you Welcome our charter review committee. At this time we're going to go ahead and it is 6 o'clock. We're going to go ahead and call the meeting to order. Madam Clerk will you call the roll please? Member Billings. Here. Member Fuseleer. Here. Member Hathaway. Here. Member Eisen. Here. Member Palmer. Here. Member Poole. Here. Member Rashida. Here. Member Raikert. Here. Member Roqueer. Here. Member Smith. Here. Member Wilson. Here. Thank you. Thank you. We have everybody present tonight. Nobody's missing. Great. First item on the agenda is the approval of the eminence from April 15th. Move to approve. Second. Member Billings. Yes. Member Fuseleer. Yes. Member Hathaway. Yes. Member Eisen. Yes. Member Palmer. Yes. Member Poole. Yes. Member Rashida. Yes. Member Riker. Yes. Member Rokier. Yes. Member Smith. Yes. Member Wilson. Yes. Thank you. All right. Thank you. The next item on the agenda is public comments. Do we have we do have public comment? We can your microphone please. Oh, do we have any public comments? Do we have, we do have public comments? Can your microphone please? Oh, do we have any public comments this evening? Yes, Mr. Merrill, seven or eight South Cooper Street. I'd like to, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, Now, three members on this dius here came with a bias in my opinion before they sat on this dius here. At the City Commission meeting, three of you stood here and said that it was unfair for the mayor to only have two years. You should have four years. It's unfair for the mayor to only get 50 plus one at the primary, as it should be automatically to the forward there. That was voted on the first thing in the first meeting here. Mr. Roker was the one. Roker was the one that said hey wait a minute. What's going on here? I mean a comment on that all right, so this was to me the first meeting was kind of like My point of view it was a train all you guys got one board and you were cut the cord and you're going down a 10 degree Great going down started going right right away. The first 15 minutes of the meeting, the first vote you took was on the mayor's four years. It seemed like it was pre-scheduled, you might say, or pre-planned. Just the view, I say it was. Then now, the second meeting Mr. Rokor, I watched the video, as I wasn't here. And you made up a lot of good points in regards to getting a whiteboard. Now to me, that should have been the first thing done in the first meeting. Coming to you and how to play and how the meeting was gonna go. And you made up a lot of good points in regards to getting a whiteboard. Now to me, that should have been the first thing done in the first meeting. Coming in and how to plan how the meeting was going to go, how the future was going to go. Pros and cons. It took Mr. Roker to make that point here. And most of you said, yes, it's a good idea. But the first meeting was all like, let's do this now. It was happening fast and it did happen fast. You guys voted on that 9-1 to have it in 4 years on there. I really passed. So now, in second meeting, you have all the white boys come in and all these things coming in. Now you want to change, remove the city clerk from the commissioners, the charter officer. It appears to me that by removing the city clerk from the city commission gives the city manager more power and you don't have a separation of the state. City clerk has their job and if city manager has their job, okay, both of them work for the commissioners. You should not remove the city clerk from the charter and make him under the city manager. Thank you. Not sure it's good to follow that, but Cindy Smith, F512 view fund. I know about half of you on the committee, and the committee is really important, and I'm grateful that you're giving your time to this. I just said hello to Susan tonight so it's the first time I've met her in person. You know, I watched the first meeting in totality and I watched the first hour of the second meeting and then I got caught up in some other things. But I saw enough in both meetings to be dismayed or caution that there needs to be a very clearly written process that the facilitator is going to use to provide services to you. The left first meeting with nothing offered by the facilitator so that you could discuss it, give pros and cons, and then come to consensus. There was nothing about how you were going to make decisions yet. In the first eight minutes of the meeting, you did make a decision. I'm probably one of the more contentious items that you're going to discuss, which is the term present, which is the term of the mayor. I heard, but didn't see it yet, that in the second meeting, you elected not to discuss as too controversial the subject of term limits. So I'm trying to struggle with those two things and you're're shaking your head, I can see some of you, but this board was to run on the basis of consensus. And how do I know that? I know that from the proposal by the facilitator's company, which I took the time to share with at least two of you, four of you, and I can share it with all of you if you like it very clearly says that enough room will be provided for, I don't wanna make a mistake, to conduct a reasonable thought process allowing for in depth, sorry, of speech thing, deliberations and consensus building. Yet we left the meeting, both meetings, without a clear view of how decisions were being made. And in fact, as a facilitated myself for decades, voting is not how you determine consensus. So I have a process problem here. And so basically in my mind, the first meeting, unfortunate that it went beyond its bounds, it went beyond decision making, especially with two members absent, who you knew, whom you knew were going to be absent. So I am concerned about that. I am concerned about long comment I heard in the last meeting that it's so obvious about some of the changes that need to be made here, that there was harm done by certain things not being addressed in the 2020 advisory review. So I have concerns about that, and I wonder if what you're doing now isn't very well-tainted by what happened just in the first meeting. So please reflect on that. Thank you. Good evening, Randy Herman 108th S. Street. I'd like to speak to the special election consideration and the issue of will of voter turnout be enough or sufficient. And I think it's a very important issue. If you approve the four-year term, I would think it might be worth considering that the election for the mayor should be in the presidential year when we do have the best turnout. I know there's an energy probably to get this done so that this can occur in the 2026 election, but that would then put the mayor's election always in the off year when we know we get the lowest food or turnout. And I know that's been discussed as important. So I thought that might be something that you could consider debating tonight. Thank you. All right. Thank you all very much. The, Mark, did you have something you wanted to bring up? Yes, I'd like to have a point of order. Based on my reflection of the first of meetings and aligned with what has been stated by some of the citizens tonight. I think the facilitator's job is to keep the dialogue going but outlining a process, understanding how we're making decisions and ensure that we're achieving what we're asked to do for discussion. I'd like to make a motion that we identify a member of this committee as the chairperson and I make a motion to nominate Mr. Hathaway. What? Perhaps it might. What? Perhaps it might be beneficial to if we're going to go that route to pick somebody who's managed meetings on this I'm looking at you, Madam Bicemer. I appreciate that, but I don't have any miss specific experience in that realm. What would the role of the chairperson be? I think we would have discussion, but I feel like consistent with what we heard tonight has been we've had some productive dialogue but a process of how we get to a decision point. When we call the question, when we have the vote after adequate dialogue, and my experience has been not in an elected capacity, but other board capacity, there's always a chair person that works in tandem with the facilitator but gets to the point where you call the question, have the vote move on to the next item. So I was impressed by some comments you made, sir, and I don't know you outside of here when we were asked about where we were and the status of some legislation and you were able to find it and quote it. So forgive me if I nominated you unexpectedly for that. But you impressed me. Thank you. I appreciate it. I would recommend Mrs. Reicho to be the chair. Okay. So procedurally wise, we have a motion on the floor and it's been seconded. So we either need to vote on that motion and then if it fails, it nominated another person. But technically, we do have a motion on the floor and it has been seconded. You can have discussion regarding that. So whether you would like Mr. Hathaway to be the chairperson and then procedurally wise just so that you're aware if he is elected he would nominate a vice chair and then you would go from there based on the resolution I have in front of me. I have a question. If I heard Mr. Hathaway correctly, he sounded like he doesn't want the job. And he refused. So the motion to me would be mute because he's saying he's not accepting the job. Is that correct? Yeah, I would agree with that. I would must prefer that go to former vice mayor, former commissioner right there. Okay, so on that note, well, if we do that, that those shouldn't we first decide do we watch chairperson just because somebody's mentioned a chairperson doesn't mean that we've decided that we want one or need one. Unfortunately you had a motion made and it was seconded. So procedurally we need to vote on that motion. You all are aware of Mr. Hathaway's feelings. The the vote can be voted so that it fails this point in time, just know where that stands. So if we call the role, then from there we can proceed with another motion. I'm used to losing elections and won't hurt my feelings. If we're in discussion, may I withdraw the motion and make a motion to nominate a chair? Yes. Okay, so I'll withdraw my initial motion, make a motion that from this committee, we nominate someone to be chair person. Also, okay. Okay, let's vote on the motion. Second for discussion, unless you, did you second it? I'm sorry. Okay, good discussion. Yes, please. I'm not sure we need a chair. Susan's been leading the meeting. She's been hired to lead our meetings and lead our conversation. I think all she really needs to do is see when it's time to call the vote or if someone says, I think we need to vote on this. Then Susan can say we need to vote on this. I'm not quite sure picking one of us to lead because we're all leaders. I mean, I've looked at us, we're all leaders, and I've listened to the meeting last time that I missed, and there's a lot of good conversation, and a lot of good leadership here. So I think to just pick one, when that is really what Susan's trying to do. So that's how I feel about it. I would agree with you, Judy. I think that even if maybe it's not the case, it would give the perception of there being a leader or someone that may have more pull than someone else. I like the idea of everyone having being in the same boat. Let's go to that way. I would agree with that. I don't think, if you compare this back to the task force that did parking, there was no facilitator. So they created a chair, and that was probably appropriate here. Most places where I've been on boards, where there's been a facilitator president, you don't have a chair, and that's what the facilitator's role is to facilitate the meeting. I have a question. It's probably discussed during the first meeting which I miss. I'm sorry if that's a case. On the resolution that was passed by the commission it did state that at the first meeting a chair and a vice chair would be elected. So was there a change that prevented that from happening? No that's still in the resolution you are correct on the reading of that. So should we then follow what they put forward? Based on the resolution as passed by the City Commission it does call that a chair shall be nominated and then that chair will nominate a vice chair. Okay. Thank you. Man, I would guess from that we need to go ahead and go back to what we started to do which was the nominated chair. Is that correct, Jay? Correct. I'm not sure. So there's already a motion in a second on the floor and some discussion. That motion was withdrawn from Mr. Halfway. No, but he knows the motion to vote on whether we want to nominate a chair. So I'm going to go on this limit third time. We've drawn the motion since we have a duty to name a chair based on the charter and I will go back and withdraw the motion of voting for a chair and then selecting a vice chair and yield to someone else to make a nomination as to who they would advocate to be the chair. Are we still open for discussion on this a little bit before we do that? I just want to ask what would the role of the chair be if it was something that was written into the commission's decision on the charter review? Medians may be scheduled by the Chair or by majority vote of the members present and voting. I believe much like what you see elsewhere, you're going to see the Chairperson kind of oversee the the discussion and the flow a little bit. I see. Okay. Then I nominate Judy Riker to be chair. I nominate Khalid Rashidad to be chair. No, I'm not. Thank you. I also decline. Point of order for, for say, if you could just clarify something. Do we explicitly have to do that because it's in the resolution or can we not not do it? Because I'm sensing that nobody really wants a chair. So resolution 0125 subsection 5 says meetings and procedure and it says the city clerk or designee shall provide a person to act as recording secretary for the committee. The initial meeting shall be called to order by the city clerk or designee who shall call for the nominations of the chair from among the committee members. The chair shall be elected by majority vote of the members present in voting. The duly elected chair shall then call for the nominations for vice chair from among the committee members who shall likewise be elected by majority vote of those members who are present in voting. The committee may adopt reasonable rules for procedure to govern the conduct of its business. Meetings may be scheduled by the chair or by the majority vote of the members present and voting. I am unsure if this got changed based on the fact that they voted for a facilitator at that point in time. But I don't have an amendment to this resolution. So that was done before the facilitator was hired? January 14th of 2025 was when it was passed. Okay. Can we table the motion and wait for clarification? Sure. Do they need a second? You need a second on that? I'll second that. We didn't have a motion. So we tabled it. moved to table the motion and it was seconded. Seconded motion. Okay, I'll call the roll. Member Billings. No. Member Fuseler? No. Member Hathaway? No. Member Ison? No. I was about to take the motion so people don't want to take the motion. Yes. Member Palmer? Yes. Member Poole? No. Member Rashida? Yes. Member Palmer. Yes. Member Poole. No. Member Rashida. Yes. Member Reiker. Yes. Member Rogier. Yes. Member Smith. Yes. Member Wilson. Yes. We have seven in the affirmative So that's tabling the motion for now all right to let the facilitator do the role that she was hired for and Based on some public opinion tonight there's a desire for more of formal process to the decision-making and more of a look at pros and cons. So assuming that we can move forward with a more on-biased, balanced approach to these issues, that's well documented, there shouldn't be a need for a chairman is what I read into the conversation in the dialogue. That's a point for discussion, inviting other people to comment. No, I agree with you, Dean. My reason for voting know is until we get clarity from staff as to what the intention of the direction was, we can't fail to do that because it's clear based on what we have that we're supposed to elect someone as chair and vice chair. I can't give a legal opinion so I have to do. We have to turn here. We have violation of the ordinance. It's a resolution. It's a resolution. It's a resolution. At this point in time we have not completed what's been written in the resolution but I do say the resolution is lacking any mention of a facilitator which was hired which would be the role of a chairperson basically when you typically have a facilitator I don't think you would have a chairperson so at this point in time my opinion would be to move forward on this meeting discuss what topics you have and we'll get clarity as to the resolution for next meeting and we can proceed forward with the chairperson at that point. At this point, I don't think we have anyone willing to take the chairperson and I don't want to sit here and stale me. That sounds good to me. Okay. So I would proceed forward with the meeting as scheduled at this point in time and next charter review will have clarity as to whether a chair vice chair needs to be elected. And then can I ask one more unrelated question that pertains to, you know, the resolution or the current city charter? And I asked this question the meeting previously and I still not sure that I fully understood the answer. So I just want shade to get another legal opinion from you. So in the current charter there's a section 7.03 that says that there will be a periodic review, right? And it says clearly in the words that that committee will be appointed by the city commission in 2026 and every 10 years thereafter. So my question is, look at my calendar and it's not 2026. So just as you talked about that resolution, why are we moving forward with this charter review committee now when the current city charter, which was approved by the last board and then approved by the commission then approved by the electorate, 2026. So I just want a little bit more clarification and you know Spencer gave his interpretation the other assistant attorney did as well so I just wanted to better understand those words. In line with with Mr. Hathaway and the previous attorney and the city attorney have articulated it is fine to be here in 2025 to be reviewing this. It was direction given by commission. The intent of that my understanding was to have a five year review and it be completed by 2026. You all are fulfilling that duty at this point in time so there is no harm in having this meeting at this point in time. So the words there shall be in 2026. Can we just change their word in to buy? So there shall be buy 2026 is what you're saying. So legally, the words in and buy are the same. I'm just saying that. And I'm just looking for another opinion, Mr. Catholic. At this point in time, the commission can make the decision when they want to review it, which allows them to review the charter at any point in time throughout their tenure. They could do it every year if they wanted to. This was just giving them a benchmark that by 2026 or in 2026 you will definitely have this done and you are fulfilling that duty of the charter at that point in time. That was the intent of that proposal and it's being fulfilled and the commission has basically that this would happen now,. Like Mr. Aftaway at Artiglia previously. Now we're 25 minutes in. We've accomplished absolutely nothing. Well, we've listened to some public opinions, public comments, and you know, that's been addressed. Yeah, good dialogue. All right, all right. So we're gonna, we're all good. We're gonna move forward. All right. So we're going to we're all good. We're going to move forward. All right. So one of the things in your packet materials that you've been provided by the city clerk is I did this spreadsheet that outlines the items that you all have spoken about. It kind of summarizes them. It talks about where we are, the're going to, that you are proposing for change, and the items that we've not yet voted on. One of the items that we need to do this evening is we need to vote on those items or continue to be a session on those items, and there it is up on the screen. So you see, basically item number two down there is Article Two City commission section 2.03 powers and duties of commission And you see the language in the third column there You see the red line the eye the verbiage that is being recommended for deletion We have not had a formal vote on that particular item. So I would suggest we start with that item this evening for discussion. I do want to point out that on section 2.1, the compensation piece that statute did fail. Yes. So the legislature did not take up the compensation of local governments. And when it's appropriate, I do want to speak on that. Do you want to hold that comment until the end of the meeting? Okay. Thank you. All right. Does anybody have any questions? Would anybody like to make a motion on that particular item? That is one of our items we have discussed at several meetings, but we've taken no final action. Which item specifically you're referring to? Right there on the second line, the second set of boxes, Article 2, City Commission, Section 2.03, Powers and Doodies of Commission. The proposed verbiage, excuse me, would be recommended to change to the city commission shell annually perform performance reviews on the city manager and the city attorney It takes out the following charter officers and the word and the city clerk mainly. It's cleaning up the verbiage Is it clean up. It's essentially deleting the city clerk as a charter officer. Is that correct? Yes. I think that's on the next page on Article 4, charter officers. It's connected. I think that's connected. Which I mean if we want to talk about the city clerk first before we vote on that we will be able to do this good deal. Yeah, I think this is a byproduct of the role of the city clerk because I need to know What's wire we getting rid of the city clerk as a charter officer? It's what are the pros and cons? Okay So if we want to go to that yet he's changing the screen Can you move the screen over so we could see whoever's controlling the screen? It's not me, you're lucky. If you can move it over to the second page there. There we go. Down at the bottom. Okay, down at the very bottom of page two, article four, charter officers, section 4.04 city clerk. So you see in the second column the current verbiage as it relates the duties of the city clerk. So you see in the second column the current verbiage as it relates to duties of the city clerk. In the proposed verbiage you see where it has been rewritten. The words that in red are being deleted. You see them line through the words in blue. Instead of duties it would say appointment. And it should in the new words would say there shall be a city clerk Who shall be appointed by and serve at the pleasure of the city manager? The verbiage is a well Again seats down here because we kind of didn't talk about them in order, but it goes back to 2.03 that we just talked about so This would be you were correct as it would be the appropriate item for us to talk about first. Yeah, so Susan, I think this would be great to move that article to the front page, because those ones that you're actually voting on, then everything else just becomes a procedural change from there. And then I really do want to thank you for putting together this document, because this gives you a chance to really see things. The reasoning column there, I think it'd be great if we can show both sides of the story, which is what the public had kind of asked for in the public comments. So if that can show either reasons for reasons against or pros or cons or reasons for the proposed or versus reasons for the current verbiage, some sort of both sides of the story I think would be really good to show there. And that would help, you know, put the dialogue and the understanding and communication to the commission when we get there. Okay. If I could interject here. Over the last two or three weeks I've been doing a small project and what I did was I went and looked at every charter in Valueschi County and I put them in a larger database to try to sort and assess it. I can't tell you exactly where I'll top my head because I don't have it in front of me, but the majority of the clerks were no longer charter officers, because charter officers give advice, charter officers manage large segments of the government, the city manager and the city attorney. Nothing again, Sharon, she has a responsible job, but the city clerk's job is less in that. It's more of a service-related kind of function, as opposed to a management decision-making, policy-making, type activity. When you put them into the charter position, the management of them, again, Judy's been on a commission. Other people have been working with commissions. You'll find it's very difficult to have five people try to tell somebody what to do. And that causes issues. And I think that it makes it simpler to have the reporting function directly to the city manager. Most of what the clerk does is what she's doing tonight. It's more of a supporting role as opposed to a management decision role. She provides access to the public for public documents and does an excellent job like that. But that's where her main functions are as opposed to the city attorney who's constantly either involved in litigation or making recommendations or just what she's doing tonight, helping guide us in making decisions in the year. The city manager sits in that corner chair at every meeting rights down every comment from a citizen and then goes back and finds those answers and reports back to the commission so they can make policy decisions while he manages the workforce. So to me it makes more sense to have fewer people reporting directly to the commission which is policy and which has a specific prohibition against direct of direction of city employees and let the clerk do their job without that interference. I don't see any reason to have it and as I said most of the ones I read which I have in the database and I think get you next time that exact number don't report they're They're all city manager reporting. Home where I have your answer. I actually question Carrie Evelyn on this, the attorney. And she responded back to me that 11 cities in Volusia County have manager appointed clerks. The only ones who do not are us, Nusmerna, Edgewater, Pearson and Orange City. So there's only four who do not have manager appointed City Clerk's. Now, the land she tells me has a City Clerk auditor who's appointed by the commission, but the auditing of the financial records is a very different role than the traditional role of the City Clerk. So she holds a duel here, she holds a duel job there. So it's a little bit different. So really, we're quite in the minority with regard to our city clerk reporting to the commission. My position would be more like with your comments because of the administrative duties of the city clerk, but also because on city commission, you're a part time. You're not in the office every single day. You're not in the office all day long. You cannot be available to the city clerk. Neither can they be available to you 100% of the time. So you're not really managing them. So they're getting no management now in the terms of a city manager, they are the manager of the city, the CEO. So they should be able to manage on their own and the city attorney protects the city as well as the commissioners keeps us all out of trouble. A professional designation but because of the job of the city clerk agreeing with you, I think that it's more appropriate that she or he be under the city manager who can manage their work every day all day. And second, there's no that position cannot go to human resources if there is an issue. And neither can their employees, that your employees can't go to human resources if there is an issue with you. So that puts their employees in a position that has less ability to solve issues than the regular employees. So I see a city clerk position more like the fire chief or the police chief or the finance director or those those. So that's my opinion on that. I have no background in this, but I'd sure like to ask the college what he thinks about From an operational standpoint The city clerk as Mr. Palmer mission she provides service to the commission and to the city I think she needs to be or he needs to be under the city manager like the 11 other cities that we have. The most important point that Mr. Raikov mentioned is about the human resources. If there's an issue with the city clerk, having the city clerk be in a charter officer, the city manager cannot do anything until the commission gets involved. And I think from that point, I think it adds up, this is one of the pros I think it gets there. The city clerk from a streamlining the process, I think, having the city clerk under the city manager makes the process a lot smoother and with streamline the process. Because the commission is not there as she mentioned. The commission is not there all the time. They see the commission once and a while, depending on how often they come and visit or they email the city clerk. But from the operational standpoint, I think, when I look at the pros and cons, I think the pros outweigh the cons way more than I can even think. So that's from the experience that I had with working with the city clerk for the last 35 years. We had four or five city clerks. They're all good city clerks. But again, when you have five people giving you directions, it's really difficult for the city clerk to even navigate through that. And I think having the city manager there to navigate because since the city manager is really navigating among the five members of the commission. So that's my two cents to it. The piece that kind of gives me the most heartburn about it is the election piece. You know, if you run for office and you're going into the city clerk, you want independent kind of advice that this person may end up working for you. They may end up serving the current commission. They may not. Now they're hired by the current commission. So there's bad. It's the same issue, but it's, I think it is different. So the question that I don't know the answer to, and I think the purpose behind having an independency clerk was for the, predominantly I think for the election officer piece, do the clerks and those other municipalities still serve as the elections officer? That's what I was able to know they do. And that was actually my exact question was going to be as we talk about 11 cities versus four cities are the job responsibilities that are in job description the same for all those cities. And that's something where I don't want to just have an opinion I think it is I'd like to understand that. So what other responsibilities of our city clerk and here's their way for us to have a job description of what those responsibilities are. And then how does that compare to the other cities because there are pros and cons, and that's what we for us to have a job description of what those responsibilities are and then how does that compare to the other cities because there are pros and cons and that's what we're going to have out and I would be very concerned you know Mr. Athaway about that you know knowing people that every city run for commission and and how valuable it was to have access to the city clerk you know not under the city management organization. I have a question not I don't want to, Dan, but I'm not sure. I mean, not the ways Mr. Hathaway's run for election. I run for election. Judy's run for election. The city clerk basically received my documents, had me fill out some forms. Subsequent to me running halfway through that election, all of the reporting process got turned over to the supervisor of elections. So really the city clerk just receives your candidacy and forwards that to the supervisor of elections. It doesn't do much after that because all of your campaign finance reporting contributions is done electronically directly to the city. I mean the supervisor election. I don't see that that's a challenge coming in to a city employee. I don't think it's any different than coming in to get a permit for something or anything else. It just become a person that handles and understands how to prepare those documents and send it out. So I hear what you're saying, but I don't see the conflict as much as before when they handle everything. I mean, it's a service that the city clerk, it provides as the service that the city manager provides. So when we have an election and we have six people running for election and they come and the meat could be salimaraj or salimaraj or salimaraj or salimaraj or salimaraj the other candidate. So I used to meet with the candidate prior to the election, given him the chance to ask any questions, if they have any specific issue. So that's the service that you provide. So I'm not sure what the city clerk would be different in terms of the service she provides if she was under the city manager or under the charter office. I don't know what difference. It's the same thing. That service, she's going to provide that service to anybody who's running for election. And as Mr. Palmer mentioned, right after that thing is there, then it would be turned into the supervisor of election. So really, it's a matter of just going through the process with the candidates and provide the application, whatever information they need, whatever proper document that they have to submit in order to be as a candidate. The other thing I think you have to take into consideration, I think we're all aware of some recent issues that have happened here. Okay. Because that person was a charter officer who went to the charter outside investigators had to be brought in, cost to the city, etc. Whereas if the person was under civil service, as someone mentioned, they can go to HR and try to resolve the issue internally at HR. So you can look at it in the most objective as you can without personalities and say, well, there's a cost savings or potential cost savings by not having Mr. Charter off you. In Palmer, you mentioned the situation that happened recently, and I just want to make sure that this isn't a knee jerk orerk reaction to that. That's why I would like to make sure I understand the responsibilities of the role in Susan. I know you tried to speak several times, so it would be great if there's a way to have that job description and have more information to understand. Well, I think we kind of have the cart in front of the horse if we do the job description. The job description is going to be the responsibility of the HR department and the city manager to put that job description together. So we, you know, we haven't made that decision, but I will tell you historically years ago city clerks answered to the commission lots of department heads answered to the commission over time that has changed. and the rule across the country, not just here in Florida, is it's reflective of what you saw here in Volusia County, which is the majority of the cities, more than the majority of the cities. The clerk is no longer a charter officer. They answer to the city manager. You will notice that those cities that were read off that still have the clerk answering to the elected body are your smaller cities here in the county. So sometimes they don't have the number of people. They are arranged a little differently than the larger cities. But the clerk reporting to the city manager is the norm out there these days. Because they're treated more like a department head, they answer, they have one boss instead of 579, however many elected officials you have. They have one boss, they're an integral part of that day to day operation of the organization hence why they've been moved to be under the umbrella of the city manager. Susan, I'd like to add one more thing. My experience with City Clerk as a charter officer. If they were under the purview of the city manager they would have some protection of their time from the public. The public is free to visit with a city manager and the public is free to visit with a city attorney and as a charter officer the public is free to visit with a city clerk and I witnessed a lot of visiting going on with the city clerk and taking of their time Not only to just get documents, but to sit and discuss political the politics of the city and who's doing what to whom and who's whatever and I just and that was only just when I would come in and out maybe for meetings or whatnot, you know two hours at a time and there was no protection of that person's time there because they were a charter officer and they had Their job was to listen to the public. So I think that if we had some protection for that person under the guise of the city manager, I think that would be important to establish getting their work done in a timely manner and not have that distraction. it really is, it's not right, it's not right for that to happen to our clerk. It did. You guys did a good point. So we've heard a lot of pros for moving it. What about the cons? What are they? I'm truly asking because I don't know. And that's why I wanted to see the current job description that the card head of the horse. What's the current job description? So what do we lose if the city clerk moves and reporting to the commission to reporting to the city manager? Do we lose any accreditation on election certification? Do we lose and anything is there anything that that's in that job just from today that we would miss out on? It's pretty short and directly from the charter It's the city clerk shall be the custodian of all city records Shall give notice of commission meetings to its members in the public Shall keep minutes of its proceedings serve as the election official, and perform such other duties as are signed by this charter in the City Commission. That's it. So would those roles be changed in any way if the case they reported to the city manager? I don't think so. I think that those services would be, whether it's they are under the city manager or under the commission. I don't see any changes from the job description honestly. I deal a lot with the city council. I'll sign on that. Yeah. I deal a lot. So question for the city attorney then is what would change? And you know Mr. you know comments are I can understand it but just from your standpoint and and then why was it set up that they were reporting through to the commission to begin with instead of the city manager can answer the what I don't know I wasn't here when they did that change but what I can tell you is that the duties and appointment the duties and those responsibilities would basically be moved into a job description of the city clerk And it would maintain the same thing I believe there is aria job description of the city clerk within the city anyway that incorporates these duties as well So basically you're just taking it out of the charter and then it would hurt job description when stand on its own Which I believe is aria and existence at this point in time and? And I'm not sure if within the charter there is a separate section that talks about her being the elected electoral official and I don't believe that's being removed. So she'll still remain the electoral official and that will still remain within the charter as her duty and that will be separate. So that doesn't change regardless of where you're moving her. She still remains the electoral official. And then the job requirements or the qualifications wouldn't change at all for future appointees. So this has nothing to do with the current city clerk. Correct. If I'm not mistaken, there's a certification, correct? Yeah, there's a certification for City Quirks. I see it on the bottom of the document. The CMC certification, I don't think it's, that would be the decision when you draft the right. The job description whether you want to make that mandatory or not, not all clerk's have it. Right. A lot of them get it over time, once they become a city clerk, but I don't, whether you wanted it to be mandatory or not, I'm not sure that it. And I would also think, should I correct me if I'm wrong, that under the charter of the city clerk had a contract, right? Correct. So some of that stuff of the job might have been described in that contract also, maybe very, if it did from what was in the thing. My guess is, it's probably pretty much the same I've never seen the contract. I mean the only changes would be that they would report that the city manager they will be evaluated by the city manager and it would not be a contract they would be like a department head. But other duties, they would be exactly the same as it stands today. Would the clerk still be a member of the canvassing board? Why not? I'm, it's just an unusual situation that a non, I don't know, only because that's always where we've done it. It's all I'm saying.'ve got two commissioners in the clerk service of Canvassing Board to certify the elections. Now the two commissioners would serve alongside a department head essentially on the Canvassing Board. But she's still the city clerk. She's still in charge of the elections. You aren't changing that. But she's answerable to somebody in the middle. But that is the way you're going to see it in most other jurisdictions these days. I think you know it's, I think Ms. Reiker and Caled both have brought it up is you're changing the umbrella under which the city clerk works. You're not changing her duties, her responsibilities. I shouldn't say her here. She, you, what you're looking at changing is that they now have one boss who they can go to 24 hours a day and get a hold of and get answers to any situation that they're having to deal with versus getting five people together if there's a decision that needs to be made. So I think that's one of the biggest situational differences. The other thing is that I will say city clerk working under the city manager is the most common form as we've you know as I've already pointed out that you see out there today. The other is kind of a holdover from the past when things were structured a little bit differently within the local governments. And Mr. Hathaway, if you look to section 3.04, can I see more that indicates that the city clerk is in there? I don't believe that's been proposed to be changed. Right, I was just wondering. It would remain okay. It just seems to me just to be alive, that's all. I don't feel real strongly when we're there. So based on all the communication that we've done, we've discussed a lot of pros and not a lot of cons. I think we've got enough support to try to bring a motion. Would you like to make a motion? Let me give that a shot. All right. Section 4.02. 4.04. 4.04 there is a motion to change the city charter to allow the city clerk to report to the city manager versus the commission. Second for discussion. Second. Mr. Roshadada has seconded. I think in the beginning of the meeting, we heard about that we make decisions so quick. So I just want to make sure that before we make this vote to make sure that no other member on the Dias has any other concerns or questions. I have a logistics question. If we go ahead and approve these changes as designated here, are these three separate changes that would go before the voters that way, or would it be one change to make, and then the language would just follow the proposal if we're going to go on the ballot? If the Commission approves it. Are you talking about because this shows up on several different? It would have to be three different changes because it's three different sections. So you know, you wouldn't have the electorate won't vote on each one. It should be, you know, anything that would follow it. That's the question I have. It's going to be broken down to each before the referendum. It's going to be to amend section 401 to change these five words. A man's section 402. Yeah, it should be just a man's section 4.04 and any other subsequent wording will follow it. I would agree that that would be the most streamlined efficient way to do it if you are removing the charter officer out of the charter than anything that would touch the charter officer would also be amended. So the referendum would say to change? Valet? I'm not sure yet and that's something we can dive into. That's outside of my realm at this point in time. It would make sense that once you make one thing that affects that dominoes affect, you don't need to vote on the dominoes, right? Because they're going to fall. Okay, so following that to its logical conclusion, we do that. We say we want to strike 4-0-4, and it does impact, for instance, the canvassing board now doesn't have a third member because we've eliminated that charter officer. No. Are you still the city clerk? She's still the city clerk, though. Yeah, that's the question. Canvassing board need to have charter officers? No. but the concern I have is if it's so it is addressing the city manager. The city manager. The question is, board need to have charter officers? No. No, but the concern I have is, if it's so it is a discretion of city manager, the city manager says I'm not going to fill that position. I just don't have the budget for this year. I mean, there's not really any, what's the commission going to do? Say, well, if you don't fill the city clerk's, we're going to fire you. I'm just trying, this is a lot of things that's going to touch, it's been that way for a long time. I'm not saying don't do it, but I'm just... No, and that's interesting, because we've asked about cons, and I haven't heard anybody on the day us have a... I'm just trying to, this is a lot of things that's going to touch, it's been that way for a long time. I'm not saying don't do it, but I'm just, no, and that's interesting, because we've asked about cons, and I haven't heard anybody on the day us have a con yet, but that's where I'd like to hear from, you know, shea in from Susan some more. But yeah, if the city manager has the right to say, Yeah, I'm not going to have a city clerk. That's a pretty big con. I don't think- And I know there's a fictitious comment. I don't think you'd ever see that happen because the responsibilities of the clerk involve the elections. It's kind of like the responsibility of the finance director is the budget and paying the bills. You wouldn't fire the finance director and not replace them. You have to have those positions. So I think that's an excellent question, but pretty far fetched that it would ever happen. So what are the cons of making them move? All right, I have something. I don't know if it's a con or not, but I mean, would this change the effect of disser anything for the commissioners by not having her to report to? None that I can. I can't think of any. I see something that was a hold that I thought we should for. Through my own experience, I can't see it. I mean, the clerk is still going to be the person who provides the agenda packets and those kind of things, public records. I mean, the duties will be in that job description. And I don't think anybody's looking at seeing those duties change. It's just who the person who sits in the clerk's position, who they report to. Do they report to five people? Who are very hard to get a hold of sometimes or do they have one person that they now report? Right, I understand, thank you. I would like to add to that, we're focusing and it's a good focus for discussion. So we're focusing on this now duty of the elections, which occur infrequently compared to the regular duties that she does every day or he does every day, which is answer the citizens who want public documents, probably the biggest thing that she handles. So I can't imagine if she works for the city manager or the city manager is not going to fill the person who gets probably the most requests for information and who then handles that through the rest of the city government. So she doesn't sit on the top of all that. She becomes the coordinator to go get that information. So I can't see them. I appreciate that as a con, but I don't see the city manager not hiring a city clerk. And I don't think the fact that she's the city employee would impact greatly that canvassing board. I don't know the reality of it, but I just say that the operations of it, I don't think it would be a problem. I mean, as far as I know, it didn't affect the other cities, the other 11 cities that they have, the city cleric under the city manager. There are certain positions in the city that I call them major positions that in case of any budget cuts and so forth, I think that would be one of the ones that you cannot touch. For example, like having a whether it's a finance director or a police chief or a fire chief. You know, there is certain positions that you could get away with for a short period of time, but that's not one of them. To that point, earlier we made a decision to get more information before making a decision. Does it make sense for us to see what that language looks like in the change to say that whether or not a charter officer they remain in certain roles and the role must be filled before we call the vote. Maybe in a later meeting. Just for your clarification, Mr. Hathaway, I believe the code of ordinance under, I believe article four, officers and employees, it says there shall be a city clerk who shall be appointed by it served at the pleasure of the City Commission granted. That will be amended upon this, but it does say there shall be a city clerk so at least we do have that and shall attend all meetings Shall be the custodium the seal so we do have duties outlined within our code itself And the only question I would have is the number of items that are going to end up on the ballot People are voting on five different language changes because it is in five separate issues of the charter I think we're going to start confusing the heck out of folks. We can get clarity on that and the next meeting. Yes. I agree completely. That wouldn't be a reason to not make the move if that's the right thing to do. Yes. I'm not sure what we're waiting to clarify. To see how the ballot is going to be structured, whether it will be five different votes of yes or no to change the charter based on the fact that when you remove the city clerk, you're going to touch about two or three other sections that fall because of it. I think there's probably a way within that vote that says upon removal of the city clerk, the following other sections will be modified to relive this. And then it can be probably all and corporate in one amendment to it. It's just the wording people don't like to read things. The longer the ballot is, the less they want to, and I think that's what Mr. Hathaway's concerned about. But we're trying to get clarification whether we could do one vote that incorporates all the changes or if it will have to be five separate yes or no vote. I would want one, if this is just to eliminate the charter position of the city clerk, I think it should be one question on the ballot. It should not be five. That would be what I want to make sure, if that would be my two cents on this, most of them would have thought. I think it should be one question on the ballot. It should not be five. That would be what I want to make sure, if that would be my two cents on this, I'm not going to vote. The question is, should the city clerk be a charter officer? And that's the question to think. You make that decision, the others roll from it, because they're just merely deletions. That's a set of sections. They're not policy. They're deletions because they're no longer a charter officer. So do we need to modify the motion to consolidate or not? No. At this point in time, you have a motion to amend Article 4 charter officer or charter officers 4.04. That was seconded for discussion. I'm not sure if you're still in discussion phase at this point in time. If not, it can be called to a vote. I'll call for a vote. Member Billings. Yes. Member Fuselier. Yes. Member Hathaway. No. Member Eisen. Yes. Member Palmer. Yes. Yes. Member Hathaway? No. Member Eisen? Yes. Member Palmer? Yes. Member Poole? No. Member Reiker? Yes. Member Rashida? Yes. Member Rokier? No. Member Smith? Yes. Member Wilson? Yes. Thank you. We will bring back some additional information about how it will appear on the ballot at the next meeting just to help clarify that question there. Okay. All right. Well given that, if we go back, the person doing the AV is going to be really upset with me. We would like to go back to page one. So. Anybody ever read the short story by DASCA? Yes, he called the death of Ivan Iliac. Yes. Sharon must have felt like Ivan Iliac. Sorry. He died slowly and late on the couch listening to everyone talking about him. He passed. Sorry about that. It would have been nice if we could have just asked you these questions. That was a high school read. Yeah. Yeah. And once again, this is a vote to have this go on to the commission and then the commission will decide what they want to do and then that will go on to the body. The other. Right. Right. And that's where I do think it would be really important to better understand how would that ballot be set up and basically to be removing the city's charter officer. Correct. And that's where on your document that you're showing here, I really do think showing pros and cons and presenting those pros and cons of the commission would be very useful in the communication. Yeah, I have no problem adding another column on a bigger sheet of paper but no. Make this type a lot smaller. All right, so and we will bring back to the next meeting how it will figure out how that will have to appear or what the methodology is to put that onto the ballot so that it's not five different sections, you know, boom, boom, you have to vote on. But for the moment now, we're gonna vote on the sections just to be sure we're all in sync. So so Road to down there as you can see in section 2.03 powers and duties of commission We go over there and you see this would be in correlation with the action you all just took. The proposed verbiage would get changed to say the City Commission shall annually perform performance reviews on the city manager and the city attorney because with the removal of the city clerk as a charter officer. They would be the only two that you all would, the commission would have to redo the annual reviews on would be the city manager in the city attorney. So what we would need to do here is if there is discussion, proceed with discussion, or put a motion out there on the table and proceed with discussion. We can move in second for discussion. Right. It's going to move forward, move on the proposed furbitch. Second for discussion. Are we doing this one at a time or these omnibus? Excuse me. Are we doing each the change in 2.03 and 2.05 separate votes? Yes please. So we had a second. I'm sorry I didn't know who second you did. Thank you. Any discussion? So in the proposed verbites why why would you remove the words following charter officers? You're still gonna have the commission perform, performance duties on the charter officers, which at this point would be the city manager and the city attorney. So just striking the city clerk would be fine. That's true. But I think you accomplish it. But I think it's important to say the word charter officers, right? So the commission is performing reviews on charter officers. It's really just for you. Okay. Grimatic. Well, we can leave those with you want to leave following charter officers in there. I think I see no reason why you couldn't. I think that makes sense to say charter officer. I'll amend my motion then to say performance reviews on the following charter officers. The. Leave that in. I'll second the amended motion. board. If you ready for a motion or you want a discussion. Call a call. Just a bit more discussion. but now we're been an eight to three vote that the city clerk will move in not be a commission officer So now we're just voting on as that's been done here the revised wording Member Billings yes, member fuselier. Yes member halfway Member Aison. Yes. Member Palmer. Yes. Member Fuse Lear. Yes. Member Hathaway. Yes. Member Eisen. Yes. Member Palmer. Yes. Member Poole. Yes. Member Rashida. Yes. Member Riker. Yes. Member Rogier. Yes. Member Smith. Yes. Member Wilson. Yes. Thank you. All right. Thank you. All right. Thank you. All right. Again, so now we come down to the next item there. You see that this is in, again, and this is in Article 2, City Commission, Section 2.05 Prohibition, the Interference with Administration. You see the current language and you see the words proposed to be changed. It would say employees who are subject to the direction and supervision of the city manager and the city attorney. And solely through these charter officers again is deleting the words the city clerk. So again, it's a correction that will correlate with 2.03 which is what you just voted on. So I would be looking for discussion or a motion for discussion. I'll make a motion for discussion to approve the language as listed in this red sheet for article Section 203 powers. I'm sorry, 205 prohibitions of interference. I second that. Any discussion or questions? No questions? All right, Madam Clerk. Member Billings. Yes. Member Fuseleer. Yes. Member Hathaway. Yes. Member Eisen. Yes. Member Palmer. Yes. Member Poole. Yes. Member Rashida. Yes. Member Reiker. Yes. Member Roqueer. Yes. Member Smith. Yes. Member Wilson. Yes. Thank you. All right. Section 2.11 compensation you all previously discussed that and the try to review committee was recommending no changes. I think we're waiting to see what the legislature was going to do. Right. That law is failed. I don't know if anybody wants to have that conversation now. That would be the pleasure of the committee. Why was it put on the list of subjects to discuss? It was brought up by somebody I don't remember who, I'll be honest with you. And I think it was also a part of the discussion because of what was happening in the legislature. We didn't know what was happening. I think it was brought up by the city attorney in the first night as a number of things that she had heard were of interest for the committee. Yeah, that's what I don't know who the person was. It was just a list that she think was. Yeah, it was recommendations that were given to the city commission that she had heard from some place. Right. All right, so the next one the very last one. Excuse me. I'm sorry. What do we tell that one for just a second because I just have a question as to honestly why don't we just say that the the city commission shall determine and they shouldn't that it should just be like a cost of living increase says that the other city employees get on an annual basis. Why can't it default to that? And the charter I looked at, you see that in many of them are references to the CPI being done. I'd like to make a comment about that if I may. I think now it's appropriate time. Initially, our facilitators provided us with information from the league of cities regarding salaries of commissioners and mayors. It was incorrect. It was incorrect. It's four years old, and the information provided was four years old. So I questioned that to our facilitators, the email through the city Clerk, which we were instructed to do. And we were provided with data information, but then request was made. Well wait a minute, why can't we get this information from our own city's HR person? So the document that's in your packet is the actual salaries of the commissioners and the mayor. We were also provided by a League of Cities information by population. Cities like our size that are on the east coast and we are kind of in the middle. And again, looking at the corrected data of 28,000 salary for a mayor and 21,000 for city commissioner is even below that. I truly I think some of us know our prior city mayor was decided not to run after he had successfully ran one and he came back for a second term. I think some of that was financially motivated. It's very hard for someone that's not retired or a fixed pension to sit on this diocese. I think that's why I asked for information. Where are we right now? I think right now, based on our city and our our population I think right now we're below where we should be and I'm thinking and I've got salary information provided most recently by the facilitator and it shows the increase each year going up by the percentage from Valuesha County but where I'm thinking is we need to true up right now our mayor and our council members because they're not going to vote or Bring a motion to give themselves a raise I think is up to this committee to see and feel are they adequately compensated by the amount of hours that they spend in both their Positions as mayor and council members. I think it's I think they're underpaid and we're a premium city So I think it would be reflective of this charter review committee to have discussions around that based on the most correct information that we have. And if we feel that the compensation isn't really just based on the time and hours and efforts that they're putting in that we true them up to a certain level, and then we can revert back to whatever Alicia County approves. And that's, I's what they've done the last three years and it's and again it's it's quite low based on four year old information it's showing it so no time where they are that they're anywhere from up to thirty nine thousand dollars for a mayor looking at this diagram and I just think we should have some dialogue about that because the commissioners are not going to approve a race for themselves or for the mayor. Is the if I recall correctly the current one now is what 50% of the Felizia County that the ordinances I believe is the mayor is 50% of the county chairman and the commission's vice president of the county council. Okay. So what I think we should have some discussion about, I feel it really low. Maybe some other folks on this dice, these don't, however, I believe there should be at least a true up to get them somewhere where they need to be because some folks can't afford to live on. Even if they only come in twice a month, which is probably what Dan would say. They're only coming in twice a month. Well, there's a lot more to that for everyone that sits up here and I'm just trying to make be fair and equitable to somebody that can't ask for a raise themselves. And it's not for, and it's truly not even for who sits in here today. I'm looking for 10 years in the future, or 15 years in the future. If we got somebody really bright and they could be a super mayor for us or a super commissioner, but they can't afford the position, that's a problem. So my comment, and since I was referenced up out here, all of our commissioners work 80 hours a week. They're not paid anything compared to the hours that they put in, but they're not doing this for the salary. They're doing this for the love of the city and for what they want to get accomplished. So I don't think there's any amount of money that we can pay them that would be worth what they're doing. So now it just comes down to how do you handle this in a responsible way so it's not done by ordinance it's done by some sort of a process. But I think everybody can curse at the work that the commissioners do from a dollar per hour standpoint, forget about it. Right? But still. But still, data four years old, we're well below middle ground for our salary position. So that's not right. I just like to say I've worked in various municipalities and the ones that I've worked in, none of the commissioners nor the mayor ever received compensation. They did it because they thought that's what they needed to do for their community. They weren't doing it for the money. Some of those had full time jobs as well as served as commissioners and mayor. So this is- I said it our last year. When I've seen some of these salaries, I'm going, oh my gosh, the people I've worked with never received a sentence. Yeah, well, you know, times have changed. Oh, yes, they do, Gaili. Times have changed. So it is at all. Sometimes it's more than just the love. Sometimes you've got a big family, big children. So I think it's worth having a discussion about. That's why I brought it up. And I think to add to that discussion just for the point of full disclosure. did children. So I think it's worth having a discussion about that's why I brought it up. And I think to add to that discussion just for the point of full disclosure, please keep in mind one of the things that I did not provide in your packet which is on page 33. It gives the commission's last five years of salary and the mayor. But keep in mind they They also are entitled to medical vision and dental. They do get that as well as they also get life insurance and they do get a contribution to the Florida State Retirement System. So just for full disclosure, so you know this, they don't get just what they get paid. There are other items that go within that pay package so to speak sure so I just wanted to be sure that we pointed that out for full disclosure I believe also that if if they have their own health insurance correct proof of our own calendar they can get a stipend in lieu of except in the city self insurance correct that's correct that's correct yeah yeah that is still correct But I still agree with Commissioner Eisen there. These folks, and I think Dan, you said it correctly, they put in far more hours than we actually paid them for. I don't think we'd ever be able to pay them as much money as they worked at it. But I think we need to do something that maybe is a little better in terms of just saying we're going to take 50% of Alicia County So does that mean they do 50% less work than our district free representative does I doubt it but that said I Think we need to get to what you're saying. I like the idea of Balance it up to work belongs now and then put some type of Automatic multiplier whether it's the same as the city gets with the CPI or whatever you want to put on to it And then it takes it out of the voting Requirement for them and it takes it out of somebody sitting there worrying about it every year But it still would have to be voted on by everybody. Yes. Yes. And give raises to public officials. It would have to be worded a certain way. Well, it would be a pass. If you put a lot of the charters I read, just said, will be adjusted annually by the CPI. That's an automatic. That doesn't require anything. It's already there. But if you put it in, so it would, it has to do a resolution. And you tie it to maybe when the commission finalizes the millage rate and the budget, they're finalizing the pay rates for all city employees so you can word it to whatever the city employees get. So there's like a couple of options there. That makes sense to me. In lieu of Mr. Eisen's comments with data, I wonder if it makes sense to look at, you know, the way it's defined today, making an adjustment to 60% or 70, whatever is fair and then annually going forward to a CPI adjustment based on what's going on externally to rest the employees. Are you suggesting taking it out of the ordinance altogether and making it a charter issue? Is that what we're going? It seems like that's the direction of discussions going and I think the benefit of that is the commission obviously doesn't have to do it themselves which they never never will and if they do the Voters will turn around and typically punish them for that But I I don't disagree with that. I think making it a set it needs to not be a political football We need to best be we can get we need to be People wanting to do it for the right reasons but also Understanding that it's expensive to do this even Even if you get elected on a post, the cost of traveling all over the city, the cost of maintaining is, you know, it's brutal. And I will tell you when I ran, as in a quick aside, several people called my boss and asked for me to be fired because I was violating dual office holding. Turned up, obviously that's not the case. It doesn't apply to assistant state attorneys, but I had to have a very uncomfortable conversation with my boss and some of these things and it was certainly distracting from my mission at hand but there's more costs than just you know the the fuel to get here and to travel to these meetings and to go all around the city it's you give up so much of your personal life you give up all of your free time you give up your anonymity you give up so much of your personal life, you give up all of your free time, you give up your anonymity, you give up so much to serve. And people do it for everybody I've ever met and the people that are interested in doing it for exactly the right reasons and they should be remunerated for that in my opinion. Then you would have to pick a salary that would be a living salary, right? Or at least try to get their son close, as close as you can afford or agree upon. Well, if it's not a living salary, it doesn't solve your problem. For instance, I worked full time when I was commissioner and took a lot from my family and my business because I lost business. Because people wouldn't give me business because they said, I would rather have your vote. So guess what? You're not going to get that development project at your title company. So I got actually a letter of release from a major developer that I had to give that up. And I just always trusted that God was going to take care of me. And he did. And I did very well. And so that worked out just fine. Jason McGurk, he worked full time. Adam Baringer, he worked full time. I mean, it was an augmentation, not that make, I think we were at 14,000 back then so it was like, hardly, you didn't do it for that. You did it because you wanted to make a change and you saw a need and you felt you could, you could do something that you could do something that would be helpful and it was a calling. I mean people say why did you why did you run? Well it was a calling it was just a calling I can't even give you a better answer than that. You just called to it so and but you're right I mean I saw what your dad did Spencer he he was constantly on the go with the city I don't, and he was a full-time employee and had so business. You almost have to have your own business and just like in national politics, when it first started out, you know, people would leave their own business and go to Washington and do their stint and then they would come back and run their farms or whatever they were doing. So it was never meant to be a full-time position for someone. It was always meant to bring whatever you have for a few years that you can give and give it. So there's just a whole different way of looking at it that we're discussing here today. And Judy, I totally agree with that and also the newcomers coming on. And I think that's really important not to be discouraging because it is so embarrassing low, but there needs to be some middle ground. I mean, I can pick a number out just based on some of the information Sharon's provided as a starting point if we want to at least try to get, like I said, a true up and then we can put put something else in. If I may add, Dan, if I sense it in my mind. Looking at time wise, I guess Sandra mentioned that the cities that she worked in, that they did not get any compensation for being a mayor or a commission. And that's probably true at that time. But I think if you look at the pros and cons in terms of compensating, I don't think we will ever be able to pay the commission or the mayor, the salary or whatever that clearly they deserve. You have some commissioners that attend every meeting, every public meeting for the city. We have one of them in the room tonight. I mean, Vice Mayor Martin, she attends every meeting that we can think of. For the, I mean, sometimes those meetings last three, four hours. Same thing with the mayor and other commissions. I think from my point of view, I think what we need to do is we need to adjust the salary. I don't think we'll ever be able to compensate them what they deserve. But at least adjust the salary and then make it connected to the city staff. If they receive a cost of living, they will be able to do that. This way they don't have the commission doesn't have to deal with it. So that would be my recommendation. And I think the days of people expecting this to be a part-time job or over. I mean that was unanimously the negatives that I got during the last campaign. As we, you can't, we don't want someone that has a full-time job we want someone's going to be devoted solely to the city and I think that's what the people expect in the the commission compensate the folks that are willing to do that as far as throwing a number out there for discussion purposes it's right now it's 50% of the county council I'm you know just for discussion purpose what we did up to 75% and that include today CPI. I think we need to look at the most updated numbers from around the cities. I don't know if we have to, so if you have that, look, look to see what the numbers are. It was the last time. But it's not updated. Those are the old ones. Yeah. Well agree. Well, unfortunately we can't get that from the city. Lega City's, right, Susan? From, yeah. They don't have it. They're working on it. They're behind. They said, sometime in the next couple of months, they'll have the past three years' worth of data, but they don't have it right now. If you want it from local cities, I'm sure a public records request can be put into each clerk for the commissioner salaries. That'd be nice because even the information we got that was not correctly reported to the request can be put into each clerk for the commissioner salaries. That'd be nice because even the information we got that was not correctly reported to the city, the city's is what I was told. I think that's important in terms of comparison before we throw a number around. This is my opinion. Is it reasonable? I don't know the answer. Is it reasonable to assume that the county council members make the highest salary of any of these similar jobs? Day 200 of each might be up there. Yeah, it's pretty, mostly browored paid more. But we were looking at strictly from the population on the East Coast and we were like third out of six. Let's see, hang on. 1-T-3-4-5 out of five we were third. Okay. Lower. Well, the reason I say that because the easiest solution to the problem is the percentage of the county council as Commissioner Huckleberry says, maybe Jack had up to 75% and then attached a CPI or whatever the city employees get. That would be the easiest way but we just make all got to feel comfortable. Because again if they're at 50% now and I'll just take the mayor, mayor is at 28.081. Okay, according to this chart. All right. So that's 50% of Broward. Which means that's what, 50, 56, 56 grand a year. So if you suggest 75% of 56, I don't want to think, figure figured out, then we're probably in the 39 range somewhere around there. Because again, I don't think we can get to, if we, you can't get to putting the mayor or the county chair at the real full-time job, full-time job because it's quote not a full-time job. I agree. So you kind of have to take somebody up there is making some decision and I'm not sure how that's done. I don't know if they vote their own. Anybody know that? I think, I think the county votes their own rating. Is there any way for the mayor to be compensated for travel? When they have to travel, for example, the South Florida somewhere? They get compensated for mileage. Okay. I mean, not just the mayor, but all the commissioners that get travel outside the. And there's a, but Kaleigh, they also, they also get their hotel room paid or their conference registration paid for them. They do, they do. I mean, that's part of the, that's part of the jobs. I understand. So I think, I think without, because of the problems that I'm hearing about getting the data and the accurate data and where we're at and because we're really talking about in the city of Valuesa County in kind of a psych cylinder here. I would maybe think about just doing something like 75% of the county council chair for the mayor and 75% for the council members for the commission members and I'll make a motion to that effect. Secretary Scott. Can I just... I think you need more discussion. You originally stated your motion including the CPI. Do you want that in there as well? Yes. Okay, I'll amend the motion to 70 to the mayor and the commission is to be 75% of the county chair and county council members to include a annual CPI after that point And second for discussion Okay, so for discussion to two two questions then if we're gonna do this true-up approach How does that get done? So that's not by ordinance who decrees the true-up as a, what was the word that was used? Well, I think we're making recommendations for the commissioners and the mayor to vote on. So if we say we feel it should be a true up and a CPI, then they can say yes or no. So the commission will make that own decision. Well, they can get the make that decision because that's how this charge set up. Right, and they'll make that decision on the day else in a public situation. And I think that's appropriate. So wouldn't go to vote, it would just be their decision with the reading of a change in public comments. And the public vote to the vote. Does it still go to the vote or so? It was still by ordinance. Well, it would be in the charter. It would be in the charter. So go to vote. So instead of a sense we're going to vote for that. Instead of it being an ordinance, or being in the charter, that would be no question about it every year. That's what it would be in the charter. It would be in the charter. Yeah, it would be in the charter. So, go to vote. Instead of a sense we're going to vote for that. Instead of it being in ordinance, it would be in the charter. That would be no question about it every year. That's what it would be. And if the county council gives them so. Yeah, well, well, well, well, the CPI would be in the charter. but that true up would be voted by the right elected. No, we went a different direction. I guess my question. Okay. Instead of doing like a one time bump, we're saying let's increase it from 50 to 75 and make it in the charter so that they don't have to. So that would be, so we would recommend that that gets put in the charter. But again, Instead of doing like a one time bump, we're saying less increase it from 50 to 75 and make it than the charter so that they don't have to. So that would be, so we would recommend that that gets put in the charter. But again, the electorate still has to vote on that item in the charter. I got you. We replaced that section. Yeah, yeah. So second second question then is we're talking about the city compensation and the new Vellusia County compensation. Is that just salary or is it total compensation? Because you listed off a number of benefits that our commissioners get. the city of Newville, the county compensation. Is that just salary or is it total compensation? Because you listed off a number of benefits that our commissioners get. Things like life insurance and health insurance and so forth do the other cities get that, as we look at this, so they get that same. Because that's what you wanna look at, not just the base salary, but the total compensation. Most of the cities that I'm aware of, that they do that the same thing, the same package. probably different in terms of the coverage. So if we're going to ask our city clerk to talk to local cities We can get the total compensation as well. It shouldn't just be salary. It should be total correct Currently you have a motion to actually make a decision on this so okay if your direction is to amend Section 2.11 to reflect that it's no longer going to be voted on annually by a ordinance and that is going to reflect the pollution county at 75% to include a CPI increase annually, then that will be your motion. We would not bring you back for their data at that point in time. We would bring you back probably proposed language change. We're getting an ordinance or we are men in the charter. We're getting a charter. So if there's a charter there, do they have to do an ordinance? No. No. The ordinance will go away. Yeah. Okay. Just for clarification, the City Commission shall determine the annual salary for the mayor and commission by ordinance. You all are recommending to do away with that verbiage and we will come back with perforage verbiage based on how you vote. Right now it appears that you are voting so that the blue shakow that will reflect blue shakowney raises. So if the blue shakowney chair raises salary, then this will automatically raise to 75% of whatever they voted on. Correct. So you don't have to keep revisiting. Correct. And then the annual CPI on top of that. Excuse me. So are we saying every time the Lusha County changes their salary, then we would change it to 75%. We're not just going to put it at 75% at this time and then annually from there on out Increase it with the CPI not the way the motion was State now I understand it. I think the motion I made what I was thinking when I did the motion What I was thinking when I did the motion was that we would do a true up right now to 75% and then Whatever that amount was when it was accomplished at the voting, from that point forward, it would be the CPI automatic increase. The other option to it would be to just say 75% of Volusia County and whenever Volusia County raises the errors, it would raise this one. So there's two options there, but I think my motion was a true up, and then from then a CPI. But that make it more confusing. I think for simplicity's sake, it would just make, to me, make more sense it for it to always be 75% of the county chair Always 75% of the county council in addition They get the CPI and if the county council decides to give themselves a raise that would automatically happen by by the charter That would be what I was Proposing when I first discussed it. Okay, but that's that doesn't match mr. Palmer's emotion. Yeah So I think you all need to take action on Mr. Palmer's motion. Yeah. And then go where you're going. Mr. Palmer, do you want to modify your motion? Yeah, I think I'll amend my motion to read. Change the charter reflect 75% of the county chair and county council members salary for the City Mayor and City Commissioners period. So wait, wait, so 75% for the mayor of the county chair and 75% for the commissioners of the commissioners Yes, the council because they get paid differently. Yes. Yes. Yes. Just straight 75 across the board. Yes I think that's that's certainly cleaner. It's much cleaner and I would second that And their raises probably do include a CPI. I mean they probably raise themself and so oh Oh, we want to have like 5% and three of that's the CPI Yeah, I mean so if you do the CPI and the 75 I think you're kind of double dip in that's probably yeah I think it gets done through the budget process and that budget process probably takes into consideration the CPI or whatever They're going to give the county employees But his proposal was a one-time screw-ups at 75%, because it's at 50% today. Correct. And then the CPI changes every year. Not this PM, ended it. Yeah, that was the first announcement. That's just to make it 75 in perpetuity. Yeah. So our current charter, does our current charter somewhere specify salaries at 50% of the ordinance. The ordinance says that. The ordinance says that. I'm not sure. Catch you. And they have to vote on every year, which. Put it in the chart, just cleans it up and prevents them from having to re-address it every single day. Do we know if the county council routinely does a salary adjustment annually? I don't think they do for county employees. I know that. I don't know if it affects the charter people. The concern I would have, not just setting it at a percentage of theirs. If we do the CPI annually and they don't change it in about three or four years, they're gonna exceed what the county council's doing. No, I amended it. I took the CPI out. It's just a flat, whatever there is, it's 75%. Thank you. And I know that for the other charter, like the county attorney, I've seen where they give him a raise and they give the county, is the administrator, is that what he's called? Manager. County manager gets a raise. So they're doing adjustments, so somehow I'm sure they get adjusted also. So today is set by ordinance at 50% of the county. We're proposing here that resetting that to 75% of the county, right, right of the county. But to have it in the actual charter. So in effect, giving the total commission a 50% raise, right, you're going from 50 to 75, which is a 50% raise. And then basically presenting that to the electorate to say we would like the electorate to approve giving all of our commission members a 50% raise. Okay. Yeah, and they get the choice. They might call us. Yeah, they get the choice. So they're going to, you guys are nuts. They're going to say you got to be kidding me. So again, we just get back to what do we gain from that? Is that going to attract better mayor? Is that going to attract better commissioners? Is that going to make our commissioners more willing to spend all the hours that they spend out here today? I don't think we're going to gain much from that, but we're going to get the public looking at the commission and say, who do you think you are? Well, unfortunately, just because it wasn't handled properly in the past. hours that they spend out here today. I don't think we're going to gain much from that, but we're going to get the public looking at the commission and say, who do you think you are? Well, unfortunately, because it wasn't handled properly in the past. So that's the answer to why such a big increase, because it wasn't done properly in the past. OK. I think it also goes to how you present it down. And I see what you're saying. How you presented. Yeah. I mean, if you presented why you're doing it and what you think the benefits work and the voters can make a decision with them. I see what you're saying. How are you presented? Yeah. I mean, if you presented why you're doing it, and what do you think the benefits were, and the voters can make a decision what they want to, if they don't buy the argument, but at least we put it out on the table. So now, and the question I've heard is, where does 75% come from? Again, it's an arbitrary number. So if it's 50 now, we're just looking at 75 because it's halfway to 100. Or we know that it works the same, or I'm just curious if it's 50 now, we're just looking at 75 because it's halfway to 100. Or we know that it works the same or I'm just curious where 75 comes from. It's just a picking a number. Just 50. Yeah, 50 was arbitrary, but just a very quick calculation that would that would they would the mayor would still be in the 30s range. Sure. Which is applicable to size of population. Yes, in cost of city. It's not overstated. It'll cost the city about $65,000 with the increases. Right. 10, 5 for 4 people and 15 for the mayor. Yeah. Would it be appropriate to say that this would bring those salaries to be commensurate with other cities of our size getting closer around the country. It's getting closer. So could that be part of the verbiage in the, you know, would be something that I would, if I saw that, I might go for it. Yeah. All right. I think we could. Because, you know, obviously the, the city council members and the mayor are going to say, okay, that's appropriate. Yes, we should, since it's been brought to our attention, yes, we'll vote on it, but it still goes to, it's going to be special. It's still going to go to the electric and special action. People are going to say yes or no. So, let's give it an option. Well, I'd love to see real data, you know, of the data that we're going to get from the city clerk that goes through the salary of the cities that are around us, not to floor your data to your point, and also includes total compensation so that we can really benchmark across the local cities. And make a decision because they are underpaid, we should do something for sure, and it's not gonna change anything happens, it just kind of puts you at a better level footing against the other cities. And the other piece though know, Volusia City to cities and then Apple's apples comparison. So when Edgewater's data comes in, I'm not really interested in what Edgewater's data is. It's Oak Hill same way. I don't really care what Oak Hills are. The county is something that I can... It makes sense. We can correlate to it. Exactly right. The city of Daytona, but just based on the news article news article that pulled up the mayor makes 50 and the commissioners make 41 and that was a year ago. They told us a bigger city but they told us also, you know, in comparison I'd much rather live here. So when we're trying to attract better quality people and we want to reflect that this city is something special, it's the gem of Valuesha County and I'm wholeheartedly believe that's the gem of central and most of Florida. Then I think our salary for our elected officials that reflect that. Well, I think another thing that it should do by doing it this way, you take it out of the annual voting. So you're not putting the commissioners in a position of having to vote for their pay raise. Right. I agree with that, completely. I mean, that's a benefit to me. Like most of the charters that I read, even where they voted their own pay raise, it did not take effect until the next seated Commissioner Council. So it didn't apply to the ones who were sitting there could if they got reelected, but it didn't apply to the next one. Shall I motion's out there? I would also recommend though that instead of having this look for the salaries in all 16 jurisdictions, like you just said, you're not really interested in what Edgewater Oak Hill has to say. You know, that's fine. Maybe we should look at maybe the eight top populations in the county, the cities that have, just the top eight. I mean, there are a lot of small cities, orange city, you know, some of those aren't very big. Maybe that's not of interest to the group here. We want to look at cities that are more the size and function to New Samurna. Just a question cuts down on how much time staff has to spend on you know getting this information. If we had data from other cities from around the state why not even use that to determine what the salary should be based on population? You'd have to tell us who you want to go to 418 or 22. Yeah well we chose the East Coast. Just to keep trying to look at apples to apples, oranges to oranges. Gotcha. When you do that statistic, can you break it down to what the salary would be per person within that jurisdiction? Know how many people, the population versus what the salary is and give us the per person cost as to what they're being paid per person they're representing? That's a good point, but let me throw this out to a con on that. Should you be basing it on per person or basing it on the fiscal level of responsibility of the citizens? Because you can have a smaller population that spends more money and more issues, which puts more responsibility on the commissioners and the mayor, than you might find in a reverse. So just putting it on, it's a good point. It's one of the data points you could use But I would also look at what their annual budgets are and the complexity of their cities I think you you bring up a very good Point Mr. Wilson, you know you if you If you live and work in the town of Palm Beach they have a whole different Set of standards on what they think the per population position, pay should be versus what you have like in somewhere like New Summer and a Beach. You know? So the mayor and the commissioners in this year are being faced with a whole bunch of issues right now and they're really working their butts off. So they certainly should be compensated more for that whether it's the money means anything or not Right, I'm not disagreeing what so I think we go back to do you want us to get all 16 cities in the county or just look at like the top eight the In size just for point of clarification you do have emotions Yeah, that is on the table about raising it to 75% I think you need to vote on that, because if you do decide to raise it 75%, I don't know that you want the data at that point in time. You'd have to give the facilitator direction on that. But the discussion probably should go back to that 75% aspect and whether it is appropriate this time to make that vote. The attorney is correct. You need to vote. Or continue the discussion on the 75%. I feel like we kind of... Yeah, we can have the vote now if you wanted to get that motion off, but I think a lot of us want some more data with cities that we can relate to before you make a decision on what the seller should be. For purposes. We're pulling 75% out of the air. We need something that we can relate to to say this is appropriate. Increase. Okay, that's fine. If it's fine for a vote then we can go ahead and vote. Knowing that, unless you want to continue discussion. For second moving ahead I'll call the vote. I think we should probably just have a final vote on it. Can we repeat the motion real quick? Can you repeat the motion? I'll try. To adjust the salary for the mayor to 75% of the Felicia County chair and adjust the salary for the commissioners to 75% of the council members. That's it. Thank you. Okay, I'm going to call the roll. Member Billings? Yes. Member Fuseleer? Yes. Member Hathaway? Yes. Member Eisen? Yes. Member Palmer? Yes. Member Poole? Yes. Member, Hathaway? Yes. Member, Icent? Yes. Member, Palmer? Yes. Member, Poole? Yes. Member, Rashidat? Yes. Member, Riker? Yes. Member, Roqueer? No, because I'd like more data. Member, Smith? No. Member, Wilson? Yes. Yes. All right. So the motion passed. So now we go back to where the attorney made us sort around get ourselves back straight again. Obviously Mr. Roker would like more information in data. So do we want us to bring back additional material or information on the salaries out there at the other set number of jurisdictions within Volusia County? Or is that no longer felt to be needed? I think the committee is spoke. I don't need to see it. Okay. Even if you did bring it back the only way it could be needed. I think the committee has spoken. I don't need to see it. Even if you did bring it back, the only way it could be changed is to have one of the S-votes change. Correct. So if any of the S-votes want more information, that's the only way you can change that vote. I think it's available. You bring it back at the next meeting and just have us look at it if it's not too much trouble Point of direction you just want Volusia County. I Would say the probably the eight cities in Volusia County I would include in that eight eight largest cities in Volusia County Yes, man, and I would also include their last fiscal budget and your budget. So their population and budget. Yeah. That'll make us all better sleep better at night then. Would they have to raise it? Yeah, they have to raise it. So the eight largest cities in Lucia County in their last year's budget or current year budget? Yeah, just the total is fine. We don't need actual budget. I see population in budget. Thank you. The population budget. Okay. All right. Thank you. All right we have 10 minutes left to so we stay on madam facilitator. We spoke regarding our timelines and I said that we should you as a facilitator should share because you we we ask you in our first meeting, what we need to back into a date to figure out because we've already approved a special election when we need to be done and what's a stop in date. So that needs to be clarified for everybody. Sure, that was pervertable in a memo from me. So I believe everything needs to go to, so the commission, correct me sharing if I get it wrong, but the commission is not meeting in June. So you would need to take your items forward to the commission for the first reading in July, second reading at the second meeting in July. If you wanted these items to go forward, you need, again, we're backing into this. So I'm just using a preliminary date, okay, and that was in an email. I mean, a memorandum to you all. So I'm using the date of November the 4th, just because that's a normal election day. So you need 90 days, you need to have it given to the supervisor of election 90 days before the date you want to have the vote. So I forget what the exact date was. I can't find that. I think it was September 4th. So September 4th, everything would have to be turned into the supervisor of elections. Now you are not by any means locked into that November 4th date. If you want to do it November the 12th or you want to do it in December, you can pick whatever date. If you want to do it November the 12th or you want to do it in December, you can pick whatever date, but you asked for and that's what my memo reflects. You asked for what's the earliest date you could take it to the voters. And it would be November the 4th backing into it assuming that the elected body gets through everything and gets the first and second readings all done in a timely manner, you would be able to hit that November 4th, they take longer to review something, everything pushes forward. Did you say 90 days before November 4th to get it to the supervisor? Yes. Okay, so 90 days, October, September, I'd be all get song time. Yeah August song. And the commission's meeting. The meeting of July. July 8th. 20 seconds. July 22nd. So in order to get it there in that time, but then the commission would have to get it before the eighth meeting to have the first and then the second meeting on the second to get it to the supervisor by the first week in August, right? Right. Right. So that means that you probably need to get it to the commission sometime in June. But they don't meet in June. I understand that, but I mean for our summons to the packets there when they walk into. Oh, well, yes, I mean, obviously it has to go to the city clerk, the week before, everything would have to be done. So everything that staff is going to have to do would have to be completed while the commission was not in session. So I would suggest that maybe that is either the middle of June or the first week in June. If you're going to have staff do something with it so they get in the packet for the July 8 meeting. Because July 8 is the meeting and then the next one is whatever I said, 20 whatever it is. Those are the two meetings that you need to get it voted on in order to get it to the supervisor of election. Correct? Yes. So I would suggest that we give us a cutoff date to have our work done. It's got to be done by the middle of June. Our second June meeting is June 17th. July 1, July 15, August 5, and August 19th, where the remaining schedule meetings, if we need them, if we were going to try to double time that and do that, I would recommend we try to meet longer than two hours. Maybe go to 9 o'clock if we're going to cut two or three meetings at the end as a thought. And that and or maybe go a little bit later in November. No, that could be. Yeah, maybe maybe do a combination of an extra hour and maybe later in November we can still get that done. We did kind of pick an arbitrary date. There are municipal elections on November 4th, not ours, but Ponce and let I think like Helen some little. There's a handful of them. Yes, so it was just an arbitrary date. Yes, you're correct. You can move it to any date you want in November or December. If you, I mean, you know. So that timeline, though, would require the first reading on July 8th. Correct. So when would this committee ever make a presentation to the commission? So I thought that would be kind of what we would do. We would have a set of recommendations that we present the commission. No, because that's going to be a reading of a proposed change on July 8th. Yeah, but that's first reading. That would be kind of what we do. We would have a set of recommendations that we present the commission. And July 8th. No, because that's going to be a reading of a proposed change on July 8th. Yeah, but that's first reading. Yeah, but they would. Yeah, you're just going to present it. You presented it in advance and presented it. Oh, the staff. The staff would work in the room. Oh, the meeting in July. last meeting in July for the commission. Because the commission meets in July. Yeah, July 8th. You have July 8th and when is that coming? Funny, sure. So you could be the either one. So that leaves us. We could certainly don't have to. We're not tied to the 4th of November. The summer's a bad month if you're trying to get people to come out and properly January. So if you don't make November, you're probably February. You got to do a report that's got to get put together and submitted to the commission, and then a presentation of that report, which could be the first reading, if you want it. I'm trying to remember when the parking task force did there's do you remember, they did the presentation was it at the first reading? Can't remember. I can't remember either, but it can be because the first reading, you're typically just reading it. There's taking no action. Exactly. And they are, in reality, the ordinance is what you have voted on, which is what you're going to be presenting to the commission. the commission is reflecting your decisions as a group within the ordinance. So that is kind of the purpose of that. You can do it on the first meeting. Could it be done before and then first reading and then second reading? Absolutely. But you know, it depends on your time crud. You are coming up if you're trying to make that November 4th like it's tight. It's tight. But if we're coming through with recommendations to change, you to change the city charter, shouldn't we be presenting those changes and the commission debating those changes? Because they might not agree. So why would we present something on July 8th and have a reading on the same day of changes that we recommended that they haven't reviewed? And then again, you don't have to have it during city commission by the presentation. I mean, you could have a workshop with the commission prior to that. Yeah, wouldn't you want to have the public available for that? That's a special meeting. So the commission's not going to meet in June, but we're going to ask them to have a special meeting with us. That's in June. I said you could have a meeting in July. There's not to be a city commission meeting. Okay. could be a workshop where the public attends. Commission discusses it and public participation is available. And then you go on August on August have the first reading and then August 22nd, you'll have the second. Perfect. And those readings would be readings of what the ballot referendum will look like. That would be what the, what the ordinance I think is. The ordinance. Yeah., well the charter amendment. Correct. We would probably show the language of how the charter was changed. And I just want to make sure that we're very transparent. That we're calling for $48,000 special election so that we can change the mayor's terms, change the city clerk's roles, change the salary by 50%, and all those things that we're asking the public to approve. So I think we really need to be very transparent and do that. So, okay, good. Should we make a recommendation maybe to start doing a three-hour meeting so we're not so we have more time for discussion? I'll be willing to sit. I would want to say I wouldn't be interested in that. Well, maybe we should do about to cut off the last two meetings to extend the rest of the meetings by an apologies. I did two ten acre wetland delineations today. I'm really tired. I don't think I would want to sit here for three hours. I'm going to sit here for four weeks. I'm going to sit here for three hours when he's only home for four today. I'm really tired. I don't think I would want to see her for three hours, either honestly. And I just come back to how this looks to the public. From the first day we were starting to move towards making decisions, trying to have this done by this special election this year, so it can be effective on the 2026 general elections. I think we need to be careful about what this looks like and not rush something through and give it the adequate time that it needs. The reason we're doing it is just the commission put us in this committee to do it this year. If they wanted it for the 2028 election, they would have done it next year. The whole point of doing it in 2025 is so that we can have an effect for the twenty-three. That's the whole point. Exactly. Well, the one thing. Why would you serve on the committee then? If you don't believe in it, what we're doing here. You've accused all of us of being corrupt every time. so that we can have it effective for the 2020. That's the whole point. Exactly. Well, the one thing. When the why would you serve on the committee then? If you don't believe in it, what we're doing here. You've accused all of us of being corrupt. Every time we're up here. I haven't accused you. I'm getting a little bit over that. Hey, I haven't accused anyone of being corrupt. I should be on an agenda. and we've all made this decision behind closed doors and said every meeting, probably cite your sources, sir. The public has said that, all right, in public. You're saying it, you're saying it. Okay, I'm not gonna get into a fight with people here on the board. You can go ahead and proceed to how you'd like to. site your sources sir. The public has said that all right in public. You're saying okay I'm not gonna get into a fight with people here on the board. You can go ahead and proceed to how you'd like to. I would like that very much. We're almost at time. I'd like to make comments that I've spoken out a lot tonight. I think we can still accomplish it if we have efficient two-hour meetings, follow Robert's rules, you get to be heard twice and you call the vote. And we can be efficient in two hours. I'm guilty for getting us off track for half an hour this, earlier in this meeting. But if we follow the proper rules of governance, we can be efficient and accomplish. I mean, we got on task, we accomplished three things tonight rather quickly. So, And we don't have that much more to do. We've really only got like that one other issue, and then we want to talk about sustainability. So I think we'll be good. And I think sustainability is a pretty big issue, right? We talked about Spencer, you commented that we're the gem of Volusia County. I'd sure love to see us keep, the newsroom to be just the gem of Volusia County. I've heard a number of people on this day of say that the city's been declining. That there have been areas, not the city, there have been areas of the city that have been degrading. We've heard a number of people on this day of say that the city's been declining. That there have been areas of, not the city, there have been areas of the city that have been degrading. We've heard some public comments that there's areas of the city that aren't like they used to be. So I'd just like to make sure that we give adequate time that sustainability portion of it, because we've got to find a way to preserve the jam of Alicia County. So, Sharon, we haven't talked about that yet. We have left. How many more meetings do we have left now? Susan, I'm sorry. Oh, I don't have my listed front of me. I'm going to wait till August. We go to August. So we think you have six. So in the 10 or 12 hours of we have left, I think we should be able to handle that. There's the meetings right here on the screen. Thank you. Thank you for So six. Seven. Thank you all for coming up on the close of the meeting. So six. Seven. Thank you all are coming up on the close of the meeting. So just the point of that previous discussion was so that you could get on that November 4th ballot. Apparently it looks like maybe that's not the back the deadline that we're going to back into. We'll be having our next meeting today is what the 6 May 20. The point of this is again to make recommendations to the commission as to what amendments you see within the charter. That is the reason that they put this committee together was to make those recommendations. And anything could be changed within that charter. That was the purpose of this committee committee and that's the purpose why you're on here is to make those valid recommendations to move forward One thing I would just like to remind you as a housekeeping matter is you may be receiving emails Regarding the charter and what amendments need to be being made or what their public positions are Please remember to forward them to our city clerk. So we are archiving and complying with public records. So I just wanna make sure that we are doing that. This is just a friendly midway point reminder to make sure that we comply with public record. Any email you are getting or text message or whatever's coming through from the public, make sure we forward that onto the city clerk. Otherwise, I'm not sure if there's more point of business. I'll turn it back over to the post-cellulator. But there was information requests made so where are we with that? Alabry. There was some information that was shared with the city clerk and with our facilitator and a public record. I think we're still looking into it. I'm not sure if you've responded to it, but I do, I know the public record that you're requesting, I believe it's still being tracked out. Okay, so maybe my two more weeks we might have some information? Possibly, yeah. Okay, thank you. All right, so I think we've had a very productive meeting this time. Please keep in mind. If you have any questions, let myself or through the city clerks and her and email, she'll get it to me. And hopefully we continue to move forward. The next couple of items coming up are related to some of the items we took action on tonight, so those should go pretty quickly. We should get into that sustainability section at the next meeting. We continue to move forward where we'll be on task. So and again, one more question. Does anybody have anything else? I asked this at the end of every meeting. That's why the only thing left is sustainability. But are there any other items within the charter that anybody, the charter review committee, wants to bring up? I have one other item that we didn't cover. I don't think we did about the winning the primary election. We didn't get to that, but we'll get that will come back up. I thought I heard you say we only have one of the items. That one, we got that one there. Also, I think I talked to you about the Susan. I thought that there's a section in the charter that doesn't need to be there regarding annexations. That could be moved into the code of ordinances and just referred to in the charter that we refer to Florida Statues. Send me that one again. By procedures should go into the code of ordinances. Send me that one again if you would please. I think it's somewhere in my notes. And okay, those are the two things we'll add to the cut of ordinances. Send me that one again if you would please. I think it's somewhere in my notes. And okay, those are the two things we'll add to the agenda to be sure that they're on there, those two items. I'll probably send you a couple of minor things to somebody email. Is it something we've already voted on or they knew items? Okay, perfect. Yeah, if you could get those to us, preferably tomorrow or the next day. Because I'm going to be out of town and I need to get with Sharon so we can get the agenda set up so she can send it out when I'm unavailable next week. Sorry. I'll do that as a reminder. I will not be at the next meeting. Okay. You're all right. I make a motion to adjourn at 805. Second. Thank you. All in favor. Aye. Aye. Aye.