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Agenda 09/24/2024 Item # 2A (August 13, 2024, BCC Minutes)August 13, 2024 Page 1 TRANSCRIPT OF THE MEETING OF THE BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS Naples, Florida, August 13, 2024 LET IT BE REMEMBERED that the Board of County Commissioners, in and for the County of Collier, and also acting as the Board of Zoning Appeals and as the governing board(s) of such special districts as have been created according to law and having conducted business herein, met on this date at 9:00 a.m., in REGULAR SESSION in Building "F" of the Government Complex, East Naples, Florida, with the following Board members present: Chairman: Chris Hall Rick LoCastro Dan Kowal William L. McDaniel, Jr. Burt L. Saunders ALSO PRESENT: Amy Patterson, County Manager Ed Finn, Deputy County Manger Jeffrey A. Klatzkow, County Attorney Derek Johnssen, Clerk's Office Troy Miller, Communications & Customer Relations Page 13 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 2 MS. PATTERSON: Chair, you have a live mic. CHAIRMAN HALL: Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the commissioner meeting. Before we get started with the Pledge and the prayer, I just want to remind you to turn that cell phone off. Don't get caught playing Brick House on your ringtone. I know, Lois, that you have that one on your phone for Wayne. And I want to remind you, if you are going to public speak today, there's a three-minute time limit. You'll see the yellow light. That means it's 30 seconds to land that plane, and we're going to hold you to it. So you're welcome to talk to us but stick within the rules. All right. With that, we'll say the prayer, get this started right. Item #1A INVOCATION BY PASTOR GLENN WIGGINS - SEAGATE BAPTIST CHURCH - INVOCATION GIVEN MS. PATTERSON: Our invocation today will be led by Pastor Glenn Wiggins from Seagate Baptist Church, and it will be followed by the Pledge of Allegiance from Patricia A. Benvenuto -- oh, I messed it up anyway -- the chaplain from the VFW Post 7721 auxiliary and daughter of World War II Army Corps veteran. PASTOR WIGGINS: Let us pray. Lord, I thank you for the privilege of living in the great state of Florida, the even greater privilege of residing in this beautiful city of Naples. Today as we gather, we seek your favor upon that county commission. Your word tells us that you ordain those in authority. These men and women have been ordained by you. Lord, I pray that you would help them to legislate righteously and serve our city and Page 14 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 3 county faithfully. We ask you for wisdom, Lord, because in this age we need it now more than ever. I pray for each person in authority in this council; that you would bless them in larger influence, place a hedge of protection around their families. I pray for all of our schools starting today in Collier County, that your mighty hand of protection would be upon all the students and faculty, that you would bless them abundantly and keep them safe. I pray that all that is said and done today will be guided by your hand. We need your power, Lord, your strength and your wisdom. Thank you for dying on the cross, being buried, and rising again the third day so we might have salvation through Jesus Christ. We ask for your blessing and thank you for this day you've allowed us to live and serve Jesus. For it's in Jesus' name I pray. Amen. (The Pledge of Allegiance was recited in unison.) MS. PATTERSON: Commissioners, agenda changes for August 13th, 2024. First, we have continue Item 16B1 to a future meeting. This is a recommendation to award request for quote in the amount of $582,842 under Multi Contractor Award Agreement No. 21-7842 to Quality Enterprises USA, Inc., and authorize staff to issue a purchase order. This is being moved at Commissioner McDaniel's request. Continue Item 16D1 to a future meeting. Recommendation to authorize an exemption from the competitive process for a subscription to the Hoopla streaming service Midwest Tape, LLC, for library patron use in an amount not to exceed $400,000 per year -- per fiscal year as budgeted through FY 2029. This is being moved at Commissioner McDaniel's request. And continue Item 16D2 to a future meeting. This is a recommendation to authorize an exemption from competitive process for purchases from OCLC, Inc., the acquisition of subscription Page 15 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 4 services to cloudLibrary and interlibrary loan services in an amount not to exceed $600,000 per fiscal year as budgeted through FY 2029 with the total maximum spend amount of $3,100,000, which includes two months and five years. This is being moved at Commissioner McDaniel's request. We have an add-on Item 10B, which is a recommendation to direct the County Attorney, working with county airport staff, to coordinate with Quality Enterprises USA, Inc., and RTH Enterprise, Inc., to formalize an agreement regarding the use of land at the Immokalee Regional Airport. This is being added at Commissioner McDaniel's request. We do have court reporter breaks set for a time of 10:30 and again at 2:50. With that, County Attorney. MR. KLATZKOW: Nothing to add. Thank you, Amy. Item #2A APPROVAL OF TODAY'S REGULAR, CONSENT AND SUMMARY AGENDA AS AMENDED (EX PARTE DISCLOSURE PROVIDED BY COMMISSION MEMBERS FOR CONSENT AGENDA.) - MOTION TO APPROVE BY COMMISSIONER HALL; SECONDED BY COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS - APPROVED AND/OR ADOPTED W/CHANGES MS. PATTERSON: Commissioners, ex parte and any further changes to the summary or consent agenda. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner Kowal. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: I have no changes and no disclosures for consent or summary. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner Saunders. Page 16 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 5 COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I have no disclosure and no changes as well, Mr. Chairman. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner LoCastro. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Same; no disclosures, no changes. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner McDaniel. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: No. You heard my changes at the beginning, and no disclosures as well, sir. CHAIRMAN HALL: No requests for lunch or anything like that? COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Okay. Lunch. I'm hungry. CHAIRMAN HALL: I have no ex parte and no other changes, but I do have a comment. I don't want to pull 16F4 off, but I do want to talk about it just for a second. We don't get together. We don't get to talk. So this is one where we're going to spend $780,000 for a construction manager to build the Sheriff's building, the forensic building. And so my comments are not so much to staff, but they're amongst ourselves. And it seems to me that this construction management and the Construction Management at Risk, it doesn't work a lot of the times as, quote, "designed." It seems like there's not very much accountability for the at-risk managers. Anything -- if there's ever a discrepancy, it comes back on the taxpayer. And there's not very much accountability. So my point is, what are thoughts about instead of paying people to do the management, why don't we just take a little higher view? We have architects. We have engineers. We have plans. We have a defined scope. We have agreed-upon timetables. And just as a simplified version, to take that approach with a contract that's firm. It spells all of the details out. When you get 25 percent of your work done, you get paid 25 percent once that work is verified. And we Page 17 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 6 can have people from staff that are capable of doing that, not so much as trying to manage that job, but holding contractors accountable for what they're supposed to do and when they're supposed to do it and how they're supposed to do it. Commissioner McDaniel. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yes, good morning, Mr. Chair. And, for the record, my mother says you have a pretty tie on today, just so you know. CHAIRMAN HALL: Oh, thank you, Ms. McDaniel. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I applaud the idea. The question that I have for you, and as you brought up adeptly, we don't get to talk about these things unless we're here and Terri is writing down all my misspoken words. Would it -- would it not be prudent for us to review our RFP process and our contract process similar to the 16B1 that I continued today to put better measurables and milestones in? In my previous life, I used construction managers at risk, and it meant something. CHAIRMAN HALL: That's my point. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: And so having it mean something, having them being accountable, if we're paying somebody $750,000, they need to earn that and stand accountable for it. You don't just get to come in with an amendment to the contract and get another couple million dollars because somebody missed something along the way. And so I guess my question isn't necessarily -- it's a discussion point at this stage. I would -- I would think maybe we should be a little more in depth on our RFP, our ITNs, our requests for qualifications. The things that we put out have a -- have a delineation for responsibilities, and not just because we have always done it, but put measurables and milestones in those processes when we put -- go out for bid and have a look at it from a management Page 18 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 7 standpoint. I'd kind of like to hear from our -- from Amy or Ed with regard to their thoughts as far as legality go, because I know we're heavily governed by the CCNA which requires us to hire a consultant oftentimes when I would prefer that we not. So I'd like to hear from our staff with regard to their perspectives and see if we can maybe tighten it up but still have an overseer who's standing accountable for what it is that we're hiring them for. They're consulting amongst one another. CHAIRMAN HALL: Rock, paper, scissors. MS. PATTERSON: Yeah. So I totally understand where the Board is coming from and some of the -- I don't want to say frustrations -- is the same that is experienced by staff. We've been in the process the last several months of looking at portions of our procurement ordinance and manual to look at where we can make changes that will be meaningful as well as tighten up areas where we think there are some weaknesses. But I'll look at Mr. Finn now, because he obviously lived this in his former role in facilities of dealing with contracts. And we live and die by these contracts and, oftentimes, we're finding that, you know, we're spending large amounts of time and effort on things that shouldn't be this difficult. So with that, Mr. Finn. MR. FINN: Thank you, ma'am. Yes, sir. I think there's some merit to this discussion, and it does, in fact, start with the contract, which is preceded, of course, by the RFP process. I think there's room to look at this. Why don't you give us a little bit of time, and we'll provide some briefings back to you. We're going to need to confer with the County Attorney as well as the Page 19 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 8 procurement people and see what we can do relative to contracts and, of course, our own internal project management personnel. We need to elevate their interest in making things go smooth. I will caution -- caution the Chair and the Board, construction contracts are complicated. The plans are complicated, often running to hundreds if not thousands of pages, sheets of plans and specifications. It's certainly not an easy thing. Change is part of managing projects, and sometimes there are problems. Further compounding our dilemma is oftentimes in a hard bid situation, if a contract was qualified, we're largely required to select the low-bid qualified contractor, and that comes with certain limitations. You've all heard me talk about certain projects there have been problematic, Big Corkscrew being an interesting example. The contractor was a low bid -- low hard-bid contractor. That contractor struggled. He was not local. Struggled to execute the contract. Got caught up in COVID, and as a result, the project was two -- two-plus years late. Now, the project -- to his credit, he stuck with the project and got it done, but it was untidy. And that one still is within the budget because it -- or largely within the budget, plus allowances, but that is an example of could we have contracted better? And I might submit that sometimes we have limitations on who actually bids on a job, which leads to some of the difficulties we have. If it's limited and we still have to move out with the job, sometimes we have to make accommodations and move forward in that sense. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Maybe -- I don't mean to interrupt, but maybe -- and I'm certainly wanting to have a longer, larger discussion with regard to this, but in the entire process, when we go out for an RFQ, the stipulations that are in the RFQ preclude certain people from being able to bid just because there's a specification there that some people can't necessarily meet, and Page 20 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 9 then -- and you've heard me talk regularly about our contract management that we have had. We had a discussion not too awfully long ago with our County Attorney in delineating date-certain times that need to be met so we're not coming in here with the after-the-facts because somebody -- somebody didn't see a particular date on a contract, so I'm -- MR. FINN: You're absolutely right, sir. Administratively, we are trying to snug up, and the County Manager and myself are committed to that. Our project management teams are committed to it. If I can -- if I could wrap up with kind of a final comment, certainly I think there's room here to hold contractors more accountable, tighten up on our contract and our bidding documents. That's our intent. We'll do a little study of this. We'll brief the Board individually here over the next couple of weeks on what we think we can do with that. MS. PATTERSON: If I may, maybe it would be helpful at a future agenda to talk about the process and the things that we're required to do and then those areas where we have room or some latitude for change from the way that perhaps we've been doing business in the past, because the things that we have to do by statute or by other rule we're kind of stuck with even when they don't make sense, but it would be nice to maybe lay those out while the five of you are together so that we all understand that those aren't -- there's nothing we can do about it, but here are the areas where we could make some meaningful change, and that would be when we could bring that back for discussion. CHAIRMAN HALL: That would be good. Commissioner LoCastro. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Thank you. Mr. Finn, your point about tightening some things up -- and I've Page 21 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 10 mentioned this here before -- couldn't agree more because, I mean, what I've seen just in my three-plus years in the seat -- and we all -- we all have done previous things. So in my previous life, when, you know, contractors came to the Department of Defense and they were the lowest bid and we were forced to take it and they were the lowest bid by $10,000, and then six months into the project they gave us an amendment that asked for another $600,000. And so then the person that came in second that was $11,000 too much and never would have changed the contract is who we should have gone with. I mean, my question to the staff would be right now, could we produce a spreadsheet that would show all the contracts that we have agreed to that got amended for one reason or another or defaulted in some way, shape, or form and, you know, do we keep, you know, track of those folks? I realize there's always changes. They found an underground line. They hit a water pipe. They didn't realize there was an environmental sort of impact. But as we've said before up here, sometimes, too, it sounded like the contractor didn't fully do their homework. They threw a really quick bid together. They knew how to play the system. They lowballed it. They got the contract, and then they knew that any amendments to the contract would just be thrown on the consent agenda, and we'd blindly rubber stamp it, which these five -- the five of us do very rarely, if at all. But I think the -- you know, in the past maybe it sort of slid by a little bit more easily, and that's also a compliment to you-all catching, you know, that kind of stuff. But, you know, that's the big problem that I have is that, yeah, it's great we're forced to go with the lowest qualified bid, but, I mean, I always scratch my head when I see these. And you've heard me say before, "Gosh, we're approving a $300,000 amendment because, you know, they forgot to look around the corner or they didn't Page 22 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 11 measure twice and cut once." You know, I think that's a contractor, then, if they have a pattern of that, shouldn't even be, you know, allowed to bid again. And maybe your answer's going to be, oh, they're not. Well, you know, a contractor that built the Marco Island Executive Airport -- not to beat up old things, but, you know, we have to learn from past history -- had a history -- my understanding from our own staff, is a history of lawsuits, a history of, you know, amendment after amendment after amendment, you know, for asking for, you know, more money and things like that. So, you know, if we're going to look at tightening up the process, I think that's a big catch is contractors who regularly come back to us with something that -- that inflates the contract or increases the contract, and then you sit here and go, "Wow, now they're the fourth most competitive bidder," you know. And I bet you the top three people, if we went back to them and said, "Do you feel confident you wouldn't have come back to us?" there's a possibility they wouldn't have. And so, you know, I just think that the secret's out among some contractors, "bid low, adjust later." And, you know, that's a -- you know, is something that I think, if we're -- like you said, if we're going to take a tighter look, I'd love to see the stats on that. And then I know that the County Manager wants to say something. Let me make one final thing. So the Chairman's basically talking about 16F4. So do you think we should -- this is one that, like you said, to talk about it. If it's on the consent agenda, it's great we're talking about it, but we're not -- you know, if we leave it on the consent agenda, then I guess we'll just have a conversation about it, and then we'll go forward and spend almost a million dollars with just a short conversation here. Is this one that should -- you know, you should do a deeper dive and come back to us? Is that Page 23 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 12 what you're sort of suggesting, or you're just trying to open it up for conversation and see what we think? CHAIRMAN HALL: I planned on leaving it, but I did want to open it up. And this is good conversation because this is a direction that we do need to go, I think, with our -- with our culture. And so I think it's good. So, Commissioner McDaniel. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yes. And just as a final note, while we're reviewing and doing what it is that you're -- is being suggested this morning -- and we talked a little bit about it yesterday, but I really want an incentive-based approach as we're managing our contracts. The merit pay for our employees. Who's the best at managing our overall expenses? It's our -- it's the staff. It's the people that work for Collier County. If one of -- if one of our staff value-engineers a project and saves the taxpayers money, then we ought to have an incentive-pay program to incentivize, further, people looking at our contracts and how we go. At the same time, on the actual contracts themselves with the contractors, on time and under budget means a bonus at some particular stage because we've saved -- that contractor maybe had value engineering that was done. So that's a proviso for a thought process when we're discussing these things. I'd like -- I'd like to certainly enhance or activate the merit pay program that we have internally and have a look at a bonus with a deduct at the same time. You don't get a bonus just because you're nice. If you -- if you aren't paying attention to what you're doing within the parameters of the contract and it exceeds budget and it exceeds time, then there's penalties that travel along at the same time. So both ways. MS. PATTERSON: Understood. We'll prepare some information and bring it back to open up the conversation, and we can include -- Commissioner LoCastro, we have probably several Page 24 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 13 examples that would be good to discuss where we've had problems with contractors that have led to change orders and other things beyond unforeseen conditions, and to that point, we do work closely with the Clerk's Office on these matters to make sure that exactly what you're describing is not what's starting to happen where somebody underbids the job only knowing that they can come back and change-order us for additional things. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: And I just don't think we should keep that a secret. MS. PATTERSON: Right. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I think that, you know, if we're vocal about one that is cut and dry that looks like, you know, it had a pattern of improper, you know, procedures, that sends a signal out to other contractors that, "Hey, we don't fool around. You know that this is a $10 million project. You bid 8-, and you knew you'd be the low bidder because the thing's going to be more than 8-," and then you come back and hit us with, you know, $4 and a half million over a three-year period of changes. I mean, that's the kind of, you know, shenanigans we've got to really kill. So I look forward to seeing, like, more detail and not just sort of just open discussion but measurement of these things, and -- and maybe laundry lists. I mean, you know, in my prior job, the Department of Defense would release a list. These are contractors that are no longer qualified to bid on contracts, and it was a public thing. And maybe we have it, and it might be buried on a website somewhere. Maybe it needs to be a little bit more visible. On the flip side, we've got some amazing contractors that do incredible work in the county, and so it works both ways. You know, thank you for giving us a proper bid, thank you for coming in on time, maybe even under budget or on budget. That should be something that's, you know, applauded, known, and highly respected Page 25 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 14 and advertised. MS. PATTERSON: Understood. Thank you. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Thank you, ma'am. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner Kowal. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Thank you, Chair. Yeah, that item that Commissioner McDaniel pulled, that 16B1, was -- I going to pull it myself, but he had already done it. And that was a perfect example. We had this discussion two weeks ago. Is there a point -- because we had a big discrepancy in some bids in something we discussed two weeks ago at one of our meetings. And I had seen No. 2 on this particular bid. You had -- the bid came in -- the awarded bid came in $528,000, but No. 2 was at $1.2 million. That's a big discrepancy between two contractors. I mean, that should trigger something. And especially, you know, in this day and age that -- who's missing something or somebody -- somebody's getting something somebody else ain't finding on this project. So it should be a discussion. And the one at first -- I think Commissioner Hall had started out as construction management more, like, you know -- you know, can we not -- can we eliminate maybe that in the process or something? But I think we need to find from staff and the County Attorney the statutory where do we stand because maybe some of these things were put in in the past because it was safeguarding the public's money, you know, having a third party involved and things like that. I just don't know statutorily. I don't know enough about it, but I think that's where we start. I think we get those rules, what we can and can't do, and we -- the five of us here have a really deep discussion with the staff and attorneys and see what we can do in the future and try to curb some of this cost we do put out. There are things that we -- probably could be done with in-house. Page 26 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 15 We had this discussion six months ago about quality control on projects and using our own engineers and our own, you know, out -- in the field and back checking some of these -- like, I believe it was referring to the Vanderbilt Beach Road extension, you know, that we're paying a separate individual contractor -- or a contract manager to go out and watch these guys work when, you know, if we can provide staff of our own to do it or have maybe a system in place where these guys are checked on a -- periodically when they get to certain levels or phases of the construction and they meet a certain element of it of completion, then they do get awarded their money as long as they meet that in a certain time, and that's put into a system, built in. So, yeah, I believe this is a good discussion we should all have, because I think the people in the county deserve it. MS. PATTERSON: Agreed. CHAIRMAN HALL: Thanks. Thanks for humoring me on that. And I don't want to be hard to work for, but I do want to work smarter, and I do want to do it more professionally, and when people bid a job, I just want them to be accountable. Do what you say and say what you -- and say what you mean. So with that, I'll make a motion to approve the consent agenda. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Second. CHAIRMAN HALL: Motion and seconded. All in favor, say aye. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Aye. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye. CHAIRMAN HALL: Aye. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Aye. CHAIRMAN HALL: All opposed? (No response.) Page 27 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 16 MS. PATTERSON: Thank you, Commissioners. Proposed Agenda Changes Board of County Commissioners Meeting August 13, 2024 Continue item 16B1 to a future meeting: Recommendation to award Request for Quote (“RFQ”) in the amount of $582,842, under Multi‐Contractor Award Agreement No. 21‐7842, to Quality Enterprises USA, Inc., and authorize staff to issue a Purchase Order. (Commissioner McDaniel’s Request) Continue item 16D1 to a future meeting: Recommendation to authorize an exemption from the competitive process for a subscription to the Hoopla streaming service from Midwest Tape, LLC, for Library patron use in an amount not to exceed $400,000 per Fiscal Year, as budgeted, through FY 2029. (Commissioner McDaniel’s Request) Continue item 16D2 to a future meeting: Recommendation to authorize an exemption from the competitive process for purchases from OCLC, Inc., the acquisition of subscription services to cloudLibrary™ and interlibrary loan services in an amount not to exceed $600,000 per Fiscal Year, as budgeted, through FY 2029, with the total maximum spend amount of $3,100,000 which includes 2 months and 5 years). (Commissioner McDaniel’s Request) Add-on item 10B: Recommendation to direct the County Attorney, working with County airport staff, to coordinate with Quality Enterprises USA, Inc., and RTH Enterprise Inc. to formalize an agreement regarding use of land at the Immokalee Regional Airport. (Commissioner McDaniel’s Request) Notes: TIME CERTAIN ITEMS: 9/16/2024 1:16 PM Page 28 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 17 Item #2B JULY 9, 2024, BCC MINUTES - MOTION TO APPROVE AS PRESENTED BY COMMISSIONER MCDANIEL; SECONDED BY COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS – APPROVED Item #2C JULY 23, 2024, BCC MEETING & CRA WORKSHOP MINUTES - MOTION TO APPROVE AS PRESENTED BY COMMISSIONER MCDANIEL; SECONDED BY COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS – APPROVED MS. PATTERSON: That brings us to Items 2B and 2C. These are the meeting minutes for July 9th, 2024, and July 23rd, 2024, including the CRA workshop minutes. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Move for approval. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Second. CHAIRMAN HALL: On both items? COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yes. CHAIRMAN HALL: Motion and seconded. All in favor, say eye. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Aye. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye. CHAIRMAN HALL: Aye. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Aye. CHAIRMAN HALL: So moved. Item #5A Page 29 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 18 ARTIST OF THE MONTH – SUPERVISOR OF ELECTIONS OFFICE – ART FOR DEMOCRACY VOTER REGISTRATION CHALLENGE BY LOCAL HIGH SCHOOL AS WELL AS ORIGINAL DRAWINGS BY STUDENT’S GRADE K-12; MORE INFORMATION CAN BE FOUND AT THE SUPERVISOR OF ELECTIONS WEBSITE AT COLLIERVOTES.GOV MS. PATTERSON: That brings us to Item 5A, Artist of the Month. And if I can turn your attention to the back of the room. The August Artist of the Month is presented by the Supervisor of Elections office. On display are past winners of the Annual Art for Democracy Contest. The contest showcases original drawings submitted by students in grades kindergarten through 12th that express what the democratic process means to them. Students in grades kindergarten through eighth can also enter a contest that awards an original design featured on the "I voted" stickers. The office also hosts an annual high school voter registration challenge with the purpose to prepare students to vote in future elections. Since its inauguration in 2013, thousands of high school students have been registered or preregistered. More information about community programs and events can be found on the Supervisor of Elections' website at colliervotes.gov. Item #5B AFTER ACTION REPORT - TROPICAL STORM DEBBIE (DAN SUMMERS, EMERGENCY Page 30 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 19 MANAGEMENT DIRECTOR) - PRESENTED; COMMUNITY HOTLINE NUMBER FOR ASSISTANCE IS 311, OR DOWNLOAD THE APP, WHICH RELAYS INFORMATION TO DISPATCH; ANYONE HAVING AN ISSUE WITH ROAD, BRIDGE, & STORMWATER, CALL 239-252-8924; A LOCAL STATE OF EMERGENCY MUST BE ENACTED BY THE BOARD AND NOT STAFF PER FLORIDA STATUTE That brings us to 5B, Tropical Storm Debby after-action report, and Mr. Dan Summers, your Emergency Management director, is here to present. MR. SUMMERS: Good morning, Dan Summers, director of Emergency Management. Hope you-all are doing well this morning. I'm happy to give you a little summary of activity associated with Tropical Storm and what ultimately became Hurricane Debby. With me today -- Trinity Scott is here from Transportation Management, of course, and Lisa Koehler from the South Florida Water Management District are both here if you-all have any particular questions as it relates to stormwater and some of our inundation challenges. But what I'd like to start off with is I do want to take this opportunity to introduce you very quickly to a short new process, and that is community lifelines. For those of you -- I know you've all been in the Emergency Operations Center at one time, and you have seen within the desk what we call emergency support functions on the EOC floor, and that's everything from business and industry to fire rescue, medical, hospital, infrastructure, et cetera. And one of the things that we realized very quickly is that with almost 18 different emergency support functions, it's kind of hard to give you a quick summary of activities that occurred to kind of give you a dashboard. Page 31 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 20 Our partners at FEMA have rolled this out, and this has become a national standard. And so this was a great opportunity for me to kind of introduce you to lifelines and a great way to communicate to you and to the public as to how we're doing in response and recovery. So to take a look, the lifelines now have been boiled down to seven lifelines. And just to give you a quick dashboard, you see these icons on the screen and, obviously, green means that things within the community are good; yellow means that there's some work, and red means there are some outages and activities that need to progress. So first of all, I will tell you, during Hurricane Debby we remained green in that communications specter -- spectrum, excuse me, and, basically, any interruptions were very, very minor. Power and energy, and we were in constant communication with Florida Power & Light, Lee Co-op. We did have some scattered outages. Most everything was restored by the end of the evening hours in most situations. And, again, they were not related necessarily to any particular action other than an occasional gust of wind or an outage -- neighborhood outage, that type of thing. So we did track that, and we did have communications, but restoration overall went extremely well. And let me just add, no reconstruction type activities. Food, water, shelter, no impacts there. No evacuation shelters were activated. No mandatory evacuations. I did not bring you a state of emergency declaration, but that is something I want to talk about just a little bit at the end and make sure you know that we know where the state stands on that state of emergency activity. Hazardous materials, no spills or incidents. Health and medical, all of our hospitals, EMS, mass medical functions remained operational. No public health concerns. Our public safety impacts, fire, law enforcement, Emergency Page 32 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 21 Management, we call that blue sky conditions. Were busy, we were managing traffic, but it was within normal levels of service activity and, obviously, we were in communication with you-all throughout the event with key staff. Last lifeline is transportation. And we've marked that one yellow because we did have to throw some barricades and have to close some roads periodically as we waited for that storm surge and short-term flooding to subside. So, again, we'll bring you from 18 reports -- 18 agency reports down to seven. In the future, this is how I'll be reporting to you, and this is how we'll summarize in the EOC in the days to come. Just a quick history on Debby. Obviously, we were watching extremely close, but we felt pretty good. When the cone -- just due south and west of Naples, when the cone remains narrow, that means we have a reasonable level of confidence in the track, so at most of the point there, the center of that storm stayed 140 miles offshore. We were, obviously, seeing something that was very slow and potential intensification. Now, granted, as we expected and was predicted, we had onshore gusts, we had onshore flow, and as we always see in these events, Mother Nature, the characteristics of the storm are going to bring some storm surge, minor storm surge to us. But we were very -- for the most part, pretty fortunate and certainly challenged by the combination of rain and storm surge that prohibited our drains from emptying. Again, the forecast was relatively reliable. We maintained a continuous monitoring posture, and we didn't see the need for EOC activation with that offshore activity. Now, again, just because we didn't activate the EOC doesn't mean we weren't communicating, coordinating with some of our key partners during that period. I really want to commend the Transportation team, our Road and Page 33 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 22 Bridge folks. The communication between Collier Sheriff, their information at their realtime operations center with traffic concerns, how we were working that through the Transportation Management team and our office as well as FDOT. We had really good communication. We were closing the loop. If the Sheriff saw something, we reported something, all of us synced up extremely well during this period. And a special hats-off to Marshal and his team who were in constant communication with traffic ops and with us in responding and deploying. An awesome job. We did -- as you-all know, we get a lot of tornado warnings during these unstable events, weather events, and those are issued directly by the National Weather Service. We got a -- no damages. There were no damages reported from the tornadic activity but a lot spotted on radar. We did throttle back, and my office can involve Alert Collier. We were getting so many severe thunderstorm warnings. So we changed that from -- instead of a voice notification, to a text notification just because we were wearing that out. But every time a polygon shifts on the map from the radar, it initiates a new action. And finally, just to remind the general public, we had very good participation in Alert Collier, but when you get that call, acknowledge it so it doesn't dial you again. You know, one or two, I've received it, and then you won't be bothered again with that particular notification. I did situation calls with our municipal partners with no unmet needs. They were in sync with us monitoring the event. Our mass casualty ambulance bus deployed at the request of Florida Department of Health and staged in Ocala with teams from Tennessee and Mississippi, Emergency Management, Collier County EMS, and North Collier Fire personnel. And I do want to -- again, let's keep our neighbors up to the Page 34 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 23 north in the big bend area, keep -- say our thoughts and prayers for them. They are really having a tough time in these rural counties with the flood inundation impacts. I'm glad that we were able to go up there and help them for a few days as they got through the critical period of that response. And, again, it speaks very -- it speaks volumes, in my opinion, as to how well the State of Florida coordinates and uses the resources of partner agencies and the county. And as you know, we've had hurricane events, and we've had a lot of folks come to help us. So I was glad that we were able to return the favor. We'll jump over to rainfall real quick. This -- these levels were provided to us by the National Weather Service. Some of these are private weather stations. Some of them are cooperative weather stations. And as you see -- and Lisa pointed out to me earlier, you know, we had some of the higher rainfall in the Estates area, and this was not unusual. That is, these bands come through and will drop rainfall at different amounts. As we saw Debby progress west of Tampa and become a full-fledged hurricane, it still brought onshore flow. And, again, we expected that. I hoped it would clear out a day earlier, but a lot of that just depends on the forward movement and, as we know, later on Debby basically stalled in northern Florida and then even as it went on up the coast. So a little frustrating for us that that storm had such a slow forward momentum. Stormwater impacts beyond the fourth. Again, when you blow that water into our coastline, there's nowhere for our inland basins to drain. We are really subject at that point from backing that water up a little bit and, again, staying in that one- to three-feet range. One- to three-foot range, it impacts outflow. And, you know, the good news here is that systems perform very well once the tide's receded. Only a few isolated areas required reactive maintenance Page 35 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 24 due to the inundation issues caused by the event. So it's just one of those challenges that we have in the gulf and with our elevation. Wind reports, we were very, very fortunate here, in my opinion. The highest gust, 43. In Immokalee, the highest gust, 36. Power outages, I've already mentioned, and there were no critical facility impacts. For our beach areas, good news there was the berm holding out a little bit. The bad news, some impact to turtle nesting. And some debris impacts from storm debris with some algae and seaweed drift. That was even more extensive up the coast for Fort Myers, Lee County, Charlotte, et cetera. But, again, something with that onshore flow that will happen. Damage assessments, hats off to the Growth Management Division who went out and did do some surveys in these areas. There is nothing, unfortunately, within the total that will allow FEMA assistance to individual homeowners. We would call this mostly water incursion as opposed to flooding. So did a couple of folks or a number of folks get an inch or two of water? They probably did. There were maybe some exceptions to that. But, again, all of this was classified as minor damages with a grand total that we were able to report for the unincorporated area, that $877,000 estimate. We did not get any damage assessment reports from the municipalities. Right now, FEMA has offered Collier County under the declaration -- and again, FEMA has -- FEMA did do a pre-event disaster declaration for this storm. Collier County was included in that pre-landfall disaster declaration, and it is what they call a hybrid, which means that FEMA right now is only offering Category A and Category B cost reimbursements at 75 percent. There is no state cost-share at this point, and it's subject to change. So this was the pre-landfall declaration. We'll know more in a Page 36 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 25 week or two of what FEMA's final policy is going to be for Collier County and Lee County as it relates to cost-share. Category A and B are related to emergency measures, emergency response costs, maybe pumps and equipment that was rented, EMS personnel that work additional hours in mutual aid, Emergency Management staff that worked some additional hours in mutual aid, at a 75 percent cost-share. But we'll know more about what that final fund offering is going to be. Right now, no SBA declaration for Collier County. I hope that will occur; we just don't know yet. That is not a determination that we're able to make. That will be up to SBA and FEMA to make that disaster declaration. Our Human Services folks do have some new monies that have opened up for housing repair and assistance. And Ms. Sonntag will certainly get that information out in the days to come. And we're also working with our non-profit partners to see what assistance they can offer. Just to remind you about disaster declaration thresholds that FEMA needs to see, we have to have about $1.78 million worth of damage to get some of those other categories, and the statewide impact is $39 million. Some of that's just a benchmark that FEMA uses for each county and for the state towards the disaster declaration reimbursements. Let me stop and see if you have any questions with both Lisa and Trinity being here. And my final reminders are, again, as -- we're not through the season yet, so continue to stock that seven-day preparedness kit, continue to monitor, subscribe to Alert Collier, monitor our home page so we can get that information out to you and the new theme of "halfway full and halfway there" with evacuation, and check out floridadisaster.org. So thank you. Let me see if you have any questions. Page 37 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 26 CHAIRMAN HALL: Mr. Summers, I appreciate that. You did -- that was a good summary, and I also want to give you a shout-out, to you, to Lisa, Trinity and Marshal in the Road and Stormwater bunch, to county staff. The communication that we received was priceless so that we could take that communication and share it with the public. It was -- it was commended over and over and over with our constituents. They appreciated it so much. To the Stormwater and, you know, Bridge department, the forethought was amazing from the drawdowns to the on-site action and all of the forethought that went in prior to this storm coming. It was really effective in the county. Y'all's communication, your expertise, and the planning was evident. I mean, there was things that you communicated to us that most people don't even consider, they don't even think of, and a lot of that was really appreciated. I just wanted to say that. And with this storm, in the end of it, the communication that we got as to why the water was remaining made all the sense in the world with the onshore winds not allowing the water to go back out in low tide and to just -- and just telling the public just to be just a smidge patient; tomorrow by this time we should see some improvements. It was a game changer, and I really appreciate it. MR. SUMMERS: Thank you, sir. And I want to commend the entire team. Everybody was on the phone and communicating, and we -- if you don't mind, we're going to take credit for this as our drill for this year. CHAIRMAN HALL: Do it. You should. Commissioner LoCastro. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Thank you, Chairman. Dan, do you know offhand how many people have registered for Alert Collier, like, as of right now and then how that number has changed, like, in the last 12 months, or -- you know, we've all been Page 38 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 27 working really hard to always put Alert Collier in our newsletters and everything. I'm just curious if it's making a difference. Has the number doubled in two years or -- MR. SUMMERS: It hasn't doubled, but I believe I can tell when you've put the word out because we do see these incremental increases over a week or two or three. And so I'll go back and check those benchmarks. I want to say we probably have around 11,000 people registered. But right now the State has funded where we have resources -- there is a database with a vendor that I can reach every resident right now on a major event but not on a minor event. So we still need the public to register. And we know sometimes that thing can be a little bit annoying, and so we manage that. We throttle that for some of the non-mission-critical things. But things like hurricane warnings, tornado warnings, evacuations, that's always going to be out, and people really do appreciate getting that reminder. Just click the acknowledgment. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I mean, 11,000's really not that big of a number when you think about it. And, you know, like you said, it might be annoying for Debby, but if a Katrina hits, then all of a sudden, it's not annoying, and it's too late to register for, you know, Alert Collier when you're, you know, in the middle of a huge storm. So I guess anything that we can all do to sort of get the number out. It's great to hear that it's been increasing, but, I mean, you know, I have 80,000 subscribers to my newsletter. Whether they read it or not, immaterial, but I mean, to hear we only have 11,000 across the whole county -- it's better than it was a year ago, I'm sure. You know, we all get Amber alerts whether we like them or not, but Alert Collier is something that's very, very specific to us. Like Page 39 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 28 you said, you do have the ability to force feed something out whether you're an Alert Collier subscriber or not, and I hope we never have to use that, but realistically, I guess, the more that we can do to get people to sign up -- I mean, I know that we're -- it's in all of our newsletters every single time, and you would hope somebody would get down to that part of the newsletter and subscribe. It takes 10 seconds. But 11,000 across the whole county, you know, I wish it was in triple digits. I'm sure we all do. MR. SUMMERS: I'll reconfirm. That's my best estimate right now. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah. But you know it's not 100,000, right? I mean -- MR. SUMMERS: No, it's not. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: -- yeah. So we know it's -- MR. SUMMERS: But one thing -- you bring -- you really bring up a good point, and let me say this: Yes, we can use it for weather, we use it for these local emergencies, but let's go back to that catastrophic event. We may need Alert Collier to tell people where to get supplies, where to go for relief registration. So the icing on the cake is sort of this initial notification. For me, it's knowing that we have a secondary communication route to help alleviate suffering or inconvenience or to get supplies and resources should we have that fast-breaking catastrophic event. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I'd like to just give a shout-out to two people who really helped me a lot. District 1, I have a lot of low-lying areas. I mean, I have Henderson Creek, Goodland. I mean, maybe some people got two inches of water across the county. I have a shout-out of a picture on my newsletter showing that Stan's was under two feet of water. And so -- you know, and there was a car, you know, stuck in front of Stan's where the water was all the way up to the windows. Page 40 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 29 Yeah, it receded, you know, over time. But the two people that really helped me a lot is Ed Finn and Jamie French. I mean, Jamie French was out in a pickup truck driving my district, and I was doing similar things. We were on opposites sides, and we were trading photos and whatnot and really attacking a lot of issues. So Jamie, in the back, you know, he put on his galoshes and, you know, he was like, you know, "Hey, boss. I'll call you back in 30 minutes." And, you know, we were sort of directing the traffic. And then Ed, similar to what the Chairman said, you know, you were pushing out a lot of great information that was helping us alert citizens. But, you know, Alert Collier is something that is very important, especially when we have, you know, an extremely serious storm. Lastly, I'll just say -- and, Lisa, I don't know if this is something that you can provide us. You know, you're the water expert. I always go to you when it comes to water. People who have lived here a really long time don't understand how swales work, okay. And the reason I say that, with all respect, is if there's water in your swale, yay, because then it's not in your living room. And so people that send us all these notes, "My swale is full of water. The county has failed me. Oh, my God, when's that water going to" -- so I would like something written by somebody extremely smart on swales that I can put in my newsletter. And I'm sure maybe we'll all cut and paste it a little bit. But the misinformation on swales is catastrophic, and also how weirs work, and that weirs exist. Because I'll get something from a citizen who's lived here for 40 years telling me that I haven't, and they're like, you know, you really need to open up the swales and let all the water out. And it's like, no, that's actually -- it's weirs that do that. And then I put, you know, my basic information that you've taught me from some of our travels driving around. Page 41 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 30 But something that's easy to understand to educate the public -- and I don't say this in a disrespectful way, but some people were lighting up the phones, "Oh, my God, my swale's about to overflow with water." And it's like, "Yeah, that's what they're there for" -- I think would be helpful because we have a lot of new people that have moved to Collier County and then that, you know, some people were saying, "My ditch is full of water," and it's like, no -- "Well, no. That's a swale, and here's how it works." CHAIRMAN HALL: I understand ditch. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Right, yeah. I understand ditch, yeah. Either way. But I don't know, Lisa, I don't mean to belabor the point, but I would like something that is eloquently written so I don't misspeak but -- I think I know just enough to be dangerous but -- and to answer citizens back and say, "I know there's water in your swale. There's water in lots of swales right now, and that's why they're all doing their job." And everybody's not asleep and warm in their beds who control the weirs. We actually have a process to open weirs. And you showed me that in person when I drove around with you a couple times. But I don't know if you've got a short comment you want to make. But something that would help us get that out would be helpful, I think, to the citizens. MS. KOEHLER: Commissioner, I'm happy to do that. The District has a lot of really good graphics that we can share with you, we can share with Troy, if you guys want to put it on CollierTV, just to get it out to the citizens as well. So happy to provide you-all some information for your newsletters. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I saw the Chairman in a ditch. CHAIRMAN HALL: I was exploited. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah. I have a photo of that. I'm going to use it at some point. Page 42 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 31 But I think that would actually be helpful. And it's not being disrespectful to citizens, but a lot of them don't realize that the ditch in front of their house has a very important role, and here's how it works, and we're not asleep at the wheel at the county just arbitrarily allowing water to move or not. And I always say as a last sentence to, you know, citizens that send me a note that water's in your swale because it's not in your living room, you know, that sort of thing, or in your house. But anything you could send, I think, then we could all use at our discretion. It really would be helpful to sort of remind -- especially new people that have moved here. Thank you. MS. KOEHLER: Absolutely. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Don't go away. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner McDaniel. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I'm next. First of all, thank you. Your cooperation with me as far as getting information out was stellar. If I was a little more attentive to my e-mails, I might have got it a little quicker, but I wanted to, number one, thank you. Number two, I would like to -- I'm on a new quest. Width, breadth, and depth create volume. And I want to work with you to elevate the dredging capacities within our waterways. We have a circumstance that -- a tidal surge comes, and we get an inundation of water. Well, if our waterways, both natural and manmade, are a foot or two deeper, we have the capacity to hold more water and not necessarily flood our residents. On the -- conversely, when we have a rain event with heavy rains on the inland side, we have a better capacity with our weir system to be able to alleviate that flooding in the interior side if we have more room to get more water out. So I'm on this quest. Page 43 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 32 I serve on the county -- the 13 county coalition with Lake O. I was corrected about the 3 foot of sludge on the bottom of Lake O, and I was corrected and then told that it was known as "legacy sediment." And so I want to talk about legacy sediment within our inland waterways both on our natural and manmade. So I would -- I'm offering myself up to work with you and the District to enhance those dredging efforts along the way. I don't want to talk about navigability just yet. I'm talking about management of water. At the end of the day, we are a low-lying area. We all have different circumstances that come with these rain events and water events. So I want to offer that up as well. MS. KOEHLER: Well, thank you. And I think we're one step ahead of you. We are just kicking off a canal bank restoration study. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I would venture you're probably two or three steps ahead of me. I'm just -- I think this stuff up. But if we have to do a study first, that's great, but... MS. KOEHLER: Well, we need to survey the canals. That's the study is how much sediment do we have in there so we know how to approach it, how many years it's going to take, and lay out that program. So we're getting ready to do the surveys now. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I'm totally down with that. MS. KOEHLER: But I'm happy to meet with you and discuss it further. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I love that idea. I'd love to enhance that, so... My next questions have to go over to Mr. Dan, but thank you very much, Lisa. MS. KOEHLER: You're welcome. MR. SUMMERS: Sir. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: The second question that I Page 44 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 33 have for you is what's the -- other than Alert Collier, what's the best way for our community to reach you or Marshal or Road and Bridges with regard to -- an, relatively speaking, isolated event? The community is everywhere, we have 400,000 people that live here. What is the best mechanism to be able to report a localized circumstance with regard to flooding? MR. SUMMERS: And sometimes when we all wear our emergency hat, we think 911 is the answer, and it's not always the answer. The answer is 311. So let's get that information. Again, another tool in our toolbox that should be on the list is to download the app, the Collier 311 app. That information gets routed to the appropriate department or subdivision and gets that information, gets those folks aware and/or dispatched. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Outstanding. Now, Ms. Trinity's behind you, so I'm going to go to her right now and then come back to you for one more. MS. SCOTT: If I could also add if it is overnight hours and a structure is imminent of having water within it, they need to contact 239-252-2924. Did I get it right? 8924. I'm sorry, 252-8924. That goes directly to our Road, Bridge, and Stormwater maintenance. We have folks who are on call, and they will dispatch someone out if we have an event where someone may have water imminent. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Because -- I forgot the number because you said it three times already. MS. SCOTT: 239-252-8924. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Now you said it four times. So I -- is there any way we can tie that to 311 dispatch where it's popped over there? Because 311, everybody remembers. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: But, I mean, if they call 311 and report something that should go to that number, doesn't 311 say, Page 45 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 34 "Thank you. We'll take care of it," and then call over to that number? Isn't that how it works? MR. MULLINS: Yes. John Mullins, director of Communications, Government, and Public Affairs. To your point, if you dial 311 during business hours, you will get an operator that can redirect that call to Road and Maintenance. If you're calling after hours or on a weekend, the message will route you to Road and Maintenance via the selections that you can dial in from your phone. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: So, necessarily, it's set up within the 311 to push somebody over there in the event that there is imminent risk of flooding? MR. MULLINS: Yes. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: It's a one-stop shop, that 311. MR. MULLINS: Yes, sir; phone, app, and website. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: And as we're moving through the budget processes, have a talk at some stage or a discussion with regard to manning up with humans during an emergency event. We all knew Debby was heading our direction for a minute, and maybe if we had live bodies on the phone, it might help. MR. MULLINS: Well, keep in mind, in an emergency event, if there is an activation, the call center at EOC is then activated. 311 moves there, and we do bolster up for that. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yes. I am aware. That was stellar during Ian, but this -- we actually -- and that's going to be my next discussion with Dan. When we don't have an emergency event but there's circumstances prevalent, even though it didn't hit the necessary thresholds to be declared an emergency, maybe we ought to have a look at manning it up just to help our community. MR. MULLINS: And just to supplement that, during, like, wildfire events, if they are after hours, a lot of times in the evenings Page 46 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 35 we will have people working over to do that. Now, we have not functioned in overnight capacity without it being an emergency activation, but we have worked some overtime. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Thank you. And the folks at 311 do an amazing job. I, literally -- by the way, I was driving out Immokalee Road one day, and there was a sprinkler head in the median shooting 20 feet in the air. It was 10 o'clock at night, and I hit 311 and got a body, some body. Because I had to go through the prompts and stuff, but I got a body, and then they came out and fixed it. So thank you. CHAIRMAN HALL: Does 311 deliver? MR. MULLINS: Within 30 minutes or less. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Collier -- Uber Collier. Last question, sir, Dan, and this has to do with the declaration of emergency. I believe we adjusted our policy back during Ian -- because I was very frustrated with having to -- you're wanting to declare a state of emergency because the Governor's done it, and then we had to call an emergency meeting of the Board. Do we have that policy established now where it can be done through necessary processes enacted by the County Manager and then ratified by the Board so we don't have to have a TV show to actually do it? MR. SUMMERS: No, sir. I think it does require -- and I'll look at the County Manager and the County Attorney, and I have an augment to that, too. It is a matter of public record, and it is a public action. So I think in terms of -- it doesn't mean that we can't make that policy, but we have -- we did that for wildfires. So the concept was the wildfire -- the burning ban we can do as an administrative -- I'll call it administratively. The state of emergency, to my knowledge, right now we cannot do that administratively. Certainly something that could be considered. Page 47 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 36 And if I can "period" and start a new paragraph, you know, when we declare that local state of emergency, that's a big deal for the community. It's a big deal for the businesses. We always kind of straddle the fence on these parallel events. And I thought that, you know, we can always manage that. And I don't think -- and I'm going to find out today or tomorrow if we even needed the local state of emergency for the FEMA reimbursement. But I do know that we can declare that state of emergency retroactively. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Well, my only thought -- and maybe we just -- we need to speak with the County Attorney and County Manager -- is to -- ease of process is what I'm looking for. Adjust the processes so that we're compliant, of course, with the law, but at the same time, I don't want to go -- I found -- I found it frustrating with the last big event that we had to call -- I think we had to call a couple of emergency meetings, which whips everybody up in here, brings in staff, does all the stuff, and we've got a hurricane bearing down on us. So I'd like to review the policy. If it is a matter of policy, I'd like to review it so that it can be done administratively and then ratified by the Board at a more convenient time. MR. SUMMERS: And each one of these scenarios kind of gives us a different flavor, so -- COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Of course. MR. SUMMERS: -- being a little bit flexible is important. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner Saunders. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just have a couple of points. First of all, I do want to thank staff for a job well done. I had a new experience. I was driving down one street about 9 o'clock at night, and there were huge trucks sucking up water and making sure that people could get to their homes. And I just want to thank staff, because those trucks were out Page 48 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 37 10, 11 o'clock at night and back on the streets at 7 o'clock in the morning, and they stayed there until the water was gone. And that is kudos to our staff for having that capability and utilizing it. But the real point that I want to make is Tropical Storm Debby was -- though it had an impact on a lot of people, was really a very minimal storm when you look at the possibilities. We got eight inches of rain in Golden Gate Estates and six inches around the coast. There are areas in Florida that got 30 inches of rain. If a storm like that came a little closer to the shore and stalled in Collier County, we'd not only have storm surge issues, but we could have 20, 30 inches of rain to deal with. And my point is that we all are looking at ways -- and there's a question at the end of this. We are looking at ways to save taxpayer dollars. We're looking at ways to cut budgets. And my comment is, and my question is, when we do that, we weaken our ability to respond in advance to storms to our stormwater needs. And a question that I'm going to raise during our budget process is -- and maybe you can discuss it a little bit right now: How much money do we have in -- if we go to a -- just as an example -- we went to the rolled-back millage rate last year. If we did the same thing this year, how much money would we have to continue our improvements to our stormwater system that we know are overtaxed even in a minimal storm? Now, this is not minimal to people that were impacted, but minimal compared to Hurricane Ian, Hurricane Irma, or a storm that hits us more directly and dumps 30 inches of rain on us. Where are we in reference to being able to fix our stormwater systems to cope with that? MR. SUMMERS: Let's phone a friend. Trinity. MS. SCOTT: Commissioner, for the record, Trinity Scott, Transportation Management Services department head. Page 49 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 38 What I can tell you is our best engineered system is not going to cope with 30 inches of rain. But what the commissioners did do last year, which -- they approved two additional swale maintenance crews. We have -- and just to give a little update on that, we have fully hired one of those crews, and we're able to use some spare equipment to get them started. Unfortunately, we had a very early on rainy season. So those folks actually became part of that strike force that you saw out in your area working those overnight hours. So they were there to be able to augment our staff. We just had a hiring event in Immokalee. We're hopeful that we're going to be able to hire our second crew. Our equipment now is fully coming in. We have a few things -- actually, I gave up my county car, so we have a crew car. So we're going to have two additional teams to be able to start getting out there and being able to do more proactive maintenance, and that's what we plan to continue to do. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So I don't have any -- we're going to get into this in the budget, but I just -- as a forewarning, when we get to our budget discussions later on, that issue of stormwater management is going to be very important to our quality of life and to being able to survive, you know, a major event. And I will tell you my recollection from some of our discussions was, well, we can fix all of our systems, but at the rate we're going, it's going to take 110 years to do it. So -- MS. PATTERSON: Commissioners, to your point, there are very large deficits in both stormwater maintenance and stormwater capital. And we can, obviously, talk about that as we move forward through this process, but it is reflected in the AUIR. And that's only looking at five years and then maybe encroaching out into the 10 years. The program is enormous. And even with the dedication of this board and the prior board of pushing more money into the Page 50 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 39 stormwater program, the needs outpace the funding that we have. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner Kowal. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Thank you, Chairman. I would also like to express my thanks to the staff, Amy, Ed, and Jamie and Trinity. I'd like to -- but I'd like to really shed the light on Marshal and his team, because they really stepped up. You know, I thought I was -- I saw that we were going to have a high tide, and, you know, I thought in my wisdom, like, knowing where my sea level streets are in my district, I jumped in my truck and went running out there to take a look. And, you know -- and I saw some -- what I saw was basically -- it wasn't the rain. It was definitely the seawater, because we were on some streets, like Danford, they're at sea level. You could see the seawater coming up through the storm drains, bubbling up through the storm drains. It wasn't rain going to the storm drains. And Marshal and his guys -- I mean, there was people -- when I got there, there was one or two staff already there, and we talked, and, you know, they were getting things done. I reached out to Jamie, and I think Jamie just accused me of wanting to drive around in my new four-wheel drive, but that wasn't it. I really wanted to see what was going on in the district. And I just wanted to reinforce that that tide was probably our biggest crutch in this whole thing. You know, it didn't want to leave. It stayed longer than a lot of people thought it was going to stay. And there's nothing you can do. The sea -- the sea is the sea. You can't stop it. You know, it's going to rise. It's going to rise up through to its lowest points and stay, so -- but it took us a few days, but it worked. And I know that -- I think Marshal said they pumped, just from one street, three million gallons of water. That's -- you know, just to imagine how much work these guys did. So hats off to you guys. Page 51 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 40 Thank you. MR. SUMMERS: Thank you all. Thanks to the team as well. Item #7 PUBLIC COMMENTS ON GENERAL TOPICS NOT ON THE CURRENT OR FUTURE AGENDA MS. PATTERSON: Commissioners, that brings us to Item 7, public comments on general topics not on the current or future agenda. MR. MILLER: We have five registered speakers under Item 7. Your first is Dr. Janine Mathesz. I hope I'm saying that properly. And Christie Hutcherson will be following. DR. MATHESZ: Thank you. I just wanted to introduce myself and my staff, and Christie is one of those persons as well. And we have with us our director of education. Laurie, stand up and say hello. And we are a new academy coming to this county. And we are not a school as one might think of a school, but we are a support -- an accredited support service for the public schools. So we come in and support your public education system and any of the other charter schools, anyone who would like to use our services. But mainly we work with the public school system to help with the socially, emotionally challenged population. And we work with the kids in grades 5 through 12. And so we just wanted to introduce ourselves as Keystone Freedom Academy, Florida. And we are excited to be here to partner with the Collier County School District and all of the schools within the district. And, again, we're a support service, so we don't come in and Page 52 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 41 take any tax money or, you know, take money from the school district. The students are still theirs. They're their students, and they still get all of their grants and everything for those students. But we do support them with students who are not able to access their academics in the regular school setting, and a lot of those students [sic] are due to various mental health issues, and we've seen an increase with behavior-challenged students since COVID. And so they help -- we help everyone because we're able to take the behavior-challenged student out of the regular classroom so that everyone in that classroom is able to access their academics as well. So, again, I just wanted to introduce ourselves. And thank you and thank the school district for partnering with us and welcoming us into Collier County. CHAIRMAN HALL: Thank you. MR. MILLER: Your next speaker is Christie Hutcherson. She'll be followed by Lynn Dirksmeier. MS. HUTCHERSON: Just to kind of echo, I'm Christie Hutcherson. I'm the CEO and partner here for Keystone Freedom Academy. I am a Collier resident. I am a born-and-bred Floridian. And when Dr. Mathesz approached me -- this is a very successful model. This school is in Pennsylvania, been operating in Pennsylvania, the state, for over eight years. They have 100 percent success rate with the students that we've taken in. And being somebody who's from the state of Florida and understanding the influx and how much our school systems are growing, that we really felt like this was a perfect fit not just for Collier County but in other districts throughout the state of Florida. So thank you so much for welcoming us. We've had incredible response for the last six, seven months both in Collier, Lee Counties, and also Glades County as well. Page 53 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 42 So we're really looking forward to, again, like Dr. Mathesz said, partnering with Collier County and the school district to help these -- I call them the forgotten children. These children, they really need a help up, and they need to let -- to know that somebody cares about them and that they do matter and that they can be a productive member of society. A lot of the research and the study that we've done is some of the children that we have taken in with these type of emotional behavioral issues fall under that category, unfortunately, of the school shooters because they just haven't been given the tools that they need to be successful, and that's what our school does. We give them the tools. We have full wraparound services. We have behavioral specialists and counselors in our schools, and we really give the full service to these students to not only have them thrive but be able to, when they graduate with their cohorts, become very successful, productive members of the community, whether that's in the trade field or going on to a college. One of our students in Pennsylvania were so excited was actually -- gotten a full ride to Tulane. So these children aren't throwaway children. They actually can and are capable of becoming responsible citizens. They just need to have that extra help, and that's where Keystone Freedom Academy steps in and fills in that gap. So thank you so much for your time. We look forward to being a partner in the community with you. And if you ever want to have any questions, we're going to be opening up our school very soon. We'll have a ribbon-cutting service, and we look forward to furthering our relationship here in Collier County. Thank you so much. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Don't go away. Page 54 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 43 MR. MILLER: Hold on, ma'am. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Don't go away. MR. MILLER: Commissioner McDaniel has a question. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: The Chair was thinking about stormwater and wasn't watching my light. Make sure your contact information gets to me, please, because I'm involved with several organizations, and I want to make sure that we connect. First of all, Keystone -- Pennsylvania's a really good thing, and -- but I also want to connect you up with several organizations that I work with. So make sure -- MS. HUTCHERSON: Absolutely. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Make sure we have your contact stuff. MS. HUTCHERSON: Thank you so much. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Thank you, Mr. Chair. MR. MILLER: Your next speaker is Lynn Dirksmeier. She'll be followed by Darlene Santos. MS. DIRKSMEIER: Hi. Good to be here. Thank you all for hearing me out. Yesterday I lived in -- I've lived in Naples for 17 years, and prior to moving to Naples, I had a -- I was in Miami. I had a non-profit no-kill animal shelter, which I closed when I moved here. But I'm very aware of the importance of trap -- TNR program, which stands for trap, neuter, and release. So I have been doing some of this on my own, and I've been going to a private charity, VAS, Volunteer Animal Services, to pick up a certificate to get cats spay and neutered. And it's really a nuisance. They're only there for a couple of hours on Saturday. I have to go to a vet. I have to make an appointment. And cats don't always decide to get in a cage on Wednesday mornings. So then the neuter -- or spay would be paid for, but I would have to pay out of Page 55 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 44 pocket to have blood tests done to make sure that they don't have some terminal disease that will cause them to die a horrible death shortly after being released or to pay for microchips or for deworming. Well, I went to get another certificate from VAS at PetSmart only to find out that DAS does this for free; that I could have been taking animals to DAS, to Domestic Animal Services every day except Thursday to have them spay, neutered, vaccinated, microchipped, dewormed, blood tested at no cost at all. I couldn't believe it when I was told. So I called, and I -- and I was told by the call center that there is a tab on the Collier County Domestic Animal Services that says TNR. So first of all, how many of you even know what TNR stands for? I know because I know the lingo, but anybody else wouldn't even have been able to identify that. But there's no TNR tab. It just says -- I had to search down all of the different selections until I got to public service, click on public service, and then there's a whole bunch of other menu selections, and it says "community cats." What does that mean? I know what community cats are because I know the lingo. Then I click it, and it gives me all the information that's needed. That information needs to be public knowledge. Do you know the money I've spent? Do you know the money that other people have spent out of their pockets having animals spay and neutered? Many private charities who used to do this have gone under. They don't exist anymore, like my non-profit doesn't exist in Miami anymore. And cats -- the program that DAS now uses is just simply -- they lethally remove and euthanize cats. That's really inhumane, and it doesn't work. The only thing that works is TNR. And I think that also community groups should be encouraged to form, should be supported by the county, and there should be community education as well that -- again, it would be private -- Page 56 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 45 CHAIRMAN HALL: Wrap it up, please. MS. DIRKSMEIER: -- groups that would help, and I just wanted to bring this all to your attention. MR. MILLER: Your next speaker is Darlene Santos. She'll be followed on Zoom by Marc Schroeder. MS. SANTOS: Good morning. Let's see. I'm Darlene Santos, as you just introduced me. I'm a member of Collier County for 12 years, and I've been very concerned with the animal, you know, community. I've been fostering with mainly Humane Society for 12 -- since 2016. So, again, I'm here pretty much for, you know, spay/neuter, return, but mostly low-cost -- low-cost spay/neuter, free. I did not know -- I think Lisa just mentioned every day you can just bring them to DAS. I had no idea. I read, you know, that there's difficulties, people trying to, you know, get that taken care of for their pets. But, I mean, that's the core of it. I mean, there are so many other problems, so many animals in the streets, abused, you know, but if you dealt with the core, the core issue, spay/neuter, low cost. I mean, people love their pets. They have their pets. And, you know, you bring them to the vet, by the time you pay the assessment fee, then you've got to get all those vaccinations. Before they're even going to consider a spay or a neuter you've already -- you know, the average person is already in deep with finances, so they're not getting done. I'm presently fostering a dog, the sweetest dog, four years old, who just had eight babies. Humane Society brought them -- brought them in. Eight babies, and the babies have been taken care of. They've been adopted, and I now have the mom while she gains weight. And, you know, this is a lovely dog. I mean, you can tell she's Page 57 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 46 come from a home, and at four years old, if she's not spayed and she's having eight dogs and, you know -- who takes care of that? So then it just seems like she was just dumped. She was just dumped at a shelter, and her -- and her puppies, you know. So people -- you know, if they didn't have her -- or whoever hasn't had her spayed by four years old, here we are, and probably because of finances. You know, probably just not enough funds to do that. Whatever. But I know that there's a budget, a budget coming up, and that there are funds. There are commissioners. There are DAS board volunteers. So I'm just hoping there can be some focus on that. And, I mean, I left work once again. I could probably pay a couple spay and neuter, or maybe one, to be done. But, I mean, I hope we can all just get together and focus on this, because this is the crux of it, you know. So anyway, thank you. MR. MILLER: Your final speaker under public comment is joining us via Zoom, Marc Schroeder. Mark, you're being prompted to unmute yourself, if you'll do that at this time. Mark -- there you are, Mark. You have three minutes, sir. MR. SCHROEDER: My name is Marc Schroeder. I've lived in Naples since 2017. In October 2021, we bought a property in 3231 13th Avenue Southwest in Naples, 34117. And, unfortunately, we bought (unintelligible) of a problem. So three out of four code enforcement cases we could solve. Those remaining issue/concerns, and it's a small building, that is 16 times 20 feet inside -- in size, and has existed since at least 1999, and it's located approximately seven feet too close to the neighboring property line. The previous owner used this building as a guesthouse. Since this is not allowed, I submitted a permit application to convert it into Page 58 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 47 a utility room. And everything has been submitted, and it's mostly in order except for the fact that the small building is seven feet too close to the property line. And to Collier County, to Growth Management, had several opportunities in the past to inform the previous owner about the problem. There was a code enforcement case in 2013 in which an inspector mentioned in his report there was one structure on site that was used as a guesthouse. I obtained all permits with the exception of the pool permit. The house permit matches to current -- the condition of the home, and no changes were observed. The small building got its new roof in 2018 with a permit. At this point, at least Collier County should have noticed that the small building itself is not permitted, and it's too close to the property line. I had several meetings with officers and supervisors from Collier County, but unfortunately, without such an end to all Collier County errors were (unintelligible) now, I'm being told to submit a variance petition application which will cost me several -- several thousand dollars with an uncertain end to outcome. I asked Collier County did -- to cover the fees and -- since the errors were to -- caused by them in the past. I was told that is not possible, but I could present my case here today. CHAIRMAN HALL: Mr. Schroeder? Mr. Schroeder, Commissioner McDaniel would like to talk to you just a second. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yeah. MR. SCHROEDER: Okay. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Good morning, Mr. Schroeder. I'm not going to ask you to give me your phone number on the public record, but I want you to call my office with these details so that I can contact you later on this afternoon. Your three minutes are up, my friend, but your circumstances -- MR. SCHROEDER: Thank you very much. Page 59 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 48 COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Your circumstances are not going unnoticed, sir. Thank you. MR. SCHROEDER: Thank you. MR. MILLER: And that's our final speaker for public comment, Item 7. MS. PATTERSON: Commissioners, would you like -- CHAIRMAN HALL: Take a break. MS. PATTERSON: -- yeah, court reporter break. CHAIRMAN HALL: Yes. Let's be back at 10:35. (A brief recess was had from 10:23 a.m. to 10:35 a.m.) MS. PATTERSON: Chair, you have a live mic. CHAIRMAN HALL: All right. Does that bring us to 10A? Item #10A PROVIDE DIRECTION TO STAFF TO DEVELOP OPTIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR COMPLETING PHASES 3 AND 4 OF THE PARADISE COAST SPORTS COMPLEX AND BRING A REPORT BACK TO THE BOARD. (ALL DISTRICTS) - MOTION TO MOVE FORWARD WITH A FINANCING PLAN AND ANALYSIS FOR PHASE 3 AND BRING BACK AT A FUTURE BOARD MEETING BY COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS; SECONDED BY COMMISSIONER MCDANIEL – APPROVED (COMMISSIONER HALL OPPOSED); MOTION FOR ALL EVALUATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS OF PHASES 4 & 5, AND BRING BACK A FEASIBILITY STUDY ANALYSIS BY COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS; SECONDED BY COMMISSIONER KOWAL – APPROVED (COMMISSIONER HALL OPPOSED); STAFF TO COME BACK AT A FUTURE MEETING REGARDING THE RELATED FEASIBILITY STUDY Page 60 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 49 MS. PATTERSON: It does. Item 10A is a recommendation to provide direction to staff to develop options and recommendations for completing Phase 3 and 4 of the Paradise Coast Sports Complex and bring a report back to the Board. Mr. Ed Finn, your Deputy County Manager, is here to begin the presentation. MR. FINN: Thank you, Ms. Patterson, Mr. Chairman. MS. PATTERSON: Hold on. This item is brought to the agenda by Commissioner Saunders. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Oh, yeah. We've got to have that. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: All right. So I'll jump in just for a quick minute. CHAIRMAN HALL: Sure. Go ahead. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Mr. Chairman and Commissioners, I wanted to bring this up for a couple reasons. Number one, we've had a lot of dialogue over the last month or so about trying to shift some tourist development tax dollars from promotion into some projects, and so I know there's going to be a lot of discussion about the different possibilities for different projects. But I wanted to see if we could make this one kind of No. 1 on the list, and the rationale for that is that we're using tourist tax dollars to build what is essentially a super regional park. If you take a look at Big Corkscrew as an example, when that's finished out, that's probably going to be a $90 million park. When we finish Paradise Coast, that's going to be $160 million, $170 million park. That's a big, big number. But this park is a real gem, and I'd like to see us finish it off. I know it's going to be painful to do it, but I'd like to see us do it. And the reason it is is that this will provide, I believe, a real facility that will greatly enhance the athletic opportunities for our Page 61 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 50 children and families with professional soccer there. This facility is becoming a nationally known venue. If we can finish this park off, it will be one of the best, if not the best amateur sports facilities in the country. It will attract tourism from all over the country. And I want to read just a couple paragraphs from a letter that I've distributed to everybody, and then I'm going to ask Mr. Finn and then Adrian Moses and Jay Tusa to fill us in on why they feel that this park should be completed. But this is from the -- from Randy Smith, Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association, and in his letter, he says that the Collier County chapter of the Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association -- I think this is important because lodging facilities, owners, managers, typically want to spend as much money on advertising and promotion as can be done, but they're recognizing the benefit of this. "The Collier County chapter of the Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association strongly supports the completion of the proposed sports complex project with Phases 3 and 4. This facility represents a significant opportunity to enhance tourism, create jobs, and improve the quality of life of our residents." And continuing towards the bottom of this, "Beyond its economic impact, the evolving sports complex will also enhance the quality of life for our residents." And remember, one of the purposes of this park was to enhance the quality of life by providing much-needed athletic fields for our citizens. "It will offer a word-class facility for local youth and adult sports, fostering community engagement, promoting health and wellness, and providing a space for families to come together." I don't know if -- I think most of us were at the drone show on July 6th at the Paradise Coast facility. There were about 10,000 people there. And I would guess probably about a third of them were kids. Families out -- the whole field was completely filled, the Page 62 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 51 stadium was completely filled, and everybody had a wonderful night at that event. This is the type of facility that will provide that opportunity. So concluding, "We urge you to prioritize the completion of this project recognizing its potential to drive tourism, create jobs, and improve the lives of Collier County residents. The Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association is eager to support this initiative and collaborate with the county to ensure its success." I know there's been a lot of discussion about this park is costing a lot of money. It's costing a lot more than we anticipated. We had problems with some of the -- some of our consultants going back to the beginning. We've solved those problems. And with the addition of Phase 3 and Phase 4, the additions of that one field in Phase 3 and the additional 11 fields in Phase 4, this facility will provide great opportunities for our kids. And I think at some point I want Adrian Moses to come on up and talk a little bit about what his needs are for this facility to make it -- it's kind of humming along now. I want this facility to sing, and I think it will if we can increase the number of fields and finish it off. So, Mr. Finn, that's my brief introduction. MR. FINN: Thank you, sir. I appreciate that. Mr. Chairman, if I may, today we're going to talk a little bit about the sports complex, and as Commissioner Saunders says, it is a beautiful facility. I think this aerial we're looking at here is a prime example. You'll see the stadium in the foreground and some of the areas to be finished in the background. Our objective today is to not proceed today but rather seek direction from the Board to allow us to do an analysis, both financial as well as contract-wise, on how we would proceed with this and come back to the Board with a report, allowing the Board to give us specific direction to proceed. Page 63 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 52 We're going to do a brief overview. We're going to do a description of Phases 3 and 4. We're going to look at the business outlook, and that will be Adrian Moses, the general manager of the Paradise Coast Sports Complex. Mr. Tusa will give us a sense of the economic impact on the sports complex. And we also have Mr. DeLony here. He's our principal project manager, and he was made responsible for this shortly after we kind of ended our relationship with Manhattan. The sports complex has a fairly long history. I know this is a little bit of an eye chart, but I will say it started in 2015/2016 with a concept development through Hunden Strategic Patterns. They did a need assessment for us. I think they had about three assignments as part of -- as part of getting us started on this project. 2017, the project picked up some steam. Concept approval and a plan of finance were established. The key thing there is there was an added -- excuse me -- fifth penny to the tourist development tax to -- the City Gate land was purchased, and the county 305 parcel was committed to the project as well. In 2018, we did contract awards both for -- to Manhattan Construction and the design contract. The TDT revenue bond Series 2018 was also issued at that point in time. In 2019, the contracts with Manhattan were established. Those were construction management at-risk contracts, and those did not go particularly well, though they did go as planned. The plan was to phase -- phase this contract. That caused some consternation in some sense that we could have done better had we simply contracted or amended those contracts all at one time. The City Gate parcel was the first to go. That was five fields: Maintenance building, welcome center, the market ticket booths, restroom, the City Gate Boulevard south entrance improvements, City Gate Boulevard -- City Gate Boulevard North, and parking, Page 64 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 53 stadium and the great lawn, plus the Cove. The 305 parcel started a little bit later. That was largely excavating the lakes, spreading the fill, doing some grading; City Gate Boulevard north extension, which wraps around the facility; internal roadways; parking; infrastructure; five fields. Originally this scope included a campground and the northwest parking lot. In 2020, Phase 1, the City Gate side of the improvements opened in mid '20 -- 2023. Mid to late 2023, we had that mediated settlement agreement, which terminated the Manhattan contract as well as, at the same time, we terminated Manhattan's CMAR contract for the forensic building that we talked about this morning. We removed a few items from the scope at that time to facilitate terminating that contract, and that includes Field 9 that we're also identifying as Phase 3 at this point. Some parking was removed from there, as well as the campground. 2024, pursuant to the settlement agreement, county staff and the engineer of record as well as Manhattan have been working through the punch list, and they're still working through some closing out permitting on the site. And we'll get back to maybe a little more -- a little easier on the eye when we look at the overall phasing plan. You'll see in the middle, in the blue box is the existing complex. That consists of the stadium and four fields, plus the green field immediately east of the stadium. What we're talking about today is Phase 3. You'll see that as a pink box pointing to the right. That is, essentially, Field 9 that I'll talk about in a little more depth there going forward, and Phase 4, pink box shown at the far right-hand side with the arrow pointing in, that's pointing to that 11-field baseball complex. I don't know if it's any easier to see on this aerial, but in the foreground, you can see the stadium. You can see a natural turf Page 65 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 54 field, then a parking, and the brown field next to that is where Field 9 would go. We're identifying Field 9 as Phase 3. That will include Field 9, associated prefabricated metal building structure, the south and west parking surrounding that field, and a bathroom structure. In a little more detail, this is a snip from the plans, and this shows the extent of Phase 3. As I noted before, Field No. 9, a prefabricated metal building. Scaled that quickly last night. It looked like about a 12,000-square-foot building. The parking surrounding the facility. Over to the left of there, you'll see kind of a white-and-black box. That's finishing up some flagpole features at the stadium, and then the pathway that runs north from Field 9. Sports complex Phase 4, the photo on the right you can see the 11 fields, in a little more than we had on the last one, eleven multipurpose fields. And while they're configured, certainly from that aerial, as baseball fields, all these fields are multipurpose. The five fields in an octagon pattern, those are sized for softball or Little League. Those would provide multipurpose fields for small -- smaller scale soccer, lacrosse, and other lawn field type sports. The larger baseball fields are configured for baseball, and those provide essentially full-size long fields. The plan by the operator, if these were to be constructed, the mounds in the infield would not be constructed as part of the site work, but rather they would be brought in and taken out as needed, allowing them to be used for multipurpose. This phase consists of a welcome center, concessions, and restrooms, a trophy presentation plaza, marketplace, storage and maintenance buildings, and potentially -- in light of kind of our experience with the facility, potentially an outdoor amphitheater that would necessitate a reduction in the field count. With that, I'm going to bring up Mr. Moses, the general manager Page 66 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 55 of the facility, and he'll talk to you a little bit about the community use, the rationale, and some of the business aspects of it. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Mr. Moses, one of the things I'd like for you to -- because we had that conversation -- to kind of emphasize is what this will mean for our citizens, our kids, and being able to use these facilities. MR. MOSES: Okay. Good morning. Adrian Moses representing Sports Facilities Companies as general manager of Paradise Coast Sports Complex. Thank you very much for bringing this motion forward and the renewed appetite and enthusiasm towards this. On behalf of the phone calls I get from sports groups, from families, from parents, I thank you because those are the groups right now that we're struggling to accommodate with the number of fields that we have right now. We provide local sports groups -- football, soccer, lacrosse, rugby, we provide our field space to those groups at a reduced rate to what we charge sports tournament operators that come in. The number of fields that we have does not meet the amount of current demands of local usage. Speaking with my colleagues in the Parks and Recs department, that is replicated at all of the other parks as well. Our youth and our recreational population are using the fields to the point that, you know, we really need an eighth day in the week, which would be helpful, or a few more hours in the day. At the fields that we have at Paradise Coast, we have no way to support the diamond field sports, which is softball, whether that be fast pitch or slow pitch or the baseball, Little League or adult -- adult diamond field sports. So the addition of these fields would really help in alleviating the scheduling conflicts that we have that are requiring parents to get Page 67 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 56 their kids to our facility early or for the younger kids essentially trying to stretch out their bedtime so they've got time to play sports at the field times that we have available. The other aspect to reducing the burden on some -- that the additional fields will have, when we bring in our larger sporting events on the weekends that require additional fields than what we have at Paradise Coast, we have to lean on the county parks to be able to accommodate and take full advantage of the sports tourism dollars that those events bring. What that has is an impact and a burden on the county parks because we're essentially taking those fields away from local use during those weekend events, granted it's not every single weekend, but still, those events are happening at peak times of the year and in peak season times of the year. And in general, there is a shortage of diamond field facilities in Collier County. That's those individual and those groups that play -- that play those sports have to travel far, and the implication on their schedules is even more amplified than perhaps those that play on long fields. So there's an absolute need for the additional fields to be built just to take care of the needs of -- the demands of our sports -- our local sports organizations. As Mr. Finn had identified, the proposed design is multipurpose turf artificial fields. Our organization, and me personally, have experience in managing these types of fields. It's not a traditional baseball field with a dirt infield that needs to be drug [sic] and maintained. It's an entirely turf field out -- infield and outfield with portable mounds that can be brought in and out to support the different types of baseball that are played on there and removed completely for softball. The use of outfield fencing to provide different -- different distances for the perimeter of the field also allows us to use those Page 68 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 57 diamond fields for bat-and-ball sports. When it comes to their use for long field sports, they're big enough -- the larger baseball fields are big enough to paint a full football or a full lacrosse or a full soccer field on. So as we have those events that come in, that we do lean on Big Island Corkscrew, and we do have those events that come in that lean on North Collier Regional Park for their long fields. We can now retain all of that -- all of those tournaments at the complex. There's an additional benefit to the complex on that. In fact, that we would -- we would have the entire footfall for those events, and our ancillary sales would increase because we're not -- we're not sharing the visitation around multiple venues, and there's obviously an operational savings on that as well. These increased number of fields would obviously support local organizations for practicing midweek. And in terms of what we have at Paradise Sports Complex, it provides the communities that play the bat-and-ball sports on diamond fields would have the high-quality comparable facilities that those in our soccer- and lacrosse- and football-playing communities have. So that would be the rationale based upon the increased fields at Paradise Coast for community use. And the other reason why the sports complex was built was to drive sports tourism dollars into Collier County. We already drive a lot. We're the most consistent driver of sports tourism dollars into Collier County. There is -- the majority of events that we have from Labor Day to Memorial Day are for out-of-region events, and we define that as people that are coming from outside of a driving range of an hour and a half. These are the groups that come in that stay in our hotels. These are the groups that eat in our restaurants. I'm sure that if you've been out on a Saturday, like I have, and try to go to a restaurant, and there's a wait for a table, and I'm kind of kicking Page 69 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 58 myself because everyone who's sat at the table is wearing a lacrosse uniform, and it's -- I can't help but feel that I'm the reason why I'm waiting for a table at that restaurant. But it's also our excursion tours, and that led to the letter of strong support that you read out, Commissioner, that the hospitality industry is really interested in making sure that this -- this project gets completed in full. Our challenge right now, in a very successful and a really good trajectory that we've seen over the last couple of years at Paradise Coast, has been in between Memorial Day and Labor Day we've seen comparatively low usage to the rest of the year, with the exception of the excellent FBU Top Gun event, which is a -- which is one of our largest events that sits in the middle of summer. The events that we attract in the summer aren't as large as the ones that we do in the other period of the year. There's a benefit here. That same period is the peak season for diamond sports. I'm going to refer later to a facility that our firm manages on the east coast of Florida in Melbourne, the USSSA Space Coast Complex. Their busiest time of year is our quietest time of the year, and they are a diamond field facility. So they are busiest from Memorial Day to Labor Day at the same time that we're not. So we're confident that we can use our network to book out the summer months the exact same way that we booked out the other months of the year. What does that mean in terms of numbers? Our firm put together and, you know, I put together some projections for economic impact. The financial return for the complex, I'm looking forward to sharing some excellent news just for the operational performance of the complex. In this year for economic impact, this is -- this is something that we define, I mentioned earlier, is people driving from over an hour and a half away. We qualified 34 events in this fiscal Page 70 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 59 year. So the majority have happened. There's three or four yet to come. But we estimate between 40 and 50 million dollars of economic impact into our community through these events that came in. Only six of these events happened within that period of time between Memorial Day and Labor Day, and that is around 10 percent of that; 40 to 50 million happens in the summer months, which I'm sure that the hospitality industry would be looking for us to support them with events in that period of time because of that reason. The venue that I managed -- that we manage in the east coast, they experience 60 percent, on estimate, of their entire annual visitation in those same months. So ultimately the development of these additional fields allow us to flatten out our performance over the year at a very high level and provide a consistent return to Collier County in terms of the performance of the facility and the economic impact that it drives. If you have any questions, I'm happy to take them, or if you'd like to hear from Jay Tusa, I can pass the -- I can pass it on to him. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner Kowal. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Thank you, Chairman. How you doing, Adrian? MR. MOSES: I'm well, thank you. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Good to see you again. You know, you were talking about the diamond sports. You know, you have been approached, and we're kind of like dispersing them to our other facilities in North Collier and stuff like that, and you said, typically, our offseason is their season. MR. MOSES: Uh-huh. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: And you see that on the east coast with other facilities. So we've been getting -- I understand it's a stress trying to get these things spread out amongst the county and Page 71 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 60 get these done. Now, we know there was a study done in 2015. I'm sure you probably read the study or have seen the study that was done. Because I'm assuming the study kind of gave this footprint saying this is -- 10 years ago this is what people wanted or what they saw or foreseeing what they were seeing. But I don't know if the study knew that we'd have a professional soccer team by now. I don't know if that was taken into consideration in the study. Are you aware that there was any -- MR. MOSES: It's unlikely that that was taken into consideration. It was in the general plan, but -- in my conversations with those who were involved in the inception of the facility, but it wasn't specifically -- it wasn't specifically identified there. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: So just -- let's just say -- I'm just spitballing. So I understand Phase 3. I think that's something we should really explore today or have our staff explore that and look at this particular portion of this. But I think also, like, Phase 4 and Phase 5, in the makeup of what's going on in the country and what sports, over the past 10 years, you know, what's up here. You have your thumb on the pulse. You know, what are we seeing that's booming? Would a field house be maybe better to start in Phase 4 instead of 5, you know, for the bulk -- multiple reasons, because it also would be a Category 5 shelter for, you know, our citizens in their time of distress and we need to shelter people. And the indoor sports, like, you could have 100 pickleball courts inside a facility that big and hold pickleball events and then even volleyball tournaments, nationwide volleyball tournaments come in, and have them inside an air-conditioned controlled climate thing all year round, you know. Because we don't know what the soccer's going to bring yet, right? We haven't played a game. Page 72 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 61 MR. MOSES: Not yet. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: So we don't know -- that might be the direction this facility goes in. You know, we might not need extra softball fields or extra, you know, baseball fields. Maybe we might need some more soccer fields, because from what I understand, this team wants to be part of this community and nurture our children and be part of their leagues and things like that. So I'm just wondering maybe just -- not say let's take a look at all -- these next three phases all at one time now and you say, "All right. This study hit it -- you know, hit the nail on the head 10 years ago. This is exactly what this place needs," or I understand doing Phase 3 and then maybe taking another look after we get a season of soccer in or this or that, because we might need more parking. We might need -- you know, this land, this virgin land, this undeveloped land may need to be parts of parking or other things like that, because we don't know what it's going to -- what it's going to bring here. So, I mean, would you agree or disagree with -- MR. MOSES: I would tend to disagree for a couple reasons. The first one being that we see across our network where we manage multiple diamond sports facilities, that diamond sports are thriving. It also is serving the local community of the diamond sports, which are -- which don't have enough fields at the moment in Collier County. You mentioned pickleball. The county invested a bunch of money in creating, you know, I think it's over 60 pickleball courts for that community in East Naples Park. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: But they're all outside. MR. MOSES: Yeah. The -- COMMISSIONER KOWAL: I bet if I told the nation tomorrow Collier County would have a pickleball tournament in an air-conditioned facility in August, we would be chasing people out of Page 73 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 62 the county, it would be so full. MR. MOSES: It would -- it would potentially be one week of the summer rather than -- rather than every -- COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Well, I'm just saying, just the outside facility, bring over 40- to 50,000 people in just for that one weekend. MR. MOSES: The way that we've structured out our economics for the facility from when first were -- put our pro forma together included the baseball and softball facilities. That allows us not only to take the existing events that we have and provide more soccer fields through the multipurpose nature of these fields but also drive into that very lucrative diamond field sports market as well. From in terms of a field house, absolutely a field house would be nice. But don't underestimate the amount that it costs to manage a field house. A field house with a parquet wood flooring requires 24-hours/7 air conditioning on top of that. So there is maintenance to outdoor fields, but it's our recommendation that the baseball and softball fields would be built before a field house. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: I guess I'm just leaning towards understanding, you know, if this soccer team and what they're saying they're going to bring to this community might change the outlook on Phase 4 or Phase 5, that's all. I mean, would it -- it would behoove us to say, well, I say we're going to spend this money -- put the money together to build these things, and then two, three years down the road we realize that maybe we could have used this property in a different way. MR. MOSES: It's possible. The same -- COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Then it's too late. MR. MOSES: Yeah, I had -- COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Then it's too late. We can't go Page 74 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 63 backwards. MR. MOSES: I had this same conversation with Commissioner Saunders, is that we already have 300 team soccer tournaments multiple times of the year. How much bigger can we go with soccer; whereas, at the moment we only very -- as a community at Collier County, we only scratch the surface of the very lucrative baseball and softball market, and that also fits the -- fits the calendar schedule for us. The reason why we don't have soccer tournaments in the summer is because soccer tournaments typically don't happen in the summer because that's not summer season. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Is our league played in the summer? MR. MOSES: The league is, yes, but in terms of youth tournaments that we can bring in to -- to drive the revenue that would support the operation of the facility and the economic impact that they would drive, there are very few tournaments that occur in -- soccer tournaments that occur in the summer. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: All right. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner McDaniel. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: On that note, I've been talking for quite some time about utilization of our TDT revenue for O&M in our parks and rec system. I've been talking about it for a long time, and I've asked for review of those TDT -- the tourist development taxes dollars for us to be able to utilize those funds for operations and maintenance of our overall park system. And I can say out loud, because I was here the day we chose to not do the Atlanta Braves baseball stadium and brought forward the advent of what's now known as Paradise Coast Park, and there was no discussion about a professional soccer team back in those days. The potential was there, but there wasn't any discussion about it or certainly in any kind of a business plan. Page 75 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 64 So I'm excited to see, with the advent of our own professional soccer team, what, in fact, that's going to bring to our community. I will also say that it was represented to me that Phase 1 was going to be an 80,000-square-foot indoor stadium for sports events. It was represented to me -- in my rationale, that was an 80,000-square-foot Cat 5 hurricane structure inside the dam of I-75, a huge, huge benefit to our community necessarily in perpetuity. And so as we're moving forward with this, I'm not -- I don't disagree with you with regard to the shortage of baseball fields, softball fields. You call them bats-and-ball sports. So I don't disagree that there is an enormous shortage with regard to the availability. We're all struggling within our park system existing today with the fee structure for our Little League teams and softball leagues and so ons and so forth to be able to have a sufficient amount of time on our fields. I want to see, as we're going forward with this, an analysis of the TPC, the total -- and maybe I need Ed back up there. This isn't necessarily for you, Adrian. But I want to see a total project cost where we're at with this project so far. It was represented to us when we brought this forward that the total -- it was going to tip out 80-, 90 million, and we're well in excess of that now, and we still have Phases 3, 4, and 5, and we're not even talking about this field house as of yet in these proposed phases, number one. Number two, I need a cost associated with these proposed phases to be able to actually have a rationale with regard to our budgeting processes for these -- for these additional phases. And then -- and then the last point is, I would like to have a review of the phasing prospects or a review of the phases in general so that this board can have a discussion about what those community needs, in fact, are. Page 76 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 65 You okay, Ed? MR. FINN: (Nods head.) COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Okay. On a global level, we have an enormous latent maintenance expense that's running with our Parks and Rec system for facilities that we already have. We belay -- and I'm going to get on a bandwagon here, but we belayed artificial turf fields in Immokalee -- a decision that was made last year that had been in the mix for in excess of two years, and we're staring at another year at least before we see the advent of those fields. We have -- I think -- we just got an analysis of our aquatic centers within our community, two of which are not even operational at this point in time. So we need -- we need to have a discussion about the priorities of the community for our existing facilities that we already have in place and balance those with any new development that we -- that we are, in fact, going to bring forward. That's my personal opinion. MR. FINN: Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner LoCastro. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Thank you, Chairman. I, too, am going to take a little bit smaller of a bite out of this apple and look at what we're being asked to approve today. Today we're just asking to recommend to provide direction to the staff to develop options and recommendations for completing Phase 3 and 4. That's all I'm looking for. I'm not voting today on approving 3 and 4. And I can tell you I'm going to need a way deeper dive. And it doesn't need to be at this meeting. You can meet with me every single day if you want so that I'm fully prepared when -- the next time that we come back here and I have much more info. But similar to Commissioner Kowal -- he made some great Page 77 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 66 points that I had written down here as well. I don't want to just see what 3 and 4 was supposed to look like and here's why we need to move forward, because we're a shortage of -- we have a shortage of fields. First of all, we can do anything, but we can't do everything. And if there is such a big giant shortage, well, before we had the sports complex, where did these kids play? And we know that it was -- there was even more of a shortage. So I'm not saying that this isn't a big, huge plus. But the points that have been made up here of "I want to see the difference between parking versus the field, softball versus soccer, soccer versus pickleball, nothing," I'd rather do nothing than the wrong thing. Commissioner McDaniel, you know, brought up what I just wrote down here. I just wrote down "pools" with a question mark. We have so much need in so many other areas. So before we continue to build the Taj Mahal at the sports complex and talk about we need this and we need this and we need this, we have things already built that are failing and that we possibly could use TDC money for. So I'm not taking anything away from the sports complex, and I think I said in my office to you, Ed, yesterday, I'll never vote against moving forward for exploration, having public comment on a topic. I mean, it costs us nothing. But I'm going to need a lot more -- I wasn't part of this, you know, 10 years ago talking about the sports complex and all that. I don't know that I would have voted for any of the things that were on that slide, or at least the way they were voted for. But, you know, maybe, maybe not. But currently, right now, if you're bringing 10,000 people for fireworks, I can tell you parking's at a premium. If you're bringing people for the soccer game, we certainly don't want 16 games a year to have everybody say how the game was awesome but parking Page 78 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 67 was -- you know, was unbelievably unacceptable. So I'm really looking for more deep-dive analysis. Don't show me the slides of what 3 and 4 was agreed to 10 years ago and now we're ready to move forward. I really need to be convinced as to why the money -- just like you said, is parking smarter, is pickleball smarter, is nothing smarter, before, you know, I personally vote on making the sports complex any bigger or more expensive. I mean, there are times -- you can go out there now. You can say, like, "Wow, the fields are at a premium." I was out there last night. Fields were crowded with kids who are now starting the soccer season. You know, I have some friends that were out there, and I was out there most of the evening last night. But you can go out there other days where that place is a ghost town. And, to Adrian's point, regardless if you build a field house or not, operation and maintenance is extremely expensive. So it was great seeing those kids on the fields last night, but when there's not kids on the fields, we're still lighting it, paying utilities, paying staff. And then when you do have kids on the fields, I'm sure there was a little bit more maintenance that needed to be done today to put things back in order. So, you know, I just want to make sure we're not overextending ourselves and we're not thinking just because -- you know, even if we have the money -- to Commissioner McDaniel's point, I really want to think about prioritization before we, you know, focus on, well, 3 and 4 is next and it's time so it's -- you know, it was in the timeline. Three and 4 might have been next, but I don't know that we could have imagined some of the shortfalls that we have in some of our parks that are currently built in some of our other areas of the county. And so like I say, it doesn't need to be a 100-slide presentation here the next time we meet. Meet with me separately, if I'm the only Page 79 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 68 one that needs a deeper dive. But I'm going to need way, way, way more of a deeper dive and comparison and contrasting and convincing before I vote on phases. But what's being asked here is just giving the staff direction to move forward and, you know, that has my full support because, I mean, I think the staff moving forward -- I guess, in closing, I would just say, I'm looking for a more comprehensive view, not just "Here's why it should be built." You know, I want to see a compare and a contrast and a bit of a deeper dive across the board, not just, "Here's 3 and 4. Here's what it looks like. Here's what it's going to cost. Please vote yes so we can get, you know, a construction company out there." That won't cut the mustard, you know, for me. Thank you. MR. FINN: Yes, sir. Good comments. I appreciate those. If it pleases the Chair, Mr. Tusa probably had a few comments he wanted to make, if the Chair's interested in hearing from him. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner Saunders. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I can wait for Mr. Tusa's report, and then I'll have a few questions and comments. CHAIRMAN HALL: Okay. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Because I think our tourism folks -- I think their thoughts are critical to this process as we go forward. MR. TUSA: Good morning. Jay Tusa, for the record, Tourism director for Collier County. I just have a few stats that I wanted to relay just so you kind of understand the economic impact and the value sports tourism has to Collier County. So we had our research firm do a little deep dive into Mr. Moses' data that he presented based on those 34 events, and very similar to the economic impact that he presented of 40- to 50 million, Page 80 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 69 our economic impact came back 45- to $55 million range. So very similar, which that's kind of good. Then you kind of have two different sources that are kind of coming up with a similar number. So that kind of gives us some reassurances that that's probably a good number. I just wanted to touch a little bit on room nights that are generated from those 34 events. We estimate 62,000 room nights with a room revenue of under $14 million, and then that equates to a TDT collected of $686,000. One thing I want to stress -- is so based on that room revenue of $13 million, just over $13 million, the average rate is $220. Right now the average daily rate in Collier County is $372. So you can kind of see a pretty big difference there in those numbers. So the one good thing about that average rate of 220 that's being generated by the sports complex is it's a little bit low of a rate, but then that also then presents an opportunity for midlevel properties to be able to sell their rooms at a more affordable rate and generate that business for them. And so we all know Collier County's a very high-end destination, but there are certainly -- there's room within our destination for multiple segments coming into our market. So this does fill a need for that midrange property that's out there. So I just wanted to convey that information to you. One little bit of information that I had a conversation with Mr. Finn about is the potential of hiring a firm to come in and look at feasibility, kind of to what some of you commissioners just kind of mentioned as far as looking forward of, you know, what the demand might be, look at the needs of the community, and have maybe a firm, you know, do that for us. I did speak to the firm Hunden Partners that did the original feasibility study back in 2015. They are available to work with us Page 81 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 70 on this project, so they could go back in and look at where we are currently, what the market -- bringing this -- these new fields or new products onto the market, what that could be for us, what that could look like for us in the future. So that could be an opportunity for us to kind of give us some insight there for the Board to make an informed decision. So certainly whatever your feelings are on that, we can take that into account. And if you have any questions for me, I'm happy to answer any questions you might have. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner Saunders. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My goal in bringing this forward is really quite simple. We're in our budgeting process now, and we don't -- we're going to collect a certain amount of tourist tax dollars over the next several years, obviously. I don't want to see us spending money in our tourist tax revenues on projects during this budget cycle until we've had a full analysis of what this facility can do for us. And so my goal is to have staff directed to evaluate what's the best use of this facility; let us know whether we need a feasibility study. I think that's a great idea; but also just to make sure that we don't do something in this budget process that we're going to conclude in the next 60 days; that we don't do something in this budget process that ties our hands so we cannot finish this park. If there's a better use of dollars for other types of facilities, whether it be a field house or whatever, I'm okay with that. I just want to make sure that we make the right decisions in this budget process. And so my motion ultimately is going to be to direct staff to evaluate all this and come back and let us know what we should be doing or could be doing. In reference to the maintenance on our pool facilities, that's kind Page 82 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 71 of a little bit of a sore subject, because back in 2021 the County Commission appropriated $17 million. We actually had a line item in that budget that said $17 million for maintenance and repair of our aquatic facilities. And for some reason -- and I'm not pointing fingers, but we do have some staff folks that are not here anymore. For some reason, the county did not spend that money to maintain our facilities, and now we have North Collier Park that's shut down. We still have -- the good news is we still have about $10 million, I believe, in the bank, maybe even plus interest; maybe it's a little more. So we do have -- we've set funds aside for that. We still have some of those funds available. We need to fix those, and I think we can do both. I think we can walk and chew gum at the same time when it comes to our aquatic facilities and this facility. So that's going to be my motion ultimately, Mr. Chairman. I know we may have some public speakers. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner McDaniel. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yes. And thank you, Mr. Chair. And I agree, Commissioner Saunders, with what it is. I was -- I was there when we appropriated those funds for O&M for our Parks and Rec system and was terribly dissatisfied that those Board-directed expenditures weren't accomplished. Number two, I was here when this park was brought forward. Phase one was the 80,000-square-foot indoor stadium in the original, put to me, set of plans. And so the project goes along, and then all of a sudden, I get a Phase 0. I've been in construction a long time, and I have never seen a Phase 0 show up. Then all of a sudden, the field house got moved to Phase 12. I don't know what phase -- it isn't even -- well, it's 5 or 6. It's way out on the list. And my whole -- my whole rationale when I was coming -- when this was coming forward was certainly to provide a Grade A facility for our community, but at the same time protect our Page 83 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 72 community, at the same time, so we have a centralized hurricane shelter that can house -- in the event of a terrible storm surge, we have place for our people to be able to go and to be able to take care of our community. So my request, Commissioner Saunders, whenever you get ready to make your motion, is we make an adjustment for this recommendation that staff's put forward to just talk about Phases 3 and 4. I would rather not delineate just Phases 3 and 4. I would rather completing -- recommendations for the completing of phases of the park in general, not just delineate 3 and 4, but all of them, and come back to us with the information that this board has requested. CHAIRMAN HALL: Before I go to you, Commissioner LoCastro, I just want to make a comment. As I sit here and listen, I don't -- I don't think this is something that we never need to do. I don't know if it's now. I agree that we have things that we have money set aside that we should have done. I can't help what should have, could have, would have been, but I do know that I've got people in the district that are screaming at me, "How can you dare close down Sun-N-Fun in the summertime?" And to me, that's what we need to be focusing on. I do think we can walk and chew gum. We can think about the future with the Paradise Sports Complex. I still question these figures that come in. You know, my old adage is, "You never ask an insurance agent if you need insurance." So to hear that -- you know, I understand needing some softball fields, some Little League fields. I understand needing another field, some parking lot. Whether it's a metal building or metal pavilion, I don't know. I heard metal building, and I saw metal pavilion. Nine million bucks for a field and some parking places and a bathroom and a pavilion? I don't do that math -- that math doesn't compute in my head. Page 84 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 73 But as far as to bring us back some options, I'm not opposed to that, but I'm not going to be excited about putting the public in debt to get some extra softball fields in or to get a $9 million double field. Just so that you know when you come back, I want real figures, just like Commissioner LoCastro said. I want to know how many parking places we have, what the size of the building or the pavilion is, what is the anticipated -- real anticipated "these are the butts that we can put on the fields, the real return on investment figures," not fuzzy stuff. You know, you come to me with a 40- and $50 million figure that's the economic impact, then there's 62,000 rooms. You know, if you divide that by 34, that's like 1800 room nights. If you divide that by two people -- two paying people for a room, that's 950 people that you've got -- 915 people that you've got per event. I question that. It may be -- it may be true. I'm just telling you I question it. So I would like to be made -- felt better about that. Commissioner LoCastro. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Thank you, Chairman. Yeah, I guess in summary, one of the -- a couple more notes I wrote down here, and then, Jay, I've got something for you. You know, as the commissioner who sits on the TDC board, especially at our last meeting, some of the things we talked about -- and I'll get to that in a minute, so... But I want to start out with the goal of you-all coming back to this committee, or at least me -- I won't speak for the other commissioners, but I feel like we're all paddling in a very similar direction, most of is -- isn't to come back and to convince me that 3 and 4 should be built. I would like to see more balance and more, you know, multiple options. I think we all look really stupid if we sit here and approve multi-million dollar, you know, fields or parking or whatever. We Page 85 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 74 have to justify that if there's some other things where we have a significant deficit. If the big evidence being pushed is how many room nights and how many this and how many that, I can tell you that's a piece of the puzzle, but that wouldn't get me to approve. You could say that for almost anything. And trust me, on the flip side, there's people that live around that sports complex that don't want it to be bigger. I always say, "Who loves Celebration Park?" People who don't live across the street from it. So, you know, let's make sure we find balance and we don't come back here, and we have tunnel vision and group think about, "Hey, this is why it's time for 3 and 4." It might -- you know, it was said up here, you know, we have to complete the sports complex, you know, or something like that. I sit here and say, "It might already be done for now." You know, Commissioner Hall said it perfectly where he was saying, and I couldn't agree more, "We might be done for now. We might have other priorities." That's not an answer we know. But please come back here with a very balanced presentation, not group think trying to steer us into why 3 and 4 needs to be approved, and if we don't approve it, here's all the room nights we're going to lose, all the revenue. You know, like I've said before, nobody can argue that Great Wolf Lodge isn't going to bring us money, but you can't build 50 of them in Collier County. How much bigger should the sports complex be? Those are some things I really want answered for me in particular. And like I said, it doesn't have to be in the commissioner meeting. It could be prior to so I feel better coming in here. You know, Jay, you don't need to come up here to the Page 86 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 75 microphone, but it's easy to throw millions of dollars around for the sports complex. How long did we talk at the last TDC money [sic] about this much money to go -- to help the Fun-N-Sun [sic], and there were people on the TDC, "I really don't know if we should be using the money for that. You know, does it really help tourism?" And then we're going to sit here with the same breath -- and I realize there's different colors of money, but, you know, your job -- and you do it well, and our meetings are very valuable. But make sure that your part in this is having a broad perspective. You don't have unlimited TDC dollars, so whatever gets thrown at the sports complex are things that maybe could have been used elsewhere. I want to make sure we're voting on priorities, because there's only so much money to go around. And, you know, it seems sometimes that we're fat, dumb, and happy with TDC dollars, and it's always -- you know, we say this at our TDC meetings, everyone's always like, "How about the TDC? How about the TDC? Oh, the TDC could pay for that." You know what, we've got tourism dollars that are used for environmental restoration of our beaches after hurricanes and things like that. So, you know, once the check's written, it's written. And now might not be the time to write it, or it might be. That's the question, you know, that I'm going to need answered. That's it. That's it. So I look forward to that discussion. MR. FINN: Very good. Thank you, sir. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Just two quick points. And as we're -- as we're talking about our aquatic centers at large -- and you brought up Great Wolf. I think they're supposed to open next month, in September. And that is an enormous for-profit aquatic center that's not part of Collier County's exposure. So that needs to Page 87 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 76 be brought in, when we get into this, as you spoke, Commissioner LoCastro, this tunnel vision of "We've got to get this done." We need to give consideration to the advent of that facility coming online. Number two, with regard to parking, there was a time when there was a big push for a public parking garage out at Seagate, and we nixed that because it really wasn't a happy place for public parking. I would like to have a discussion when we're talking about parking at the sports complex about a public/private partnership with parking garages to -- because we suck up an enormous amount of available space for horizontal parking when we could do a parking tower or a parking garage facility that would also allow for storage for our community for vehicles during storm events and so on. But I would like to have a discussion as we're doing this future analysis, Ed, with regard to at least one parking garage, maybe two, and free up some of the parking spaces that are being -- or field spaces that are being utilized for parking. MR. FINN: Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner Kowal. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Thank you, Chairman. I know Commissioner Saunders is going to make a motion. You know, what we have on the table here is these -- Phase 3, 4, and 5. Like I said at the beginning of my initial comments, I kind of understand Phase 3 because it kind of -- it coincides with us having a professional soccer team now and having the ability for them to practice in inclement weather and having that partial covered field as part of that Phase 3 and some of the upgrades to some of the -- and the one additional parking lot is all part of the Phase 3. That kind of makes sense to have the staff go and take Phase 3 right now and maybe take a deep dive and look at it and see where the money can Page 88 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 77 be used from the -- from tourism money and things like that. But I don't think anybody has a crystal ball for Phase 4 and 5, and I don't think telling the staff today, saying, "Well, give me an answer on 4 and 5," I mean, and then they come back and say, "Oh, yeah, we do need six long fields, we need five softball fields, and this, this, and that," but I don't know what they're basing is on, because we don't know -- I just want to pump the brakes and say, "All right. Let's get through one season of professional soccer, revisit the 4 and the 5," because maybe they need to be flipped. Maybe we do need to go to the field house now instead of the fields or maybe vice versa, or maybe we do need the extra parking. I don't think anybody on our staff, Mr. Moses or anybody, has that crystal ball to tell me what the future holds after we have a season of soccer, or at least let's have a season of soccer and revisit those other two phases. I don't have a problem with maybe moving on with Phase 3 today, because we do have a commitment to that soccer team, and to provide, you know, the facility for inclement weather practice, things like that, with the overhang half field. I believe that's how it's going to be designed, Mr. Finn, correct? MR. FINN: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: And the additional parking lot off the second circle and things like that. So -- and I remember when they gave us the presentation, they talked about the numbers of the people that are going to come and use hotel rooms during the games. I don't think we even have the ability to support that right now. And we need the private sector to catch up, too, and some private money willing to invest in some maybe newer hotels in the area and things like that, too, and see where we're actually at, you know, what kind of draw we have. So that's kind of my position. I mean, Commissioner Saunders is going to make his decision on how he wants to move forward on Page 89 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 78 this motion, but that's just my opinion. You know, it's just being wiser about how we spend the people's money in the future and just, you know, making a more educated decision, I guess. That's the way I'm kind of putting it, so... MR. FINN: Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN HALL: So I -- you know, like I said, I'm not saying -- not never. I'm just saying maybe not now. And I can so much agree with Commissioner Kowal on "let's see what the season -- let's see what the soccer's going to turn out. Let's see what that's -- let's see what it is," instead of guessing at it. Then we'll have some real hard data, and we'll know. So, Commissioner Saunders, do you want your motion? COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Yes. Do we have any registered speakers? If not, I'll go -- I want to do this in -- I want to do this in two pieces, if I could, Mr. Chairman. First of all, first motion, let's direct staff to move forward with the financing plan on how to complete Phase 3, which is just that one field. If we can get consensus on that, I think it's important to move forward as quickly as possible on that field that we already have the design work and we're ready to move forward with it. So I'm going to do this in two motions. That's the first motion, Mr. Chairman. Let's move forward with Phase 3, which is just that one field, and get that completed as a priority. Then I'll make a second motion if that one -- assuming that one passes. CHAIRMAN HALL: Okay. Commissioner McDaniel. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: And my question is, are you asking to do the analysis on Phase 3 and then come back and vote on it at a later date? Because I'm not prepared to vote to support Phase 3 today. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Yeah, that's fine. Page 90 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 79 COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: If that's your motion, then -- COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I'll make that -- I'll amend the motion for staff to come back specifically on how we can proceed with Phase 3, that one field, and to do that fairly quickly, because I think that analysis will be pretty simple. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yeah, you're correct. Per my understanding, they're already along with their plans and such, and -- COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: The design. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Just with the analysis of. We're not approving it as of today. But I'll second that if it's the analysis portion. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: That's all that I'm asking for right now is for staff to come back on how to -- the analysis on Phase 3, the need for it and how it can be financed. CHAIRMAN HALL: I've got a motion and second. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I was just going to say, don't make the analysis simple. So maybe the analysis was simple a few years ago that Phase 3 was a foregone conclusion. It's not for me. So I'm going to need a lot of meetings in my office before you come back here or come back here with something that's a much deeper dive. Because I think that a lot of the analysis has changed, and a lot of our priorities have changed. So I'm going to need a lot more slides. MR. FINN: Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN HALL: All right. Motion to move forward with the options to come back for Phase 3 only. Second's made. All in favor, say aye. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Aye. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye. Page 91 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 80 COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Aye. CHAIRMAN HALL: All opposed? Aye. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Then, Mr. Chairman, the second motion is I do want staff to begin the evaluation of and recommendations concerning Phase 4 and Phase 5 -- we'll include all of the completion of this park -- to come back with some information on how we can consider moving forward, if we decide to do so, with Phase 4 and 5 or parts thereof and also to come back with information concerning a feasibility study, what that would cost, who would do it. I think we have a company that's already done it once, but to come back with just some analysis as to the benefits of having another analysis done, another feasibility analysis done. So no commitments. Just simply directing staff to start looking at how we can potentially complete Phases 4 and 5, and whether or not a feasibility study would be beneficial. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Second. CHAIRMAN HALL: All right. We've got a motion and a second. All in favor, say aye. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Aye. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye. CHAIRMAN HALL: All opposed? Aye. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Aye. MR. FINN: And if I may, Mr. Chair and Commissioner Saunders, my inclination is to do that study. So insofar as we have the authority to do that under procurement, we will do so. If we have to return to the Board if it exceeds that authority, we will probably do that. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Well, I think, based on the Page 92 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 81 conversation we just had, I think it would be important for this board to -- I realize you may have some authorization in your budget, but I think just based on what's been said -- I mean, I'd be willing to make a motion to direct you to do the study now, but I think you need some direction from the Board as opposed to just going off and doing it. I think that would be a bit of self-preservation, if you will. So let's see if the Board wants to proceed with that feasibility or have you come back and tell us what would be involved and how much it would cost. I think that -- I think that's the best thing. Come back to us next meeting or a meeting in September and just let us know what a feasibility study would involve. Let us make that decision as to whether you should do it. MR. FINN: Very good. Thank you, sir. Item #10B DIRECT THE COUNTY ATTORNEY, WORKING WITH COUNTY AIRPORT STAFF, TO COORDINATE WITH QUALITY ENTERPRISES USA, INC., AND RTH ENTERPRISES INC. TO FORMALIZE AN AGREEMENT REGARDING USE OF LAND AT THE IMMOKALEE REGIONAL AIRPORT. (COMMISSIONER MCDANIEL’S REQUEST) - MOTION TO APPROVE BY COMMISSIONER MCDANIEL; SECONDED BY COMMISSIONER LOCASTRO – APPROVED MS. PATTERSON: Commissioners, that brings us to add-on Item 10B. This is a recommendation to direct the County Attorney, working with county airport staff, to coordinate with Quality Enterprises USA, Inc., and RTH Enterprise, Inc., to formalize an agreement regarding use of land at the Immokalee Regional Airport. This is brought to the agenda at Commissioner McDaniel's Page 93 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 82 request. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I apologize for the tardiness of this. I assume it was all sent to you. CHAIRMAN HALL: It was. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I was told that it was all sent to you in a one-way communication. And, basically, for summary, we have worked with the Hesters, the operators of the Raceway in the Immokalee airport, the lessee of one of the hangar facilities that we've gone to contract with for construction of hangars at the Immokalee airport. They've all -- they all have come to a consensus it's going to take about nine months for construction to actually commence on those new hangars. And so a negotiation has been agreed upon by the parties to extend the Raceway's operations through next March, for nine months, and they have an agreement themselves to work out those technicalities, insurance, and so on. And I just am bringing this forward to let you folks know of the shift in the timing for the -- for the termination of the lease with the Raceway. Have you got any questions of me? (No response.) COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Then I'll make a motion for -- CHAIRMAN HALL: It's cut and dry. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: It is pretty cut and dry, but -- so I'll make a motion for approval here. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Second. CHAIRMAN HALL: All right. We've got a motion and a second to approve the timing of the airport and the lessee. All in favor, say aye. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Aye. Page 94 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 83 COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye. CHAIRMAN HALL: Aye. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Aye. CHAIRMAN HALL: All opposed? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HALL: So moved. MS. PATTERSON: I turned my mic off. Item #11A APPROVE AND AUTHORIZE THE CHAIRMAN TO SIGN TWO (2) AGREEMENTS BETWEEN COLLIER COUNTY AND RENAISSANCE HALL AT OLD COURSE, LLC. 1) AGREEMENT ARP21-24 FOR $8,916,402.76 FOR PRE-DEVELOPMENT AND CONSTRUCTION, 2) AGREEMENT ARP21-25 IN THE AMOUNT OF $1,130,551 FOR IMPACT FEES ASSOCIATED WITH PHASE I TO FURTHER AFFORDABLE HOUSING INITIATIVES PROVIDED THROUGH A GRANT FROM THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY, STATE AND LOCAL FISCAL RECOVERY FUNDS. (HOUSING GRANTS FUND 1835, PROJECT 33765) (ED FINN, DEPUTY COUNTY MANAGER) (ALL DISTRICTS) - MOTION TO APPROVE BY COMMISSIONER MCDANIEL; SECONDED BY COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS – APPROVED MS. PATTERSON: Item 11A is a recommendation to approve and authorize the Chairman to sign two agreements between Collier County and Renaissance Hall at Old Course, LLC. One, Agreement ARP21-24 for $8,916,402.76 for predevelopment and construction; two, Agreement ARP21-25 in the amount of $1,130,551 for impact Page 95 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 84 fees associated with Phase 1 to further affordable housing initiatives provided through a grant from the U.S. Department of the Treasury State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds. And Mr. Ed Finn is here to present or answer questions. CHAIRMAN HALL: Mr. Finn, before you begin, Mr. Fabian, what is your drop-dead time that you have to leave this afternoon? MR. FABIAN: Three. CHAIRMAN HALL: Okay. So we have time. We're good. MR. FABIAN: Thank you. CHAIRMAN HALL: All right. Sorry about that. Go ahead, Ed. MR. FINN: Thank you, sir. Thank you, Ms. Patterson, Mr. Chairman. This item before you today is a continuation and a necessary step to proceed with the financing for the Renaissance Hall project at the Golden Gate Golf Course. This has been through the Board previously both in terms of the financing plan as well as adjustments to the use of these federal funds. This is consistent with this. I will note that there is an increase in the amount by approximately $100,000 over the previous amounts, and that, to a great extent, is a convenience because of the timetables on this. The other -- the other proposed user of these fees was unable to use them, freeing up a thousand dollars -- $100,000, I'm sorry, and this is in a "use it or lose it" type situation. With that, I will endeavor to answer any questions you may have. You may have a registered speaker on this one. MR. MILLER: We do have one registered speaker, Steven Kirk. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Are you going to talk us out of it? MR. KIRK: No, no. I don't want to speak unless you want to Page 96 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 85 listen to me. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: No, no. I'll make a motion for approval. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I'll second that motion. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Didn't we say one time in here a few meetings ago, "Don't talk," right? I mean, you're about to get what you want. Don't speak. You can only screw it up. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: We're really happy you're coming forward, Steven. MR. KIRK: I'm really here for questions. As Ed said, this is really an implementation of two awards that were previously awarded and have been in the budget for this -- in this pro forma for many, many months. The grant agreements have been reviewed by the County Attorney's Office -- COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Mr. Chairman, I'm going to withdraw my second. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: He continued talking, didn't he? MR. KIRK: -- and the lenders, and so this is really just to get us to move -- to be able to move forward with the grant agreements. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I'll renew my second. CHAIRMAN HALL: All right. Motion and second for approval. All in favor, say aye. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Aye. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye. CHAIRMAN HALL: Aye. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Aye. CHAIRMAN HALL: All opposed? (No response.) CHAIRMAN HALL: So moved. Page 97 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 86 MR. FINN: Thank you, gentlemen. Item #11B A PRESENTATION REGARDING THE DRAFT RESOURCEX PRIORITY BASED BUDGETING RETURN ON INVESTMENT REPORT AND PROVIDE GUIDANCE AS WE MOVE TOWARD THE SEPTEMBER PUBLIC BUDGET HEARINGS. (CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON, DIRECTOR - CORPORATE FINANCIAL AND MANAGEMENT SERVICES) (ALL DISTRICTS) - MOTION TO ACCEPT THE PRESENTATION BY COMMISSIONER HALL; SECONDED BY COMMISSIONER KOWAL MS. PATTERSON: Commissioners, that does bring us to our ResourceX presentation. If that's the direction we want to head, go ahead and get that started. CHAIRMAN HALL: How long do we anticipate? I mean, we could break for lunch now and come back early. That way we would just -- we'd get it done in a -- COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Mr. Chairman, before we do that, though, let me make one comment. We do have some registered speakers, and maybe we can hear from the registered speakers. That won't take more than probably 10 minutes. MR. MILLER: I've got thirteen registered speakers, so that will take a little while. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Well, I think a lot of them are ceding time, so maybe they will be quick, maybe by 10 minutes after 12 we could have all the speakers out of here. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Can I just throw an option out there: To keep the momentum going and hear from the speakers, Page 98 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 87 you know, now. But do -- and we've done this for meetings that I've chaired before. Do we really need to take a lunch break? Can we just press and, you know -- do you really have to have lunch at 12:15 and -- COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Let's get the speakers out of here, and then we can decide whether we want to break. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah, that's fair. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Over even just -- even a 30-minute break. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that's -- yeah, that type of thing. CHAIRMAN HALL: All right. Let's hear the -- let's go ahead, Troy. MR. MILLER: All right, Mr. Chair. Your first public speaker is going to be Laurie Harris. She will be followed by Stephanie Nordin. Now, Laurie's been ceded additional -- oh, I've got the wrong PowerPoint here. Give me just a second. Laurie's been ceded additional time from Awa Front, who I can see that she is here. (Raises hand.) MR. MILLER: So she will have a total of six minutes. MS. HARRIS: Still morning. Good morning, Commissioners. It is good to see you all again. And I am presenting on Domestic Animal Services, as you could already have guessed. What I want to show you-all is -- and that presentation this morning from Linda -- I've never met her. I didn't know she was going to be here, nor did I know she was going to speak on spay and neuter programs. No clue. So her timing was incredible. But what she was saying is absolutely right. If you -- these are just the July statistics. We've had 508 animals come into the county shelter. This is just July. This happens every month. These numbers are unsustainable. Every month. So no matter how many Page 99 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 88 you can move out, adopt, get to other departments, other counties, all over the country, they still keep coming in. You can see our ending inventory. That's how many are in our care at this time. So there is a spay and neuter initiative program that is currently happening. The language needs to be tightened up. There is a resolution that speaks to it. It was written many years ago. That language needs to be tightened up because, as Commissioner Saunders had said with the aquatic center, $17 million never was used for the aquatics center. We don't want the money that's in the budget to go to any other use other than a spay and neuter initiative program. And it is -- the money's already in the budget. So here is the program. We want to make sure that the current funding is maintained and goes towards this program and potentially maybe set minimums per month. We have a surgical vet on staff. She can crank out an amazing amount of spays and neuters in a day. So if we can start setting minimums, that would be wonderful, and ensure that the money goes towards this program. So here are some things we've been kicking around. Try to get partner vets throughout the community. There are a lot of rescues that we could also work with, but partner vets, if we could maybe get a rescue rate so the vets would charge us maybe $100 for a neuter, maybe 150 for a spay. It's all dependent upon anesthesia. The larger the animal, the more anesthesia. That's where the big money is. So the vet could donate their time, but we're still going to need the money for the anesthesia. If we can determine low-income families for this -- I mean, we don't want just to have free spays and neuters throughout Collier County, but have it dedicated for certain people. Low-income families, maybe if they're already on some kind of government assistance, they would, you know, immediately qualify for this Page 100 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 89 program. And then we've also learned that there could be a very high need for people who can't get to the shelter. People out in Immokalee potentially. They may not have a car. They may not have transportation. They may have a job. They can't drop the animal off first thing in the morning. So if we have a voucher program with local vet partners, they can take their vet [sic] to their local vet partner, have the spay and neuter done for a much reduced rate. Some other initiatives that we've been kicking around -- again, this is low-income families. The frequency would be determined by the need in the community, which we understand is tremendous. So all of those strays that come in -- I think it was 460 strays for just July. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: For -- yeah. I was going to say, per month. MS. HARRIS: Just July. Right, per month. Seventy percent of them are not sterilized. So the problem is just repeating itself. And as the Collier -- the growth of Collier County has taken place -- we've seen it in absolutely everything. There are communities going up everywhere. Larger population of humans, larger population of animals, and they are reproducing. Ten cats will get you a hundred in a couple of months. So we're trying our very best to identify the root cause of the problem, which is these animals are not sterilized. So if we can be proactive and go after this, make sure that the money is in the budget, work with the new director to get this program up and running, that that money is dedicated towards spays and neuters in the community. We can also bring in a vet for the day. I believe it was -- For the Love of Cats has done this already. They bring in a vet, the community brings in their animal for the day, and they get spays and Page 101 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 90 neuters. So there are multiple ways of doing this. Just trying to be creative. Some of our local vet partners, SNIP Collier you all know. Vet Services for Animals, that is where that woman went this morning. They do amazing work. They do a TNR program. They do have a food bank. We need to expand that to local rescues. We get food donations. Let's see where the need is. And For the Love of Cats, they are a current partner, and they do have a TNR program. I have one last thing for your consideration. Also, this would be out in the field, not inside of DAS. Enforcement. Out in the field, we do have cruelty cases. One of them was just arrested. There's also backyard breeding. This backyard breeding is contributing to this overpopulation of animals. Maybe add a negligence charge instead of cruelty, so if we can't get to cruelty, maybe negligence. Right now we do have an animal cruelty task force. It has one officer on it. He, I am certain, is overworked. And then maybe introduce a cell dog program, so once we get the animals into the shelter, they have to be sterilized before they can go out, but this program is really not bringing prisoners into the shelter to take care of the dogs. It's they become the foster for the dog, so the dog goes to the prison; it's a very different program. Thank you. CHAIRMAN HALL: Thanks, Laurie. MR. MILLER: Your next speaker is Stephanie Nordin. She's going to be followed on Zoom by Brad Cornell. Stephanie's got quite a few ceding times here. Let me go through these. Jay Kohlhagen. I know Jay's here. MR. KOHLHAGEN: Yep. MR. MILLER: Liz Goodman. (Raises hand.) Page 102 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 91 MR. MILLER: Is here. Christine Hutcherson -- (Raises hand.) MR. MILLER: -- is here. Dr. Janine Mathesz, I see, is still here. Dr. Amy Perwien -- (Raises hand.) MR. MILLER: -- is here. Ashleigh Whitchurch. (Raises hand.) MR. MILLER: She will have a total of 21 minutes and will be followed by Brad Cornell on Zoom. MS. NORDIN: Good morning. I'm not going to take 21 minutes, but I'm glad I have it. My name is Stephanie Nordin, and I am the founder and executive director of Autism Collier. During Autism Acceptance Month, we celebrated a significant milestone here in Collier County, a shift from awareness to meaningful action. The commitment shown by this commission to addressing gaps in special-needs programs has inspired hope across this community. Today I'm here to build upon that foundation with a request for $700,000 in funding to support two critical initiatives that will foster a more inclusive environment for individuals with disabilities here in Collier County. Our funding request prioritizes, one, expanding and enhancing adaptive inclusive recreation summer camp programs and, two, the establishment of Autism Collier Resource Center, or ACRC, with a focus on training programs for county employees, service providers, businesses, families, as well as leasing space to address the growing demand for our summer camp expansion. The demand for specialized programs for children with Page 103 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 92 disabilities in Collier County is growing rapidly. According to the CDC, 17 percent of our children age three to 17 are -- have one or more developmental disabilities. So in Collier County, that translates to about 10,000 of our children that may have -- may require specialized support. However, our current offerings are insufficient, leaving many families to struggle and find the necessary service. This request marks the beginning of our efforts to expand these services and meet the full scope of demand. As Collier County population continues to grow, so will our special-needs children programs. By supporting this expansion now, we can lay the groundwork for our broader initiative to ensure that every child can participate fully in our community. Since April, Autism Collier has received 425 requests from families seeking special-needs summer programs, demonstrating the critical need for expanded services. The community is rallying behind the cause as well. Collier County libraries have reached out as well as local healthcare providers for guidance in better serving our children with special needs. This past weekend at the Neapolitan Family Expo, we had eight providers come up asking for training regarding autism. So approving this funding will directly respond to the urgent needs and advance a countywide movement towards inclusivity. So let's talk about the programs that we currently have. We have two inclusive summer camp programs. One is called AIR, Adaptive Inclusive Recreation, over at Golden Gate Community Park. Its focus is tailored towards children that need a higher level of support. And then we have our AIR 2 program located at North Collier Regional Park, and their focus offers more of a traditional camp experience with integrated support for children with disabilities. Both of those staff ratios currently are one to 10, and Page 104 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 93 both camps have a limited capacity, 20 spots for AIR and 40 for AIR 2, highlighting a significant gap in services compared to the other community needs. Now, for campers that require assistance with daily living activities like eating, dressing, toileting, or mobility, Collier County Parks and Recreation currently requires a personal care assistant to be provided by the family. To illustrate the financial burden on families, consider a typical summer day when a child goes to camp from 9 to 5. The parents would need to hire a personal care assistant, and that is at an average rate of $25 an hour, which would be $200 a day. At nine weeks of a summer camp, that's $9,000 addition to that camper on top of the regular camping fees. With each camp accommodating 20 children, the collective cost for all families is $180,000 for the summer per camp. The financial burden severely limits access to these essential services, addressing stress -- adding stress to families that are already managing complex care needs. And thanks to Commissioner Saunders for coordinating a meeting we recently had with the Parks and Rec department. It's abundantly clear that the leadership within Parks and Rec is dedicated and passionate to serve all of our children. They shared with us that their long-term vision goal is to have an AIR component in every one of their children programs. So the proposed expansion is the first step in realizing a broader vision. At our meeting, the collective belief is the most effective way to begin this expansion is by targeting our areas with the highest need, such as our friends over in Immokalee where services there are extremely limited. So by starting where the demand is most urgent, we will ensure that our efforts have the greatest impact from the offset. So to address this, Parks and Rec has come up with a 230,000 Page 105 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 94 allocation request to expand our AIR camps to Immokalee, to establish an AIR camp in Immokalee providing essential service for 20 children with disabilities and enhancing our existing AIR camps, lowering our staff-to-camper ratio from 1-10 to 1-6, allowing for more individualized attention and support, as well as relieving the financial burden on families by supporting the personal care needs with county funds. So for the next part of the allocation request, I have an announcement to make. I'm excited to announce our recent submission to the school district to form Autism Collier charter school. This school is intended to open 2025 to 2026, and our target student population is for those that are most significantly impacted by autism. We will serve children ages kindergarten through 22. So while our application is still currently under review, I can't go into the specific details, but I would love to talk to you further about the school in private. The ACRC, or the Autism Collier Resource Center, will serve as a wraparound support system for this school and the community at large, offering training, resources, year-round camps and outreach programs. Training is the backbone of any successful initiative, especially in the context of developmental disabilities. Without proper training, even the most well-intentioned efforts can fall short, leading to gaps in care and support. So our goal is to extend this training to every corner of our community. We envisualize [sic] offering special training for professionals in education, healthcare, public safety, corporate sectors, and local small businesses. By equipping these areas with the tools and knowledge they need, we can create a more inclusive environment for individuals with disabilities, ensuring that they are supported and understood in all aspects of life. The 470,000 we request will support countywide employee Page 106 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 95 training, family support and outreach training, staffing cost, and leasing space. This request is a modest yet critical step addressing the growing needs of individuals with disabilities in our community. As resources are allocated and the community becomes more engaged, the ACRC is expected to become a cornerstone support in Collier County. So in conclusion, Commissioners, your leadership and your commitment to inclusivity have already set Collier on a path toward a greater understanding and support with individuals with disabilities. By approving this funding, you will help us expand our vital services to underserved communities like Immokalee and equip our workforce with the knowledge and skills needed to support the residents effectively. Thank you for your time and your continued dedication to make Collier County a place where everyone can thrive. Thank you. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner LoCastro. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Thank you, Chair. Stephanie, how you doing? MS. NORDIN: Good. How you doing? COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: You have really accelerated and increased action for autism since the first time that I met you at the Boy Scout troop. MS. NORDIN: Right. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Two boys. MS. NORDIN: I have -- yeah, four boys. You met two of them. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: The two, how are they doing? MS. NORDIN: They're in high school today. Today is the first day of ninth grade. Go Cougars. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I don't want to get off track, but you popped up in my Facebook timeline, the pictures from that Page 107 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 96 Boy Scouts. I bet they look totally different now, you know. Obviously -- MS. NORDIN: They grow. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: -- they were little boys. Just a couple quick questions for you. First, really applaud what you've done to shine a spotlight on autism. You're so close to it with your family, but, you know, so many families that you've helped. Just a couple quick questions. Autism Collier, how has your fundraising gone? I mean, you know, folks come here. They ask the county for money, and one of the things I always say is, "The county doesn't have any money. It's taxpayer dollars." And, obviously, worthy cause, so I'm not trying to give any kind of, like, hidden meaning here. But what kind of support have you had from the community to raise funds on your own or anything of -- you know, has any of that been possible? MS. NORDIN: For the last two years, we've been completely funded on our own. So this is a much bigger expansion trying -- especially this training piece, trying to get the materials and the resources together. But until this moment, I've never actually asked for funding before. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah, right. MS. NORDIN: So... COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I just say, like, when you groups come to ask for funding, the one thing that makes it the most powerful is for you to explain to us, like, what you've done so far on your own and how you've self-funded so that it's more of a partnership, because I assumed you -- like you said, you've been self-funded, so -- and it doesn't need to be, you know, right this second, because I already sort of knew the answer. I just -- I don't know the numbers. But for people that are listening and thinking Page 108 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 97 that, you know, we're about to write a $700,000 check just because anybody answers -- asked for it, that's -- you know, I wish it worked that way for causes like this, but it's more of, you know, sort of a partnership. But all that's not going to get solved today, but I think all of us would benefit from how you've grown. MS. NORDIN: Okay. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: You know, organizations and -- or maybe philanthropic people that are supporting you up to this so we can see what we would be adding taxpayer dollars to would be -- would strengthen your ask. MS. NORDIN: Okay. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: The summer camps that exist already, just explain to me, are they most -- are they all just through the county, or are you self-funding summer camps on your own? MS. NORDIN: So -- yes. So the ones that we talked about for that 230 allocation -- COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah. MS. NORDIN: -- that is Collier County Parks and Rec. So that's through you-all. The parks, that will be funded through us, the ACRC. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Okay. So the current counselors that are working with, you know, your kids, that -- they're our counselors. They're county staff, right? Or are you -- you're not funding separate staff that are part of these camps? It's not your -- MS. NORDIN: Separate. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: -- camp counselors. MS. NORDIN: This would be separate staff. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: No, I know it would be, but currently, what's happened up till today? It's been -- MS. NORDIN: Currently -- COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: -- your kids in county camps Page 109 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 98 funded by the county camps that already exist, but these kids need a little bit more help, and that's where the families come in. Hey, they might need a caregiver. I just want to -- I wanted to make sure I wrapped my mind around actually how it's worked up to this point. So it's been county camps that these children have been part of, but if they join the county camp and it's our -- it's county-funded counselors but they need a -- they need a little extra support that in most cases the family provides, supplements; is that true? A little -- you know, either an extra person or something? I might not be asking it right. MS. NORDIN: I think I -- I think I understand the question. So right now Collier has the two AIR camps. The City of Naples has a camp. Our local schools have a three-week period of, like, extended school year for ESE students. And that's all that I know that exists in the area, and both the county and the city currently have that personal care support ask of the families. And so -- COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Okay. I got it, okay. CHAIRMAN HALL: I guess I'm confused a little bit. So is it -- is it your personal camp -- is the autism camps that go on and they're just doing it at -- MS. NORDIN: There are no camps through my personal -- I'm trying to create -- CHAIRMAN HALL: Okay. So it is a -- (Simultaneous crosstalk.) CHAIRMAN HALL: It is a county program that your kids are participating in? MS. NORDIN: My children -- CHAIRMAN HALL: I'm not talking about yours personally. MS. NORDIN: Okay. Yes, that the kids are -- the 60 participants that we have in Collier, that's what we've got so far. We're trying to grow that. Page 110 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 99 COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Mr. Chairman, if I might just kind of jump in to maybe provide a little clarification, because I am going to ask the Board to talk to our park people about this particular issue. But we have 20 kids in our county park system where the parents that sign up for that, they're not charged an extra fee because we have the counselor there. So we have 20 in one group, 40 in another group spread out amongst a couple parks. We have new parks now, and we have a greater need. At some point I'm going to ask staff to talk to us about can we increase that number from -- you know, from 20 to perhaps 60 and from 40 to 120 just so that there would be more kids that can come to our county parks and participate in these programs, keeping in mind that we have new parks, and we have an increasing need. So that's going to be one of the questions I'll ask our park director when this -- when we get into our budgeting process on that particular issue. But these are -- these are existing county programs, but they're so limited that we need to consider, at least, expanding them so more kids can participate. CHAIRMAN HALL: Okay. Thank you. MS. NORDIN: Thank you. MR. MILLER: Your final speaker under this item is Brad Cornell. Brad, you're being asked to unmute yourself at this time, if you'll do so, please. Brad? He's been -- oh, there he is. There you go, Brad. You have three minutes. MR. CORNELL: Thank you very much. Good afternoon, Mr. Chair and Commissioners. This is Brad Cornell. I'm here on behalf of Audubon Western Everglades and Audubon Florida, and appreciate the opportunity to address you on Page 111 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 100 the priority-based budget return on investment report. We've reviewed this report, and we've found it to be very helpful on efficiency ideas and some really good insights from other local governments around the country, actually, which is really helpful in this -- in this process of prioritizing how we use our resources. I want to recommend also emphasizing input on efficiency and effectiveness in the budget process from your own staff which, for those that I know and have worked with, are very experienced in their disciplines and highly qualified. They're sure to have some really good ideas to complement and expand on this return on investment report that's before you today. Regarding the Conservation Collier insights, just two comments. One, on the idea of asking non-profits to collaborate on Conservation Collier preserve management, I will say that I know this collaboration already occurs amongst Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary and the CREW land manager, South Florida Water Management District, and other agencies. There's data-sharing on monitoring. Our Audubon Western Everglades biologist, Brittany Piersma, shares lots of data from Marco Island and Fiddler's Creek and other places like that with Conservation Collier staff, and it's a -- it's a big mutual effort for land management, burning, prescribed fire, et cetera. However, we've got 6300 acres-plus for Conservation Collier now, and that demands really dedicated equipment and staff. So I just want to emphasize that collaboration will continue, and it is very important. We should look at every opportunity, but we also need our own robust program for managing. And, finally, I just want to comment that currently Audubon does not support asking for fees to raise money for people to use these preserves which they paid for with their tax dollars, but I think it might be something to consider charging for parking. If somebody's going to drive to a preserve in a car, well then, they Page 112 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 101 should pony up some extra money for the parking facilities because, you know, you could bike there or get dropped off or take the bus, et cetera, et cetera. So perhaps consider that as a strategy for extra funding for that. So thanks very much for listening, and I hope you have a good discussion today. Appreciate it. MR. MILLER: And that concludes our speakers on this item. CHAIRMAN HALL: Okay. You all want to take a 30-minute -- 30 minutes? COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: That's what I think. CHAIRMAN HALL: And then back -- because this is going to be -- COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I'm down. I like that. CHAIRMAN HALL: All right. Let's break for 30 minutes, and we'll come back at -- let's just come back at 12:45. (A luncheon recess was had from 12:09 p.m. to 12:46 p.m.) MS. PATTERSON: Chair, you have a live mic. CHAIRMAN HALL: All right. MS. PATTERSON: Before we get started, let me just read the title in, because I think we neglected to do that before we heard the speakers. This is Item 11B. It's a recommendation to hear a presentation regarding the draft ResourceX priority-based budgeting return on investment report and provide guidance as we move toward the September public budget hearings. Mr. Chris Johnson, your director of Corporate Financial and Management Services, will begin the presentation. MR. JOHNSON: Good afternoon, Commissioners. For the record, Chris Johnson, your Corporate Financial and Management director. I'll start here with what we're going to do today. We're going to go through briefly the budget timeline again just to get everyone Page 113 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 102 oriented on where we're at. From there, I'm going to turn it over to my colleague here, Mr. Fabian, to go over the draft ResourceX ROI report, and then we'll go into some of the initiatives that we've developed through the ResourceX process, on to program insight summary, into the in-process implementations from the ROI report and, finally, we'll finish with some potential future implementations that staff have identified within the report. So to start it off here, you guys are familiar with this, I know. I just kind of wanted to go through where we're at because we do have something coming up on the calendar here. The items in peach are the ones we've already accomplished. If you look at the first blue one there on the bottom, on or before 8/24/24 [sic], the property appraiser will mail out the TRIM notices. That's the next step in the TRIM process. Just for, kind of, public information purposes, that TRIM notice will contain the tax -- last year's tax levy for the property along with the millage rate last year, the millage neutral rate, which is our maximum millage rate for the General Fund, Unincorporated Fund, Conservation Collier, and the pollution control districts, along with all of the maximum millage rates for the MSTUs and the associated levy and the rolled-back rate and the associated levy. And that will be mailed out, like I said, sometime between now and 8/24. From there, we go on to our public hearings. Just again, for your calendars, the first public hearing is on September 5th. That will be at 5:05 in this building. The second public hearing is on 9/19. That's where we'll be adopting the budget. Again, that's at 5:05 in this building. Any questions on the timeline at all? (No response.) MR. JOHNSON: All right. Well, moving on then, I'm going to flip it over to Mr. Fabian for the ResourceX return on investment Page 114 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 103 report presentation. MR. FABIAN: Thank you, Chris. Thank you, Commissioners. Pleased to be back in the county and have an opportunity to talk about the return on investment first report, the first draft, and progress on that report as well as where we're headed next. I'm going to start with a little bit of a recap on when I was here last in the county and what we delivered, and I want to spend some time just describing what the ROI report actually is and what its purpose is, and that will lead us into how staff have been using it and reacting to it thus far. The first step after you have created your priority-based budgeting data -- and as a reminder, the priority-based budgeting data is the program inventory, the list of every program and service being offered by every department across the county, along with a cost, the translated cost from line items to program costs, as well as program scores. The evaluation of the programs relative to priorities sets us up for what you have here is a -- what we call the blueprint to open the door on where we have opportunities to think about different funding models for the programs that we offer. So primarily, in priority-based budgeting, we're trying to derive two main opportunity areas, which is spending your current budget differently or freeing up how you're currently resourcing programs, as well as entrepreneurial and opportunistic ways that you could bring new revenue into the equation, and if you think about it, why are we trying to do this over on the left-hand side of that blueprint. As you've heard about all morning and as you're engaged in in your budget discussions, the county looks out towards the future and tries to understand its needs, the vision that you're trying to accomplish. And in order to fund your future vision, we're trying to present all options on the table, every -- every other way to fund current Page 115 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 104 operations, every other way to fund your current programs, to perhaps free up resources, especially in the General Fund, but not only in the General Fund. And if we can alleviate that pressure with other funding models, then you have new resources, perhaps readily available resources, to be able to allocate towards other needs. So the first way to get there is the ROI report, the return on investment report. When I was here, it's just under two months ago now when we first delivered -- first presented on the report and then delivered it with updated numbers a few weeks after my presentation. You'll recall that we broke out all of the programs that we studied in priority-based budgeting into 16 categories. The categories allow us to see different programs and, therefore, different opportunities as it pertains to that priority-based budgeting blueprint. We sorted programs on impact; how did we get there? Impact on your county priorities overall as programs were scored and evaluated, as well as differentiated by high cost to low cost, high mandate to low mandate, and high reliance to low reliance, meaning is there an opportunity to partner? Again, I'm pleased to hear so many conversations today around partnerships where they could possibly exist. And depending on where programs fall among the 16 categories, there are specific opportunities for each and every program to reconsider its funding model. So the initial scoring leads us from priorities to a program evaluation to understand how we can optimize resources overall. The fine-tuning of that initial ROI report -- if you recall, I presented at the Board meeting in late June, and then we refined the program costs that we had to reissue a new report -- said if you add all of the opportunities across every program, perhaps there is as much as $101 million worth of resource reallocation in new revenue generation opportunities, up to $151 million in opportunities. Page 116 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 105 And those are not all immediately actionable. They don't materialize overnight, if you will. But each of those potential opportunity areas requires investigation for feasibility. Are they reasonable recommendations? Will they work here in Collier County? For every recommendation, these are proven implementation plans from other county governments or other local governments. And, again, the concept of that ROI report is to -- is to prove that there are other options for how you go about funding each and every program overall. So with this initial ROI report, if you've been through it, you'll see that every program has an insight, at least one insight, potentially up to three specific program insights, and insight is related back to the blueprint, an opportunity to free up resources or generate new revenue, and every insight that we're bringing back to you is backed up by another local government who has implemented something like this before. So that was the starting place. And, again, that was just towards the end of June when that very first report came out. Since I was here to present, the next step in the work is to find out for every insight is it a real opportunity for the county? Is it realistic? Is it something that you could implement overall? And this is where the rubber hits the road. So we take all of the universe all possible opportunities for resource reallocation and new revenue generation, and then we have to put it in front of staff to say, can this actually be implemented? And if so, when? When can we begin to anticipate that this opportunity could be realized? So since the last time that I was here and since the numbers were updated in the ROI report, the departments have had a chance -- just approximately two weeks in their review, which is exceptional. I do commend staff for the commitment to take on reviewing what is a Page 117 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 106 very long report of possible insights and recommendations and being able to categorize them in buckets, if you will, similar to what you see on the screen. Let me just run through these real quick. First and foremost, we want to find out, is the recommendation included in the report an insight that has already been implemented or is currently in the process of being implemented? So it very well might be the case that as we looked at the data, we're bringing back, hey, the best practice is partnership, or the best practice is looking at fees in a certain way, looking at a revenue approach. And as departments were looking at their own programs and their insights, we're able to capture where progress is already being made, and Chris is about to demonstrate that here in just a moment. A second area is, is the insight actionable and is implementation of the recommendation or some variation thereof possible for FY 2025? So meaning it's practical, we can implement this, we could save money or generate new revenue, and it's near term. Why is that important? It's critical as you're considering the budget process ahead. The third is, is the insight actionable? It's practicable. We could do something like this, but it's likely that implementation might extend beyond FY 2025 somewhere into the future. And the fourth area is the insight does not apply. It's not yet practical for one reason or another at this time. And for those I did want to make clear that -- we talked last time that this is a living document, and for every single insight that we're bringing back to the organization, we want to find out, if the insight does not fit for the county for any given program, we can go back to the well. We can go back to other insights and other opportunities for that specific program, and that's what it means to have a living document is we want to find out why, what is it about Collier County specifically for any given insight that it doesn't work here so we can bring back Page 118 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 107 additional recommendations and not give up on it, because it still meets the criteria that we're identifying for the blueprint, so that is something that we could consider for the future. So, with these -- with this categorization, as departments began to internalize the insights and report back on them -- Chris, go ahead -- for every -- Commissioner McDaniel, you had mentioned this in the last presentation. For all of the types of insights that departments find applicable, we want to bring back more than what you saw. The case studies were just reference that this has been done before, but as an example, for any given insight that looks actionable for FY 2025 or in the near future, we bring back far more detail on the implementation plan and how this insight could be executed here with the county. We don't include this for every single insight that was in the initial report because it would double or perhaps triple the size of the report. We're really trying to narrow and achieve focus. Commissioner Hall, I think as you were looking at the initial report as well and seeing, well, it's insight and a little bit of information on the case study, but it's surface level, we need more depth on each and every recommendation. And so that's part of the process is that for every insight that we're looking at for moving forward with, we get a lot more depth on exactly how that insight was achieved. So that is a component of the process that takes place next is, as you get into what Chris Johnson's about to present, not to take any thunder, but for all of the more actionable insights we then, from ResourceX Tyler, move to producing implementation plans that are far more specific for any given case study overall. So we had this one just as an example, from a museum example, specifically, that you're going to hear about and how Santa Clara, California, in your slides, was able to move forward, so we'll get into Page 119 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 108 those in just a second. We have another one in the slides. Go ahead, Chris. But just to illustrate, that's all these slides are showing is that for any chosen insight that we really do want to move forward with, we want to get more detail on how do we achieve it. How did this other organization bring about the results, and what can we expect? Go ahead. Okay. So if you're following along, we have the prioritized insights, if you will, the most actionable opportunities with implementation and execution plans as our immediate next step, and in addition to that, we have begun another component of the analysis, which is efficiency analysis. And I wanted to talk just briefly about why do we structure the order the way that we do. With the initial priority-based budgeting information that you have, the question on the table is, "Should we be in this business? Should we actually be providing this particular program?" We've heard about prioritization many times today. Commissioner LoCastro, you've talked about the need for prioritization. The first question in priority-based budgeting is, if something is a low priority, meaning it doesn't achieve the highest degree of impact on your priorities, it's not mandated, perhaps, there's another partner, it doesn't pay for itself, the first question is not, "How can we make this more efficient?" The first question is, "Should we be in this business at all?" That's the question. And so we bring back to you those programs as well as alternate funding plans, but it's from there that we can say, once we're pretty well settled taking a look at all the insights, now we want to move towards how can we streamline the operation, and where we can we look for those types of opportunities as well. So I did want to give you at least a forward look at two ways that we're starting to go about the efficiency and streamlining Page 120 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 109 analysis looking for opportunities for centralization, looking for areas where there's, perhaps, redundant operations or staffing or resources in the organization. This is where we can start to squeeze out some of that efficiency overall. First, we'll be looking at -- this is an analysis of positions and programs. So where do we have common functions taking place across the organization? So we have IT, HR, and Planning Department in this particular example whereby having that program data and the staffing, we're able to see where there is commonalty. So positions called very similar things performing similar functions overall and where that centralization and streamlining can exist, this being one example overall. Chris, go ahead. And not only staffing and positions, but also looking at streamlining processes within each program. So with all the programs identified, this being an example from IT, seven different analysis of the various processes that take place within IT-related programs that were identified in priority-based budgeting and being able to see, if these processes are taking place in IT, where else are they taking place from other departments overall? So these are two examples of internal focused streamlining redundancy process evaluation. So just as a recap, first and foremost, prioritization got us to understanding the programs that you provide, and we're putting on the table should we be providing this program and how else can we fund this program? That's the ROI report. The second report that we're engaging in is an analysis, then, of beyond the programs, what about the people, the positions that we have in the organization, as well as the processes, and where can we streamline those once we decide that these are the programs that are highly prioritized that we want to continue to provide overall? Page 121 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 110 So that will be a continuation of the process. CHAIRMAN HALL: So, Chris, just to clarify. MR. FABIAN: Yes. CHAIRMAN HALL: This is in addition. This is other than -- MR. FABIAN: Other than. CHAIRMAN HALL: This is not part of the ROI. This is in addition to that. MR. FABIAN: Absolutely. Yep. CHAIRMAN HALL: Because that's where I want to get to. MR. FABIAN: This is in addition. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: We all want to go there. MR. FABIAN: Right. And I know -- I feel ya. I know that we want to get into understanding the efficiencies and streamlining positions and processes. I also hope that we continue the dialogue on why we ordered it the way that we did because we want to put programs -- entire programs on the table, first and foremost, and then get into streamlining what we choose to remain in the business of doing. CHAIRMAN HALL: Oh, sure. I see the method to the madness. So, you know, I'm following. MR. FABIAN: Okay. Sounds great. All right. Well, Chris, I want to turn it back over to you for continuing on with this component. MR. JOHNSON: Thank you, Chris. Give me a second while I pull this up again. All right. Commissioners, the next thing I want to talk to before I dive into what staff has done with these insights is just to kind of go over -- go over some of the initiatives that have been developed through the ResourceX process since we started in January. We've been looking at resource alignment with the help of ResourceX. As you guys are all well aware of, there's organizational Page 122 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 111 realignment that we're working towards moving into the next fiscal year. We've created in your tentative budget the workforce prioritization pool to utilize for strategic staffing of initiatives. That workforce prioritization pool on its own right now sits at about $2.8 million in that cost center. Fee right-sizing, the Water/Sewer District impact fees have been before you, and they will be again at the next board meeting. The GMCD permit review and inspection fees have been right-sized; you guys have approved that in the past few months. We're also looking at beach parking fees, marina parking and launch fees, and Parks general fees. Privatization and partnerships, there's an ITN on the street right now for the aquatics facilities, and we also plan on looking at the museums as well. Level-of-service considerations, you've heard level-of-service considerations for the libraries, and that will be back before you shortly as well. Again, museums and parks programs are also included in that. Any questions on that at all? (No response.) MR. JOHNSON: All right. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I have questions, but I'll wait. MR. JOHNSON: All right. I'll move on into program insight summary. So in that document, your ROI report, there are 381 programs included and 957 insights. What staff has done over the past couple weeks is we've gone through those. We've identified the type of -- the type of insight, whether it's in-sourcing, revenue generation, a grant opportunity, inefficiency, or a partnership. And just to go onto the next slide, I'll kind of show you the breakdown of those 957 insights in those categories. We had seven in-sourcing insights, 309 revenue-generation insights, 275 grant Page 123 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 112 opportunities, 31 efficiencies, and 335 partnerships. What we also did was -- and, again, this was a quick turnaround -- we sent out the report to staff, and we had them identify which of these insights have been currently implemented, which of these insights are in the process of implementation, and how many of these insights are a possible future implementation. Now, you'll notice that this number doesn't add up to the 957 because there are a few that might not be possible in Collier County that we need to look a little further into and have a little more time to identify. But, again, there's 321 currently implemented, seven in the process, and 174 with the potential of future implementation. Moving on from there, I just want to kind of touch on some of the in-process implementation of these insights. The main one that were the insights provided were energy efficiency insights. A few things relevant to that are the campus chiller replacement that we all see the nice tower going up on the other side of the campus. We've had the replacement of 23 or 25 building chillers. We're working on different landscaping ideas with xeriscaping and native plantings. The LED streetlight conversion that we've been doing over the past few years, sports field lighting evaluation, and utility plant operation efficiencies. Another one of these in-process initiatives is the low-cost spay/neuter vet service, and I know we've heard about that today. There is -- included in the FY 2025 tentative budget is additional funding to kind of pilot and start that program working with the other agencies and hopefully vets within the area, and then we have various program partnerships that we're working on currently as well. Now, moving into the potential future implementations, we asked staff to identify these and provide us with a short list of these potential future implementations that we can move forward with in the coming short-term future. So this is the potential future Page 124 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 113 implementation list that we currently have. I won't leave this up too long for you guys to stare at unless you want me to. Overall, it hits all of our departments. And the total, based on the case study opportunity -- which, again, the case study opportunities were included in the ROI report with each insight. It's about $40,985,000 in case study opportunity. A lot of that is on the Public Utilities side within wastewater collections, and that deals with technology and partnerships. Any questions on this before I flip the screen? CHAIRMAN HALL: Yeah. Can you give us just -- give us hard data for just one example of potential future implementations. MR. JOHNSON: Certainly. CHAIRMAN HALL: I mean, I either need pictures or bigger writing. MR. JOHNSON: Let me drop down to that wastewater collections. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: A truck, wastewater. There's a photo, picture. MR. JOHNSON: So, again, this information comes straight from the ROI report with the exception of the next steps and the estimated implementation. So the program cost annually for the wastewater collection is $19 million. The case study had an opportunity of 20 million by developing strategic partnerships with engineering and environmental firms to enhance the capabilities. Currently, what the Utility department is doing is moving from these traditional gravity systems, which need to be up to 30 feet underground to pump and allow the gravity for the flow into the lift stations. And in Palm River, currently, what they're doing is piloting a program to have a low pressure system, which keeps these pipes up along -- a little closer to the surface where they're easier to maintain. So that's an example of something that will be an upfront cost that Page 125 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 114 could potentially save us in the future. Good with that one? (No response.) MR. JOHNSON: I'll fly back up here. Don't mind me. All right. And then this is just a few more charts on the potential future implementations by department, and then on the bottom there you'll see the potential future implementations by funding source, which, as you can see there, the Enterprise Funds of the identified future implementations have the brunt of the potential opportunity. Any questions on any of that? (No response.) MR. JOHNSON: Any questions on the presentation as a whole? COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Are you done? MR. JOHNSON: This is where, unless you guys want to go into anything else, we have discussions, questions. We're ready to answer any -- COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: What do you think, we just wanted death by PowerPoint? Class dismissed. Those slides were just a formality, you know. We're not dumb or stupid. No. Good overview. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner LoCastro, go ahead. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: You know, I probably am the best to start out with, because the comments that I just wrote down here are just more generic to set the table. I have a deeper dive, but I just want to set the table with a few things. First of all, I like the pro- -- or these are things that are important to me, okay. So I like the proactive and extremely -- and an extreme focus on very specific areas, which you've done, but as we drill through this, this isn't the last meeting. We're going to get a lot Page 126 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 115 deeper. It's easy to say, "Let's pick the low-hanging fruit." I actually am not looking for the low-hanging fruit, because the low-hanging fruit are the libraries and the museums, okay. I'm looking for the rotted fruit, okay. So I'm looking for the stuff where it is obvious we are wasting money and we have an unbelievable amount of overlap, okay. That's the rotted fruit. Low-hanging fruit is, you know, only 20 people go to the library a day. That's not very much. Let's just shut down all the libraries. Okay. I'm not -- there's no -- and there's some stuff -- and I'm going to give you just one example, and I don't want you to take this as directive. And it's a little bit later, but it's just an example of something that I read in the detail that I was like, okay, that part -- that I don't like because there's a little more background information than what you would have because you haven't, you know, been here as long as us. And not that we've been here a hundred years, but I'll get to that. But I'm looking for the rotted fruit in the county departments, in their budgets. And then I wrote down here, "waste and redundancies." And these are all words you've got all over your report, so I love that. But those are the things I really want to hit. Some other key words I wrote down after reading through your whole report, when you talk about how we can take better advantage of possibly grants, you know, really want to run with that because that's gaining us something, not reducing something, and it's gaining us something that maybe was already out there. We just weren't astute enough to go after it. You know, similar to what we said a few hours ago, we had 17 million to fix our parks, but for some reason, you know, everybody missed it. Let's not miss any of the grant opportunities, and your keen eye, especially helping other counties, it seems like Page 127 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 116 will identify some things that are maybe easier grabs than we thought or that we just were unaware of, so I like that. Any kind of technology improvements, like you've said in there, these are things that I think are higher on my list. Because it's not necessarily reducing a service and going, "Well, you know, it's not the best bang for your buck, so a bunch of people are going to be ticked off, but you know what, you're going to save a bunch of money." I'm not saying you don't attack those things, but, you know, some of your technology examples here, it's like, wow, if we were doing this, we'd have much more efficiencies. Nobody gets hurt. They actually get helped, and we save money. So I like that. Partnerships. You've got that sort of, you know, spiced in here. Love that, too. Fees. We have patted ourselves on the back in this county at times and saying, you know, we haven't reduced -- we haven't raised the fees for, you know, X number of years out at wherever, the marina, the parking, you know, what have you, yet our costs went up, so we were losing money over those years. And then all of a sudden someone came up with the idea and said, you know, we're going to have to triple the fees to catch up where we should have been where, if you take small bites of the apple, people can understand that, hey, you know, you raised the fee a dollar, but, you know, you didn't wait 15 years and then raise it $15. And I know we have missed opportunity or -- what I hear from some people that sort of tell me this in confidence because they're like, hey, you know, I love that the fee is super cheap for A, B, C, D, and E, but I can't believe what a steal it is for us to pay, like, a minimal amount to get an unbelievable -- unbelievable access to whatever, a marine, or you know -- you know the examples. So those -- the fee focus is really a big one for me because that's Page 128 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 117 bringing us in more revenue, and maybe it's slowing the bleeding a little bit. You know, there's some things that we have that they're not cash cows, but they can't be, you know, cash -- you know, huge cash exits of taxpayer dollars. I wrote down here next to fees, things that are more self-sustaining. Hey, it didn't pay for itself, but it paid for itself a lot more and closer to what it should have been. I really want to try to dig into this report as it becomes more detailed and get a lot deeper. The one spreadsheet you have where you talk about high impact, low reliance, you know, all that, the two key words for me are, man, I really want to know what the high-impact things are with low reliance. And if I'm understanding it correctly, it's like, wow, this thing could really save you money or make you more efficient, and it's not going to hurt a bunch of things. In fact, you're already kind of doing it. You just need to do it a little bit better. And so I look at that as sort of rotted fruit, you know. It's like, okay, this one's a no-brainer. It's high impact, and it's, you know, low reliance on, you know -- and I hope I'm reading that right, but, you know, my takeaway from that it's -- if we implemented it, it's a very small negative or maybe a zero negative but high impact on the budget. And if I've taken those two words out of context, whatever the right words are, those are the things that would really resonate with me because I look at that as the -- like I said, the rotted fruit, for a better example. And then lastly, I'll just say -- I'm going to give you my one little museum example. It's not directive. It's in the weeds. We're not there yet, okay, but it's just at least an example. So in your report, it talked about the Marco Island Historical Society. And like I said, Chris, this isn't, like, any homework assignments. This is just like an example to give you the 50,000-foot view. Page 129 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 118 So in there it sort of suggested -- and it's in a much bigger summary, so it's not like you were targeting them or anything, but, you know, I really like the way that this was put together. But it basically -- and I'll summarize. Hey, they pay this amount of money, the county pays this amount, and they get to function. Maybe let them pick up the county piece, and everybody is still happy. The missing pieces, we've been squeezing them to pay more and more for quite a bit. So they've been really good team players. So I -- it doesn't mean they don't get analysis, but there's some people that, I think, should -- and we all will have knowledge of things in our district that wouldn't be -- they'd be very low on my target list because they've been so positive and proactive that the county has sort of tightened what little bit the county has done, and they have done an unbelievable amount of job -- unbelievable amount of work getting donations, finding other funding sources. I will tell you, that one little organization, I'll just use it as an example, man -- and I've said this to Jay Tusa at our TDC meetings, we need so many organizations to follow their model, organizations who haven't changed what they've brought to the table for years and, in fact, have begged the county for even more money. Little Marco Island Historical Society, they were rated like, you know, top 10 of all the best locations to go in the United States, and they're always bringing really positive things to Collier County. And I'm not trying to put them on a pedestal like they're the number-one thing, but they are a really good example of an organization who has really played ball with us fairly and has really come to the table with a lot of funds. I'd love to find the organizations that have sort of been kind of sliding by, you know, and skating and saying, you know, we raise 100,000 every year, and then we always get 70,000 from the TDC, and we do just fine. Page 130 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 119 It's like, "Okay, but why haven't you been able to raise 150,000?" where the Marco Island Historical Society really gets it. They have an incredible leader. And so that's just one example. It's in the weeds, but that story is something that I think is woven through this -- your entire report, and we've got to make sure we target the right type of organizations who have really been sort of sliding by and maybe not pulling their weight, and then those that have, I don't want them to feel that they're sort of victims of this deep dive that we're doing; that they sort of all got caught up. Everybody had to tighten their belt by 20 percent. There's -- or, you know, I'm just talking off the top of my head. But there's several that have already done that. So we've got to make sure that some of those organizations that have really done an impressive job to lessen the burden on the taxpayer and carry their own weight are somehow highlighted and rewarded and not sort of caught up in the tidal wave of, wow, you know, there's a lot of money to be saved and we're going to, you know, lump all these people -- you know, all these organizations are a little bit different. We've got to really target the ones that stand out as sort of maybe not pulling their weight, if there is -- if there are some. And then, you know, lastly, like, I'll end on libraries again. It's a very sensitive topic from all -- by all of us. But I don't want anybody to hear the word "libraries and museums" 100 times in this meeting and make it sound like that that's our target. There is so much more fat, I believe, in the county -- or wasted where there isn't as much efficiency, and those are the things I really want to see in the -- earlier in the slides and not, you know, the low-hanging fruit which are always the easy targets that we always sort of start with. But in reality, those are things that bring services to our county. You know, the taxpayers help fund those things, you know. So sometimes you sit here and go, "Well, only 20 people walked in the Page 131 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 120 library." I'm not saying you don't make changes, but, you know, for those 20 people, though, that was really an important visit, you know. So that may not be the best example, but there's some stuff, I think, that will jump out at us as sort of, like, easy targets, but we've got to make sure we do a deep dive, that we're not targeting and penalizing maybe, you know, a certain organization or even a department in the county who actually has done a really good job. We have some departments that come here during budget time, and they say, "You know what, for the third year in a row, we're not asking for any more money. We've already moved around" -- okay, well, that -- you know, that deserves a little bit of praise, reward, and maybe they're -- you know, they're not an initial target. Lastly, I was just going to ask you, are you having one-on-ones at some point, or you're open to that for us? I mean, I've met with the county staff and whatnot, but I don't know, you know, if you've -- if you've -- you know, of course, you've met with Commissioner Hall. But at any time we can reach out to you and get on the calendar so that we're not doing such a deep dive in here of something that's very specific to me, because there's a couple of slides that I sort of flagged and -- you know, and I mentioned it, you know, at the one-on-one meeting that we had yesterday to see if, you know, I could meet with you so I don't sort of waste the discussion here, or I get more info from you that makes it much more easy for me to feel better about, you know, things that we're targeting. But I'll just say your first dive into this was very impressive. So thanks, Chris. MR. FABIAN: Do you want me to -- COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yeah, he's got a response to all that, and then I'll go. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah. There was 11 questions in there, Chris, so go. No, I'm just kidding. Page 132 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 121 COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Was there one question? CHAIRMAN HALL: No. It was the same question just 11 times. MR. FABIAN: I wanted to make a couple clarifications and reiterate, number one -- I'll keep it short as well. Yes, please, one-on-ones, let's talk. Second, you mentioned getting into the specifics, and that is intentional by design. It's part of our unique approach to this work. As opposed to giving you, "Here are 10 things that are really big dollar amounts that you can do that are very controversial," we're giving you -- how many insights did you see, nine hundred -- MR. JOHNSON: Nine fifty-seven. MR. FABIAN: Nine hundred fifty-seven that are all actionable at some level, and that's very specific. I mean, there's a whole theory behind this about the long tail. You, very quickly, picked up on our emphasis in the first cut to not focus on reducing services. We can. We absolutely can, and the priority-based budgeting framework sets you up to look at services to be reduced, but it's starting with, "Here are your other options that can create a win-win. Do you want to consider that?" If it's a no-go, then we might get to service-level changes if it's low priority, which gets me to one clarification. You're super close on your interpretation of the 16 categories. High impact is high impact on your community priorities. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Okay. MR. FABIAN: So you want to look at that next level down. Commissioner Hall, you mentioned this last time I was here: "Don't we want to focus on Categories 5, 6, 7, 8?" And that is totally true. So that's low impact on your priorities. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Gotcha. MR. FABIAN: Low mandate, high cost. Page 133 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 122 COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: High cost. MR. FABIAN: Yes. And so you're basically there. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah, I gotcha. MR. FABIAN: And then, lastly, on taking a look at fees, these are not global fees to ask for more revenues. You are all over it. These are targeted fees specific in an entrepreneurial way that other governments are succeeding with where that user base is willing and excited about preserving a particular program. And if that allowed you to alleviate the subsidization with general government resources, General Fund resources, and take those resources and put them somewhere else, that's what we're trying to target. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Great. MR. FABIAN: So I just wanted to reinforce learnings that you already had for everybody else. CHAIRMAN HALL: Thanks, Chris. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: You ready? CHAIRMAN HALL: Yes. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Okay. First of all, he talks to me all the time. If he isn't talking to you, then... COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I don't want to talk to him. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Just so you know. And I'm joking about that. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Boy, those must be fun meetings. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yeah, they really are. It's all by phone. I want to say this -- and my comments are going to be very global today, not with specificity. I'm really excited about this process that we're in. This is -- this is something that I've wanted to do since I became a Collier County Commissioner. This is the first time, I believe, in our history as a county where a third party's been Page 134 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 123 looking at how we do -- and I'm pointing at those folks over there -- at how we do what we do every day. And having -- having these insights, having these opportunities, if you will, is extremely refreshing, a lot of which has already been shown that we do do, and then we can improve as we go forward. And you were quite -- quite certain to talk about that this is a living document. This isn't the last time we're going to touch this. We're going to be going through this on a regular basis. From a suggestion standpoint, I have -- without naming names, I have heard several departments, several divisions that are mentioned in your report that didn't get a lot of communication from you, represented to me that there wasn't enough communication with you. So my suggestion is really, really reach out to the people that are in charge of these different divisions and departments just to ensure that we're all talking the same language. Second of all, I still have not been able to distinguish a split between the reallocation of the funding and then the compensation for services rendered. You refer to it as "fees" regularly, but "compensation for services rendered" is a -- I think a little more palatable way of saying what we're, in fact, talking about, and I'd like to see that split between -- because to me I know what "reallocation" means. That means something's getting whacked over here, or cut, and I want to make sure that we focus on those low-impact, high-cost, high-mandate, low-reliance or resiliency, I think, as your report goes. So -- and I wasn't able to really distinguish that. After I read through the suggestions, you know, the program was 675,000. And if you do this and this and this, you could save up to 675,000, but I wasn't -- I wasn't seeing a specific path to get to that point out of those insights that were brought forward. Two things that I'd really like us to focus on is -- and even our Page 135 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 124 friend Brad Cornell mentioned it today. Who's the -- who are the best people we have to rely upon looking at different ways to do things within our system? Our staff. And so an implementation of a merit pay program, bonus program for incentivizing our staff to relook at how they're doing what they're doing every single day, I think it's absolutely imperative that we do that. I've used this example before, at least with Amy and Ed. Your particular department is given a million dollars to operate for one year -- for your ensuing year, and because of your superior management techniques, you only spend 800- of that million. Well -- and rather than burning the last 200- in September before the end of the fiscal year on technically potentially frivolous expenditures, turn that 200- back, because it is the taxpayers' money, minus 20 percent. Turn back 160-. Take the 40- and pay it from the manager -- I'm pointing at you because you're sitting there. But pay it -- from the manager of the department to the broom pusher that effectuated that $200,000 taxpayer savings, pay the people in the department a bonus. Now, we're a government. We're not a private sector. We have a little -- it's a little trickier for us to do bonus pay and merit, and Amy and Ed and I and Chris spoke about it yesterday about some adaptations to that that we think we may be able to bring forward and help implement, which will help incentivize the people that work for us, the people that are on the ground doing what our government does for our citizenry every single day to incentivize them to bring these ideas forward and actually implement these savings. The second side of that is you can't cut your way to prosperity. You have to -- you have to -- I believe we have to better manage the revenues that we, in fact, have; making the adjustments to our -- for compensation for services rendered is going to ultimately be huge for Page 136 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 125 our community. The example I'm going to cite there is a couple of weeks ago we had the discussion with our water bill payers that were utilizing credit cards as the mechanism to pay their water bill. And I thought it was only $160,000, but it actually was two $80,000 budget amendments to a 1.7, almost $2 million annual expense that we put out for credit card fees. And by making that singular adjustment, we have that opportunity to not spread that cost for the credit card users out over the whole ratepayer base, but we actually are providing for compensation from the -- from those who are choosing to utilize that particular service that's rendered. Today -- on today's agenda -- and not to beat on the libraries, as Commissioner LoCastro said, but we have two agenda items that I pulled today that are multiyear contracts for, relatively speaking, large annual fees where supplementation from the General Fund taxpayer base is going to a fairly, relatively speaking, small group of users that are taking advantage of services that are rendered through our library systems for access to digital materials. And so -- and so we pulled those agenda items, continued them. We're going to review the contracts, look -- get data to see who's, in fact, taking advantage of that and how much supplementation is coming from the General Fund, and then determining what a proper compensation for the rendering of those services, in fact, could be -- could be, in fact, utilized for. My last suggestion is just from a personal standpoint, from a -- we have a tendency to look at savings that -- unless we actually adopt a rate reduction or a roll-back rate in our taxation, our taxpayers don't really see the savings other than a reduction in their tax bill or at least a leveling of their tax bill. So one of the things that I'd like for us to do is specify -- distinguish the actual program or process that needs to get Page 137 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 126 done that doesn't have the funding. I want to fence off these savings. I don't want them just dumped into the General Fund and being utilized at our discretion. If we save -- if we save a million dollars over here and we need to fix the Sun-N-Fun aquatics center, I want to specify the savings that are generated. When a savings is, in fact, generated, I want to specify it and fence it off so that that money is then -- so that then our taxpayers can actually see, we had a need that was over here, the funding wasn't, in fact, in place, we appropriated a savings through budgetary manipulation, and now that money's going to be appropriated over there so that it's taking care of a dire need or a true need that our county -- or our community, in fact, has. So -- and the last thing is, is I want to see -- and I think you put up a slide on the separation of our divisions, General Fund, Unincorporated Fund -- that one right there. My little screen down here's not working today, so I'm having to go around this way. But I really like that. I think it's important for us to even -- because we have two enterprise funds. You only have one up here right now, but -- isn't our Utilities one and GMD another? MR. JOHNSON: Correct, and that's the combined. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yes. So I'd like them split out. There's two Enterprise Funds and -- so that we're talking individually, because a lot of our -- a lot of our community doesn't necessarily understand this fund accounting that we, in fact, do and how different revenues go into different places. And if we effectuate a savings over in Utilities or Wastewater, we can't really dump it over into the General Fund. Now, if we're able to move out of the TDC, the tourist development tax, and offset O&M in Parks and Rec or maintenance and so on in Parks and Rec, then that's going to free up monies in the General Fund. But this, I think, is important with one extra split there on the two different Enterprise Funds. Page 138 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 127 MR. JOHNSON: We can delineate that. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Okay, please. That's all for now, sir. CHAIRMAN HALL: Go ahead, Rick. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Were there any questions in that -- in that at all? I didn't even hear one. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I didn't ask -- yes, there was. There was direction. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: And take note, since our screens, at times, don't work up here, that's Troy Miller. So we might have some savings in there in his salary. We might be able to save a little more. Troy, kidding. MR. MILLER: I didn't have the money to buy the replacement. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Good answer. You know what I wanted to just say is one final thing, and then I know Commissioner Hall's -- you know, he's got a big chunk. I didn't want to leave you with sort of a misconception as to like, oh, I need to meet with you. You've done such a great job briefing the staff that -- I mean, Ed is, like, who I've been firing questions at on our staff, and they already have absorbed so much of what you've done. The questions that I've had up to this point, I haven't had to hunt you down. So you're obviously connected with them at the hip perfectly, so -- and they're much more easily getable possibly. I don't know. You know, I always start with the staff, and, you know, when -- I get them instantaneously, but they've done a great job digesting where you are and what -- you know, what you're trying to relay to us. And so that's a testament to, you know, how -- you're off to a very fast start. So I know I can call your cell phone at any time and wake you up at 11 o'clock at night, but that's what they're for, you know. Right? Page 139 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 128 CHAIRMAN HALL: It's one o'clock in the morning our time. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Is it? Yeah, that's right. But, you know, thank you, but -- I know you're always reachable. MR. FABIAN: Thank you. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: I would just like to say I would definitely entertain a sit-down with you, though, because I haven't had the opportunity to talk to you one-on-one. So these guys know how to get ahold of me, so... MR. FABIAN: Welcome it. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Thanks. CHAIRMAN HALL: Excuse me. So, Chris, I mentioned I'm beginning to see the method of the madness. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: That's a drill or something. CHAIRMAN HALL: Oh, that's a drill. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Whatever department that is, we probably have some savings there, right? You know, those are obviously -- CHAIRMAN HALL: They're hanging pictures in Klatzkow's office. But, you know, I mentioned I can see the method to the madness, and today it really came -- it's starting to come into focus with the ROI being part of the blueprint and the reallocation or -- you know, Commissioner McDaniel calls it reallocation. You call it fees. What he's trying to do is make mud into legacy sediment. So -- but, no -- and then you mentioned, now we've got that. Now we're going to focus in on the efficiencies, the redundancies, the streamlining, the optimization, you know, the minimizing resources to maximize the service levels, and that's -- those are the hard decisions. Page 140 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 129 So I feel like the -- I feel like the sled dog at the front where I'm jumping up and down ready to run, and the sled's not even loaded yet, but that's what I feel like. So I can see now where the sled's going to get loaded, and we're going to be able to pull that thing. And as we move from potential -- potential savings and ideas to reality to the hard decisions, the hard one-time decisions that can lead to years, year after year after year of great benefit. So I just need to be patient with that, but I just want to work smarter and not harder. And if we can get this culture changed and get this spending-and-collecting machine well oiled, I'll feel like we've really done a good job with that. And so I said that to say I have confidence, and I see hope, and I'm starting to get it. So I'm just going to remain a little patient. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Good luck. Good luck with that. CHAIRMAN HALL: Yeah. But I'm -- you know, I still have to fight chomping at the bit, so... Anybody else? COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I'm good. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Good. CHAIRMAN HALL: Thank you. MR. FABIAN: Thank you. MR. JOHNSON: All right. Commissioners, then with that, we just have a recommendation to accept the discussion. CHAIRMAN HALL: So moved. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Second. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Second. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Third. CHAIRMAN HALL: All approved, say aye. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Aye. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye. Page 141 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 130 CHAIRMAN HALL: Aye. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Aye. CHAIRMAN HALL: So moved. MR. JOHNSON: Thank you, all. MS. PATTERSON: Commissioners, that brings us to Item 15, the staff and commission general communication. Item #15A PUBLIC COMMENTS ON GENERAL TOPICS NOT ON THE CURRENT OR FUTURE AGENDA BY INDIVIDUALS NOT ALREADY HEARD DURING PREVIOUS PUBLIC COMMENTS IN THIS MEETING MS. PATTERSON: First up, 15A, public comment on general topics not on the current or future agenda by individuals not already heard during previous public comments in this meeting. MR. MILLER: We have none. Item #15B PROJECT UPDATE FOR ‘VANDERBILT BEACH ROAD EXTENSION’ (PROJECT NO. 60168) (MATT THOMAS, TECM PROJECT MANAGER SUPERVISOR) (DISTRICT 3) – PRESENTED MS. PATTERSON: Okay. Item 15B is staff project updates. We do have one. Item 15B1 is a project update for Vanderbilt Beach Road extension. Matt Thomas, your TECM project manager supervisor, is here to present. Page 142 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 131 MR. THOMAS: Good afternoon, Commissioners and Chair. For the record, Matthew Thomas, supervisor of Project Management for Transportation Engineering division, and I'm here this afternoon to present to the Board an update on the Vanderbilt Beach Road extension project along with an update and provide some operations that are happening about the project and some fun-filled facts. You can see from the project here, this is an extension of Vanderbilt Beach Road extension. It extends seven miles. We are currently extending six lanes from Collier Boulevard to Wilson, and from Wilson to 16th, there will be a two-lane expansion with future expansion available as well. Felipe Baez is my project manager, and he's doing a phenomenal job with this project helping to maintain the schedule, making sure the contractor's adhering to the schedule, and continuing to see that some of the operations you'll hear today are continuing to process and move forward as we continue on. Along with the seven-mile corridor, there's some new intersection improvements on Wilson, on 8th, and also on 16th Street Northeast. We're also relocating a canal over a mile long, and some of the existing intersecting streets on Weber, Massey Street, which has some major drainage operations, and Douglas there on Collier -- right close to Collier Boulevard. Sacyr Construction is our contractor. This project is a $153 million construction cost. Johnson Engineering is also helping us offset verification testing. The construction started in September of 2022. After the last change order that was approved by the Board, Change Order No. 1, it brought us to a three-and-a-half year duration. Completion is expected to be in the spring of 2026. Currently, we've completed over 50 percent of the work. Time completed there is 52 percent. So we're right in that threshold of construction where we want to be. Page 143 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 132 Some of the major operations I'm going to discuss today is -- the canal excavation is one of them. The pictures there on the left-hand side just don't do justice to how massive an operation this is. You can tell I'm a construction guy. I get a little excited when we talk about heavy machinery and heavy equipment. This excavator is a monster of a machine. It's currently -- some of those rocks and boulders it's pulling out there are the size of pickup trucks, just to give you a visual on how massive this is. A Vermeer trencher there on the bottom left-hand side, that's over 45 feet long. The blade is sticking underneath the ground about 15 feet. So they're just tearing up this -- excavating this new canal. Again, just some of the complexity, some of the size. Some of the size of this equipment is just stuff that's not seen in Southwest Florida or practically in the United States that often. Along with the excavating of the canal, you can see on the right-hand side that picture. That's around 21st Street. Looking east, you can see the newly excavated canal there on the right-hand side, the existing canal on the left, you can see some double row silt fence as well. And along with that, we're processing material. There's three different processing locations on our project as -- currently 24 -- going around 24/7. And the three different operations are -- this is about the size a mine that's operating processing materials. The anticipated completion of this operation in itself is to be by the end of this year for the canal excavation itself. Another major operation is pond excavation. We have over 18 different pond locations that we're excavating on the project. You can see the picture there on the right-hand side; that's looking east onto 8th Street looking toward 16th. This pond is pretty much completed. There's some minor things that are done with the gradings. There's a little bit minor operations of sloping and sodding Page 144 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 133 the material, but that's the skeleton of the footprint of the pond that you will see. The top left-hand picture is a pond that's currently being excavated and processing the material. The picture there on the bottom left-hand side you can see is actually what I mentioned previously from the previous slide of the processing of material. A lot of that material is being processed on site. And to give you an understanding of how much that is, there's over 600,000 cubic yards of material that's being excavated on this project between the ponds and the canal itself. Another major operation -- and this one is coming closer to a close than the other ones -- is the bridge construction. Currently, Corkscrew Canal, Orange Street Canal, and Curry Canal Bridge are substantially complete. Most of the operations are completed, and we're working on a Change Order No. 2 to really -- for the -- there was some upcoming rock layer and some unforeseen conditions with the rock that we didn't expect, laying the pile foundations. But those pile foundations are very important, as we want to make sure that we get the longevity of a 75-year lifespan of the bridge itself. Some minor things that need to be done, some planing and grooving, some of the parapet walls need to be poured. But for the most part, these bridges are substantially complete. And these bridges are also being used by construction traffic to help alleviate traffic offsite. Some of that heavy truck traffic we want to make sure we keep within the project. So these bridges are also utilizing that for us as well. Erosion control and silt fence is an ongoing operation and will be for the duration of the project. Especially with hurricane season and rainy season, we want to make sure that we're keeping all of that water on site. We're making sure the dewatering operations, that we're not dewatering off the project site. Page 145 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 134 Currently, right now, we've installed over 112,000 feet of erosion control silt fence on our project. The contractor is responsible for adhering to the stormwater pollution prevention plan throughout the duration of the project. We also make sure the contractor adheres to the national pollutant discharge elimination system. That's called NPDES. We make sure the contractor adheres to these processes while they're operating. And, again, along with the silt fence, you can see the picture on the top there; that's a little Vermeer trencher compared to the one we saw on the previous slides. This is what we use typically for a silt fence to cut through and make sure that we're installing the silt fence. All silt fence that's installed on the project is per FDOT specification. And along with following the specifications, we make sure that the contractor has -- all silt fence that comes on the project is from an approved product list that comes from FDOT itself. Another major operation that's ongoing -- I feel like I keep saying "major operation," but with $153 million construction cost, there's not many thing that are minor. Embankment here on the left-hand side, you can see at 15th Street, this is looking east where the road starts to bend. And to give you a visual, there's over 1 million cubic yards of embankment that's going to be placed on this project. To give you a visual of what that looks like, that's 80,000 dump truck loads of embankment that would be placed on this project. Now, luckily for us, a lot of that is excavated material, so we're not hauling in and making wear and tear on our roads, but for -- that's one million cubic yards of material that's being used. The picture there on the left-hand side, you can see a little bit to the right there's a little temporary bridge. After further discussions with Collier County and Sacyr, we -- they decided to place a temporary bridge there to help alleviate truck traffic for ease of Page 146 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 135 operations with their material, for their equipment. And this also further helped keep -- alleviate the truck traffic and the heavy traffic that would be making up their arterial roads of Wilson, of Golden Gate Boulevard, of Collier Boulevard, and also on Immokalee. So this really helped out with that. We want to make sure that we try to keep that traffic as minimal as possible, that it's not impacting the residents but also all those -- that material and those trucking [sic], it stays within the project limits itself. Another operation that's ongoing throughout the duration of the project, including on Massey Street, is the drainage installation. You can see a picture on the right-hand side here. This is a picture of the installation of drainage pipe and structures. There's going to be, at the end of this project, over 72,000 feet of drainage pipe installed. There will be over 500 drainage structures installed as well. And we make sure that the contractor adheres during the pipe installations, that he's adhering to backfill, density testing, and compaction of all pipe and structures that are happening, and that's per FDOT specification. You can see the picture on the right-hand side, there's a little plate compactor. They compact the earthwork down so we can get six-inch density lift -- density test for lifts there. And also, along with that, all pipe and structures are cleaned and flushed using a vac truck. You can see the picture on the left-hand side, the top left. That's a vac truck where they block off either with the structures, they plug them, and then they flush the lines there till we make sure that we get a clean pipe. After the pipe is cleaned, the picture on the bottom left-hand side there is a video. They take a little video rover, and they stick it in the structure and the pipe, and they run through the structure and pipe, and they check multiple different things. Some of that video encompasses laser pipe alignment, joint size, connections, Page 147 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 136 cleanliness, and damage. And before we continue on with anything more from the drainage pipe and installation, we make sure that those videos are checked. If there's any deficiencies that are found, we make sure the contractor repairs, replaces, or continues to move on and repair and replace any of those things that are needed before we continue on with the subbase, base rock and, at the end, asphalt. And last, but not least, is curb and gutter. This is a picture on the left-hand side of 16th Street looking east. There will be, when this project is completed, over 128,000 feet of curb placed. Currently, the contractor's moving from east to west on this project, so we're starting at 16th, moving east, at least with the roadbed. There's over 10,000 feet of curb that have been installed so far, so we're already west of 8th Street moving forward with that. And the curb and gutter is just a great visual. You can see in the picture there on the left is -- you get to see the skeleton and the framework of the new road. This is -- with this picture on the left, you have one more lift of base rock, and then as in construction, we like to say, "You get that black gold." We like to see that asphalt. And so asphalt is anticipated to start in the fall, and we are anticipating to start there on 16th Street and moving east -- or moving west, sorry, as we progress. The contractors continue to push forward. We're continuing to move operations forward. And with that being said, just the last picture there before questions and comments. This is a picture there. On the bottom you can see 16th Street there, and this is a good visual of just the whole project. You can see the bend there further down before the horizon there of the VBR extension. So we don't make it all the way to Collier, but we're pretty close. So with that being said, leave it for questions and comments. CHAIRMAN HALL: I think if you need to place any -- if you Page 148 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 137 need a place to put some rocks, I think Commissioner LoCastro has some -- COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Oh, yeah. CHAIRMAN HALL: -- spots and with Ms. Cook. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Just what I need. Rocks size of cars, is that what you said? Yeah, I don't have enough of those. CHAIRMAN HALL: Thank you. Commissioner Kowal. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: I do have a question. Nick, I know a project of this size -- and when you guys do start spreading that -- setting that asphalt down, are you -- I'm assuming you're going to have the batch plant and everything on site, or are they going to truck it? MR. THOMAS: There's a batch plant that would be preferred, which is in the Estates already, so it's very short trucking for asphalt itself, yes. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Okay. So do we have -- we have one in the Estates already? MR. THOMAS: Yes. Yes, we do. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Really? COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: It's out off of 5th. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Huh? COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: 5th. At the APAC plant. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Interesting. MR. THOMAS: So very close by. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: All right. That was the only question I had, because I know that can be -- you know, them trucks are common to keep that machine rolling, you know, you have to you keep that hopper full. MR. THOMAS: Yep. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: So, you know, I know our traffic Page 149 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 138 issues we have already in this town, that, you know, if you get a cold patch, you know, you create a problem for yourself. MR. THOMAS: Yeah, absolutely. And we like to try to do that at night as well to kind of alleviate the traffic and stuff like that. But, yes, it's definitely something to keep close by for sure. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Okay. Thank you. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner McDaniel. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Just a quick comment. You're doing an amazing job, by the way. I've been watching. I go by. I look at the project. Especially during this time, I really want you to pay attention to the drainage issues, so the folks that are along the corridor, property owners that are along the corridor. I've had a couple of folks share with me that there's been blockage in the drainage that used to, in fact, be there. So just make sure we're tending -- especially in this times of heavy rain, that we're taking care of the folks that are along that corridor. MR. THOMAS: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: And then, number two, I just want to -- I think I already know the answer to this question, but of the 675,000 tons of material that you're excavating out at the re-dig on the canal, what are you doing with that material? MR. THOMAS: A lot of that material is processed and used on site, so we'll process it, they'll screen it, they'll crush it, and they'll actually use it for base rock and embankment even. I mean, we get a better product of embankment than we would typically get in other projects just because there's such a variety and such a mass amount of material that's being used. But take into consideration as well we're going to have to backfill the existing canal. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Sure. MR. THOMAS: So a lot of that material will be used in that regard for that as well. Page 150 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 139 COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: That's what I wanted to hear. I mean, that was a huge savings when we brought this project forward. And the relocation of the canal was -- a lot of cost efficiencies with the excavation of that material and reutilizing it and not have to in-haul and buy more. So thank you. MR. THOMAS: Absolutely. CHAIRMAN HALL: What's the speed limit going to be? COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: As fast as you can go. MR. THOMAS: Forty-five. CHAIRMAN HALL: Welcome to the Autobahn. MR. THOMAS: Forty-five, yes, exactly. CHAIRMAN HALL: Great. Matt, thank you so much. MR. THOMAS: Thank you. Item #15C STAFF AND COMMISSION GENERAL COMMUNICATIONS MS. PATTERSON: Commissioners, that brings us to Item 15C, staff and commission general communications. I have nothing for today. Jeff? MR. KLATZKOW: As do I. MS. PATTERSON: Commissioners. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner McDaniel. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Yes. If, Mr. Iandimarino, who's sitting in the back of the room, if you could come forward. You weren't here two weeks ago. I don't -- and I'm not going to put you on the spot, Thomas. You don't have to bring your laptop. Just come on. The discussion that I want to have is -- as he's coming up -- is if Page 151 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 140 it's prudent for our board at this time to have a look at how we're managing our code enforcement efforts. We've been -- ever since I've been a commissioner and for the most part of Collier County's history, we've been a reactive code enforcement agency. And I'd just like to hear a little bit from you -- because I spoke with Jamie yesterday. Collier County's growing in leaps and bounds. We have a lot of people coming here from a lot of different places, and they move into Rural Golden Gate Estates, and it's the wild, wild east for us. And because they're in the woods, they think they can do whatever they want. And so I'd like to hear from you if you have an idea of how we can better manage our code enforcement issues so that -- because one of the frustrations I have, and just -- I'll lead you to the troth as to where I'm wanting to go. I file -- I file a complaint on behalf of a constituent that wishes to remain anonymous about an illegal camper rental out in Golden Gate Estates, and our officer goes to that complaint and drives by 10 that are readily visible by the road and doesn't necessarily stop. And I'd like to know how we can enhance the self-initiated efforts of our code enforcement officers without, on the same token, intruding on the private property rights of our residents. MR. IANDIMARINO: Okay. For the record, Tom Iandimarino, Code Enforcement director. I wish I knew the answer to that one, but the reality of it is is that we can't stop at every single property on every single violation. At some point in time, you've got to reasonably recognize what do we address. With the staffing that we have, we can't address -- I'd have to have one officer per that street. Once they finish that street, they do all the cases, then they'd go on the next street. You know, it seems like there's a lot there. Currently, we're acting at about 20 to 25 percent of self-initiated Page 152 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 141 calls. So 75 to 80 percent of calls are calls for service that are complaints. So each code enforcement officer is averaging about 100 cases, carrying about 100 cases. Simple numbers for this year, we've had about 4,000 cases already opened up, and about 3,000 or so were complaints and about 1,000 or so were self-initiated. Of those, about 60 percent, 65 percent have already been closed through voluntary compliance in about 90 days or less. Some of them take more. Some of them take less. It just depends, okay. Those that -- people who are going into voluntary compliance may take a little while, may take six months, eight months, nine months because they have to get permitting done. You know, those kind of drag out, and they tend to carry those cases and monitor those cases. You know, how do we go about recognizing what really is a violation on these properties? When you look at RVs, you look at people living in potentially, quote-unquote, guesthouses that are being rented out, guest Conex boxes that have been converted, guest garages that have been converted. You've seen it all out there. I mean, we've had school buses that have been converted that are, you know, being put on Airbnb or Facebook. It's a challenge for us to hit every one of these properties. It really is. With the amount of other calls that we have, we almost have to go to that one, take care of that one, because I've got others that I have to go to that people are complaining on as well. If I had 10 complaints on that property -- on those 10 properties, I'll stop at every one of them. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Agreed. MR. IANDIMARINO: I really would. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: And, again, Thomas, this isn't -- I don't want to belabor this point all that much today, and Page 153 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 142 maybe you and I and Jamie can have a private meeting, and then we can bring forward some amendments to our processes to try to enhance this a little bit. I'd like to engage with the Naples Area Board of Realtors. MR. IANDIMARINO: Got it. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: They're huge advocates for our community with regard to property rights and how we can -- how we can better manage this just to -- again, we're not a little fishing community of less than 100,000 people anymore, so -- and being reactive puts us behind before we ever -- before we ever -- MR. IANDIMARINO: It does. We're always treading water to stay afloat in this. And, you know, I recognized it. I think everybody here recognizes it. You guys get the complaints just as much as we do. When they come to us, those are our priorities. Those are the ones that we deal with right now, because those are the complaints that we have. Those are the people that are going to call you, are going to call us, and we have to go out there and do something on these. You know, we do get some frivolous complaints. Those have fallen by the wayside quite a bit. It's rare that we get the neighbor saying, "Hey, could you call my neighbor and have him turn his TV down because it's too loud?" You know, we're not getting those calls anymore, like, you know, I think we used to in the past. But the reality of it is is that when we see an RV in a property and it looks like somebody's living there and it looks like there's possibly somebody there, we should be knocking on the door and going from that. If we see an RV in the property and it doesn't look like anybody's living in the RV, the RV's just got a wire to it, it's plugged in because somebody's running their air-conditioning in it, there's no plumbing coming out the back of it, they're just keeping their A/C cool or keeping it at 85 degrees to keep the humidity down Page 154 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 143 on their RV that they own that they use when they go to the Smoky's to go camping, that's not a case that we're looking at, you know. But we get calls on those, too. So when we go to those properties, we knock on the door, and it turns out to just be that, we close the case, and we go on our way. So there is the balance in there. Oftentimes it's the former, not the latter, so... COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Thank you, sir. I'll set up a meeting with your people and my people, and we'll have a chat and see if we can bring forward some initiatives to help your -- help your process. MR. IANDIMARINO: Be glad to work through that. Thank you, sir. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Thank you. That's all, sir. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner Kowal. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: I've got a question, Tom, while you're here, because I know we spoke about this a few weeks ago -- COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I know people. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: -- and I had made a comment that I know in certain situations that, you know, by statute you can't self-initiate an investigation, is that correct, or am I wrong on -- MR. IANDIMARINO: Not necessarily. There are certain things in the ordinances that the Sheriff is responsible for and certain things that, you know, any of us could really enforce as far as the Sheriff, if they really wanted to go down, that they could. But, no, we could open up cases that we see. Now, we may have to get determinations from the Building department or the Zoning department or Engineering to determine whether or not a violation truly really exists, but we do and we can open up those cases. Page 155 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 144 COMMISSIONER KOWAL: So just any blanket thing that's in our code enforcement, in the rules, we can open a self-generated investigation on? MR. IANDIMARINO: Pretty much, yes. MR. FRENCH: Life-safety only. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: It's life-safety only. MR. IANDIMARINO: Well, self-generated, yeah. If we get a complaint on something, yes, we can -- COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Not a complaint. A complaint's different. I said self-generated investigation. Riding through a neighborhood and you see a violation with a building code, can you go on that property and -- MR. IANDIMARINO: If we see active construction, specifically on weekends, you know, on a Saturday -- or on a Sunday we see active construction where they're not allowed to be doing any construction on the weekends, in that regard, we'll go and address those. You know, if somebody's parked on the grass a little bit -- COMMISSIONER KOWAL: They already have a permit. MR. IANDIMARINO: Well, yeah, we'll confirm if they do. We could check CityView to see if they have a permit. If they do, that's -- then we'd go from there. "Hey, you can't work on Sundays." Whatever it is, we'll go down that road. But if we see somebody's parked on the grass a little bit, we're not necessarily knocking on their door saying, "Hey, can you put these tires off the grass and put them on the paved surface," if that's the question you're looking for. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Well, I'm only asking these questions because I want to make sure we're moving forward, you know, because I don't want to give the -- people are watching this. I don't want to give the impression that we have the ability to just go around and seek these out ourselves and start investigations on these properties. Page 156 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 145 I just want to -- I heard -- because from what I understand, it was the life-safety was the only one that was kind of like an exception, like what Commissioner McDaniel is talking about. If you have extra people living on a property, you've got an unimproved trailer, because of the septic systems and things, those can be considered a life-safety type investigation, but not so much the guy that doesn't take care of his backyard or -- you know, things of that nature. That's why I wanted to get some clarity, because I don't want the public to think that we have carte blanche -- MR. IANDIMARINO: Yeah, we're not actively going out and looking at every property and taking photos of it, looking at it from the sky, looking down to determine whether or not -- COMMISSIONER KOWAL: That's not the question I'm asking. I said, "Do we have the authority, yes or no, to self-generate?" MR. IANDIMARINO: Yes, we would have that authority, but self-initiated is, I think, what Commissioner McDaniel is saying. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: That's what I'm talking about, self-initiated. We don't have that authority. MR. IANDIMARINO: Well, we have the authority but we -- MR. KLATZKOW: You do have that authority. MR. IANDIMARINO: -- but we have been -- MR. KLATZKOW: You do have that authority. The Board, years ago, decided to go to retroactive [sic] rather than proactive because of complaints from the citizens, but you have that right. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: I'm just -- I'm hearing two different stories; that's why I just want to get clarity. MR. FRENCH: Commissioners, for the record, my name's Jamie French. I'm the Growth Management/Community Development department head. Under Florida Statute Chapter 162, we cannot patrol or Page 157 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 146 self-initiate a code case unless there is a -- it's deemed to be life-safety. Now, we do have an item coming back to you at the next meeting that we would identify those things. So a trailer, as Tom mentioned, it's being occupied, and we recognize that it's for temporary use, we see that it's got a septic connection that was not approved by the Florida Department of Health or the DEP, you have an interlocal that exists that says you will enforce that state law because they're not an enforcement agency. That's life-safety. Florida Building Code, life-safety. Florida Fire Prevention Code, life-safety. Tall weeds that are within seven and a half feet from the house, you have an ordinance that already says anything above 18 inches is a fire code violation. That's already on the books. That's life-safety. Unlicensed vehicles that are in the back of the property that are storage that we don't have a lawful vantage point, and even if we did, so long as they're not leaking oil, the Estates, if you own it, you're allowed to store things on your property. That's not life-safety. Mosquitoes, probably not life-safety. Storage is not life-safety. However, perhaps debris, if you're dumping mulch, or you're a landscape company and you're dumping those things, we want to bring those back to you because that would best help us define what the Board might consider to be life-safety outside of what the state law or what your already adopted ordinance is, or resolutions, give us guidance on. So the answer's yes, as Jeff said, totally agree, but there's a section of that Florida Statute that says no. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: So do you know what kills more people every year in this world? Mosquitoes. MR. FRENCH: I would -- growing up here and having as many different species of mosquitoes, I would totally believe that. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: It's the truth. Look it up. Page 158 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 147 COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Most dangerous animal on the earth. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: Most dangerous animal on the earth. Commissioner Saunders, do you have any comments? COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Not on this issue. Enough of that one for me. I did want to mention one thing on the DAS -- Domestic Animal Services' budget. And there was some discussion about a voucher program and freeing up money for spay-and-neuter programs. I'm going to be bringing back a couple things; one is some language changes in our budget that just gives staff the ability to take the existing funds that we have for spay/neuter programs and using it for community cat programs and things of that nature, just to give flexibility. And in addition, we have -- and it's referenced in our budget document. We have reference to Resolution 2017-104 which deals with the spay/neuter program, but it restricts those programs to spay and neuter activities at our DAS facilities. And so I'm going to change all that language so that we can spend that money more efficiently out in the field and perhaps the 10 cats that go to 100 cats in three months, we can eliminate that. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: And would that include partnering with other agencies -- COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Oh, yeah. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: -- and that sort of -- COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Voucher program, the whole nine yards -- COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: That sounds like a good idea. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: -- to provide more flexibility. So I will be bringing that back, unless there's some Page 159 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 148 objections to that. And that's all, Mr. Chairman. CHAIRMAN HALL: Commissioner LoCastro. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Okay. Just to piggyback on this spay and neutering, the one thing that really resonated with me with one of our guest speakers was how she said she had to really drill down to find services for different things. So I hope somebody took that as a homework assignment. I know Commissioner Saunders isn't suggesting this, but before we move money around from maybe a pot that's not being used, it might not be being used because nobody knows about it, you know. So, you know, just to make sure that -- we've got some programs they're really proud of down there at DAS. And we all maybe know about it and someone that's been a volunteer at DAS for 10 years knows about it, but if I was an average citizen that just moved here from Wisconsin and I went to that website, would the obvious things that I'd really care about really jump out at me? There's a lot of great pictures on there of cats getting, you know, held and dogs being walked and how the area looks, but people really are looking for our services, and I think some of them don't realize, like, how much we actually do provide down there. And she brought up a good point that she's practically an expert, and she had to drill down, so... MS. PATTERSON: Yes, sir. We've been -- we've been working on the website quite a bit, and a key to this, of course, is public education. So we'll take a look at what she had to go through to find the information she was looking for and try to make it more user friendly. That feedback's actually really helpful. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: It was helpful, yeah. James, can you come to the podium? I wanted to talk a little bit about Parks and Rec. Page 160 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 149 He's like, "Oh, crap." MR. HANRAHAN: Yes, sir. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Oh, darn. No. You know, what I want to say, James, is I don't know too many departments that have gone through as much turnover as Parks and Rec. I mean, I've been -- in the short time I've been in the seat, I don't know how many leaders we've had, you know, in Parks and Rec. So I really just want to say publicly just what a great job that you're doing and how you've really stepped up. You know, you put on the blazer. You're now in the seat. You know, I think of how much you've done behind the scenes at Isles of Capri, Tigertail, Eagle Lakes Park, you know. COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Immokalee. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Immokalee. You know, well, Immokalee's a different district, so he had a chance to call you out. I'm just going to talk about District 1. And I can't believe you have people. You said, "I have people"? COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: No, I know people. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: But, seriously, today was the first day of school, and I don't want to miss the opportunity to say how much our parks were enjoyed over the summer. You know, I know we all have caught a lot of spears of Fun-N-Sun [sic] and all that kind of thing, and that's not district specific. That's all of us, you know, I mean, but also a lot of great things have happened in our parks. In particular, in Eagle Lakes Park we've had lifeguards save several children in the park, and, you know, that's never front-page news, which it's unfortunate. But I just want to say what a great job that you're doing, your sense of urgency. I mean, I've sent you stuff at zero hour, and so have citizens. And sometimes before I'm even able to reply to the Page 161 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 150 citizen, because they put you on it -- and you know the e-mails I'm talking about -- you hit "reply all." Your replies are so professional even when their e-mails aren't. So just, you know, thank you for stepping up and forward. And I know you've got a lot on your plate. But, you know -- and you're standing there representing a bunch of people that aren't here from Parks and Rec. So a lot happened over -- like I said, over this summer in a lot of the parks, a lot of great things, on a shoestring budget in some cases, and a lot of miracles that nobody ever heard about. And so, you know, keep it up. You have all of our thanks and support. We all have parks in our districts. But you and I have been through a couple of battles recently with a few of the parks but, you know, you've been a great partner and a great representative of the county staff and of your team. So I just wanted to thank you, you know, for that. So no questions. You're not being grilled about anything. MR. HANRAHAN: I was ready. I was ready. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I know you are. I know. I just wanted to scare you a little bit. MR. HANRAHAN: I appreciate that, Commissioner. Thank you. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yes, sir. Thank you. Keep it up. And then I want to end with just a little bit of levity. I feel like I'm the informal scribe maybe here, or maybe I've just appointed myself as that. So whenever I hear really good one-liners from some of our commissioners -- so whenever my last day in the seat is, my whole newsletter to 80,000 subscribers is going to be what I've heard here. So I'm going to go back a little bit in history without mentioning any names. So the funniest first thing I ever heard in this Page 162 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 151 commissioner meeting from a commissioner who's no longer here, quote, "So if the cell tower is higher, that means it will be taller." That was a real quote, okay. CHAIRMAN HALL: I was here. I was here. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: That was an actual thing. COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: That was not me. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: It was not. It was not. That person's not here. Now, a person who is here, and I won't mention any names, but it's the last commissioner who just spoke, he's known for saying "words matter," right? That's going to be sort of your token line. Here's what I heard a little bit today from a commissioner. "The sea is the sea." That was an actual quote. "Does 311 deliver?" I got that down. I've added that to the list. And then I didn't think you were going to be able to top it, Chris, but you totally did, and this one's a great one. "Making mud into legacy sediment." I mean, you can't -- I mean, that can't be better -- you can't get better than that. And then -- and then I added this as a freebie at the end. "Do you know what kills more people in this world?" See, these meetings are educational. CHAIRMAN HALL: What did you learn? COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: These things are educational, right? You know, our job is hard. Sometimes I think it's nice to add just a little bit of levity. I'm proud to serve with all five [sic] of you, and we did a lot of good today. We really did. COMMISSIONER KOWAL: I got one, too. COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah, what's that? COMMISSIONER KOWAL: I heard, "Water in a swale's Page 163 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 152 good." COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Oh, yeah, there you go. That's right, because it's not in your living room. I'm going to add that. Mr. Chairman, over to you, sir. CHAIRMAN HALL: James, when you get new lights at Veterans Park, then you'll be a champion. I have no comments. Great meeting today. Thank you, all. Bye-bye. ******* ****Commissioner Hall moved, seconded by Commissioner Saunders and carried that the following items under the consent and summary agendas be approved and/or adopted**** Item #16A1 A ONE-YEAR EXTENSION TO THE MEMORANDUM OF UNDERSTANDING BETWEEN THE COLLIER COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS AND THE EARLY LEARNING COALITION OF SOUTHWEST FLORIDA, INC., AND TO PROVIDE LOCAL MATCH FUNDING IN THE AMOUNT OF $75,000 IN FISCAL YEAR 2025. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16A2 RESOLUTION 2024-142: A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE TEMPORARY CLOSING OF A PORTION OF STATE ROAD 29 AND DETERMINING THAT THE CLOSURE IS NECESSARY FOR THE CHERRYLE THOMAS' – “CHRISTMAS AROUND Page 164 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 153 THE WORLD PARADE & SNOW GALA'' HOSTED BY THE IMMOKALEE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE. THIS RECOMMENDATION IS TO FULFILL A REQUIREMENT OF THE FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION (FDOT) TEMPORARY ROAD CLOSURE PERMIT APPLICATION. THE IMMOKALEE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE HAS HOSTED THIS EVENT FOR OVER TWENTY-FIVE (25) YEARS. THIS YEAR, THE EVENT WILL TAKE PLACE ON SATURDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2024, FROM 5 PM TO 10 PM. (DISTRICT 5) Item #16A3 AGREEMENT FOR SALE AND PURCHASE UNDER THE CONSERVATION COLLIER LAND ACQUISITION PROGRAM WITH 1) CONCHITA V. ARISTIZABAL FOR A 5-ACRE PARCEL AT A COST OF $20,000, AND 2) ANACELY AYRA FOR A 3.18-ACRE PARCEL AT A COST OF $65,710, FOR A TOTAL COST NOT TO EXCEED $88,910, INCLUSIVE OF CLOSING COSTS. (DISTRICT 5) Item #16A4 THE CONSERVATION COLLIER PEPPER RANCH PRESERVE FINAL MANAGEMENT PLAN 10-YEAR UPDATE UNDER THE CONSERVATION COLLIER PROGRAM. (DISTRICT 5) – UPDATED PLAN WAS REVIEWED BY (CCLAAC) ON JUNE 5, 2024 Item #16A5 AGREEMENT FOR SALE AND PURCHASE UNDER THE Page 165 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 154 CONSERVATION COLLIER LAND ACQUISITION PROGRAM WITH LINDA L. ARNDT FOR A 1.14-ACRE PARCEL AT A COST OF $30,320, FOR A TOTAL COST NOT TO EXCEED $31,850, INCLUSIVE OF CLOSING COSTS. (DISTRICT 5) - PARCEL 39776880004 Item #16A6 RESOLUTION 2024-143: THE CONSERVATION COLLIER 2024 CYCLE TARGET PROTECTION AREAS MAILING STRATEGY. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16A7 APPROVE THE MAXIMUM HEIGHT FOR THE NAPLES GREENWAY DEVELOPMENT SDP#PL20230014765 UNDER FLORIDA STATUTE 125.01055(7)(C), THE LIVE LOCAL ACT, IN EFFECT WHEN THE SDP APPLICATION WAS SUBMITTED. (DISTRICT 1) - LOCATED AT THE NORTHEAST CORNER OF GREENWAY ROAD AND TAMIAMI TRAIL EAST. Item #16A8 RECORDING THE FINAL PLAT OF TERRENO AT VALENCIA GOLF AND COUNTRY CLUB - PHASE 3, APPROVAL OF THE STANDARD FORM CONSTRUCTION AND MAINTENANCE AGREEMENT, AND APPROVAL OF THE PERFORMANCE SECURITY IN THE AMOUNT OF $2,461,116.33 (PL20230014749). (DISTRICT 5) Item #16A9 Page 166 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 155 THE CLERK OF COURTS TO RELEASE A PERFORMANCE BOND IN THE AMOUNT OF $516,320, WHICH WAS POSTED AS A GUARANTY FOR EXCAVATION PERMIT NUMBER PL20190000534 FOR WORK ASSOCIATED WITH CURRENTS OF NAPLES – PHASE 1. (DISTRICT 1) Item #16A10 FINAL ACCEPTANCE OF THE POTABLE WATER AND SEWER UTILITY FACILITIES AND ACCEPT THE CONVEYANCE OF THE POTABLE WATER AND SEWER UTILITY FACILITIES AND APPURTENANT UTILITY EASEMENTS FOR CAYMAS PHASE ONE – PHASE 1A & 1B, PL20230011732. (DISTRICT 1) - STAFF CONDUCTED A FINAL INSPECTION ON MAY 8, 2024 Item #16A11 FINAL ACCEPTANCE AND ACCEPT THE CONVEYANCE OF THE POTABLE WATER AND SEWER UTILITY FACILITIES FOR GROVES AT ORANGE BLOSSOM PHASE 3, PL20240004723. (DISTRICT 5) Item #16A12 FINAL ACCEPTANCE OF THE POTABLE WATER AND SEWER UTILITY FACILITIES AND ACCEPT THE CONVEYANCE OF A PORTION OF THE POTABLE WATER FACILITIES AND APPURTENANT UTILITY EASEMENT FOR BENTLEY VILLAGE – 64 UNIT MULTI-FAMILY BUILDINGS Page 167 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 156 (PHASE 2, BLDG. #36), PL20240004856. (DISTRICT 2) Item #16B1 (Moved to a future meeting per Change Sheet) Item #16B2 THE FY24 PROGRAM OF PROJECTS AND AUTHORIZE SUBMITTAL OF THE FEDERAL TRANSIT ADMINISTRATION 49 U.S.C. 5307/ 5339 FY24 GRANT APPLICATION TO SUPPORT THE TRANSIT SYSTEM CAPITAL AND OPERATING COSTS IN THE AMOUNT OF $5,632,209 THROUGH THE TRANSIT AWARD MANAGEMENT SYSTEM, ACCEPT THE AWARD, AND AUTHORIZE ANY NECESSARY BUDGET AMENDMENTS. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16C1 THE SELECTION COMMITTEE’S RANKING AND AUTHORIZE STAFF TO BEGIN CONTRACT NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE TOP-RANKED FIRM, JOHNSON ENGINEERING, INC., RELATED TO REQUEST FOR PROFESSIONAL SERVICES (“RPS”) NO. 24-8211, FOR “DESIGN SERVICES FOR SOUTH COUNTY WATER RECLAMATION FACILITY ELECTRICAL SERVICE #1 UPGRADES,” SO THAT STAFF CAN BRING A PROPOSED AGREEMENT BACK FOR THE BOARD’S CONSIDERATION AT A FUTURE MEETING. (PROJECT NO. 70288) (DISTRICT 1) Item #16C2 AGREEMENT NO. 24-007-NS, “SUPERVISORY CONTROL AND Page 168 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 157 DATA ACQUISITION (SCADA) EQUIPMENT AND SOFTWARE,” WITH DATA FLOW SYSTEMS, LLC, FOR A PERIOD OF FIVE YEARS UNDER A SOLE SOURCE WAIVER, AUTHORIZE THE CHAIRMAN TO SIGN THE ATTACHED AGREEMENT, AND AUTHORIZE EXPENDITURES IN THE AMOUNT NOT TO EXCEED $500,000 PER FISCAL YEAR. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16C3 THE THIRD AMENDMENT TO AGREEMENT NO. 15-6365, FOR “DISASTER DEBRIS MANAGEMENT REMOVAL AND DISPOSAL SERVICES” WITH CROWDER GULF JOINT VENTURE, INC., TO ADD A LINE ITEM AND ADJUSTING AN EXISTING LINE ITEM FOR DEBRIS HAUL-OUT, AND TO AUTHORIZE THE CHAIRMAN TO SIGN THE AMENDMENT. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16C4 BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS, AS EX-OFFICIO THE GOVERNING BOARD OF THE COLLIER COUNTY WATER- SEWER DISTRICT, TO RATIFY ADMINISTRATIVELY APPROVED CHANGE ORDER NO. 1, PROVIDING FOR A TIME EXTENSION OF 30 DAYS UNDER WORK ORDER UNDER UNDERGROUND CONTRACTOR SERVICES AGREEMENT NO. 20-7800, WITH QUALITY ENTERPRISES USA, INC., FOR THE “EAGLE LAKES METERING ASSEMBLIES AND IMPROVEMENTS” PROJECT, AND AUTHORIZE THE CHAIRMAN TO SIGN THE ATTACHED CHANGE ORDER. (PROJECT NO. 70166) (DISTRICT 1) Page 169 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 158 Item #16C5 CHANGE ORDER NO. 2, TO DECREASE THE CONTRACT PRICE IN THE NET AMOUNT OF $199,129.12 (WORK DIRECTIVE NO. 1 DECREASE BY $250,879.12, AND WORK DIRECTIVE NO. 2 INCREASE BY $51,750) TO $13,784,850.58, UNDER CONSTRUCTION AGREEMENT NO. 23-8115, WITH METRO EQUIPMENT SERVICES, INC., FOR THE “GOLDEN GATE CITY TRANSMISSION WATER MAIN IMPROVEMENTS – PHASE 1B” PROJECT, AND AUTHORIZE THE CHAIRMAN TO SIGN THE ATTACHED CHANGE ORDER. (PROJECT NO. 70253, 70243 & 51029) (DISTRICT 3) Item #16C6 CHANGE ORDER NO. 2, FOR WORK ASSOCIATED WITH WORK DIRECTIVES 2, 3, AND 4 AT A TOTAL COST OF $60,800.72, UTILIZING THE OWNER’S ALLOWANCES, AND ADDING A TOTAL OF TWO DAYS TO CONSTRUCTION AGREEMENT NO. 22-7982, WITH DOUGLAS N. HIGGINS, INC., FOR THE “105TH AND 106TH AVENUES PUBLIC UTILITIES RENEWAL” PROJECT AND AUTHORIZE THE CHAIRMAN TO SIGN THE ATTACHED CHANGE ORDER. (PROJECT NO. 70120) (DISTRICT 2) Item #16C7 AFTER-THE-FACT PAYMENT TO ALLIED UNIVERSAL CORPORATION IN THE AMOUNT OF $19,045.36 FOR THE PURCHASE OF 50% SODIUM HYDROXIDE FOR THE NORTH COUNTY REGIONAL WATER TREATMENT PLANT, WHICH Page 170 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 159 WAS MISTAKENLY ACQUIRED FROM THE TERTIARY VENDOR UNDER AGREEMENT NO. 21-7921, “COUNTYWIDE CHEMICALS” INSTEAD OF THE LOW BID PRIMARY VENDOR AND DEEM THE EXPENDITURES HAVE A VALID PUBLIC PURPOSE. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16C8 CREDIT ADJUSTMENT TO JENSEN UNDERGROUND UTILITIES’ WATER ACCOUNT TO REFLECT AN OVERCHARGED AMOUNT AND AUTHORIZE THE ISSUANCE OF A REFUND TO JENSEN UNDERGROUND UTILITIES IN THE AMOUNT OF $125,187.57. (DISTRICT 5) Item #16C9 AGREEMENT NO. 24-029-NS, “XYLEM MIXERS, PUMPS AND RELATED EQUIPMENT, PRODUCTS, AND SERVICES,” WITH XYLEM WATER SOLUTIONS USA, INC., FOR A PERIOD OF FIVE YEARS COMMENCING ON OCTOBER 1, 2024, UNDER A SINGLE SOURCE WAIVER, AUTHORIZE THE CHAIRMAN TO SIGN THE ATTACHED AGREEMENT, AND AUTHORIZE \ EXPENDITURES UNDER BOARD APPROVED STANDARDIZATION OF SPECIALIZED PROPRIETARY EQUIPMENT AND SERVICES IN AN ESTIMATED AMOUNT OF $1,500,000 PER FISCAL YEAR FOR AN ESTIMATED TOTAL AMOUNT OF $7,500,000 FOR THE DURATION OF THE AGREEMENT. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16C10 Page 171 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 160 AUTHORIZE STAFF TO MAKE EXPENDITURES FOR THE SOLE SOURCE PURCHASE OF CERTAIN LABORATORY PARTS, SUPPLIES, AND SERVICES FROM IDEXX DISTRIBUTION, INC. (“IDEXX”), IN AN ESTIMATED AMOUNT OF $250,000 PER FISCAL YEAR, FOR THE REMAINDER OF FY24 AND FY25. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16D1 (Moved to a future meeting per Change Sheet) Item #16D2 (Moved to a future meeting per Change Sheet) Item #16D3 THE FIRST REVISION TO THE HOME-ARP ALLOCATION PLAN AS REQUIRED BY THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT (HUD). (ALL DISTRICTS) - TO PROVIDE FUNDING FOR ACTIVITIES THAT SUPPORT COMPREHENSIVE AFFORDABLE HOUSING FOR THOSE THAT ARE EXPERIENCING HOMELESSNESS AND OTHER VULNERABLE POPULATIONS. Item #16E1 TO RATIFY PROPERTY, CASUALTY, WORKERS’ COMPENSATION AND SUBROGATION CLAIM FILES SETTLED AND/OR CLOSED BY THE RISK MANAGEMENT DIVISION DIRECTOR PURSUANT TO RESOLUTION NO. 04-15 FOR THE THIRD QUARTER OF FY 24. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16E2 Page 172 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 161 THE ADMINISTRATIVE REPORT PREPARED BY THE PROCUREMENT SERVICES DIVISION FOR VARIOUS COUNTY DIVISIONS’ AFTER-THE-FACT PURCHASES REQUIRING BOARD APPROVAL IN ACCORDANCE WITH PROCUREMENT ORDINANCE 2017-08, AS AMENDED, AND THE PROCUREMENT MANUAL IN THE AMOUNT OF $46,984.59. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16F1 A SITE USE LEASE AGREEMENT WITH VB-S1 ASSETS, LLC, FOR THE INSTALLATION OF TWO 700MHZ MUTUAL AID REPEATERS ON A COMMUNICATIONS TOWER LOCATED IN EVERGLADES CITY TO SUPPORT PUBLIC SAFETY AND EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT ACTIVITIES. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16F2 BUDGET AMENDMENT IN THE AMOUNT OF $657,000 TO CONSOLIDATE INFRASTRUCTURE SALES SURTAX FUNDING FROM THE HEALTH BUILDING ROOF REPLACEMENT PROJECT (50165) AND HEALTH BUILDING, 3RD FLOOR HVAC REPLACEMENT PROJECT (50164) TO BETTER COORDINATE PROJECT EXECUTION. (DISTRICT 4) Item #16F3 BUDGET AMENDMENTS IN THE AMOUNT OF $1,168,000, TO REALIGN CURRENT CAPITAL PROJECT FUNDING WITHIN COUNTY-WIDE CAPITAL PROJECT FUND (3001) TO SUPPORT ESSENTIAL CAPITAL MAINTENANCE OF COUNTY Page 173 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 162 FACILITIES AND ADVANCE FLEET MANAGEMENT IMPROVEMENTS. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16F4 AWARD A WORK ORDER USING FIXED TERM AGREEMENT NO. 20-7712, “CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT SERVICES” TO JACOBS ENGINEERING GROUP, INC., IN THE AMOUNT OF $790,810, TO PROVIDE CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT SERVICES FOR THE COLLIER COUNTY FORENSIC AND CID FACILITY PROJECT (PROJECT NO. 70167). (DISTRICT 5) - TO OBTAIN CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT SERVICES FOR THE COLLIER COUNTY FORENSIC AND CID (“CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION DIVISION”) FACILITY. Item #16F5 BUDGET AMENDMENT IN THE AMOUNT OF $300,000 FROM OTHER GENERAL ADMIN COST CENTER (103010-0001) TO LAW ENFORCEMENT EXPENSES COST CENTER (106010- 0001) FOR UTILITY RELATED EXPENSES FOR FACILITIES UTILIZED FOR LAW ENFORCEMENT OPERATIONS. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16F7 AWARD INVITATION TO BID (“ITB”) NO. 23-8176, “OVERHEAD DOORS & AUTOMATIC GATES MAINTENANCE, REPAIR, AND REPLACEMENT SERVICES,” TO VALIENTE BUILDERS LLC, AS PRIMARY VENDOR, AND ATLAS DOOR & GATE INC., AS SECONDARY VENDOR, AND Page 174 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 163 AUTHORIZE THE CHAIRMAN TO SIGN THE ATTACHED AGREEMENTS. (ALL DISTRICTS) - TO RETAIN A VENDOR TO PERFORM MAINTENANCE, REPAIR, AND REPLACEMENT SERVICES FOR OVERHEAD DOORS AND AUTOMATIC GATES Item #16F8 RESOLUTION 2024-144: A RESOLUTION APPROVING AMENDMENTS (APPROPRIATING GRANTS, DONATIONS, CONTRIBUTIONS, OR INSURANCE PROCEEDS) TO THE FISCAL YEAR 2023-24 ADOPTED BUDGET. (THE BUDGET AMENDMENTS IN THE ATTACHED RESOLUTION HAVE BEEN REVIEWED AND APPROVED BY THE BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS VIA SEPARATE EXECUTIVE SUMMARIES.) (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16F9 BUDGET AMENDMENT TO RECOGNIZE ACCRUED INTEREST AND CARRYFOWARD, IN THE AMOUNT OF $7,304.29, FROM OCTOBER 1, 2023 THROUGH JUNE 30, 2024, EARNED BY EMS COUNTY GRANT TO SUPPORT THE PURCHASE OF MEDICAL AND RESCUE EQUIPMENT. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16F10 INCREASE IN EXPENDITURES NOT-TO-EXCEED $255,000 PER FY UNDER A SINGLE SOURCE WAIVER FROM THE COMPETITIVE PROCESS WITH COOPERATIVE SERVICES OF Page 175 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 164 FLORIDA, INC., FOR THE PURCHASE OF MEDICATIONS AND SUPPLIES USED BY THE COLLIER COUNTY EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES DIVISION, AND AUTHORIZE PAYMENTS BE MADE TO LEESAR, INC., AS THE PRIMARY DISTRIBUTOR AND SUPPLIER OF PRODUCTS PURCHASED UNDER NON-STANDARD AGREEMENT # 23- 008-NS. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16F11 APPROVE AND RATIFY A PURCHASE AGREEMENT BETWEEN CENTRAL FLORIDA BEHAVIORAL HEALTH NETWORK, INC., AND COLLIER COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS IN THE AMOUNT OF $145,833, TO PARTICIPATE IN THE COORDINATED OPIOID RECOVERY NETWORK OF ADDICTION CARE PROGRAM IN WHICH FUNDING WILL BE USED TOWARD PREVENTING AND TREATING SUBSTANCE ABUSE IN COLLIER COUNTY AND AUTHORIZE NECESSARY BUDGET AMENDMENTS. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16J1 TO RECORD IN THE MINUTES OF THE BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS, THE CHECK NUMBER (OR OTHER PAYMENT METHOD), AMOUNT, PAYEE, AND PURPOSE FOR WHICH THE REFERENCED DISBURSEMENTS IN THE AMOUNT OF $70,972,400.56 WERE DRAWN FOR THE PERIODS BETWEEN JULY 11, 2024, AND JULY 31, 2024, PURSUANT TO FLORIDA STATUTE 136.06. (ALL DISTRICTS) Page 176 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 165 Item #16J2 THE BOARD APPROVE AND DETERMINE VALID PUBLIC PURPOSE FOR INVOICES PAYABLE AND PURCHASING CARD TRANSACTIONS AS OF AUGUST 7, 2024. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16K1 RESOLUTION 2024-145: DECLARE A VACANCY ON THE GOLDEN GATE COMMUNITY CENTER ADVISORY BOARD (DISTRICT 3) Item #16K2 RESOLUTION 2024-146: APPOINT BONNIE HAWLEY TO THE BAYSHORE/GATEWAY TRIANGLE LOCAL REDEVELOPMENT ADVISORY BOARD. (DISTRICT 4) - APPOINTED TO THE COMMITTEE AS AN AT-LARGE MEMBER, TO A THREE-YEAR TERM EXPIRING ON MAY 22, 2027 Item #16K3 RESOLUTION 2024-147: APPOINT TWO MEMBERS TO THE ANIMAL SERVICES ADVISORY BOARD. (ALL DISTRICTS) – ALLEN SCHANTZEN WITH TERMS EXPIRING ON APRIL 13, 2027, AND SUSAN MEHAS AS A CITIZEN AT-LARGE MEMBER, TO A TERM EXPIRING ON APRIL 13, 2028 Item #16K4 Page 177 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 166 RESOLUTION 2024-148: A RESOLUTION APPROVING A PLAN OF FINANCING INVOLVING THE ISSUANCE OF MULTIFAMILY HOUSING REVENUE BONDS IN AN AMOUNT NOT TO EXCEED $10,500,000, BY THE PUBLIC FINANCE AUTHORITY, A WISCONSIN BOND ISSUING COMMISSION, FOR THE RENAISSANCE HALL AT OLD COURSE MULTIFAMILY HOUSING PROJECT; APPROVING ISSUANCE OF THE BONDS BY THE PUBLIC FINANCE AUTHORITY; AND RATIFYING A PUBLIC HEARING HELD BY THE HOUSING FINANCE AUTHORITY OF COLLIER COUNTY, FLORIDA, IN ACCORDANCE WITH SECTION 147 OF THE INTERNAL REVENUE CODE OF 1986, AS AMENDED. (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #16K5 INCREASE IN THE PURCHASE ORDER FOR WOODS, WEIDENMILLER, MICHETTI, AND RUDNICK, LLP RELATED TO ITS PROVISION OF LITIGATION SERVICES IN THE CASE STYLED NAPLES GOLF DEVELOPMENT, LLC V. COLLIER COUNTY, CASE NO. 23-CA-1795, WHICH IS A BERT HARRIS ACTION FILED AGAINST THE COUNTY CONCERNING THE CONVERSION OF A GOLF COURSE TO A RESIDENTIAL DEVELOPMENT. (FISCAL IMPACT $100,000) (ALL DISTRICTS) Item #17A RESOLUTION 2024-149: A RESOLUTION RENAMING A PLATTED STREET FROM CLEAR BAY DRIVE TO PERRY DISE LANE, AS SHOWN AS TRACT 3 ON THE PLAT OF THE Page 178 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 167 COCOHATCHEE RIVER TRUST P.U.D., IN PLAT BOOK 18, PAGE 98, LOCATED APPROXIMATELY 450 FEET NORTH OF THE INTERSECTION OF WALKERBILT ROAD AND TAMIAMI TRAIL NORTH, IN SECTION 21, TOWNSHIP 48 SOUTH, RANGE 25 EAST, COLLIER COUNTY, FLORIDA. [PL20230017298] (DISTRICT 2) Page 179 of 4908 August 13, 2024 Page 168 There being no further business for the good of the County, the meeting was adjourned by order of the Chair at 2:15 p.m. BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS BOARD OF ZONING APPEALS/EX OFFICIO GOVERNING BOARD(S) OF SPECIAL DISTRICTS UNDER ITS CONTROL ________________________ ___________ CHRIS HALL, CHAIRMAN ATTEST CRYSTAL K. KINZEL, CLERK These minutes approved by the Board on ____________, as presented ______________ or as corrected _____________. TRANSCRIPT PREPARED ON BEHALF OF FORT MYERS COURT REPORTING BY TERRI L. LEWIS, REGISTERED PROFESSIONAL COURT REPORTER, FPR-C, AND NOTARY PUBLIC. Page 180 of 4908