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BCC Minutes 09/18/2003 B (Budget)September 18, 2003 TRANSCRIPT OF THE BUDGET MEETING OF THE COLLIER COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS Naples, Florida, September 18, 2003 LET IT BE REMEMBERED, that the Board of Commissioners, in and for the County of Collier, having conducted business herein, met on this date at 5:05 p.m. in SPECIAL SESSION in Building "F" of the Government Complex, East Naples, Florida, with the following members present: CHAIRMAN: TOM HENNING JIM COLETTA DONNA FIALA FRANK HALAS FRED COYLE ALSO PRESENT: Mike Pettit, Assistant County Attorney Jim Mudd, County Manager Page 1 COLLIER COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMblISSIONERS AGENDA Thursday, September ;.8, 2003 5:05 p.m. NOTICr_: ALL PERSONS WISHING TO SPEAK 'ON ANY AGENT)A ITEM MUST REGISTER PR/OR TO SPEz-LKING. ANY PERSON WHO DECIDES TO APPEAL A DECISION OF THIS BOARD WILL '.NEED A RECORD OF THE PROCEDINGS PERTAINING THERETO, ANT) THEREFORE MAY NEED TO ENSURE T HAT A VERBATIM RECORD O F T HE P ROCEED1NGS IS MADE, WHICH RECORD INCLUDES TESTIMONY AND EVIDENCE U'PON WHICH THE APPEAL IS TO BE BASED. ALL REGISTERED PUBLIC SPEAKERS WILL BE FIVE (5) MINUTES U,LN'LESS PERMISSION FOR TIME IS G1L&NTED BY THE CHAIRMAN. LDdlTED TO ADDITIONAL 1. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE 2. ADVERTISED PUBIJC HEARING- BCC FY 2003-04 Budget. A. Discussion of' FY 04 Millage Rates and Increases over the Rolled Back Rates B. Discussion of' Further Amendments to the Tentative Budget C. Budget Discussion Items: · Airport Authority Budget Changes o Sell County Airplane o Other Revenue/Expense Changes o Grant Writer Position Available UTR Balances: o General Fund - $1,578.600 o MSTD General Fund- $307,200 D. Public Comments and Questions E. Resolution to Amend the Tentative Budgets F. Public Reading of the Taxing Authority Lewing Millage, the Name of the Taxing Authority, the Rolled-Back Rate, the Percentage Increase, and the Millage Rate to be Levied · .:.-H. Resolution to Adopt the Final Budget by.Fun{t~ - 3. ADJOURN. September 18, 2003 CHAIRMAN HENNING: Would everybody take their seats. We're going to have the pledge of allegiance, and who's going to lead us in that is Dr. Richard Woodruff. And following that, we're going to have a short presentation, and then we're going to open up the meeting. Dr. Woodruff. (The pledge of allegiance was said.) Item # 1 PRESENTATION OF CHECKS FROM U.S. HOME FOR HERITAGE BAY FOR PREPAYMENT OF PARK IMPACT FEES, SCHOOL IMPACT FEES, AND A PURE DONATION TO ASSIST THE COUNTY WITH ADDITIONAL PARKS AND RECREATION IMPROVFJMFJNTS - PRESENTED MR. WOODRUFF: Good evening, Mr. Chairman and members of the Collier County Board. We would like to ask if the Chairman would come down for a presentation. I'd like to have Mr. Anderson and Mike Cunicon (phonetic) of U.S. Home also join me. In July of 2003, the Board of County Commissioners gave approval of a planned unit development DRI for U.S. Home, and that was called Heritage Bay. At the time the Board approved that development of regional impact, there was a commitment on behalf of the developer to make prepayment of impact fees for certain items to the county government. Today it is our pleasure and indeed our privilege to come to present the Board of County Commissioners with $2.8 million in prepayment of park impact fees; also a check for $717,000, which is a pure donation to assist the county as they do additional parks and recreation improvements. We also have -- there's the third check. We also have a third check, which is a Page 2 September 18, 2003 prepayment of school impact fees. Because the county collects those impact fees for the school board, tonight we also make a prepayment of $1.7 million to the school board for prepayment. As you will also recall, there is a requirement for us to make prepayment regarding road impact fees. That is a five million dollar prepayment, which will occur at the time you have issued a notice to proceed on certain improvements on Immokalee Road. Mr. Chairman, we recognize you may have difficulty getting those three checks through the Brinks or armored car service, so at this time I would like to ask your County Manager Mr. Mudd to step forward and receive the smaller versions, which may be easier to process. Colonel? Thank you very much. Mr. Chairman, on behalf of U.S. Home, we thank you for your and the Board's courtesies. Thank you very much. Item #2A DISCUSSION OF FY 04 MILLAGE RATES AND INCREASES OVFjR THF. ROIJJF. D FIACK RATFJS- DISCIISSED CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay, I call the final budget hearing of 2003-2004, the date being September 18th, 2003, to order. County Manager? MR. MUDD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This is our second meeting. If anyone in the public in attendance would like to sign up to speak, there are sign-up slips right outside the room on a table that's on the hallway. And Sue Filson, sitting next to Mike Pettit that's talking to that person right now. Sue, if you could raise your hand. If you could turn those slips in to Ms. Filson, she will put you on the list of people that would like to speak this evening. Mr. Chairman, without further ado, I'd like to turn this over to Page 3 September 18, 2003 Mr. Mike Smykowski, our Office of Management and Budget Director. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Thank you, Mr. Mudd, and welcome, Commissioners. We're going to move right into the public hearing. Item 2(A), in accordance with Florida Statute, the first substantive issue to be discussed at the budget public hearing are the proposed FY '04 millage rates and the increase over the rolled back rates. With that, if you'd turn to page -- Item 2(A), Page 1, there's a list of the proposed tax rates. The general fund proposed is a 10.3 percent increase over the rolled back rate. It is the same tax rate as that levied in fiscal year '03, 3.8772 mills. And the principal uses of the additional ad valorem money to be collected is direct general fund support of roads of $7.8 million, a $10.2 million reserve for future road construction, and an increase in funding for the sheriff of $10.2 million. The second fund is the water pollution control fund. The proposed millage is .0347. That again is the same tax rate as that levied in fiscal year '03. That is a 10.2 percent increase over the rolled back rate. And that is due to a decrease in fund balance within the pollution control fund. The unincorporated area general fund is also the same tax rate as that levied in FY '03, it's .8069 mills. That's a 10.9 percent increase over the rolled back rate. And the principal funding increases are for landscaping projects and maintenance, as well as a decrease in fund balance. The Golden Gate Community Center proposed tax levy is .2596, an increase of 2.1 percent above the rolled back rate. That amounts to a $29,000 increase in the tax levy. And that will fund exterior painting of the original Golden Gate Community Center building, and a remodeling of the lobby in the initial -- initial community center building itself. Page 4 September 18, 2003 Naples Park drainage, the proposed tax levy is .0062 mills. There was no levy in fiscal year '03. It's a $5,100 levy for maintenance of a storm water system within Naples Park. Pine Ridge Industrial Park is .0562 mills, an increase over the rolled back rate of 22.2 percent. While that is a large percentage increase, it amounts to a $4,800 increase in the tax levy, funding maintenance within the Industrial Park boundaries. Victoria Park drainage, the proposed levy is. 197 mills. It's an increase of 22.6 percent over the rolled back rate. That is a $900 increase in the tax levy, or accumulating funds for replacement of an auxiliary gas engine that is used for the storm water pumping within that MSTU. Golden Gate Parkway beautification MSTU is a constant half mill levy, as per the citizen advisory committee, and that is used for median improvements. That is a 15.3 percent increase over the rolled back rate. Naples Production Park maintenance is .0129 mills, that's a decrease of 38.3 percent below the rolled back rate. And this is a by-product of our effort to consolidate funds. There was some residual cash available in the initial Naples Production Park Project fund. We've transferred that residual cash and then we'll be collapsing that construction fund upon completion. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Excuse me one second. I didn't mean to interrupt you. Could we possibly put it on the visualizer for the rest of the audience to see, the sheet we're working from? MR. MUDD: We're going to try. No, you can't do that. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Leo's not here to do the technical stuff?. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Good work. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Commissioner Coletta would like to retract his request. Page 5 September 18, 2003 CHAIRMAN HENNING: Please continue. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Vanderbilt Beach MSTU is a half mill. That is a decrease of 34.4 percent below the rolled back rate. That is a constant levy for improvements, future improvements, as recommended by the advisory committee and prioritizing the master plan that is being developed currently within that MSTU. The Isle of Capri Fire MSTU levies a constant 1.5 mills. That's 13 percent above the rolled back rate. Again, a constant levy, as per the advisory committee, to provide adequate reserves and funding of the operational costs within this district. Ochopee Fire Control is a four mill tax levy, an increase of 15.6 percent above the rolled back rate. That is a constant levy for fire control within the rural area of Collier County. Collier County Fire millage is two mills. It's a nine percent increase above the rolled back rate. That again is a constant levy for homes that are outside the direct boundaries of a dependent or independent fire service provider. The Goodland/Horr's Island Fire MSTU is a proposed levy of .5614 mills. That's a 2.3 percent increase above the rolled back rate. That overall amounts to a $2,500 increase in the tax levy for fire protection provided by the City of Marco Island via contract for the Goodland and Horr's Island residents. Radio Road beautification is a half mill tax levy. It's a 9.6 percent increase above the rolled back rate. That is a constant levy as per the advisory committee for median improvements within that -- boundaries of that MSTU. Sabal Palm Roadway, there is no proposed tax levy. Lely Gulf Estates beautification is a proposed two mill levy. It's a 10 percent increase above the rolled back rate. That's a constant levy as recommended again by the citizen advisory committee. And the principal use is to improve the main entranceway on St. Andrew's Boulevard. Page 6 SePtember 18, 2003 Hawks Ridge stormwater pumping MSTU is .0309 mills, an eight percent increase above the rolled back rate. That's a $200 increase in the tax levy due to a decrease in the available fund balance. Forest Lakes roadway and drainage is a three mill tax levy, 13 percent above the rolled back rate. That's a constant levy as per the citizen advisory committee. They're increasing reserves for future improvements to implement the master plan that is currently being developed. Wilson-Miller I believe is the contractor there, and they're working with the citizen advisory committee to develop the priorities for future expenditures. Immokalee beautification MSTU is a one mill levy, 5.3 percent increase above the rolled back rate. Again, a constant levy. Proposed improvements include sidewalks, as well as landscaping on Roadway 846 south to the airport. Bayshore Avalon beautification is a two mill tax levy, 11.8 percent increase above the rolled back rate. The principal improvement to be completed in fiscal year '04. And the remaining component of that project are the bridge improvements on Bayshore Drive. And that's been a very successful project and has made a major impact, I think, in that area. Livingston Road, Phase II MSTU is a. 1231 mill tax levy. There was no levy in fiscal year '03. And that's -- we're collecting money for the balance due to repay the advance for the decorative street lighting within the boundaries of that MSTU. The Conservation Collier is a quarter mill tax levy. There was no levy in fiscal year '03. That was a voter-approved referendum to acquire environmentally sensitive land in Collier County. Parks GOB debt service, there is no proposed levy. It's a decrease of 100 percent below the rolled back rate. That was a -- the debt was retired in fiscal year '03. That was a 20-year bond issue that was used to construct the five community parks in Collier County. Page 7 September 18, 2003 Isle of Capri Municipal Rescue debt service, there is no tax levy and there was not in FY '03. Collier County Lighting is a. 1464 mill tax levy, 8.8 percent increase above the rolled back rate. The increased debt MSTU continues to grow in terms of the volume of streetlights that are being continually added within the boundaries of that district, so obviously we're budgeting for the additional electricity and the installation of the street lights. Naples Production Park street lighting, there is no proposed tax levy. That's a decrease of 100 percent below the rolled back rate. Again, one of the fruits of our fund consolidation effort, the Naples Production Park street lighting fund was consolidated into the Collier County Lighting District in the past year. Finally, the Pelican Bay MSTBU, the proposed tax levy is .1337 mills, a decrease of 18.8 percent below the rolled back rates. Available fund balance will offset the millage required for a total aggregate millage rate of 4.7994 mills, an increase of 16.25 percent above the rolled back rate. That concludes Item 2(A). Item #2B DISCUSSION OF FURTHER AMENDMENTS TO THE TENTATIVE lql IDGET - DISCI JSSED Item 2(B), discussion of further amendments -- CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Coyle? COMMISSIONER COYLE: I just want to make sure that we explain what this really means. The millage rate is the same this year as it was last year for people's property. We didn't change millage rates. But you're showing an aggregate change in millage rates, which is resulting from the special taxing districts where those Page 8 September 18, 2003 districts themselves decided to set their taxing level. So I don't want there to be any confusion that because there's an aggregate increase in the millage rate that it reflects a change made by the Board of County Commissioners concerning the ad valorem property tax rate, right? MR. SMYKOWSKI: That is correct. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Okay, there is no change in the tax rate for ad valorem property taxes this year. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Except for the -- MR. SMYKOWSKI: The new tax for the Conservation Collier, that was the quarter of a mill. But obviously that was by voter referendum, so that was the will of the people speaking in that instance. COMMISSIONER COYLE: This gets very confusing, because it leaves people with the impression that we've somehow increased the tax rate, and that really isn't the case. MR. SMYKOWSKI: No, and in fact with the Save Our Home cap for homesteaded properties, with the tax rate staying the same and the school board tax levy decreasing, and I believe the mosquito control decreased slightly as well, most folks with homestead should see little to no increase in their ad valorem property tax bill when compared to the previous year. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Good, thank you. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Thank you for that clarification. Further amendments, Item 2(B), the principal changes involve a few things: The general fund change, we adjusted reserves to reflect additional revenue sharing. And there was a reduction in budgeted tax collector fees. The county is required to pay the tax collector fees, not only for the county taxes levied but for the municipalities and the school board. We had assumed, because we're setting our millage rates and budgets back in July, that a worst case scenario was everyone would levy the same tax rate as the previous year. With the Page 9 September 18, 2003 school board levying less than the levy in FY '03, the tax collector fees are reduced accordingly. So we sharpened our pencils, took a look and analyzed that based on what tax levies are actually being proposed by both the municipalities and the school board. And as a result, we were able to reduce the budgeted tax collector fees on the ad valorem tax levied by over $400,000. So that was a change obviously we wanted to make as we headed into the public hearing. The principal other changes in the MSTD general fund, there's a point of sales system in parks and recreation that was budgeted that would not be under contract by the end of the year, so we're simply rebudgeting that. As well a final component of unobligated funds to complete the community development expansion. The board has also approved in the intermittent period some grants in natural resources. These were approved via executive summary at previous board meetings. Accepting grant funds for exotics removal and emergency. management grants, that totals about $65,000. The balance of the changes involve simply updating capital project forecasts to reflect what will actually be under contract by the end of the fiscal year. Item #2C BUDGET DISCUSSION ITEMS: AIRPORT AUTHORITY BUDGET CHANGES- 1. SELL COUNTY AIRPLANE 2. OTHER REVENUE/EXPENSE CHANGES 3. GRANT WRITER POSITION; AVAILABLE UFR BALANCES- 1. GENERAL FUND $1,578,600 2. MSTD GENERAL FUND $307,200- DISCI ~SSF, D That would bring us to Item 2(C), a budget discussion item as a follow-up to our first public hearing. The airport authority had submitted some proposed budget changes. We have those set up on Page 10 September 18, 2003 the visualizer for you to walk through. And I believe we have some representation from the airport authority here, as well. I know I saw Mr. Schmidt. Ultimately what these proposed changes would do, though, is decrease the general fund transfer to the airport authority operations by $63,400. We did want you to understand that that includes the sale of the Cessna airplane that is currently owned ultimately by Collier County, but it is used primarily by the airport authority. They've also taken a reevaluation of the proposed rental income and have made adjustments of $18,300. A portion of that money they would like to allocate for contractual services for a PUD at the Immokalee Regional Airport. But again, the net impact would be a reduction of your general fund transfer by $63,400 for the upcoming year. But it doesn't involve the sale of the airplane, one, and just recognize that obviously that is a one-time revenue source, reducing the transfer in '04 that would not be available in '05. I just want you to be obviously aware of that fact. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Questions by the members? Commissioner Coletta? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Right. In an earlier conversation with Mr. Schmidt from the airport authority, I was wondering if he might be able to come up to the Mic. He was pointing out the fact that the market for used airplanes at this point in time is quite soft, and he had an alternative he wanted to offer, I believe. MR. SCHMIDT: Thank you. For the record, Gene Schmidt, the Executive Director of the Collier County Airport Authority. First I would like to say that we did not request that these items be put on the agenda, so this was not a request from the airport authority. With regard to the airplane, I'm sorry, I missed part of the question. Page 11 September 18, 2003 COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Sir, it was a statement you made to me earlier, and I thought you might want to take the time to get it on the record, about the value of the airplane as far as the market goes, the present day market being soft and another alternative you had to generate revenue from that aircraft. MR. SCHMIDT: Yes, we did put the airplane on the market. We found that it was a pretty soft market, and we have reached an agreement with the EMS. EMS is going to be using the aircraft for their proficiency checks and for their recurrent training. And as a result, why, we'll be sharing that aircraft with them until such time as it's sold. The arrangement agrees to let the EMS organization pay for the maintenance on the airplane, and from time to time it will be housed at their facility. For the most part it will be at our airport. And I intend to reevaluate the sale of the airplane and to readvertise it. But in the meantime, why, we are reducing the cost on it until we have it sold. By -- with this arrangement with EMS. CHAIRMAN HENNING: That's news to me. I don't know if any of the other Commissioners heard from EMS that they wish to do that. County Manager, have you heard anything like that? MR. MUDD: No, sir, not at this time. CHAIRMAN HENNING: I don't know if that's really on the table at this time. What -- have you had any interest in the plane? MR. SCHMIDT: We have not. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay. And I don't know where you sell airplanes-- MR. SCHMIDT: You sell airplanes the way -- much the way that you sell other things. You advertise it. And we did advertise it, but not nationwide. And so when I continue with the sale of the aircraft, or trying to sell the airplane, we will advertise it nationwide Page 12 September 18, 2003 and we'll certainly investigate that. But for the time being, until the marketplace improves somewhat, we felt that this was a reasonable arrangement to have with EMS. And it's helping to reduce our costs. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: If I may, would you explain what EMS uses it for and how that would be a benefit to the county? MR. SCHMIDT: Yes. The EMS, as you know, flies a helicopter. And all of their pilots are cross qualified, both with helicopters and fixed wing aircraft. They have found that it's much cheaper for them to do -- much less expensive, I should say, to do their recurrent training and their proficiency checks in a fixed wing airplane than it is in that expensive helicopter. And so for that reason that's the primary reason for them wanting to use it for their training. But they may also find other reasons for using it, I'm not sure. But they certainly have an opportunity to use the airplane for other purposes which I'm not aware of. Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Halas? COMMISSIONER HALAS: In regards to the EMS using this aircraft, what do you anticipate? Do you have any figures of what the airport commission would receive in regards to benefits when it comes to maintenance of the aircraft that you say the EMS is going to pick up? And do you have a contract in hand, or is it just that the talks are in the preliminary stage? MR. SCHMIDT: We do not have a written contract. We have a verbal contract -- a verbal agreement at this time. We know that there has been some monies that have been spent to do some minor repairs on the airplane, and that's about all I can tell you about it right now. COMMISSIONER HALAS: And when would you have some additional facts on if this is going to be a full-fledged contract with EMS or the other alternative is when are we going to sell the aircraft? MR. SCHMIDT: That is a good question, and my intentions are Page 13 September 18, 2003 to pursue the selling of the aircraft and to advertise it. I'm going to be looking to some friends of mine who have more knowledge in the selling of aircraft and brokering of aircraft. And they said that they would advise me when they thought that it was a good time to advertise it nationwide. COMMISSIONER HALAS: And the last question I have, if you do come in agreement with the EMS, will our hands be tied in regards that we won't be able to sell the aircraft? MR. SCHMIDT: Not at all. COMMISSIONER HALAS: They understand the stipulations that they can use that for check-out or whatever else they need to do but at the time that it comes where we have a buyer for the aircraft, that contract ceases; is that correct? MR. SCHMIDT: Yes, that's correct. And we have discussed that and they understand that. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Okay. Thank you. CHAIRMAN HENNING: I think it's appropriate to hear from our staff members on this. And in my perspective, I think we ought to clean the mats up, polish the outside of it, throw one of those stinky things in there and put a For Sale sign on it. Commissioner Coyle? COMMISSIONER HALAS: I think that's what they've done. MR. SCHMIDT: Maybe you could tell me where I could find one of those stinky things? CHAIRMAN HENNING: 7-Eleven. COMMISSIONER COYLE: EMS has lots of them. Gene, just my perspective on some of this for your consideration. Trade-A-Plane is a real good place to put a small, single engine aircraft, it gets nationwide, worldwide circulation at relatively low cost. But you're absolutely right about the market, it's very soft. But I would suggest that somebody really take a look at the cost of holding Page 14 September 18, 2003 the aircraft and waiting for the market to turn around. That might be counterproductive, because I think whatever increase in cost -- or price you might be able to get by waiting will be more than eaten up, I suspect, by the cost of annual inspections, maintenance and insurance costs. The other thing, I'm a little surprised, that -- and you know more about this being an airline pilot, but I'm a little surprised that the EMS people can actually meet currency requirements in a fixed wing aircraft if they must fly a helicopter. MR. SCHMIDT: Yes, I was surprised at that also. But that is the FARs, that's the federal air regulations, and they're allowed to do that. And it works. It's mostly instrument training, and as you know -- you're a pilot, you know that instrument training in a helicopter or in an airplane, the instruments read the same. So they're able to do this recurrency training, and apparently it's quite a saving for them. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Really? That's surprising. I'm glad they can do that. There's a big difference in flying the two, as you know. But nevertheless. MR. SCHMIDT: By the way, I do agree with you that Trade-A-Plane and some of these other areas are certainly the places that I should be advertising, and I intend to do that on a nationwide basis. And I also agree with you that we can't wait forever for a soft market. I will be pursuing that. CHAIRMAN HENNING: What was the next change? MR. MUDD: The next item, I think Mike pretty much hit their budget. The last piece, the last bullet came up about grant writer position, and the Board asked to go back to our grant coordinator and see if Marlene Foord could take that additional duty on. She's basically coordinating with everybody's grants within Collier County. She can help them, but in no way, shape or form can she take on that total position's responsibility. Page 15 September 18, 2003 CHAIRMAN HENNING: And I didn't see enough support on the Board to do that. So thanks for the information. MR. MUDD: Yes, sir. The next item is available unfinanced requirement balances. Mike, you have sheets on this? MR. SCHMIDT: You're all through? CHAIRMAN HENNING: Yes, thank you. Is there any speakers? Do we have any speakers on the airport authority? MS. FILSON: No, sir. MR. MUDD: Commissioner, on the slide that you see on -- on the overhead that's there, there's a -- and this is -- these are the last two pages in the handout that we have for the folks that came to this meeting this evening. There's 1.5 -- there's $1,578,600 that is an available balance out of the general fund that we can put into reserves or you can allocate to additional unfinanced requirement type items. You'll notice at the bottom of the page that I took a look at what was there. It says staffs recommendation. What I did is took a look at what we could justify to be paid out of the general fund for landscape maintenance -- or excuse me, the landscape beautification plan, and talked to transportation and our representatives, and we came to the agreement that we could fund $500,000 legitimately out of the general fund against items that were in the plan for the first year that Ms. Flagg had presented to the board in May. And those basically, it would be work that would be on those arterial roads that are basically gateways ways into Collier County from 1-75. We talked at the budget workshop about $600,000 that we thought we could find in tourist development revenues from previous years and carry that money forward that was unspent. Staff did research, worked with the clerk, worked with Michael to try to find those dollars, even though the books said it was open, when we went Page 16 September 18, 2003 to look, the accounts had been rolled into the general fund reserves years ago. So those dollars were basically ghosts. They were there, but somebody didn't cross them out or zero the account out. We believe, and I asked Mr. Dunnuck to take a look at the museum account, because it's about $300,000 less than it was last year. As you know our museum is funded out of tourist development revenues. There are some capital projects out at Roberts Ranch and whatnot that they've got ongoing that they would have to put on hold for a year or so if we didn't try to bring some dollars into their account to try to keep these projects rolling, or significantly cut down on the hours of operation at the museum and other museum annexes that we have throughout the county. So we put $200,000 there. And I think the beach parking estimate that's in Mr. Dunnuck's budget is about $100,000 short of what it's really going to turn out to be. So that's what that $100,000 -- if the board went with the staffs recommendation, there would be still $778,600 that would still be unallocated to particular projects. Mike, if you could go to 111. In the 111 account, the Board had previously allocated $1.3 million, and you'll see the landscaping amounts for transportation and for the Immokalee Road-- the Immokalee Road initiative and the Golden Gate community character plan. That left about 300,000 -- $307,200 left over. If the Board saw fit, the thing the staff recommended would be to try to increase the median landscaping by $300,000. And that's the staffs recommendation at the bottom of the page, leaving $7,200. I just wanted to put that down and let you see it before we started public comments. Because public comment normally talks about monies and where it needs to go or cuts or whatever or additional items, and I wanted you to have a look at that before they started so you'd have a point that you could start from. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Question. The landscaping master Page 17 September 18, 2003 plan, does that mean that it's funded fully? MR. MUDD: No, sir. The landscaping master plan that was laid out had a outlay of $2.9 million, of which at the workshop the Board only allocated $1.1 million toward it. So it wasn't funded completely to the tune of about $1.8 million as a deficit or a difference between the amount that the plan needed for the first year and what was allocated out of the unincorporated general fund at the workshop. CHAIRMAN HENNING: So it's short 1.8 million? MR. MUDD: Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Coyle, Commissioner Halas. COMMISSIONER COYLE: I had understood your presentation to indicate that there was additional money that could be put into that fund for the purpose of perhaps doing some of the landscape projects that were not previously funded. Is that not true? MR. MUDD: Commissioner, what I said was in the staff's recommendation, there was -- if you add what was in the general fund in the unincorporated, that recommendation would be -- the staff is recommending another $800,000 out of the unbudgeted dollars that you have as a difference that you could put into reserves against that particular -- against that particular project. COMMISSIONER COYLE: So that would add another $800,000 to the landscaping budget? MR. MUDD: Yes, sir. And that would bring it from $1.1 million to $1.9 million, still a million dollars short of the planned amount for that particular item. COMMISSIONER COYLE: And what would that mean with respect to Livingston Road landscape? CHAIRMAN HENNING: Ms. Flagg I think could speak on that. MR. MUDD: That would basically bring in -- Mike, if you Page 18 September 18, 2003 could go to the visualizer. Commissioner, that would bring Livingston Road and Airport approximately three miles -- that would bring an amount of about $595,318 into -- coming out of the 111 fund with approximately 200,000 -- $217,000 coming out of the general fund to come up with that. So she'd get about three miles. There would be a difference of about 217 on the amount needed in order to do that full amount, which is the 812 versus the 595. So she -- our transportation department would get it -- get some of that landscaping, based on the plan that I have in front of me. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Halas? COMMISSIONER HALAS: Where does that leave the stretch of Vanderbilt Beach Road? Where does it sit in the process? That would be from U.S. 41 to Airport. Anybody from staff, could they give us some idea where they are in the plan? I see that we have $4,500 there. MS. FLAGG: Diane Flagg, for the record. Your question relates to the budget work sheet you're looking at? COMMISSIONER HALAS: That's correct, on the visualizer. MS. FLAGG: Okay. Just to clarify, your master plan, which is your landscape master plan that you passed in April, is the third column over. Anything that's in the first two columns is work that's already been programmed and/or maintenance cost occurring. So the only column that we're talking about right now is that third column, which is your master plan that you all approved in April. And that master plan amount was 2.908808. COMMISSIONER HALAS: And how did you prioritize the roads that presently have funding into them? Is that basically based on that they're gateway roads; is that the criteria used or -- MS. FLAGG: There is -- we can do it any way that the Board wishes. I can tell you that if you look at Pine Ridge Road East Page 19 September 18, 2003 Gateway, you can use your general fund dollars to fund that fully, if you wish. If you look at your Livingston Road gateway, you can use your general fund dollars to fund that fully. The balance of your master plan projects would need to be funded by 111. COMMISSIONER HALAS: So when do we anticipate to get to some of these other projects that -- this is a five-year project; is that correct? MS. FLAGG: Well, it depends on what the Board decides. If you decide to provide 500,000 in the general fund, an additional 300,000 in 111, then with those funds, if you look at that 500,000, we split out a gateway, and then funded the balance of the cost of Pine Ridge to 111, and then moved Livingston to 111. So you can move these projects around however you wish. You can add funding, you can delete funding. The only thing that I need to point out is that the gateways can be fully funded by general fund, but the balance of the master plan projects will need to be funded by 111. MR. MUDD: Diane, can I -- Ms. Flagg, can I ask a question? The Commissioner asked the program. The program that they approved in May during the workshop was a how many year program? MS. FLAGG: It's a three-year catchup plan. So any of your new roads are already programmed in for the funding. So this is a three-year catchup program, so if you don't fully fund the master plan as approved, then whatever is not funded this year will go to the top of the list next year and on past that. COMMISSIONER HALAS: And so the column that we have zeros in we're looking at within the next two years, most of this is going to be addressed, is that what you're -- MS. FLAGG: Correct. And again, you can move the zeros around. 'In other words, these projects can be moved around by the Board, depending on how much funding you allocate. And then Page 20 September 18, 2003 whatever is not funded according to the master plan will go to the top of the list next year for funding. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Coletta and then Commissioner Fiala. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Ms. Flagg, could you explain me where would Golden Gate Boulevard would be in this? I know the last time we did this when we agreed to the plan we found out we didn't have the funds for yet, it was to be done in the coming year. Where is it now in this plan? MS. FLAGG: Again, this is -- this that you see in front of you, this is not something that you all have seen before. This is just an attempt to show you these are the master plan projects and this is the funding that the Board has approved so far. So if you go with this where you provide 500,000 in the general fund and 300,000 in 111, and you choose to accept these projects as written, then the ones that are zeroed out are Airport Road and Golden Gate Boulevard. So they would go to the top of the list next year. If you choose to change these and/or revise your funding and add more funding, delete funding, then we would change these accordingly. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Is there -- CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Fiala? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I never quite finished, if ! could -- if I may. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay, sorry. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Thank you. I'm a little bit concerned, because the reason that I bought into this originally when we went with this master plan because of what the ranking was for Golden Gate Boulevard. You know, the rural area had nothing going for it, and they were paying into the taxes for it. Now I find that we're asked to take a back seat. And I really don't appreciate it, and I'd like to see what we can do to try to remedy that. Page 21 September 18, 2003 I'm also very concerned about the museum, but I guess we're going to come to that in a few more minutes. CHAIRMAN HENNING: The -- you know, we can move funds around, Commissioner. I think that's what it's all about. If we fund the whole program, then Golden Gate Boulevard comes in, Vanderbilt Beach is not put out as far and so on and so forth. The original plan that we approved is what we've seen at a regular meeting. And that was contingent upon funding. We're not funding the whole program, what's being presented by the direction of the Board of County Commissioners. I'm sorry, Commissioner Fiala. COMMISSIONER FIALA: That's all right, that's all right. You had to finish one subject before I got on to another anyway. That's okay. I wanted to talk to you just a little bit, you have 41 East on here, but from what I understand, the state was giving us money to landscape that, $262,000, from what I remember. It doesn't even need to be on here then. I mean, that's taking away positions for somebody else, right? MS. FLAGG: No, ma'am. The U.S. 41 East, again, that's on your far left column. So that has to do with maintenance. The master plan, the only column we're talking about right now are the projects listed under master plan in your third column. So your third column only is what we're discussing tonight, is that in order to fund the master plan fully, it requires 2.9 million. And you can, if you choose to fund-- do a split funding and fund partial from general fund or your 001 budget, you have 1,395,900 that you can fund out of the general fund, because you can use the general fund to fund Pine Ridge and you can use the general fund to fund Livingston. And then you have 1.5 million in 111, if you choose to fully fund all the projects listed in 111. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Halas, then Page 22 September 18, 2003 Commissioner Coletta. COMMISSIONER HALAS: I guess obviously we're going to put additional funding in here, but may I make a suggestion that maybe we ought to look at how long some of these roads have been completed and haven't had any landscaping, and maybe give them a weighting number so that we have some way of figuring out the best way to administer the extra funds that are coming out so that, in the case of Commissioner Coletta, he's looking for funding on Golden Gate Boulevard. I'm interested in some projects maybe in my area too. So maybe what we ought to do is look at how long these highways have been completed and maybe have that as a weighting number, give it some type of a weighting number with regards to how long it's been completed without any landscaping. Just as a suggestion. CHAIRMAN HENNING: I'm going to have a big problem with that, you start pulling out of district three, Commissioner. Commissioner Coletta? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I think district three is a wonderful place, I drive through it every day. I just -- I like the idea, but I have to agree that we're getting to the point now where we're going to be fighting a little bit of turf fight here. May I make a suggestion that may divide the baby up so we all get one little piece of it? How about if we take this thing and we prorate it out. Instead of trying to do one whole road, we divide it up across the whole spectrum so we each can share in the next couple of years in these things getting done. In other words, every road would get a certain percentage of it done, rather than just go ahead and argue over Livingston Road versus Golden Gate versus Airport versus 41, why don't we go ahead and just take it and divide the -- divide it up so we're doing it proportionately right across the thing, and we'll all share in the eventual outcome in a couple of years, rather than to say that one project is less worthy than another and so Page 23 September 18, 2003 they're moved back a couple of years. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Coyle? COMMISSIONER COYLE: I don't think that's going to result in efficient use of taxpayer money. I can't imagine that we'll take a little bit of money and just throw it at half a dozen or a dozen projects and do part of the irrigation on each project and then stop and then next fiscal year we'll do part of the landscaping and then stop. It would be a very, very inefficient way to proceed with the project. It seems to me that when we let a landscaping contract, or we even perform it ourselves to the extent we can, you're going to have to give somebody a project, an entire project, and you're going to have to bid that and you're going to have to have it done and pay for it. I don't see that you can just parcel out a little bit of money for each road without having enough money to complete any single project. MR. MUDD: Mr. Chairman, if I can help just a little bit. We can come back to the Board at a regular scheduled agenda meeting with the work plan for final approval to get that done. What I wanted to do with this particular item was to show you projects and to show you the allocation at the workshop to let you know, now that we've got all of the tax collector's numbers and what his roll back's going to be for the year, that we're coming back, to make sure that you had the numbers, to let you know, to give you an idea of some things that we could do within the budget, and then to try to -- you have people that want to talk to you about different ideas, listen to all of those folks, figure out how you want to allocate dollars to finish up the budget to approve it. And in this particular case whatever it is we will come back to the Board of County Commissioners and get you to approve the work plan. And we can do that by 14 October, no problem? MS. FLAGG: No problem. MR. MUDD: And then we can talk about which particular projects based on the dollars that you finally allocate. Because right Page 24 September 18, 2003 now we don't have the allocation done, and we have no idea what the public is going to talk to the Board tonight about, as far as items are concerned. And I would just recommend that we hear from them and then we can come back to this particular discussion at the end of the meeting. I think it would speed it up. And I understand, but I will tell you, we don't want to try to decide how we want to dice this up, we'll come back to a Board meeting and let you all see it so you can have some time, because you haven't seen this document before. I just wanted to kind of give you an idea and at least have the staff take the first chop at it to kind of let you know what's out there. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Got it. COMMISSIONER COYLE: It would be a lot easier just to let me have it for Livingston Road, and then you wouldn't have that problem. MR. MUDD: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Actually, I was looking at it for district three, but -- CHAIRMAN HENNING: I'll provide a district three map for you. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Yeah, I'd like to know my way around there. I can't see where to go because of all the vegetation. Item #2D PI llqlJlC COMMENTS AND Ol IESTIONS - PRESENTED sure CHAIRMAN HENNING: Let's go to public speakers and I'm they're going to assist us in trying to get out of this dilemma. Ms. Filson? MS. FILSON: The landscape public speakers? CHAIRMAN HENNING: No, let's -- I know we have some Page 25 September 18, 2003 folks here from -- I see some folks from EDC. Why don't we take those folks. MS. FILSON: Okay, EDC, we have eight speakers. The first one is Jeri Trevisani. She will be followed by Kathleen Adams. MS. TREVISANI: Good evening. For the record, my name is Jeri Trevisani. I am a full-time resident and homeowner in Collier County, and am manager at a senior level with a Fortune Five company that has offices in the United States, including Southwest Florida and 79 other countries. Tonight I am here on behalf of the Chamber of Southwest Florida, a regional group, and I am representing an approvement by the Board of Directors. I believe that you have listened to this talk before by Steve Tirey, who's the president and CEO of this organization. However, so I don't miss anything, I would like to go ahead and read this to you as quickly as I can. I also have copies to leave with you this evening. The Board of Collier County Commissioners has a sound proposal before it that can serve the citizens of Collier County for years to come through the creation of new high-skill, high-wage jobs. Investment funding by county government in Collier bolsters the overall economic development strength of the region by providing new tools to grow and attract higher than average employment to Collier and the region. The approval of an economic stimulus package in the amount of $2 million will provide numerous opportunities for professional advancement and will enhance the overall quality of life for all citizens in the community. The Collier Economic Development Council will leverage these resources for targeted economic diversification and stimulate a year-round economic return to the community by adding producer dollar jobs that strengthen our currently cyclical economy. The payback from this investment may far outweigh the benefits Page 26 September 18, 2003 of investing the same dollars in other areas of development that attract more visitors or more retired and non-wage earner residents. Targeted business growth provides a more balanced and diversified tax base that contributes a continuous net positive flow of financial resources to local government that can be utilized to provide services to area citizens and visitors. Perhaps, although this is not in this statement, to some of the landscaping and other projects that we're talking about. Collier's average annual wages, $30,401, are reported to be below -- CHAIRMAN HENNING: Ma'am, I'm have to ask you to wrap you, please. MS. TREVISANI: Sorry about that. Anyway, we're below the national average. And what we think that we can do through this $2 million, if you should vote to allocate it, is improve our overall living conditions year round. So I'll leave a copy. Sorry I couldn't read faster, but thank you for this opportunity. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Thank you. MS. FILSON: The following speaker is Kathleen Adams. She will be followed by Janet Vasey. MS. ADAMS: My name is Kathleen Adams, I'm vice president of the Village Walk Homeowners Association. In the September issue of the North Naples Journal, County Manager Jim Mudd outlined the current and projected road construction for our county. There were 25 projects listed. Some current, some expected to start within the next three years, and some preconstruction efforts for projects to begin within the next five years. Most are from 951 West. In fact, only two of the projects are for roads east of 951. Due to the number of residences and businesses west of the 951, these road expansions are necessary, even if not always welcome. Even with these expanded roads traffic will be heavy, especially in Page 27 September 18, 2003 season. The last thing we need west of 951 is to attract more businesses to this area. It is my understanding that in June the Board of County Commissioners allocated $2 million to the Economic Development Council to attract businesses to the county with 500,000 of this designated to Immokalee. It would make so much more sense to take half of this $2 million and use it for the area east of 951 and take the remaining one million and add it to the 800,000 designated for the landscaping master plan. 1.8 million may seem like a lot of money, but consider the miles of roadways that need to be adequately landscaped if we are to keep Naples looking like the town we chose to live in and not a concrete jungle. Livingston Road will flow past numerous communities from Radio Road to Bonita Beach Road, or to put it another way, through three of your districts. Currently those of use living in the area from Golden Gate Parkway to Vanderbilt Beach Road feel a desperate need for this additional money to adequately landscape the right-of-way. Now, I'm not totally altruistic, but I also know that Village Walk can't realistically expect to solely benefit from these funds. However, we do not have a wall separating our community from the road, nor are we as wealthy a community as some of the others along this roadway. Yes, our home values have gone up since we moved in eight years ago, and we very much want to see these values maintained. Many of our residents are living on fixed incomes. We pride ourselves on how well our community is maintained and how beautiful our landscaping is. We've spent over 33,000 this year to plant additional foliage along our boundary adjacent to Livingston Road. Our most vulnerable area is also one of the narrowest stretches of our perimeter. And while we've done our best to hide the five feet higher Livingston Road, we need the county to step up to the plate and fund the landscaping master plan. Page 28 September 18, 2003 If this area is to be adequately landscaped, it has to be done so with bushes, as well as trees to make it less of an eyesore. To do this we need adequate funding, which can only come from the money previously allocated to the Economic Development Council. We hope you will revisit this issue for the good of everyone in Collier County. Thank you. MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Janet Vasey. She will be followed by Shannon Clark. MS. VASEY: Good evening, Commissioners. Janet Vasey, for the record. I'm still against the EDC program. It's too expensive, it won't work and businesses are moving here and to Lee County without additional incentives over and above those that are provided by the state. Having said that, if you're going to do this program, I agree with your keeping it east of 951, because that Would be definitely better than a county-wide program. My e-mail to you on Tuesday showed how expensive this incentive program can be to bring just one new company to Collier County. If Source Interlink came to Collier County with the proposed incentives of this new program, we would have paid them 9 -- we would have paid them $813,000 plus the $960,000 that the state provided in that incentive, which we also pay 20 percent on. You don't really need such generous incentives as this EDC plan calls for. Lee County is our main competition in Southwest Florida, and this program is overkill. It's like using a precision guided munition to kill a gnat when a fly swatter will do the job. So what should be changed? The state is already giving $2,000 per person for high wage jobs, so why are we giving another 1,000 on top of that? Lee County doesn't do this. We can take that money out of the program and save it. And in the Source Interlink example that I gave you, that would save $400,000, and that's $400,000 that Page 29 September 18, 2003 Lee doesn't pay either. Now, there's nothing sacred about the impact fee calculation that's included in the EDC plan, so let's reduce that to a more realistic amount. You will still be competitive with Lee County, because they don't offer anything for impact fees. This incentive is calculated by taking the price of the land and buildings, multiplying that by the millage rate times 10. There's nothing magic about this number. Why don't we do it times three? In the Source Interlink program, that would result in impact fee cost of 116,000 just using that different calculation, instead of 388,000. And I would also recommend establishing a 200,000 or a $250,000 maximum on the impact fee payout. That would still compensate for the fact that impact fees are higher in Collier than in Lee, and it would also reduce your monitoring period, you wouldn't have to do it for 10 years, and so that would cut down on the bureaucracy. As to the broadband incentive, it has nothing to do with the EDC goal to stabilize the local economy in the event of a downturn. And it applies to existing businesses too. I'd suggest saving the money by eliminating this incentive altogether. And also, I'm not sure if you're aware of it because it hasn't really been discussed -- could I finish one -- CHAIRMAN HENNING: Yes. MS. VASEY: Okay. And it also -- the impact fees also apply to existing businesses, and not just new businesses. And what that means is that an existing business that wants to expand as few as 10 new people that are high waged could qualify for this program. And if they chose to build a $10 million office building, they would qualify for over $400,000 in incentives for 10 new people. They would qualify for $2,000 for each of the 10 new people, that's 20,000, and then for the building, the impact fees, they would qualify for 388,000. And if you throw in the broadband, that's 400,000. Page 30 September 18, 2003 This program is seriously flawed. You don't really want to do that. Also, if you just scale it back, the Source Interlink could have been brought to Collier County for $116,000 instead of what the EDC plan would have called for, which is $813,000. And to wrap it up, you could take quite a bit of money out of this program and give it to landscape median, if you like. Thank you very much. CHAIRMAN HENNING: What is your recommendation? MS. VASEY: I'm sorry, sir? CHAIRMAN HENNING: Your recommendations? MS. VASEY: My recommendation would be to, number one, trash the whole program. If you don't want to do that, then scale it back to the much reduced incentives and take this money and use it for something for the citizens in Collier County, like landscape median, beach access, even looking to the court problems that you're going to have when Article 5 takes effect in the last quarter of this fiscal year. There's all kinds of things you could do with it. And I don't really care, as long as you don't spend it on the EDC. Thank you. MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Shannon Clark. She will be followed by Jeremy Giles. MS. CLARK: Good evening. I'm Shannon Clark. I'm a year-round resident of Naples and chairman of the landscape committee in Village Walk. Thank you for allowing me to speak this evening, and thank you, Kathleen Adams for addressing so succinctly the environmental landscaping needs of road expansion and development in our area and throughout Collier County. She did such a good job. I would like to address another issue important to the environment of and the quality of life in Collier County, and the rapidly expanding northern reaches of our county, and that of public Page 31 September 18, 2003 access to beaches and open space and public transportation to reach them. First, public beach access and parking. Public access to beaches is limited in northern Collier County. There are only two parking lots and almost no street parking. Commissioner Henning at the last meeting proposed the use of tourist development fund dollars to purchase beach access parking and the rare opportunity to purchase the Vanderbilt Beach Inn property in north Collier. It is my understanding from listening to discussions that if tourist development funds can be used to pay 20 percent of the cost of development of public beach access, that the state and federal grants would be available to pay for 80 percent of the cost for beach -- public beach access. That being so, it would appear to be a no-brainer when someone will match you four-fifths to one-fifth of the cost to move forward on an opportunity such as this. Where there are developed utilities, parking, restrooms and the food service concession framework on-site already. Second, access by public transport. I hope you consider and plan for arterial North Collier public transportation to beaches and parks, such as the planned water park, et cetera, to lessen the traffic impact at the beaches, while allowing greater access to all citizens of the county. This system would ease traffic, make our amenities available to more people, and also facilitate better transportation to jobs and schools, as well as parks and beaches. Overall, there would be less impact on our environment as a whole. Thank you very much. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Thank you. MS. FILSON: Jeremy Giles. He will be followed by Fred Thomas. MR. GILES: Good evening, Chairman and Commissioners. I'm Jeremy Giles on behalf of the Economic Development Council of Collier County. Tammie apologizes that she can't be here. Page 32 September 18, 2003 CHAIRMAN HENNING: Boy or girl? MR. GILES: Baby beautiful girl -- beautiful baby girl. So she apologizes for not being here. CHAIRMAN HENNING: We understand. MR. GILES: Commissioners, your public private partnership with the EDC has required great leadership to make economic diversification a top priority for Collier County. This economic incentive program has been thoroughly reviewed, analyzed and determined to be among the best options to add a few more tools to our tool box. In an effort to diversify the economy in Collier County, Commissioners, I would like to take the opportunity to thank you for your time and the attention that you've given this important issue. I would also like to thank Joe Schmitt and his staff for the tremendous effort they've put forth in this program. I respectfully request that we not lose sight of what the ultimate goal is, and that is to create high value jobs for the citizens and the next generation of Collier County. In my opinion, we would also like to see our economy diversified and less dependent on tourism, agriculture and the service industry. The budget that has tentatively been approved, coupled with the economic incentive ordinances coming before you in October, will provide you with the flexibility to allocate the incentives for projects that you deem worthy for the community. In closing, I would like to reiterate that the budget and economic incentive program will greatly enhance the ability of the EDC and Collier County to compete with other communities and states for high-value jobs and companies more effectively. I would also like to point out that the program has safeguards and mechanisms in place to provide the Commissioners and Mr. Mudd and the County Manager the final approval or disapproval of any budget allocations or utilization of economic incentive ordinances. Thank you for your Page 3 3 September 18, 2003 support and your future support. Thank you. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Thank you. MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Fred Thomas. He will be followed by Bruce Preble. CHAIRMAN HENNING: If we could get the next speaker standing behind Mr. Thomas or over at this Mic the County Manager is pointing out, we could speed up the process and get everybody in and out on time. MR. MUDD: Twenty-eight speakers total. MR. THOMAS: Good evening, County Commissioners. I'm glad you gave me an opportunity to come out and talk to you again. I know it's redundant and repetitive, but we need to understand that if we're going to keep the ambience of this county nice and economical for the residential, we need to have a good, solid economic base that doesn't require the same drain on dollars as residential does. Contrary to one of the other speakers, when you start talking about economic development here, you're not going to want to put it on coastal Collier County, when you were talking about manufacturing plants or what have you. You're going to go interior county, and interior county does not compete with Lee. We compete with places like Wauchula, Clewiston and other parts in central Florida. As we begin to become -- to develop a trade port in Immokalee, we're not competing with Florida. We're completing with the Chattanoogas and other towns that have received places like the BMW plant up in South Carolina. That's the kind of competition we're trying to get that helps the overall ambience in this county, without creating any more growth on the coastal Collier County, out there where we can use it. Remember, with the Western Hemisphere and NAFTA going the way it goes, we can't even count on agriculture much longer to be Page 34 September 18, 2003 a solid boom in our neck of the woods, so we've got to diversity our economic base. We've also got to look at ways to try to find housing for our work force here so that the money that we pay in salaries, not only the government but the local businesses pay, can circulate in our community, as opposed to the work force taking that money to another county. In fact, you know, I think Lee County would have a fit if we ever left this area, because of all the money we bring to their county without them having to provide a whole lot of services for it, okay? So we need to support the economic development package that is put forth by the Economic Development Council and your staff, because I think that it helps the overall health of our environment. Thank you. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Mr. Thomas, don't leave yet. A couple of questions, if I may. What's the unemployment in Immokalee right now? MR. THOMAS: Right now we're probably up to about 20 percent. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And could you tell me, up to this point in time have the economic incentives that the citizens of Immokalee could offer, has it attracted any businesses just because of the fact that it's there? MR. THOMAS: We are beginning to try to attract -- got people looking at us. But now everybody's sitting back trying to see because the competition is tough out there. It used to be a time, folks, when you get ready to attract a business, the Chamber of Commerce would invite somebody from the technical school, somebody from the county to talk about land and access to the land, transportation, and they would look around to find out what kind of housing they have for the employers. In today's competition, you've got to do all that plus look at some other incentives like relocation costs for a major company. If Page 35 September 18, 2003 they're bringing in major employees to your community, that increases your commercial viability, your gas taxes go up, your sales taxes go up and your ad valorem tax base goes up. And all that's healthy. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: One last question and I won't delay you any longer, Mr. Thomas, but can you tell me what the difference between Immokalee and coastal Collier County is? MR. THOMAS: Coastal Collier County competes with Hilton Head, Scottsdale, Monterey, Carmel, California. They can sit back and be as picky as they want and people will beg to come here because of the kind of ambience they get there. Immokalee is like the rest of the world. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Pick your words carefully. MR. THOMAS: Immokalee is like the rest of the world, okay? Immokalee is like Nashville, but smaller. Immokalee is like Wauchula, like Highlands County, like Palatka here in this state. You know, there's a lot of towns all over the country that if a Wal-Mart was coming, they want to be able to drive to the edge of town, folks, oh, the Wal-Mart's over there, oh, Howard Johnson's over there, as opposed to Scottsdale and Naples where you'll be in front of the golden arches and can't see them. Different kind-- different part of the world. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I think the message you're trying to say is that you need these economic incentives -- MR. THOMAS: Without a doubt. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: -- to be able to elevate Immokalee. MR. THOMAS: Because we're in competition with other communities that are trying to get these big companies. Thank you, sir. CHAIRMAN HENNING: How many more speakers do we have? Page 36 September 18, 2003 COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Can I talk to every one? CHAIRMAN HENN1NG: Sure, I wish you would. MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Bruce Preble. He will be followed by Larry Hodges. MR. PREBLE: Commissioners, for the record, I'm Bruce Preble. I've had the chance to address you before on this issue. I'm in support of the EDC's programs. I don't think it's a matter of a choice between any kind of landscaping and the iEDC program. It is true that you have a defined set of budget that you have to deal with that you can only allocate a certain amount in -- to landscaping, a certain amount to this kind of thing, but it's not a matter of, in my opinion, that you should end up cutting a budget proposed by the EDC. This incentive program will in fact reap significant benefits over time. I own a small business here in Naples. It suffers from the cyclicality of the current business climate that we have here. I would prefer to see that balanced. And I think that programs like this that introduce a broader base of business in fact will achieve that balanced kind of economic environment for us. Thank you again for your consideration. MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Larry Hodges, and your final speaker on EDC is Robin Doyle. MR. HODGES: Thank you, gentlemen and lady. My name is Larry Hodges and I'm a small businessman in town also. And I'm here to support the EDC economic incentives. I feel that this is a very vital part of what is going to happen to Collier County now and in the future. And for the health and growth of this community we need diversification of businesses because the tax base going to max out at some point with homes. At some point we're not going to be able to build anymore homes and we rely on homes and new home construction for the increase in our revenues. And when that stops, then the property taxes for everybody in this Page 37 September 18, 2003 town for your homes is going to skyrocket beyond comprehension, and that scares me to death. And I think that if we work with EDC now -- I noticed that Lee County has been for the last four years giving a certain amount of money every year for economic incentives, and they have made some great progress, because they're doing the same amount every year and watching the incentives and watching things happen and they're really making some inroads in Lee County. I feel that our county has the capacity to do that, and you people also have the foresight and knowledge that this county is going to be in trouble, real trouble in the not too distant future, because what happens when we don't have any more houses we can build? What happens to the people that are paying taxes now? Ask some people that bought a $60,000 house 20 years ago and had a $200 tax bill. Ask them what their tax bill is now. And if we don't diversify and bring businesses that give us a more profitable revenue, a profitable tax dollar, ! feel that we're going to be in a great, great deal of trouble in the near future. And we thank you for your consideration. MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Robin Doyle, and he will be followed by Kathleen Sullivan. MR. DOYLE: Mr. Chairman and members of the Commission, I'm Robin Doyle. I'm the immediate past chairman of the Economic Development Council. I've lived and worked in Collier County since 1975. I have a very strong interest in economic diversification and the creation of high-wage jobs, because I believe that that is necessary for us to continue the quality of life that we enjoy in Collier County, and it's necessary for us to provide opportunities for a younger generation to find good paying jobs in our county so that they can get an education and come back here to live and work. In the 1990s, the United States went through an unprecedented economic expansion. If there ever was a time that we were going to Page 38 September 18, 2003 diversify the economy in Collier County or create high-wage jobs without incentives, it should have been then. But during the Nineties, the gap between rich and poor became greater in this county. We had growth, but the growth was in low wage jobs. I think that we need this economic incentive package because it will give us an opportunity to have a stronger and diversified economy. Landscaping will make our community an attractive place. Landscaping will not diversify the economy, it will not provide high-wage jobs, it will not bring my children, who are Ph.D. candidates, back to this community to live, and I don't think it will provide good jobs for our children or grandchildren to come back here. So I would encourage you to support really a very modest package of economic incentives. Thank you. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: May I ask a question -- MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Kathleen Sullivan, she will be followed by Renee Beckner. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: May I ask a question of Mr. Doyle? CHAIRMAN HENNING: Sure, please. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Thank you. Mr. Doyle, the economic incentives we're talking about, the previous Commission meeting, the Commission was in agreement that they wanted to limit this economic development to the east side of 951. Has there been any adjustments to the budget in consideration of that from the EDC? MR. DOYLE: I'm not sure what the -- whether there have been any adjustments made in the proposal. Certainly we support economic development east of 951 and in that area. CHAIRMAN HENNING: We're not done with the public hearing, folks. MR. DOYLE: So we would certainly support that. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: What did I say? Page 39 September 18, 2003 CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Coletta must have said something. No, just kidding. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I take it back, whatever I said. MR. DOYLE: Commissioner Coletta, I'm sure it's something I said, not something you said. So we would certainly support that. We would ask that the Commission leave in the package the opportunity for you to consider the need for incentives in the coastal area as well. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Mr. Doyle, I believe, though, the incentive package basically is directed to Immokalee area in and out of that eastern area; isn't that your assumption? MR. DOYLE: We certainly think that's where we have the greatest opportunity for economic expansion, yes. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Especially when we have 20 percent unemployment in that area. And that's a burden on the county here. MR. DOYLE: Yes, sir. And there's a lot more to economic development than simply incentives. Education is an important part of it, providing a knowledgeable work force, providing affordable housing. All of those things go into it. But this is one small aspect of the need for economic diversification. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay, thank you. MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Kathleen Sullivan, she will be followed by Renee Beckner. MS. SULLIVAN: For the record, my name is Kathleen Sullivan. I am a relatively new resident, permanent resident of Collier County, but have visited here for the last four years. And because of the beauty and wonderful things your county has to offer, we decided to move here permanently. But during our visits, because of my work across the country on behalf of adolescent health programs, .several of your residents had Page 40 September 18, 2003 talked to me about the possibility of getting the program that my - organization developed into the local schools. Much to my surprise, this August we were invited to bring down a teacher trainer and took part in the regular official in-service teacher training which was held August 7th. My staff, I guess, did such a very good job that we -- by the end of August, I was asked could they implement it immediately. They wanted to put our program, which is a textbook called Game Plan, teaches choosing abstinence as a lifestyle against getting involved in sexual activity, drugs or alcohol, which has been extremely successful in other areas, particularly in Illinois. I made the decision that I in fact would make the books available immediately, even though frankly we had no idea at all how they would ever be covered and funded. But I was willing to take the chance because of the great enthusiasm of the teachers. Thirteen teachers were trained and they wanted to start the class the next Monday. So this is a very, you might say, different item than you've probably approached in some time, but it's a time element. It was too late to go to the regular school board budget hearings for it to be able to be started immediately. Our request to you is for a small amount, actually. And because we have the opportunity to have Miss America, Erika Harold, the current reigning one who will unfortunately be going out of office on Saturday, she's going to be in Naples again in November and will be speaking in the schools as a motivational speaker. There's also another very wonderful speaker, Jeffrey Dean, who's scheduled to come down the end of October. So our funding request, to be able to keep this going for this year, will cover 5,000 students in the ninth grade. And I must say, the response from the teachers has been remarkable, including great appreciation from Immokalee High. We're in all six high schools, Page 41 September 18, 2003 and it really has been something that they have welcomed. I've got a letter from the curriculum director, Deborah Ogden, who is the one that invited us to come in, and I would be happy to leave that with each one. You've each got a sample of the book and the background on project reality. I'd be happy to answer any questions. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Questions by the board? What's the success rate of this program? MS. SULLIVAN: Well, in Illinois alone, which is our most extensive experience to date, 18 years, we've been funded by the State of Illinois for 14 years, and we covered 76,000 students in three different programs the Project Reality runs. Let me just give you in one of this -- I brought samples, executive summary of our evaluation. But in our newsletter, for instance, there's some sample questions. And this one really says it all, because one of the questions, does this relate to kids who have become sexually active, do they respond. In fact, they respond remarkably well. A person who has been sexually active is able to choose abstinence for the future is one of the questions we ask pre-depose. That went from 48 percent positive, agree, strongly agree, to 83 percent after the program. That's a rather remarkable display. And this covered from seventh through tenth grade. And 1,600 that were in this particular evaluation had done last -- a year ago last spring. So the success rate is really, I would say, remarkable. It's a program developed with A.C. Green, the basketball player. It is a very teacher friendly as well as user friendly text. And it's very intriguing for the kids. Each student gets a workbook. Each page is different. They discuss as well as write in the book, so the teaching process is very, very good. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Thank you. Page 42 September 18, 2003 MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Renee Beckner. She will be followed -- we're going to start on the landscape speakers next, Jack Lawton. MS. BECKNER: Hi. My name is Renee Beckner. I'm actually the president of the Life Network, and we're the group that is sponsoring the program that Mrs. Sullivan is talking about. The Life Network has been in existence for about -- actually, since 1999, and through different things that we've been able to do with the different community leaders that are on the Life Network, this is the road that we have traveled to to get the program into the school, to work with the teachers and to work with parents within the community. This is just a one-time request, it's a small request, and we would just like to see if the county would be able to support us in this project. Like Mrs. Sullivan has already said, it's been a phenomenal program already, well established in the Chicago area. It's been well received there. The schools here are enthusiastic about the program. And through the local Life Network, we're just trying to seek out some funds to get this program implemented and then from there on out we'll be able to kind of hold our own on it. CHAIRMAN HENNING: What's the funding request? MS. BECKNER: There's actually two funding requests. It depends on a one-year program or a two-year program. The one-year would be for 34,000 and some change, and then the two-year, which will be for middle school and high school, will be close to 64,000. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Thank you. MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Jack Lawton, he'll be followed by Betsy Seligman. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Mr. Lawton, just one minute, please. Is there any Commissioners interested in assisting the ladies in their request? Page 43 September 18, 2003 COMMISSIONER FIALA: Has the school board been approached? CHAIRMAN HENNING: Yes, they have. And from what Ms. Sullivan said is it was -- didn't meet the funding budget time. And the school board was cut down on their budget, as we all know, from the state, so they have a budget shortfall. Commissioner Coyle? COMMISSIONER COYLE: I am in support of their goals. I am concerned about the precedent. I am not aware of any commitment by the Board of County Commissioners to provide funding for a nonprofit organization. We have many of them who are asking for funding, and we have denied them funds. And my concern is one of equal treatment. If you do it for one, you're going to have to do it for all. The other thing is that I believe that we must be very careful about having the Board of County Commissioners get involved in sponsoring educational programs in the school. And I do believe that's a school responsibility. But I strongly endorse the concept and the objective of this effort. It really is one that is very unusual for the Board of County Commissioners to deal with, and one that might establish a precedent, which we do not wish to establish. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Well, I understand your concern about the precedent, Commissioner, but if the funding is to be given to the school, that's not a precedent. We've funded other programs in the school system in the previous -- in fact, even this year. COMMISSIONER COYLE: But that isn't the request. The request is to give the funding, as I understand it, to a for profit -- or not for profit 501(C)(3) organization. They then would prepare materials, which they would provide to the schools. And just speaking from a personal standpoint, I think it is the school's responsibility to pay for their own materials. I don't think we Page 44 September 18, 2003 should be paying for their materials. But the objectives of the program I think are very good. MS. SULLIVAN: No, Commissioner, it's not to prepare materials. The materials have already been approved and are being used actually. And this is simply -- we're fulfilling the request of the schools. So the entire amount goes for use in the schools. COMMISSIONER COYLE: But the money is going to your organization; is that not correct.'? MS. SULLIVAN: Well, if that's the only problem, the procedural thing and you'd rather give it straight to the schools. The difficulty I see there is the time element again. Would it be very much more cumbersome for you to have to go through and have the school apply and so on, rather than simply dealing with -- we have already got it all in place with the school. So it's simply we've got a voucher for the amount, which we can turn over to you. If it's got to go through a process with the schools and so on, it's the timing problem. COMMISSIONER COYLE: That's why I've suggested that the place to start with that, in my opinion, is with the school board. If the school board came to us and said we approve this process and we would like to have some funding assistance from the Board of County Commissioners, I think we can deal with it a lot easier. But procedurally, as I see it, what has to happen here is if we agree that this is a good thing to do and we put some money aside for doing it, we're going to have to advertise the expenditure, and it has to be -- a decision has to be made during a publicly advertised meeting that will provide opportunities for public comment, both pro and con. And it's not a simple procedure, as I understand it, of us just deciding hey, this is a good idea, let's give them some money. MS. SULLIVAN: Well, excuse me, my understanding from the curriculum director, that they have accepted supplemental stuff from not for profit organizations continually. That's a normal procedure. Page 45 September 18, 2003 So there's no problem there. Which does expedite the time element, rather than their going through the process. And for that matter, couldn't our request go in through your allotment of public health.'? The Commissioner-- the county does fund public health issues. And this could easily be the conduit through the public health to make this possible to the school. And that is done in many other states, too. Because it is a public health issue. It is a health matter for our young people. So the health department interacts with the schools all the time on funds being provided by other entities than the school board. CHAIRMAN HENNING: You're saying that a possible savings of the health and human services department by education? MS. SULLIVAN: Right. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Jim, what is the procedure for allocation? Let's say we set aside, you know, the first year for the school board for this program? MR. MUDD: Commissioner, what we do is you've got your budget item. Before the expense could happen, we bring it back to the Board of County Commissioners on an executive summary. So it's announced. It's like everything else. It's over $25,000, so we don't have the authority at staff. In order to cut that check we have to come to the Board. I would mention to the Board that the Board of County Commissioners has a policy on -- in their policy, and I'm reading it from over here on Mike. When did the budget guidance we said the Board of County Commissioners will not fund any non-mandated social service agencies. I would give you maybe an option here, that if you decided to set some dollars aside, that you could make it contingent upon being reimbursed by the school board next FY. And I can do that in a memo to the school board. And if they think that this program is a high priority on their list and the reason -- because I've had no school Page 46 September 18, 2003 -- Ms. Sullivan, I believe you, but I haven't had anybody from the school side talk to me or talk to the Board of County Commissioners. And in this way I can get the school to figure out if that is a high priority, and if they're willing to do that, then we could do that arrangement with them and we could set it aside and be reimbursed by the school board from their budget next year for the dollars that you outlay this year. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Halas? COMMISSIONER HALAS: That's basically what I was going to refer to prior to you bringing it up there, County Manager Jim Mudd. I believe strongly in your ideas and concept, and I think we need to teach our young people to -- on abstinence, but I also believe that if the school board strongly endorses this program, then I believe it's the school board's responsibility to come up with this funding. And that's where I think it needs to lie. And I'm sure that the school board hopefully would have some funds left that they could allocate those in an emergency meeting towards your endeavors here. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Fiala? COMMISSIONER FIALA: Okay. I'll try and wind this up. As you can see, we all support your effort and it's an excellent, excellent idea. And we would hope it works. In my past experience, I've always found that the way to be certain that a project or the materials are read and of value is to place a value on them. In other words, if they're given out to people, many times they end in the trash can because they really didn't want to look at them anyway. But if they had to buy them because they were of value, and so maybe the school board could sell them to the students. They could pay for their own. You know, when you pay for something, you read it. Whereas if it's given to you, it's placed on each desk, some don't bother to read it at all. So that might help to pay for the program itself. Page 47 September 18, 2003 CHAIRMAN HENNING: So that's what's wrong, we're giving the books for the kids to read instead of them buying them. MS. SULLIVAN: Please, please, I really plead with you, that just isn't practical. It's really discriminatory to ask certain kids to buy textbooks if they want to. It just doesn't work that way. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Well, I thought I'd try and see if the program couldn't pay for itself. Thank you. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Coletta? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Thank you. I also think this is a very worthwhile project. However, I'll tell you what my concerns are. I spend a lot of my own personal time working with social service agencies on many, many projects, and I've seen them come to the Commission numerous times for everything from food to the poor to emergency housing, and over and over again this Commission said, you know, that there's no way to be able to discriminate one project from another. You get to the point where pretty soon you're running against everyone coming in and you're trying to handle it. And, you know, our heart goes out for you, you can tell by the way we're trying to deal with this that we'd like to do something for you. But I can see this opening Pandora's box. Once we start -- and I mean I wouldn't have a problem to a point with it. But once we start, where are you going to draw the line, number one. Number two, there's all sorts of organizations out there that I mentioned to you earlier that you haven't applied to these funds for. One of them is Community Foundation, which gets very much involved in ventures such as this. And I would suggest that that would be the way. I've been there numerous times for various projects I've been involved in from the social service agencies. MS. SULLIVAN: We hadn't approached them, but I'd be very happy if you'd write us a letter recommending that they make this consideration. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I'd be happy to write a letter for Page 48 September 18, 2003 you, but I would recommend the Chair write it and I can possibly back it up with a letter of my own. But it would mean a lot more coming from the Chair. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Coletta? You know, pass the buck. COMMISSIONER COYLE: I don't see anything wrong with the County Manager's recommendation. I still see it as a school responsibility, not only for implementing the program but for paying for it. But if I can help the school do it and the school will reimburse us, I would support it. And that would not cause a problem with any kind of precedent that would come back and bite us later on. So I think if we sent a letter to the school board and asked them if they would be willing to reimburse us, we would be willing to provide some front end funding, if they can't fund it through other means. But I will say this to you: If the school board wants to do it, they can do it tomorrow morning. They've got just as much budget flexibility as we do. But we've had this discussion before, and I don't think that anybody is going to go to the school board, so we can go to the school board and we can ask the school board if they want this program and if they're willing to pay for it. If they don't have the money, we can give them some financial assistance for a short period of time, they can give us the money back. MS. SULLIVAN: May I just ask if the limit of under 25,000 having a different process, could we qualify under that even to cover the speakers who are coming in because of the time element? CHAIRMAN HENNING: No. I mean, there's no magic thing there. It's-- MS. SULLIVAN: No way of facilitating that? CHAIRMAN HENNING: No. I'm in favor of, you know, what Commissioner Coyle -- where Commissioner Coyle is going. Is anybody else? Page 49 September 18, 2003 COMMISSIONER FIALA: Yes. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Well, as long as we have -- if we have a letter from the school board in writing that they endorse this program and that they are in full accordance with this, that's number one. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Signed in blood, right? COMMISSIONER HALAS: Exactly, signed in blood. That they endorse this program. And if they don't have the funds -- MS. SULLIVAN: Well, the curriculum director did it. COMMISSIONER HALAS: -- necessarily to put this in hand, then I go along with what Commissioner Coyle is stating. MR. MUDD: Mr. Chairman, I can take $35,000 and put it off to the side of the UFR list for this item, contingent upon the school board agreeing that they will reimburse the Board of County Commissioners within the next year or next year's budget for that particular outlay. If they agree to that, then we'll bring it back to the board and chop the check to the school and they can disseminate with those dollars. CHAIRMAN HENNING: We're there. Thank you, ma'am. MS. SULLIVAN: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HENNING: I'm sorry, sir. MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Jack Lawton. He'll be followed by Betsy Seligman. MR. LAWTON: My name is Jack Lawton. I'm a permanent resident of Collier County for about 15 years. I live in Royal Wood and I'm president of the master board. We have 800 units in Royal Wood. My presentation will be brief, and it should be refreshing to you, because I'm not going to ask you for any more money. I'm asking to you rearrange or extend your priorities to the improvement of the median strips on Rattlesnake Hammock Road. You improved that road about 14 years ago. We've had four medians for 14 years. Page 50 September 18, 2003 They've been cut occasionally, and I'm asking you to allocate your monies that you've -- you're voting to improve the median strips to allocate that to the area from County Barn Road east to Polly Avenue. It's about six-tenths of a mile, and that hasn't been included but should be prioritized. There's about $350 million in value of property in the immediate area. We have 136 million in our area alone. So I think we bear some consideration for the allocation of funds. Thank you. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Thank you. MS. FILSON: Betsy Seligman, and she will be followed by Myra Tutwiler. MS. SELIGMAN: Good evening, Commissioners. I am the general manager of Royal Wood Golf and Country Club, which is located on Rattlesnake Hammock Road in East Naples. I'm here representing the approximately 1,600 members of our community who have repeatedly asked the master board and myself to do something about the terrible conditions of the medians and the sides of Rattlesnake Hammock Road. We pride ourselves in taking the best possible care of our neighborhood and are constantly improving our facility. Rattlesnake Hammock Road has been of constant concern to the residents of the area. First and foremost, it looks terrible. It detracts from the area and makes East Naples look unkempt and rundown. It is maintained very poorly and sometimes is so overgrown it is an embarrassment. There is no design concept whatsoever and appears to be a forgotten child in the county's planning. It is a growing and developing area and should be upgraded in appearance to match the ambience of Naples and Collier County. While property values have risen in the area, they have not kept pace with the rest of the county. I know that our board works for the good of the whole community, and I'm sure that the County Page 51 September 18, 2003 Commissioners also work for the good of the entire county. We ask that you please appropriate the additional funds necessary to implement the landscape beautification project from County Barn Road to Polly Avenue on Rattlesnake Hammock Road and allow us to share in the pride and betterment of the area. Thank you for your time and consideration. MS. FILSON: The next speaker is Myra Tutwiler, she will be followed by Bill Confoy. MS. TUTWILER: Good evening. My name is Myra Tutwiler and I am president of Windemere Country Club. We're located on Livingston Road between Golden Gate Parkway and Pine Ridge Road. On behalf of the approximately 700 members in our community, I urge you to vote in favor of the funding of the landscaping of Livingston Road, as promised and set forth in the master landscape plan. The improvement of our segment of Livingston Road to a six-lane thoroughfare has been a long and costly project for our membership and community. We have been forced to build a new entrance and gatehouse, as well as replace all landscaping, both inside and outside our walls, to the cost of over a million dollars. In addition, we have participated in the $225,000 cost of decorative lighting for our segment of this corridor. We have done our part. We were promised over and over again that our section of Livingston Road would always remain residential and that the landscaping of the medians and along the roadways would be done and maintained by the county. We believe that the 2004 budget should be spent to fulfill this promise and not be spent on economic incentives in an already over populated area, especially in the west of our county. We believe that the county's beautiful and well landscaped roadways are an Page 52 September 18, 2003 enticement in themselves to future economic development and promotion of our section of Southwest Florida. This roadway, when finished to Lee County, will be a major north-south thoroughfare in Southwest Florida. Should it not be as attractive as other gateways in the county? We thank you for your consideration and your support in this matter. MS. FILSON: Bill Confoy. He will be followed by Rick Thomas. MR. CONFOY: For the record, Bill Confoy. Landscaping of major road builds were left behind in the rush to build new roads -- or the landscaping was left behind. The county recognized this problem and came up with a landscape master plan for the next seven years, which for the first three years would catch up with those roads that were left behind so that they would look as good as the ones that had preceded it. The plan also made sure that future road builds would include landscaping at the time of construction, which made more sense. In April of this year, the Board unanimously approved that plan. The plan called for a budget of $2.9 million in fiscal year '04 to stay with the program as outlined. In June, however, only 1.1 million was voted on by the Board, leaving the plan shorted by 1.8 million. At later hearings, Mr. Mudd identified $800,000 that was unappropriated and could be used for that landscaping program. We concur that this is needed but still falls short of the planned goals. The EDC has put forth ideas for business incentives that total $2 million. We also agree with previous speakers that the requested $2 million could be cut in half, using $1.0 million for east of 951 incentives and use the remaining $1.0 million to close the loop on the entire landscape master plan so it can start off on the right foot and as approved in April. Incentives really should only be offered east of 951 where they Page 53 September 18, 2003 could perhaps be justified, but nothing west of 951 where Naples sells itself and needs no incentives. As you may know, I was involved with two businesses that started here and came here without any incentives. My children also grew up here, went away to college, came back, one's starting a new business without incentives and the other one is working in the community. The landscaping plan shown for fiscal year '04 would then be cleaned up and would do as the Board has approved, Livingston Road, Airport Road, Pine Ridge Road, Rattlesnake Hammock Road and Golden Gate Boulevard. Those are all the roads called for in FY '04 master plan. And we urge you to support this today. There are other speakers, quite a few of them you have there that are following me, and they have agreed that if they wish to stand up or acknowledge that they do not wish to speak but rather would support what has been said from the previous three speakers, that would be fine with us. That would save you about 16 times five minutes, or an hour or so. MR. MUDD: Mr. Chairman, I also went out and that exodus of people that left, the 30 or 40, they were from Village Walk, and they were to support their speaker who basically spoke in favor of more landscaping. CHAIRMAN HENNING: So you're saying you want the people who support what you're saying to stand up now? MR. CONFOY: Yes, that would be fine, if they'd like. And these, by the way, represent people from Kensington, from Windemere, from Grey Oaks, from Mediterra, from Bridgewater Bay. Any more? I guess that's it. Thank you. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Thank you. Next speaker? I guess what we're hearing kind of makes sense, that since we cut down the economic incentives in the area by half, like Ms. Vasey said, cut the funding down in half but keep the Page 54 September 18, 2003 Immokalee -- COMMISSIONER HALAS: I disagree with you. CHAIRMAN HENNING: May I finish, please? COMMISSIONER HALAS: Yes, you may. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Thank you. Cut the funding in half, keep the Immokalee incentives, you're cutting the area where you can locate businesses more than in half because most of the commercial properties are within the urban area, not in the rural area. Commissioner Coletta? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Yeah, I think Commissioner Halas is next. I'll follow him. COMMISSIONER HALAS: No, go ahead. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: You want me to go? CHAIRMAN HENNING: Please. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: No, your math is a little bit off. I mean, sure, we've taken the whole Collier County and we reduced it down to that east of 951, which remains to be 85 percent of the county, I mean if we want to work with numbers. Also, too, the economic incentives, regardless of what we were going to do throughout the whole county, I think the majority of them were destined for that east of 951. And if you take a program that's got a whole program and you start to cut it to the point where you're going to just remove dollars from here and dollars from there and expect the final product to come out that's going to work, I think you're going to be very disappointed. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay. Well, I know it's on the ground, Commissioner, and there are more commercial areas in the urban area west of 951 than there is east. Commissioner Halas? COMMISSIONER HALAS: Yes, I -- the reason I disagree, I feel that we need to keep these economic incentives in places, is that Page 55 September 18, 2003 what we're doing here is we're looking to build the future of this county and to build the future for the young people that live here presently, go to high school. And what we're trying to do is make sure that when they go off to college that they have a place here. And we're looking to bring in high-tech businesses, hopefully in the area of medicine, aviation, or any of these other high-tech areas. And part of the Internet process, bringing in new businesses here. And I feel that we need to look to the future and make sure that we have incentives put in place here so that we can attract businesses of high wages so that all of us can indulge in a lifestyle. And I believe some of the speakers here also stated that we have a serious problem out in the eastern part of the lands. We have a town out there called Immokalee, and I think that basically in the past that that's been forgotten. And I think that we need to try to assist in bringing industry to that location so that we can hopefully lower the unemployment rate. We -- as we know, when you have people that aren't working, they become a burden, and not only a burden in the sense that the medical and everything else, but a burden to the point where they don't feel that they're included in the whole community here. And I believe that we need to look strongly at economic development, we need another engine in this community for economic stimulation-- stimulization, excuse me. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Fiala? COMMISSIONER FIALA: Thank you. I'm still having a real problem with -- I'm sorry, they're such nice people, but I'm still having a problem with the EDC package. I don't care for it at all west of 951. I don't even care for it for a mile east of 951. I like it for the Immokalee area, I think they have 20 percent unemployment. I'd like to create jobs for them. But to me $15,000 a year is not a high-wage job at all. What you're doing is creating more problems because you're not giving these people enough money to pay for their living. And so they're going to need Page 56 September 18, 2003 more services. And Commissioner Halas, I know you said last time these $15,000 jobs would probably give them health insurance. I don't think so for a minute. I realize that landscaping seems only aesthetic, but you know that landscaping on the roads which makes it a beautiful place to live draws more people to move here. More people moving here buy more products. The business people see that their products can be bought, whether it be a hospital, another one just dying to get in here. So that would be another hospital right there, HMA. Now we'll have three hospitals. And they didn't seem to mind at all. They know the business is here. And I think that the landscaping does a lot to create the ambiance that draws the people here that will buy the services. So I just -- I really feel if there is an EDC package to decide upon, I feel it should be only that package or only a portion of that package, just a part of that package to be dedicated to the Immokalee area. I'd like to take a million bucks out and put it into the landscaping. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Can we go to the rest of the speakers? Can we go to the rest of the speakers? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I was just going to make one suggestion. It's been two hours since the stenographer's had a break, you might want to give her five minutes. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Are you ready? Okay, five minutes. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Is that why your eyes are so wide? CHAIRMAN HENNING: You can see the glow in her eyes. MR. MUDD: Mr. Chairman, you still have 15 speakers after the break. (A brief recess was held.) CHAIRMAN HENNING: Everybody take their seats, please. The next speaker? Mr. Pettit, would you call up the next speaker, please. Page 57 September 18, 2003 MR. PETTIT: The next speaker is Rick Thomas. MR. MUDD: If your name is called and you would like to waive because you support the landscaping that Mr. Confoy had talked about, all you have to do is put your hand up and say I waive. MR. THOMAS: I waive, Rick Thomas. MR. MUDD: Thank you. MS. FILSON: Connie Thomas? MS. THOMAS: I waive. MS. FILSON: Karen Confoy? MS. CONFOY: I waive. UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: All the rest left because they thought standing up was the right thing to do. MS. FILSON: Adrian Williams? Bill Lawrence? Dan Lawrence? Dave Hapley. Andy Kelley? Gloria Kelly? Eleanor Hopley? John Dowd? You have two speakers left for the museum. Three. Jack Thompson. He will be followed by Judy Tryka. Oh, Mary Jo Forsnight was landscaping as well. MR. THOMPSON: Good evening, Commissioners, my name is Jack Thompson. I'm past president of the Florida Anthropological Society, Director of the Craighead Archeological Museum -- Laboratory at the museum, Director of the Southwest Florida Archaeological Society, and I want to speak for all of them. Members of the Southwest Florida Archaeological Society operate the laboratory as museum volunteers. We pay lab expenses. We are available to the public and welcome visitors. We are able to assist the public with questions that might normally be answered by a county archaeologist, which we don't have. We also assist the Collier County Historical and Archaeological Preservation Board of which I am a member. We analyze material from Collier County digs and publish reports that have a worldwide distribution. Areas for which we have or will sometime soon issue reports include North Naples, Page 58 September 18, 2003 Goodland, East Naples, Horr's Island and Marco Island. There are 15 chapters in the Florida Anthropological Society. These people visit us whether we're having a joint class or other things, and they go away much impressed with this museum. The general feeling is gee, for a small museum this is pretty nifty. Two people who work at the Getty museum, which is not a bad museum, came in to see us one day and they were most impressed also. So what I want to urge you to do is to adequately fund the museum so we ~an continue to do the job it's doing. Thank you. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Thank you. MS. FILSON: Judy Tryka. She will be followed by your final speaker, Patricia Huff. MS. TRYKA: Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, my name is Judy Tryka, for the record. And I am a volunteer in the research library at the Collier County Museum. My job is to clip articles of historical importance from the Naples Daily News every day. And it has given me a wonderful education as to the workings of Collier County. I have been a permanent resident here for three years, and I arrived from up-state New York. Everything in up-state New York is very, very old, including me when I was there. But everything down here is very new. It's very young. And you do not have much history, and you do tend to tear it down. I have never-- I never heard the term teardown until I came to Naples, and that means taking down an old historic building, granted it may be termite infested, but leveling it. And we have to preserve what little history this young county has. My background -- I have a Master's in history, so I know how important history is to the common man and to the general education of the populace. I am concerned because the museum, which its funding is now being cut back, is the only valid place -- is the only place that has valid history. It is the repository of all the valid history in this Page 59 September 18, 2003 county. And the staff is very minimal, they work very hard. We have volunteers who also work very hard. And any budget cut certainly will severely impact their ability to keep the history of Collier County. The Collier County population is growing. You have a year round population now that is really getting very big. And a lot of children. And we must remember that to be an educated citizen, to be an informed citizen, you have to have a background of where you have come from and what has happened before you. So I urge you to restore funding to the county museum so we can continue to keep a valid history. And I stress the term valid because there are a lot of historians wandering around Naples and vicinity that are not what we -- that are just not valid. And I stress -- that's why I'm stressing the term valid. Please reconsider the budget museum again, and I thank you for your time. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Thank you. MS. FILSON: Your final speaker, Patricia Huff. MS. HUFF: Good evening. My name is Patricia Huff, I'm a resident of Everglades City and president of the Friends of the Museum of the Everglades. I believe this is the third time I've come before the County Commissioners or the TDC to plead for funds. We're dependent upon a percentage of the TDC monies, which can fluctuate drastically from year to year. Unfortunately our fixed costs do not fluctuate but increase. It seems unreasonable to ask the museums to continue servicing the public and visitors without ample funds. I hope all of you are familiar with the Museum of the Everglades and have visited us at least once in the last five years since we've been open. Our building, which was built by Barron Collier in the 1920's, is listed on the National Register for its architectural significance. The Friends of the Museum donated this building to Collier County with the agreement that the county would continue to put the Page 60 September 18, 2003 renovation of the building through grant funding and provide ongoing financial and personnel support. Due to budget restraints, we have a manager who is able to spend only one day a week at our site and a part-time assistant to coordinate the volunteers and handle all the matters when the manager is away. There are many days when our volunteers are the only ones available to keep the museum open to visitors. Every year we receive between 13 and 15,000 visitors who want to learn about our history and how Barron Collier created a city in the middle of a swamp and financed the completion of the Tamiami Trail. We've seen a 15 percent increase in visitors for this calendar year. Last month alone in August visitors came from 24 states outside of Florida and from every county in central and southern Florida. Nearly every month our register shows tourists from seven to 10 foreign countries. I continue to see repeat visitors from Naples and Marco Island who return with relatives from out of state. The Museum of the Everglades is a tremendous asset to our town, to our community, to Collier County and to our economy. Our manager coordinates with our school to give our students the opportunity to display their talents. One of our local graduates had a one-man show with his oil paintings this summer. Many times the museum is the focal point of our community's activities. This year we helped sponsor the 75th anniversary of the opening of the Tamiami Trail, and every year we invite the old timers from around the area to share their stories with us. I love beautifying our streets, but I feel strongly that our museums are just as important. It's our history, it's our heritage. When I was here at a previous County Commissioners meeting, we thought we had 600,000 allocated to our budget needs. We had plans and we had dreams of enhancing our exhibits. Now I see only 200,000 recommended. Please do not cut our funds. I request that you reconsider the original budget allocation and that we go back to Page 61 September 18, 2003 the 600,000. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I'd like to ask Ms. Huff some questions, if I may, Mr. Chairman? CHAIRMAN HENNING: Please. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Ms. Huff, originally the TDC did agree to give you 600,000? MS. HUFF: They said they found the money somewhere. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: They found the money, yes, and later it was unfound and we were all going through -- MS. HUFF: It went into a general fund or something. They don't have the money. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Can someone tell me if this money is cut all the way back to 200,000 exactly what that means? From 600 to 200? CHAIRMAN HENNING: Mr. Dunnuck? MR. DUNNUCK: Commissioners, for the record, my name is John Dunnuck, Public Services Administrator. Yes, this is -- I think the key word that I heard earlier was this is adequate. This is not what we could have had, we would have been able to do much more exhibits, we would have been able to go a little bit further with the Roberts Ranch package, but it does allow us to proceed forward. The issues I've had, and I think they brought it up in discussion before, is frankly we have a lot of fixed costs that have gone up while the TDC allocation has remained fairly steady. We've had some one-time allocations last year and now we're using those for capital projects and matching as part of a grant program that will soon be gone. But from a standpoint of operations and moving forward and being able to bring fresh ideas to the museum, we are very limited, because we're a fairly bare bones budget. Two hundred thousand gets us through, and it's not 600,000, but it's 200,000, and that's what Page 62 September 18, 2003 we've recommended. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Mr. Dunnuck, if I may ask you another question. When this was all taking place and we were going back and forth on the budget, there was all sorts of understandings about the botanical garden and the museums and how everybody was going to be funded for this and that. What about the botanical gardens funding, is that still in place? MR. DUNNUCK: They're based upon a specific allocation. The $600,000 that were available was money from a couple of years ago that they thought was available on a purchase order. When the budget office started looking into it after it had gone through the Board approval, they found that while the P.O. was still open, the money wasn't there behind it, it had rolled forward at some point in time. So it was kind of independent of the botanical garden percentage issue. That is by ordinance and there's no way of changing that here from a budgetary perspective. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: In other words, the botanical garden, which isn't a museum of Collier County, is vested for a certain amount, while our own museums have to be for whatever is left over. MR. DUNNUCK: That's correct. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Okay. So I take it that Robert Ranch once again is going to be shut down and the project is going to be put on hold and we're going to have to put the grants to one side? MR. DUNNUCK: Well, where we are right now with Roberts Ranch is we are going through a site development plan process through community development and we're also in a site improvement plan. At the very least we've done the renovations to the buildings themselves. The future expansion, yes, will be on hold because we have some issues in the Land Development Code that we have to meet. We're going to be probably applying for some grant money for Page 63 September 18, 2003 sidewalks around the facility. That was stuff that wasn't anticipated originally. We're trying to get the restroom up and running. That's our number one priority. And I believe we will have funds to get that going, so that people will be able to visit Roberts Ranch, they will be able to see the renovations of the building -- of the facility, but we won't be able to get to that Phase II expansion. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: So the intentions is to close down Roberts Ranch for this coming year? MR. DUNNUCK: No. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Oh, to leave it open and continue the renovation? I'm a little lost. How can you do it with only $200,000 in the budget? MR. DUNNUCK: Well, there's not 200,000 in the budget. Two hundred thousand is the additional money we're asking for in addition to the money we already have, which is a little less than a million dollars. So we're talking about a $1.2 million operation to run the museum. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: So what we're looking at is not the full budget of the museum, the budget for the museum is over a million dollars; is that correct? Is that what you just said? MR. DUNNUCK: If we get this allocation, it will be over a million dollars, yes, for the full museum. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And what was it last year? MR. DUNNUCK: Last year I believe we were in the neighborhood of-- MR. MUDD: 1.3, John. MR. DUNNUCK: -- 1.3 million. And we had some one-time money on top of that. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: What was that we had on top of it; if you could explain? Just so I know where we stand. MR. DUNNUCK: We had found pockets of TDC money that were available and we had allocated towards the museum. And Page 64 September 18, 2003 because that money was allocated towards the museum, we could use that toward capital projects. That will still be in the funding loop. You know, it's a matter of whether some of the money gets rolled forward or we get some of those projects encumbered in this fiscal year, and we're working hard to do that. But some of it's tied up in the site improvement plan. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: It's not okay, but go ahead. MS. HUFF: Can I just say one thing to the -- I'm at the -- CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Halas? MS. HUFF: Oh, I'm sorry. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Are you done, ma'am? MS. HUFF: Well, I wanted to answer Commissioner Coletta's question a little bit. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay. MS. HUFF: He just asked about, you know, some of the funding. With the Museum of the Everglades, though, we did have plans to enhance some of our exhibits there. And I don't know if that will be on hold, if we're restricted now, because that was going to be the funds that we thought were coming from the 600,000. Also we are very, very bare bones in the Museum of the Everglades. If we didn't have the volunteers, we wouldn't be open, because we don't have the staff to support the Museum of the Everglades. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Thank you. COMMISSIONER HALAS: I've got a question for John. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Halas? COMMISSIONER HALAS: John, how many museums do we have in here in Collier County that funding for the museums is allocated for? MR. DUNNUCK: We have three museums. We have Everglades, we have Immokalee, Roberts Ranch, and then we have Page 65 September 18, 2003 the main museum here. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Would additional 100,000 be of any added value to some of the projects that you have ongoing at the present time? MR. DUNNUCK: In addition to the 200,000? COMMISSIONER HALAS: Yes. MR. DUNNUCK: Pushing it up to an additional 300,000? Yes, it would. CHAIRMAN HENNING: And may I ask where we're going to get the extra 100,0007 COMMISSIONER HALAS: Well, I think we have some funding available at around 778,000 and we could probably get -- take 100,000 from that. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay. Just let me ask this question: You've got -- out of the 778,000, 500 for median landscaping, 200,000 for museum, and beach parking is 100,000. So are you making a suggestion of one of those? MR. MUDD: Commissioner, can I interrupt for just a second? The UFR available fund money in 001 is $1,578,600. If you take the staff recommendation of $500,000 for landscaping, $200,000 for museum, $100,000 for beach parking, the remainder, when you subtract those from 1.5 million, is $778,600 that's still unidentified as far as a project that you want to put it to. So that's what's remaining. Now, you told me earlier that you wanted to take $35,000 of that money, okay, and talk to the school board and get them to come up with an agreement for some reimbursement, either this year or the first of next year for the start of that program. If they agree, then we would allocate that $35,000 to the abstinence program. So that leaves you $743,600 still available to identify to projects. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay. COMMISSIONER HALAS: I would like to see us put forth Page 66 September 18, 2003 100,000 towards the museums. I think it's very beneficial to not only the visitors but also the school children that visit that whole -- especially the one right next to the government complex here. MR. MUDD: And also, while we're talking about that, there is another issue that was just talked about -- landscaping, and Mike -- we're learning more and more about this system as we speak and doing slides. If you take a look at your computer monitor or the screen in front of you, you'll notice that the landscaping master plan was -- the money that was asked for in the May workshop that was identified was $2.9 million. If we talk about what the budget workshop allocation in June was, out of the 111 fund, it's $1.1 million. The staff's recommendation today would be $500,000 out of the general fund and $300,000 out of the unincorporated general fund, which totals $800,000. So the potential shortfall is $1 million to that allocated amount. You also -- and I want to make sure the Board remembers -- you allocated $200,000 out of this year's monies to the landscaping folks so they could start the designs on their projects so they could be raring to go so they didn't crunch into the high season and have all the traffic stopping about their median landscaping enhancements. So the total shortfall of that program is $800,000. And I just wanted to make sure I at least gave you that so that as you're debating the issue you have those dollars in front of you. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Coletta? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Question, Mr. Mudd. When you say that's the total shortfall, that's the total shortfall of what, of the whole thing including the museum and everything else? MR. MUDD: If you were going to totally fund your landscaping program at $2.9 million, that would get at Golden Gate Boulevard, that would get at Livingston, that would get at Rattlesnake Hammock, that's what those dollars are. Page 67 September 18, 2003 COMMISSIONER COLETTA: But at what expense? I mean you're talking about the other entities of this whole thing too, including the economic incentive and the museum. MR. MUDD: I haven't -- the staff's recommendation for museum is still $200,000. It's still subtracted from that, the remainder, which is 743. So you're still okay. And beach parking is 100 K. So we're within a couple hundred thousand dollars of being where you -- I think where the Board is going -- well, I can't speak for you. If you decide to totally fund the landscaping program, if you decide to do $100,000 for museum, in addition to the $200,000 that the staff recommends, we are about $150,000 shy of that amount of money that you have. So that you'll have to find something to take about 150 or $200,000 out of in order to fund it completely, if that's what the Board so desires. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: One last question, if I may, Mr. Mudd. Some time ago we set aside $700,000 for the trauma center, which never materialized. We didn't use the money, for various reasons. I know we used a portion of it for various needs; but is that money still out there? Is that hanging? MR. DUNNUCK: No, sir, we turned that into the general fund reserves. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Okay. So that's already accounted for in these numbers. MR. MUDD: Yes, sir, it's already been -- it's been brought into the carryforward. So it's in the budget that you've already seen, so it's already been subtracted. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: So say it once more, how short are we from reaching the goals that this group is talking about, economic incentives, the museum and the landscape master plan with everything that can you find and put together? MR. MUDD: $156,400. Page 68 September 18, 2003 COMMISSIONER COLETTA: That's what you're short? MR. MUDD: Yes, sir. MR. SMYKOWSKI: And that would give the museum an additional $300,000. MR. MUDD: No, it would give the museum an extra $100,000 on top of the staff recommendation of 200,000. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Do 100, which will make it 300 plus the part of their budget, which -- COMMISSIONER COYLE: Take it out of lmmokalee's incentive program. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Right, yeah. I see it. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Would you let me borrow your gun for a minute, sir? CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioners, my perspective, a lot of people have spent their time either through electronic e-mail or phone calls and -- or being here today. The majority of them that I hear, and again, it's their money, they want to spend it on landscaping. So who are we trying to pick and choose what we personally want to fund when the people are here telling us what to fund? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I can respond. CHAIRMAN HENNING: So I'm -- you know, I want to fund the landscaping program in total, period, what is recommended, and to keep it in our plan intact. COMMISSIONER HALAS: So what does that leave us with -- CHAIRMAN HENNING: -- for the '04 budget. COMMISSIONER HALAS: I'm sorry. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Halas. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Where does that leave us with the incentive programs then? CHAIRMAN HENNING: Well, I'm always going to believe that that should be cut in half. And I know you disagree. I heard you. Page 69 September 18, 2003 Commissioner Coletta? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: How about a compromise? We're only, what did you say $150,000 different? MR. MUDD: $156,000, sir. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: $156,000. Let's play a couple of dollars off each one of these things as we go down through it and make it balance out. I'm sure in the end we can make it work. So we're not going to be able to sacrifice one thing without a lo;r of problems on this Board. Everybody's got priorities in this world, that's for sure. We all represent segments of the population out there that are looking for certain things. I commend you, Mr. Mudd, in getting it down to that amount of money. I mean it's -- compared to what we're talking about with the total budget, we're very close to where we need to be. How about if we just take it proportionately, go right across the board and pick it out from each one of these things so it's fair and equal and we can move on? COMMISSIONER COYLE: It's $150,0007 MR. MUDD: $156,000. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: And work it out percentage-wise. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Take $52,000 out of the three programs and go with it. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Which three programs? COMMISSIONER COYLE: Immokalee incentive. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Call it economic incentive, put it that way, don't say Immokalee. COMMISSIONER COYLE: The economic incentives. The landscaping plan, take $52,000 out of that one. And 52,000 out of what we were talking about for -- COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Well, no, I was thinking in proportion to the amount that's going to go to each one. In other Page 70 September 18, 2003 words, if the landscaping master plan is 60 percent of the whole thing, it would be 60 percent of that total, and we work it right on down. Because it would be a big hit if we were to do it to the museum at $100,000 and they were going to pay an equal share as compared to $2.9 -- $2,900,000 against the $1,000 (sic), it just doesn't come out equal. CHAIRMAN HENNING: You know, Commissioner, staff has recommended $200,000 for the museum. And I'm hearing two Commissioners wanting to kick that ante up another $100,000. So that's just throwing us way off. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: No, it's not. It's part of the figures that Mr. Mudd just came up with. Sure, we could take the museum and let them be the -- take the shortfall on the whole thing, but that wouldn't be fair to them. CHAIRMAN HENNING: I'm saying staff has recommended $200,000. Two Commissioners said let's increase it by $100,000. Commissioner Halas stated that and it sounds like you're in support of that. So, you know, we're our worst enemies sitting right up here by throwing it off even more. COMMISSIONER FIALA: May I ask a question? CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Fiala? COMMISSIONER FIALA: Yes, this landscaping master plan figure, how inflated is it? I'm sorry to ask that flat out like that, but -- CHAIRMAN HENNING: That's a great question. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: We'll let Diane answer that one. Do you love your mother and apple pie, too? MS. FLAGG: Diane Flagg, for the record. Actually, what we did when we developed the master plan, besides identifying all the roads in Collier County is we actually broke the cost down to a square foot. So we went right down to a square foot, measured every single median and then took the cost and compared it to the square foot. So we're right on target there. Page 71 September 18, 2003 COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Do you think we could be frugal enough to take one dollar out of every 30 and be able to make $29 go as far as $30? MS. FLAGG: I wouldn't want to speak for you all, but if you have the EDC at 1.5 -- 1.5 million and you're only $154,000 short, that may be to fund all the programs, that may be an option for you. CHAIRMAN HENNING: You know, the economic development incentives, you got it down to the square foot. We don't know where this money is going. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: We do. It's been laid out for us several times, several ways. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Not which business. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Well, also -- CHAIRMAN HENNING: Commissioner Halas? COMMISSIONER HALAS: Also, I think we were looking at some of the incentive programs were probably for CRA's, which we have out in Immokalee, and we also have in Bayshore. So we're looking to put money into that area. And I know that's a bone of contention because-- COMMISSIONER FIALA: But they're paying for themselves, like the Immokalee CRA and the Bayshore Triangle CRA, that's all money coming out of their own TIF funds. COMMISSIONER HALAS: That's true, but do they have enough money to bring in incentives for high-tech? COMMISSIONER FIALA: They're not asking -- I'm just going to speak now for Bayshore and the Triangle. They're not asking for any dollars, so this isn't part of this at all. CHAIRMAN HENNING: I'm going to go ahead and ask for a motion and see if there's a second, and we're going to vote on how to allocate these programs and see where it goes, okay? Commissioner Coletta? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I'd like to make a motion that Page 72 September 18, 2003 we set the final budget to reflect an adjustment to the programs on the landscape, for the economic incentives, with the exception of the CRA's, which are self-sustaining; am I correct on that? MR. SMYKOWSKI: CRA's are, yes. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: So that wouldn't figure into it. The economic incentives, the landscaping and the museums, in proportional amounts that we were discussing, you know, $100,000 additional to the museum, the economic incentive as is, and take them and take a percentage off each one of them and make it come out to the correct amount. I think the amount would be so little off each one that it should operate, working with a percentage that's realistic to the amount of money that we're actually dealing with. Is there any way you can get those numbers, just so we can take a quick look at them for comparison? CHAIRMAN HENNING: There's a motion on the floor to take it out of the three identified programs and split the difference. Is there a second on the motion? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HENNING: Is there a second on the motion? COMMISSIONER COYLE: Who made the motion? COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Commissioner Coletta. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: I thought you did. I second it. Just kidding. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Motion fails for lack of a second. Is there another motion? COMMISSIONER HALAS: I make a motion that we just take the funds from the EDC to make up the difference of what we're missing in the landscaping and leave the rest of the funds intact with the EDC. So we're looking at what, $200,000 that would be taken out of the EDC fund to make up the difference on the landscaping? MR. MUDD: Are you talking landscaping and the $100,000 for the museum? I want to make sure. Page 73 September 18, 2003 COMMISSIONER HALAS: Yes, landscaping and the $100,000 for the museum. MR. MUDD: Yes, sir, that's $156,000. COMMISSIONER HALAS: And we're talking a $1.5 million for EDC. So why don't we take the funds from that EDC and then we're -- I think everybody's -- we take care of the issue of landscaping, we take care of the issue of the museum, and that still leaves us money to be set aside so we have economic incentive development packages for Eastern Collier County. COMMISSIONER FIALA: I'll second that motion. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Now, does that include the program that Mrs. Sullivan brought up? MR. MUDD: Yes, the $156,000 figure that I gave you was minus the $35,000 for Mrs. Sullivan's program, contingent upon the school board agreeing to our agreement. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Now, what's on the viewer here, the -- that shortfall is not a shortfall then, that is -- COMMISSIONER HALAS: That would take care of it. CHAIRMAN HENNING: That's taken care of. MR. MUDD: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Everything's taken care of. COMMISSIONER FIALA: And we've added $100,000 to the museums. COMMISSIONER HALAS: COMMISSIONER FIALA: master plan completely. MR. MUDD: Yes, sir, let's make sure I'm very, very specific. It's $156,400. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: That's coming out of the economic incentive. MR. MUDD: Yes, sir. That's correct. And we've funded the landscaping Page 74 September 18, 2003 CHAIRMAN HENNING: Discussion. Commissioner Coyle? COMMISSIONER COYLE: Yes, I just have a question. I think it's a good solution. But the last time we discussed the economic incentive program, I raised several questions about certain qualifying salary levels, maximum salary levels and that sort of thing. And I'd like to understand where we're going with that, because it appears this motion will allocate the funding for all three of these programs. MR. MUDD: Commissioner, you have to still pass the ordinances. When you met the last time, you changed the ordinances so much they didn't even look like what was originally advertised, and so we have to bring all six of those incentives back to the Board to have you agree to how you want the program to be run. And if these dollars are not spent within the year, they will roll back over into the general fund reserve. And you have not told us how you want the programs to be run yet. And we plan to bring that to you on the 14th of October. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Okay, that's very key. Because there are several concerns with respect to how that's going to be done. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Any further discussions? All in favor of the motion, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Aye. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Aye. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Aye. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Aye. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Aye. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Opposed? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HENNING: Motion carries unanimously. Thank you, Commissioners. Now we have to go ahead and get the motions -- Page 75 September 18, 2003 MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes, and I have to read all the millages as well, in compliance with statute. But first -- COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Go real slow. Item #2E RESOLUTION 2003-316 AMENDING THE TENTATIVE RI IDGETS - ADOPTED MR. SMYKOWSKI: Item 2(E) is a resolution to amend the tentative budgets, based on your motion and the changes that staff brought forward to this public hearing. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Entertain a motion. COMMISSIONER COYLE: So moved. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Motion by Commissioner Coyle, second by Commissioner Henning. All in favor of the motion, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Aye. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Aye. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Aye. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Aye. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Aye. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Opposed? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HENNING: Motion carries unanimously. Item #2F PUBLIC READING OF THE TAXING AUTHORITY LEVYING MILLAGE, THE NAME OF THE TAXING AUTHORITY, THE ROLLED-BACK RATE, THE PERCENTAGE INCREASE, AND THE MILI,AGE RATE TO FIE I,EVIED- PRESENTED Page 76 September 18, 2003 MR. SMYKOWSKI: That moves us to Item 2(F), a public reading of the taxing authority, levying the millage, name of the taxing authority, the rolled back rate, the percentage increase and the millage rate to be levied. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Entertain a motion. COMMISSIONER COYLE: So moved. MR. SMYKOWSKI: No, no, no. I actually have to physically read. No such luck. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay. MR. SMYKOWSKI: General Fund 001, the rolled back rate, 3.5150. The proposed -- MR. MUDD: Ladies and gentlemen, this meeting is still going on. If you could just hold it down. If you want to have your conversation, please go out into the hallway. Thank you very much. MR. SMYKOWSKI: General fund, the rolled back rate, 3.5150. The adopted millage rate will be 3.8772, an increase of 10.3 percent above the rolled back rate. Water Pollution Control, fund 114, the rolled back rate, .0315 mills. Proposed millage .0347, 10.2 percent increase. Unincorporated area general, fund 111, rolled back millage rate .7273 mills, proposed .8069, a 10.9 percent increase. Golden Gate Community Center, fund 130, rolled back rate .2542, proposed .2596, a 2.1 percent increase. Naples Park Drainage, fund 139, rolled back rate is zero, the proposed millage rate .0062, and percent change is N/A, as there was no levy in '03. Pine Ridge Industrial Park, fund 140, rolled back .0460, adopted millage rate .0562, a 22.2 percent increase. Victoria Park Drainage, fund 134, rolled back. 1607 mills, proposed. 197 mills, an increase of 22.6 percent. Golden Gate Parkway Beautification, fund 136, the rolled back rate .4338, proposed .5 mills, increase of 15.3 percent. Page 77 September 18, 2003 Naples Production Park, fund 141, rolled back .0209 mills, proposed .0129, a decrease of 38.3 percent. Vanderbilt Beach MSTU, fund 143, the rolled back rate .7626, the adopted millage -- or proposed millage rate .5, a decrease of 34.4 percent. Isle of Capri Fire, fund 144, rolled back 1.3279, proposed 1.5, an increase of 13 percent. Ochopee Fire, fund 146, rolled back 3.4601, proposed four mills. An increase of 15.6 percent. Collier County Fire, fund 148, rolled back 1.8348, proposed two mills, 9 percent increase. Goodland/Horr's Island Fire, fund 149, rolled back .5486, proposed .5614, a 2.3 percent increase. Radio Road beautification, fund 150, rolled back .4562, proposed, one half mill, 9.6 percent increase. Sabal Palm Road, fund 151, rolled back is zero, there is no proposed tax levy. Lely Golf Estates beautification, fund 152, rolled back 1.8184 mills, proposed two mills, a 10 percent increase. Hawks Ridge storm water pumping MSTU, fund 154, rolled back .0286, proposed .0309, an 8 percent increase. Forest Lakes Roadway and Drainage MSTU, fund 155, rolled back 2.6556 mills, proposed three mills, increase of 13 percent. Immokalee beautification MSTU, fund 156, rolled back .9494 mills, proposed 1 mill, an increase of 5.3 percent. Bayshore Avalon beautification, fund 160, the rolled back rate 1.7889 mills, proposed two mills, increase of 11.8 percent. Livingston Road Phase II beautification MSTU, fund 161, the rolled back rate is zero, proposed .1231. It's N/A in terms of percent increase, there was no levy in the previous fiscal year. Conservation Collier, fund 172, the rolled back rate is zero, proposed is .25 mills. That's also N/A, no levy in the prior fiscal year. Page 78 September 18, 2003 Parks GOB debt service, the rolled back rate .0241 mills, proposed is zero, a decrease of 100 percent. Isle of Capri Municipal Fire, fund 244, rolled back is zero, proposed is zero. Collier County lighting, fund 760, the rolled back rate .1345, proposed. 1464, an 8.8 percent increase. Naples Production Park street lighting, the rolled back rate .0394 mills, proposed 0 mills, a decrease of 100 percent. The Pelican Bay MSTBU, rolled back rate. 1646, proposed .1337. The percent change is a decrease of 18.8 percent. The aggregate millage rate rollback is 4.1285, the proposed 4.7994, an increase of 16.25 percent. Item #2G RESOLUTION 2003-317 SETT1NG MILLAGE RATES- ADOPTED That moves us to Item 2(G). We would need adoption of the resolution establishing the millage rates. We will need two separate motions, one for the principal taxing authorities, which includes everything with the exception of the pollution control and the Conservation Collier, which are dependent districts. That would need two motions, one for the principal taxing authorities, one for the dependent districts. COMMISSIONER COYLE: May I make a motion that the -- CHAIRMAN HENNING: Go ahead. COMMISSIONER COYLE: What was the first? MR. SMYKOWSKI: For the principal taxing authority. COMMISSIONER COYLE: For the principal taxing authority rates be approved. COMMISSIONER HALAS: I second that. Page 79 September 18, 2003 CHAIRMAN HENNING: Motion by Commissioner Coyle, second by Commissioner Halas. All in favor of the motion, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Aye. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Aye. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Aye. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Aye. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Aye. CHAIRMAN HENNING: (No response.) CHAIRMAN HENNING: Any opposed? Motion carries unanimously. MR. SMYKOWSKI: Now a separate motion, sir, for the dependent districts. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: So moved. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Motion by -- COMMISSIONER COYLE: Second. CHAIRMAN HENNING: -- Commissioner Coletta, second by Commissioner Coyle. All in favor of the motion, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Aye. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Aye. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Aye. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Aye. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Aye. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Opposed? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HENNING: Motion carries unanimously. Item #2H RESOLUTION 2003-318 ADOPTING THE FINAL BUDGET BY FI JND - ADOPTED Page 80 September 18, 2003 MR. SMYKOWSKI: Sir, Item 2(H), we need a resolution to adopt the final budget by fund again for the principal taxing authorities, followed by the dependent districts. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Two separate motions? MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER COYLE: It's a motion to accept the final budget, right? MR. SMYKOWSKI: Yes, sir, for the principal taxing authority. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Principal taxing authority. So moved. COMMISSIONER HALAS: I second. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Motion by Commissioner Coyle, second by Commissioner Halas. All in favor of the motion, signify by saying aye. COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Aye. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Aye. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Aye. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Aye. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Aye. CHAIRMAN HENNING: (No response.) CHAIRMAN HENNING: Opposed? Carries unanimously. MR. SMYKOWSKI: We need one final motion, sir, for the dependent districts, which are pollution control and the Conservation Collier. COMMISSIONER COYLE: So moved. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Second. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Motion by Commissioner Coyle, second by commissioner Fiala. All in favor of the motion, signify by saying aye. Page 81 September 18, 2003 COMMISSIONER COLETTA: Aye. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Aye. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Aye. COMMISSIONER HALAS: Aye. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Aye. 'CHAIRMAN HENNING: (No response.) CHAIRMAN HENNING: Opposed? Motion carries unanimously. MR. MUDD: for this evening. COMMISSIONER FIALA: Motion to adjourn. COMMISSIONER COYLE: Second. COMMISSIONER HALAS: I second. Mr. Chairman, that's all the business that we have CHAIRMAN HENNING: Just one question. Have we figured out what we're going to do at the second Land Development Code hearing, or do you want to hear that next Tuesday or Wednesday? MR. MUDD: Mr. Chairman, the 8th of October we will have the second Land Development Code reading. Commissioner Fiala will be in attendance. CHAIRMAN HENNING: Okay. Great. We are adjourned. Page 82 September 18, 2003 There being no further business for the good of the County, the meeting was adjourned by order of the Chair at 7:50 p.m. BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS BOARD OF ZONING APPEALS/EX OFFICIO GOVERNING BOARD(S) OF SPECIAL DISTRICTS UNDER ITS CONTROL TOM ~H~E~ING, Chai~rfin ATTEST: DWIGHT E,:i!BROCK, CLERK Thesem~nutes !~l~t~Br,~Pb~y the Board on as presented ~/ or as corrected TRANSCRIPT PREPARED ON BEHALF OF GREGORY COURT REPORTING SERVICE, INC. BY CHERIE NOTTINGHAM Page 83