Welcome to the City of St. Petersburg City Council meeting. Your elected officials are Mayor Ken Welch, District 1 and Council Chair Copley Gertis, District 2, Brandy Gabbard, District 3, Mike Harding, District 4 and Council Vice chair, LaSeth Tanowitz, district five, Deborah Fick Sanders, district six, Gina Driscoll, district seven, Corey Gibbons Jr., and district eight, Richie Floyd. Good morning, we will call to order the May 1st, 2025 City Council meeting. If we can do a roll call please. Exenders. Here. Driscoll. Here. Gibbons. Here. All right. Here. Gertis. Here. Ever. Harding. Here. Here. Here. Here. Here. Here. Here. Here. Here. Here. Okay, this morning we will have an invocation given by Deacon John Gertis from the St. Jude Cathedral, followed by a moment of silence for fallen first responders, and then please remain standing for the Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you and good morning. I ask that we just silence ourselves and recognize that right now and always we are in God's presence and appreciate the peace and safety that he provides and maybe we just feel that as we pray today. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen. God our Father, your glory, illumines our city with the light that is your sun and our Lord Jesus. Your blessings upon our city and love for our citizens are self-evident. Please send the Holy Spirit upon all of us, and in a special way upon our elected representatives and city staff, that they may receive wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and awe of the Lord in rendering decisions in a just, merciful, and loving way. May their discussions and decisions always begin with your inspiration, continue with your help, and reach perfection under your guidance. Father, we ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, amen, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, amen. St. Peter, pray for us. Please join me in a moment of silence for Detective Wayne M. Barry, end of watch, May 23, 1929. Professor Frank A. Pike. 19th 1933 End of Watch Firefighter Robert F. Parker, last alarm May 10th 1969. Thank you. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Thank you, please be seated. Well, if you haven't figured it out, yes, we have another girdis in the room this morning. And so that's my uncle John who became a deacon last year at the Cathedral of St. Jude's Uncle John and Rob's older brother. And so Uncle John, thank you so much for being here and blessing us with that in vocation. Okay, council members, we have an agenda in front of us. I'll entertain a motion for approval. We have a motion to second. Seeing as no other council members wishing to speak. Clerk, could you please open the machine for voting? Council members, please enter your votes. Seeing as all present council members have voted. Clerk, please tally and announce the vote. Mr. Chair, motion to approve the agenda passes unanimously. Okay, we have a consent agenda. Do we have any cards on the consent agenda? No cards, Mr. Chair. Okay, council members, we have a consent agenda. We'll approve all. Second. We have a motion as second. Seeing as no other council members wishing to speak. Clerk, could you please enter the machine for voting? Council members please ending your votes. Seeing as all present, Council members have voted, clerk please stallion announce the vote. Chair, motion to pass the consent agenda passes unanimously. Okay, let's move in to open forum clerk Could you please read the rules? You wish your address city council on subjects other than public hearing or quasi-judicial items listed on the agenda Please sign up with clerk only the individual wishing to speak may sign the open foreign sheet Only city residents owners of property business owners in the city or their employees, and the city of Santa Barbara, and the city of Santa Barbara, and the city of Santa Barbara, and the city of Santa Barbara, and the city of Santa Barbara, and the city of Santa Barbara, and the city of Santa Barbara, and the city of Santa Barbara, and the city of Santa Barbara, and the city of Santa Barbara, and the minutes to speak and after which the microphone will be muted. If you wish to address City Council through the Zoom meeting, you must use the raise hand feature button on the Zoom app or enter star and hide on your phone at the time. The agenda item is addressed. When is your turn to speak? You will be unmuted and access to state your name and address. At the conclusion of your comments or when you reach the three minute time limit, you will be muted. All raised hands will be lowered after each agenda item. Regardless of the method of participation used, normal rules apply, including the three minute time limit on comments, the requirement that any presentation materials must be submitted in advance of the meeting and the rules of the court. If live live public comment is disrupted by violations of the rule of the quorum, the chair is authorized to accept public comment by alternate means, including by email only and we do have some speakers, Mr. Chair. Okay, let's call two to time, please. First to speakers, walk triggers and amber woods, please go to I the podium, state your name and address for the record and and you will have three minutes to address the council. Good morning, well, Driggers, one beach drive, Southeast St. Petersburg, Florida 33701. I'm here this morning to representing Friends Abort-Witted Airport, and first would like to encourage you to support the execution of the agreement to update the electrical vault. And then I would like to thank you for the proclamation for Friends of Hybrid Witted Scholarship Day on May 5th. That was very moving experience for me. And also wanted to, for those of you who couldn't make it, I wanted it for those who did make it, I wanted to thank you so much for your help on scholarship day. And those who didn't because of prior commitments or study and fermentation and napah valid. I didn't get the whole thing. Want to make sure that you know what happened there. So here's what happened. We gave away 29 scholarships from 16 to 24 year olds of St. Petersburg with $184,000 bringing our total since April 2023 to $425,000. Here's what that has achieved. We've gone 11 private pilots. We've generated five instrument ratings, four commercial ratings, three CFI ratings, one CFI, which is a commercial instrument rating, and one multi-engine rating, and we have four more checked-ride scheduled right now. It's working. Finally, I'd also like to tell you about last Saturday, we did a STEM, what we call, Aerospace Day, out of there. We had 32 students, 12 to 16 years old. They came, some came from Academy Prep to the South and others from Dunedin High School to the North and everywhere in between. And during that time, it started at three o'clock in the afternoon and went to about nine o'clock at night. It started with the Coast Guard coming with their helicopter and doing a demonstration where they dropped down, threw out their dummy, then flew away, and came back with and I put a guy down, brought the basket down, picked up the guy in the dummy and went away. The kids love that, the parents love that. From there, they did, we had a mechanic talk to them about mechanics of that. They learned how to pre-flight a airplane with their selves doing the hands-on stuff. They did rocket-making, rocket-launching with compressed gas. We had the Coast Guard there with their drones off, that they use on their ships, and it ended with Helen Tavora who is a past NASA scientist who also now works at the Miami Science Center. We got her 10 gallons of liquid nitrogen and she did a lot of experiments with the kids making ping pong balls, violence off the ceiling. It's an excellent video you ought to see some time. With that said, her teaching experiences involve the kids and we believe that exciting STEM training can spark interesting kids and let them know they have choices and how to find them. And thank you for helping us prove that Albert Wittard is a better place or St. Petersburg is a better place because Albert Wittard Airport. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Amber Woods. I live at 1024, Joining Park Street South. I'm here today to discuss the incident that happened. About a month ago, in the March, we had about five shootouts that happened over the course of one weekend. And right now I preside over the Wildwood High School neighborhood association. So I called a safety meeting. We were supposed to have a meeting to pick our board, but instead we changed it to the safety meeting. I invited our community service officer. I invited the St.P. Housing Authority. And the community service officer did not show, did not answer, did not give a response at all. The St. Pete Housing Authority showed to the meeting the residents, while what residents and joint and part residents were very disappointed. We were basically told that we need to be better parents, we need to get control of our children and that there was no money in the budget to do anything further about the safety in our area. A representative of the city gave us our work that they would be there and they came and didn't show up all at the same time. So in three different areas, we seem to be a there seems to be a disconnect. I sent a letter to the St. Pete Police Department to the mayor's office. I think maybe two other places I forget. I was deeply affected by that last shootout. I lost property. I had property damage. My daughter was caught in the middle of it. Her and my sister were effectively used as shields from the other side and it was just very scary. And so my emotions were definitely in that letter. We were basically told we're going to put it on the next agenda item and we haven't heard any follow-up since there was a safety meeting at St. P. Housing Authority. The residents were not invited, and we still have not heard any real action that has been, you know, what's gonna happen, you know. So I'm here to just make my voice heard. I know that there's gonna be a meeting with community leaders, May 28th, to address gun violence in the CRA. And I came here to speak because I don't want my voice drowned out in the sea of community leaders that are going to be there. I do want you to have heard from me personally that it is a problem. I'm a mother, I'm a resident. I've been told that since presiding over while with high-snabblehood association because I live in the projects, my voice is not going to be heard. I don't pay taxes and so nobody cares. So I want to make sure that you all know that I don't believe that. And I'm hearing good faith believing that you don't believe it either. Thank you. Thank you. Next to you, speakers, please. Chris, Chris Dinocker and Esther Matthews, please go to I the podium, state your name and address for the record. and you will have pre-ministered rest of the community of the state of New York. I'm a director of the community of the state of New York. I'm a director of the community of the state of New York. I'm a director of the community of the state of New York. I'm a director of the community of the state of New York. I'm a director of the community of the state of New York. I'm a director of the approved the Consent Agenda, our contract. We're seven months into it, but we've done a pretty good job. I do want to explain a little bit about what we're doing and announce something we're going to be doing. But because of this partnership that we have, we have been able to do a lot. In fact, this year the Buck and Airs noticed our partnership with you all. And while the city was given out $250,000 to our businesses, the bucks matched $100,000 of that and we were able to do that as well through this process. But over this last three months alone, we've navigated over a hundred different businesses. Our EA class is just finished up. We're gonna have graduation in two weeks. But we graduated 22 new businesses. 12 of them being veterans. And that's one of our targets that we have allowed in to get scholarships. and they were the ones that got them this year. We created something new for our not-profit connect. We're right now. We have trained 17 small not-for-profits on what's called the seed program and how to create the case and use to be able to raise the money you're looking for. They're looking for so we're helping small not-for-profit businesses. Last week alone and chair girdies was part of it. We convened the first ever tech founders of St. Petersburg through the greenhouse where we had over 30 tech leaders in our room helping us understand really what the next steps as Mike Swisi who's in our room at EDC as he lands new businesses here. How do we make them St. Petersburg? How do we make sure they invest in us and how do they make sure we care about us? You all helped us do that. And then finally, on Tuesday, we will be awarding $10,000. That's increased by twice the amount from previous years, and that's based on our partnership with you all and our ability to raise sponsorships against it to give, to have five different businesses, be able to pitch their businesses to all of you all and everybody else. We anticipate a good crowd for that. An exciting announcement for us is we had to change locations very quickly as a matter of protocol for some issues, but we also heard of some other efforts going on in our community. So I invite you to clear your calendar for Tuesday night to come here pitch night because we're also going to be at Blackleaf tobacco at cigar bar It's a great event venue. It's gonna serve our purposes quite well But I really want to fill the room with folks that want to hear these pitches But also want to support Blackleaf another great chamber member small business We are working hard as a city and a chamber. I appreciate our partnership with Tracy, the greenhouse manager and Brian who helps and the entire team. I do believe this is what makes us different and I do want to say thank you very much. Good morning chair assistant chair and city council members. Esther Matthews. I stand today as the president of the St. Petersburg NAACP and Chris Wow. That's a great segue to the reason that I am here, right? I want to talk about businesses that are not being celebrated in businesses that are being pushed out. In particular, I want to start with Black Leaf. As Chris mentioned, this is a new Black owned business. However they're being targeted, they're being pressured, they are being intentionally pushed out of doing business. I want to start as always with facts. Red Mesa, Cantina built the firewall for their expansion. That firewall was compromised at time of build or shortly thereafter. Black leaf went into a lease with the property manager with clear understanding of what their business operations were going to be. Because of the compromised firewall, the aroma of cigars is wafting through the firewall. Red Mesa is intentionally not taking responsibility for the compromised firewall and the property manager and the owners are trying to force Black leave to fix a pre-existing defect. So today I'm calling on Councilwoman Driscoll to not only reach out to this business but to stand with them as we have seen you stand with so many white owned establishments in downtown St. Pete. It's important that we do not remain silent while larger businesses leverage influence to quietly push out smaller businesses. Black-owned establishments are not just here to generate dollars. We are here to generate economic development. I think it's a betrayal of what equitable representation is when we don't stand for all businesses. Secondly, I want to talk about the catalyst. It was brought to my attention that the catalyst is being singled out for issues that other businesses along central avenue are also Experiencing Central avenue has fights in front of businesses as a matter of fact central avenue has more fights in front of businesses Central avenue has women who have complained of being attacked intimately and sexually. If you go to Janice landing at any given time you're gonna get a buzz because they always end up smoking weed. But I haven't seen any of those businesses being targeted. I want to make sure that when we address issues, when we say that businesses are quote unquote being a nuisance, that we put a blanket across St. Pete and ensure that all businesses are captured in that net. And not just black owned businesses. Thank you. Well y'all lucky because I was getting ready to go in. All right. Next to you, Spears.ey. Please go to Highly Potion. State your name and address for the record. You have three minutes to address to the council. Good morning, Chairperson Gertis and members of the council. Mike Sweeney, 235 Third Avenue North in St. Petersburg. I am also the president and CEO of St. Pete Economic Development Corporation. And I'm here today to thank you for your continued support, our consent agenda item of a three-year extension on our agreement, much appreciated. Additionally, I'd like to thank the council, the city and the Chamber of Commerce for establishing the EDC and our development corporation eight years ago, so we're in year nine. Just a couple quick items. Our mission is to help out of market companies discover, explore, and choose St. Pete as a location to do business raising the awareness of St. Petersburg as a business destination, not just a leisure and retirement destination, which is all good as well. And so we are working hard to increase the awareness, as I mentioned, identify companies that are in the active search or will be soon searching for potential new locations. So we've launched a new website. We have a new brand identity. As Christy and Hocker mentioned, when we get companies here, we want them to become St. Pete. That is our tagline, become St. Pete, and we're become St. Pete.com. So we work hard on companies that really fit St. Pete and will come to St. Pete, become St. Pete, and not change it. And so that's what we're all about. So we're also doing additional marketing campaigns directly to site selection consultants. We reach out by monthly with a few highlights of what's happening in our great city. We're on social media, very active on social media. And with our new website, we build in search engine optimization, which we are now getting higher scores on Google searches and things like that. And then lastly, I'll say for the first time ever, we are engaging a PR firm to do national placements for St. Petersburg as a place to do business. So thank you for your support. The economic development team at the city is awesome. We just love working with them and your support greatly appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Any more speakers? No more speakers? No Zoom. Okay. We'll go ahead and close open forum and move into awards and presentations and if you couldn't figure out what we were celebrating today we weren't paying attention. We're going to celebrate Law Enforcement Appreciation Month and we're joined by Mayor Kenneth T Welch. We probably got to him fast. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, members of City Council, our St. Pete team, all the members of our community who are watching us today. As each of you know our police department sets a standard for professionalism, accountability, community engagement, and innovation in law enforcement. I call it having that DNA of service. We are honored to have the leadership of Chief Holloway and his command staff for setting that standard for our police department and today I'm honored to be joined by Chief Holloway if you all could could join us. Assistant Chief, Cavaasif, Gilliam and Gerardo and many members of the St. Pete Police Department and a PBA President John Vasquez for this proclamation and all the members of the St. Pete Police Department. Thank you for the work you all do every day. We appreciate you. Chief, do you have a proclamation? OK, it's on its way. And the proclamation reads, whereas the safety and security of our community are paramount. And whereas law enforcement officers dedicate themselves to protecting and serving our citizens with courage, integrity, and professionalism. And whereas these brave men and women risk their lives daily to uphold the laws that safeguard our neighborhoods, businesses, and families. And whereas law enforcement appreciation month provides an opportunity for us to express our gratitude and admiration for their unwavering commitment to public and community safety. And whereas their dedication often goes unrecognized and undervalued, yet their contributions are invaluable to the fabric of our society and the safety of our city. And whereas their sacrifices and selfless service deserve our utmost respect and support. and whereas we honor their bravery, sacrifice, and unwavering dedication to community safety and progress in our community. Now therefore, I, Kenneth T. Welch, mayor of the City of St. Petersburg, do hereby proclaim May 2025 as law enforcement appreciation month in the city of St. Petersburg. and I call upon all citizens to join me in Recognizing the invaluable contributions of our law enforcement officers and's why the proclamation is latest. My father. Go ahead chief. Never late sir is a great honor. So mayor, city council members, these men and women behind me, we just wanna say thank you so much because we know each and every day we know that the mayor's office, we know this council that you support us in what we do every day and it shows also to the community, to the communities out there. Because when these officers get in contact with them and they always say thank you for your service, what can't you do? Again behalf of the men and women of the St. Petersburg Police Department I just want to say thank you for your support making it easy for us to come to work and making us want to come to work for the city So thank you very much Council chair council members. Thank you pretty much echo everything chief. Just say thank supporting us. Thank you for recognizing us. For the men and women who do the tough job to keep the community safe. We truly depend on you guys to make sure that we're taking care of Indus City as well. So we appreciate you. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Gabbert. Thank you, Chair. And good morning everyone. I said when I walked in, man, I think we are the safest place in the city of St. Petersburg today. Thank you all for being here. And just thank you for what you do every single day. Approclamation, words of support are not enough for us to really show you what you mean to us and what you mean to our city. You keep us safe, you keep us feeling a sense of pride in the work that all of you do. We have the best police department in the entire country. And I know that without a doubt. And Chief, that is because of your leadership and the leadership that you have shown mayor in leading this organization. We are so incredibly proud of all of you and thank you for what you do for us. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Council Member Harding. Thank you, Chair. Offer me some latitude here. I think that everyone has their own personal heroes. Some are political, some are historic, some are athletes, some are actors. This is the latitude. You are mine, and I wanna tell you why. Four years ago, my daughter called me about 11, 11.30 in the morning. She was having lunch at St. Pete High. My business is about a mile and a half away. And she called me to tell me that there was a school shooting in the cafeteria. She was having lunch. She heard the gunshots. And thankfully,'ll skip ahead. It was a prank and some kids had some fireworks, firecrackers, not the point. So she called me. She was in the process of running. She didn't know exactly what to do. Ordinarily they would shelter in place in the classroom. She wasn't in a classroom. She didn't know what to do. And I told her to think about where she knew the safe classrooms were and get there. And the meantime, I was headed out of my office into my car. I was going there to do what I have no idea, but that's what you do. And I said, I need to make a phone call, call you back. So I called a buddy of mine who's a St. Pete Police Officer. And I said, Bobby, what's going on? And I said, Bobby, what's going on? And I said, Bobby, what's going on? And I said, Bobby, what's going on? And I said, Bobby, what's going on? And I said, Bobby, what's going on? And I said, Bobby, what's going on? Sorry, he said, Mike, don't worry we got this. I was at the hang-up, he had things to do. So I'm headed to my car and I'm starting to think rationally about, I have no business in this, I have no background in this, and I need to, and as I'm headed to my car and I'm starting to think rationally about, I have no business in this, I have no background in this, and I need to, and as I'm walking out, I hear sirens coming from everywhere. Holy crap. Bear with me. Here's what I knew. I knew that a whole bunch of people were on the way to save my daughter. They're trained. They sign up for this. They know what to do. Everything is in place. This has been practiced. None of that matters. The point is that there were people coming from literally all over the place that were willing to give their lives to save my daughter. That's it. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Vice Chair handwits. I'm fun following that. Right. Mike, I know exactly what you talk about because when I was a prosecutor and had to work with law enforcement and see the cases that they had to deal with on the daily basis, I was lucky that I just saw it in a courtroom. I don't have to be on scene. I didn't have to view the child pornography. I didn't have to view the dead bodies. I saw pictures. And that's what they do. And every time that we're out there and you see a lot of enforcement officers stopping somebody on the street, okay, you know, they were speeding. And that's what you see. But you don't see all the horrible stuff that's out there. They're dealing with on a daily basis. We have the privilege of living not knowing what they see. And I remember when I was in line with my husband and family that that would have dinner with me and y'all know this. And it's like, maybe we should not be talking about that during dinner. Because you get to the point that that's your life and you actually believe that it's just all around you. So what you're saying is what they live day in and day out. And I appreciate you for that. And I want to pick public to know what we see sometimes is only a sliver, a sliver of what they're doing out there every day. And if you actually knew everything that was going out there, it would shock you. And we are very lucky that they do what they do because that way we live in the environment and the city that we live in. And yes, there's crime. Of course, there's crime everywhere there's crime. But trust me when I tell you that the way that this city is run in terms of our law enforcement and what they do to keep our city safe is unbelievable and the best. So thank you for your service. Council Member Fick Sanders. Well I'm on a different note. Hey, first of all, I was excited. I was like the first one here for the meet and greet because I really was. Because you know you have everybody's experiences and I am so incredibly grateful for everything that you all do. The relationships that I have established, the conversations we have, the assistance that you have provided, our POPs program, they don't know about the awesome things that you do. You work and go to our preschools, and I was there for the bicycle giveaway. It was so funny. There was one little boy, when we were talking about police officers, and he looks, he said, I want to be a fireman. I was like, no, they're giving you free bicycles. That's not what we say. But it was the innocence of a four-year-old right as loud. But I say all that to say yes you do deal with some really really serious and heart-wrenching incidents of life and you do it with grace you do it with gratitude you do it knowing that morning what it is that you're supposed to do. But there are those awesome things that our community don't know that you provide. You know, for working with our children, for being there establishing the mentorship that you provide, I don't want us to forget that. So for Chief Holloway, you know, we don't speed that. I really do appreciate you for that. The mayor for how you have continued to support. And I tell people all the time, regardless when it comes down to our officers, I'm 10 toes down. I'm going to always support everything that you do. I appreciate you, and I appreciate the support that not only you give us, but what you've given me. And so you're going to continue to see that. You know, you all got me up for another four years, God willing. And so I'm always going to support our officers, because y'all look good in that bloom. And I really do respect what you all do. Thank you so much. Thank you. Councilmember Gibbons. Thank you so much. And I want to thank you, Chip Holloway. Thank you to our assistant chiefs, lie, all of the tenants, sergeants, majors, all of the above, officers, those of you who patrol and protect our communities and you keep them safe, you know, acknowledge. Yes. the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of And I thank you for the service that you give, the sacrifices that you make. There's a song that we sing at church. How can I say thank you for all the things that you have done? Things that go notice, then things that go unnoticed. We say thank you. We say thank you to your families because they have made a sacrifice as well. I come from a law enforcement family, so I know the sacrifices I've seen them firsthand. And I thank you for putting your life on the line to protect our lives. Your work is not in vain. So God bless you and thank you. Thank you. Council Member Driscoll. Thank you. And Mayor, thank you for giving us the opportunity to share this proclamation with you and With the department chief. Thank you for your incredible leadership You truly are the best of the best and it's reflected in the team that you have and continue to recruit Some have talked about the the big things things, but there's also those little things that you do every day. You're there not just when someone's in trouble or when someone's having a bad day. I love how our police department is out there to bring smiles to people's faces. Just a couple of evenings evenings ago I did a neighborhood park walk-and-talk during one of the evenings and we had members from the neighborhood association teamed up with CSOs. The police department had made up door hangers reminding people how to keep their cars and their houses safe and ways you can call if you see something, you can say something and here's how. Not going on doors together and saying hello, people were thrilled. They did not care that their city council member was standing there. They cared that a police officer was there with a friendly smile and an offer to be there for them anytime they need something. It was amazing to see up close face to face these residents responding so positively and almost every single one of them said thank you to that officer. It's, you know, it's when something has gone terribly wrong, I can always count on getting the communication that I need. Thanks to Chief Kavassif, thanks to Major Miller. For me, I cover two just police police districts one and two are within District six. So I've got a lot of people to remember. So I'm missing major bushes awesome. We have I have these great daily almost daily interactions with those who are really on the ground in my district and that means so much me. And whether it's with something that has gone wrong in the level of communication that I get about it, or those everyday concerns that people have where the resident calls me instead of the non-emergency number, and I have to figure out how can we solve this. So it's those little things that maybe you didn't realize you had signed up for along with everything else but those things really add up and that improves the quality of life for our residents. There are many many more of those little things thanks to you know just having a wonderful department but those things do matter and I just wanted wanted to bring that up and thank you. Thank you for being there when someone's having a really bad day, and thanks for being there to make someone's day. I hope that you can see that you have our support very firmly. And the only thing I want to know is what can we do for you? And I will always ask that. And I always want to act on the answer. So we're here for you. Thank you. Thank you. Council member Floyd, I'll be brief. I just want to say thank you to the police department for being innovative, particularly for this is maybe a little comical knowing when you're not needed. Specifically like the call program ideas like that are what sets our city apart and are what makes us forward thinking. And it was because the department and the union supported it that it happened. And so I'm really grateful the forward-looking nature of the department and of the union. Thanks. Thank you. Well I told you downstairs I thought you'd see it and I think it's very clear that this council is completely and utterly supportive of our law enforcement and so chief, I know I say it the time, and chances are at least your comments will be shorter now, because I think everybody got the appreciation out of the way on your presentation here in a couple of minutes. But I think I've said it before, it starts from the top down. And so it starts with you, your command staff, all the way down, all the way to our volunteers. And so when I think about the completeness and the wholeness of the department and what you're doing every single day, 24-7, I could not be more thankful for each of you and the job you do and how you do it. And so thank you so much for being here. Thank you for celebrating with us and like you've heard now for eight times you have our support and you're going to continue to have our support and let us know how we can do that on a daily basis with you and for you. So thank you for being here and let's celebrate you one more time. Okay. We're going to move right into it and we're going to invite Chief Holloway up for our quarterly report. Thank you, Chair and Council members. I guess I can see you have any questions. Before I get started, I just want to thank again, Council, for all those comments you made for the police department and tell me about my leadership. But you know, behind every great leader, you have to have great support and my executive team. They're the greatest there is. So the reason why I'm so good, because I have three great assistant chiefs, a great PIO person and legal advisor. So we are where we are because of that tight team that I have. So I want to thank you for that. So let's get into the meat potato soda speak of this report. So for this quarter, which is January, February, March, the first quarter is autotus or down by 19%. Burgers are down by 17%. Property crimes are down by 17%. Violent crimes are down by 36% overall crime is down by 21% in the city A homicide as of this quarter we have a five compared to five last year We have one open case, but we have a great lead to that case So hopefully we'll get bring closure to that family soon others five homicide five homicide, one was by hand, one was by a handgun, two were by knives, and one was by a vehicle. Our grit team, again, that's the team that go out and respond to where there's shots fired. And I can tell you after the person's spoke, there's more like the mayor said, someone Miss Rita was outside talking to her and chief Gilliam, because we want to figure out what happened, because I know Major Miller and Sergeant Matthews do go to those meetings, so we want to make sure if there was a miscommunication at the next meeting that we're there and we talked to her personally because everyone's safe to end the city matters to us. Our gun report, I think every quarter I keep saying it's getting better and better. So I know we're never gonna be zero, but I'll take what we've got. Also, I wanna report that what we can you to see is people returning their guns. So for this quarter, we had 65 guns, returned us for safe keeping and we recovered 24 24 so that was 98 guns taken off the streets for this quarter. As I reported earlier as you can see from the number of crimes is trending down in the city for this quarter so we're very happy for that. The arrest report because crime is trending down also you're going to see the arrest trending down. I know cal asked us the last time So we did do a breakout Our concern is still 65% of those arrests for motor vehicles are juveniles 47% of the vehicle burglaries are juveniles Burglaries are 13% and robberies are 24%. So we're still having an issue with our juveniles walking around trying cars that are unlocked and I'm going to talk more about that how we're handling that. Again, we're never going to be perfect but we are focusing on how we can prevent our juveniles from committing crimes in our city. Trafficking enforcement is still going well in our city and we go to meetings and we tell people you you call we come we write so just remember that if you want to report traffic incident we will come out there and we will take care of that problem. Our juvenile second-chance program is still going well the one that we had juvenile didn't show up for the program. Our home program, again, which is a county-wide program, as you can see, our intensive revision is down, which is great and intense supervision, is where a juvenile, here she's, has been convicted of five or more felonies. That means we are starting to reach out to the right children for that program. Our past team, as you can see, they're still out there making lots of contact. I know last time there was some question about the numbers. So I'm going to break that down for you. There is 500, 751 contact, but of those that have broken down to how many people refer to those different organizations. So that number may be high, but some people may have refused some services. So again, they're out there, they're making contact, they're asking a person every day, what can we do to help? What can we do to get you out of this situation? We also still partner with St. Anthony's Hospital where we have a nurse practitioner right with us once a week, so we can also handle medical issues that are out there on the street. Park walk and talk the weather is getting better so we're getting out there. We're trying to make contact with the people that don't call us for assistance, but we can ask them what can we do and how can we make it better? Eagle Eye Program. I'm gonna have a goal, the one with gold. If we can get 10% of the people that live in the city to sign up for this, we increase by 14%. So we're going to see if we get about 20,000 people in our city to sign up for the Eagle Line Program. And I want to promote that here for like two seconds. And what that is for the people that are listening is all we want you to do is tell us if you have a ring camera at your home, at your home. So we can register it. So when something does happen, we can come out knocking your door and ask a permission to look at your camera. We don't want to feed to look at your cameras everyday we don't want that but when something happens in your community we'd like to be able to go to your home or your business and look at the camera see if we can make a case collusion. Are you so forced policy again stand for the quarter? We had three citizen complaint, of those three citizen complaint, they had nothing to do with use of force. So we get into the program that we talked about. Our call program is still going great. And I think she's still here, Megan leads that. She leads both of our programs. And as you can see, we first started. Everybody thought this wouldn't work. 97% of the call, the officers are not responding to. And just like councilmember Floyd said, we don't need to go to all these calls. We're happy to give this to specialists. So our navigators are doing what they're doing. And the last bullet point I want to bring out because I talked to other police chiefs and share zero incidents. Zero. Because The people are calling to they need help. They don't need a badge and a gun. They need someone to help them through the crisis that they're dealing with. Again as you can see, the incident that Council heard about at the library, soon as that happened, we sent the call team there to talk to the city employees to make sure we could help them out. Call is now going out also to the Saturday program to make contact with people. And on April 10th, we had call there for our candlelight visual. So there's a program I want to spend a little bit of time about, because it was the mayor started this program, the citizen community voted on this. So and council approved this. This was the a million dollars that was given to the police department again how can we continue to work with the community uh... to hope our juvenile that we talked about so and again i want to thank making me gie she's here today with us she is the really the person that works on this all the time so i'm gonna just start off with the golf course so what we did was the golf course is part of part call program, but we said, OK, how can we help the kids? And the kids did not like having someone call a navigator or a counselor coming to their home. So we said, OK, we asked the kids, what's the best name? I want to coach. So now that person that comes to their home, they're their coach, and they're coaching them through their crisis. The biggest number that I want you to see is 73% of these kids, and these are the kids that are committing felony. 73% of these kids have 73% of these kids have not reoffended. So that means we're doing what we need to do on the front end. We talk about it all the time. We can't arrest that way out of this. We got to come up with solutions so we can work our way out of this out of this the other part is the power program the power program is as you know there's a lot of sports that go on in our city and there are a lot of parents that can afford this so through the power program any child that needs funding or help funding we will help them get to that we will help them get the equipment to the league so that really does help us out with that. And again, I just want to iterate to the mayor's staff. I mean, the mayor's office they gave this money to us because without this it wouldn't be possible. So that was a million dollars, a million dollars that was given toward our youth. Our second part of it is a CFA and I'm sorry I should have gone to PALall. Pall is very interesting. With that, Pall is allowing the kids to come to a place after school. But what we did is again, I want to give Megan credit for that is now we hire kids from USF that plan on being teachers so they can come in the afternoon and work with the kids to do their reading and math. So now the kids are getting additional help to getting through their program. And CFW, that's when I jumped ahead. Of those are the ones that are paying for helping kids with anything they need. And they came here to last city council meeting where you saw that we're giving out scholarships. We're working with the schools. And as you can see, as we keep looking at programs, we keep talking to the mayor's office, So the mayor is saying, what else can we do? Because we're trying to figure out how we're going to help the youth and how we're going to help the family. So we don't have to deal with. We keep talking to the mayor's office, our mayor to say, what else can we do? Because we're trying to figure out how we're going to help the youth and how we're going to help the family. So we don't have to deal with them on our end. And again, like I said, because we're not going to rest our way out of this. We're going to work our way out of this problem. So with that, I'll be able to do that. OK, Council member gathered. Thank you chair and thank you for the presentation. This morning chief always good to see you for our quarterly reports. Just a couple of questions. So you know, glad to see that the guns stolen in district two is down to one icon. So I think the message is getting out. But certainly always more that we can do around that and when you shared the statistics around juvenile Car burglaries and things like that we know that as the summer months come less Activities for our youth especially you know during the day Crime kind of tends to ramp up a little bit idle hands. So What are we doing to be kind of proactive as we walk into those summer months and what can we do as council members to help spread the word about these programs and all of these innovative things that we're doing? Sure so I'm gonna say something that I'm regret saying here but it all starts with parks and wrecks. We got to get it in once a day so you got it. And Mike Jeffries and his team, they do a hell of a job because they open up thing. We work that partnership to say, okay, what can we open up, how can it help happen? And then again, through this innovative equity program, we're able to help out with that. So that child is here she needs funding for something that money's available for. So again, I want to go back and say thanks to City Council because you approved that. So as funding is available, as the parents got to want to do that with the child and get the child involvement. So it's all of our job to get people to be aware of it and to work together. So we are ready for the summer month. Chief Gilman's always got his team in place. We use our school resource alcers because they know the kids, so we try to get that blend together. So we are ready for the summer month. Chief Gilmins has got his team in place. We use our school resource alters because they know the kids so we try to get that blend together. The collaborative effort. Yes. So speaking of your innovative equity program updates, one of the things that I've heard a lot from community groups advocates looking for more resources for our youth is that it's not just about the programming. It's also sometimes about barriers in transportation. So have we had conversations about what it might look like for the city to assist in some way with transport for our youth to be able to get to these programs? Yes, we are looking at that. We already talked to PSTA. We looked at certain things, but that liability comes into it. But I want to thank Jack and her team, because every time we're trying to come up with an idea, they go, well, we're working through it. So again, that's solution to it. So we are trying to figure it out. That's the hardest thing, because parents are working, but how do you get that child from point A to point B. Right, I mean, and then that is probably overwhelmingly the one gap that I hear most often. So as a council member, you know, I would be very interested in having a conversation with you one-on-one about maybe some creative solutions, what the city can do, would like to understand from legal, what the parameters are, because if we can create all the programs in the world, but if we cannot get our youth to those programs, it's all for not. So I just want to make sure that we're looking at all of those gaps and how we fill them. And I said, again, with Jack and her team, we are trying to find solutions to that, because we know know that's a big barrier just trying to figure out how we can do it fantastic and then my last thing and this is not really for today it's a more of a request for your next update so City Council if you haven't seen our wake zone legislation passed this week both chambers of the Senate and the House. It was part of the larger transportation package that was passed first in the Senate, and then came over and was adopted by the House. And so we're very excited for that to be implemented. The governor should sign that into law hopefully soon. And I believe July 1st is when that goes into effect. So we are going to have a job around communication, enforcement, what that is going to look like. It's going to go into law right before our busiest part of hurricane season. And for those who may be listening who don't know what this is, this is a bill that was sponsored by Representative Lindsay Cross and Senator Nick DeSigley. It was actually written and collaborated on by Assistant City Attorney Michael Dima, Chief Holloway, Sheriff Galtieri, Amber Bolding and Emergency Management. It was really a Saint Pete-born team effort. And so that has been passed. That is now in state law. And going forward, the law enforcement will be able to enforce lower speeds when roads are inundated with flooding. And so that was a situation that we had where they were really tied if somebody was going the speed limit. There was nothing that law enforcement could do to keep the wake that they were pushing from going up into homes. Now we can start to enforce that, but now it's gonna be about how we enforce that. So on your next report, if we could have a conversation about that versus bringing you back or bringing you to a committee or something like that, I think if we could just incorporate it into your next quarterly report for how we're gonna communicate it and how we're going to enforce it. first to have a conversation about that if we could just incorporate it into your next quarterly report for how we're going to communicate it and how we're going to inform them first to have a conversation about that if we could. We'll be done. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Council Member Driscoll. Thank you. Thank you, Chief, for the report. First, about the report overall, it really shows some improvements in pretty much every area. And just wanted to commend you for that. I noticed that the what you talked about at the very beginning and we didn't have a slide about it, but the reduction in, you know, those more significant crimes, the violent crimes or, you know, the bigger stuff. How do you also measure this smaller step, like the non-emergency calls, or do you only focus on, I'm just wondering, because we always hear about the big stuff, where this is coming from is actually this morning, I was listening to a piece about New York's police department has, earlier this month, they launched a quality of life policing program. You might wanna look at it. It was, it's pretty interesting and I know I'll be following up with you on it later. But it's really focused on more of those non-emergency calls. They said that although they're in New York City, their violent crimes have gone down but the smaller infractions the those non-emergency calls have actually gone up So that and and that's about It can be about noise it can be about panhandling it can be You know those everyday life kind of things that you run into as you're walking around so So, it can be about panhandling, it can be, you know, those everyday life kind of things that you run into as you're walking around. So it got me thinking we haven't really examined that so much. So I know we're doing a, you know, a great job in reducing crime overall and reducing those bigger crimes. But how are we doing on the smaller stuff? Because that adds up and I think it's a good way to pit it. It really does impact someone's quality of life. Well I can say we just want to talk about it maybe I can say New York is following up. We have stats for stats. If you were all those stats numbers, we can tell you how many pan handling. You name it, we track it. But again, I don't, council wants all those numbers. I can give all those numbers. There are a lot of numbers. Yeah. Through the call program, we track those. Are we increasing, decreasing, what else? So I'll be more happy to talk to you one on one. But you want all those numbers. I look at a merry month and I can give them to you. Yeah, and maybe not broken down by exact category, but maybe as part of the next quarterly report, even, you can start including that. What the number of non-emergency calls is. And I mean we'd have to give that some thought. Like if you do want to narrow it down somewhat. I can meet what you want to want so you can try so I can show you. Yeah, let's work through that. Show me what you want to see. Yeah, I'm very interested in this part because most of what I hear from residents is those everyday things and not so much the major crimes but the everyday stuff that they see especially downtown where you have a lot of people walking around a lot of people gathering and displaying all kinds of behavior. So it'd be cool to take a deeper dive into that just to make sure we're really on top of this small stuff just as much as the big stuff. When you were talking about juvenile crimes, then I love that we have different options and programs to try to get them on a better path. I'm wondering, in that immediate time, though, when a juvenile is arrested for, let's say, a vehicle burglary. And it's the first time. Are they brought in and then just sent home? Or do you talk, or are they, at what point are they offered the second chance program? So the second chance programs are a misdemeanor crime. Basically what happened is, is that child will you shoplifting? Here she is shoplifting today. What we would do is, first of all, they have to admit that they did wrong. The parents have to agree to put the child into the program. And then that following week that child will be enrolled into the program that Saturday. They would get six hours of some type of community service in the last two hours that we need to get a coach or a navigator to see what the problem is and how we can help them out. It's much better than our court system because our court system just tied up. Usually that kid would wait two or three months. Now we're talking within seven days that we're handling that child. The same thing with moving forward together is that within 48 to 72 hours, some of our coaches or someone with golf coach is now talking to that child and talking to the parents and saying, how committed does that problem. Now, there's still a consequence that child still has the answer to what he or she has done, but along the way we're working with them. So when they get into court, we can say we've done this, this, this, and this. And I was going to make this child better. Hopefully that child does not commit another crime before the court date. Right. So, right. So hopefully they don't commit a net, so with that, what does completed successfully mean? That means that they've shown up to the course, they've moved on, they've done their eight hours, there's no arrest record, so they've shown up for that Saturday class, they've done their eight hours of community service and we're moving off from there because we're getting them to help that they need. Yeah, and are you keeping track of them down the road six months later, a year later, to see if there's any recidivism? So I can tell you on that number 68% of the kids that have gone through this program, I'm not reoffended. It's pretty good. Yes. Thank you. Regarding it was brought up about the transportation access for youth for some of the programs. PSCA has a student bus pass. It's as part of an agreement with Pinellas County Schools. So they are able to take any bus anytime for free. Is that not enough? Is that what I'm hearing? Well, again, we have to go talk to the kids. So when you're talking to the kids, they're saying, I'm not going to wait for bus. I'm not going to ride on a bus. And I'll use one of their quotes because it, kind of funny chief. How can I pick up a girl and ask her out on a date when I said I'm going to pick up on a bus? So we need to make buses cooler? I guess so. So how do we go about getting that in our transportation? How do you make it more convenient, like you're saying? Do I wait an hour for a bus? I'll wait 20 minutes for a bus. So I know we're working on it, because I know one of council members on a transportation committee is free, but how do you make it where I want to ride the bus? Yeah. All right, well, I think council member Figs Sanders, that's the chair of PSCA's board, and I as a member of the board sounds like we have a project ahead, or some thinking to do on that to see if PSTA can come up with something. I mean they have a fantastic marketing team so you never know. I think that's the biggest thing. Make the kids want to ride the bus. Yeah. Okay. You've given me something to think about. Thank you. Thanks for bringing up the Eagle Eye thing. Wanted to throw out there, that one way to boost participation could be to have friendly competition among neighborhood associations. So you may want to consider talking with Susie Ahock and her team to see if maybe this, we could make it fun. And, you know, between Kona and then the individual neighborhood associations, they are great communicators throughout their neighborhood and they're always looking for ways to increase public safety, of course, that's always top of mind for our residents. So, you know, creating a friendly competition wouldn't hurt to try it and see if that boosts the numbers. But I love how you have a great ambition to really increase that participation. You know it's something I'm passionate about. A couple of years, it's been a few years ago. We did some of those group park walk and talk evening additions together with door hanger specifically with eagle eye information that was created by the police department. So if that is still in a file saved in someone's computer somewhere, we could bring it up and print some more of of those and I think that could be something that could be a great tool for neighborhoods to help us get the word out. And we print those up if the sauce or knees and could be over on printing shops so we can take care of that. Yeah yeah they looked really nice I like to using those so that good use. And then finally, I wanted to just give a shout out to Chief Gilliam. I didn't see him here earlier when we were doing the proclamation, but hello, good morning, and thank you for all that you do. Another rock star on your team. I don't know what I'd do without him. So thank you, Gil. Thank you, Chief. And thank you, Chair. Thank you. Bye, Chair Harons. Thank you. Thank you, Chief. For the update, it's good to see you again. I want to first start with the thank yous in terms of coming to the Neighborhood Association when someone asked you to show up at Crescent Heights. You went there to talk about the Cal program that we're interested in finding out all the details and everyone was extremely happy to see you there. So, appreciated that. And also, Chief Gilliam was also at a leadership meeting somewhere. And he was asked by someone just randomly, can you show up to our meeting a couple of days? And he did the same. And they were extremely happy. It was all positive that I heard from the Neighborhood Association. So I think it's wonderful. It's a great place for neighbors to get all the updates, obviously, as to crime stats and what's happening in the neighborhood. So they're always very happy to hear from you all. In terms of eagle eye, I have to say, I think it's fantastic for those that are scared about eagle eye and saying, you know, being part of the program, they have phones. That's more scary. Having the police just know that they can go and contact you to look at surveillance after the fact, not so much. And that's what it is. When they're investigating crimes, you go out there and you have to see a camera catch somebody stealing the packages off the porch of the neighbor's house or the bicycle in the garage. And that's pretty much what they do to build a case to make sure they can apprehend the individual, which prevents other crimes if they're doing that type of crime. So it's very helpful. I will definitely make sure, I think the community service officers are already right, telling neighborhood associations when they go about the EGLEI program. So I think that's wonderful. I'll make sure that I do that also. The other thing I want to touch on is the, I'm happy about hearing the innovative equity project updates that you provided. I'm excited about the work with St. Pete Police Athletic League. That's in my district, that's in Woodland Park, and it's great. And what I want to find out is, is that program at capacity, or are they taking as many kids as they can, or do you know? They're taking as many kids as they can and I don't think they're trying to turn any kids away if they can find a way they're doing it. Good, good. I just want to make sure that they have the tools that they need to serve the community and obviously with this program, if there are any issues that can address the issues in terms of any capacity issues. Thank you. Okay, great. Thank you, Chief. Thank you. And just quickly before I go to Councilmember Givens, I don't think they're a capacity. Historically, during their summer months, they've probably had capacity for 50 or so kids more, but are totally willing to staff up and make sure that every kid has an opportunity to be there. So they've got a good bench of teens as part of their camp staff that are absolutely willing to do more. Right. Thank you. Thank you for the question. Council member Givens. Thank you so much. I appreciate that. Thank you Chief. I appreciate you. I appreciate all of our law enforcement officers and all the work you do. Happy to hear that our violent crime is decreasing To a point brought up earlier by another colleague. I am concerned about the number of calls that are increasing for shots That have been reported. So your office provided with the report That stated that in the year 2024 in District 7 there were 120 gunshots that reported alone in the year 2024, in District 7, there were 420 gun shots that reported alone in Jordan Park that was in 2024. And then there were from December 1st to March 1st of 2025, 100 plus shots that were reported in Jordan Park. So my question is, is this an issue? And if it is, what are we doing to correct that problem? Because you and I, we know we talked about it in private, so I'll bring the conversation in public. The residents are hungry for a substation in that neighborhood. We have one in Tangerine Plaza, I get that, but that's a long walk for a senior citizen at the legacy who has a complaint or for a mom who has three kids in no vehicle If there was a janitor shed there our studio let me use that word an apartment That the St. Pete housing authority wanted to open its doors to the police at no cost What would prevent us from being able to utilize that that service so that residents feel safer? what they don't want is intimidation. They feel intimidated when they see a tank parked in front of their house that says we're watching you. But what they feel is trust when they see officers parking and walking throughout their neighborhood. So if we can't utilize that facility, what can we do to create more of a presence with our officers? Sure. So let me make sure I can wrap all that for you. Yeah, I'm sorry. So the thing you're saying 400 versus 100, what that probably means to me again, I have to really do a deep dive. It could mean that more people calling in. It could be one shot, one person, one shot fired that night, but maybe seven people called in. instead of that being a shot call, it's seven shot call. So you have to do really do a deep dive. If one person calls in, that's one. If 10 people call in on that one shooting, 10 calls. 20 people call in, it's 20 calls. So again, you have to do a deep dive to look at that when you're saying shot call, because it just could be everybody calling in. And in regard to substations, when I came here, I looked at substation, everybody, I can guarantee you every city council member would love a substation in their district. But here's the problem with that, when you put all sorts of substations, now we're not out patrolling the streets. You want to also sit in a station or do you want to also want you to talk about, sit and walk walking around. I want that also walking around because I want him or her patrol mystery. I want to also sit in the station or do you want to also want you to talk about sitting walking around. I want that also walking around because I want him or her patrol industry. I want them to get to know you. So you can offer me all the buildings in the world which is great but then we got to talk about contract. Who's going to lock it? Who's going to take care of it? Now people are going to complain about I see three police officers parked at a the subststation and out patrol in the street. I want to see them patrol in the street so if the Residents in Jordan Park feel like is unsafe. I know you were out there No, we'll do more park walk and talk I don't and I'm saying chief Halloween my stack when we talk about it I don't want most of us sitting on their bus. I want them out there walking If there is an issue with the community, then let's park our command bus out there and let's walk that community. Because it's just because the substation there doesn't make it any safer. All it does is just saying there's a place that you can go. Well you pick up your phone I'll be right there. So when people talk about that again so I'll be more happy to do a deeper dive with the shot's call because again, that can be any number but far as put in a substation in. Once I put one there, then there's gonna be one downtown. There's gonna be one west, there's gonna be, and then we have all sorts of sickness stations. Yeah, I certainly hear you, Chief, but what I beg to differ on is other districts don't have the problems that I have in District 7. Other districts don't have the gun violence and the murder that I have in District 7. Other districts don't have the problems with you stealing guns out of vehicles. Like, that I have in District 7. Other districts don't have the gun violence and the murder that I have in District 7. Other districts don't have the problems with you stealing guns out of vehicles like I have in District 7. Other neighborhoods don't have the same problems that Jordan Park has. So to compare those, that's like comparing apples with oranges. It's not the same. If you have officers parked at Tangerine Plaza, the Post Office on 22nd. I see those vehicles there all the time. Okay, maybe I'm gonna walk in there because I see offices there now. But if I don't see offices in my neighborhood, then I begin to think that I'm out of sight out of mind. They don't care. I'm not saying you don't, I know you do. But what I'm asking for is the partnership, right? Help me help you by building the trust with the residents and what the neighbors have said that I've spoken to that your offices have heard that your offices have said we want to do it. We want to be amongst the residents we want a substation here we want to be present so again other neighborhood I don't feel based on the statistics that I've gathered have the same issues that I have in Jordan Park. Well, or sir I'll agree in this because every community has an issue that we have to address? You can say there's more shooting than this because once there's one shooting in one neighborhood and we pull resources to that. So your district no different than any other district. Everybody wants the field quality of life. Everybody wants to feel safe. So our job, these 600 and some men and women are working out there in communities. How do we make this whole city safe? You're right, because there could be something that happens in your district tonight that happens in her district tomorrow, his district, and I'll give you a good example. Now, the west side, there would be more off to that Tyrone Mall, they could. We don't have a substation in Tyrone Mall, so we don't have a substation downtown. There's more active in the area. So when you're saying shots fired, I agree with you to a point, but at the same time is my job as a police chief and as my staff is how do we bring quality life to everyone in the city? Because we want everyone to feel safe. Because you can say that, then we can talk about 16th street. We can talk about MLK. I could go on and on and on. Because soon as they crime happened and someone's neighborhood, they want the police. And again, like I said, substations are not the answer. All you're doing is putting a bill and putting a sign on it. And if we're not in it, then it's not getting anything done. I want to see boots on the ground. Those officers that tell you they want a substation, please have them go up their chain of command. Because then if they want to be there, I'll find a way to put them there. But at the same time, they're going to walk that neighborhood. Good news. Thank you, Chief. I appreciate it. We talked about intense supervision. Why do we wait until youth have committed five felonies until we decide that we want to reach them. You need to contact the court system. OK, well, what is the St. Pete Police Department doing if they have a parent that reaches out and said, hey, I want to reach them. You need contact the court system. OK, well, what is the St. Pete Police Department doing if they have a parent that reaches out and said, hey, I want to reach out to an officer now to intervene with my child. So I was told about the youth care program, right? But to my understanding, you aren't taking direct referrals from like a school counselor or something or would say a coach, a football coach, you said hey I have a child that hasn't committed to felony yet but I want to refer them to that program. What would be the steps that they would take because I've had people who have called and said I didn't get a call back or they told me that my child didn't qualify for this program so I just want to be clear about that process. And I want to be clear. Each island in the city of St. Petersburg can be referred to call or they can be referred to our new program. I adopted to make sure that child, here she does not reoffend or offend. So if that coach or someone else needs someone, call us, that's what our program is about, that the mayor started. We will help that child out. We will, just like I showed you earlier in that slide, you wanna play sports, we'll figure it out. You need mentor, we'll figure it out. We've got everything in place. This mayor's office has given us more money, you have approved it. We will put it out to where those kids need to be. If they need it, we got the answer to it. or we don't have the answer, we'll find an answer. So when someone's telling you that this child didn't qualify for that, I guarantee, well I know once a month I meet with my team because I'm looking back at May. or we don't have the answer, we'll find an answer. So when someone's telling you that this child didn't qualify for that, I guarantee, well I know once a month I meet with my team, I'm looking back at Megan, like, no, no, we've got everything in place and we're still asking people for other programs. Well, I wouldn't wait until the child gets caught up in the system, so I don't wanna have to ask judicial system why we didn't save this child's life if they get caught up in the system. What I'd like to do is talk to those schools, right? What students do you have that have been suspended at a learning high rate? the initial system, why we didn't save this child's life, if they get caught up in the system. What I'd like to do is talk to those schools, right? What students do you have that have been suspended at an alarming high rate, right? What students do you have that you consider at risk that we need to be reaching those hard to reach? So I'd like to see your youth cares or whatever program it is, be proactive about reaching those kids before they offend, because like you say, 73% of the kids that you're working with don't re-offend. So I think it's a program that's working but I'd like to see us try to do a better job at targeting that demographic that we're trying to reach and we need to do a better job of marketing because I can tell you again under the mayor's equity program that's already in place every month we meet with the vice president of the school board that brings us a list of the kids that are suspended and need help. So everything your name is already there. That's good news, Chief. Thank you. And then my other question regarding resources you brought this up. So what I found during the park walk and talks is that these kids don't necessarily want these programs. They don't want place works. It's not like it was and we were growing up. Things have changed. They want jobs. They're struggling, they're watching their mama struggle, and they want to help. So this is just a recommendation. I know you have some FDLE dollars. I know there are some other funds that the police department has obviously city council. We can only do so much with the parts that we're given. I would love to see some outreach to these nonprofit organizations who told me I didn't know the police department had these dollars. trust me, I'm your biggest, your biggest performance chief. But I'm saying yes, reach out to chief Holloway. He has dollars left over like he wants to make sure these funds are expended and allocated. So I'm thinking about like Bowley. I'm thinking about the Pinellas County Urban League and these other organizations that specialize in youth employment. I would love to see them get some of these dollars like I don't know what the rules are from what we talked about, they're pretty flexible and nimble. So I would like to see these youth get employed by these nonprofit organizations or see these nonprofit organizations utilize those resources that you have that are plentiful to employ community navigators or coaches to help get out there and do more work. Is that something that we could do? And if I could achieve here, I mean, Councilmember, we'd be happy to sit down with you and go over our workforce programs. We have several youth workforce programs, after-school programs, summer programs. We initiated the Mayor's Youth Academy. So I think more of that really falls into our economic development and workforce team in some other areas in the city, and we would be happy to sit down with you and go over that. I hear you you but I would hope that the police department will be willing to share their budget as well with the youth and these nonprofit organizations. I'm sorry, Dunne. Your Honor, Fernandez has done a great job. We publicized that area of marketing that here is a chance for you to apply for the asset for the grant. This is what you need to do. These are the criteria for that. you apply for it myself and the assistant chief would go over. We don't have a dollar limit, so to speak, if there's 20 groups that are out there, we will look at it. But we also say the same thing I tell a group, what skin do you have in this? I'm not going to put all the skin in this. What skin do you have so I can meet your skin? So when those groups come to us, this is your idea? That's a great idea, but what skin do you have in this? Because we want to make sure that we're using our dollars the correct way. So all the groups that you've named, I don't know if they ever apply for asset forftry, because I couldn't tell you that because we have over 100 people applying every year. But the only reason why they would be turned down if they didn't meet the criteria that are put before us by the federal and state government. The skin is their youth, the skin is their babies, their children, that's their skin that they have in the game. So I want to be clear about that. That they do have stake in this community. And the people that I've met, they're passionate about making sure that there are programs in place that help fund not just youth athletics, but also youth employment. So I appreciate what the administration's doing, but I'd love to see, again, just more from the police department. But I'll digress from there. And when you talk about resources, maybe even, I was talking to some kids in Jordan Park. Why can't we swim at the pool for free? Like I don't know if that's an opportunity there for you out of work with Park and Rec to make sure there's a partnership for Jenny Hal Poole, but just opportunities and then resources, the Eagle Eye Program. So we've all mentioned that. We haven't acknowledged the fact that there are socio-economic barriers that keep people from being able to afford a door camera, right? So maybe I'd love to see some sort of collaboration with the St. Pete House and authority, right? I think that could help you all when it comes to solving crime, would you agree? And agree and again I think that comes down to messaging under the mayor's program equity program and I asked it for for your and again Mike Jeffy's parking right. If a child says he or she cannot afford pay for a swimming I guarantee you we would find a way to make sure that child had an opportunity to swim and not only that I know parks and rec I'm not going to speak for them, but I know they have programs, I know the Fisher program through CFY. They have a class with a teach kids how to swim. So all the things are in place. It just people need to be, and again I'll put that on us, marketing. Everything you name it has already been checked off, it's on a box. so we need to market that more so people wear it you said it chief it's great that we're doing it but it means nothing of people don't know about it thank you chair thank you councilmember fix enters thank you thank you minor quick chief I just want to concur with what you said and thank you for the report about the sub stations I was 10 feet away from the substation and it did not work. There's the one right there in Tangerine Plaza, it did not work. We would talk to the offices all the time because it just did not work. So I do concur with you in regards to the substations because I had one seven years. Right there, 10 feet away from me, office right there I can walk out and speak so it didn't work. The question I have is in regards to the call program where it says the decrease in contacts were due to the turnover was this when Gulf Coast took over part of... I want to have Megan collection she's the one that really runs the show. Oh, okay, okay, because I love the call program, but I was trying to figure out was that a transition in staff or agencies? Morning, everybody. Thank you for the opportunity to answer that question. The dip in numbers for this past quarter for the call program was connected with some prior turnover. We've actually had excellent continuity with staff from the very beginning and the launch of the call program back in 2021. So this was really our first experience where we did have staff turnover. So during the last quarter, some of the contacts the team would normally be making in the community. Some of that was pulled back as they were recruiting training and onboarding new staff. I can report as of today, the call team is fully staffed. OK, OK, because I was thinking that it was some of the agencies that we were working with some turnover changes in that. But this was internal staff. Yes, the internal call staffs, I believe one or two, decided to go to grad school. It was certainly for some positive reasons as well. All right, Austin. Thank you. That was my question. Thank you, too. Thank you. Chief, thank you so much for the presentation. Two quick things. I appreciate you spending the morning with us. Thank you for your intentionality on Park Walk and Talk. I know we talk about it a lot, but as I continue to look at past maps, not just citywide, but specifically, I'll speak for District One. I'm just, I continue to see officers out and about outside of their car in all neighborhoods in District One. This is probably the best map we've had in a bit. And so I just appreciate the intentionality from all of the whole department on Park Walk and Talk. I think that's it. I'm very happy to hear on the decrease in major crimes. I am jealous of District 2 and District 8 when I look at the gun stolen map. So you guys are doing something right, you two. Councilmember Floyd and Councilmember Gabbard making people lock their cars. And so again, Chief, thank you so much for the update. Thank you for being here this morning for a lot of appreciation, Mon. And always appreciate you having here. Thank you very much again. I just want to thank the City Council for your support, working with us and working with the community because again, we're going to solve these problems we've solved them together. So thank you. Thank you, Chief. Okay, we're going gonna move into our public hearings and we're gonna start with E1 in ordinance authorizing the public transportation agreement and insurances to be executed by the city. And so if we could, we've got Rich Lesniak but let's read the title please. In ordinance, excuse me, proposed ordinance number 609H in ordinance and a coordinate with section 1.02C5B. St. Petersburg City Charter authorizing the execution of the public transportation grant agreement PTGA. And the assurances grant the assurances grant assurances. Which are attached to the PTGA to be executed by the city as a requirement for receipt of the Florida Department of Transportation FDOT grant for the Albertwear to Airport in the amount not to exceed $134,800 for the construction phase of the Rehab Airfield Vault FY 23 project 19235. authorizing such encompasses or restrictions not took seat 20 years from the effective date of the PTGA. Authorizing the mayor or his designated to execute all documents and necessary to effectuate this ordinance, providing an effective date and providing for exploration and we do have one speaker on this. Okay. Rich, you have anything before we go into speakers? No. I don't necessarily have any repair bell. I'm happy to answer any questions. Thank you. All right. Let's go into public comment. Barbara, Barbara Hedge, please go to I the podium. podium stage. I'm going to address for the record. You have three minutes to address sitting Council. Hi. Good morning. My name is Barbara Hedge. I live at 5214 Dover Street, Northeast. I'm an active airline pilot and a user of Albert Wooded Airport. I've been a flight instructor for almost 30 years. I'm a member of the Albert Wooded Airport Advisory Committee, and I appear before you today to let you know that the users of the Albert Wooded Airport support your acceptance of the grant from the Florida Department of transportation for 1,000. 1,034 I don't remember. Whatever this grant is for the construction phase of the rehab air field vault project. The project's total cost is over $1.6 million of which the FAA is going to provide 90%. With the city's acceptance of the FDOT grant that airports financial contribution for the project will be reduced to $33,700. City records are not very clear as to when the electrical vault was constructed, but the Albert Whitton Advisory Committee estimates it to be about 70 years old. It houses the electrical switch gear for all of the airfield lighting and needs significant Rehabilitation to bring it up to standards for the 21st century. Another part of the project is to add an emergency diesel generator to power the airfield lighting in the event that normal power is lost. Please accept this FDOT grant. We'll approval. Okay. Any other public comment? That only speaker? Okay. Council member Floyd. Thank you. I just have a couple of questions to get clarity. It did have some constituents reach out to me about this and I just wanted to make sure. I think I understand I just wanted to clarify. So first, I guess the simple question like this sounds like a capital need that's been a long time coming and it's pretty important for safety at the airport. I guess you'd agree with that then. Yeah absolutely. I mean fortunately it doesn't happen that frequency but there's been a couple times where we've actually had the power power that feeds the airport they blow a transformer and you know we got to wait for Duked to do the repair so the airfield vault the lighting there is no backup so if we you know if we lose power we lose the lighting so this this does that and in addition the regulators and stuff that are in the vault they're gonna actually to actually raise them up a little more. So for future resiliency, flooding, and that type of thing, they'll be at a higher elevation as well. I mean, the vault itself is already elevated, but the equipment in will get raised even more. Okay, thank you. And so that sounds to me like, you know, this is something that needs doing, and these grants make it to where we're not spending city funds doing it This next question is is you know, I've had people reach out about the you know time frame that How do I describe this that this locks us into continuing airport use? But this doesn't seem to me to be any different than like us just accepting FAA grants Which is a thing that we do all the time. And so we're already locked into long time frames of airport use, and I just wanted you to confirm that and give any information you could about that. Sure, yeah, we actually accepted an FAA grant for the design phase of this project last year. So technically it's 20 years from when you accept. So when we accepted that FA grant last year, it reset the 20 year timeline. And we almost in my time, it seems like most years we've accepted those grants and I'm assuming that means going back well before my time, it was we were accepting those grants. So you know, this isn't changing anything about how the airports used or the future of the airport in general. This is the way that we fund the airport without having to expand large amounts of city funds. Which we had a big debate over a couple of years ago spending city funds in order to not have that one year that it would have extended it over. And so I just wanted to make sure some of that stuff was clear for people. because I had been getting questions about it that weren't, I just didn't make sure some of that stuff was clear for people because I had been getting questions about it that weren't I just didn't think the whole picture had been painted. I wanted to make sure I understood, I wanted to make sure that it was set out loud for everybody who might be listening. Thank you that's all thank you chair. Thank you. Okay we have a motion in a second seeing no other council members wishing to speak. Clerk could Could you please open the machine for voting council members please enter your votes Seeing as all present council members have voted clerk please soundly and announce the vote Mr. Chair, I'm mostly to approve a genitom E1 passes unanimously. Okay. Thanks Rich All right, we're gonna move into E2 an ordinance and many city code chapter 17.5 related to affordable housing site plan approval If you could read the ordinance, please Well, excuse me, propose ordinance number 6-0-H. In the ordinance of the City of St. Petersburg, Florida, mending. report. If you could read the ordinance, please. Excuse me. Proposed ordinance number 6-0-H. In the ordinance of the City of St. Petersburg, Florida, amending chapter 17.5 article 6 of the city code related to affordable housing, site plan approval, amending section 17.5-111 related to applicability criteria, creating a new section 17.5 dash 124 related to conforming uses, providing for survivability and providing an effective date and we do not have any cards on the side. Okay and we're welcome by Derek Kilborn who's got a presentation for us. Good morning Derek Kilborn manager urban planning and historic preservation. As you just heard in the introduction, I am here to present to you about changes to City Code Chapter 17.5 relating to the city's affordable housing program. In short, the changes that have been considered here over the past year and recommended this morning are to get our city code compliant with changes that were adopted in Florida statute through Senate Bill 328. So what we'll do is we'll just walk you through those really quick this morning and then we have our team here to answer any follow-up questions you may have. First, with the affordable housing just going back a little bit in time starting in 2020. Most of know, the state adopted House Bill 1339, which was an affordable housing preemption that allowed local municipalities to approve affordable and workforce housing projects outside the normal land use and zoning process. And so following that the city set out to create those procedures in the code which you can see were adopted in 2022 through our standard text amendment process. In 2023 there was an update or replacement of that legislation Senate Bill 102 which we commonly know as the Live Local Act. And in 2024 through Senate Bill 328, there were updates to that Live Local Act. And so what we're doing now this morning is incorporating those changes into our local code so that we can utilize some of those changes. Specifically, the list of changes that are included in this ordinance update are first a change to the floor area ratio allowance. You can see that the units per acre density stays the same, but this does come into compliance with that state language by allowing and synchronizing our FAR language. The second thing is that the amendment changes the opportunity to exclude airport-impacted areas and ad requirements for TOD areas. Third, we are adding this parking exemption reference for the Sunrunner 22nd Street South Overlay. It looks like Council Member Floyd has just stepped out. He did have a question at an earlier meeting about this parking language. And very simply, in the 328 language, there's a reference to how parking is regulated in TOD areas. So we are just putting this reference in here, identifying sunrunner as a TOD area but essentially the regulation is zero parking and it will continue to be zero parking. The fourth thing is an amendment to the height regulations that speaks to proximity to single family zoning when it is a joining or adjacent to single family zoning and then finally there's some language relating to conforming and non-conforming provisions. We did want to close by just highlighting four of the projects that have been through this process to date. First we have Fairfield Departments which was the first project approved back in 2022 and if you haven't been by the site recently in the last couple weeks they have started demoing the buildings on site and so that is positive progress for this particular project. Following that in 2023 we had Palm Lake Christian Church, come forward with a proposal that was approved in March of that year and then the third project that came through was for the Raytheon site out on the west side. And then finally the most recent project that was approved under the Live Local Act is the Hanover Project which is the JB carpet location on 22nd Avenue North. So this concludes our brief presentation on the text changes that are recommended here. We are aware that there is active legislation under consideration now, Senate Bill 1730. That includes potentially additional updates to the Live Local Act and our plan would be to follow up in the new year and come to this council through your HLUT committee and work on any changes that may come out of this legislative session as well. But we do think it's important to proceed with this in reaction to the changes that were adopted last year. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. We have a motion and a second. Seeing as no council members wishing to speak, clerk could you please open the machine for voting. Council members please enter your votes. Seeing as all present council members have voted, clerk please tally and announce the vote. Mr Chair, I most would approve of agenda item E2 passes unanimously with council member Floyd being absent. Okay, thanks, Derrick. All right, we're going to move into F3 in ordinance approving the vacation of the western 120 feet 20 foot alley of budding lots 5 through 8 located at 18 33 first half south and 18 50 central Avenue. Clerk could you please read the ordinance. Opposed oners number 1172 dash V in the ordinance approving the vacation of the Western 120 feet of the 20 foot alley, abutting lots five through eight in block 16 of Fuller subdivision located at 1833 First Avenue South and 1850 Central Avenue, setting forth conditions for the vacation to become effective and providing an effective date and we do have one card on this item. Okay, council members, do we want the presentation? No move approval. Well somebody may I'm sorry second All right, let's go to public comment please Greg Tarraski please go to either podium states your name and address for the record and you have three minutes to address to the council Craig Tarraski 360 Central sweet 500 Representing the property owner an applicant. I'm here to answer any questions I have for presentation, but it's not necessary. Thank you. Okay, we've got a motion and a second. Seeing as no other council members wishing to speak, Clerk could you please open the machine for voting? Council members, please enter your votes. Seeing as all present council members have voted, Clerk, please tell you an announcement vote. Mr. Chair, I'm most sure to approve a gen you nine and eat three passes unanimously with councilmember Floyd being absent? Thanks, Cheryl. Thank you Okay, we're gonna go back to reports now and we've got an update from administrative girders on the state of emergency. Thank you chair and good morning city council. It's good to be with you this morning as you know Per the city code the administration is required to provide a brief update on the current state of emergency. As we discussed last time the current currently the state of emergency is being used for two purposes essentially. The first one is to waive permit fees on repair or demolition of storm damage properties and that is set to expire on June 30th. I did bring City Council just a few statistics for your awareness on that. So far on storm-related permit fees, we have waived $1.95 million in permit fees as of a few days ago and that was for 10,036 storm-related repair permits that have been issued. And we certainly understand that that's not a significant amount of money per permit, but we do hope it sends a signal to those property owners that we do care about the suffering and the difficulties that they've had through the storms. The second part of the state of emergency that we've been using is, as you know, not to enforce certain city code requirements related to domestic equipment for storm damaged homes or boat docks. You know, this is RVs in the front yard. Why homes are repaired or a boat dock was destroyed in the boats in the front yard. Interestingly enough on a complaint basis, we've only had 10 complaints related to domestic equipment post-stores. in the front yard. Interestingly enough on a complaint basis, we've only had 10 complaints related to domestic equipment, post storm. Two of those are specifically related to RVs in the front yard, where there's homes being repaired. Now obviously there's a lot of others, but we're not proactively enforcing those, but that's a really small number of complaints from the community, so the community seems to be very understanding of what we're doing. I just also want to just take one minute to thank Don Tyre, our building official for the workload that him and his team have been under post storm. And Joe Wall encodes compliance in his team. They've done a significant amount of work. Post-war, whether it was through the street teams or helping people with permit issues. So the workload has been very heavy in both those departments and just want to take a minute to thank them. That's our report this morning and we're happy to answer any questions. Councillor Members, any questions? I'm just thankful that you brought up Don and Joe Now I got to sit with Don yesterday and Mon the phone with Joe often and just Very thankful for all the work both them and and their departments are doing and so I'm very happy you brought that up Rob Okay We'll move to F3 a resolution adopting the 2025 Penalist County Multijera Strictional Local Mitigation Strategy. We're joined by Hannah Rebels. Welcome Hannah. Hello good morning. Happy Friday Eve. I am Hannah Rebels. I am theplain manager, and I am here to talk to you about the local mitigation strategy which we call the LMS. Every year I come before you guys, and I ask to adopt our annual update. It's a very quick process, we don't get into it, we all know the drill, but this year we are adopting the five-year update Which is much much bigger much more robust and a lot more information So I thought I'd give a little bit more of a description of what we do for the LMS and what it is and what it means to our city So it's a little bit longer this year. Mm-hmm. Did that work? Okay. So what is an LMS and why do we need it? So the county and us, we are required to have a hazard mitigation plan in order to have FEMA funding or FEMA grant funding in order to get any backup from FEMA. up from FEMA we have to have a hazard mitigation plan. Our LMS is what acts as our hazard mitigation plan not only with the county but with us. The LMS provides actions and updates to programs that are happening that we can use to reduce our hazards and the consequences from those hazards. It also provides us guidance on how to merge our mitigation plans countywide because there's a lot going on in the county, a lot of separate municipalities and communities and the LMS helps us merge those together and have one united front of mitigation and hazard planning. What we're adopting today is the five-year update of the countywide LMS and this five-year update focuses on the changes to the communities and the vulnerabilities that have happened in the past five years. The scope of the LMS is pretty large. It covers a lot of ground. Not only does it explain how we can implement our mitigation activities, but it gives us our risk assessment. It gives us potential funding sources, and it also explains how we found all of those risks in our planning. The third part of the LMS, the mitigation strategy, I think is the most important because it helps us become a more disaster resilient community. It helps minimize focuses on helping to minimize coastal flooding, which is what we're big on, and helps to minimize our riverine and inland flooding, which is also stormwater flooding. And then it also follows up with funding resources, which we all need. The purpose of the LMS and why we rely on it so much is it helps us reduce our risk. It helps increase public awareness and education. So a major part of the LMS is our PPI, our public program for public information. And it is, it's a very robust, it's a whole different section of it, and it actually goes to our CRS points as well, separately. We are one of the largest factors in the PPI, countywide, so the city is of St. Pete really holds their own ground when it comes to that. Like I said before the LMS lets us hold our grant eligibility not just for our residential elevations, but we have to have this in order to get HMPG funding and to get what we used to have as brick funding. It also maintains our CRS score, so we all want that. With that, my recommendation is that we adopt and approve this five year update and keep moving with our hazard mitigation planning. Any questions? Council Member Gabbert. Thank you chair. Real quickly Hannah. Thank you so much for all of your work on this and certainly I think that one of the lessons learned from the storms of last fall was the importance of collaboration with the county and you know that really is the work that you're bringing here to us today. Is that collaboration? Once upon a time, before I was on City Council, I set as a stakeholder on what we call the PPI, which was the program for public information. And it was a stakeholder group that came together to really do the work that resulted in this work product. But we did it at a very localized way. And so can you talk a little bit about how the decision that was made to kind of envelop our group into the county? I know that was before you were in your current role. Your predecessor was part of that. But can you talk about ways that you feel really we benefit by working more collaboratively with the county instead of being a standalone PPI. So it was 2020 when we decided to not do our own PPI and to join the counties, the LMS PPI. There's tons of benefits. It's not easy being a loan ranger so the more the merrierrier. We do quarterly meetings with everybody throughout the county and all their stakeholders. So not only do we get more ideas on how we can make our outreach better, but we also get the lovely opportunity to use what the county and everybody else does as ours as well. So we're not our own and we have to we don't hold the whole the whole weight of our PPI. We actually can use the counties and then we get we get a lot of information and a lot of ideas of what we can do locally as well by being part of that larger group. And I will say the communication that comes from the LMS out to the individuals that are involved, I think I kind of got caught up in their email list whenever I was a stakeholder. And so I still appreciate seeing all of that information, understanding what they're doing, how it could potentially apply to us, and kind of maybe even having a little bit of a forward thinking, you know, what's coming because that email list is very, very informational. So I still appreciate getting those and appreciate all the work that you do with the county because that collaboration is so critically important to our overall resiliency goals. So thank you for that and thank you for this report and with that do we have a motion yet? I will move approved. Second. Okay we have a motion and second. Seeing as no other council members wishing to speak. Clerk please open the machine for voting. Council members please any of your votes. Seeing as all present council members have voted. Clerk please tell you to announce the vote. Mr. Chair, motion to approve of Janine F3 passes unanimously with councilmember fully being absent. Hannah, thank you so much. Thank you. Okay, next we're going to go to a resolution approving the acquisition of a vacant property, generally located in northwest corner of Fort Street South and 18th Avenue South with the Stalk Creek Property Project. I'm going to throw it over to councilmember Driscoll before we go to Aaron. Thank you so much, Chair. And thank you to all of my colleagues who have supported this, up to this point. This is an idea that started way back in 2019. Sometimes, it's worth the wait because what we've ended up with today is a project that is even better than the idea we started with. I want to give big thanks to Mike Jeffress and to Claude Tancersley and his team and to Aaron for working so diligently to make this happen. This Salt Creek property, once it is in the city hands, is going to undergo a transformation that will create a park-like setting along with a pump station project that's actually going to help to reduce flooding at Lake McGory by pulling the water towards the bay and having salt creek going diagonally through the property creates an opportunity for us to maintain that part of the creek, which improves the water quality. There is a historic footbridge that goes over the creek that we can do a little project on and then of course the beautification throughout the park and the establishment of some natural area that can help with the flooding for the properties that are west of that. I mean it just goes on and on. This is going to be something that's beautiful and educational, and also a really big boost to our environmental efforts. So I couldn't be more proud, and I'm kind of glad it took us this long, because we got into, we got to such a great place. So thank you, thank you to everyone, and I'm very, very happy to move approval. Okay we have a motion in a second. Aaron do you think you still need a presentation to this point? Gina would you like or council member Jessica would you like a presentation still? I would not unless anyone else wants it. All right, we have a motion in a second. Seeing as no other council members wishing to speak, guys, great job on this. Very much appreciated. Awesome. Council member Driscoll is same to you. Thank you. Okay, we've got a motion in a second. Clerk, please open the machine for voting. Council members, please any revotes. Seeing as all present council members have voted, Clerk, please tell Ian announce the vote. Chair, I'm going to approve a genitom F4 passers-unanimously. OK, awesome. Congratulations. Seeing as all present council members have voted, clerk, please tell you an announce the vote. Chair, I'm going to approve of a genitom F4 passers-unitimously. Okay, awesome. Congratulations. Council member Driscoll again. Thank you for your work on that over the last three years, four years now, six. Here's a 19, I don't know how to count anymore. That's right, it's early. and just great job. It's going to be a great project. Okay, we're going to move into new business item. First one, H1 is me, respectfully requesting referral to the Health Energy, Resilience and Sustainability Committee, or other relevant committee discuss beautification, access points, jurors just jurisdictional responsibilities and ownership related to the planonial trail. And I entertain a motion for approval. We'll approve. Second. We have a motion in the second. Seeing as no council members wishing to speak. Clerk, could you please open the machine for voting? Council members, please enter your votes. Seeing as all present council members have voted, Clerk, please tell in and out the vote. Mr. Chair, motion to approve a gin out of H1 passes unanimously. Thank you, council members. Okay, H2 is also being respectfully requesting or referral to the committee of the whole to discuss how the Chamber of Commerce, the greenhouse procurement, the Office of Supplier Diversity worked together to create a coordinated workflow that supports St. Petersburg businesses and I entertain a motion for approval. Second. We have a motion and a second. Seeing no council members wishing to speak, Clerk, could you please open the machine for voting? Council members, please any of your votes. As all present council sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry and recommendations of the expanded ground penetrating radar survey and historical background research of oak lawn cemetery and with that chair I'd like to move for approval. Second. We have a motion in a second seeing as no council members wishing to speak. Clerk could you please open the machine for voting? Council members please any of your votes. Seeing as all present council members have voted clerk please tally and announce the vote. Chair, motion to approve the time. H3 passes unanimously. Okay. All right. We'll move into our second open forum. Clerk, do we have any speakers? No. No? Nothing on Zoom? No. Okay. Council members, any announcements? Council member Gibbons. Thank you, Chair. I'd just like to remind the community that this weekend on Saturday, we will have water safety day at Walter Fuller Pool. So we encourage everyone to bring their families out. We all know this Florida heat. We could all use a nice cool off. So it'll be a great opportunity for us to celebrate unity and community and to get wet. So thank you so much, Chair. Thank you. It's my home pool there. And so just a couple of quick things, council members. First, I just want to give a big shout out to Parks and Rec. They had Green Thumb Festival and the St. Anthony's Triathlon this past weekend. Let me tell you, I was at both. They were busy. 3,000 competitors, I think 5, 6, maybe 10,000 people more watching at St. Anthony's Triathlon, up and down, beach drive and to Snell Isle. And then obviously the bike goes almost all the way to the west side on first, or excuse me, on central. And then with green thumb on the west side, maybe the busiest I've ever seen it, it was incredible. And so for those of you that were the joint district one on the west side of the green thumb, thank you very much. But just want to give a big shout out to police, fire, parks, and rack, all the departments that were out there. Just two amazing events that showcase St. Petersburg in two very different ways. But as I was sitting there at the St. Anthony triathlon as the sun coming up. up man we live in just the best damn place on the face of the planet and so it was a great it was a great weekend to celebrate St. Petersburg and so just wanted to say a big thank you to Parks and Rec and all the other departments. Okay if there's nothing else for the good of the order council members City Council is adjourned thank you everybody. Thank you.