Mayor and commissioners, C.R. Moreiro, director of engineering and community development. And accompanying me tonight is actually Daniel Roseman, who's virtual. And so I'm actually gonna turn the affordable housing update over to Daniel to kind of keep this moment off. Thank you, Miss Moreiro. Good evening, Mayor and commissioners, Mr. Manager. It's a pleasure to be with everyone again. I apologize that I could not be there in person. It would it's a pleasure to be with everyone again. I apologize that I could not be there in person. It would have been my pleasure, but tonight we have a quick update on affordable housing. There will be some information that will be in the form of a review, Sprinkle, Dan, some additional, some new information to share with the commission. As you all know, affordable housing is one of those topics that is forever on the forefront, not just of a local discussion or at a state level, but a national discussion. And I want to just commend the City of Oakland Park for being progressive in terms of taking this topic and this initiative very, very seriously. Next slide, Sierra. So this is a slide that you all will remember seeing previously. This gives you a brief timeline of our engagement on this topic of affordable housing. We started back in 2020. It seems like so long ago, where we did an initial white paper and completed the phase one study. That study was really just a baseline to usher in a little bit more of intense conversation and Exploration on the topic specific to Oakland Park You will recall that in 2021 the city was awarded a grant from the Department of Economic Opportunity to further evaluate affordable housing and that led us to be able to apply for the grant again in 2022 where we did an even deeper dive in regards to affordable housing within the city. That reported something that we've presented to the commission previously. We did in 2023 last year an attainable housing workshop which included several of the practitioners in the space. We were gathered together at the Funky Buddha really just to look at that report and provide some insights and some recommendations to the city and those recommendations were provided to the commission in the various reports. And in this year, you'll remember that was a year that the city was really following the lead of Barra County. There had been a lot of discussion regarding a 10 year affordable housing master plan. And that master plan was accepted in March of this year. Next slide. So what the county adopted this again is a familiar slide at the the BCC the Barrett County Commission accepted the plan on March 7th. Acknowledging recommendations and the plan but not entirely agreeing to the process of implementation. And it approved an allocation of 90% of expiring tax increment finance funds for one year for the 2025 budget year. There's three primary components of the 10 year master plan. One is funding to his densification and third is program and regulatory incentives. One of the issues with the master plan you all will remember that went back and forth, there were certain implications for cities. The master plan that was accepted has no specific funding mandates for cities that was one of the controversial issues you might recall. The plan recommended that all cities establish a trust fund. And it also recommended that land use zoning for appropriate densities be adopted. And so those are the high points in the plan that was accepted by Breyer County. Next slide. The last time I was with you all in June, we gave you an update on the Brewery County plan, the components, the county policy actions, and the implications for city. Since that time, some of you may have seen that Broward next had been hosting these workshops, inviting all cities and all practitioners in the space relative to discussing affordable housing. The first meeting was on September 12th, which yours truly attended. And in that meeting, really what was discussed was the gravity of the housing affordability problem. This is something that was repeated in the plan many times that the problem in terms of housing affordability is getting worse. It's not getting better. The questions really about county and local government political will to address these issues. That is something again, commending the city of Oakland Park to really not take a passive approach, but to take a very proactive approach relative to affordable housing. The other element that was discussed at that September 12 meeting was the gap in affordable units for Oakland Park specifically it's 2 of September, where there were multiple practitioner experiences on challenges and successes of past projects. The intention, I think of that meeting was really to give the participants an understanding that affordable projects can work. There were many iterations of projects from restoration projects to conversion projects to brand new construction. And so it really was an intention to give the communities or those that were represented an idea of what projects could look like in their respective communities. Next slide, please. So today one of the things we wanted to share with the commission and with the audience is what we are doing as a city, as a community, we are providing more affordable housing and without a strategy for increasing incomes it is short-sighted. So this is something that we've talked about, that I've talked about before. It's really, really important to have a strategy that makes sense for the community in affordable housing strategy. There's not a one size fits all. It really is, has to be tailored to the community and the needs of that particular city and its demographics. Oakland Park has an over-representation of affordable housing based on key metrics. Those key metrics as indicated in past reports are the housing stock age, the housing values, the income levels in the city, etc. City government must be mindful of its total scope of responsibilities for all of its residents. While certainly affordable housing is a topic that is near and dear to my heart as a practitioner in the space, I also recognize that for cities, you have to recognize and you have to consider everything relative to your residents and stakeholders, not just housing affordability. That's one of many things that this body has to consider. And a county goal of providing more affordable housing must be effectively evaluated at the local level. That's something that the master plan talks about. And really while there are no mandates specific to cities, there is an emphasis that cities really do what Oakland Park has been doing for the past several years, which is to really evaluate its specific needs, look at strategies that make sense for it and its residents and proceed accordingly. And here on the right of this slide, you see some of the things that we had presented and have been working on for the past several months. At this time, I think I'm gonna turn it over to Sierra to talk a little bit about another element of housing affordability, that is the Live Local Act, which you all have certainly heard and read about. Thank you you Daniel. And some of those new project ideas that we do have while we're working on a lot of opportunities. This one is actually a project that kind of fell into our lap through a Senate bill 102 that was passed in 2023. It was actually amended this year in 2024 this summer. And that's referred to as the Live Local Act. So it actually creates a very unique opportunity for the city of Oakland Park if we make sure that we plan and develop accordingly. So the key provisions of this act is to really streamline development in parcels that are a commercial or industrial zone. It's also to preamps, there are some zoning controls as you may have heard that it takes commission and certain authorities away from the city, which will go through momentarily. But the biggest impact that it's going to make is that there is a 30 year requirement for 40% affordable housing in all of these developments at a 120% AMI or less. So the preemptions of the Live Local Act, the only authorities that are taken from the City Commission's ability to act on and is put at administrative level is the use, which allows any commercial or industrial property to become a mixed use residential project with commercial space on the bottom and residential on the floors two and above. It does preempt density. The law requires the city to allow the highest density in the city's currently in development code to be the density that that project can utilize at this time that 65 dwelling units per acre. It also preamps heights. So the height, unless other conditions are met, surrounding residential areas, which was part of the amendment, is any height of any building within a one-mile radius of the subject property. There are some things that will lower that height depending on where it's located next to a residential, and they cannot use the height of any bonuses. So if the building that they're utilizing the height off of had any kind of bonus provisions, whether it's in our city or not, they cannot utilize what was gained by the bonus provision. The other aspect is the floor area ratio, which kind of goes hand in hand with the height and the density component. and there are some parking requirements that are put in place for waivers. So we outlined this a little bit more in detail as to how that applies to Oakland Park and our policy, but that's just the high level preemptions. So one of the biggest concerns is that I've heard is what still applies. So if we lose the ability to control the density, the height, the floor area ratio, the parking, and where these projects are located, what applies? Well, what still applies is everything else of the city's land development code. That's all of our other built requirements. So that's our setbacks and stepbacks. It is the provisions for making sure that the infrastructure is taking care of. They still have to do parking studies. Everything that you've seen with our other developments still apply with the exception of just those zoning preemptions that you know I presented to you. So the process as stated before, there's no amendments that we can bring forth under the Live Local Act and it must be approved administratively. So how does that impact us here in Oakland Park? So we have 40% as I stated, this is actually a great opportunity to get affordable housing very quickly within the city, but it's only beneficial if we do it the right way, which is what one of the items on commission before you this evening for the live local act policy aims to do. And so for qualifying developments, which have the 40% of residential units at an AMI of 120% or lower for 30 years, that's part of the qualifications. They also as part of that have to have 65% of the total square footage of the building must be for residential use. And it can only be built on those lands zoned as commercial or industrial. The long-term benefits is increasing that housing supply. We also have the mixed-use development component, which is now bringing commercial to different areas of the city that we would not normally see that. And then it also improves the economic growth. So in talking about smart growth and in honor of our planning month that we received the proclamation for earlier, we really did want to sit down the planning and zoning division has been ironing out the best way to move forward and control these projects because it is not a one-size-fits-all scenario because these projects could come up in all areas of the city. So the Live Local Act policy is our first step in making sure that we have the tools in place to ensure that we have the best development possible coming in. And so that's that critical tool that addresses those housing needs. It establishes our policies and procedures. It doesn't show alignment with the city's vision. It creates a streamlined process. It provides our legal framework as to how we handle these projects through processing, but also monitoring and enforcement. And it doesn't establish those compliance and oversight. So I know I went a little bit in detail on the Live local act just because we have that on the agenda tonight, but we were excited to bring that forward and just have that discussion with you, but at this time I'm actually going to now let Daniel speak on the next item that a couple of slides ago that one of the recommendations for cities from the 10-year master plan accepted by Broward County was to create a dedicated funding source. One of the things that is important as a reminder to those that are listening or in the audience tonight is that Oakland Park does not receive direct federal housing funds and must find local solutions to address housing demands. The city is a non entitlement city. When we had done the previous community meetings, this was a question that was often asked and just as a reminder, the threshold to be considered an entitlement city is 50,000. And because there's an election coming up soon, it's really, really important that voting and participation is at an all time high, mainly because this is one of the ways that the city through its growth can perhaps reach the threshold to be considered an entitlement community. Primary funding source, only current funding source is the local tax base for the city of Oakland Park. And as the mayor pointed out, all of the projects that the city has been undertaking and the importance of making sure that the city commission services all residents not just those that are cost burden as it relates to housing. So that leads us into identifying funding strategies which are exploring options like impact fees, linkage fees, and other creative mechanisms to overcome limited resources. And the city has done a fantastic job of leveraging its funding and resources, but this is certainly the path that needs to begin from the standpoint of creating the pot of money to be able to address programs and projects specifically. The key challenge in all of this obviously is developing sustainable local funding sources to meet the growing demand for affordable housing. Let me just say this with regard to funding, and this is again a topic nationally that regardless of how much money you have as a city, there seems to never be a sufficient part of money to address all of the needs relative to housing affordability. So it's really important to look at this very, very soberly and making sure that the policies and the advances and initiatives at the city considers that they are done in a way that recognizes that you're not going to be able to meet every single need, but you're going to do the best you can with the resources that you have. Next slide. So the last time in June when I was before this body, we talked about advancing the affordable houses, the creation of the affordable housing trust fund. And we have been working on that myself and staff have been looking at the structure of what that would look like. And just so that you know that we will bring back a full presentation on the Housing Trust Fund in the near future. But right now what we have developed is a framework to be able to give you a sample of what we will be looking at. So local housing trust funds are flexible sources of funding that can be used to support a variety of affordable housing activities. As I mentioned, it's either programs, projects, or a combination of both. They are created and administered at the city, county, or state level. Those are housing trust funds. And again, this is a recommendation in Broward County's 10 year master plan. And they are not subject to the restrictions of federal subsidy programs, and therefore can be designed specifically to address local priorities and needs. What this means is to give you an example if the city of Oakland Park was an entitlement city, you would have to use the funds to address those that are at 80% or below area median income. By creating an affordable housing trust fund or a local housing trust fund, the body can, this commission can designate the policy parameters that it chooses to address the local needs as deemed by community input and other considerations. And so it's really, really important to know that this mechanism gives you a tool once created gives you a tool to really address the specific needs for the Oakland Park community. As we talked about before, these are options for funding. We have been in conversations with the legal department and will continue to vet the structure of a local housing trust fund. And then we will obviously need to establish the parameters for how funds will ultimately be administered because this is obviously a very, very important step in the life of the city of Oakland Park so it needs to be done very very carefully. Next slide please. So to kind of land the plane what the city's efforts will continue to be over the next weeks and months is the adoption of the live local act policy to guide project approvals and enforce affordability. As Ms. Murrow mentioned, that's on your agenda tonight. We will review land development code and design standards to align new development with Oakland Parks vision. I think it was in 2022 or 2021, where I have provided a presentation that talked about the idea that affordable housing doesn't need to look ugly or less attractive or a detriment to the neighborhood. It can serve both the purposes of providing housing for income levels deemed to be a priority by the city, but it can also be an enhancement to the community if those standards are done right. And if in fact, the staff will work with the developer to ensure that those standards are met. We will be making recommendations to the city commission to amend the land development code and design standards as needed. We will continue to monitor grant opportunities for advancing Oakland Park specific projects. And we will also continue to work with existing affordable housing projects and programs to ensure consistency with priorities outlined by the City Commission. And again, I just want to express my appreciation for the city's vision relative to the Affordable Housing Initiative. It's obviously a subject that is important, not just to the community, but it's important as you all are leaders in regard to the things that other Broward cities are doing, and so you all should be commended for that. And I believe that's it, Ms. Murrell. And we'll be happy to answer any questions at the