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HEX Minutes 05/22/2025 (Draft)May 22, 2026 Page 1 TRANSCRIPT OF THE MEETING OF THE COLLIER COUNTY HEARING EXAMINER Naples, Florida, May 22, 2025 LET IT BE REMEMBERED that the Collier County Hearing Examiner, in and for the County of Collier, having conducted business herein, met on this date at 1:00 p.m., in REGULAR SESSION at 2800 North Horseshoe Drive, Room 609/610, Naples, Florida, with the following people present: HEARING EXAMINER ANDREW DICKMAN ALSO PRESENT: Michael Bosi, Planning and Zoning Director Raymond V. Bellows, Zoning Manager Maria Estrada, Planner III Laura DeJohn, Zoning John Kelly, Planner III Ailyn Padron, Management Analyst I Kevin Summers, Technical Systems Operations Managers May 22, 2026 Page 2 HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Good afternoon, everyone. Good afternoon. Let's take our seats, please. My name is Andrew Dickman. I'm the hearing examiner. Today is May 22nd, 2025, 1:00 p.m. meeting as noticed. Let's start with the Pledge of Allegiance. Please rise and join me. (The Pledge of Allegiance was recited in unison.) HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Once again, my name is Andrew Dickman. I'm a Florida Bar attorney. I have been practicing for over 20 years in the area of land use and zoning and local government. I'm not a County employee. I was retained to -- by the Board of County Commissioners to fulfill the duties of hearing examiner as they're prescribed in the Code of Ordinances. My job is to hold this quasi-judicial hearing in a fair and impartial manner and to collect all the competent, substantial evidence that is available and also testimony from the County, from the applicant and from the public, and then close the record and render a decision within 30 days. I will not render a decision here today, but the important thing here is to get as much information about the particular item here so that I can ask questions and understand and get it into the record and so that as it's applicable to the criteria associated with the petition. We have a court reporter here who is transcribing everything verbatim, so let's all try to speak very, very clearly. Don't speak too fast. Don't talk over each other. She'll stop us if we get into a situation where she can't capture what we're saying because it's very important to have the history of this meeting. I frequently go back and look at some of the transcripts when I'm drafting the decisions. So it's very helpful that the County has May 22, 2026 Page 3 supplied a court reporter to do that. The process that we're going to follow here today is that the County will introduce the item using the podium here in the middle. They will simply go over their staff report, any recommendations, any conditions, things of that nature, not a very in-depth presentation. The more in-depth presentation will be done by the applicant or the applicants' representatives over at this other podium, and they will do their case in chief. I will allow them to reserve time for rebuttal because we'll have a public comment. We'll have, not only public comment here live and in person, but we also -- the County also supplies this to the public via Zoom. So we may have some folks that are going to testify via Zoom. If you are going to speak here today, if you're a public speaker, please fill out a speaker's card over there and provide it to the County folks over here. Anyone who is going to testify here today will have to do so under oath, and in a minute I will ask the court reporter to administer the oath. This is a fairly informal proceeding. Anyone that's nervous about speaking in public, please don't be. I want you to take your time. It's more important for me to get as much information germane to the subject matter that I can get here today because after today I can't talk to anybody. I can't call the applicant. I can't call the County. I can't call anybody. I won't do that. I will disclose I have read everything that's in the record that's been provided, the applications, all the backup material. I have also done site visits to all of the sites. So I'm disclosing that now for the record, but other than that, I have had no other what's May 22, 2026 Page 4 called ex-party communication with anyone. I'm here strictly as a neutral decision-maker in the capacity under the Code of Ordinances. So with that, why don't we go ahead and swear in everyone that's going to testify here today. So if you are going to speak to me today here formally, please stand and raise your right hand. (The speakers were duly sworn and indicated in the affirmative.) HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you, everybody. I appreciate that. So we have, it looks like -- one, two, three, four, five, six -- seven items, and one is a companion item, correct? Okay. The last one. Okay. All right. So why don't we just go ahead and get started with 3.A. MS. ESTRADA: Good afternoon, Mr. Dickman. For the record, Maria Estrada, Planner II, Zoning Services. Before you is Agenda 3A, which is a variance request, PL20240000608. The request seeks a variance from the Land Development Code, Section 4.02.01.A, Table 2.1. This is to reduce the required west side setback from the 7.5 feet requirement to 3.25 feet for the proposed principal structure with an attached shed and wet bar located at Lot 5, Block S, Unit Number 3, Conner's Vanderbilt Beach Estates, also known as 424 Egret Avenue, Naples, Florida, Section 29, Township 48 South, Range 25 East, Collier County, Florida. Staff has reviewed the petition according to the criteria established in LDC Section 9.04.03, A through H. Staff believes that this petition is consistent with both the review criteria outlined in the LDC, as well as with the GMP. Regarding the public notice requirements, they were met as per LDC Section 10.03.06.F, the application distributed to the location letter on Tuesday, February 4th, 2025. The property owner notification letter and newspaper ads were taken care by of by staff May 22, 2026 Page 5 on Wednesday April 23rd, 205 -- 2025. -- sorry about that. And public hearing signs were posted by County staff on Tuesday, May 6th, 2025. The only communication from the public was the neighborhood -- the neighbor adjacent to the structure, who had no issues with the shed's location; therefore, staff recommends that you approve the variance request as detailed in Attachment B of the staff report. And this concludes the staff's summary. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you very much. Appreciate that. Hello, Counselor. MR. LOMBARDO: Good afternoon. For the record, Zach Lombardo. I have 700 slides. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Got the green here. MR. LOMBARDO: Oh, my gosh. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: It's green here, red in Naples. MR. LOMBARDO: I missed it. I wasn't sure what the rules were. Zach Lombardo, for the record. I will not repeat my 700 slides joke. We -- first preliminary matter, Mr. Martin is present here in case you need to take some additional testimony, but preliminarily we'd like to incorporate staff's analysis and testimony as the applicant's analysis and testimony in this particular case and do not have additional evidence to provide other than to walk through this. Is there a clicker that I can use to advance, or do I have to say, "Next slide"? HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: You just say "next slide." May 22, 2026 Page 6 MR. LOMBARDO: "Next slide" works. Here's an aerial identifying the location of the property on Egret Avenue. This is on one of the finger canals to the west of Naples Park. Next slide. As mentioned, this is a side setback reduction from 7.5 feet to 3.25 feet for an expansion to the principal structure. Next slide. The primary basis for this application that we talked through with staff and staff has agreed with is largely relating to the age of the structure and the fact that it's a pre-FIRM structure and sort of changing nature of the increased storm surge and hurricane events leading to some desire to improve the ability to secure possessions, exterior homes during storm events, and so the shed is in reaction to that. But given the existing footprint from 1971 and the existing footprint of the pool in 1978 with very limited space to address this problem, and so from this angle we are suggesting and staff has agreed that there's a special condition and circumstance here. And I think I want to touch on this is a challenge that we see in these older neighborhoods. As we build new homes next to older homes in the flood zone, you basically have two options. We can either try to fit them in in their existing format or everything gets raised, and then the ground is lifted creating additional issues for the neighbors. So there's kind of this difficult balancing act in these neighborhoods of how you redevelop here without causing more flooding issues and stay consistent with the FIRM. So this variance is, I would suggest, in that space. And if we get to the next slide, the -- as far as time, the conditions, all of this, the applicant purchased the home in 2016. As I mentioned, this is an early 1970s build, and essentially what is May 22, 2026 Page 7 creating the issue is all of the site planned locations. Next slide. Accordingly, we believe that there is a literal interpretation issue here, the side setback 7-1/2 feet. I think it's important to know in my view there is one person in Collier County who is impacted by this. That's the western neighbor who has said that he has no objection, signed a letter of no objection to this particular issue. And so when we are balancing -- looking at the hardship, obviously this restricts the ability to build this structure by the literal interpretation. And since -- we can go to the next slide, B -- actually, I guess it's E, but I won't bounce around on the slides. There's a minimal harm because the neighbor is not taking any issue with this. And as far as minimum necessary, we would suggest that that is met here because really what we're looking at is, in the building to building analysis, was the distance between the two buildings still maintained, the ten-foot that require -- they generally advise it. So we're not going past that point. Next slide. From a special privilege standpoint, I would suggest that the -- if this were a post-FIRM home, maybe it would be some sort of special privilege, but, again, we're trying to balance these older structures and keeping them viable without having to demo and raise the entire site. I think that's the principal argument that keeps getting repeated throughout these elements. Next slide. One of the key factors, I think, on the neighborhood, and I certainly will stand to be corrected should the audience be filled with objectors is, if the neighborhood had come up and taken an issue, I think that may be an indication here, but my understanding is that there are no objections to this particular issue; and from a view May 22, 2026 Page 8 standpoint, from a structural standpoint, I don't think there's anything inconsistent about what's being proposed here because at the end of the day it is not uncommon for single-family homes to have exterior storage. Next slide. The canal really is what is causing this, and I think there's a lot to be said here and a lot to think about when it comes to what the County's canal dredging policy is, does that impact this, and a lot of other things that have nothing to do, again, with the property owners here. So usually on this slide, I always say, "No, there's no natural conditions, but I think here it is appropriate to say that the canal as dredged is a natural condition that is directly playing a part in this, and until -- you know, I guess, not related to this petition, but until the County establishes a dredging program countywide for routine maintenance dredges, this is an existing problem. Next slide. I did not find anything in the Growth Management Plan that would prohibit this as far as we're not -- this in no way modifies the density. It's not additional dwelling units. It doesn't really change the use of the structure, so -- and it also is not a significant, massive change. So based on all those kind of analyses, if we go to the next slide -- looks like twice. We'll go to another slide again. Here's the letter of no objection from the neighbor. There's a beautiful signature. Next slide. Staff recommends approval. We ask that that recommendation be adopted. There are no conditions provided, so there is nothing for us to agree to, but we agree with this. If there's questions, I would love to answer them. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. That's pretty straight forward. I do understand that. May 22, 2026 Page 9 I do have a question for the County. I think that I had talked about this last time, about the that dredging. I'm also curious. Is this a County? This is totally off topic, but -- MR. LOMBARDO: No, I raised it. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: But I have always wondered about that because this is obviously a dredge and fill community back when you could do that. And so is it sort of like when you plat a neighborhood, the County takes over the rights-of-way, and they also take over like -- are you the wrong person to ask this question to? MR. BOSI: Mike Bosi, the planning and zoning director, yes, I'm the wrong person to ask. Someone from coastal zone, but I don't think we have a representative here today, but I can -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. No problem. MR. BOSI: No. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: I'm just curious because it seems logical to me that, when you plat a neighborhood like this, and the County takes over the rights-of-way which is transportation, you know, how do they interpret the waterways, so -- because these are old waterways, and I would imagine they have been silted in quite a bit. You know, at some point I don't know who's -- I don't know anybody that's been dredging there except for the pass, the Wiggins Pass area. So, anyway, off topic. Sorry about that, but Mr. Lombardo brought it up, so I feel like he opened the door for me to ask that question. Why don't we go to public comment, see if anybody is here to comment on this. MS. PATRON: Mr. Dickman, we have no speakers. May 22, 2026 Page 10 HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: No speakers in person and virtually, right? MS. PATRON: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. All right. Do you want to rebut any of that? MR. LOMBARDO: Vehemently. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Vehemently. MR. LOMBARDO: But I will pass. I do have a copy of the plat. I was looking to see it from the dedication -- because typically the canals get dedicated to the public, but this is an older plat and it's too small to -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: No, I -- I looked at it as well. I see that it's -- MR. LOMBARDO: I think it's an interesting question. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: This is something that's been running around in my head for a while, sort of the strange things that run around in land use attorneys' heads for too long. I will look into it a little bit more myself. But it's pretty straight forward. I get it. There's a lot of -- these -- this neighborhood with all of the different houses, you're right, not just on the canals but in the Naples Park area, it's going through quite a metamorphosis. There's people that are basically changing their existing older, you know, 1960-'70s home, and then there's people that are just demolishing them and building gigantic houses. So I get it. There's a lot of -- it's sort of a good topic for a planning student somewhere to study this neighborhood as far as like how houses can change over time and whether that's a good thing or not, but either way this is what -- this is the correct place to come to ask for this, a side yard variance. There are no objectors. May 22, 2026 Page 11 You actually have the abutting neighbor to the west with a no-objection letter. I think the arguments from counsel and also presented by the County planning staff are well taken, and I will get a decision out as quickly as possible. Thanks for being here. MR. LOMBARDO: Yeah, thank you very much. Enjoy the rest of your hearings. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you. You're welcome to stick around. All right. Let's go to 3.B. Oh, look who's here. MS. DEJOHN: Good afternoon, I'm Laura DeJohn. I'm contracted to assist with zoning reviews on behalf of Collier County. So in that capacity, I'm here as the zoning reviewer for your Item 3B, a conditional use. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Welcome. MS. DEJOHN: Thank you. This one is identified as PL20240008176. It's a request for the hearing examiner to approve a conditional use, Conditional Use Number 12 of the Rural Agricultural Zoning District as provided in Section 2.03.01 A.1.c of the Land Development Code. It allows for a collection and transfer site for resource recovery involving generation of a product called Biochar through thermal processing, which is air current incinerators that burn organic fire lands. This is on 15 acres of property within the agricultural zoning district with mobile home overlay, Rural Lands Stewardship Area overlay. This is to the east of the Immokalee area. So it's 15 acres located at 2951 State Road 29, southeast of Immokalee in Section 19, Township 47 South, Range 30 East, Collier County, Florida. May 22, 2026 Page 12 It is an innovative type of use. The petitioner has secured an economic development, fast-track project authorization from Collier County's fast-track program under Ordinance 20.2016247. The administrator of that program, Cormac Giblin, is here for questions on the economic development fast track. We have reviewed the petition in accordance with LDC Section 10.08 governing conditional uses, Chapter 3.C.1 of the Administrative Code, and the petition is consistent with LDC and the Growth Management Plan. Public notice-wise, there was a duly advertised neighborhood information meeting held in January, January 15th at 5:30 at the UF/IFAS Extension Office on Immokalee Road. Remote attendance was also available by Zoom, but no members of the public attended. News -- or notification letters went out by Collier County staff. A newspaper ad was posted by Collier County staff. We know that the letter was successfully sent because, one, I did get one call from a property owner, who was just northwest of the site along State Road 29. The gentleman just had questions about the project location and the nature of the project; and I made sure that he understood this is a public meeting that he could attend if he wanted to. Based on a thorough review, the coordination of many staff people who needed to look at this project, we do recommend approval. There is a series of seven recommendations of conditions in your Attachment B to the staff report. There's a conceptual site plan in your Attachment C to the staff report. We recommend approval subject to those conditions and that conceptual site plan. May 22, 2026 Page 13 The key conditions, just to kind of boil up the important items here, is transportation conditions where the applicant has agreed to work with the County to convey a road easement of up to 200 feet wide based on a proposed road corridor that's proposed in the draft of the 2015 Long Range Transportation Plan. And the North Collier Fire Control Rescue District fire marshal was gracious in reviewing this item and providing his recommended emergency planning commitments that the applicant agreed to and included in the conditions of approval as well. With that, I will turn it over. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Thank you very much. Yes, I will go over the conditions with the applicant, but I was particularly interested in is the purpose -- I guess I need to know a little bit more about the -- the activity, but, you know, when you have hours of operation, I don't know if you guys had any conversations about the potential for trucks or folks queuing up before. You know, that topic comes up a lot, especially with dump trucks and things like that. MS. DEJOHN: Right. So we were -- we were conscious that in this agricultural area there's usually a lot of trucks, heavy-duty agriculture going on, and there could be the equivalent amount of loading and unloading that goes with agriculture as with this type of operation. So it was considered compatible with what already occurs in that area. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Thank you. Nice to see you. MR. ARNOLD: Good afternoon, Mr. Hearing Examiner. I'm Wayne Arnold, certified planner with Grady Minor & Associates here representing the ArborX application. And we have members of our project team. If you could advance the slide. May 22, 2026 Page 14 I'll introduce our team to you. We have Chris Borgeson and Troy Van Tongeren -- is that correct? Yeah -- with ArborX. Kevin Dowty is a civil engineer with Bowman, who will be working on the project. I don't think he's present today. Jim Banks is our traffic engineer -- and Marco Espinar is the biologist on the job -- and he is here if you have any questions regarding traffic. For vegetation -- and ArborX folks are here if you have some specific questions about the processing that they do. Next slide, please. So location-wise, this is located southeast of the Immokalee community on State Road 29, which is a state road, and I'll touch on that in a moment, regarding your question on truck traffic. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you. MR. ARNOLD: Next slide. This shows you a little closer image that most of the site has been previously cleared and used for agriculture. The far tip of the triangle does have some native vegetation, and we've set that aside as a tree preservation area to satisfy the native vegetation requirements for the county. You can also see on the site -- it's a little interesting because that aerial photograph depicts the property as it's shown on the Property Appraiser's Office. That is not what the survey site looks like. If you can go back to the next [sic] slide. The other direction, please. That one. We actually own all the way south through the existing road that runs through the property. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah, I was wondering about that. MR. ARNOLD: So the Property Appraiser, you know, they utilize good information, but there's a reason you require boundary surveys to be included with these applications so we know the exact boundaries of the property. May 22, 2026 Page 15 So you can advance that a couple slides again, please. So I apologize. I had made a correction to this slide that didn't get into your -- into the presentation. It says we're in the Immokalee planning area, but we are not. We're actually in the Rural Mixed Use and Rural Lands Stewardship Overlay. But the property is zoned agriculture. And one of the conditionals uses -- and you may have seen others. This is the first one I've been involved with, this creation of the biochar. That's the product of the processing, because you've probably seen others that have used the same Conditional Use No. 12 for fabrication, and it's -- a lot of times it's not only horticultural debris, but sometimes it's also construction debris that gets processed and separated, et cetera. But this one, as it's conditioned, it's only for horticultural material that will be brought to the site. It's going to be processed through the incineration method, and the product that's created is called biochar, and that biochar has value for a soil additive for the fertilizers. It also can be used as filtration. There's also -- because of the processing available, credits that can be sold. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So when you say "horticultural products," you're talking about, like, trees and things like that. MR. ARNOLD: Yes, sir. Primarily green -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Especially during hurricanes when we have lots of -- MR. ARNOLD: Yeah. Primarily, though, green is preferred because of the way it gets processed in the char. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. ARNOLD: So it's better than just the old debris, but they'll be working with different horticultural companies to bring materials May 22, 2026 Page 16 in here. And that, of course, gets diverted away from the landfill, which is a good thing, which is one of the reasons we allow this type of use as a conditional use in the code. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. ARNOLD: Next slide, please. So here is our proposed conceptual site plan. And I guess I could show you with my pointer on there just to highlight some of the things, because I don't think you have the ability here, but -- so the feature you've already talked about with Laura, there's an identified 200-foot-wide corridor in this area that the county has identified on their Long-Range Transportation Plan. So we worked with the County Attorney's Office staff and your Transportation staff to craft Condition No. 6 that talks about how we move this property into the county's possession once they decide to act on it. And that's -- that road, I don't have a depiction of the entire road alignment for the Long-Range Transportation Plan, but it will extend all the way west through the property, which is Silver Strand grove now, going through the process to become a sand mine, and then eventually probably will become a village of some sort. It's owned by the entity of the Barron Collier Companies. So that road connection will be an important one all the way over to the west. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. ARNOLD: There is today an existing road that's depicted here. There's a turn lane on State Road 29, and you talked about the trucks, et cetera. This is -- actually, because of the way the product's prepared, it's subject to standards that are statutes and DEP. So they establish some of the rules and regulations that we have to abide by in terms of how high the vegetation could be stacked and the hours of processing and things like that. So there are some regulatory hoops that we had to go through beyond Collier County. May 22, 2026 Page 17 Just to orient you to the site, these are shown as the primary areas where the vegetation materials are going to be stored. They'll be sorted in this area, and then the incineration will take place in these areas. And if you advance the slide, please, these are our conditions. So if you could go forward, I'll just show you a picture of what these -- there you go. This is a picture of one of the incinerators. There will be multiples of these, but you can see that they're on tracks and can be a little bit mobile on the site. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Are they incinerators or grinders? Do they chop 'em up or do they burn them? MR. ARNOLD: No, they actually burn it. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: They're burning it. MR. ARNOLD: It's called an air curtain incinerator. It's got a blower on the top of it, and it basically reduces the smoke that's associated with the production of it, and it creates a biochar that's left in the bottom. That gets scraped out and it gets, you know, packaged up, and that's the product that's sold. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Interesting. MR. ARNOLD: So if you go backwards, go back to the site plan, please. Thank you. So that production area is going to be generally in this area, and we called it out as processing and production. With regard to permanent structures, there's probably -- you know, other than a portable restroom building, they probably don't need a hardened building here. It will probably be storage container type of materials where the product is stored to be then shipped off site. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So the product that's stored, is it bagged, or is it just out in the open, and then -- so there's not retail sales going on here? It's -- May 22, 2026 Page 18 MR. ARNOLD: That's correct. There are no retail sales that occur here. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. So it will just be somehow put in a truck or bag or whatever and taken to where it needs to be? MR. ARNOLD: That's correct. It will be sold to other providers, but you and I are not going to go there to buy biochar. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Gotcha. MR. ARNOLD: A couple slides forward, please. That one's good -- the condition. Yeah, let's go back there. So we do have seven -- this is just another diagram showing you how, like, carbon gets created. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: It looks dangerous. MR. ARNOLD: Yeah. That's why I have professionals that handle this. So you can see that -- it talks about the biochar discharge here. So that's where it falls down into these, and then they get scraped out and stored for offsite use. But the air curtain itself, you know, it creates this curtain to reduce smoke. So these -- they have these ventilation systems on them. So obviously, there's no [sic] smoke that's emitted, but it's a lessened amount of smoke that's emitted through this system. Can you go back to the conditions, please? A couple slides. Thank you. So we did have the seven conditions. The fire department one is -- we understand it, and we agree with. It's a little lengthy, but we've been communicating with the Immokalee fire district and understand and can live with all of their conditions. Again, No. 6 was the road condition, which is a lot of words, but that was done to make sure that everybody understood how the land May 22, 2026 Page 19 gets conveyed when the county needs it, and it's going to be -- not in the next few years. It's going to be the next many years. But we can accommodate that by keeping any of our improvements out of that area except for probably a little shed that gets inserted for somebody to check in material just to make sure that it's the vegetative material that's supposed to be there, and we'll accommodate it that way. The others are fairly straightforward conditions of approval. Like I said, we don't really have immediate neighbors. I know that -- I think we have one speaker at least here that's a representative from Collier family. And again, we've been coordinating with them throughout the project. Again, it's a unique project. Collier County has qualified this to be one of the -- an industry that is fast tracking, and they're also getting some incentives for job creation. So that was approved by the Board, I think, a couple months ago now. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Let me ask you real quickly about the -- MR. ARNOLD: Sure. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: -- number six. MR. ARNOLD: Okay. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So the way I read this, it's "upon request," right? MR. ARNOLD: Yes. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So you're on notice to keep anything out of that area, or else you'll have to take it out. But I just wanted to make sure that if -- I mean, sometimes there's a lag between when you -- when you convey it to the county, and then it's just open, and, you know, I'd want to -- you know, has there been any discussions about, like, if you were to convey it to the county but yet they don't come in for a year or two and do any improvements on it, May 22, 2026 Page 20 are you going to keep it gated and closed so that people aren't going to be driving back in and out of there? MR. ARNOLD: Well, the way I understand that it's going to work, you know, the county's going to make their request, and then within 60 days we have to make that happen. We're going to have access rights through it because, presumably, whether it's a sand mine or a future village, it's going to be utilizing that same connection to State Road 29. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: But this will be just the extent of your property line, right? MR. ARNOLD: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So it will essentially be a road to nowhere until it becomes extended further, right? MR. ARNOLD: Yes. I mean, that could be -- it's in the 2050 plan, so, I mean -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: That's right around the corner. MR. ARNOLD: -- we're a few years away from that. We'll see. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Gotcha. The other question I had -- and maybe this is -- this is really along the -- I see you have a -- there's a -- it looks like a decel lane -- MR. ARNOLD: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: -- coming into the roadway. And this goes to the point about the type of vehicles or trucks that are going to be bringing debris in for incineration. Number one, what size truck are we talking about? MR. ARNOLD: Well, I think it's going to vary, and they're going to have contracts with different landscape people. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. ARNOLD: So they'll be the trucks that are normally on May 22, 2026 Page 21 your roads anyway. And so, I don't know, some will have trailers, some are trucks that will be full of vegetative debris. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. ARNOLD: But -- and again, there's a right-turn lane, and that is a state highway, so we'll be coordinating with DOT for any additional improvements. We don't really anticipate any in the immediate future. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. So my concern, I guess, and I've -- I'll repeat this, was, you know, your hours of operation are 12 hours per day, seven days a week, but sometimes trucks like to get there early and then they start queuing up before 7 o'clock in order to -- or whatever the hours are. I guess it's dawn, starting at dawn, ending -- MR. ARNOLD: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: -- after sunset. You know, is -- has there been any discussion about that? Because I know I've dealt with this issue with the mining and dump trucks and things like that, and those seem to be a little bit more of difficult trucks to deal with because they're dealing with a lot of rocks and rocks that go in the road, and then they're pulling off on the side of the road to wait till -- the operation to open, and I think that we would want to avoid that. MR. ARNOLD: Well, I think, as Laura mentioned in her presentation, I mean, what's occurring here is probably not vastly different from some of the other agricultural operations that you and I get no say over. They're permitted by right. And they can have tomato production, they can have their large vehicles coming in and out, semi-trucks. I mean, those are basically unregulated by Collier County. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: But are they allowed to May 22, 2026 Page 22 just queue up on the -- on the state roadway? MR. ARNOLD: No. They would have to queue up in the turn lane or on our property. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. ARNOLD: So the turn lane is existing, and it's been serving the ag Silver Strand Orange Grove for many, many years. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. All right. I was just curious about that, because I've heard it before. And then as far as, like, the vehicles, the -- they'll be covered, I would imagine, so debris doesn't fly out and onto the roadways or hit cars or hit other trucks or things like that? MR. ARNOLD: Well, the material that's leaving the site is going to be the biochar material. That's going to be different. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: That's different. I'm talking about the ones coming out. MR. ARNOLD: The ones coming in, I mean, I don't know what the regulations are for the landscape vehicles in town. I know that I see some that have covers over them; some do not. The guys that cut my lawn, they don't have a cover on theirs, but they're driving around 20 miles an hour on our streets. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Well, hopefully somebody thinks about it, because I've had to replace my windshield twice driving on I-75 because of trucks that are carrying aggregate, and their little rocks are bouncing all over the place. MR. ARNOLD: Sure. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: And next thing you know, you've got a crack in your windshield. MR. ARNOLD: Yeah. The aggregate is a different story. There are different regulatory standards for them having cover for their material. Jim Banks can probably address it if you need to May 22, 2026 Page 23 know information. But ours is simply going to be the green vegetative matter. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. All right. Anything else? MR. ARNOLD: I don't think so. I mean, I feel like it's a fairly straightforward request. If you have any specific questions about the processing, Chris Borgeson from ArborX is certainly here happy to answer questions. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. I'm actually very fascinated with this, but I don't want to go too deep into my own personal interests here. But I think it sounds like it's a good -- it's an innovative way to use debris that would not normally be used and that it actually gets to be reused. So why don't we see if there's any public comment and then be able to answer any of that. Anybody sign up for public comment? MS. PADRON: Yes. We have a total of three speakers; two in -- one in person and two virtual. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Great. Let's start with the in-person. MS. PADRON: Nick Kouloheras. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Good afternoon, sir. MR. KOULOHERAS: Good afternoon. Nick Kouloheras, and I'm a senior project manager with Barron Collier Companies, and we are the owners and operators of the Silver Strand 3 parcel immediately to the west of ArborX's parcel here. And I just came here -- we have no objection -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. KOULOHERAS: -- to the project. We think it's a good May 22, 2026 Page 24 thing for Collier County. We think it's a good thing for the environment. And I would just like to further that statement with this whole access easement and State Road 29 connection. They've been great to work with because, as the property owner to the west, that potential connector road one day from Camp Keais to State Road 29 comes right through Barron Collier's -- or the Silver Strand parcel. So we've been working with them closely. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Good. MR. KOULOHERAS: And Chris and his whole team over there at ArborX have just been great to work with. So I just wanted to come and say we have no objection to the project and hope it moves forward. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thanks for being here. I appreciate it. MR. KOULOHERAS: Thank you. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you. The two folks that are online, please. MS. PADRON: Our first speaker is John Peabody. MR. PEABODY: Yeah. I'm supportive. I don't have any major comments. But thank you for your time and (unintelligible) contribute to the community and help the environment at the same time. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. That sounded to me like he's supportive of the application. Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. MS. PADRON: Our next speaker is Alvaro Sanchez. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Hello, Mr. Sanchez. MR. SANCHEZ: (Unintelligible) Sanchez. I'm just in support of the petition and support the variety of benefits it's going to bring to Collier County and the area. May 22, 2026 Page 25 HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you very much. Anybody else? MS. PADRON: That's it. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Great. Well, the community seems to love it. MR. ARNOLD: I won't rebut any of their support. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: That joke's getting old. We'll have to leave that one alone. Okay. Nice presentation by the county, by Mr. Arnold and your group. This sounds like a great project. Good use of lots of debris in this county, a lot of stuff going on. But I appreciate it. I have plenty of information. And just for the record, I want to make sure you're -- you and your clients are in agreement with the conditions that are exactly as written here, all seven of them, right? MR. ARNOLD: Yes, sir. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. All right. MR. ARNOLD: Thank you. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you very much. I'll get a decision out as quickly as I can. Thank you. And our number two court reporter is here; Number 2. She snuck in. All right. This is 3C. And look who's here. MR. KELLY: Good morning, Mr. Dickman. John Kelly, Planner III, for the record. And I guess it's good afternoon. Sorry. This is going to be Agenda Item 3C. It's a boat lift canopy deviation, PL20250000062. The petitioner requests the Hearing Examiner approve a 30-foot-by-13-foot boat lift canopy and a boat lift canopy deviation to allow a second 30-foot-by-13-foot boat lift canopy on a canal-front lot pursuant to Section 5.03.06.G.3 of the Land Development Code. May 22, 2026 Page 26 The property, Folio No. 68290840009, is comprised of two lots that were combined for development totaling 0.66 acres located at 115 New Port Drive, also known as Lots 21 and 22, Port of the Islands, Phase 1, in Section 9, Township 52 South, Range 28 East, of unincorporated Collier County, Florida. The properties are located in a Residential Single-Family 3, RSF-3, zoning district. And to note, Section 5.03.06.G.2 allows for one boat lift canopy on canal-front lots. Two are allowed on bay-front lots. The applicant desires to construct two boat lift canopies each measuring 13 feet-by-13 feet and -- I'm sorry, 30 feet-by-13 feet and 12 feet in height on a canal-front lot. The existing dock facility was constructed per building Permit No. PRMAR20230722798, for which a certificate of completion was issued on April 17, 2024. The provided Map of Specific Purpose Survey produced by Court Gregory Surveying, Incorporated, dated March 9, 2024, demonstrates that the dock facility is consistent with the zoning and building department approvals. As per public notice requirements, they're contained in LDC Section 10.03.06.H., the property owner notification letter and Clerk's posting were affected by the county on May 2, 2025, and public hearing sign was posted by Planning staff on May 5, 2025. While the LDC does not provide review evaluation criteria, in the event of a deviation from the boat lift canopy standard criteria, staff recognizes that both requested boat lift canopies are compliant with the criteria existing within LDC Section 5.03.06.G.1, and therefore, staff can support the requested deviation from Section 5.03.06.G.2. No public comment has been received in response to advertising for this project, and staff, therefore, recommends that the Hearing May 22, 2026 Page 27 Examiner approve this petition as described in accordance with the canopy and site plan -- plans provided within Attachments A and B subject to the following conditions: One, that the boat lift canopies are to be removed upon the issuance of a hurricane warning affecting the location of the canopies; and, two, a building permit shall be obtained for the construction and/or placement of both boat lift canopies. That concludes staff's presentation, and I hand it over to the applicant. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. John, let me be clear about this. So you're telling me that -- so by requesting two canopies, there's really no criteria for, like, dealing with that as a variance or something like that, right? Is that what I heard you say? MR. KELLY: Correct. The only criteria we have are for the administrative approval of a boat lift canopy. The deviation, there are no real standards. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So the deviation is one where -- or two where one is permitted? MR. KELLY: The deviation is the quantity or the number of canopies. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: All right. Got it. Okay. I understand. Thank you. So we'll just make something up. Just kidding. MR. KELLY: And I believe we have Sherry Gaston with Waterway Boat Lift Covers. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Great. Ask her about dredging. Hello. MS. GASTON: Hi. How are you today? HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Good. MS. GASTON: Wonderful. So I'm Sherry with Waterway Boat May 22, 2026 Page 28 Lift Covers, and I am the permitting specialist there. And Mr. Farace came to us needing two canopies -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Uh-huh. MS. GASTON: -- to protect his investments that he has. If we could do the next slide, please. And the next one. Thank you. Just a little introduction about our company. We've been around since 1983, for one. We install boat lift cover systems over existing boat lifts. We have two styles of systems that customers can choose from. We have the radius veranda, and we have the radius beam style. Our systems are built with marina grade aluminum, vinyl, and bungees, built to withstand the harshest elements of Florida. Next. Go ahead. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: If I could ask you a question, because I don't think I've met you before. MS. GASTON: No. First time. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Could you tell me a little bit about what you do with this company and your background and your experience as an expert? MS. GASTON: I do all of our permitting. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MS. GASTON: I deal with 15 to 18 different counties and cities. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. And how long have you been doing that? MS. GASTON: Going on four years now. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Four years, okay. That's -- MS. GASTON: I started out in docks. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Docks. And -- May 22, 2026 Page 29 MS. GASTON: Yeah. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: -- moved to canopies, okay. MS. GASTON: Yep. And now I'm with canopies. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MS. GASTON: I do all the local permitting. I also do DEP and Army Corps and all of that as well. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay, okay. MS. GASTON: These are our two styles of canopy -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So I will recognize you as an expert. That's why I did that. I wanted to get that on the record that I see you as an expert so that the information you're providing me is competent substantial evidence. And if you could pull the microphone a little bit closer to you, that would be helpful. Thank you. Because you're speaking a little softly. MS. GASTON: Okay. These are our radius veranda style beam. Then this is what Mr. Farace has chosen to go with. And the next slide, please. And, as I said, his request is to allow two canopies at his address to protect both of his vessels that he has investment in from the elements of Florida. And the next slide, please. And this is the ordinance that is in effect now. It's 05.03.06, Section G.1.2.3, no more than one canopy for each residential unit lawfully exists on canopy -- on canal-front properties, and two shall be permitted on bay-front properties. No canopy, when measured at its highest point, shall extend more than 12 feet above the seawall cap, or if no seawall exists, above the decking of the marine improvement. No canopies shall exceed 35 feet in length, no more May 22, 2026 Page 30 than 37 inches of overhang. His particular canopies are 33, and his overhang is 2-foot. Next slide, please. This is the site plan showing the location of where they'll be. His dock is built with these slips at an angle so we have plenty of room for navigation. We're within the 25 percentile of the waterway. And the next slide, please. And this shows his property, which is very nice, by the way, and he owns both of the properties there. He purchased one first with the home and then purchased the one next to it as well. Next slide. And that's the conclusion, that we are asking for the additional canopy so he can protect both of his vessels from the Florida elements, and Waterway Canopies is asking on behalf of Mr. Farace to have the deviation approved. And just a little bit of knowledge. On the canopies themselves, the canopy itself, the material, it is held with bungees to the aluminum frame. They are to be removed at 70 miles an hour or higher, and they are posted on the products as well. The frames without the canopies withstand up to 180 mile-an-hour hurricane winds, and they are actually secured to the lift pilings. So we have no end-water works or anything like that. And that's about it. Pretty simple. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Yeah, I was just curious. I was looking at -- I mean, because it seems like there's -- there's definitely a distinction between bay and canal. MS. GASTON: Yeah, I think it has to do with the width and navigation things maybe. I don't know. Mr. Kelly could probably answer that better than me. We just follow their rules, so... HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. That's good. May 22, 2026 Page 31 MS. GASTON: Yeah. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Well, let me go to public comment if there is any. MS. PADRON: We have no speakers for this one. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: No public speakers. MS. GASTON: Oh, I also meant to tell you, too, Mr. Farace came here today also with letters of approval from both of his adjoining neighbors as well. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Oh, okay. All right. And we have those in the record, then, right? MS. GASTON: We do not. He brought them with me today. I could give them over if you'd like them. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: That would be great. I think you should put those in the record. MS. GASTON: Sure. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: You can give them to John. He'll take them in and give me copies of them. MS. GASTON: All right. And that would be it unless you have some questions. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: No, I have a question maybe for John or someone on the county side. At what point does an area become a bay versus a canal? I know I'm throwing zingers at you, but it does seem to be relevant, because a canal -- I see this as clearly man-made, but, you know, at some point something becomes a bay. I don't know, does it have to be surrounded by natural features? If you don't know, don't guess, please. Okay. MR. BOSI: Mike Bosi, again. And I don't know the specific definition, but when I look at the -- the aerials, it doesn't strike -- it does strike me as manmade, but it does not strike me as a typical canal where you have a very limited May 22, 2026 Page 32 size and width. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. MR. BOSI: This is a much different arrangement than a traditional canal -- a canal waterway. It has more attributes similar to a bay, but it is most certainly manmade. And I think that was probably what the distinction is. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: I agree with you. I was just curious about that. Because I'm going to have to grapple with this idea of two canopies without any real controlling distinction other than how you would do individual canopies. But it is meaningful that you have no objections from the -- are those from the neighboring properties? MS. GASTON: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Neighboring properties. Are the docks in existent [sic] now or -- MS. GASTON: Yes. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: They are. The docks are there? MS. GASTON: I think we were -- 2024, I think, was when they got those. Yeah. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. All right. Interesting. Okay, great. I don't have any further questions for you. MS. GASTON: Okay. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you for being here. It was nice to meet you. MS. GASTON: Nice to meet you, too. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: And I will get a decision out as quickly as possible. May 22, 2026 Page 33 MS. GASTON: All right. Thank you so much. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Keep up the good work. MS. GASTON: I'm trying. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: All right. Now we're moving to 3D, right, correct? 3D. MR. JOHN: Again, for the record, John Kelly, Planner III, for the county. This is going to be Agenda Item 3D. It's a boat dock petition, PL20240011787. The petitioner requests that the Hearing Examiner approve a 22-foot boat dock extension beyond the maximum permitted protrusion of 20 feet allowed by Section 5.03.06.E.1 of the Collier County Land Development Code for waterways greater than 100 feet in width to accommodate the construction of a second floating dock that will protrude 42 feet into a 280-foot waterway pursuit to LDC Section 5.03.06.H. The property is located at 259 [sic] 2nd Street, Folio No. 53852040001, also known as Lot 24, Block B, Little Hickory Shores, No. 1 in Section 5, Township 48 South, Range 25 East, of unincorporated Collier County, Florida. It's located within a Residential Single-Family 4, an RSF-4 zoning district. And the subject property comprises 0.41 acres and is uniquely situated, as it has water frontage on three sides. The 390 plus-or-minus feet of shoreline consists of riprap and mangroves. The petitioner desires to replace an existing dock on the northern side with one comprising a single boat slip with a boat lift for a 40-foot vessel and a deck over platform lift for two personal watercraft. Said dock will satisfy setback and protrusion requirements. The petitioner also desires to add a second floating dock on the south side of the property to serve as a second slip for the temporary May 22, 2026 Page 34 mooring of their vessel at all tide levels and for the launching of kayaks and paddleboards. This dock will satisfy the side riparian setbacks and requires a boat dock extension to allow for the 42-foot protrusion as measured from mean high water line required -- which is required for the slope of the gangway for safe access to the floating dock. Public notice requirements were as per LDC Section 10.03.06.H. The property owner notification letter and Clerk's posting were affected by the county on May 22nd, 2025, and a public hearing sign was posted by Zoning staff on May 6th, 2025. This petition was reviewed by staff based upon the review criteria contained in LDC Section 5.03.06.H. Of the primary criteria, it satisfied four of five. Of the secondary criteria, it satisfies five of six with the sixth being the Manatee Protection Plan, and it has been found to be consistent with both the Growth Management Plan and the Land Development Code. As for public comment, I received one phone call in response to advertising. Upon providing the caller with additional information, they stated they had no issues with the dock. Staff recommends -- with the second dock, that is. Staff recommends the Hearing Examiner approve this petition as described in accordance with the proposed dock plans contained within Attachment A. That concludes staff's presentation. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thanks, John. Nice work. All right. Let's get to it. Hi, Jeff. MR. ROGERS: Good afternoon. For the record, Jeff Rogers with Turrell, Hall & Associates here today representing the applicants, Michael Beyer and Lisa Trautner, and they May 22, 2026 Page 35 reside -- actually are currently building a home here to live, but they live down the street located at 230 1st Street, which is actually not down the street. It's one over. So they currently reside in this neighborhood as well. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Is this really Bonita Springs? MR. ROGERS: It's Collier County, and it is -- it confuses me every time. But yes, it's Bonita Springs. It's -- it is. Yes, sir. To answer your question, yes, sir. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: It confuses me. MR. ROGERS: All the time. I don't get it. But yes, it is Bonita Springs. So moving forward, if you would. Here's a couple -- this property is unique for the area. As John mentioned, it's at the end -- it's a terminus end of the cul-de-sac. So it's oddly shaped in the sense that it does have three -- technically two, but three usable sides for a shoreline, and it has a considerable amount of usable shoreline. This area is on Little Hickory Bay, also state lands. So it is a natural waterway that does enter to the Gulf of Mexico through Wiggins Pass. You could go north under Bonita Beach Road in a smaller vessel. As John mentioned, there is an existing dock on site on our northern shoreline that is currently there, as you can see in these pictures. If you'd move forward one, too. I think I've got some other potential, yeah. So -- and it does accommodate, currently, two boat slips. It has a natural riprap shoreline. And the owners basically came to us and they wanted, A, to put a seawall in first and foremost. So we did May 22, 2026 Page 36 permit a seawall with the state and federal government to do that as well as these docks. And part of that request was to replace the historical floating dock that was there originally and in roughly the same location as the existing -- or the proposed floating dock that did wash away during Ian, but that did -- I don't know if it had BDE -- or I don't know the history of that. But there was a dock there in the past. Moving forward, if you would. So here's just a quick little historical aerial overlay showing you that it is a natural waterway, and it has been man altered with the canals being dredged out. I would consider this being on a bay, back to your other question. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah, yeah. MR. ROGERS: So -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: How would you define that? So if it's -- MR. ROGERS: There is a definition. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: If there's a natural -- if it's natural boundaries, then it's a bay, and if they're not natural boundaries -- MR. ROGERS: You can get -- you get into the weeds on natural and, you know, what was here historically and not. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. MR. ROGERS: But yes, that is a good way to look at it; however, larger water bodies, there is a definition that DEP has that I would defer you to to defining what a bay is. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay, gotcha. MR. ROGERS: So anything manmade and has -- it looks like a square, in my opinion, is more of a canal design than a natural bay. That's just my opinion. May 22, 2026 Page 37 HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. I think it could get tricky if you're looking in the Vanderbilt and the Conner's Estate area -- MR. ROGERS: Yeah. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: -- where there is a lot of open area that goes back in there, and at one time that was natural -- MR. ROGERS: Correct, 100 percent. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: -- but the canals going east and west aren't natural, more or less. MR. ROGERS: The funny thing about it is this is Little Hickory Bay, and that's Vanderbilt Lagoon. So how did they come up with those names historically? Do you know what I mean? I just -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: I'm side tracking everyone. Sorry. MR. ROGERS: Yeah, anyways. So moving forward, they wanted to rebuild the existing dock that's on your north side which is not drawing your attention to it because it does meet the 20 feet. The second dock was proposed along the south side. And the proposed protrusion is ultimately 42 feet. So the applicant is requesting a 22-foot boat dock extension out into the waterway that is considerably wider than the rest. It's 280 feet. I forget my -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: It's going to be over here, right? MR. ROGERS: Correct. Yes, sir. If you move forward one more slide, I think -- there you go. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. ROGERS: So the blue line -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Is this -- is this for the same vessel -- May 22, 2026 Page 38 MR. ROGERS: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: -- basically to be able to temporarily moor it over here -- MR. ROGERS: Correct, correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: -- versus -- so it's not going to be multiple vessels. It's the same vessel but wanting to be able to put it up on a floating -- MR. ROGERS: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: -- type thing. MR. ROGERS: Yep. So -- and when they're out, and they come back at a low tide, they can tie up to the floating dock because water depths are sufficient down there at all tide levels. But on the north dock, if they were to temporarily moor that boat on the outer -- outside, the waterway is so much shorter. I think it's 73 feet. I have a visual for that ahead. But it would block the waterway considerably. So this is a multiuse. It's recreational activities, kayaking, paddle boarding, but it also allows them to temporarily moor their boat there and let the tide come in, so to speak. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So will the riprap go away, or are you just building a seawall behind the riprap? MR. ROGERS: So state rules are a new seawall, you're required to maintain riprap in front of it or put it in front because of it being on a natural bay and waterway. So that's a state rule that -- so there will be riprap there, to answer your question. But the blue line represents where the new seawall will be placed. And the importance of that is the elevation of the seawall is proposed to considerably raise the top of bank for -- obviously, they're building a new home, so they're going to be filling the site, but also to help with storm surge protection a little bit. But ultimately, May 22, 2026 Page 39 what does that do? That raises the gangway of the floating dock, which at higher elevation, for a slope, a decent slope is the longer the gangway goes, pushing the dock out. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So this entire dock is a floating dock, right? MR. ROGERS: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So it will go up and down with the tide, and then the gangway is aluminum or metal, right, and it's -- MR. ROGERS: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: -- going to be on -- it will have -- I know how these work. So the whole thing goes up and down with the tide? MR. ROGERS: Correct, yeah. And -- but the top of it is either mounted to the cap of the seawall or pile supported right at the cap elevation, and you walk just down the gangway to it. So dead low winter tides, it could be a little steep, so... HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: How did these types of docks fare with storm surge in the last hurricane? MR. ROGERS: Pretty well. I mean, honestly, it all depends on the control pile elevation. These docks are obviously -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Where it goes up over the top of the pile? MR. ROGERS: And it happened, and it has happened. Fort Myers Beach, during Ian, it was a nightmare because of that. So we have extended our pile elevation requirements. It used to be around 10 feet above mean high water elevation, the 10 to 12, and now we're going 15 to the top of the pile. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Isn't there a hook on the top of the pile that -- May 22, 2026 Page 40 MR. ROGERS: No. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Even if there were, probably the pressure would pop it right off. MR. ROGERS: Would break it, yeah. Especially a concrete floating dock, so much weight, you know what I mean? It's just going to -- it's just going to -- you can't stop water. So it really depends on elevation of your piles. And there is no limitation in Collier County on that, so they could be, you know, 15, 20 feet if they want it. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: No. It seems like a good solution. MR. ROGERS: Yep. So moving forward, you know, we're requesting a 22-foot extension. I'll just quickly run through the criteria. There's your best visualization. You know, what's driving this -- and No. 1 of the primary, let's just start there, whether or not the number of docks, facilities, or boat slip is consistent with what's allowed with the zoning. And, yes, we do have two docks, but the number of vessels proposed to be moored there is two. Personal watercrafts are not considered a vessel per Collier County. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Let me ask you a quick question. So I would think that these come prefabricated, right? MR. ROGERS: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So that is the 6 feet. So it's not as easy as, like, just cutting a, you know -- MR. ROGERS: No, no. They come -- typically, they come in 10-foot sections. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah, I gotcha. MR. ROGERS: And then you just either -- basically through-bolt them together is a good way to explain it. May 22, 2026 Page 41 HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Got it. MR. ROGERS: There's a gangway. There's your seawall cap. You can see -- the length of the gangway is really what's -- I worked with staff. I worked -- you know, I had some meetings with John and Ray and tried to bring this in as much as I could. I did, just so you know, reduce the gangway length from 25 feet to -- I knocked it down to 20 just to bring it in a little bit more. So I did make that change to -- tried to bring this in as tight as I could for this petition. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Uh-huh. MR. ROGERS: So worked with them on that, and that was fine. Primary No. 2, whether or not the water depth at the proposed site is so shallow that the vessel, general length, type, is able to moor there. The water depths on this south side are sufficient at all tide levels. We have about six feet mean low tide, so we do not meet this criteria. It's more of the elevation of the seawall and the fact that it is a floating structure. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: But let me ask -- so you mentioned something. So the point being is that coming in at low tide, it's difficult to get into the slips, so they would moor out here, but then it becomes a navigation issue; is that what you were saying? MR. ROGERS: Yeah. Yes, sir. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: All right. MR. ROGERS: So the applicant actually came to me and asked for a much smaller floating dock, and I pointed that out to them. Growing up in Royal Harbor in Naples, I know the canals are tight, just like this. And so I pointed that out to them. And they're like, just make it longer, and we'll do it that way, and it helped justify our petition, which, you know, it wasn't them coming up with that. They were going to use more of a recreational kayak dock, to be honest with you, but I was, like, guys, what if this happens? You know, May 22, 2026 Page 42 wintertime, you could get a lot of low tides. You're really restricted. So let's get a little bit bigger dock here for you to do this, and they agreed, and that's how we got here today. But the main driver is not to block the waterway, which it technically could do, moor the boat out there on a primary basis. Number 3, whether -- of the primary, whether or not the proposed dock facility may have an adverse impact on navigation. As you can see here on this exhibit, the waterway is -- it's open for navigation everywhere. There's no marked channel, so it should not impact navigation at all. Number 4, whether or not the proposed dock facility protrudes more than 25 percent of the width of waterway. I believe we're right at 15 percent of the waterway width, so we are well under the 25 percent. The waterway's 280 feet, so, yes, we are 15 percent. Number 5, whether or not the proposed location and design is such that it would interfere with the use of neighboring docks. And as you saw in the previous aerial, it will not interfere with anybody else's access. The property to our south does have two docks as well, you could see on that aerial. And even as-is, we maintain a -- I think we're a 50-foot setback, so we're well over what's required per the county rules. So No. 1 of the secondary, whether there are special conditions not involving water depths. And here I would have to say it's the seawall. The fact that we're changing the shoreline elevation is a special condition. That's a self-inflicted change, per se, right? So it might not be special, but it is a significant change that is driving the slope and length of the gangway that we have to take into consideration when we design this. And the fact that the waterway's width -- and there's plenty of depth, you know, that's all natural that we can do, push the dock out this far and even propose something May 22, 2026 Page 43 like that -- allows that as well. So No. 2, whether the proposed dock facility would allow reasonable safe access. Going back, I believe it's an 8-foot-wide dock, off the top of my head, so there's plenty of room for access to the vessel as well as maintaining access to the water for recreational activities on the dock. Number 3, for single-family dock facilities, whether or not the length of the vessel or vessels, combination, exceed the 50 percent of the property's shoreline. No, we -- we're well under that requirement. One vessel, but even if we had two 40-footers, as kind of shown here, we're 80 feet. There's 200-and-some-odd feet of shoreline. I forget what it is off the top of my head. I should know that, but I don't. I can tell you here in a second. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Is this a natural -- like some kind of natural shoreline? MR. ROGERS: Three hundred. Yeah. I mean, go back to the -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: It seems like they kind of created -- MR. ROGERS: It is. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: I was just curious. MR. ROGERS: And we have to follow the meandering mean high water line with the seawall. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. MR. ROGERS: So if you go back to one of the earlier slides, go way back to the beginning, the historical aerial, you can see the shoreline. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Oh, yeah. MR. ROGERS: The shoreline was altered. My assumption is this county line is a little bit off, and the shoreline you can see kind of May 22, 2026 Page 44 still follows that shape. So I'm sure it was changed over years, slightly, but -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So all this would be mangrove probably? MR. ROGERS: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: But not this, right? MR. ROGERS: No. You can tell -- you can kind of see the line. That kind of turns to, like, a scrub, you know. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Scrub. MR. ROGERS: Yeah. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Hardwood. MR. ROGERS: Yep. So the flood -- the mangroves take the flood. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: What year is this; '52? MR. ROGERS: '52, yep. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: That's amazing. MR. ROGERS: You should see Vanderbilt Lagoon. Yeah, it's pretty. You need to get one of our books. Number 4, I believe I'm on, whether or not the proposed facility would have a major impact to views of the neighboring properties. This should not have -- in our opinion, should not have any impacts to existing views of the waterway due to its location and the current setting of the adjacent properties and their current views. It will not, in our opinion, impact that. Number 5, seagrasses. There were no seagrasses. There are plenty of mangroves around there, but there are no seagrasses located in this area within 200 feet. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: How come there aren't any seagrasses? Is this an impaired waterway? MR. ROGERS: No. It's just -- my opinion is the -- May 22, 2026 Page 45 HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: The turbidity? MR. ROGERS: Yeah. It's the water clarity. They have a lot of mangroves, so these red mangroves do release a red dye into the water, which does cause, like, a tanning of the water, so to speak, but also freshwater input is -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Gotcha. MR. ROGERS: -- you know. But Little Hickory does have areas out in the actual bay on the other side that is -- does have seagrasses for sure. It's a pretty high-quality bay, honestly, it is. But that really wraps up my presentation. I'm happy to answer any additional questions that you may have or, you know, that come up, so... Thank you. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Any public speakers? MS. PADRON: We have none. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: No public speakers. So if I'm not wrong, I think the boat -- the boat dock lots are just to the north of this, right? MR. ROGERS: They're just to our -- if you -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: North or south? MR. ROGERS: -- keep going forward, they're just to our southwest. See them over there? HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Oh, okay. There they are, yeah. MR. ROGERS: Bottom left corner. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So these lots are actually making up for the boat dock lots that don't have room for a house. Interesting. MR. ROGERS: Those are unique to Collier County, too, those boat dock lots. I think that's really one of the only areas. May 22, 2026 Page 46 HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: No. Capri. MR. ROGERS: Where is the others? HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Capri. Capri Island. MR. ROGERS: Capri -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Isles of Capri has a few of them. MR. ROGERS: Do they? HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. MR. ROGERS: Okay. That's news to me. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: I think so -- or they had houses on the other side of the street. MR. ROGERS: Oh, that -- yeah, they have those, yes. You're right about that. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So they did have the principal structure on the other side of the street. MR. ROGERS: Other side of the street. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: But I don't -- yeah, you're right, I don't think they're boat dock lots -- they're true boat dock lots. MR. ROGERS: It's just a -- it's for, like, a car and you've got your dock boat, so -- done a lot of those, too, over the years. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. ROGERS: Anyhoo. Yes, sir. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you. I have nothing else. Thank you. Very informative. I will get a decision out as quickly as possible. MR. ROGERS: All right. Thank you. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thanks for being here. MR. ROGERS: Yep. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: All right. Sorry for May 22, 2026 Page 47 the -- taking you guys on tangents. Okay. So we're going to do -- these are -- this is a compan- -- both of these are companion items, which means that I will be rendering two different decisions, but it involves the same property, so we're going to allow for one presentation from the county, one presentation from the applicant, which will cover both petitions, but with the understanding that I have to render two separate decisions. MR. KELLY: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you. MR. KELLY: For the record, John Kelly, Planner III. Before you is Agenda Items 3E and 3F. First is a variance petition, PL20240011209, and secondly, the boat dock petition, PL20240007613. It's a request for the Hearing Examiner to approve both a variance from Section 5.03.06.E.6 of the Collier County Land Development Code to reduce the minimum side yard required setback from 15 feet to zero on the north side for a proposed dock facility on the lot with 70 feet of water frontage and for a 90-foot boat dock extension from the maximum permitted protrusion of 20 feet allowed by LDC Section 5.03.06.E.1 for waterways 100 feet or greater in width to allow a boat docking facility that will protrude a total of 110 feet into a waterway that is 1,138-plus-or-minus feet wide pursuit to LDC Section 5.03.06.H. The subject property comprises .19 acres and is located at 19 Capri Boulevard, Folio No. 52341760002, and is also known as Lot 46, Isles of Capri, No. 1, in Section 32, Township 51 South, Range 26 East, of unincorporated Collier County, Florida. It's located within a Residential Single-Family 4, RSF-4, zoning district. Public notice requirements for the variance petition were as per LDC Section 10.03.06.F.2, and for the boat dock extension per LDC May 22, 2026 Page 48 Section 10.03.06.H. The agent letter to property owners within 150 feet was sent by the applicant's agent on January 24, 2025, and the property owner notification letter and Clerk's posting were affected by the county on January -- I'm sorry -- on May 20 -- I'm sorry -- May 2nd, 2025. The public hearing sign was posted by Zoning staff on May 5, 2025. The variance application was reviewed by staff based upon the criteria contained within LDC Section 9.04.03, a through h, with findings stated within the staff report. The boat dock extension was reviewed based upon criteria contained within LDC Section 5.03.06.H. And of the primary criteria, it satisfies five of five. Of the secondary criteria, it satisfied four of six with the sixth being not applicable because it's the Manatee Protection Plan. Both have been found to be consistent with the Growth Management Plan and the Land Development Code. No phone calls or letters have been received in response to advertising for either project. And staff recommends the Hearing Examiner approve both the variance and both dock extension in accordance with the plans contained within Attachment C of the individual staff reports. Approval of the boat dock is predicated upon the approval of the companion variance. That concludes staff's presentation. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: John, question. And if you don't have the answer for this, maybe Mike or somebody else does. What would be the -- what is preventing having both requests on the same petition? It's the same dock, right? MR. KELLY: Same dock. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: One's an extension and May 22, 2026 Page 49 one's a variance of the side -- MR. KELLY: They're two individual application types, and to my knowledge, each -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Because of the criteria. MR. KELLY: -- requires a public hearing, and so they're heard individually. I could be wrong and would defer to Mike. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: I just -- I know they have different criteria for sure, but I just didn't know if there was any reason why you can't ask for more than one thing on the same application. MR. BOSI: And Mike Bosi, Planning and Zoning director. Just because of the way that our application forms -- they don't provide that flexibility. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Gotcha, okay. MR. BOSI: So, unfortunately, we have to file two applications. But because of -- it's one project, we have coordinated with the County Attorney's Office, and they said we can just -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Do it this way. MR. BOSI: -- everything can be heard as one hearing, but there has to be two separate decisions. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Decisions, right. MR. BOSI: Because it's two separate applications, unfortunately. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: I understand. Two separate fees as well? MR. BOSI: Correct. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. All right. Okay. Great. Gotcha. Thank you. I was just curious about that. Thank you. Hi. May 22, 2026 Page 50 MR. PEARSON: Good afternoon, Mr. Hearing Examiner. For the record, my name is Nick Pearson, owner/operator of Bayshore Marine Consulting, and I am here representing my clients, the Ambrogis, on this BDE and variance petition. Okay. So to start the presentation, you can kind of see the general location where the property is. It's on the south side of Capri on what I would call is a bay. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: I was going to ask you that question. How would you characterize this, a bay or a canal? You're characterizing it as a bay. MR. PEARSON: I would call this a bay. It's natural, although it has been altered historically via dredging. That was before it became part of the aquatic preserve. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you. MR. PEARSON: You know, there are other areas on Capri I would not feel so confident about, but yes, I think this area is a bay. If we could go to the next slide. So this is a little bit of a better depiction. You can see in that red circle exactly where the house is, and there is an existing dock here already. Obviously, you can see as well some of the other residences along this little stretch of Capri. There's lots of nonconforming docks here. Whether they were grandfathered or granted BDEs, I think it's a mix of both. Okay, if we could go to the next slide. So this is the survey. The reason I wanted to provide this is, it just shows a little bit of a depiction on how long the existing dock is, kind of where it is in relation to those water depths. You know, you can see that it's basically sitting in one to two feet at the end at low tide. So the existing dock really is not adequate. I'd also note that the side setback is really not enough to allow a May 22, 2026 Page 51 vessel on the north side without crossing a riparian line. You know, that's problematic for obvious reasons. You don't really want to be putting your boat on somebody else's riparian area. And then the other thing I want to point out is that the dock to the south actually does cross the riparian line. So there's a little bit of it that's on my client's riparian area. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: How long has that dock been there? MR. PEARSON: The neighboring dock? HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yes. MR. PEARSON: Probably quite a while. I don't know off the top of my head. I didn't research that dock in particular, but -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: More than five years? MR. PEARSON: I would guess so. Most of these docks have either, like I said, been grandfathered or -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: I'm innocent then. I didn't approve it. MR. PEARSON: Okay. I mean, there's lots of docks out there. It happens all the time where I look at these -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Gotcha. MR. PEARSON: -- and, you know, most of them are either grandfathered or they have a boat dock extension. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: But interestingly, though, if you took this property line, the riparian -- the riparian line would go this way, right? MR. PEARSON: Probably. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Straight out? So it's kind of like mirroring that. MR. PEARSON: There's a little bit of an oddity with some of these lots where there is land beyond the platted boundary. May 22, 2026 Page 52 HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. MR. PEARSON: And you'll notice that that's actually the case with this lot as well. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. MR. PEARSON: And we'll get into that a little bit in a minute with, you know, basically establishing where the protrusion comes from. But yes, that added land can alter the riparian line a bit. I know I've said it in the past, but it's kind of a common misconception that the riparian lines are always a direct extension of the side lot lines, and that's not true. They often are, but not always. Many times they come off at angles. Obviously, that's not the case here. The surveyor established these riparian lines, and he did establish them as coming straight off of -- you know, basically as an extension of the side lot lines. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. MR. PEARSON: And I think that's it for this one. If we could go to the next slide. So this is our proposal. You can see this is not entirely different than the existing configuration except that it's slightly longer, slightly narrower. In this instance, we would be able to put boats on both sides of the terminal platform. Note that we've kind of put the dock where it is for a couple of reasons. The first one being that the water depths kind of cut into shore a little closer on the north side, so pushing the dock north allows us to kind of shorten the protrusion ask a little bit. The second reason, it kind of also spaces the dock evenly between the two neighboring docks. Even though we are asking for this setback variance, I think moving the dock closer to the south neighbor kind of would, I don't want to say encroach upon them May 22, 2026 Page 53 more, but it basically just provides a little more space for everybody. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So what's the point of going from four feet to five feet width here? MR. PEARSON: Sorry. Could you repeat that? HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: This is four feet, right -- MR. PEARSON: Yes. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: -- width? MR. PEARSON: Yes. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: And then it ends up going to five feet here? MR. PEARSON: Yeah. So that's basically the terminal platform. I mentioned earlier this area is located in the aquatic preserve. There's a state code that says the terminal platform cannot exceed 160 square feet. So that's a little bit of, I guess, a projection of what -- you know, showing that we're in line with those rules. But for our sake, yes, it's just a -- it's just an emphasis on what the terminal platform is. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: But you couldn't reduce that to four? MR. PEARSON: You could build inside of that footprint if you wanted to. You know, generally speaking, you want to have a little more space at the end of the dock. It just provides a little more room to move around, load stuff on and off the boat. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. Okay. Even if you did bring it in, you'd still be asking for a side variance, yes? MR. PEARSON: Probably, yes. Yes, I mean, because the lift is still -- you would have to move. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: You would gain one foot; that's it. MR. PEARSON: Yes. You'd have to move the entire lift inside May 22, 2026 Page 54 the side setback, though, to avoid -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. PEARSON: -- to avoid needing the setback variance. And I also should bring up that the state approval in this case required a no objection letter from the north neighbor. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. PEARSON: So we did have that. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: And we're going to -- you're going to be absolutely positive these are not crossing over the riparian? MR. PEARSON: I recommend it on every one of these sorts of -- whenever these petitions go to construction, that they hire a surveyor to put a pole in the ground, make sure that when the piles get driven, that they're put in the right place. Otherwise, you know, you end up, you know, potentially not finding out about this until you go to get an as-built survey at the end of construction, and at that point it's too late. You have to -- you'd have to tear the whole dock apart. And you know, at that point, it's like, do you redo the whole dock, or do you come in to try to get a new approval here? HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. MR. PEARSON: I'd prefer neither. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: No, I think it's a good idea. I mean, putting in piles in the water is a lot different than using a posthole digger on dry land and being able to be accurate about it, because sometimes when you're jetting them down or however they want to do them, you could slip over and move over, and -- but I just -- hopefully they'll be careful about this and make sure it goes exactly where it's supposed to go. MR. PEARSON: Yeah. And when I say "the surveyor," I have them put a pole out there. I'm talking about just like a little PVC May 22, 2026 Page 55 pole. Something that is temporary. It can be removed after construction. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Thank you. MR. PEARSON: I think that is it for this one. If we could go to the next slide. Okay. So this is just a standard kind of slide. I know this comes up in every petition. The width of waterway here, obviously, is -- it's quite wide if you measure directly perpendicular to the lot line. Next slide, please. So again, this is just a -- kind of a rough, you know, measurement of some of the docks around here. You can see many of them are a fair bit longer than actually even what we're asking for. The other thing that I want to point out, too, is that on this slide, I have a number on our proposed dock that says 93 feet. It's a little different than what the total ask is on the petition, which is 110 feet. The 110 is measuring from the platted rear property line. So there's some additional measurement there in our protrusion -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: You're going to shoreline here, right? MR. PEARSON: Yes. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: So basically that's from the shoreline. MR. PEARSON: Yes. That's from the mean high -- HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: But from the red line here, it's 100 -- yeah, that's -- okay. MR. PEARSON: Yeah. And if -- actually, if we could go back to the proposed, I can actually -- I can point that out a little better. I think I meant to bring that up. I think it was one or two -- or two back. This is fine, too. You can basically see there's the platted rear property line -- May 22, 2026 Page 56 HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Two feet, three feet, yeah. MR. PEARSON: -- and then there's 20 feet between where that additional land was that I sort of mentioned earlier. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Uh-huh. MR. PEARSON: So kind of regardless of where you take protrusion from, 20 feet, which is what the county code typically allows, really isn't adequate here at all. So almost no matter what you build here, it would require a BDE to be functional. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay for a canoe, I guess. MR. PEARSON: If -- yeah, if you don't mind pulling it across the ground. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Yeah. MR. PEARSON: And you can see where the mean low water line is there, too. It's even further than 20 feet. So -- so yes, that is kind of the basis for -- or part of the basis for why we're having this petition. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Got it. MR. PEARSON: Okay. Next slide, please. So this is another, we'll say, wrench in the gears. There were seagrasses at this site. So you can kind of tell that the grasses -- they're more thin in density than I think this hatch probably portrays. We're talking somewhere between 2 and 10 percent on average coverage. So that's pretty thin. Still, it's -- there is a delineated area where you can see them. And you can see that it basically is a continuous stretch across the riparian area. The only exception being the footprint of the existing dock. So that's important because, obviously, we can't really avoid them here. You can't actually put the dock past the minus 4-foot May 22, 2026 Page 57 depth contour at low tide, so that prevents you from traversing them entirely. As shown, we are complying with the regulations in the Land Development Code for building within the seagrasses. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Got it. MR. PEARSON: So if we could go to the next slide. So this is what the site looks like. You can imagine the proposed dock is pretty much right to the right of this one, so pretty much evenly spaced between the neighboring docks, and it's pretty -- this is a pretty typical design, as we demonstrated earlier. So I don't think this should be an issue for views or appearances. If we could go to the next slide. Okay. And kind of to echo everything I've said so far, I know the county said it too, we met all five of the primary. That "4" at the top is a typo; that should be five of five. And we meet four of the six secondary. The only one not being met being the vessel-to-shoreline length ratio. This is one that's kind of tricky. We almost -- it seems like we never meet this one on any petition, so... HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Remind me again why the Manatee Protection Plan is not applicable. MR. PEARSON: John and I have had discussions about this at length, and I -- I might have an unpopular opinion on this, but essentially, the Manatee Protection Plan is this -- this plan that is intended to control the number of slip spaces primarily for commercial and multifamily developments. There is some conflicting language in the plan where it -- where you could construe it to mean it's not applicable at all to single-family residences; however, there are some -- there are one or two references in it that do control some aspects of single-family homes, particularly in Port of the Islands. May 22, 2026 Page 58 So almost -- basically, if you're not in Port of the Islands, you're guaranteed to miss this criteria. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: Okay. MR. PEARSON: Which is odd to me, because that means if you're in Port of the Islands, you can meet more criteria, which makes it easier to get a boat dock extension. So that's been my beef all along. I know -- I know John may disagree with me on that. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: I get it. I understand. All right. Do we have any -- anybody signed up to speak? MS. PADRON: We do not. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: No speakers signed up or online here. So other than that, I don't have any questions. You always do a nice presentation. Good job. Once again, I have two decisions to render. So the presentation that was given is going to be adopted in both items for both reasons, but I will be rendering -- I'll mention that in the decisions. So does the county have anything else? Do you want to weigh in on the bay or canal issue or -- MR. PEARSON: Manatees. MR. KELLY: No, sir. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: I kind of think if you can water ski in it, it's probably a bay. That's my legal determination. MR. KELLY: Works for me. HEARING EXAMINER DICKMAN: All right. Great. All right. Well, thank you for being here. Nice work. It's a challenging spot, but a beautiful spot, of course. So other than that, is anything else -- that's -- we'll end that item. And do we have anything else to talk about before we adjourn? Set up for the next meeting?