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BCC Minutes 06/22/2001 B (Budget Workshop)June 22,2001 BUDGET MEETING OF JUNE 22, 2001 OF THE BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONER LET IT BE REMEMBERED, that the Board of County Commissioners in and for the County of Collier, and also acting as the Board of Zoning Appeals and as the governing board(s) of such special districts as have been created according to law and having conducted business herein, met on this date at 9:06 a.m. in BUDGET SESSION in Building "F" of the Government Complex, East Naples, Florida, with the following members present: CHAIRMAN: VICE-CHAIRMAN: James D. Carter, Ph.D. Pamela S. Mac'Kie Jim Coletta Tom Henning ABSENT: ALSO PRESENT: Donna Fiala Tom Olliff, County Manager David C. Weigel, County Attorney Page 1 COLLIER COUNTY GOVERNMENT BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS FY 2002 BUDGET WORKSHOP SCHEDULE Thursday, June 21, 2001 - 9:00 a.m. General Overview Ad Valorem Tax Implications Debt Service Funds (200's) Trust Funds (600's) MSTD General Fund (111) Special Revenue Funds (100's) Enterprise Funds (400's) Internal Service Funds (500's) Gas Tax/Impact Fees Capital Funds (300's) Friday, June 22, 2001 - 9:00 a.m. General Fund (001) Overview Ad Valorem Tax Implications General Fund Operating Divisions: State Attorney Public Defender BCC County Attorney Management Offices Support Services Emergency Services Public Services Community Development/Environmental Services Transportation Airport Authority Operations Courts & Related Agencies - 3:00 p.m. Requested Review of General Fund Supported Capital Projects Constitutional Officers: _Property Appraiser Supervisor of Elections Clerk of Courts Sheriff's Office Monday, June 25, 2001 - 9:00 a.m. Wrap-up June 22,2001 CHAIRMAN CARTER: We're live. Thank you. Good morning. Welcome to the second day of budget workshops. Today we will be focusing on the General Fund. That's why we have so many smiling faces out here this morning. If you'd all join me by standing for the pledge of allegiance. (The pledge of allegiance was recited in unison.) CHAIRMAN CARTER: Good morning, Mr. Olliff, Mr. Smykowski. We're all ready. Good morning, Commissioners. You're all smiling. I see you have plenty of sugar up here. The caffeine is on its way. We ought to be really great here in about an hour. We -- for the schedule today, we will break at noon for lunch, 12 to 1, 1:15, then we will be back and complete our work -- workshop. We also have two time-certains, I believe, this morning. If you'd like to review those with us, Mr. Olliff. MR. OLLIFF: We can do that. I'll ask Mr. Smykowski to do that in just -- the last of the preliminary housekeeping items. I think if there's anybody here from the public who's interested in speaking, there are speaker slips out in the hallway, and if you could bring those up to Mr. Smykowski here we'll have public comment at the end of the workshop. Mr. Chairman, I think in addition to the two time-certains, the only -- the only comments I wanted to add this morning -- I promised you I wouldn't take you through another hour-long presentation before we got into the budget this morning, but I did want to make you aware that in the budget that you will be reviewing today that as your office of management and budget staff and the county manager's office and your division of administrators reviewed all of these budget requests, do keep in mind that the budget you see before you does not include $23,211,000 worth of capital that was requested. So in terms of General Fund, in particular capital, there's always -- this Page 2 June 22, 2001 probably more for the new commissioners -- there's always a tremendous amount of request and need that is out there especially for General Fund related capital that is never in your recommended budget. And as well on the operating side, there was better than $3 1/2 million of operating requests that were not included in this budget as well. So the budget that is actually being presented to you today is just shy of $27 million short of what the actual total requests were that came in, and I just thought that was good for the board's knowledge before we actually started reviewing particular department budgets. With that, Mr. Smykowski. CHAIRMAN CARTER: So you telling me, Mr. Olliff, that you put the knife to 27 million before we ever saw it? MR. OLLIFF: We had to bring the mop in to the floor. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I would imagine. Well, I heard a lot of screaming out of your office, so I didn't venture in. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Mr. Chairman-- for the record, Michael Smykowski, budget director. In addition to scheduling changes we noted yesterday with the State Attorney and Public Defender starting our workshop this morning, at three o'clock, again, the courts would like to be heard at that point based on the judges' schedules. In addition, the Airport Authority has requested a 10:30 time certain. I believe some of their board members were planning on attending. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. MR. SMYKOWSKI: With that, Mr. Chairman, on pages A-2 and A-3 are a macro summary of the General Fund. On the left-hand side are the appropriations, on the right-hand side the revenues. Again, the General Fund are services provided on a county-wide basis, and this would include residents of the City of Naples, City of Marco Island, and City of Everglades paying into this fund. We have Page 3 June 22, 2001 a summary before you here on the le~hand side, and that will be followed -- each individual divisional or major departmental break has a separate individual summary. For instance, the board agency or each of the county manager divisions with a list of expanded services. So with that I would like you to mm, please, to pages A-38 and 39, and we'll here from the State Attorney initially. They have three expanded service requests, but overall their budget requests still reflects a net decrease of 5.1 percent, and Mr. Perlman's here from the State Attorney's Office. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, unless there's any questions on that, I know Mr. Perlman came down from Fort Myers and usually is kind enough to come and answer any questions the board might have. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I was only glad to see him here so I could get to say publicly how much we appreciate the outstanding job that the State Attorney's Office is doing in our community. MR. PERLMAN: Well, thank you very much. Dennis Perlman, executive director for the State Attorney's Office on behalf of Mr. D'Alessandro who is traveling in Orlando today for some Florida Bar commitments. We appreciate the working relationship that we've had with the board and -- and, Commissioner, those kind comments I'll relate to Mr. D'Alessandro. Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Any questions on behalf of the board in regards to the State Attorney's Office? COMMISSIONER HENNING: None. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Seeing none, we thank you very much, sir, for being here. MR. PERLMAN: Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: And appreciate your continued hard work in this region. MR. PERLMAN: Thank you. Page 4 June 22, 2001 MR. SMYKOWSKI: Thank you. Next we'll turn to the Public Defender. They have two staff representatives here. It's still on A- 38. It's the second item on your list. here is a 2.8 percent increase. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: service page. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Public Defender. sir. Their budget as represented We don't have an expanded That is correct. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: MR. SMYKOWSKI: Correct. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: There are none for the Basically CPI? Also appreciate your great work, MR. JACOBS: Thank you very much. Robert Jacobs, Public Defender, and Marlene Parrots, my assistant. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And, ma'am. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Good morning. Commissioners, any questions for the Public Defender? COMMISSIONER HENNING: None. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Hearing none, seeing none, no nods. I would say thank you very much for being here. It will be the easiest audience you've ever had to face. MR. JACOBS: Thank you so much. CHAIRMAN CARTER: You're welcome. I believe are next, sir. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes, sir. The judges budget typically small minor operating expenses within each of the circuit and county court judges. There's a decrease of 3.6 percent in circuit. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: What page is that? MR. SMYKOWSKI: A-38 again. CHAIRMAN CARTER: A-38. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I'm sorry. Circuit Court Judges Page 5 June 22, 2001 CHAIRMAN CARTER: Item 3 left. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Circuit has a net decrease of 3.6 percent. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: COMMISSIONER HENNING: accept it. How is that? Well, don't ask. Let's just MR. SMYKOWSKI: It may have had a one-time capital items for replacement furniture or computer equipment in their -- in their request in the adopted '01 budget. CHAIRMAN CARTER: No questions. county judges? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: COMMISSIONER COLETTA: COMMISSIONER HENNING: Let me ask the board, Same, no questions. No questions. No questions. MR. SMYKOWSKI: With that, Commissioners, we'll turn to pages A-6 and A-7 for the board office, the county attorney, and other general administrative. The expanded services are proposed on page A-7, an additional executive secretary in the board office to provide dedicated clerical support for each county commissioner. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: The only comment I have about that is I think this is wonderful. It's a great idea. I just want to use this forum to get to say to Tom, to his HR staff, to whomever that we continue to call these executive secretary positions. They're really much more than that. If they're merely secretaries -- you know, I don't think we'd even need them, but they are more, in fact, more like aides, administrative aides. There needs to be a new position, in my judgment, created for them to classify them as the sort of legislative aides that they really are. They are much, much more than secretaries. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I concur, Commissioner Mac'Kie. I don't know what the Board of County Commissioners -- each commissioner would do if we did not have associates that work with Page 6 June 22, 2001 us on the basis that they do every day. I know all of us receive anywhere from 50 to 75 e-mails a day alone plus the correspondence, plus the phone calls that come in, and these people direct a lot of the people that inquired to us to the proper sources and immediately get results. So they are like our right hands, and I don't know what I would do without my associate. I believe that I could not function. We grew up together in this job, and I will tell you we value them so much, so I agree, Commissioner. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, we just recently went through an internal job classification and salary range study, and I think Ms. Lemar can give you a little update. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Excellent. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Hi. Joanne Lemar. The results of DMG will reflect the additional duties and responsibilities in those positions, and they will stand out from the rest of the executive secretary class. That will become effective October 1st. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Good. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: That's -- I don't have any questions. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Mr. Coletta. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Yes, I do. I want to question the allotment that we have for the commissioners for mileage and also for travel. Ms. Filson, would you bring us up to where we are now when the last changes took place. MS. FILSON: Yes, Sue Filson, for the record. I have budgeted $1,200 for travel reimbursement since 1995. For each individual's travel it's $2,500 and we've had that since 2000. Prior to that from '94 to '99 it was 2,000, then we increased it to 2,500. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I'd like to bring a couple points Page 7 June 22, 2001 up to the board. One, on the mileage allotment that we have, I believe you said it was $1,200 for the year? MS. FILSON: A hundred dollars a month, that's correct. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: If you take a look at the map over there on the wall to our right, the audience's left, you'll see what District 5 looks like in relation to the rest of the districts. It's 85 percent of the county. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Is yours the yellow one? That's all one district? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: That's all my district, 85 percent. It includes Immokalee. It includes Everglades City. My mileage is in excess of 300 miles a month, easy, and for me to cut back to what is allotted for the commission as a whole, if I was given the whole thing, it would be totally inadequate. I would be unable to serve the constituents in the rural areas I should. Two, maybe I'm out there quite a few more times than past commissioners have been, but this seems to be what the public wants. I'd like to see a serious consideration on the mileage allotment that we have for, number one. We'll take them one issue at a time. Let's handle that one first. CHAIRMAN CARTER: What do you need, Commissioner? Tell me what you need. I will support -- COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I would like to see for District 5, especially -- and you people can come in where ever you think your needs are. I'd like to see an allotment of 400 miles per month minimum. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And what does that do? How does that translate to dollars? Somebody do the math. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: COMMISSIONER HENNING: gasoline reimbursements? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Well, if we used it. And you're talking about Well, yeah, the mileage. Page 8 June 22, 2001 Everything's documented. CHAIRMAN CARTER: It's whatever the -- whatever the reg is, Commissioner. MS. FILSON: It's 29 cents a mile. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Twenty-nine cents a mile times -- MR. OLLIFF: It actually works out to about $1,400 during the course of the year. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I think we could probably take it out of each others -- the rest of the boards' travel allotment and -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: You can reduce mine. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Yeah. MR. OLLIFF: Actually, I think if you gave Ms. Filson the flexibility to be able to use from one account to the next, I don't think ever between the five accounts there's ever been an issue at the end of any given fiscal year. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: But Commissioner Coletta is traveling a whole lot more than anybody else ever has. CHAIRMAN CARTER: That's true, and commissioners are traveling more in terms of legislative business than they ever have been before, and based on the results that came out of Tallahassee last year it's beginning to pay off, so as long as we have the flexibility within the accounts, fine. If you -- and I guess we could always do a budget amendment if we had to -- to do that. MS. FILSON: I have a separate travel fund specifically for FAC, and in that fund I have $2,000. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: What I would like to do is my district is extremely compact and not a travel problem. How about if we cut my mileage in half and put that balance in Commissioner Coletta's. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: The problem is is the total mileage allotted is only 1,200 miles for all the commissioners. Page 9 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER HENNING: Well, and Tom Olliffjust said it would only be $1,400 if you brought it up before -- MR. OLLIFF: It's not 1,200 miles. It's actually $1,200. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: $1,200, forgive me. MR. OLLIFF: And so based on 400 miles per month reimbursement rate comes out to about $1,400 annually, and I'm just suggesting to you that there is enough flexibility within our budgeting rules to allow Ms. Filson to go ahead and use travel monies from one commissioner's travel allotment to another, and if that's -- that's something the board's comfortable with, I don't think you need an adjustment to your budget in order to accommodate that. MR. SMYKOWSKI: That would give you each 4,800 -- 4,800 miles, $400 miles a month. MS. FILSON: Actually-- actually, with the individual travel budgets we have project codes, so we can't go over that, so it would require budget amendments. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I'm sorry, but somebody check the math here. If it's -- MR. SMYKOWSKI: Four hundred miles a month at 29 cents a mile is $116, times 12 months is 1392. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Okay. So to make this comfortable, could we just move half of my travel money into Commissioner Coletta's fund -- MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes. We can do that, and that will solve the project accounting issue -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: -- because of the difference in our districts. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I do appreciate that. I don't want to short any other commissioner. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, it doesn't bother me any. I mean, Page 10 June 22, 2001 if you need help from my -- from mine, you have it because mine's compacted just like Commissioner Mac'Kie's so ... COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And the -- I do appreciate that. The other issue, of course, that I wanted to bring up was the travel allotment that we have now. I have been very active as far as going to Tallahassee. I've been involved in the certification program from the Florida Association of Counties and also to have taken quite an interest in emergency management, been training -- attending seminars in different places so that at a point in time that this training is needed I'll be available -- be able to serve. I'm going to be short in this year by about $300 for the planning that I have, and I kind of hope that one of my fellow commissioners might have it in their travel budget to help me see it until October. CHAIRMAN CARTER: We'll take it out of Commissioner Mac'Kie's. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: It's easier. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: That sounds fair enough. COMMISSIONER HENNING: COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: don't think I've used any. Second. I mean, have I used any of it? I COMMISSIONER HENNING: Commissioner Coletta, just a suggestion; if you tie it around a vacation, then you only have to take out half of it. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Well, I already cancelled my trip to Alaska and my trout fishing trip to New York so I could stay here, and so there is no vacations this year, but I'll make it up next year. MR. OLLIFF: And we can handle that current-year change through budget amendment and still stay within your total approved bottom-line budget for this year. MS. FILSON: And, Commissioner Mac'Kie, you've used $25 Page 11 June 22, 2001 so far. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. Commissioner Coletta? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: for putting up with me. Comfortable with that, Very comfortable. Thank you CHAIRMAN CARTER: No -- no problem. the road, sir. Any other questions for Ms. Filson? move to the county attorney. MR. SMYKOWSKI: County attorney, Mr. Weigel. There are two positions requested totaling $97,200, a legal assistant and a legal secretary. They are outlined on page A-7. In addition, there is $50,000 in offsetting -- in offsetting revenue. We discussed yesterday from -- from TDC given the amount of legal work and technical issues that the county attorney has been involved in in those. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: So net bottom line this is a $47,000 increase, or is it really 1507 MR. SMYKOWSKI: No, it's a net. That would net to forty- seven two in the expanded. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: That's great news because, frankly, I don't have any questions about whether or not this is necessary. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: We are building other departments for services rendered in all cases? MR. WEIGEL: We either have indirect billing with the General Fund services which is really an accounting measure that Mike Smykowski and Tom do. But for enterprise funds and development services, we have a direct relationship in regard to the funding they -- the funding they provide toward our office with the services we are providing on an annual basis to them. And the same is -- the same is now to be true with the tourist tax -- the Tourist Development We will get you on Seeing none, let's Page 12 June 22, 2001 Council. As you know, we provided a lot of service and up to this point have not been factored in to the service factor of payout which is a legal possibility, so we thought we'd bring it up to you this year. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And when we do right-of-way acquisitions that would have to do with utilities and transportation. MR. WEIGEL: Yes. And that's an interesting point you make. For instance, the legal assistant in our budget as an expanded position is a request actually from transportation to us, and so although we had chatted in terms with Norm of "if you can fund that, it's income to our office" since it's all part of a General Fund part of the government operations, it's actually not an income to our office. It's still coming from the General Fund, but to the extent that there are any further-- I see where you're taking us. Are there any further opportunities for us to approach you in the future in regard to utilities, we'll do so. I think we're pretty tight right now because we work pretty close with Mike on that. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Any other questions of the county attorney? Thank you very much, Mr. Weigel. MR. WEIGEL: Thank you, all. MR. SMYKOWSKI: The last item is other general administrative on that page. It's reflecting a large increase, but it's pretty easily explained. Actually, this is an aggregation of things that -- such as the annual county audit. We also make the payments to the Naples Community Redevelopment Agency through the tax increment finance district, and as the value of that property -- properties in downtown increase, that increased $366,000. The computer leases, the board approved computer lease program this year. That was done by budget amendment. That's 209,000 and we've also as part of the motor pool capital recovery, rather than budgeting that within each individual department, as part of the Page 13 June 22, 2001 change in methodology there we're just aggregating that in a single place in the General Fund, and that's $215,000. CHAIRMAN CARTER: So instead of spreading it around, you just put it under one. MR. SMYKOWSKI: That is correct. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Much more straightforward. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Makes a lot more sense to me. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Pages A-10 and 11 are the management offices, the first of which is the county manager's office. There are no proposed expandeds. Board-related costs are reflecting a major decrease. That's primarily due to shifting the cost of the agenda printing to public information office where that is administered. In the office of management budget, there is an expanded service requests. As part of the opening remarks, Mr. Olliff indicated we are in the process of purchasing a new financial system for approximately $2 3/4 million. Our consultant retained by the clerk to assist us in the implementation of this process had recommended that staff add 12 positions equivalent for the implementation of that. On the county manager's agency we've added three, and one is in budget, one is in purchasing, and one is in human resources. In addition to that I've also provided some survey information. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: That's really interesting. MR. SMYKOWSKI: -- when you see the relative dollars per analyst to some of our comparable counties. I also just did a little research going back to approximately 1989. When I started there were five OMB staff members. With this position there would be eight. That's an increase of 60 percent. The county budget at that point was $209 million and as proposed were in the $758 million. So it's grown by 261 percent and, obviously, much more complex. We're also getting involved in much more technical issues in terms of now that we're going to be financing a whole host of capital projects Page 14 June 22, 2001 and improvements. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Looks like Sarasota does a whole lot of analyzing, so if I can figure that out, 17 positions. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Indeed. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: So no problems on there. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I have no problem. Thank you. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Thank you. That will move us to A-14, the support services division, and Mr. Dublis and Ms. Lemar will walk you through those. There are the expanded lists beginning on page A- 15. MR. DUBLIS: Chris Dublis, for the record. The support services are from A- 14 to A- 16. It includes 13 positions with the total expanded request of $1,007,200. I can either go through each expanded request, or we can just open the floor to questions. What is the pleasure of the board? CHAIRMAN CARTER: My question, sir, would be as it may apply to any area. Can any of these positions be contracted versus being permanent positions? Has there been a cost-benefit analysis done on this to determine what is more cost effective for the county? MS. LEMAR: Yes. We have done a cost-benefit analysis, and in each case it is more economical for us to hire the staff. Financially it makes more sense as well as the level of service that we'll be able to provide. Joanne Lemar. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you. Commissioner Coletta. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Yes, two questions. I noticed there was quite an increase in human resources and real property and also facility management -- facilities management. Could you explain that, why the increase? MS. LEMAR: Sure. Looking at human resources, we have a large increase in the current budget. That is related to a new career development program that came on-line this year. Part of the work Page 15 June 22, 2001 force assessment study said that our employees wanted to have a career development program that we needed to develop bench strengths so that when people are promoted they are well prepared. We began that program this year, and the total cost is reflected in next year's budget. That represents a $52,000 increase. In addition, there's a $36,000 increase for document imaging. We are trying to get away from pushing paper and becoming more electronic. That initiative was started this year, however, the cost of maintenance will kick in next year. That's $36,000. Also the printing budget has increased $12,000. We will be reprinting our practices and procedures manual, updating that so our employees have a current document of what our practices are. Now, let's see. Also a $14,000 increase for replacing computers that will no longer meet the county's standards. The speed and memory will be insufficient. And as far as the expanded position, as Mike mentioned, there is $49,000 for an analyst to assist with the FMS project implementation. We did do a cost-benefit analysis, and it made more sense to hire someone to be part of that team from cradle to grave. It will -- they'll be working on the work-flow analysis re-engineering, the implementation, running the systems parallel, as well as the training. The project's going to take about two years, and at such time they would have the institutional knowledge from going through that process as well. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: In public information, 68 percent -- 66.8 percent. Excuse me. MS. LEMAR: A lot of the increases in public information are related to the agenda printing being shifted from the county manager's budget into public information. That's almost $85,000. In addition, two new staff were hired this year. So the total cost of those employees are reflected in next year's budget. You just approved a few meetings ago a video specialist -- video production analyst to Page 16 June 22, 2001 produce many more shows this summer and work on -- MR. OLLIFF: Those were both done under executive summary at the board and primarily in response to the board request for additional activities on 54 and additional activities in terms of public information campaigns from this -- this county government in terms of public-education-type efforts, and so we had to beef up your PIO staff in order to just keep up with the board's demand for better public information. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I don't have a problem with that at all, Mr. Olliff. My only question is, have we budgeted enough to do the job that I feel personally that is the key to the success of-- of county government, and that is to provide information, education, and awareness of what we are, how we operate, and what the benefits are to each taxpayer out there for what they're paying us, this is what we're doing with your money. So, you know, it's been a high concern of mine. So are we going to be okay in terms of having the horses to get the job done? MR. OLLIFF: I believe you've got the horses. I will tell you that we are borrowing stables from everybody else, though. I think in terms of production capability for your channel and everything else, we have had made a conscious decision to run very, very lean, but we have also made a decision to try and work this summer with FGCU that has a state-of-the-art production studio, and so for a lot of the production work that we're going to do, rather than trying to purchase and duplicate, frankly, a lot of equipment that's in the public arena already, we're simply going to try and have the staff here, have the production equipment there, and see if we can't make that kind of relationship work. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, I admire you for that. We'll just make sure we have the staff that can do what needs to be done, and if you feel comfortable with that and can deliver, I'll be all right with Page 17 June 22, 2001 that. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I've had many comments where Channel 54 has been a great educational of how the county operates and how we spend our money and a lot of positive comments on that. MR. OLLIFF: I'm absolutely amazed at the amount of people that watch that on a regular basis and will stop me regularly and tell me about programming on that channel. COMMISSIONER HENNING: The -- the GIS, how does it come into play or why? MS. LEMAR: It will be -- there are three expanded requests in next year's budget for GIS. They will be dealing with managing the database. They will take the property appraiser's base map and then layer the additional maps or layers that Jim talked about yesterday on top. So you'll -- we'll have people out surveying and then also coming back and putting that data into the database managing that. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Who benefits from that? What I'm trying to get at, should that be billed out? MS. LEMAR: It is billed out. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. I just didn't see that here. MS. LEMAR: Yeah. There's a corresponding bill to all of the users who benefit from GIS. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Under the revenue, Commissioner, for information technology there's $164,300 from -- that's listed on page A-14 that would be offsetting revenue associated with those positions. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I see. MR. SMYKOWSKI: And, Commissioner Coletta, you had asked about department of real estate, the additions there, and we're talking about having the horses in place to do the job, and given the aggressive road campaign that we're -- that's currently underway and Page 18 June 22, 2001 needs to continue, obviously, acquisition of right-of-way and easements in all those corridors as well as for the utility projects is necessary, and we felt we need to shore up that area to insure that the right-of-way is acquired so as not to delay those necessary projects. MS. LEMAR: That cost is offset by $103,000 which is billed back to the capital projects, so it would be paid out of the revenue source for-- for the road construction or the utility acquisition of right-of-way. MR. OLLIFF: I'll tell you, this was one of the key factors in our ability to actually get those road construction projects that are under construction today. Under construction was trying to go back and determine what is the critical path for getting projects built and realizing that at the very beginning of the process. If we don't have enough resource in buying the property that we have to buy, because that is a -- Commissioner Mac'Kie knows, it is an extremely tedious process under Florida law to try and obtain property, and if we're going to be successful both in utilities, transportation, and now in our aggressive stormwater program, we're going to have to have the real property horses to be able to go out and get the property we need. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And, of course, that would also affect the county attorney's budget. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Which is why we have that new position for an eminent domain lawyer, basically. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Any other questions, Commissioner Henning? COMMISSIONER HENNING: No questions. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. Thank you very much, Ms. Lemar. MR. OLLIFF: Chairman, we did promise you that as we went through this budget that we would highlight those remaining questions from Commissioner Fiala's budget comments, questions, Page 19 June 22, 2001 and suggestions list and, Mike, if you'll take us to the one question on support services. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Sure. There was a question about expanding custodial service to existing buildings that already have service in place and discussions with Mr. Camp in certain areas where we're beefing up the services that are provided. For instance, additional cleaning of the library restrooms during the day rather than just at the end of the day. And while it's a little abnormal to see an existing custodial service associate with an existing building being expanded, that is enhancement to the existing level of service that is provided, and that is why it is reflected as such. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Is there that much of a need? MR. CAMP: For the record, Skip Camp. Absolutely, especially in the -- the main Naples Library and your new library. The new library's actually going to have a limited food service and all day long those two facilities particularly are used heavily. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Right. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you. Can we move now to emergency services, please. MR. SMYKOWSKI: That's on pages A-18 and A-19. CHAIRMAN CARTER: If you'll notice, if the camera swings, half the audience has left to go back to work. MR. DUBLIS: Chris Dublis, again, for the record. Emergency services have expanded request in emergency management which is a request for half a position to be taken from 118 and be placed in the General Fund. There's a request for a helicopter pilot, night vision goggles, and associated training. This is dictated by safety concerns. In EMS there is a request for one warehouse technician, a Secretary I, money for document imaging, e-government web development, which is associated with the IT request, and health benefits for part- time EMS personnel. Finally, in the Ochopee Fire District there is a Page 20 June 22, 2001 request for conversion of two part-time firefighters to two full-time firefighters. The total request is $390,700. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Any questions? COMMISSIONER HENNING: What is the purpose of night vision goggles? CHAIRMAN CARTER: To see what you're doing at night. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Fire situation. COMMISSIONER HENNING: We have a fire department. MR. OLLIFF: No. This is for helicopter operations, and I think your pilot can give you some great examples. MR. BURTSCHER: Good morning. If you're flying out through the Everglades, which is almost no light at night, to fly in reference you need either ground reference or a horizon. If there're no lights, there is no horizon. If you have the capability of night vision goggles which is basically giving you the light intensity of the ground, you will be able to see a horizon or structures and everything so you're going to be able to have a horizon to fly. MR. OLLIFF: We get a number of calls out of the middle of Alligator Alley in the middle of the night, and if you've ever been out beyond the city lights out on the Alley in the middle of the night, you know how dark it can get, and I consider this one a safety issue for us. I believe it's something that certainly the sheriffs department pilots have for their evening flying and-- and we were concerned, frankly, with our helicopter and the investment and, frankly, the personnel on board trying to go out there and land in the middle of the pitch-black dark. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Only question I have, and this is not that I'm against it at all, I would like to know about the health benefits for part-time employees. Not just reflecting EMS, but does that now cover a wider base? COMMISSIONER HENN1NG: Can I answer that? Page 21 June 22, 2001 MR. OLLIFF: Go right ahead. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Our part-time EMS employees are EMTs they work more than 40 hours a week, and their salary is not all that great. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I know. COMMISSIONER HENNING: But this will, you know, being that they're working over 40 hours a week they don't have time to get a full-time job that help pays insurance. So my opinion I think this is one of the better things that we're doing is providing insurance for a classification that is part-time, but actually they are working more than -- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Really what we call part-time full time. MR. OLLIFF: Well, our rules are for someone working less than 30 hours a week they do not qualify for benefits, but in this case most of the employees we have are on-call type employees, and that's what qualifies them as being or their schedules don't qualify them for being full-time employees but the number of hours actually puts them over that almost on a regular basis. Frankly, this is one of those things that we looked at and thought it was the right thing to do for those employees. They've been with us for years. They're working, generally, more than 30 hours a week, and we need to pay them the benefits. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Great investment. Thank you. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Commissioner, there were a couple questions, again, from Commissioner Fiala's budget committee. In regard to the warehouse technician, do we need one and couldn't light-duty employees do that? Mr. Page, I think if you wouldn't mind addressing that. MR. PAGE: For the record, Jeff Page, Director of EMS Ops. Commissioners, what we found with that particular position is is that Page 22 June 22, 2001 when we brought in part-time employees to do that job, we're actually paying overtime in the field to cover them. So in looking at that it actually became cheaper. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Answers it. MR. SMYKOWSKI: And there was another question, "Do we need another helicopter pilot? Shouldn't the existing positions be sufficient? Are the helicopter pilots flying at their FAA limit presently?" CHAIRMAN CARTER: I have no problems with that. Unless another question by the board, It's just pure logic to me. MR. OLLIFF: It was a coverage issue for us, frankly, if you look at a 24-7 operation and the number of pilots and the total number of hours we had available, we don't have enough coverage, and this was the number of pilot hours we needed to provide full-time coverage. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I am told that we're doing routine transportation between Marco and NCH, is that true, with the helicopter? MR. BURTSCHER: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER HENNING: What's the purpose of that when, my opinion, you should be doing that from the ground? MR. PAGE: We are looking at that. I think what happened initially was when the construction was going on on 951 it was a time element. Certainly, in an emergency situation that's warranted. Whether that will continue with routines, that's something we're discussing now. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Well, in that case is it warranted for another pilot being that hopefully we're going to adjust that? I mean, I don't know how many calls you do routine transports from Marco Island. MR. PAGE: I think the issue in talking to Anton just this Page 23 June 22, 2001 morning about it, is that that extra pilot or the part-time pilot would be the one to cover the vacation, the extra hours that the pilots work. They work over 40 hours. They're scheduled to work over 40 hours, so that was the issue there. MR. OLLIFF: And that issue regarding non-emergency transports has been brought up to me this week as well from another source, so we'll get you a response back on that because we need a response on that, but the coverage issue is going to be necessary whether we're making those transports or not. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I don't know about that other source, but that's been told to me from my knowledge of it for a long time. The -- we had a brief conversation about charges for routine transport for NCH and Joe Blow taxpayer being a different charge and -- or a different fee. Can you -- can you explain that? We didn't get time to finish that conversation. MR. PAGE: In the negotiated contract with NCH and then we subsequently changed the billing ordinance that an interfacility transport between NCH facilities there would be -- they only pay Medicare's Inflation Index Charge, which is less. I will tell you that we're looking at the billing ordinance right now, and we'll be coming back to the board to reflect the change. Medicare's rates are changing in July. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Are they going up? MR. PAGE: In some cases less, in some cases more, but I think that the billing ordinance as you see it now will change and will address the issue that you had with that. COMMISSIONER HENNING: What about comparable counties? Are we in line? Do we know that? MR. PAGE: Well, I know that Lee County has already adopted Medicare's rates, and I believe that's where we will head also, but we're -- we're less than most counties, I'll tell you that. Just like we're Page 24 June 22, 2001 less as far as the taxes. We charge less for transports. COMMISSIONER HENNING: My only point is, is the taxpayer -- I truly believe in user fee, and the taxpayer is supplementing this and not everybody uses it, although it is there for their use in case they have a need, and I don't know how everybody else feels, but I would like a study of what the other counties are charging and maybe do an adjustment of our fee schedule. MR. PAGE: The county manager requested benchmarks, and we've already prepared that. Mr. Store has it, so we'll be coming back to you with that information. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And just to let everybody know that there are a lot of things that were offsetting the cost for NCH, and we're looking at it this year, and this is just another one that we are doing for the not-for-profit. MR. OLLIFF: Jeff, roughly -- I'm sorry. Jeff, when are you coming back with a revised rate schedule? MR. PAGE: Medicare's revised rates should be out in July, so I would imagine when the board gets back in September we'll have that. MR. OLLIFF: So we will provide the board with some options, and we'll also have those comparative numbers for you from other counties so that you can make some decisions about your ambulance rates. MR. SMYKOWSKI: That would still give you the opportunity to adjust the mix between ad valorem and fee-supported EMS before you adopt your final mileage rates at the public hearings in September as well. The timing actually works quite nicely. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Thank you, Mr. Page. MR. PAGE: There was a plan so ... MR. OLLIFF: Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Any other questions by the board? Page 25 June 22, 2001 Let's move on. MR. SMYKOWSKI: That moves us to public service division which is pages A-22 and 23. MS. STONE: Good morning, Winona Stone. Public services expanded request totaled almost 4.1 million. That's representative of four departments expanded request. Domestic Animal Services has requested 8 1/2 full-time equivalent positions. Three of those positions, excuse me, are animal control officer positions. In association with the expanded position request, there are two vans requested outfitted with the necessary equipment for those out-in-the- field officers, and also operating expenses. The library's expanded request is for 12 positions, 10 of those will be for the new North Regional Library. Also there's a little over $200,000 requested, and that's primarily operating expenses, electricity, utilities, and that kind of thing for the new building. Turn to page A-24, the beach and water parks have requested three positions. Those are two park rangers and one park ranger/naturalist position. They requested a truck to be shared with those park rangers and tractor and other heavy equipment. And then the Public Health Department for enhanced public health programs, 2.9 million. And that represents the 4.1 million public services expanded request. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, I will indicate to you that the one public speaker slip that we do have regards public-services-related issues, so you -- at the conclusion of this portion of our budget review, you may want to take that public speaker. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I will do that. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Mr. Chairman, there were also two questions from Commissioner Fiala's budget response regarding possibly paring down new positions in the library, if that were feasible. And a question, whether or not we need to hire all the DAS, Page 26 June 22, 2001 Domestic Animal Service, employees this year. And, Mr. Jones. MR. JONES: Good morning. John Jones, public library. Public libraries have very few benchmarks that are nationally recognized, but one of the benchmarks that is recognized is called Circulation Per Employee. It's a very simple formula. You just take the number of employees you have and you divide them into your circulation to get some idea of the workload that's being turned over in the system. The national mean is about one employee to every 14,000 circulations. In the State of Florida, it's about one employee to every 16,000 circulations. Since 1994-95, we have maintained about a one employee to every 28,000 circulations, and as one of the former commissioners pointed out, that just shows how good we really are. The new building based upon demographic studies of the neighborhoods will indicate that we will circulate about a half million volumes during the first year, so that basis, the number of employees that we asked to operate the system. Further, the regional system was designed to do away with Building 4, neighborhood libraries. The square footage is approximately the same, but the number of employees needed to operate it is only about 60 percent. So the selling point of building the regional when I first presented this four years ago was that in the global perspective, the long-term perspective, the taxpayer saves a good deal of money while at the same time being able to receive a level of service that is acceptable in our environment. We will point out to each of you that the library is consistently one of the top-ranked programs that you offer. I think if you think in your own lives as commissioners, you very seldom hear negative comments about your public library service. It's a good service. It's definitely not overstaffed. There are those people who automatically just assume that because you ask for people that you're overstaffed. Page 27 June 22, 2001 In Collier County the citizens demand a certain level of service of which we try to provide. CHAIRMAN CARTER: for you to speak this morning. Mr. Jones, I know how difficult it is I feel the passion in your voice for that system. I couldn't agree with you more. I am totally satisfied with how you run the library system. I know you wouldn't come here and ask for one nickel that you didn't need. Everyone is excited about the north library. I would say this morning I bet when we build the one for the south we will not be able to staff it as cost effective as we can this one just by the sheer fact of cost continuing going up. You've done an outstanding job, and I would never quarrel with your budget for a moment, sir. MR. JONES: Thank you, sir. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Mr. Jones, I do have a question. MR. JONES: Yes. COMMISSIONER HENNING: literacy program? MR. JONES: Yes, sir. Beginning -- literacy has always been a national project of the public library system. President Bush made literary everyone's responsibility through his wife and through his mother. Even the governor of the State of Florida has publicly stated that literacy is our number one objective in the State of Florida. We must improve it. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Do you think we can get them to pay for it then? MR. JONES: No, sir. We've actually -- they did -- there's quite a bit of grant money. You have no -- the literacy program has so far run purely upon private donations. The amount of the materials used by the literacy program are all provided privately funded. The literacy program is the project of the Marco Island Friends of the Library. Three years ago we accepted a grant. We accepted a Is the outreach specialist for the Page 28 June 22, 2001 donation of $ ! 50,000 from a private family to establish this program of which the first two years we paid for out of that money. The balance of the money we used to buy children's books for the system. Now, many library systems choose to teach. In other words, if you go to Broward County, they've got five teachers on staff that conduct classes in the public library setting. I agree with you, that is not my role. What we do is we train tutors. We organize those tutors to where they can work within the business environment or the public environment to help employees of Collier County learn to read and speak English. At the present time I have, I think, three employees of Collier County that we have trained tutors, matched them with tutors, and begin teaching them the English language. We have working agreements with the hospital. We have working agreements with most of the hotels. We go into that environment. We train tutors. That's all we do. We train the tutors. We facilitate, which, I think, is the role of county government or the role that I view the library as a facilitator, and we offer assistance to the citizens to make them better taxpayers. Our commitment to that is one employee. That's all it will ever be you. Will not ever see me coming back here asking you for assistance. You will not see me asking for support money. Our commitment is one employee for the entire county. We plan next year to merge this into the Marco Information Referral Service which is going to be up and running that will make most of the manager's obligations of providing on-site locational information for all counter services. COMMISSIONER HENNING: It's a much-needed program in this county because more and more we have immigrants coming to Collier County, more and more every year, and my only question would be if the -- if it's the benefit of tourism through the hotels Page 29 June 22, 2001 shouldn't that be funded by tourist tax. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Not legal. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Probably not legal, Commissioner, but I concur, and I think this is a public-private partnership. If I'm listening to Mr. Jones, I think there is some revenue streams from this I see over on the revenue side and I continue to encourage that and in my judgment don't hesitate to ask us if that program needs to be expanded in a way that we can help from the governmental side to be a partner with the private side to do the outreach. As the President keeps saying -- and I couldn't agree more -- "Let not one child be left behind," and we're going to be doing everything we can to meet that goal. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Well, just to -- just to shock everybody, this is -- this is -- I'm not going to object to this, but it's not something that has my strong support to be honest with you. If it were a pure literacy program that means teaching people to read as opposed to teaching speakers of other languages to speak English, then I would be more supportive of it. MR. JONES: It is the reading also. They work one on one with a tutor. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I know, but I checked it out, and I know how many of them are actually learning to read when English is their first language. It's mostly speakers of other languages learning to speak English. That's good and that's fine, you know, and I'm not going to argue about it. I don't want to get in the way, but it's not really a pure literacy program. I wish it were. That's something I'd like to see us working on. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Probably outside the prerogative of the library system, and I'm not going to debate this commissioner on that this morning because I could take the other side of that pretty quick, but this is a budget session, not a debate on literacy. Page 30 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER HENNING: Well, and we heard from Mr. Jones that -- what I understand is we have a lot of volunteers that give their time. MR. JONES: A lot of volunteers. And as I see it, good, bad, or indifferent, a lot of times you get my point of view, my philosophy with the library system. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: You have my support, sir. I'll be there for you when you need me. MR. JONES: The one employee is sufficient to meet this demand in my opinion right now. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Any other questions for Mr. Jones this morning? COMMISSIONER HENNING: None for Mr. Jones. Thank yOU. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you, sir. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I have a question on the beach water parks request for a tractor and loader. MS. RAMSEY: For the record, Marla Ramsey. The equipment that we're requesting for the beach area tractor and loader is to move a lot of elements like mulch and fertilizers and various things like that from one place to the other. The beach water area does not have any large equipment, and as you know we recently put a maintenance facility in Sugden to have a homebase for our beach and water facilities. And now that they're there we need a few extra pieces of equipment in order to be able to accommodate a lot of the activity that we've been doing. MR. OLLIFF: Marla, why don't you give them a brief description of what actually is included in all of beach and water. MS. RAMSEY: Okay. Let me get to that sheet. Just a second. Everything or just expanded? MR. OLLIFF: I just mean in terms of the program itself Page 31 June 22, 2001 because beach and water as a program may not be self-explanatory. MS. RAMSEY: Okay. Beach and water encompass taking in the maintenance of all of our regional facilities such as Sugden, Barefoot, Clam Pass, Vanderbilt, Tigertail, all of the beach -- all of the boat ramp facilities like Bayview, 951, Caxambas. We collect all of the garbage, maintain all of those facilities, including the restrooms, cut grass, similar to what you would see in a community park, but it's done by our beach facilities instead. It also has all of our ranger programs in there which encompass compliance as well as educational information to our public. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Well, what I see here is a tractor and loader to grade the parking lots and move heavy material, a bush hog for Sugden Park, three generators for the use of power tools in the field, an ATV for Marco Island crew, and the request is less than 29,000. Are we buying all that equipment for less than 29,000? MS. RAMSEY: The dollar amount is -- yes, dollar amount is 28,900 for a tractor, bush hog, chipper-- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, the question is that we're buying all that for 29,000? MS. RAMSEY: That's correct. COMMISSIONER HENNING: What a deal. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: What? MR. OLLIFF: When we're talking about tractors, these are small, small -- MS. RAMSEY: These are little tractors. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Talking about garden tractors, like cut-your-grass type -- MS. RAMSEY: No, it's a little bit bigger tractor than that. I mean, you can put -- it will have a loader on the front, and it will take care of bush hogging the back of Sugden in areas that we had just Page 32 June 22, 2001 done all of our exotic removals, but it's not a large field tractor. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. MS. RAMSEY: I don't have what the horsepower of the tractor is in front of me, but it does have loader capability, yes. I think the tractor itself was $17,000. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Any other questions? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I would like to ask some questions of Domestic Animal Service, if I may. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Sure. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Let's talk about the dog pound. They don't call it that. Hi, Jodi. MS. WALTERS: Good morning. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: How is the new facility working out? MS. WALTERS: The new facility's great. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: You just need enough people to make everything work. MS. WALTERS: Right. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: The problem has been fairly acute in the last couple years because of the lack of personnel trying to get response out in the field. I totally commend you for asking for these number of people. My question is, do you have enough? Are you going to have an extra person in Immokalee with this particular budget? MS. WALTERS: We will hopefully be able to actually use one of those officers to work where we have a problem at that time, so we can actually move it around, other than just giving it a permanent location. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: So that person's going to float from one spot to another? Page 33 June 22, 2001 MS. WALTERS: That's what we're going to try and do, yes. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And the response time should be quite a bit improved over what it was before because you can only take so many inspectors and have them in so many places. MS. WALTERS: It should be improved, yes, sir. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Okay. That -- basically, I just wanted to make a point. Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Jodi, let me ask you this question: Are you comfortable that we have the personnel to deal with what I'm going to call the very vicious animal situation that we periodically encounter? There is some, quote, attack animals that get loose and do some really nasty stuff, and I know that's a personal responsibility of the owners, however, sometimes people are not very personally responsible. Are you comfortable that we've got the resources to deal with that? MS. WALTERS: I had actually asked for more officers this year, but we have compromised with the other needs in the county. I will be coming back next year to ask for more staffing, but I believe that this will put a good start to -- to the amount of officers that we need on the road. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I have a comment on that, too, Commissioner, just because there's one situation in my district that I know you're completely familiar with, but where we have a really dangerous dog that we've gone all the way through the court system. We've had him designated, you know, a dangerous dog. Now, but -- my bottom line is, there hasn't been, in my judgment, adequate staff to be able to pay attention to what could really be a life-and-death situation over there, and I wonder if, you know, we might -- I know for sure that that situation needs more attention. MR. OLLIFF: Well, in that particular case, we've actually looked at the possibility of hiring a private investigator to be able to Page 34 June 22, 2001 spend the time. We have hired a private investigator to spend the time. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Have we? MS. WALTERS: Yes, we have. MR. OLLIFF: We have to catch the violator, the perpetrator, in this case, in the act of violating the court order in terms of keeping that dog muzzled when it's out in public or it won't be in public, and we continue to hear of violations of what is historically been a very dangerous dog, and Commissioner Mac'Kie is right, to monitor that situation you almost have to be there all the time in order to be able to catch the person, and it -- it requires a tremendous amount of staffing. I don't think you can do it with staffing. I think we've got to look at alternative ways like we are here through a private investigator. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I think that's brilliant, and I appreciate that you've taken on that responsibility because I was worried about how -- I know that Jodi can't just send everybody who works for her over there to sit and watch in that one driveway, but it's so dangerous. I'm glad to hear you've addressed that. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: One question. Jodi said that she made some compromises to meet the needs of the rest of the county's budget, and I commend you for stepping forward and doing that to help out, but I'm concerned. I'm very concerned, 'cause I've had some very serious complaints out there about the lack of prompt service with dangerous dogs, and I know Jodi's been working at the uppermost limits. Is there any way that during the course of the year that -- if we see that we've got a serious deficiency, that we could draw funds from someplace to put another inspector on? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Called reserves. CHAIRMAN CARTER: We do have reserves. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And is that quite involved to be Page 35 June 22, 2001 able to tap into that? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Yes. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Or is that something that we could do on a short notice, 'cause I'm going to be monitoring this situation very closely 'cause-- MR. OLLIFF: The answer to that the first question, yes, it can be done in the middle of the year at any point the board wants to and, is it difficult, the answer is no. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Thank you. MR. OCHS: Mr. Chairman -- for the record, Leo Ochs, public services administrator. Just a related bit of information, this coming Tuesday on your commission agenda you will see a proposed ordinance amendment to your domestic animal control ordinance that addresses some of these enforcement issues. There's a provision on dangerous dogs, Commissioner Coletta, and also you'll see that we are trying to offset some of our increased cost with increased fines and fees and penalties for those that are repeat offenders of your animal control ordinance. MR. OLLIFF: The other thing that the board ought to be aware of is on the dangerous dog side Jodi several years ago was very aggressive in terms of getting a full complement of what they call certifications within her department so her staff is always fully certified to be able to go out and do chemical capture and then some of the other things that are required when you're really dealing with some dangerous dogs. So I think we have a very professional domestic animal services department, staff but I just don't think there's enough of them. So I think we're trying to beef that up this year, and I think this is a pretty aggressive addition to a single department in any given year, and we'll see when we put these people in place how it functions. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And I've been working on this Page 36 June 22, 2001 ordinance along with Leo and Jodi for some time, and the ordinance is great, but without the people to enforce it we're not going to get anyplace. So we just have to go into this and do the best we can and make adjustments where we have to. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, Commissioner Coletta, I will say at any time that reaches a point where we need to do something mid-year or whatever it is, I will totally support you in that effort, because I love animals and I detest anyone who has one that is out of control, that is a vicious animal. They can only do harm to everything around it. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: So that endorsement gives me the title of dogcatcher? CHAIRMAN CARTER: Along with being the stork king, yes. MR. OLLIFF: But I'll tell you, Commissioner Coletta, the board does need to appreciate -- and this is sort of, again, stretching the county's service area -- especially in Commissioner Coletta's district the amount of growth in the eastern part of the estates has caused the domestic animal services response area to be so significantly larger that the number of miles that those people are putting on vehicles is astronomical. And some of the issues that we're dealing with now are issues that we've never dealt with before as well. We've got some influxes of population where we're dealing with some very bizarre type animal cruelty cases. We're dealing with a lot of cock fighting type issues, dog fighting issues out in the estates, and those all take a great deal of time because it becomes criminal activity which we have to do in conjunction with the sheriffs department. And I would say, Jodi, in any given year we're probably dealing with ! 0 of those to 12 of those every year where there are major type operations like that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Really. MS. WALTERS: Yes, we do. We work with the State, with Page 37 June 22, 2001 FDLE and, of course, our local law enforcement. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: The-- the issue is very complex because very often the people that are irresponsible with their pets are also irresponsible landowners and have caused quite a bit of grief out there in the rural area, not to mention also the urban area. CHAIRMAN CARTER: We have a lot of sick animals including mankind. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, unless there's any other questions, we now have two speakers, and I believe they are both related to public services. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I don't know how the chairman wants to handle the Public Health Department with the huge increase there. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, we can go to public -- we can go to public speakers and then have the discussion. That would be fine. MR. OLLIFF: And I would bet you dollars to doughnuts that's what the speakers are here about, and I think the board had a summary of what the indigent healthcare program is in your budget, and we'll go ahead and put that on the visualizer for the public speakers' sake as they're speaking for your sake. But I think if we go ahead and call those speakers we'll probably get to that issue. MR. SMYKOWSKI: The first speaker is Jane Varner followed by James Tindall. MS. VARNER: My name is Jane Varner, and I'm representing TAG. We have asked-- TAG has asked and also the Republican Party has passed a resolution that we would like this indigent healthcare plan to go out to us as a referendum. This is a new program. We're going in a different direction. This, to me, is amorphus because if you'll notice by the letters to the editor, no one quite understands what's -- what's being talked about. We don't know Page 38 June 22, 2001 who it covers. We don't know who it entails. We don't know if there'll be some type of a co-pay for certain people. We really know very little about it, and also the term "indigent" seems to cover people who aren't indigent. So it -- it goes beyond what the title seems to imply. We request that you allow us to vote on this, and I really don't understand why you won't allow us to vote on this. This is an important program, and if it is as worthy as you -- number of you seem to think, you shouldn't be afraid to put it out to the public to get our input, to see what we feel about it, to have it spelled out precisely so we know exactly how far is this going to go, what are the costs, is this going to expand, or are we going to have it somehow capped at a certain amount. You owe this to us as the people, the citizens, the residents, the taxpayers of Collier County. You owe it to us that you allow us to vote on this issue. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I think it's a great idea. MS. VARNER: Thank you. Thank you very much. Could I ask the others of you, would you be willing to allow us to have a vote? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: You mention that these are all new services. They are not. We have offered dental service for a long time. We're not going to go back and revote on something we've been doing for a long time. Healthy Kids has been part of our beam forever now. It's something that's always been there. Women's health, we provided it over here for years now. It's not something that's totally out of the blue. It's something that's been there. MS. VARNER: Is this a new program, or is this not? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: No, it's not a new program. It's expanded possibly. MS. VARNER: It is to me a new program. I'm sorry. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Time out. MS. VARNER: I'm sorry. It is a new program -- Page 39 June 22, 2001 CHAIRMAN CARTER: Ms. Varner-- talk. You asked a question, MS. VARNER: Yes. And now -- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Let him respond, and then you may MS. VARNER: You're right. All right. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I would appreciate it. I might not have got that chance before in this particular room, but I do have this seat today where I can respond to these type of questions. I'm taking personal responsibility for this healthcare initiative myself. We haven't reached any final conclusions on the whole thing. When we get to September, we're going to be taking serious looks at what the whole thing's all about. We're going to be making the adjustments for the best interests of the public out there. School nursing is something that's been in place for many years. True, we're coming in to pick up the slack, and if you tell me you don't think we need school nurses, then I'll give serious consideration to going forward with what you suggested. We need them. There's no way around it. It's got to happen. I'm not going to leave the children of this county without the resources that they need. So when-- when we get down to the indigent healthcare issue, this hasn't been decided yet, and when we get to the point in September if there isn't something definitive there I personally will make an end to it. MS. VARNER: Would you allow us to vote on this? Could you please answer. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: There's nothing to vote on. Do you want to vote on the subsidy we do to ambulance care, too, which is $7 million and would also raise your ambulance bill about threefold or have the improvements we did along Immokalee Road for $3 million to the bank of the canal? We're talking an item that is Page 40 June 22, 2001 not of major consequence. Even though your feelings are very strong on it, it is not necessary the opinion of every individual out there. MS. VARNER: Well, would you allow us to have a vote on the proposed plan that you are proposing right now? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I personal would not. MS. VARNER: Because you don't -- for what reason would that be? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I already stated it, because I'm acting for what I was elected to do. I have no special interest that I represent, but I was -- I was elected to represent my constituents as far as health, safety, and welfare for the residents of the community, and that's what I'm doing. MS. VARNER: And -- and the taxpayer also. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And the taxpayers. That's who they all are. That's why they put me in office. CHAIRMAN CARTER: One at a time. One at a time, please. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Forgive me. CHAIRMAN CARTER: No, that's all right. Ms. Varner, I will let you ask any question that you want, and then commissioners will answer them. If you want to ask another one, fine, but we will not have a long debate here on this issue this morning. Commissioner Mac'Kie. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I just wanted to weigh in on the referendum question in addition, frankly, in support of what Commissioner Coletta was saying. I will -- I'll take some responsibility for how this got to be the giant public debate it is, and that is I wish that I had cancelled the healthcare committee to present their information to us in this forum, in this budget hearing forum instead of in the special meeting that we had, because that created this -- this public issue. Page 41 June 22, 2001 What's happening here, Ms. Varner, is really -- you were here, I think, maybe in the room. I know you were in town and I was on the board when we gutted the Health Department budget one year. I think we cut $600,000 one year. We didn't ask you to vote on that, and let me just -- and -- we are restoring some of that money, and we are considering -- considering and we will decide for sure before we put any -- before we charge anybody a nickel, we are considering adding primary care back to the healthcare function, the Health Department function, adding it back. All of the others are already in there. We're considering adding primary care back, and we're considering doing that in a public-private partnership where we contract with private physicians who will take these patients at a reduced rate. What we're -- what we're considering doing won't be done, a nickel won't be assessed for that purpose, until we have answers to the questions that you have and I have who qualifies. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Exactly. COMMISSIONER Mac'Kie: What -- is their a co-pay, et cetera. Nobody's going to pay a penny of tax until those questions are asked, and this has just gotten blown out of proportion because as Commissioner Coletta said, respectfully, you have elected us already to do -- we spend way more than $3 million of your money every day. We spent $3 million on a bank of a ditch along Immokalee Road. We're thinking of spending up to $3 million on some healthcare issues. We already spend way more than that on healthcare issues. We already spend more than this on healthcare for the ambulance service, for example. So this is not a giant new program. This is putting some money back into programs that we formerly did, and it's a consideration of the primary care reinstatement of some of those services, if the questions can be answered and in a conservative republic kind of way so that we have -- it's possible. A public-private partnership is what it Page 42 June 22, 2001 should be. A public-private partnership is what we are considering on primary care. And that is the right way. That's the end of my -- MS. VARNER: Your answer is you would not allow us a vote on this, then? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Not unless you also want to vote on the $3 million on Immokalee Road, not unless you also want to vote on the ambulance service, not unless you also want to vote on the State Attorney's Office, and the grant funds, and the internal service funds, and the Clerk of Court's budget. MS. VARNER: Well, I guess the question is is with healthcare, and this is why I'm saying with the vote is that it is a more -- obviously, we have a number of programs. It keeps growing and growing. We keep adding more and more. Now, you don't call this something different. You call this more of the same thing, and so what we're saying is that where is the end? When do we step in and say "This is as far as we go?" And, obviously, you have your opinions, but I think you're ignoring our opinions out here in the public. We have elected you because this -- we thought that all of you were Republican. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Ms. Varner-- Ms. Varner, we have heard you. I appreciate your point of view. I'm going to go to Commissioner Henning. I'm going to let him respond to that, and then I will give you a quick summary of where I am on this issue, and then I will go to the next speaker. We are not going to have a public debate here this morning on an expanded potential issue in a budget which is the perogative of those elected to office. It is like saying will you go to Washington now and ask that the Patient's Bill of Rights be put to referendum so that you can make an input. You know what they're going to tell you in the U.S. Senate? "Thank you very much, Ms. Varner. You elected us to make that decision." Mr. Henning. Page 43 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. And I disagree and, Ms. Varner, all she is asking and I hear it, is the primary care is a new service. We have never offered that before in Collier County, and all you're asking is, are you willing to let the people decide this is how they want their tax -- tax money spent. And, correct me if I'm wrong, Commissioner Mac'Kie, dental service for adults, that was done in Collier County before? I know we've done it for children. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: It's currently being done, isn't it, Dr. Colfer? DR. COLFER: We-- CHAIRMAN CARTER: The record. DR. COLFER: I'm sorry. I'm Dr. Joan Colfer. I'm the Director of the Collier County Health Department. Colfer is C-o-l-f-e-r. Some of this predates me. I've only been here about 15 months, but, yes, I do understand that we did offer dental services before in the health department. When I arrived we had three full operatory sitting vacant with nobody doing anything in them. Back about five years ago it was essentially privatized to a group called CHSI which ran it for a year or so and couldn't -- couldn't make it fiscally work for them, and it shut down. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I think the question, Dr. Colfer, was, did we do it for adults in the past? DR. COLFER: I believe we did. Yes, but it predates me by so many years, but I believe the commissioner is correct, it was both a children's service and an adult service. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Martha Skinner is nodding her head, yes, and she is our historian. Yes, it was there. Yes, it disappeared. Yes, it came back under Dr. Colfer to offer that service again, and the benefits are just outstanding on that. COMMISSIONER HENNING: If I may finish. DR. COLFER: Sorry. Page 44 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER HENNING: This -- bringing back this program, is there any co-pay for the adults? DR. COLFER: Yes, there is, and I'm so glad you asked the question. Actually, there is going to be a co-pay -- there is a co-pay for everybody. We -- we reopened the dental clinic as a Health Department program. Forget the privatization. I'm sorry. It didn't work, but we can make it work, and we're doing very well with that program. I think we've seen -- I'd have to check my notes -- about 1,200 kids so far since January. Currently, we're seeing -- there is an income-eligibility piece to it. You have to be less than 185 percent of poverty if you're a child. If you are an adult or plan -- with the expanded program -- if you approve the funding is that you would have to be less than 100 percent of poverty, so we're talking about people with extremely limited means. There is a co-pay now. It's on a sliding fee scale. Everybody is expected to pay something even if it's $5. So we do have a tiny bit of revenue coming in. Can I tell you that there are people that pay nothing; there probably are a few because we try and work with the people. But that's not the plan. The plan is everybody pays something. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Now -- I'm sorry -- lost my train of thought. Are employees -- are they afforded the same opportunity? DR. COLFER: My employees are. I can tell you that our dental insurance is pretty awful but mostly because the dentists in town won't take any dental insurance no matter what plan you have. COMMISSIONER HENNING: So do we pay dental for the dental insurance to the employees? DR. COLFER: I'm -- I'm in the state system. You-all are in the county system. I see that-- COMMISSIONER HENNING: I see that Leo Ochs is shaking his head, no, that we're not. We don't pay dental insurance. Page 45 June 22, 2001 MR. OCHS: That's correct. The board's health plan does not cover dental services. It's for employees or dependants. They have an opportunity to buy into a plan that they pay for. COMMISSIONER HENNING: What about liability of this -- where you bringing back this old plan? DR. COLFER: That all the liability the-- for both the physicians and the dentist is covered by the state system. Just like I'm insured and the doctor that sees the AIDS patients, the doctor that sees the STD patients. Same thing, we're covered by the state. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. Well, I don't think Ms. Varner's request is all that out of line, and I'm sure we -- it's very controversial. There's a lot of issues, a lot of questions out there that need to be answered, and hopefully we will get them by September, but I think the majority of the residents want to really learn more about this and have a chance to vote on it to see if this is an expanded service they want to provide here in Collier County. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: A couple of us are running for re-election. They'll get a chance to vote. CHAIRMAN CARTER: My position, Ms. Varner, is this. First of all, all of this is premature. The Republican Party was premature. That's why I was opposed to the resolution. It was an interim report on where they were. If everyone is listening to Mr. Snyder who chairs that healthcare committee he is saying, when it's all done and when we know exactly what is to be proposed, he is saying it may be in the best interests of the community to take it to referendum. We don't know that yet. It has not been totally outlined. I have set the criteria myself. I want due diligence. I want to know qualifications. I want to know who's served. I want to know who the providers are. I want to know how it will operate as a public-private partnership. I will take a stand that says I want something to happen differently. It is not acceptable to me today of what we do in this county. Page 46 June 22, 2001 Now, I have not determined yet what the outcome is going to be because I haven't seen it. And when it happens I will give you my answer whether I would support it going to referendum or not. It is too early to determine it. Anything that you see today is expanded within our system and which we the Board of County Commissioners will vote on and feel is necessary to take place in this community to do what needs to be done. That's why we're in these chairs, whether it's a road, whether it's a sewer, whether it's healthcare. And if you don't like how any one of these commissioners perform their jobs, everyone has the perfect right to remove us, but I will tell you this, the issues will not change. You can change the chairs, but you can't change the issues. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Ms. Varner, if I may, I want to apologize if I came across kind of strong on my initial statements. I have the greatest respect for you and the party. I want to comment, too, I've been working very close with the situation. What Commissioner Carter said is absolutely true. This is far from a done deal. We're looking at the possibility that this may carry into the following year and go on a referendum and be tied into a trauma center -- trauma care. There's so many different possibilities but they are all in the discussion stage. We need to be able to flush this out when we get to September. I can assure you that if this thing here is too complicated and if its got too many holes on it, it's not going to see the light of day come September as far as the primary-care issue goes. The rest of them, expanded services or continuation of the service that does exist. But I do appreciate your comments, and I wish I could have more input from you in the future. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Mr. Carter, I have got one question. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Commissioner Henning, and then I'll Page 47 June 22, 2001 have to go to the next speaker. I'll let you have one more comment, Ms. Varner. COMMISSIONER HENNING: The dental services, is that for U.S. Citizens, Collier County residents, or just Collier County residents? DR. COLFER: It's for whoever needs the service, Commissioner, that comes to our door. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Ms. Varner. MS. VARNER: Well, I want to thank you, Mr. Henning, for showing deference to the taxpayers by allowing that we should -- would be able to have a vote on this. I appreciate that very much. I'm sure a lot of other people do too. The rest of you may in good conscious feel you're doing what's right, but you are shutting us out, and we are paying the bills, and we would appreciate that you would listen to us. It's very difficult for us out here to know what's happening. We open up the paper, and then one day we see, oh, you have this program. So if we're early it's because we don't know when the appropriate time is to step in, so we had to get in early to say, "Let us be a part of this. Let us be in on this, and then let us discuss it. Let's see what's coming up, and then let us have a voice in it." That -- that, to me, is - - is the democratic republican thing to do because we Republicans are concerned about taxpayers and the bills and how we do spend the money. CHAIRMAN CARTER: All of us are concerned, Ms. Varner. And you have complete access to any commissioner, to the process, to the system. No one's shutting anyone out, and I hope you were really listening to what I just said, and I get the feeling you have closed your mind to me. Please, one more time hear me. I am not going to do anything until it's done until we find out what it is. Page 48 June 22, 2001 And if it's something that it changes the whole complexity of what we've ever done in the past, of course, it may be an issue that goes to referendum. We don't know yet. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: You know, Ms. Vamer made a good point on one thing. These meetings have all been open, but I'm going to personally extend an invitation to you for the next ones that are coming up, and I'd like very much for you and other representatives from TAG to come to it and sit there and watch the processes unfold. You'll see some things where there'll be internal arguments. You'll see some things when they reach agreement, and your opinion would be very much welcome, because I do seek opinions from people that aren't members of this particular committee, and I will send you that invitation. MS. VARNER: Well, I thank you for -- I thank you for that, and we appreciate that you're -- you would reach out to us and let us be a part of this. So thank you, again, for listening. Thank you, again, Mr. Henning. Yeah. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you, Ms. Varner. Next speaker, please. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Commissioner Carter, while the next speaker is coming up, just for your information in the editorial in the Naples Daily News this morning -- I don't know if you've seen it -- it was saying this was the last chance to speak on the health tax, and I -- as it said here today, no, this is not the last time. This is not the last -- you know, it's going to come up in September. The committee's going to come back to us, and we still have the final budget. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I'm kind of glad they made that mistake because that drew some people out that would have stayed home. Page 49 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And you know while we're arguing with people who are buying by the barrels, just not the smartest thing, I hope the public will not be manipulated by the misinformation the newspaper has put out so far by this issue. They've created this controversy. It's not a controversy. You know, it sells papers, and they're making a big deal out of it, and it's a wonderful program that the county's considering, but to have -- to be opposed to it. Well, they showed their ignorance today when they said, "Better speak up today. It's your last chance." Not even close. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I'll have to retract my article that I just wrote. We can take shots at them from the dais. Well, anyhow -- MR. OLLIFF: And, Mr. Chairman, these are workshops and are not even designed for a great deal of public input. CHAIRMAN CARTER: You're exactly right. MR. OLLIFF: The public hearings are scheduled for September, and that is when we urge and -- and hope to have public input. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And then we will have facts. MR. OLLIFF: Yes, ma'am. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Mr. Tindall. MR. TINDALL: My name is Jim Tindall. I'm a taxpayer in Collier County, and I'm a member of the Collier County Healthcare Planning and Finance Committee. I'll be very brief because you have much more substantive business to deal with. But in response to Ms. Varner's comment I would only say that all of the meetings, the monthly meetings of our committee, have been publicly noticed as have the subcommittee meetings per state sunshine law regulations. There have been more than 40 meetings that have been so publicly noticed, and none have been attended by TAG to the best of my knowledge. Secondly, we had a town hall meeting at the Golden Gate Page 50 June 22,2001 Community Center. We sent out 20,000 invitations for parents of the children of Collier County to attend through the public schools. We advertised and promoted that program, and to the best of my knowledge, no representatives of TAG were at that meeting. I think that's unfortunate. They're an important part of the debate, and we are anxious to hear them out. But I can only say that we have tendered the opportunity to them, just as we have to others in the community on this issue. In closing, I would only say that I have -- I have nothing of substance on the issues beyond what the commissioners have said, but speaking for the committee, we welcome the high bar that the commissioners have set on this issue with regard to satisfying them on the details of the program, on the specifics of the program, on aspects to prevent fraud and abuse, et cetera. Those are all good questions. We will have responses to those questions, and we welcome the opportunity for further public dialogue. Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Mr. Tindall, thank you, and thank you for your service on this issue. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, unless there's any further questions, I'd suggest two things. One, whether you agree or disagree with this issue, you have to take your hats off to that committee. That committee is perhaps one of the best advisory committees we've ever had in terms of actually professional and quality information and hard work. But the Airport Authority was next on your schedule at 10:30, and I would recommend that we probably take a little break for your court reporter and then come back and handle the Airport Authority. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Right. Okay. Commissioner Coletta says right when it was getting good. Thank you so much. I echo your comments on healthcare committee. They are outstanding. We're adjourned for 15 minutes. (Short recess taken.) Page 51 June 22, 2001 CHAIRMAN CARTER: Time to rock and roll. Back in session, ladies and gentlemen. Next item up in front of the board is the Airport Authority. MR. GREENWALD: Randy Greenwald, for the record. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Are we on? MR. GREENWALD: Airport Authority. It's on page A-42 through A-43. They requested one maintenance worker, one position. We recommended that it not be funded. There are two other issues in current that -- that I think Airport Authority needs to address. One was they have a $50,000 debt service payment that will be due next year. It was omitted from the budget originally, and we included it, and we also included a negative $50,000 expense when we put that in the budget. They have not yet identified where they would make the cuts to fund the debt-service payment. The other question that they need to address is they -- we -- we ended up cutting their reserves by about $100,000, and we also decreased their General Fund transfer by the same amount. It, in effect, what it does if they need to do a budget amendment instead of taking reserves from Fund 495, they would have to do a budget amendment from General Funds, and I think John probably will address some of those issues now. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Good morning, Mr. Drury. MR. DRURY: Good morning, Commissioners. John Drury, Executive Director for the Collier County Airport Authority. On my left is Gene Schmitt, Chairman of the Collier County Airport Authority, and on my right is Gary Vincent who is the director for our finance department. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Good morning. MR. DRURY: I would like to hand out a summary of our budget that explains it in very simple terms and then open up a discussion on how you would like to resolve the differences between Page 52 June 22, 2001 what the county manager is recommending and his staff and what the Authority board is recommending and then obviously go forward with what you recommend. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And basically the difference is this $13,200. MR. DRURY: It's more than that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: More than that, oh. COMMISSIONER HENN1NG: It's 50,000 plus 50,000, I think it is. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I'll wait and learn. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you, sir. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Thank you. MR. DRURY: I'm going to start out by saying that in 1994 when the Authority was created this business plan was created. It was then updated in 1998 with this business plan. That business plan projected what the General Fund transfer would be for the next ten years. On page 1 of the document that's before you, you'll see that we projected in 2002 that we would need $270,100. That's what we projected in '98 we would need for 2002. The county has added three fixed charges, that are reasonable charges, that were not in the original business plan, 182,900 for indirect service cost, 60,200 for the health insurance, and 32,200 for general insurance. Those are fixed county costs that had they been added to the business plan the total for 2002 would have been 545,500. You go to page 2, you will see three categories. One is what the business plan projected, one is what the Authority approved at its board meeting, and one is what the county manager's and his staff are recommending. If you go to the very bottom, you'll see what the loan amount -- the General Fund transfer in the form of a loan -- should be. The business plan projected 545,400. The Authority reduced that to 511,500, and the county manager has Page 53 June 22, 2001 reduced it to 356,000. The biggest difference between the Authority's budget and the county manager's budget is that he has cut basically all of the reserves for the Authority, number one, and number two is he's cut $50,000 out of the budget. We would be the only department without reserves. Every other department has its 5 percent reserves. For the last seven years we've always had our 5 percent reserves. Not having reserves means that if the roof breaks and we have to go out of our reserves for an unforeseen cost, we will now have to come to the county commission and say, "The roof's leaking. We didn't foresee it. We need to repair it." Reserves are for unforeseen costs, and that's why most county departments have that in their budget. Ours is being cut. We're recommending that it be put back in like every other department and like we've had for the last seven years. The $50,000 cut is basically an attempt to pay for the debt service on the loans for capital projects. We've recommended that it be included in our budget, which is what that 511,500 is. The county manager's staff is saying, "Go find it somewhere." Well, I do not believe you can run your three county airports with a $356,000 transfer, because that means I'd have to cut positions to make the $50,000 up. We don't have any fat in this budget. We -- if I -- I have, like, one line tech who's handling all the jets down at Marco during the season and to start cutting positions would just result in us not being able to fuel airplanes. So -- and the other-- the third issue that's the difference between the county manager's and the Authority's is that we have asked for a seasonal part-time line technician. At Marco during the months of January, February, and March we get inundated with jets. We have one line tech who is out on the ramp trying to fuel airplanes and trying to marshal airplanes and park them. If you go to Naples, you'll find five or six of them running around trying to take care of Page 54 June 22, 2001 everything. We have come to the conclusion that we cannot operate that ramp safely and fuel all those airplanes with one person. So what we asked is if we could get a part-time seasonal employee during those three or four months to come in and help us jockey all those jets around and fuel them. So the differences that you'll see between the county manager's recommendation and the Authority's budget is basically reserves have been completely cut out, they cut our budget by $50,000, and they are not approving a line technician during the season. Our recommendation is that we had a business plan. We stuck to the business plan. We're very close to the business plan. In fact, when you look at it, we're about forty -- thirty thousand dollars less than what we projected four years ago. I think we're the only department with a business plan, and if you looked at us four years ago, and we said, "In four years we think we're going to need $545,000," and we came to you with 511,000, I think that's pretty good. So that's the general difference ! see between what the Authority's recommending and what the county manager's recommending. There's one more thing I'd like to add, and I have not had a chance to talk to the county manager about it or my board, and that is that I think that it's time for the Authority to add a senior fiscal clerk position to work on a day-to-day basis with the Clerk of Courts. The Clerk of Courts has pointed out in the last several weeks that we need to really micromanage every dollar better, and I agree with that. I think he's right. We talked about some of the things that this person would do, cash-flow management, and page 6 identifies what this position would do. Basically, this person would work with the Clerk of Courts and a grant agency and handle all of the funds on a microlevel and on a daily basis related to every project we manage. The salary would be $35,700. With benefits it brings it up to 52,300. Page 55 June 22, 2001 A computer, a desk, and an adding machine. This person's sole purpose and mission would be to coordinate the Clerk of Courts, the Authority, and the grant agencies so what happened over the last several weeks doesn't happen again, that we are on top and this person has his thumb on every dollar and coordinates with the Clerk and the grant agencies to make sure that we don't have any of these problems. I think the 52,300 is probably the best money spent to make sure that the public funds are properly accounted for and watched in the method that the Clerk and the grant agencies require. So the issues before you today for your consideration on the operational side are the differences between what the Authority's recommending, which I think is really close to the business plan which is what they've been sticking to, versus what the county manager's staff is recommending and this consideration to add a position that handles nothing but microaccounting of public funds for projects and grants. CHAIRMAN CARTER: What I would like my -- I need comments from the board and questions. What I would like to hear is from the county manager myself in terms of his analysis and also the requested position here. Twofold questions. One, looking at revenues I probably have difficulty justifying another position on that basis, but I'm looking at what is the role of the Airport Authority and what do we want out of this entity in Collier County and, therefore, I would go to the county manager and say, "I would like the benefit of your analysis" and also I would like to know how do we deal with the issues that have been raised and what is the most cost effective way to do that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: May I ask a question first? CHAIRMAN CARTER: Yes. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I just want to be sure I have the issues sort of in a little format I can understand here. We have a new Page 56 June 22, 2001 issue on the table, and that's the $52,500 for the fiscal clerk or fiscal analyst you were discussing? MR. DRURY: That's correct. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Separate from that we have a $50,000 cut that we are being asked to find, a $13,200 or $12,600 part-time person, and the elimination or reduction of your reserves. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Yes. And that's $100,100. That's the reserve number. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Reserves is -- $100,100 is reserves. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Right. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And then 12,600 is the part-time person and the -- find $50,000 is the other cut. CHAIRMAN CARTER: The 50,000 is the cut -- the debt- service payment. County manager told him to go find it out of revenues. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: But what I'm asking is is that $50,000 cut in addition to the 100,000 reserve reduction? MR. DRURY: Yes. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Okay. So at least then now I know what numbers we're talking about. CHAIRMAN CARTER: You're putting behind -- you're putting the pieces behind my question, and I was asking for the county manager's analysis. MR. OLLIFF: When we looked at this budget, Mr. Chairman, the -- and I would like to cover the reserve issue first. I think all of your General Fund supported departments do not have their own reserve. All of those departments if they need to come to the board because of an unforeseen roof leak or something like that they have to prepare a budget amendment requesting monies out of General Fund reserves, and it's placed in front of you for your Page 57 June 22, 2001 approval. Because this is a General Fund supported department, that's where the subsidy comes from, and because of the issues that were raised by the clerk in terms of transfers that the board may or may not be aware of, there's nothing difficult about that process, and the process simply provides a little public -- MR. DRURY: But-- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Let him finish. MR. OLLIFF: -- a little public notice, and then the worst thing that happens in that regard is you may have to wait an extra week or ten days in order to meet a board agenda deadline in order to be able to get the money from the General Fund reserves if you truly have a need to be able to access reserves. So that's why the recommendation is what it is for the reserve fund. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Can we talk about that item separately because just to be straight with you, John, you know, I don't see a problem with that. I don't see what's wrong with coming back to the board for budget amendments and reserve items. MR. DRURY: Well, EMS has what for its reserves? MR. OLLIFF: EMS is not a completely General Fund supported department, and it has a separate revenue reserve which is required by state law -- a 5 percent revenue reserve. And that simply means that-- MR. DRURY: They have a 5 percent -- MR. OLLIFF: The 5 percent revenue reserve is a state law requirement that simply says that you don't budget 100 percent of your revenues for any of your revenue funds. You actually have to budget a 5 percent cushion -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: In case the revenue doesn't come in at the rate we anticipated. MR. DRURY: We're not talking about revenue reserves. We're talking about expense reserves. We're talking about the 5 percent Page 58 June 22, 2001 expense reserves. MR. OLLIFF: And EMS does because they are a fund- generating department quasi-enterprise fund, but for my office, for your office, for human resources, for support services departments, for public services departments, none of those have a reserve fund. MR. DRURY: But the Authority -- the Authority is a revenue producing somewhat enterprise fund. In fact, we bring in -- 75 percent of our budget is made up by revenues and 25 percent by General Fund. EMS 25 by revenues and 75 percent by General Fund. MR. OLLIFF: John, you need to explain to me what's the downside of coming to the board for General Fund budget amendment. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Me too. MR. DRURY: If we have to come to the board every time we have an unforeseen expense, I first have to set up a meeting with the Collier County Airport Authority, publicize it, put it together, and get a quorum. They meet once a month, so I'll have to hold a special meeting and try to get it together. Then I have to present the problem that we have and get them to approve it. Then if they approve it, I need to get on this agenda -- another couple of weeks -- come before this -- this -- this board, and ask them for $20,000 to fix a thing that broke. I don't think that any of your other departments are doing that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: MR. OLLIFF: They are. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Yeah, they are. Absolutely. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Let me ask you this, John: Could it not be worked out with the Airport Authority Board that they waive that requirement that when you have an operating problem they would give you the authority to immediately prepare whatever you did and come through our system so that you would not have to go through that stuff?. Page 59 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I mean, our county manager has some spending authority. Maybe that would shorten the process. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: My question would be is if we go this particular route and you don't have a reserve fund, how will that deter you from your operations as we now know it and your goals? MR. DRURY: I know that what we've done in the past is when we have a problem I -- the Authority gives me a certain amount that I'm allowed to take care of. I think it's up to $50,000, and then I have to bring it back to the board, and if it's an -- it has to be an emergency-type situation and get it approved. It's different and I don't have a problem, I guess, with changing and coming back to the county commission on our reserves. It adds another step to the -- to the process and if, you know, that's what the board wants to do and the county manager wants to do, obviously, we'll go through that process. We were trying to become more and more self-sufficient and more and more independent. I was looking at this board as being more of a decision-making board and less of an advisory board. In reading the ordinance and everything that was created, it was trying to create more of a decision-making board like you have at Naples Airport Authority and like you have at Lee County and all the airport authorities in the State of Florida. This is turning around and saying we're going to make it less of a decision-making board and more of an advisory board and bringing back the decisions of reserves and different projects back to the county commission. COMMISSIONER HENNING: John, can I ask you, how many -- how much money does the Airport -- Naples Airport Authority go to the city council for money each year? MR. DRURY: They don't. They are both self-sufficient. COMMISSIONER HENNING: That's probably the reason Page 60 June 22, 2001 why; they are more self-sufficient in decision making in the process. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: That's not fair too. They've been going for, like, about 40, 50 years. They have had the initial support of the Naples City Council to get to the point that they are. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: loans. COMMISSIONER HENNING: They didn't have to pay back I didn't mean to be unfair. We're just trying to make comparisons to apples to apples here. MR. DRURY: Well, they don't go to the city council every year like I do right now to explain the whole budget for the year, tell you the programs we're doing, and what's needed. We do that every year and have been for seven years. The difference is now when you manage your budget, we want you to come back to us on your budget management. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Let me ask this question, John: You know, in your experience there in emergencies -- needs to do things what is -- how much have you normally had to go to your advisory board for? 10,0007 15,0007 5,0007 MR. DRURY: Many years we go through almost the entire reserve, and it just depends on what's going on. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Could you give us some examples, John, so that we get a better idea what this whole picture looks like? MR. DRURY: I think we go into reserves for when we run out of fuel. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Need to get on a mike if you're going to talk and identify yourself. MR. VINCENT: Gary Vincent, finance manager, Airport Authority. Normally, we would use reserves for things like lightning strikes, and those happen quite often out at Marco, Everglades, and Immokalee where the fuel farm will go down. And just recently we Page 61 June 22, 2001 just had to pay about $3,500 to repair the software and the computerized fuel pumping system at Immokalee and Everglades. There are the fuel truck often breaks down, and that's another-- same thing. Lightning strikes are very dangerous and seems like the fuel truck attracts those types of things, but runway lights going out. There are -- there are many things that are unforeseen. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Aren't these normal maintenance items? MR. VINCENT: We do have normal maintenance items for those, but to replace bulbs that go out is not a problem, but when an navaid goes out and shuts the airport down to all IFR traffic, we have to repair it very quickly, and many times -- that would probably not be in the maintenance budget. We would have to call the people that can repair the navaids. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: you're saying on this particular point. I can understand your-- what Is there something that counters this, Tom? I'm a little bit lost in this. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Because what I'm -- because what I'm starting to think, Commissioner Coletta, is -- is that these -- your use of reserves is more routine than parks and recs use the reserves. It means if-- and so maybe up to an amount we ought to delegate that authority to the Airport Authority Board to make that decision. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, another thing I'll raise here, John, is you got a history with some of this stuff. Maybe you need to have increased operating budgets that says I know on an annual basis I've had "Y" number of things happen in these sensitive areas and budget more dollars for that so you're not going to a reserve. To me it's -- we're taking pots of money here, and we're dipping in and out of them so, you know, if I knew more up front what an operating expense was for these things based on history, I wouldn't even have Page 62 June 22, 2001 to worry so much about a reserve program. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Is this something possibly before September John could bring back to us? MR. OLLIFF: I will tell you that -- and in a lot of departments, especially those that are like fleet maintenance or in this case the Airport Authority, you have line items within those budgets for other repair and maintenance-type items. My suggestion would be here rather than creating this as a reserve fund, I think the Chairman's exactly right, that a lot of this appears to be ongoing operational issues that ought to be budgeted for as part of the regular budget, and we ought to look at creating a larger operating budget with a larger other general repair and operating type line item. And we'll go back and look over the last three or four years at what has been the use out of the reserve fund and bring back to you for your September budget review whatever changes to his actual regular operating budget that will avoid having to use a reserve fund. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I think that is a real step in the right direction, and I also -- just while we're facing realities here I wonder if by September we'll know. For my nominal look at the situation with the Clerk of Courts, it appeared to me that based on the way your grants work or the way grants work in your industry is that you may have to have a cash flow budget amount, too, so that you aren't moving money from Fund D to match Fund A because of timing requirements. It may be that you have to have a floating amount of money that moves among those, and I just would hope that if that's true that we'll know that by September too. MR. DRURY: Yes. We're -- we're working with the clerk very well and addressing all the issues and on a staff-to-staff level so we should have answers well before that time frame, but it became very clear that managing cash flow takes people, and if we're going to do it right, we need a full-time person. And I remember the clerk telling Page 63 June 22, 2001 us, it takes almost three people full time to manage all of the cash flows. You have all these different fiscal years. You have -- the State has its fiscal year beginning July 1 st and ends June 30th. That means grants don't become available till July 1. Then you have the federal fiscal year begins on October 1st, and then you have your private foundation fiscal year which begins in January. Well, to -- if you borrow -- the easiest and safest way is just borrow all the money you need and then when the grants come in pay back. That's not the fiscal savvy because you end up paying a lot of interest with taxpayer dollars. So if you have somebody who's handling cash flow and watching exactly what the contractors are spending and when the grant's coming in, you can get away from this whole borrowing thing and this interest paying. And I think we're -- I mean, I know I've come to the conclusion that if I had a fiscal senior clerk whose sole mission and purpose in life was coordinating with the clerk's staff every day and the grant staff every day, we wouldn't have the problems that you saw over the last month. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And this person would be managing the grants? MR. DRURY: This person would be managing the accounting system for all of the contractors, engineers, and grants. COMMISSIONER HENNING: So he would be managing the grant? MR. DRURY: Yes. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: But d.o we have somebody that could do that in your office already? MR. OLLIFF: Well, actually, just so the board's aware, last year as part of John's expanded service request he added an accounting technician to his staff, and so he's got a fiscal manager and an accounting technician. And for a total $2 million operation here to have more than two full-time people devoted to nothing but tracking Page 64 June 22, 2001 and managing the finances, it's just hard for me to justify that. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I would like you to rethink that financial management section and before September come back and ask, "What do you really need there?" You've got a couple positions, and you've got dollars already budgeted. I want you to rethink that. You've got a bright advisory business board, and work with Tom's office and rethink that one. And I think what I'm hearing maybe from the board this morning is that perhaps we'd like to take this out to September and then relook at all this to find out what we need to do here, John. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Well, if we have to come up with an amount right now, could we -- we can't go anything but down from that point in September, probably going to have to pick an amount above the recommendation from the county manager. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I have a lot more questions. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. Let's take your questions first. MR. SCHMITT: If I could just take a moment of your time. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Identify yourself. MR. SCHMITT: I'm Gene Schmitt, chairman of the Collier County Airport Authority. As a former chairman of the Naples Airport Authority, I can address some of the questions that seem to me were that were always here a few minutes ago. One is is that the Naples Airport has been completely self-sufficient since, I believe, 1971. The Authority was created in 1969 because of fiscal difficulties that the Naples Airport was having and the desire to make it totally autonomous, self-sufficient, and to relieve the taxpayers of Naples the responsibility of that Airport. It's been extremely successful. They never have to go to the city to ask for money. They never come to anyone with their hat in their hand asking for-- to bolster their fiscal problems. They're totally self-sufficient, and so it would not be completely fair or logical to compare the problems that Page 65 June 22, 2001 we're having here on the issues that we have. I shouldn't call them problems. These issues, to compare them with the Naples Airport. They're totally different. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And, Mr. Schmitt, I hope you understand that -- that I wasn't. John Drury was comparing them, and I just had that question. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. Can we go to your other-- thank you, Mr. Schmitt. I appreciate that. Commissioner Henning, can we go to your questions, please. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Early in your opening remarks you said that the county threw in 182,000 of unexpected charges or -- MR. DRURY: Not unexpected. When we created the business plan in 1998, the county had about $20,000 in indirect service charges which is county attorney, budget office, H.R. Department, risk management. And when we were discussing putting this business plan together we were asking them, "Well, what is going to be the number over the next years?" And they hired a consultant to determine what is the fair amount of money to be charging each department for all these services. In lieu of guessing what that would be, we left it out over the next five years. What I've just done is put it in. I said, if you take the -- what we projected and you add to -- add reality, which is this indirect services charge of 182,000, you add healthcare, additional costs that weren't in here -- COMMISSIONER HENNING: Just that one item I was interested in. MR. DRURY: Okay. You come up with-- with this-- with what we projected we would be asking for in 2002. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Is that according to the ordinance, or is that something new? MR. OLLIFF: There is no ordinance. I think the board has for a number of years charged what they call an indirect cost plan, and it is Page 66 June 22, 2001 to try and generate back to your ad valorem supported departments a fair-share cost from the other departments that get services from the county attorney, your human resources and purchasing departments and all of those administrative support-type services, and we have a charging system for all of those departments. And -- and to be honest, I mean, not criticizing the business plan at all but, I mean, knowing also that the business plan has a tremendous amount of growth on one hand, you should expect to have a corresponding increase in both indirect service charges, your insurance cost, your-- all of those other overhead-type items, and there probably should have been incorporated into the long-range projections from that business plan's beginning in 1988. MR. DRURY: And we've incorporated it now, and it shows what the request would be, 540,000, and that's exactly what we're -- actually we're requesting less than what we projected. COMMISSIONER HENNING: The Marco Island -- how many employees do you have there on a full-time and part-time basis? MR. DRURY: We have two line technicians, two customer service reps, and an airport manager that handles Everglades as well. Those are the people that handle Marco. And then we have the administrative staff which is based there which is myself, our secretary, our finance director, and he's got a full-time receivables person who handles all the receivables and collections, and then a full-time or part-time -- part-time payables accountant that handles all the purchase orders and payables for everything. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And the hours of operations? MR. DRURY: Excuse me? COMMISSIONER HENNING: The hours of operation? MR. DRURY: Well, we operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, so when a jet comes in at three o'clock in the morning we have on-call basically. Your line tech works seven in the Page 67 June 22, 2001 morning to seven at night, twelve-hour shifts. Goes home, wears a pager, and when the jet comes in in the evening, he goes back to the airport, handles the jet, and then comes back. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. And there's something that I couldn't understand in the 2002 budget. It appears that the income from Immokalee is dropping? MR. DRURY: I think I'll let Gary address that. Is that -- I'm guessing that's the profreight -- yeah, we had projected a -- the air freight company that was up there had DC-3s which purchases a lot of Avgas, and we projected that he was going to purchase all this fuel. Well, he sold all his DC-3s and went to Caravans which is a jet -- a little turbo jet single propeller, but it takes jet fuel. It's more efficient for him to handle the Bahamas by fueling in Opa-Locka because with a DC-3 you can fly from Immokalee, fill it, and go direct to the Bahamas, and then come back, purchase all your fuel in Immokalee. What he's doing now with his Caravans is he's making multiple trips. He'll go -- he'll go to Opa-Locka, fill up his cargo there, go to the Bahamas, come back to Opa-Locka, fill up again, and go back. And then he comes and brings his airplane back to Immokalee. So he's not buying jet fuel from us, and he's really running his operation between Opa-Locka and the Bahamas. So when he sold his aircraft, switched fuel, we reflected that in the budget. COMMISSIONER HENNING: The incubator, how many signed leases do you have with businesses? MR. DRURY: There is one, two, three, four companies operating out of the incubator right now. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. Out of the incubator, how many signed leases do you have? MR. DRURY: They're all signed. COMMISSIONER HENNING: They're all signed. Page 68 June 22, 2001 MR. DRURY: Four-- four signed leases. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Thanks. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, my suggestion to you would be for tentative budget purposes if the board wants to put the $50,000 back in here in terms of the debt-service payment in order to have a number to work from. The reserve fund, regardless of whether it's in the Airport Authority budget or whether it's in the County General Fund, doesn't make a difference in terms of the bottom line here, and that with the productivity committee working on this, with the clerk of courts working on this, with your office of management and budget staff, that we come back to you in September with a budget that I think everybody can be happy with. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I'd support that. CHAIRMAN CARTER: And we're reinstating the thirteen-two for the tech, too; right? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: No. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, I mean, you can pull it down, but at this point it's as Commissioner Coletta said, easier to pull it down than it is to bump it up. Is that going to negatively -- what's thirteen-two going to do to the millage rate? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: It's not that. It's just that maybe MR. DRURY: I can tell you that, you know -- and we said we shouldn't compare to Naples, but other airports you got to have more than one person out on the ramp when you've got multi-million dollar jets running around, and we've got one person that's handling it working 12-hour shifts, and we're just asking during those three months that we have another person to help out during that busy season. To me it's a -- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Let's not lose sight of this, I mean, in terms of the size of the operation, I mean, this is not-- this is not Page 69 June 22, 2001 gigantic here, folks, thirteen-two against what we're doing. I just think we ought to leave it in there at this point in time so we don't distort anything. Just leave it there. You can always pull it down in September. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Well, I mean, I think we have enough people looking at the operation of the airport. I'm sure we're going to get some recommendations from them. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Fine. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And then if we are going to remove that debt of $50,000, then I guess we need to know when we're -- when the county's going to receive some money -- CHAIRMAN CARTER: We do know that. COMMISSIONER HENNING: -- for these debts. CHAIRMAN CARTER: We do know that, Commissioner, and I really believe if we just incorporate everything now, you got the reviews going on and in September we're really going to get the answers here to determine what's the best way to do this, and it's easier -- like it's easier to lower your price, you never can take it up without a big fight and a lot of work. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Am I wrong that the business plan stated that it was going to be a payback of 50,000 this year? CHAIRMAN CARTER: Mr. Drury, you answer that question. MR. DRURY: What was the question? COMMISSIONER HENNING: The repayment. Did we have some repayment in 2002? MR. DRURY: There is a $50,000 debt-to-service payment. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I just would like to know, again -- you know, that's going to change what the commissioner or Tom Olliff is saying is are we going to make that up, or are we going to extend it out or-- MR. DRURY: I think we're going to include it in the budget Page 70 June 22, 2001 and pay it. COMMISSIONER HENNING: that. Okay. That's fine. Let's do CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. All right. MR. DRURY: We both put that in the budget that's to be paid. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I think everything's fine, sir. I thank you, Mr. Drury, and I thank you. MR. DRURY: We have a capital program that we need to go over. If you turn to page 4, I've broken it up into three categories, the business plan category, the Authority's request, and the county manager's recommendation. If you look at the business plan and you go very -- to the very bottom, we anticipated that we would be coming to you in 2002 and asking for $479,125. That's what was in this business plan. The Authority is requesting 172,300, an awful lot less. We're doing fewer projects. We've done a lot of projects. The county manager is recommending 147,300 less than what we're requesting. The reason his is less than ours is he's recommending that we do not do the Everglades City Airport Runway Project. Now, if you look at the Everglades City Airport Runway Lighting Project, we have lined up $100,000 grant in the state -- from the Florida Department of Transportation Aviation Office, and it is in their five-year work program, and it is scheduled for next year, and we're asking for a $25,000 match to rehab those runway lights. They are very old, in constant need of repair, and constantly going out. When we have no runway lights down there, the airports close at night. That means pilots who want to have dinner at area restaurants can't come. So the businesses in the community suffer, the airport's closed, and we wait until we can repair whatever the problem is. In lieu of returning the $100,000 grant, we're recommending that we match it with 25,000 and go ahead and rehab those runway lights that Page 71 June 22, 2001 are 30-some-odd years old. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I'd like to comment on that. I can see a better reason than just providing lights for somebody that wants to come for dinner, and I agree with you $100,000 grant against $25,000 expense. I see those lights as an important part of our emergency management initiative. What happens that day that we do have a hurricane and we need Everglades Airport to be able to get supplies in and out? It's not going to be always a day effort. It might be an emergency night effort. What are we going to do if we have to bring in EMS at night or something else, some sort of major transport to be able to move people? I see it as a critical need for emergency management. I'm really not that impressed with lights for somebody to come in and eat dinner. I would like to see it included in the budget. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: You've got my support. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Commissioner Coletta, you got -- we just approved a helicopter for night vision goggling. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: We did. We did, but can you lend those goggles to other people that don't have them coming in from the Army, coming from other parts of the state. How about the transport planes that may want to come in and use that runway in an emergency situation? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And I see this, and with all due respect about the people for dinner, what we also -- you know, the Airport Authority is just one of the very, very few -- I almost said almost the only one of the economic development projects that we have in this county. We're doing a lot. The airport is doing a lot for- - for economic diversification in Immokalee. With these lights we might be able to do a little more in eco-tourism area in the Everglades City as well. This would be an economic engine for them. You've got my support a hundred percent. Page 72 June 22, 2001 MR. DRURY: We have -- we ship an awful lot of stone crabs out of there -- out of that airport. I mean, an awful lot. That little airport is really a little economic engine for that little community. You got $100,000 grant-- CHAIRMAN CARTER: For $25,000, ladies and gentlemen, you've got it. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: So that's back in then, Mr. Smykowski? MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I have to be honest, though, before you go. I'm confused about what's -- what was decided on the operating budget. Does everybody understand that but me? Maybe somebody ought to restate it. MR. SMYKOWSKI: I have the $50,000 debt-service payment is in which would be -- require additional subsidy from the General Fund. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Of $50,000. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Correct. And I do not have the maintenance worker at this point. MR. DRURY: And I thought that we were putting in the line tech person. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I'm going to support putting it in, and then you've got three, I think. Didn't you support that, Commissioner Coletta? CHAIRMAN CARTER: I support the line tech. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Okay. So put that line guy back in for now, but we need to see it. But here's the piece that I'm worried about is, is this our final shot at this budget before trim notices? MR. OLLIFF: Yes. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes. Page 73 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Because I-- I think-- I'm worried that this -- okay. And -- but we don't have to worry about reserves. The 110,000 is there; it's just a question of which budget it's in and-- MR. SMYKOWSKI: Is it in the General Fund, or is it just moved to -- so we can administratively adjust that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: So what we're telling John to do is to go and look at his budgets, and you're going to do that too, and see what our recurring maintenance items that might should come out of that 110,000 reserves and automatically go into their budget right now. But we have the play to do that in the $110,000 reserve number? MR. OLLIFF: Yes, ma'am. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Okay. I got that. MR. DRURY: The additional senior clerk position to work with the clerk of courts and grant agencies, my understanding is not being approved at this time, is that -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: John, what are the other two accountant types doing? MR. DRURY: Full-time revenue collection and part-time expense. COMMISSIONER HENNING: It's only a $2 million-- you know, budget. I can't find a need for that. MR. DRURY: Well, when you get into managing grants, it's very complicated. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And that's what the bonus program and everybody got copied on, where all that's going. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: COMMISSIONER HENNING: COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: MR. SMYKOWSKI: That's entirely different. No, it isn't. That's not? The justification for the accounting Page 74 June 22, 2001 technician last year was to handle daily and monthly financial accounting and reporting requirements, handle the daily routine bookkeeping tasks that the finance manager is currently doing to allow the manager to concentrate on more complex and significant issues and capital projects. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I'd say one or the other. It would work and I think Dwight is willing to look at the books regardless of who is at the other end. Dwight's not here, is he? MR. DRURY: I -- I'm recommending and maybe you can ask the Clerk of Courts his position on this. If you have a full-time person managing those grants on a microlevel, you're not going to have -- you're going -- you're going -- you're going to be in a better position. I also think that the grants are going to pay for a good portion of that because every time that person works on a grant, that's an eligible cost for reimbursement. It's a recommendation. I think it's the right thing to do, but I understand that -- you know, that you've got to make your decisions. It's just grants are very, very complicated. Single audit act is very, very complicated. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: You've been doing pretty good with them at this point in time, though, John, haven't you, as far as the reporting goes and all that? MR. DRURY: We've been doing -- we've been doing pretty good, but I think the clerk has pointed out that you need to do better. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Well, let's ask the clerk if he'll donate a little more time just to look at them as we're going through the process, and I'm not that excited about spending that amount of money for that. I can see maybe if we do away with a different position and maybe elevate this position to encompass the other, I might be a little more receptive to it, but last year's and this year's together -- MR. OLLIFF: And then, frankly, I'm uncomfortable with a Page 75 June 22, 2001 request that shows up here on the floor out of a workshop that hasn't been reviewed by the Airport Authority and hasn't gone through the regular budget review and been stacked up against other priority requests either. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. At this point, John, you're going to have to work with the clerk, work with the monies for your finance operation, and you may have to make some decisions internally. MR. DRURY: Got it. MR. OLLIFF: If there's no other questions, Mr. Chairman, we can move on. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you, John. Thank you, Gene Schmitt. MR. SMYKOWSKI: We're on pages A-26 and A-27. That is community development division functions that are supported through the General Fund. There's one expanded service request proposed on A-27 in the natural resources department. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I have no questions, Mr. Chairman. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I have no questions. Commissioner Mac'Kie is talking to -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I'm sorry. No, I don't have questions. CHAIRMAN CARTER: She has no questions. I think we're all right on that one. Next one, Mr. Smykowski. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Pages A-30 and A-31 -- excuse me. A-30 through A-33 is the transportation support by General Fund. The expanded positions begin on page A-31. MR. OLLIFF: And I'm required to point out to you that the major storm outside that passed through this morning was John Boldt's answer to prayer as we started heading in and talking about Page 76 June 22, 2001 stormwater management related issues. Tony, you want to walk them through the expanded service request, please. MR. GAMBINO: Okay. What, we're going to do stormwater? MR. OLLIFF: Starting on page A-31. MR. GAMBINO: Stormwater management they were asking for two positions for a secondary drainage system, right-of-way management crew to increase productivity needed due to the growth in the county's urban areas. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Oh, good heavens. Surely nobody's opposing this. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I have no problems with it, Commissioner. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: This is -- MR. OLLIFF: Just for education of the new commissioners. John, why don't you give them a 15-second overview of the difference in the canal systems and -- and who maintains what, just so in the future everybody's on the same page. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And I have a map because John Boldt was kind enough to take a map of the county and magic marker it for me if anybody wants to see which canals are ours and which canals are the districts. CHAIRMAN CARTER: You might want to replicate that for the other four commissioners, Mr. Boldt. MR. BOLDT: John Boldt, Stormwater Director. There are over 300 miles of canal systems in Collier County, and we split the responsibility with the Big Cypress Basin South Florida Water Management. They have the primary system. The county has the secondary system. I have 146 miles that my crews maintain. I have essentially five crews, two-man crews. Three of them are in spraying operations. One primary responsibility is for the operation or maintenance of water level control structures and pumping stations. Page 77 June 22, 2001 And the final crew, two people are working on, particularly, in the urban area doing some control work, a little hand work, line trimmers and mowers and picking up litter. And it's an increasing problem because as we urbanized, a lot of my system's no longer available to drive a truck along and to spray. So we have to go in by hand and do all that work. Actually, I asked for four additional people. You're looking at the request for two. This would let me to step up my level of service in the urban area to meet the demands and expectations of the public for these backyard drains. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: So, Tom, why did you cut the two of the four that he requested? MR. OLLIFF: Just trying to establish some priorities for the board and keep your millage rate within some reasonable level. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: You guys, I probably get fewer pothole calls than most of you because so much of my district is in the City of Naples, but the calls that I get are about stormwater and the ditches needing cleaning out and the maintenance needing to be done and the flooding that results. I would -- I would be willing to listen to the justification for more than two. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Well, if I can-- I appreciate Tom's trying to keep the millage rate down as much as he can, but talking to Mr. Boldt and the needs out there is the extra two positions are going to be doing maintenance, and if we don't do it now, it's going to cost us more later. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: COMMISSIONER HENNING: Pay now or pay later. Right. So I would like to see if we -- if we can find, you know, that extra $100,000 somewhere else. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: That's two. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I'm not saying just add to it, but my opinion is let's find $100,000 somewhere else in the mix to put to this. Page 78 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Could I make a compromise here? Could we go with one rather than two positions and make it work that way so we don't have to impact anything too demanding? MR. OLLIFF: I think -- I think this is pretty much a two-or- nothing kind of a deal because you need a two-man crew in order to be able to actually do the work that has to be done on the stormwater side. COMMISSIONER Mac'Kie: How about if we have this as a goal that as we go through the budget, if we can find a hundred thousand dollars, this is where we're going to spend it? COMMISSIONER HENNING: What's your least favorite department? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Not good. I don't have any. I love them all. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Let's put it down as a goal, and we'll just assess and see what we look like at the end of the day. MR. OLLIFF: You can put it down as a goal if you keep in mind that we've added half a million dollars for property purchase on Bayshore Drive and we've added one-hundred-thirty-some-odd- thousand dollars to the Airport Authority this morning, and we've probably gone about $700,000 the wrong way so far as we've gone through the budget. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: But this is important. CHAIRMAN CARTER: We're just saying it's a goal, We haven't -- but we will listen, John, so you're still alive. You may die at the end, but you're still alive. MR. OLLIFF: John, thank you. Page 32. MR. GAMBINO: On page A-32 is transportation services' request for expanded positions. There's 18 positions that they're requesting. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Eighteen? Page 79 June 22, 2001 MR. GAMBINO: Total of 18, starting with human resource analyst. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Sorry, but I didn't notice there was 18 positions. MR. GAMBINO: So we have a human resource analyst position and a transportation planning. There's two positions, but they're currently on board, and they're in Fund 126, and they want to move them into Fund 101, the transportation manager and the fiscal analyst position. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: That's 120,000 or more right there that's not really new money. It's moved. MR. SMYKOWSKI: That is correct. It was formerly funded by grants. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And that I can't say how strongly I support that change 'cause there has just been no chain of command, and this will help with the chain of command on transportation. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I -- I support that, but I do have a question on the budget procedure. When we take something from one budget and we move it to another budget, how does it reflect? I mean, a little bit earlier we seen where from county manager's budget was moved to information technology. The county manager's budget showed an increase of, I think it was, 3 point some percent. Did that -- how does that reflect? I mean, would it actually have been more because all we did was transfer the dollars back and forth? Are these percentages remaining true, or are they -- they changing? I'm just trying to get a better grip on this. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Commissioner, in response to that, pursuant to your budget policy where you have grant funded positions where the grants run out and the requests of the staff is to absorb that position in a general operating budget, we treat those as Page 80 June 22, 2001 expanded service requests. You'll see this afternoon when we talk about the sheriff's budget there is $3.6 million worth of positions that were previously funded by grants and as such -- COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I follow you. I think you answered the question, but let me try one more time. In the county manager's budget where it showed an increase to 3.2 increase, that increase came after we shifted money from that budget into information technology for them to pick up on their budget. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Correct. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: So if we left that money there originally, then to the increase county manager's budget -- and forgive me for using -- MR. OLLIFF: No. No. That's a good example. You're right. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: -- would have been higher than 3.2. MR. SMYKOWSKI: That is correct. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Fine. If this is the way you've been doing it forever, but maybe next year somebody might be able to brief me before we get into this meeting exactly what these percentages truly represent. MR. OLLIFF: That's a fair comment. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Continue. MR. GAMBINO: Okay. In road and bridge, they're asking for a sidewalk for the four maintenance worker II positions, and there's also request for five positions for a drainage crew. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I'm sorry. I heard you say four maintenance workers II positions, but did you say something about sidewalks? MR. GAMBINO: Right. That's going to become a sidewalk crew. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Okay. It doesn't say that in here, Page 81 June 22, 2001 but that's what the $140,700 is? MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes. MR. GAMBINO: Yes. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Sidewalks, okay. And I guess we're getting sued a lot for cracky sidewalks, and that's probably what we're thinking about? MR. OLLIFF: We do a lousy job in terms of regular maintenance inspection and repair, especially of broken sidewalks. CHAIRMAN CARTER: And we settled one this year, what was sixty -- seventy thousand dollars if my mind's right. I mean, that's half of what you're asking for right there that you might have prevented. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: What the county manager meant was for his extremely high standards that are way higher than any standards for liability that might be incurred in a court of law -- we do a wonderful job for that purpose -- that he has such high standards and wants us to do better. MR. OLLIFF: Yeah. That's what I meant. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: That's what you meant. Yeah, that position stays. Those positions stay. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Gambino. MR. GAMBINO: Okay. Then we had five positions for drainage crew and four positions for an urban mowing crew. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Pause me on this drainage crew. We got $300,000 here on a drainage crew. This is drainage crew maintenance. How's that different from the $100,000 that we wanted over for Mr. Boldt? MR. KANT: The work that Mr. Boldt does is on the secondary canal system. Out work is confined to the roadway right-of-ways and all of the drainage swales and ditches associated with the rights-of- way. The bulk of the work that this drainage crew is going to be Page 82 June 22, 2001 doing -- as you heard earlier today and yesterday, we've had a tremendous amount of growth out in the estates area. Many of those roads -- and I use that word advisedly because many of them were put in over 30, 35 years ago, need significant amount of work. The ditches and the drainage out there was cut at the time 35 years ago. Nobody lived there, didn't receive much attention. Now because we're getting a tremendous growth spurt, we've been playing catch- up. So the bulk of this crew's work, not all of it, but the bulk of it will be to try to catch up in the estates and also to get ahead. You go outside and just look around what happened this morning, and you can see some small pockets that need to have some remedial work done. We have two major drainage crews, and this will augment those two. Oh, I'm sorry. Edward Kant, Transportation Operations Director. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: My question, just thinking back to the map that -- that I have with the primary, secondary, tertiary canals are -- are your crews working only on tertiary canals and not secondary? MR. KANT: Our crews do not work on any of the big blue lines that you see on John's map. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: But I know they don't work on the primary canals. MR. KANT: That's correct. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: But on John's canals they don't work on them at all. MR. KANT: No, ma'am. No, ma'am. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I just think that we might ought to think about spreading this money between the two. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Oh, boy. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I have a question. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I think you just gored District 5's ox Page 83 June 22, 2001 big time. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I'll address it. COMMISSIONER HENNING: equipment to this? As soon as the bleeding stops, Mr. Kant, is there any added MR. KANT: We're looking at -- this particular request includes some trucks. We have the backhoes and the other heavy equipment. We tend to move them around the county, but for this crew we will need a crew cab and a dump truck. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Related cost? MR. KANT: I beg your pardon? COMMISSIONER HENNING: What's the cost for the equipment, the pickup trucks? MR. KANT: That's all included -- that's all included in that request, sir. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Oh, okay. How about if we take that out and -- and request for the AVTOR Fund to fund that since you-- MR. KANT: That fund is defunct, sir. COMMISSIONER HENNING: It is? MR. KANT: Oh, yes. That fund was collapsed several years ago. All that money was used. Talking about the JAC Road Fund. COMMISSIONER HENNING: How come they're still meeting then? MR. SMYKOWSKI: Land Trust Fund as well. He's talking about -- no, there's a JAC There are two -- MR. KANT: And I have -- I have no avenue to those funds. That's controlled, I believe, by an advisory board. MR. OLLIFF: It is. We can certainly make the request between now and September for the advisory board to consider this as a funding request, and it's usually -- Page 84 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Make a funding request but don't cut this back. I can tell you right now I've been getting an outpouring from out there that's just unbelievable over these ditches. And the lack of-- now that the rains going, what I'm going to do is if this request isn't met, I'm going to be directing those calls to people that might be able to answer them better than I can. Are you listening out there in Channel 54? CHAIRMAN CARTER: Just don't point at me. I'm not going to gore your ox. MR. SMYKOWSKI: In the JAC Land Trust Fund there are projected reserves of 696,300 next year, so that certainly -- from a viability standpoint that's certainly an option, obviously, that there was an advisory committee that we would have to make that recommendation to. COMMISSIONER HENNING: So, Mr. Kant, how much is equipment for these vehicles? MR. KANT: The pickup truck will run about twenty-three to twenty-five thousand fully equipped. The 15-yard dump truck will run about forty-five to fifty-five thousand fully equipped and, well, that would include the radios. All of the radios themselves run about 2,000 to 2,500 apiece. COMMISSIONER Mac'Kie: Then I would ask that we would make a seventy-five thousand dollars request or eighty, whatever it is, of this trust and put that money toward Mr. Boldt's stormwater needs. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Well, we're still a little short there, I think. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Actually, we're looking at about seventy-five grand. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Pickup trucks thirty, 15-yard dump trucks are eighty-five thousand, three mobile radios thirty-six hundred so ... COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: So can we do that? That's one. Page 85 June 22, 2001 MR. OLLIFF: We can and we'll get back to you on their recommendation, because usually they try to reserve use of those funds for sexier type things, whether it be park improvements or library-type things that are real sort of public service customer -- MR. KANT: I might point out, Commissioners, that two years ago the trust did give us a $50,000 grant for the rural safety refuges, that we did as a pilot program, and they were -- they were -- at that time indicated that that was a type of funding they would prefer to do. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I can tell you firsthand, because we've been to them for different things, what we're looking at next is the beautification of part of the median getting the sign up 'cause there isn't any funds available to us. Golden Gate Boulevard is completed, and the planning will be nil, and they've been looking for some funds from there. You can by all means approach them. I encourage you to do so but, meanwhile, leave this amount intact rather than saying you're cutting it, and if they don't make it up then you're going to have to have full ditches. That wasn't the intent of this fund. MR. KANT: And, again, I might point out that during our -- our early -- or shall I say, early negotiations with the manager's office and my administrator, our original request had been for seven. We wanted to get two dump trucks in there, but we've been cut to five. We can make it work. It will work quite well, but we felt at the time that we wanted to go for full crew. This crew will certainly augment what we have out in the field today. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Actually, I thought maybe we could get the money from the Golden Gate Community Center. Just kidding, Tom. COMMISSIONER HENNING: The -- I hope their priorities of the advisory boards is the public safety of property out there instead of beautification. Page 86 June 22,2001 COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Thank you. MR. SMYKOWSKI: It certainly is in the past. I believe bought some firefighter equipment for Big Corkscrew fires so -- COMMISSIONER HENNING: And there is a road maintenance in there when-- when-- that's where the money comes when roads go from dirt to a blacktop. MR. OLLIFF: We will make our best pitch to them. MR. SMYKOWSKI: We'll leave that funding in, make the pitch, bring back the recommendation, and then we'll see how things stack up. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Wait a minute. I want to make sure we know where we're going with this before we go one step further. CHAIRMAN CARTER: We're not going to take it out, Commissioner. I will vote. You've got my support. We will not take it out. We are looking at an option. Do we have another support for that too? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: That -- if we're looking at it as an option, I'm for it. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: It only takes two to keep it in. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I would -- I would say recommend cutting it out and then for you to help them out in trying to get the money from the JAC Fund. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Tom Henning is going to appear before this committee and ask them to take care of the taxpayers needs by appealing for those funds rather than take it from General Revenue. Also, maybe we can get some money from them to help out in East Naples and Golden Gate City too. Thank you. MR. OLLIFF: That commercial break was sponsored by -- Mr. Kant, you want to move them on and explain that urban mowing crew for us. Page 87 June 22, 2001 MR. KANT: Yes, sir. Commissioners, we have -- currently we have two urban mowing crews. As you're aware, the emphasis on the urban portion of the county from 951 west with the improvement that we have been making to the roadways has increased the need for increased mowing frequencies as well as added number of areas that we used to mow with different equipment. So this urban mowing crew will be used in three of the five districts. That's all I can say about that. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I guess you won't have to worry about that one. COMMISSIONER HENNING: It's part of our community character plan I think that we want to see. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Next item. MR. GAMBINO: Okay. They had two traffic -- traffic operations. They are requesting two traffic technician II positions due to additional signals in FY'01 and FY'OO. MR. COLETTA: Little more detail. MR. SMYKOWSKI: In addition to the signals, Commissioners, you also have the whole traffic -- computerized traffic signal system. MR. KANT: These are the last two of the four technicians that were recommended under the feasibility study which the board signed off on about two or three -- actually, three years ago now. And originally we were asked -- we were told under that study to ask for four technicians, and I split it into two in two years, and this is the second year of that. I might also point out, we did add for your edification the fact that we're adding signals at a much greater rate than we were adding them five years ago. And, again, this goes back to that rapid urbanization. We're finding, for example, we're even putting signals in part of the semi-rural or surburban area that were not originally anticipated to be signalized. We now have 137, I believe, it is signals including school Page 88 June 22, 2001 flashers. We have about six that are going to come on-line within the next six months, and then as the new projects -- the new capital improvements projects come on-line, we will have four new major intersections along Livingston Road that were never signalized before that will begin to be signalized. Begin to couple that with the increases in traffic, with the computerized signal system itself which will come on the first phase which will come on-line in about seven months, and we need to make sure that we have adequate response times and also that we begin -- we must begin to get into a mode of doing more preventive maintenance rather than being reactive all the time. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: No argument here. CHAIRMAN CARTER: No argument here. Next item. Any questions on that7 If you got the operator, you got to move them around. The last one -- I mean, any questions down the line. I'm looking and I'm saying -- MR. OLLIFF: There wasn't a lot of room for me to move on these items either, Mr. Chairman, but now that we're at the conclusion of transportation -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Got a question. One question on transportation. MR. OLLIFF: Okay. COMMISSIONER Mac'Kie: Why do they need their own human resource analyst position? MR. OLLIFF: That's a great question and I'm going to jump in here if you don't mind. The transportation division, in particular the road and bridge portion of that, is a unique operation and one where we continue to have a large number of human resource related issues that we need to address better. A number of your divisions have gone to a human resources analyst that's actually not located here at the government complex but located in the field so that your employees Page 89 June 22, 2001 have direct access to them immediately to be able to get some answers and, frankly, to do a little conflict resolution on a lot of cases when we're out there and help improve some of our management labor relationships. And we felt like this was a very important thing for road and bridge. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Not going to argue with you. MR. OLLIFF: Okay. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Thank you. MR. SMYKOWSKI: That also addresses Commissioner Fiala's response with her budget committee. That was one of the final questions she had raised as well. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: So if we take our lunch break, we're not coming back until three o'clock because that's our next time certain? CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, we have some other items in there we can deal with. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, you do have a very important lunch, but there is also a member of the public who's registered to speak on the capital items and I think it's more of a generic comment that he can probably make, and if you'd allow him to speak I think we can get him out of here and not make him come back after lunch. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Sure. It would be my pleasure to have him speak. MR. OLLIFF: And while he is coming to the podium, I also think Commissioner Coletta had one question regarding a state law change that requires counties to pay for an additional two days of Medicaid bed time for Martha Skinner who has been staying in order to be able to answer that question. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I apologize, Martha. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Dexter Groose is the speaker. MR. GROOSE: Good morning. I'm Dexter Groose. I'm a Page 90 June 22, 2001 principal of Value Research, Incorporated, a value engineering consulting firm. I would like to recommend to the commission that you direct county staff to consider the use of Value Engineering design reviews for any capital plan that would exceed $5 million. What this technique does is it evaluates the cost of major capital plans and envisions ways that it -- that these plans can be made more cost effective. Typically, they can reduce the cost of a plan by 5 percent. I recently completed one in Dade County, $11 million project that we took almost 20 percent of the cost out, and it represented almost a hundred to one return on investment. But this is something that I would like to recommend to the commission that you have county staff take a look at and see if it makes sense for Collier County as well. Dade County does it routinely. I do a number of these type studies for the Miami Airport Expansion and other areas of Dade County, and I think it can just help you ensure that you're getting more bang for your buck on capital plans. Doesn't have to be me. There's other professional consultants in this field as well. And then, lastly, if I could, I noticed this morning's paper talked about a 12 percent property tax hike, and I'm not so sure that's the correct amount, and if it's not, I think it might be helpful if you could -- could reassure permanent residents like myself who are homesteaded, are we not protected by a maximum increase of the cost of living, three and a half percent whatever it might be? CHAIRMAN CARTER: I will let Mr. Olliff answer that for you, sir. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Sir, the cap is on the -- the increase in the assessed value of your property is capped at CPI 3 percent or CPI, whichever is less on an annual basis, but the board has the discretion to go up to ten mills within ad valorem taxation. Obviously, the recommendation at this point is to go from what was 3.5 last year to Page 91 June 22, 2001 approximately 3.9 in the current year, so the board does have that latitude. MR. GROOSE: So we could be looking at a 12 percent. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes, in the millage rate itself. How it will impact your individual property will be -- also be a function of the exemptions you have, homestead, et cetera, and-- CHAIRMAN CARTER: The key here, I guess, is -- I get the question, too -- it's the millage rate and people don't understand that. We're going to have to translate that early and often into how many dollars per hundred thousand that means, and maybe that's -- MR. SMYKOWSKI: It's a little over $41 per $100,000 of taxable value, so that gives you a nice barometer to equate to your individual property. MR. GROOSE: On that issue I just would like to say that 12 percent seems very high to me, especially that our base is expanding so much. The paper claimed that the base almost doubled in five years, and if the pace is growing that fast, you know, why do we have to incur 12 percent increases? That's a concern of mine. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Well, we have some unfunded mandates from Tallahassee, and whether my colleagues agree or not, $3 million for a program of healthcare for the needy here in Collier County. And those are just two examples, and we've had capital needs, and they are going to continue, and put in a new library last year. Now we need to put those positions in there, and we have a new government center going in in North Naples providing more service to people instead of having to drive down to this complex to pay their court fines or child support or registration of their boat or vehicle or stuff like that. MR. GROOSE: It still seems to me, if our tax base has doubled in five years, that we shouldn't be looking at tax increases or millage rate increases. Page 92 June 22, 2001 CHAIRMAN CARTER: Sir, our millage rate is lowest in the State of Florida out of 67 counties. We are No. 67, and we have some nice comparisons we can show you and we appreciate the assessed valuation. I mean, that has of course helped, but on the other side of it if you wouldn't have had that assessed valuation going up like this, of course, you would never have had all these people coming here. And the more people that come -- 65 percent change in growth -- 65 percent growth change in ten years, all of this compounds itself in terms of what ends up in taking one number and running a headline that says 12 percent property tax increase, which if you went back and looked at everything, you would find that if I have an assessed value of a home of $500,000, that means, gee, if everything stays and we think we're going to be able to reduce, we're talking $200 a year. And then you look around and say, "I've got a multi-million dollar library. I've got a government center close to me for access. I've got improved road systems." There's 94 or 95 million being spent in District 2 next year. So I'm just asking everyone to take into consideration services rendered for what you pay. And I appreciate the concern and, believe me, I catch a lot of heat where I live in my own household about when they see a number, you got to explain it because I don't understand it. So we're trying to break it down. MR. GROOSE: I'm very-- I'm very thankful for the good work the commission does and has done in the past to keep us at the lowest tax county in the state, and I'm hopeful that the school board will be as cost efficient as you people in the future, and that's one of my -- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, that can be subject for the school board for you to go and have a little chat with them. If you looked at our pie chart yesterday, which we ought to provide this gentleman before he leaves, that will give you some indication or what their numbers are versus ours. Page 93 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Plus what controls we have over the money we can actually adjust as we go along. The sheriff's budget is one of those things we have very little control over, and it's a good percent of our whole budget, constitutional officers. Also we have to meet their needs. As long as they can reasonably prove, we have to meet them. You get through the discretionary part of the budget we can work with, it's a very small amount. Tom Olliff will supply you with that, give you a better reference point to work from. And I also suggest you share it with the news reporters in the audience. CHAIRMAN CARTER: And I appreciate your comments, sir, on Value Engineering. I really do, and I will ask Tom and our group, if they're not utilizing this, to take a hard look at Value Engineering and how to -- MR. GROOSE: Thank you for your time. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, just to maybe address one last of those unfunded mandate examples. Commissioner Coletta, go ahead. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Yes. Mrs. Skinner, thank you so much for coming here today. Would you please enlighten us on the unfunded mandates that the state has passed down to us? MS. SKINNER: Yes. This year when they started into session they said that they were going to have a quid pro quo, that they were going to take away the mandate for local government to fund Healthy Kids, but they were going to get it back by adding two additional Medicaid days to the county budget that we would be obligated for. We are obligated for -- the state pays the first ten -- eleven, then they added two more of those, but we pay the rest of up to 45, so they took their part down two and added two to ours, which statewide that is a huge increase. Our county doesn't have the population of Medicaid Page 94 June 22, 2001 patients that some counties do, so our part was figured at $144,000 increase that we have no control over. As it turned out, the governor didn't sign the bill saying that the counties, you know, would have that relief for the Healthy Kids program, so now we're getting both of them. My program pays a million three in Medicaid payments right now, nursing home and Medicaid hospitalization for the indigent. We have no choice. We pay it, and there are others like indigent burials, medical examinations for abused children. There are some others in the budget, and that's about half of the social service budget, and it's all mandated cost. We have no control over it. MR. OLLIFF: I know that we're running late, Mr. Chairman, but I do need to point out to you that the State of Florida probably hates Martha Skinner and their budget because they do a great job of reviewing the Medicaid bills that we get, because there are certain criteria that all those bills have to meet, and we review those and, Martha, give me the number from the past year. MS. SK1NNER: Anywhere from 300,000 to 400,000 in error rate we subtract a year. COMMISSIONER Mac'Kie: And just if I can take a chance to say if there is a most-valued employee for Collier County, I think it ought to be Martha Skinner. If there's anything we can do to keep you from ever retiring, I want you to please let me personally know what it is. MS. SKINNER: Tom has done this, and he's talked to me. I think I set three dates so far. Now, he's asked me to set another one, but, you know, I've given 32 years this October to this job and then five years before that to the school board, and I don't know that I like retirement. I don't know that I like retirement, but I think I want to give it a try. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: We will miss you so bad, if that Page 95 June 22, 2001 were to happen. MS. SKINNER: I told Tom I'm as close as the phone, and I tell you that too. My connections won't go away just because I'm not on the job. Call me if you need me. MR. OLLIFF: I'll tell you, legitimately she has offered to help us to continue to lobby for issues in Tallahassee with those connections, and I think on social service fronts you couldn't pay anybody in the State of Florida to be a more effective lobbiest for us on those kinds of issues. MS. SKINNER: Let me take two minutes and tell you that with Department of Elder Affairs a bill came down that would absolutely have done away with our Services for Seniors program. She was intending to omit lead agency status and case management. That's all we can bid on. We have had this program 26 years, and thanks to Burt Saunders it passed the house. It got to the Senate, and I called Burt and I said, "Do not -- please do not let that come to the floor." And he worked with his committee, and it didn't make the floor, and this is two years in a row that we've had to work to fight that one off. So it is effective if you get in there and notify your legislators and work with them. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: is. And if you're as smart as Martha Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Martha, thank you so much. MS. SKINNER: You're welcome. CHAIRMAN CARTER: We fought the good fight on all of this. MR. SKINNER: I know you were a big help. Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Unfortunately, we got stuck on the Medicare, but we saved the other. MS. SKINNER: Right. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, I think you have a very important Page 96 June 22, 2001 lunch that you're about 15 minutes late for. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Yes. We'll adjourn until 1:30. (Lunch recess taken.) (Proceedings recommenced at 1:40 p.m., Commissioner Mac'Kie not present.) CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, the Board of County Commission Workshop is now back in session. We're in Day 2 of budgets, and we are at capital projects; is that right? MR. SMYKOWSKI: That is correct, Mr. Chairman. We're on page A-46 and A-47 in your General Fund tab. Again, these are projects that receive support from the General Fund. Obviously, they're not impact-fee eligible. Many of these projects that we will talk about Mr. Olliff alluded to in his initial opening remarks, but we're prepared to go through those -- Susan's not sure -- with the assistance of the appropriate department directors and effected parties will walk through those projects. They start on A-46. CHAIRMAN CARTER: We probably need to highlight those, if we can, for the listening public. I think the commissioners are pretty well versed on that, but let's make sure the public understands how we're spending their money. MR. OLLIFF: Just to orient the board again, if you'll just pay attention to that far right-hand column, that is your fiscal year '02 request for each of those projects. Because there's a number of them that are shown with zeros in that column, they continue to show up on these sheets because they are current-year projects, and we try and show you the history of what's in this year's budget and what's in next year's budget. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you. MS. USHER: Good afternoon. My name is Susan Usher. We had over $60 million in requests from staff, and we only had $11 Page 97 June 22, 2001 million to fund or to give out or to meet the requests. On six of our projects, we're recommending that we use some kind of funding mechanism, a loan, commercial paper, and then the balance of the projects we're just going to pay with ad valorem. CHAIRMAN CARTER: So $11 million made the cut. All right. MS. USHER: On page A-46 I'd like to go over some of these projects real quick. The first project is the horticulture learning center for $100,000. This is to build a pavilion out at the ag center. It 'will function as an outdoor classroom. There are no other revenues coming in. Ad valorem will pay for the entire project. Our next project is the GIS or Geographic Information System for $1,939,000. This is a three-year project in the amount of $4.6 million. This $1.9 million represents the purchase of various software products and their maintenance agreements, hardware, training for staff, and the consultant's costs. Ad valorem will be paying about 32 percent of this or $625,800. The balance of the funding will come from various departments within the county, for instance, road and bridge, gas tax, community development, pollution control, solid waste, EMS, utilities; these departments will contribute to the balance. The next item is the financial management system for $2,500,000, and that's to replace the current accounting system that the board and the clerk's employees rely on. We would like to take this time to thank the board for -- to the thank the clerk for his generous contribution of $1 million from his trust fund to help purchase this new system. With his contribution -- also, he's paying for a consultant. So with his contribution and paying for the consultant with the money left over, ad valorem will be paying approximate $1,750,000. The next item is computer system network improvements for $140,000. This is to purchase hardware, computer hardware, servers, Page 98 June 22, 2001 backup equipment, tapes, and disk drives for community development. Community development will be paying 100 percent of this. There will be no ad valorem on this project. Electronic registration and payment, what we'd like to do is have the capability from any computer in our homes or anywhere in the county or wherever where you can go into our web site, and you can register or make payments via the internet. Also, some of this money will go towards parks and rec to give them a better connection to the main campus and to purchase infrastructure and software to achieve this goal for them. Ad valorem will be paying for 53 percent of that project in a total amount of $188,500. The next project is the North Naples satellite office for just over $3 million. We're recommending that this project be financed over ten years. This building is located adjacent to the north regional library on Orange Drive. It will house the tax collector. It will be able to do tax collector services, voter and library registration, pay utility bills, apply for homestead, and access property records. The next item is the courthouse annex design. Again, we'd like to finance that over ten years. This building will house court system employees and constitutional officers. The next item is some various re-roofing projects on county buildings. That will be funded totally out of ad valorem. New air conditioners for $278,600. Again, that's for replacing or repairing various air conditioners around the county or in county buildings. Building "J" renovations, that's for $1 million. That's to replace the roof over at the jail and to replace and/or repair the air conditioning system that sits on top of the roof. The next project for $250,000 is general building improvements. Again, that's just to help with the repair and replacement of anything that breaks that hasn't been mentioned above. Next, the supervisor of elections for voting machines, $6 million. Page 99 June 22, 2001 Again, we would like to finance that over 10 years. The state is contributing money to us for these purchases. They will give us money over two fiscal years. The dollar amount we're expecting next year is $180,000, so that will help defray the cost of the new voting machines. The next item is the Immokalee jail renovation. That's to provide a better facility than what's out there right now for 192 beds. We would like to finance that project, also, over 10 years. Then the last item here is the mobile data infrastructure for the sheriff. This is the last piece that we need to make smart cars. The sheriff has gotten quite a few grants in to buy the computers for the -- the laptop computers for the cars. This piece here will help us make the cars communicate with the radio dispatch system. We would like to finance that over five years. Do you have any questions? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I do, as a matter of fact. MS. USHER: Okay. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Isn't there a substation being planned at Orangetree? MR. OLLIFF: I'm sorry. What was the question? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Is there a substation that's being planned at Orangetree? MR. OLLIFF: If you'll turn the page. On page A-48 -- COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I didn't mean to get ahead of yOU. MR. OLLIFF: No, no, no, that's fine. On page A-48 is the list of capital improvements that were requested and not recommended for funding. Down at the bottom of that list you'll see replacement of an Everglades substation, Orangetree substation, Fiddler's Creek substation. All of those were requested but are not being recommended as part of this budget. Page 100 June 22,2001 COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Is there anything that you'd like to say to defend that? MR. OLLIFF: We have two representatives from Don Hunter's office here who manage the sheriff's finances, and Crystal can probably -- COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Hi, Crystal. MS. KINZEL: Hello. Good afternoon, Commissioners. THE COURT REPORTER: Your name, please. MS. KINZEL: Crystal Kinzel, finance director for the sheriff's office. We had requested, as you can see on the list on page A-48, numerous substations and buildings, but, of course, we also understand the tax situation that we have in the county. So we're working very closely with Mr. Olliff's office, and we've agreed to phase these in over the next five years. We tried to get a lot of our facilities consolidated, get out of the rental properties, and also build the additional substations as we grow. So this was part of the compromise that we worked out with the county manager's office, but we do anticipate the need for an Orangetree substation in the very near future. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Have you already planned that in long range for, like, two years out or three years out? MS. KINZEL: Yes. We're working with the county manager, as I said, for about a five- to ten-year capital plan. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Thank you, Crystal. MS. KINZEL: Thank you. MR. OLLIFF: Two points I'll make here. One, I think you've made some major progress in terms of sheriff's office space and capital needs with the purchase of the Barnett Bank building on Horseshoe Drive and secondly by actually funding in this year's budget the Immokalee Jail improvements that are necessary out there. Keep in mind, too, that we just got done completing the new Page 101 June 22, 2001 administration building portion of the sheriffs office here on campus. Also, I believe we've already had a preliminary discussion about investigating a law enforcement impact fee which may help in terms of our ability to be able to plan for some of these capital projects in the future. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Mr. Henning -- Commissioner Henning. COMMISSIONER HENNING: You can call me -- I mean, I've been called a lot of things. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay, Colonel. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Whatever works. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I like Colonel. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay, Colonel. Take it away. COMMISSIONER HENNING: The agricultural learning center, did you say that's a gazebo? MS. USHER: It was supposed to be a pavilion. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Pavilion? MR. OLLIFF: We'll let Miss Blanton answer that. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you. MR. OLLIFF: It's one part of a long ongoing project there. MS. BLANTON: Good afternoon, Commissioners. Denise Blanton, university extension department head. What it is is a 900- square-foot building, and it's called a pavilion because it doesn't have air conditioning. It's more open air. It's not a gazebo. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. It doesn't have walls on it? It's just a -- MS. BLANTON: It has walls, but the idea is that you can open up the walls, and there will be screening versus walls that need air conditioning. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Has this been budgeted from previous, or is this a new -- Page 102 June 22, 2001 MS. BLANTON: COMMISSIONER HENNING: educate me on your entire plan? MS. BLANTON: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER HENNING: MS. BLANTON: Thank you. This is a part of the entire plan, yes. Oh. So some day you get to Okay. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Thank you. MR. OLLIFF: I'll tell you, too, that there are some grant funding opportunities for the next phases of this project. In fact, Denise was just telling me at break about some opportunities and some discussions we've had with some of our legislative delegation about how to try and better get some state funding for this project. And for those of you who aren't aware, I think a large portion of that actual facility was paid for out of state grant funds, the building itself. And so I think there are continuing opportunities through a number of different budget -- department budgets primarily as opposed to special funding requests that we can look for continued funding for some of this garden improvement out there. MS. BLANTON: Another thing, too, is that $89,000 in private money, actual cash, has been donated. Although we're not fortunate to have large lump-sum contributors as a normal rule of thumb, we do, for example, anticipate all but 60 of the 1,000 plants that are going into the color garden area are donated. A lot of our clients are working families and businesses, and what they do is they're very gracious in giving us very good in-kind donations, but we've also been fortunate to have $89,000 in hard cash too. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Good. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I think Commissioner Henning's question is a good one, Dr. Blanton. When you look at your total project and everything that's going on, what this piece represents, I'm Page 103 June 22, 2001 sure it will help all the commissioners at some point in time just to do that spreadsheet and show them where you are. MS. BLANTON: And we'd like to invite you out, of course, too, and we're hoping to have a grand opening later on this fall of the new facility, so I welcome the opportunity. Thank you. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Any other questions, Commissioners? MR. OLLIFF: One last note that I do need to make for the record. The courthouse annex preliminary design project under the facilities management portion on the blue sheet, page A-46, keep in mind that is the project which I alluded to at the opening of our budget presentation. It is the plus or minus $30 million estimated construction project. So this is the actual architectural design and permitting money that will hopefully lead us to the construction budget next year which, again, will have to be a financed project in order for us to be able to construct that. But I think if you'll talk to any of the state agencies, court-related agencies, or your constitutional officers who will be housed there, they will tell you about the need that they have for some expanded space. In fact, in the short term, we're already working with both the supervisor of elections and your property appraiser to try and find some temporary space and stop-gap help for them before we can get this building built. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I have one question left. Under support services, web contents, electronic registration and pay, $355,700, could somebody explain to me why it's so expensive? I'm a little lost on that. There must be more involved there than I realize. MS. LEAMER: That's going to be -- THE COURT REPORTER: Your name? MS. LEAMER: Jo-Anne Leamer. That project will encompass many components. It's the first effort towards an e-government or an Page 104 June 22, 2001 e-commerce environment. We are going to be focusing on getting parks and rec up online with dedicated connection to the county and the ability to communicate with the citizens for registration online. In addition, that will include utility billing so people can make payments online as well as looking at any other initiatives where we can start to do e-commerce. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: So you're going to be coming up with a voluntary system with people that opt not to receive bills by mail and save the county money and receive their bills more instantaneously by receiving them online and then paying for them online also? MS. LEAMER: Correct. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: It's something we need. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Commissioner Henning? COMMISSIONER HENNING: No. MS. USHER: If you would turn to page A-49, there's only one project on this page, the one that's folded, the first project, the Golden Gate Community Center improvements for $200,000. The other projects listed below we've already discussed yesterday in the unincorporated ad valorem section. This $200,000 is needed for improvements for the WIC office. Then on page A-50, that's for the library. That's to buy periodicals, books, microfilms, library-type materials. Then on page A-51 is your stormwater management capital projects. If you would like, Mr. Boldt can come up and discuss some of those projects. MR. OLLIFF: I will tell you that going down Mr. Boldt's list we simply asked him to prioritize these requests, and then we tried to physically determine what projects we thought we could actually get done in the course of a 12-month fiscal year. Again, if you'll harken back to that list of requested and not approved projects, there were a number of stormwater projects that were requested that we didn't Page 105 June 22, 2001 approve, but the major one that I would point you to is the Lely canal with spreader structure. We hope to actually get a permit by the end of this year for that Lely Basin 6 project, the one that I think you-all have been told we've been chasing for about 12 years now. We have the Army Corps of Engineers revised plans from a recent application in August, and we full well expect as a result of that permit application to be able to get a permit. But I will tell you, Mr. Chairman, that if we are not successful and we continue to see the same kind of responses that we've had from South Florida and the Army Corp, that we're going to escalate that project a little bit and bring it up to your level, and we may be asking the board for some assistance in flying to Jacksonville to talk to the Army Corp directly or writing some letters to some of our elected officials to try and get that project moving. For the new board members, there is an entire drainage master plan program that needs to be made in this county, that needs to be done in this county, and you start at the tail end of a system and you will work your way up north. The water in the county primarily flows northeast to southwest in this county, and we want to start down at the tail end of the system, which is this project. Until we can get this project permitted and constructed, the rest of the whole system from the south all the way to the north is at a standstill. One of the commitments that we made to you last year as part of the budget was part of a request to get some additional resources and staffing for this department was to make a much more aggressive effort in trying to get this permit. So I just want to sort of put you on notice about that project and give you a little update. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Mr. Olliff, you know that I will do anything that I can. Ever since I've been here I've heard about this and even years before. It is just atrocious what the Corps of Engineers has done here. They like to put heat on everybody. Page 106 June 22, 2001 Well, we're going to reverse the torture. COMMISSIONER HENNING: We're going to have a workshop in August on the stormwater systems. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I think that will be very educational for everybody, the importance of John Boldt's department. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Right. That's August 1 from 9 to noon. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Question. On the $2 million for acquisition of mitigation land within the drainage basin, how big of an area does that cover? MR. BOLDT: For the record, John Boldt, stormwater director. At this point in time, we are focusing on one piece of property. It's almost 100 acres going for about $25,000 an acre, you know, so at this point it's not recommended. We're still looking at the possibilities, what it's going to take to mitigate. Those numbers haven't been established yet. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I mean, is it open? You've already got a property in mind, I take it. MR. BOLDT: We do at this point in time, and we've entered into some early negotiations and may try to get an option on that piece of property for two years and hold the option to purchase open until the whole thing starts to fall together. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Okay. I'm going to be looking very much forward to our tour. I think it's next week. MR. BOLDT: Yes, sir. We'll try to get out there. The workshop, also, we're going to get into the nitty-gritty details with maps and pictures of what this is all about, so you'll have another opportunity to see it then. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Whenever I see, you know, Page 107 June 22, 2001 money available for mitigation, I get a little excited thinking of some of the areas out there that we're going to be losing fairly soon if we don't move on it. MR. BOLDT: Very good. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Question on A-52, the item on the Wiggins Pass outfall, is that now just being deferred, or where are we? MR. BOLDT: Actually, Wiggins outfall is going to be in two phases. We're about ready to get permits and go into construction for Phase I. It's in this year's budget in cooperation with the transportation department. It's going to be a large storm drain along the west side of Gulf Harbor Drive south from Wiggins Pass down to the outfall. The second phase, the $736,000, is more for Phase II and includes a major portion as a land purchase of that property on the south side of the road, which is the key to the rest of the project. The flow-way and mitigation, we're going to have to do there. So that's what the second-phase monies are for. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. (Commissioner Mac'Kie is now present.) MR. OLLIFF: This list is actually a description of those projects that are funded and in your budget. If you'll look on page A- 51, in fact, the very first project on that list is the Wiggins Pass outfall project which, as part of our recommended budget, is $736,000. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you. Any other questions by commissioners? MR. OLLIFF: John, you can ease up on those rain prayers for us. I mean, it's been raining long enough. Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I believe we are to -- Page 108 June 22, 2001 MR. OLLIFF: Elected officials. CHAIRMAN CARTER: And we have the honorable Dwight Brock in the audience, our clerk of courts, for anyone out there who does not know this gentleman, and Mr. Jim Mitchell, his chief financial officer. MR. BROCK: Good morning, Commissioners. My name is Dwight Brock. I'm the clerk of the circuit court. If you have any specific questions, I'll be more than happy to answer them. If you would like me to go through some of the things, I'll be more than happy to do that, however you wish. We can make it as short or as long as we want. CHAIRMAN CARTER: That will be up to questions by the Board of County Commissioners. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I don't have any. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Commissioner Mac'Kie has none. I have none. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: None. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I have some. The finance management system, the new computer system, is that going to save on staff, or are we going to see a reduction later on in staffing the clerk's office? MR. BROCK: You're talking about the financial management system that we're working with the administrator on today? COMMISSIONER HENNING: Yes. MR. BROCK: Well, the reality is that over probably the next two or maybe three years you will see an increase in staff to support that. The reason for that is because you're going to have to put the system into place, which is going to require substantial conversion costs. Those costs will be in the form of human resources for the next couple of years. In addition, there will be an outflow of funding to purchase the system and get everything operational. Page 109 June 22, 2001 But the anticipation, I think, of both the county administrator's office and my office, is that over a period of time those costs in the first few years will be far and away exceeded by the benefits we receive down the road. For example, some of the expanded services - - well, almost all of the expanded services you see in financial functions, the MIS functions in my budget this year, will be a consequence of the need to put in place the new financial management system. Whereas, hopefully, through attrition and through the benefits we reap from more efficient operations, those will be recovered in the years down the road. Obviously we're not going to take the system that we have online today and throw it away and start another one. We will be running parallel systems for a period of time to insure that everything that we put in place is correct. Since you bring that up, I'd like to discuss that for a little bit and to thank the county manager as well as this board for the efforts that have been put forth in this process and give you a little history of how this came to pass. Back just prior to the turn of the century we actually went out and analyzed the cost benefit associated with replacing the old financial system that we have in place with a new financial system. Because of the time frame that we were contemplating doing this in, we made a determination at that point in time that it was not cost effective for us to replace it at that point in time, but rather to wait until after Y2K was over with and resources became available in the industry to assist us to do that. As a consequence we've now been going through this process for a little over a year. And I think the decision that we made at that point in time has been well borne out to be a very wise decision. The cost of the systems have gone down. Something else that I'd like to point out is part of the system that we are putting in place, which is a relatively expensive system-- Page 110 June 22, 2001 through the ability of us to save funds in a trust fund that the State of Florida has created for the clerk of the circuit court for records modernization, we have been able to designate approximately $1 million from the clerk of the circuit court to assist the Board of County Commissioners in putting this in for the citizens. You know, a lot of things that people probably will not understand about the system that we are putting in place, hopefully, is that a lot of our objective here is to be able to provide information to the general public and that means through technology. People sitting at their desktop, their computer at home, will be able to find out information from the computer system as opposed to having to come over to the county or to drive over to this complex. For example, what we're looking at will allow vendors to look at the system and see exactly where their payments are in the payment process over at the computer system down the road, so you're not having to build facilities to handle those people coming here. Some of the systems that we have looked at are going to be phenomenal. Now, obviously, we're not going to be able to take advantage of the e-commerce engines that are there immediately, but it is our anticipation to provide as much information as we possibly can, both on your county administrator's side and the clerk of court's side, from your home as opposed to having to come here. I, as the clerk of the circuit court, over my tenure as clerk and in my experience with your county administrator, we realize that the goal of government is to serve the people, and if we can take service to the people as opposed to making the people come to us for the service, we've done our job better. I think that is attributed and is shown by the desire to take our services to the outlying areas, i.e., the branches that are out there in place. And in dealing with your county administrator and his staff over the last couple of years, we have seen a trend on his part to be of the Page 111 June 22, 2001 same opinion that we are. That's our goal in life, to service the people and not require them to comport to what we want them to do. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, if there's no more questions, I do need to make a couple of comments. One is, as part of the annual budget from the clerk, you need to recognize that we actually budget about $1.8 million that the clerk actually returned back to your general fund at the end of the year. So in terms of excess fees that he collects and things that, frankly, he could spend -- he budgets and returns that money back to your general fund and that, frankly, just helps to lower your ad valorem tax rate each and every year, and that number has gone up significantly this past year. Secondly, Dwight has, frankly, a fairly reasonable and, in fact, a much smaller increase percentage-wise than the budget that I presented to you, and I think he's done a real good job of turning in an efficient budget and making sure that he's not asking for anything beyond what he actually needs. Lastly, I have to pat him on the back. That decision he just sort of brushed over about looking at this FMS system at the turn of the century as he put it -- when we were looking at it just prior to Y2K, the costs for the same system that we're looking at were at least double what the cost of the systems are today, and it was, frankly, Jim and Dwight's decision to postpone it thinking that post Y2K some of the software costs would come down. We had no way of knowing that. They crystal balled it, and, frankly, we'll end up saving probably two and a half to three million dollars of taxpayers' money as a result. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Good work. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Wow. MR. BROCK: You know, most people don't realize how the clerk of the circuit court is funded. You know, let me give you a thumbnail sketch of how we're funded. The Florida legislature Page 112 June 22, 2001 developed the funding mechanisms for the clerk of the circuit court. It requires the Board of County Commissioners through its annual budget to fund certain portions of my budget, that being the portions that relate directly to the Board of County Commissioners, i.e., the financial functions, i.e., the board minutes and records. Now, that comes out of general ad valorem dollars. The other piece of that puzzle is fees for services that the clerk of the circuit court provides. When you come over to the clerk of the circuit court to file a civil case, you're charged a fee. That is the funding mechanism that has been created by the Florida legislature. It's not created by the clerk of the circuit court as to what we charge. It is created by the Florida legislature as to what we charge. Out of that we are able to give you, as Tom said, approximately 1.75 or 1.8 million dollars. That helps to reduce the taxpayers' bill at the end of the year. So, you know, as an elected official, you know, obviously I would like to take credit for everything that transpires in my office, but the reality is that I can take credit for very little that transpires in my office. The staff that I have hired does the daily chore of, I think, running a very good shop. You know, I'd like to thank them for what they do. I'll be more than happy to answer any questions. As an attorney I can stand here and talk all day, or we can all quit wasting our time, and I can go back to the office and do something. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Yes, sir. Again, I just want to compliment you for a job well done. Your personal assistance in, I know, helping me and other commissioners and the spirit of cooperation between your office and the county manager's office is where it always needs to be. We duly respect that. You now, just in your requests this year, over 30 percent of that comes out of a fee basis. So you don't come to us and say, "This is what I have to have." Page 113 June 22, 2001 You always are bringing back to the party too. It's duly appreciated on our part. MR. BROCK: Well, you know, Tom has thrown some accolades over here so, you know, I have to pass them back. I've been here since 1993, and I have dealt with three county administrators or county managers, and it has been a sincere pleasure to deal with your county administrator that sits in that chair today. MR. OLLIFF: Thank you. MR. BROCK: It's always been a cooperative effort. It's always, in my experience in dealing with him, been one of mutual cooperation and, you know, it's something that has made my job a pleasure, which has not always been the case, I'll grant you. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Everything was played out in the public, and that was the wrong thing to do, and I'm glad we had some turnaround here. It makes everybody's life a lot easier. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: You can't fully appreciate it, I think, unless you've been here. I've never seen such a black-and- white, night-and-day difference, and it affects day-to-day operations around here because of the cooperation and respect that these two men have for each other and their offices have for each other. MR. BROCK: I do have one issue. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Okay. Now we'll get to it. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Here we go. Payback time. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, now you're at the end of the lovefest. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: The million dollars he just gave back to us. MR. BROCK: You know, we do a verbatim transcript of your Board of County Commissioners' meetings and, you know, I think the public likes having that verbatim transcript of the Board of County Commissioners' meetings available to them on the website so Page 114 June 22, 2001 they can see exactly what was said. There is, however, one aspect of what is taking place in county government today that I would like to talk to you about for a moment, and that's your workshops. No decisions, as I understand it, are made at your workshops. My question to you is one of, do you wish us to continue the verbatim transcripts for the daily workshops because I can tell you they are becoming relatively expensive. But if, in fact, you desire for us to continue that, we will be more than happy to do that. If, in fact, you prefer that we not do that with the workshops and rather try to make a synopsis and come up with a program with Mr. Olliff that is a little more summary-- and I'm only suggesting this because there are no decisions made at the workshops. I think the general public would insist upon it if there were decisions being made, that the verbatim transcript continue. But as it relates to those workshops, I'll leave that to your discretion because you're the ones who are going to have to ultimately pay the bill or the taxpayers are going to have to pay the bill, and you're going to be the ones that are held accountable. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Question, Commissioner Coletta. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Thank you. Dwight, how many requests are you getting for these transcripts of the workshops? Are you getting many requests for them? MR. BROCK: I would have no idea because they're on the internet. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Oh, that's correct. MR. BROCK: You can pull them right off of the web, so I would have no way of knowing that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I've looked at them. My thought is, I'm very grateful that we have verbatim transcripts. It was a change that came when we got Dwight, and it's a lot better now than just trying to figure out what happened at a meeting with the Page 115 June 22, 2001 summary minutes. But for the purposes of a workshop, considering that we have it on tape, we have it on 54, we have it on audiotape, and we would have a summary set of minutes -- and you can probably tell us how much -- you know, not right this minute, but you can certainly find out for us what we've spent in transcribing workshops so far this year. And, guys, it's probably -- what I thought he was going to do was fuss at us about how poorly we make the record every time we have a meeting because we do make poor records. You know, we don't communicate well. We talk over each other, and I'm as guilty as anybody. But in the workshops in particular I would imagine those are not especially good records. Oh, both of you hush. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I didn't say anything. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: But for me I would say no need for it in workshops. I'm glad to hear you're openminded about it. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I would like to know how much it does cost us. MR. BROCK: I can provide you those figures, but I can tell you it is a big chunk. COMMISSIONER HENNING: It does add up to a bunch. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Is there a counter on that website by any chance to tell us how many people are hitting on the pages? MR. BROCK: There is, but they also, from that same website, have access to the court records, so you know, you're not going to be able to tell how many of them are actually hitting the website. Maybe I can make a suggestion. You know, I can probably build a counter on that page. You know, we don't have to make the decision today. We can make the decision as more information becomes available. But, I mean, I simply wanted to bring to your attention the fact that the workshops are, in fact, costing quite a bit in terms of Page 116 June 22, 2001 verbatim transcripts. Now, you know, I'll be more than happy to look at it in conjunction with your county administrator, and you can communicate with him, and he can communicate with me, or you can communicate with me directly later on. I mean, that's not some decision that you have to make in a board meeting since ultimately the decision can be made by me. I'm just looking for input from you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I think what I'm hearing from this board is, Dwight, we would like you and Tom Olliff to work together to find out what it costs and give us a summary back so that we can deal with this, not deterring public information in any shape and form, but at the same doing it on a cost-effective basis. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I agree. I would like to see if you can put a counter on that, too, so we can try to get an idea of what we're doing with it. We might find there's no hits. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I just hit it. MR. BROCK: The more I think about that, I mean, that's going to be very difficult to do because it's in the same location as the regular minutes. So you're not going to be able to tell what it is they're looking at. But let us work at it. We can provide you with more information, and it's not a decision we have to make right now. I have budgeted to provide it verbatim for the upcoming year, and during the course of the year we can re-evaluate it and move from there. To each and every one of you, if you don't have any more questions, I would like to thank you for-- you know, I've talked about how well I've worked with Tom, but it's been a pleasure working and dealing with each one of you as well. Thank you very much. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Thank you, Dwight. Page 117 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER HENNING: Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you, Mr. Brock. MR. SMYKOWSKI: That moves us to the sheriffs budget discussion on page A-62 and 63. MS. USHER: On page A-63 you can see all the expanded requests from the sheriffs department. The first six items are 32 employees that were formerly funded by grants and now are coming off grant funding and now will need to have ad valorem funding. The next item is a mobile data connection. This is like the telephone costs to connect all of the 335 laptop computers from the vehicles so that they can communicate with the main office. I believe that communication is done through phone bills. That's going to be a new cost for the sheriff, and it will be a recurring cost. $93,100 is computer-aided dispatch equipment maintenance agreements. The other agreements, the warranties, have expired. And $262,600 is for the mobile data replacement match grant to replace laptop computers that are at least three years old, and that would be about a third of their laptop inventory. Then there's $147,100 for computer software, and that's the standardized sheriff agency with all their software so that the computers in the office will communicate and all have the same programs on them. Over in detention and corrections, there are -- the sheriff is requesting 13 new positions. Seven of them are for the D.R.I.L.L. After-care, and the other six positions are for the new juvenile -- MS. KINZEL: The detention and-- THE COURT REPORTER: Your name, please. MS. KINZEL: Crystal Kinzel, finance director for the sheriffs office. Actually, the seven for D.R.I.L.L. After-care have been previously funded by the Department of Juvenile Justice, so those two are coming off of grants. The six for the detention and assessment center will be new positions. The center was scheduled to Page 118 June 22, 2001 be online in May of this year. They've moved that back to July 1 of this year. We think probably August 1 is a little more realistic, but we would need those six positions at the assessment center when it does open its doors. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Crystal, was that funded last year? MS. K1NZEL: No. The detention and assessment center was not at all funded. It's brand new. CHAIRMAN CARTER: We didn't have it. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: We didn't have it. MR. SMYKOWSKI: That's the building that's currently under construction adjacent to the financial center where the clerk's office is housed. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I misunderstood it. I thought you said it was supposed to be done in May. MS. KINZEL: Of this year, but we didn't have that scheduled when we did budget last March and April and May, so it was not included as part of this current year budget that we're operating at. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Where does the $100,000 that we're going to get from the State of Florida -- is that matched up against us somewhere, or is that still not been officially signed by the governor? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Oh, it's been signed. MS. KINZEL: It has been signed. We're not exactly clear on the 100,000, whether that will go to the state agency that is running the assessment center or if that will come back to the county. We haven't gotten any notification on it. Their original plan was to, perhaps, bill back the county for any pre-sentenced juveniles that are in the center. We were hoping that that would go away. The 100,000, we're not sure if that will go to the operations of the assessment center or be available for us to apply towards these Page 119 June 22, 2001 positions. It's still up in the air because we're running so close to budget, but we should know within the next month. MR. OLLIFF: And if it does come directly to you, then we'll make a budget adjustment and reduce this by $100,000. MS. KINZEL: Exactly. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Right. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Questions by the board. COMMISSIONER HENNING: The laptops, correct me if I'm wrong, is so the officers can run license plates and do their reports while they're in their vehicles? MS. KINZEL: Correct, Commissioner. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And, therefore, at the same time they're out there in presence in the community maybe at a corner of an intersection just to let the people know that the sheriffs are out there and you need to obey the law? MS. KINZEL: Exactly, Commissioner. One of the advantages that they've seen nationally in the in-car mobile data terminals is the ability of the law enforcement office to directly run vehicle tags. Then the increase in recovery of auto theft, vehicles that have been stolen, it's substantially increased with this technology. It also frees up deputy time when they are in a parking lot or are looking or on preventative patrol, they can run these tag numbers themselves. They can also do reports from the vehicle, and they can also have dispatch information to the vehicle. So it's also another way to complement the current radio system. So it has a lot of advantages to the in-car computer. COMMISSIONER HENNING: How many of these are we -- MS. KINZEL: Well, we're asking for 335. That's about half of our certified law enforcement patrol. We would like to phase this in over a couple of years. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And I can support it, but I Page 120 June 22, 2001 would hope that we would see the deputies at intersections where we're having problems or in communities where they need to be and hopefully not at a 7-Eleven where you're going to see three or four of these vehicles. MS. KINZEL: We can assure you that we try desperately to keep -- the law enforcement officers are on the road. They do have breaks, comfort breaks, because they are in their vehicles, so you may see them stopped for a comfort break. But their duty -- we actually find that they don't get a full complement of an hour or a half-hour lunch. They're running from calls, and they're doing a lot of preventative patrol. So I think that you'll see a significant use of these. We have already seen officer timesaving without even this component piece. Right now they're currently able to do some reporting from their car, not online. They have to go to a docking station and download that information. But just in the report-writing component, we are saving probably a thousand, at least, deputy hours in timesaving and writing. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. Well, I'll take my comment back. I didn't realize they got those breaks. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: They need them. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Yeah. Everybody needs a break. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Other questions for the sheriff's department? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: None. CHAIRMAN CARTER: None. MS. KINZEL: Commissioners, I, too, would like to thank-- I know that you each have had some citizens come and review our budget. Commissioner Fiala's citizens came and worked with us. I met with them. I've met with Commissioner Carter. I've met with Page 121 June 22, 2001 each of the commissioners and provided a lot of detail, I think, in working with them. But I want to say what a difference it is for our budget and this process. We've been working so closely with the county staff on our capital needs. We really feel that we're making progress and still trying to keep a reasonable budget, and I just want to comment on that. We've really seen a difference in working together, and I think that goes a long way for both the sheriff's office and county government, so we appreciate that. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you, Crystal Kinzel. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Commissioner Carter, I'm sorry, I thought we were just looking at the capital needs. I do have a question. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Sure. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And a lot of people ask me about it, and I just don't know the answer. Why is it Lee County can operate their county with so few deputies than Collier County has the ability to do that? MS. KINZEL: Okay. We work very closely, also, with Lee County, and we've had a great opportunity with Sheriff Shope. We did work with Sheriff McDougall. But we met with the new administration, and they have, actually, the same budget director, so we've been working with Mr. Berquist routinely. But we went up there, in fact, last week and started -- we're going to meet once a month to compare their operations and our operations and make sure that each of us can draw from the other. But one of the elements that Lee County is different than Collier County -- of course, we're larger. We have 2,000 square miles. They do have a little bit more in population. But the most critical difference is that in Lee County they are supported by the Fort Myers Police Department, Cape Coral, Sanibel, and the headquarters for highway patrol. That Page 122 June 22, 2001 adds about 300 certified officers to complement the sheriffs office in Lee County. In Collier County, in looking at our two municipal forces, certified law enforcement only, we see about 100. So you can see that the sheriffs office in Lee does have the support of additional certified law enforcement officers with much larger municipal forces. And if you look at the budgets of those forces combined, Lee County actually -- and it's without highway patrol because we couldn't get that from the state yet; you have to go through some channels -- but just with the municipal forces, the law enforcement budgets would be over $81 million. And in Collier County, if you include Naples, Marco, and the sheriffs office, you're at $68 million. So we still do pay a lot less for the overall law enforcement services in Collier. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. And this second pay plan, the final pay plan for the deputies, is that comparable? That's right. You did a study on that. MS. KINZEL: Right. The study-- this is Phase II of the sheriffs office pay plan that was a county-wide pay study and a joint effort with your agency. That Phase II is included in the budget for this year, and it was part of your budget policy that was approved in March. MR. OLLIFF: Has it made a difference? MS. KINZEL: Absolutely. Since the implementation of the pay plan, we've hired 143 new members to the agency. We've also been rapidly closing the gap on vacancies. Now, fortunately, we have also added some grants, so we're adding -- we have those vacancies. But overall staffing has significantly improved since the implementation and advertising this pay plan. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: If you haven't seen it, there's a graph. I recommend it to you. It's incredible. MS. KINZEL: It's phenomenal the immediate impact of Page 123 June 22, 2001 changing that beginning salary in retaining our deputies. They have specifically said to me, "I know that I'm going to get a good salary, and I have a secure salary here in Collier County. I'm not going to look elsewhere." And that's what we want. We want experienced deputies on the street, experienced people in the jail, and I think the pay plan is definitely impacting that. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I don't know if that's on the net anywhere but, you know, we have copies in the office, and I know you do. If anybody listening out there would want to have a copy, that graph really shows you visually what we did and how we stopped the hemorrhaging. I'll just say it one more time. Every time you lose someone out of your organization, at a minimum it will cost you over 125 percent of that salary to get them back here or probably more to replace that person. That is expensive, expensive, expensive. This pay-plan adjustment will pay for itself in no period of time at all. MS. KINZEL' Thank you. And, yes, Commissioners, we do appreciate it, especially with the significant amount of training with the certified law enforcement officer, the cost savings, you will see it over the long term. Thank you. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I don't know if this is the proper time to bring up a law enforcement impact fee, but looking at the capital needs over the long period of the sheriffs department, the citizens here that are paying for the growth in Collier County and the sheriffs department, I would hope that we can give direction to our staff to work on looking at a law enforcement impact fee. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: That's very good, Commissioner Henning. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Yeah. I think I -- I totally agree. If we didn't do that on the first day, we certainly want to give a board direction to explore a law enforcement impact "whatever-you-want- to-call-it" kind of fee that might help offset future costs. Page 124 June 22, 2001 MR. OLLIFF: We have budgeted, I believe, $50,000 for a consultant study to come in and work with the sheriff's department and our management and budget office to see if there's a possibility of adopting or implementing it, and we'll bring something back for the board as soon as the fiscal year starts rolling around. MS. KINZEL: Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: It's been a pleasure. MS. KINZEL: Yes. Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Give the sheriff our best. By the way, Tuesday we will have a proclamation, and I know the person will be here, but if the sheriff or undersheriff could be here, it would be duly appreciated. MS. KINZEL: Okay. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Turning to pages A-64 and A-65, it's the property appraiser's budget, which is ultimately approved by the State of Florida. His budget needs are dictated primarily around the final stage of the GIS implementation. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Does anybody have questions on that? I don't have any. We can move on. COMMISSIONER HENNING: MR. SMYKOWSKI: Two. COMMISSIONER HENNING: We've got a new position? Oh. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Two clerical positions in the Golden Gate satellite office. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: You don't want to fuss about those, do you? We can eliminate them if you don't think they're necessary. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I'll get back to you on that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: MR. SMYKOWSKI: Well, let me think about that. Yeah. I don't think so. Okay. Mr. Olliff had indicated previously in this Page 125 June 22, 2001 morning's discussion about lease space needs and taking some interim steps until the new campus facility is constructed, and that's what we have here. That's funding due to provide some additional leased office space in the interim for the property appraiser because he is -- they are bursting at the seams as well. MR. OLLIFF: Both the clerk of courts, Abe Skinner, and the supervisor of elections are all just absolutely cramped in terms of their office space. And as much as I dislike having to lease space in the interim, I don't have another option at this point. And the board is required under statute to provide the office space for all the constitutional officers. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Realistically, I think anybody who's looked at it will know that's necessary. Do we have any other issues? COMMISSIONER HENNING: Yeah. It looks like we have a 200 percent increase of funding by the BCC. Is that another unfunded mandate from Tallahassee? MR. SMYKOWSKI: No. That's primarily driven by that hundred and sixty-seven thousand five, which is for the leased office space. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Oh, okay. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Again, the board provides the facilities for the constitutional officers, so that's actually shown as a board-paid expense. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. MR. OLLIFF: Primarily the lion's share of every increase in this budget either has to do with that lease space or GIS. And the GIS numbers, just so you know, were included in that number that Jim Mudd gave you in the initial rollup. And we've been working really closely with Abe and his staff to make sure we have a coordinated project here on both sides of the house and, frankly, I Page 126 June 22, 2001 believe this will be the fiscal year when you start to see some benefit from all of this investment in GIS. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Speaking of unfunded mandates, let's move on to the supervisor of elections' budget. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Ms. Edwards is here. We're on pages A-66 and A-67. She is requesting two new positions in the upcoming year. MS. EDWARDS: For the record, my name is Jennifer Edwards, supervisor of elections, and I'm here to answer any questions you may have. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I think these outreach coordinator positions -- to the extent they're discretionary, because I wonder if they are because of some new regulations -- I think they're very good ideas to get people in and get them registered and informed about how to vote, especially with the new machines we're going to be having. I don't have any problem with them. Anybody else? COMMISSIONER HENNING: This is a new program that you wanted to initiate? MS. EDWARDS: It's something that we had already planned to do. Then, of course, with the change in the equipment, we're going to have to do it, but we want to do more voter outreach, voter education in the community. What we'll be doing now to begin that project is we'll be focusing on training people, the voters, on how to use our new equipment, also, as well as improving our voter registration programs. COMMISSIONER HENNING: When is the committee going to come to the board and tell us all about the -- well, you have a recommendation for the new equipment. MS. EDWARDS: Yes. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Tell us how you got there and what the options are. Page 127 June 22, 2001 MS. EDWARDS: We met 14 times since February. Of those 14 meetings, 6 of those we have had different equipment vendors here to demonstrate their equipment. What we have done is filtered through all the pros and cons of the two different technologies, the optical scan and the touch frame. My recommendation and the recommendation of my staff, who have done a thorough research also, is that we move to touch-screen technology. I have the support of the majority of the elections resource committee also. Now, our next step is to begin the formal RFP process, and we're working closely with your purchasing staff to go through that process. That's when we'll decide the vendor. And the selection committee will be made up of the supervisor of election staff members. And we will determine the vendor, and then we'll come to you and recommend the vendor. We'll have a demonstration for you and have the vendor here at that time as we go through the contract process. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I guess maybe I don't know if there is any wishes from anybody else if they want to learn the process of the committee on the new equipment. This is a large expense to the taxpayers. If nobody else does, maybe we can meet individually. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Actually, I've been keeping up with it as it goes along, so I'm completely up on it. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Okay. We'll get together. MS. EDWARDS: I'd be glad to share with you anything you'd like. It's a very serious, very important decision. It's a big investment. That's why we've been very cautious. Also, I want to remind you that the division of elections is involved in this. I talk to them on about a weekly basis, and they will be also sharing information with us and helping us with the process. Page 128 June 22, 2001 MR. OLLIFF: Jennifer, why don't you just-- while you've got the opportunity, I mean, there are basically two technologies out there that are being talked about. Why don't we just -- why don't you go ahead and give them your rationale for the technology that I think you are leaning towards, and then maybe you can answer some of those question -- so when they get those questions from the public, it might help. MS. EDWARDS: My recommendation is for the touch-screen system. First and foremost, I consider the voter. What's the easiest thing for the voter to use. To walk into your precinct and be able to touch a screen as though they're working their microwave oven or an ATM is an easy process, rather than when you consider an optical scan system. The optical scan system has a printed ballot with the names of the candidates on it. In the future, because of the growth of our county, we're probably going to have multiple-page ballots. So the voter would walk into the precinct, receive their ballot pages and a pencil, and go to a voting booth and mark the circle beside their candidate. And then when they finish that process of voting, they'll go to a scanner, stand in line, and insert their paper ballot into a scanner. And if they have overvoted, which means selected more than one candidate in a race, then that ballot is going to come back to them, and they will be offered another ballot, and then they'll go back to their booth and complete that process again. Now, a touch-screen system will not allow that to happen because you cannot overvote with a touch-screen system. Also, the touch- screen system will provide for the voter when they finish voting a summary ballot that says, "This is the way you voted. Do you wish to cast this ballot, or do you want to make a change?" At any time in the process, the voter can back up and make a change to how they voted. Or after they review the summary page, they can back up and Page 129 June 22, 2001 make a change. And they're -- literally, it's going to ask them, "Are you ready to vote?" And before that ballot is cast, there's another step where they would push another button in order to cast the vote. Another important consideration is the ADA requirements. The touch-screen system has an audio headset that will allow the disabled to vote confidentially, unassisted. Optical scan systems do not provide that, and there's the possibility that that will be mandated in the future. COMMISSIONER HENNING: don't know what ADA is. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: COMMISSIONER HENNING: I know what ADD is, but I Americans with Disabilities Act. Oh, okay. Thanks. MS. EDWARDS: This system, also, will allow us -- if we have someone that's disabled, unable to get out of their car to come into a precinct, we can literally take a touch-screen monitor, I'll call it -- a unit is what the vendor calls them -- out to the curb or out to the vehicle and allow that disabled voter to vote without having to come inside the precinct. One of the big issues in post election was voter intent. I touched on that before, and that is, remember when you watched on TV all of the people in Palm Beach County, the canvassing board, and others who were doing the recount trying to determine the intent of the voter. With a touch-screen system, that goes away because you cannot overvote. Now, that -- please remember, though, with this system we will still have to purchase an optic scan system which is part of this whole estimate of cost, but we would have to have an optical scan for the absentee votes or absentee ballots. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: MS. EDWARDS: Uh-huh. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: questions. If I may ask a question -- -- Mrs. Edwards, or a couple of One, on the optical scanner, you only need to get one copy Page 130 June 22, 2001 or one scanner basically to be able to count it. You're not going to have one for each election district by any means. You're just going to need one of them to be able to feed those through for this period in time; is that correct? MS. EDWARDS: For the absentees? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Yes. MS. EDWARDS: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: So, I mean, it's a minor expense for the most part. Also, two, eventually you'll be able to have this system grow as the state allows us to do so where possibly our disenfranchised people in the armed services that didn't get their votes counted in the past would very possibly be able to vote from a remote location when we figure out the security angle on this. MS. EDWARDS: IfI may, the future of voting for the military -- I believe that's what you're talking about -- is internet voting. Touch-screen voting is not internet voting. In the November 7th election, there were two county supervisors that worked with the defense department and provided two pilot projects for internet voting for the military which were very successful, but that's way down the road for us. But you are absolutely right in that the future of voting is what's called nongeographical voting, meaning that you can go to another precinct in your county rather than the one that you're registered to vote in and be able to vote using the touch-screen system. And that's something that will develop across the country in the future. Future plans would be to have your voter identification and your driver's license so that you can use that as your smart card. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And then put in a PIN number. MS. EDWARDS: Right. So the trend, like many other things, is to technology for voting. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Well, I endorse you in going Page 131 June 22, 2001 the direction that you're taking. I know that it's going to cost more money -- MS. EDWARDS: Yes. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: -- in the long run, but we know that the accuracy will be there, and I believe that's what the public expects. MS. EDWARDS: Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: That's as foolproof as you can get, and eventually we have to do it, so I'd rather bite the bullet now and go forward. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: If you're looking for three votes, you've got them, because you already know from our conversations you have mine because it's a difficult expense, but we've got to do it. I would rather spend more money now than less money plus more money later, because that's where we'll be if we go without the touch screen. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Do you have any idea where West Palm is going? Are they going to go touch screen? MS. EDWARDS: They're going touch screen, definitely. They already have their vendor selected. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: They're following our good example; correct? MS. EDWARDS: Absolutely. CHAIRMAN CARTER: That's wonderful. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, unless there's any further questions for Jennifer, I just thank her for working with us. Maybe we can send a thank you note to the state and tell them how much we appreciate that $378,000 they're putting towards the $6 million purchase. MS. EDWARDS: Well, it's really $360,000. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Wasn't that nice? Page 132 June 22, 2001 MS. EDWARDS: We are getting some funding also for voter education and poll worker education. But I want to thank all of you for your time you've spent with me in talking about the budget and the equipment and for your support and for those of you who have helped us on the canvassing boards also and will help us in the future, and thanks to Tom and his staff too. MR. OLLIFF: Thank you. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Thank you. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, thank you, Miss Edwards. It's always a pleasure and, of course, we'll look forward to the donations from CNN, NBC, and ABC who will be contributing to voter reform. MS. EDWARDS: Thank you. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, next on your list is courts, and while we had scheduled this for three o'clock in order accommodate the judges' schedules, if you look at the Court's budget -- and we don't have any particular heart-burner questions over their budget, they are standing by, and we can send a call and not make the judges walk over here in the rain if we can answer your questions for them. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Refer us to a page just so I can remind myself. MR. SMYKOWSKI: A-37. MR. OLLIFF: A-36 and A-37. Mike, if you want to just walk them through it. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Oh, no. I already looked at it. I didn't have anything. MR. SMYKOWSKI: There's a case manager position for family-law cases just to expedite the processing of those cases through the court system. A legal secretary for -- there's two existing staff attorneys and Mr. Middlebrook's secretary. Most of the time the staff attorneys are actually doing their own clerical work, and obviously -- Page 133 June 22,2001 COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: It's cheaper to hire secretaries to do that than to have lawyers doing it. MR. OLLIFF: And they don't do it well, to me. MR. SMYKOWSKI: The next two are to convert a part-time program specialist in domestic violence to a full-time position and conversion of half of the teen court's coordinator position salary that was previously grant funded and to move that to the General Fund support. The CJIS system is their computer network system enhancements. Those are their dictates from their MIS department. And then for security there's -- actually security and/or to monitor court activity, they're going to have TV monitors on Floors 1 and 4 in the courthouse. In terms of caseload, probation, they've had a huge increase in caseload since May of 1999. They're requesting one additional probation officer. On the revenue side on A-36 under probation fees, you'll note that probation fees are up approximately 36 percent, so they've done a great job in terms of chasing down and insuring that those funds are materializing. And there's finally an additional secretary position associated with that additional caseload to complement the new probation officer. MR. OLLIFF: I think on the probation side you've actually seen about a $200,000 increase on the revenue side, and you've got about $100,000 worth of expanded service request. I think it's all just related to the increased activity. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Any questions by commissioners? COMMISSIONER HENNING: I think that answered my question. Court administration got a 35 or almost a 36 percent increase. Is that what you're talking about? MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes. The bulk of that is associated with-- those first block of expanded services totaling approximately $243,000. Those are all a function of the -- or are budgeted in the Page 134 June 22, 2001 admin component of their budget. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I understand. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I suggest we call the judges and tell them to keep their umbrellas. MR. OLLIFF: The only other plug I'll make is if you've not been to teen court, I am really going to recommend that you go. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I have been. MR. OLLIFF: It is one impressive program, and it's one that I think we ought to just drag as many people as we can possibly get into that process. MR. SMYKOWSKI: We have one public speaker. Charles Abbott. MR. ABBOTT: Good afternoon, Commissioners. I'm here as a CBIA, building industry-- CHAIRMAN CARTER: You need to identify yourself, sir. MR. ABBOTT: Didn't I? CHAIRMAN CARTER: No. We did, but you didn't. MR. ABBOTT: Oh, excuse me. I'm Charles Morgan Abbott. I am a CBIA director, and I'm here to make mention to you-all that the CBIA is actively working trying to let growth pay for growth. Like, an example is the new fire inspection fees and such, to remove things from ad valorem, but then at the same time to make things that are paid by permit fees that maybe ought to be ad valorem and referred to that way. What I'm specifically speaking about is code enforcement is paid with 40 percent of their budget from permit fees, and we feel that that ought to be much more addressed through ad valorem taxes. And we're faced with a permit fee increase coming up. We were discussing a number of these things, and I would just like to call it to your attention that we would like a hard look at that, please. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I know that code enforcement Page 135 June 22, 2001 looks at new construction as well as existing residences. MR. ABBOTT: Well, I'm prepared to argue it minorly. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Well, I know for a fact they do, but I will -- I think you bring up a valid point. Maybe that's something that we should consider in September in our final budget. MR. ABBOTT: I didn't want to wait until September to comment on it, like early in the budget process to at least be considering it. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Right. MR. ABBOTT: And the way we look at it, our permit fees are paying for inspections and all the costs that are related there from the actual building inspectors. But typical code enforcement stuff concerning signs and bunch of other stuff, there's a minor overlap with new construction, but it's much more existing issues and more with residences. And with 40 percent coming from permit fees, that's -- we happen to know we're the big cash cow in regard to funding and community development, and we just urge you-all to possibly look hard. We're making sure that what ought to be ad valorem is and what ought to be from growth is growth. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Sir, I'm glad to do that -- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: -- but with all due respect, you don't want to start down that road. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Just a moment. Mr. Smykowski. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. For the record, for clarification there's $400,800 in a transfer from the community development funds supporting the total appropriations of slightly over $2 million amounting to 20 percent of the code enforcement budget, and that decision was reached-- that question arose, and you asked the productivity committee to look at that. Janet Vasey had done a study and worked with Mr. Cautero in developing Page 136 June 22, 2001 that recommendation. And as a result of the board action in that regard, that was the recommendation that was implemented by the board at the 20 percent level. COMMISSIONER HENNING: When was that done? MR. SMYKOWSKI: About two years ago. MR. ABBOTT: My 40 percent comment is merely reflecting what Ed Perico and I discussed. We could possibly have some miscommunication there, but that's where I got my 40 percent. MR. OLLIFF: Charlie, you can go back and tell him you saved 20 percent. You saved -- MR. ABBOTT: No, no, no. I don't want to tell him that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: You slashed it. MR. ABBOTT: Like I said, I just urge your consideration on it. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Mr. Abbott, I have a request for yOU. MR. ABBOTT: Certainly. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I know or understand that you have an inside with the school board, and I'm requesting from you to fund the nurses -- pass it on to fund the nurses program. MR. ABBOTT: I hear it. I will pass it on in about 30 minutes -- COMMISSIONER HENNING: Thank you. MR. ABBOTT: -- and make sure that it's said with the appropriate things. The only thing I urge you-all to do -- this is a different hat entirely -- as the director of the Friends of the Collier County Museum, is we need a new roof on the discovery cottage. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: We've got that. CHAIRMAN CARTER: We've got that in there. MR. ABBOTT: Now, also, just a comment, if there's any reluctance on it, the Friends would be glad or happy to gather bids and prices and supervise the work and do our usual thoroughness on making sure it's a minor price for a rather major item. Page 137 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER HENNING: While we're on that item, I understand that the -- what do we have, the cannon? Not the cannon, but the -- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Tank. COMMISSIONER HENNING: There's a repayment schedule on that? MR. ABBOTT: Yes, there is. COMMISSIONER HENNING: We're on line with that? MR. ABBOTT: Well, what I had asked -- I've only spoken to Mr. Coletta about it. We typically buy assets such as that over a four- or five-year period, and through, I think, a contentious matter between former Commissioner Constantine and me, it ended up being one year, and that we weren't going to be able to do. We could pay it, but we'd have to pull it out of some of our reserves. We would rather have a longer show of paying it. So the desire is to keep the tank. It is a valuable asset. We've fiddled all around with engines and making it run and various a sundry other things, but I had mentioned to my Friends board that I think we ought to consider selling it. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: No, no, no. MR. ABBOTT: There was a lot of thought to keeping it, and there was a little bit of thought to selling it. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: The good news is Commissioner Constantine is not a commissioner anymore. He's gone. MR. ABBOTT: Right. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: (Applause.) COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Hold your applause. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Sorry. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: The other news is that I recommend to staff that we look to put this on something more Page 138 June 22, 2001 realistic, like five years. I appreciate everything the Friends of the Museum are doing out there to try to make it work with such a limited budget, and it's still a limited budget even though we stepped it up enough to put a roof on it and repair a couple things down on Robert's Ranch. Everything you're doing is greatly appreciated, so hopefully you'll agree with me to direct staff to that direction to get this onto a five-year plan rather than a one-year plan. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Well, the agreement was a one- year plan? MR. ABBOTT: Yeah. Only because we were digging our heels in at the time on the Wilkinson house because we had knowledge of- - I'm president of the Civil War Round Table. The Historical Society of Collier County is another group, and the Friends of the Collier County Museum is another group. But we all overlap on membership. So I know my board at the Friends. I know my Civil War Round Table group, and I also know all of the historical society people. So we knew that there were problems on the financing there, and we didn't like the idea that the museum's cookie jar was being raided to support it. We thought it would go bad, and look what happened. In the meantime, by the time of messing with the Robert's Ranch funding, it cost us, like $100,000 off a state grant. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Oh, I see where you're coming from. MR. ABBOTT: That's strictly how the state calculates certain formulas and a few other things. But we had applied for something like a $247,000 grant and only received $144,000, and my numbers could be a little hazy there, but that's pretty close. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I'm in favor of doubling the original time of the original agreement. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: That's only two years. Page 139 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER HENNING: Oh. MR. ABBOTT: Give me four or five. I didn't even come to mention this today. I just -- it just happened. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: You don't think you'll lose the tank in the next five years, do you? MR. ABBOTT: It's kind of hard to run off with it, you know, and also hard to vandalize it. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, why don't we just -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Please. MR. OLLIFF: -- pass it back to the Friends of the Museum and have them recommend a longer term that you might consider at a future board meeting. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I'd be glad to. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: One more thing before you disappear, Charlie. On Tuesday morning are you part of that little group that's going to be getting together out in the front of the building? MR. ABBOTT: We get to wear wool uniforms in July for your amusement, yes. CHAIRMAN CARTER: For his amusement; right? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Tell them what we're going to be doing. MR. ABBOTT: We're going to have -- I believe the time is 8:30. I was told to show up early because we have to move the cannon over. And we're going to have a number of re-enactors dressed up appropriately representing them kind of like a kick-off to the Fourth of July parade. We'll have our cannon, and we'll fire it three times for the common good and car alarms. They love it. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And car alarms. CHAIRMAN CARTER: You'll blow all the car windows out in the parking lot. Page 140 June 22, 2001 MR. ABBOTT: And then you-all can adjourn and start your regular meeting. We've done this before in the past where the Friends of the Museum were planting some trees and various Rotary Clubs, so it's not unprecedented, and it's kind of an interesting start to a commission meeting. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Start it off with a bang; right? MR. ABBOTT: Sure. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: It's going to be Jim Carter's birthday next month, and he'll be gone and won't be here. Do you think we can honor him by letting him fire the cannon? MR. ABBOTT: Absolutely. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Thank you. have CHAIRMAN CARTER: to wear a wool uniform? MR. ABBOTT: No, no. Oh, it would be my pleasure. Do I We allow volunteers. MR. OLLIFF: Whoever fires the cannon also accepts the calls from the Glades residents 15 minutes after you fire the cannon. MR. ABBOTT: Hey, half the Glades residents ain't here anyway. CHAIRMAN CARTER: He made me do it. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Oh, Charlie. MR. ABBOTT: No. We deal with the Glades a lot. By the way, the Glades have supported us in the past on our Old Florida Days event because they lent us one of their very fancy golf carts, a tractor type one to drag stuff around for us, and I think that's very nice of them. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Mr. Olliff, who's paying for this advertisement? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: You are, dear. MR. OLLIFF: I want to make sure Alicia understands that's Charles Abbott, A-b-b-o-t-t. Page 141 June 22, 2001 MR. ABBOTT: you very much for your time. CHAIRMAN CARTER: pleasure. Any other speakers? I'll tell her. That's all, Commissioners. Thank Thank you, Mr. Abbott. It's been a MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, there are four items left, and then barring any further questions from the board, if we can cover these, I think the lion's share of your budget review for the year will be over with. The first had some questions about the county's NACO membership. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Just say no. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Just say no. I agree. It's never did a thing for us. MR. OLLIFF: Okay. That was an easy decision. The second was the grants development -- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Spend that money on lobbying and legislature in Tallahassee. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I'm in. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Yep. MR. OLLIFF: The second was the grants development and management program. And while I know a couple of commissioners have mentioned this in workshop format, in discussions with our division administrators and O & B staff, I couldn't generate any support out of our staff for having an independent grants coordinator program. They all felt strongly that the number of grants that are out there are, one, they are all very familiar with the grant programs that are there, and two, most of them are specific and specialized enough that a general grants person wouldn't be in a position to be able to do any better than we are. I will tell you that your transportation staff has got tentative approval for another $3 million in grants, so I think in transportation Page 142 June 22, 2001 alone you've got about $12 million over the course of the last year. And I think Greg Mihalic, also as part of your CDBG program, has got a centralized grant information person, and he has committed to work with the balance of our staff to make sure that he's providing information on any other grants that we might not be aware of, but our recommendation is that you don't fund this as a new and separate program. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Mr. Olliff, I know that that was my initiative, and I withdraw it at this time. But I will pursue it again next year. MR. OLLIFF: That's fine. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Mr. Olliff, do you have someone in your office that is the coordinator or the accountable person that does grants or has it in his or her portfolio to make sure that the divisions all interact and we get the best of the best? MR. OLLIFF: Actually, our support services division, and Jo- Anne Leamer is the person who functions in that capacity for our organization. But we're looking at with the additional staff through the SHIP program and Greg Mihalic's office about perhaps shifting that there. But we would be happy to be able to report to you perhaps in these quarterly report processes about how much grant money Collier County actually does get, because I think it would surprise you on an annual basis in particular how much we do get in grant monies. CHAIRMAN CARTER: As long as we have a person who know what all the coordinators are doing or all the grant writers are doing. I don't want to leave any money on the table anywhere. I'm sure that's Commissioner Coletta's concern. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: You can't force staff into something that they don't want to do at this point in time. I'll continue to work on this over the next year. Page 143 June 22, 2001 CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. MR. OLLIFF: Okay. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: It's something I've been wanting too. So I'm disappointed, but I'm also willing to be educated if I'm wrong. I've been thinking that a grants coordinator would result in us getting more money. I would like to have, you know, an annual report of total county-wide grants money received, you know, and I'm sure you can do that for us. MR. OLLIFF: That's fine. That's easy. And I will tell you, I was a proponent of the program going into the budget process as well. Our staff was adamant enough and convinced me, but we can continue to talk about that as next year's budget comes around. CHAIRMAN CARTER: And another thought along that line is there are a lot of retired people in the community who were or are still active in the grant writing business, and perhaps the dollar-a-year consultant concept gets one of those people or a group of them to lend their collective minds to the process. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: So it's time for a commercial announcement. If you are so interested, please contact Dr. Carter. He'll be happy to steer you in the right direction. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you. Brought to us by Commissioner Coletta, pleasantly known among us as the bear. All right. MR. OLLIFF: The third of the four is a Character First program. I think you can remember recently having a presentation from the Character First representative from Lee County. We had an opportunity to be able to sit down and talk with him. The total cost, direct costs, at least annually are $54,000 for that program. Then you have to recognize that there are some lost productivity costs as well. We've showed those in the budget. And in discussions with our staff, we think it's a great idea. It's a Page 144 June 22, 2001 good program. But in terms of the cost benefits, our staffjust simply didn't think it was worth the cost of the program. For this program to work, the program requires that every single employee in the county go to training monthly. For an organization like ours, that is just a very, very difficult thing because you've got employees that are stationed out of Everglades City, Immokalee, and trying to draw those people in and make them go through a Character First training is very time consuming and costly. Frankly, there was some concern about our ability to actually teach character to people. What we did include for you as backup is at least some understanding that we are making our own internal effort to do some character training and some recognition that character is important in this organization. And we have created a theme-of-the-month program where we are picking a character trait and having each of the administrators and/or someone in my office providing from their own perspective what some of these character traits mean to them. And we can expand on that program if it's the board's desire, or if it's the board's desire to enter into a contract with Community (sic) first, we would gladly do that as well. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, when I look at indirect costs and what you're suggesting, Mr. Olliff, I want to weigh that against what's in Character First, and I don't know. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I think that the indirect costs is just false, unintentionally, of course, but false because there are measurable benefits too. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Let me clarify indirect costs. Indirect costs of trying to do it yourself versus using this as the vehicle which may, in effect, accelerate what you're trying to do on your own. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Well, I'm extremely disappointed that this didn't make it to the budget, but Tom already Page 145 June 22,2001 knows that. This is something that I really think is right for the county. Other counties have done this. Other states have done this. Other cities have done this. There are measurable success rates. If $50,000 is too much to spend, I wish we could ask our staff to -- and, frankly, I think that what I intended with our earlier discussion was to -- our earlier direction was to ask staff to go back and tell us how we could incorporate a program like this or incorporate this program into our training. It's not that every, you know, two-hour-a-week worker in Everglades City has to do this, but what would you recommend as a cost-effective, positive way to incorporate this into our current employee training because, of course, we can't teach character, but this is a program that has had measurable results. So instead of wasting time sending out, you know, little smiley faces that say everybody should be nice to each other, we should use a program that is already in place and has measurable quantifiable results for governments. The sheriff is doing it. Hopefully the City of Naples is going to do it. If this is -- if the $50,000 program is too expensive, then propose something else, but don't throw this whole thing out. It's important. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: May I make a suggestion, Mr. Carter? I think the problem isn't just $50,000; it's the lack of interest on the part of staff this time. Do what I plan to do as far as the grant writing goes. Go back and start lobbying for it early on because without the support there, there's so many projects we're competing for staff time that it might not be all that successful. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: That's one way of looking at it, and I understand it, and I will take that challenge on. I see that, however, as an indication of need for the program. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I would have liked to have seen it piloted at the executive level in this county through the upper- Page 146 June 22, 2001 management structure before it was carried downward, at least piloted to try it and tell us at the end of an evaluation period. I can't take a horse -- I can take a horse to water, but I sure can't make it drink, and I don't want to force it, but I share my concerns as does Commissioner Mac'Kie that -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Would the board support directing staff to get a cost estimate for taking this just through the department-head level and telling us or, you know, evaluating it from that perspective or some other cut-off point that you might think is appropriate? MR. OLLIFF: Uh-huh. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I just think this is important. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Would that be a workable compromise, Mr. Olliff-- MR. OLLIFF: Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN CARTER: -- that we can do it on that basis? MR. OLLIFF: Yes, sir. Whatever the board wants to do, we will do it. I do think that if there's a compromise that, frankly, it was the difficulty of the way the program was presented to us by the representative of the company, and that it was sort of an all-or- nothing kind of approach with every employee. And if there is a medium road that we can do, then I would be happy to research that and bring that back for you as an option to consider. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I wouldn't agree with the company's presentation. I believe that you need to get the folks where it really -- you have to get the "buy in." If the executive team doesn't buy in, you're throwing money down a rat hole. But if the executive team tries it and says, you know, "This is really good," and a division or two want to then carry it forward, I would much rather crawl, walk, run with it. So if we can do that, the board would agree to that, then I would like to see us try it. Page 147 June 22, 2001 COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Can we get three nods for that? (Chairman Carter and Commissioner Mac'Kie nodding.) COMMISSIONER COLETTA: You've got a nod here. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Before we leave this topic, there was some confusion in the staff about -- and, frankly, I pulled the minutes. I think it was pretty darn clear. MR. OLLIFF: It is. You're right. We're working on it. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Thank you. Please advertise for the creation of a character-- a community character council. We said we wanted to have that. I want to get that created. That doesn't cost anybody any money. That's volunteering, and we'll get it started. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Yeah. I thought we were moving on that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: We're going to now. MR. OLLIFF: We are now. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. MR. OLLIFF: Mike had one other item that was not part of this package that he needed to cover from the United Arts Council. MR. SMYKOWSKI: The United Arts Council, there was that request of $10,000, and the board said you would address that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: They gave you a number? When did you get the number? MR. OLLIFF: I had the number before they actually presented the item on that Tuesday. They provided me a number of $10,000, which was the requested contribution from the county to do the community -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Assessment for the arts. MR. OLLIFF: The arts assessment. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: They asked city council this past week for I think it was $5,000, and I think they turned them down. Page 148 June 22, 2001 CHAIRMAN CARTER: Why doesn't that surprise me? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Could we consider possibly making this a partnership deal with several other municipalities out there where they buy into it at certain levels? COMMISSIONER HENNING: Yeah. I think that's a great idea, to go to the other municipalities for participation. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: So -- CHAIRMAN CARTER: They're looking for ten grand from us. I guess my question is, I would like community -- other entities, Naples, Marco, Everglades City, whatever, to participate in that. Is there some way? I mean, $10,000 -- is there anybody anywhere that's got a few thousand that can contribute that so we don't have to go through a board action? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: May I make a suggestion? CHAIRMAN CARTER: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: You meet with the mayor of' Everglades and the mayor of Naples there -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And Marco. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: -- on a regular basis. I don't know if the mayor of Marco Island joins your-- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Sure, it does. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Possibly you might be able to bring it up to them and we can go forward. Possibly we could commit $500 -- $5,000 with the idea that they make up the balance. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: if that's what you want to do, but I -- COMMISSIONER COLETTA: COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Could I just -- well, I'll go there What's your thoughts, Pam? It was my expectation, Tom, that they were going to come back to us with a presentation. I didn't know that they had just given you a number and they were going to drop it on us for budget, because I don't know how -- I think this is Page 149 June 22, 2001 probably a great idea, but I don't know how to analyze whether or not there's -- what does this bring to the community? Once we count how many arts events we have and how many we need, will this help us get grant money? Will this -- I don't know anything about this except that it sounds like a really good idea. MR. OLLIFF: I think in government terms they're trying to establish a community agreed upon, if you will, arts level of service, and I think that they believe that in terms of contributions to the arts that Naples is lacking and the Collier County community is lacking. They would like to be able to establish some goals, some benchmarks for us to be able to try and achieve. I think it would help in terms of their ability to be able to obtain some grant monies, but I think it would also help in terms of their ability to work with both TDC organizations and even county government, being honest, I think coming in to try to get the county to become more of a participant and player in terms of the arts in the county. And if you look at other counties in the state -- Sarasota, for example, is always held up as a very high example of a county that really participates in the arts as a policy. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I told them the same thing, Tom, that they needed a plan. I said, "You need a plan to tell you what is it you're trying to accomplish and all the ingredients in it," and they agree. MR. OLLIFF: Wouldn't that be more appropriate through the Tourist Council? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: They're not eligible, I don't think, for those funds. But for my vote, anyway, I can't support it until they come and give us a cost-benefit analysis, a plan, and we can always fund it out of reserves if they came and made a great pitch that we thought was worthy of taxpayer money. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, or if the four municipalities sent Page 150 June 22, 2001 us $10,000, or whatever it is, and we come back and -- we can do an executive summary that would give everybody the right information. You're right, Commissioner. Then I think we can deal with it. I don't know. When do we meet with the mayors again? Before August? No. We don't meet again. MR. OLLIFF: I don't believe -- it's up to the city to schedule it, and it's probably not going to be until late August, I would think. I think in fairness to the arts council, I think they had asked how do we get something considered as part of the budget, and so we steered them towards the public-petition process. Also, in fairness to them, though, I'm not sure that we did a real good job of following up with them to tell them this was the workshop. They probably need to come and make that presentation, make the pitch. So what I may do with your blessing is just have them scheduled for a presentation at a county commission meeting between now and September. They can make the pitch to you, give you the full picture about what it is they're trying to do, what's the total cost, what's the contribution from the county, and there's nothing that says you can't make a decision at a regular board meeting about whether to include or not include something in your budget for us to consider in September. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Okay. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I'm okay with that. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Good. MR. OLLIFF: Okay. With that, Mr. Chairman, unless the board has any other questions -- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Any other questions, Board? Well, I'll see you again Tuesday morning. We stand adjourned. Thank you. Page 151 June 22, 2001 There being no further business for the good of the County, the meeting was adjourned by order of the Chair at 3'18 p.m. BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS BOARD OF ZONING APPEALS/EX OFFICIO GOVERNING BOARD(S) OF SPECIAL DISTRICTS UNDER ITS CONTROL ~ JAMES .~CA'RTER, P h.D.~ CHAIRMAN ~DWIGHT E/BROCK., CLERK "' TheSe'minutes approved by the Board on as presented or as corrected TRANSCRIPT PREPARED ON BEHALF OF DONOVAN COURT REPORTING, INC., BY CAROLYN FORD and MARGARET A. SMITH, RPR Page 152