you you you The commission for Thursday, the 15th of May will come to order. Again, please silence your cell phones. Deputy City Clerk, please call the roll. Sorry, Commissioner Ashley. Here. Commissioner McGurk. Here. Commissioner Perine. Here. Vice Mayor Martin. Here. Mayor Cleveland. Here. Con, thank you very much. I appreciate that. We're going to open it to public participation for a second, but if you're unfamiliar with the topics this afternoon, we'll be talking about a sign, amritation program, a sidewalk project, and the landscape ordinance. So if you would like to opine on any of those three topics, we'd love to hear what you're offering is, what your monologue is. So please come forward if you have any comments, suggestions on those three topics. We recognize the community's community's community's community's community's communityability in our community through thoughtful landscaping and tree preservation policies. We recognize the importance of protecting our national environment and maintaining the unique character of New Smyrna Beach. At the same time, we do believe that it is essential to strike a balance that respects both private property rights and avoids unintended burdens on homeowners and small businesses. As an organization deeply rooted in the community, we are committed to working collaboratively with the city to ensure that any new ordinances as well understood by the public and our members. We are ready to assist in educating our members and their clients about the benefits and responsibilities that may come with any of the changes that you all decide. We respectfully encourage the city to continue engaging stakeholders from all sides to find a balance that preserves our tree canopy and environmental integrity while also honoring the rights of those who are lucky enough to call New Surnabeach their home. Thank you so much for your time and your continued service to our city. Thank you, Aston and continue service to our city. Thank you. I appreciate your testimony. After you, Paul. Paul Wilson, one on one, Donovan Drive, News from Urubich. First of all, thank you all for the other night. You went through a lot in this room. It was probably the biggest event I've seen locally, and I appreciate every one of you taking the time out of your life to help guide this city. With that said, I want to make a couple of comments about trees. Not opposed to trees. I'm just opposed to some possible rules that should not be applied to the single family residential properties in this town. Trees on roadways? Great. No problem. But they also come with a requirement for the city to maintain those trees and to prevent those trees from causing accidents with motor vehicles. That's not happening. There's trees, lambs hanging over city streets all over the place and it's down. And perfectly legal, your traffic is hitting those trees and causing damage both for the vehicle as well as the trees. So I encourage you to take a look at that. Again, I support the trees on the streets. I support the trees on public property. But I think you need to take another look at this regulation. I can't find anything in any of the documentation that tells me there's a problem with single-family homes. In fact, I asked the city and apparently only find one single-family residence in the last five years for an improper tree removal. This sounds like a solution looking for a problem, not a problem looking for a solution. You heard comments the other night about Volusia County's approach. Single family residential homestead exemption for trees. You might consider that. That would solve your problem. But I see nothing in here on the CO2 exchange, no data, no scientific evidence, no anything. It says we need to change the ratio on single family homes to increase the number of trees. It's not there. So I don't know why all of a sudden, a lot was perfectly alright today seems to be not perfectly alright tomorrow because Orman Beach thinks it's that way. This is not Orman Beach. I recommend you take a look at that. I thank Commissioner Freen for stepping up the little while ago, reference to signs. I would suggest to you, I was one of the people couldn't see, two signs sitting in front of me. No place to move given the size of the crowd. I suggest maybe a compromise has had the signs to stand in the back of the room or the size of the room, but not throughout the audience. You got to do some back because my rights are being impacted. Thank you again for last night. I appreciate you taking a look at it. I was strongly recommend looking at the Volusia County Code. Thank you. Thank you sir. Appreciate your comments. Good afternoon my name is Jennifer Peace. I am Director of Operations for Southeast Felicia Habitat for Humanity. I'm here regarding 722 south sea freeway which is our restore and the hardship it would create if we were required to take down the road sign at that site. So I would just like that to keep that in mind as you guys make your decisions about the road sign. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you for your comments. Thank you for coming. Good afternoon. My name is Steve Manzo. I live at 4186 Saxon Drive, New Sumerna. And I'm not sure how your Senate bill 180 is going to fit in here, but this is about storm water. This project, massive project, raised the level of this land almost three feet and over the past two, well it's maybe one week, a couple of rainstorms, dumped water onto my property, flooded the whole side. At no point in 13 years that I ever have standing water there, I did for two days that. So I went to your inspectors and I have copies of, I guess they're from the beginning we're going to check it out and see if they were revised but they were supposed to be retention areas on this property. As far as I'm concerned I mean I was in construction for 40 years I think I know what a retention area is. This slopes right towards my property is covered with grass. I have videos of water cascading over the wall. Through the wall, they put a retaining wall. So John Fagera, I think his name, very nice guy, came out and he is addressing it. However, he's very soft on telling this contractor anything about these retention areas. The land just slopes right towards my land. I thought and did think for 40 years that a retention area is an area where they give you a square footage and the bottom of it is relatively flat. It retains the water and then it can soak in. So I don't know how your new Senate bill, if that's passed yet, I guess that still remains to be seen. But this project's been ongoing for a year and a half. We've had multiple problems with this contractor. I have a huge problem with what was allowed to be built, but I understand that's water under the bridge. I told this contractor the whole time, there was only two issues. The town gave you a permit to build this structure, ridiculous commercial garage, four bays, minimum of 50 feet long, three cars deep, 10 feet from my property. You got to go ahead, okay? Water under the bridge. Two things I'm interested in. Do not impede the line of sight with becoming out of my driveway, my wife and I getting onto sax and drive, and I'm very concerned about the rain water. Oh, we're going to take care of you. We're going to take care of you. Lip service for a year and a half. This is where we are. I appreciate your comments. Thank you, sir. Thank you. Good afternoon. Cindy. Cindy, Cinez Act 512, UPON. I won't talk about the D-PIC meeting, except to that while some of you think that's the best contract you've ever seen, it's not even close the best contract I've ever seen. Working in private industry, performance bonds are a natural part of the business. So the fact that the city has never gone into that area or maybe didn't even review the edgewater agreement so that we could kind of organize things a little better. But we're now signed up for 30 years. And I would hope that in future meetings, there's opportunities to kind of plug some of the gaps that were clearly in that agreement. So, you know, I'm a trust and verify kind of girl too, but their lawyer seems better than our lawyer. So, I think we want to be mindful of that going forward. And I hope I'm never at a quasi again, where I hear anyone on the die of say, in my opinion, this is what we should do. It's the safest way to go. I think that disqualifies a one vote, but that's something for the attorney to consider. So, I'm a happier note. I wanted to remind everyone, because I know you were all there at the meeting that on the March 25th meeting, there was a little photo shoot and a proclamation made, New Smirno Tree City, USA. So that's something to keep in mind when we talk about the proposed ordinance. And the proposed ordinance from what I can tell was done at the Beheast of this commission, not the prior commission, this commission. And you did hold a workshop on it in June. And so just as you lecture us that there's time to give input, you've had a whole year to reshape parts of this as it was going on. And while people may sound mildly alert today, when there's caps on websites that claim to be protecting New Sumerna and the government overreach crowd, caps mean you're yelling at people. And reasonable adjustments can be made in that that perhaps there should be a smaller lot size that has a lesser requirement but to use it a USA you need to put your action where your words were. Thank you. Thank you, ma'am. Appreciate your comments. Anyone else for public participation? I see Dr. Herman moving to the podium. Good afternoon, everyone. There's been so much said. I only have a couple of comments to make. And I think Cindy talked about the Tree City USA, and we've talked about tree counties for the 15 years that I've lived in this city and I think there are a lot of people who really love this city and love the fact that it is well landscaped. So I really encourage you to sink clearly about this ordinance and also want to really congratulate the staff for putting this together because I think it's very comprehensive and I appreciate the time and energy they put into it. I just like to make the point that I think clear cutting what we saw on Zaxon and some of the other, those are commercial properties, I'll give you that, but there are a number of private properties with clear cutting. And it's not just what happens on that property. It affects the neighborhood, the neighborhood ambiance. And importantly, it affects the value of adjoining properties. So I think you need to consider that as you're making your decisions. And thirdly, when I read the ordinance, unless I'm not reading it right, there are several places in the ordinance where one person is making the decision about exemptions. And I would like very much for you to take a look at that, because I think exemptions are really important. It provides flexibility, and not every situation can be covered by an ordinance. However, I really do not think that one person making these decisions without some accountability loop is a good idea. So I'd really ask you to take a look at that, see what you think, and so on. And then with regard to the signs, I sit on the historic preservation commission, we've talked about historic signs and their beauty, I was shocked with the report on signs. I never thought there were 175 or so poll signs in the central city. I was also quite fascinated by going up north on Highway one to go into South Daytona where there are only monument signs. And I'd encourage you to take a look at that in terms of the beauty that that provides. Thank you. Thank you, ma'am. Appreciate your comments. Anyone else for public participation? Seeing none, public participation is now closed. Director Corbin, we're anxious to have your report as it relates to the sign amortation program. Good afternoon. I get to bring all the fun stuff to you. All right. So this is an issue that was brought to my attention a few months ago. I brought it to city managers attention. This is a situation that a previous commission had put in place and passed an ordinance on and then extended. And now if we go forward with it, you will be the elected officials that will be getting the calls and the emails upset about the results. So we just really need some guidance on what direction that we wanna go. And I'll try to get through this fairly quickly. But these poll signs are really common in the 50s, 60s, and 70s. The issue with them is they don't have a consistent design and they're all different heights and sizes and what happens as you get commercial corridors that look like there are no rules like when you come in your house and your kids have strung things out everywhere. And the house isn't clean, that's kind of the same visual thing that you get with pole signs. This is not New Smyrna Beach, but we've stopped issuing permits for them a long time ago. And I'll show you a map with all the signs that we do have on it. So we changed course many years ago and went to Monument Sign Style. But this is pretty much anywhere in USA. You can find this all over the place. Here are ones that we do have on US1, again not in the same concentration of the previous picture, but we have these all over the place. Here are some examples of some signs that meet our current standards. They're required to be less than 10 feet of height and can't be more than 4-8 total square feet for the actual sign face. So that's pretty standard. And so the idea is you bring the signs lower to the ground. You give them a consistent look and it makes an area look much cleaner or more modern. So in 2011, there was a major update to the sign code. And in that update, it was established that all the poll signs would come down in 10 years. Before that actually came to happen the commission at the time extended that date until November 29th 2025. So that's the date that we're looking at this year that we need to, if we're going to change course, we need to prepare to do that sooner than later. But that was extended due to COVID and the commission at the time didn't want to put additional hardships on the businesses. What also happened is it carved out an exemption for historic science. And so we've got four of those. We've got Southern Paint, Poppas Restaurant, Poppas Plaza, and the Dairy Queen. So those are the four historic signs that we've got. That are poll signs, but they're exempt from the amortization. November of 23, we stopped issuing permits for face replacements. If a new business comes in or something of that nature, we want to use the existing sign. We don't issue permits for or change of ownership, but I'm told we don't have any records of having to enforce that, but that is part of the ordinance and it's on the books. In November of 25, that's when all the signs, poll signs are supposed to come down. This was a flyer that was made back in like 2016 or 2017 by Manager Doster. I was an attempt to put together some outreach material to notify the businesses of the new rules. And then this is a map. I don't know if you had a chance to look at it in your packet. But there's red dots that show where all the signs are. It's a little hard to see. This is a blow up here. The largest clusters of them are on US1 and over beach side when you're going through the turn. And with that, I think we just need some direction. On rather, we are going to stay the course and begin enforcement in November or if we want to extend this and do public outreach or how you want to proceed. Shane thanks for your report this for clarity this was a supposed to take place in 2010 or it was an adopted in 10 supposed to take place in 20 we got COVID so we kicked it down the road that's the general idea. 2011 was the update and it was supposed to kick in in 21 but was extended to 25. Really good. So question. I just I would love to get some of stuff. Okay. I'm chomping at the bit again. I know you're really. I can't share that. I have a question for you for now and then I'll call men after you guys do. One thing I was going through this list and I've sold some properties in West canal and I didn't see their names on here and I'm like why? Because that was a fixed asset and when I owned that property I had a separate personal I'm like, why? Because that was a fixed asset. And when I owned that property, I had a separate personal property tax payment that I paid into the county for the sign only. And it was a fixed asset that for some reason, I had to make payment on the sign. And I got to think, that's county. So even if the city makes these changes, there's a lot more poll signs than what we've shown them list because you're not reporting the ones that are county. And remember we can have two businesses side by side. One business will be county, one business will be city, and the issue with that you're going to have is why is the county have these poll signs in the city? Don't. I've been trying to get those people to annex forever into the city. Who's going to want to ever annex into the city? We have a lady come up here and say, you guys find ways to increase your property tax base, but we keep being this far apart between county and city rules, and it's going to be difficult to get people to want to annex. My question is, please confirm the county ones are not on here, so we have actually more than 200. I don't believe and we had staff go out and do the inventory I don't believe they did county properties so there might be more. Your points are more many many more. Very good. Mr. McGurk. So I was on P&Z in 2011 and on the commission when we postponed it. The idea, as Shane described, was a beautification. The idea of poll signs is that they're ugly and so on. I've had a lot of time to reflect on it because I have multiple properties that have poll signs. One that is, is the historic designation. I actually was looking forward to bringing down a monument sign. So I didn't ever have to put letters up there that are 10 feet high. And what I realized was that there are so many people in the community who were devastated when one of the hurricanes came through and threatened that sign that it made me realize how important it was to the community. So I applied for the, except the venture sign ordinance and was approved. Another property that I won't do that with, that it's not a historic sign. Now, the idea is that it looks great. Here's the problem. There are some really neat poll signs, considered poll signs. The idea of a sign is to have it, signs that are interesting, signs that have a lot of thought and artistic stuff put into it. We lose that with this new box. One example example I'll give you is black birds. They have a really neat at what is considered a pole sign. And that's awesome. Some of the what we don't like about pole signs I think is there's all kinds of different sizes in there but a lot of them were in disrepair. They're old, the businesses that have them aren't running well, they're not keeping up the sign, there's no creativity in it, it's rusting. Like the one we just showed, someone just threw it, I didn't realize that I drive by this property every day, but the transmission, someone, they put a transmission on top of it. So, I mean, that's not, it's made out of two by fours, I guess. That's not pretty, that's not very creative. But if you go down and you look at these monument signs, there's... I mean, that's not, it's made out of two by fours, I guess. That's not pretty, that's not very creative. But if you go down and you look at these monument signs, they're not creative or artistic at all. And they kind of just, they're there. So I'm not against, I don't want to stop doing what we're doing. I understand why we want monument signs, we don't want pole signs, but I'm not so sure that when we get down the road 20 or 30 years from now, we're going to have a lot of monument signs and everyone's looking at and saying, gosh, they kind of just sit there and there are a lot of them are in disrepair and not taking care of them. There's no artistic value in these in these monument signs. So I so where I'm going to conclude that is number one, we need to make sure that staff is allowing because I've been told it's not my thing so I can't verify it. That the way it's currently written doesn't give a lot of ability for a monument sign to be artistically created. So that's important. And then the other thing is, pollsigns aren't the worst thing in the world. The monument signs are worse for visibility. There's benefits to pollsigns. So what I would like to see is we continue. They're very expensive, by the way, to replace signs. It has gotten out of control. One of the reasons we did that in COVID in 2001 is because many businesses were struggling due to COVID and these sign replacements are between, you know, $8,000, $20,000, $50,000. If you want any kind of any kind of it, you're looking at a $30,000 to $50,000 sign. So we're not talking about $1,000 or a couple of $1,000. So I would definitely like to move slowly. So we're not harming businesses. The small business environment is very, very challenging because of just inflation. So that's my thoughts. I hope I made it, I was able to articulate it clearly, but the key is the artistic creativity in signs is completely being lost. Any other thoughts by my colleagues? Yes, ma'am? Yeah. I must say that I think 15 years should be sufficient time to save up for a sign. In the hurricane season, as I, from my knowledge, a number of these signs do not do well in the wind, because they're tall and available to the wind. And I still remember going to Hilton Head the first time in driving down the road leading into Hilton Head, and it was almost entirely wooded, but when I looked, I could see a gray concrete or monument sign for Wal-Mart's. So there were all these thriving businesses going on with the most subtle signage imaginable, which was very impressive. I think for safety as well as, and I also think it's very difficult to establish aesthetics when I think everybody has a different idea of what looks good. So there's no real way to make an objective statement about aesthetics. I believe we said 15 years ago we wanted the monuments and I think we should stay with it. Okay. Okay. Okay. So I went back to 2011 when they had this discussion originally and it looked to me like there was a sign committee and it composed the historic district one person and a couple of businesses and so on and a couple different people, someone. Then it went to the planning and zoning. So they had a lot of time to hammer out back in 2011 what was good and what wasn't good. looking at it today and seeing I was over on Going up and down highway one and beach side beach side taverns got a big sign that you can clearly see If your hurricane went through like Commissioner Martin said or car hits it The sign pole and it goes down and they have insurance. These sign poles can amount to $20,000. It's not a chunk of change. So we're talking large dollars that some of these cost. At that point, Sean, do you, or Shane, I'm sorry, gosh, I knew that. Do you tell them they cannot replace their poll with the same poll through their insurance? They have to get a monument. That's correct. We want to issue the permit on those. Okay, and it's kind of like the utility commission a little bit. We've got power lines everywhere. If they want to remodel their home, they have to bury the power lines and that's their expense. So would it be feasible where we just don't demand these people to take down their poll signs, but continue this one that if a hurricane knocks their big poll sign down or if they need to get a new sign we just don't approve that pole sign. Yep, that's the direction we're looking for and if that's the direction you want to go. Okay. And then I would think that every one of these businesses would need a new letter because some of them have changed hands and everything. If we made something that would impact their bottom line that this heavy before we'd ever make a decision that they'd have to get a certified letter or something saying, hey, we're we would like you to have a monument sign or have it go back to PNZ, have it go back to sign committee, whatever it takes. I'm not here to impact businesses' bottom lines, no way. Thank you, I appreciate that, Commissioner Ashley. I just have a specific question. I passed by the Denny's on 44, just east of Mission Road a lot. And that sign has been damaged. Probably it's come down. Well, my question is why is it still up there and why isn't Denys doing anybody? And what do we have a role in that? I actually noticed that the other day, I haven't done anything with it or talked with staff about it, but you just reminded me too. We do have an active code case on that. I've inquired about that. We do have an active one. Second question is there's a just more west of that. There's a super market over up fast food, a little building. I forget that sugar creek something or other. Where like, uh, Lynch oil used to be. Yeah, right next door or maybe it's the maybe it's the little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a. So that's the problem these state roads and these county roads, you know, people are going to be questioning that. The other possibility is the code is when a new business opens up, they would have to change out and convert to the money in the city. Yes. Is that accurate chain? That's's correct. So right now the business is closed up. Whoever opens up a new one will have to deal with that sign. Thank you all. Before I offer too much of an opinion, there are businesses here in town that are, I want to say they're struggling, but we have cycles and some of the small-moment pops as Commissioner McGurk and Commissioner Perina alluded to. This would be no small undertaking. Is there a middle ground, your shame, where if your sign is in place, We're gonna let it go until the business changed and the new sign would be required for the new business. So they would go for a permit or it became disrepair. It fell into disrepair for whatever reason aged out or whatever. Or if a hurricane knocked it down, then we could say, okay, if those things happen to you, you're gonna have to start over. But to unilaterally go across and say, you've got a window of time, X number of years to take your sign down, even if you've been taking good care of it for 20 years, but we don't want full signs. And I'm reluctant to have that extra expense on our businesses. So Mr. Manager, you've been around, you've been to other places, you've managed three times our size. Have you got a view on how we ought to proceed on this? Of course. So a couple of things that I would suggest here. These signs are generally in the older parts of town. And I think of US one in particular. So, and this is a redevelopment area we've got active efforts to redevelop that area. I wouldn't want to over redevelop that area. There's a certain charm to that area. It's very eclectic. There's real great mix of businesses out there. Certainly some of them we would like to transition. So the kind of the collected funky kind of character is kind of cool. And I kind of think that is something that we should attempt to preserve and promote. And the signs are a big part of that. So I dealt with a crispy cream sign in my last stop. And this was like the most iconic landmark in the entire city. Everybody knew the Krispy Kreme sign. And so great effort and care was taken by Krispy Kreme when they did renovations to preserve that sign and everybody loved it. And so I would say, first and foremost, we need to make an effort to designate more of these signs as vintage signs as appropriate. You mentioned one restaurant in particular. You know, I would like to see us have more designations. I would not recommend that we go forward with this kind of abrupt, you've got to start complying as of this November date. My recommendation to you would be to continue with this kind of natural amortization that we've been going through over the last 10 years or so as businesses change out, make them come into compliance if they're damaged, make them come into compliance. I think that would be a much easier transition. And the fact of the matter is, if we go forward with this in November, the city attorney is going to end up with a lot of work to do. Probably most of them won't voluntarily comply. be be pursuing code enforcement action, will be pursuing legal action, and I'm not sure that that's worth the left at this point I think these signs will transition naturally. Next part I would say we need in some instances to provide a program perhaps for some financial assistance where this transition can occur. Certainly if it's in a community redevelopment area, then we could potentially utilize CRA funds to provide some sort of assistance. And, you know, if that's your desire to go in this type of direction, then I'll work with the CRA director to develop those types of programs. I appreciate your comments. I know that crispy cream sign on Palafax Boulevard in Pensacola so I know what you're talking about. Any follow up by my constituents here, you heard his advice which was an attrition based approach and I think it's consistent with what Director Corbin was offering. Anybody with some opinions about that? Commissioner Perrine. I like what you said about the CRA many of believe that they're in the area that the signs are already included within that program. So that could be a good faith effort for us to start one to at least address the, do in a natural nutrition, but at least get some of those to see. They still have to pay for half. So, but that's a start. If they pay for half of the sign, then you'll see some results maybe on some of that list. Bring it back to us and let us look and see how that went for you. I think the one talk time would just go down the line here. Mr. Martin. Just wondering if you have a record of how many reminder letters were sent out. One of the things I noticed was in the list of owners that I got with the map. A number of them had changed to owners leading me to wonder what process of any we've done over the last 15 years to remind owners. I don't have an answer for you on that. I know we've got the flyer that I showed you. I don't know how many times that went out or what outreach was done, but that was of the purpose of this workshop was to find out if we need to send out reminders immediately. I was under the impression they were going out a few months ago and I guess I was wrong because we knew this November deadline was coming and that had been you know five extension. So we really don't have a good feeling about how many property owners, current property owners know about this. Is that correct? I don't have an answer for you on that. I'm sorry. Mr. McGurd. I like the city manager's recommendation for at the rate of attrition through the policies that are in place. I like that a lot. The only thing I'll recommend is I would love for staff to maybe take a look at. I've had a number of signed companies say that the requirements do not allow for a lot of artistic creativity. So once you, you know, there's a box and once you do what needs to be done, the letters need to be a certain size so cars passing by could actually read it. Just maybe give that consideration and I may just, and I may find someone who can articulate better than I can what their concern is. I just don't think that the signs these days, I think there is no real artistic value in it. But I understand the goal, thank you. Is there artistic value? Yeah, there's no artistic creativity in the signs these days. I do think that this is an opportunity for creativity, for sure. And this discussion we're having, based on what Commissioner Perencia said, it's half the problem. The other half is the county. So I wonder, has there ever been a joint workshop city county about anything, but in specifically since we're talking about science, science, you know. Only thing that we've met with the county about, since I've been here, I'm not to say that other departments don't but we've met and talked about stormwater. We haven't. You have? Yeah. We haven't discussed any land development regulations or trying to mirror any of theirs. I wonder if they have a meeting like this. The county does that. I don't know. But does somebody know? the county has meetings like this. I'm sure they do. Yeah, I'm sure they do yeah I'm sure they do I think they do I have but I think Shane's counterpart check it out and see if there is room Commissioner Pring points out quite appropriately that in the same zip code in the same neighborhood you're gonna have suits to have suitsets or rules. That's going to be hard to navigate and know fine. Well, in one city that I lived in New York City, they have what's called the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. And the reason they have the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey is because the ports occupy water that both states and city have to deal with. And so by making one authority over those bodies of water and those boards, it becomes much easier to affect change and force laws. And it may sound kind of dumb. But if there was a sign authority that spanned the city and the county, and that sign authority had artistic creativity in mind, the environment, the business environment, the street environment in mind, and they were tasked to do what we're trying to talk about and solve here. That might go a long way for actually solving the problem for good. Now that might be a pie in the sky idea but it's kind of where my mind is headed. I mean I've met Danny Robbins tonight for the first time so I'm going to call Danny Danny and say, what do you think of that? I didn't see what he said. Thank you, sir. I appreciate that. It occurs to me that we've got a town that is a destination similar to Key West and similar to Hilton Head. We're probably somewhere in the middle geographically and probably somewhere in the middle philosophically. Hilled in head is famous in the urban planning world for its sign and color regulations. So I think from a preservation and heritage standpoint there's room for what the city manager calls funky signs and upon attrition appropriately if they're not maintained or taken care of or blown down, maybe that is the end, but rushing otherwise doesn't seem in the best interest of the business for another expense. So with that, is there enough direction as a city manager and direct and directbin. You're comfortable with the direction you're receiving do you want something more specific? Well, I think what I was hearing is that you're comfortable with with the kind of outline that I was proposing. So we can direct a Corbin can draft up. We'll have to do some sort of amendment. And I think we'll just need to strike out the provision that says they have to be taken down by November 29th and leave the rest as is. Can I ask a question? I noticed that in the current we have a prohibition against signs attached to buildings, walls. And I know crabby has one that is attached to the side wall. It's got a big arrow pointing out towards on the south Atlantic side. projection sign sign. Mm-hmm. And I thought our current regulations prohibited that, but I'd like to verify that. And if so, if we could enforce it going forward, that particular sign reminds me of back alleys in Philadelphia. Bar with the arrow pointing to the door. I'll be happy to check on that. Thanks, Shane. Hey, that's pretty retro. It is retro. This may not be related, but since we're talking along the lines of signs, this past two weeks I've had a lot of controversy going on on Canal Street regarding the feather flex signs and code enforcement went through, had them remove those. At what point would we maybe look at that to see if we can make those? I would go. Valley, I'm here. What type of sign? So this week I have five letters maybe and it all had to do with those feather. They look like open house, grand opening, the flag, the flag signs. And they were pinning those in the planner boxes going down Canal Street and I had some complaints and Mr. Calper was gracious to help those people and look up the ordinance and apparently it's not illegal against the rules, whatever you want to call it, to have those, but you can't stick them in city planners. So with that, is that like, do you look at the sign ordinance at the same time we're looking at all of this? Or do we need to make a rule that those can't be on Canal Street? We need to amend the sign code to include those feather signs in them because right now it's sort of worked on this when I first got here a couple of years ago because they were all over the place. It's a banner but it's also a flag so it doesn't have like a real clear definition in the sign code. It's a pretty easy amendment. And again, if you guys want to give me direction to bring that back to you, I'll be happy to do it. Just a fluke. I had all of those hit me this week. And I think the new business that just opened triggered that because they didn't really know the rules. So when there were a couple others getting away with it and then some were told they couldn't, we just need something consistent because I can't really say one way or another. I don't know and it sounds like it's vague and even in our rulebook. Yeah, I think we'll ask Director Corbin to provide some definition and clarification to that to include in the ordinance so that we can deal with those Excellent. Okay Shane, thank you appreciate it. I mean, I think you've got plenty and if you need more we've probably got it Thank you And now I'd like to welcome director Ray from our Public Works Department to come up and offer his report. Thank you. I thank you Mayor and commissioners. What we wanted to do was give you an update of where our sidewalks are and the different processes that we're moving forward with, what we want to be able to fix and how we want to fix it and some of the new sidewalks that we're going to be looking to implement. Wanted to give you a little bit of background. We have roughly 120 miles of sidewalk and it's roughly 3.1 million square feet of sidewalk. Right now outside of what our own staff does, we do contract annually with an outside vendor to take care of some of the tripping falls. They grind some of the sidewalks. Most recently they went up and down Canal Street and Live Oak and Riverside getting rid of some of the lips on some of the sidewalks. Anywhere between 30 and 40,000 has been the average. You can see last year we went up to about 62,000. This year we did 80,000 with that company. Some of the obstacles when we're looking at sidewalks, when we're trying to decide which ones to repair, which ones to move. Obviously we have right away obstructions, whether it be trees, poles, things of that nature. What we look at a lot is construction activity, where you can see kind of in the middle picture there. And some of the construction takes, whether it be several weeks, several months. So we don't want to fix or repair a sidewalk or a whole stretch of sidewalks where we know there's going to be construction And then we also have a lack of space within the right-of-way That's a picture of Oakwood Repite Dept Waller Park there We did bring in a new process this past year where we actually brought in a company It's the same company who looked at our roads and gave us the PCI as far roads. We had all of our sidewalks graded. That's actually the piece of machinery that was used. It did a lidar mapping of our, of every single sidewalk we have within the city. It essentially graded the sidewalks. It helps us identify the problems, which then allows us to be able to see which ones need to be repaired. Any upgrades, any additions, it shows where we don't have a connection. The initial results of that study, and we actually, we do have a meeting with them on Monday to go over the data and far more detail, but these are the rough numbers that we have so far. You know, 77% are in the good condition. 21% is the fair and 2% is poor. Our main priorities in year one was to tackle the poor and the fair areas, but that's also within reason, as we start mapping out what we wanted to do was focus on the areas whether it be around schools, parks, businesses, anything where there's a lot of foot traffic and things of that nature to make passageway safe all throughout the area. This is the initial proposal. If you're looking at these are the three different snapshot maps. Blue is brand new sidewalk, additional sidewalks that we're going to use to kind of close some of the gaps. And all the green is repairs. Essentially everywhere where you see green is a sidewalk that we currently have that is either in the poor or fair condition index from the study we had done and that is essentially all the areas that we are looking to repair and replace right now. But all the blue ones would be proposed new sidewalks going in. This is just like I said in the beginning this is just phase one this isn't a complete you know five to ten year plan yet but we tried to hit some of the a lot of the main areas where we see a lot of walkers where there are different issues and try to save enough a lot of the areas and try to make some connections that's where you see some of the blue. Like one of the one of the biggest ones in the blue would probably be ocean. We're trying to make another connection between peninsula and South Atlantic in the in the east west side. There are other streets and roads that we would add all throughout here probably in years two through five two through six but we're still putting that process together. I see Cunningham drivers on that. Yep. Get with me before you start. Oh yeah. There's there's a lot on there that we're going to have to get with the homeowners ahead of time. I haven't heard any homeowner tell me that they were sidewalks. Especially where there are the new ones, it's going to have to go to the homeowners and really be able to kind of talk to them. But this is the initial plan. Can you come with us, ma'am? Are we aware of the areas of town that have the most pedestrians? You know, I don't know that we have that quantified per se. I think what we tried to look at is the major business districts, anything around major parks, anything around schools, is where we typically see the most foot traffic? Well, I'm wondering because there are so many people who walk and bike to Flagler. And we really don't have the kind of sidewalks, I mean, families walking in the street. And I know, for example, we have a gorgeous sidewalk along South Street. Gorgeous, it's beautiful and it's even being repaired I think. I believe I've seen one pedestrian on it through the years. So I mean and so I would like to set some priorities based on what we know about the pedestrian traffic. Sure. Yeah, and like I said, this is, this was our first year proposal and plan. You know, our goal is to put together a full, you know, two to, two to seven year plan based on the data that we have. And a lot of those, a lot of those other, other roads are going to be added in, but it's going to take a little more thought because there are some other obstacles in the way on some of those roads as well. I'm also aware of our Munich Code Land Development, you know, Part 3, Section 1, on Munich Code, 104.02, C-17, that states, among other things, a, New Spurner Beach is a beach and retirement community, and thus has a large amount of bicycle and pedestrian traffic. B, sidewalk and bicycle facilities are required, are needed to assure a safe separation between vehicle, bicycle and pedestrian. And when this was written, it says the city averages approximately one pedestrian vehicular accident per month I'm thinking that may have gone up and the city may be held liable in a pedestrian or bicycle automobile accident for not providing adequate facilities. So I'd like us to keep that in mind as we look at our planning in light of our regulations. Thank you. Commissioner Breed. I just have a couple of questions out of curiosity. I walk a lot in my zone. It's the history district in. I've noticed that a lot of the lots will have a sidewalk going along and then all of a sudden those sidewalk and then a couple of houses down the road. A sidewalk will be going along and then no sidewalk. So why? You know, a way how do you determine where there should be a sidewalk and where there shouldn't and zone one in the historic district? And that's where the study that we had done is going to show us all of those breaks. And then it'll be on us as a PubWorks Department to put those breaks together and connect the brakes and if there is a break in there why is there a valid reason do we have to put a cross walk across the street move it around but there to make safe passage my biggest surprises we had one lot that was recently developed and there wasn't a sidewalk there before but they allowed the redevelopment, new development and then they didn't have them put the sidewalk in because when I lived on Riverside the sidewalks were all cracked and bad and for some reason the city made me pay for those sidewalks and I'm like how can This homeowner didn't have to and I did. So those were just curious questions about how you determine who pays for it. And why did I have to pay for my sidewalks when I'm a Riverside, but the people around and someone not only didn't add a sidewalk, but they're still missing on a few. So yeah.. Well typically if you look at your driveway apron, if there's a clear cut where a sidewalk is, then if it's within the city limits, then our department takes care of it. But if it is part of your full driveway without a clear cut, you know saw a cut area to show the sidewalk, then it's on the homeowner to repair that section. We just want repairs only because my thought was I thought land development regulations now stipulated that new houses or new properties you had to put in a sidewalk. I thought we can double we can double check that I mean it's got to fall within I'm going to put a sidewalk Generally, as they start putting in a brand new driveway, they're putting in a separate sidewalk. So anything that happens. Well, I think that the LDR does have requirements for a customer. It does have that extra money development. Yeah, thank you. And that's what I thought with mine. But there might be a reason, maybe this lot on Murray was grandfathered in, and they don't have to have a sidewalk, maybe. I don't know. That's, and there's a lot of that Faulkner street, got a nice little sidewalk, and all of a sudden, I'm walking in the street a little bit with my dog, because there's no sidewalk, and then boom, there's a sidewalk again. And I know Beachside has some of that too. So I was more curiosity other than finger pointing or anything like that. I just don't know the reasons behind that back in the old days. I don't know why they did what they did. And that's one of our goals through this process is to get to those reasons as well if there is a reason and if it's not a valid reason, then let's not prepare. Thank you for all you do. We really appreciate all your help. Anyone else, Commissioner Ashley? You haven't had a chance. You're good. Good. All right. Director Ray, help me on the repair and whether the repair means moving the sidewalk in kind of a half-done out around it or what. But I'm assuming that your priority list here was based on some type of need for repair. Similar question on the sidewalk addition. Can you walk me through that again? Sure. So, when we had the analysis done in the first year, the first proposal, we focused on any of the sidewalks that fell in the poor or the fair range and we tried to focus on the areas whether it be around business districts, schools, parks, and anywhere where we see a lot of a lot of foot traffic. Did you also include input from the lawyers team for claims of slips, trips, and falls because of unevenness? that that inner into it. That's a continual discussion we have. Yeah okay just I don't know from a liability perspective. I would think that would top either top of charge. Yes yeah we work real closely with Carrie and and her team. Really good. Any other discussion, any other direction required? We haven't given you much as a commission. We heard individuals here say here's what I like, here's what I think. Are you, are you, is this suffice, Mr. Manager? You have done this at Infanitom, so. Yeah, just a couple of things I want to bring out. And, you know, we have some funding available to do some work now. And so, you know, we can move forward certainly with some of the repairs. And those are just prioritized based on the need. I've asked Director Ray and City Manager, Nibburt, to work with a team approach and kind of a neighborhood area type approach to this where we go into an area, we rate the streets and the sidewalks, the lights, the street signs and landscaping everything. We look at the whole kind of complete street, ADA accessibility would be another one and really try to take a holistic approach and go in and not just piecemeal kind of address things. And so we'll develop that program as time goes by, but certainly as I walk around this area at the beach area, there's a lot of sidewalks that are in this repair that we need to address, you know, just for general pedestrian accessibility, for liability reasons, all of those. The new sidewalks are a harder type discussion. Some certainly where we have schools, churches, where we know people are walking then. Those are relatively easy. There are others that have major obstacles and impediments to getting the sidewalks built. A lot of that is just the attitude of the neighbors, the homeowners may not want those sidewalks. There may be narrow rights of the way. There may be trees. There may be other limiting factors. So we'll need to look at all of that. But if there are specific areas that you would like us to look at, we're certainly happy to get that input from you and take that into consideration. But for today, we just want to show you what we're doing, what we're thinking, and where we're headed with this program. Just want to do a reminder that central beach is in the CDB-G area. So take any money we can get, right? Yes, ma'am. Thank you, Director Ray. Appreciate it. And nice report. Okay, we'll move on to our landscape ordinance discussion. I see manager Dostor ready to go. Stephanie, where anxious for your report? All right. I think we can pick up kind of where we left off at our last meeting. I've got a little bit of information that was requested by a few of our commissioners. First I want to start off with we have circulated the landscape code amongst community groups and we did get responses back from the Blue Shack County Association of Responsible Development, B.C.D. Southeast Balloucia Chamber gave us some good feedback. Dr. Griffiths from the University of Florida and I had a nice long conversation with Pierce Jones also with University of Florida and working on that Sumbridge project. Lots of great information there. So we did incorporate some of those changes that we received. It was a good amount of feedback. So I think at our next hearing, we'll put that in a packet, show those changes that were proposed from those conversations and that feedback. Another question that was asked is how many tree permits have been pulled in the last few years? Since 2022, May of 2022, we have issued 255 tree removal permits. of those 255 permits, only four permits were denied. Two of those were because the trees were located in the right of way. So they were trees owned by the city. One of those trees that were denied was in an HOA open space. So those are required to remain if there's no good reason for removal. And one was in a required buffer zone. So I just want to point that out. Currently we have since 2023, seven tree removal violations. One has been remedied. We're still working on six others working towards coming into compliance with their mitigation. I think that was the most of the data I wanted to give you guys. In front of you, I have given a breakdown of what the current code violation for tree removal without a permit mitigation looks like and what our proposed options in the new landscape code looks like. And then following that on the other two pages is just another view of that same data. So I'm ready to answer questions if you need to go up. Better up, Commissioner McGurk. Thanks, Stephanie, appreciate it, first question is, remind me where we're at with the state and homeowners. I know commercial property didn't get the exclusion. Homeowners did. My understanding right now is you have to come into the city and at least show the city if you're a homeowner, residential property. Tell you what, why don't you update me on that and let me think about it so much. Okay, I just did this check. Where are we at with the state in the city? Where's all that at? So there's a state exemption. If you have a tree that is hazardous on your property to infrastructure. You can have an arbor report do a track analysis. So that's just a standard arbor report that would say that this tree is detrimental. It's either dead, dying, diseased or it has a potential to impact infrastructure utilities a home a neighbor's home. A homeowner does have the option to get that report and and remove that tree if it does say that this is a dangerous tree without coming to the city without providing any documentation and without getting a tree removal permit. As long as they have a hardware report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Our report. Current penalty when you say 31 and then in parentheses two and a half inch trees is 30 what is 31? So if a 14 inch tree was removed without a tree without a tree removal permit, we break that down into the size of the tree. We have to do the cross sectional inches of the tree, and they have to replace it at 100% of the cross sectional inches removed. So taking out all the math problem that we didn't want to show here, because it's a long math problem. You have to divide by pie, get the cross sectional inches of the diameter of the tree and translate that. It comes out to 2 1 1 1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1 trees is equal to that 1-14-in-1 tree that was removed. So that's telling me that I would have to put 31-2 1-1-1-1-1-1-1 trees or pay 7,750. So that says 31 trees either need to be planted on the property that the violation occurred or planted on the property and then if it does not fit donated to the city. So we- 31 trees at 2.5 inches in diameter. Yes. So the $7,750 there is about how much it would cost to buy 31 trees. Trees are at that size. Where do we get that number from? So we try to keep track of industry standard. So that's not a price that can be paid to us. We were trying to give a visual on how much it may cost a property owner to purchase 31 trees and either put them on their property or donate those trees to the city. So that may be, I can tell you that I just recently bought a little oak tree and planted it at my business because I want a tree brother. It was little. I'm not the expense of the actual tree. Probably wasn't that much, but the expense of the people transporting it and putting it in. So that was expensive, I think more than the trade. But the $7750 doesn't reflect the cost of actually having to have it installed. It's just roughly the cost of the actual trade. Yes. OK. So I understand the rest of this. And what I'll say is, my general concern on this is when I look at numbers of 70,000 very wealthy people and there's some examples I won't call it out in this town at Clearcut, beautiful piece of property. $70,000 if they had to pay it is not a big deal. $70,000 to the average person can be life altering, life changing to the average person it is. So you have a situation where there's a residential, I guess it's not residential. This would only affect a healthy tree cut down, right? Non-residential or residential? This is residential. Oh, good. So you have someone who of modest means for whatever reason they cut a beautiful live historic tree down, which is devastating. They could be looking upwards of 70,000 or more just for the tree replacement. Sure. Yeah. So to me, it's unfortunate. I would love to be able to emotionally, emotional impact is huge. I would love to take a chunk out of them. But in, you don't want to lean on their home, take away maybe the only asset. So I don't know how we do this disproportionately and, you know, if someone has $100 million of assets, or, you know, it's just so different. So the wealthy are always going to be able to abuse the system because I would never want to put a fine even 30,000 on someone of, you know, any average person or family homeowner in the city. And there's no perfect way to handle this. So my only question is this, someone gets a $30,000 or $70,000 assessment penalty against them. Can they come to the city commission for relief? Bring leave. That's a good question. Because what I would say is at a certain, at least at a certain threshold of the penalty, I would want the ability to be able to, it's not, this is something I'll go on the book, time goes on, people change, positions change, attitudes change, everything. But I would not want to penalize somebody. I wouldn't want staff to say, well, that's what the rule is, it's out of our hands, we sympathize with you. I would want at least some safety that in an extreme situation thank you. Mr. Martin. Yeah. First of all how much does it cost to remove a tree with a permit? $28. Thank you. And so one could assume for example if you park next to a no parking sign you might get a parking ticket and incur a cost. So $28 if you follow the rules, lots of dollars if you don't. Correct? OK. I had a constituent say that he didn't think he could cut down a tree. That was, the roots were disrupting his garage, separate building his garage. I said I thought he could, if it was damaging this structure, was I right? He could apply for a permit, and absolutely we would not deny a permit for someone who's having structural damage or infrastructure damage. That's what I thought, just like to make sure I was right what I told them. And my last question is, what does the city do with the donated trees or money? We plant them on city property. So how many trees have been planted this way? Well, this year, I think our latest mitigation, we got 89 trees. And our public's works department will distribute those in areas where we have parks, right-of-ways or retention ponds areas within the city that are in need of coverage. One area that I know Holland Park got quite a few southern red seaters or cypress trees and they used it as buffering in the front so that people were not driving around the front gate Which is great. We actually have two flood lots one on Pine Street and one on Goodwood that are just empty Greenspaces that could be super miniature pocket parks and it would be love to have, love to have trees on those city owned properties. Thanks. Thank you. Mr. Prairie. Yes. Hi again. So I rewatch reading one and reading two and I took notes of all the questions I've had from constituents and here they go. So one person said that the buffer zone being changed to 12 inches to 15 inches. He said some areas in the town that isn't a hardship but in other areas that would be a major hardship and that's one of the changes in your new. The buffer zone you said? Yeah. So we require buffering between commercial properties only. And we're commercial abutting residential, but it's on the commercial side requirement, parking lots. So he was seeking out was supplying to personal. No, okay. We don't require buffering between residential properties. Okay, so I do like that the permitting is only $28 on with Commissioner Martin. That's probably not going to impact a lot of people. But it's a disclosure part of it that I walk through my neighborhood and just looked at all the homes that don't have sod. They have the shells, seashells, or the mulch and river rock or whatnot. When I had my house on riverside, I had nice sod and the hurricanes took it out twice. And my insurance company doesn't cover sod. So I'm a little bit, I have a problem with the sod part and how a majority of homes in my street, Lisa's street, everywhere, we're not in compliance. And you guys may not enforce it, but why do we have rules that are never enforced on that? And that you have mentioned that there are studies showing that we need sod, could we see those studies? And did that go down when we didn't require sod or did require sod? I don't know that there was a time we didn't require sod. So we require sod specifically in rainwater retention areas or areas that lead to them. So like the banks of a retention pond. That's for stabilization. And if you have retention areas in we would, it's required to be stabilized so that you don't wash it out, right? We did get some feedback on ground cover material and sod being one of the only options for the massive ground cover. We did change that to other full coverage. If you can provide full coverage at time of planting. So, when you spoke about rocks and shell, we don't go around looking for that. We're not code compliance, but if it does come to us as a code compliance situation, we do look at how imperviously coverage your property is. So rock and shell or any other material that's non-organic is considered impervious. And so we look at your calculation. It, we say, okay, how can you scale it back? And scaling it back doesn't always require sawting. Scaling it back and say, now you're gonna put in a planter bed that doesn't have paper under it to create the runoff and not have water go through. So it's not ideal to have a full lot that is impervious. Obviously we know flooding is an issue. So we do follow up with that when it comes to us, but we're not out there looking for violations regularly. Okay, you're not, but what if we get a new person that does? You know, I don't know. I'm just questioning, I've got a lot of questions. I'm not gonna focus on that. It's just so I know that if people realize they're not in compliance when they buy a home and later down the road they get it dinged and they didn't know. I mean I think it's awareness that we may need to let people know because if they know that then they may not put that mulch, shell, rocks, whatever is compliant whatever isn't like I said before I'm in the weeds and I don't even know what compliant, what's not. Typically that comes to our attention when they're looking to do alterations to their home. They're wanting to put on an addition or a front porch and they start looking at impervious coverage as well and when we're going through that building department review. I think that's the other problem I have. That triggers if they have a dead tree. And it triggers a needing air permit. They can't get it because they might not be in compliance for something. And that maybe they're short for trees or something. I don't know. But I want to look at that specifically. And then the one tree per 2000 versus one tree per 2500, this is a 20% increase. You guys keep telling us, well, we are lowering the cost of the fees for penalties. but then the mitigation fees or the mitigation is going to go up because you want to stop the code enforcement having to be included in this process, which I agree. Code enforcement, you know, shouldn't be in that. And could host you for wanting to streamline a process. I like that part of it. There are a lot of things I like that you guys are really doing and looking into it. Your fees are going to go up with mitigation fees because you did mention by increasing those that might or things they need right now because they're doing a lot of the mitigation banking instead of the cash instead of money. That's where the zero to 17,000 came in because the fines are going to go up for historic trees that can't be mitigated correct. So if you, if you have a permit for a historic tree, it comes to commission for removal. I think maybe that's a $400 permit, because we have to go through the advertising process and when it comes to a public hearing. So if you apply for a permit for a historic tree removal, but yes, if you're doing it without a permit and it is brought to our attention, yeah, it would be $750 fine per inch removed or the inches that were removed replaced with a minimum three inch size tree. So they have the option to replant or pay the penalty. So if they chose to replant, we would obviously work with them on a planting plan. We do that now. If folks remove a tree and they have to replace a tree, and they say, you know what, I'm gonna wait for my grandson to come help me in six months this summer. We say, okay, we'll follow back up with you in six months. Or if they say, you know, I just don't have the money for a tree right now, but I'm going to save and buy a tree after hurricane season. We work with folks. Okay. So I believe, gentlemen out in the audience today said that he had only, He only saw one tree removal violation, but I think his range was a little bit different than yours on 2023. But you guys come into the reason you're doing this is to save the personal property owner, fees and fines, but we've only had seven. So what's the real reason you're doing this? What you mentioned that people want our our landscape buffer strict more strict, but where there already one of the most strict cities in the county Well the city of edgewater requires one tree per 1500 square feet So we're not as strict as edgewater our closest neighbor so We are doing this to preserve canopy and to help increase our canopy for the benefit of our community. You know, trees have significant benefit, not only for rainwater runoff, helping stabilize soil. Ground covers aren't the only ones that do that, but also pollution filtration, carbon sequestering. Those are all beneficial elements that trees provide that are unique. And I think increasing our canopy and trying to preserve that is something that was a directive that was given to us in the beginning. Folks were wanting us to be a tree city and continue to preserve our assets. So I think encouraging our... Right. I agree trees are good. But then here we go back to the county exemption here where personal property owners are exempt from all of those fines. And in 2022, we added quite a few trees to our historic list. And I think that's the best of the think that's the best. I think that's the best. I think that's the best. I think that's the best. I think that's the best. I think that's the best. I think that's the best. I think that's the best. I think that's the best. I think that's the best. I think that's the best. I think that's the best. exclude because we have not addressed clear cutting which I totally oppose that. I would guess most of us up here would oppose clear cutting. So how do we get to an area where it doesn't burden like Commissioner McGurk said, the personal property owner, to we can't discriminate and say, you developer, you be held to these rules and you person a property and you hold to these rules but we can't have an exception. Well we do have over 9,623 properties that are homes that adhere in New Samarna. So if everyone had carte blanche ability to remove their trees without any type of review or penalty, that's over 33,000 trees that could be removed. That's a significant impact on our community. I don't think anybody's just going to run out there and cut those down. Willie Nilly just because they can. Most of us don't even know we can't, but it is illegal to cut down any tree. So, here we go. I agree with Roberta Finnecy. She said and this is very important to me that we need to hold our tree services accountable because in theory the tree services, especially after Hurricane, we get these knocks on the door and they're wanting to cut our trees down. They go cut it down, boom, gone. I think you should target the tree services way before you target the personal property owner, because they're doing it without permits. And there's only a few legit tree companies that require the homeowner or ask the homeowner to pull the permit. If you really look into problems, there's a problem half the time. We agree. Unfortunately, we don't have the ability to penalize tree companies. They're not regulated. The same as a contractor would be if you hired someone to do work inside of your house. We could have the builder trade board or you know You can slap the building code on them and say you're in violation and there's repercussions Tree companies don't have that same oversight. They don't have that same licensing So we really have no method of recourse on these companies. They can fly into town, go door to door, take out trees, one house at a time, and the homeowners are ultimately responsible. And there's from what I've been told, and we've looked into this because it has been something that we've, it kind of burns your skin when you're like, I have to follow through with this property owner who maybe didn't know that they needed a permit because this person falsely told them it wasn't required. But I have no way of going after these companies. So we have a lot of holes here. We've got holes where we're different than the county. We've got holes where we all may have homes or cell homes or buy homes that aren't compliant. We don't have enough trees on our lots at $2,500 or $2,000. No matter what, none of us really even know that. So we've got holes there just like we do with this poll sign problem. We don't have exceptions like we should with property owners and we don't have stricter rules for clear cutting. We don't have any grandfather situations in there so we don't decide all of a sudden the city needs to go out and start finding more people than seven tree violations in three years. So I really don't know the purpose of this, other than to streamline and to make it better for our process improvement internally. And I love that. But again, mentioned the audience. We've had a year to look into this. And I've dug into this and spent a lot of hours and I know you've spent more. So where do we go from with all of this? There's a lot here. Well, we did take the community. I mean, it was that we we circulated. We took those comments and we've adjusted a small portion of this. We didn't get a lot of feedback that said you know this is out of control. Most of the feedback was minor saying you know this seems redundant or maybe you need to add more options than just sod or not requiring a survey for all trees, just trees that are a certain size. So we implemented that, but overall, the response that we've gotten has not been, drastically different than what we've got in writing. I think it's not until you hit their pocketbook that they're going to scream. My last comment is that Mayor Cleveland mentioned that he would like other people involved with your process and you did get some other opinions. Can we see that before you present it to us in July and then just whammy us to vote that night? I don't want, this is a lot. And your changes I love to see, but I don't want it done the same nine on second reading. Okay. And I know you're gonna work hard on a presentation. I would love to see that. So, you know, I spend an hour and a half asking all these questions I'll probably have more by the time you tweak it. I just would like that before we get for the audience that don't know. We get the agenda on Wednesday or Thursday depending on what we're doing in our lives. And then we only have to Tuesday to read thousands of pages and dig. So that would be very helpful. Thank you. Thanks for tolerating me in all my questions. No problem. Could I ask a quick question? I thought, and again, maybe I'm wrong, that the landscaping requirements, the sod, went into effect to get a certificate of occupancy. Is there I didn't know that I've lived here for four years that I still need to have sod? Is there a question? Yeah, I mean and my wrong does is it is the requirement for specific landscaping in the sodded area tied to receiving your certificate of occupancy for new builds or new construction. So we require full coverage of the lot to prevent wash out. No, I understand that. So we just recently had a CEO that they were not wanting to put in sod. So they said we're gradually going to create a native garden. And we said, okay, so we'll need more than just what are they mulch down? We need more than mulch. We need to start seeing where this is going to fill in. And we allowed them to start filling it in with their native plants to stabilize the ground versus putting down sod. Not my question. Okay. I've got my certificate of occupancy. I've complied with everything. Okay. It's now four years later. You coming back and looking for sod? I'm not coming back looking for sod. Unless you've been code enforced because you put shell across your entire front yard. Yeah, well, I have somebody across the street for me. But you understand what I'm saying. I understand. So the deal is is that to get your certificate of occupancy and it's not particularly monitored thereafter. And of course, when we have the buildings that are almost zero lot line because their retention is underground, the permeable percentage of land seems you no longer apply, correct? Well, in commercial districts, the impervious coverage is different than residential. Yeah, I'm looking at residential all over beach side. You know, so I, you know, I'm saying, oh my gosh, that's got to be 90% coverage of the lot. And so it seems like we're not using permeable, impermeable the same way we used to. We absolutely are at CO. We are in, we inspect, they have to provide a survey showing that they're not covering more than their allowable coverage. And in some of these newer PUDs, the coverage is written into the PUD, so it may not be the same as our L.A. I understand that. I'm just looking at the big houses, you know, beach side. Yeah. Our engineering department does go out. They inspect these. They measure. And, you know, they're taking garden beds into consideration. taking your side lot lines which may not be as big as they used to be with smaller periwinkle homes on them but we're definitely holding them to the same standard there's not exceptions made for impervious coverage SEO. Interesting. Any other questions? Okay thank you. Mr. Manager Manager, before I offer an opinion, you have been a council for many cities on this particular item. Can you offer a perspective of where we might wind up or where you have seen other places go, knowing that people that moved to New Samurna know that they're coming to a tree-friendly town knowing that they're coming to a place that as immense beauty because of this canopy that covers the entire city as best we can. At the same time we do understand and we do regard property rights of individuals to be able to do no harm to others but be able to do what they desire to do on their own property. Is there a navigable path that you've seen work in other places that we might consider? I know we don't have to vote in anything tonight but before before we go home and ponder this, I'd love your input, sir. Certainly. So a couple of things that stand out to me, the current ordinance, I think, is excessive in the fines and what results from tree removal. And I think is excessive in the fines and what results from tree removal. And I think the staff is proposed something that is reasonable, something that will deter, but won't bankrupt somebody. So I like the approach that we've taken there. You know, I said at the last meeting at some point in history, New Sumerna Beach made a decision how they wanted to grow and develop and the value that you place on tree canopy and tree preservation. And those decisions were made 25, 30 plus years ago. And. on tree canopy and tree preservation. And those decisions were made 25, 30 plus years ago. And we're not, the staff isn't proposing any changes to permit requirements, exemptions, or anything of that nature. You're required to get a permit for tree removal today, just like were 25 years ago with certain exemptions to that. It seems to me that the major sticking point here is focused on the individual homeowner and the requirement to get approval to cut down a tree. That seems to be the basic argument. And I think that's a policy decision that you're going to have to decide. In my view, it's already been decided 25 or 30 years ago, but if you want to change that, then you need to give the staff the direction to go in that way. We can provide for that exemption if that's what you do, if that's what you want us to do. We, as Miss Dostor has said, we have stringent requirements when the development is happening. We're going out making sure that the landscaping is there. But we are not patrolling neighborhoods to make sure that your sod and your trees are still there six months or 12 months or five years later. Certain events may trigger that if you do an addition to your house or whatever, we may get triggered and that may may well come up. But I fully would expect that over time people are covering impervious areas with pervious pavers or whatever the case may be that may create a technical violation but again we're not out there measuring your yard to see what the issues are. If you want us to do that then give us the direction to do that and we'll hire 50 more code enforcement people that will be required. I don't think you want us to go in an absurd direction like that. But we're monitoring and forcing, I think, in a reasonable way. Things happen to trees. They get disease. They get struck by lightning. And they have to be removed. It's a simple process to come in, get a permit for the tree removal and remove the tree. Missed doctors said four out of 275 or something have been denied for a good reason in the last several years. That doesn't seem like a real problem to me. But again, I think the major concern that I'm hearing is do we or do we not require single family homeowners to get permits to remove trees if that's what they do? Ultimately, that's a policy decision for you guys to make. You've heard the recommendation from the staff and their thoughts on the value of trees and the need to preserve the tree canopy. But again, up to you. Mr. Mayor. Yes, sir. Mr. Ashling. Does this apply to HOAs? Yes. It's always as a, HOAs as you would direct instructions, let's say to the leadership of an HOA to do something with a group of trees, trees in a neighborhood. If they were part of the HOA. Original development. They were part of the development in in a buffer zone in a- Well suppose the controlling body of an HOA is not a compliance with trees that you know that's just one question so you know I mean so they're not a homeowner there maybe a developer possibly and they're maybe not doing something. Well if an HO if's common areas, and HOA is responsible for that property, then they would be responsible for correcting anybody. So if a homeowner inside an HOA saw something that the common area was incorrect about the common area and the governing body of theA. wasn't doing about it. What would the homeowner do? So are you saying if a homeowner removed a tree from H.O.A. property? No. I'm saying if a homeowner went by a common area and saw that that common area was in violation of the tree ordinances of the city, what would the homeowner do? They could report it to code compliance. They could maybe review their PUD to see what the requirements were Well, I say they did that. Okay. They did that. I mean they could report it to code compliance that so code compliance from the city would enforce an ordinance that an HUA must do they would they would then report it to us and we would do the research, make sure that the information that's being given is accurate. Well, let's say it was accurate, what would happen? Would you make these two words? We would address the HUA to be compliant. We have a code compliance coordinator for that reason. The work I've had at this work, Jason was a little while ago. They have plenty plenty of money. A developer, for example, has plenty of money. So they would pay a fine and forget it. I'm making this up. I'm making up a hypothetical. But is it unrealistic? Is it a fantasy conversation? Have we ever come across something like that? We have come across where HOAs are not compliant with their tree requirements. And we will address them and said, they need to be replaced. What is your plan to become compliant with your? And they've complied. And then they would comply. Mr. McGurk, cabbage farms. Cabbage farms. Included in our... As a, you know, at one point they were excluded from the, you could cut a cabbage palm down. We allow cabbage palms to count as trees, especially on the beach side where it can be difficult to grow other trees. So they're included in this? They're included. Okay. So in theory, you've got a nice stout cabbage palm. It's the ones that do grow grow very stout on the beach side. And you have a 14 inch cabbage palm. You're looking at roughly $2,000 to if it was a 14 inch diameter. We have a separate calculation for palm trees. Because palm trees do not grow at the same rate, they don't provide the same benefit. They're, we allow them to be counted as trees. We do calculate them at a different rate. And that is in our code and another, I think it's in the section. I would just curious because I know that we've been in yane for that for decades in this town many decades. They counted, they didn't count all that kind of stuff. So I just curious about it. I was just curious about it. Thank you. Anyone else? Stephanie, thank you for the re-research. Thank you for different reasons. Not to you have F. Dr. Jones and Mr. Griffith from Stetson. I think it was instructive to have those professionals have a look at our work and I'm delighted that you were able to find some value in that and take it on board. That said, there are many aspects of this landscape ordinance and trees seem to be the center of attention for tonight. And it'll be interesting to see how this body votes absent any more information that you may or may not be asked to provide. The balance between a tree, you know, Tree City USA, not news to us, but been that way for quite a while here. And the protection of individual property rights is what is being discussed here So be interesting to see what type of outcome our Group comes up with I appreciate the city managers wisdom from His experience and other places and your dedication here because you're a staple product Born and raised here in unit you you you you You understand all the trappings of what Newsom Arnaz best has to offer. And our tree life is some of the best things that we do have to offer. And we cherish it greatly. That said, we're coming to look at this again when. You continue this to July, I think the first meeting in July. So it will come back. And so, making up on what Mr. Preen requested, we have sufficient time to get us more than the regular notification so that we have time to pour through the documents? Okay, very good. Any other questions from my colleagues? Very good. Thank you for your report. Mr. Manager, we've taken up the three issues that you asked us to do anything else or any commentary on those three topics that you'd like to offer us. No, sir. I'm good. Thank you for your help. Thank you so much. So we've been in this room in the last three days for over eight hours. And so not minimizing everybody's personal time. I wanted to give everybody one more opportunity to have any closing remarks. They might feel Vice Mayor. No, thank you. Mr. Perrine. Mr. Ashley. Mr. McGurk. Couple here. 27th Avenue. City Manager and I toured the 27th Avenue beach access in park. We are getting consistent emails and letters about, hey, what are you doing? What are you doing? The good news is the contract has been let. It has not been let been sent out for solicitation. The rules set of getting FEMA funding for this is not a straightforward path. And including the county, the county seawall in that proposition makes it further complicated. So there are those who would say it's been years what the heck are you guys doing? Are you trash in our town? The simple answer is no. We're following a protocol that FEMA dictates if we are to receive the thousands of dollars that it will take to get there and we're almost there. National boat safety week. National boater safety week kicks off Saturday in the back of the Brandon Center with Coast Guard auxiliary. There'll be a service out there, a ceremony out there at 9 o'clock. So 9 o'clock on Saturday if you're so inclined, please come out out to the Brandon Center behind it. The county has received $180 million worth of grant money for stormwater initiatives. We will be part of that. And the county is making sure that all the cities are in cooperation, in coordination to do no harm and to to move forward in a deliberate manner. Unless we think the county's not on our side and we're not working hand in glove, we really are. And lastly, a comment about last night, or two nights ago, we didn't end the last part of our meeting with any comment on that. But I would like to say that the contribution of the under 50 crowd, which I have not seen in this room for two and a half years, I've sat here, was significant and palpable from perspective of their interest in shaping the ideas of where our future goes as current residents here to the city. I would like to see that participation continue and it would encourage them to please come back and to please continue to get involved with your city. For the 17 meetings that this public meetings public meetings that this staff put on, Mr. Manager, to you and the legal team and to the planning team, thank you for arranging all those and for making the conversations open and transparent. The question in my mind is to plan for the future or not to plan for the future and allow to happen what will happen on personal property out to the west. I think the responsible move is to plan that and I think that is a step in the direction we are heading. Those that would say it's over, it's one and done. I think are ill informed. We are many, many steps away from the first shovel, the first the first grade stake, the first the first well. And I look forward to the same letter level of intensity from your staff and from this commission as we go down that road. With that said, we are adjourned at 606. Thank you. you