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BCC Minutes 02/05/2002 TH (District 1)February 5, 2002 WORKSHOP MEETING OF FEBRUARY 5, 2002, OF THE BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS 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 have conducted business herein, met on this date at 7:10 p.m. in DISTRICT 1, TOWN HALL MEETING in WORKSHOP SESSION at Edison Community College, East Naples, Florida, with the following members present: CHAIRMAN: VICE CHAIRMAN: JIM COLETTA TOM HENNING JAMES D. CARTER, Ph.D DONNA FIALA FRED COYLE ALSO PRESENT: TOM OLLIFF, County Manager DAVID WEIGEL, County Attorney JIM MUDD, Deputy County Manager Page 1 COLLIER COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS District 1 Town Hall Meeting Agenda February 5, 2002 7:00 - 9:00 p.m. Edison Community College NOTICE: ALL PERSONS WISHING TO SPEAK ON ANY AGENDA ITEM MUST REGISTER PRIOR TO SPEAKING. SPEAKERS MUST REGISTER WITH THE COUNTY MANAGER PRIOR TO THE PRESENTATION OF THE AGENDA ITEM TO BE ADDRESSED. COLLIER COUNTY ORDINANCE NO. 99-22 REQUIRES THAT ALL LOBBYISTS SHALL, BEFORE ENGAGING IN ANY LOBBYING ACTIVITIES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, ADDRESSING THE BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS), REGISTER WITH THE CLERK TO THE BOARD AT THE BOARD MINUTES AND RECORDS DEPARTMENT. ANY PERSON WHO DECIDES TO APPEAL A DECISION OF THIS BOARD WILL NEED A RECORD OF THE PROCEEDINGS PERTAINING THERETO, AND THEREFORE MAY NEED TO ENSURE THAT A VERBATIM RECORD OF THE PROCEEDINGS IS MADE, WHICH RECORD INCLUDES THE TESTIMONY AND EVIDENCE UPON WHICH THE APPEAL IS TO BE BASED. ALL REGISTERED PUBLIC SPEAKERS WILL BE LIMITED TO FIVE (5) MINUTES UNLESS PERMISSION FOR ADDITIONAL TIME IS GRANTED BY THE CHAIRMAN. IF YOU ARE A PERSON WITH A DISABILITY WHO NEEDS ANY ACCOMMODATION IN ORDER TO PARTICIPATE IN THIS PROCEEDING, YOU ARE ENTITLED, AT NO COST TO YOU, TO THE PROVISION OF CERTAIN ASSISTANCE. PLEASE CONTACT THE COLLIER COUNTY FACILITIES MANAGEMENT DEPARTMENT LOCATED AT 3301 EAST TAMIAMI TRAIL, NAPLES, FLORIDA, 34112, (941) 774- 8380; ASSISTED LISTENING DEVICES FOR THE HEARING IMPAIRED ARE AVAILABLE IN THE COUNTY COMMISSIONERS' OFFICE. Pledge of Allegiance Agenda A. Update regarding South Wastewater Plant Expansion B. Update regarding South Water Plant Expansion C. Update regarding Santa Barbara Extension D. Stormwater Update E. Parks and Recreation Update F. Library Update 3. Adjourn INQUIRIES CONCERNING CHANGES TO THE BOARD'S AGENDA SHOULD BF MADE TO THE COUNTY MANAGER'S OFFICE AT 774-838:~. February 5, 2002 COMMISSIONER HENNING: I want to welcome everybody to the East Naples -- or Commissioner Fiala's District Town Hall Meeting. As Vice Chair I'm going to open this meeting and hand it over to Commissioner Fiala to conduct the meeting. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Oh, thank you very much, Tom. I appreciate that. I want to thank all of you for being here tonight. It's a nice crowd. I'm really pleased to see everyone here. I see a lot of people representing different communities in our District 1 and, just to let you know, that we're holding this town hall meeting, we'll hold another one again in about six months, and it's for strictly District 1 people. (Thereupon, Commissioner Carter entered the meeting.) COMMISSIONER FIALA: Our District 1 is kind of unique in that it's divided into two areas. The Island area, which is Marco Island, Goodland and the Isle of Capri. There's four islands on the Isle of Capri, and so we are going to hold a separate meeting for them next month, kind of just a meeting for the Marco Island people, the islanders around there, and just a few key people from our county who represent facilities that aren't operated by the City of Marco Island. So we'll be going out there on March 8th, just for all of you, in case anyone would like to travel out there. And I would like to introduce the people. MR. MUDD: Can we do the Pledge of Allegiance first, Commissioner? COMMISSIONER FIALA: Yes. (The Pledge of Allegiance was recited in unison.) COMMISSIONER FIALA: Commissioner Coletta will also be joining us. I'm not going to take much of your time, but I'd like to introduce just a couple of people. One of them is Joe Schmitt. Joe, would you stand up. Everybody's read about you in the newspaper. Page 2 February 5, 2002 This is Joe Schmitt. (Applauding.) COMMISSIONER FIALA: You know all of us commissioners, so I won't bother to go into that. (Thereupon, Tom Olliff entered the meeting.) COMMISSIONER FIALA: Tom Olliff, who is walking in, is our county manager. And David Weigel is our county attorney, and from here on end, I'll turn this meeting over to Jim Mudd, our assistant county manager -- deputy county manager. MR. MUDD: We've got an agenda; there's some updates. I'd ask the presenters to get your point across, be brief, be informative -- the B's, be brief, be brilliant, and be gone. And then we'll do those presentations. We're going to talk about the South Wastewater Water Expansion, the South Water Plant Expansion, the Santa Barbara Extension, Stormwater Update, Parks and Recs Update, and the Library Update. And when we're done with those, then we'll go into public comment. Now, some folks have signed up, and they've done these slips in the back as they came in, and we'll go in order of how they turned them in. But if there's anybody that wants to talk that didn't sign one, don't feel like because you didn't go there and do it -- we'll give you an opportunity to get in front of the mike and put your opinion out to the Board of County Commissioners. Without further ado, could I please have Joe Cheatham up here to give a South Wastewater Plant Expansion Update. MR. CHEATHAM: Good evening. My name is Joe Cheatham, Wastewater Director for Collier County Public Utilities. I'm here this evening to give a report on the South County water and that facility expansion. With me tonight is Roy Anderson, our Public Utility and Engineering Director, and also Page 3 February 5, 2002 with us is the principal engineer, Dr. Ron Benson from Hole, Montes & Associates. Before I talk specifically about the South County projects, the county's really divided into two sections of our district. We have a north section, a south section, and divided by the Golden Gate Parkway. Everything north of Golden Gate Parkway goes to the north county facility. All the wastewater that's collected from the south of Golden Gate Parkway goes to the south county water reclamation facility. So, see, we have two very large treatment facilities. We have over 650 miles of transmission mains running all through the county. We have 650 wastewater planning sections. Fifty miles of reclaimed water mains. This past year we treated over 5 billion gallons of wastewater, which was converted into almost 4 billion gallons of reclaimed water used for irrigation of golf courses and developments, parks, schools. And that is really our -- what we do. We take wastewater from the homes and communities, and we convert it to reclaimed water. Actually, the wastewater treatment department and the water treatment department is a last line of defense of public health for the community. This past year we also processed over 27,000 tons of bio-solids. That's a lot of stuff. We take our bio-solids presently to a landfill. We're also right now working on a project to convert our bio-solids to compost. It will also be recycled back in the community. The South County project is taking an existing 8-million- gallons-per-day expansion to 16 million gallons per day. In 1991 the plant expanded to 8 million gallon a day. In 1994 the county worked with neighborhood associations on a lot of concerns, and we invested over $15 million in plant improvements. Those included converted gaseous chlorine to liquid chlorine bleach to help with the safety Page 4 February 5, 2002 concerns of neighborhoods. We had low building profiles. We moved a inerration tank across the acreage of the site and covered it and scrubbed it with a state-of-the-art scrubbing device. Reduced glare from lights by having low-intensity lights. We also reduced noise by covering plant equipment with open structured wood with noise retention devices. We installed a landscaping berm around the property. We also improved the stormwater retention of the area. In 1999 we conducted a task analysis board to show the plant expanded from 8 million gallons a day to 12 million gallons per day, but due to the neighborhood concerns, we decided to go ahead and expand the site to 16 million gallons a day so the construction would have less impact on the neighborhood. We also met with the community, and the community would like us to change our entrance road to a different site on Wildflower Way. We also added additional odor control units. We're going to have construction traffic planning to eliminate construction traffic of the neighborhood during certain times of the day. We plan to include traffic calming in the area, and we just want to make sure that we are good neighbors to the community. Now I'd like to turn it over to Roy Anderson, our engineering director, who's going to talk specifically about the permitting issues and the construction schedule of the project. MR. ANDERSON: Thank you very much, Joe. I'm Roy Anderson, Engineering Director for Collier County Utilities. As Joe mentioned, though, this treatment plant is an expansion from 8 million gallons per day to 16 million gallons a day. It's a basically biological wastewater treatment facility which functions as a reclaimed water facility. In this expansion we are going to be -- we're adding storage tanks. I can refer to the map up here. We have the plan. We have the storage -- Page 5 February 5, 2002 MR. MUDD: Do you want to talk in the mike if you would. MR. ANDERSON: Oh, sure. The equalization storage tanks are right here (indicating), and that's where the flow first comes in, which is kind of in the back end of the property, and then it flows through our biological treatment process where the primary method of treatment occurs. And then from there it moves on down into the -- for further processing and then comes out in the effluent storage and percolation ponds. We also have our residual's handling facilities where the sludge material is dewatered from a liquid form into a solid cake form that's actually transported to the landfill. The total project cost is in the range of $39 million, and to tell you a little bit about the schedule of the project, we are currently in the state permitting phase. The State has issued the draft permit just very recently, and that process lasts about 45 days. There will be a notice in the paper, in fact, this week and after that 45-day period, then we can commence the actual construction, which will take generally about a two-and-a-half-year period. So that's basically a summary of the status' of the project. Thank you. MR. MUDD: Thanks, Roy. The next presenter will be the South Water Plant Expansion, Paul Mattausch, the director of our water department. MR. MATTAUSCH: I'm going to follow the same format that Joe Cheatham used. I'm going to give you just a brief background about what the water department is about and what we do, and Roy Anderson is going to come back up, and he'll talk about the capital project portion. The water department consists of 96 employees. We cover about 110 square miles of unincorporated Collier County. We have about 620 miles of water main that we distribute the water from the water treatment plants to your house, and we have currently 32 million Page 6 February 5, 2002 gallons a day of water treatment plant capacity, 8 million gallons of that -- a lot of people don't know we've been in the reverse osmosis water treatment business since 1999, and we're utilizing brackish groundwater. And we're taking water that's too salty to use for irrigation and too salty to drink, and we're treating that water, making it into drinking water. And we're currently underway with a project building a water treatment plant of an additional 8 million gallons a day of reverse osmosis treatment capacity. And Roy is going to talk about that capital portion of the project. We started that project, started construction in July, and we planned to be complete in early 2003. Roy. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Does everyone know where the water plant is? MR. MATTAUSCH: We have two water plants -- thank you, Commissioner. We have two water plants. The north water plant is located on Vanderbilt Beach Drive. It has a plant capacity of 20 million gallons a day -- Vanderbilt Beach Road, I'm sorry, east of County Road 951. And the South Water Plant is -- that's currently being expanded is on Utility Drive, which is just east of 951 and just north ofi-75. If you're driving 1-75 and going one way or the other, just past the toll booth there, and you see a big lighted structure there; that's a well rig, one of the largest well rigs in the world. And they're currently drilling an injection well to handle the waste stream, the waste product from the water treatment plant, the reverse osmosis process. So you might want to drive by and take a look at that. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Paul, before you go, you talked about the deep water injections. How far down is that, and how does that affect the environment? Page 7 February 5, 2002 MR. MATTAUSCH: We are, of course -- from the reverse osmosis process, it's about 75 percent efficient. For every 100 gallons we take out of the ground, we send 75 out to our customers; 25 gallons of that is a waste stream higher in hardness and chlorides. That goes into the ground about thirty-two or thirty-three thousand feet below the ground surface. The waste stream that we are putting into the ground is actually less concentrated, has less total dissolved solids or total chlorides and hardness than the water that's actually there in the aquifer naturally occurring. So that water that we're putting down there is actually a little better quality water than the water that's in the aquifer. COMMISSIONER FIALA: While you're there, I think a lot of people are not aware that we have reverse osmosis right here in Collier County. Would you just brief them on that, please? MR. MATTAUSCH: Yeah, the 8 million gallons of capacity that we put on line in 1999 at the North Plant is reverse osmosis. We're using brackish water, salty water, and we're actually -- under pressure we're driving that water through a membrane that retains the salt on one side of the membrane and allows the water molecule to pass through the membrane so you get almost pure water on the treatment side or on the process side of the membrane. So that's where the drinking water is coming from in the reverse osmosis process. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Thank you. MR. MATTAUSCH: Roy. MR. ANDERSON: Thank you, Paul. Our construction project started last August, and it's anticipated to be complete in and around the time frame of early 2003. Right now the project is approximately 20 percent complete. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Excuse me, Roy, could you speak into the microphone. Page 8 February 5, 2002 MR. ANDERSON: Could everyone hear what I said? Basically, the project started in August of this past year, and it will be completed in early 2003. The contractor is United Engineers and Contractors from Florida. The engineering design firm is Metcalf and Eddy. The construction cost was $25 million for the plant itself and the wells and another $6 1/2 million for the two deep injection wells that Paul described. So it's quite a complex project. It involves construction of the wells of which two are now complete, and it also involves the treatment plant process and the two deep injection wells. I might add that we also were fortunate to get a grant from the Big Cypress Basin because we are using the brackish alternative supply of water so we don't have to rely on the Tamiami aquifer, so we did get a grant in recognition of that. We'll be happy to answer any questions -- or that basically concludes the presentation. Thank you. MR. MUDD: The next presentation is on the Santa Barbara Extension. Norm Feder will be our presenter. He's the transportation administrator. MR. FEDER: Thank you, Jim. It's a pleasure to be here with everybody this evening. I am Norman Feder. I'm transportation administrator here in Collier County. I've seen most of you folks at some other meetings we had on Santa Barbara, so at least we got to hear you. Basically, we don't have a lot to tell you, other than tell you where we are in the process of those discussions. As most of you are quite aware, we had an analysis done in the county in the development in what was called Linements A and C, which is essentially two laning Polly from Rattle Snake Hammock -- excuse me, from Davis down to Rattlesnake Hammock, and then a six-lane that basically came off of that that went over to the south and Page 9 February 5, 2002 the east and connected up just by the West Winds Development on there just to the west of there. That was to be six lanes and then to join up with Grand Lely Drive or Resorts Drive. We did some analysis based on a lot of meetings here with folks in this community, and from that along with Commissioner Fiala and night meetings, we came to the board basically with a memorandum I provided last March identifying the possibility that if we could work through some issues, the consideration of a six-lane Polly, take that alignment down to Rattlesnake, six-lane Rattlesnake to 951, and then establish a highly controlled access of 951 of six lanes on down to 41. To do that, obviously, we felt we needed to have some assistance from Lely Development Corporation, essentially, to allow along the Lely Resorts or Lely Drive to go to six lanes but to stay as a four-lane arterior. Those discussions have been underway for some time. Back in July Commissioner Henning was set up as the liaison for the board for that issue. There's been a number of meetings. About November we sat down with a consultant that Lely brought on board. They have now provided us the first methodology, analysis if you will, a study outlined of how they will go about the study. We're reviewing that right now. We expect we'll have some comments back to them, resolve that issue of that methodology in the next couple of weeks, and they probably have about a month or two months worth of work to then do the study itself and come back to us probably about the spring. So what I'm here to tell you is the issue is still ongoing. It started out with meetings about this time, I think, last year, and it's continuing to progress. And I'll try to answer any questions anyone might have on that. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Mr. Feder, if I could interject. It's because of Commissioner Fiala's persistence not to six-lane Grand Lely Boulevard that I felt there was a need to get involved in, and I Page 10 February 5, 2002 think we made a lot of strides in the last few months looking at some really creative alternatives so we don't have to six-lane that boulevard. I notice in your community -- how many people are here from Lely? Raise your hand. (Indicating.) COMMISSIONER FIALA: How many from Parker's Hammock? (Indicating.) COMMISSIONER HENNING: And my concern about -- my interest in it is that it needs to be feasible for all the residents in Collier County, that it doesn't cost other residents for a developer winning. And I know that you would win, but I think that we're going to come out of this process with something that you're going to be proud of and be happy. I am committed to working out this issue, and I'm sure you'll be happy. COMMISSIONER FIALA: I'd just like to mention, I'm so glad you're taking up this charge because I'm so close to the situation, and I hope they're looking at possibly four-laning, not six-laning, you know, being that it's in such a residential community. I'm hoping that there may be -- and right in between homes, six lanes seems a little overdone for that particular area. MR. FEDER: We're still looking at six laning based on the model, and what we're proposing for use and allow capability in only looking at six lanes, allowing two-lane access lanes. We had eight lanes. We're going down really to six. The reaction I got -- and some folks may correct me on this now, but were fairly supportive. It talks about the quality and this six lanes. I can tell you to meet the needs of transportation for east county, I think we need to stay with six lanes on Polly, Rattlesnake and 951 if, in fact, we can divide that as a bypass lane. Page 11 February 5, 2002 COMMISSIONER COYLE: Norm, do you have a diagram? MR. FEDER: Yes, I do over there. It's not very easily seen. I will tell you that most of the folks here know it by heart, probably better than I do. And after four night meetings they have shown me every nuance of it, but it's over there, sir. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Yes, Dudley. MR. CHISM: Dudley Chism, president of Lely Country Club. I need to know what you're going to do when Polly hits Rattlesnake. MR. FEDER: Basically, we're looking at doing a set-up coming down to three southbound lanes, set up a situation -- a triple left and a right, so what we're encouraging folks to do is basically make that maneuver there. We're going to allow that thru and right so some folks can go onto St. Andrews, but the facing will predominate for the turning movement and encourage that movement over towards 951 and therefore discourage any major thru movement, and there will be a single lane down in St. Andrews. MR. CHISM: As you know, we have two areas that we're very concerned with; that's St. Andrews Boulevard and also a concern if they don't come down St. Andrews, they're going to hit Augusta with a lot of traffic with homes and villas. We don't think that's a very smart thing to do. MR. FEDER: If they're going in that direction, they're probably coming off of 41 and 951. What we're saying in developing this, we're going to try and structure in a manner that doesn't encourage more traffic through St. Andrews, but keeps the original concept of two lanes, just as AFC has with a two-lane Polly connecting to St. Andrews. MR. CHISM: the County Barn? MR. FEDER: MR. CHISM: Along with this are you going to continue on with Are you going to four-lane that? County Barn, yes. So we're going to come down to four-lane the Page 12 February 5, 2002 County Barn and have six lanes on Polly? MR. FEDER: Yes. And originally we needed four. Two on County Barn, two on Polly, six lanes on the extension, and on 951 we're pulling probably lanes back, but we're trying to make it meet the needs of the community and reduce the number of lanes overall. MR. CHISM: My question, I guess, is if you're going to have six lanes coming down Polly, why do you need to four-lane County Barn? The only thing that's up there is the county transportation traffic. MR. FEDER: You'll have a lot more traffic, actually, on Country Road and Davis. We're going to move it to Davis. You're going to have the County Barn -- you have growth along County Barn Road, and today you have a lot of deficiencies even on County Barn, and again, that will happen after four-laning County Barn. MR. CHISM: Thank you. MR. FEDER: Thank you. MR. MUDD: The next speaker will be John Boldt. He's the stormwater director for Collier County. He's going to talk about the Stormwater Update. MR. BOLDT: We have a presentation. We can easily take an hour. We reduced it down to 15 minutes, and I'm going to try and do it in 10. We do have some handouts. (Applause.) MR. BOLDT: The Power Point presentation we're going to show is, we have 50 maps the young ladies are handing out, and there are, like, 60 or more here so we're going to ask you to share and kind of follow along. We're going to talk this evening specifically about LASIP, the Lely Area Stormwater Improvement Project. It's a project we've been working on for a number of years, and with us this evening is Dan Brundage who is the lead consultant for the team that we have involved. Page 13 February 5, 2002 And also you'll hear from Robert Riley who's our principal project manager. He's going to have the most part of our presentation about what's proposed and kind of the status of the project. Robert is going to talk about easements and mitigation. And I'm going to talk very briefly about financing and funding the project. So with that, Dan, you're on for about nine minutes. MR. BRUNDAGE: First of all, I'd like to introduce you to the project boundaries. The project is bounded by the north by Radio Road and on the east by Collier Boulevard. A portion of the project is bounded by wetlands of the Rookery Bay and Dollar Bay systems. And then the westerly boundary over here is bounded by an FP&L easement that generally runs along this line here (indicating), and this area also would be the easterly limits of the Haldeman Creek basin. The project area is divided into two basins. One basin is the Lely Main Canal basin, which this is it, Lely Main Canal that flows in this direction (indicating), and also the Lely Manor basin handles the easternmost portion of the project, and it will have two outfalls in this area (indicating). If you take a look at the permit documents later on -- they'll be available for public review -- they have been broken down into seven different regions. Regions 1 through 4 are handled by the Lely Main basin, while Regions 5 through 7 handle the Lely Manor. The purpose of the project is to lower the plant elevations and reduce the duration peak stages, while providing as much water quality improvement and groundwater recharge as possible. That's pretty much the description of the project in a nutshell. And I'm going to give you just a brief idea of the proposed construction activities. We are proposing to widen and deepen several of the existing canals. We're going to construct some new channels and swales. We'll be constructing several new control structures throughout the area. We're going to improve several of the Page 14 February 5, 2002 existing control structures so they can pass more water than they currently do. The project will cost for installing new flood control gates in the event we hear of a hurricane approaching, the water management will be able to go out and lower the system very quickly. Also, we're going to be making improvements to the outfalls by construction spreader lakes and berms, and there's also a pump station that's going to be constructed to pull water out of the Lely Manor System and use that to rehydrate and replenish the water in the wetland area that currently is overdrained. So that will be done to make that wetland system healthier. I'm going to go very quickly through the project and try to give you an idea of what's proposed. I hope you guys don't get seasick looking at this. This is the Lely Main Canal (indicating), and it's currently an existing channel that runs from US 41 in a southwesterly direction down to the wetlands of Dollar Bay. And this portion of the project is proposed to be improved by making the swale or the channel wider and a little deeper. We'll be constructing a little shelf in the process so the wetland species can exist. And then we have a similar lake and a berm at the tail end of the system that will take that point source of discharge and reintroduce it to the wetlands. Then as we move further upstream, the main part of the channel heads in this direction (indicating), and here lies Rattlesnake Hammock Road. We'll be constructing a new weir here (indicating) and also widening and deepening the existing channel also. From this main channel here there's two other points of flow to come into. One is along County Barn Road, and again, we'll be improving the conveyance there by improving swales. There's a new ware proposed just south of the County Barn system that will be constructed about in this location in here (indicating). Page 15 February 5, 2002 Then we have quite a bit of flow that heads on a southerly direction, and it flows through the Royal Woods Development, so we're going to be improving the existing weir. While we're also going to be improving the size of culverts within Royal Woods. Upstream of Royal Woods there will be several swales, and the box culverts here will be constructed in these directions in here (indicating). And also some improvements along Whitaker Avenue, Cope Lane, and Country Road, in order to direct flow to the south. There will be a system of several weirs. There's a weir proposed in this location (indicating), and there's three along this alignment here (indicating) that will help control the flow also. And, finally, for this part of the main branch, there is a gate that's proposed to be located at the headwaters of a box culvert here that will allow water to be interchanged between the Lely Manor or the Lely Main Canal. We'll be able to send water in the other direction if we need to relieve that part of the system. Now, continuing up, this is the main branch that heads up in this direction along the FP&L easement, and this channel will be part of the Phase I construction, and it will be proposed for it to be widened and deepened, and discharging into it is water that flows over a weir at this location right in here (indicating), and that weir will be increased in size to be able to pass additional flows that will be directed to it from the north. The water that will be coming to the north will be carried to this weir-- proposed weir that's located here (indicating) along the currently existing canal improvements along the north side of Davis Boulevard. You'll notice there are quite a few developments that as they were developed they were required to build portions of the canal, and because that criteria was in place we actually have a completed channel all the way from Santa Barbara Boulevard to this location here to control the flow there. Page 16 February 5, 2002 Finally, for the main branch, there will be some improvements to the east of Santa Barbara along this alignment here that will be made in order to help direct runoff from this area to get into the system. That's pretty much the Lely Main System in a nutshell. Now, the Lely Manor basin has two outflow channels, and again, we'll be constructing a spreader swale and a berm at the discharge point of that conveyance. The channel in this location here is large enough to control the flow so there is no improvements, but we will be putting a weir control structure at this point here (indicating) so a wetland area will not be overdrained. This portion of the canal here (indicating) is proposed for widening and deepening, and as we head upstream for a minute there's an existing channel that runs along the northerly part of Naples Manor, and that will be widened with the construction of two new weirs. One will be at Warren Street, and the other one will be at a location about right here (indicating) that's actually adjacent to the South County and Sewage Treatment Plant. (Thereupon, Commissioner Coletta entered the town hall meeting.) MR. BRUNDAGE: This weir will actually take flow from a slough coming out this direction, and it will be directed into the channel as it flows in that direction. The other outfall is this major canal in here, and it's highlighted in pink denoting that it's part of the Phase I construction as well. The pump station I'll talk about is located right in this direction here (indicating), and it will pull this dry water flow or the normal flow out of the canal and direct it to this wetlands slough area here (indicating). But the system is designed when we have a peak, it will bypass that pump entirely and will flow right on down the channel improvements. There's two minor channels located in these directions here Page 17 February 5, 2002 (indicating) in conjunction with these two major outfalls that will help provide the drainage for the Lely Manor system. We are proposing to construct a conveyance along in here (indicating), and that conveyance will be in the form of pipe, a 72-inch pipe that's proposed in this direction right here (indicating). Now, as we move further upstream, this is Wildflower Way, and there's a large existing wetland slough that drains from Rattlesnake Hammock Road to the south. There's several culverts that are already in place in Wildflower Way to carry this flow, and one point of interest is half of this flow will continue into the Lely project, whereas the other portion will be directed into the Lely Resort Area. Their permit actually calls for pulling off of that flow. So we'll get some of that water that's coming out of this direction, and it will enter that water management system there. North of Rattlesnake Hammock we have the Wing South Airport, which is located in here (indicating), and there is an existing swale along this easterly boundary that will at this point be maintained; it will just be reshaped but not a major widening or deepening effort there. We'll be constructing a new swale along the westerly part of Wing South. Down here will be a control located at this point (indicating). Part of the flow will go over that control structure. Part of it will enter into a wetland which will discharge through some pipes through a restricted south of the slough area we previously mentioned. And then, finally, we have a weir at the very top end of the Wing South area that will control the flow coming off of the developments that are located up in here. That weir will actually be designed to help rehydrate a 1 O-acre parcel that is located in this point which is a parcel that the county owns right now, and it's going to be improved and cleaned up and sort of refurbished. It's part of Page 18 February 5, 2002 mitigation for the project. We'll be disturbing some wetlands along the alignment, so in some of the improvements -- so this will help mitigate for that disturbance. The county is currently in the process of negotiating a purchase of a 99-acre parcel that's located in here (indicating), and that will serve as further mitigation for the project. That's compressing about two or three hours of presentation down into five or ten minutes. A VOICE: I just missed what all this is intended to improve. Under what conditions and do we have a problem now that this is intended to relieve? How does this work? I mean, what is it intended to accomplish? MR. BRUNDAGE: Characteristically, there's a history of flooding in various locations, and this system has been designed so it will minimize that flooding. A VOICE: Are there any issues related to hurricane storm surge? Is it going to make it easier for that to back up into some of these properties or-- MR. BRUNDAGE: Just from the point that the swales that are directing the flow downstream will be enlarged. Again, that's the reason that there's control structures along the way, so it's sort of stair-stepped if you will. A VOICE: So it has no impact really, those areas that are in storm surge danger? MR. BRUNDAGE: They are going in storm surge. There is a reasonable concept -- I'm kidding, of course, but there's going to be a final exam you are going to have to give us the definitions of swale, sloughs, and rehydration watch. We have engineers, technicians talking. Robert is going to talk very briefly now about the status of our Page 19 February 5, 2002 permitting and easements and the mitigation. It's a very critical part of this. MR. RILEY: My name is Robert Riley. I'm the senior project manager for the stormwater maintenance department. We've been working on permits for a number of years. The status of it is we submitted back in November the Water Management, District 28. We got good comments from them, and in December there were 19 questions they asked; 15 of them or-- 30 answered, 4 of them are not. So we met with the agencies, and we think we are able to work through most of the 19 that we anticipate submitting probably at the end of this month. Army Corps of Engineers, we submitted to them at the same time, in November. We still have nothing from them, other then we held a meeting with them. They anticipate us going to public notice, which is the first phase of actually getting a permit. You'll see the notice in the newspaper probably by the end of this month. When you see that, it also will tell you, you can come to the library on U.S. 41, you can come to the stormwater management office, or you can go to Mr. Brundage's office. That's three locations. If you have any questions, you can always give me a call. If you have homeowner meetings, I'll come by and show it to you. There's 135 sheets just in permit applications for the plans. Most of those are conceptual level. They're not even in construction level. We are looking at acquiring easements right now. As Dan mentioned we're trying to get a 99-acre parcel into our possession for mitigation purposes, but primarily along our Phase I construction which will be along Myrtle Lane, Cypress Lane and down south of their, a place called Neighboring Gateway Estates, which is basically vacant land. There's a few lots or houses. We are trying to buy the easements in Page 20 February 5, 2002 anticipation of going to construction as quickly as we can get the permits. Also, up along the Main Lely Canal south between there to U.S. 41, we'll be needing a few more narrow easements. The rest of the easements for Phase I will be north of Rattlesnake Hammock on FP&L power line. We have those in our possession. So we're anticipating going to Phase I construction fairly rapidly as soon as we can get the money. That's always a question too -- just joking -- but if any of you wish to contribute to silent offerings, only no coins -- but it is a serious matter. You heard that before, silent offerings. You haven't been to the old church that I've been to. They didn't want coins; dollar bills only were good. But in all seriousness, when we get to permit from the Water Management District, the big issue is getting to the Corps, and we anticipate being able to going to the Corps. If things go well, the next dry season I hope Greg can do something, but that's a big if. We've been saying "if" for a number of years now. MR. MUDD: This project -- and just to highlight this, this project's been 12 years in the making. And that's not out of the ordinary for some very complicated projects that have to do with wetlands and drainage and things like that in the United States. The stormwater department has stayed on this project, and I think we finally have the regulatory agencies, the South Florida Water Management District and the Corps of Engineers. In the process of talking, providing us the comments, that 99 acres of wetland mitigation land that we need to purchase is key to this project because there are some wetlands that are disturbed, and you have to mitigate those according to federal law and the Clean Water Act of Section 401. I will say this: Robert and his folks have done work. This hasn't been a small task. It's a very complicated project. Our hope is to, in Page 21 February 5, 2002 the summer, have the permits in hand and then go forward with phases in this project. COMMISSIONER FIALA: I was just going to comment on Kerry's question because many people -- we all know what this is about, and so we attack it like, "Look at the great work we're doing," and, you know, if you haven't been listening to it at all, you're scratching your head and wondering why. Well, as you probably understood -- but I'm just going to bring it down to basic. Water flows down Florida like this (indicating) and down Collier County like this (indicating). Well, as the developers came in and made their little developments and the road builders came in and built their roads, they chopped up these water flows and backed them up. So areas began to experience flooding. The more roads we built, the more houses we built, the more flooding occurred. There's some areas that really are under water. Along County Barn is a good example. Lakewood is another example, but there are many areas that have a lot of flooding. What this giant project is going to do -- and it's taking them so long to prepare to do -- is try and get that water flowing the way it should have before, instead of being stopped, and it's also going to clean that water as it goes down into the Gulf of Mexico instead of-- you know, water is just captured and shoved into the gulf without percolating through the land. What happens is, you actually damage the eco-environment. You pollute the water with fresh water. And so this water needs to be brought back down into the land, spread like they were showing you with the spreaders, get down into the land again, percolate down and flow into the gulf naturally. And that's what they're trying to do with this huge project. Did that make it a little clearer? COMMISSIONER HENNING: You did a great job. Page 22 February 5, 2002 MR. RILEY: I don't really have a lot to share about the cost of the project because the costs are still unknown. We're still trying to get easements, And litigation, and we think we know what that's going to cost us, but there's still some unknowns there. Once we have those figures and update engineer's cost estimate, then we'll be going to the Board of County Commissioners, and you'll hear about this as part of the meetings as to how we propose to finance this project and to fund it. Our recommendations will include public county at large paying for partials of the project, just general health welfare and convenience. We're going to be talking to the South Florida Management, Big Cypress Basin about cost sharing, especially the water quality and environment enhancement portions of the project. And they already indicated their willingness to do that. We are going to recommend a special taxing district be established throughout the whole area to pay for probably, I'm going to suggest, somewhere in the area of 50 percent of the project. And depending on the timing and the availability, there are some state and federal grants that we're going to apply for if the timing is correct, and we can make that all work together. The funding options we're going to suggest to the commissioners at the time appropriate, it could be a pay as you go when we raise the monies for all these funding mechanisms, we'll do that. There also is a state revolving fund that's been enhanced for stormwater that we can get very low interest loans, not grants, but loans from the state to finance the project and pay them back over a longer period of time; or if that's not available, if we don't qualify for that, bonding is a possibility but not -- it won't be our highest recommendation. So once these figures start to fall together here over the next few months, we're going to put the bid in a package and going to the Page 23 February 5, 2002 commissioners, and you'll be hearing more about what the project's going to cost and what it will cost you. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I have a question. This 99 acres of land, that is for mitigation? MR. BOLDT: Strictly for mitigation, yes, sir. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Is that going to be in the basin area? MR. BOLDT: That's in the boundaries of the basin. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Is there any way that we could use it as a passive park or boardwalks or something? MR. BOLDT: I would seriously doubt that. They're looking for strictly conservation/preservation easements. Keep it in its existing wetland state. They won't be looking for any other uses. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Is this that FTAP, or is this the Corps, the requirements of the mitigation? MR. BOLDT: Mostly South Florida Water Management District. COMMISSIONER HENNING: And that's people that are appointed by the government that control that? MR. BOLDT: That's true. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I would hope that the citizens on many different issues, on this one in particular that -- you know, we're buying up a lot of land out there that your tax dollars are going to, and I think you should have input in how that land could be used with a dual use such as a passiveness of a boardwalk or something like that so... MR. MUDD: Thanks, John. The next presentation is -- go ahead, Doug. MR. CHISM: If the City of Naples votes come through the way that we hope it does, maybe Collier County will be able to construct the estuaries and swales, if you will, that you have been looking for, Page 24 February 5, 2002 John, and get some of that water out into the gulf because they promised that they would do that; is that correct? And, secondly, as I understand it, I thought six or seven years ago we were trying to get money -- I thought that the voters had voted to give a percentage to this Lely basin and the county on behalf of it. And thirdly, Robert, things are going on on the west side of 41 where ponds are going in and some roads are being cleared back there. What is that? MR. BOLDT: The third one, that U.S. 41 that you're looking at, six lanes, what you're seeing is some water quality treatment that are for the runoff strictly from the U.S. 41. And those are in the process of doing what I see in the construction; that's all the advance work prior to them starting the roadway construction itself. Now, you asked about the funding. MR. CHISM: Did we get funding? MR. RILEY: John says he will do this one. MR. BOLDT: November of'96 general election we had a non- binding straw vote on the general election, trying to teach the commissioners whether there was general support for creating a taxing district in the area. And the vote, my recollection was, like 40 percent for and 52 percent against, something of that neighborhood, which we thought was an outstanding show of support for it. And the commissioners at that point in time indicated their willingness to go and create a taxing district. At this point we still hadn't gotten all the permits and all that, but we hope to have that in place by the end of the year. Your third one was. MR. CHISM: The Collier. MR. BOLDT: The Collier DRI which was -- how many years ago was that, Robert? Page 25 February 5, 2002 MR. RILEY: That's the Collier DRI which is the main outfall or the water canal. In that DRI they called for them to construct weirs to construct the canal, everything that will be getting in place for us to use. They never did that because they never got the permits through the state agencies. Just recently, they came back through with modifications to the PUD, which means that they opened the entire community back up for accounting staff. So we have recently submitted documentation to them that it updates everything to match the old Collier DRI to the current Lasic plant, and that just went to them. But, in effect, it says, if they get it first, they build the Lely canal system down to U.S. 41. The same as it had been before, but now it addresses it under the current design, not the old design. So we are keeping that update too. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Dudley, were you asking -- as far as the road goes, were you asking what's happening to the extension of Rattlesnake Hammock, or were you asking-- MR. CHISM: There's a lot of-- yes, further down there's an extension of Rattlesnake Hammock where Publix is going to go and some other things, but from that there was some ponds going in. And I know that in talking to Robert Riley is putting some things in there and expects to do some things on that side of the road which is going to enhance the entire area. That's a good question, Donna. What are they doing up at Rattlesnake besides Publix? COMMISSIONER FIALA: Well, right now unless Norm Feder wants to jump in here, the Lely -- or I'm sorry, the Collier Enterprise people are building the road. They're extending Rattlesnake so instead of where Thomasson Road is, they're going to extend Rattlesnake Hammock right on through, and it's going to curve around by a shopping center, and you're right; and it's going to end up in Thomasson, but that will allow people to flow on through. It will Page 26 February 5, 2002 provide a better mm lane for the kids going to school -- you know how the school buses can't turn around this way. The school buses will be able to mm in there. It will enhance our transportation system. Norm, would you like to add anything? MR. FEDER: Commissioner, you covered it. We came in with a commercial portion, and looking at what they're proposing we made sure that, in fact, we got a continuation across Rattlesnake along with the school site and some other things. They are, again, subject to their development, but the project will be a big improvement to the transportation system. MR. FEDER: Basically, if you came across 41, it then curves over and pulls back probably about a mile back on Thomasson. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Right before the school and park. MR. CHISM: Two lane? MR. FEDER: Yes. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Back in that area, too, they were kind enough to come to my office on Marco Island, and they showed me the preliminary plans for that area and the shopping center and Publix that they're thinking of doing a little mixed use where they might even build a few apartments on top of shops. And they're setting aside some land for a middle school in that area which is far down the road, and it's going to be right next door to the park. They're also setting aside an area on the comer of the school area where they're going to build a fire station. So those are some of the plans. I think this is the beginning of the long awaited that we in East Naples are fully supportive of and are hoping to see come. It's really going to enhance the image of East Naples. Jim? MR. MUDD: Our next presenter here is parks and recreation Page 27 February 5, 2002 update, and it's John Dunnuck, the new public services administrator -- what used to be community development administrator. John? MR. DUNNUCK: And, of course, I've had a smile on my face ever since. I don't have any slides, and I don't have any pictures tonight, but what I do have is a number. I want to let you all know that in the last five and a half years Collier County has spent over $19 million on parks and recreation in the District 1 and, you know, coming from parks and recs prior to going over to community development -- and Tom can recall this as well -- this is a pretty good plug to thank your Commissioner Fiala who was very instrumental in a lot of those park projects that went over that period of time. Prior to being on the commission, we dealt with her in East Naples quite a bit, and she was very active and always asking that question, "Why can't it be in East Naples? Why can't it be in East Naples? Why can't it be in East Naples?" And I think we deliver quite a few products there. Just to give you a quick update on a couple projects we've recently completed, I don't know if you've been out to Southern Regional Park recently, but we completed the second half of the walkway that goes around the entire lake. It's outstanding. I actually just went prior -- since I've only been at public services for a couple of weeks, I've been fairly busy over at community development. Actually tonight I went and walked it just to see how nice it was, and there were probably 50 or 60 people walking on it at about five or six o'clock tonight. So I think you have an outstanding facility there. We also recently completed some improvements to Eagle Lakes Park. That's a new park that was completed about a year and a half ago. We've added some bathroom facilities out there, and if you drive by there at night, you know how active that park is as well. MR. MUDD: Before you leave on Eagle Lakes, we're in the Page 28 February 5, 2002 process of putting in a walkway and interpretive center on those ponds. We get about 166 species that go out there. We'll have a walkway and interpretive center in that park, and that will be going up in the next year. COMMISSIONER FIALA: What about the water park? Aren't you going to have a little children's water park? MR. DUNNUCK: Long-term plan, coming up in the next couple of years, we do have plans to put in a water park out at the Eagle Lakes Park. If you've had an opportunity to go up to the Vineyards Community Park, what we have now is, it's called a zero water level play park where kids can go and play in the water and, you know, it shoots water, and it's kind of neat with the fountains and everything, and we plan on doing that for the kids in the area as well. Projects we have on schedule right now, we have improvements to complete and improve the 951 boat ramp, add additional parking. If you've driven down there and you're a boater, you recognize how important it is to add additional spaces, because as we grow it's important as a county to add those additional spaces for boaters, and we plan on doing that. That's scheduled to be completed in 2003, but we'll be beginning that project later on. Additionally, similar to the north side of the community, we're looking to put in a dog park out at Manatee, an area where people can take their dogs out to play. It's been very successful in the north area with people who live in condominiums and just want a place for their dogs to interact with other dogs, and we're very excited about that as well. Probably more pertinent to the next meeting we are going to have in District 1, but we are working in a lot of neighborhood park projects as well down in Isle Capri and right now we're working on some land acquisitions there. Transition over to the library, right now we're completing our Page 29 February 5, 2002 North Regional Library. It's going to open February 25th. It's an outstanding facility located off Airport and Orange Blossom, but I guess my point I want to get to you-all tonight is that under our current plan right now, we have plans to build a facility of a regional library type in the East Naples south region of this community in 2007. Right now, we're building the funds up, and it's based upon our currency plan in the community, but we're working on a quality facility for you as well. And I hope you take an opportunity to go out and see the quality of the facility we've built in the north area, because it's something that we'll look to build down here as well. COMMISSIONER HENNING: We have a grand opening in March? MR. DUNNUCK: The grand opening will be March 1 st. A VOICE: Where will this new library be? MR. DUNNUCK: Currently, right now, we have 5 acres slated at Eagles Lakes Community Park. MR. CHISM: Speaking of Eagle Lakes, I have a two-part question, if I may. One is, what are the next -- I understand there are other phases in addition to the kiddie park or water park. What else is going in there? Anything like tennis courts, shuffleboard, any of the facilities that might appeal to some other people? MR. DUNNUCK: I would have to get your name and number and get back to you on that, because I can't answer that off the top of my head only being over there for two weeks, but I'll be happy to get that information for you. MR. CHISM: The last part of the Eagle Lakes scenario is, have you received any complaints about the lights in that area? And can anything be done to mitigate that? There's a lot of property currently under development. There's a lot of property that's been sold. Those lights are an annoyance to a great number of people in the Lely Resort in particular, I'm not sure who else. Page 30 February 5, 2002 Anything in the works to do something about that? MR. DUNNUCK: I may have to defer to Leo who is my predecessor over at public services, but certainly I'll follow up. I haven't received any complaints since I've been there the past couple of weeks, but it's something to look into if you feel that there's been some concern out there by the community. MR. CHISM: There's some significant concern, and there's property that's currently being sold, and that's one of the issues that addresses that property. MR. DUNNUCK: Yes, sir. MR. CHISM: A while back there was a plan to build, I believe, next to this college on 25 acres an amphitheater that would seat or service I guess 12,000 people. The residents of Lely Resort were flabbergasted by that proposal because no one ever heard of it, and it was endorsed by the Daily News, in fact, the next day after the article appeared. Without going into a long explanation of this or dissertation on this, is that amphitheater proposal dead, or are we going to be in another struggle here when this thing gets underway? MR. DUNNUCK: Well, right now it's a difficult question to answer because there are some issues with the property that we've looked at from the legal standpoint of what can be done there. The Board of County Commissioners has placed money in the budget to build this amphitheater, but with the property that we've looked at in the Lely Community, we recognize that there are some issues with some deed restrictions as far as that goes, and we've also looked at opportunities with the developer where we can exchange property that may be more beneficial to the community. MR. CHISM: A second question with regard to Eagle Park, are you aware of any security problems? MR. DUNNUCK: No. MR. CHISM: Such as gangs? Page 31 February 5, 2002 MR. DUNNUCK: No. I do know that we regularly visit with our park ranger staff, and we keep somebody there in the evenings. If it's after hours, we'd be happy to take a look at it and work with the sheriff's office. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Maybe the sheriff's office would like to answer that. Scott, have you been aware of any problems there? MR. ANDERSON: COMMISSIONER: MR. ANDERSON: At Eagle Lakes? Uh-huh. I'm not aware of any major issues. I'm not aware -- or any of the other parks we have in East Naples district, not that we encourage anybody to do anything. If you call us, we will investigate on a case-by-case basis. A VOICE: Dudley, I do a lot of games at Eagle Lake, and I have never seen anything out of the ordinary when we've been playing soccer or baseball on one side and softball on another diamond, and everybody is just as happy as can be. I've never seen any problem whatsoever. It's a nice facility. MR. DUNNUCK: Thank you. MR. MUDD: Commissioner, that basically ends the presentation, and we have five speakers that signed up, and we'll just open the floor in case anybody has a comment. Our first speaker will be Paul Kibias. MR. KIBIAS: I would just like to direct a question to parks and recs, subject Lakers. We refer to it as Laker Soy, and I know this is a previous commission that gave him a 99-year lease on this property, and I don't mean to dump a whole lot of extra work on John, but I think there ought to be a monitoring of how ridiculous this Youth Outreach Program is. As far as I'm concerned, it's a private lake, and I think a lot of people agree with me. MR. MUDD: The next speaker is Lynn Moore. Page 32 February 5, 2002 MS. MOORE: My question -- and getting back to Eagle Lakes and so forth is, I'm beginning to notice more and more graffiti going down 41, and it's a concern. We had some in that vacant building next to the Big Cypress they painted. Now it's going on the billboards all the way down the road. Are we in a situation where we need to be aware of gang activities, or does anybody know the source of all this graffiti? COMMISSIONER HENNING: I think in Collier County all over we need to be concerned about gangs. And I would hope that maybe the Sheriff's Department through the substation can set up a -- they do have a task force to deal with gangs only. And to try to -- I think it's important for everybody to be educated on certain symbols, the status, and things of that nature. Maybe Commissioner Fiala could arrange that in a setting. COMMISSIONER FIALA: You mean some kind of a town hall meeting just strictly focusing on the gang unit? CHAIRMAN COLETTA: The Sheriff's Department puts that on. COMMISSIONER FIALA: That would be fine. I would be happy to do that. Scott, what do you think? We have a gang unit right here. Would you like to tell them a little bit about what's going on? MR. ANDERSON: I'm not representing gangs, but I can arrange whatever. If you want to make contact, I'll arrange to have our gang task force people meet. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Would you folks like us to do that? Would you like us to put together something focusing on crime or gang units, anything along that line and just to advertise it as well as we can? (Unanimous response.) Page 33 February 5, 2002 COMMISSIONER FIALA: Scott, you and I will work together on that. We'll start tomorrow, okay? MR. ANDERSON: Yes. COMMISSIONER FIALA: We'll try and pick a date in March, so while the people are still here we get to contact them. Thank you. MR. MUDD: In response to Lynn Moore, if you see somebody putting graffiti on a building, report it to the sheriffs office. If you see a building that's full of graffiti and it's an eyesore, report it to Michelle Arnold over in Code Enforcement. Michelle, raise your hand. MS. ARNOLD: (Raising hand.) MR. MUDD: Okay. And she will get with the property owners in order to get that repainted, resanded, and whatever it takes in order to get it back in its original state. It's always better to catch the culprit doing it, and that's why you call the sheriff if you see some kid out there with a spray can or an adult out there with a spray can, so please do that if you would. If you see a crime being committed as far as graffiti, report it to the sheriff. And if you see a building that has graffiti, report it to code enforcement in Collier County, and Michelle will get with those commercial establishments and sometimes private homes in order to get that corrected. Our next speaker is Diane Taylor. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Before we continue, Michelle, do you contact the sheriff's department and make sure they take pictures of the graffiti before it's washed off?. That's one of the programs with the gang unit. They want to identify where the gang activity is taking place and those symbols that they write on that graffiti, it's very important for their knowledge. MS. ARNOLD: I'm going to use the mike because my voice doesn't project. Page 34 February 5, 2002 Michelle Arnold, code enforcement director. We would take photographs of those and coordinate with the sheriffs office so that they can do their analysis for the gang activity. And we would expect the property owners themselves to take care of the problem. COMMISSIONER FIALA: So if they have graffiti sprayed on their property, they have to bear the burden of fixing it; right? MS. ARNOLD: Correct. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Can we ever make the offender who are arrested that belong to gangs cough up some money to pay? MR. ANDERSON: One of the things we do, we have the kids that are out at the sheriffs, really camp out in Immokalee -- as part of our trying to reeducate some of these youths who have learned the art of graffiti we do get to take those young men, and they do repaint areas that have been damaged with the graffiti. So when we spot that, the first thing we want to do is we photograph that, we do police reports on it, we maintain an intelligence file or try to know what gangs are in what areas, what their communications and graffiti mean. And we do get those youths to go and repaint that. And we try to do as expeditiously as possible. It seems that as soon we get their markings down, the longer it's there, the more they feel they have accomplished each other. So to answer that question, we try to get those people responsible -- maybe they didn't get caught actually doing that particular graffiti, but they go to cover some of the things their other associates have done. MR. MUDD: The next speaker is Diane Taylor. MS. TAYLOR: What are we going to do about Town Center? It's a disgrace to our county. MR. OLLIFF: I guess I'll take that since there's this long dead silence. We've been working on a number of things. One is, there's some code enforcement issues there which Michelle and their staff Page 35 February 5, 2002 are going out and not only looking at the landscaping, but some of the structural codes that are there to try and at least put pressure on the property owners to bring those up to current land code. The second thing we've been looking at is an effort through your current East Naples Civic Association-- in fact, they are very aggressively looking at a redevelopment plan for the entire east 41 corridor starting primarily with that particular shopping center. I think they are looking at coming to the county and having a master plan or overlay plan done, if you will, that will provide some development incentives, some additional harsher development penalties for projects that are in the condition that one is in and doing whatever we can from a government standpoint to encourage those kinds of projects to make themselves better or discourage existing properties from getting in that condition in the future. So I think that's the second project that's going on. And then, thirdly, we have ourselves actually been looking at some of the opportunities in there for lease space and looking at what other anchor tenant opportunities we might be able to encourage. And we've been working with both the Economic Development Council and the Chamber of Commerce to try and encourage them in their search for businesses -- and not just businesses for the county- wide area, but specifically for the East Naples area. And Commissioner Fiala has been working with EDC and the Chamber on that. So there's a lot of things going on and will actually be successful. We'll have to wait and see, but as long as everyone is patient, our hope is that we can make some improvements on the shopping center, because we agree. COMMISSIONER FIALA: MR. OLLIFF: Yes, ma'am. COMMISSIONER FIALA: May I ask you a question? Oh, thank you very much, Tom. I Page 36 February 5, 2002 hate to ask it in this public forum, but here we are. Is there a way we could kind of twist their arm to force them to improve the appearance of their property to a point where it's not a disgrace to us? MR. OLLIFF: The only thing we can actually do is force them to bring their buildings up to our current code. And I think there should be enough financial disincentives for them that, hopefully, if we continue to be a pest, frankly, and continue to cite them for each and every violation that we have, that we will provide them the incentive to fix it up, get some tenants in there, or do something significant. Other than that we agree with you, and it's dragging the entire neighborhood down. And with the neighborhood's help, we need to partner up and do everything we can together to try and make that develop and that landowner make that place better. COMMISSIONER HENNING: Commissioner Fiala, I support giving the county attorney direction for condemnation for being a public nuisance. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Can we do that? COMMISSIONER HENNING: I do think that we can ask -- direct him to come report back to us on that topic of condemnation. But, again, you might lose opportunities for redevelopment or get that tenant in there. What it would be is tearing down the building and then you'd just have a vacant lot. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Well, of course, the Town Center is owned by three different owners. I'm sure you're aware of that. The other two owners seem to care about their property, especially the one down at the end. They seem to keep it up and keep it clean. Can you condemn one end of it? I mean, just one owner? I mean, I would love to follow it. I love that idea, Tom. I would love to follow that too. COMMISSIONER CARTER: It would cost money. And I want to see it down like anyone else, but you have to find the most Page 37 February 5, 2002 effective pressure points to put on people like that, and usually it's being nibbled to death by ducks. You keep pushing and pushing and pushing. If you go the other route, sometimes they dig in and say, "All right, go ahead and condemn it." And then they're going to start coming after you and how much money they can take from you. CHAIRMAN COLETTA: And then you're into a lifetime. COMMISSIONER CARTER: I would rather use everything we have to push them to bring it into the system along with the community development authority. It may get you a lot. You may get there quicker than trying to take the harder route. CHAIRMAN COLETTA: I agree with you, Commissioner Carter. You have to give a little bit of care. The care will be the. development district would be a economic benefit for them to do it. It's going take a little while to put together until we start the first day. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Get that Michelle over there to start dishing out citations. MS. ARNOLD: And we have been. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Thank you. MR. MUDD: Commissioner, the next speaker is Rick Irreseri. (No response.) MR. MUDD: Rick, are you still with us? (No response.) MR. MUDD: The last speaker that signed up is Ken Drum. MR. DRUM: I don't have much to say about the Route C after Norm Feder's kind of upbeat report, except that I'd like to thank Commissioner Henning for getting involved because that's probably what it's going to take to reach some sort of a closure on it. As long as I have the floor, though, we have a couple of additional problems with roads, and I don't know if you can solve this or not because I don't, frankly, know if the county owns all the roads within Lely Resort. I'm not sure which streets they own and which they don't. Page 38 February 5, 2002 One of the problems we have is striping, that the striping on our roads is eroded to the point where sometimes crosswalks aren't properly marked, and the striping right near a stop sign is faded to the point where it's questionable whether people, you know, would even see it. I wonder if something could be done about that. The second thing is, I don't know if the county is responsible for sidewalks, but we have several places where we have a sidewalk to nowhere. The sidewalk leads to somebody's lawn. And when you cross the street -- COMMISSIONER HENNING: Ask the former commissioners. MR. DRUM: Anyway, we have sidewalks, but in some cases it's sort of dangerous to cross the street because you have to go in somebody's driveway in order to walk across the street and hit the other sidewalk. So I wonder if something could be done about that. And the third problem that we have -- and unfortunately this has gone on for several years, but this year it kind of came to a head -- is that we have a problem with the high school and the drivers of the high school. And I'll just tell you what we've had so far. We've had one car completely overturn with the kid hanging out of it. We had another one that crashed into a house. We've had two cars go up and almost hit the horses. They went up on the grass. In fact, if you go down there, there's tire tracks, and unfortunately, the way these kids drive when they leave the school -- and there is some law enforcement up there. They show up one day, and they sit out in the middle where everybody can see them, and then they're there the next day, and they write a couple of tickets, and you don't see them anymore. What can be done about this? I mean, I know it's easy to say, "Well, it's the sheriff or it's not our responsibility," but we do have a -- the way I see it -- we have a safety problem with the striping, the sidewalks, and these motorists that just tear through. Maybe we need Page 39 February 5, 2002 speed bumps. I hate those speed bumps but... COMMISSIONER FIALA: I wonder if the sheriff's office has volunteers that would volunteer every day to sit out there that are allowed to write tickets. Do you have something like that, Scott? MR. ANDERSON: We don't have -- in order to write a uniform safety or traffic citation, which is what that would be called, you have to be a certified law enforcement officer. We do have volunteers that can write parking violations, and there's certain county ordinances. We are aware of the driving issue at Wildflower, St. Andrews. We do patrol that area. We try to maintain our presence there, and unfortunately, still with that, we still see unfortunate circumstances like we did quite recently on County Road 951. A VOICE: How about getting together with the principal of the school and working something out where if you have somebody that you catch driving recklessly or, you know, way over the speed limit, the principal takes away their parking permit at the school? A VOICE: If they're caught. MR. DRUM: Something like that. You have to do something. Whatever is being done now doesn't work. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Tom, did you have a suggestion? COMMISSIONER HENNING: If I can help out on that, if you want to give me the streets that need to be restriped, we'll take a look at them, and we'll see if it is the county's responsibility. If not, I'll be happy to call Joe Riley and work with him. And also with the sidewalks, if you could point that out. The only reason I'm getting involved is because I'm already involved in Lely. And a suggestion, maybe a personal contact from the county commissioner to a board member on the situation with the Lely High School students driving through their might be an avenue, and let it bleed down to the principal. COMMISSIONER FIALA: That's a great idea, and I can get a Page 40 February 5, 2002 board member as well as the principal, a couple of people that he would want to be involved and a couple of people from Lely to discuss the problem. Sometimes people aren't really aware of how terrible the problem is. And let's see what we can do together. I'll start on that tomorrow. Thanks for bringing that up. MR. FISHER: Bob Fisher, I'm from the Falcon's Glen section in the Lely Resort. About mid December I had the experience -- I happened to be coming about 20 after 2:00 across Wildflower Way when they were emptying out of Lely High School. My observation would be about half the kids go over towards St. Andrews and the other half towards Lely Resort Boulevard. They were very frustrated with me because I was going the speed limit, 30 miles an hour. So by the time I hit Lely Resort Boulevard there was probably 15 of them backed up behind me, except for the one that came out and actually passed me and about eight other cars, okay? Didn't stop when he hit Lely Resort Boulevard going around two wheels and headed out to 41. When I got there, I turned out, and I figure they're going to want to pass me, and I have to make the second cut through to get into Falcon's Glen. So I pulled out as quick as I could and got in the left- hand lane. Well, they passed me on the right-hand side like I was standing still. You know, I was going 35 miles an hour, and I mean -- I would estimate that some of these kids were doing 70, 80 miles an hour by the time they hit 41. I had been hearing this from several of our residents who had almost got hit previously trying to come out Falcon's Glen and had to kind of nose out so you could see over the shrubbery to be able to make an exit and almost got clipped by these kids coming out 70, 80 miles an hour. Ken talked about the various accidents that have occurred, and I talked to one of the kids, and he admitted to me he Page 41 February 5, 2002 was drag racing with another kid, and the other kid had the right-hand lane, he had the left lane, and when he got up towards the horses he lost control. So I called the Sheriffs Department, was directed to the organization that goes out and does radar traps around the area. They promised me that they would take some action. I did get a message from the lieutenant involved actually yesterday. He promised me some feedback. They have run two radar traps on Lely Resort Boulevard, have handed out quite a number of tickets. His message said we realize we have a very serious problem and he's looking at whatever steps they need to take to try to solve the problem. Interestingly, the gentleman from the Sheriffs Department -- there was an accident on 951. The young girl was killed a few days ago. The car she was in happens to be one of the cars I saw the day that they were speeding by me. She was one of the kids in that car back in December. So, you know, that's why I told the lieutenant when I talked to him, I said, "Some of these kids are going to kill themselves." It's a shame. You don't want to see them kill themselves, and you don't want to see them kill our residents either. I think we have a very serious problem. I'd be very happy to stay involved. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Thanks, Bob. I'll ask you to be on that committee as well. And Dudley from Lely Estates has called me on numerous occasions to tell me of the speeding problems, as well as Naples Manor. So we do have the problem. I already have your name down. MR. CHISM: I have something else. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Okay. MR. CHISM: We recognize the problem, especially this and some of our people have clocked races down there at 70, 80 miles an hour from the kids, and we are currently working with Joe Cheatum, Dr. Benson, and Lisa to put in -- when they put in a new road, which Page 42 February 5, 2002 is approximately 400 feet down from the old road, then I've asked to put in a speed calmer just before they get into that road. Two purposes. One, to slow the traffic down so they don't rear-end the truck that's turning into the wastewater treatment plant. And secondly, to slow the traffic down on Wildflower Way. That's only one speed calmer that we've asked for. I think -- with the comments tonight, I think you really ought to take a look at putting more speed -calmers on Wildflower Way. The Lely traffic is horrendous. They use it as raceways, and we've already had one person killed, and to protect themselves -- it's no sense going to the principal and taking their driver's license away. The only thing you're going to do is put something out there to deter them. The only way you're going to deter them is to put speed bumps in, so I highly recommend that we do that. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I think we are going to have the parents coming to us and telling us to take them out because it's tearing up their vehicle. They're going over them too fast. And enforcement is where we need to be with this issue. The school needs to get tough with them. The law enforcement needs to get tough with them. They're going to go fast. They're teenagers. I went to that school. I remember when I had the vehicle tearing out. Well, Lely didn't have a road. Kids will be kids, so if they lose their privileges -- MR. CHISM: We had fifteen of them put in on St. Andrews Boulevard. CHAIRMAN COLETTA: May I make a suggestion? Usually your best answer with something like this, enforcement is one way. The other way is education. When we get the Sheriff's Department to get the juniors and seniors together in the auditorium for a briefing that the problem exists, possibly a couple of concerned residents in the community can go there. We might be dealing with young Page 43 February 5, 2002 people, but they're still members of the community. I think if we can educate them and make them aware of the results of their actions, we might be able to temper their direction. I don't know if law enforcement will be continuous. Possibly something like that with a couple members of the community. Do you think Don might be receptive to that? MR. ANDERSON: Our youth deputies do place a lot of emphasis on traffic safe driving. They do quite a few educational programs there. I recall back in 1982 we had a speeding problem on Cougar Drive between the school and Airport Road. I don't know exactly how long, but the deputies back then -- I wasn't one -- I was a student, but they put a radar on that small piece of roadway. I have to agree with Commissioner Henning. We definitely try to educate. We don't condone reckless driving. If someone has a taillight out, let's be safe but-- however, if we have someone driving in a manner that's going t° cause an accident or to the point that they're not being safe, they're going to get a citation. We don't pedal softly with anyone. And traffic is an issue throughout the county here; it's not just about Lely. For years one of our big traffic problem areas was Lakewood Boulevard. Commissioner Fiala is aware of that. They did go to traffic calming devices and I can honestly tell you, after being in East Naples District coming up on 19 years, I've noticed a definite decline as with the section of Lely. Now, we see the calls between Warren Street and U.S. 41, and we started getting complaints concerning Augusta Boulevard. There is no speed bumps. There is one portion where you come to a pond at the clubhouse, and I recall where unfortunately a young man stopped before. The only other action he had was the plants that slowed him. Fortunately no one was hurt, but we work -- and like I said, we're well aware of Wildflower. We're well aware of St. Andrews. We'll continue as an Page 44 February 5, 2002 agency throughout the county to provide enforcement but, again, I definitely have to agree with Commissioner Henning, these young people -- you know, hopefully, they learn when they get a ticket. Unfortunately, that's not the case. We see two, three tickets, suspend the driver's license. Ultimately their parents are responsible for the actions they commit. Once they get a driver's license, the parents need to monitor and be aware of that. Naturally, they're not going to be aware of when a child gets a ticket or gets pulled over in every circumstance, but they should be aware that they're getting citations. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Thanks, Scott. I appreciate that. Fred, did you have something to add? COMMISSIONER COYLE: Yes, I did. I think educational programs for teenage drivers are wonderful, but I think they're absolutely useless. It's difficult to tell a teenager that you're going kill yourself or somebody else and expect them to pay attention to you. The other problem is, as long as there's a large number of them speeding along these streets, they're not going to be too concerned about being the one singled out. They probably think they can get away with it; somebody else will get caught. I'm convinced the only solution to a problem such as this is continuous and vigorous enforcement. I understand you cannot put somebody there 24 hours a day, but the time this occurs is a relatively short period of time. We know exactly when they're coming down the street. It seems to me that we could put people out there to give tickets. And absent that, as Commissioner Fiala brought up earlier, there are volunteers that the Sheriff's Department uses to write down the tags of vehicles that are observed violating the law and report them to the Sheriff's Department. That then can be turned over to the parents and the school principal, if necessary so that we have -- not only certified officers who can write the speeding tickets, we have Page 45 February 5, 2002 volunteers who can take down the names of the repeat offenders, and those people can be out there for a considerable period of time each day and, of course, trying the control devices. There have been instances where traffic control devices have been installed and because the teenagers do not slow down they actually result in an accident. That's one consideration. The fact of the matter is that with speed control devices they cause less difficulty if you go across them 50 miles an hour than if you go across them 3 5 or 40. So I wouldn't rule out speed control devices. I think it would be a good idea to proceed with them but understand there are some complications, but I'm convinced you'll never solve this problem without vigorous enforcement and sustained enforcement every single day until it stops. And I believe we probably have the resources to do that, particularly with some volunteers. I think if the parents understand that their teenagers are doing something, at least we have another level of authority to try to get some control over these. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Thank you, Commissioner Coyle. I agree and I'm going to form this little task force, and I bet we can cover those points. Yes, sir. A VOICE: The method of going through a bridge today is a little thing you put on the window, you pass through the gate. Right then you have assistance like that where cars coming along at a speed and a picture is taken at a spot where a video is wired in the road and the picture taken of the license plate and live with that. CHAIRMAN COLETTA: I can answer that for you. We just had a workshop on that. The problem is there's a couple things. One is Florida statutes don't allow for it. The other one is the fact that the picture taken is usually the front of the car, and there is no license plate in the front of the vehicles, so that raises a little bit of a Page 46 February 5, 2002 problem. But I believe that the idea of the volunteers out there -- it takes about two hours' worth of training to teach them, and they write out the warnings, and the warnings might not have a tremendous effect. The letter would go out to the home of the license offender, tell them that a warning was given. The thing is, if they're stopped and they pull up their record, it will be very unlikely they will give them another warning. They will issue them a ticket at that time. explained to us today at the workshops. Those do work. COMMISSIONER FIALA: They do work. COMMISSION CARTER: The reporter is out of paper. We can give her a break. COMMISSIONER FIALA: We'll give her a couple of minutes here. COMMISSIONER HENNING: I think we are all done. COMMISSIONER FIALA: I think we can take any more questions. I can't ask you to give any questions. Our reporter is done. We'll stop. (A break was taken.) COMMISSIONER FIALA: Thank you. I see several hands raised. Okay, I'll get you first. A VOICE: The point I'm trying to make is another special safety concern on U.S. 41 right in front of Whistler's Cove Apartments, people tend to cross from the apartments to the 7-Eleven. I was coming home one night, it was dark, one adult, two children, and a dog trying to cross in the dark. I did not see these people until the dog jumped and somebody reached for the dog. My peripheral vision caught the movement. Otherwise there could have been an accident. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Thank you for mentioning that. I've had a couple letters three, four letters already on this same That was Page 47 February 5, 2002 particular area. In fact, we went to the FDOT with that one because that, of course, is their roadway and asked for better lighting. Let's see, Norm Feder, are you still here? MR. FEDER: Yes, I am. COMMISSIONER FIALA: I sent you. I copied you on that. If you'd like to respond to this, please. CHAIRMAN COLETTA: If I may add, you people are very lucky to have Fiala as your Commissioner. (Applause.) CHAIRMAN COLETTA: The woman is ruthless. She brought home the bacon everytime. We feel like we're being denied, but how can we say no to Donna? COMMISSIONER FIALA: Isn't he something else? Do you have any comments before we close Commissioner Coyle? Anything you'd like to add, Commissioner Coyle? COMMISSIONER COYLE: (Shaking head.) COMMISSIONER FIALA: And Commissioner Carter? COMMISSIONER CARTER: No, ma'am. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Okay, fine. Jim Mudd. MR. MUDD: It's adjourned. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Meeting is adjourned. Page 48 February 5, 2002 There being no further business for the good of the County, the workshop was adjourned by order of the Chairman at 8:58 p.m. BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS BOARD OF ZONING APPEAL/EX OFFICIO GOVERNING BOARD(S) OF SPECIAL DISTRICTS UNDER ITS CONTROL ~~~A FIALAf~RMAN Attest.,as, to ' AT,ES'T: . DWr,9 BROCK, CLE~ ~hdse minUtes ~proved by the Board on presented / or as co~ected . TRANSCRIPT PREPARED ON BEHALF OF DONOVAN COURT REPORTING, INC., BY CATHERINE A. FROMMER, NOTARY PUBLIC. Page 49