Charter Review Advisory Commission 07/14/2026

Here. Ashley Mara. Here. Rebecca Kerr. Here. Alec Cohn. Here. Kathleen Shanahan. Ron Kristolvi. Oh, okay. Here. This is Ron. I'm here. Sue Carlton. Here. I'm here. Sorry I was on mute. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Now we're moving public comment. Thank you, Madam Chair. Board meeting members. During the hubbub is going on the city council right now. It shouldn't have a bearing on what you were chosen to do. And that is look at the charter and feel that you need any other things or any decisions on how it should change. Please don't let it affect a great job you have been doing what the city council is saying now. Secondly, please look at any type of zoning change that should be and could be done by a hearing master. It will not only speed up the process, but it will also have greater opportunities for the public to speak about this and will need more important things for city council to do, such as city. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right. So I would like to entertain a motion to approve the meeting minutes from June 23rd, 2026. Second. Second. Second. Second. Second. Second. Seconded by Garrett Greco. Any discussion? All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. All say aye. All right. Thank you. Hello, everyone again. Good evening. Agenda-wide. Fairly standard, but a couple of tweaks. So one, again, progress objectives. I want to really see our plan to finish because we're getting real close. I'll leave a little bit of time for a new business. Some of you may have some things to discuss. We'll see how we get there. I'm going to adjourn. Moving into the slides. So the good news and congrats since that we really did complete the review of the charter language itself last week and agreed to recommended changes. Again, that's related to what's there today. We are working on items that have come out from either public comment or new items this group recommended we discuss. One is around ethics, fraud, waste, abuse, etc. So hopefully tonight we can complete that discussion. We have four related action items that have been completed to share with you. And admit. We don't control. I don't know what you're saying. I don't know what you're saying. But we don't control them. We don't control the wrong news. We don't control the wrong news. We don't control the wrong news. We don't control it. It said Allison. I was trying to get it on it. But honestly, I didn't see that. I thought she said she was here earlier when she answered. Allison, are you on? No, she's not. I'm here. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Allison. Zoom is backing up. We didn't see it. Okay. Thanks. Thank you. So we have four action items completed for your request last week. We'll go through that. The zoning discussion. We spent some time last time on that. And we asked for Kent to provide language options that we might consider for inclusion. That was the one action item for that topic from last time. And then, actually, there's an item about revisiting the notion of trying to provide the part of language that might assist with rigor around getting projects completed on time. We'll get to that. But I just want to mention, those are the three areas. They're all past the content proper from where we were. So that's the plan. And let's jump in, everyone. I think it's a little bit smaller, differently. So the first topic was driven by, if you remember, a public comment, by someone. We, all of you, I think, have seen that detail. It was really around the notion that a complaint is filed against him. With HR. HR was essentially the arbiter or the ethics group. The fellow didn't have anywhere to go. Left the city. I'm not commenting on the grass and they're just commenting on the comment. That led us to a conversation around the general topic of independent inspection inspector general's ethics to the auditor said. I highlighted the new items because this is the second time we've spoken about this. To give you a sense for where we are. Let me, let me drain these and then we'll go to them. And I'll also ask Ken, too, how I do some of the work he did. So thank you, Ken. What was the research on municipalities with inspector general similar language in a charter that didn't reform that function. And Ken has done that. And I'll take us there a minute. Find out how the city has a compliance office or they do not. That's the short answer on that. So no links there. Obtainment city auditor's job description, which I've done and provided. And then find out more about how the city handles progress of abuse allegations and request policies and procedures. We can see sections of the personnel manual, the ethics code, and then the internal fraud information. So those are our takeaways. We've completed those. And what I'd like to do now is actually go there and give you the rundown and then have that conversation again and see if you all want to move forward to leverage in the charter or not. With me, how do they perform the function? This is the document. Can you hold together? Can you just summarize that? Can you just summarize that with a quick? If you don't want to. I can bring it around. Let me take a video if you can. I knew where we were going. I'm going to go. Thank you. And good job. Sure. Before I begin, I want to introduce Avery. Hi, guys. My name is Avery. I'm a summer associate at Carlson Fields. Pleasure to be here. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. So we do. Hopefully you all got a chance to take a look at this. What you had tasked me with was coming back with an explanation of what these inspector general offices do. And I tried to narrow it to the three different structures from the smallest medium to Jacksonville, which is always weird. Jackson, as you probably know, is a consolidated city county and has one of the longest charters that exists in the state of Florida. Don't do anything small there. What I'm trying to compare for you is the idea of a single office, single person, a small office of the staff, and then obviously a much larger operation. The idea of this inspector general, I found the common point across the board was this entity sits aside from the mayor and council, uh, has different levels of authority to investigate the standards that are put, uh, to look at city contracts, employees. Uh, there was a difference between the three as to whether or not the complaint had to be signed, whether someone had to put their name on it or it could be anonymous. Uh, lots of choices there in terms of the level of detail. But none of them had the ability to set policy. Uh, this was to draw attention to things, to issue reports, and to make referrals outside, uh, if necessary, uh, the city, uh, that they found longer. Uh, so the idea of this was to give you kind of the, both lay the land as to what's out there. Uh, there's not a lot of places that have it, but, uh, clearly there's been some issues in certain jurisdictions where they felt having a third party that was attached to the city government, uh, for this kind of review was necessary. I'll stop there and see if you have questions. Have you gleaned any reviews of how these offices work, uh, or perceived work in the cities? I, I don't know if I have any judgment costs. Uh, the newest one is Durao. Uh, they just went through a co-chart or elision. It's all to end. Uh, as to the others, it appears these have been long-standing programs and it's just a part of city operations. And from this, I scroll just to give you a sense of the light was covered. I think that's the end of it. So, everybody, you can see the, the common themes here is to being able to refer things out. It's the unique thing. And Durao is the person who can also be a cousin of the officer. That struck me as interesting. Uh, and then you see the one from anonymous complaints are not accepted to, uh, Miami. You'd have to be sworn to Jacksonville. It's a hotline. Anybody can call. Uh, so that you can see the variety that's happening. Thank you for the work. Um, any questions yet for that? The first item. The second is eternal water or job description. Again, I'm not going to read all of this. You guys probably would have already, but you can. I had a question on the, not a question on the IG, but could I, I don't know, are you moving on to another topic, Ron? Go ahead Kathleen. It's great. Can you guys hear me? Sure, ma'am. Yes. I'm sorry. I'm not there. My, my sister just had her knee replaced like this morning. I'm, I'm sorry. I'm not in the room. But, um, you know, for the state of Florida, we had an IG office that was like three people. So just to give you some, that was for the entire state. And they really dealt with, but they did have IGs in each one of the departments. Um, so I, I think I was wondering if there's a way, and I don't know what the motivation is around this and how complicated we wanted to make it, but I don't know that you want to create a whole division or operation. But I wonder if there was an ability to do a contract that was focused on an independent resource. Um, you know, that you had to go through a application. So law firm basically would serve as an IG for the city and have whatever the structure is that gets further refined through discussion that they provide the service that clearly some members of the commissioner looking for that to them to do without having to pay for a full time employee that might not be so busy or a staff of whatever, two or three people. I mean, that's an inordinate expense to add, but you're trying to get the service provided for, um, I guess, ethical considerations and review and outlet. Anyway, just to, just to consideration. So really outsourcing is what you're saying there. That link, would that be an option? Correct. I mean, outsource the function so that you're not adding all the cost. Um, with some definition of what their authority would be. And that would all be part of a contract that could be bid. Okay. You scroll through it. What do the three cities do? Yeah. I didn't get a chance to look at this kind of problems. How are they appointed? Yeah, actually. For each, it was an appointment through a, having a committee outside of, uh, both combination of inside and outside the city that would then make a recommendation and went through the regular process with city councils with the mayor. Okay. At each point of having some other group that help participate, um, in the process. And to answer Kathleen's question, there's always the ability for city council to decide, you want to hire a firm to handle X, Y, and Z, and handle an issue. And I'm assuming that process would be unfolding the same way for them. They hired someone. The current staff, or this guest, I would suggest to hire a firm or someone to outsource there. Exactly. And if, if you were to propose this, and see council of three, something forward in the charter, it's a question then similar to the zoning issue. Do you put a very high level? We're going to have something like this, and we'll deal with this in an ordinance, and what do we outsource, or how do we handle it? Where do you, where do you tear all this in that challenge? This is Ron. Can I ask a question? Um, Ken, thank you for putting this together. Um, well done. I, I know in what's on the screen here that, um, in the core functions, at least I think two of these, if not all of them, I think all of them have mention of audit. Um, and on the staff, some of them, uh, have reference to an auditor, what, you know, an auditor being part of the office. Um, in my mind, um, and an inspector general and an, and an auditor general are two different positions. Um, my question for you is twofold. One, um, do these offices, to your knowledge, combine an audit function and an inspector general function so that they're, they're doing both things? And then the second question is my understanding at the city of Tampa, but I, I am not sure about this. So it's a question. We already have an, a, an audit office. We already have an internal auditor. Right. For each of these, they have the ability, uh, to do audits on a specific basis. They'll be attached to, there's a complaint about a particular contract. There's been something, uh, that's come up to their attention to audit. It is none of them fill the regular role of the, the internal auditor or jurisdiction. So then think of it as a special purpose audit. Uh, the most detailed was Jacksonville. They have an entire audit unit unit to it where they regularly go through different departments on the sequence. Uh, but they still don't perform the internal audit or bookkeeping purposes that the government requires. Got it. And in, in, in of these three, um, correct me if I'm wrong, but Miami and Jacksonville are a county and a city, correct? Miami's not. Miami, uh, and Miami-Dade are separate jurisdictions. This is simply the city of Miami. Okay. Jacksonville is a combined jurisdiction. Perfect. Thank you, Ken. Okay. Shifting over to the, uh, city auditor's job description. I'll just scroll slowly, not be dulled it. Most of this, I think is fairly typical. Uh, so nature of the work is a big fundamental component, of course, for this example of duties. So standards, federal guidelines, et cetera, consulting studies, trolls, compliance. Practices, reports, knowledge, skills, and abilities. You guys can read that. What are the sort of content that I just saw? I've retrieved their, their roles. I don't think we have to worry about too much on the physical requirements. And then some minimum quals. Service. Sandwich. Okay. So that's that one. Next item we requested. This is the... I'm sorry. We moved on to another topic after the IG. Um, it's hard to track here from afar. Yeah. What I'm doing right now is just showing everyone the, the materials that we were asked to gather for your readership as a group coming into today. So if you're looking at the master list, we use those are all hyperlinked. Okay. But I just wanted to open them in case people have questions or want to make comments. But these are the things that the group requested to be able to guide on the next steps of the conversation. And to that, we can talk purposefully about it because I think these things are all kind of related, but go ahead. I just wanted to know what the, what the process was that you were following because there is, I was just on the, I mean, there is, there is with the city, a pretty Tampa S board. So I don't know. Anyway, go ahead and go through your process. And I guess when we get to the conversation, we can look at what we're actually trying to accomplish here, but this is a different topic at the time that you're on. Absolutely. Thank you. This only take a minute. So this, this here really gets into, um, preventing fraud, how those procedures work, what the definitions of responsibilities are. Again, you guys have probably seen all this. Um, so I'm certainly not going to drain it off and many of you are looking online, but that was another item that was requested. The ethics code was requested and similar. There's a lot of overlap here, but it really explains the way the city manages these items and these issues. This is really around a hotline for intake for those things. Don't think, uh, entry zone. Okay. So going back to our conversation to point Kathleen, those are the items that we did manage to get all the exception that there's not a compliance officer, but still got an answer to that. And I open the floor to thoughts with what people maybe have learned from his materials and how we are thinking about this topic and what we might do with it. Inside the charter or outside of the desert recommendation. Um, any volunteers to start the conversation now that we've gotten these answers? Bobby? You can get off. Sure things. Um, I think I was one of the ones who was really into this during our last meeting. It sounded like you checked a lot of boxes. So if I did some research into, um, what Ken said, and thank you for all that work. Um, Tampa has all the things that we need to address issues of fraud, waste, abuse, grievances, disparities, etc. But what it lacks is, what the process lacks is independence in terms of the accountability, oversight, transparency. So, based on my research, what I found is we're at CW 57 independent body that is apolitical chosen by a committee that's separate from the local government that exists parallel to the local government. What we have is a mechanism that is kind of embedded within the administrative branch of the government. And we talked a little bit about investigations on the council, etc. How these things might interrelate. So, just as a brief overview, um, from what I understand, if somebody has, uh, a complaint, they'll notify their supervisor, the director, or the head of HR. The head of HR acts as the ethics officer, and HR is the ethics office. So those two are one and the same, uh, in the way that the same as mechanisms work. HR will then coordinate with the internal auditor, because the internal auditor has the skills to go in and look at departments, look at how their policies work, their internal controls, um, basically the department systems would check some balances. And HR, internal auditor, and the city attorney, will then conduct the investigation on if there's fraud of waste, abuse, or if there's some other grievance or ethics violation. Which is, you know, all the things we want, we want that explored, for sure, and there needs to be a way to do it. This is just Tampa's way they do it. My problem with it is, I, I feel like it would be more, maybe fair is the wrong word, but I'm gonna use it more fair. If there was a body that did all those things, or when that complaint, or that, that red flag, that signal was alerted, instead of being deviated into kind of HR, or a monitor framework, it just took a parallel crack, and then an independent IG would then loop in, right, maybe this is something that needs to go to HR. Maybe not. Maybe it's something that needs to go to an ethics commission. Maybe it's something that needs to be investigated by law enforcement. But it would be the independent IG that does the investigation. They're the ones who have the subpoena power to look into things. And then, if there are any relevant findings, then you have these other parts of the puzzle kind of come in as needed. Right now, there isn't a separation between the end of the investigation and the government kind of investigating itself. But there needs to be that outside view, or outside opinions, to problems. Do you like the IG concept? I like the IG concept, and I've got a proposal for one, if you guys want to hear it. Could you pull up, sorry, Miami Beach's Inspector General website, used to Miami Beach Investigator General will pop up. I think it would work for Tampa if we look at their organization chart. Miami Beach. Miami Beach Inspector General. Is that tough? That would be enough. And then if you go to the website, one of the first tabs is about, yeah, that one. We've got our team to have their org chart if you scroll down. So what Miami Beach did is they had an internal auditor, an internal audit department, but because of various issues in their city, they identified that they needed that separate body, but they still, of course, need an auditor for their city. So what they did is they collapsed those two departments into one. They didn't add a whole lot of staff for the Inspector General. Essentially, it's still the same audit department. They just added the ability to investigate and the separation from being embedded within the administration or the executive side of the government. I think maybe a similar model would work in Tampa. We have auditors. We have an audit department. They set their criteria for what to audit. They make their own audit plan. They independently devise that. In Tampa, the internal auditor sits on the executive board of the mayor. The mayor needs to sign the plan for the internal audit. So there is kind of that, let's say, inflation between executive authority and auditing within us. They separate that, and then they lump in the investigation. So I think this is an interesting model. It keeps, it would keep what we already have, and then also add that independence, so that we can have that transparency and accountability. When they did that, do you know how many additional people are they having? I'm guessing the ones that they added there, but I didn't go that deep into the history of the reorganization. And who hired the IG for my image? How was he picked? Is that the independent body, Ken, did you talk about? I did not look at my image as you know how that was chosen. I didn't go into their selection process, but I would agree with Ken from what I saw. It's usually a body of, like, the, I don't know, a couple of nouns, like judges, state attorney, and public defenders. They have my ad hoc session, further established by ordinance, Rob. Bobby, would you agree that the IG, this concept was a good one? Is this one of those that we would script out how a city did it in the charter? Would you recommend your thoughts on whether this would be more the concept generally and how we build it? It would be left to those that could, you know, workshop it and do that. But what's your thoughts? I envision a lot of her, but I think that's, that's partly a political philosophy, because I think the charter needs to be kind of high level. And then the details get worked out in the ordinance when they're figuring out what policies work or not. Because you want to have the flexibility to change that if it's codified in the charter. Right, I agree with that. Hey, Ron, could you go right there? Yeah, I was just going to ask, Bobby, how does this differ, add to, I think the city of Tampa already has an ethics officer and it has an ethics commission that includes my recollection. It includes, for instance, the president of the Hillsborough County Bar Association and the dean of the Stetson Law School and stuff. So it's got the commission and an ethics officer. With that, you know, help me understand how this would fit in and why this would be necessary in light of the audit function that we have and the ethics commission and the ethics officer we have. Sure. So I think the ethics commission, the, the IG, and the internal auditor, three separate, but different tracks that work together. I'm liking that perfect word to describe that, but they, the way that it works in Tampa right now is that the ethics commission, the ethics officer, the KAHR, and the internal audit, when they conduct an investigation, they kind of work in parallel and come in as needed. In a situation where there might be an IG for, for Tampa, I don't, I don't see how it would differ. There would be three separate, but complimentary, maybe it's the word that I was looking for, three separate complimentary functions that they play. So the IG may be the one conducting the information. That's their primary role. In their investigation, they discover that there's an ethics violation. At that time, it would be referred to the ethics commission for their, their fact finding. And if they find that there was, they would conduct a public hearing. Um, if an IG is doing their investigation, basically the auditor through, through their capabilities, and they discover this, Hey, we need to look into this a little further. Maybe there's some waste or, or abuse going on here. That's where the IG comes in, because they can take things to step further than an auditor. An auditor essentially just looks at internal controls to manage risk, and ensures that there's a plan to address that. The IG, an additional layer on top that says, well, there's risks, but maybe there's a reason that there's a crack in the system in this form. Did you know that, Ron? Yeah, I understand. Thanks, Bobby. I, I mean, I, it seems to me that I, my feeling is that we have this stuff covered already, but I'm interested in the discussion here. And, and Bobby, thank you for the explanation. It's what well stated. Sure. Ron, I had the same thought process. I started looking into the different boards and HR and ethics committee, all that sort of stuff. And I realized the same thing you did, which is that the city does have its bases covered. However, there's no body looking at the process itself. There's no body looking at the exact procedure. You know, a city employee goes through where something may have happened to them, and they felt like they were in a bad position to share how they felt or how things went. Um, with ethics violations and other violations, I think we've seen on this board and in the media in the last couple of years that there are problems. And again, the city does have a process to flush off these issues, but there's no body looking at things holistically. And I think that's exactly what this IG inspector general provides. Um, the city of Doral did their inspector general by referendum amongst the voters. Um, and they put it in the city's charter and what the city's charter provided was a inspector general selection committee. Um, and I think no different than how this committee was created by charter as a body to evaluate the charter. I think that's the path this committee, this body should take is just establish the office, um, through a selection committee. That selection committee could be appointed, um, by the council and confirmed by the mayor or whatever way to get blocked out. But that, but ultimately that committee within select. Um. Um. Um. Um. Um. Um. Um. Um, so that the council could make changes as necessary to fix whatever procedure. The inspector general file that problem. Um, number one, I'd like Garrett's suggestion in terms of, um, process of putting that together. My, my personal experience has been dealing with IGs at federal level. Um, and I think it could be useful on the municipal level cause it takes a lot of the politics. Um, the friction out between the legislative and the executive branch because the IG would be in, in, you know, a dependent body. Um, and we would get with, uh, what happens to all and where both sides, um, you know, describe politics over any kind of effort to investigate, uh, anything. And, you know, I, and I know from my, my, my journalism career, I always look to IGs at the federal level to, um, to get answers and give answers to, uh, questions in a way that people have perhaps more faith in than what too many people have at this point in terms of their trusting people. Any other comments before we get a read on where we may take this? Say one more thing. I, I agree too, Ron. There's, I think all the bases are, all the essential bases are covered. Um, but I'm gonna borrow your praise bill. I think this is just, I think there's a better mousetrap out there. And I think that, I think that this is it. Um, for me, it's just that there's not that separation there where there's the independence. Could the, um, could the ethics commission's responsibilities be expanded to include an IG function? So you're building on an already existing relatively independent commission. I mean, the commission, it consists of the president of the Hillsborough Bar, the Dean of Stetson, the president of the University of South Florida or University of Tampa. And then one appointment from the mayor. I don't, I don't know if that's gets at, I mean, I just trying to go back to what we talked about from the very beginning was what problem are we trying to solve? So I keep hearing independence and the ability to look, I guess, cross functionally or enterprise wide, or at least be able to take in anonymous or, or not anonymous, you know, pursuits. So I just wonder if we could look at some of the existing structure and how would we add the function of an IG with whatever integrity we're looking to build without building out a whole huge department. Yeah, let me mention one thing before, which is, I go back to what, what you said, Bobby, in the beginning. And I only mentioned this because it's based on the public comment that started the conversation. And it was around this function kind of living inside the HR department and the public comment. Again, I'm not talking about the veracity. The claim was they look at everything else, but that, and therefore it was a dead end in terms of options to try to fix it. I'm oversimplifying, but that seems to be a distinction between the two. Who owns it? Where does it live? Is it inside or maybe more outside? Rebecca, go ahead. Isn't there a civil service board that specifically is set up to hear employee grievances? That's a question. And Ken, I don't know if you know the answer to that question. If you don't, it's okay. What's the name of the board? The civil service board. I was on that board. I was chair of that board. If I may, real quick, it's a mediation between the employee and the city of Tampa. So I guess the answer is yes. It exists. I'm either Rebecca or just because she had her. And I look in the back here on this side. Rebecca. Sorry, I guess I'm really torn on this one. And I didn't vote to continue the discussion. Actually, I feel bad about that. Actually, the last three weeks weighed on my mind far more than what I would expect. Um, because I didn't feel that I've had enough information to go forward. And really what we were saying is we need more information. So I hopefully badly, but in the forward anyway. So I'm going to move on with my life. But it was really well. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm glad to continue the conversation. I feel that I must be the conversation rather than not do that. I am still a little torn. with creating, um, a, a new position. And, and I, what Kathleen said at the very beginning is, you know, great. They go through and they look at everything that we do. And you put a set of eyes and frankly, they're not going to have the expertise to look at all of our different, um, the different areas. You can't look at this area, this area, this area, and be an expert in all of them and provide really, to me, a lot of value. And then you're paying someone to find things versus somebody really going in who knows what they're doing in this particular areas. So I'm, and, but I also will say, I, I hear, I, I'm struggling because I do hear what you're saying about, um, some level of a third independent, not, um, created by ordinance, um, which is basically driven by city council and not, you know, on the, you know, the mayor's executive staff. And so where does that leave me? And I, I, I am thinking about what Kathleen said about, you know, if I say like a law firm or something or it's going to take a special lawyer. So I don't know if that's where I think there are, there are firms like KP and she, and I'm not recommending them. I didn't even like my dealings with them, particularly, but there are firms like that. And maybe them who do specialize in that, maybe, yeah, stuff on track something for those instances. Um, and so I guess to be somewhat linear, which I'm not going to call. I'm not really sure we need a new position to go and review all of the different processes at the city, because I don't think you're going to have one person who's particularly good at that. Um, I, I just don't, um, but I do feel that, you know, when you have your ethics officer as the HR person and it's like, what, like, what do you think? It seems like maybe there is some place for some independence in, in that section. And I, and I don't, and it's not that I don't think that it would be great for, you know, each individual operation to have another set of eyes on it. I just don't think one person is going to do a great job of that. Um, so I, in, in some, um, I am interested, I, I don't think I could just support an attorney and attorney general position, although I may be in the minority on that, to just a full-scale, be an attorney general inspector on everything. And, and I feel like, you know, we don't need redundancy in the audits. Um, and I prefer to have more specialized people come in and look at things. Um, but if there was some, either a suggestion or somebody had some idea of the chart on some independence on how to review, you know, some separation between HR and the ethics officer or something like that, I'm open to it, but I need to do an authority involved. Rebecca, good points. But I think the ethics officer reports to the ethics commission too. And those people are independent. That's one of them. No. You get it. But I, I think I saw him back here. Yeah. Okay. Thank you, Rob. Uh, what I was, what I was saying is Rebecca points are well taken. I, I, my understanding is that the ethics officer reports to the ethics commission, which, which is an independent group, um, it's, it's made up of kind of community members. Um, I, I would, one thing I would suggest to my colleagues here is, um, I feel like we're, we've jumped to the form of something, right? We've picked the title IG and we're talking about it, but we have skipped over what, what the need is. Um, we've talked about HR needs, but, but there's a civil service board that hears a charge grievances. We've talked about ethical issues, but there's an ethics commission that exists to hear ethical issues. Talked about an audit function, but we have an independent internal auditor. So I would challenge us to, to try to figure out what function the city doesn't have that we need. And then if there's a charter change that needs to be made because of that, whether it's through creation of an IG office or placing that function somewhere else. Um, so be it, but I feel like we've, we've jumped a little bit ahead to creating the position without fully identifying what function we need to serve that doesn't already exist with the city. Well, thank you. Um, other than the HR issue, that seems to be the one thing that is a real issue. The others have been more independent, it's a process over. So I go ahead and go. Well, yeah, I'm going to follow up. I have a couple of comments, but, but what do you see is the function that the IG or someone in that world, whatever it may be, what do you see it doing that we don't already do? I have some ideas. I'm going to test you on this, but I want to show you. One more time. Sorry. I was just trying to capture a thought real quick. Okay. Ron posed a good question. What, what, what role do you see in IG planning that provides a service that the city doesn't require? Fundamentally for me, it's a question of, do you want a stronger, impolitical oversight on the way government investigates itself or not? And to me, that's, that's the question. My answer to that is yes. I agree with that, Bobby. You said no. Yeah. I'm just trying to answer Ron's question. Ron's question was a global question. I personally don't speak for anyone else. I mean, independence is always a great thing. No one can argue with that. Right? So the question, go ahead. But I will acknowledge, I mean, these, these functions exist, you know, they, they could not, not, you know, for the double, double negative that they need to exist in government somewhere. They, they exist in the government. I can't acknowledge that. But like I said, for many of that, that's, it's just a better mousetrap. The independence. I, I don't, someone mentioned that I have an ethics commission, chairman, or city president of the Hillsborough Canyon Bar. I have a look at that as an appropriate, you know, mission to handle some of the issues that we're all talking about. Um, and then that's, you know, you've got people coming in and out of that. They volunteer their time. I think we're, we're conceptually talking about is a point of position more from someone who's actually paid to do the job. I think you're always better off when you have someone who you identify, okay, this is your job description. This is what you paid to do. Um, but Ron, I don't want to say anything. I mean, you, you made a good point, but I think, I, I think everyone agrees independence is a healthy good thing. Right? It is. And, but what would we charge that inspector general with doing? Maybe you need more, you know, what is it that they've done in these other cities? How is it different? They all seem to have audit committees. They all seem to have ethics committees. So they're, you know, they're, they're clearly doing this. So I think it's something worth fleshing out. I think it's a good idea. Okay. And this, uh, goes to what we were just saying, do you want me to give a, or just a real, real-world specific example of this. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. You're welcome. Yeah. Let's take a look at this. Okay. Okay. inspector general investigate you because in a bureaucracy like that you have so many vested interests between people who live on being an efficient government and people who are concerned about an obvious problem the inspector general was for me to investigate these allegations and determine whether or not you know these were major problems or not so I'm not thinking about an IMG in to duplicate the function of a boiler or even what HR traditionally does this is for other things so all parties can have confidence that if a problem arises it will be looked at independently rather than the conclusion of any kind of query being solicited it doesn't have to be a permanent position either the route does a two-year term and then if needed they can really state that personal interest but also too we've talked tonight about how well if there's an ethics issue we have an ethics quarter there's an HR issue we have an HR department but what body or person controls the process in which someone goes through to go through with HR or an ethics complaint or whatever it may be to me that is the goal of establishing this is that person would look into the very process of our already established processes right our boards that already exist I don't think it's a specific task necessarily I think it's an overall 30,000 foot view of waste fraud abuse policies etc that this this office or this person would be handed certain tasks by a committee that would be established and then execute on that if it's a concern of well we don't want a situation like on the board where it's 10 or 15 different people maybe one person have them have the ability to hire a couple people and have the term two years they come in just like we do every seven or I think we switched it to every 10 or 12 or whatever it doesn't need to necessarily be in annual permanent position within the city or outside of the city it could just be a simple independent review of the way our government runs the reason we're talking about this the reason we've had former city employees the reason why council has came down here to this room to talk about fixing this charter to address these issues is because there are issues and I think to say well we already have an ethics board or we already have a you know a specific body that deals with the stuff frankly it's not good enough and so I think this has to be implemented strictly for the independence just like Bob said I agree or are we mostly about the problem let's try and solve trials and fixes beginning and saying let's try to fix the problem we're asking what is the problem and I'm being called the carpet next month if you did not know what to talk about what we've been doing in this room and my um the thing is we got presented with a bunch of questions and when we get those questions it didn't come with what why you're adding that club like citing the issue that we're running into so to your point we have this in place we have that in place well it's not working so that's why they're asking this question and that's why Bobby and a lot of you have posed questions about certain things and you're saying well why don't you do it and they say well we already have that well it must not be working because there are complaints and there are people being fired and people leaving and you know put so many things in public comment so I think those are the problems that we need to address um and yeah I know it's it's and it's just sometimes it's not even just a one-off it's a it's a bunch of people that's active too so yeah thank you Ashley Rebecca and then I want to get a sense for the next steps I'm sorry I was just going to say um in addition to the director of internal audit for that or staff people report them so that department has five people so it's four auditors two senior two regular auditors that report director so it's already department five people um and then the second thing is I keep going back to the fact that ethics is is bigger than hr to me that's a conflict of interest perceived conflict of interest and it could be a real conflict of interest in certain situations and I don't know how you've yet to find a solution to that assuming we all agree to problem isn't it just when I when it's um appropriate I'd like to ask a question thank you for the one second Rebecca do you want to jump in real quick before because you're going to get the my question was for Garrett and that was are you what you're proposing sounds different than what Bobby is proposing what do you think each of us is part of it so what I what I heard Bobby say was that we have processes in place right now um and that the city would benefit and I'm sorry I'm getting this wrong but the city would benefit by having an independent third party who um worked in conjunction with those three existing or two existing i guess hr ethics I mean I'm complaining it but um to be an independent person that people could go to and then kind of filter it out if appropriate to these different boards or do their own independent investigations what I heard you say was the city would be best served by having an independent person come in and look at those processes and determine whether they are running um in in in the best way that they could and then that would sunset they would propose changes which would then either need to be adopted either by charter or by city council um and then those changes either would happen or not happen with the position of something i was i'm a fan of baby steps and so i was saying you know a couple comments to make were like do we really want to establish this big board like cost i think was insinuated i was more saying if that is somebody's issue maybe it's only a 24 month term or or etc um i agree with Bobby i'm in favor of what you just described i think i'm in favor of both to be honest um to me the city of Doral did in a really interesting way is it was put up to the voters a board was established and a person was picked and then that board had recommendations that that person dug into and it was a two-year to me that's reasonable um there's a lot of other ways you can complicate that i think Bobby you were describing more of a permanent office that these various organizations Rebecca described could go to to resolve disputes right or maybe we're maybe i think you're right maybe we're talking about two different things you know we also go back to what i think your early question was Bill to Bobby around broader specific in the charter because we're sort of solutioning this thing a little bit which some of that permeates language as well depending on how far we go so i want to give ron a chance to speak but then i also want to really get a pulse on are we in a similar situation where maybe seeing some sample language might be a good next step for us to react to as opposed to solutioning which is a little tricky to do we probably all could have pieces of that but it would never really be willing to do i need to go to ron and just even ron go ahead and then to steven yeah i was just going to ask there was some discussion a little bit earlier about the questions that council posed to us and the mayor and other things like that and and public commenters but i just want to make sure i'm understanding correct this specific issue was not one of the questions that was posed to us by city council and it it only came to us through a public comment and it was one single public commenter is that correct am i or is there something else that i'm not remembering correct it did not come to us through questions from council it came to us as one of the items that we didn't otherwise address discussing the charter because maybe we did steven yeah and i think we're but it but it rob it came it was one single public commenter that raised the issue one commenter raised him i think people around the room though are saying the validity of this stretches beyond that one example but all that i i yeah i'm listening to the people in the room that wasn't it was just a yes or no question was it it's just one person who brought it up initially one public commenter um yeah i think if the question is um did anybody from the public or did anybody in council specifically ask to create an inspector general position no i don't think that was a question but a number of at least one sorry at least one question from council did involve ability to conduct investigations i think they were talking about them but the topic investigations have come up and i'm i just responding you know using body language to in the broader sense from not the more specific sense which i think is the way you were asking the question the second thing i wanted to say is i don't know who said a second ago but it's just um i think the comment was made that the ethics officer reports to the ethics commission and then we don't the ethics officers then add duty on something that's better than the hr book chart so that was just a point of order that i wanted to throw out okay thank you next time someone goes to the next minute bill the um whether it came from one citizen whether it came from city council um that's a issue it's a fact but again i think this body i'm doing a great job of it what have we done we ground able those issues that we were we were asked to do or independent or informed by city council mayor's office certainly we've been asked questions you know i personally believe that we've answered every one of them i think if you look back at the track record of what we've done we have fed but we don't even have it we do this so i see it was just i agree with everything just listen at the end of the day we think ig is the right thing to do well you know that's what we should do if we don't you know and then you know i do think the idea we can talk circles i mean can coming up with some language for us to look at and i personally when i looked at this language about the zoning order i think it was great to see something on paper can be something to be something to look at something to think about i'm going to double check did you want to say one last thing that means if you might have scenes as well probably and steven then we'll get a check on whether and accept that we can bring about something for sure just just real quick um just to tie up a couple of loosens for the conversation um kathleen mentioned if the function of the ethics commission can be expanded to good investigations from my understanding it's no maybe maybe you can have more information on this but i believe the state legislature could pass the bill have a sign that that limits ethics commission's ability to investigate this maybe maybe that's something we need to look into but that was something that i don't know the reason was on uh the idea that things have to be identified uh that will be built for anonymous complaints they have to be promoted um the only thing i would add to the conversation is that i do think it's you know when when you use the word inspector general i think this goes to balance point that he's been made a couple times just the people know what that means whether you're investigative journalist or you're you know a member of the media calling for just verification or you're an employee or somebody making a complaint if it goes to an inspector general so that that title alone is having somebody having the authority over that process or you know that responsibility i guess and and i you know i don't think it would be done by a volunteer to to bobby's point in the ethics commission so i think you'd have they'd have to have the ability to have somebody on contract that's fulfilling an inspector general like role or services and that they could then you know activate i guess is what i'd say and um i'm just trying to think about it from a structural perspective that you have some independence i think inspector general you know is um in most people in government's mind or in analysis they they understand that that's different than ethics and audit you know it might be a little bit more expansive but you do have to work with all those entities and i just i don't think i don't think that that's a full-time job and a full-time department and i'm not one for adding government when we're going into this whole property tax conversation that's going to happen in the state of florida so i'm trying to figure out how we add the function with integrity for consideration it would not be a part of the hr department it would either be part of the ethics commission or part of the general council or somebody somewhat independent i mean i just so um that would be my my you know sort of consideration as we're talking about this thank you for absolutely my thought the pleasure about however speed and then we'll see if you all agree with moving forward we can bring us something to do right actually no i'm not saying that the two years is like a no no any and all ideas or options are appreciated i just know that it takes a long time to get those records in two years you can blow half that time just waiting for discovery so you refer to the term concept the term concept and that's i can't in my head in this short about a time to grab and i'll turn to him i'm just throwing that out there okay okay maybe just a quick poll to gauge interest in having ken bring back some options like you did for zoning and i just have a maybe just start with people online like i said we don't get to do a promotion for this online uh kathleen uh ron and um allison are you a favor of ken coming back with some language for us to at least consider and evolve our thinking around this for potential charging kathleen first yes or no yes ron allison i'm sorry sorry i was on mute i'm sorry rob i was on mute i'm not sure are we talking about language to create an attorney and inspector general office we we're going to allow ken to bring us options that would potentially do that well obviously or more specifically he'd have to work his magic for us to react to it's really just to bring back something to look at and evaluate that's concrete okay thank you for the clarity i'm a no okay um show of hands with like pretend to bring back options to adjust this need we've got everyone with hands up so we'll take that action then and come back to you on that basis do you want to say something about it my question was going to be if we have um any thoughts about what we do or you don't want to see in that language do we offer that or do we just see what we get no right later we can go if we do that are we only left with two very specific decisions shouldn't instead we vote whether or not to establish the office of inspector general and then based on that vote then we can dig deeper into the details like what is what if someone like me for instance is in favor of this but for whatever reason these two options don't include things i like that i'm forced to vote no okay can you jump in here and finally if you would frame this because i think we're talking about a role but you might even have something just based on your conversation i was seeing pre-pass one one is a enhanced enhancement of what is already there in terms of that role with a separation now from hr uh the next level up is a spectrum general but it's very general and very vague at the point uh it's a requirement to have this putting a lot of ordinance whether it's going to be a permanent position it's going to be a law firm uh the third is a more detailed version probably similar to the drought version uh as to a particular position that's created with staff that's why i was hearing from your conversation yeah and i think here we're we're stuck voting on his three i think what he's going to do is give us this we can then push back on and say well i like this but i don't really know so i didn't know how many days you mean i don't know i mean that's going to be left my point is if there's a will of them to send something up to council regardless shouldn't we just vote on that establishing some sort of an inspector general office and then we can choose you know one of three to center council we haven't even had a motion and an entertainment vote on if this is going up i'm just saying we only have how many meetings left it's maybe two right it's not okay super though how it reads is that you know good point here i mean i personally would vote to send up the concept of an ig how we build that i just love the independence of the problem so how we build it i don't know you but if you question people's how will i vote on whether we send up the concept of an ig i mean yeah but yeah there's not different people that didn't have to unfold in the house so that's just kind of what i said i'd support the function but i don't support building an office because i think there's two distinct ways to look at it but again that's like you know if you're on a board you're micromanaging the activity i think saying that we support advocacy for inspector general service or process is important so just to get back to to here ellen go ahead and then i thought um two points uh to gary's point um if we just voted to establish an office and then let the city council you know why i have the details i think we're just kicking the can to them that they we voted for establishment office and then they would have to share all the work to figure out what it is the other thing that i'm sure there will be questions about is that you are adding a cost to the city at a time where the property tax issue is we don't know what's going to happen and the only thing i would say about that is by the time and even the city council um adopted our uh ideas here it would still go to voters that next spring where i would hope that there would be more light and more information about whether or not this property tax idea will be a way or an a so that ultimately it will be up to the voters of the city decide whether this is money well spent given the larger financial situation assuming the council puts it through yes and agrees with the council i wasn't suggesting we vote and it's a council i was suggesting we vote to send it to council with ken coming back with charged suggestions and then number two i think it passes council and i think it passes the voters like 80 i think i don't think the concern is i think city council has been pushing this specific thing in fact i i could i could be wrong but i could have swore there was a question about this um from council and maybe that was said when alan was here or something but i'm pretty sure we're talking about this for a few reasons and i i have a good feeling council would be excited to see something like this and i also think the voters would too are we are we are you suggesting we need to ask a more direct question around i'm using the words i'll work with the will of the board i'll just say instead of a simple hand up hand down what if we entertain a real motion to push this up and then looked at real language i mean maybe it's effectively the same thing the path we're taking now is effectively the same i just didn't want to be locked into a binary issue right with one a meeting left so one second five minute um okay do not think about which way i want to go with this i could i could make a motion for something maybe we could all agree on or do we want to do this like can you see a person and then we'll get to the motion i would i would move that we may get an office of inspector general i would second that and go ahead let's go through the description motions and see if we have support because you can more more more direction on specificity of the yeah whether comments before is that a formal motion or just i would make a motion i formally make a motion yes we determine that we have an office it's that we have an inspector general office or ends i think we're doing the charter establishing they just try to make sure we're clear that's what i meant we mean language in the charter establishing an inspector general the implication is that it's not contract it's not anything else but that the word inspector general is established in there general can i hear anything yeah i would second that um just maybe an amendment that it would be the creation through the charter of an office of inspector general selection committee to establish who this person is and what they will be inspecting for sure i was trying to do with the optometrist do we want an office do we want a contract on the office do we like that i think i think you can do a third party contract through an office right so that's the solution we're going to have from the function right but you still have the ig office that bothers you just articulate they're essentially adding up with the energy yes the idea as opposed to they could come off that contract position right because that's the black or white i don't know how to take it to get over the office okay independent versus office office work within the city right what did you mean contract exactly so it would be one that was this family talks about a lot but i don't believe it i don't believe what i don't believe establishing the office would change my room from hiring a law firm or hiring i think i think what you're asking about already what i'm studying was very high level i think it went okay she's trying to make a a or b yeah maybe it was it was bob bobby could hire a law firm to you know and visit the budget right was this thing and doing something right so but you did accomplish what you were trying to accomplish yeah maybe i do i never find it okay see if we get it tonight let me see you'll see she's not doing it okay let's try the motion again everyone here again this will give ken more specificity that we have to do concretely but go ahead if we get a second and we'll think also the participants go ahead i move that we amend the charter to including him but you're in general i'm sorry bobby you broke up for on i just heard we also have a computer that's going to be restarting him the motion as i as i heard it was to amend the charter to establish an inspector general bobby is that that i hear that correct i'll second myself yes thank you thank you yes and garrett seconded it chair we just need to take this motion forward for okay and we're going to take a minute about a minute what i mean we're going to be doing everything that's watching it because of yeah all right any further i think you've got to be done before we've been moving properly second discussion i just was curious if there's is that something that we're going to talk about later yes it's embedded in the concept right there's nothing implied that if we want to apply something we have to restate the motion i mean we just have to be correct in our process um all right so i move that we amend the charter to include an independent inspector general second are we going to argue about what independent means now right everybody know what that means yes it's been moving and probably seconded any discussion yes um i support the the idea of it of an independent inspector general position but not necessarily a full-time position and that is what i understood you're saying and so therefore i think you're asking for that distinction and so while i support that other concept i will be voting now two years okay but just to clarify i'm aligned with you in that like if this particular position was only established for okay not two years two or three years i would be in favor of that so i think your hesitation i share with you but i would be i have second admission on voting yes so am i wrong in the way of thinking about this because you're saying you you aren't sure if you want it full-time i'm not sure i want it full-time i'm not sure i want it forever i am interested in both of the things that you all said i was supportive of kind of coming back with some language that we could look at and then dive down and i'm also supportive if we want to take a vote and say i'm supportive of the concept period and then have and then have a separate vote about can doing it so we can say we have a vote that we all support the concept in general but bobby wanted to be specific and i respect that that he wants a position a person there and i'm not there yet so i'm that's why i respectfully say no to that specific emotion so bobby didn't say full-time or part-time so is it right about first at least moving ball down the field as stated you don't need my vote i don't think no i know i don't think this we can vote i wasn't trying to hold up the okay so i think the kind of discussion we want to it's not full-time what you're talking about is it okay but we're still in discussion how long was the term it's not a part of the okay that's it perhaps perhaps um if there's more refinement of what the motion would need to be in order to get it passed uh madam chair perhaps it's appropriate to with you know ask um commissioner um bobby here to withdraw so that it could be discussed a little bit more now than refine the motion well we're in the middle of the motion we're going to do the um the vote discussion's over all in favor favor say aye aye who says aye on the on the call ron i don't care i see you don't hear you so i'm assuming the chair hasn't called for no but i'm a no vote uh i'm a no vote i'm a no vote i'm a no vote on this mission and i support what rebecca said for kathleen rebecca and ron knows everyone else's yes did i get that right for rush so she could capture it yes all right also okay okay and ken now we'll include some options on what rebecca was saying and there's an option on whether this part time falls unless you tell me otherwise we would like you to address them well we can we can also take that language when you see it right you've given me a title uh so far right and you and you got away from one of your three down to a more specific more tweaked language around ig and we can work on that part-time full-time we can go on now so ken and your eagle hands okay i need to just do a check where are we on our computer rebooting this because it may make sense before we go to zoning to do take a break and do that yes we can we start now and okay let's do that let's take a break because we're going to be you've been here we've all lived this experience and it forces you um so we go when you start we open the relative documents and access for 10 yeah it's only 10 minutes okay we'll do something okay let's take a break and come back thank you good all right zoom folks go next yeah so for those on zoom we're going to need to so what we'll do is if they get kicked off yeah you just don't have to walk back in and get kicked off which is highly likely because we'll probably restart the computer so just keep that in mind sorry for the inconvenience we didn't see this will come do we need a motion for recess or no a motion to recess i don't think so okay um i get a motion for the recess approach to recess uh it's been room department session all in favor say hi i'm okay okay okay okay guys don't give my eggs we're going to shut this down we can go on leaving behind our left we're going back to everything i'm saying there's not a lot of you guys get ready to start up if you can hear me just um remember to unmute thank you um . . . . . . I can see you in college . But they can't be able to find out . I agree. So, the library starts . . . . . . you can just be very friendly to invite it out you're like i could invite a lot of my friends with that they're all invited and yeah if you wanted to start a little bit today hey i have no way it's a little bit too I did tax cut being with the joint. Hopefully Sheila's going to have a nutshell of the delays there. We can get started again. Just follow the World Cup, Spain 1, just letting you know. All right. So last time we had one action item, which was forgetting to do when he was about to walk you through. I did want to mention, if you remember prior, one of the possible actions we requested at the same time that, I don't know what's the name, Julia Mandela, and we talked about it. She was on vacation. I didn't have her come tonight because we moved again. We moved the discussion to the point where everyone here in principle gave this direction. We wanted to see language. So I felt like we had skipped over the need for that. If you want me to do that, I can. I just in full disclosure, I want to mention I didn't reach out again since we did get to the point of asking, can we come back with this? I think there's some compelling information from Julie and I think I remember you, Bill, summarizing how that resonated as a potential way forward. So I'm going to head over again so you can explain the language and the distinction between them. Now we can discuss what we want to do with it. Go ahead, Ken. Sure. Well, hopefully you all saw before the meeting were two options. You guys want to come back. Two different ways of doing this. Obviously, it is very similar to whatever county uses in terms of their process. The more detailed one is option one. The idea being that the city would have one or more independent zoning officers. I use the same language that you have focused on the idea of someone being appointed by the mayor and then confirmed by the council. We had a renewable term. I would just take four years as a first start with that. That could be obviously whatever you'd like to do. Then set it out of some qualification. They would be a lawyer with expertise in this or a land plan. I would actually. They would not have their elected office. They wouldn't have things that they would represent people in front of the city. Again, down to their work. The concept here that is before the city council has a public hearing on the matter. It goes to this hearing officer. It has a public meeting. It has the basics of the due process that are presenting applications. And then requires this individual to have a render a non-minding, but written recommendation and finals of fact that then go to the council. The council public hearing, then, is limited to that record. The idea of being able to create the record at the zoning hearing officer stage. And then the council considers that record. And then someone had to appear at the lower level in order to then address it at the council and with the ability to make exceptions. Special circumstances. It has an implementation provision that then requires the city within six months to create an ordinance that pulls out all additional detail. The idea was not to put everything in the charter, but not that it creates the framework of the position. And you see we've created a list here of the kind of things. The disqualification standards, the notice requirements, procedures. All that goes into then making this process work. I did add to both provisions language that says we're not changing anything regarding the plan. Just to make sure there's not confusion with that. That's something you need to have. It didn't sound like you were asking to change any of that. The less detailed proposal. It simply puts the requirement on council to have either. And I have a problem. It's either an officer or a body, a big planning board, a zoning board kind of thing. That's designated by ordinance. It's basically your idea of having an interim review, but pushing the details of how that is, whether it's going to be a body, when it's going to be an officer. Push that out to organs, and it has the same kind of implementation provision as to all the details that need to put in. Get that done in six months. And again, it's not intended to touch anything regarding the planning. So a much higher level approach that you could put in the charter. It's not intended to be considered what pushes a lot of detail down the road, or you could come up with a more specific proof of that. Yes, you're going to have any dependent. It's not even very close. So I think someone said this earlier, and I remember pulling it as my theory of charter to the charter should be high level, and we should not get into the level of detail. So that being said, in this particular one, one of the main reasons that I've heard people discussing it as something positive is that you are getting a professional recommendation, and the second one allows it to be a lay person body without any professional qualifications. And to me that defeats a lot of the purpose. If you're just sending it out to people who don't have the training and the qualifications, because the hardest part about understanding land use is a foreign language, but once you get to foreign language, it's pretty simple. So that being said, to me, the purpose of having as many administrators, you have an independent professional put your eyes on the case and pull out the facts and the rules and put them together in a document, and a lay body isn't going to be able to provide that. And they, it's also very hard, unless you're a trained professional hire specifically for that purpose, to not, like, you know, if I'm a member, I am, I am a similar, I am a member of my association. It's really hard to, you're putting those people in the same position that city council is in, you know, voting regarding their neighbors. So, to me, the first one, bringing the zoning hearing officer, it's important if you're just going to create another lay, or you're just creating another layer of bureaucracy that's not adding any value. That's my opinion. Sure. One question. The first one, is that modeled significantly after the county? Yes. Okay. And to her comment, you know, zoning isn't an easy thing. I mean, I've, I've, I've had a lot of hardness of practice and zoning and talk to them all the time. I think it's, it can be more complicated. So I think it is much better to have someone learn in that topic as a hearing master. I mean, I wouldn't have a similar decision to do that analysis. I'd much rather have someone who has criteria. And I'm, I'm agreeing with Rebecca. I just don't want to imply that other people aren't capable of doing it. It's just, it's a specialized field with all those languages. Yeah. It's so important. She won't say it's a challenge. I don't do it. So I would say that. So to, to in favor of the more prescriptive suggestion, without any specific edits. Any other comments? I agree with Rebecca. I just, you know, I know I've been pushing this since the very beginning. I think this is an independent zoning hearing officer or master zoning officer or whatever's the right language. And then again, let that be further defined by whoever's responsible. But I think it's really important to have somebody who's a professional provide that service. I agree with Rebecca that I think the more prescriptive recommendations is the way to go. Um, especially since we asked for it, but didn't get any, um, we can as well come up with what we think is the best solution. Um, I mean that very respectfully. Um, I do have a question. It sort of relates to this, that same, that same topic of this kind of being done on arrival. If it gets to council, it's not, if it's not palatable to them from their perspective. And that's the perception that this might be taking decision making authority away. I mean, I know it's not, but, um, I would just like us to view it through that lines in every possible way before we push it forward. Because I think there's already a perception out there that we're going to propose something that's going to take this, take councils, you know, control out. Not by that necessarily, but by folks in the community who are following this, because apparently people do that in their free time. Um, I appreciate, um, yeah, yeah, um, so, um, I was going to ask, um, along that same train of thought, how the appointment process is handled at the county since there is no, I guess, is it the county minister appointing it and then the board not, uh, confirms or how does that? It's an application process. Okay. Okay. And the commission says, okay, I would be curious of having the conversation between something similar rather than having the appointment confirmation process for this work, just like a department. So, for example, the planning commission appointees apply to, uh, I think they submit through the clerk and they have to come and speak and the clerk verifies the criteria and they're appointed. I assume by ordinance and I'm assuming the mayor signs that to her, but I think then looking at that process, which I think effectively does the same thing because they pocket to wait on it. They all got to wait in on it. It's just council needs to vote first and then the maker signs rather than the space has to nominate somebody and then the council, um, confirms them, especially sometimes the perceptions of. In your scenario, I'm trying not to impress a lot like a clause. Who is nominated? They come and they submit an application. The clerk interviews them and they make sure they can check the boxes. Um, okay. So the planning commission board, the process is that, um, there's a call for applicants. Yeah. And an application is predominantly. You fill out the application. You return it to the clerk. The clerk verifies you made it and then, um, you go before city council. You're trying to speak at city council and then they go through a process of voting to pick who your nominee is. And that's. I think she was. Name is. It was. Or against somebody. It's most likely a resolution. Something here. Yeah. Yeah. At the moment. No, no, no. That would be an active though to it. Uh, it's. Well, it's just running like a department head. I'm going to be very clear that this is not like a position in the mayor's cabinet. And I'm just worried that's going to be perceived that way. So let's make sure it's not too long. Any other comments I'm trying to write in? Go ahead. This might be a dumb question, but, um, in section of seats, is only those persons who qualified as parties of record for the zoning hearing officer might they participate in the city council public hearing? That doesn't include. Does it. The public. It does. It requires that somebody for the public hearing on the zoning dissipate at the first level, uh, if they would participate at the second level. So it would be, um, people who were against or testimony would would be at the zoning. Procure investor meeting. That would be wrapped up in a report and then go to council. And then if the parties wish to have further discussions, wherever the applicant is, because you wouldn't be one there. No, no. If someone participate at the first level, they can then participate again. They can participate again. Yeah. The idea, though, is that they created the record at the first level, and then they're talking about the record that was created. It's not new information about what it is. Yeah. That's new information. Solidify what the debate is about. Let me summarize what was just requested for this language to be changed. I took it as model, the appointment process on the planning commission process. Yes. Correct. I think everybody has a full open up person entity to participate at the hearing. Um, there's, there's no limit as to who can participate in the first hearing. You don't have to receive notice. Anyone can find it. And the second hearing, it's just saying that if you didn't choose to participate at the first hearing, you can't then just show up at the second hearing. Because the first hearing is the one where you're getting a record and they're taking facts and everything that everyone said. And so if new people come in and it's a whole new hearing, there's no point to the first hearing because the hearing master didn't have the ability to hear that. It would be more protective of the city. So if you don't have things going sideways, then after the fact, you've got to go through the city. Many of the many parts, chunks of mine, building a record. If there's, um, maybe somebody, this, this happens a lot. Things get 80% of their way through a process. Then somebody hears about it. They're like, I don't like that this change is happening. Could they just email a city council person and say, here's my opinion about what decision I would support you in? You know, you have a rezoning coming up in my neighborhood. I just found out about it. All the hearings already coming up. I've been email my city council person and say, hey, that's coming up. Yeah, usually that level of detail. We've worked out the ordinance sound, we've got to handle it. The goal of this kind of process is that the opinion and all as to the case gets heard at the first level. Um, if there's nothing that ever stops a council from deciding, I'm going to send this back to the area officer. But the idea of if the goal is to have established a record. If there's nothing that controls put off the access. But everything about these things is quasi-judicial. The fact that the council is sitting in a role that is different from the typical. I just want to make one point. I can't say whether I'm right or wrong because I shouldn't be getting to go. Okay. But when you have the zoning hearing, um, right now the two hearings go before city council. Um, people emailing city council, having conversations with city council outside of the record is actually considered an ex parte communication and, um, create a presumption that something funny is going on. Um, if it were to be challenged in court. So if city council was supposed to get one of those emails and they have to put it into the public record and disclose it and allow the other side to have an opportunity. Otherwise, just one side is talking to city council. It's a due process, a due process issue. I know it's going to happen. It happens now and they, in, in city council and their aides deal with it and have a process. You know, they see them and they disclose them on the record, et cetera, et cetera. Right. That goes to the, the process. That's what you're writing. It does. It, it will happen. And you never want to be in a position of telling people they can't contact their elected officials. Um, it's just what the elected official does with that information. Um, and that's what we need. Just to do a check. It sounds like you're wrong. Yeah. I was just going to say, Rob, at the appropriate time, if I can, uh, make a comment. Go ahead, Ron. Thank you. First, uh, Ken, very well done. Um, I, uh, you laid out both proposals, I think, as we asked you to. And I find them both to be well done. Um, I'd like, I listened to the discussion and lots of good points made. I'd like to make a motion that we adopt option one as presented. Second. Um, will you properly send it in discussion? And then, uh, Ron, I'm assuming that your motion comes with the clarification that Stephen and others asked Ken to make about the appointment process. Is that fair? Yes. With, with the clarification on the appointment process that that's, that Ken will draft. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. That's good. That's the same thing. All right. I was just gonna say, what was the less detailed, um, proposal? Was that long? I just wanted to say the less detailed, but the decision as far as whether they do this as a single officer, the body, uh, and all the details about that, but that's more. If you require the council to do this, to have a intermediate level of review, but push that would be, as you request a semester. And Rebecca mentioned that a potential risk in that approach might be having people who are not as qualified to do, right? To do the, the function that you set out there to be up to the bureaucracy. If someone was not a land lease attorney, for example. Or, or a certified plan. Right. Right. This would put a burden on the council's side to have a board. Are they going to put a qualifications outcome? They're going to have to be this or that, or that will fully open. Yeah. And, and Garrett, just to give you, um, the benefit of my thought process and motioning on option one, my, my feeling is if we put the more detailed option before city council, they can always take things out of it. Um, but it gives them a full menu of, of how it might look that way. Okay. Okay. So we. Stepping with any possible. Um, I have a question about what's an option one. Um, it's a little in the wings, but since there's a motion to pick the other weeks, I got it. So, um, I'm not just asking you, Rebecca, but I think that you might have an answer to the relationship. Like, so this goes forward. We in Tampa, we do, there are a number of zonings that are processed concurrently and contingent upon the approval of a companion plan amendment. How does that process work at the county? When we're going to be having a potentially this, um, so then hearing master, you have something for hope compliance and also consistency with the comprehensive plan that is currently in place, but also the one that's about to be able to fit into. So at the county, um, in, in, in, because we both do things with the county, I've got a couple of days right now. At the county, um, you, you go through your comprehensive plan amendment, and then at some point you file the rezoning. So at the end, they line up together. Okay. But if you're, I think the point that you're really asking is how you review rezoning, and the rezoning is reviewed as if the comprehensive plan amendment passed, not as if it did not pass, because you wouldn't be getting a problem if you didn't get rezoning. So the planning commission and, and your, whatever they call it, you know, the planning growth management at the county assume that the comp plan passes, and when it goes before the county, the county tweaks the comprehensive plan amendment at first, and if it doesn't pass, you never get to your zoning. So knowing that we do changes between first and second reading and negotiate on apply and scale down a project and then approve it again at the second reading if the comp plan doesn't pass, is that still going to be possible, or are they going to have to get back in line if they change what the original application said, and the zoning here and master now has to be something totally different. Right. The idea here is that you're assuming that an application is going to stay the same. That you lock something at the first level, and that's the decision that's going to happen. I can never stop someone drawing an application and then try to come back with some of that. And if the comp plan doesn't pass, the zoning is irrelevant, typically, because you're only asking for changes to the comp plan if you have to. No one does that for a month. So the idea of being, you're not changing the comp plan process because of the involvement of the planning commission and all that. Plus, and this is pretty much the least, as you know, it's a different standard review for a comprehensive plan, and it's a legislative decision as opposed to a traditional decision. So. And to your, I think, some question about the changes between first and second reading, that I don't think covered in here. That's something I think that they would probably deal with in the ordinance. At what level are you triggered to go back to your zoning hearing master? And that happens at the board of county commissioners. People come up and say, I'm changing my application based upon the other bad. So hearing master recommendation. So now I'm going to add a bigger buffer. Does that bigger buffer have to go back before the ZHM or does it go forward? I don't think that has to be covered here. But they're going to have to draw a more specific . Okay. Sorry. My last question is, are they going to review compliments? Or are they going to counsel? Are they only reviewing this rezoning? A lot of the benefits are really slighted. And so. Not the way it's like. Okay. Can we get a motion in a second? Yes. Yes. That's discussion. Yes. I, I made a motion and it was seconded. Okay. Okay. Yes. Uh, bill seconded it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Um, it's been moving. Sorry. Motion carried. Okay. We're going to get your homework. Thank you. We're going to go back with that. Great. Thanks everyone. Thanks for having to move that forward for us. So let me plan to get us back in the chat around the agenda. And for that. So, um, just from the wrapping standpoint, what I'm going to do is take the language as updated with the planning commission and put it in your working charter draft, uh, so you see for consent. And when you do, um, there's one more item that's, um, was open-ended. If we remember. I, I, I, I, I actually wanted to revisit the notion of, of exploring charter language that would help reinforce the, uh, that reinforce the final completion of projects. And we, we actually talked about that at length, the pros, the cons, the challenges, where rightly belongs, but you brought it back up for, for a potential recommendation. Maybe, I think you can update it because I think you talked to your friend. Yes. So, um, and then I have some free suggestions. Um, I did upload this to share one and y'all want to read it here, though. Um, but it's under documented reference material actually. Um, and so the first suggestion was mandate project execution, technical progress report. Uh, currently in section 4.01 of the charter state, the mayor must furnish the council with information. Um, we could, uh, amend this section to mandate, uh, proactive reporting for, to mandate proactive reporting for capital projects, um, underneath the article 7 finance, um, portion of the charter. Uh, the amendment would be requiring the administration to submit an estimated execution schedule or timeline for all approved capital projects within a certain number of days. If that's already in place, then I guess enforcing it would need to happen. Um, is that already in place? In place in the charter? As far as the schedule will be submitted for steps to get a project done. Um, I wouldn't know how Tampa operates this time. Of course, the charter, the charter's at a higher level. But it's not the charter at the moment. Oh, right. But the ordinance, that affects that. Right, right. Um, so, I guess it was suggested that something be put in place in the charter. So that way, and I know you got a higher level, whatever's going on right now, not working. So that's why I'm saying maybe jump into the higher level. We mandate that a schedule be submitted to a council. Um, as far as production, production, execution of this project. Um, in that way, the administration has to plan the project immediately without aligning them to an impossible, um, religion date by giving an estimate. Uh, and here it is with replacement requirement for the mayor to provide mandatory quarterly or bi-annual progress written progress towards the council. Is that already happened? Again, I don't think it was based on what we've talked about. But you guys didn't know more about what came here. When you say, does that happen? If, are you asking if there's a required submittal process? Yes. Or if somebody actually keeps a schedule? Oh. Uh, okay. You know, I'm not aware of there being a required submittal process. But I think it's safe to say that the project manager keeps a schedule. They're not as detailed and meets what you're describing. Yeah. I would agree with that. This is my answer. Everyone has a schedule. It's a schedule, but it's not everybody's job. But if the schedule changes, of course, I think what should be the agenda update would be provided if the schedule just changes. Um, and then if you've got a question. But the only thing was to add that the capital improvement program that city does manage. It is posted online. They're a project by project. Uh, it sounds like you're looking for more detailed update to council. Yes. Yes. Um, I know website was suggested, uh, and I showed her that website. She said, yeah, but that's not every project that city has. Those are much bigger projects or things that are, um, kind of medium sized projects that aren't as high of budget. But they may not be on this map that the CIT does. Yeah. Yeah. Um, right. So if, but anything that funding is approved for, that's the right to talk about, you know? Um, obviously spending time voting on a project is important. Um. Automatic hearings for stall projects section 2.14 of the charter currently brand through the council of power to conduct investigation, the whole hearings regarding city affairs. Um, you can propose an agreement to standardize this process for delayed projects. The amendment would be to trigger a, uh, start to create a trigger requiring the mayor, uh, to appear before council for a public hearing. If a budgeted project has not reached a specific phase, um, within 12 or 18 months of budget approval. Um, it respects the realities of the construction delays, but prevents, uh, this is why it works. It respects the realities of the construction delays, but prevents projects from sitting in silent limbo. Um, and if there are unexpected hospitals and remaining issues, the administration simply explain with them on public record maintaining transparency. And the final guess. You said in that, uh, the, um, mayor would be the one that would have to come to city council. Would there be another option instead of having the mayor be the one to have to come on? It could be, but I like, you know, shoot, I think the same thing. American city council like that. I feel like if it was something they, okay. This is done. Yes. I don't want to. So I don't know. I feel like that may be something that would be an incentive if to get something done so that I don't have to come before. I know they only usually come forward for the budget to suggest the budget or recommendation, the budget's recommendation or whatever. But I don't know if that's something they, they want to put a representative. They can't that represent. And I think that's what they do anyway. Now. But, um, for the state and mayor coming mayor, future mayors. I just feel like, you know, well, it's fine. Why do you have this feeling like this person is above coming to come speak or? No, it's not. It's not actually my question. Yeah, I know. That's how you feel. But even like come to speak to us, it's like, well, we shouldn't ask the mayor to come. I don't know how many projects are generally going on at the time. Hundreds. Hundreds. So all I'm saying is the mayor's not going to have brilliant knowledge of any one particular project. That's how a CEO operates. So I'm assuming there's got to be someone who's in charge of the jobs that you could call that. They would have that knowledge. I just don't know. I feel like is that a place now where the lady comes by and talks about projects? Are you looking at me? I have no idea how the city. Yes. Okay. Administrator. It depends on if you're talking about the CRA budget. Yeah. The general. I'm going to get it. If you're going to go out through bookmarks or what bar. Right. I don't know how you guys are structured. So. And so what we were saying earlier is the processes that are working that we have right now aren't working to process different or suggest something different. That's just a suggestion because we are able to come to report. Clearly, that's not a big enough jump or impact enough to try to move this project along. So that's why I told we had discussed with that being the suggestion to have an actual mayor explain this project because they shouldn't know what's going on. In my head. Yeah. I think they should. Even though it's hundreds of projects, if it's something that's being held up over a year or 18 months. Like, not saying it's behind a month or it's behind a week or something like that. I'm saying there's something held up for a significant amount of time. What's going on? Yeah. I just want to make sure I got it all. If there was. Mandated, um, execution schedule and project, of course, was one. I just want to make sure. Yeah. Mandating project execution schedules and prior students was one. And I'm driving to share my job as a PDF. It's just. Um, this was, let's have a conversation with city staff or former city staff member. And these are just on the suggestion that he came up. Um, the second one, automatic hearingings were sold by because I just explained where the mayor comes. And, uh, just give you an update of what's going on with the product that's installed over 18 to 12 months. Um, three was a lower threshold of auditing installed products. So currently, you need a super maturity. If you just make it a simple majority vote, uh, word. A product that may be. That was a slow road or it's not, uh, being. Pushed through or it's not happening as quickly as they look like I see. The council just would like a report on an audit of what's going on with that project. And, um, as far as verbiage. This will not do when I'm going to keep a shot at it, but verbiage paper. Look. The mayor shall. And your script. The mayor provide city council with quarterly public reports regarding status of all capital improvement projects exceeding an amount established by coordinates. Such reports shall include project milestones, signatures to date, estimated completion dates, and explanations of any material delays. If a project experiences a material delay beyond a document implementation schedule, the mayor shall present a revised implementation plan at the public meeting of the city council. That's my total report. So, normally we spend quite a bit of time talking about a topic with more specificity. Do you wish to proceed with a motion for this group to have something to react to? Because I think that's probably the most expedient next step. Um, all of those things could, you know, I don't know how prescriptive we want to get with the charter. Those are various ways you can move projects along by shining more of a light on them. Yeah. And putting some rigor around structure. Yeah. One of them kind of explains how, like, this is kind of already in the charter as far as, um, the council being able to initiate an investigation. Um, but it's not having, not having, but as far as the thing with the charter, it's creating a trigger, whether it's a timeframe or something like that. Um, and the third one about the, uh, threshold of auditing, uh, that voting threshold, maybe a majority instead of a supermajority. I mean, investigations and audits would suggest that something's really off the rails. But a predecessor to that would be what you, what you seem to suggest, which is some structured quarterly staff reporting process, public staff reporting process would be public anyway. So I guess it really comes down to, um, what do you suggest this group consider? And I don't want to jump again, but I think because we talked about this, we might be ready for a motion and then have a discussion about that motion and refine it. Otherwise it could be a protracted process. And I just want to make sure we get to what you want. Oh, sorry. Um, what do we ask? We have other things that may happen. What did you mention? You mentioned investigations when you first started, but were you suggesting making, you know, an addition or subtraction to section 2.14 investigations? Because we talked about that before, and that actually was a question specific for council. So maybe we look at that section specifically to address this concern. The word we were caught up on was legislative. So the first sentence is any exercise of its legislative powers, the council or any special committee thereof shall have the power to conduct investigations. And it goes on. I think we talked about, you know, you remove that word legislative or to your point, do you add, you know, if a specific project has gone over six months or whatever, you know, council has the power to investigate. Yeah. And again, we said, well, we believe. Well, why don't you just ask this question, Jen? Well, why don't you just ask this question, Jen? Is the number of top office saying it as my boss? So just to tear me out on this. If the idea is that a project is so materially delayed that it's garnering attention, is that necessarily an investigation or just a staff report explaining what's happened and what corrective measures are being put in place? I think an investigation suggests, I wouldn't use it for inferiors, but suggests a different type of thing than projects, which are all often delayed for good reason. So I just want to actually practice. So you don't have like a good audience in an investigation. I think it's too, I'm just asking the question whether or not that language is meant to be used for updates on projects, which are often seen and they're often good reasons or not. And then maybe there's some recourse, but I think it's two different things. I think what you're describing as an update would be like Marley said, a member of staff or a specific department coming and updating counsel for investigations. This is, you know, compelling witnesses, production of evidence, right, issuing subpoenas and the power to punish for content, which brings up an entirely new avenue of authority, which is the reason why I think this board was hesitant to do anything in this room. But I think an update from a particular member of staff and then investigative authority are two entirely different things. I would agree with that. Garrett, just so I'm understanding, are you advocating one of those approaches? Ron and Bill are both going at the same time. Ron, what a second. Ron, what a second. Bill is going just a second ahead of you. Then the provision, I think, is completely separate from what Ashley's talking about. That is for something very different. Well, Ron, what are you hearing this different? No, you had 2.14. Yeah. 2.14. Right. I'm just saying that doesn't seem like that fits with the idea of delaying project. That's, that's subpoenaing witnesses. That's, that's something I think a lot different. Even if they're, you know, good or bad reason, good or bad reason for the delay. I think you can accomplish what Ashley's concerned with, which I think is just making certain projects move as they should move. And if not, there needs to be an explanation why. That deals with subpoenas. That deals with contempt. That deals with a lot more than I think what you're, maybe I'm wrong, but I don't know. So I think that it, we just happened to the investigations, um, because it does deal with subpoenas and it requires you to come explain what's going on with this project. Yeah. You can't see the council compelling. They tell me out here. The city council developed this and the employer come in and talk to them. Council member of the question report on something. Right. The difference here, what I'm hearing is you're mandating a set of reporting requirements, a set of processes in the charter, as opposed to the broader legislative investigative power. So, uh, that's, that's what I was hearing. Yeah. I think, Ron, you were about to ask something if I was advocating for this one. Yeah. And the answer here. Yeah. Go ahead. Go ahead. I, I, that's what I was at. I, you had laid out a few different options in explaining something. And I, um, was asking if you, if you were leaning in one of those directions or advocating for one of those. What I was saying is this body has discussed this investigative authority in section 2.14 before. And I, if I remember correctly, the consensus was removing the word legislative power and giving council that super broad authority for subpoena power was a little too crazy. I think for the board, I wasn't out of getting one way or the other. I was bringing up section 2.14 because Ashley had brought up that could be a section we look at to potentially add language to, instead of removing the word legislative, for example, maybe you add in. If it's related to a delayed project, maybe I'm sort of spitballing, but that's what I was saying. Understood. Thanks Garrett. Yeah. I respect the idea. I think it's getting a little bit beyond what I would read is maybe even here in a tad Ashley, which is that, you know, starting to scale as well power. I think this actually is something that belongs more so in the section of the charge of the budget, because that is squarely within their oversight authority. And they are asked to weigh in on the use of the residual funds reported in March every year as part of the fund balance. And I think that's the time that they need to understand. If something was budgeted 18 months ago, have it been acted upon, but then they could validate the fund too. Right. I don't think it should be, I mean, I'm taking a step back. I don't think that should be like this huge added duty event. I'm going to have to submit a monthly report and all that stuff. I think if we're just focused on accountability and this council have the information they need about the status of projects to the side. Is the money just going away saving on that project? It should have been moved. It should occur in the spring when the fund balance is reported, because that's when they actually have a segment of the output. Okay. No other doubts. Thank you. That first option is a section of under article 7. In regard to the pro-active reporting for capital. And I'm like a whole rule of thumb. But I think it should be tied to their financial authority, not to them that only project management decisions. And I think that's squarely outside of their purpose. Okay. In many other places. So. So how do we make it within their permit? If I think you spend money on something and it doesn't get spent, like I feel like then that's my business. If I give you money to go spend money at the ice cream truck, the money doesn't get spent, I have a truck, but you still got the money that's in your room. Well, I remember the other thing we talked about was even if there was something in the chart that said a road paving project has to be done within 18 months. Well, what it was talked about. You know, if even if council was to take the money away from that particular project. That was that. Can I make a comment too? Yeah, I just we talked about this a little bit before, but I just want to make sure we don't conflate the fact that just because we budget for something doesn't mean the project should be or has to be done. It really it's approving the money to spend for a project, but that's not a mandate to do the project under any circumstances. And so I think there's a bit of a conflation of a budget approval and a directive that the project has to be completed at any under any circumstances. There there may be good reasons why, and there are good reasons in all kinds of budgets, why things are budgeted, but they but they just don't proceed. I understand. I said that I was I I agree with that one, and that's why I think having it occur at a time when council can actually move the funds to something else. And frankly, it's a pet project, and it shouldn't be in the budget anyway. It shouldn't be reported on so that the other council members are they have pressure put on them to say, was this really the right thing to budget for the administration is holding on it? Why don't move the funds to something where everyone has consensus and wants to move forward? So I'm assuming your intent wasn't just like shutting projects through, but it was also being under being spent in a timely fashion on things that there's consensus on. And I think that would also accomplish that from the other perspective. Totally. And to go back to the whole, you know, from reading and trying to go with a what the problem here, we have a problem that we I'm trying to figure out what the solution should be because it's a problem that they're being proved and they are not used. The projects are being executed in a timely fashion. Or what? How do we fix that? And if it's not being based on that lower level, is there something we could do? Is there other other cities? Can that do this? I don't know. I don't know. You know, we've asked you to do a little research. I should have actually, if we still do research, if there's other cities that do this, or is there a way for us? Tampa just the best that we have the best city, and we are going to have other people. Other cities are looking at us. I don't, but I feel like we have to be pioneers in some spaces in saying, you know, whether the projects fall within a certain budget. They need to be done with an X amount of months or whatever. If they are paving projects, if there's a certain type of project, but we need to have some time frame mapped out. So if that could be put in the terms of value, great. Go ahead. One question. So if I'm just going to correct the channel. If the council wanted to receive reports on projects late by or over budget by being a premier, they could request inward beginning, correct? So if council wanted to turn the screws on project managers in a good way, to say, you know, you said indeed these things, where are we? Are we in a trap? Today they could do that. That would increase the visibility of these things, more pressure on the departments, the PMs. That always results in better performance. That's just a norm. But that doesn't happen today, correct? That's my understanding. Okay. So there's a problem. Something's broken. I mean, I know the public city has. Even if they're not doing it, and they have the ability to do it, and they're not doing it, it's not happening. Or it is happening. I know I can see reports on some projects sometimes, but I guess it's something that's just not required. And so if we have projects that, you know, they're like, well, where are we on this, and where are we on that? The next meeting, let's call this person. Because you have to call somebody to come to the next meeting, and then wait a few meetings until that person can come. So I guess what I'm suggesting is that there is a trigger already put in place for the project manager. If this project is not done by this date, or we haven't reached this phase by this date, I need to submit a written something. It doesn't have to come up there or written something to say what the holdup is, and they can announce that or whatever. Or you need to put the wrong portal. The reason I ask that is they're representing constituents who we've heard are unhappy projects not being done. My question is why they're not asking for those staff reports. So that was trying to write on those projects. It would require explanations, just like you're requesting. So I don't know why they haven't, but they have the authority to do so down the charter. I'm asking what else is needed, just for the group's conversation headline. Yeah, when we talked about this the first time, that was kind of my original hang-up. Just ask for what you want to hear from the staff. Steven, you tied it in in a way, and kind of digest this all at once, and kind of read through it and listen to everybody. But I think you tied it in in a way to the charter through the budgeting process. Can you say that again, just so I can work that in and hold it down here and listen to them? Yeah, I mean, I think this is DOA unless we find a way to tie it back to what their job is, and that is to make sure, I mean, to budget for projects. And I don't have it in front of you, though. I mean, I'm pretty sure we're not supposed to be budgeting for something unless it's a reasonable expectation that we can spend the money. So that I don't know how there's clearly this connect if that's the perception is that we're not doing that to your point. I think that council really only has a couple of different things that they can do when something isn't being acted upon, and that's to reappropriate the money. They can only do that when they set the budget, and then when the fund balance is reporting, which the fund balance is basically when they approve the budget in September. It's based upon an assumption that the books are going to end up getting trued up, and these are the conceptual numbers at the end of the year. That doesn't actually happen until March. So sometimes, what's in the bank is more than what they budgeted for, and so there's additional money, and they kind of all decide how they're going to spend that. So I think before they make decisions about what to bring in that's new, before they make decisions about what that fund balance should be used for, they should know what projects have been hanging out that haven't been acted upon in three years, and potentially decide to divert those funds. If they're going to cannibalize the fund balance, they should cannibalize projects that the administration doesn't want to move forward on. I'm just, and then it's the public basically part of it, too. I'm not just concerned about like, you know, just counseling about what's going on. I feel like there should be a way for the public to know the progress of these things, whether they come on record and stated, and it can be three sentences. I don't care, but the reason why we have not started this project is because this is what's going on, and that's it. But I'm just, I just feel like there's no accountability, and like, by the time the public reaches three years late, you're like, what's going on? Why is this not like, why don't y'all know what's going on? That's kind of a lot of money, just sitting in a limbo. And the way I had my friends when I was having that conversation, if you give little Johnny 50 cents to go to the store to get something, and he leaps out the house. Little Johnny could go to the store and get what he needs or whatever. Little Johnny might get distracted. Little Johnny might break his leg on the way. But at some point, you're going to find out why little Johnny didn't get to the store and he doesn't make it there. So I just feel like that accountability isn't happening unless I ask you. And I'm like, but we just approved X, X, X, X amount of dollars for this project. Why haven't we heard back about it? Like, I feel like they should be, they should want to tell you what's going on with the project. I don't know. It's about your accountability. Are you familiar with the, on the city's website, there's a capital improvement project update that's, it's got, it's searchable and I'm not terribly familiar with it, but I'm just looking at it as we speak. It's got the, it's got the title of each project, the project type, the status, the dollar amount, what district it affects, what fiscal year it was approved. And then you can click on the status and it gives you more info. I'm not sure that that is at the level of detail you're talking about, but I just wondered, are you familiar with that online mechanism? Yes. And then I have folks who she's aware of it too. And she said, that's still not an adequate way to report what's going on with all the projects that are happening. So, and I didn't know what she meant by that, but she said, that's why we just came up with some just congenitions, but she said that wasn't the best, that was not the best system either. So if we, if we want to move forward with some sort of mechanism for reporting, I'm just trying to think of a way to tie that in. Steven, you're thinking it would be in the charter under where the budgeting procedures are, and we would have to decide on some sort of timeline threshold, whether it's a year, two years, three years. I'm just trying to figure out how we angle into this, into the, the charter language. If that's something that we might just take time around the head around where we left it last time too. Did we ask somebody like, is there anybody that either the budget officer, I do agree with Steven, it could be in the budget section. And I think that there could be some time in terms, in terms of an appropriated dollar amount. I think Ashley's just looking for more than just, you have to report on it. There has to be some action. And I don't, I don't know. I mean, I don't know what other, how other cities handle this, but I think it's. I think it's and I don't know, I don't have enough of a understanding of how much, what volume of the budget ends up in these protracted unresolved projects. So I don't know. We either should ask the budget officer or somebody to come back to us with language. What we're trying to do is put more meat in their responsibility of fiscal management for project appropriated dollars. That's what it sounds like to me. But I think, Kathleen, there's a presumption in that, that there are unjustified protracted projects. I'm sure that things are delayed. Right. But an outdoor construction project could be delayed from whether it could be materials. Oh, there's a thousand reasons. I mean, I've been in construction for 30 years, so I'm not. Yeah, no, no, I know. But I died. But I do think that there if there's a reportability in more than that, there's there's going to be an action taken if you don't get a defined whatever, you know, resolution. I don't know how big the problem is, I guess, and what we're trying to solve and what percentage of the budget is in this limbo area. Is it 2 percent? Is it 10 percent? Is it 1 percent? And this is, I guess, a question for Ashley. Are you more concerned with transparency or a mechanism to force a project forward? I feel like with transparency, that would help with pushing the project forward. Yeah. So it's just, yeah, I understand. So the question you're raising is how do we how do we give the public and others within the city who want the information? Well, in the neighborhoods that are waiting for these projects and then they don't get done, like rational, you know, reasons for the delay. And that's explained and that's understood. I get that. Yeah. It raises the the question is, is it a charter amendment or is it a operational issue? And and, you know, it does. So it would might be it might seem like there might be a language like a sentence you could put in the budget sections to Stephen's earlier point that, you know, somehow defines an action that is not a subpoena. But as some reportable action on a delay over a certain period of time. Yeah. I mean, I think setting a dollar amount at this moment in time is tricky because some projects that are low dollar amount are of high value. And I don't just want to assume that we're looking at the big stuff. Right. Stuff actually gets overreported on and the mediums, the small stuff gets underreported. But just for context, since I don't know that we're going to end this tonight, but I'm just going to throw this out there. If anybody isn't clear on like what types of projects aren't being acted upon, just Google it. But there's plenty of the council members have been speaking out about that recently. One day blue sphere trying to get power stations done since he got on council. So I think if you're curious about the examples, go look them up. I don't think it's a huge dollar amount number, you know, but it's that's, you know, one fire station is one fire station. It's very important to that community. So it's just right. And I'm really talking about performance at the end of the day and getting a lot of stuff is just one measure that you would hold the administration to and the delivery of services and projects and everything else. It's just another. So to me, the bigger question is around the performance of their team. And and, you know, they're anyway, I think it's just one piece of that conversation around what they're charged to go do deliver. I want to personally that characterization. I'm doing it strictly to the ones of city council from the budget. They expect certain projects to be done that are committed to. They're not being done either because the administration doesn't want to do them or because they're not feasible. I agree with Ashley. That should be reported on transparently. And each side should be brought to the table to explain why, because the public has an expectation of something. And I think we talked about this. And not make it about are they managing projects? Good job. I don't think that's how we should be doing this. I think it's more about a fiduciary responsibility council. It's a different lens for sure. Ron, go ahead. Yeah. I was just going to ask. I think we talked about this last time. It's more of a question for Ken. But either in approving the project or approving the budget or by ordinance, the city council can require that certain information be made available to them or to the public. Right. They can do it. They can do it that way, even if it's not in the charter. Yeah. Well, I'm hearing just the difference here is having a mandated schedule of reporting versus upon request. But but the but the council could mandate that themselves if they wanted to. Yeah. Then they have that for some reason. So I'm just saying, yeah, I'm just, I'm just saying that maybe they don't want to do that because it's going to seem like an attack every time. I just, Hey, I like it. I mean, why are you asking about this project? Why do you ask about this project? If it's just mandated that you are going to do this, like this is the rule because it seems amazing. Like they may ask about some projects over the others or not ask about certain projects. And then it's like, you know, if it's just in your production process for the project manager is to do this. If this is wait, then it takes the hands off and just glissize. Oh, why did you ask about the fire department? So why didn't you ask about our project? Why didn't you ask about this project? So. Yeah. I'm trying to figure out how we can move the ball down the field. Do we want to see who's in favor of just keep it really broad, having some language in section in article seven finances about reporting at all? It sounds like maybe that people are in favor of any budget change based on students expertise. That might be where it goes. Do we want to explore that? We can. I mean, just a quick guess or no. So we've got clear how we're going with. Right, right. Might even be a broader question. Do we even believe the charter is the right place to try to get this done? Sure. So maybe, maybe we start with that and then we consider into where it lands. So let's just, just, just to get a sense, not to do a formal motion. Sorry, but I just want to make sure. Is something good to keep down the cans on keeping it. No, it hasn't, it hasn't. And that's what this group is here to do. Either you just have to stop kicking it or feel like it should be handled elsewhere. So how many, I'll last those in a second, go on, and Katherine. Show of hands, how many think that some type of charter amendment should be done to address the issue of transparency, accountability, and delayed projects in the charter? I'll vote for it now, but I might vote against it depending on the word. No, that's okay. Just in principle, I mean, the charter should be in place to try to fix, I'll fix the situation. You're right. So it looks like, how many hands are up here? One, two, three, four. Okay. So everyone in the room said that it's worth exploring charter language to help fix the issue or help ameliorate the issue. So we're going to, that's a threat to at least move forward. Well, I think we voted on that same question last time, wherever we are. Is there a specific direction, actually, or what would be next? Would Ken look at the charter? Well, when we were talking about the last time, we did not make any charter changes. Oh, I don't know. Okay. So we voted on. But now we're essentially a few months. So I'm just saying what that looks like is if that was a question. Actually, my recollection was this, you know, the consensus of the group was mostly I wanted to move forward on something, and here we are. Okay. Yeah, I mean, I think it was still a little bit cloudy last time. We're going to talk about intervention or just transparency, which I think we did address just now. And we don't want to do interventions, we don't want to force it, but I think some transparency is necessary in order to try to just shine a light so that way there may be some type of push for things to move forward. So maybe instead it's a research task into whatever cities do when it comes to reporting on the status of a previous investment projects? Yes. And it's the right spot for that. Yeah. I'm just kidding. I don't have any steadfast. I just want to put on the record that I'm not clear what a project is. Apparently it's something smaller than a capital improvement project, because that is like defined in all capital letters. But is it every line item budget in the budget? I don't understand the label. So I'm having a hard talk. It's a good question. But I am all about transparency. And if it is, and I'm all about like, if this information is everywhere, how hard is it to get it somewhere that everyone can go look at it and not have to try and call people and not get rid of them, whatever. Like if we can get, if everyone has it and it's just talking about paying it somewhere, and somehow that's not happening and it takes a charter change, I would probably support that. But I'm really not even sure what, I have a fundamental gap of understanding of what we're talking about. But I'm happy to vote to him before if we don't have to be that diverse tonight. I just want to. What do we need to do? At some point, I'm going to do some clarification. So maybe do we need research on this? What are the next steps? Because I have to reserve 15 minutes from here. That's just right. So it's the fire department. Can you put me at the end? Yeah. The fire department. You'll be right at the beginning of it. The fire department, is that a capital or is that medium size? The fire station example. That would be capital. That would be capital. Roller work, streets. Yeah, paving was in the council's question. Yeah, specifically there. So I agree this does blend into like things councils asked for and haven't been acted upon. I think we should be very specific about asking. So should we actually ask council members, what are some examples of mediums? That can be there, research and ask them. I mean, we could. I don't know where to get there. I mean, this came about, I think, public interest, right? I mean, it's on the other side of the council. I think the question is whether we ask them to look at what other cities do on things that their council has set aside money for and see, you know, whether the checks to get in the wrong way. And then, you know, at least we'll have an idea of what other cities do. Right. And we can make a decision based based on them. So can we take a look and see if there's any language covering this issue? Well, and if there's not, we need to be high names. I mean, I would throw out if the administration has me suggested language and I'd be interested in hearing how I'm sure they would agree that transparency is good. And if they have some way to frame this in a way that seems to work with them. I agree with that. And I'd also ask other, I mean, there's isn't there a city and county association in the state of Florida? I mean, there have to be people that are trying to get information quickly on the status of allocated appropriated dollar projects. So there might be some input we can get from them in terms of what is more than just sort of hoping that they report back. Like, what are other steps to encourage more active reporting? I want to be sure to understand that the request is expensive. So, can we check out the charge for language around transparency of project on that project delivery? Rebecca, did you add to that request? I think the administration wanted to suggest, um. The language with some parameters that something that would be workable on there. It'd be interesting to hear for charter language. Is that ever thinking? Yes, parameters, anything they wanted to do. And this would be in the budget section, you're thinking, Rebecca? Well, Steven was thinking budget, and I don't have to. Yeah, I was thinking budget. Same question, and I used to the city council, too. Sure. Like, I mean, the administration would be the one that provided it. So that's what I was thinking. Like, I got some thoughts of what's the dollar amount. Yeah, like what's feasible or, you know, I don't know. Yeah, I mean, it's not understanding. So that's what we need. Anyone can give suggestions. Right, right, right. I mean, if it's just raw input around the topic, that's why I can do that. I was just going to say, and I think that the administration asked us to look at the CIP viewer, and I think Brian brought that up and we never really dealt with it. I think that the CIP viewer is a communication tool that just presents something about the CIP, which is not necessarily what we're asking. I think what we're asking more is about how the CIP changes from year to year, and are some projects getting on and staying on and not actually progressing forward in the development process. So if the same project is budgeted for design for five years in a row, it's going to look like, yeah, every time you look at the CIP viewer, oh, it's in design. But really it's not. It was budgeted for design and we're actually moving forward. So I don't think the CIP viewer actually answers the question that you're asking about. If the project has been sitting behind for too long. I think we've more or less concluded it's helpful, but not enough. But what are we asking? Are we just asking, what are we asking the administration for precisely? Are we just asking for them for ideas on ways to improve this? Are we asking them for their opinion of the issue? Are we asking for the language? I just, I'm the one asking. Can we do the research first and then ask the administration? Because I agree with you. I don't know what they have to say. I just don't want what they have to say to print, whatever. Is that okay? So can you do the research deciding so? Okay. Okay. So. And then let me just ask, as Ken does that research, what I would particularly like to know is when we look at other cities, do they have something in their charter? Not necessarily what are their policies and process? If other people want to see that other stuff too, great. But specifically anything that's in a charter of another city. Yeah. Agreed on. That's the language I've got too. Okay. But we need to be pioneers. Those campuses. Okay. That's it. And I skipped the slide. I'll tell you we didn't discuss their questions. So just in terms of timetable, I don't think many of you guys are really almost done. It all depends on what you guys want. You guys follow your lead on this. We're certainly not done tonight. And we probably, or maybe it may not be done next week. It really depends on if we get to the point where, like, let's say, King comes back with that language around the parent master and adolescent, right? It's really running around every single item we're talking about. And we're getting close to this new issue. This is a new one that's going to occupy a collection of time next week. We'll see how that goes. And all I can say is we'll play it by ear as to when we'll be done. And eventually we run out of time. We're getting, actually, we're getting close to that. I really was hoping at the end of August we would be done. And there's also time needed to simplify all the port, which I'd like your input on around things like lessons learned, how we can get better next to them. So all I can tell you is where are the, where are the, you know, we'll be on our desks here at the front of tables. We're just here to support you in Canada. I would like to open the floor to, to a new business for about 10, 15 minutes. I think some folks would like to raise some issues. Now's the time and open it up. Question. Didn't we talk about the evening meetings? Did we talk about that already? Maybe the request for evening meetings? Yeah. We have a recommendation around maximizing public opportunity to stay in government. So a new business from. Yeah. One thing I raised a couple of weeks ago. Bob, I'm assuming there was awareness. There were three issues raised that were a concern to me. The first was that there was someone here from the mayor's office, somehow intimidating us on one issue that was raised. The second issue raised was whether we had fully vetted and discussed the questions posed to us from city council. So that was issue two. The third issue raised was that Rob, for some reason, somehow wasn't doing his job, so to speak. I mean, he was a facilitator. So when I saw that, my reaction was a couple. One, and I hope y'all fit this way. I'm very proud of what this group has done. You all have worked very, very hard to come together as a group, listen to each other. We come from very divergent backgrounds. That's a beautiful thing. I have to make independent decisions. I can't imagine anyone around this state, if I am able to sit in any direction, you know, asked vetted questions. Lord, we have talked and talked and talked about all of the questions and all the issues that have come up for us. And then lastly, I, you know, listen, I don't know how many of y'all know, I'm probably in the 50th one of these types of situations I've been in when there's a facilitator. You have to have a facilitator or else you just die. And, you know, Rob, I'm not going to get up hungry, but you don't find your job in my opinion. Okay. So, you know, I don't know where we stand on this. I do know that there was a moment in time. There were one of those meetings. They wanted to hear from us. They wanted to hear, you know, they specifically said you, Ashley. But if there's anyone speaking to city council, that's going to do Q and A. Well, we have to be very, I think, circumspect and conscientious about that. In other words, if anyone, if it's you, if it's anyone of us, if you're speaking on behalf of the commission, then that's one thing. Speaking on behalf of yourself would be another thing. So I don't know where that stands, whether or not we've got, whether that's, there's a follow-up on that, whether there's really is an expectation of someone go there. But I, I really, when I listened to this, my reaction was selfish, not selfish, but it was a defensive one for all of us, because I do think we busted our tail the best job possible. So I wanted to put it out there. I don't know if anyone's heard back from anybody, but it really is an indication that you want to hear from someone. Has anyone heard anything subsequent to that meeting? At that meeting, they made a date for a... Yeah, like on August 6th. But they didn't make, I didn't hear, I was like, that was for a meeting in that sense? There were two meetings, there were two meetings. And Steven, I can't remember the exact date, within the last 30 days. But I watched one, wherein the issue concerning... June 11th. June 11th. At exactly. I think it was my dream of a comment. No. It was a career business at three hours and 29 minutes and 50. Exactly. It was... I don't know. Sorry. It was not a person. It was a time. It was someone that was... One or three fraud. Okay. Maybe it's not about the intimidation one time. I don't even sure. I appreciate it. Um, last time I played the clip of when they were talking about the special business. I think that what you're referring to might have been safety. It was. It was just right before. It was in June. Something was a second. No, no, it wasn't. It was before. It was for two meetings. But you played the clip, and this was right before you played the clip. And then I hadn't heard this clip. I just heard your clip, and I was like, wow, they seem really... I didn't hear your appeal for that. Yeah. I was joking. Yeah. And it's because, I would think, that this other clip, which if anyone's interested, we can play if you haven't looked at them. Yeah. Yeah. We can play it, but I do want to play it for land development code construction services fees. There are times lines for July 16. All right. Now. I'm going to ask the second question. The last one was just one that I added. I've been hearing that. I haven't listened to all the charter commission meetings, but I've been hearing that they dismiss most of all of our questions that we asked, and now the mayor of political advisor is sitting there. Some members feel intimidated by that, and bullied to follow certain rules by the mayor. It's one thing if the mayor wants to send them most, but to push the committee in a certain direction, I guess what it means is if they're going to do that, then we should go sit there as well. So that's a side issue, but I would like to make a motion to ask the charter review committee to give us an update on the answers to our questions on July 30th. Okay. So now representative come and give us their response to our questions. We had about 30 questions. We need to know whether they're going to answer our questions or not, and that is kind of a midpoint. If they're not, then we need to figure out what we're going to do about it. I have been advisedly to dismiss all of our questions. I'm sorry, I'm a motion to ask the girls and second problem. I'll see it. I'll see it. So with my name, we're all saying that, but can we get it at the time? Maybe 10 minutes, I remember 10 minutes. Yeah. I mean, that's for presentation. July 30th. Probably we're going to get it actually, but, um, yeah, August 6th. August 6th. August 6th. By the way, I said, unfortunately, actually, because I think she's someone who wants to follow the questions and there are others who disagree would be better for the ones who disagree to come in and tell us fine. Um, um, but I think, so we have a motion from Council to have the charter review commission. I'm the city council to answer the, uh, we have something on the answers to our questions. Okay. August 6th. Yeah. August 6th is good. Okay. At least there is here. I don't think I cut off anything. So. Okay. Um, at the last meeting, these two, which is amazing. So, then, from the left, how was it? Um, and it was asked, they asked me, haven't we like, you know, how we speak and spoke about all the questions. Um, or talk about all the questions and I, I shared with me, uh, there was some questions that we didn't know the answer to. So we said, let's get back to you guys. And I went back to, I was wondering, like, had y'all going to the council and ask them what for clarity. Sometimes we need one clear. And granted, I can go to council making this plan. I don't know where it came from. So I can be that. I don't know where it came from. But, um, I was like, maybe they're taking some, I said, well, maybe there were some questions that we need to get clarity on. We just kind of skipped over the questions. So I said, as a person that knows the research, what I want to do is go back and do all these videos in their transcripts and include all the questions that were posed and put them in a spreadsheet. So now there is a spreadsheet with all the questions along with the YouTube and to the point where we had discussions. So, um, the questions are in a column, the answer to that question and then another column and the reason why we came to that conclusion and it is under, um, documents, reference materials, action review. And did they work with us along? Um? Was this from Ken and Mom? Yes. Because they put down a question. Well, let me, I'd like to refine that. We, I'd like to add a little, if I could just add a little context since we were part of a conversation in the Whitehall State Office. Um, you know, my, my view is, of course, we've been through all the questions. We have records of it both on the video, on the charts, some of us in the minutes, uh, and in the tracking machine, which I tried to make sure that we complex everyone's, uh, preferences, uh, to the level of being, because our minutes aren't he said, she said, word for word, Ashley took, took the steps to try to be very precise about our conversation, which went all over the board, depending on how much we do, how much more information we needed, and we had a guest show up. So her working on that was done independently after those conversations to answer the question of yours, Bill. I hadn't looked at it yet. I know it's out there. Um, but, but that's, but that's what's happened. Um, the, the assertion was that they were dismissed though, which I would hope everyone agrees is, is not the case. I don't think they were, you know, and, and how you get through answers to 25 questions, each with some, sometimes very complicated summaries in a board meeting is a question I can't answer for, for you, Ashley, but that's what happened. I won't say they were dismissed. There are some questions that I could not find our discussion. Um, so just in transparency. Yes, we did answer a lot of questions, but there were some questions that I thought that weren't on that question column. So I don't know if they got rolled into something else or something like that. Did you leave, Ashley, did you leave if there was a question that you didn't believe? If you believe, what is an answer? Is that listening to this? Every single one of the questions. Do we all have time? Yes. Yes. So we should all review that. Make sure we are free with that. And Ken or Rahm, you know, do you, like, find? Five of unanswered ones. I did not find, like, the... Five of 30. Correct. And then maybe we can get to the bottom of whether they were... We'll look at them, right? We're going to do our child. We're going to look at them. Maybe they were rolled up to something else. Or maybe they're out there. We'll look at them, right? We're going to do our child. We're going to look at them. Maybe they were rolled up to something else. Or maybe they're out there. We... We'll get to the bottom of those five. If there are five that weren't answered, I think we could all say, well, then, if we miss something, then we will roll up our sleeves and we will answer the question. Okay. And then the next part... Sorry. It... For what it's worth, I didn't... I didn't... I don't see those as questions that we have to answer. I saw those as questions about the charter that we should consider. In other words, it's not within our scope to give advice to the city council on every question that they may have. It's to make recommendations on the charter. So we consider the questions that they said, but we don't have to answer the question. We may not know the answer to the question. We... We... We consider the issue and determine whether we think a charter amendment needs to be made. Okay. Yeah. I... I appreciate that. I know that was a huge amount of work. So thank you all for doing that. Seriously. I do... I will say though, I... I'm a little concerned because I think that we have an end in sight. And I do think that we're... My hope is that we are able to produce some tangible recommendations. And I... I personally think that we've spent most of our time trying to reverse engineer their questions to figure out what the problem was that they're trying to solve. And to pre-engineer it back in a way that we're all comfortable with. If we even are. Like, I feel like that's been a lot of our discussion. Yeah. So, my concern with just responding to a bunch of yes or no questions is that we're not really going to do our job and it's just going to take them off. So, I... I think that if we are going to respond literally to the questions, then we also need to respond about what we're doing about the topics that they raised and the issues that they brought up and the problem... and the potential problems that we think they might have been trying to solve and what we're doing about it. Right. And that's what Ron was saying. No and there it is. But yeah, it's not just a yes or no. We consider, I think, almost all of these. I don't think we just answer the question. I think we obey it seriously. Why is it that you would have this? Why... Okay, that was the question. We took it as, let's evaluate it to the bottom of it. I think that whatever we do here has to come with a recommendation saying in the future, questions need to be put in context in terms of asking them and what is, what is the specific or some specific examples of why this is an initiative? So, you've come to the part that was my comment. I love all of them. I don't know if I could choose with anybody. But what I explained to them is when you post questions to us, we're going to have a discussion. We don't know what the problem is. We're not in your space. We can, you can say, we want eight parking spots along Kennedy instead of six. We're like, there's no problem. People are parking. It's not an issue. But you have all these, you have these documentation as the why there should be eight instead of six. I do like what should just happen instead of questions. Maybe give us a suggestion for verbiage or what, what it should say or what should be added. And then I don't have to take an offense. I think they thought we would have taken offense as you're telling me what to put. And we're not professional. We don't work in the city. We don't know all the inner workings. Well, you may have some city experience and stuff, but I know. So, like, I don't know all the things that are going on or what, why, who's coming to you and complaining. But just to make it short, I just think, and when I spoke Clinton, I think what would have helped is if you gave us recommendations for other questions. Because we're going to have a discussion and it may work out for or against your favor or whatever, just not materializing anything. It was also, you know, discussed and Rob corrected me about attachment. There was a suggestion that was put forward. I think the mayor would to let up more of the memo about the process of us having the appointment versus the something else. It wasn't unsolicited. Yes. It wasn't unsolicited. It was actually for us to collect more information about our decision. Right. We asked for it. So when I had that conversation with him, he explained, Rob explained to me that it wasn't something that I just said to us. It was something that we asked for. So I guess my thing is maybe for all these questions, we should pull this back at them and say, where do you want this in the charter? But now we're at the end. Whoa. Can I hold up? Yeah. Now we're at the end. Now we're at the end. So. Done. No, actually. Can I, I just want to make your comment. I want to get to Steve and Bonnie. So that you know, my view of the questions is very much, and if I miss five, I'd be surprised, but I've been wrong before, it won't be the last time. I've been fine. But was more in line with LeBron said, and in my mind, what the, what the council would get would be, we talk about questions. If they result in a charter language recommendation, we proceed with that. If they didn't capture the conversation, move on. We answer the yes or no, move on. And again, in the absence of, of knowing what problems we were trying to fix, if you remember, we have, and I have most of this track, we were asking for more information. Repeatedly around these things to understand. Whether it was the chair coming, whether it was the CFO arriving, whether it was the planning commission, you know, and, and some of that was probably just pure charter of you guys being interested in it. A lot of it was prompted by questions. We just didn't understand the underlying issues around. But for your benefit, in my mind, those questions were kind of guideposts, and if they let us toward a recommendation, we did it. And if they didn't, we completed the conversation, recorded our response, and we're done. I'll just let you know how I did it. I'll come on in and speak in. Okay. So, operationally, what do we do from here? There needs to be a report created and presented by August 6th. Is that Ashley and you and Ken? I don't know if that's the case. Let me just ask, that clip that I just listened to was the first time I heard that. Was that officially communicated to us in any way, Rob? No. I don't think we'd do anything until something's communicated to us. I feel like we have talked a ton about the issues that were raised. We had the chair very kindly come and speak to us for a lengthy period of time about some of those questions. I took his tone from it, consistent with my statement earlier, which is, these are things for you to take into consideration. They weren't directives to do anything, or he didn't say to us when he was there, we want written answers from you. So, I understand that it was said at a public meeting, but until something's communicated to us, I don't think we should do anything. I think we should handle this the same way the angle of the city. I think that Ashley should have a conversation with the chairman and let him know that the timeline for completing our work is in the very near future, after that deadline, and that we would like him to please continue this report so that we did report on what they asked us to speak to, which is the answer to your questions, as well as the recommendations that resulted from the research that we did investigating the questions. Okay. I think that there's a way to do, I mean, one of the recommendations I was going to have a new business today is if we're getting to the point of our wind down, we should do a summary statement that we all sign and say, we're honored to have served in this purpose. We, you know, honored to sort of try to build Tampa into the next generational city that attracts blah, blah, blah communities, diverse and active communities. And, you know, we welcomed all the input from the city council, we debated every point that they raised, we had how many outside speakers, we met this many times, we, I mean, that becomes a public document that they can't, you know, with all due respect, and I don't deal with them, and I don't have to lobby them, and I don't have to interact with them, except to vote for them or give them money. Okay. I think that there's sort of a little bit of group grope here. I mean, we took that verbatim, everything that they sent and tussled with each one of those things over the last however many months we've been meeting. And they never asked for a report back, and frankly, we're an independent commission, so let's own our space, let's be respectful, let's do a summary statement, and let's send our submissions forward. And then let the, you know, personalities slash egos slash ownerships sort of fall where they lay, I mean, I don't, you know, my, I feel like we were appointed, and the audience is the public, and we dealt with the three issues, in my opinion, that have been the most meaningful. The other question was, you know, that we asked ourselves is what are we trying to fix as we looked at all these different suggestions from the city council and the public and everybody else. So, I don't want to get into a defensive position, and I won't, and whether we sign this letter or this note or this summary statement as a group or as an individual, I will send something like that so that there's a public document to the length and the depth and the integrity with which we looked at this charter review for the city of Tampa, which should be, you know, and is, continues to be a great city leading Florida lots of ways forward. And with all due respect to the elected city councils, which I have huge respect for anybody that runs for office and wins that office, and I respect their service, you know, they've got to also respect the service of the commission. So, I, one of my new business points was, I think we should try to see if we can figure out a summary statement that just lists out all the different people we did get input from and we sought input from and we listened to and not be defensive in any way. I did not see the clip until I listened to it 10 minutes ago. It was a good input. That's good. Good input, Kathleen. Thank you. Gary and then, and Alan. Yeah, I think that's all fine. I just, there was a motion at council that was approved for a summary and your name was brought up and you did this awesome work. Thank you. I just, I wouldn't want to leave it at that and have you in a position where you're, you don't have power backing as an entire group. Since it's our group being brought to a question, I feel like we should operate as a cohesive body in support of you, the chair, as you deliver it to council, whatever they're asking for. Um, where did you leave it if you were telling the story about you back to the chair or the other house? Um, it's really interesting. Um, has he seen this hair? No, no. I ain't quit. It's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's. Well, it's not, are they looking for just a presentation? Are they looking to, to blow by blow, put you up there and go through Q&A? Yes, that's a document. The thing was, I know you said, discuss all questions. So we're just going to put something together, basically show, this was the answer. And this is why we came to that. I did not dismiss, um, call the concern about whether, whether we look at all the questions, because I was like, I don't know. I'm not going to complain, so let's put all questions down and see. Um, with when I put the plan in it, his concern was that we, uh, the whole thing that we agreed to with the recommendation, that's what, uh, told me that, that wasn't, that wasn't, that wasn't, we asked for that recommendation, uh, word. Remember, it wasn't a recommendation. It was more information related to how the last charter change affected fire. Wasn't a recommendation. I just want to be accurate. It was, it was kind of contextual, um, as we wanted more information. We wanted more, more real. Like we talked about the pros and cons and what it meant to be higher and dominated. And we said, why don't we find out, it wouldn't matter, it, it wouldn't matter. By the way, we reached the conclusion we thought was the right conclusion on each and every issue we addressed, period. That's why I feel the, the, the, the amended charter that we're going to present is the work product that speaks for itself. I mean, we, we, we did what we were asked to do, which is consider those issues and voted on them. And I thought, yeah, we did a thoughtful review, a very thoughtful, substantive review. What this group did. I mean, it's, these are public meetings. Everything we said is recorded. Thank God they're public. Let's go back and refresh. Remember who didn't want them to be public? And don't, don't get me wrong. I want to be clear, I'm not saying we'd be dismissive of what, what city councils asked to the contrary. What I'm saying is, I think that they will see when we produce the work product that we, we did that, those things. I mean, again, we did talk to the chair at length as a group and, and we looked at what the city asked us to look at. And, and we came up with a work product that was, uh, come about honestly as a debate amongst this group. I don't think we should try to explain it in a written document because I also think if we do that, it's going to, each one of us is going to wordsmith it. And I just don't, you know, the work product for our group is the, is the proposed charter amendments. Thank you, Ron, I'll let go of the, the sentiment that us agreeing on precisely what we discussed for each question, August 6 needs to be 2027, if we're to get that done. It will take a long time, um, here for the duration, but let's be practical about it. I think that will be a difficult thing to coalesce around with the next students. Um, I, so I, I do believe that we received a specific request from the administration to change the charter back regarding the assessment process and we agreed to it. Except very early, early on. So it was a recommendation. I'm just, yeah, and I, I think that we're getting a little bit caught up in the fact that it's going into silly season and we all knew this was going to happen anyway. I don't think it's, we should get too dramatic about it. I think we should treat them like adults and actually should have a one-on-one and say, we need another month and we'll give you our final report. It's going to address, it's going to address the questions you asked yes or no. And it's also going to address other recommendations that we came up with throughout the process. I think that the, um, I don't know if they're asking me for a whole report on each question. I think they just wanted to know why are we ignoring the question and that's why it's going to be an easy 10 minutes. This, Bob, you want to add to that? But then when the question, if the question is posed, did you speak about this? I can say, Ed, Tom Cole, is this a thing? Sure. Yes. Well, we have the proof. So I have to find out with this mysterious five bar, I didn't know that we missed anybody, go ahead. So I'll, I'll preface this by saying I respect that certain council members feel a certain way. I would disagree with the characterization, but I personally find this conversation agonizing. This is so difficult to sit here and listen to. I feel like we need to keep our eye on the wall, we've got work to do. We don't have that much time. I agree with Steven. If you just, if we could deal with this in a way, we would say, Hey, look, I made this beautiful work of research. Let me sit down with you one-on-one and explain where we're at. We got to focus. We can't just get thrown off the trail right now. We got to finish our job here and like, this is too painful to sit here and listen to this conversation. So it gets back to something that Ron brought up a few minutes ago, actually, were you requested and required to go to that council meeting? They made a, I guess, maybe the communication hasn't come yet, but they made a motion saying they did all that stuff, didn't they? They did all that. It's not a long time. It's a long time. It's a long time. It has to become something. They wanted to go going forward. It's for years and not at least. They said, they think they said they are. They said, they're on you. But we encourage us to continue, it's just like anybody else can, especially if it's a timely date. But I think we're very close to meeting. Yeah. That's the way to go. Given the hour, you will meet again before that deadline. I assume all of this conversation will get back to the council, and I also think it would make sense to reach out to the chairman to see if we have all clarification on what exactly they're asking for, and they have the opportunity to discuss that. And I think if they want, actually, I think that it's not sure that it's appropriate for them to ask you to speak on behalf of the group. I mean, honestly, if anyone's going to go and present substantively the changes, Ken is our counsel and can do that. Ken, I don't mean to put you on the hot seat, but there's – these are – if they want to ask you, actually, about process or something and you want to talk to them, then certainly have at it. I have relationships with a lot of council members, and I've talked to them along the way about things. I'm sure many of you have as well. But I think we should be careful, too, of them putting you on the spot to explain why something didn't happen because we all have a plurality of views. If there's a no vote on something, if there's nine votes, we may have nine different reasons why we voted no, and I think it's unfair to ask you as an individual to substantively talk about the substance of it as opposed to the process, if that makes some sense. Yeah, report can – that's where it's going to – that's – I will call him and – I'll call him and let him know what we're going to – are we able to send this to them yet? Or we will. Be able to send this to – I would not. I think we should – I think we should ask for it to be continued. I think it might be good to talk about what we think we're going to be done before we leave tonight so that you know what to ask for in terms of the time. But I think that that shouldn't get to there at some point. I'm not saying no, it's just – I think we should wait until we finish. You put it on our own. Well, we all should wait a long, long time. The start of it will be done. Like I said earlier, Steven, it's hard because we – If you end up digging further into something, which we – it's here to do, our deadline, I think – I think if we pushed it, it would be – September 17th. 17th. I was really hoping, honestly, we would be done for August. I don't even know if that's the case anymore. But we've got another new this month and two in August. And honestly, we need some time to compile this, and I want to make sure we all have a chance to see those things, that you reviewed them, that when we have things like lessons learned, as Alan mentioned, I get working on the process as much as the content as well. That's a really nice package. So, and that's going to take a few weeks minimum anyway. So – How much did we change? We changed a lot? What do you mean? In the charter? Well, I think everyone knows – I mean, everything's documented, everything's highlighted. All the changes we've agreed to are already there. Not in the charter. Rob, what's going to take multiple meetings? I mean, we're having three-hour meetings. We're already 20 minutes, or three-hour and 20 minutes tonight. What do you – help me – help us understand why we can't wrap up in one more meeting. I think if I force, for example, you to take a very direct motion, we vote, we say no, move on, we can get done quickly. But since now we're asking, for example, more research on other charters, I'm not letting a judge come against that. Then you have to digest that and decide what we do with that. So to your point, Ron, if I have this group, again, this consent to push us harder than we have, and leave less time for conversation and research, we can be done next meeting, two weeks from now. That would give us ample time, because I think it's going to take three or four weeks to really make sure the product's where we want it to be. So I was hoping finish our substantive conversations next meeting, and then maybe one more virtual meeting where I really get your input on the process. Make sure you understand the review cycle around this deliverable and document. But it depends really on how much we want to discuss the matters. the last two issues that we've got meeting, one is far to expect in general, right? That's coming back to us and Ashley says, sure, but there is his, isn't it? He's sorry, right? So it was an issue. We, we, we, we got on time, right? Eight to one. Right. I don't know who the whole thing is. It's pretty firm when we get language from, from Ken. But that, that language is not just how the, the, the church is. We're laying on the relationship. Yes. We're already pretty much aligned on them. That should take about 10, 15 minutes. We've got, we, we've come back to the concept around projects, transparency, if it's in the chart or not. Remember, we said we're naming more information from counseling and administration. First, we want to do research. We go to an app, but we're looking at a longer timetable. There's one step includes the other, and it comes before. So you'll know for sure. If you'll see much around projects and delivery, it feels to me like you probably will, but I don't want to, again, I don't know. You come back and say, I haven't. So if we can buckle down and just kind of commit to a little bit more rapid decision-making next meeting, ideally, we would be done. And do we want to do that? That's the group. I'm following your base while trying to respect your wishes to get things done. You should try. I do. Can we try to really, you know, not go down and, you know, some, you know, mail them reports. So I know that's a long answer, but I think what we're saying is, let's finish next week. And then, when I say finish, I mean, discussions. And then it's more around product, final reviews, and input on that, which is an easier that we're not talking about. Can we each just agree that we're going to talk to our whoever at the best and say we all agree that we'd like to continue, but it's still this day. We're working on the answers to their questions, but we're also working on finishing up and we're really close to being done. Yes. Yes. I'll do that. But I don't, I wouldn't say we're working on answers to their questions. I wouldn't, because I don't think we're answering the questions. I think the questions were for our consideration in order to do, I'm opposed to us answering, you know, substantively every one of those questions. I think the question was, should we make a charter amendment, and we should discuss that and make a decision. So maybe you didn't mean this, but I would steer away from telling them that we're going to give them answers to those questions. I think we answer the question through whether there's a charter amendment or not. The question, every one of those questions was, should you amend the charter in light of this? And the answer is, here's the, here's, we took all those into consideration, and here's the charter amendments that we suggest. So, Rob, is it hard to say that we are working on responding to their motion as well as the charge that our committee was given? I think to what Kathleen was saying earlier, I think, and I don't mean to put words in her mouth. If we all feel comfortable, and Rob, I would ask you to just, I mean, it was, you did a good job facilitating this, and you, I think, intended to go through every one of those things that city council raised, right? So, could you just verify between now and the next meeting whether we missed anything? But I think all of our intent was to review all of them. And if we didn't, we'll go back and talk about them. But I think we should just say when we transmit the charter that we thank you for all of the questions. We want to assure you as a group of nine that we discussed all of those points, and this is our work product in light of that. I will do that, Ron. And when I first received those questions, I actually nailed them to the charter. And, you know, I was tending on being comprehensive. I tending if I missed any. I don't know how I did, but I only visited that. Yes. And check on that for sure. But I don't, I don't know that I did, but if I did, I don't. And, and to be clear, Ashley didn't say you missed them. She just said she couldn't find in the transcript when we talked about it. So it may be that we didn't miss any. I would go to the tracking document. That's all the questions, Liv. And two of the videos are not full of friends. So, like. So if you were looking and trying to find them in the transcripts or in the videos, that's, I would not do that. I would go to the document on SharePoint that the here are our questions and go to the one we use and say, can we map them all? The other thing is just in context, right? If anyone wants to hear our conversation, aside from those first two, it's out there. Like anyone can really hear the substance on our tongue. That is not information. It's literally on YouTube. More importantly, I took the comments to be that some of us or somebody else who's sitting in the room in our galley in our audience were intimidating or causing others not to. If I heard that correctly, the audio was a little unclear to me because I'm on Zoom here. But I don't feel that way. And if anybody does feel that way, please speak up. But I think we ought to communicate that everybody here felt like they were heard and able to talk and raise issues. And we had good debate on all of the things that came up relative to the charter. I don't feel like anybody intimidated me or there was any. I was voted down on some things, but I respect the votes and and felt good about every discussion we've had. We're really proud of our discussion. We said that a while ago, about 30 minutes ago. No one felt intimidated. We're all good. We didn't ask the group the question, but no one said, yes, I did. So I certainly as a facilitator never. I felt like everyone was trying to participate. Like we had to see much of my students, right? That this is due after the next meeting. So we should talk about some sort of continuance. They've asked for it. August 8th. That's right after the next meeting. So why don't we get our final product and then decide if there's something we haven't addressed? Because I don't know. I mean, it feels to me like we're going to capture. We're going to do what we were charged to do as a group. All right. And you want us to go to someone to go to our appointor, speak to them about? I have to go to the chair. I have to go to the chair. Well, here's one thing. Here's transparent. This is just actually speaking. If the person that appointed you wanted something, then if Nia wanted me to do something or fight for something, I'll be fighting my number for it. That's just the way I took it. But in some of your mind, y'all are like, we are all personally our own opinions and all things, and that's fine. But I would think the person that appointed me knows the issues going on in my community. So they're trying to tell me to come and speak about it. That's why I'm pushing for what I'm pushing for right now. But if the person that you appointed is not championing that or whatever your question was, then that's not on me. And Ashley, what— That's why I told—what's it called? Ashley, your point is well taken. I couldn't see the video clearly from here, but was it Councilman Carlson who raised that issue? Or who was speaking? Councilman Carlson. And Bill, you're Councilman Carlson's appointee? Yeah. I would be comfortable authorizing you, Bill, to call Councilman Carlson and talk to him about it. You know, not that you need my authorization, but to speak on behalf of the group, I think, with him. Discuss this. You know, what do you mean I'm authorized to do what? Call him and say what? Or to show up at the meeting and speak on behalf of the group to answer his questions about our process. I mean, you're his appointee. You presumably carry the most credibility with him. He chose you. And if he has questions about the process, I would be comfortable with you being authorized on behalf of the group to go and address those questions. Motion to adjourn. Second. All right. It's good. It's good. It's good. It's good. It's good. It's good. It's good. You know, totally different subject. And I'm not great. But anyway, next time, or we should take a group picture. Yeah. You know, Alan, that's on my time hop of a photo of the last group. All right. All in favor. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.