. Everyone can't, nobody else say that. Everybody else just grabs somebody else and say, well, you're going to be with us for today, or you'll be with us for tomorrow. We're the only constitutionally bound brother and sister fraternity in the world. Our ladies' Founder's Day is tomorrow. Ours will last Friday, so that's how close we are, because we are bonded together through our, through our legacy. We're bonded together through our Founders. Our Founders helped put together Phi Beta Sigma, and our Founders also helped put together the state of Phi Beta. So that's how close we are. We're in constitutionally bound, but I appreciate the opportunity, and I thank you, everybody. I guess I will need to say something as the chapter president. Thank you, thank you, thank you from us all. When you think of Sigma, think of good trouble. We're always out here trying to drum up everything that represents good trouble. We also have a 501c3 DOS Crescent Foundation. If you want to keep in touch with us, please check out PinellasCountySigmas.com. Thank you again. Thank you. If you could stay standing for a minute, because we have Council Member Givens that wants to say a few words. Thank you, Madam Chair, and to my brothers and my sisters in blue, happy Founders Day to each and every one of you. Chris has stated the history so eloquently, but for those who don't know, it all started with a lover's stroll on the campus of Howard University. And I'm so glad that they took that stroll in 1919 because that birthed this beautiful bonded, constitutionally bonded, brotherhood and sorority and fraternity. So thank you all so much for the bond that we share. We wear more than just colors. This is a family. And whenever we are out there serving our community, we do it out of love. And so I see our sisters in the pink and green. Thank you so much for the love that you show to this community. Thank you, Council Member Fig Sanders. You know, we all endeavor, and Mayor Welch as well, City Clerk Chancellor Navassa. Thank you all for what you do. Although we wear different colors, like I said, we serve the same mission, which is community and making this community better. So I'm so grateful to each and every one of you. We are a part of and not apart from the City of St. Pete. So thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. And I would be remiss not to mention that Chris celebrated 25 years with the City. I don't think he hears that I'm talking about you. I don't think you heard I was talking about you. Madam Chair. Hold on a second, Chris. Just very briefly, I'd be remiss if I did not recognize our Deputy City Attorney, Janine Williams, and other Deltas. They also celebrated their Founders' Day this month, January 13th. So we want to recognize our other Divine Nine sisters for their Founders' Day. So thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Thank you all. I'm waiting. I'm just waiting for everyone. All right. The next up, we're going to go to reports, F1. We're going to have our Tampa Bay Water update. I'm happy to welcome Shuck Garden, who is the general manager of Tampa Bay Water. Since I've been on City Council, I've been the fortunate City Council member who's represented the city at Tampa Bay Water. And it's always my honor and privilege. And I also noticed that you also brought some of your team with you. So I know I saw Paul and Brant, and maybe if you can introduce them all. So that would be great during your presentation. Absolutely. And I want to thank you. And good afternoon, City Council. My name is Chuck Cardin. As Council Member Hanowitz said, I'm the general manager of Tampa Bay Water. I have been with the organization since 1993. And I have been the general manager for the last five years. And I am very happy to have Council Member Hanowitz as the representative from the City of St. Pete. She is currently our vice chair. And if all things go the way I hope they go in February, she will be the chair for the next two years after that. With me today is Paul Stanek. He's our chief operating officer. And Brant Bartlett, he is the chief, our legislative aid manager. So he does our legislative work. Thank you. Tampa Bay Water was formed in 1998 by the member governments that we serve. And that includes the three counties, Hillsborough, Pinellas, and Pasco County, and the three cities. Of course, the City of St. Pete, Newport Ritchie, and the City of Tampa. We have a very simple mission. It is to reliably provide clean, safe drinking water to the Tampa Bay region now and for future generations. We do that by supplying water to our members. The year we're in now, our budget is to supply 209 million gallons a day each and every day. The City of St. Petersburg purchases around 28 million gallons a day from us. And it provides essentially all the water to the customers that you serve. Our distribution system is shown in this graphic, and it includes 13 well fields, a surface water treatment plant that is attached to two surface water intakes. We have a seawater desalination plant, and we have a 15 and a half billion gallon reservoir. And all told, there's 21 points of connection that connect these six members to our system. We do all of that work providing water to the six members at a fee of $2.64 per thousand gallons, which is a little bit more than a quarter of a penny per gallon. Our system is very complex. Every day we deliver a blend of treated water. We are the only water supply system in the country that blends seawater, river water, and groundwater. These three sources all vary in cost, so blending keeps the wholesale rate affordable and allows us for more dependability, especially in drought and emergency situations. This pie chart you see here is what we expect to average by the sources in fiscal year 2026. So about 56 percent will be from the ground water, and then the other 44 comes from the either the river or the desal. Prior to 1998 this pie chart was one color and it was all blue. It was 100 percent groundwater. Over the years we've gone through cycles of growth and also cycles of maintenance. Currently we are in the growth cycle. This chart tells you the story. If we compare the 2025 actual demand numbers by our members to the projected demands out 20 years, you can see the growth and that's primarily in the Hillsborough County, mostly South Hillsborough County, and also you can see in Pasco moving towards the east. Pasco is growing by leaps and bounds. Right now a majority of our active capital improvement program budget we will be spending on expanding our surface water treatment plant. We were starting a new South Hillsborough wellfield project and we're also expanding our distribution system with a new pipeline in South Hillsborough County. The surface water treatment plant is designed for currently 120 million gallons a day and we will be expanding it to 145 million gallons a day which will yield us another 12 and a half million gallons a day for the region. The plant is considered our workhorse of the system and it is real close to the fairgrounds in Brandon if you're over that way. We have just finished the design and permitting and construction is starting any day now. We are moving trailers in and mobilizing so they'll be starting that work to expand the plant. Just recently, I think it was in October, the board approved another new supply and it's the South Hillsborough wellfield. The facility could bring us between another 6 and 12 million gallons a day of new water. It's a groundwater project. Half of that wellfield water is 6 mgd. I say it could be a 6 or 12 mgd plant so half of that is already from permits that we have acquired from private entities who sold them permits that they were no longer using. The other 6 million gallons a day would come from an agreement with Hillsborough County. They are treating their reclaimed water currently and they're putting it in wells right on the coast near Apollo Beach to stop saltwater intrusion. But the permitting agency SwiftMUD will allow for us to take advantage of that inland about four miles and we predict about 10 million gallons a day of them injecting would yield as another 6 million gallons of fresh groundwater inland. The wellfield will be built in phases so we are currently moving forward with the first phase which would be the the first six million gallons a day up to the next which would be 12 maybe 15 in the future. And then just in December we started the construction of a new South Hillsborough pipeline. The new pipeline will be 26 miles long and it will range in size between three and five feet in diameter. It will connect our system to two Hillsborough County water treatment plants. The pipeline is being funded by SwiftMUD, Tampa Bay water and Hillsborough County. The three parties are participating in the funding. We are hoping to have that pipeline in service by the year 2028. It will be a challenging project as it goes right through Brandon about 26 miles so it's going to be a journey. We also continue to look at projects for our implementation beyond our 2033 time frame. We are currently conducting feasibility studies for the project shown on this graph and we will be finishing the studies and then we'll be recommending to the Tampa Bay water board some projects to move forward for that time frame in 2033. But we plan to bring that back in the year 2027. Probably next year you'll be seeing that Councilmember Hanowitz. And as you can see on the graph all of the projects are geographically located. So you actually have one number C is interesting. It's at Lake Tarpon just in northern Pinellas County trying to take advantage of some of the water there in the outfall building a reservoir and possibly a surface water treatment plant for that area. Regardless of the source of our drinking water all the water that we provide to the the citizens meets or surpasses all the local state and federal standards. This time last year I presented to you uh we were we were studying PFAS which are known as forever chemicals that can make our their way into our water our raw water sources. The EPA has issued new PFAS regulations that would take effect in the year 2031. Currently uh last year they came up with uh regulated uh parameters at four parts per trillion and now they're looking at that uh there's some lawsuits that are that are in the in the system right now um but uh what we've done is we've sampled all of our uh regional facility our assets along with all the members and uh we have found there are three connection points uh they're primarily where you see the orange uh stars on there two uh in the Brandon area and then one at our surface water uh those three sites are slightly over the four parts per trillion and we are looking at um treatment options there and we will be giving a board presentation in two weeks at our board meeting with recommendations going forward not not for approval yet but we're going to be discussing that uh we also we're looking at taking out total organic carbon in the water in the in the region and so those are married up in this study that we'll be presenting uh to our board but right now we're proceeding on as uh it's four parts per trillion and we have the year 2031 to be ready for that so uh we are getting that to our board to to look at and uh with that uh i want to thank all of you for providing me with the opportunity to visit you i do this annually so uh i'm happy to do it anytime sooner than that but uh i'm happy to provide an update to you thank you so if we can go back to um page four of the presentation i just want to highlight something so when you look at these projections you can see how saint petersburg and you only see two years down there is some growth but we've had a lot of growth and we've been pretty consistent in our demand for many many years and it's because good choices have been made in the past in terms of our reclaimed water system and other ways where we have been able even with the growth that has happened in our city we've been able to keep those numbers pretty constant and that graph shows a lot because when you think about the region and where the growth is happening south hillsboro and pasco county is insane the amount of growth that's happening over there and how they have to find ways to get the water because a lot of the projects that tampa bay water is working on is to actually get water to those communities in south hillsboro county because this is a regional effort and don't freak out when you see tampa the thing with tampa is they get water it's just from the river and tampa bay water comes in if they need water because that those numbers look weird but they are getting water it's just they get river water and after a point if they don't have it then they buy water from tampa bay water correct yes that does look misleading that shows the water we're going to sell them in the future currently when we turn in the tampa bay water they were allowed to keep 82 million gallons a day they are now that that shows you over the 82 so they will be uh paying and by buying more water from us going into the future and i do want to commend jury reclaim water system it's one of the finest in the in the country um back in the 70s uh the leaders took approach that some of the others didn't maybe and it's paid off very well for for the for the city of st petersburg over the years yes and i will tell you i also want to thank um jane wallace is here she is from our city attorney's office and she's the one that knows all things about tampa bay water and all the history she is the point person my legislative aide works with tampa bay water john palanchar scott lewis obviously claude tankersley i want to thank everyone in administration um who works um with us on whenever projects come in um and always work collaboratively collaboratively with your staff chuck you did a great job during the storms um communicating with our city and making sure that we were getting water that was a very difficult time um and you all were there every step of the way and you also kept the board apprised of what was going on so i'm very thankful for that and for the team and it's always my pleasure to go to the meetings believe it or not thank you thank you very much i appreciate that oh yes i'm sorry council member mike harding chuck thank you i'm gonna keep you for one more question no problem the the you alluded to uh to what demand will look like as time goes on um and and it seems like it's going up we just take a minute and talk about the supply side um we've every once in a while you catch a you catch an article about uh about fighting over water out of uh out of lake lanier or anywhere anywhere downfield from that and every once in a while you'll see an article about salt water intrusion into the aquifer um is this uh and then and then you get the crazy articles about the the next wars will be fought over water um how do we look on the supply side well it's it's getting more and more scarce and i'm talking when i say that it's the the traditional supplies that everybody would go to uh the cheapest is groundwater so that went you know that's pretty much not there i talk about some groundwater projects today but we went we put our heads together and we looked at already permitted quantities that somebody did not want so we bought them so but it's harder and harder to get the the i know this is worn out the low-hanging fruit the low-hanging fruit is is not there so now you're you're moving into other worlds um desal uh we do have a desal plants this uh second uh that's probably no second in the in the country we were the first years ago and it's had some issues that it runs very well but it's not a very large facility it's i'll tell you we need 209 million gallons it's 20 20 million gallons of of that supply uh and it's mostly the cost the cost prohibitive but as you get scarcer and scarcer costs are not going to be a a factor and so you're looking at how do you how do you uh benefit from desal uh reclaim water there's communities in the country that are using it as a potable drinking water source it's not quite here there at this point uh the the public you know there's a member that has tried it for several years of trying to introduce it um but it's not uh been accepted by the public but but again as you get fewer and fewer options what you do have you're going to have to start looking at um one area that we we uh take a a large look at is it's something that we think there's a lot of room for is conservation and in the city of saint pete does a wonderful job with that but we have a program called water wise where we're offering money for for rebates for folks to to change out their uh their fixtures and um our our goal is to have 3.8 million gallons a day saved by the year 2030 and we just passed the 1 million uh gallons per day mark uh in november and we celebrated that but that's still about one third of the way to go we have a ways to go but we found that um older hotels and older apartment buildings i really what a huge savings by coming in and letting the owner take advantage of the rebates and putting in all new fixtures that save water uh we had one that that did it a year ago and uh he shared with us a one year's worth of bills and it was a 30 savings for the whole year versus his old his old appliances so there's a lot of room in conservation it's the cheapest water uh the cheapest water that you you know if you don't have to build any construction but you're going to see um more and more uh desal look at and and how do we take advantage of reclaim water not just necessarily drinking it but how do you get to use it that project i told you about the well field we're going to take six million gallons a day pay the county hillsborough county for for them to inject treated reclaim water into a non-potable zone that will keep salt water from intruding but what it did it increased the pressure to allow fresh groundwater so you're going to find innovative ways to come up with the water but it is getting harder and harder uh as we as we have the population shifts and growth coming this area thank you appreciate it and council member harding i will say right now we are in a phase one drought i believe right with swiss mud um we had a drought condition before the hurricanes that was pretty pretty dire um and then the hurricanes came and people at tampa bay water people don't like hurricanes but let me tell you it brought a lot of water and the reservoir went up and that water is actually what's sustaining the shortage of rainfall now it is um but we deja vu is happening right now right that's exactly it's half that's what i'm saying it's happening again we are we're getting to that spot where you have a reservoir holds fifteen and a half billion gallons it it's filled during the rainy season we never have an issue trying to fill it uh then we got into a drought two years ago we didn't get it filled and then we continued into the drought it went down to about two billion gallons in july still wasn't raining in july that year it was july 24 i believe and so uh there's no way i thought we were going to be able to to sustain we wouldn't run out of water i don't want anybody to think we would you know you get your taps right we we would start over pumping over our permit limits the groundwater and then two hurricanes happened which you know how bad that was but it there was a silver lining in the two hurricanes it filled up our reservoir and so we got back to equilibrium and then now we're in the middle of that cycle again where it didn't rain again um and so the district i know they're having a meeting and they'll probably go to phase two which is one day a week watering and uh you will be amazed when they did that two years ago going from the the two days to a one day how much water decreased in demand about 50 percent of the water that is delivered goes on people's yards and so uh 209 that we deliver about half of that goes to the environment instead of through through drinking so that's going to happen probably here in the next couple weeks and uh hopefully we can get through this drought again and i will say in terms of the over pumping what happens is you have all the environmental issues that happen afterwards and having lakes dry up and that that was the whole tampa bay you know bay water uh wars that we had back then and the reason why tampa bay water came about so they've been having you know the droughts lately but we've been finding new solutions to try to keep up with the demand and hopefully educate the public on conserving water better so thank you chuck for everything you do thank you for the the great questions f2 we have orlando health bayfront hospital annual update um and i believe this was council member girdes yes thank you madam chair um just i thought it was important to get an update from orlando health obviously we have a lot going on in our health care system here in st petersburg but um we hadn't talked to him in a while and i just wanted to give john the opportunity to come in and and share because i think there's some really cool things going on especially with some of the additions that have happened if you've driven over by the hospital lately it's hard to miss and so really exciting news and and um i guess what we're we're my family is very happy to have those things here and so uh just wanted to have him come in and give us an update and i thought it was timely with uh some of some of the exciting stuff that they've got going on there so thank you very much madam chair and welcome john madam chair council members thank you for the opportunity i appreciate it you know i'd be remiss if i didn't say this i think this is my fifth presentation uh we acquired the organization from chs in um october of 2020. um i think i said that john moore and i have the privilege of serving as as president of the hospital but i was thinking as i listened to all the proclamations and all that today you know my wife and i we came here about five and a half years ago uh one of the first people uh i was introduced to and met was chris steinocker sitting here in the front row and we were welcomed with open arms to the community so it's been awesome but you know listening to those proclamations every time i come here there are a few proclamations right but it makes you proud to be a a citizen here in st petersburg so i just want to say that so we'll move on to our annual update a lot going on with uh the overall organization of orlando health as well as orlando health bayfront hospital so again we always start with our mission we these are our pillars these are the things that every decision we make we we tie to these pillars one of these pillars and then this just shows our growth most recent growth has been uh in the state of alabama with the acquisition of uh five hospitals in that location again just an overall picture of uh who orlando health is i think you see there at the bottom we are the only adult trauma center and with our partners next door provide the adult and pediatric trauma coverage for pinellas county accolades many awards that have been won by orlando health organizations and then let's talk about our commitment to st petersburg so i'm here today to really reaffirm that commitment by orlando health to uh st petersburg community and i will tell you that we we look at three major three major things that we focus on obviously are the quality of care we're providing the experience of our patients when they come to us and then making sure that we maintain a solid solid financial footing for the organization so i'm here today and overall if i had a closing statement it would be that we are providing high quality care we're providing an ever improving patient experience and we are on solid financial footing as an organization very proud to say that since the acquisition we have moved one of the uh top um organizations in the nation that grade hospitals you read about this in the tampa bay times every twice a year now they they grade us so when we came here uh you know the hospital was graded at a d level and i'm happy to say that 2025 uh the team at the hospital and the physicians there were able to work together to move the organization to an a and we are not looking back from that several awards that have been won primarily around safety uh this past year i won't go into each one two that i'm very proud of though are uh the lantern award which is a national award probably only we might be one of two emergency rooms emergency departments in the region that have won the lantern award which is given for exemplary emergency departments in addition also the emergency department won a national daisy award really around our policy work in the area of opioid addiction so working to get our people in our community the help they need for what has become a national crisis around opioid addiction i won't read all of these but we've talked at the previous meeting about the challenges that myself and our my colleagues that had other health care organizations um experienced and and everyone in our community experienced related to the hurricanes many lessons learned in that and i would highlight one and that would be that um you know we depended on and we're thankful for all of the fire departments in the city and the surrounding areas that helped us maintain our air conditioning systems by tankering water in for two days into our chiller systems to keep our air conditioning going that has motivated us to install a well which we're in the process of doing now which will alleviate that that concern going forward council member fig sanders a couple of years ago i think now had asked that we provide um kind of demographics of our team members and we continue to grow you can see we're nearly 2400 team members now and you can see how the demographics break out uh here on this slide we continue to grow our service lines in the organization to be able to provide services some of which just matching the growth that's happening in our community some of which are new services that we'll talk about in a moment that we're bringing to the community we can see here this is a combination of both bringing on physicians who have asked to join us in an employed status like a dr garriere or dr brunson who's up in carillon um and and others on this page represent new uh physicians that have been recruited and moved to our community to care for patients uh like in west st petersburg neurosciences has been a focus of ours being a trauma center neurosurgery is is a critical element of what we do uh you know unfortunately dealing with um auto accidents scooter uh injuries e-bike injuries those kinds of things it's a very critical area so we have been focused on recruitment and have brought on board uh several physicians and and providers in that space general surgery we were happy to add well-known physicians in our community who've been here many years uh in the general surgery area who asked uh to become part of our organization so they have now joined um orlando health bayfront hospital in an employed status we have added ob-gyn hospitalist services and what that helps us provide is to make sure we have physicians on site 24 hours a day seven days a week who are there when maybe your physician hasn't quite made it there to help you with that delivery when you arrive at the hospital these physicians are there they're staying there they're caring for patients they're helping your physician along the way through the delivery so we do have an ob-gyn residency program the residents are there but this gives us physicians that are there on site another tremendous service line for us has been cardiology and cardiovascular care we continue to add to the complement in that area as well a new service that we'll be providing i'll talk about our new facilities here in a moment but um radiation oncology as we open the orlando health cancer institute also in partnership with florida cancer specialist some of those services actually are already open in the new buildings now florida cancer specialist is seeing patients there today radiation oncology will be added in in march that will open dr nina johnson we recruited from michigan well-known physician there who will lead the overall oncology program her specialty is radiation oncology so happy to have her join the team we continue to grow our digestive health institute with the addition of dr abud and also with a physician assistant in katherine burns that makes our complement now i think five providers in the gi space and then the various support services that are required that we need anywhere from physician assistants in the critical care area to a dietitian to a psychologist to the star clinic which is a clinic we have now opened we realized that many patients come to us in the er leave our er but don't really have a um primary care physician which leads them to just continue to come through the er uh as their primary care home so having the star clinic gives them a bridge as we help them uh get to a primary care physician and community we have always invested in the community since the day we arrived with that that's a cultural thing with orlando health so um i'll go through a few slides here i won't read through them all but but just know that we have continued our efforts around our pillars and also with these focuses of how we invest in our community we also established a foundation which is a part of that overall giving back and that has been very successful as you can see here we've seen some really great either grants or support coming from our community which we now are turning into actual services additions to our services whether that's additional i think we're up to our fifth robotic robot in the surgical area now to new neurological brain mapping software so a lot of new things that are coming on board and i thought i would get away with not saying ai but i will say ai today you can't read anything without saying that but uh again more and more happening in the ai space in health care again highlights of the various um organizations we support throughout the community more than events we we really get out there and try to um you know put our hands in it and get and get in there and volunteer the list of organizations that continues to grow and our partnership with the foundation for healthy st petersburg has continued we continue to uh we now have three funding cycles that we go through in partnership with them to um we provide funds they match those funds and then we together take those in those funding cycles we we look at potential impact that can be made in our community through not-for-profit organizations and then uh distribute those funds and you can see this last cycle was uh 243 000 and then we're very proud to finally be opening and i want to say thank you to the city uh you know it has been a journey with our our construction team uh that we've had here the city has been very patient with us and and i appreciate the administrative team and helping us um through this and getting us to the opening um so the three buildings that are represented in this photograph which is one of my final photographs so i'll take a moment here so the the building that's represented on the right we call this entire block is called institute square the building on the right is the institute square building that is housing all of our oncology services you can see florida cancer specialist logo there again they are open and operating we also have the jewett orthopedic institute which was longest standing orthopedic provider in the state of florida based out of orlando is now located here in saint petersburg as well as tampa and wesley chapel with about 15 providers so they are open and operating in that building as well this will also house our surgical oncology area and the surgeons that we've recruited over the years in that space the building to the left is currently houses our ob-gyn residency program and their clinic as well as a fertility clinic separate from that in addition we'll be adding more service lines to that on the second and third floor and then in the rear is primarily a parking structure but has two very important services that are offered on the first floor one is um the wound healing center which was partially housed on down on fourth street for many years but we have relocated that and added new hyperbaric chambers for a wound healing program there and then also an outpatient imaging program with all the new new equipment in that in that space and with that i say thank you and and entertain any questions obviously that you have thank you so much um i have to say that when you were hired um they haven't kept it dull for you you've had hurricanes uh the acquisition all the growth uh and you've done a fantastic job uh navigating that council member harding thank you chair john thank you very much i've lived here forever bayfront's uh always been a hospital here um you all came along and turned it into part of the community um and i i wanted to to take a moment and call out the the the the the effort and the leadership in involving yourselves in the community i i see um again when i was growing up um bayfront was always here um but now i see anything that i that we go to in the community that uh that is charity based or raising money for a great cause there is a there's there's something there there's a nomenclature on the front page from uh from your organization and it shows it's important um that you know that the the truth is that there's a great business here and and and it it has done well for this community but the difference is that that your organization has the culture that that you have to give some of that back and it's important to be a part of the community and uh and it's very recognized and it's very recognizable and i wanted to say thank you for that thank you yes sir thank you chair thank you council member council member girdus thank you madam chair uh i just quickly wanted to just touch on two things john i'm really glad you brought up uh the the improvement of patient experience and i just thought i would tell a quick story um as as all of you know but anybody that listening i sit on the cappy committee and uh during open forum last year somebody came in and shared an experience at bayfront and uh immediately i had john on the phone answering questions matt came to multiple cappy meetings and they were moving things around inside of the hospital to make sure that that experience had never happened again and so and it was fast uh which says something for a large organization and so i just i thought that story uh hits home with the improved patient experience and um and then we had some other cappy members go and similar story different experience and so they were able uh to be nimble and make those changes and listening and i just think kudos kudos to the entire team over at the hospital there the other thing i just wanted to bring up quickly and and certainly don't don't want to go down a rabbit hole but um you know having gone gone through the last few years in our families lives i know that there there are headlines about providers and things that can happen inside of the the cancer world and where you might go and where things are happening and and again kind of the titles and the headlines but let me just tell you um the the what's available here in saint petersburg is life-changing and so yes we want to continue to recruit and bring and bring more partners to saint petersburg but i don't want it to get lost that what is what is happening already in saint petersburg with the partners that we already have is life changing and so uh and i know the continued investment in this new building and those services and those providers john um you know that it's it's it's exactly what i said it's life-changing and i appreciate that and thank you for making that investment and that continued investment in in saint petersburg so thank you madam chair just wanted to bring up those those two experiences thank you councilmember gibbons thank you very much madam chair and thank you john so good to see you um you know councilmember harding i'm a bayfront baby so i can see the progress i've actually experienced it and i thank you so much for the uh behind the scenes tour um that you were able to provide um to myself and also i brought miss mary murph with the saint petersburg sickle cell disease association um i'd like to preface my comments there um i know we talked a little bit john about the future of sickle cell disease treatment here in saint petersburg and possibly having some sort of specialized hematology wing similar to the oncology wing um where do we stand in those conversations so if you remember in the conversations we had sort of a two-pronged approach one was that we felt like there was a and not just in our organization but in many healthcare organizations a miss when it comes to the er as far as how sickle cell patients are treated when they walk in the door their symptoms are very um there's a lot going on with a sickle cell patient when they walk in the door of an er so if that's not recognized if that's not understood and if that family is not assisted during that in an appropriate manner it um you know it is not a pleasant experience so uh for us uh we took that very seriously and have focused our er team on training around sickle cell disease and how to more appropriately address the symptoms that occur because it's rare that it walks in your er and that's a good thing i guess but when it does you need to recognize it and understand what is needed by the family as well as the patient so that's been really our initial focus um as far as a hematology wing we are renovating two areas of the hospital currently right now one of those will be around uh hematology so um or will end up being um focused on hematology so not just sickle cell but many other human heme i'm not i'm not a clinical person but i know what you mean what diseases let's call it that so so yes we did hear you and we did address both those i appreciate you so much that is great news um miss murk was here earlier so i will certainly share that news with her um and thank you so much i will say the sickle cell warriors who um are clients of ours they speak highly about the treatment that they receive at bayfront hospital from the doctors to the nurses the bedside manner is impeccable um so thank you so much for leading the way there um you spoke a little bit about trauma in the er um you brought up e-bikes can you talk a little bit about the spikes that we are seeing all over the country specifically here in st petersburg as it relates to those trauma services we have clearly seen a spike in uh injuries related to um scooters e-bikes in particular and i think you may have if you watch the news you may have seen some of our er trauma physicians interviewed about those um you know personally and this is john moore's opinion i don't know if it's so much the e-bike or the scooter as it is two things one the training before you jump on one of those devices uh and then secondarily to that the protective equipment that nobody seems to wear right particularly when i talk about neurological injuries and people that don't wear helmets when they're riding those bikes and i can remember i never wanted to wear a helmet either when i was a kid but these are fast moving you know pieces of equipment this isn't my one speed bike i had when i was a kid right so um that's my opinion but we definitely have seen a spike in those those and the seriousness of those injuries i'm glad you shared that you know i think a lot of folks think sometimes when you get on these things it's like a video game you know you'll get back up and life gets back to normal but brain damage is irreversible um and this is something that i've you know brought up uh to chief holloway also shared with the administration i would love to see um some sort of public service campaign um where we can educate our constituents and the residents in the city especially our young residents who don't understand that it may not necessarily be cool or sexy or hip to wear a helmet but it could save your life um and so i would love if you know perhaps we could work with bayfront hospital to make love to do that awesome and then lastly um one of the things that i thought about was workforce housing um i i think about not just the white-collar but the blue-collar employees that work not just at bayfront but all children's and saint pete general across saint petersburg all these hospitals is there an opportunity for us to embrace workforce housing a partnership um i love the work that the foundation for healthy saint pete is doing um and the impact that you're making but i'm wondering if we can go a step further and work together with these non-profits with yenby laws now changing to provide that housing that we need for those blue-collar workers who are living paycheck to paycheck we would love to be a part of that um you know we've looked at even our property we we do not have we are we are landlocked uh so to speak where we are but we would love the opportunity to work with uh with individuals about that i mean you've got people in the room here like a john barkett who they have a lot of ideas around some of these things so um i think uh certainly our organization while we pay well it's a challenge for people to live in saint pete and then work that organization so yes we would love to be a part of that well i'm planning a round table conversation for march john so i will definitely be inviting you to join us um because i think what we have to do is now get creative as you said land is not growing on trees um so we have to work with our our developers um those for-profit and non-profit developers to try to figure out how we can solve this crisis so thank you so much for what you're doing thank you madam chair thank you thank you john again for a fantastic presentation and for all the work you do appreciate it thank you thank you next up is f3 we have a resolution for our consideration extending the deadline for the advanced air mobility task force to complete its work by approximately one month to february 28 2026. we have a motion and a second hello bath how are you doing we have a motion and a second uh clerk please open the machine for voting council members please enter your votes seeing that all present council members have voted clerk please tally and announce the vote madam chair motion to approve of john f3 passes unanimously council member driscoll being absent thank you everyone thank you thank you next up we have new business uh this is a business item i uh put forward um and before i i i read it i just want everyone to understand kind of the reason it came up um i'm making appointments city beautiful commission some of you have served on it um i start asking kind of like purpose role and all that and i realize it's been decades since this probably has been discussed um i had a conversation with mike jeffries they're excited about actually having this conversation um by chance i had an appointment with one of the members of the commission who was like this is great because um you know city council believe it or not actually established this committee back in the day um and there was a purpose and role for the commission which was to actually have a beautification plan for the city and then to report make a report to city council um there's other things that the committee does and i think there's probably a lot of opportunities um of things that we can do because i want it to be productive both for the members of the commission and for the council members and everyone that's involved so that's the reason for my uh referral so i'm respectfully requesting a referral to the committee of the whole or other relevant committee for a discussion of the purpose and role of the city beautiful commission including its role in advising city council on matters pertaining to the beautification of the city okay second the motion and a second clerk please open the machine oh council member given sorry that's okay i'll be brief i just want to thank you for bringing this forward madam chair i serve on cbc and i know the we've been having this conversation now for the past a few months and so thank you very much for bringing this hopefully this will give us a little bit more guidance as we serve so thank you thank you and i could not have this conversation with you we had to have this conversation here but i wanted to make sure that it would it would be a good opportunity especially at the beginning of the year to kind of have this happen so if there are changes we could do that so thank you for that did i say we have a motion second yeah okay council members please enter your votes seeing that all present council members have voted clerk please tally and announce the vote madam chair motion to approve it g1 passes unanimously thank you next item it's another referral it's a referral to psi it's also mine i had an issue with a constituent who um in a neighborhood it was greater woodland neighborhood there was a new development they removed the hex block sidewalk um and replaced it with a concrete side block they weren't supposed to um based on the site plan and so what happened is in looking at this issue we started reading our ordinances and there is one part of the code that says historic granite curbs and hex block sidewalk pavers shall be preserved and protected any damage or two caused by construction shall be repaired prior to a certificate of occupancy being issued and that is in the building regulations and then there is another part of the code in land development regulations which deals with street street scape preservation which applies only to local and national register historic districts which basically prohibits the installation of any alter alternative construction material for hex blocks the building regulations apply citywide this applies just to local and national historic districts there have been different interpretations i've spoken with legal and i've spoken with administration um this is a matter that we have to address at one point or the other um and the issue isn't putting in um hex box pavers in place everywhere because there's also a limited supply of that and other conversations that we can have about it but the issue is um whether we can have a conversation as to if there are another alternatives um that can be done whether it's stamping sidewalks and so on and so forth to kind of keep the look of the neighborhood even though it's not a historic district so that's the reason for um the new business item so with that i respectfully request a referral to psi or other relevant committee for a discussion of the city's practices pertaining to the maintenance preservation and protection of hexagon sidewalks also known as hex block sidewalks including house sections 8-6 subsection 3 and 16.40.130.3 of the city of st petersburg code of ordinances are applied by administration second we have a motion and a second clerk can you please open the machine for voting council members please enter your votes seeing that all council members that are present have voted clerk please tally and announce the vote madam chair motion to approve a jam g2 passes unanimously thank you next up we have open forum are there any speakers no no soon thank you we move to announcements any announcements council member gordis hey madam chair just quickly i know it is a little chilly out but this weekend it is the st pete boat show so it's the largest boat show on the west coast of florida and so it's always a great weekend shows off our waterfront and uh just really excited for that and so if you have a few minutes go out and check it out great thank you well with no other speakers um we have made it before five o'clock so the january 15th 2026 meeting is adjourned thank you all thank you