BCC Minutes 01/11/2022 RJanuary 11, 2022
Page 1
TRANSCRIPT OF THE MEETING OF THE
BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS
Naples, Florida, January 11, 2022
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 members present:
Chairman: Penny Taylor
William L. McDaniel, Jr.
Rick LoCastro
Burt L. Saunders
Andy Solis
ALSO PRESENT:
Mark Isackson, County Manager
Amy Patterson, Deputy County Manager
Jeffrey A. Klatzkow, County Attorney
Crystal K. Kinzel, Clerk of the Circuit Court & Comptroller
Troy Miller, Communications & Customer Relations
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January 11, 2022
COLLIER COUNTY
Board of County Commissioners
Community Redevelopment Agency Board (CRAB)
Airport Authority
AGENDA
Board of County Commission Chambers
Collier County Government Center
3299 Tamiami Trail East, 3rd Floor
Naples, FL 34112
January 11, 2022
9:00 AM
Commissioner Penny Taylor, District 4 – Chair – CRAB Co-Chair
Commissioner William L. McDaniel, Jr., District 5 - Vice Chair - CRAB Co-Chair
Commissioner Rick LoCastro, District 1
Commissioner Andy Solis, District 2
Commissioner Burt Saunders, District 3
NOTICE: ALL PERSONS WISHING TO SPEAK ON AGENDA ITEMS MUST
REGISTER PRIOR TO PRESENTATION OF THE AGENDA ITEM TO BE
ADDRESSED. ALL REGISTERED SPEAKERS WILL RECEIVE UP TO THREE
(3) MINUTES UNLESS THE TIME IS ADJUSTED BY THE CHAIRMAN.
REQUESTS TO PETITION THE BOARD ON SUBJECTS WHICH ARE NOT ON
THIS AGENDA MUST BE SUBMITTED IN WRITING WITH EXPLANATION
TO THE COUNTY MANAGER AT LEAST 13 DAYS PRIOR TO THE DATE OF
THE MEETING AND WILL BE HEARD UNDER “PUBLIC PETITIONS.”
PUBLIC PETITIONS ARE LIMITED TO THE PRESENTER, WITH A
MAXIMUM TIME OF TEN MINUTES.
ANY PERSON WHO DECIDES TO APPEAL A DECISION OF THIS BOARD
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January 11, 2022
WILL NEED A RECORD OF THE PROCEEDING PERTAINING THERETO,
AND THEREFORE MAY NEED TO ENSURE THAT A VERBATIM RECORD
OF THE PROCEEDINGS IS MADE, WHICH RECORD INCLUDES THE
TESTIMONY AND EVIDENCE UPON WHICH THE APPEAL IS TO BE BASED.
COLLIER COUNTY ORDINANCE NO. 2003-53 AS AMENDED BY
ORDINANCE 2004-05 AND 2007-24, REQUIRES THAT ALL LOBBYISTS
SHALL, BEFORE ENGAGING IN ANY LOBBYING ACTIVITIES (INCLUDING
BUT NOT LIMITED TO, ADDRESSING THE BOARD OF COUNTY
COMMISSIONERS), REGISTER WITH THE CLERK TO THE BOARD AT THE
BOARD MINUTES AND RECORDS DEPARTMENT.
IF YOU ARE A PERSON WITH A DISABILITY WHO NEEDS ANY
ACCOMMODATION IN ORDER TO PARTICIPATE IN THIS PROCEEDING,
YOU ARE ENTITLED, AT NO COST TO YOU, THE PROVISION OF CERTAIN
ASSISTANCE. PLEASE CONTACT THE COLLIER COUNTY FACILITIES
MANAGEMENT DIVISION LOCATED AT 3335 EAST TAMIAMI TRAIL,
SUITE 1, NAPLES, FLORIDA, 34112-5356, (239) 252-8380; ASSISTED
LISTENING DEVICES FOR THE HEARING IMPAIRED ARE AVAILABLE IN
THE FACILITIES MANAGEMENT DIVISION.
LUNCH RECESS SCHEDULED FOR 12:00 NOON TO 1:00 P.M.
1. INVOCATION AND PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
A. Invocation by Pastor Ed Brandt of Lely Presbyterian Church
2. AGENDA AND MINUTES
A. Approval of today's regular, consent and summary agenda as amended (Ex
Parte Disclosure provided by Commission members for consent agenda.)
B. October 26, 2021 - BCC Meeting Minutes
C. December 14, 2021 - BCC Meeting Minutes
D. Recommendation that the Board authorize the new Chairs for both the Board
of County Commissioners and the Community Redevelopment Agency to
execute all documents approved at both this meeting and those documents
which were previously approved but are pending signature, and to appoint
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its members to the Community Redevelopment Agency, the Tourist
Development Board, the Community and Economic Development Board,
the Affordable Housing Advisory Committee, the Public Safety
Coordinating Council, and the Southwest Florida Regional Planning
Council.
3. AWARDS AND RECOGNITIONS
A. EMPLOYEE
B. ADVISORY BOARD MEMBERS
C. RETIREES
D. EMPLOYEE OF THE MONTH
1) Recommendation to recognize Jonathan Bartos, in the Public Utilities
Department, Solid & Hazardous Waste Management Division as the
December 2021 Employee of the Month. (All Districts)
4. PROCLAMATIONS
A. Proclamation designating January 17, 2022, as a day to remember and
celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream. To be accepted by Vincent
Keeys, President, Jeris Smith, Chairperson, and other representatives of the
Collier County Branch of the NAACP.
B. Proclamation designating January 2022 as Human Trafficking Awareness
Month in Collier County. To be accepted by Linda Oberhaus, Chief
Executive Officer, The Shelter for Abused Women and Children.
C. Proclamation designating January 2022 as Florida Panther Month in Collier
County. To be accepted by Ricky Pires, Director, Florida Gulf Coast
University "Wings of Hope" Program.
D. Proclamation recognizing the 50th Anniversary of the Naples Concert Band.
The proclamation will be presented by Commissioner Penny Taylor on
January 16, 2022, to the Naples Concert Band at its performance at the
Cambier Park Bandshell.
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5. PRESENTATIONS
A. Presentation of the Collier County Business of the Month for January 2022
to Prestige Insurance Consultants, Inc. The award will be accepted by
Shannon Morgan and Sonia Rocca, Agency Owners. Also present is
Bethany Sawyer, Vice President of Membership, The Greater Naples
Chamber of Commerce.
6. PUBLIC PETITIONS
7. PUBLIC COMMENTS ON GENERAL TOPICS NOT ON THE CURRENT
OR FUTURE AGENDA
8. BOARD OF ZONING APPEALS
9. ADVERTISED PUBLIC HEARINGS
10. BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS
11. COUNTY MANAGER'S REPORT
A. Recommendation to award Request for Professional Services (RPS) No. 21-
7881 "Design Services for Old Lely Utility Improvements" in the total
amount of $15,908,833 to Johnson Engineering, Inc. with authorization to
issue an initial purchase order for Task 1 and Reimbursables in the amount
of $5,152,020, to be followed by future purchase order modifications for
subsequent Tasks 2 and 3, both encompassed in the total contract amount,
subject to and dictated by Board-approved funding under Project #60224
(Funds 412, 414 and 327); and authorize the necessary budget
amendment.(Trinity Scott, Deputy Department Head, Growth Management
Department) (District 1)
B. Recommendation to accept the status report for Collier County Local
Government Infrastructure Sales Surtax Projects, acknowledge the planned
move of the Domestic Animal Services (DAS) facility to County Site #305,
and authorize completion of design for Sheriff’s Forensics/Evidence
Building to include expanding the size of the Sheriff’s facility to
accommodate a move of CCSO Criminal Investigations Division from 2373
East Horseshoe Drive to the GOBP campus. (Ed Finn, Interim Facilities
Management Director) (All Districts)
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C. Recommendation to accept Staff's update on Collier County boat ramp park
use and Commercial Vessel Launch Permit sales. (Melissa Hennig, Regional
Manager, Parks and Recreation Division) (All Districts)
12. COUNTY ATTORNEY'S REPORT
13. OTHER CONSTITUTIONAL OFFICERS
14. AIRPORT AUTHORITY AND/OR COMMUNITY REDEVELOPMENT
AGENCY
A. AIRPORT
B. COMMUNITY REDEVELOPMENT AGENCY
15. STAFF AND COMMISSION GENERAL COMMUNICATIONS
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16. Consent Agenda - All matters listed under this item are considered to be
routine and action will be taken by one motion without separate discussion of
each item. If discussion is desired by a member of the Board, that item(s) will
be removed from the Consent Agenda and considered separately.
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A. Growth Management Department
1) Recommendation to approve the release of a code enforcement lien
with an accrued value of $66,100 for payment of $1,550 in the code
enforcement action titled Board of County Commissioners v. Rafael
Barrios Montero, Tomas B. Avila Reyes, and Ricardo Abril, relating
to property located at 1281 25th St SW, Collier County, Florida.
(District 5)
2) Recommendation to authorize the Clerk of Courts to release a
Performance Bond in the amount of $155,062 which was posted as a
guaranty for Excavation Permit Number PL20200001219 for work
associated with Ventana Pointe. (District 5)
3) Recommendation to approve a Resolution for final acceptance of the
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private roadway and drainage improvements for the final plat of Golf
Club of the Everglades Phase 1, Application Number
PL20140001653, and authorize the release of the maintenance
security in the amount of $699,615.37. (District 5)
4) Recommendation to approve final acceptance of the sewer utility
facilities for Springs at Hammock Cove Phase 3, PL20190002127,
and authorize the County Manager, or his designee, to release the
Utilities Performance Security (UPS) and Final Obligation Bond in
the total amount of $7,898.12 to the Project Engineer or the
Developer’s designated agent. (District 4)
5) Recommendation to approve final acceptance of the potable water and
sewer utility facilities and accept the conveyance of a portion of the
potable water and sewer utility facilities for the 7-Eleven #38985
Greenway, PL20210001822. (District 1)
6) Recommendation to approve final acceptance of the potable water
facilities, and accept the conveyance of the potable water facilities for
The Pointe at Founders Square, PL20210001958. (District 5)
7) Recommendation to approve a Resolution for final acceptance of the
private roadway and drainage improvements, and acceptance of the
plat dedications, for the final plat of Legacy Estates, Application
Number PL20140002627 and Application Number PL20140001803,
and, and authorize the release of the maintenance security in the
amount of $53,700.85. (District 2)
8) This item requires that ex parte disclosure be provided by
Commission members. Should a hearing be held on this item, all
participants are required to be sworn in. Recommendation to
approve for recording the minor final plat of Altis Santa Barbara,
Application Number PL20210001774. (District 3)
9) This item requires that ex parte disclosure be provided by
Commission members. Should a hearing be held on this item, all
participants are required to be sworn in. Recommendation to
approve for recording the final plat of Cambridge Park at Orange
Blossom (Application Number PL20210000167) approval of the
standard form Construction and Maintenance Agreement and approval
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of the performance security in the amount of $644,292.28. (District 2)
10) Recommendation to approve an extension for completion of required
subdivision improvements associated with Esplanade Golf and
Country Club of Naples Phase 2 (PL20120002897) subdivision
pursuant to Section 10.02.05 C.2 of the Collier County Land
Development Code (LDC). (District 3)
11) Recommendation to approve an extension for completion of required
subdivision improvements associated with Esplanade Golf and
Country Club of Naples Blocks E and G2 (PL20140002187)
subdivision pursuant to Section 10.02.05 C.2 of the Collier County
Land Development Code (LDC). (District 3)
12) Recommendation to provide a waiver of the optional local public
hearing pursuant to Section 190.046(1)(d)3., Florida Statutes, on the
Boundary Amendment Petition submitted by Fiddler’s Creek
Community Development District #1 to the Florida Land and Water
Adjudicatory Commission. (District 1)
13) Recommendation to recognize carry forward funding for the Collier
Metropolitan Planning Organization (“MPO”) in the amount of
$1,746.24, earned from the FY 2020/21 Transportation Disadvantaged
Planning Grant, and to approve all related necessary budget
amendments. (All Districts)
14) Recommendation to recognize and accept revenue for Collier Area
Transit bus shelters in the amount of $73,844 and to approve all
necessary budget amendments. (District 1)
15) Recommendation to approve Memorandum of Agreement (MOA)
FM# 449463-1-93-01, between the Florida Department of
Transportation (FDOT) and Collier County, where FDOT will provide
the County with connected vehicle equipment and software for
monitoring traffic conditions and providing messages to the traveling
public at 19 intersections on State Roads within Collier County.
FDOT has included this project in its Five-Year Work Program,
described as 'Collier County Connected Traveler Information System'
in the amount not to exceed $496,000, and execute a Resolution
memorializing the Board's action. (All Districts)
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16) Recommendation to approve and authorize the Chairman to sign a
Use Agreement between the Department of Environmental Protection
– Division of State Lands and Collier County in relation to ITB No.
21-7935 “Wiggins Pass and Doctors Pass Dredge 2021-2022”
allowing the placement of dredged sand onto Delnor Wiggins State
Park beach, per the State’s request (Project No. 80288). (All Districts)
17) Recommendation to authorize the necessary budget amendments to
reallocate funds, in the amount of $8,535,606, within the Growth
Management Department Stormwater Bond Fund (327). (District 5)
18) Recommendation to approve the final ranking for Request for
Professional Services (“RPS”) No. 21-7862, and begin negotiations
with Kimley-Horn and Associates, Inc., to perform professional
engineering services for the Airport Road Widening Project from
Vanderbilt Beach Road (CR862) to Immokalee Road (CR846),
County Project Number 60190, so that a proposed agreement can be
brought back for the Board's consideration. (District 2)
19) Recommendation to hear a Land Development Code Amendment at
two regularly scheduled daytime hearings and waive the nighttime
hearing requirement. (All Districts)
B. COMMUNITY REDEVELOPMENT AGENCY
C. PUBLIC UTILITIES DEPARTMENT
1) Recommendation to approve an Agreement for Sale and Purchase
with Carol A. Dessing, for 1.14 acres under the Conservation Collier
Land Acquisition Program at a cost not to exceed $19,500.
(Conservation Collier Trust Fund 172) (District 5)
2) Recommendation to approve the attached Settlement Agreement and
Release with Douglas N. Higgins, Inc. and authorize Staff to issue a
purchase order in the amount of $83,350.00 in satisfaction of all
claims on the Creekside Force Main Extension Phase #1 Project,
Wastewater User Capital Fund (414), Project No. 70044. (District 2)
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3) Recommendation to approve an Agreement for Sale and Purchase
with Mercedes Cabrera, a married woman, for 9.16 acres under the
Conservation Collier Land Acquisition Program at a cost not to
exceed $115,650. (Conservation Collier Trust Fund 172) (District 5)
4) Recommendation to approve a Third Amendment to Agreement No.
18-7429 for Security Services with Universal Protection Service, LLC
to extend the current term of service, make ministerial revisions to
performance criteria, and to adjust the fee schedule for the renewal
term of the Agreement ($148,360, Fund Number 001-122255.) (All
Districts)
D. PUBLIC SERVICES DEPARTMENT
1) Recommendation to approve an Exemption from the Competitive
Process as set forth in the Procurement Ordinance for subscription to
Flipster, NoveList Plus, and NoveList Select, proprietary software
offered through EBSCO, for Library patron use in an amount not to
exceed $150,000 per fiscal year, as budgeted within General Fund
(001). (All Districts)
2) Recommendation to accept two (2) library grant donations, one from
the Hsi-Yang Wu Memorial Fund through the Branch County
Community Foundation in the amount of $500, and one from the
Kirsch McLaughlin Trust through the Fidelity Charitable Grant
Program in the amount of $100, for the general support of the Collier
County Public Library. (Public Services Grant Fund 709) (All
Districts)
3) Recommendation to approve and authorize the chairperson to sign
three (3) mortgage satisfactions for the State Housing Initiatives
Partnership loan program in the amount of $63,000 and approve the
associated Budget Amendments to appropriate repayment amounts
totaling $63,000 within SHIP Grant Fund (791). (All Districts)
4) Recommendation to approve and authorize the Chairperson to sign
three Emergency Solutions Grant Agreements with Collier County: 1)
NAMI Collier County, Inc., (increases award by $200,000), 2) The
Shelter for Abused Women & Children, Inc., (no funding change),
and 3) the Hunger & Homeless Coalition, Inc., (decreases award by
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$200,000), for the administration of CARES related services with a
net $0 impact. (Grant Fund 705) (All Districts)
5) Recommendation to award Request for Proposal (RFP) #18-7470S,
Services for Seniors, to Hemo Medika Care LLC d/b/a Harmonia The
Club, Sunshine Health Care Services, LLC d/b/a A Better Solution of
Sarasota, Home Health Care Resources, Corp. and authorize the Chair
to sign the attached agreements. (Estimated Annual Fiscal Impact
$2,934,443, Human Services Grant Fund 707) (All Districts)
6) To approve and authorize the Chairman to sign four (4) Emergency
Solutions Grants subrecipient agreements; two (2) Collier County
Hunger & Homeless Coalition in the amount of $2,536.62 and
$30,462, NAMI Collier County in the amount of $26,970, Youth
Haven, Inc. in the amount of $71,000 and one (1) HOME Investment
Partnerships subrecipient agreement for Collier County Housing
Authority in the amount of $424,993. (Housing Grant Fund 705). (All
Districts)
E. ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES
1) Recommendation to approve and authorize the Chair to sign a
Memorandum of Understanding with Southwest Florida Professional
Firefighters, Local 1826, outlining the payment of Premium Pay for
all Collier County EMS employees, not to exceed the funding amount
of $408,000 as approved within the American Rescue Plan Act
Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Fund as approved by the
United States Treasury and previously authorized by the Board of
County Commissioners. (Housing Grant Fund 705) (All Districts)
2) Recommendation to approve the administrative report prepared by the
Procurement Services Division for disposal of property and
notification of revenue disbursement. (All Districts)
3) Recommendation to approve the administrative reports prepared by
the Procurement Services Division for change orders and other
contractual modifications requiring Board approval. (All Districts)
4) Recommendation to approve the administrative reports prepared by
the Procurement Services Division for change orders and other
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contractual modifications requiring Board approval. (All Districts)
F. COUNTY MANAGER OPERATIONS
1) Recommendation to approve a report covering budget amendments
impacting reserves and moving funds in an amount up to and
including $25,000 and $50,000, respectively. (All Districts)
2) Recommendation to adopt a resolution approving amendments
(appropriating grants, donations, contributions or insurance proceeds)
to the FY21-22 Adopted Budget. (All Districts)
G. AIRPORT AUTHORITY
1) Recommendation to approve and authorize the Chairman to execute
the attached Resolution authorizing the County Manager’s execution
of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Airport Rescue Grant
Agreements in the amount of $59,000 for the Marco Island Executive
Airport (MKY) and $32,000 for the Immokalee Regional Airport
(IMM) for eligible operating expenses and authorize all necessary
budget amendments. (Projects #33793 and #33792) (District 1,
District 5)
H. BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS
I. MISCELLANEOUS CORRESPONDENCE
1) Miscellaneous Correspondence (All Districts)
J. OTHER CONSTITUTIONAL OFFICERS
1) Recommendation to appoint Commissioner McDaniel and
Commissioner Saunders to the Collier County Canvassing Board for
the 2022 Election Cycle. (All Districts)
2) Recommendation that the Board of County Commissioners authorize
the County Attorney’s Office to participate and represent the Collier
County Canvassing Board during the 2022 Election Cycle. (All
Districts)
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3) 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 were drawn for the
periods between December 16, 2021 and December 29, 2021 pursuant
to Florida Statute 136.06. (All Districts)
4) Board ratification of the purchasing card transactions and invoices
payable approved and determined to have a valid public purpose by
the County Manager during the Board’s scheduled recess. (All
Districts)
5) Board ratification and recording 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
were drawn for the periods between December 2, 2021 and December
15, 2021 pursuant to Florida Statute 136.06 that were approved by the
County Manager during the Board’s scheduled recess. (All Districts)
6) Request that the Board approve and determine valid public purpose
for invoices payable and purchasing card transactions as of January 5,
2022. (All Districts)
K. COUNTY ATTORNEY
1) This item has been continued from the December 14, 2021 BCC
Meeting Agenda. Recommendation to reappoint four members to the
Development Services Advisory Committee. (All Districts)
2) Recommendation to appoint a member to the Animal Service
Advisory Board. (All Districts)
3) Recommendation to approve a Stipulated Final Judgment in the
amount of $225,000 plus $40,330 in statutory attorney, experts’ fees,
costs and statutory supplemental attorneys’ fees if necessary (not to
exceed $7,000), for the taking of Parcel 1257RDUE/TCE, required for
the Vanderbilt Beach Road Extension Project No. 60168. (All
Districts)
4) Recommendation to approve a Stipulated Final Judgment in the
amount of $371,000 plus $35,680 in statutory attorney and experts’
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fees and costs for the taking of Parcel 1109POND required for the
Vanderbilt Beach Road Extension Project No. 60168. (All Districts)
5) Recommendation to approve a Stipulated Final Judgment in the
amount of $156,000 plus $31,574 in statutory attorney and experts’
fees and costs for the taking of Parcel 218FEE required for the
Vanderbilt Beach Road Extension Project No. 60168. (All Districts)
6) Recommendation to approve a Stipulated Final Judgment in the total
amount of $110,000 plus $21,767.50 in statutory attorney and experts’
fees and costs for the taking of Parcel 220FEE, required for the
Vanderbilt Beach Road Extension Project, Project No., 60168, and
delegate authority to the County Manager or his designee to process
payment of additional statutory attorney’s fees for supplemental
proceedings, if any, as authorized by Ch. 73, Fla. Stat. (All Districts)
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17. Summary Agenda - This section is for advertised public hearings and must
meet the following criteria: 1) A recommendation for approval from staff; 2)
Unanimous recommendation for approval by the Collier County Planning
Commission or other authorizing agencies of all members present and voting;
3) No written or oral objections to the item received by staff, the Collier
County Planning Commission, other authorizing agencies or the Board, prior
to the commencement of the BCC meeting on which the items are scheduled to
be heard; and 4) No individuals are registered to speak in opposition to the
item. For those items which are quasi-judicial in nature, all participants must
be sworn in.
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A. Recommendation to adopt an Ordinance establishing pedestrian safety
regulations in unincorporated Collier County, and to repeal portions of
Ordinance 87-60, as amended. (All Districts)
B. This item requires that ex parte disclosure be provided by Commission
members. Should a hearing be held on this item, all participants are
required to be sworn in. Zoning Petition - PL20200002317, Ave Maria
SRAA. Recommendation to approve a Resolution amending the town of
Ave Maria Stewardship Receiving Area (SRA) to revise the SRA town plan
and master plan in accordance with Section 4.08.07.F.4 of the Land
Development Code, and specifically to: reconfigure a portion of Town
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January 11, 2022
Center 2A and the Neighborhood General Context Zone near the intersection
of Pope John Paul Boulevard and Camp Keais Road; to add a new
multifamily dwelling unit rental housing type consisting of single family
detached, single family attached or townhouses located on a single parcel
called a Cottage Court as a permitted use in the Neighborhood General
Context Zone and Town Centers 2 and 3; to add civic use, open space and
parks as a permitted use in Town Center 1; to add development standards for
the Cottage Court dwelling unit type limited to a 10 foot external project
setback and a maximum height of 2 ½ stories; to add an access point near
the southwest corner of the SRA boundary to serve the existing golf
maintenance facility only; to remove the root barrier requirement in
Neighborhood General Context Zone to be consistent with the LDC; and
modify the numerical spacing of the grid system for the University District
to correct a labeling error. The subject property is located north of Oil Well
Road and west of Camp Keais Road in Sections 31 through 33, Township 47
South, Range 29 East and Sections 4 through 9 and 16 through 18,
Township 48 South, Range 29 East in Collier County, Florida. (District 5)
C. Recommendation to adopt a resolution approving amendments
(appropriating carry forward, transfers and supplemental revenue) to the
FY21-22 Adopted Budget. (All Districts)
D. Recommendation to adopt an amendment to Ordinance 93-81, as amended,
known as the “Parks and Recreation Advisory Board Ordinance,” to add an
alternate member to the Board. (All Districts)
18. ADJOURN
INQUIRIES CONCERNING CHANGES TO THE BOARD’S AGENDA SHOULD
BE MADE TO THE COUNTY MANAGER’S OFFICE AT 252-8383.
January 11, 2022
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MR. ISACKSON: Madam Chair, Commissioners, good
morning. You have a live mic.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Good morning. Good morning,
everyone. Welcome to 2022. May it be a blessed year for you, a
healthy year and full of family and friends and progress in all we do
as individuals and as a community.
Today, we have Reverend Beverly Duncan who is going to give
us our invocation.
Would you all rise, please, and then I'd like Mr. Keeys to lead us
in the Pledge of Allegiance.
REVEREND DUNCAN: Good morning.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Good morning.
Item #1
INVOCATION AND PLEDGE OF ALLEGINACE –
INVOCATION GIVEN
REVEREND DUNCAN: Let us be prayerful. It's a new year
and a new day with all of their possibilities, even thorny challenges,
short and long term, present fresh possibilities for our spirits and our
lives. So let's go into this never-before morning each of us with
clear eyes and open hearts to be gifted yet again with opportunities to
rise above and beyond the ordinary and the expected. May we,
commissioners and Collier citizens, take advantage of places in
conversation and discussion today to be generous. So many people
need us to be there for them, to listen, to be their voice, and to care.
It's a calling, it is, from a higher, wider presence that needs us to
venture outside of ourselves. May we sense and even hear that call,
and may it be a way of life that we carry with us no matter where we
are or what day and year it is.
January 11, 2022
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And in the light of that presence, may this new year and this new
day be especially blessed with health and wholeness.
Amen and Shalom.
(The Pledge of Allegiance was recited in unison.)
(The American Flag was moved.)
COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: There we go. Thank you,
Commissioner.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Thank you, Commissioner LoCastro.
You do that --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I've done it once or twice.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Yeah, you've done it a few times.
Thank you. Thank you.
Item #2A
APPROVAL OF TODAY'S REGULAR, CONSENT AND
SUMMARY AGENDA AS AMENDED (EX PARTE
DISCLOSURE PROVIDED BY COMMISSION MEMBERS FOR
CONSENT AGENDA.) - APPROVED AND/OR ADOPTED
W/CHANGES – APPROVED
Item #2B and #2C
BCC MEETING MINUTES FOR OCTOBER 26, 2021 AND BCC
MEETING MINUTES FOR DECEMBER 14, 2021 – APPROVED
AS PRESENTED
MR. ISACKSON: Thank you, Madam Chair. These are the
proposed agenda changes for your Board of County Commissioners
meeting of January 11th, 2022.
The only item I have, Madam Chair, is to move Item 17A to 9A,
January 11, 2022
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which is a recommendation to adopt an ordinance establishing
pedestrian safety regulations in unincorporated Collier County and to
repeal portions of Ordinance 87-60 as amended. That was requested
by Commissioner LoCastro. I have no time-certain items proposed.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Thank you very much.
So now we'll do approval of today's regular, consent, and
summary agenda, any ex parte. And at the same time we will take a
motion to approve the minutes of the October 26th, 2021, BCC
meeting and also the December 14th, 2021, BCC meeting.
Commissioner Solis.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Thank you, Madam Chair. No
disclosures and no changes to the agenda. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Thank you. Commissioner
LoCastro.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Same. No disclosures and
no changes.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Commissioner Saunders.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I have no disclosures and no
changes as well.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Commissioner McDaniel.
COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I am the same as well; no
disclosures, no changes.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: I am the same also; no disclosures, no
changes.
Do I hear a motion to approve the minutes as stated?
COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: So moved.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So moved.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Do I have a second?
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Second.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: All those in favor, say aye.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Aye.
January 11, 2022
Page 5
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Aye.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Aye.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Those opposed, like sign.
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: It carries unanimously.
Proposed Agenda Changes
Board of County Commissioners Meeting
January 11, 2022
Move Item 17A to 9A: Recommendation to adopt an Ordinance establishing pedestrian safety
regulations in unincorporated Collier County, and to repeal portions of Ordinance 87-60, as amended.
(All Districts) (Commissioner LoCastro’s Request)
Time Certain Items:
2/10/2022 4:46 PM
January 11, 2022
Page 6
Item #2D
THE BOARD AUTHORIZE THE NEW CHAIRS FOR BOTH THE
BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS AND THE
COMMUNITY REDEVELOPMENT AGENCY TO EXECUTE
ALL DOCUMENTS APPROVED AT BOTH THIS MEETING
AND THOSE DOCUMENTS WHICH WERE PREVIOUSLY
APPROVED BUT ARE PENDING SIGNATURE, AND TO
APPOINT ITS MEMBERS TO THE COMMUNITY
REDEVELOPMENT AGENCY, THE TOURIST DEVELOPMENT
BOARD, THE COMMUNITY AND ECONOMIC
DEVELOPMENT BOARD, THE AFFORDABLE HOUSING
ADVISORY COMMITTEE, THE PUBLIC SAFETY
COORDINATING COUNCIL, AND THE SOUTHWEST
FLORIDA REGIONAL PLANNING COUNCIL - APPOINTING
COMMISSIONER MCDANIEL AS BCC CHAIR AND
COMMISSIONER LOCASTRO AS VICE-CHAIR – APPROVED
APPOINTING COMMISSIONER MCDANIEL AS CO-CHAIR
AND COMMISSIONER TAYLOR AS CO-CHAIR TO THE
COMMUNITY REDEVELOPMENT AGENCY – APPROVED
APPOINTING COMMISSIONER SOLIS TO THE TOURIST
DEVELOPMENT COUNCIL – APPROVED
APPOINTING COMMISSIONER TAYLOR TO THE ECONOMIC
DEVELOPMENT BOARD – APPROVED
APPOINTING COMMISSIONER LOCASTRO TO THE
AFFORDABLE HOUSING ADVISORY COMMITTEE –
APPROVED
APPOINTING COMMISSIONER LOCASTRO TO THE PUBLIC
SAFETY COORDINATING COUNCIL – APPROVED
January 11, 2022
Page 7
APPOINTING COMMISSIONER MCDANIEL AND
COMMISSIONER LOCASTRO TO THE SOUTHWEST FLORIDA
REGIONAL PLANNING COUNCIL – APPROVED
MR. ISACKSON: Madam Chair, I handed out during our
one-on-one sessions a little tutorial for Item 2D, which is the
authorization of new chairs.
COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: I left that in my office. No,
you keep yours.
MR. ISACKSON: And at this point in time it would be
appropriate since we have, I think, a rotation system in place for the
BCC chair and the vice chair, but I'll turn it over to you and let you
lead those proceedings. And then after that, we certainly have
appointments needed for updating of the CRA, the Tourist
Development Council, the Community and Economic Development
Board, Public Safety Coordinating Council, and the Southwest
Florida Regional Planning Council.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: All right. Thank you very much.
Just for those that don't necessarily follow us as closely as we
follow each other, when Commissioner Saunders was elected, one of
the -- one of the many things he brought to this board was a sense of
order in terms of the succession of the Chair. The Chair sits for one
year, and then it is turned to another unless there's a majority vote of
the Commission, and that's the way it was before. Now we have a
set rotation process which is really consecutive according to our
district numbers. So I am now the outgoing chair. It is January.
And Commissioner McDaniel will be the incoming chair. He's in
District 5.
So on that note, Commissioner Saunders.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Oh, I know we're going to
switch seats here, but I think this would be an appropriate time to
January 11, 2022
Page 8
thank you for your leadership in the past year. We've had some
difficult political issues. And the one thing that I can say without
any hesitation is that we've maintained decorum in this room, and it's
in large measure due to the leadership of the Chair. So I want to
congratulate you and thank you for --
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: -- keeping us on a straight
path for the last 12 months and look forward to hopefully a straight
path when Bill McDaniel takes over.
COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: You never know. You never
know. Do you want to go down front for the presentation, or do you
want me to do it right up here?
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Your call. Your call.
COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Let's go down front.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Okay. The outgoing chair always
gets something, so...
COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: Look at this. This is kind of
nice.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: It's pretty.
COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: And with this, I concur with
Commissioner Saunders with regard to your leadership and how
you've done this year, and we really appreciate all your extra effort.
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Thank you very much.
COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: How about a hand?
(Applause.)
CHAIRMAN TAYLOR: Commissioner McDaniel, I guess we
can change our seats right now.
COMMISSIONER McDANIEL: They don't want us to do it
until the break. Apparently there's a changing of name tags and
everything else that needs to transpire, and the folks over in the
backroom that make all this happen want us to wait until we give
January 11, 2022
Page 9
Terri a break for our court reporter, so...
MR. MILLER: Mr. Chair. Over here, Troy. I just want to let
you know we have a registered speaker for Item 2D, the appointment
to boards. I don't know when you wanted to hear that.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: We still have the vice chair.
MR. ISACKSON: Yeah. It would be appropriate for a
motion, I think, to solidify Commissioner McDaniel's and the vice
chair also.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: And the vice chair. I'll
make that motion. Commissioner LoCastro will be the vice chair,
District 1. Congratulations.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: And congratulations,
Commissioner McDaniel.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Very good. Do you want to call
for a vote?
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I'll second that motion.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It's been moved and seconded.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: So when you show up late for
traffic, then I immediately take over. So, you know, if you get
caught in traffic, like you have been, then I'll jump right on it.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Did anybody notice that I was
exceptionally early today?
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I did.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Oh, we noticed. Yeah, we
noticed.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I just want to make sure it didn't go
unannounced, so...
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Thank you. I appreciate the
honor.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: If there is no discussion, all in
January 11, 2022
Page 10
favor, say aye.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Aye.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Opposed, same sign, same sound.
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So moved. There we go.
Now, let's go ahead and hear from our public. And before we
go, who's running the air conditioning?
MR. MILLER: I can make a call on that, sir. You want it
cooler?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Please.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Oh, yeah.
MR. MILLER: Yes. Your speaker is Kristina Heuser.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Oh, okay.
MS. HEUSER: Good morning.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Good morning.
MS. HEUSER: I just want to urge you all, as you consider
reappointing to the various boards and agencies, that you not
reappoint Commissioner Solis to the Tourist Development Council in
light of the fact that he weaponized this position -- his position on
that board previously to manipulate this board to revote on the mask
mandate and did things that were violative of the civil liberties of the
residents of Collier County and not in the interest of tourism, since
we know that people come here to enjoy the freedoms that we enjoy
here thanks to our governor and state legislature.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: On that, I'll make a motion
to appoint Andy Solis to the Tourist Development Council.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I'll second that.
January 11, 2022
Page 11
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, before we go there --
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I'll withdraw that motion
until we get to it.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I was going to say. And let's not
act in haste, number one. Number two, I actually had a proposition.
I wanted to see if you would like to consider swapping with me on
the -- with me taking the TDC and you moving onto the RPC
so -- because I'd like to -- I'd like to get more involved with the TDC
and learn and educate and edify myself and so on and so forth. And
that was -- before that came about, that was one of the things that I
was going to discuss this morning.
So let's go through the process. Let's start with the -- we don't
have any more public speakers, do we, Troy?
MR. MILLER: Not for this item, sir.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay. Let's go ahead and do the
community redevelopment and the CRAs.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I don't think it can be anything
else but us, right?
MR. ISACKSON: Well, traditionally, the district
commissioner of the -- that encompasses the Immokalee CRA and the
district commissioner that encompasses the Bayshore are typically
appointed.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Yeah.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And if we're okay with continuing
on with that, I certainly am. I know I'm --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Well, I think it makes good
sense. When you represent the district that the CRA is located in,
then the buck stops with you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Sure.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I think it's important that it's
like that.
January 11, 2022
Page 12
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, then we'll stay with that.
And, Commissioner Solis, how do you feel about the trade?
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Not very good. I'd like to stay on
at least one more year for the TDC, I think, to have some continuity.
I'd like to continue to work with the folks related to the sports park
and the marketing program. So I'd like to -- I'd like to give it one
more year if that's okay. And I, obviously, take exception with the
speaker's comments. I mean, I think --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Of course.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: -- it's ridiculous.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: That's part -- not part and parcel.
That's just someone's opinion. So I -- and there, again, I'm not -- I'm
certainly not going to argue. I just would like to have a chance --
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: You're going to have your hands
full as Chair.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: What else do I have to do?
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: The CRA and the Chair. That's a
lot of work.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: That's true.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, we've leave it alone. I'm
fine with Commissioner Solis staying on with the TDC.
Now, the Economic Development Board. Commissioner
Taylor, you okay with staying there?
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Yeah, I'm very content to do
that. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Affordable Housing Advisory
Committee, Commissioner LoCastro?
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Absolutely.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay. Public Safety Coordinating
Council. Commissioner Saunders, you have had that rein. Are you
okay with that?
January 11, 2022
Page 13
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Sure.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay. And then if it meets with
everyone, Commissioner LoCastro and I will stay on the RPC.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: And I was the public safety
coordination. Are we switching it?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Oh, you were?
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I thought.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I'm sorry. I thought
Commissioner Saunders was.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I think I took it from him last
year.
MR. ISACKSON: Commissioner LoCastro's the current
representative.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Forgive me, then. I wasn't trading
on purpose. I actually thought it was still Commissioner Saunders.
So if you still want the public safety --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I mean, I'd like to. I, you
know --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I really enjoyed that position when
I was there, so it's quite an education with our sheriff and our court
systems and so on and so forth. So I wasn't moving you somewhere
where you didn't need to be.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: That's fine.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And then are you okay with
staying on with the RPC?
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Absolutely.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And so am I.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I think you're going to have
your hands a little busier than you've had in the past because of the
issue of resiliency and the compact that we are talking
about -- talking about forming. And I think if we can indulge our
January 11, 2022
Page 14
board for a second, if Ms. Patterson could speak to that, because there
is some thought that a coordinating agency might be very helpful to
gather Charlotte --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Sure.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: -- Lee --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And you and I have had long
discussions about it.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: -- which is what you always
wanted.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: RPC needs some -- for lack of a
better term, some loving. So let's -- I'll be happy to stay on the RPC
and --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I think it might be moving in
the direction that you've always said, look, you're a great
organization, you've got a framework, you just need to figure out
what you're going to concentrate on.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And in the end, if the compact
does come to fruition, the RPC can be -- should be that mechanism in
order to ultimately manage that. So I'm happy to stay there.
So with that, Commissioner Saunders, I saw you --
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Yeah. I'm on the Property
Appraisal Adjustment Board.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yes.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: And also the elections.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: You and I both are.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Oh, you're canvassing?
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Canvassing.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Those aren't the appointed
positions by us, are they?
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So I don't have any problem
sticking with both of those two.
January 11, 2022
Page 15
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Nor do I. I'm on the canvassing
committee as well, so...
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: And so everyone understand,
elections are really very, very important. You are with us for the
year on the Canvassing Board on all the elections that take place
during that year.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: That's correct. So with that, I'll
call for a motion for those nominations to take effect.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: So move.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Second.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It's been moved and seconded that
those nominations will take effect as of today. All in favor?
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Aye.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Opposed, same sign, same sound.
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So moved. All right. We got
through that.
MR. ISACKSON: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Item #3D
RECOGNIZE JONATHAN BARTOS, IN THE PUBLIC UTILITIES
DEPARTMENT, SOLID & HAZARDOUS WASTE
MANAGEMENT DIVISION AS THE DECEMBER 2021
EMPLOYEE OF THE MONTH. (ALL DISTRICTS) –PRESENTED
MR. ISACKSON: The next item on your agenda is 3D. It's
January 11, 2022
Page 16
the employee of the month. Let me read a little blurb about Jonathan
Bartos, your December 2021 Employee of the Month.
Jonathan is a recycling coordinator in the Solid and Hazardous
Waste Management Division in Public Utilities and has been with the
county since 2019.
Jonathan is a dedicated and hardworking employee whose
enthusiasm, approach, and attitude allow him to make the difference
in the community every day. He does more than provide advice.
He engages communities and businesses throughout Collier County
regarding recycling, preserving landfill airspace, and ensuring the
safe disposal of household hazardous waste.
He dedicated months to visiting businesses in a focused
campaign of getting the owners and employees to support and
participate in recycling by educating them on why. During that time,
he found over 100 businesses and removed Collier County generated
recyclables that were later processed out of the county, alerting them
to our local ordinance and encouraging them to assist with the
recycling rate.
His education efforts included information about how the
industry works, the benefits to their organization, as well as the
long-term positive impacts to Collier County of engaging in
recycling.
From the pandemic impact outreach efforts, Jonathan took it
upon himself to find alternative ways to reach out in eight
communities and businesses about recycling. One of those efforts
was a Facebook commercial for recycling. And while acting is not
part of his job description, Jonathan jumped at the opportunity to take
part so he could get the message out about how each person,
community, and local business can make a difference.
Through his tenuous [sic] efforts over many months, Collier
County hit a 74 percent recycling rate for calendar year 2020, ranking
January 11, 2022
Page 17
fourth in the state of Florida. Quite a remarkable feat, since it is not
common for a county without a waste energy program to meet this
goal.
Jonathan demonstrates a true passion for our goal and mission to
maintain Collier County as the best place to live, work, and play.
Jonathan doesn't show up -- doesn't just show up every day; he
inspires every day, and that is why he was selected as December
2021 Employee of the Month.
Jonathan Bartos, please.
(Applause.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: There you are. Congratulations.
MR. BARTOS: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you for all that you do and
have done.
(Applause.)
Item # 4A
PROCLAMATION DESIGNATING JANUARY 17, 2022, AS A
DAY TO REMEMBER AND CELEBRATE DR. MARTIN
LUTHER KING JR.'S DREAM. ACCEPTED BY VINCENT
KEEYS, PRESIDENT, JERIS SMITH, CHAIRPERSON, AND
OTHER REPRESENTATIVES OF THE COLLIER COUNTY
BRANCH OF THE NAACP - READ INTO THE RECORD BY
COMMISSIONER MCDANIEL
MR. ISACKSON: Mr. Chairman, we have several
proclamations today; four to be exact. The first proclamation, 4A, is
a proclamation designating January 17th, 2022, as a day to remember
and celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King, Junior's, dream to be accepted
January 11, 2022
Page 18
by Vincent Keeys, president; Jeris Smith, chairperson; and other
representatives of the Collier branch of the NAACP.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Outstanding. I believe Mr. -- I
believe. Forgive me, Troy. I'll get over here by the microphone. I
believe Mr. Keeys is here, and you have a few words to share as well.
MR. KEEYS: Sure, sure. Good morning, Mr. Chair and
Broward County commissioners, staff.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Collier, by the way.
MR. KEEYS: Collier, excuse me. Excuse me. My
apologies.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Wrong side of the state for that.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I think you've been a busy man,
haven't you?
MR. KEEYS: I'm telling you. I'm telling you. It's a pleasure
to join you this morning.
Of course, I want to say thank you to our staff as well as the
chair, Ms. Smith. You've done an excellent job.
We all look forward to honoring Dr. King. He has been a
person that we honor and live up to. We hope to, hopefully, make
Collier County a better place, and we look forward to next year, '23,
of actually having the parade.
So we would like to invite everyone to please attend the virtual
event this year and, like I said, we look forward to having the actual
parade and celebration next year.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, I really thank you all.
(Applause.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And after we do our pictures, I'm
going to read the proclamation, because this is just really nice --
MR. KEEYS: Very good. Excellent.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: -- and I'd like to do that, so...
January 11, 2022
Page 19
Now we understand why he was here.
You know, this proclamation says a lot. And so I'd like to read
it, if you will indulge me for a moment.
Whereas, on the steps of Lincoln Memorial, Dr. Martin Luther
King, Jr., spoke passionately of his dreams of an America where all
citizens would be judged by the content of their character and not by
the color of their skin, where all Americans would enjoy the riches of
freedom and the security of justice, where the door of opportunity
would be open for all; and,
Whereas, the celebration of Dr. King's birthday is intended as a
time for all Americans to reaffirm their commitment to the basic
principles that underlie our Declaration of Independence and
Constitution, equality and justice for all;
Whereas, on Monday, January 17th, 2022, all people of Collier
County will remember Dr. King's dream and renew our commitment
to bringing forth positive change throughout our nation; and,
Whereas, the Collier County branch of the NAACP will help us
all to remember Dr. King's dream by presenting the 25th Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr., Day celebration themed, "We must walk on in the
days ahead with an audacious faith in the future."
This year's celebration will be conducted virtually.
Now, therefore, be it proclaimed by the Board of County
Commissioners on -- Monday, January 17th, be designated as a day
to remember and celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King's dream. Signed
Commissioner Taylor as chair.
And with that, if you would, please.
(Applause.)
MR. KEEYS: And with that, I really would like to turn this
over, actually, to the chairperson.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Oh, okay.
MR. KEEYS: Thank you. Thank you so very much. Thank
January 11, 2022
Page 20
you so very much.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Absolutely.
Item #4B
PROCLAMATION DESIGNATING JANUARY 2022 AS HUMAN
TRAFFICKING AWARENESS MONTH IN COLLIER COUNTY.
ACCEPTED BY LINDA OBERHAUS, CHIEF EXECUTIVE
OFFICER, THE SHELTER FOR ABUSED WOMEN AND
CHILDREN - READ INTO THE RECORD
MR. ISACKSON: Commissioners, the next proclamation is a
proclamation designating January 2022 as Human Trafficking
Awareness Month in Collier County. That's to be accepted by Linda
Oberhaus, chief executive office, the Shelter for Abused Women and
Children.
MS. OBERHAUS: Do you want me to come up or speak first?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Either way. What do you prefer?
MS. OBERHAUS: I'll be happy to speak first.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Since you're right there, go ahead
then.
MS. OBERHAUS: All right. So good morning,
Commissioners, and Happy New Year to all of you. Thank you so
much for acknowledging January as National Human Trafficking
Awareness Month.
I just wanted to share a couple of stats with you about human
trafficking and then talk with you a little bit about a partnership that's
happening here locally to address the issue.
So some basic stats are that human trafficking is the third largest
and fastest growing illegal business in the world following weapons
and drugs. Florida ranks third in the nation for the number of calls
January 11, 2022
Page 21
to the human trafficking hotline, and looking at some data recently, I
was looking at those statistics in Florida being third in the nation, and
Fort Myers and Naples is the second highest -- have the second
highest number of calls in the state of Florida.
It's estimated that 83 percent of all human trafficking cases are
U.S. born Americans; 50 percent of those trafficked are children.
The average age of a trafficking victim is 15; and it's estimated that
over 70 percent of women and girls are now sold online.
So people ask the question, why is human trafficking one of the
fastest organized crimes in the world? And that's because traffickers
choose to trade in human beings because historically there has been
low risk and high profits and high demands.
And I just want to give you one example of this. So the
minimum wage is approximately $15,000 a year, the average law
enforcement officer makes approximately $60,000 a year, and the
average human trafficker makes an average of $240,000 a year.
And so what are we doing about this here in Collier County?
So just briefly I want to let you know that we recently -- we recently
signed an MOU with the Collier County Sheriff's Office, Naples
Police Department, and Marco Island Police Department in
partnership also with our state attorney for the 20th Judicial Circuit,
Amira Fox, and our treatment courts. So the whole point behind
this -- and it's called the Nordic model. I would encourage folks to
look online at the shelter, NaplesShelter.org. It's to deemphasize
prosecuting these victims and putting them in jail and offering them
support and services and placing a stronger emphasis on the buyers of
women and girls in our community because it's really the buyers that
are creating the demand for the traffickers to go out and exploit other
victims.
And so with that, I just want to thank you all again for your
acknowledgment.
January 11, 2022
Page 22
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you, Ms. Linda.
(Applause.)
MR. ISACKSON: Congratulations.
Item #4C
PROCLAMATION DESIGNATING JANUARY 2022 AS
FLORIDA PANTHER MONTH IN COLLIER COUNTY. TO BE
ACCEPTED BY RICKY PIRES, DIRECTOR, FLORIDA GULF
COAST UNIVERSITY "WINGS OF HOPE" PROGRAM. READ
INTO THE RECORD
Commissioners, the next proclamation is a proclamation
designating January 2022 as Florida Panther Month in Collier
County. To be accepted by Ricky Pires, director of the Florida Gulf
Coast University Wings of Hope Program.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Are you going to speak first?
MS. PIRES: Sure.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Absolutely.
MS. PIRES: All right. Well, thank you all for honoring our
artists. I hope you guys enjoy the artwork back there and
everything, too.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Tell us a little bit about that,
too.
MS. PIRES: I am.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: All right, good.
MS. PIRES: Also, my FGCU Wings of Hope program slash
Florida panther posse, we bring about 5,000 fourth and fifth graders
up to the university in their big yellow limo, you know, and so -- and,
also, they learn about the Florida panther, okay. And I have about
400 during the year of FGCU students, you know, the cool college
January 11, 2022
Page 23
kids that educate the kids also, our fourth and fifth graders.
And we teach them about the natural history of the Florida
panther, their babies, their kittens and wildlife that lives with the
Florida panther, you know, what the panther goes grocery shopping
for and also research. The posse is actually part of research. They
have infrared motion cameras out there, and they buy those with their
Pennies for Panthers, and just ways they can live in harmony with the
Florida panther, because most of them are in their backyard, all these
panthers are.
With only 120 to 230 left in the world -- we've already lost our
first one this year, okay. It was a male on Collier Boulevard -- by a
car. Last year we lost 27, okay. Twenty of them was by cars.
And, you know, the males always like to go and defend their
territory, and also a lot of dating going on, hopefully. Sorry.
Then after the program, we give a form to all of our students,
and even the college kids, and they educate at least two people about
the Florida panther. So the results came back, and it was kind of
disturbing, because a lot of people think there's about a thousand
Florida panthers in Southwest Florida, okay.
And also, the color of their coat is black, okay. No, they are
not. You know that two-thirds of the body of the Florida panther is
tan, okay.
Black panthers are leopards or jaguars. The Disney does not
get it, okay, with their characters. And also some of our sports
teams for their mascots. So I decided, okay, we need to get the
information out. So I created this "Never say goodbye to the Florida
panther" art contest, and I recruited Florida Wildlife Federation,
okay, FDC panther team, that helps us a lot, and the wonderful
Naples Zoo, and, of course, the Collier County art department, and I
even recruited my husband's law firm, Woodward, Pires &
Lombardo, you know, so they were on board to help honor these
January 11, 2022
Page 24
artists. You know, they worked really hard. We have 2,500 kids
that participated that got actually one of the big panther posters, okay.
And we also didn't leave out our art teachers. You're the ones
that actually work really, really hard, so we honored them also.
And they asked, Ms. Ricky, okay, why are we doing this? Why
are we protecting the Florida panther and its habitat? So it's an
umbrella specie. Think about it. When we protect the Florida
panther and its habitat, we protect all the wildlife, don't we? All the
clean air. You need clean area. How about clean water? Exactly.
So it all results down: It's saving us when we save the Florida
panther.
So the students and the teachers and all of us got together, and
we realized that it's our responsibility, all of us, our responsibility to
take care of this Florida panther, its habitat, and carry it into the
future and never, never say goodbye. And thank you guys so much.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you, Ms. Pires.
(Applause.)
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: You've got to do this.
MS. PIRES: Twenty-one years.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Twenty-one years.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Make sure I gave her the right one.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: You did.
MS. PIRES: I didn't look. Fantastic. Thank you all. I really
appreciate it.
(Applause.)
Item #4D
PROCLAMATION RECOGNIZING THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY
OF THE NAPLES CONCERT BAND. THE PROCLAMATION
WILL BE PRESENTED BY COMMISSIONER PENNY TAYLOR
January 11, 2022
Page 25
ON JANUARY 16, 2022, TO THE NAPLES CONCERT BAND AT
ITS PERFORMANCE AT THE CAMBIER PARK BANDSHELL.
READ INTO THE RECORD
MR. ISACKSON: Commissioners, your final proclamation is a
proclamation recognizing the 50th anniversary of the Naples Concert
Band. The proclamation will be presented by Commissioner Taylor
on January 16th, 2022, to the Naples Concert Band at its performance
at the Cambier Park band shell.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: And just a note, if you've never
heard the Concert Band, you're in for a treat. And believe me, come
early. You bring your lawn chair. You sit there, but spaces are
limited. It's very, very popular. They're an extraordinary group
who not only have, quote-unquote, amateur musicians who practice
through the week and present, they also support students in the
schools and help them with their music career. So it's a worthy
endeavor. It's a lot of fun. You know, you might meet some people
that you kind of like to talk to. Thank you.
Item #5A
PRESENTATION OF THE COLLIER COUNTY BUSINESS OF
THE MONTH FOR JANUARY 2022 TO PRESTIGE INSURANCE
CONSULTANTS, INC. THE AWARD ACCEPTED BY
SHANNON MORGAN AND SONIA ROCCA, AGENCY
OWNERS. ALSO PRESENT IS BETHANY SAWYER, VICE
PRESIDENT OF MEMBERSHIP, THE GREATER NAPLES
CHAMBER OF COMMERCE.
MR. ISACKSON: Mr. Chairman and Commissioners, under 5,
5A is a presentation of the Collier County Business of the Month for
January 11, 2022
Page 26
January 2022 to Prestige Insurance Consultants, Incorporated. The
award will be accepted by Shannon Morgan and Sonia Rocca, agency
owners. Also present is Bethany Sawyer, vice president of the
membership of the Greater Naples Chamber of Commerce. I think I
also see Mike Dalby there also. Is that Mike in the mask?
MS. MORGAN: I just click -- I'm Shannon Morgan. That's
my business partner, Sonia Rocca. I wanted to thank all the county
commissioners for this award and also for the Chamber for
nominating us. We appreciate everything that you all do for our
community and also the Chamber in making this a great place to live.
We started our business in 2006, have had great growth, and I
appreciate all of you for what you do, because that helps us do what
we do and be successful and be able to give back to our community.
We are very active in different charities and donating to charities.
Definitely believe in our success, putting that towards other people
and other charities within the opportunity to give back. So thank
you. I appreciate it.
(Applause.)
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Thank you.
Item #7
PUBLIC COMMENTS ON GENERAL TOPICS NOT ON THE
CURRENT OR FUTURE AGENDA
MR. ISACKSON: Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, that brings
us to Item 7, public comments on topics not on the current or future
agenda.
Troy, I think we have four, correct?
MR. MILLER: That is correct, sir. Our first speaker is
Kristina Heuser. She will be followed by Al Schantzen.
January 11, 2022
Page 27
MS. HEUSER: Thank you.
I just wanted to take a moment to express my extreme
dissatisfaction with your selection of Map 2 at the last meeting.
There's no clear reason why you would do that other than pandering
to two special interest groups. It does not serve the interests of the
residents of Collier County. What it does, actually, is create the best
possible environment for a democrat to be elected from District 5,
which we hope that does not happen, because we know that what's in
the best interest of the residents of Collier County and this state and
this nation is Republican government.
And I would expect that five elected Republicans, at least in
name, would share that value. But it's evident by your approval of
the Map 2 that you do not. And it's very disappointing.
And I know that my comments are meaningless to three of you,
Commissioner Saunders, Taylor, and Solis, that voted for that, but I
just wanted to make these comments for the benefit of the voters so
that they know that you have revealed yourselves as pandering to
leftist groups and you do not support Republican government and
values, once again. Thank you.
MR. MILLER: Your next speaker is Al Schantzen. He'll be
followed by Cathy Novy.
MR. SCHANTZEN: Good morning, Commissioners. For the
record -- congratulations, Mr. Chair.
I'm here to talk on behalf of the Domestic Animal Services.
We've had a meeting in the past, and I'd like to just bring you up to
date where we're at on that, is I'm a volunteer down with them and
happy to do that.
It continues to improve with a good team heading up
management now and staff improvements and additions to the staff.
And the overall communication and morale has progressed, but
there's a lingering concern about the Humane Society's attempt
January 11, 2022
Page 28
to -- and do a full court press to still trying to take over DAS.
The Humane Society does not appear to be looking at a
cooperative effort as staff had -- as the Board had directed staff to
look at ways of getting all interested parties involved to make
transitionary or different aspects of instead of a full takeover. It is
still seeking single-source control.
It's totally their prerogative. It's a great country we live in.
But a little sunshine on the progress would be nice to disinfect the
wounds that this process causes. Behind-the-scenes meetings with
key players and not in public view, it makes for a toxic -- toxic
atmosphere, and your attention to this and previous discussed
cooperation and understanding of open dialogue with all the parties
would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you, sir.
MR. MILLER: Your next speaker is Cathy Novy. I hope I'm
saying that properly. And she'll be followed by Tim Carpenter.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: May I speak to that just one
second?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yep.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Mr. Schantzen, please be
assured that it is customary and really something that just happens
because of how we do business in terms of meeting with folks who
are interested in this and that quietly in a room, but any
decisions -- any decisions, especially of something that is so
important which is Department of Animal or --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: DAS.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: -- DAS, that is always done in
this room with full public participation.
MR. SCHANTZEN: I have no doubt in that, ma'am. I'm just
here to put the punctuation point on this to make sure it stays in view,
and I have no doubt about the Sunshine Law and the way it will be
January 11, 2022
Page 29
done, and I've got no doubt that it will be done to the satisfaction of
our four-legged friends. I'm just -- wanting just to make sure this
stays in public view so that it can be supported. And any decisions
that you make will be on behalf of the employees and the animals; I
understand that. But I'm going to stay ahead of it. Thank you.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Thank you. Thank you very
much.
MR. MILLER: And now your next speaker is Cathy Novy.
And she'll be followed by Tim Carpenter.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I'm sorry, Ms. Novy.
MS. NOVY: It's okay. Is Mr. French here?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: In the back.
MS. NOVY: Hi, there. All righty. I believe I sent -- I don't
believe I sent this to all the commissioners. The Taormina. You all
got this email? Do I hear a yes from everyone?
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Yes.
MS. NOVY: All right. And you saw the over 250 signatures.
All right.
We have to stop the crushing of the concrete at this site. Don't
know how else to say it. I'm not going to belabor it, but it's out of
control. Has anybody been there lately, driven by the city dump at
Santa Barbara and Davis? The concrete is so high it's pathetic, and
we cannot have this guy, Mr. Cadenhead, crush it to get it all into our
lanais adjacent to the Boys and Girls Club.
And you know the story; it's all in the petition. So, frankly, do
you folks have any questions? Because we're not letting this go.
We're not letting this go. You guys allowed this to happen two years
ago. You allowed it, and now you have to stop it.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: This is not a question-and-answer
period. Say your peace. We'll respond appropriately, then we'll go
forward. This is not the time and the place for you to be asking
January 11, 2022
Page 30
questions of our board. Continue on with your presentation, please.
MS. NOVY: My presentation is self-explanatory in this
petition.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay, very good.
And, Commissioner Saunders, would you like to address her?
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I want to ask Mr. French a
question or two, here.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I understand what you're
saying in terms of we don't generally get into that dialogue --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: No, we don't.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: -- but this has been an issue
that's been before this board at least four times, and I've brought it
here.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Correct. And we have addressed
this multiple times.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Right. I'm going to address
it again.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Okay.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Mr. French, my
understanding is that there's no crushing going on; that that would be
a violation of -- a code violation and a violation of their Site
Development Plan. What is the status there, and -- because I haven't
spoken to you now in a couple weeks on this.
MR. FRENCH: Thank you, Mr. Chair and Commissioner
Saunders, Board.
So the Site Development Plan is still active. It expires on
March 14th. It just so happens that it will expire at the 90-day
period that you adopted the latest ordinance with regards to removing
of the debris within 90 days. There is no activity currently going on
on the site. We monitor the site on a regular basis.
January 11, 2022
Page 31
I did have conversation with Mr. Siesky, who is representing -- I
don't know if he's representing Mr. Cadenhead or the Hubschman
family. But Jim Siesky, Jaime Cook, and I did have a conversation
with regard to staff's position that they are required to have an
environmental resource permit from the District, which they don't
currently have a valid environmental resource permit, so no activity
is currently going on on that site.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: The reason I wanted to make
sure that that was still the case is that obviously this site has to be
cleaned up at some point, and it seems to me that if there's going to
be any crushing done, it's better to have it done after season in the
rainy season so there won't be the problem with dust. And so just so
you understand, there's no crushing going on at this point from what I
understand.
MS. NOVY: I understand there's no crushing going on, but we
want him to get an excavation permit so he can remove the concrete,
as silly as it might sound, and crush it elsewhere where it should have
been done in the first place. You allowed it to be done there in a
residential area adjacent to a Boys and Girls Club, sir. We've had
this discussion, you and I, one on one.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Absolutely. And the
problem that the Commission has is that they were issued a Site
Development Plan by the staff, not an issue that came before the
Board. They received their environmental resource permit from the
state. Again, another issue that was never brought before the Board.
The first time that the Board became even aware of there being an
issue was when the public brought it to our attention.
And so we inherited a situation where there is a tremendous
amount of concrete on a piece of property that, arguably, was put
there legally because of the state permit and the county permit that
was issued. So the issue becomes how do we get this site cleaned in
January 11, 2022
Page 32
the most efficient way without causing some environmental hazard to
the community.
So my belief was, well, the best way to do that is to stop any
crushing until after the -- until the rainy season begins so at least
there's not a dust problem. But we are not in a position -- and the
County Attorney probably could opine on this, and maybe it's a
question for the County Attorney -- this board simply cannot say to
the property owner "you have to remove that material." We don't
have that legal authority, because it was put there legally.
And that's a question, I guess, I would ask the County Attorney.
Because if the County Attorney says, yes, we can order them to
remove the property [sic], I'll make that motion right now, but I don't
think we can do that, and that's kind of the problem.
MR. KLATZKOW: This board enacted an ordinance fairly
recently. The ordinance is effective in March.
We gave the owner 90 days to comply since the owner said it
would only take him 90 days to fix it. Once that ordinance becomes
effective, I will be coming to this board asking the Board whether or
not they want to institute a legal action to compel the owner to
remove it, but that's going to be in March.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Okay. And when that is
available to us, I guarantee you I'll make that motion to move forward
to do that.
MS. NOVY: Let me understand. So in March, in less than
two months, you're going to -- I want to be clear so I can bring this
back to people. You're going to -- tell me again what you're going to
do.
MR. KLATZKOW: In March I will bring an item before the
Board of County Commissioners asking the Board to direct me to
bring an action in the local trial court here to compel the owner to
clean up the property.
January 11, 2022
Page 33
MS. NOVY: Cleaning up could mean crushing it at the site?
MR. KLATZKOW: No. Removing it.
MS. NOVY: Removing it, thank you. That works.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So that will happen in
March.
MS. NOVY: That works. So we're not going to have any
crushing until --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: No, no more crushing.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: That's been the goal.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: That's what Commissioner
Saunders -- there's no more crushing. It's over.
MR. FRENCH: Commissioner.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Well, there's going to
be -- well, I don't want to have you leave with some potentially false
hope here. The County Attorney's indicated he will file a legal
action.
MR. KLATZKOW: This is in March.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: We still have to win it.
MR. KLATZKOW: What happens between now and March I
cannot tell you what the owner's going to do. I cannot tell you what
staff's going to do. But come in March, I will be coming to this
board for direction.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: And there will be potentially
a lawsuit filed to force him to clean it. The county still has to prevail
in the lawsuit. So there will be two sides to that, but that's the
position we have right now.
MS. NOVY: Just truly read what I wrote in the petition. It's
scientifically based. Unlike COVID, it is scientifically based that
this is causing a health hazard, and we've been dealing with this for
two years and --
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: And that's exactly why I
January 11, 2022
Page 34
wanted to make sure there was no crushing during this dry season,
because of the potential dust issue.
MS. NOVY: I have news for you, Commissioner. Even
during the rainy season, we have this much on our lanais. It's -- we
can't keep breathing this in. So I'm over this. We're good?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yes.
MS. NOVY: Thank you.
MR. MILLER: Your final speaker under Item 7 is Tim
Carpenter.
MR. CARPENTER: My name is Tim Carpenter, and I have a
couple of things I want to talk about, a couple of questions or
comments. One is on the redistricting. I was really disappointed in
how it was done. We had candidates that had gotten printed
certificates or petitions from the Supervisor of Elections that had their
names on it. They had gone out and worked to be school board
candidates. Some of them had spent up close to $1,000. Suddenly
that was all changed with the redistricting, and those people were
totally not living in the district they had been working in. And it just
seemed like it came out late, and they could have been informed of
that earlier and not had to put forth the effort.
Also, another thing about it that really bothered me, I know that
a lot of it is done because of federal regulations, and you have to do
certain things, but there was only two groups that apparently gave
you influence and gave you direction or at least that were mentioned
that were concerns. One was the League of Women Voters. The
other one was the NAACP. It seems like there would have been
more Collier County people that would have been involved in the
decision-making process.
Where District 3 was added and the changes between 2 and 3,
there was seven churches that was literally split down the front of
those churches of which district those -- and it mainly would be
January 11, 2022
Page 35
influence that they would have with their school board members.
But I found that you guys hadn't contacted any of those
churches. I just think in 10 years from now when that's done again
there needs to be a little more advance forethought and information
put into where the district lines are drawn. And I really realize that
you probably can't do much in retrospect, but let's change it in the
future is my comments on that.
The second thing is -- and I didn't intend to talk about this till
last night. I don't hang out down here in your courtyard real often at
night, late at night, but last night I happened to be down here for a
meeting. As I was leaving, there was seven homeless people
sleeping in the courtyard.
Collier County is growing and is growing tremendously fast. I
would think that we were better than that. I wanted those people to
have a bed, not a concrete pad to sleep on. Why can't there be a way
that they are put into some kind of a facility to sleep, then move them
out to the place that they are from, give them what they need to
survive? Some of them I realize might be a long term, a lot of them
could be moved back to other areas of the country where they've
come from. And I'm sorry, my time is up. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thirty seconds.
MR. CARPENTER: Thirty seconds.
So I would just like to see some long-term plan, because it's
going to get worse on the homeless people. So you have to deal with
it now while you've got seven in the courtyard, or you'll have
hundreds in the street. So it's up to us as Collier County to decide
how we're going to deal with those people, because we're better than
having them sleep on the street. I don't -- I mean, whatever I need to
give, whatever I need to do, but let's get them off of the street and in
beds. And that's my speech.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you, sir.
January 11, 2022
Page 36
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Appreciate it very much.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I wondered, the Chair, just a
gentle question, given the length of our meeting, which is shorter
today. We have the former chair of St. Matthew's House here who I
think could respond very succinctly to the concerns expressed.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: You know, I appreciate your
bringing that up. I saw him here, but that is an item that's coming
before this board --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: That's true.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: -- the second meeting in January,
and I don't want to have that discussion without the parties, because
Mrs. Pires' husband will turn us upside down. So I would rather say
to Tim, there's a plan -- not you, sir, but the gentleman who spoke,
Tim, that there is a plan in place. There are circumstances that are
happening as we speak to assist with that process for the
homelessness. So I'd rather let that --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Yeah, I think that's good.
Thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yep.
Item #9A
ORDINANCE 2022-02: AN ORDINANCE ESTABLISHING
PEDESTRIAN SAFETY REGULATIONS IN
UNINCORPORATED COLLIER COUNTY, AND TO REPEAL
PORTIONS OF ORDINANCE 87-60, AS AMENDED – ADOPTED
MR. ISACKSON: Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, that moves
us to 9A, which was formerly 17A. It's a recommendation to adopt
an ordinance establishing pedestrian safety requirements in
January 11, 2022
Page 37
unincorporated Collier County and repeal portions of
Ordinance 87-60 as amended. And this was brought forth by
Commissioner LoCastro.
MR. KLATZKOW: And Assistant County Attorney Colleen
Kerins will present.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Say that again.
MR. KLATZKOW: And Assistant County Attorney Colleen
Kerins will present.
MS. KERINS: Good morning.
MR. KLATZKOW: Colleen's relatively new to our office.
She came on board about a year ago. She was a partner in a
litigation firm.
MS. KERINS: Good morning. Our office worked in
conjunction with the Sheriff's Office to put forth a pedestrian safety
ordinance to address concerns regarding individuals within the
medians of the county.
We broke it down, and we tried to highlight some of the main
parts of the ordinance here. Section 5 of the ordinance deals and
tracks along with the recent changes to Florida Statute 316.130 which
pretty much, in laymen's terms, says that you can't willfully obstruct
moving traffic or sidewalks in the county. The same thing, our goal
here is to make sure that there's not people between travel lanes of
traffic, as most of the county, as you know, is made up of arterial
roads, and the rate of speeds can be concerning.
With that said, this particular ordinance does not regulate free
speech. It is content neutral in nature, and it does not restrict
individuals from communicating or passing items with vehicles on
the roads of Collier County if they are lawfully stopped.
We do have parameters on these items. FDOT defines a
median as being anything under -- or over eight feet preferably, and it
goes down to say anything over six-and-a-half feet can be considered
January 11, 2022
Page 38
a median. It notates a difference as to a traffic separator, which is
under six-and-a-half feet. With that said, we are not restricting
people being in the larger medians but trying to get people away from
the middle of intersections where there's more of a chance of having
safety issues.
With that said, we did break it down as to how any
correspondence or communication with vehicles on the roads can be.
If it's a one-lane road and the car is lawfully stopped, individuals can
approach a vehicle from either direction on either side, the driver's or
the passenger's side. If it is a one-way road with two lanes, they can
approach from either side if it is lawfully stopped.
The largest concern is on our many arterial roads where there
are more than two lanes going in two different directions, multiple
lanes in terms of traffic left-hand turns. In that situation, the only
time a vehicle can be approached is when it is in the right-most lane
legally stopped on the right side of the vehicle. That prohibits
anyone from violating the prior portions of the ordinance in terms of
walking through the lanes of traffic or people standing on the median
and coming off of the street to communicate with the traffic.
The reason it is set up this way is due to the national trend and
constitutional challenges to these ordinances, and the Sheriff's Office
and our office wanted to make sure we had something put in place
that is able to be defended and something that can actually be
prosecuted to address the underlying safety concerns.
And Section 6, once again, defines what a traffic separator is as
to where our main concerns are within the county, and it also gives
exceptions, as do the prior portions, for law enforcement officers,
Solid Waste, or other types of maintenance vehicles legally working
in those landscaped areas or other areas of those medians and traffic
separators.
And the penalty enforcement goes along with the rest of the
January 11, 2022
Page 39
codes of laws in terms of it being a misdemeanor with a fine not to
exceed $500 and jail time not to exceed 60 days.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner LoCastro.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yes, sir.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: You're the one that brought this up.
I'm assuming you have a comment or two.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I do. You know, I brought
this forward because it was in the summary agenda, and a lot of times
when things are in the summary or the consent agenda, they sort of
just get missed by citizens not -- you know, we make one vote and
we approve, you know, a whole plethora of things. I think we all
know we've gotten a lot of emails from people. I mean, we
know -- I know you used a lot of good legal speak and whatnot, but
we're talking about people in the roads asking for money or trying to
sell things or whatnot, and it's really gotten -- it's really escalated in
some key areas.
And, although, as -- you know, I've spoken to the Sheriff's
Office, and I'm sure most of us have. It's not illegal to come up on
the street and ask them for $5, but the big thing is, we want to make
sure that in areas where it presents a safety issue, we actually have
enforcement. I mean, I've gotten tons of emails, as we all have, from
people that just say, well, just arrest everybody in the street asking for
money, and that's actually not something that is possible. And so we
want something that is enforceable.
And so we're taking, you know, small to medium bites out of the
apple. And also, too, when I spoke with Sheriff Bloom about this,
Colonel Bloom, we're learning a lot from other counties who either
tried to pass things like this and they weren't enforceable so people
were in and out of the jails in, like, five minutes, and I'm not sure that
that's what we want to be the primary job of our sheriffs is to, you
know, arrest people and then release them five minutes later because
January 11, 2022
Page 40
we have an ordinance with no teeth.
So this is a start, really, of a process to control. And I'll never
say "eliminate," because there are some areas where you actually can
do this legally. But I really commend our County Attorney and
County Attorney's Office working with the Sheriff's Office so we can
have something that is, as you said -- I liked your term -- enforceable,
defendable, and prosecutable.
And so I wanted people to hear it and not just have it buried in
the summary agenda, because it's been a hot topic where we've gotten
a lot of notes, and a lot of people think we're sitting on our hands
doing nothing, and really over, you know, the last weeks and months
our County Attorney's Office has actually been working with the
Sheriff's Office and other counties to give us something here in
Collier that had more teeth in it.
So it doesn't mean you won't see anybody on the road, but we're
hoping this will control and, in many cases in some areas where
safety is an issue, eliminate, you know, those folks out on the road
either, you know, selling things or asking for money or whatnot.
So I just -- I met with our County Attorney. I thought it was
important maybe that we did a little bit of a deeper dive than just
have it sort of buried in the summary agenda. So, you know, there is
a lot going on to put more teeth in our County Attorney ordinance,
and this is what I think is a strong start.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Agreed.
MR. KLATZKOW: And for clarity -- and Ms. Kerins did all
the hard lifting here along with the Sheriff's Office over the past six
months. For clarity, what this boils down to is that the sidewalks are
public forums so that if you want to hold up a sign "Vote for
Commissioner McDaniel" at the next election, you can do that on the
sidewalk. If you want to hold up a sign "Eat at Joe's," you put it on
the sidewalk. And, quite frankly, panhandling's no different than
January 11, 2022
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that. It's just a different form of expression. Many of us may find it
distasteful, but still.
So what we're doing with this ordinance is we're limiting the
public forum to the sidewalk itself keeping people out of the
right-of-way. And the primary motive for that, quite frankly, was
my telling Colleen, my God, we installed a six-lane arterial system in
Collier County with God knows how many turn lanes. Cars are
whizzing by at 55, 60 miles an hour. We just can't have people in
the right-of-way.
Now we've got a provision in there that allows people to be in a
median if it's six-and-a-half-feet or greater. We don't really have
those. And the ones that we do, we've got landscaping in them, so
they're not going to be usable.
So, again, the key feature of this is that the sidewalks are public
forums for any expression whatsoever but keeping people out of the
road for safety sake, because we've had this in the past where people
just get run over, and it's just -- it's just awful.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And there is a -- there is a trespass
provision as well, because a lot of times these folks that are
expressing themselves in our right-of-ways end up on private
property, and there is an avenue for a property owner to actually
physically trespass someone off their -- off their own property, so
step by step.
And you feel, relatively speaking, that this is something that -- I
like the language that you used that we have an opportunity to make
some adjustments.
MS. KERINS: Yes.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Good. Do we need to call for a
vote on this individually? Yeah, we do. So any other discussion?
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: No. Thank you, sir.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Make your motion, Commissioner.
January 11, 2022
Page 42
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Make a motion to approve.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Second.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Second.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It's been moved and seconded that
we accept the ordinance as presented. Any other discussion?
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I'd just add one thing; that
much like many other things that we approve here, that they're living,
working documents. So as we get more citizen input, any of us, or
as the County Attorney continues to converse with our Sheriff's
Office, if we think we need to make some amendments or some
changes or we realize there's some holes in it possibly because people
will find where the loose ends might be, that at any time you can
bring back, you know, an updated version to ensure that we have as
strong of a policy and ordinance as possible.
MR. KLATZKOW: Absolutely.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: All in favor?
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Aye.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Opposed, same sign, same sound.
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So moved. Next?
Item # 11A
AWARD REQUEST FOR PROFESSIONAL SERVICES (RPS) NO.
21-7881 "DESIGN SERVICES FOR OLD LELY UTILITY
IMPROVEMENTS" IN THE TOTAL AMOUNT OF $15,908,833
TO JOHNSON ENGINEERING, INC. WITH AUTHORIZATION
January 11, 2022
Page 43
TO ISSUE AN INITIAL PURCHASE ORDER FOR TASK 1 AND
REIMBURSABLES IN THE AMOUNT OF $5,152,020, TO BE
FOLLOWED BY FUTURE PURCHASE ORDER
MODIFICATIONS FOR SUBSEQUENT TASKS 2 AND 3, BOTH
ENCOMPASSED IN THE TOTAL CONTRACT AMOUNT,
SUBJECT TO AND DICTATED BY BOARD-APPROVED
FUNDING UNDER PROJECT #60224 (FUNDS 412, 414 AND
327); AND AUTHORIZE THE NECESSARY BUDGET
AMENDMENT - APPROVED
MR. ISACKSON: Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, that brings
us to Item 11, the County Manager's report. 11A is a
recommendation to award Request for Professional Services (RPS)
No. 21-7881, design services for Old Lely utility improvements, in
the total amount of $15,908,833 to Johnson Engineering, Inc., with
authorization to issue an initial purchase order for Task 1 and
reimbursables in the amount of $5,152,020, to be followed by future
purchaser order modifications for subsequent Tasks 2 and 3 both
encompassed in the total contract amount subject to and dedicated by
the Board-approved funding.
Ms. Trinity Scott, your deputy department head for Growth
Management, will present.
MS. SCOTT: Thank you. Good morning.
So today we're here to obtain professional engineering services
to replace aging infrastructure in the Lely area.
And I wanted to bring up a location map because, as
Commissioner LoCastro's well aware, when we refer to Lely,
sometimes we have to determine which section of Lely we're actually
talking about, and we're talking about the section of Lely along St.
Andrews Boulevard over to Rattlesnake Hammock, not the Lely
Resort area.
January 11, 2022
Page 44
And this agreement, as Mr. Isackson pointed out, includes
multiple tasks, the first of which is preliminary engineering. It will
be followed by design and permitting and, ultimately, construction
administration services for infrastructure to include stormwater,
potable water, wastewater, irrigation quality water, and sidewalks.
As we have done with many of our other public utility and
stormwater partnerships, we are working so that we can go in and
replace that infrastructure together to have less inconvenience to the
residents in the area.
What we are asking for today is authorization to move forward
with Task 1 in reimbursables, which comes up to $5,152,020. There
will be future agenda items as we progress through this project, and
we'll come back before you for authorization for Tasks 2 and 3.
There is a slight modification to what was presented in the
executive summary regarding the funding for this project; therefore, I
would like to read the following into the record: A budget
amendment in the amount of $1,854,727.20 is required to establish a
budget in the Stormwater Fund 327. A second set of budget
amendments are needed in the amount of $3,000,297 -- I'm
sorry -- $3,297,292.80 for countywide Capital Fund 301 to advance
funding to Water and Wastewater Capital Funds 412 and 414.
All budget amendments are necessary to cover the cost for Task
1 and reimbursables and, as noted on the slide, Fund 301 will be
reimbursed at the completion of Task 1 by the Water Fund 412 and
Wastewater Fund 414.
And with that, we're asking for your approval to award
Agreement No. 21-781 for the total contract amount of $15,908,833
to Johnson Engineering and authorize to issue the initial purchase
order for Task 1 in reimbursables and authorize the necessary budget
amendments.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: So moved.
January 11, 2022
Page 45
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Second.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It's been moved and seconded.
One question, and that's, if the balance of this amount's coming back
to us, why are we being asked to approve it all? Because I
have -- I'm just wondering why we're having to do all three when
we're only taking care of Task 1.
MS. SCOTT: So we are authorizing the entire contract because
we want to have the same consultant who goes -- has continuity for
the entire project; otherwise, we would have to go out through a
request for professional services each time and hope that we're lucky
enough to have the same consultant each time, because there will
need to be continuity throughout the project.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Absolutely. Always know the
answer before you ask the question. All in favor?
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Aye.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Opposed, same sign, same sound.
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So moved.
MS. SCOTT: Thank you.
Item 11B
ACCEPT THE STATUS REPORT FOR COLLIER COUNTY
LOCAL GOVERNMENT INFRASTRUCTURE SALES
SURTAX PROJECTS, ACKNOWLEDGE THE PLANNED
MOVE OF THE DOMESTIC ANIMAL SERVICES (DAS)
FACILITY TO COUNTY SITE #305, AND AUTHORIZE
January 11, 2022
Page 46
COMPLETION OF DESIGN FOR SHERIFF’S
FORENSICS/EVIDENCE BUILDING TO INCLUDE
EXPANDING THE SIZE OF THE SHERIFF’S FACILITY TO
ACCOMMODATE A MOVE OF CCSO CRIMINAL
INVESTIGATIONS DIVISION FROM 2373 EAST
HORSESHOE DRIVE TO THE GOBP CAMPUS. (ED FINN,
INTERIM FACILITIES MANAGEMENT DIRECTOR
APPROVED
MR. ISACKSON: Commissioners, Item 11B is a
recommendation to accept the status report for Collier County local
government infrastructure sales tax projects, acknowledge the
planned move of Domestic Animal Services facility to County
Site 305, and authorize completion of design for Sheriff's
forensics/evidence building to include expanding the size of the
Sheriff's facility to accommodate a move of the Collier County
Sheriff's Office criminal investigations division from 2373 East
Horseshoe Drive to the Government Operations Business Park
campus.
Mr. Ed Finn, your interim Facilities Management director, will
present.
MR. FINN: Thank you, Mr. Isackson.
Good morning, Mr. Chairman. Congratulations.
Edward Finn.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Everybody's congratulating me for
more work. What's up with that?
MR. FINN: I'm sympathetic.
I'm your interim Facilities Management director, and thank you
very much.
We're going to talk today about the Collier County local
government infrastructure surtax program. I'm going to tell you
January 11, 2022
Page 47
what we hope to achieve today, then provide a brief overview of the
surtax program and projects, then we'll discuss in a bit more detail the
Domestic Animal Service relocation approach as well as alternatives
for the Sheriff's forensic evidence building construction to be
constructed at the government operations business park.
Our objective today is to provide you with a status report, first
of all, about the surtax program. That program totals $420 million in
local projects. The project overall is 490 million with the difference
being distributed to the municipalities in Collier County.
The second objective is to acknowledge the planned relocation
of the DAS facility to Collier County Site 305, which is adjacent to
the sports complex and the government operations business park.
And the last thing is to approve design for upsizing the Sheriff's
forensic evidence facility in order to relocate the CID operations that
are currently at Horseshoe Drive East. That building was, kind of,
built in the late '80s and is subject to a lot of concerns
maintenance-wise. Generally, the Sheriff has outgrown the use of
that building.
I'm going to give you a quick overview. Voters approved the
additional penny sales tax for infrastructure funding in
November 2018. Collections of that tax began on January 1, 2019.
The tax is in place for seven years or up to $490 million, and at this
point we have approximately three years of collection history.
Exhibit A of Ordinance 2018-21, which governs the surtax,
specifies three primary categories, three primary categories of
projects: Transportation, facilities and capital replacements, and
community priorities.
The transportation component totals 191 million; facilities and
capital replacements, $79 million; kind of core HVAC roofing and
maintenance projects is 39 million; hurricane resiliency is 15 million;
EMS stations is six million for three stations; and community
January 11, 2022
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priorities total $90 million.
The first category is the transportation projects. They're listed
here on this summary sheet. And the largest project is the
Vanderbilt Beach Road extension. This is not the full project cost;
rather, this is the surtax component of that.
And if it suits the Chair, I'll deal with these on an exception
basis, and if there's a question, we'll address those.
Very good. If there are no questions, I'll move on.
The surtax projects under Facilities Management are pretty
involved and complicated. There's eight completed projects that are
maintenance related, there are 22 projects in process, and five future
projects to be validated. Just -- I probably should describe the
validation process.
The statute and the local ordinance requires that these projects
be validated by the Citizens Infrastructure Surtax Committee. They
review these projects for compliance with the surtax ordinance, and
they validate the projects before we actually create budgets for them.
There's a couple of groups of projects. Two of them on here
we're going to discuss a little -- in a little more detail in a moment,
the forensics evidence building and the DAS facility relocation. The
other major project in this category is the Phase 1 of the Big
Corkscrew Island Regional Park. That is at approximately
85 percent construction and seems to be moving along pretty well.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Very slowly, by the way.
MR. FINN: Yes, sir. It's a quality project.
This is a list of the -- what I'm broadly terming the maintenance
projects, the core maintenance projects we're responsible for. I will
point out that the largest project on here actually has two
components. The first component is the chiller replacement at
$11 million. That's the chiller at this campus. The other component
of that is to replace the chiller water lines, also on this campus, for $4
January 11, 2022
Page 49
million. Very good.
Hurricane resiliency, this category is a little bit unique in that
there's a good chunk of money, about $8 million, that hasn't been
validated yet. At this point, staff is not proceeding with that. We're
waiting on some resolution on hurricane -- hurricane sheltering and
whether this would be used for something to that effect.
EMS substations, there are three substations. This particular
category is a little further along, and the funding here is a little bit
narrower than some of the other areas. As a result, there's a bit of a
funding shortfall at this moment in this category that we'll be
exploring at the Citizens committee.
Community priorities, again, in the not-yet-validated category
are the Career and Technical Training Center, the state -- and it's
important to say, the state veterans nursing home and the Workforce
Housing Land Trust. Those are in various stages of an early -- early
program development and analysis. And as those unfold, those will
be brought before the Surtax Committee for funding. The mental
health facility is further along. That is actually in the process of
having design and construction underway -- not underway, but rather
design to commencing.
So, again, I'm just today, when we get down to it, our
recommendations are to accept the surtax program status report that
we just went through, some discussion or acknowledgment of the
DAS location to the 305 site, and approve design work to upsize the
Sheriff's facility to accommodate the CID building operations in their
entirety.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Commissioner LoCastro.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I don't have the board down here,
so --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Commissioner LoCastro wants
to speak.
January 11, 2022
Page 50
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I see. I just -- I see them hitting
their lights, and you still have the pad. So I think Commissioner
Saunders was first, then Commissioner LoCastro. And it's okay. I
can watch till I move down there, Troy. It doesn't matter.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I'm actually listed as No. 2,
so I think Commissioner LoCastro was first. I don't want to jump in
front of you.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: No. Well, I'll just ask real
quick. You know, Mr. Finn, this may be premature because it might
be in your presentation. But after all is said and done, all this design
and construction happens, what tracts of land will the county then
have in excess that they will put up for sale? I mean, I've got some
notes here. It says here, if the existing transportation facility is sold.
Are there -- can you give us a short thing that if everything happened
perfectly, what land would be in excess? And then I have a
follow-up question based on how you answer that.
MR. FINN: Very good.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: And I'm not trying to set you
up. It's more of just I'm trying to educate myself and the citizens on
how we sell land.
MR. FINN: I appreciate that. Thank you, sir.
There are three pieces of land that potentially could be declared
surplus at the end of this. I'm going to talk about -- first about the
piece of land that most likely is going to be declared surplus, and that
is the current operations center for the Collier County Water/Sewer
District. It's located at Mercantile. The plan generally considers
that that's going to be disposed of and sold at surplus.
The other two properties that are listed here include the
Horseshoe Drive East, which is the location for the Sheriff's CID
building. The ultimate disposition of that is -- continues to be
subject to additional considerations. There's no determination made
January 11, 2022
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at this point.
The last building is the Growth Management building. There's
still some debt outstanding on that. The net value of it is -- as you
can see, is kind of -- is not particularly large at this point in time.
That determination hasn't been made either.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: So I guess what I would just
stress, and it's more of just a comment, is the county actually doesn't
own land; taxpayers do. And one of the things I think that we've got
to make sure we do the best job possible is that we make the sale of
this land competitive, that we don't have three people come in under
the table with low bids, and then we take the highest of the low bid.
Counties across the nation have been guilty of that. So I'm not
sitting here citing a specific example. This is more of a comment,
you know, going forward.
But if we have some surplus land, especially now when real
estate is at a premium, we shouldn't unload surplus land. We should
competitively sell it. You know, we need to be in the business of
making sure the taxpayers get their money's worth. And even if we
bought this land for $10,000 50 years ago, if it now has a fair market
value of $8 million, you know, we should go after that because it's
real money.
And so I'd rather see land sit for sale and not be sold then sold to
the highest of the lowest bidders and under -- and I'm sure you would
agree with me. And we actually had this conversation a little bit
when we were at my town hall meeting at Port of the Islands.
But I just know that there's surplus land that's coming up and,
you know, we just want to stress to the public -- and I would expect
that you're a guy that sharpens your pencil, you know, multiple times.
You know, let's make sure we're doing the best for the taxpayer and
that we're getting the fair market value for the land, we're not settling
for something because we want to unload, you know, the land. And
January 11, 2022
Page 52
like I say, we've got a few things that are probably coming up on the
auction block, so to speak. You know, it's real money, and so
it's -- you know, the taxpayers are the owners, not us.
MR. FINN: Yes, sir. I concur. Thank you. Very good.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: We're not done get.
MR. FINN: I'm sorry, sir.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner Saunders is next,
and then I have a comment on what Commissioner LoCastro just got
done with, so...
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: When this sales tax issue
came up, there were three of us on the Board, Commissioner Taylor,
Commissioner Solis, and myself, that voted to place this on the
ballot. Commissioner LoCastro was not on the Board at the time.
The reason I want to ask these questions is, undoubtedly, there
will be some negative comments concerning taxation, and why would
a Republican vote for this type of a tax to be placed on the ballot. So
I'm going to ask you a couple questions. The first question is: On
this list, which of those projects are simply not necessary and in the
public interest? There's $420 million worth of projects. Some of
them have to be of no public need. So which ones of those on that
list are unnecessary?
MR. FINN: That's an interesting question, Commissioner.
MR. KLATZKOW: The Board found that all of these were in
the public interest in the public hearing.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I understand. I'm asking a
question.
MR. KLATZKOW: I don't think he knows the answer.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I know what his answer's
going to be, of course. I'm asking the question. I'll continue with
asking the question.
MR. ISACKSON: Let me -- Ed, let me take that question. If
January 11, 2022
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you don't mind, Commissioner.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Sure.
MR. ISACKSON: The $420 million in projects were obviously
verified. Had we not issued 420- -- had we not proceeded with the
one-penny sales tax, then we would have been in a situation where
the Board would have been forced to prioritize specifically, because
we would have now had to go out for debt on some of these projects.
So the County Attorney's right, we identified what we thought
was a list of essential not only municipal projects but also community
projects. Had we not done that, then we would have been back to
the Board and said, okay, now we're going to whittle this down a
little bit because, obviously, we don't have the money coming in from
the penny sales tax. We're going to have to begin to prioritize. So I
don't know if that answers your question, sir.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: It does. I think the answer
is -- to summarize your answer, I think all of these projects are
necessary; we've made that determination.
Next question, if we did not -- what percentage of this sales tax
is paid by visitors and part-time nonpermanent residents of the
county? I've heard a couple numbers as high as 35 percent.
MR. FINN: I'm going to apologize for not having that specific.
I believe it is between 20 and 35 percent, sir.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Close to that.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: All right. And if we did the
alternative funding, which would have been bonding, what would
have been the additional cost to the taxpayers for the projects,
approximately?
MR. ISACKSON: Yeah. I think you probably
would -- depending on how long you went in terms of the debt
service, you probably would have been in the 30, $35 million range,
guessing. That's a -- that's what I would call grenade math without
January 11, 2022
Page 54
having the numbers. But I'll bet you I'm pretty close.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So approximately
10 percent --
MR. ISACKSON: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: -- increase --
MR. ISACKSON: Over time, over time, yeah.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I ask those questions
because, as I said, the three of us on this board that are going to be
vilified for voting to put this on the ballot, and there's nothing on this
project -- on this list that doesn't improve the quality of life of the
residents of this county, and that's why I, as a Republican, voted to
put this on the ballot, and I'm sure that's the same thing for Mr. Solis,
and I'm sure it's the same thing for Penny Taylor.
As a matter of fact, Commissioner Taylor, I'll ask you this
question. How much of this money will go to the City of Naples for
very important public projects in the City of Naples where your -- the
heart of your district?
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Nine -- is it 90 million?
MR. FINN: Well, the delta between all the municipalities is
70 million. I would say roughly half would go to the City of Naples,
roughly half would go to the City of Marco Island.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So residents in your district
are going to certainly benefit, especially in the City of Naples --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Yes.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: -- from this for projects that
the City Council will identify as critically important for the residents
of that. So I want the public to understand that.
And then another question -- and this is not any kind of a
criticism. I just want -- this is part of the education process,
Commissioner LoCastro. In terms of a piece of property owned by
the county that is determined to be not needed by the county, to be
January 11, 2022
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property that can be sold, I'll ask the County Attorney what the
process is. And I think it's important, because the public has to
know that it is a very public process, and it is a competitive bidding
process.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I'm aware.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: It's not -- it's not some folks
picking a bid that's in, you know, the best of the lowest bids.
So, Mr. Klatzkow, just real quickly.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah.
MR. KLATZKOW: Yes, sir. On a particular piece of
property, the Board will direct staff to put it out for bid and will have
commercial agents out there. And it's like nobody -- it's no different
from anybody else selling a piece of property. You go out, you try
to get your highest value for it by putting it on the market.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Isn't there a statute that
requires that?
MR. KLATZKOW: Yeah, you're required to do that. We also
have a list of surplus --
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I just wanted the public to
understand there's no situation where staff members meet with
somebody who wants to buy a piece of property and then they --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Oh, absolutely.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So it's just a question of
letting the public know that that's --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Can I make a comment? My
comment would just be, having had 100 town hall meetings in 12
months, then we need to do a better job at putting out information and
educating the public, because I just get large numbers of people who
are in business. Some of them their business is real estate who don't
believe the county, even though they might be following statutes and
everything -- so maybe it's a bit of misinformation -- but they don't
January 11, 2022
Page 56
think that we get our money's worth. They see things publicized and
they say, wow, the fair market value for that property, I don't know
where you got your estimate or who appraised it. And so I'm just
giving you back, you know, feedback that I hear.
MR. KLATZKOW: But I will tell you --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: So I understand the process.
MR. KLATZKOW: The reason for that is we are selling the
property with the zoning as-is, okay. What will happen is a
developer will buy that property and up-zone it, and the property's
worth much more. So in a developer's mind, these properties are
worth higher than us, because we cannot go out ourselves up-zone a
property, and then put it on the market. So if there's a differential
there, that's where it's coming from.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah. So we maybe need to
do the best job to make sure the public, you know, realizes that we do
have a process and that --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It's an -- do you have a comment
before I --
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Not on that. I do have one
more question in reference to the sales tax. I want to take a look -- I
want to focus on the mental health facility just a minute because
that's a -- it's a big-ticket item. It's $25 million.
This facility is one that has been recommended by our citizen
committee, by the courts, and by the sheriff's department; is that -- is
that correct?
MR. FINN: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: And this is something that is
generally important to law enforcement as well as the courts to deal
with mental health problems of people that are picked up by the
sheriff's department; is that accurate?
MR. FINN: Yes, sir. There's a large group. There has been
January 11, 2022
Page 57
an enormous amount of support in the community for that particular
project, and that is, in fact, why that is a little further along than many
of the other community-interest projects.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Now, that project, if it had
not been for Commissioner Solis, would not be on this list. And so
the question is -- because he brought that issue up. The question is,
if we did not have a sales tax, a one-cent sales tax with this project on
the list, would we even be talking about a mental health facility and,
if so, how would we fund something like that?
MR. FINN: In my view, it would be highly unlikely that we
would be looking at this project.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Okay. Thank you.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: And the result would be that
folks that the Sheriff picks up for whatever reason would end up in
the jail, not in an institution, a mental health facility where they could
be helped. I mean, that's -- we as a county are at the cutting edge
nationally of what other areas in this country are doing in terms of
dealing with repeat offenders that perhaps don't require jail time.
It's -- it's very exciting, and we've been doing this for about six or
seven years under the leadership of Sheriff Rambosk.
MR. FINN: Yes, ma'am.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And just one point, Commissioner
LoCastro. There is -- there's a very, very stringent process that we
go through. There is a misconception. I took a lot of heat last year
on the 47 acres and the representations that were made. We put the
property up for sale, we advertised the property, we put a sign on the
property, we received three bids, and then the Board deliberated on
those three bids for the highest and best price, terms, and conditions
that met the criterium that we had going on.
The representation -- or the thought process is -- and I talked to
the County Attorney about this shortly after I became a
January 11, 2022
Page 58
commissioner. I was like, why don't we rezone it ourselves? And
his simple answer was, first off, it's illegal for us to do that, and
second of all, if we could do that, we could eliminate impact fees at
large because we would be able to do with our properties and receive
the highest and best use.
You're absolutely correct that they are -- the property is owned
by the taxpayers, but we're regulated by law as to what we can and
can't do. We're not allowed to expend taxpayer money, pay $10,000
for a piece of property 50 years ago and then rezone it for a greater
price and do that. It makes good business sense, but it's not legal.
And it's important --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: If we have three bids that
come in and we think they're all underbid, we have the ability to
reject all of them and just continue to hold the property, correct?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: We did that last -- two years ago
on the Bayshore piece, that 17 acres that we still own, forever. We
did that when we didn't get the satisfactory offers that we had, and we
sent them back again. You're absolutely correct. We have the right
to not accept and receive or accept an offer that, in fact, comes in.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah. And I merely brought
it up just for an educational piece, so not just for me just because I
hear citizens that, you know, they summarize sort of what we do and
what we don't do, and sometimes it is a lot of misinformation. So if
we have several pieces that are coming up here in the near future, I
just think that it behooves us to maybe even more aggressively
explain, you know, the process to citizens, even if we just do it from
this forum here when we vote on it, for sure.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, I appreciate you bringing it
up --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Absolutely.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: -- because it is a misnomer and a
January 11, 2022
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thought process that we're not doing right, but we are -- we are
prohibited from rezoning property that the government already owns.
Now two quick questions, then we're going to take a break for
Terri, unless you folks want to continue on.
Are you lit up? All right. Go ahead, Commissioner Solis.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: I just wanted to reiterate what
Commissioner Saunders was saying. All of these projects were
desperately needed. The only way to do any of these projects was to
pay for them with taxpayer money. One way or the other, it's
taxpayer money.
We heard from our County Manager that if we had gone out
with bond financing or other debt financing mechanisms to
accomplish this list of infrastructure projects, we would have paid
more. And for me, a conservative approach is to pay less for
something rather than more for something.
And to have about 30, 35 percent of the cost of these projects
paid by visitors to Collier County and not necessarily the residents
makes absolutely great sense to me. And I think it was, in fact, the
conservative thing to do to pay less rather than more. And my
understanding was, is that, at least when we looked at it, that the cost
of the bond financing long term, I thought, was even higher than
35 million. I thought it approached, like, 100 or something.
But, anyway, neither here nor there. And Mark would know
better than I. But -- so I think it's important that the public
understand that as we're looking at these and approving again -- not
approving the projects but accepting the report, that this was the best
way to accomplish what was a backlog of capital improvements and
projects that were sorely needed by Collier County, and we are, in
fact, going to pay less taxpayer money to accomplish this than we
would have otherwise.
MR. ISACKSON: If I can, maybe before we go to break,
January 11, 2022
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Mr. Chair, Commissioners. Oh, I'm sorry.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner Taylor has a
comment.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: No, just briefly, and also for the
public and, Commissioner LoCastro, so that you understand. This
was, in so many ways, a grass-roots effort. This came -- the concept
of the sales tax came from the Chamber of Commerce. They heard
from the businesses of this community, they heard the needs of this
community, and they came to us. And with their cooperation and
collaboration, we developed that list.
So this was done in the Sunshine. This was done with the best
thing that could ever happen, taking it to the people to ask them, do
you support this, or do you not, and they weighed in.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yep.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: So it was, I think, financially a
very wise decision of the public, and I think Collier County will
continue to reap the benefits of their decision.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I'll just add, I have no
questions on the list of construction projects. My questions were on
the land that's going to be in surplus and making sure that we get fair
market value and that if we get three bids that don't meet it, that the
public knows that we can reject those and should in the best interest
of the taxpayer, for sure.
As far as the surplus tax money being used for all of these lists, I
echo what Commissioner Saunders says: We need to have a priority
list, should there be a little hiccup somewhere. I mean, all these are
great projects. Some are, you know, higher up on the list than
others, but no question, they've all been -- they all make a huge
positive impact. But the land that's left over, we want to make sure
we recoup that money to the maximum ability and following every
step of the law, was my point, so...
January 11, 2022
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CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: On that note --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yep.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: -- just to editorialize, I was not in
support of the sales tax. I lobbied against it. I didn't vote for it. I
certainly -- and I think Commissioner Solis typified it, when you
have this much of a backlog, this was the way to actually handle it.
I think we, as a board -- it is incumbent upon us as a board to not
allow the circumstances to prevail to allow that backlog to end up the
way that it did. We have a GMP. We have a five-year CIE. We
have priorities of this community for the support -- infrastructure for
the residents that are, in fact, here, let alone those that are coming,
and that backlog precipitated the necessity of this in order to pick up
that necessary infrastructure, several of those projects.
The Big Corkscrew Regional Park, it's 20-years-plus behind
when our GMP triggered its necessity to be constructed. Vanderbilt
Beach -- you talk about saving money? Vanderbilt Beach
construction, that extension was slated and triggered by our GMP in
2006. The cost then would have been 50 percent of what it is, in
fact, now. And there is 50-plus million, Commissioner Solis, in
additional expense that the taxpayers have borne --
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Sure.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: -- because decision makers at the
time made decisions based upon the circumstances that were, in fact,
going on, and so we were put -- we -- you were put -- we were put in
a position of taking care of these backlogs in that manner.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: But the -- and it's a capital "the"
decision, or the area or the environment that was going on at the time
was called the Great Recession. When the Great Recession came in
2008, they let go of 320 people from this government.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: We all lived through the Great
Recession. We all saw what, in fact -- and, again, I'm not debating it
January 11, 2022
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with you, the circumstances. We're certainly all entitled to our
opinions. But to answer Commissioner Saunders' statement at the
beginning of this, all of these are essential to the residents of Collier
County Government or properties that are essential to our
community, the betterment of our community, and shouldn't have
been deferred.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Well -- and, again, I think I
maybe have misunderstood you and, if I did, forgive me. But I
heard that it was the leadership within this government that caused
this backlog, and I don't think it was.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It was circumstantial and decisions
that were made.
So to that end, County Manager.
MR. ISACKSON: Do we need a motion on this, or do we
already have one?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: County Manager has a comment, I
think.
MR. ISACKSON: I think we have two speakers. And I don't
know, Terri, if you can hold on for another 10 minutes or if you want
to do that, but I just want to reiterate that what we're asking for is
essentially to proceed with what we're doing with the government
operations business park, specifically moving ahead with our Sheriff
facility relocation, moving ahead with our design work for the
Department of Animal Services facility.
Ed, did I leave anything out?
MR. FINN: No, sir. Acknowledge the planned move, and we
are planning on it the 305 site for DAS, and the upsizing the Sheriff's
facility to accommodate the full move from the Horseshoe Drive CID
building. We need the approval of the Board principally with the
Sheriff's thing because that is a change in the contract for the design.
The DAS, we simply want the Board to acknowledge that that's what
January 11, 2022
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we're doing because that has, in fact, been the plan for the last two
years.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: If there's not a motion on the
floor, I'll make that motion.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: We have two public speakers. Do
you want to hear them before we make the motion, or are we going to
change the --
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Sure.
MR. MILLER: Mr. Chair, your first speaker is Joe
Trachtenberg, and he will be followed by Michael Dalby.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I don't think either one of
them will try to talk us out of it, so...
MR. TRACHTENBERG: Good morning, Commissioners.
First, let me thank you, Chairman McDaniel, for reminding the
public of our hearing on January 25th involving St. Matthew's House
where we're seeking approval to add 46 more beds. I might say that
yesterday our waiting list was 90. So there's no shortage of a
problem with the homeless in Collier County and in Naples.
So I'm Joe Trachtenberg. Yesterday the Affordable Housing
Advisory Committee elected me its new chairman, and it's my honor
to appear before you today on AHAC business.
Among the reasons provided in the surtax ordinance was to
acquire land and support construction for workplace housing. And
as we saw in that last slide, the amount designated for workplace
housing included in the community priority section was $20 million.
In 2019, this commission revived the Housing Trust Fund.
Among other things, it was tasked with determining eligibility to
accept invitations for proposals. It was also tasked to develop rules
on how to develop funds and, in fact, concluded it would be best to
utilize the exact same eligibility criteria as is now used for SHIP
funds.
January 11, 2022
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The biggest stumbling block then and now for the fund is
determining from where the money will come to support its essential
efforts. Funding is necessary in order for the Housing Trust Fund to
accomplish anything as it relates to encouraging more affordable
housing in Collier County.
So on your agenda today is approval of some of those funds.
And we certainly concur with a recommendation that you proceed to
do that. We think what's missing is a mention of our affordable
housing funds. I'm requesting on behalf of AHAC that the Housing
Trust Fund be designated the venue to which the $20 million of
surtax funds dedicated to workforce housing be distributed. This
money needs to be put to use, and right now that designation has not
been made, and the recommendation hasn't been put before you.
Moreover, I'm asking that as you've done in other cases
involving surtax money already collected, that you authorize partial
payments to the Housing Trust Fund so that we could actually start
spending some of this money and doing something now.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: You and I are meeting next week,
correct?
MR. TRACHTENBERG: We are.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: We'll talk about this then. Your
time's up. You got three minutes.
MR. TRACHTENBERG: Okay.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you, sir.
MR. MILLER: Your final speaker on this item is Michael
Dalby.
MR. DALBY: Good morning, Commissioners. I'm Michael
Dalby with the Greater Naples Chamber.
Thank you for continuing forward on these critical infrastructure
projects. Obviously, we've been your partner in this through the
process. Good to see things moving forward.
January 11, 2022
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Maybe just some things to think of as we continue to move
forward on these. One, the other day we got a great tour of the Big
Corkscrew Island regional park coming along. We would
encourage -- we've encouraged this before -- that you put up some
signs to publicly acknowledge that any of these projects that are
under construction or have been built, that they are being paid for by
the citizens in the penny sales tax. I mean, that helps people to know
that that's their money at work and how this is all coming to be to
help us with the infrastructure needs.
We'd also -- it was great to see on the community priority
projects the mental and behavior health receiving center. That's a
critical project, as Commissioner Taylor mentioned, and we are glad
to see that moving forward. Housing is another issue. Workforce
housing is a major issue in our community, and I would only reiterate
the statement that was previously made that it's time to move that
forward by putting those monies to work. We have monies. We
can start that trust fund and begin that work now, because now is
when those housing needs are the most prevalent.
I also want to talk a little bit about our workforce training center.
We have -- we had an opportunity, perhaps, to get some building
previously. We weren't able to make that happen, but I think what it
did was it enabled all of us to realize there's a critical need in our
community for workforce training space, expanded space. We have
great facilities at I-tech, we have great facilities at Lorenzo Walker,
but they're completely maxed out. And having more facility, we
have a need to move what is currently the Center for Manufacturing
Excellence to some new space. They've only got about a year and a
half left in the space they're in.
So moving these things forward because we have those taxpayer
funds and those sales tax funds that come from our visitors as well to
enable us to be able to make that happen, we just want to encourage
January 11, 2022
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that. We're going to keep supporting these efforts. We will keep
being your partner in this effort, but we just want to always push on
those community priorities, that they continue to be addressed.
So thank you very much. Any questions?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you.
MR. DALBY: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I'll take your motion now,
Commissioner Saunders.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So moved.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Second.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It's been moved and seconded that
we accept the report, acknowledge the DAS relocation, and then our
Sheriff's expansion of the facilities at the 305. Any other
discussion?
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: All in favor, say aye.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Aye.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Opposed, same sign, same sound.
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So moved.
With that, I'm going to move to a court reporter's break because
Terri's panting. We'll be back at 11:00.
(A brief recess was had from 10:44 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.)
MR. ISACKSON: Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, you have a
live mic.
Mr. Chairman, let me -- before we -- I mentioned the term
"grenade math." I went down and grabbed my calculator. I was
January 11, 2022
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talking to Commissioner Solis at the break. If we had done the full
420-, assuming various interest rates, you'd be close to that $100,000
number. I had in my mind, though, if we took out the community
priorities, you'd be down to, like, let's say 300 million, so that's where
I came up with my number, which was pretty close. But, anyway, I
just want to put that on the record.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: So we wouldn't do the community
priorities.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: What is the debt service?
MR. ISACKSON: Well, if you did a full 420-, let's say over 25
or 30 years, you'd be a little over $100 million probably, depending
on the interest rate. But if you had whacked out the community
priorities like I had in my mind when I was talking -- addressing
Commissioner Saunders' question, you'd be closer to my number.
Anyway, I'm sorry, sir.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And just as -- and I forgot to ask
Ed because I got so happy about moving on to a vote. How far
along are we? I think it was in the executive summary, but we're
really ahead of schedule with our receipts in relationship to the term,
if I'm not mistaken.
MR. ISACKSON: Yeah. Let me -- if I can, I'll just share with
you that we've collected to date on our side about 242 million.
Interest on that at about 1.9 million. So -- and if you factor in the
city's contributions, we're at -- our collections are at about 267,
almost 268 million of the 490 million that was authorized.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay. So plus/minus 50 percent?
MR. ISACKSON: So you're probably through 2023, end of
'23, early '24 in terms of our collections and meeting that deadline.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: And, again, it sunsets.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Right, at the amount or the term.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: It sunsets, it's done, unless this
January 11, 2022
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board decides to re-up it, and then that's a public meeting. But it
is -- it sunsets. There's no more tax after we reach the goal.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Does the re-upping of it
require a referendum?
MR. ISACKSON: Yeah, it does.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I think it does. So I don't
want the public to think that we can simply vote.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I'm sorry.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: That's all.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: We'd have to go to referendum.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay.
Item 11C
ACCEPT STAFF'S UPDATE ON COLLIER COUNTY BOAT
RAMP PARK USE AND COMMERCIAL VESSEL LAUNCH
PERMIT SALES - STAFF AUTHORIZED TO ISSUE 38 NEW
PERMITS, LIMITING THE ISSUANCE OF PERMITS TO 180 –
APPROVED; STAFF TO INVESTIGATE VALET PARKING AND
TO EVALUATE SIGNAGE, A POSSIBLE INCREASE IN FINES
FOR EXPIRED PERMITS AND TRANSFER OF PERMITS –
CONSENSUS
MR. ISACKSON: Commissioner, Item 7 -- 11C, excuse me, is
a recommendation to accept staff's update on the Collier County boat
ramp, park use, and commercial launch sales.
Melissa Hennig, your regional manager, Parks and Recreation
Division, will present.
MS. HENNIG: Good morning, Commissioners. For the
record, Melissa Hennig, Parks and Recreation regional manager.
January 11, 2022
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And as requested when we brought this item before you in
November, we're coming back with an update on how it's going out at
the boat parks.
So I'll do an overview of how it's going with the dockmasters; an
update on the variable message board we're going to put on Collier
Boulevard; a boat park visitation update for the month of December,
commercial launch permits issued, and just an update there; and then
also go over how we're moving along with any developments
improving the Caxambas and Goodland parking.
First, we have positioned dockmasters at both Goodland and
Caxambas Park, and we've had overwhelmingly positive reviews.
Right now we have them during the busiest times of the week,
Friday -- or Thursday through Monday, and we are still actively
looking for an additional dockmaster so that we can have someone
there every day of the week.
They're improving the parking compliance and the traffic flow,
they're enhancing the visitor education, and they're improving the use
by both the recreational and commercial activity.
At Goodland, one thing that's happened now that we have better
oversight of the single car parking, as you reduce -- people used to
park overflow into the trailer spaces. Now, we haven't had any
issues with trailers not finding parking, but now as these single cars
can't find parking in the park, they're searching for parking outside
of -- in the village and different places. So it's like a balloon when
you squeeze it and they pour out. We are in the process of
permitting the variable message board for Collier Boulevard with the
state.
So here's -- oh, it was -- my apologies -- annual, annual
visitation. I did show you that the visitation did increase in '19 and
'20, and then we did get the numbers, the total numbers, and it just
continues to rise in 2021, and I show you all the boat parks and
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particularly the Caxambas and Goodland.
So as of right now, I did update from the executive summary
that was as of January 4th. As of yesterday, we've sold a total of 115
of the commercial permits. The cap was 180 that were sold last
year. And one of the directions you had given was to allow marine
service industry and sale industry people only -- have one permit for
as many trailers as they like. That wasn't a feasible option this year
because of the way we identify. We had to give them a permit -- a
sticker for their truck so we could identify it. That's why it's broken
out on the chart. So 14 of those permits issued were to marine
service and sales; 101 for ecotourism.
And you can see from this chart and the table the majority of the
permits were issued to this point to Caxambas Park, 40 percent of
those permits. Goodland is next, and then all parks. Now -- and
that's another thing on the graph. Historically, when people were
issued permits, we didn't even ask where they were going to launch,
so they were able to use any park. This year we asked, okay, what
park are you going to use? And we didn't limit them just to one
park. So that's why we have some that say, well, we're going to use
Caxambas/Paddlecraft, Caxambas/Goodland. I wanted to capture
that in the table. In the future, if we want to restrict it, permits per
park, that would be an option.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Typically, we let them do the
presentation and then you ask. Do you want to -- do you mind if we
do questions while you're --
MS. HENNIG: Oh, no. Go ahead.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Go ahead, Commissioner Taylor.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Just something you said about
you asked them what park they're going to use. So they are
restricted from using other parks, or this is only for your
informational basis?
January 11, 2022
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MS. HENNIG: Correct. At this point it's for informational
basis.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Okay.
MS. HENNIG: We don't have different stickers for different
parks or anyway to --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I think once they get a sticker, they
can go whenever they need to.
MS. HENNIG: Yeah, yeah.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Okay. I wanted to --
MS. HENNIG: But in general -- and that's the thing, we go on
what they put in their application at this point.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Okay. Thank you.
MS. HENNIG: So the next couple slides, if you want me to
keep going into them, I broke down by each park what kind of uses
the permits were issued for. So, overall, the largest number of
permits issued were for boat tours, which would include sailing
vessels, eco tours, shelling trips, dolphin cruises, that kind of thing,
and then kayak and paddleboard rentals and jet skis, charter fishing,
marine sale and service, and you can see.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Before you go away,
Commissioner LoCastro's got a question.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Melissa, just real quick, do
you think the 115 that have been the grandfathered ones that have
been re-upped for 2022, do you think the number is less than 181
because of the graduated fee structure? Did we have anybody come
in and say, wow, when I could get -- you know, spend a 100 and
something dollars, and I'll take eight, and now that we know that
it's -- you know, the last meeting we passed a graduated fee structure.
Have we had people say, you know, I had eight in the past but now
that I know it's going to cost a lot more, just give me three or I only
used three? Do we think that that helped at all?
January 11, 2022
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MS. HENNIG: Honestly, I don't believe so. I think everyone
got their max.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Okay. So you think the
number, then, is lower for other reasons; companies that have moved
on or --
MS. HENNIG: Right. Historically, people have had the entire
year to come in and get a permit, so we didn't put a deadline on it.
We encouraged them to come in by this date, and we are in touch
with them, and we are going to encourage them to get back to us
before the next update we come to.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: And I just wanted to add for
the Board's information, I'm intimately involved in this because the
two marinas that are in the spotlight are in District 1, you know,
Caxambas and Goodland. But gathering the data on where the boats
are really operating -- this is part of our accelerated program to just
gather much more information than we had in the past.
I mean, I don't even know if a couple of years ago if we would
have just said out of the blue, how many permits have we sold, you
know, in the last few months? Somebody would have to go check
that. Now we really want to have stuff at the ready. And in the
future it is possible, using this data, if we wanted to do something
different, more aggressive, more business friendly, customer friendly
with specific passes for specific marinas, at least we have the data, or
the data might prove that's really a waste of time or whatnot.
But, obviously, heavy use at these two marinas, so the data is
what we sort of thought, but...
And keep us posted on it, too, Melissa. You know, there again,
over time, you know, come to this podium fairly frequently so that if
we need to make some changes or we just need to be educated on the
numbers and whatnot, because this is really good information.
Thank you.
January 11, 2022
Page 73
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner Saunders.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And I've got a couple questions that I can wait until the end, or I can
go ahead and proceed now.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I called you. Let's go.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: All right. So we all
received a letter from Laura Gelman concerning the fact that there
was some entities that were trying to put together a business plan and
then kind of got caught up in this moratorium on the passes, and I'm
kind of concerned about that.
And I guess the question is -- there's a couple questions mixed
into this. Can we issue some additional permits for folks that let's
say they establish that they were actually working to set up their
business prior to the date that we imposed the moratorium? It would
be easy for someone to do that.
So, for example -- and I'll use Laura Gelman as an example, her
letter. She mentions someone who started purchasing equipment
and started putting together a business plan and then wound up not
being able to get a permit because of the moratorium. Well, if we
have someone who can show evidence that they started that process
prior to our moratorium, can we go back -- and this is a question for
the Board as well. Can we go back and say, okay, to be fair, no one
knew this was coming. We're going to make an exception for those.
That's one question that I would ask the Board and our staff.
And then the second question is -- and we'll deal with it, I think,
in some detail, is different ways to deal with the parking problems
there. And I'll just kind of plant the seed. Is it possible to
even -- for the noncommercial people that are just coming there to
park, is it possible to set up a service where -- a valet service type of
thing so cars can be stacked? And so I pose that as a question, but I
want to get to the first question from the Board about the other
January 11, 2022
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permits.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: If I could make a comment.
I spoke with Laura personally. Some things in her email were not
quite factual, and she -- once we -- we had a really good
conversation, but I think in the end -- I mean, I've cheated a little bit
because I've been working so closely with this issue.
But in the end, you're going to hear a recommendation, because
it's always been our focus to be able to give permits to the people that
either didn't operate in 2021 and weren't grandfathered or these
special new business circumstances or whatnot, and because the
number is 115 and it's far from that 181, you know, and sort of an
artificial ceiling. We didn't set that as -- you know, we had some
latitude there. But I think you're going to find in this presentation
people like Laura -- and I think it was actually her son, you know,
starting the business, but I've had a few other people. I think you're
going to be pleasantly -- very pleasantly surprised with the
recommendations they're about to bring to the Board of how we're
going to be able to address those folks who still don't have the
permits.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: That's perfect. And as
you're making your presentation -- and Barry's sitting here -- give a
little thought to how we can deal with the parking in a more efficient
way. Some entrepreneur may want to set up a valet parking facility
there and valet park vehicles and stack them. That would increase
parking significantly. Again, just trying to get some thoughts going
here.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: One thing that I will
add -- and there's a few business owners in the audience here. We've
had some take it upon themselves to encourage their customers to
Uber, and I got a -- there's a few emails we might have got saying
there's no Uber that exists on Marco. Well, I've taken Uber probably
January 11, 2022
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a dozen times in the last few months for different reasons and
whatnot, but Uber does exist.
But there's some business owners that have also taken it upon
themselves to get a van and pick up if they have a customer that's on
Marco already at a hotel or somewhere close by. So they're already
helping us with that, but any of -- you know, that's a great suggestion
as well, anything we can do to maximize that parking lot, because we
don't want our businesses to suffer because we have a parking
problem. And we've said that from day one, so...
But thanks to the businesses back there. I'm not sure if you
guys that are here have done some of that, but a few have, so thank
you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Continue on, Ms. Hennig.
MS. HENNIG: So here -- in the next couple slides, I broke
down what types of businesses are operating at each of the parks, and
at Caxambas you can see the majority are boat tours and jet ski
companies, or permits.
At Goodland it's primarily boat tours and charter fishing; paddle
craft, 100 percent nonmotorized. Bayview, we have 33 percent
charter fishing, 33 boat tours. And as an example, I'd like to point at
Bayview. We know that there's more than two charter fishing
companies working out of Bayview.
So to the point made, we have had a lot of people contact us and
say, you know, I had one in '19 and '20, didn't get one because of the
COVID or some other reason, or I didn't even know I needed a
permit. So we do have a list of those people that contacted us.
Again, Cocohatchee, we've only issued four, and Port of the Islands
and 951 park.
The final slide I have in this presentation, and then I'll open the
slides that point towards the number of people that have contacted us
and permits remaining. We have -- we did have a meeting with the
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City of Marco Island regarding the parking issues at Caxambas Park
and the recommendation made by the city staff was to pursue a
rezone. Right now the park is public use, but in the Comprehensive
Plan it could be a community facility. So they recommend pursuing
a rezone to community facility, and then under community facility a
conditional use of marina. So that is the route we're going to pursue
that would allow for the maximum number of commercial entities to
operate there, and the way we would decide on how many could
operate would be you look at the parking, and then based on the
parking, that's how many commercial entities can operate.
At Goodland we are seeking a proposal, a feasibility study, to
just see, can we get any more parking there before we move on to a
full conditional use. The other question is: Right now the
conditional use requires 75 trailer spaces and a maximum of, I think,
21 single car spaces. So is that a ratio that you would like to
change?
So that's my update to date on the issued permits.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Before you go away, are you
suggesting we hire a consultant to do a feasibility study?
MS. HENNIG: Yes, because of the conditional-use
requirements and just the site plan.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I understand over on Caxambas
Pass; that's a --
MS. HENNIG: An engineer to look at the site plan to see if it
could be modified.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, it says a feasibility study for
actual -- for adding actual parking, and I don't -- I don't know -- we
all know there's a need for parking. We don't have to hire somebody
to tell us that. We just need somebody to tell us where we're going
to put them.
MS. HENNIG: Right. What I meant was, is it even feasible
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to -- in the current footprint of the park to get more based on the
codes.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Forgive me. I misread your
caption.
MS. HENNIG: So now here is a breakdown of -- although we
didn't collect the data last year, we were pretty confident with what
the different businesses were doing in the parks.
So as of right now we have 65 remaining, 38 different
companies from 2021. Thirty of those permits would be for marine
sales and services, 15 charter fishing, 13 for boat tours, six for kayak
and paddleboard, and one for jet ski. I do not have a breakdown of
where we think they might have been operating. There were a
couple that could be Caxambas/Goodland.
I have one more slide. And here's a breakdown of -- we had 34
companies contact us that are interested and that we compiled a list.
Like I said, they didn't have them. There were six -- or eight that are
new companies. Eight that had them previously in '19 and '20 but
not '21, and then 16 that they just didn't have them in the past, and
two that are current 2022 permit holders that are seeking additional
permits. And here's the breakdown. A majority are charter
fishermen that are seeking these permits.
And that's the end of my section of the presentation. I'm going
to turn it over to Barry Williams.
MR. WILLIAMS: Good morning, Commissioners. Barry
Williams, Parks and Recreation director.
And I just wanted to publicly thank Melissa and the work she's
done over the last six months in trying to get a handle on this. And,
again, the leadership and direction we've gotten from the Board on
this issue, we appreciate it very greatly.
It's a long-standing issue that we think we're working towards
getting under control. You know, and as Commissioner Saunders
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mentioned, you know, so what we took from the direction earlier
was, you know, putting a moratorium, 180 permits. So we had that
number in our heads. We know that the permits expire
December 31st. People would be renewing for the next year. So
we've got 115 in the book, and so we've got a capacity there.
There's still the question, you know, you're hearing stories of
people that didn't realize they needed a permit. We know that there
are some folks out there that are operating without a permit. But the
question of opening this up again, we had a 180 moratorium, 115
given, to try to let those remaining permits -- again, if we looked at
that 180, you know, as kind of the top number, what we would be
prepared to do is to open this up for a period of time, say 30 days,
encourage people to come in to get the permit, us reevaluate our
statistics of what we've got. We could come back to you in March,
give you a report on that.
There are some things that we're seeing, though, in terms of
trends. Caxambas is a concern, and Melissa talked about us working
with the City of Marco. We do think there's some opportunities
there as that community center's built. We'll remove the modular
that's there now where the Coast Guard Auxiliary is. That will give
us some more parking.
There's still a question, though. Caxambas is such a small
footprint, you know, our recommendation to you would be opening
up, you know, to that 180, looking at not allowing any more permits
at Caxambas, and that could be a little bit of a controversy, but you
just don't have enough room there now to deal with it.
And so we think we've got the bulk of the people that have been
operating at Caxambas. And so limiting it until we can get through
this work with the City of Marco would make sense to us if we could
expand parking and then reevaluate down the road.
So the other thing that we would recommend to you is, you
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know, there had been some discussion about limiting the folks that
got permits just to Collier County residents, and we'd like to offer
that as a thought. There may be some legal considerations that we
have to look at in terms of whether that can occur. But, again, trying
to limit it.
And just to summarize this, looking at the 180, we've issued
115, so looking at expanding, allowing those additional, give a
30-day window to get these permits in, limiting it to Collier County
residents only in terms of their ability to get a commercial permit,
and ceasing permit issuance at Caxambas.
So that's kind of the summary of what we'd like to suggest to
you. And I know you have some speakers that perhaps will also
have some thoughts on the matter. But, again, with that I'll stop, and
if you have any questions, certainly, I'll try to answer them.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner Taylor.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I would support supporting our
Collier County businesses. I think over the pandemic, the East Coast
found us. And I think that we need to limit the permits to Collier
County businesses.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Is that all?
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: That's it.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay. Commissioner LoCastro.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Barry, if we -- if we keep it
to Collier County residents only, do you have an idea of how many
businesses that would exclude, then? Because I know it's a tiny
number, so it's not like, you know -- but one is still, you know, a
significant person who's going to be boxed out. But do you have an
idea of what that would -- how it would affect things?
MR. WILLIAMS: You know, Melissa did some research on
our permits from last year. I want to say there was, perhaps, five or
six from out of county. It will be a small percentage of your overall.
January 11, 2022
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So I don't have that --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Some of these people
enjoyed permits for quite a while, correct? So this is going to be a
big muscle movement for them, but I don't disagree that we're trying
to get control over the situation. We have to do something. And,
you know, Collier County residents only or at least having the
priority. I was just curious of the number. So you answered that.
Second of all, if they can get a permit right now and go
anywhere like we were saying, right, and we're just gathering what
marinas they use, you know, just for our own edification, then how
would we be -- in the next 30 days offer, say, 30 more permits but
say nobody to Caxambas? How would we be able to enforce that?
How would we be able -- just on a hand shake and hope that they're
honest people, or --
MR. WILLIAMS: It would be, honestly. But I will suggest to
you, now that you have a dockmaster, you have, you know,
somebody actively managing that ramp at Caxambas. So we are
intimately aware of the folks that are there. So you do have a better
handle of doing that, but --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: They're not ramp-specific permits.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah.
MR. WILLIAMS: They're not. They're not.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And so limiting the number of
permits for Caxambas Pass is counterintuitive to me.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Me, too.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I mean, I didn't mean to interrupt
you. I'm just -- I like -- I mean, I like Commissioner Taylor's idea,
but we've got to consult with -- or your idea with regard to limiting
for Collier County businesses and residents, but we've got to talk to
the County Attorney about that.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: You know, I'm a big
January 11, 2022
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advocate for trying to find -- I keep saying, fairness and balance.
But the other thing I would say is the best thing we've done at these
parks -- and I've heard it from businesses who are saying, thank you,
your person's doing great. It's the dockmaster. They're not down
there seven days a week, but we're working towards that. But when
we are there, we hired good-quality people. I've gotten multiple
emails saying, you know, this person, that person, amazing.
But they're only one person, and the things we really need them
to do, to control parking, keep the giant trailers from not parking
diagonally. Now we're asking them to look at very specific permits
and then go, oh, you're not supposed to be at Caxambas.
I just think that's too big of a knee jerk. So that may change the
number. And I know we're just spitballing here and talking, but if in
the end we're going to vote on how many new passes we can allow, I
think all of these sort of very unique restrictions this early is going to
be sloppy. And then dumping that on the dockmaster and having
them turn a boat away and say, you know, your pass was only for
Goodland. You're not allowed to be here. Sloppy.
MR. WILLIAMS: Understood.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yeah. No doubt.
Commissioner Taylor.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Just a thought about the
out-of-town permits. Whatever exists now for how many years, I
think we can be fair about it. I think we can do it gradually. I also
think that we might consider as a board, depending on the legality of
it, having a lottery each year with a set number of out-of-county
permits issued which would be perhaps fair to folks who have
established a business here.
But, clearly, we -- you know, boat ramps are -- there's not a lot.
There's not a lot in Collier County. There's not a lot on the East
Coast. As we're growing as a region, we do have to protect our
January 11, 2022
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businesses.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Local businesses, sure.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: You know, I just wanted to
add, though, so that whoever's watching this is clear, we're not
boxing out out-of-county businesses.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: No.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: What we're doing here is
prioritizing. So much like the people that wanted to start a new
business in 2022 and misheard what we said at the last meeting and
they said, oh, I can't believe I'm not -- like Laura and a few other
people that I talked to, we didn't say that. What we said is, let's sell
to the people that have already been operating in 2021, figure out
what that number is, then immediately come back here in January and
try to figure out a magical number so we can continue to give
permits, offer them to new businesses. And what -- we haven't voted
on it yet, but if we went Collier County as the priority, that doesn't
mean we're kicking out all the other ones. We might, because the
number might just be too much to handle, but we're taking this in
small and medium chunks.
And so it's a matter of you're next in line, and it's based on how
many we sell. So I don't want any -- you know, we all get that 100
emails after this meeting. Oh, you put me out of business. I
couldn't get a permit. Well, you couldn't get a permit today. You
couldn't get a permit this week possibly because we're trying to
prioritize properly.
And so, you know, I just want to make that clear, because we all
are getting emails with so much misinformation based on someone
not watching this meeting, not reading these slides, not, you know,
following what's going on in the news and whatnot. We're trying to
prioritize our locals first, our current businesses first, but still figure
out how much room is left for the other folks without, you know, it
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being the wild west show again out there, especially at these two
parks.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Let's go to the County Attorney for
a quick update on legalities with limitations on local business in
relationship to out-of-town business.
MR. KLATZKOW: What I'd like to do -- because I've heard
from the Board, I understand what you want -- is to go back and
speak with staff and then bring something forward to the Board rather
than just trying to cobble something together here. There are some
significant legal issues here.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yeah.
MR. KLATZKOW: But like I always wanted to tell you,
Commissioner McDaniel, when you first came on board, I may not
be able to give you 100 percent of what you want, but I can give
90 percent of what you want.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: You said 95.
MR. KLATZKOW: I think I said 90, but you could be right.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Maybe I heard 95.
MR. KLATZKOW: But I would like to come back to the
Board on the next available agenda with a proposal.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, let's do that if it meets with
our will, but I also want to take care of the adventure that's here in
front of us with regard to the theoretical cap of the permits that we
issue. And I want to make it very clear, from my perspective,
similar to what you said earlier on, these boat ramps are Collier
County residents' boat ramps. They weren't ever built to facilitate
someone operating a business out of. That has become a part of
what the ramps are, in fact, used for, but these ramps were public
ramps built for the public for huckleberries like me to try to back my
boat in and go fishing once in a while. So accommodating the
businesses is really, in fact, important, but these are public boat
January 11, 2022
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ramps for our people.
I would like to address, if I can -- because I haven't heard
anybody say anything. I brought this up in December,
Commissioner Saunders, when we were talking about this cap. I had
suggested that we -- because there are several one-offs, folks that
didn't have a permit, didn't have a permit in '20 or '21 because of
COVID or whatever, or a new licensee. I have a friend whose son
became a charter captain last year, and we decided to not give
permits to anybody that didn't have one from the year before, and I
had suggested that we allow our staff some latitude of an additional
10 percent of that 180 mark to be able to try to catch some of those
one-offs that are out there, special circumstances, folks that chose to
not get a permit, didn't know they had to have a permit, so on and so
forth, and accommodate the new business owners that are coming.
That was my suggestion back in December, and we agreed to wait till
today.
And I don't want us to go away from here and have folks that are
sitting on the edge of their seat waiting to get a permit to have to wait
another two weeks or another month to come back to you in order to
get that permit.
So what's your -- what's your suggestion as far as going forward
with the -- with the balance of the outstanding permits and then some
latitude?
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Can I just add one thing that I
think will help his answer? The latest meeting that we had, the 180
seemed like almost an excessive number when we had no supervision
out there. What we're finding out there now is the dockmasters are
doing such a good job that we're able to manage -- and we're trying to
figure out what that magic number is. Like Commissioner McDaniel
said, maybe it is a plus or minus, you know, 10 percent. But the
dockmasters are helping to manage what we have out there and
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proving that maybe 180 isn't artificial. I'm not saying we go up to,
you know, an exorbitant higher than that, because the sweet spot's
somewhere in there. But if you remember at a meeting -- and we all
voted against it -- a lower number was thrown out of 150, and we
thought that that was not fair and balanced and whatnot.
But I just want to make a play that whatever you're about to say
of what number you think we could go to to sell new permits, a lot of
that is because we now have so much better oversight that the number
is somewhat much more flexible, correct?
MR. WILLIAMS: Absolutely. And I think you also have a lot
of the commercial guys that are, you know, understanding that there's
an issue here and trying to work with this and taking some of the
suggestions. The Uber, you know, getting folks there. So you do
have an active group that is trying to help solve this problem. They
know it's a limited footprint.
But to go to our point, 180 -- you've given 115. You've got 65
left. I think your point is, can we arrive at a number that doesn't
constrain us where, you know, we're limited if there are some people
out there that are looking to get. I think, for us, it is coming back to
you, you know, in March, perhaps, and let you know most of the
people, we would assume, you know, with the new permit year
coming up, have come and gotten it. And there is this question of,
well, what about the rest of these guys; where are they and how come
we haven't seen them yet?
So if you wanted to put 180 plus or minus 10, you know, if that's
useful, that would be useful to us as well, and we'd appreciate that
latitude, I think.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: We'll move that direction when we
get to taking a vote.
Commissioner Solis.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Barry just answered my question.
January 11, 2022
Page 86
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I would add, though, I think
March is too late.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I almost want to see you guys
at the podium every single commissioner meeting. I mean, I'm in
the thick of the war zone right now with trying to find balance and
working with the Marco City Council and all the other moving parts
we've discussed here. I mean, this is front and center on my plate.
And all of us. I mean, we all care about the ramps. It's not a matter
of whose district it's in. But I want -- you know, we all can get
regular updates in between meetings.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yeah. I was just going to say, I
don't want them at the podium every two weeks. These guys have
got to go to work.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: They're scared to death that we're
going to do something that's not going to be all that happy.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Well, they don't need to be
here every two weeks, but for us to get an update. And even if it's
not at the meeting and it's just you shooting something out, Dan, that
says, here's where we are, you know, 21 days later so that we have
the information that arms us a lot better. Let's not sit on it. Because
every day is business to these folks out here. So the ones that don't
have the permits, trust me, they will be here every single meeting,
because this is their livelihood. So, you know, I don't want to sit
here and sit on something and then in March make some big
announcement and they miss two months' worth of business because
they could have got a permit. So I think you're following me.
MR. RODRIGUEZ: I understand; exactly. For the record,
Dan Rodriguez, Public Services department head.
January 11, 2022
Page 87
The direction -- the request is -- basically the recommendation
is, let us bring those 34 in and issue those permits. We have the
capacity at the 180. If there's somebody that's sitting out there, we
believe that if they wanted a permit and they want to do business in
2022, they're here. If they're not, we'll work through that. And I
think we have the capacity to do that, and a lot of those individuals in
the 34 number, they were operating already, and they still are
operating, so...
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I was going to ask you that.
Commissioner Saunders, you're lit up, please.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Well, I wanted to make a
suggestion. We've got a bunch of speakers, I understand.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yes.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: And I think we're all ready
to start making some motions to give direction. Could we go ahead
and listen to the speakers, get that input, and then --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Sure. One quick question, then
we'll go. What's the fine if the dockmaster catches you without a
tag?
MR. WILLIAMS: So you have a -- in your fee policy, a series
of fines. I believe the citation is a $30 fine.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay. And how much does the
license cost?
MR. WILLIAMS: The license itself, it's a tiered approach.
You know, your first permit is $250; second, 350; third, 450; plus the
$10 launch fee every time you launch.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So if I want a tag -- I'm just
talking. If I want a license or a permission slip to be able to run my
charter business and I can't get one because of this cap that's been put
out and the decision making that we're, in fact, going through, I can
continue to run my business and pay $30 a hit on the tickets when I
January 11, 2022
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get caught at the ramp conducting my business without a permit. So
I can do that eight times and be the equivalent of the license fee.
MR. WILLIAMS: You can. There is a question. And
forgive me for bringing this out. I mean, in terms of -- you know,
with parks, what our typical approach is is to educate people. We're
not about giving tickets.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, we don't want to give tickets,
but we also have people that are looking to get licenses and aren't
getting them issued because they didn't fit the box, as we said. They
didn't fit the box that we established for them to be able to come in
and get a license.
MR. WILLIAMS: You do have other mechanisms. If people
continue to not follow the park's rules, there is the ability to trespass
them. It's not something we do --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Right.
MR. WILLIAMS: -- very often, but you do have that potential.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, all I'm looking forward to do
is to accelerate this process to a conclusion and allow us to
continue -- allow our residents to use our boat ramps and the
businesses that are functioning at our boat ramps to continue to do so.
That was -- that was just where I was going with all that, Barry.
MR. WILLIAMS: Understood.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Let's hear from our public. I don't
have -- how many public speakers do we have?
MR. MILLER: Well, we're up to eight now, sir. I'm going to
ask our speakers to use both podiums so we can move this a little bit
quicker. Your first speaker will be Tim Supranawich, and he will be
followed by Josh Erickson.
Mr. Erickson, if you could queue up at the other podium.
MR. SUPRANAWICH: Name's Tim Supranawich. I'm a
Florida resident, and I've owned my house here for 14 years.
January 11, 2022
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I want to share with you my experience a couple of weeks ago
on Tuesday, December 28th, as I went down to the Bayview boat
ramp. As I was driving in, I got down by the bait store, and I could
see dozens and dozens of trailers lined up. Then as I proceeded
down to Bayview, I went by the marina, and there was trailers lined
up there with a few open spots for cars.
I got into Bayview, drove around, nobody at the ramp, but over
50 percent of the spots were -- that would accommodate trailers had
cars in them. There was one open slot, so I quickly moved over to
the ramp, launched my jet ski, got it in the water, got back, and there
was a car then sitting in that one spot. So I drove out looking for a
spot from the marina that I could parallel park a trailer into it.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: How did that work out?
MR. SUPRANAWICH: It didn't work out. I mean, I'm good,
but not that good. So then I turned around, I came back. And once
before when I was there, I actually asked some individual to move his
car because he was parked in a trailer spot, which he did. So I went
to the little park area where some kids were, and I said, is anybody
parked in a trailer spot? They said no.
I went over to -- by the restrooms, and there was a guy there
with a trailer full of jet skis. I think he had six of them on there. He
was leaning up against the trailer. And then there was an individual
and then a wife -- a husband and wife over there. So I went over and
asked -- approached them and said, is anybody parked in a trailer
spot? You know, I'm 71 years old. I don't feel like hoofing it a
mile, you know, down to the bait store.
So the guy on the trailer then -- leaning against the trailer
answered for him. He says, don't get mad at them. Your problem is
with the Collier County board, because the sign says Saturdays and
Sundays and holidays is the only time those spots are reserved. At
any other point in time anybody could park in any of these spots.
January 11, 2022
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So that's, you know -- when I hear Mr. McDaniel say that, you
know, the residents built the boat ramps -- I'm running out of
time -- built the boat ramps, I agree with him. The City of Naples
does not allow commercial people to operate out of their boat ramps.
There's got to be a better solution. You've got to keep the cars
out of the trailer spots. But that's where we're at.
You know, the 10 bucks more you're going to get for the cars,
the people that are paying the hundreds of dollars to rent a jet ski are
gone fish [sic], that doesn't mean a thing. Thank you much for your
time.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you, sir.
MR. MILLER: Your next speaker is Josh Erickson. He'll be
followed by Jesse Karen.
MR. ERICKSON: Good morning, Board. My name is Josh
Erickson. I've been here before to talk about some of the issues that
we're facing down there at both the parks.
I own a business. I applied for three permits this year and was
granted the three permits. I had three permits last year. The year
prior to that we had more. We downsized our permits due to
COVID, and we're subsequently limited in the max that we could
obtain because the permits we obtained the year before was what the
quota is.
I'm a little frustrated because I saw this coming for a long time.
I've been working to remedy the situation offsite with a commercial
location and shuttle people to the park.
We're in the process of building out a storefront. Hopefully it's
done in the next month or two before the next real busy season. But
what I'm seeing is the dockmasters and the rangers down there trying
to organize traffic and organize the parking situations, but they're
overwhelmed. They're overwhelmed. They're having a tough time.
A lot of them, you know, their tempers are running thin, and it's
January 11, 2022
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subsequently running off on customers that are showing up getting
treated, you know, kind of poorly with somebody who's frustrated
and then showing up to the dock to hop on boats and go on charters
when guys like myself who have the permits are watching myriad
other charters come through, and they do not have the red stickers.
You know, the numbers that Melissa just said, I think, are
severely underestimated as to how many people are actually out there
running without permits. I think a lot of people don't know that they
need permits, and none of the numbers really account for that. I
think that there's a substantial amount of people that have been taking
advantage of the docks for the last 30 years, and they simply are
going to continue to do so, especially if the fine is only $30, and
that's maybe if they got caught. And, ultimately, all of that parking
pressure from these other guys that are doing it illegally is
contributing to the parking problems at the parks for the residents and
the business owners that are trying to do it legally.
I think enforcement is critical. I think trying to raise the fines
on those people that are doing it illegally is important. I think that
making sure that the dockmaster down there are not just parking
attendants but also, you know, trying to regulate the traffic coming
inbound and outbound out of there commercially. That shouldn't be
there.
I think if you did those two things more effectively, increasing
those fines and really having some teeth behind people monopolizing
the ramp, it would help out a lot.
The other thing I'm concerned about going forward is if we start
limiting permits, the number of launch permits based on parking
spots available, what happens to businesses such as myself that have
invested a lot of personal capital to create an offsite parking location,
subsequently shuttle people to the ramp, and not use any parking?
We use zero parking, and yet I'm limited in the amount of
January 11, 2022
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commercial permits I can obtain. That severely hinders my
business, and it's challenging and scary and tough to plan going
forward with that kind of criteria.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Are you running out of Caxambas,
Josh?
MR. ERICKSON: I run out of Goodland.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Goodland.
MR. ERICKSON: Yep.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you.
MR. ERICKSON: Yep. And thank you guys for your time
and everybody. I know this is an issue and tough topic, so thank
you.
MR. MILLER: Your next speaker is Jesse Karen. He'll be
followed by Greg Stastny.
MR. KAREN: Happy New Year, guys.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you.
MR. KAREN: Here we are again.
I'm kind of here for a couple reasons similar to Josh, more of an
update. And I'm one of the people who -- I might be one of the two
who needs a permit because my boat sunk right prior to COVID. So
I've always had three boats. I'm different. I don't launch. I rent
slips at the county marina, have done so since it opened up in
Goodland.
I've always had those three slips and those three boats. Boat
sunk. Couldn't find one. And the price of boats are like cars;
they're crazy. So another operator, I rented his boat until I found
one. When I found one, it was too late to buy a permit in 2021, so
this year I am down a boat and had to lay off two families. That put
me in a really bad situation. So I really need to get that third permit
for my third boat that I've always had but have not been able to do so
until this meeting happened.
January 11, 2022
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That aside, the parking situation, man, they are trying very hard
and doing a good job at keeping things right. We've made -- I've
made some arrangements for offsite parking, but people don't read
the emails and the confirmations we send them, so they pull in, they
park in the trailer parking, and then me or one of my other captains,
we go over to move them. But a lot of the times we get to them,
they are being berated by a couple of the people that are working at
the park to solve the parking problem. I've had people go home,
cancel their trips because they were so flummoxed and surprised that
they would be treated this way by a county employee, and I didn't
know what to say to them except apologize profusely.
So the system is working but I think, like Josh says, I think some
of the people are getting a little overwhelmed and maybe a little hot
under the collar. I've personally walked up to my folks when they
got there to move them, and the first word out of their mouth is, I'm
going to trespass you and tow them. I haven't even said anything
yet. I was just going there to move the people to the parking
arrangements I made.
So I think we're in that growing phase where there's some
tweaking that needs to be done because it's -- it's a little bit of a mess
right now.
But that's really all I wanted to say was, is I think they need a
little bit -- I think we're headed in the right direction. I think they
maybe need a little bit more help or perhaps training, because the
person that I'm referring to, I'm sorry, has complained that -- okay, I
can stop -- has complained that they didn't have the necessary
training to do their job.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: We got it. Thank you.
MR. KAREN: But thank you for listening to me. Happy New
Year, and congratulations on the extra work.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: On my extra work.
January 11, 2022
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MR. MILLER: Your next sneaker is Greg Statsny. He'll be
followed by Michael Pope.
MR. STATSNY: The topics I wanted to bring up were already
addressed, so I'll be brief.
We have problems a lot of times with some of the canoe groups.
They'll unload all their canoes and block the entire boat ramp.
They'll let people off to load and unload their canoe right on the
curve where you launch the boat. So you can't even drive a trailer
through there without people blocking that whole area. The easy
thing with the canoes and kayaks is let everybody go off by the
Goodland bridge. They don't even get charged an amount, and it's
an easy place to access all their tours. End of problem right there.
Why are they paying extra money when they don't really need to?
And then they also have off of -- adjacent from one of the other
boat ramps on Isles of Capri, they have their own boat ramp that no
motorized vessels are even allowed to be in. So as far as some of the
canoe and kayak tours, they could launch that area for free, and they
don't take up all that space and hold up all the commercial people that
are trying to load a boat and unload a boat, blocking.
A big problem. The park people enforcing everything, great
move. I think that's good. It's a lot of organization, but they do get
overwhelmed. They don't have police powers, and I think there's a
lot of irate people that eventually maybe have a deputy or one of our
other law enforcements patrol that area so they don't get
overwhelmed.
The big thing is the parking. We've talked briefly, the
commissioner and I, before on the break. As far as having some of
these big groups double up on the parking spots. They know how
many people -- by 8:00, there's no parking spots for anybody. Now,
the commercial fishermen, they have maybe four people in their
group all day. They usually don't do doubles. Every once in a
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while they do. So they have their boat spot, and four people show
up, and they have to park miles away, literally.
If some of the big boat tours could meet their people and say,
hey, you know, I know you don't know this person you're parking
behind, but we're all coming back at the same time, so what's the
difference? You know, it's going to eliminate four or three people
parking there instead of one. So you're going to get a lot more
parking in if the groups organize and get their people to park behind
each other, and it's going to open up more spots.
Thank you very much for your time.
MR. MILLER: Your next speaker is Michael Pope. He'll be
followed by Jason Fullerton.
MR. PAPE: Hello. It's Michael Pape.
MR. MILLER: Oh, I'm sorry, sir.
MR. PAPE: I'm used to it. Don't worry.
But I just kind of wanted to piggyback off of what Jesse and the
other speaker said. I know, Commissioner McDaniel, you spoke
about how the boat ramps were more built for recreational use, not
really for commercial at first.
Commissioner Taylor, you spoke about kind of how people in
the East Coast are moving this way and how Florida's expanding as a
state and as an economy. So as we move forward, we need to update
our infrastructure, especially when it comes to things like parking,
Goodland, Caxambas, and the other boat parks. That's very
important to look at.
I know, you know, hundreds, thousands of people are moving
here a week, every month, coming down to Florida, and we have a lot
of people coming down here for tourism. It's no surprise that
tourism is a huge economic factor in Florida, so we need to -- you
know, when we have them get frustrated with the park rangers and
the dockmasters, we can't leave a bad taste in their mouth, because
January 11, 2022
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that's just such an important thing for the state and for Collier
County, especially, with so much public land. We want people to be
able to come here, more streamlined experience, not have to worry as
much about parking and things like that when they come down so
they can enjoy this beautiful county we live in and this beautiful
state.
So just keep it short, but I just kind of wanted to reiterate that
idea. Thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you, sir.
MR. MILLER: Mr. Chair, your next speaker is Jason Fullerton.
He'll be followed by our online speaker, Enrique Carrillo.
MR. FULLERTON: Hi. How's it going today? I'm Jason
Fullerton, and I'm an owner/operator out of the Goodland county
ramp.
Just to speak on some of the things that affect me, I was born
and raised in Collier County here in Naples. I live in Lee County
now. I basically can walk to the Collier County border. I've been a
charter guide for 15 years in this area.
As so limiting commercial launch permits to people outside of
Collier County would severely impact my business.
And, you know, I hate to sound entitled, but, you know, being
from this area and seeing what has happened to this area, it's alarming
to me, and it's alarming to me that I would move to Bonita Springs
because I can't afford to be in Naples anymore, and, you know,
having to run a business for, you know, however long I've been
running it and being a guide for 15 years and to think that I could be,
you know, out of a commercial launch permit and out of my business
just because of where I live, that's extremely frustrating.
And one of the other things that I'd like to mention is, is when
you guys think that limiting people outside of the county, the launch
permits for those people, is going to affect the parking, well, guess
January 11, 2022
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what, there's companies with multiple commercial launch permits. I
don't ever want to be that. I always want to be an owner/operator. I
always want to have the ability to run charters, my passion, what I
enjoy doing.
I'm a Florida master naturalist. I've been a fishing guide for 15
years. This is -- this is my life. This is -- I say this to people
sometimes. This isn't a job. This is a lifestyle. You know, I wake
up at 4:30 in the morning to get in to take care of what it is that I need
to take care of to run tours for not only our Collier County residents,
which I have many regulars that are that, but for the tourism industry
as well.
And just to kind of reiterate something for you guys, they are
inundated over there at the ramps. You know, the rangers that are
there, they're having issues, and a lot of it is not with the commercial
sector and the commercial people. It's with the other people that are
coming to the ramps.
And, you know, we are efficient, you know, Jesse and Josh and
all of us. Like, we are safety first. That's our job as a captain, and
we're in, we're out. We're not the ones that are just sitting there at
the boat ramp, you know, taking up the space or, you know, the
people that are, you know, pulling their cars up to, you know, gas up
their boats and things, you know, at the ramp, which they're not even
supposed to be doing anyways.
It's just -- it's hard to listen to some of these things and realize
that -- you know, that I'm not being represented as a local to this area.
And it's just -- it's tough and frustrating. I appreciate what you guys
are trying to do. It's definitely helping. The guys that are there at
the ramp are definitely helping with some of the problems, but what
you have to understand is that the commercial people are not the
problem. And I appreciate your guys' time, thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you.
January 11, 2022
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(Applause.)
MR. MILLER: Your final speaker is online, Enrique Carrillo.
Mr. Carrillo, you should be being prompted to unmute yourself. If
you'll do so at your time [sic], you have three minutes. There you
go.
MR. CARRILLO: Good afternoon. Thank you for having me.
MR. MILLER: Go ahead, sir.
MR. CARRILLO: Hello? Good afternoon. Yes, good
afternoon. Thank you for having me.
So I am a small business owner. I had a permit last year, and
I'll be grandfathered in for this year. I have not submitted it yet due
to I needed for you guys to change the rules or the regulations for the
application.
The insurance requirements are very high standards. So the
application is standardized for huge commercial companies like for
the rental companies, the jet ski rental companies who take a majority
of the spots, parking spots, majority of the people and the traffic.
My business is unique, totally different. We just deliver for the
residents of Marco, Naples, Doctors Pass, in that area, basically just
to residents of Naples area. We deliver the jet skis. For example, if
you purchase a jet ski at a dealership, you have no need for a trailer,
you have no truck, we'll bring it to the ramp, the family member
usually meets us at the ramp, and they go off on their way home, or
your jet ski's not working, you'll bring the jet ski to the ramp. Sea
Tow brings it to you, you bring it with your other jet ski or your other
boat, we'll put it on the trailer. We're in and out in two minutes.
We do not take any parking spots whatsoever. We pay our fees each
time, licensed and insured.
The only question I have is if you guys could change the
standards a little bit or work with me on this, because we're so small
we can't even afford the qualifications you're offering for the
January 11, 2022
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insurance. We have a 100,000 policy commercial. You're requiring
500,000. That's a little bit too stiff for us. We don't even make that
much every year to make that.
But our service is to supply delivery service for the jet skis to
the residents in Marco and Naples. And you're right, my heart goes
out to all the workers at Caxambas, because we don't even deliver on
Saturdays and Sundays. It's ridiculous. We're in and out. We
won't even waste our time going over there because it's
overwhelming with traffic and cars and tourists.
So if you could work with me on that. And I do understand
with a lot of legal [sic] people doing the rentals out there, I see them
out there, a lot of shops, repair shops are going in and out picking up
jet skis. We know who they are. They're not having permits.
Sometimes they're not even paying their in and out. But there's so
much traffic out there, it's hard to tell.
Thank you so much for having me here for this.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Appreciate your input, Enrique.
MR. MILLER: Mr. Chairman, that was the final speaker for
this item.
MR. D'ANTUONO: I signed up but didn't get on there. I put
a form in. Can I speak?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Sure. Come on.
MR. MILLER: Stop after and give me your name.
MR. D'ANTUONO: Bill D'Antuono. I put it right there.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, the County Attorney
probably threw it out when he saw who you were.
MR. D'ANTUONO: Sorry about that.
MR. KLATZKOW: I just tossed it.
MR. D'ANTUONO: All right. Well, here I am again. This is
my sixth or seventh time. Appreciate you guys for giving us the
time to talk.
January 11, 2022
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I want to say I fully support the 30-day reassessment period,
because there are a lot of people that don't have the current permit
and they've had running businesses, small businesses, for
20-something years. There's a lot of those guys that, you know,
they're kind of talking to me and asking me what's going on? What's
going on? And, of course, they don't show up, but they want to
know what -- you know, these are the guys that are -- have been
running for a while. They've been promoting this town to come here
for years and, you know, pretty much the backbone of our tourism.
And I want to say that to have a specific permit just for
Caxambas and possibly Goodland, I think it's great you guys are
figuring out, like, who's going where. All you would have to do is
just have a different colored sticker. That's it. You don't have the
colored sticker of the year and you're going to Caxambas, you don't
get to go in. That's a simple solution. Just something I wanted to
point out.
Another thing that was in the items that were proposals or is that
over time that these permits are not going to be transferable. So
down the road when I want to go to sell my business, I can't do that.
Now, I have federal permits. I could sell my federal permit, which is
$25,000, and I have two of them, so that's just me. But all these
guys that are just running backwater, nearshore stuff, they don't have
those, so they're SOL is reselling their business and also, if they
wanted to give their business to their kids, then that's -- the legacy's
done right there. So I just wanted to say, like, consider, you know,
maybe passing the -- being able to transfer those permits and, over
time, that's going to shrink the number of permits which we were
told, you know, wasn't going to happen.
Another thing, you know, that goes along the lines of that, is,
you know, access to the fishery. The non-boat-owning public have a
right to have access to the fishery. That is actually in the
January 11, 2022
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Magnuson-Stevens Act which is a federal law, that the federal
lawmakers have to abide by this act, and it's called the
Magnuson-Stevens Act. There's a lot to unfold in it. But one of the
things in it is that you have -- the next generation fishermen have
to -- that has to be a priority for the next generation to come up on, so
that's something to consider.
And, once again, fishing and ecotourism operations generate
millions of dollars for this county, and they advertise this county for
absolutely no cost. And by eliminating them, you're going to cost
these businesses millions of dollars.
So thanks again for having me up here, and I operate offshore
Naples. I'm a sole proprietor. I also have commercial fishing I run
and my charter offshore, so thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you, Bill.
(Applause.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: All right. I want to -- I want
to -- before we get going, I want to be resistant because we were
called here today to accept staff's update, and so I want to be resistant
on making specific motions and finalize decisions today if, in fact,
we can get to that point, give some direction to staff. But there
are -- there are other people that weren't necessarily expecting us to
pull the trigger on any -- on any specific decisions today, so...
Commissioner LoCastro.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: And I concur with that. We
don't want to get ahead of ourselves. We're trying to do this, you
know, in small to medium chunks.
But a couple of homework assignments for you all, or at least
something to think about, and I'll see if my colleagues here agree.
First off, if somebody doesn't have a permit or it's expired, I
thought our dockmasters had more latitude than to just say, you
know, your permit's expired, but then the boat just continues to
January 11, 2022
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operate. We don't have the ability to turn them away or say, "I'm
sorry, you can't tie up here to the dock; you have an expired permit"?
I mean, I know that's putting a lot on the dockmasters.
Let me just go through, just for the sake of time. So that's
number one. And if the answer was, yeah, but it's difficult for them,
they're juggling a lot of things, then I would hope you would come
back in the future, and if we need more dockmasters out there, great,
if we need to readdress stronger fees -- rather, fines, I should say, or
put teeth into it, how can we do that? I mean, certainly our hands
aren't just tied to say, too bad, so sad.
Because Commissioner McDaniel makes a good point. If I
can't get the permit, I'll just keep taking the fines. And we have
people that do that in parking spots all over Collier County. I don't
have a beach sticker; give me a fine; you're not going to tow me.
But I think we have a little bit more latitude than that.
I like how somebody said it's a little bit of a mess out there. My
response to that would be over many years it's been a lot of a mess.
And so some of these sins of the past for five years we can't fix in
five weeks. So I'm actually encouraged by hearing some of you say
it is a little bit better out there, and in some cases I hear a lot a bit
better.
I will tell you, I was at Caxambas, and I might not have
interfaced with the one customer example you had that said the
county staff was rude and they were horrible. I was out there, I
think, for that exact person or somebody very similar. And in my
case I can tell you what happened. Our county staff basically said,
you can't park here. You're in the wrong spot, blah, blah, blah, this
and that, and the person basically said, too bad, so sad. I didn't read
the email from the company, but I'm here now. We're all in our
bathing suits, tough. You know, tow me if you want.
So, you know, sometimes it's on the customer. And like you
January 11, 2022
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said, there's a lot going on. So just as you said, they don't read your
fine print. Make the print bigger for us, because I watched that
dockmaster have a 20-minute conversation with that person, and it
was more of the person yelling and, meanwhile, the dockmaster then
is -- who knows what's going on behind the dockmaster now while
they're dealing with this one person.
So there's a little bit of blame to go all around, but I'm actually
proud of what I see happening out there by our county staff. It
doesn't mean we can't get better, but I witnessed something and then
actually interceded into it and said, I know you're upset, because
you're breaking the law right now, and we're trying to move your
vehicle that's in the wrong spot. And so that deals with the frustrated
customers.
But transferring the permits -- and, Barry, this might be
something that you can't answer now, but I think it would be
important to all of us. There's a difference between selling your
business to someone and not being able to transfer the permits and
giving your business to a family member where the company is still
the same name, it's still the Johnson Jet Ski Company, or what have
you.
So I'd like more detail on that, because I think there is a
difference between selling and transferring. I would hate to see a
family business, you know, squashed. But if you're selling your
business to somebody that lives in Miami and expecting everything to
transfer, I mean, you can't sell your car and give that person your
driver's license as well, so we've got to take a look at that, but I think
there's a difference. But there's a few things in there that don't
necessarily need a response because, just like Commissioner
McDaniel said, we're trying to just vote on one thing, which is how
many more permits can you offer. That was really why we've come
to the table today based on how many you've sold, so -- but there's a
January 11, 2022
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few things I'd like an update for all of us on so we can continue to
improve.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Actually, we can do that next
month when they do come back. Not every month.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Yeah, absolutely. Not every
month.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner Taylor.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Yeah, just a couple of things.
To the County Attorney, I think where our control on all of this is the
parking.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: No.
MR. KLATZKOW: Okay.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Is it?
MR. KLATZKOW: I mean, you have a limited number of
parking spaces.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Streaming [sic] or restricting
the parking will determine who uses these ramps.
MR. KLATZKOW: Yes.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Okay. And so I think that's
something that I don't think we can solve today, but that is
really -- that is really the heart of what we're doing now.
What I heard from the folks here and the independent
businessmen and then, of course, from Commissioner McDaniel who
said, you know, this is really geared for private use, and then I heard
from the businesses say, you know, we need this parking, we need to
be able to run our businesses from here.
So I think as -- going back to staff, that's going to be the
conundrum. That's going to be where, are we going to restrict -- are
we going to limit the parking for commercial so that the public can
use it? How can we -- how can we take care of this going forward?
That is not an easy question to solve. The City of Naples has
January 11, 2022
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grappled with this for years. The City of Naples you can run your
business from some home. If someone's on the water, as a charter
boat person, you can run it out of the back of their house. That's
how they solved the problem as they sold, bit by bit, the waterfront.
This is not what we have. We have limited waterfront, and we
need to address in a fair way how we are allowing people to use it.
I would agree with transferable permits but, again, the devil's in
the details on that.
Are we -- again, with parking, are we required to have specific
businesses park in specific areas? Let's just say for this conversation
you have a jet ski business and you have 20 jet skis on the back of
your trailer and you want to bring everybody there to use it, do we
say to these businesses with this one gentleman who said he has a
storefront, that's where we do the business, that's where we park, and
then people come over to us, do we require that for businesses? I
don't know the answer to that.
But those are questions going forward that we have to
determine, which is not an easy thing to determine. But I think the
more information we can gather, the better it is. And I'm certainly
welcome to talk to any of our small businesses, because I'm a huge,
huge fan of the independent business watermen, huge fan of it. Not
so crazy about the companies who have three or four or six trailers
and they monopolize. But the independent, the charter boat, what
did people come here for at the turn of the century? They came to
use the water. They came to fish. They came to explore these
areas, which is why Caxambas and Goodland are so popular. So I'm
really very much a supporter of that kind of business. But, again, it's
about the parking.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And we're at a turning point here
with our court reporter. Are you okay with us wrapping this up?
Because I hope we'll be done in a minute or 10. By 12:30. I'm
January 11, 2022
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going to push out to 12:30, and we're going to be done 12:30, and
then we'll call it a day, if that's okay. You all okay with that?
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: If we're finished with
everything, that's okay.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: We'll be done by then.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: All right. Good. That's a
good goal.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I don't want to say we're
going to shut down the meeting at 12:30 no matter what.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Maybe. Who's got the gavel
now?
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Yeah.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Go ahead, Commissioner
Saunders.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: All right. I understand the
reluctance to do anything specific today; however, all we're doing
right now if we just accept the report is we're just accepting the
information. And we've had some general conversation here which
may be considered direction. But I'm not so sure if we have given
the staff some concrete direction. So I'd like to give staff a couple
concrete directions if the Board is in agreement with it.
So, for example -- and I'll go back to the letter from Laura
Gelman. We do have people that want -- that have tried to set up a
business, didn't realize there was going to be a moratorium. I think
we can take care of that situation. So what I'd like to do -- maybe
we can do this piecemeal. But I'd like to have staff -- direct staff to
open up the permitting, even if it's only for county residents who
have proceeded to establish a business prior to today, to at least give
them the opportunity to open up.
January 11, 2022
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Now, the other aspect, other part of that could be, depending on
what the Board wants to do, to simply open up the permits for
another 30 days since we have some capacity there.
So I'd like to give staff some direction, one of those two
directions, at least, to be fair to some people that may have gotten
caught up in this moratorium unaware that we were going to impose
it. So that's a question for the Board.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: A thought I have -- and I think one
of the things we're going to find out, as has been alluded by several of
our public speakers, is there's a lot more people that need a permit
that aren't getting a permit.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Yes.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And so as we start to enhance the
penalization for not having a permit, we're going to find out that
potentially that 180 cap that we set isn't near enough to accommodate
the people that have been using our ramps and haven't had a permit.
So I would suggest today that we open up the issuance of the
permits with that 10 percent deviation for that -- which is an extra 18
permits, just for today to allow us to move some of these people
through: Jesse that needs an extra permit, the young man who's a
friend of mine's son who got a charter's -- captain's license last year,
and to -- on that premise of that 10 percent float.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: No one on the Board is
objecting to that, so that's one direction.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: And I think that's actually
what they're asking us to do. I mean, they brought us a number.
Maybe we're going to play around with the number a little bit. But
isn't -- your homework assignment for us is you're asking us to
approve the opening of permits to allow new businesses that have
been on hold, businesses that didn't operate in 2021, right, to open
that aperture for them? I think that's what they're asking.
January 11, 2022
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CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Right.
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Okay. I'm going to make a
motion on one item, and that is for staff to be in the position to issue
up to 18 more permits over the next -- and you're going to be coming
back every couple meetings, but go ahead and have the authority to
open up the permitting for 18 permits to accommodate some of the
people that are in this audience that have said they need a permit and
also to deal with the potential that there may have been some people
that got caught up in the moratorium, but no more than the 18
permits. And you can issue those beginning today. So I make that
motion.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I'll second it.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It's been moved and seconded, and
I see Commissioner Solis giving me the --
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: A question, just to make sure I
understand. So it's 18 additional. So it's 18 on top of the 180? So
it's --
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: No, it's 18 on top of the
hundred and --
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Fifteen that we have.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: -- fifteen.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Okay.
MR. WILLIAMS: Mr. Chairman, if I could clarify. We do
have a list of approximately 34 folks who, you know, weren't within
this grandfathered section. So I think where you were heading, you
know, so you've given 115 permits. You had approved 180. You
have 65 left. The suggestion of taking that 180 number plus
10 percent where an additional 18 -- so, you know, we'd like to take
care of those 34 folks, including --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: The number they're asking.
January 11, 2022
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COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Then I'll amend the motion
to deal with 34 permits.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Thirty-four, yeah. That's
what they're asking.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So the people that are caught
up in this can get working. So that's motion number one.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: And the seconder agrees to the
amendment.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So it's been moved and seconded
that we'll -- it's been moved and seconded. Because we're not
stopping -- and forgive me. We're not stopping the issuance of the
65 permits that are still out there that haven't been consumed. We're
actually reaching out to those people and having those discussions.
MR. WILLIAMS: That's right.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So, necessarily, you have 34
people that are in -- the 10 percent isn't enough. Maybe 20 percent's
a better number for today's discussion.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: No, no, no.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thirty-four.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I don't mind going to 36.
That would be 20 percent. It's just a number.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I think 20 percent. If we could
use that opposed to a fixed number, because --
MR. WILLIAMS: Mr. Chair --
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Twenty percent is a fixed
number. I mean, up to 20 percent is 36 permits. That is a fixed
number.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay. Fair enough. Yes, it is.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So that's the motion.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It's been moved and seconded that
we allow for an additional 20 percent of the permits to be issued.
January 11, 2022
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COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Of the 115?
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Of the 180.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Of the 180.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: That's 36.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: So we're increasing the number of
total permits. I'm trying to make sure I understand what we're doing.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Staff has issued a hundred
and how many permits?
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Fifteen.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Okay. They're going to
have the authority to issue 36 more.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Thirty-six more.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: To accommodate -- 36 over
the 115.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Of the 115. See, I keep getting
confused, because Commissioner McDaniel is saying something
different.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yes, he is. Forget the 180.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: The motion is --
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Okay.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: -- 36 over and above the 115
you've already issued. Not over and above 180.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: They were asking for 34.
We're making it 36 because it's a round 20 percent number, and then
they'll come back to us and tell us --
MR. WILLIAMS: If I could just offer a couple of thoughts.
And so you have 180 cap, and these are for people that were
grandfathered in from last year that had permits. You've gotten 115
of those. There's still some people out there that may still fall in that
category, that having those 65 available permits for them, you know,
meets the spirit of what you look for. Then you have in addition
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these 34 that don't meet that criteria.
So it's kind of the question, if you wanted to go from 115 plus
34 -- or 36, that's cool, but if you wanted to -- 115, you know, up to
your 180 of people that were grandfathered plus these 34 that didn't
make it --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Here's what I say, Barry:
This issue is so known. If I'm a boat captain and I know this thing is
such a hot topic and I had a permit in 2021 and I still haven't renewed
my permit, well, 115 people were smart enough to do it.
So those folks that are sitting out there thinking they'll just come
in whenever they want -- all the people in here that -- have renewed
their permit. So I say at some point -- we have done unbelievable
amounts of advertising. It's the common discussion at every single
boat ramp: Get your permit. Get your permit. They might limit
them. They may cap it at 180 or whatever. At some point we've
got to open this up to the people that were boxed out in 2021 due to
COVID or they're a new business or whatnot and give them the
chance to come forward, you know.
MR. WILLIAMS: We would be comfortable with the concept
of an additional 36, you know, and take care of these people that
we're aware of that haven't been able to find it. And, again, we can
continue to report back to you how -- what kind of business we're
doing.
I did want to make one other clarification, if I may, about the
concept of only issuing new permits of these 34; only issuing new
permits for Collier County. You've already grandfathered folks that
have included some out-of-county folks. There's no thought to pull
their permit. They've got their permit in hand. It's just for these
new ones, this question of do we just restrict it to Collier County?
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: We have one gentleman who
spoke who lives in Lee County. Now, I don't know if he needs
January 11, 2022
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another permit or not.
MR. FULLERTON: I don't need another permit.
MR. WILLIAMS: He's good.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: You're all right. There may
be other people that are in that same -- same circumstance. So all
I'm saying is, issue 36 more permits.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, can I --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Above the 115.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, we've already -- but that -- to
me, that's counterintuitive. We've already approved for 180 permits.
He could be standing here today if the people that had the licenses
were as diligent as Commissioner LoCastro wanted them to be in
telling us they've already issued 180 permits, and there are still 34
that are in the wings that are looking for permits, and that was the
discussion that I was having about exceeding that 180 theoretical cap.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So I understand what you're
saying, so, like, the 36 that we're talking about now is part of the 180
cap, right?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, they're outside of that 180
cap. He's --
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Not if we say it isn't.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, he has already said that
we're --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: No, it's -- we're making the
motion.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: This isn't that difficult.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: This isn't that difficult.
MR. WILLIAMS: So you've got two options. You've got
Option A, which is 180 permits. You've given 115. You've got 64
to let for people grandfathered, with an additional 36 permits for
these folks that didn't make that criteria. That's Option A. Option B
January 11, 2022
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is, you've given 115, you're going to give 36 more.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I'm going with Option B,
because that still leaves some flexibility in terms of people in the
county that have the ability to apply for a permit that just haven't
done it. So let's -- and we're coming back in a few weeks. So let's
just deal with the 36 to anybody who wants a permit.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: And one thing you said,
Barry, that may or may not be true is, you say, well, we gave 115, we
have 65 out there that are grandfathered. Some of those people
might never come back. I've already talked to some of them. They
got six permits. They already got two, and they didn't ask for those
six. Some went out of business. Some moved to Wisconsin. So at
some point, you know, if you want a permit, it's mid January. It's
time to get your 2021 [sic] permit.
So Option B, to me, is the only smart solution here. Everything
else is hypothetical. And then you'll be able to come back, tell
us -- and maybe it doesn't need to be a big presentation, but to just
give us a report card on what you're finding out there. How many of
the 36 did we give? How many of them were new businesses?
But I think the thing that's still out there is, out of the 36, do they
all have to be Collier County residents? Right?
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: We haven't answered that.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And he's not talking about people
that have existing licenses --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Right.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: -- that were part of the original
180. These are 34 people who are in the wings that want a permit
that weren't part of the original vested licensure that we established.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Right.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And that's the -- that's the -- if we
January 11, 2022
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limit this to 34 or 36 permits today and 65 of the ones that are already
vested come in in the next two weeks, you're stuck at 36.
MR. WILLIAMS: We are.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And I don't want to be stuck.
We've already -- what I'm actually talking about is allowing for an
increase in our theoretical moratorium, our cap, to accommodate the
one-offs and the people that didn't have a license or fit into the box
that we established when we set that 180 limit, theoretical limit.
And if we do it without too much recourse from the out-the-towners
and don't allow new businesses that aren't from here in that increased
amount, I think we've accommodated what we need to do for now for
the business owners that we have, the permits that were issued, and
then the one-offs that are out there.
MR. WILLIAMS: Mr. Chair, just one other thought along your
lines is, it's possibly very true that the people that were grandfathered
have come and got their permit. It's high season. They need that
permit to operate now. So the bulk of these folks have come in.
You might have a few that trickle in after the fact, but you've
accomplished the goal there.
But I do think, to Commissioner McDaniel's comment, limiting
it by saying, okay, we're done with the grandfathering, we're not
giving ourselves some opportunity if we do get some to trickle in, it
does constrain staff. So if 180 -- if that 65 delta is not the number, if
there's a number you'd feel comfortable with where we have that in
our toolkit, we're going to take care of the 34, and then we had a
handful if we get grandfathered people in. So if that helps any.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner Solis is down there
beating his button. Poor thing.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Okay. I'm just -- I'm going to
support Commissioner Saunders' motion. Until we get to the 180, I
don't know that we need to even have this discussion about increasing
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it. The whole point of the 180 was that there was too many people
using the boat ramps. I mean, that's why we set it at 180. So I'm
not sure why we're having a discussion about increasing it over the
180.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Perhaps -- and I'll add to the
motion -- that regardless of what happens, regardless of how many
people come in on this 34 or 36 number, you're not to issue any
permits over 180. So if 50 people come in and -- or 100 people
come in from the county that haven't already come in, you're limited
to the 180.
MR. WILLIAMS: That's helpful.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: And I would just -- let's call the
question, at least, on the first motion.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I'll second that.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: All right. It's been moved and
second -- I'm not quite sure where -- it's been moved and seconded
that we're going to issue up to -- and forgive me if I'm paraphrasing
incorrectly, but we're going to issue up to 180 permits until we meet
again.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Okay. That's fine. If you
want to say it that way, that's fine.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Is that the motion, or is your
request with the information you're bringing us that you want
permission to issue a smaller chunk in the next couple of weeks or 30
days of 34 or 36? I think you're mis-summarizing.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It was asking the motion maker to
clarify what I was repeating.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Okay.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: And we have 34 people who
don't fit into that 180 cap.
MR. WILLIAMS: That's right.
January 11, 2022
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COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: The motion is to issue up to
38 [sic] more permits but not to go -- for that group, and if someone
comes in who was eligible from the county but had not applied in that
first 180, you can still issue those, but you cannot exceed 180
permits, period, and so that's the motion.
MR. WILLIAMS: Melissa's whispering in my ear. There
is -- there is one condition that -- you know, so you've got 34 people
that don't have a permit. You have a couple of folks that have
permits that were grandfathered but want additional permits. You
know, our concern with that is just you're kind of opening the door.
And not to throw that twist at you last minute. I think if you give us
up to 180 and we can accommodate these 34, I think we got what we
need, so...
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: That's the motion.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: And that's my understanding as
the seconder.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Let's call the question.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So we're going to -- are you clear
on what the motion is? We're going -- we're going to allow for the
180 and accommodate those 34 that are out there within that -- and
not exceed 180 before you come back and talk to us.
MR. WILLIAMS: That's correct. I understand.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Are you okay with that,
Commissioner Saunders?
MR. WILLIAMS: I am.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Uh-huh.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And the seconder okay with that?
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: That's right.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay. Any other discussion?
(No response.)
January 11, 2022
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CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: All in favor?
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Aye.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Aye.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Aye.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Opposed, same sign, same sound.
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So moved.
MR. WILLIAMS: Commissioners, thank you.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: There were a couple other
things, so don't --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: We're not done yet. We have a
couple other things to talk to you about.
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner Saunders.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I threw out the concept of
valet parking for the noncommercial parking people --
MR. WILLIAMS: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: -- or even for the
commercial parking people. So I'd like for staff to -- if the Board is
in agreement, I'd like for staff to evaluate whether or not valet
parking at our -- at these boat ramps to accommodate not just
Caxambas but Bayview and other parks where that may be necessary,
just to look at that, report back as to whether that's a feasible thing.
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Okay. And then as part of
that also, there was discussion about signage at one of our parks, an
indication that people just don't know that they can't park their cars in
a trailer parking spot on the weekends. Evaluate what signage is
necessary so that people know what they can and cannot do.
January 11, 2022
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MR. WILLIAMS: Absolutely.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: So that's my second motion.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Those are all -- we're all in consent
with those as additional directions.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: I wanted to just summarize
my direction.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It's not your turn yet. You have to
hit your light.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Okay.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner Taylor.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Would you agree,
Commissioner Saunders and Board, that we just, perhaps, put that
part under the umbrella of parking and to really examine, number
one, what can we do to restrict parking? Can we require commercial
businesses to park off site and allow private individuals to use the
parking ramps? What legally -- what, legally, can we do so that we
look at it?
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I don't have any problems
with that as long as staff looks at those two issues I've raised in
addition to that.
MR. WILLIAMS: Understood.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner LoCastro.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: So, Barry, just to summarize,
also take a look at if we can put more teeth into the people that pull
up to the docks with expired permits, and they don't manipulate the
systems by just saying, just fine me.
Also, what can we do to possibly increase the fines? Thirty
bucks is nothing, a drop in the bucket. And if it's been 30 bucks for
the last 150 years, maybe we need to take a look at it, much like our
boat fees.
January 11, 2022
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The transfer of permit, it's different to me if you're transferring a
permit to your son or daughter or somebody in the family or you're
selling it to somebody that lives in Fort Lauderdale or in, you know,
Wappinger Falls, Idaho, or something like that. I just think that
there's a big difference to that. So I don't need an answer tomorrow,
but these are things that are, you know, sitting out there.
MR. WILLIAMS: Sure. Gotcha.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And I think mainly, just to
reiterate, we had some really good suggestions from our public
speakers today that are people that are living with this all day every
single day, and they're the ones we need to be listening to and hearing
from you how you can remedy circumstances coming back to us so
we don't have to do that higher math ever again.
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir. Understood.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: And one quick thing. It does
appear that, from the testimony of the gentleman about what is going
on at Bayfront [sic] Park, it's not reflected in the numbers that you
gave us.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yeah. Do we have a dockmaster
at Bayview?
MR. WILLIAMS: You do not have a dockmaster at Bayview,
but certainly with the concept, we are looking at that.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And when are we going
to -- because I was at Bayview on Saturday. It's a mess.
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: When are we going to get that
parking done that we did with the enhanced parking up along --
MR. WILLIAMS: Facilities Management is working that
project. They have a contractor on. They're going to be mobilizing
in the next 30 days. So that project's well underway.
January 11, 2022
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COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: So I'm wondering, as we go
forward -- and this is a discussion that -- this is a thing that you need
to look at long term as we, perhaps, raise commercial permit fees or
however we do it. I really think as we grow, especially right now,
that we need to look at enforcement. We can make all the rules and
regulations up here, but if it's not enforced on the ground, it's a waste
of time, so...
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, ma'am.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: The cost of enforcement, the
cost of manpower needs to be factored into this. In an ideal world,
what can we have?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Like Commissioner LoCastro said,
you know, when our attendant's standing there arguing with
somebody for 20 minutes and there's a whole bunch of stuff going on
behind, it shouldn't be a discussion. Tow truck and off they go.
And you tow a couple of them, and they'll stop doing it.
MR. WILLIAMS: Absolutely.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Absolutely. We talked
about that.
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: All right. I think we've -- I think
we've accomplished a lot there, so we'll go forward.
MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Mr. Chairman, I know we're
getting towards the end. I've got a couple items under commission
communications, and you know there's no one on this board that
wants to facilitate moving meetings along more quickly than I do --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Oh, yeah, exactly. So do you
want to take a lunch break and then come back?
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I've got a couple items that
January 11, 2022
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are going to take a few minutes. We need to take a break. Whether
it's a lunch break or not, that's up to you. But we're not going to
finish at 12:30.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: What's you-all's pleasure? I'm
okay if we want to give a court reporter break and come back and
wrap it up early.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Quick break and wrap up,
because I have some closing things I want to say, too.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Fifteen minutes enough?
THE COURT REPORTER: Ten is fine.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Ten, let's do 15. 12:45.
(A brief recess was had from 12:31 p.m. to 12:45 p.m.)
MR. ISACKSON: Mr. Chairman and Commissioners, you
have a live mic.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: There we go.
Item #15
STAFF AND COMMISSION GENERAL COMMUNICATIONS
MR. ISACKSON: We're onto communications, Item 15. I've
asked Dan Summers to address the Board regarding the fallout from
the Governor's press conference and the issues connected with Collier
being designated as one of these monoclonal sites. So I'll turn it
over to Dan, and he can brief the Board.
MR. SUMMERS: Commissioners, good afternoon. For the
record, Dan Summers, director of your Bureau of Emergency
Services and Emergency Management. And I would just say it's
been all hurricane season since you've seen me, so I hope my
evaluation reflects that. No.
Just briefly, to set the framework for you -- and this has been a
January 11, 2022
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blessing because we have certainly been immersed in COVID
operations. To set the framework for you, Florida Department of
Health, of course, Kimberly Kossler, is your local health administer,
and the Florida Division of Emergency Management and your local
emergency manager, which is my team, we are the partners in the
delivery of all the vaccination efforts coming down from the state and
coming from the feds and, of course, those efforts also involve
everybody in our community that's been such a great partner in the
delivery of vaccines.
Now we're to the point where the Governor has made an
announcement and made resources available -- these are
state-contracted resources -- to open up sites for monoclonal antibody
therapy. This could be a shot. This could an IV infusion. These
are individuals that are in the early stages of symptomatic displays of
COVID.
The Monday before the Governor's press conference, late
Monday evening I received the word from the state that this was
going to happen. We have worked nonstop to find a suitable site for
this, because you want some degree of isolation, you want some
degree of traffic flow, et cetera. And we've been -- we've spent a
week and a half working on that.
Some partners came to the table. We are in the process of
drafting a lease. It is in the private sector. And I would prefer not
to announce that location at this point because that particular
organization would like to work with us diligently on public releases
and coordination and those type of things because of the -- for a
number of reasons.
We are still also getting our certificates of insurance, and the
State Division of Emergency Management is still in the process of
negotiating with a contractor to operate this site. They have a
number of contractors. So we hope to have contractor selection in a
January 11, 2022
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day or so.
The tasker for Emergency Management here, my responsibility
to help find a site. Collier County will lease the site. We have been
offered an incredible rate. And if you will remember back in
September, you authorized the County Manager and set aside funds
for us to quickly execute a site license or a site lease just in case.
So the wheels are turning. We're negotiating the lease. There
is not yet any monoclonal antibody therapy resources that have
arrived by federal allocation to the state of Florida yet. So we are
not -- there's no product on the -- on the dock, so to speak. And we
hope that we'll have some type of engagement with that product early
next week.
Additionally, when we open the site, remember, certainly my
office and our other partners will liaison. It will be a contractor
operation. It will be by appointment only, and all the news releases,
public information management will come through Florida
Department of Health.
So that's a quick update as to where we are. We're working
hard. We'll get that site identified, get the I's dotted, T's crossed.
We'll liaison with the local contractor. And, again, Florida
Department of Health Collier and my team will continue to work
together, and we'll do our best to do a very good job to make those
resources available.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner Taylor.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Just a quick question. The
time that this clinic will be open is determined by the state, correct?
MR. SUMMERS: That is correct. The timing,
typically -- and, again, we've not seen the contractor. We don't
know the scope. Typically, it's been anywhere from 8:00 to 6:00
Monday through Saturday.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: But for how long? What
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duration?
MR. SUMMERS: The planning assumption right now is a
90-day operation.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Okay.
MR. SUMMERS: That may be -- could certainly fluctuate
based on demand.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It is kind of fluid. We had that
facility in Immokalee, and they closed it down because there wasn't
sufficient --
MR. SUMMERS: Very fluid.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: -- utilization. So it is very fluid.
Commissioner LoCastro.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Dan, just while we have you
here, switch gears a little bit. Emergency Operations Center, last
time I was there and you and I were talking, there were some
upgrades that were on the -- first of all, you had gotten some
impressive things post Irma that were great, the vehicles and all of
that. The air condition of the warehouse, a few of the other things,
what's the latest on all that? What's been done and what's still on the
list to do in our Emergency Operations Center updates?
MR. SUMMERS: Commissioner, thank you. And, again, I
want to keep this in the appropriate box, and discussion. But the
ESC east bay enclosure was one of your surtax projects. I think
the -- Ed reported that that's at 100 percent design.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Okay.
MR. SUMMERS: So I think we're in the process of bringing
that back to you for pricing and/or contracting pending some other
discussions from the County Manager. So we're about 95,
98 percent in design. I have been programming that space for
supplies and equipment and been borrowing space and, you know,
doing some occasional rentals, and we continue to have -- again, with
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this particular event, we, too, will probably have commodity coming
through there, so...
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Any equipment that we've
purchased already that just still hasn't arrived? Anything you're
waiting on to add to your inventory or --
MR. SUMMERS: I do have a lot -- a fair number of items in
the grant queue right now, but nothing that's impacting operations.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Okay.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Back on the monoclonal.
MR. SUMMERS: Yes, sir.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Any idea as to when we're going to
effectuate the lease arrangement time-wise, plus minus?
MR. SUMMERS: It's my goal -- both parties, both the
owner -- and Michael Dowling is working on that today with the
County Attorney's Office. So I'm hoping that we have a lease
executed or ready for the County Manager to execute under your
previous approval by the end of the week. We've asked the
contractor to -- at least in state discussions we're aiming for sometime
next week, maybe with a soft opening. And I want to stress again, it
is by appointment so that we can manage traffic.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, media -- and the reason I'm
asking is the media (inaudible) the Governor's press conference, and
I'm sure you all have been asked as well. I've been pinged a couple
of times. So I just wanted to offer a little bit of certainty with
timeline, so...
MR. SUMMERS: We're doing our best. And, again, lots
of -- lots of dominoes to line up here to get this to operate --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Sure. Thank you.
MR. SUMMERS: -- appropriately. Thank you all for the
support.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Any other questions?
January 11, 2022
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(No response.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Nope, all good.
MR. ISACKSON: Commissioners, if I can, just two minutes
before we get to the dais. I just wanted to -- if I could hit the right
button here. I just wanted to lay out for the Board something that I
handed out on my one-on-one sessions with you. Just two dates,
please, if I can. January 24th is your joint Tourism Development
Council.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: You might need a microphone.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Yeah, if you could grab that
microphone there.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Behind you, I think.
MR. MILLER: It's on the dais. It's on the podium.
MR. ISACKSON: We'll do it right.
Thanks, John. Thank you. Testing.
All right. January 24th is the scheduled -- and I think it's on
each of your calendars -- is a scheduled meeting with the Tourist
Development Council at the Tourist Development Council's regular
January meeting. So just a notation there.
And the other thing that I'd like for the Board to consider, we
don't have to discuss it today, but it's the various workshop items that
were talked about at the December meeting. I'd like the Board to
give some thought as to scope, content, and dates which I provided
for you on the bottom there. And we can talk about this. I can put
it on the next agenda under communications and give everybody a
chance to have a look at it.
I will make one note that typically your CRA workshop is either
in April or May. The last couple of years it's been either in April or
May. So we could hold those dates off for the CRA workshop and
then work around for March, June, et cetera.
That's all I had to say on that, but I wanted at least to give
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everybody a heads-up on the workshop, and that we'll be talking a
little more about that when going forward.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: When? Are you going to come
up --
MR. ISACKSON: Next meeting.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Are you going to come up with
some dates and propose them to us?
MR. ISACKSON: Well, I think what I'd like for the Board to
do is give some thought to the workshop topics that I've listed up on
top, and what's the prioritization, because -- and do you want to have
workshops every month? Because you could. This board could
take every month and have a workshop. So that's your priority for
what topics will be discussed certainly, and how often do you want to
have these workshops.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Right.
MR. ISACKSON: So that's, I think, something -- a do-out that
the Board would have between now and, let's say, the 25th meeting
of January.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So you want to have it as an actual
agenda item, or do you want to -- what's the Board's pleasure? Do
you want to converse with the County Manager individually? I
mean, because, you know, today would have been a perfect day on a
light agenda, but we don't necessarily know when our light agendas
are. If we scheduled our workshops on the same day as our board
meeting, we're already here kind of sort of planning on utilizing our
time. And I'd like to bring a little formality to it and have a --
MR. ISACKSON: Well, if you want to have that discussion,
feel free, because your light agendas are over, I will tell you that,
going forward.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay. So these are extra meetings
other than -- other than our normal county commission meetings.
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MR. ISACKSON: It's the Board's pleasure in terms of if you
want to have that discussion now or you want to -- because you've
already got January wrapped up, because you're going to have your
joint TDC board workshop on the 24th. Then it becomes, are you
going to do anything in February or March knowing that your CRA
workshops are in either April or May. Most likely April.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: And we usually have those the
same day.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Right.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: The CRAs the same day.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: All right. Commissioner
LoCastro has a comment, and then Commissioner Solis.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Well, I can help a little bit
here, so -- and this will be part of my closing comments, or this will
be my closing comments.
Yesterday I chaired the Affordable Housing Advisory
Committee, as I do every month. Had a really great meeting, several
hours long. You met Joe Trachtenberg. He's our new chairman,
and we also moved around a few people and empowered a few more.
It was a -- it was a well-attended meeting, well over 100 percent, and
I say that because I had invited some citizens, some who you heard
from at our last meeting at our podium that were talking about the
struggles they have with rent and whatnot. A few of them took up
our invitation to actually come and gave us really great, valuable
information.
Also, the news media had been reaching out to me over the last
few days about affordable housing. I invited all of them to attend,
and all three, WINK News, NBC-2, and Fox was there at our meeting
and also interviewed me afterwards.
We don't believe we need an Affordable Housing Committee
workshop. Part of our longer meeting yesterday is we had a Zoom
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with the affordable housing team in Tallahassee who was educating
our group, and what we all -- you know, in the interest of time, but
also, too, to get down to the meat of what we need to have here, we
believe we can just add something as an agenda item, have
Mr. Trachtenberg come in here and give a presentation of what we're
working on, what our challenges are, educate the commissioners here
a little bit, rumor from fact, how we're working closely with the state,
and it could just be, you know, a semi brief presentation, ask
questions or whatnot, and we think, you know, that would be
sufficient to just give a presentation overview.
So, anyway, I had something else I wanted to close with, but
maybe I'll reengage. But I think to make sure that we know the
difference between something on the agenda and workshop. We feel
like an agenda item would cover what we all need to hear, if you
agree.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: It would be more effective if we
had an agenda item in the future in that regard.
Commissioner Solis.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Well, that was going to be,
actually -- in terms of prioritizing what workshops we're going to
have, I was going to put that as number one. But if it's -- you want
to do it as an agenda item, that's fine. I think that's a high priority.
The other one I would like to do since -- because we didn't have
one last year is another mental health workshop. I think so much has
happened in terms of the strategic plan that I think it's time that we sit
down and get an update and figure out, you know, what's next, what's
on the horizon, and how can we update the plan if that's what's
needed.
And I was hoping that we could schedule that one maybe for
June. I think that's when we had the first one, and it just seemed like
it worked well for the stakeholders.
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Then the other priority was, I would say, stormwater, the CRAs.
And then do we traditionally have workshops with the municipalities
every year?
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: No.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: COVID has thrown me for a loop.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: No, not -- it's not always
COVID but, no, we haven't. We had a very interesting and
memorable one with the City of Naples and have not had one since
then, so it's time.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: It was so memorable, I can't even
remember it.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I'm not sure you were even with
us, but you may have.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: He was. I was here.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Okay.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I was here. We had a discussion
about the -- that's when they were thinking about charging our county
residents for parking in the City of Naples --
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Beach parking.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: -- and then we had a nice
discussion about that, so...
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: That's right.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: So now you remember.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: I do remember that. I do
remember that.
Yeah, I don't know if -- you know, if that's something we want
to revisit. But those are the priorities that -- I would say the mental
health first or second, stormwater with hurricane season, and the
CRAs after that because -- and maybe the CR -- I don't know, tying
the CRAs with affordable housing, I don't know if there's a reason to
do that or not, but...
January 11, 2022
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CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: No. Just -- I think we already
pretty much, personally -- I don't mean to jump in ahead of you.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: No.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: But we already do the CRAs in
May. Just keep doing them in May. And we do both the CRAs in
the same day. So those folks are all in and out, and we do their
thing, so -- and, you know, I like Commissioner LoCastro's idea of
doing an -- having an actual agenda item for the affordable housing,
because then we could take a vote and not just sit around and talk
about it.
So, Commissioner Taylor.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Well, I think with affordable
housing, I think that's very important, but I also think we need to
understand that -- whether or not we have staff that's going to bring
ULI in here for an update to the affordable housing program. I heard
somehow that was supposed to happen, and I'm not sure that it is.
So I need to -- we need to understand that.
But also, as affordable -- as we are moving forward in this very,
very hot real estate market, we really need to get very real time on
what's going on and how to address it. There's just -- this isn't -- this
isn't planning for 10 years from now. This is what is going on.
How can we change it, or what can we do?
And I have challenged at least two people in the development
community to come back and tell us what it's going to take. I mean,
it's that kind of conversation. What's it going to take for you to stop
building? What kind of incentives do you want in order to stop
building market rate and build affordable housing? Because they're
building. And I'm actually meeting with a development community
this week. So as we go forward, it certainly can be discussed at a
meeting.
But, gentlemen, growth management. My, my, my. Are we
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willing to keep approving developments that triple the density over
the Comprehensive Plan? Are we willing to -- or are we -- in my
opinion, what we need to do is have a robust discussion. If we want
to change our Comprehensive Plan, great, but let's have the public
come in. Let's have an open conversation about it and then decide
what do we want for the next 10, 15 years for this community. And
it's a big discussion. It's a touchy discussion, but I think that one is
probably right there with me.
Stormwater management, I think it would be an informative
workshop to discuss what we're actually doing with stormwater in
this community and what needs to be done, because it's going to
become a topic. It's always retroactive, right? People flood, and we
come in. But let's look at this and understand it from, I guess,
Deputy County Manager Patterson's point of view where we really
dig into what we've done, what we're planning on doing, why we're
doing it, and what -- what are we looking at going forward.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, maybe under stormwater we
could do a presentation by staff as opposed to an entire workshop on
it and just get that update, because I know we appropriated -- in the
ever-popular sales tax, we appropriated money towards stormwater
and so on and so forth, both in maintenance and in capital. So
maybe we just have a sooner-than-later agenda item where staff does
a presentation with regard to stormwater, and that will take care of
that.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Yeah, I think we borrow the
money. But, yes, yes, I think it's very important to talk about it.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner Solis.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Actually, this will just be my
communications, too, but I pushed the button over here because of
what Commissioner Taylor was bringing up.
And I thought I heard something today when we were talking
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about the surtax, and Mr. Trachtenberg brought it up again, that
there's funds that are earmarked for the land trust that are not in the
land trust yet. And if not -- and I was kind of under the impression
that it was. But if not, I think this is -- probably our biggest crisis of
the moment is we need to be ready to do something. I don't know
what that something is, but we need to be ready. And if the money's
not in there, I think we ought to just start funding the land trust.
That's what we said we were going to do.
MR. ISACKSON: Maybe talking about the 20 million that's
been allocated as part of the sales tax, and what's the program for
that? Do we go out and buy property? Do we engage a developer
to build? I think that's the conversation.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, is it allocated specifically for
the land trust, or is it allocated to assist with housing affordability?
MR. ISACKSON: The latter.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So it is not specified for the land
trust per se. It's designated for housing affordability. Now, there
was -- there was, I thought, a line item in there for the housing trust.
I thought there was at one time.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: There is.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: That's what I thought it was.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Yeah, that's what it is.
MR. ISACKSON: I'm sorry. Workforce Housing Land Trust
Fund.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Right. And if it isn't being
allocated, then we need to have that discussion and make sure that it
is up on the list of priorities and not held to the end. I mean, we've
got -- again, when you're behind, you're behind. And we've got the
appropriated $490 million. It's where are the priorities for the
expenditure of those funds.
I know we have committed some money with the Schulze
January 11, 2022
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Foundation and the Community Foundation for the project over at the
golf course at 951, and I'm not sure if that's part of that 20 million or
not or if that's outside.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I don't think it is. That's
already funded, and we already own the land, so...
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: And I bring this up because I have
been contacted by a developer that's already here that -- you know,
wondering if we have thought of what we're going to do with that,
because they are ready to do more housing with significant affordable
numbers, but the land costs keep going up. So we have to figure out
a way to incentivize that. And, you know, if there's 20 million that's
earmarked for that, let's figure out a way to make that happen sooner
rather than later.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, I guess to me the posing
question is is who picks the priorities of the priorities that were
established for the allotment of the sales tax revenue? And if that
hasn't been -- on a proportionate share been going into all of the slots,
there's another level of priority out there.
MR. ISACKSON: I think you're talking from a cash flow
standpoint. We don't have a cash flow issue right now, so -- and
probably never will when you start looking at how much collections
we get in every month and that those collections will probably run
through the next two fiscal years.
So even with Vanderbilt Beach Road, we don't have a cash flow
issue. So the sooner decisions can be made regarding the land trust
and what you want to do with that particular dollar value, whether it's
developer incentives, whether it's direct county, I mean, it's a
question, I think, for the Board, and it's probably something that staff,
through our housing folks, need to probably present some options to
you through maybe vetting it through the Affordable Housing
Commission first before it comes back to the Board.
January 11, 2022
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COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Sooner rather than later.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner Saunders.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: And this is kind of a
question. But let's say tomorrow Commissioner McDaniel identifies
a piece of property that would be perfect for this and the developer,
and they need $10 million from this land trust fund, and we don't
have -- we have zero in there. I believe we could borrow from our
other funds and then pay it back. So timing is not going to be a
problem. We have resources to expedite something and pay it back
is the point.
MR. ISACKSON: That's right. We have flexibility. I like to
use the term.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: And the other part of this
equation is we do have a provision that requires developers who
come in market rate to -- if they want to increase density -- I think it's
10 percent. I think we kind of backed into this very --
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I think that's been raised to
20 percent now.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Well, I'd like to see it more, and
I can tell you why. We can't keep -- we can't keep ignoring the fact
that we have people moving out of this community because they can't
live here.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Let's stay -- we can't go -- you're
certainly welcome to say whatever you would like to say, but I don't
want to get down a debate on --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I'm not getting a debate on it.
I'm just --
(Simultaneous crosstalk.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: -- on regulating a percentage of
affordable housing to be dictated upon.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Well, that's a discussion we
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need to have. I'm --
(Simultaneous crosstalk.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, let's have it at the
appropriate time, not today.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: But that is a discussion we need
to have because, obviously, the more we allow this to continue, the
more people like principals of schools will tell you that they can't
stay here because the rents are increasing. When you have someone
living in a -- the Chamber sent me this letter from Ricciardelli's
office, a principal wrote her and said, I love being here. I have a
child. I'm paying $1,500 a month, $1,565 I think it was. I've just
been noticed that to stay here for another year the rent is going up to
2,600. I'm not going to be able to stay here. This is going -- this is
happening across our county and other counties, too. So it's a
problem that I'm pleased that we're going to start looking at.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I agree we should.
Commissioner Solis.
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: So -- and this will be the last thing
that I'm going to say, is, so can we have a consensus, or is there a
consensus to ask staff to come back with the recommendations of
how to implement some, you know, incentives, or whatever it is,
through the land trust so that we're prepared to start making things
happen so that the developers know that we're ready to make things
happen and they're not waiting for the future, that they can start
factoring that into their math?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Can you do that by our next
meeting?
MR. ISACKSON: That might be a tall ask, but why don't you
give me the first meeting in February; how about that?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: How do you like that?
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Yes.
January 11, 2022
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COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I think we'd have to go to
AHAC also. AHAC would have to look at it.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: When does AHAC meet?
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: AHAC will meet this -- I'm sorry.
Go ahead. Don't they meet this --
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: Well, we just met yesterday,
so -- we meet once a month. So it's the first -- what is it, the second
Monday of every month, I believe.
MR. ISACKSON: Well, maybe if you want to --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Maybe the second meeting in
February after you've had time to pile it up and bring it to AHAC and
then come to our board.
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: And when they brief us here,
it won't just be Joe Trachtenberg. It will be our staff as well, and we
talked about a good strategy to, you know, maximize the presentation
and not maximum time.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I think Commissioner
Taylor -- Commissioner Taylor suggested bringing it to AHAC
before it actually comes to us to get --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Yeah.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: -- their input as well. So the
second meeting in February will at least give a time-certain for us to
be looking at to have an agenda item and actually make some
decisions on what we're going to do with that. And, again, with the
thought if somebody has a different mouse trap, we do have
flexibility, as our County Manager likes to say, so...
All right. So you got something else on the workshop idea?
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: No, no. I thought you were
getting ready to move on. No, I've just got a couple items.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: County Manager had two.
MR. ISACKSON: So we have the TDC in January.
January 11, 2022
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CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Right.
MR. ISACKSON: And Commissioner Solis has suggested the
mental health workshop in June.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Fine.
MR. ISACKSON: And we've got two items that we're going to
bring back to you, to the Board, one's stormwater, and the other one
is an affordable housing/workforce housing report to the Board, so
that's my understanding right now.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And then the CRAs are in May.
MR. ISACKSON: The CRAs are April/May. April slash
May.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay. One or the other. Do
them both in one or the other. So that really only leaves the GMP
and the city workshops.
MR. ISACKSON: GMP.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: You want to try to do both the
municipalities on the same day; have one in the morning and one in
the afternoon?
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Sure.
MR. ISACKSON: And what would be the timeline for that be?
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: How do you like March?
MR. ISACKSON: We can endeavor to see if that could be
accomplished.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: How do you like March? March.
Let's try for -- let's try for those workshops in the month of March.
You've got it on March 1st, but I'm assuming it's fluid as well, so...
And then -- I mean, after that, it's not all. It is something that
needs to be discussed. We have to have a discussion about our
GMP, so -- and I'm not sure -- I mean, we have a GMP. I'm -- I
would be okay with having that discussion after we come back from
our summer break, assuming I can't induce you to work through the
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summer.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: No, I would rather not do that.
Even if we have to put it on an agenda item, I think we need to
address it. Yeah, I think it would be very helpful for the community
to know where we're going with it.
The amount of small-scale and large-scale amendments to the
Comprehensive Plan in the year 2020, of all the issues that came
before us was 44 percent; 44 percent of everything coming before us
was to amend the Comprehensive Plan for increased density. It's
time.
MR. ISACKSON: I'll have a conversation with Mike Bosi, and
we'll bring a -- we'll bring an item back to the Board, and if the Board
decides that there's more additional information that's required, then
we can go from there into a workshop setting if that's appropriate.
But let's start with the report to the Board.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And the GMP?
MR. ISACKSON: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: And with the CR -- with the
City of Naples discussion, I really would like it to focus on the
beaches.
MR. ISACKSON: Well, we generally -- as I recall in the years
I've been here, they generally come up with a -- we come up with a
joint agenda.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Right.
MR. ISACKSON: And I'm certainly -- I'm sure that that will
be one item on the agenda.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: It will be.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, I like that idea as far as the
management of the GMP as an actual agenda item, and then we
can -- and then we can -- if we need to go off into a workshop, we
can. So at least that will bring the subject matter up for discussion.
January 11, 2022
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MR. ISACKSON: That's all I had, Commissioners.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: That's all you had?
How about our County Attorney? No infinite wisdom for the
day?
MR. KLATZKOW: None, sir.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay. Commissioner Solis?
COMMISSIONER SOLIS: Nothing from me.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: LoCastro?
COMMISSIONER LoCASTRO: No.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Commissioner -- I'm going to hold
Commissioner Saunders till last because he said he had some
important things.
Commissioner Taylor?
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Nothing.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I do have a couple items.
The first, in reference to the workforce training facility, we had
donated to the county that piece of property on Golden Gate
Parkway, that big white building, which is probably a teardown, but I
don't know if that property would be suitable for something like a
workforce training facility, so I wanted to just kind of throw that out
as a possible location. We own the land. We've got plenty of
parking there. And so if staff could take a look at that as a possible
location since the other building fell apart.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: That's a good idea.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: Number two, Mike Dalby
had suggested that we start putting up some signs on some of our
construction projects that say "paid for by," and I think that that's a
good idea. I've seen that in a lot of communities, and I think that
helps people understand they may be paying a little bit more in sales
tax, but it's going to some very major important items. So I would
throw that out, if the Board has no objection --
January 11, 2022
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CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Absolutely.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: -- to have staff take a look at
that.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I agree.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: All right. And the third
item, and the more difficult one I saved for last. Obviously, we've
gotten the letter from the Manager indicating his imminent
retirement, and well understood. We have essentially five months
between now and the time that that occurs, and we need to start the
process of determining how we're going to fill the spot of County
Manager.
I don't want to -- we don't need to have a discussion today, but
we do need to put this on an agenda pretty quickly, and I would
suggest certainly to have a discussion at our next meeting on what is
the -- what are the alternatives. How do we want to proceed to select
a new county manager. Five months sounds like a lot of time, but it
will go by quickly. And so I think we should utilize it. So I would
ask the Board to place on the agenda for discussion how we want to
proceed to fill that spot.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: I agree.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I agree.
MR. ISACKSON: We'll make sure that there's an agenda item
on your next meeting for that, sir.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: And if you can with that -- with
regard to that -- because when we spoke yesterday or before, you
talked about a secession plan, and I know most of it's swimming
around in your head, so maybe we could get an idea as to that process
so we can have that be --
MR. ISACKSON: We can paraphrase in a framework and give
you some options regarding how the Board might want to proceed
with choosing my successor, so...
January 11, 2022
Page 142
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Okay.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: And I would suggest
that -- obviously, the Chairman and the managers kind of set the
meeting, but I would suggest that you put that as an item late in the
afternoon or towards the end -- at the end of the meeting --
MR. ISACKSON: A time-certain item.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: It could be that, but I mean, I
just think at the end of the meeting is probably better than at the
beginning for something like that.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Sure. When it occurs really is
irrelevant as long as we get -- as long as we get the ball rolling. And
then, you know, you and I talked about communication's nine-tenths
of the law, and the sooner we get it out -- and then -- because one of
the issues -- this isn't -- this isn't like our private life where we all just
go in the back and make decisions and then bring it forward. We
can't legally talk about these things unless the TV's on and Terri's
writing down all my misspoken words. So having that discussion
sooner than later, I think, will help all of us.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I do have something.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: No, no. I already called on you.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: So Lauren Melo wrote a bill
that talked about supporting the mechanical removal of vegetation,
specifically with Lake Okeechobee, but the idea that this is
something we need to explore, the state needs to explore. They have
a -- they have a Senate sponsor on this. I'd like to see if there is an
agreement up here to support her bill, because I think it's very, very
important. In fact --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: We already did a resolution on that
last year.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Not on mechanical --
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Absolutely.
January 11, 2022
Page 143
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: -- supporting Lauren Melo's
bill.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Well, we didn't -- we did a
resolution in supporting the shift from the spraying mechanism for
weed eradication and debris eradication to mechanized extraction.
We did that, but not -- and that was what Lauren and I talked about
that precipitated the creation of this actual bill that she's bringing
forward, so...
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: So I would like to see if we
could have that because on -- in February we're going to
Tallahassee -- I'm not going to be part of it -- and I'd like to see if the
folks going up there would be willing to carry that letter.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: I'm going to be going up
there, and I don't have any problem with that, but before making that
decision, I have to see the bill.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Yeah, I'd like to read it.
(Simultaneous crosstalk.)
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: I've got it in my office. I'll
give it to you.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: And we have another
meeting coming up in January, so we have plenty of time to jump on
it, but I've got to see what the bill is.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Let's actually have a discussion, a
quick agenda item on our second meeting in January with that bill
being part of the agenda so that the public can look at it and input as
well.
MR. ISACKSON: I could have Mr. Mullins send a one-way
communication -- I think he has the bill structure -- to each board
member, and then we'll place it. I'll have John put together a little
tutorial for the Board on the 25th.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: Perfect. It hasn't been through
January 11, 2022
Page 144
committee yet or anything, so I mean, it's just -- it's going to change.
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS: We have time.
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Well, it's interesting that we are
now starting to go back to the future and using mechanical removal in
appropriate places throughout Collier County for stormwater plants
and things that are in the canals where appropriate.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: We finally came up with a --
COMMISSIONER TAYLOR: Back to the future.
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: So anything else for the good of
the order?
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN McDANIEL: If not, we are adjourned.
****Commissioner McDaniel moved, seconded by Commissioner
Solis and carried that the following items under the Consent and
Summary Agendas be approved and/or adopted****
Item #16A1
RELEASING A CODE ENFORCEMENT LIEN WITH AN
ACCRUED VALUE OF $66,100 FOR PAYMENT OF $1,550 IN
THE CODE ENFORCEMENT ACTION TITLED BOARD OF
COUNTY COMMISSIONERS V. RAFAEL BARRIOS
MONTERO, TOMAS B. AVILA REYES, AND RICARDO ABRIL,
RELATING TO PROPERTY LOCATED AT 1281 25TH ST SW,
COLLIER COUNTY, FLORIDA
Item #16A2
CLERK OF COURTS TO RELEASE A PERFORMANCE BOND
IN THE AMOUNT OF $155,062 WHICH WAS POSTED AS A
January 11, 2022
Page 145
GUARANTY FOR EXCAVATION PERMIT NUMBER
PL20200001219 FOR WORK ASSOCIATED WITH VENTANA
POINTE
Item #16A3
RESOLUTION 2022-001: FINAL ACCEPTANCE OF PRIVATE
ROADWAY AND DRAINAGE IMPROVEMENTS FOR THE
FINAL PLAT OF GOLF CLUB OF THE EVERGLADES PHASE 1,
APPLICATION NUMBER PL20140001653, AND AUTHORIZE
THE RELEASE OF THE MAINTENANCE SECURITY IN THE
AMOUNT OF $699,615.37
Item #16A4
FINAL ACCEPTANCE OF SEWER UTILITY FACILITIES FOR
SPRINGS AT HAMMOCK COVE PHASE 3, PL20190002127,
AND AUTHORIZE THE COUNTY MANAGER, OR HIS
DESIGNEE, TO RELEASE THE UTILITIES PERFORMANCE
SECURITY (UPS) AND FINAL OBLIGATION BOND IN THE
TOTAL AMOUNT OF $7,898.12 TO THE PROJECT ENGINEER
OR THE DEVELOPER’S DESIGNATED AGENT
Item #16A5
FINAL ACCEPTANCE OF POTABLE WATER AND SEWER
UTILITY FACILITIES AND ACCEPT THE CONVEYANCE OF A
PORTION OF THE POTABLE WATER AND SEWER UTILITY
FACILITIES FOR THE 7-ELEVEN #38985 GREENWAY,
PL20210001822
January 11, 2022
Page 146
Item #16A6
FINAL ACCEPTANCE OF THE POTABLE WATER FACILITIES,
AND ACCEPT THE CONVEYANCE OF THE POTABLE WATER
FACILITIES FOR THE POINTE AT FOUNDERS SQUARE,
PL20210001958
Item #16A7
RESOLUTION 2022-002: FINAL ACCEPTANCE OF THE
PRIVATE ROADWAY AND DRAINAGE IMPROVEMENTS,
AND ACCEPTANCE OF THE PLAT DEDICATIONS, FOR THE
FINAL PLAT OF LEGACY ESTATES, APPLICATION NUMBER
PL20140002627 AND APPLICATION NUMBER PL20140001803,
AND, AND AUTHORIZE THE RELEASE OF THE
MAINTENANCE SECURITY IN THE AMOUNT OF $53,700.85
Item #16A8
RECORDING THE MINOR FINAL PLAT OF ALTIS SANTA
BARBARA, APPLICATION NUMBER PL20210001774
Item #16A9
RECORDING THE FINAL PLAT OF CAMBRIDGE PARK AT
ORANGE BLOSSOM (APPLICATION NUMBER
PL20210000167) APPROVAL OF THE STANDARD FORM
CONSTRUCTION AND MAINTENANCE AGREEMENT AND
APPROVAL OF THE PERFORMANCE SECURITY IN THE
AMOUNT OF $644,292.28
January 11, 2022
Page 147
Item #16A10
AN EXTENSION FOR COMPLETION OF REQUIRED
SUBDIVISION IMPROVEMENTS ASSOCIATED WITH
ESPLANADE GOLF AND COUNTRY CLUB OF NAPLES
PHASE 2 (PL20120002897) SUBDIVISION PURSUANT TO
SECTION 10.02.05 C.2 OF THE COLLIER COUNTY LAND
DEVELOPMENT CODE (LDC)
Item #16A11
AN EXTENSION FOR COMPLETION OF REQUIRED
SUBDIVISION IMPROVEMENTS ASSOCIATED WITH
ESPLANADE GOLF AND COUNTRY CLUB OF NAPLES
BLOCKS E AND G2 (PL20140002187) SUBDIVISION
PURSUANT TO SECTION 10.02.05 C.2 OF THE COLLIER
COUNTY LAND DEVELOPMENT CODE (LDC)
Item #16A12
RESOLUTION 2022-003: WAIVER OF THE OPTIONAL LOCAL
PUBLIC HEARING PURSUANT TO SECTION 190.046(1)(D)3.,
FLORIDA STATUTES, ON THE BOUNDARY AMENDMENT
PETITION SUBMITTED BY FIDDLER’S CREEK COMMUNITY
DEVELOPMENT DISTRICT #1 TO THE FLORIDA LAND AND
WATER ADJUDICATORY COMMISSION
Item #16A13
RECOGNIZING CARRY FORWARD FUNDING FOR THE
COLLIER METROPOLITAN PLANNING ORGANIZATION
January 11, 2022
Page 148
(“MPO”) IN THE AMOUNT OF $1,746.24, EARNED FROM THE
FY 2020/21 TRANSPORTATION DISADVANTAGED
PLANNING GRANT, AND TO APPROVE ALL RELATED
NECESSARY BUDGET AMENDMENTS
Item #16A14
RECOGNIZING AND ACCEPTING REVENUE FOR COLLIER
AREA TRANSIT BUS SHELTERS IN THE AMOUNT OF $73,844
AND TO APPROVING ALL NECESSARY BUDGET
AMENDMENTS
Item #16A15
RESOLUTION 2022-004: MEMORIALIZING A MEMORANDUM
OF AGREEMENT (MOA) FM# 449463-1-93-01, BETWEEN
FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION (FDOT) AND
COLLIER COUNTY, WHERE FDOT WILL PROVIDE THE
COUNTY WITH CONNECTED VEHICLE EQUIPMENT AND
SOFTWARE FOR MONITORING TRAFFIC CONDITIONS AND
PROVIDING MESSAGES TO THE TRAVELING PUBLIC AT 19
INTERSECTIONS ON STATE ROADS WITHIN COLLIER
COUNTY. FDOT HAS INCLUDED THIS PROJECT IN ITS FIVE-
YEAR WORK PROGRAM, DESCRIBED AS 'COLLIER COUNTY
CONNECTED TRAVELER INFORMATION SYSTEM' IN THE
AMOUNT NOT TO EXCEED $496,000, AND EXECUTE A
RESOLUTION MEMORIALIZING THE BOARD'S ACTION
Item #16A16
AUTHORIZING THE CHAIRMAN TO SIGN A USE
AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE DEPARTMENT OF
January 11, 2022
Page 149
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION – DIVISION OF STATE
LANDS AND COLLIER COUNTY IN RELATION TO ITB NO.
21-7935 “WIGGINS PASS AND DOCTORS PASS DREDGE 2021-
2022” ALLOWING THE PLACEMENT OF DREDGED SAND
ONTO DELNOR WIGGINS STATE PARK BEACH, PER THE
STATE’S REQUEST (PROJECT NO. 80288)
Item #16A17
BUDGET AMENDMENTS TO REALLOCATE FUNDS, IN THE
AMOUNT OF $8,535,606, WITHIN THE GROWTH
MANAGEMENT DEPARTMENT STORMWATER BOND FUND
(327)
Item #16A18
FINAL RANKING FOR REQUEST FOR PROFESSIONAL
SERVICES (“RPS”) NO. 21-7862, AND BEGIN NEGOTIATIONS
WITH KIMLEY-HORN AND ASSOCIATES, INC., TO PERFORM
PROFESSIONAL ENGINEERING SERVICES FOR THE
AIRPORT ROAD WIDENING PROJECT FROM VANDERBILT
BEACH ROAD (CR862) TO IMMOKALEE ROAD (CR846),
COUNTY PROJECT NUMBER 60190, SO THAT A PROPOSED
AGREEMENT CAN BE BROUGHT BACK FOR THE BOARD'S
CONSIDERATION
Item #16A19
HEARING A LAND DEVELOPMENT CODE AMENDMENT AT
TWO REGULARLY SCHEDULED DAYTIME HEARINGS AND
WAIVING THE NIGHTTIME HEARING REQUIREMENT
January 11, 2022
Page 150
Item #16C1
AN AGREEMENT FOR SALE AND PURCHASE WITH CAROL
A. DESSING, FOR 1.14 ACRES UNDER THE CONSERVATION
COLLIER LAND ACQUISITION PROGRAM AT A COST NOT
TO EXCEED $19,500. (CONSERVATION COLLIER TRUST
FUND 172)
Item #16C2
A SETTLEMENT AGREEMENT AND RELEASE WITH
DOUGLAS N. HIGGINS, INC. AND AUTHORIZE STAFF TO
ISSUE A PURCHASE ORDER IN THE AMOUNT OF $83,350.00
IN SATISFACTION OF ALL CLAIMS ON THE CREEKSIDE
FORCE MAIN EXTENSION PHASE 1 PROJECT,
WASTEWATER USER CAPITAL FUND (414), PROJECT NO.
70044
Item #16C3
AN AGREEMENT FOR SALE AND PURCHASE WITH
MERCEDES CABRERA, A MARRIED WOMAN, FOR 9.16
ACRES UNDER THE CONSERVATION COLLIER LAND
ACQUISITION PROGRAM AT A COST NOT TO EXCEED
$115,650. (CONSERVATION COLLIER TRUST FUND 172)
Item #16C4
THIRD AMENDMENT TO AGREEMENT NO. 18-7429 FOR
SECURITY SERVICES WITH UNIVERSAL PROTECTION
January 11, 2022
Page 151
SERVICE, LLC TO EXTEND THE CURRENT TERM OF
SERVICE, MAKE MINISTERIAL REVISIONS TO
PERFORMANCE CRITERIA, AND TO ADJUST THE FEE
SCHEDULE FOR THE RENEWAL TERM OF THE AGREEMENT
($148,360, FUND NUMBER 001-122255)
Item #16D1
AN EXEMPTION FROM THE COMPETITIVE PROCESS AS SET
FORTH IN THE PROCUREMENT ORDINANCE FOR
SUBSCRIPTION TO FLIPSTER, NOVELIST PLUS, AND
NOVELIST SELECT, PROPRIETARY SOFTWARE OFFERED
THROUGH EBSCO, FOR LIBRARY PATRON USE IN AN
AMOUNT NOT TO EXCEED $150,000 PER FISCAL YEAR, AS
BUDGETED WITHIN GENERAL FUND (001)
Item #16D2
ACCEPTING TWO (2) LIBRARY GRANT DONATIONS, ONE
FROM THE HSI-YANG WU MEMORIAL FUND THROUGH
THE BRANCH COUNTY COMMUNITY FOUNDATION IN THE
AMOUNT OF $500, AND ONE FROM THE KIRSCH
MCLAUGHLIN TRUST THROUGH THE FIDELITY
CHARITABLE GRANT PROGRAM IN THE AMOUNT OF $100,
FOR THE GENERAL SUPPORT OF THE COLLIER COUNTY
PUBLIC LIBRARY. (PUBLIC SERVICES GRANT FUND 709)
Item #16D3
AUTHORIZING THE CHAIRPERSON TO SIGN THREE (3)
MORTGAGE SATISFACTIONS FOR THE STATE HOUSING
January 11, 2022
Page 152
INITIATIVES PARTNERSHIP LOAN PROGRAM IN THE
AMOUNT OF $63,000 AND APPROVE THE ASSOCIATED
BUDGET AMENDMENTS TO APPROPRIATE REPAYMENT
AMOUNTS TOTALING $63,000 WITHIN SHIP GRANT FUND
(791)
Item #16D4
AUTHORIZING THE CHAIRPERSON TO SIGN THREE
EMERGENCY SOLUTIONS GRANT AGREEMENTS WITH
COLLIER COUNTY: 1) NAMI COLLIER COUNTY, INC.,
(INCREASES AWARD BY $200,000), 2) THE SHELTER FOR
ABUSED WOMEN & CHILDREN, INC., (NO FUNDING
CHANGE), AND 3) THE HUNGER & HOMELESS COALITION,
INC., (DECREASES AWARD $200,000) FOR ADMINISTRATION
OF CARES RELATED SERVICES WITH A NET $0 IMPACT.
(GRANT FUND 705)
Item #16D5
AWARDING REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL (RFP) #18-7470S,
SERVICES FOR SENIORS, TO HEMO MEDIKA CARE LLC
D/B/A HARMONIA THE CLUB, SUNSHINE HEALTH CARE
SERVICES, LLC D/B/A A BETTER SOLUTION OF SARASOTA,
HOME HEALTH CARE RESOURCES, CORP. AND AUTHORIZE
THE CHAIR TO SIGN THE ATTACHED AGREEMENTS.
(ESTIMATED ANNUAL FISCAL IMPACT: $2,934,443, HUMAN
SERVICES GRANT FUND 707)
Item #16D6
January 11, 2022
Page 153
AUTHORIZING THE CHAIRMAN TO SIGN FOUR (4)
EMERGENCY SOLUTIONS GRANTS SUBRECIPIENT
AGREEMENTS; TWO (2) COLLIER COUNTY HUNGER &
HOMELESS COALITION IN THE AMOUNT OF $2,536.62 AND
$30,462, NAMI COLLIER COUNTY IN THE AMOUNT OF
$26,970, YOUTH HAVEN, INC. IN THE AMOUNT OF $71,000
AND ONE (1) HOME INVESTMENT PARTNERSHIPS
SUBRECIPIENT AGREEMENT FOR COLLIER COUNTY
HOUSING AUTHORITY IN THE AMOUNT OF $424,993.
(HOUSING GRANT FUND 705)
Item #16E1
AUTHORIZING THE CHAIR TO SIGN A MEMORANDUM OF
UNDERSTANDING WITH SOUTHWEST FLORIDA
PROFESSIONAL FIREFIGHTERS, LOCAL 1826, OUTLINING
THE PAYMENT OF PREMIUM PAY FOR ALL COLLIER
COUNTY EMS EMPLOYEES, NOT TO EXCEED THE FUNDING
AMOUNT OF $408,000 AS APPROVED WITHIN THE
AMERICAN RESCUE PLAN ACT CORONAVIRUS STATE AND
LOCAL FISCAL RECOVERY FUND AS APPROVED BY THE
UNITED STATES TREASURY AND PREVIOUSLY
AUTHORIZED BY THE BOARD OF COUNTY
COMMISSIONERS. (HOUSING GRANT FUND 705)
Item #16E2
AN ADMINISTRATIVE REPORT PREPARED BY THE
PROCUREMENT SERVICES DIVISION FOR DISPOSAL OF
PROPERTY AND NOTIFICATION OF REVENUE
DISBURSEMENT
January 11, 2022
Page 154
Item #16E3
ADMINISTRATIVE REPORTS PREPARED BY THE
PROCUREMENT SERVICES DIVISION FOR CHANGE ORDERS
AND OTHER CONTRACTUAL MODIFICATIONS REQUIRING
BOARD APPROVAL
Item #16E4
ADMINISTRATIVE REPORTS PREPARED BY THE
PROCUREMENT SERVICES DIVISION FOR CHANGE ORDERS
AND OTHER CONTRACTUAL MODIFICATIONS REQUIRING
BOARD APPROVAL
Item #16F1
A REPORT COVERING BUDGET AMENDMENTS IMPACTING
RESERVES AND MOVING FUNDS IN AN AMOUNT UP TO
AND INCLUDING $25,000 AND $50,000, RESPECTIVELY
Item #16F2
RESOLUTION 2022-005: APPROVING AMENDMENTS
(APPROPRIATING GRANTS, DONATIONS, CONTRIBUTIONS
OR INSURANCE PROCEEDS) TO THE FY21-22 ADOPTED
BUDGET
Item #16G1
January 11, 2022
Page 155
RESOLUTION 2022-006: AUTHORIZING THE CHAIRMAN TO
EXECUTE A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING THE COUNTY
MANAGER’S EXECUTION OF FEDERAL AVIATION
ADMINISTRATION (FAA) AIRPORT RESCUE GRANT
AGREEMENTS IN THE AMOUNT OF $59,000 FOR THE
MARCO ISLAND EXECUTIVE AIRPORT (MKY) AND $32,000
FOR THE IMMOKALEE REGIONAL AIRPORT (IMM) FOR
ELIGIBLE OPERATING EXPENSES AND AUTHORIZE ALL
NECESSARY BUDGET AMENDMENTS. (PROJECTS NOS.
33793 AND 33792)
Item #16I1
JANUARY 11, 2022, MISCELLANEOUS CORRESPONDENCE
Item #16J1
APPOINTING COMMISSIONER MCDANIEL AND
COMMISSIONER SAUNDERS TO THE COLLIER COUNTY
CANVASSING BOARD FOR THE 2022 ELECTION CYCLE
Item #16J2
AUTHORIZING THE COUNTY ATTORNEY’S OFFICE TO
PARTICIPATE AND REPRESENT THE COLLIER COUNTY
CANVASSING BOARD DURING THE 2022 ELECTION CYCLE
Item #16J3
TO RECORD IN THE MINUTES OF THE BOARD OF COUNTY
COMMISSIONERS, THE CHECK NUMBER (OR OTHER
BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS
MISCELLANEOUS CORRESPONDENCE
January 11, 2022
1. MISCELLANEOUS ITEMS TO FILE FOR RECORD WITH ACTION AS DIRECTED:
A. DISTRICTS:
1) Heritage Bay Community Development District:
Meeting Agenda 09/02/2021; 11/04/2021
Meeting Minutes 09/02/2021; 11/04/2021
2) Naples Heritage Community Development District:
Meeting Agenda 05/04/2021
Meeting Minutes 05/04/2021
3) The Quarry Community Development District:
Meeting Agenda 09/20/2021
Meeting Minutes 09/20/2021
B. OTHER:
January 11, 2022
Page 156
PAYMENT METHOD), AMOUNT, PAYEE, AND PURPOSE FOR
WHICH THE REFERENCED DISBURSEMENTS WERE DRAWN
FOR THE PERIODS BETWEEN DECEMBER 16, 2021, AND
DECEMBER 29, 2021 PURSUANT TO FLORIDA STATUTE
136.06.
Item #16J4
BOARD RATIFICATION OF THE PURCHASING CARD
TRANSACTIONS AND INVOICES PAYABLE APPROVED AND
DETERMINED TO HAVE A VALID PUBLIC PURPOSE BY THE
COUNTY MANAGER DURING THE BOARD’S SCHEDULED
RECESS
Item #16J5
BOARD RATIFICATION AND RECORDING 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 WERE DRAWN FOR THE PERIODS
BETWEEN DECEMBER 2, 2021, AND DECEMBER 15, 2021,
PURSUANT TO FLORIDA STATUTE 136.06 THAT WERE
APPROVED BY THE COUNTY MANAGER DURING THE
BOARD’S SCHEDULED RECESS
Item #16J6
BOARD DETERMINATION ON VALID PUBLIC PURPOSE FOR
INVOICES PAYABLE AND PURCHASING CARD
TRANSACTIONS AS OF JANUARY 5, 2022
January 11, 2022
Page 157
Item #16K1
RESOLUTION 2022-007: REAPPOINTING JAMES BOUGHTON,
CLAY BROOKER, JEFFREY CURL AND CHRIS MITCHELL
TO THE DEVELOPMENT SERVICES ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Item #16K2
RESOLUTION 2022-008: APPOINTING SUE LAW TO THE
ANIMAL SERVICES ADVISORY BOARD
Item #16K3
A STIPULATED FINAL JUDGMENT IN THE AMOUNT OF
$225,000 PLUS $40,330 IN STATUTORY ATTORNEY,
EXPERTS’ FEES, COSTS AND STATUTORY SUPPLEMENTAL
ATTORNEYS’ FEES IF NECESSARY (NOT TO EXCEED $7,000)
FOR THE TAKING OF PARCEL 1257RDUE/TCE, REQUIRED
FOR THE VANDERBILT BEACH ROAD EXTENSION PROJECT
NO. 60168
Item #16K4
A STIPULATED FINAL JUDGMENT IN THE AMOUNT OF
$371,000 PLUS $35,680 IN STATUTORY ATTORNEY AND
EXPERTS’ FEES AND COSTS FOR THE TAKING OF PARCEL
1109POND REQUIRED FOR THE VANDERBILT BEACH ROAD
EXTENSION PROJECT NO. 60168
Item #16K5
January 11, 2022
Page 158
A STIPULATED FINAL JUDGMENT IN THE AMOUNT OF
$156,000 PLUS $31,574 IN STATUTORY ATTORNEY AND
EXPERTS’ FEES AND COSTS FOR THE TAKING OF PARCEL
218FEE REQUIRED FOR THE VANDERBILT BEACH ROAD
EXTENSION PROJECT NO. 60168
Item #16K6
A STIPULATED FINAL JUDGMENT IN THE TOTAL AMOUNT
OF $110,000 PLUS $21,767.50 IN STATUTORY ATTORNEY
AND EXPERTS’ FEES AND COSTS FOR THE TAKING OF
PARCEL 220FEE, REQUIRED FOR THE VANDERBILT BEACH
ROAD EXTENSION PROJECT, PROJECT NO., 60168, AND
DELEGATE AUTHORITY TO THE COUNTY MANAGER OR
HIS DESIGNEE TO PROCESS PAYMENT OF ADDITIONAL
STATUTORY ATTORNEY’S FEES FOR SUPPLEMENTAL
PROCEEDINGS, IF ANY, AS AUTHORIZED BY CH. 73, FLA.
STAT.
Item #17A – Moved to Item #9A (Per Agenda Change Sheet)
Item #17B
RESOLUTION 2022-009: ZONING PETITION - PL20200002317,
AVE MARIA SRAA, AMENDING THE TOWN OF AVE MARIA
STEWARDSHIP RECEIVING AREA (SRA) TO REVISE THE
SRA TOWN PLAN AND MASTER PLAN IN ACCORDANCE
WITH SECTION 4.08.07.F.4 OF THE LAND DEVELOPMENT
CODE, AND SPECIFICALLY TO: RECONFIGURE A PORTION
OF TOWN CENTER 2A AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD GENERAL
CONTEXT ZONE NEAR THE INTERSECTION OF POPE JOHN
January 11, 2022
Page 159
PAUL BOULEVARD AND CAMP KEAIS ROAD; TO ADD A
NEW MULTIFAMILY DWELLING UNIT RENTAL HOUSING
TYPE CONSISTING OF SINGLE FAMILY DETACHED, SINGLE
FAMILY ATTACHED OR TOWNHOUSES LOCATED ON A
SINGLE PARCEL CALLED A COTTAGE COURT AS A
PERMITTED USE IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD GENERAL
CONTEXT ZONE AND TOWN CENTERS 2 AND 3; TO ADD
CIVIC USE, OPEN SPACE AND PARKS AS A PERMITTED USE
IN TOWN CENTER 1; TO ADD DEVELOPMENT STANDARDS
FOR THE COTTAGE COURT DWELLING UNIT TYPE LIMITED
TO A 10 FOOT EXTERNAL PROJECT SETBACK AND A
MAXIMUM HEIGHT OF 2 ½ STORIES; TO ADD AN ACCESS
POINT NEAR THE SOUTHWEST CORNER OF THE SRA
BOUNDARY TO SERVE THE EXISTING GOLF
MAINTENANCE FACILITY ONLY; TO REMOVE THE ROOT
BARRIER REQUIREMENT IN NEIGHBORHOOD GENERAL
CONTEXT ZONE TO BE CONSISTENT WITH THE LDC; AND
MODIFY THE NUMERICAL SPACING OF THE GRID SYSTEM
FOR THE UNIVERSITY DISTRICT TO CORRECT A LABELING
ERROR. THE SUBJECT PROPERTY IS LOCATED NORTH OF
OIL WELL ROAD AND WEST OF CAMP KEAIS ROAD IN
SECTIONS 31 THROUGH 33, TOWNSHIP 47 SOUTH, RANGE
29 EAST AND SECTIONS 4 THROUGH 9 AND 16 THROUGH
18, TOWNSHIP 48 SOUTH, RANGE 29 EAST IN COLLIER
COUNTY, FL
Item #17C
RESOLUTION 2022-010: APPROVING AMENDMENTS
(APPROPRIATING CARRY FORWARD, TRANSFERS AND
January 11, 2022
Page 160
SUPPLEMENTAL REVENUE) TO THE FY21-22 ADOPTED
BUDGET
Item #17D
ORDINANCE 2022-001: AN AMENDMENT TO ORDINANCE
93-81, AS AMENDED, KNOWN AS THE “PARKS AND
RECREATION ADVISORY BOARD ORDINANCE,” TO ADD
AN ALTERNATE MEMBER TO THE BOARD
*******
January 11, 2022
There being no further business for the good of the County, the
meeting was adjourned by order of the Chair at 1 :23 p.m.
BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS
BOARD OF ZONING APPEALS/EX
OFFICIO GOVERNING BOARD(S) OF
SPECIAL CTS UNDER ITS CONTROL
C e)
WIL AM L. McD EL, JR., CHAIRMAN
ATTEST
CRYS : kINZEL, CLERK
•
f.iai ; s rJ i
0 c •
Atf tasto an'es
signaidit only,
These minutes approysd by the Board on etionAmi
as presented or as corrected
TRANSCRIPT PREPARED ON BEHALF OF FORT MYERS
COURT REPORTING BY TERRI L. LEWIS, RPR, FPR-C,
COURT REPORTER AND NOTARY PUBLIC.
Page 161