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BCC Minutes 10/15/2001 J (w/Lee County BCC)October 15,2001 JOINT MEETING WITH THE BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS OF COLLIER COUNTY AND LEE COUNTY OCTOBER 15, 2001 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 9:41 A.M. In JOINT WORKSHOP SESSION with the Board of County Commissioners of Lee County on the first floor conference room of the County Administration Building, 2115 second street, Fort Myers, F1 33901 with the following members present: Collier County: Chairman James D. Carter, Ph.D. Vice-Chairman Pamela S. Mac'Kie Commissioner James Coletta Commissioner Donna Fiala Commissioner Tom Henning Also Present: Tom Olliff, County Manager David C. Weigel, County Attorney Page 1 October 15,2001 Lee County: Chairman Douglas R. St. Cerny Commissioner John E. Albion Commissioner Robert P. Janes Commissioner Ray H. Judah Absent: Vice-Chairman Andrew W. Coy Also Present: Donald Stilwell, County Manager David Owen, Assistant County Attorney Page 2 JOINT LEE COUNTY/COLLIER COUNTY WORKSHOP OCTOBER 15, 2001 9:30 AM - 11:30 AM 1st FLOOR CONFERENCE ROOM COUNTY ADMINISTRATION BUILDING (BLUE BUILDING NEXT TO OLD COURTHOUSE) 2115 SECOND STREET FORT MYERS, FLORIDA 33901 AGENDA Discussion requested by Collier County: 1. Coordinating of the Legislative Agenda - Discussion of proposed State budget reductions 2. Redistricting 3. Update on transportation projects - Livingston Road, 1-75 4. Update on Beach Parking Lot Interconnection 5. Affordable Housing 6. Solid Waste Initiatives 7. Plan for beach renourishment to recover from Tropical Storm Gabrielle Discussion requested by Lee County: 1. General transportation/environmental issues, i.e. including purchase of CREW Lane 2. Update/status on Solid Waste issue from Collier County 3. DOT update on Lee portion of Livingston/Imperial connections and SR 951 extension Discussion requested by the City of Bonita Springs: 1. The timing of construction of intersection of Bonita Beach Road and Imperial 2. Regional approach to joint lobbying of our Legislative Delegation General Discussion October 15, 2001 CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Good morning. I'd like to start by welcoming everyone here today to the joint county workshop between Collier County and Lee County, and I welcome you all here today. We do have a full agenda, and there are copies of the agendas floating around. And what we will do is try to stick to the agenda in discussion. And at the end of that agenda, I will -- time permitting, but we will have public comments, and we'll open it up for the public, anyone who came to speak on any one of the issues that we have on our agenda. But for right now what I'd like to do is just go around the table and have everyone introduce themselves starting with the chairman of the Collier County board, Jim Carter. Jim. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Thank you very much, Doug St. Cerny. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you for hosting the meeting. I've known the chair for quite a while. He's a wonderful gentleman. And it's our pleasure to be here and to be a part of this meeting. As chair of the Collier County Commission, one more time I'll say I'm very proud of our Board of County Commissioners. As you all know, we are under a lot of-- of attention at this point, but I'm here to assure you that this commission is doing everything we can to go forward. We are not the evil empire. We are not Darth Vader. We're here to participate and do everything that we can. So to my left, a short-termer on our commission because she's going off to some great things, and I'll let her introduce herself. Commissioner Mac'Kie. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Hi. I'm Pam Mac'Kie. A short- termer? I've been here longer than anybody but Ray. I'm Pam Mac'Kie. I'm the District 4 commissioner, vice chair. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And I'm Jim Coletta, District 5 commissioner. COMMISSIONER FIALA: And Donna Fiala, District 1. Page 3 October 15,2001 COMMISSIONER HENNING: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Tom Henning, District 3. MR. OLLIFF: Good morning. I'm Tom Olliff. I'm the county manager for Collier County. MR. WEIGEL: Good morning. David Weigel, your county attorney for Collier. MR. OWEN: Good morning. David Owen with the Lee County Attorney's Office. MR. STILWELL: Don Stilwell, Lee County Administration. COMMISSIONER JANES: Bob Janes, District 1 county commissioner. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Hi. Ray Judah, District 3 county commissioner. COMMISSIONER ALBION: Good morning. John Albion, District 5 county commissioner. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: And Commissioner Coy's out of town. I think he returns this evening and sends his regrets, but he's up working on the family farm, and he'll be back tonight. CHAIRMAN CARTER: A conflict of interest. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: I did want to say that originally we did have a little scheduling problem with Florida Gulf Coast University, and that's when we decided that we would host this meeting here. And it's something we used to do years ago, and hopefully our next meeting we can talk the Collier County Commission into extending the invitation to us, and we'll come to Collier County for the meeting. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Consider that done, Mr. Chairman. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: And I do have a memo that President Bill Merwin from the Florida Gulf Coast University wanted to be here, but he sends his regrets. He's out of town today. So with no further ado, what I'd like to do is get started on the Page 4 October 15, 2001 agenda, and the first items on our agenda are discussion items that were requested by Collier County. And I think everyone has an agenda, so I will mm it over to the chair of the Collier County Commission to start with the first item. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We have worked hard. I think there's no question that the whole region, meaning Southwest Regional Group, has worked very hard to protect this area. The whole west coast has worked hard to make sure that we stay intact as a district. And what I'm hearing is that the committee that is -- that has been around and taking public information is very supportive of keeping the west coast to the west coast and that we will not be broken off in pieces and end up over on the east coast, as far as your district. So I think that's very positive. We have worked hard. We can't let up on that, but I think that was one of the critical things that we have demonstrated, is a commonality of the west coast counties on why we need to be kept together. Secondly, as we begin to look at the total agenda of what we're proposing to work with the state legislators, the key thing that needs to take place here is that the legislators don't start doing what they call cost shifting. That means that they will take these programs and give all of us at the county level the privilege and opportunity to pay for it. And this could be disastrous. As Commissioner Janes and I participated with the Florida Association of Counties about a week and a half ago, we have developed the impact of potential reduction of state-shared revenues and have generated back to FAC, as I'm sure Lee County is in the process, the impact of what would happen if you begin to tamper with the revenue streams that go to the general fund that would deal with the many projects that our counties work up on a regular basis. So I would encourage all the cities within our region to do the same thing. We must continually work on the legislators to get them Page 5 October 15,2001 to understand what the impacts are. Most legislators don't understand the county budgetary process. The state runs from July 1 to June 30th. We run from October 1 to September 30. We all know we set our millage rates. We know that we can't change those, and yet the state is saying what are they going to do in this current fiscal year to reduce dollars down to the counties, whether it be healthcare, Medicaid, Medicare, whether it be in roads, whether it be in other infrastructure needs, whether it be EMS, your sheriffs' departments, which are other constitutional officers. But these impacts could be staggering if we don't stand up and defend our rights and get the legislators to understand our position. The position of the Florida Association of Counties is we'll go to the table not as adversaries, so we will go there as tough negotiators with an iron fist covered with a velvet glove. And we won't take that glove off unless we have to. And if we have to, we will encourage all the correspondence, phone calls to the legislators and to the governor, on these issues. And we have no apprehension and no bones about doing that. We will do that if necessary. Our own delegation, though-- let's separate it out. Our own delegation really understands how unique -- our own delegation, I think, will be a force in working cooperatively with us. That's not the problem. The problem is other areas who may not understand the process and who may come after us in some very vulnerable areas. So as I look at the agendas that have been put forward, our legislative delegation is very supportive and will work with us, but let's not lose sight of the goal. The legislators will be out there looking at a way to shift costs to cut their own budgets at our expense. One of the major things the legislators could do is to work with us in revamping, if you please, or taking a hard look at the ordinances, the permitting processes imposed by state bureaucracy. If we could streamline some of those things, it would save the Page 6 October 15,2001 counties an enormous amount of money, and it would relieve us of some heavy burdens which, in the permitting process, some of it reaches the level of being ridiculous. And we're not compromising the environment. We're not compromising the safety or anything. We're trying to eliminate that. That could be a huge cost savings to the counties, and we will be actively putting that on the table for discussion. Commissioner Janes and I both could tell you some real horror stories about what happens to counties on simple projects because some bureaucrat goes to some ordinance, some paragraph, some line item and says, "You know, you have to have a study for this." And 18 months later they're still studying it, and in the meantime it's costing the county thousands and thousands while that's taking place. As Commissioner Albion has told me often, if you split a bureaucrat's arteries, you get right to the point. And we may go up there and split a few arteries and get a little blood on the table so they understand that we will not be victims. We will be cooperative. We will work hard to keep Florida moving and do everything that we can to be a player, but we will not be the ones that end up paying the bills because of the challenges we have in front of us. So I think, Mr. Chairman, that is where we have seen the coordination of the legislative agendas and the job that we have in front of us and the fights that we have to continue fighting. And I think later on you'll be looking at some of the road situations where Mayor Pass, myself, other members -- Lee County, even on Friday part of the TOP committee, demonstrating our needs for projects in Southwest Florida. And when the -- the chair, Tom Conrecode, asked, "How many are here from Southwest Florida to support these projects?" three- quarters of the room were on their feet. That was impressive to that advisory group, because you had the political leaders. You had the -- Page 7 October 15,2001 you had the administrators. You had everybody involved uniformly saying this is what we need, 91 point -- $91 1/2 million against $700 million that are requested statewide. It's a tough challenge but if there's any money there, we want some of it. So those are the kinds of things that you're finding that your elected leaders and your administrative people are doing throughout this region to try to get those projects funded in these areas. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: You're welcome. Any additional comments from any commissioners -- COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Mr. Chairman. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: -- in regards to this item? Yes, Commissioner. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Yeah. I can't let that go. I appreciate the comments, but it's not the streamlining of the permitting where the cost savings takes effect. It's really an effort where the legislature needs to repeal the multitude of sales tax exemptions that they've handed out over the years to the tune of $800 million ever since 1991. It's the need to recognize that we need to move forward with partial-year tax assessments so we can have tax equity in the State of Florida generating tax dollars without increasing taxes. It's the need to recognize that on user fees, such as registration fees, there's an inequity in the fee structure, fees that the legislature considers a tax but is not so. It's a necessary fee to pay for services like transportation disadvantage programs; recognition that the legislature needs to give local communities an opportunity to impose real estate transfer fees. So I hesitate to start to bang away on the streamlining of permitting, with all due respect, because to me it's just an end run to compromise environmental regulations that are necessary to protect Page 8 October 15,2001 the environment. I'm not taking a shot at you in that respect. CHAIRMAN CARTER: No. I believe what you just said needs to be demonstrated and put in a package and go forward, Commissioner. I truly believe everything you said. I was only using one example. You have demonstrated, brought forward, far more impacting examples. And I would hope that you would write those up, your commission would support that through a resolution. I know we would support those kinds of things in Collier. I speak as one commissioner, but I would have to ask the rest of our commissioners here if they would support the same thing. These are the kinds of things we need to do. I want them to feel the pain of what they have done to us. And we need to get equity here, you're absolutely right, from gas tax indexing right on through. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Commissioner Judah, you're talking about the tax exemptions, for an example, attorney's fees? COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Oh, gosh. There is -- there is a plethora of sales tax exemptions from dog food to golf course sport hall of fame. It just goes on and on. I don't know whether that specific one is on that list. All I'm saying is I think Senator MacKay is at least asking to revisit that -- that list. Since 1991 there's some 800 million sales tax exemptions that have been given out. Any time you go through a legislative session, you see the host of lobbyists, special-interest groups that are also asking, with their hand in the trough, to be granted a sales tax exemption. And it's just gotten way out of hand. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: If I could just comment, I -- COMMISSIONER JUDAH: See, Representative Kyle was trying to get a sales tax exemption on diapers. You know, it just goes on and on. It's crazy. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: The sales tax exemption is certainly, you know, a real important issue, and it is a crazy list. The Page 9 October 15,2001 one that I think local governments could have some real impact on and hopefully never falls off FAC's legislative agenda is the partial- year assessment. And hopefully -- you know, that's -- that and gas tax indexing, as far as local government issues, are the two that are the most troubling for me for local government taxing opportunities. Partial-year assessment, that's just a shame that we can't get that through. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Commissioner Albion. COMMISSIONER ALBION: Just briefly, I agree with some of those concerns, but they're going to be long-term issues. I guess what I'd like to see is twofold: One is let's recognize it's the agencies that are ending up having to figure out how to absorb the cuts. It's not the legislature itself or the -- well, the governor has to deal with it. The other is this: I just care as a local official to understand what they're intending to provide for a level of service so whatever the shortfall is, assuming that whatever they're doing is fair and meets state law, then we know what we have to budget for. And the problem that I keep running into is the state turns around, changes the rules. We have people that are -- this year it was G. Pierce Wood and perhaps education, as has been argued, and then next year it's going to be something else. And I just think that there needs to be an understanding. And instead ofjust dollars brought in, we need to understand how level of service is going to be affected. That would put a little bit more character into the discussion, I believe, and maybe it will be a lot easier then for the legislature itself to make some of these decisions. But that's really the root of it, and that's the part that I think is really missing in the conversation and I would hope that FAC and all of us are going to fight for. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Mr. Chairman, if I may. I agree with you, Commissioner Albion. But what we've got here is a very simple problem that translates to not enough money to cover Page 10 October 15,2001 enough services. The state being limited mainly through revenue from sales tax, we've taken quite a bit of beating over the years. And one of the ways we're taking a beating -- and I don't know how it's ever going to be addressed -- of course, is the Internet and the people's ability to buy over the Internet and save themselves a 6 percent tax. They save the money on one hand. On the other hand, they don't want to pay for the infrastructure and the services in the form of new taxes to be able to cover it. And I don't know if we're going to be able to rely totally on the state for some of these problems. I think if we had been a little more proactive in the beginning to be able to address these needs, we'd be better off today, and we wouldn't all be scurrying for those few dollars that are out there, trying to beat everyone else -- not only our other counties surrounding us, but the rest of the state -- for the available dollars that are out there. I guess right now the answer is going to be twofold: One, to get out there and fight for our fair share right down to the pits and, like Mr. Carter said, cut a couple of veins there and let them bleed a little; and the other one would be to start some long-range programs so that we understand exactly what our responsibility is going to be. Like you mentioned, Commissioner Albion, it's going to be a long road. And I tell you, it's not going to be an easy time to be a county commissioner. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Any other comments on this subject? Before we move on to redistricting, I was remiss in not introducing the mayor of Bonita Springs, Paul Pass. Paul, would you like to stand and introduce any of your councilmembers or any key staff that are here with you? MAYOR PASS: Thank you. We have here councilman from District 1, Wayne Edsall; and our city manager, Gary Price; and our Page 11 October 15,2001 city attorney, Audrey Vance. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Thank you for being here. I apologize for the oversight. The next item on the agenda from Collier County is on redistricting. CHAIRMAN CARTER: It looks like we've got a lot of stuff on the agenda, doesn't it? Again, redistricting is an issue that I think we all have been uniform on. Both commissions have passed resolutions to that effect, in support of keeping the west coast together. I think that we have been very diligent on this, the need to do that. It's been a uniform approach by both Republicans and Democrats. In Collier County Chuck Nolty, who chairs the Democratic party and Mike Carr, who chairs the Republican party, have both been very active in working as a united group. I know our turnout in Collier was excellent for this at Naples High School, and we continue to support the unification of the west coast as far as redistricting. And how it affects the counties and what we have looked at in our own county is lining up the redistricting as far as an alignment with the school board district, and we have five plans on the table, and public hearings are this coming week. I think there are three of those. And after that we'll have an opportunity to see what the final lines look like, and that's where we are. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Any comments by other commissioners in regards to this subject matter? Okay. We'll move on to update on the transportation projects on Livingston Road and 1-75. Norm. Good morning. MR. FEDER: Good morning, Commissioners. Norman Feder, Collier transportation administrator. I want to encourage both boards, obviously, on anything to do with transportation to share that list of legislative items. I think we have a lot of mutual concerns. I'll even add a more specific one to the very broad and good set that Page 12 October 15,2001 you've thrown out. And that is that what we've found is on the county incentive grant program, both of us were awarded grants for Fiscal Year '03, and in both cases they have not been submitted by Florida Department of Transportation to the governor for the governor's budget to the legislature. What that effectively means is we're likely not to get that funding and still try to hold on to Fiscal Year '02 funds. The program -- the county incentive grant program originated out of our own legislative delegation here in Southwest Florida. The effort was to try to set up a point system, and we did end up with a program that we've been very competitive at, both Lee and Collier. What I will note to you, though, is that the program was supposed to go to funding out of 4 cents of the 7 percent, if you will, that is collected by Department of Revenue for basically collection and redistribution of the local gas tax. What I would submit is if we're not able to get these projects funded either out of that 4 cents now in Fiscal Year '03, that we might want to consider recommending to our legislatures that we, in fact, request that they repeal the county incentive grant program but make sure that that 4 cents out of the 7 cents stays and is returned back to each of us locally so we don't have to go out and compete after those funds. So that's another specific item I'll throw to your attention along with indexing gas tax and a few others that Scott and I have talked about that we need to pursue. Livingston, obviously Collier and Lee, very important facility for both of us as an alternate to 41, 1-75. Phase 1, our first section of Livingston, Radio to Golden Gate Parkway, that six-laning section is complete. Golden Gate Parkway to Pine Ridge is currently under construction, completion third quarter of 2002. Phases 3 and 4 -- 3 from Pine Ridge to Immokalee, 4 from Immokalee up to the Lee County line -- both are set to go to construction the first of 2002 Page 13 October 15,2001 calendar year. Second quarter, third quarter of 2003, the section from Immokalee up to the Lee County line will be complete. Second quarter 2002 (sic), that middle section, if you will, now between Immokalee and Pine Ridge will be complete. So essentially we're talking mid-2002 for the section up to Pine Ridge, mid-2003 for the section from Immokalee up to the county line, and mid-2004 for that middle section between Pine Ridge and Immokalee. I know that Mike Rippe is going to discuss 1-75, but what I'll do is first defer to your Lee County No. 3 and let Scott give you an update on Livingston/Imperial. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Thank you. Norm, Commissioner Albion's got a question for you. COMMISSIONER ALBION: I agree with your idea about the situation of the 7 cents and keeping 4 cents for local. My only question is, how do we pursue that? I mean, this is something we should be agreeing on right here to determine where we're going. MR. FEDER: I firmly agree. I think that is obviously an issue you need to decide if you want to take up. But it was a feeling that obviously what we need to be doing is telling our delegation that if, in fact, it's not going to be funded by surplus general revenue as the first three years were to be funded, that we want that to apply now, the 4 cents, to fund 2003 and then for action to be taken to repeal the legislation and just allow that 4 cents to, again, be returned; in other words, only 3 cents be collected by the Department of Revenue for the collection and distribution of the funds. COMMISSIONER ALBION: And I'd request that between the two staffs they come up with a resolution. And, I mean, let's get this thing moving in a direction. Let's not think that the other's doing it, and then nothing happens. MR. FEDER: We'll do that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I'd support that, at least from our Page 14 October 15,2001 -- our commission. We can't take action in another county, of course, but I sure hope that the majority of the board would agree to support that and get it on an agenda soon. That sounds like a real practical solution. MR. FEDER: I believe that it's on on the 23rd, probably. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: People are nodding in consensus. We can do that. MR. OLLIFF: Mr. Chairman, one of the things that I'd suggest, too, is not only would our boards adopt something like that, but we really seem to, this year in particular, find that coordination through the RPC, through other communities in Southwest Florida has worked really well. And when we draft that resolution, we'll provide that up through some of the other jurisdictions in that planning council. And then I also suggest that we forward it up to Florida Association of Counties and ask that it be placed as one of their legislative agenda items and that we all include that as part of the resolution. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Commissioner Mac'Kie. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: This question kind of, I'm afraid, drags me back to the first agenda item just to ask, are we considering any kind of a joint lobbying effort or something for this special session in particular? Or, you know, for example, if we should try to take this -- this issue forward is something that's so important to just draft a resolution and send it around and hope people pay attention to it. This is a real practical issue that both counties ought to get very excited about. And I just wonder if we want to talk about how we're going to coordinate our lobbying efforts or if we are going to have any particular lobbying efforts on, you know, behalf of the counties or the region. Do you guys have plans to do anything as far as lobbying? COMMISSIONER ALBION: We absolutely do. That's why Page 15 October 15,2001 we have hired a firm to do that. But I would recommend that we direct -- do you have a lobbyist in Tallahassee also? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: No. COMMISSIONER ALBION: Okay. Well, whoever you would like to assign to being responsible in terms of the Tallahassee end of your world, that they should get with our lobbying firm -- which I assume Keith Arnold will be heading up for our side -- to talk about specifically narrowing it down to what the joint issues really are and try to then gain that greater support, and I think that this is part of what I believe we pay these people to do. If you should decide to go with a lobbying firm, then obviously those groups will be getting together in that sense and really make it, hopefully, easy for the delegation to understand where we're all coming from and where we're trying to get to rather than -- because we only meet here periodically. So I think that would be very important, for one. For two, let's not forget the MPOAC as a statewide organization in terms of the 4-cent situation to -- as well as I would recommend the state chamber of commerce. And let us also possibly make sure what's in the resolution is that with the governor coming forward with an economic stimulus package that's weighted heavily towards road construction, it would certainly make a lot of sense that this should be coming in on the heels of that because there is a way that doesn't -- should not, theoretically, hurt the state budget because it's only administrative, unless they're just playing with it, which they may be. But this is a common-sense solution to back up what the governor's plan's all about for an economic stimulus package while keeping ethically, I believe, what the state has already promised to come true. So this involves a lot of areas. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And that kind of worked into my ulterior motive, which was to say to the Collier County Commission Page 16 October 15,2001 about the need to have professional lobbying during this special session, I think in particular, and certainly in general. I just think we need to look at professional lobbying in Collier County. I keep saying it, and I hope we'll do it. COMMISSIONER ALBION: The Bonita Springs lobbyist needs to be included in that also. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Tom Olliff and I have talked at great lengths about this for Collier County in terms of our lobbyists, in terms of coordinating the lobbyists that exist and other constitutional officers, and I think it's time for the administrators then to pull this together. Who are the lobbyists? How can we jointly use every resource? We have a Regional Planning Council meaning Thursday. I think we certainly can bring that up, and it'll be appropriate to be talking about it in that forum so we can move that forward. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Scott. And we'll follow up with Mike Rippe. MR. GILBERTSON: Good morning, Commissioners. I'm Scott Gilbertson from Lee County DOT. We have, actually, three separate projects that extend Livingston/Imperial up into Lee County from the county line. The one that's currently under construction we call the Imperial/Livingston four-laning project. That's under construction right now, and we hope to have that work done by July of next year. The next project we have is the Imperial four laning that runs from Bonita Beach Road up to East Terry Street in the City of Bonita Springs. We're getting ready to start design work on that next month and anticipating about a year's worth of design work and permitting there, and we should be able to finish up right away with acquisition by May of 2003. And then the construction, that's funded for Fiscal Year 2004, so we'd start right away in October 2003 with construction. We could move that up some if the city is interested in advance funding it like they had talked about, and we'll be talking Page 17 October 15,2001 more with them about that. We probably could start construction as soon as June of 2003. And the last project we got is from Terry Street on up to the city limits, The Brooks and San Carlos Estates. We've been working closely with the city on that designing, working on that alignment alternative, and we've reached an agreement on that with the city. We're ready to proceed with the design on that. We hope to start the design by February of next year. We're going to allow 18 months for design and permitting on that project because it is a new alignment, and there's quite a few environmental issues involved in that one. We hope to have right-of-way completed by December, then, of 2003. And then we could conceivably start construction January of 2004, even though our funding is set up for the following fiscal year, which would make it October of 2004. That's a summary of those projects, but once we are finished, we'll have a good corridor all the way up to Daniels Parkway in Lee County. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Questions for Scott? Yes. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Scott, I got to tell you the troth. I'm a little disappointed there wasn't a little better cooperative effort on the part of Livingston Road and Imperial to Bonita. It just seems like we probably could have planned this out a little better so the whole thing would have been completed at the time, maybe, we did, or we could have put our resources someplace else in the county and then brought them in line when it was needed out there. We got our end of the road completed to the county line back about, what was it, six months ago, eight months ago? And I know at that time there was a number of people using the hard-packed ground to reach our road to be able to get into Collier County and back into Lee County. And it was quite successful, even that limited opening that was there. I understand the safety concern Page 18 October 15,2001 and why the road was blocked off. Is there anything that we can do in some way to offer limited access so that the citizens of both counties can utilize that road a little bit sooner than July? I'm very concerned about that day. MR. GILBERTSON: We ran into some delays there with right- of-way acquisition, and that was the primary reason that it ran behind. We also were successful in getting a SWFTI grant that allowed us to expand that two-lane design to a four-lane design. So we went ahead with the four-lane design and had to get a change order for construction, that sort of thing. So those two things are part of the reason for the delay. We can certainly work with the contractor down there to see what kind of access could be provided to the public during construction, but at this point -- COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Even limited access with reduced speed limits on the Lee County side would take quite a bit of pressure off of 41 and 75. It's really the only corridor in the eastern section there that would get people back and forth. It's dearly needed as soon as possible. And anything we can do at our end to help you with your end, we'd be happy to do it. MR. GILBERTSON: We'll work with the contractor on it. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Thank you, Scott. Mayor Pass, did you have anything you'd want to add to this at this time? MAYOR PASS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think before we get off the transportation issue, I had an opportunity September the 14th to fly up to Atlanta and attend the Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations, their annual meeting. And there probably was a hundred people there. There were three elected officials. And all those staff people from across the country emphasized-- we talked a lot about the Transportation Equity Act of the 21st Century, TEA-21. Page 19 October 15,2001 The emphasis after what happened September the 1 lth with the airline industry basically being grounded-- I flew into an empty Hartsfield. It's spooky to go into Hartsfield with no one picking up luggage. It was scary in there. The emphasis was to have that TEA- 21 program reiterated in 2003. They were concerned we couldn't get enough elected officials to budget and commit time to go to congress to not let that program be gutted. We need to budget time to do that, budget the dollars to travel up there to get face time with our congress people, key appropriations people. I think maybe Representative Young, maybe, from Sarasota would be a key person. But it's imperative that if we don't want to continue to be a donor area with federal dollars and get our money back equitably, we need to go to Washington and lobby our congress people. That was probably the largest emphasis that was there, that we, in fact, get our elected people to be there. Don't send your staffs up; get your elected officials to show up and get that money back down here, or else we're not going to have enough dollars to take care of-- our roads and rail systems were really taxed September the 12th. Everyone was on the road then. They weren't in the sky. And we need to be careful that that project, that TEA-21 program, is, in fact, kept intact as is, that those dollars, if not used, are not appropriated somewhere else and that we keep all that money coming in our direction. So while we're talking about transportation, that would probably be an important issue for us to think about in the next 18 months, to do that. Thank you. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Any other comment in regards to the discussion specifically on Imperial and Bonita Beach Road? MAYOR PASS: Keep plugging. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Mr. Chairman. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Yes. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: I didn't mean to interrupt, but I Page 20 October 15,2001 want to thank the mayor and the council. They did a really good job, and our staff, to come up with an alignment that seemed to be acceptable to the San Carlos Estates residents, and I certainly appreciate the effort. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Mike. MR. RIPPE: Good morning. I am Mike Rippe, district director of the Florida Department of Transportation, Southwest area office here in Fort Myers. Thank you for the opportunity. A little update where we stand on 1-75. The PD&E study, or project development and environmental study, is under way. We are expecting to have a workshop on December 5th from 5 to 8 p.m. That will be at the Three Oaks Banquet Center-- I think it was previously called the Three Oaks University Center -- up on Corkscrew. We picked that location as kind of a joint location so that Lee and Collier can both be there. I think as you are aware, we have two separate studies under way but track them together, if you will. The Collier study is being done by Parsons Brinckerhoff. The Lee study is being done by Yule S. Griner (phonetic). At the public workshop, we will be presenting both the ultimate configuration for the interstate and also the Mobility 2000 Program that the governor and legislature passed in 2000. We will also be showing proposed interchange improvements, especially at Corkscrew and Daniels, as those were the two that were (inaudible) for design and right-of-way in Mobility 2000, but we will also be showing concepts for the remainder of the interchanges. As you are aware, the multilaning is currently funded from Bonita Beach -- from the county line in the City of Bonita Springs up to Daniels in 2008 in Lee County and from there south down to Golden Gate in 2009 in Collier County. We are trying to look at every possible way to advance that. We appreciate any assistance that we get from the counties also in advancing that. At this point I'd Page 21 October 15,2001 entertain any questions. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Questions for Mike by any commissioners? COMMISSIONER ALBION: Mike, do you have any comments about Mayor Pass's presentation in regards to TEA-21, state position on it? MR. RIPPE: We will continue to encourage Florida getting its fair share of dollars. We are becoming -- we became less of a donor state in the last round when we went from to TEA-21. We would hope that that would continue, we would become even less of a donor state. COMMISSIONER ALBION: And my concern is that, Mike, what FDOT did on the last round. They go up there, in my opinion, as if they're -- a unit of an Army is what they should be like, and instead of that, they're going up there as if they're the whole Army. I mean, frankly, I don't think they're doing a lot to keep the counties really in touch with what needs to be done to try to influence the congress as to what is the right thing for a very fast growing state like Florida. And I would think that there should be -- we need information. What are the states we should be teaming up with? Because those congress people we need to get to, and senators. We need to be understanding further what the arguments are and try to get, in the general principles, what those arguments are and then be able to use examples from our area so that congress will understand this is not just like a form letter, that what we're all talking about is real, and we're experiencing it statewide and/or other states are experiencing it besides, and you build your case. But I don't see that building block going on, and the only reason that we did better the last time was because congress put more money into the low end. So there were no losers; there were only winners. Page 22 October 15,2001 And that's why I'm fearful in the next round that unless they're going to dump a whole bunch more money into it higher than what it has been, then we're going to have a very difficult time really having any real advancement, because 90.5 cents for every dollar sent up, 9.5 cents being returned, is, quite frankly, very inadequate considering what our responsibilities are to this nation in terms of handling citizens from all over who come down here in the winter and how fast we're growing and the whole situation of international trade. And the state DOT needs to very seriously understand we can't afford to mess up on this reauthorization, because five years later Florida is going to be really behind the eightball if we're not getting back a greater fair share in this whole situation. So I think there needs to be some serious coordination to get all of us involved, as Mayor Pass talked about, and we need to be really singing from the same hymnal. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Any other comments by any commissioners? Yes, Commissioner Henning. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Can you give us an update on the U.S. 41 widening project? MR. RIPPE: U.S. 41 in north Collier County? We have two projects as one going together from just north of Pine Ridge Road up to old 41 just south of our friends in Bonita Springs. That project is slated to be completed by the end of this year, significantly. We will -- our charge has been have six lanes of traffic open by the end of the year. I'm talking with the contractor on a weekly basis, and he states that he will meet that commitment. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I think it's important, if anyone hasn't been there in the last few days, to take a look at what's developing. My question would be, I know they're short of crews. Any way they can work six days a week in laying blacktop? MR. RIPPE: The contractor has assured me, Dr. Carter, that he Page 23 October 15,2001 will take whatever measures are necessary. If it is working two shifts or three shifts, that he will have six lanes of traffic open by the end of the year. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Is this going to affect our projects that we have with the contractor in our county? MR. RIPPE: I could not answer that, sir. You'd have to talk to the contractor directly, or maybe Mr. Feder could elaborate on that. MR. FEDER: Yes. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Mike, do you have a summary there of 41 north of the Collier County line? MR. RIPPE: Well, actually, starting from Old 41 up to the Lee- Collier line and the Lee-Collier line up to north of Imperial -- south of Imperial River, north of Bonita Beach Road, both of those projects are funded next fiscal year, 2002-2003, for us. Dr. Carter and several others of us, Commissioner Albion, were up in Orlando last Friday. We were pursuing a TOP grant. Actually, the City of Bonita Springs was the applicant, but pursuing a TOP grant for the Imperial River bridge and that next section from the bridge up to Old 41. The section from Old 41 up to Corkscrew we currently have under design. It's funded for construction in Fiscal Year 2004-2005. However, the governor did announce an economic stimulus package on Friday. This project was one of the projects that will potentially be moved up as well as the U.S. 41 project in Collier County from Barefoot Williams to 951. From Corkscrew up to San Carlos, we have design. And in your new fifth year of your work program, you will see right-of-way -- 60 percent of the right-of-away funded for that. Construction is currently not funded. The section north of that from San Carlos to Alico is under construction as we speak. That comes up to Alico Road where we already previously six laned. Just if I could for a note, we will be at the Southwest Florida Page 24 October 15,2001 Regional Planning Council this Thursday, as Dr. Carter mentioned. We will be holding our work program public hearing for the southern six counties in District 1 there on Thursday. Also, on Friday we will be addressing the Lee MPO, and then the following Friday we will be at the Collier MPO. So we're in the tail end of our work program cycle, if you will. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Thank you, Mike. Any further questions? Certainly appreciate your presentation, Mike. Thanks for being here. We'll move on to Item No. 4 on the agenda, an update on beach parks. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Mr. Chairman, this issue -- and, please, I didn't mean to interfere. It's just that this issue came up the last time we met, this joint Collier/Lee County Commission meeting, and we talked about ways in which to enhance access and the terms of public access, also ingress/egress to the park and expansion of the public parking spaces. But really what this comes down to is Lee County has a parking fee, and I don't believe Collier does. And I don't know if this conversation is going to go much further unless there is an interest by the Collier commissioners to impose a parking fee. That's helped us to augment our budget to make sure we properly operate and maintain our parks there in Bonita. Again, I didn't mean to interrupt, but I didn't know if there was a willingness to consider-- COMMISSIONER HENNING: Commissioner Judah, I agree with you. How it is set up in Collier County, our residents who have a beach parking sticker get to enjoy the beaches. Anybody who does not have a sticker gets to pay to enjoy the beaches. It's a different system, and there is a lot of constraints. I recognize that. And I'm not sure if we really -- my opinion is I'm not sure if we're -- if I'm willing to take it forward. Page 25 October 15, 2001 CHAIRMAN CARTER: I think we need to hear from Mr. Ochs on the subject. I believe that, as Commissioner Henning stated, that's pretty much where we are. MR. OCHS: Yes, sir. Good morning, Commissioners. For the record, Leo Ochs, assistant county manager. This schedule is a brief update on the prospect of this connection between the two beach parks at the county line. Commissioner Judah's correct. There's an issue with regard to fees for parking. Moreover, on the Collier side, there's a couple of other issues that make this connection a continuing difficult prospect and not the least of which is the existence of a reverted clause in the existing beach parking easement between Lely Development Corporation and Collier County which says, in effect, that if a separate access is constructed on the Barefoot Beach parking lot, that the developer has the option of closing off the existing access point off of Barefoot Beach Boulevard. And county staff would obviously strongly oppose that action. So that -- that's a continuing legal restriction that we have. The other issue, of course, is the one that was just alluded to. I believe that Lee County charges everyone who comes in and uses the Lee County park. Collier County charges only those Collier County residents that don't have a beach parking sticker. And, of course, we charge also the noncounty residents and visitors. But there would have to be some kind of arrangement made there, even if we were able to overcome the initial legal restriction that we're currently facing. That notwithstanding, even if we got to the point where we agreed that we would let everyone park for free, Collier County does have a revenue issue there. We would lose about $25,000 a year that we take in annually at our Barefoot Beach parking lot for noncounty residents or county residents who did not display the beach parking sticker. Page 26 October 15, 2001 COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Motion to table indefinitely? Would that be-- CHAIRMAN CARTER: I think in all due respect, Commissioner Judah -- and I can only speak for myself, but I am comfortable with our system. And with these legal constraints and -- it works for us. And our philosophy is if you're not -- if you don't have the sticker, you have the privilege of paying, and we would honor the same thing in -- COMMISSIONER HENNING: And -- CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: That kind of stops the discussion. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I'm not really sure if it takes a motion. I don't believe that we've ever -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: No. I was just -- CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: We can't take a motion at a workshop. I do have a request from Mayor Pass, though, who would like to address this subject, if it's okay. MAYOR PASS: Thank you again for your indulgence, Mr. Chairman. I get down there quite frequently, and I think to do something together would be a blend for both. I think there's probably a compromise there to be able -- Lee County has the largest facility there. If you go into the Collier County side, most of the people are going to go over and use the Lee County comfort station and shower and rest room facilities. I think probably we could consider an interlocal agreement between the two counties for a mutual access point; for Lee County to continue to maintain it; recognize both stickers at that facility, as it would become merely one; recognize the Collier County sticker; recognize the Lee County sticker; make the parking fee applicable to the entire parking lot; Lee County then retain the revenue for those parking fees for the maintenance of the entire facility, much as Collier County pays for -- $60,00 a year or something for the Bonita Page 27 October 15,2001 Beach Road corridor. Do that interlocal agreement, and everyone wins. We'd probably add another 30 parking spaces there. We've enhanced the facility. You've given more people an opportunity to enjoy the beach, and I think that's what we're all about. And I think something along those lines could probably be worked out. I don't see that -- don't have the cul-de-sac at the south end of the Lee County park connected there. Turn that big turnaround into parking, and I think you've really got something there. And I think there's an opportunity there that this group can make it work. I've got all the confidence in the world you can make it work. COMMISSIONER FIALA: I love it when there's a compromise. And would that, Leo, injure our agreement with Lely Development in any way? And is there a way that we could communicate with Lely Development to see if they could -- MAYOR PASS: Well, the entrance into the Lely -- we may have a different access point. We may have an enhanced access point to where the beach park is now. I think I -- some of these people I've been able to work with for a long time, and they're fairly creative individuals, and I don't think that's a hill that we can't climb. I really do. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: If I may ask a question too, I think it's a great idea to consider this. We're also going to be able to avoid two entrance points. You won't need to have the personnel working two different gates. It's been my experience at some of the smaller parking areas where we charge the fee to be able to allow people in, the fee that was actually there was just paying for the maintenance of the attendant that was collecting at the gate. We'd be able to have more fees to work with if we had one entrance. I'm willing to bring it back to our own commission for -- CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: What I'd suggest is probably what Page 28 October 15, 2001 we should do is allow our staffs to work together with the mayor's office and respectively bring back whatever agenda items to each board to see if there's a basis for an interlocal agreement, that this would work in the way that's been described by the mayor. But I appreciate the input, Paul. And if we can keep talking, we will. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Just a quick question for the mayor. You're talking about setting a -- imposing a parking fee. MAYOR PASS: On the Collier side where there's none now. Both parking lots have -- if you don't have a -- if you've got a Collier sticker, no matter where you park -- look at it as one park. If you have a Collier sticker, you don't pay. If you have a Lee sticker, you don't pay. If you don't have either sticker, you pay. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Well, but that obviously is contrary to what the county's been doing, imposing a parking fee, a user fee, for all. MAYOR PASS: If you try to build consistency into it, this is the most inconsistent point that either one of us have as parks -- or any of us have as parks. If we become flexible with this, the consistency would be you recognize both stickers. And if you don't have either sticker, you don't (sic) pay. You have the same staff. I mean, it's easy. They're going to see the Collier County white sticker with blue in the upper right or the Lee County sticker. If they have one of those stickers, fine. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I have a question, though. In Lee County, even if you have a sticker-- I don't know if you have one -- you still have to pay to park; right? COMMISSIONER JUDAH: You can get a parking sticker, an annual parking sticker, for $30, as a resident, for county -- MAYOR PASS: Countywide. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Countywide, $30 for the year. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: So we'd still be giving our Page 29 October 15,2001 stickers out for free; you'd still be charging -- COMMISSIONER COLETTA: That wouldn't be quite correct because free -- there's nothing free. Somewheres along the way, the taxpayer's paying for it. So whether we're paying for it up front and we're giving them the stickers out or they're collecting it as a user fee, it's still -- it equates out to the same thing. MAYOR PASS: It's probably impossible to break it out, but I'm going to say that most of the money that's generated in parking fees are from people who don't live in Lee or Collier. They don't live in the state of Florida year round. That brings in added revenue. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: But Lee County, we've certainly been strongly supportive of a user-fee based system. Paul, we're talking some excess of $80,000 that we'd have to otherwise pull from the general fund. MAYOR PASS: I'm saying we'd have an interlocal agreement with Collier County where Lee County would maintain the entire facility. Lee County would keep the parking revenue that comes in, which is -- I've talked with John. It's over $80,000. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: But that's with a fee to the residents. MAYOR PASS: No, no, no. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Oh, yes. MAYOR PASS: John. MR. YARBROUGH: John Yarbrough, parks and recreation. Actually, Collier County does have stickers. Lee County has stickers. Lee County citizens pay for stickers. Collier County citizens don't pay for stickers. So there is a difference. MAYOR PASS: But if you have -- in Collier County you have, what, 180 parking spaces over there? If you're getting 25 cents an hour for them as we do in the -- MR. YARBROUGH: Seventy-five. Page 30 October 15,2001 MAYOR PASS: Seventy-five cents an hour as we do for the 87 spots that are in the Bonita Springs/Lee County parking area, you're going to enhance that revenue. It's going to go up significantly because there's no fee over there now, and you're not going to maintain any more facility because the facility's already there. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Paul, who's going to be paying that? Because people are parking there with stickers. MAYOR PASS: There's a lot of people that go there without stickers. I mean, obviously the dollars that are taken in at 75 cents an hour are significant. So if we open that much more up that is being paid for instead of-- CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: I would suggest we go forward and let staffs work on it, and they could come back to the respective boards or the next time we have another joint meeting. MAYOR PASS: I mean, I think if you look at it as a potential for 180 more parking spaces that someone's paying 75 cents an hour for instead of 87 -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: But we've got to have some portion of those available for county residents to park in without paying. Right now all 180 of those are available to Collier County residents without a fee, and we -- we have a dearth of public parking for beach parking. If we -- you know, we could be cutting -- reducing access to beaches for Collier County residents, is what I'm afraid would happen. MAYOR PASS: I know Commissioner Coletta's been up there several occasions to that. Jim, how many people are Collier County residents that are in that parking lot when you're there on holidays? What would you guess the percentage would be? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: To be honest with you, I kind of avoid the lot during holidays. But I'll tell you one thing, in Collier County we just put on the holding pattern the Vanderbilt parking Page 31 October 15,2001 garage. We are never going to have any more parking places unless we provide for them. And there's times that these parks are completely filled, and you can't get into anything. And they'll keep circling around, and that's not what people come down here for. I think we have an obligation, any way we possibly can, to provide parking places. And how many more did you say we could pick up? MAYOR PASS: You'd have to get a little creative, but I -- I can picture in my mind as I drive down -- you do away with the cul-de- sac, probably 30 at least. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Those are 30 people at the busiest time. MAYOR PASS: That's 30 automobiles, however many people are at a whack. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I'm still willing to consider it, and I hope the staff will start to work on this and come back to you, Mayor, and consult you on this to get your input on it before it comes back to us. COMMISSIONER FIALA: That's what this is all about, is for us to meet -- present our concerns about an issue and see whether we can come up with a compromise. And this is something that we feel very good about, both Lee and Collier County, coming to that compromise. I'm sure that we can get staff to -- CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: We'll let staffs work on it. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, John. Paul, I'd ask that you stay involved. MAYOR PASS: I probably will. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Next item on the agenda -- on the Collier agenda is affordable housing. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Greg Mihalic will speak to that issue for Collier. MR. MIHALIC: Good morning, Commissioners. I'm Greg Mihalic. I'm housing and urban improvement director for Collier Page 32 October 15, 2001 County. Would you like a synopsis of what we do in Collier County or talk about work-force housing as a regional issue, which is really what we have? You know, as you look at the statistics, all of Southwest Florida is a growth engine for job development, and really, work-force housing has to be dealt with as a regional issue. In Collier County we helped about 700 families last year get their first house, and we're proud of that. We also assist usually two or three multifamily apartment developers build affordable housing per year. Locally we offer impact fee deferrals as well as density bonuses. But more importantly we help developers get state money through the Florida Housing Finance Corporation and tax credits to allow them to bring down the cost and provide affordable housing in Collier County. But, again, as I mentioned, really we're talking about a regional issue. We have an interlocal agreement with the cities in Collier County where we assist them to cover their needs, and we have about $2 million in SHIP funds a year. All the money that we give out is on a revolving basis. We get that money back from the people that we lend it to when they refinance or sell their house. So we have a little over $3 million this year that we will use for affordable housing ownership programs. I guess I'd like to open it up for questions or delve into the areas that you'd like to discuss. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Commissioner Coletta requested this on the agenda. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I'm glad that we had a chance to do a reality check. I mean, we can talk about this as nice as we want to. But the truth of the matter is the way the HUD funds are divided up, they go to the City of Naples and the City of Marco and really aren't utilized in the true spirit of what they were intended to be, which is to provide new low-cost housing for people out there Page 33 October 15,2001 that need that. The work force has a heck of a problem. And the truth of the matter is, to be honest about it, we lean on Lee County very heavily for our affordable housing, and you're starting to run out also. The next frontier is going to be Immokalee. Of course, with the Immokalee Road in the plans now for seven years out to be four laned, that'll open up a new community, but that's not the answer. We have to start looking inside of our own communities to try to find an answer that's going to offer a solution that will bring down the price of land to something that's more affordable and possibly something that might be a impact fee or a tax on new commercial going in based upon the number of people that are going to be there, be employed by that particular commercial entity. And that money that would come in, we could use that money to buy down the cost of certain lands within Collier County in the more urban area so that we could do something with affordable work-force housing to meet the needs. This has been a real concern, and I know in Lee County it must be a concern for you to see the number of people that work in Collier living in Lee. I'd like your comments and your thoughts on that. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Commissioner Albion. COMMISSIONER ALBION: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Commissioner, I've had the opportunity of being the liaison for our board to our affordable housing committee, and frankly, you're right. What we discuss pretty regularly is look at 1-75 in the morning headed south and look at 1-75 in the evening headed north at rush hour times. And frankly, yes, we are supplying a lot of the affordable housing for Collier County. One of our concerns, however, that we have to look at is that we are not going to be essentially just handing off the problem, probably more toward inland counties coming up, because as Lee County's values have been going up, especially starting from the south and Page 34 October 15,2001 heading north, we're seeing some of the same problems. I really think that it's something that both counties should be perhaps working together on. I know that I've asked our staff to work on what's the actual public sector expense of not having reasonable affordable housing? Because we are providing significant lane miles, first from Lee into Collier just to get people to and from work. We have to provide -- normally if these folks are looking for affordable housing, they have to go more to the rural areas. I know Collier's had some situations with the state on that. Well, Lee County's moving in that direction too. So we have to spread out those services because the only variable becomes the land cost, so you're going to move into a more rural area because everyone pays the same amount for 2 by 4's and nails and everything else. Then I think at that point, if we can get something moving, whether the studies already done in this nation by an institute or otherwise or another government or we supply from our staffs a reasonably conservative number, what that's going to do is that will start to show our public that perhaps -- I think the result of that study will probably show that we will be saving significant tax dollars in the future if we do not have to extend services out for EMS, for libraries, for water/sewer hookups, for roadways and so on, and public transportation. So, therefore, there is a greater justification for government to be getting properly involved. But I do not think until we can actually show the citizenry that what we're doing is good business sense, that we're investing in reducing the cost of the future in a very real way, are we going to be able -- possibly be able to show people that we're not just basically trying to manipulate or subsidize the marketplace in a way that people are going to say, "You're just making that land owner rich." No. Sometimes you do things to cut costs, and that's Page 3 5 October 15,2001 what I think this study's going to have to prove. And I think that our groups really need to have some greater face time, frankly, to possibly be able to, you know, get some of these base skeletons down. We have concerns about deferring-- questions about deferring impact fees. We certainly can't waive them by law. But what we are going to hopefully look at is even giving a grant for people who meet a certain criteria to offset those impact fees. That is legal, but you have to be able to justify the public expense. So we've got a long, long way to go on this issue, and it's like the ugly stepchild nobody wants to talk about. And that's what needs to change, because that ugly stepchild, if you will -- and I say that tongue in cheek-- is going to be extraordinarily expensive, I believe, over time to all of Southwest Florida. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: May I make one suggestion too. I started an initiative with a local charity, Catholic charity, who's coming into the picture. They're trying to see if it's going to be feasible for them to do it. It's looking better all the time. They're going to intercede for housing for the -- the mentally challenged adults in our community. It's a limited number, and we think we might be able to do something with that. And we're talking to Greg here about that possibility. We might be able to bring in some local outside-organization charity. They'll take a dollar that -- you know, one dollar would take us seven to do the same thing, and they'll make it go a lot farther, and right now we're working on that little initiative. And I think if I put together a nucleus that works -- in fact, we're meeting on it again today -- that maybe we might be able to get more outside nonprofits involved with a certain little part of the whole problem, and we might be able to come up with a solution. I agree with you. Government by itself shouldn't take on the total responsibility of this. Page 36 October 15,2001 COMMISSIONER FIALA: Just a question. One of the ideas I put forth for us to be discussing over the next couple of months is maybe a requirement that there is an affordable housing component in each new PUD. Do you have anything like that in Lee? COMMISSIONER JUDAH: We have a bonus density in certain land use categories. But to be honest with you, you just hit the nail on the head. That should be an absolute requirement for planned unit developments, X amount of units set aside for affordable housing. COMMISSIONER FIALA: And that's where I'm pushing. I'm the liaison for our affordable housing unit, so we need to talk more. And that's where I'm pushing -- that's what I'm pushing for the next LDC hearing. So if you have any suggestions or can offer any guidance, I could sure use it. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Commissioner Mac'Kie. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Just a suggestion. God forbid we have more meetings, but this might be a real opportunity where the two board committees and their liaisons should -- this is a problem that's going to have to have a regional solution. And maybe our committee and your committee could meet together and, you know, come up with a strategy for the region. COMMISSIONER JANES: Mr. Chairman, if I may just comment too, I just want to remind everybody that this -- we're merely beginning to scratch the surface, and this is a terribly, terribly complex problem. For example, it's one thing to talk about perhaps waiving impact fees or adjusting impact fees; another thing to talk about public versus private participation programs. But we're also -- very frankly, as Commissioner Judah indicated, we're looking at density changes and density -- and that, let me tell you, is one tough issue. But I think we have to look at it, and eventually we'll be forced to do it if we're going to get a sensible affordable housing program. We don't want to generalize affordable housing, and yet on the other Page 37 October 15,2001 hand, we can't make it such that it's unattractive within any development. So that's just a tough problem. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I would agree. It's a land use issue involving density. It's involving the Burt J. Harris Act. It's a whole -- it is fraught with legal implications that we cannot ignore. But I think the stuff is to put the groups together, begin to look at the big picture, and pull all of this together and take proactive direction on this so we can begin to deal with it instead of each county or each city struggling with this individually and getting pasted by the community. As you alluded -- well stated, Commissioner Albion, we have to have the economic data to support that it is a cost-benefit issue, land use issue, density issue, all of these rolled into one package that says we're going to be proactive, not only as two counties, but I see the Regional Planning Council expanding upon this. But I don't want to wait for that mechanism. I think we have to initiate it between the two counties. So whatever direction, I think, is taken by the appropriate boards to do that would be -- COMMISSIONER JANES: I think-- excuse me, but encouraging both counties and their affordable housing committees to work together is an important first step. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Commissioner Carter, I don't know if there's something in the Regional Planning Council's -- under their DRIs to link affordable housing and PUDs, if we can step up that process and get some more affordable housing units in there. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Well, Commissioner, I think you're right. That's one mechanism and one piece that should be brought forward in this total discussion, because I think you're right. That is needed within that process. But, again, it's limited to the number of DRIs that are out there, and there's a whole host of other land use groups which would have probably a far greater impact. But I like Page 38 October 15,2001 the idea because there's a couple of DRIs -- or at least potentially one that may have to come back and be revisited in Collier that would have an impact in that area. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I just would like the chance -- I -- being a short-timer, I keep looking for these opportunities to communicate with my fellow board members about issues, and that is if you do get a chance to sunset some PUDs in a significant way, then that's where in Collier County -- because DRIs, they're done. PUDs, though, if you can get a chance at the -- at the existing ones to require some kind of an element that Commissioner Judah and Commissioner Fiala were talking about, then you'll have -- that's going to be your opportunity to have a real impact. Otherwise, you're going to be talking and not accomplishing as much as you'd like. CHAIRMAN CARTER: And infill areas. I know in our own county where if you had increased density, you could make this happen. And it's not segregated into one particular area. It's a question of what's allowable, and it can take place without the negative -- the negative connotations that we have. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Commissioner Judah. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Just real quickly. Bonus density has worked to some extent in Lee County as an economic incentive for developers to provide additional units, but unfortunately, it hasn't been applicable across the board. And I think to a large part it's perhaps, maybe, because of our own board. When we hear from others in a neighborhood where there is infill that's going to occur and that infill actually is essentially greater density than the surrounding neighborhoods, as you can well imagine, it gets difficult at times. Maybe we all have to have the political courage sometimes to recognize if the infrastructure is there, that we need to bite that bullet. But there have been areas where it has worked where we have not had the difficulty with the surrounding neighborhoods, but for the Page 39 October 15,2001 most part, I'm afraid there has been conflict. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: By bringing -- sharing these ideas and getting both committees together, I think there's some real potential on it. You know, the problems aren't unique to one county versus the other. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Yes. And I'd like to learn from your past experience because I think it's a solvable problem. We can get there. MR. MIHALIC: Thank you, Commissioners. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: You're welcome. Thank you very much. It was a good discussion. The next item on the agenda is solid waste, everybody's favorite subject. MR. WIDES: Commissioners, good morning. My name is Tom Wides from the Collier County Public Utilities Division, the interim administrator. I'd ask you, if you would, for just a few moments if I could have your patience, we do have two topics before you, both solid waste and beach renourishment. I'd like to just get our projector set up, and it'll just take a few moments. (A break was held.) MR. WIDES: Commissioners, again, I do apologize, but I have a feeling that break might have been okay, so we'll move on from there. Again, I'm Tom Wides from public utilities, Collier County. The topic I'd like to introduce to you this morning is the activity in Collier County on the solid waste initiatives. Unfortunately this morning George Yilmaz, our director of solid waste, is unable to be here with us this morning. He has been extremely instrumental in putting in place many of the activities. On the other hand, I am pleased to introduce Rob French from Malcolm Pirnie, our consultants, who will also give us a little bit of an update on the activities this morning. Page 40 October 15,2001 Briefly, the initiatives that we've been talking about, as you can see on the board, will be a little bit on our current environment in the landfill, the gasification opportunity, horticultural trash, C & D processing and recycling, and also the recycling activities themselves, organic waste processing, and grease trap waste. With that I'll turn it over to Rob. MR. FRENCH: Commissioners, ladies and gentlemen, it's a pleasure for me to be here on behalf of George Yilmaz and the solid waste department of Collier County this morning. The growth rate in Collier County has completely stressed all of the infrastructure in Collier County, including the solid waste department and the infrastructure associated with it. This inspired the Board of County Commissioners and the staff last year to begin a comprehensive review of alternative technologies that might be available to increase recycling within the county and reduce the waste stream going to landfill, also looking at alternatives to landfill. The result of this has been the development of a dynamic, integrated program based on each solid waste stream coming into the county or generated by the county. Next slide. By basing it on the -- on the waste stream, I'll start out with the mixed municipal solid waste because certainly that is the -- that is the largest volume of solid waste generated within the county. The county's program currently consists of two major initiatives in this area: First of all, landfilling. The county has just received a permit through Waste Management and by the Department of Environmental Protection for the continued operation of the landfill. That particular permit imposed some additional restrictions on the operation, and it is the county's intent to maximize the space that's available at the landfill to continue that operation with Waste Management doing the contract operation. In addition to that, a team of-- consisting of Collier County Page 41 October 15,2001 elected officials, staff, and Malcolm Pimie recently visited a new technology, a facility in Australia, that takes municipal solid waste as it is collected, does initial source separ-- an initial separation of recyclable materials -- this is primarily ferrous and nonferrous metals as well as larger plastic bottles -- separates those out at the front end, then takes the remaining organic fraction, further processes it, then gasifies it, takes the gas generated by that process, bums it in internal combustion engines and potentially a gas turbine generator set to produce electricity. The remaining -- the residue from this process is a char or a very inert carbon ash which could then easily be landfilled or recycled in its own right. The county is moving ahead with preparation and, soon to be issued, a request for proposals for gasification processing in Collier County that will handle at least part of the mixed municipal solid waste stream there. The next slide, one of the -- one of the major initiatives in Collier County has been to reduce the amount of solid waste going to the landfill. One of the most successful initial operations is their horticultural trash program. This is the yard waste that's collected throughout the county. The material is current -- is now being shredded, it's being composted, and it's being used as agricultural mulch in some of the large-scale ag businesses out towards Immokalee. The next -- the next waste stream that -- that we wanted to talk about today is the construction and demolition debris. This is material that results from the demolition of-- of bridges, of buildings. It includes crushed concrete, as you can see here. It also includes wood waste, cardboard, insulation material, asphalt shingles, concrete shingles, that kind of thing. The county has an existing C & D program at the existing landfill. But because landfill space is critical and they're starting on a Page 42 October 15,2001 program now to prepare an RFP, request for proposals, to establish a new C & D processing facility, perhaps off site of the existing landfill, this will sort the materials into as many recyclable materials as possible. Hopefully up to 80 percent of the C & D debris will be recycled. In the case of concrete, this will all be ground and used as cover material at the existing landfill. It'll be further processed. The ferrous metals will be recovered. Cardboard is recovered from this as well as -- as well as other materials that can be recycled. So we're looking at perhaps as much as 80 percent of the C & D waste stream to be recycled with only 20 percent ending up ultimately in the landfill. The next slide is an expansion and continuation of the county's source-separated recycling program. Similar to Lee County, the material is separated at the curb into two fractions. The first fraction is the fiber. This is the newsprint, magazines, and other paper-type recyclable materials. The other fraction is the containers, glass and plastic containers. Both of these programs have been expanded recently through a new agreement with Waste Management, who does the collection. That program has continued to be increased in the sense that the county has agreed to implement an ordinance which will make it mandatory for the collection of glass from commercial establishments. That will go towards reducing the amount of material going to the landfill as well as recovering an additional recyclable material. Finally, the electronics scrap is a new initiative that we'll be kicking off very soon in Collier County. Electronic scrap is things like old televisions, old computers, and that type of thing. The program is through, once again, a negotiated agreement with Waste Management where this material would be collected and recycled Page 43 October 15,2001 rather than ending up at the landfill. The next slide, this particularly -- organic-rich waste is an area that's becoming more popular throughout the United States and Canada. This is the collection basically of food waste -- high, high in organic material -- from both residential and some select commercial establishments. The select commercial establishments would be such places as grocery stores where they -- where they can segregate the vegetable waste, the spoiled vegetable waste; perhaps also restaurants, certain restaurants contributing; but also residential, to pick up separated-- source-separated, organic-rich waste, food material, from the residential areas. This will be processed to remove any -- to remove any contaminants in the organic-rich waste resulting in a material that can be further processed, composted, perhaps bagged and sold as a very high-quality product locally, once again reducing the amount of waste stream going to the landfill or to the gasification process and producing high-quality recyclable material available to Collier County residents and other residents for use in their own personal lives. The final area is very exciting. Grease trap waste throughout Southwest Florida has long been a major problem for wastewater treatment plants. Most restaurants are required -- I think all restaurants are required to have grease traps as an integral part of their liquid waste system. The enforcement of regulations requiring pumping out of these grease traps has been somewhat compounded by the fact that there's no place, really, to take this material once it's been collected. As part of the trip to Hawaii (sic) by one of the commissioners, the staff of Collier County, and one of our people, they stopped in Hawaii on the way back and looked at an innovative solution to processing grease trap waste. And that is essentially to collect it, Page 44 October 15, 2001 thermally process the -- the grease trap waste into a low-grade fuel. And, in fact, they visited a facility. In fact, this facility that you can see on the slide is an asphalt plant. Those white tanks are actually containers containing this -- this processed grease trap waste which, in fact, now is a low-grade fuel that's used to fire the asphalt plants. So it's -- so rather than causing a problem in this community, it is contributing to -- to improvements to the infrastructure in the area. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Has the City of Naples started yet? I understand the City of Naples was going to undertake this and use it for fuel for their trucks. Are they doing that yet? MR. FRENCH: There's two processes that they actually -- that were actually looked at: One is the biodiesel process. Now, the biodiesel process is different than the grease trap waste. Biodiesel takes the used cocking oil from the restaurants, processes that used cooking oil into a biodiesel material which is then either burned directly or mixed with diesel fuel to be used in trucks. I think the county can proceed with that. One of the largest single facilities in the country is currently located in Lakeland, and it is producing biodiesel primarily from soybean oil. The reason they're using soybean oil instead of used cooking oil is because due to -- due to government grants by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, it's actually cheaper to buy soybean oil than it is to buy the used cooking oil. Used cooking oil is currently collected. It is currently sold to rendering companies. It's made into glycerin and other products which are already being recycled. We have offered this as -- in the preparation of the RFP, and it's not finalized yet, but we are preparing language that will allow the same vendor who would do the grease trap waste processing to set up a biodiesel plant to handle the used cooking oil as well and process that into -- into a biodiesel product. It's not-- the grease trap waste is not particularly conducive to making biodiesel because of its Page 45 October 15,2001 chemical makeup. It's high in fatty acids, and that doesn't lend itself well. It can be done as long as it's blended with cooking oil, but it doesn't lend itself well to making the biodiesel. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: This is just one of the technologies that I thought sounded like hocus-pocus, but it turns out to be real. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Very much so. If I may add a couple points on that. The reason why we're such a favorable location -- up in Lakeland they have to use natural gas to be able to process this, and the expense is quite high. At our landfill site, they'd be able to use the gas that's generated from the landfill or through the gasification process to run this. Of course it would bring down their cost. There's been a government subsidy for a number of years for at least part of it, but I understand it may be sunsetting in the near future. So whatever we do, we're going to have to make sure it's cost- effective. The oil that's produced from the grease traps would be more of a boiler fuel oil. But the interesting part about both of these products is we noticed that the tanks that were being exposed that you were seeing the picture of, there was no containment around it for the simple reason that if there was a breakage in these tanks and the fuel leaked onto the ground, it would biodegrade in a very short period of time. I did learn something on the trip. MR. FRENCH: You did. Very good. Thank you very much. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Any questions by any commissioners in regards to this presentation? COMMISSIONER FIALA: Oh, yes. I did have a question. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Sure. COMMISSIONER FIALA: mandatory business recycling? CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: How does Lee County handle their Lindsey. Page 46 October 15,2001 MR. SAMPSON: Good morning, Commissioners. I'm Lindsey Sampson. I'm the director of the Lee County solid waste division. Lee County does not have a mandatory business ordinance. Lee County thinks that -- in fact, we're initiating -- we're initiating a newer program whereby we believe that businesses can be educated and informed in such a manner that they can be shown that it's actually in their best economic interest to do more recycling, and this is the approach that -- that Lee County has taken. Our primary, you know, initiative right now in recycling is towards the businesses. We believe we've come about as far as we can right now. As long as we can keep residential and multifamily in a recycling mode, the business area is the biggest area to address right now. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: If I may ask a question on that. Of course, the reason why there's some concern on our end, the local chamber of commerce, rightly so, that represents the business interest in Collier County, has expressed some questions, some very good questions, about how this would impact businesses, and that's the reason why we were asking you. If you -- your volunteer program, is it based upon some other county that may have had some success in the past, or is this something you created right from scratch? MR. SAMPSON: Actually, we've looked at some activities from several other counties; although I don't believe there's any one particular pattern, necessarily, to follow. It really involves, on an individual basis, knocking on doors and finding out what approach particular businesses need or makes sense for the particular businesses to follow. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Do you have a particular-- do you have a success rate currently? I mean, what -- what percentage of business waste is currently recycled? MR. SAMPSON: In the past four to five years, I don't have an Page 47 October 15,2001 actual percentage of business waste, but I do have a percentage of businesses that participate in some program, some kind of recycling activity. And it has fluctuated between 35 and 50 percent in the last four to five years. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: But that's -- MR. SAMPSON: It's very much an economic thing. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: But it doesn't necessarily mean that 35 to 50 percent of their waste is -- MR. SAMPSON: No. Just participation. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Because frankly, you know, I'm -- MR. SAMPSON: One area where Lee County is a little advanced on now is with a new recycling facility that will allow more businesses to divert recycled material in a mixed fashion as opposed to a separated fashion, and that's where I think they will be interested in that. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Another fast question. Do you recycle Styrofoam? MR. SAMPSON: No. Only from the standpoint of there are a few businesses that recycle it on their own, and we make that information available. But, you know, from a practical standpoint, we also look at the recycling from the standpoint of what makes sense, what the volumes are, what the dollars are. And I wouldn't necessarily say that Styrofoam is a big recycling item or a big solid waste problem. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Commissioner Albion. COMMISSIONER ALBION: I didn't know if you wanted to maybe take No. 2 under Lee County on -- CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: It's already included. COMMISSIONER ALBION: Thank you. What I was curious about, though, was in regards to the Collier County landfill situation, Page 48 October 15, 2001 there was discussion at our board level at one point about the possibility of a waste-to-energy facility. And we read in the newspaper that Collier did not really want to, perhaps, go that way. But one of the concerns that was also discussed amongst our board was use of Lee County roads as part of the equation, some concerns in terms of littering, the heavy trucks, and how that uses up road capacity. Well, even with the alternatives that I read in the newspaper a few weeks after that, it appeared -- and I was asked this question by some constituents -- that there was going to be some potential garbage truck traffic on State Road 78 somehow because you were considering a deal with Glades County or-- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: That's gone. CHAIRMAN CARTER: That's gone. COMMISSIONER ALBION: Okay. So there's no issue there in terms of the roads. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Commissioners from Lee County, I just wanted to tell you what an asset you have in Lindsey, working with him and visiting the -- your facility. But I do want to extend -- if you want to see some great technology and you do have a -- a need to do something with your yard waste, we're doing some great things and actually have a product that the farmers are -- are wanting. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: It's a fabulous thing. They started with the farmers and asked them what needs -- what are the organic needs? What is the chemical makeup you need to have in the compost that you are purchasing? And so we've started with that and built the compost to meet that need, instead of here we have some compost; would you like to buy it? That's going to be a really positive recycling effort in Collier County that we're proud of. COMMISSIONER ALBION: What a neat concept. Page 49 October 15,2001 COMMISSIONER JUDAH: You're already producing this? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Yes. Come see it, Ray. It's worth the trip. CHAIRMAN CARTER: We have an advantage that our potential users are six major families that are in the ag business, so that -- that really helped us in our process. But it's a fabulous operation, and we can only encourage you to pursue that. And I think it's one that we're proud of, as Commissioner Henning talked about, kind of one of the many that we're looking at. We know this one will work, and we're looking at other operations. So we will probably end up with several ways to get waste to energy and not be solely dependent on one avenue. And I think that's the great thing that we've learned out of this total study. There's many ways to get to the goal, and we're pursuing all of those that will work for us. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Thank you. We'll go on to beach renourishment. MR. WIDES: Commissioners, Tom Wides. Tropical Storm Gabrielle was a significant event all up and down the west coast. This morning we wanted to just bring you up to date on some of the activities that we're embarking on to remediate the beach itself. I've asked Harry Huber, who is our project manager for the beach renourishment efforts up to this point in time, to give us a few comments. But bottom line, the beaches were under water. In many cases, you'll see in a couple slides this morning, the sand was pushed back up into the dunes. In other cases we actually washed out approximately 400 cubic yards of sand. And Harry will talk to you a little bit more about that this morning. Thank you. MR. HUBER: Thank you, Tom. Good morning, Commissioners. Prior to Tropical Storm Gabrielle, we had a program in place to put 50,000 cubic yards of sand on the beach pretty much on an annual basis, but Tropical Storm Gabrielle sort of changed that Page 50 October 15,2001 a little bit, a significant increase to that program. But we're -- our objective is to place the 400,000 cubic yards of sand on the maintained beaches prior to May 1 of next year. We're currently in the process of trying to coordinate all the activities that are necessary to do that. As you see here, there's a couple slides just to show you the result of Tropical Storm Gabrielle. Prior to the storm, the sand was pretty much up to the top of the sea wall there. And in this one portion of Park Shore here, we had just completed a renourishment where we put about 35,000 cubic yards of sand on the beach last April. This is our public beach up at Clam Pass Park. Even in the July storm we lost about 4 to 5 feet of sand, and then during Gabrielle the sand was actually pushed landward. You see on the upper photo there, the sand was pushed back into the dunes. Next slide, this is Vanderbilt Beach up in the northern end. We've got a map back here that shows the different locations of our different beaches. Vanderbilt Beach is the northern end of the county. Park Shore and Clam Pass is south of there, then the Naples beach. Pretty much the damage was uniform pretty much the entire length of the Collier County coastline. And here again, prior to the storm, the sand was up near the top of the sea wall. So we're currently in the process of coordinating all the activities that have to take place to bring this about. Also, we've made an application for disaster reimbursement from FEMA, and that's just a matter -- I think they've pretty much accepted our application. It's just a matter now of documenting the actual volume of sand that was lost, to get reimbursed. We're estimating to put the 400,000 cubic yards on the beach, that's going to involve about 300 truckloads of sand, 20-cubic-yard truckloads of sand per day. And we're going to be limited to the Page 51 October 15,2001 number of access points that we can get the sand on the beach. We've got one up in Vanderbilt. We've got Clam Pass, which hopefully we'll be able to use a dredging event to put some of that sand on the beach. Park Shore, we only have one access at that point. We've got a couple down in Naples beach. So we're going to have to be doing those concurrently to be able to achieve this objective. Probably the biggest concern is the traffic impacts that -- you know, that are going to be caused by this operation. We also need to get permit modifications from the regulatory agencies because right now we're only permitted to put 50,000 cubic yards on the beach. We have to modify the permits to increase that to 400,000. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Harry, are these issues that the Lee County Commission wanted to hear about, or are there some regional -- you know, I just don't want to take their time telling them how -- what streets we're going to drive on to renourish our beaches. You know, are there regional issues related to this issue? MR. HUBER: I'm not -- I think probably Lee County has the same situation that they're involved with. COMMISSIONER HENNING: They might even have our sand up there. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: That's why we're here. We want our sand. COMMISSIONER ALBION: We'll sell it for 30 bucks a cubic yard. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Now we're talking. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: At this stage of the presentation, is there any comments by commissioners in regards to any concerns with this? COMMISSIONER ALBION: Is there anything we need to do in regard to FEMA funding that we need to do jointly to try and make Page 52 October 15,2001 sure there'll be enough money available and in a way that it would be beneficial to both counties? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: That would be a lobbying question too. That's something else we ought to be watching for in our lobbying opportunities. FEMA is certainly at all of our front doors. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: If I may, FEMA puts on a course every year in Ellersville (phonetic), Maryland. It goes for about one week. The government picks up the tab, and it's all about mitigation and how to go about getting these funds. I attended it last year. And I believe I sent a letter out to a number of you about the new one coming up, and you might want to follow up on that and send some staff members to it. CHAIRMAN CARTER: Again, the critical issue with FEMA is not only that we lobby to get what we need, but if we could ever speed up the reimbursement process. It takes two to three years to get your money. That would well be worth lobbying our congressmen and senators, to see if they could expedite that. COMMISSIONER ALBION: This, to me, has to fall more in the area, at least for us and our Tourist Development Council, as far as the beaches and shores and so on -- and we do have another committee like that too. But it seems to me that maybe there should be some greater coordination, as Commissioner Coletta talked about, in terms of what does happen annually, for one. Of course, we have the immediate situation of disaster funding right now. So, again, do we have any indication, is there going to be enough FEMA funding to be able to handle beach renourishment issues, do we know, for one; and for two, is there going to be a battle? Is it going to be competitive to try to get those funds compared to the rest of the state? Are we okay? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: We're fine with that. I believe Page 53 October 15,2001 it's 12 1/2 percent we have to pay. Is that where it is now, or has it changed? CHAIRMAN CARTER: I think Mr. Mudd, our public -- well, he's now our deputy county administrator-- could comment on that. MR. MUDD: FEMA gives you 75 percent. The state will come in with 12 1/2 -- but if you're going to do the budget cuts that the governor's been talking about, the 12 1/2 is at risk -- and that leaves the county with 12 1/2. So what we're basically doing right now is we're planning on getting 75 from FEMA, and we're probably going to have to cough up the 25 percent unless -- COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Not without a fight. MR. MUDD: But not without a fight. And the other issue that I think was brought up is getting FEMA to reimburse in a -- in a quick fashion once the bills are laid out. You've got 18 months from the time of the disaster to have your bills in to FEMA, and then FEMA takes -- it could be anywhere from two to three years in order to -- in order to pay it back. And if the bills are right and they bend in the process the entire way with you, if your engineer estimates of exactly what was lost, all that stuff is in there and you've worked them through the process, then I would hope that their reimbursement could be expedited and more timely because this causes some real issues with our reserve as far as TDC dollars are concerned, just like it will for you, I think. COMMISSIONER ALBION: Can I request that the staffs get together in terms of figuring out where that process may be able to be sped up; and if there may be some competition for dollars, whether it's part of the 12 1/2 percent or if there's any issue in regards to FEMA, that then they can try to put something together that our boards will be able to act upon? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Certainly that 12 1/2 is going to be a difficult fight to get that out of the state with current constraints, Page 54 October 15,2001 so we ought to -- we're gonna fight to the death for it. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And I believe it's a federal law right now that they have to do it that way, if I'm not mistaken. We'll see what happens. But one of the things I want to leave you with -- I know this is not going to sit well with some of the residents in Collier County -- you notice the very worst examples that you've seen all have sea walls in them? I hope Lee County hasn't made that mistake. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Thank you very much. The next item on the agenda -- that completes the agenda requests from Collier County. We have one left on Lee County -- actually, two. Number one, which is just general transportation and environmental issues, we've talked about most of those. But Commissioner Judah, did you ask for the item to be on for the CREW Trust, CREW lands? COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Just as an update, Mr. Chairman-- and really it kind of plays into the Greenways mapping strategy, but that may be something that we still need to kind of discuss in terms of Lee County as opposed to bringing Collier in, in regards to economic incentives to protect more lands in the southeastern part of Lee County. But it does play into 951, so when that's discussed, I guess by DOT staff, perhaps we could also kind of expand the conversation to include the CREW lands and how we plan to protect the area from the standpoint of a wildlife, Florida panther corridor. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: All right. Thank you. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: If I could. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Yes. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: If I could just ask Commissioner Judah just to tell this county commission the unhappy history of Collier County with CREW, I think it's -- I think it would be good for them to sort of know where -- you know, from whence we come. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: We've been having a pretty good meeting. Page 55 October 15,2001 COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Go ahead. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: In a nutshell, 1989 the Lee County Commission voted to assess two-tenths mil for three years to ultimately raise $8 1/2 million, and we used those monies to leverage funds from the Save our Rivers Program sponsored by the South Florida Water Management District to proceed with the acquisition of lands under the CREW program in the southeastern part of Lee County. Collier was to have entered into that agreement, was set COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Had voted to. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Yeah. -- to go ahead and move forward jointly with acquisition of lands in Collier County too. The Big Cypress Basin assisted in levying, I think it was, one-tenth mil or maybe a mil itself. I'm not -- I'm not quite sure. But they did levy a millage increase to generate some dollars to start to acquire some lands in Collier County as part of the joint Collier/Lee County effort to protect more lands through the CREW program. But the Collier County Commission never did levy any kind of millage or set aside any matching dollars. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: The other -- the impolite word is "reneged." And I just think that, you know, that's one of those things that needs to be on the table so that Collier County -- this new commission -- because, Lee County Commissioners, you have a new commission you're dealing with with Collier County, not just by the people who are here, but by their commitment to -- to their word, their commitment to the community. And I -- I think that these are people who would want to know when their predecessors renege and might be more open to, you know, doing the right thing in the future -- certainly would be more open to doing the right thing in the future. But having that history's important so that when those questions come up, they know from whence we come. Page 56 October 15,2001 COMMISSIONER much lands do you have COMMISSIONER COMMISSIONER COMMISSIONER Actually -- HENNING: Commissioner Judah, how set aside for preserve in Lee County? JUDAH: Total? HENNING: Yes. JUDAH: It's -- I'm just trying to think. COMMISSIONER HENNING: A percentage. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Well, it's only about -- I'd say maybe we're -- through the (inaudible), it's probably about 18 percent now of the lands in Lee County are set aside as publicly owned land through a couple of land acquisition programs, including CREW. I know that Collier benefits by having a significant amount of lands that are in state or federal ownership. But if you're looking at it at a contribution from a county standpoint, Lee County has really led the way in terms of local dollars to acquire environmentally sensitive lands. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And what's your target on acquisition? COMMISSIONER JUDAH: It depends on really who you talk to in the community, but I would say it would be safe to assume that we would like to set aside at least 30 to 35 percent for all of Lee County as publicly owned lands. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And no doubt you're going to hope to match as much of your local money as you can with federal and state dollars, but an important distinction is that Collier County has benefited from these federal and state purchases and from some private donations. But Collier County's got to belly-up to the environmental bar here and start taking some responsibility. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Being a new commissioner, can you tell me how much lands that we have set aside in Collier County for the public? Page 57 October 15,2001 COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I don't know the number, but it's a lot. Somebody else probably knows it. You're talking about state and federal lands? COMMISSIONER HENNING: COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Public lands. It's a lot. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I believe it's about 60 percent. I think every bit of it is in District 5, by the way, and we're very appreciative of it. The Everglades National Park is a great asset to everyone in Florida. And the Big Cypress Preserve, that was something bought out many years ago, and that's also a tremendous asset. We have more land that we're trying to incur (sic) through various mitigation funds, whatever. But the big problem right now is that we balance this with property rights. And it's one of those things we're struggling with, and we know you must be dealing with the same. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: What we try to do through CREW is to coordinate, from a regional standpoint, the efforts in Lee and Collier County, recognizing a lot of significant watershed, that includes the Cocohatchee, to try to move forward jointly to acquire both in Lee and Collier to protect that watershed. So I think while Collier certainly has benefited greatly with the partnership of the state and federal government, it would be nice if continued effort could be placed towards finalizing the goal of CREW, and that's to be able to protect that watershed that, like I say, includes not only the Imperial and Estero River, but also the Cocohatchee. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I think Commissioner Judah hit it right on the head. It's not a question of the percentage of land; it's a question of the high-impact areas in watersheds and in protection of certain areas. And that's the issue that we always have to be faced with balanced off against, how do you work with the stewards of the land so that they do not have an economic loss? And I don't know Page 58 October 15, 2001 what happened to the ag bill in congress yet in terms of there might be some additional incentives there for the stewards of the land to find out how that might assist in the process. But I think jointly we have to look at how it impacts both of our areas, Lee and Collier, in terms of how the waters flow and how we protect the aquifers, and it can't be a single or county or city issue. It has to be one we look at through more of a regional basis. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Thank you. Commissioner Albion wanted to mention briefly hurricane shelters, and then I need to move on to public comment. COMMISSIONER ALBION: Thank you. What I did want to mention was -- and, Commissioner Judah, maybe it would be an appropriate consideration on the CREW situations, that maybe Collier would like to have some representative to -- at least as those conversations start to gain better shape, that they're right there understanding the direction and perhaps the importance, etc. That might elevate that conversation that much quicker. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Commissioner Carter has been serving as the board liaison for the CREW Trust, and we're very appreciative of that. We're going to continue to try to strengthen our partnership. COMMISSIONER ALBION: Okay. I just -- on the next agenda, because there's certainly no time on this one, just to bring up and discuss where we are with the hurricane shelter deficit issue. Right now Collier County is in a very odd predicament as far as I know from what I've heard from the Regional Planning Council, just as Lee County is, but considering you're at the bottom of the state, even more so than we are -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: We're coming here. COMMISSIONER ALBION: Well, and I've got news for you. If coming north is a bad idea, it's a long way east. Therefore, there Page 59 October 15,2001 better be some consideration from both of our counties of how we're going to handle this situation before we're trying to explain, God forbid, while cleaning up the mess. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: We'll catch that on the next agenda. I'm glad you brought it up. That concludes all the scheduled topics for both -- both commissions. What I'd like to do is give the mayor of Bonita Springs -- COMMISSIONER JUDAH: CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Mr. Chairman, I-- -- a brief opportunity to address us, and then we'll go to public comment. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: I apologize. I thought we were going to get on to 951 because it is on the agenda here. It was just, unfortunately, overlooked. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I can probably help you with that. That's been my baby for ten years. I originally worked on this project back under the chamber of commerce, Golden Gate Chamber of Commerce. I was the 951 corridor chairperson, so it's been an item that's been very dear to my heart for a long, long time, and I know the necessity of it. When I started running for public office and when I became -- got involved in public office, this is one of the items I've been pushing. And when we laid out Mediterra, we made sure that we had the corridors -- a couple different ways that we can go with this particular road. However, in all fairness because of the dollar shortcoming and the immediate need on Immokalee Road to expand the road to the community of Immokalee which turned into a bedroom community, I very graciously with the commissioners -- my commissioners and the MPO, have put that on the back burner so we can put our resources into Immokalee Road. But it wouldn't hurt to keep the item alive and moving forward to that day and time when we can get into it. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: I know also -- and I'll try to be Page 60 October 15,2001 quick, Mr. Chairman. Of course, this dovetails right into the CREW program because it was a need both with Lee and Collier to recognize the importance of protecting the watershed (inaudible) Imperial, Estero, and Cocohatchee. And now it involves, you know, a major (inaudible) even emphasize more importance for us to coordinate our efforts to target and acquire those appropriate lands within the Cocohatchee watershed. The other issue has to do with maybe getting a quick overview from Dave Loveland or Scott Gilbertson because I know there's a conflict resolution consortium coming up, Mr. Chairman, I believe, and there's a certain amount of survey work that's being done by our consultant. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: While he's coming up, if I could just-- as I understand it, you guys have retained the conflict resolution consortium to sort of mediate out in the community where this route should be and what its -- acquisitional lands, what the environmental issues should be. And I don't know if Collier County has had a staff liaison or a commissioner liaison, but frankly, I think that's a model that we need to follow in Collier County, and we need to get more involved in the process to the extent we haven't been. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I can tell you one thing in Collier County, that road will not go over -- go through environmentally sensitive lands unless it's elevated, and that's one of the cost factors that's being considered. We're very much in tune with the environment, and we'll make sure it's done right, or we won't do it. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Go ahead, Scott. MR. GILBERTSON: Scott Gilbertson, again, Lee County Department of Transportation. That's correct. We did retain staff from the University of Central Florida for the Florida Conflict Resolution Consortium. That work is wrapping up, and we intend to Page 61 October 15,2001 schedule it for our board management planning committee meeting in November to review the report and the recommendations in there and then get some direction from our board on where to go to next and looking at possibly doing a project development and environmental study in conjunction with the second phase of consortium efforts as part of the public involvement process and the PD&E study. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Any other questions of Scott? COMMISSIONER JUDAH: One last comment. Scott, you know the South Florida Water Management District has a target date of 2003 to finish up their acquisition of lands in the southeast part of the county there. They're only about halfway to their goal. And the South Florida Water Management made it clear that -- the governing board made it clear that they wanted staff-- our Lee County staff to come up with that alignment in south Lee County for 951 so they can then proceed as to moving forward on what lands to acquire. So I'm wondering, where are we with -- according to district staff on that 951 alignment at the south end of Lee County? MR. GILBERTSON: Well, we've coordinated with them (inaudible) presenting an alignment without going through the necessary evaluation process. With all the environmental issues out there and social impacts and all of that, it's going to take a period of time, I would guess at least two years at this point in time to get a recommended alignment. And even at that, then we still have the permitting process to go through with the sponsoring agencies. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: That seems -- that time frame seems to conflict with (inaudible) do it before 2003 with the acquisition of the lands. MR. GILBERTSON: It may very well, but road alignments, you have to go through a very deliberate process to do that. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Well, we're going to know somebody who's in charge of land acquisition for the South Florida Page 62 October 15,2001 Water Management District pretty soon. And just a thought is, surely there must be areas that we can eliminate. Surely we can at least narrow -- even if we can't, you know, set a road alignment, surely we can indicate areas that will be outside of the alignment so that the district could start there. Just a thought. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: What's your take on that, areas that could be eliminated that certainly wouldn't be a part of any corridor? MR. GILBERTSON: Well, again, it should be done as part of the evaluation process. We're looking at -- we're trying to do a preliminary study design in there which would narrow it down to a corridor of some width, maybe 300 to 500 feet, rather than set the final alignment design. We can do that and eliminate everything outside of that corridor. Again, that's a process we'll have to work through. If we start making those determinations now without the evaluation of documentation, then the whole thing is subject to challenge. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Maybe we're going to need to look to you to try to reconcile this, Commissioner Mac'Kie. It's a big task, I know, but if you got your people to forego those dollars from the federal government (inaudible) land acquisition consider it ongoing. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: It'll certainly be high on my priority list. COMMISSIONER JUDAH: Thanks. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I guess what I'm hearing here, Commissioner Judah, is that you-all are doing a study, and you're going to bring this thing down to recommended areas and how that ties to Collier in the possible interconnection and what would be workable for us, hinging around South Florida Water Management District. I got a feeling there's a lot of loose ends here. And I think that that may be the understatement of the meeting. Page 63 October 15,2001 However, I think we better all get our act together here and work cooperatively to figure out where we're going with this and what the potentials are and not let this thing drift. I don't want to lose funds, and I don't want to have one going like this (indicating) and one coming like that (indicating). You know, that doesn't work. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And, Mr. Chairman, Collier County, in my opinion, is behind Lee County in this process because they've already done this public facilitation through the conflict resolution consortium. You know, as bad as the news is that they can't identify an alignment or may not be able to within the water management district's time constraints, they're ahead of Collier County. And we need to be working with them on-- you know, we should have jointly acquired this consortium. But maybe we could get in on Phase 2 of the process because otherwise, Norm -- CHAIRMAN CARTER: Norman Feder, our department of transportation, I think has a comment. MR. FEDER: Commissioners, we worked very, very hard to make sure that we kept alignment options open for 951. Essentially, in Collier County we are pretty well set to be able to tie up as soon as we know where the connection will be in Lee County. We've talked to the consortium. We've discussed issues with them to coordinate with what Lee County is doing. But essentially, our end is a very short part of the distance. The real issues and more significant environmental issues are in Lee County, so they have to look at their alignment. And, as Scott pointed out, they need to do that very deliberately. But nonetheless, they need to look at that. We have retained the ability within some parameters to hook up, depending upon where it is that they finally come and hook up at the county line. So we're not really behind, as you say. I think we're set, waiting to hear what comes out of their study. Page 64 October 15,2001 COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: I understand. I didn't understand that they had to choose first, but it makes sense that they would. MR. FEDER: Their issues are a lot harder to work with, so we're trying to give some flexibility to align. We obviously need to keep the communications going, but we're not behind. CHAIRMAN CARTER: I apologize, Mr. Feder. I should have known better, that you were on top of it. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Me too. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Okay. Thank you. Now we're going to move on. Mayor Pass, did you have any closing comments before I go to the public? MAYOR PASS: Real briefly. For one, I wanted to thank everyone for coming in here to these meetings and having a can-do attitude. Instead of saying, "We can't," let's figure out how we can. That makes a significant difference. The other thing is I just wanted you to know that the City of Bonita Springs, right now for bonding, we're out for bonding for $40 million to do road enhancement projects with. We're going to try and bring the projects -- work with the state, the U.S. 41 project, up faster to be done, create some different traffic circulation patterns within the city. I think we all need to work together because the scheduling as right now, if we have U.S. 41 and 1-75 both torn up at the same time, we've got a huge problem in Southwest Florida. So if we can get the six laning of 41 done first before we start tearing up 1- 75, I think we'll all benefit. Other than that, thanks for inviting us and letting us come up to the table. CHAIRMAN ST. CERNY: Thank you, Mayor. At this time I'll open it up to the public. I would ask that the comments be kept to under three minutes. Is there anyone from the public who waited this long to speak? IfI could see a show of hands. Going once, going Page 65 October 15,2001 twice. Okay. There's no one from the public that cares to speak. In closing, we tried to stick to the schedule the best we can. We said 11:30. We're close. I think it was a great meeting. I think we covered a lot of subject matter. More importantly is the lines of communication, the dialogue, personal contact of the two counties, neighboring counties working together, our staffs working together. All I've seen today is -- as Mayor Pass said, were a lot of heads nodding yes, that we can do these things together. And it's much more efficient for the taxpayer to do it once and do it correctly, walking hand in hand, than it is for you to do it your way and us to do it our way, and then all of a sudden we got to make corrections and fix it so it works for all of us. It's all in the communication. And so to my board and to your board, Chairman Carter, thank you so much, and we'll look forward to the next joint meeting that we have. If there's nothing else to come before us, we stand adjourned. Thank you very much. There being no further business for the good of the County, the meeting was adjourned by order of the Chair at 11:47 a.m. BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS BOARD OF ZONING APPEALS/EX OFFICIO GOVERNING BOARD(S) OF SPECIAL DISTRICTS UNDER ITS CONTROL JAM~. CX~'~, Ph.D., CHAIRMAN Page 66 October 15,2001 A..:TTEST:~' - . . ~. ~'~.~ ~ "' '" '::' CLERK . DW!G'H~ :'~BRO CK ltt~,t These minutes approved by the Board on as presented ~ or as corrected TRANSCRIPT PREPARED ON BEHALF OF DONOVAN COURT REPORTING, INC., BY BARBARA DRESCHER, NOTARY PUBLIC Page 67