. Morning, everyone.
let me welcome all of you to
the orange county board of county
commissioner meeting of december 2nd,
2025. As we begin this morning, we're
going to call
on commissioner nicole wilson to introduce
her
guest who will be bringing the invocation
for today. Following
the invocation we'll ask commissioner wilson
if she'll lead
us in the pledge of
allegiance, after we will then move
forward on
our agenda thisthis morning. With
that, commissioner
wilson you are recognized.
>> thank
you so much,
mayor. Good morning, everybody. Today we
are especially honored to have
pastor scott blue with us to offer
this
morning's invocation. A
homeless outreach nonprofit he launched
in west orange county in
2010. Matthew's hope is dedicated
to
meeting basic needs and offering a hand up to
men, women and
children experiencing homelessness.
individuals
can access clothing medical mental
health care, eye exams, case management,
showers,
hair and nail salon, and even day
care and early learning institution.
pastor scott has found
success in helping people by
prioritizing self-sufficiency and
stability for a
better quality of life. Under his
leadership with a small
but extraordinarily dedicated team
matthew's hope has become
known for its approaches for serving
our winter
garden and west orange community and
as of
june 2022 they are serving in brevard
county.
the organization currently operates
a mobile
emergency shelter busses providing
safe overnight accommodations for
unsheltered individuals if
you haven't had the opportunity
to see these I would invite you to
do that.
in september I had the privilege of
visiting the
brevard campus where the shelters
are changing
lives. Today is especially meaningful
to have pastor scott here because we
have
the opportunity to approve the mobile
shelter
project here on our consent agenda.
it will
serve residents all over west orange
county in an effort many have worked
tirelessly to bring
today. I am so thrilled to
support him
and the homeless
outreach efforts. I want to say this
is
off the script editorial,
pastor scott blue is somebody who
also speaks truth to power in
a time that power seems to have lost
compassion and I think it's
a critical voice that needs to be
heard, and I am really,
really grateful to have him in my
community and as a friend. Without further adieu.
[ applause ]
why are
you all standing up?
I heard I can stay five or ten minutes so
I want to make sure
you're comfortable because I'm not on
the pulpit any more and so this
is my opportunity to speak a little
jesus into your life. I have a few
things I want to share with
you because I'm able, and I'm watching
things happening right now that, quite
honestly in 63
years, I never thought I would see
happen again. The lack of empathy
and compassion
for others is at an all-time low.
when it comes to homelessness we seem
to have figured out
the best way to handle things is
simply lock them up. Don't kid
yourself for a minute this isn't happening.
I track it.
we can show it happening every day.
recently
was you're going to love this,
camping paraphernalia. As
a drug addict I
know what drug paraphernalia is. It's
something to think about. But I want
to
share with you that matthew mobile
teams
are throughout from basically
I-4 up into claremont. Out well
before the sun rises caring for the
homeless men, women and children living on
the streets of our community. As the
cold
weather approaches and will soon arrive
imagine having no
shelter, going with no or very little
rest, with
no relief in sight. Not even being
able to sit
down without being told to move along
or risk arrest. Don't buy into
the false narrative that homelessness --
what homelessness looks like. The
truth is, the truth is is
that many are elderly, some very ill,
while
others are physically or mentally disabled
and then the
young families with children with no
understanding how they are
supposed to survive on our streets.
due to the increased law enforcement
of new laws coming out
of tallahassee, basically making it
illegal to sleep outside, illegal to
be
homeless, the anxiety and tension
we see on
the streets right now is at an all-
time high. And when people
feel that anxiety and that kind
of tension, they do desperate things.
good people
do desperate things. Simply I
ask from each of you today and our
commission and
mayor, pray for them. If you can't
do
anything else, if you want do anything
else, pray for them. We go where we
need to go.
we do what needs to be done. If not
us, then who? Emily
dickinson said, I dwell in possibilities.
mr. Mayor
and commissioners, I choose to dwell in
the possibilities and
god does the rest, and I am --
invite you to also, I choose to live
in possibilities, dwell in the possibilities.
let us pray.
this morning, lord,
god, father, I lift up our
elected leaders to you and pray that
they may have
open hearts and open minds and choose
to dwell on the possibilities. As
they gather here this
morning, may they acknowledge with
courage that all
people desire to realize all the potential
that
life offers. May each be led with
conviction, enthusiasm and passionate
resolve.
may the needs, hopes and
dreams of all peoples be given consideration,
those
with homes and
those finding themselves without.
living on our streets.
may each one here place politics aside and
look to you for guidance and strength,
if you are with us who could
be against? Us the many task and
challenges ahead are not easy but
nothing worth fighting for has
ever been easy and greatness isn't
achieved
by the faint of heart. Creator
god, often making the proper decision
is not always the
popular decision. So may you provide a
fortress
of protection of those will to do
what is
right rather than simply
doing what is easy. Lord god, our
country is hurting,
if we ever needed you, we need
you now. May your presence be known
in this place today and
every day,
in your precious son christ jesus, amen.
>>> I pledge allegiance to the flag
of the united states of america and to the
republic for which it
stands
one nation under
god indivisible with liberty and justice for
all.
>>> we
have no proclamations or resolutions
or anything like that
today. Let me acknowledge that I
hope you all had a wonderful thanksgiving
holiday period of
time. Now that we're in the
season, this is my favorite time of
the year,
as it is all about how wewe treat
others and how we recognize and give
to the
least of those in our community,
and so we have one more board county
commission meeting in this calendar
year. We have a board meeting in a
couple weeks and that
will be the final one for this year
and we move into 2026.
so today we do
have a full agenda and we're going
to
move forward and open it up
for any public comment this is a period
of time in which we
ask members of the public to come
forward regarding matters or
issues of concern, matters that
are appropriate discussion during
this period of
time, these matters would
include procurement of land issues
or property
concerns, rather than this board, this
afternoon we will be taking up the
various land use related
issues and we will be soliciting public
input during each of the public hearings
this afternoon. The public comment
period is this morning.
do we have members of the public present
who wish to be heard?
>> we do. We have seven registered
speakers this morning.
>> all
right. We're going to give each of
our speakers a couple minutes
by which to make their case, and
we'll generally call them in the order
in which you signed up. You can go
ahead and
proceed with calling those who wish to
be heard.
>> thank you, mayor. Folks, I'm going
to call your names in
batches. Line up along the back wall in
the
order called when you approach the
podium, begin with your
name and address for the record.
first speaker is gavin
kian, zachary
moldof, and joe silvistrus.
>> thank you, mr.
kian up first, is he here
at this time?
>> does not appear.
>> does
not appear he's here. Mr.
moldof.
>> good morning,
commissioners, mayor, staff. Thank
you for the opportunity to be here.
before I say anything I came
here to say, I would like to say thank you
for displaying
the menorah here. As a jewish
person, we
don't always find representation or
even acceptance in
all spaces and it's felt good to know
that I'm accepted
here and to see that represented
so explicitly. I would just like to say thanks.
my name is zach moldof
I reside at --in district
5, 32792 my zip code.
my full address in the written record.
today
I did come down here with a whole
written and
prepared things, but there's just
other things happening in the community
that call for attention as well, so
I'm going to do my best
to split my time here. I think
when it comes to visit orlando
and everything that we've heard lately
about investigating the
spending and revealing what's been
spent and
what it's been spent on, it shows
there's a
tremendous opportunity for orange
county to
innovate and to create opportunities
where
this marketing money can be spent
differently to
achieve the same results. And
there's all kinds of ways to
structure these
programs so that
the revenue expended circulates in
the community much more
so than being paid out in marketing
firms we would
like to emulate here. We can
cultivate the talent here and make this
a place where people who
are leaving from new york and los
angeles want to move to and we can
pay less to get that talent here and help
that talent shape our community into
what it should be so they want to
be here and all those great outcomes can be made
possible.
separate from that, I am --I am
really proud to see that the
commissioners and the mayor are taking
up
with such
urgency the issue of basically motorized
vehicles on
our sidewalks,
simply because they have electric
motors. We've slipped into this space
where
we've forgotten that the distinction
is
about the motor not what powers
the motor. Serving on the transmac this
is a citizen who came
down and pointed out the urgency to
this --to us and
I just wanted to echo that, you know, it
is really
important, and I'm glad to see that action is being
taken. So thank you for the time.
>> all right.
thank you mmoldof.
we'll move to our
next
speaker, please.
>> good morning,
mayor
demings, my name is joe. I serve as
the
senior director of safety and emergency
management at orange county public
schools. I'm here today representing
the school district to
share some thoughts on micro
mobility devices which will be discussed
later on
the agenda. Last month our district
held a school board work
session focused on these devices prompted
by concerns
from parents and the community about
how students are
using them. Over the past few years,
we've noticed these
devices becoming more and more popular
with students as a way to commute
to and from
school, however with the increase of
the use of these devices we've seen
an increase
in incidents resulting in jers and
some cases serious injuries to the
rider
or bystanders. We are working with nonprofits
and other
stakeholders to address the challenges
posed by thee
devices and determine best way to
curb unsafe behaviors
to ensure safety of students and the
community members at large. We request
the opportunity
to partner with the county and future
discussions regarding micro mobility
devices given many of
our students rely on them daily to
get
to school. We want to thank you for
your
leadership, attention to this issue
in consideration of a partnership
to keep our students an community
safe when
using these alternative methods to
commute to school. Thank you.
>> all right. Thank you mr.
silverest. We look forward to working
with the school district as
we better understand how these devices
are being
used and what we can perhaps do from
a regulatory perspective on making
the
safer for our youth and others who
seem to be
drawn to using these devices.
more to follow. Thank you. We'll move to
the next speaker.
>> our next batch of speakers is going
to
start with
val mobilely, followed by david segal,
jake patroski, dr. Jim moyer.
>> good
morning, county commission.
>> good
morning.
>> val mobley,
226 west king street. In the spirit of
the
season I am here today
to give thanks for your leadership,
for what you've done with the budget
of
this county, and the ways
that you give back through the
budget to the people who live in orange
county. I think it's --y'all have
done a tremendous job. I
don't agree with every expenditure
but that's beside the point.
the point being, a lot
of good is being
done. Let me highlight the
housing initiative trust fund that
y'all
created. That was and
is a landmark legislation. And I hope
that every other county in
the state will follow suit.
I can see where the smaller counties
think they
can't afford it, but I think that
anything you do county wide to
help people have a roof over their
heads, is worth it.
so thank you for that.
I just wanted to point out
that I'm here
supporting the unhoused and I will
be
here, y'all are going to see me.
I just don't want you to
forget the unhoused. These are
our friends, our neighbors, maybe
we
don't know their names, but we know
that they don't
have a safe place to rest their
head at night. And so just don't forget
them.
one other thing off
that
topic is, [ inaudible ] it's on
the agenda, red light cameras.
if you're not breaking the law, why
are you afraid of
the cameras? They're a good thing.
thank you.
>> all
right. Thank
you, ms. Mobilebly.
it's very
difficult for those of us who serve at
the local level to forget about
the homelessness in our community,
we see them, we're around them.
yes, this board is
very compassionate board and every
board
meeting we have, we
are passing new, contractual
relationships to address those issues
in
our community. Perhaps more than most
communities within the state of florida.
and
sometimes without a lot of help
from tallahassee. So thank you
for being thankful this morning.
we'll move to the
next
speaker.
>> good morning, everyone.
I'm david
segal. Can't tell my joke anymore.
I live
at 1868 corner
view lane in orlando. First of
all, I would like to thank the
commission for their
legal activity against
whatever the
draconian 180 bill is. I was going
to suggest if you look
at the florida constitution you may
find
a greater ally than the approach
you're using. Just two things. There's
three levels of things going on
here. There's the state
masters, there's the county commission
and oftentimes you do the same thing.
you want to increase your own power.
home
rule is really not in
our constitution. It's
an interesting, like I said I know
the points being argued
are kind of --well, one, they haven't
been
challenged before, so you've got problems
there.
so I would say that first thing, if
that's your
argument, maybe you should look to
ways to being sure there is home rule
in things that you
do. When you appoint people to the
tdt or crc they
are a political situation, reflections
of your own will and that's just the way
it is.
and if
you, again, if you look in the constitution,
the ultimate power
is the people. The
first big section in there says all
the power of the state government
are invested in the people. Doesn't
say
that about the county or anything
else. If you kind of hook
the county, other than saying we're
elected, by
the way you select commissions or
things
like that, you can make the
argument to the court that you are dealing with
home rule.
last thing I
will
say someone mentioned the tdt
money, last time someone tried to touch
that, even republicans, they
kind of got burned, so I would
thank commissioner scott, your comments
years ago, on kind of
sticking with this the
statute as very wise. Thank you.
>> thank
you. Move
to our next speaker,
please.
>> good morning. My name is
jake
petrosi. I you in
windmere. Thank you, mr. Mayor
and commissioners for your service
and
commitment to the community. It is
commendable and we
really appreciate
it. I have a
rather urgent comment about public
safety
issues. On november 7th a high schooler
at olympia was struck by a vehicle
in
a crosswalk.
it is my understanding from research
74% of pedestrian incidents happen
outside of the crosswalk while 26%
happen inside crosswalks.
that's kind of scary, but it gives
us a
good opportunity. The smaller the
area the better it can
be controlled, the
safer we can
make it. There are no school
signs in that area. It is 45 miles
an hour. It
takes the average car about 229
feet with human reaction
time factored in to stop, to come
to
a complete stop at
45 miles
an hour. There are no
flashing pedestrian signs. Tease the
only public entrance
to olympia high school, I believe.
I
just wanted to bring this to your
attention because it's a matter
of time before
tragedy strikes there again. I understand
there's a process to
government to get things done with
analysis and
procedures for reductions of
speed, but there's a school there
and I believe there should be a school
zone
sign that shouldn't take very long to figure
out or throw up a possible flashing
light pedestrian sign at that crosswalk where students walk
every morning.
I am not on a crusade
for pedestrian safety, but I am passionate
about
student safety and getting our kids
to school every day, and I
think we can all agree on the. Thank
you very much for your
time.
>> thank you, mr.
petrosky and we have several members
of
our transportation and engineering
department here listening
carefully to what you said. We'll
investigate and
take appropriate action. All right.
dr. Moyer.
>> good morning. My name is dr. Jim
moyer.
I'm an
elected water conservation district
2
supervisor. I live in north
ocowey. I have a list
of thank yous this
morning, post-thanksgiving or november.
it seems like --there it is. I always
want to thank orange
county and their partnership with
the orange soil and
water
conservation district administration.
especially mr. Miles back here who
does
an
outstanding job, I also want to thank ms.
almeda in the audience for all
she does for the veterans here.
I personally choose to
recognize my fellow veterans daily,
but orange county
does
an outsanding job
recognizing veterans. I want to thank
the people of
lockhart who allowed me to do a
presentation, not just because it was for
25
minutes. I want to thank winter
garden. He did an article in orange
soil and water conservation district.
I want to thank commissioner moyer
for
allowing me to join her
at her fourth quarter district 2 meeting.
I want to thank the
breakfast club
for hosting it orange county water
soil and
water conservation district
fundraiser. Thank you
for representing lopez for sending
her staff. The
picture here she
encouraged us to take.
I
thank orlando district
3, miguel from representative lopez's
office, commissioner nesta,
ogburn, pastor
heart, and several other people, farm
bureau executive director mike, et cetera.
thank you and god bless you all.
>> thank you.
onto the next speaker.
>> that was
our last registered speaker.
>> thank
you so all of our
speakers this morning. We will move
forward on our agenda at this time
and move to the consent agenda and ask
the
administrator to present the concept
agenda.
>> thank you, mayor. >> we do not
have any changes so
staff presents it
as submitted.
>> so move. >> second. >> all right.
commissioner gomez says she was first.
all right.
>> second. >> who is the
second.
>> commissioner uribe is the second on
the motion. All in
favor let it be known by saying yea.
>> opposed no.
motion passes and it is uman muss.
I would like
to highlight some of the items that
we just passed on the
consent agenda, especially given some of
the commentary this morning. Our mental
health
and homeless division continues to
innovate with new
and exciting ways to
serve some of orange county's
most vulnerable citizens. Working
with matthew's hope,
we recognized minister scott,
the division will convert a transit
bus into overnight mobile
emergency shelter providing sleeping
accommodation for
unsheltered individuals county wide.
the total cost of the bus conversion as well
as the delivery of social services
to
these individuals who suffer from
homelessless
while they are in our care
is
$787,000 in one year. We anticipate that
the mobile emergency shelter will
serve approximately 2,000
individuals annually. Orange county
head start will be working with big
smiles
florida to offer mobile on-site
dental services for all students all of
the students, services will include
dental
exams,
cleanings, fluoride treatments, sealants
and follow-up care. All services are
provided at no cost to the program
families. These are
families within our orange county
head
start program. The county identified
the affordable
housing trust fund as a funding source for
the rebuilding together central florida
safe at home program.
and reserved $460,000 for minor repairs
of single-family homes.
the program anticipates
completing repairs to at least 15
owner/occupied single-family homes,
with very, very or moderate income
households where at least
one household member is either
a senior citizen or
disabled. Repairs are focused
on increasing safety so these seniors
can age in place
and allow those who are disabled to
have
full accessibility of
their homes. We approved
the sand lake road safety
improvements project. These
operational improvements will add
east and
westbound right turn lanes between
rialto drive reducing the
potential of side-swipe cashes.
the upgrades along with
other access management will eliminate
several existing conflict points.
the construction
of
a 10-foot wide shared use path on
the south side of
the road they will provide a safety facility
for
pedestrians and recreational
cyclists.
also, as part of the orange county
vision zero initiative,
the public works is applying
a comprehensive strategy to provide
safe facilities for
all roadway uses and eliminate conflict
points
that can lead to more severe
crashes.
this project is another step to help
our
county eliminating all
roadway fatalities
and serious injuries. So that's good
news for
our community.
so sometimes when you hear criticism
by
the state of florida about how we
might
be spending your dollars, general
tax dollars, without those dollars, we
could
not do these types of things within
our
community. So this is as a direct
result of what we
hear from you, the citizens who
come before us sometimes during public
comment you bring
different issues that you want to
address, almost all of those
issues that you bring to us,
require some type of financial solution.
and this is
where within our budget where we
have flexibility to address these
myriad of issues. This is
how we do it. So keep that in mind
as
you hear some other
narratives that sometimes come
out for other reasons. So with that,
we're going to move to
our discussion
agenda. Carey mathis, award-
winning manager from the
procurement division be will be -- our
items.
>> I want
to recognize matthew's hope. Thursday
night in district
two we are hosting a homeless
services town hall thursday night
6:00 p.m. At the center
and we will have the bus there
if people want to come and tour one of
these sleeper busses.
thank you for the opportunity for
a little
plug for lisa gram and
matthew's hope we will have that thursday
night
at 6:00 p.m. Thank you. Way to go
as you're leaving. See you soon.
>> all
right.
ms. Matthews, you're recognized.
>> thank you. Good morning, mayor
commissioners. The
procurement committee has evaluated
proposals for security
guard services for
utilities. Requesting one firm and
two ranked
alternates. Commissioner uribe was
assigned.
>> commission are uribe do you have
a
potential motion.
>> I move fort selection
of
aps american protection services and
investigations with 386. 74
points with security alliance llc
with
315. 66
points, and fidelity
security agency llc with 297 points
as
a ranked alternate as well as a requested
action
on this.
>> second, scott. >> we have a
motion and a second.
all in favor let it be known
saying yea.
>> yea. >> opposed no.
motion
passes. It is unanimous.
we'll move forward move to the
next discussion item,
each year during this time
of year the board takes under
consideration nomination for vice
mayor and this would be the vice
mayor position for 2026 calendar year.
to
give the
board perspective for the last six
years beginning in
2020, we had district 5 commissioner
serve as the vice mayor,
2021,
2022, district 3, 20 --correction,
2022, district 3,
2023, district
4, 2024,
district 1, and 2025, is
district 6. So
commissioner michael scott is currently
serving as the year
comes to an end and we'll
take
up nominations for 2026.
>> commissioner
scott
has nominated commissioner semrad.
>> I
second that.
>> okay. >> we have a
second
on that. There are no further
nominations. Are you ready
for the vote all
in favor for
commissioner semrad from district
5 serving, say
yea. Opposed no. The vote passes it
is unanimous.
congratulations commissioner semrad.
with that comes
other duties that
you will be
required to during the year and
2026, what I'm doing, I
would
be on the road quite a bit
throughout florida and it's important for
the voice mayor
to help cover me on the road doing part
of
the people's work. Thank you very much.
>> thank you, mayor.
with that let's all give commissioner
scott a round of applause for the wonderful year.
[ applause ]
thank
you, commissioner scott.
>>
and now we'll move forward
on our agenda
to
the next item, ms.
mark will be coming forward to present
the red
light camera program
summary report for fiscal year
2024/2025, no specific action required, this
is
something that is mandated legislatively
that each year we have
to come forward, and
he has to actually read
the summary of what occurred with
the
automated red light enforcement program in
the last
year. So with that, mr. Marks,
you're recognized.
>> thank you, mayor.
good morning, mayor and commissioners.
my
name is jer rald marks. I'm a project
manager in
the traffic engineering division of
public
works and traffic engineering oversees
the red light camera
program. As of july 1st
, 2024, the state of florida has implemented
changes to florida statute
316. 0083, also known as the
mark 1 bill act. These changes require any
local
government or entity operating
a red light camera program to
publicly summarize and read
aloud its annual report. This report
is submitted each
year. It's in a questionnaire format
we send to the state, but this
is the first year it's required to
be put into a
report and read to the public
and allowed for public comment.
the presentation provides a summary
that
allows the public to comment as well.
so the purpose is to provide a written
summary
that must be read
aloud that complies with the
new legislation, florida stat today
316.0083.
the overview has the statistics of the
number of
notice of violations
which you'll hear me refer to as
novs, captured when a vehicle has
entered into
the intersection and the light has
turned red.
uniformed traffic citations hear me
refer to those
as utcs and the
utcs when goes unanswered for a period
of
time, that notice of violation is
converted into a uniformed traffic
citation or utc and the
fines are increased with that and
then if
that still goes unanswered, the owner,
the registered owner, is the driver's less
is suspended and the registration
put
on hold. And then we'll talk about
the
revenue dispersement and thatthat
moneys that come from
the citation goes to a
different variety of pots and some
of those are required
to send to the state and some of those
we use for the program itself and
improvements within our safety system.
okay. So orange county revenues
fund the --some of the projects we
have, so the money
that we received from things we used
for
intersection improvements in district
one a turn lane addition
at seidel
and bowery creating issues with some
of the
residents. A traffic circle, the
first picket at the stop, at sherrington
and
shorecrest. We were having cut-
through traffic
on lee road and in that area so
this traffic circle slows down the
traffic as
this approach
the intersection. The bottom is
a raised intersection on
powers drive in district 6 at the
park and issues with people exceeding
the speed limit and so we constructed
a raised crosswalk
with the rapid rectangular
beacons at the park and
made a huge difference in vehicles
traveling on powers
drive through that area. A corrected
report
is being read into the record today
and these statistics match
the numbers I have mentioned earlier reported
to
the state every year and the questionnaire report.
so
this presentation is for informational
purpose only. No
action is required and public comment
is allowed after
the
reading of this
report. Okay.
the orange county red light program
supports the vision
zero initiative by enhancing safety
intersection
safety, reducing red light violations
and advancing the goal of eliminating
traffic fatalities
and serious injury on county roadways.
the orange county currently
operates 57 red light cameras at 35
intersections located within unincorporated
areas of the county.
effective july 1st, 2024,
florida statute 316. 0083 was
amended to require municipalities
and jurisdictions
to operate red light camera programs
to provide a report of
program results to the local
governing body. This report must be
presented both
as written presented
and written summary read aloud at
a
public meeting. The table below contains
the
required information for the july
21st --july
1st, 2024 through june 30th,
2025,
reporting period. The number of notice
violations
issued, 79,471 and that's a
dated number from the
79,569 that was published.
including 542 right turn on reds.
the rtor stands for r turn on
red. The number of violations paid
for this
reporting period 44,470 and
we've added the included 357
for right turn on reds.
the number of notice of violations
contested during this period
was 111. The number of notice
of violations that were upheld
contested but upheld were 71, including
three right turn on reds. The number
of notice
of violations dismissed from the ones
that were contested were 9. And the
number
of notices of violations issued
as uniformed traffic
vietations is 21,750
corrected from the 31,019.
we've corrected the including
177 right turn on red from
117. And the number of pending
issuance violations that were
issued as or
pending for uniformed traffic citations
are
1,935. Below it has
a couple notes, rtr, right turn
on red, new statistic required for
reporting. Orange county has two intersections
we monitor the right
turn on red. The fines for the notice
of
violations are $158. And then the
increased fine when it turns
to a utc or uniformed
traffic citation is $262. Due to
the overlap of within the reporting
period and when
the violations are collected versus
when paid and versus
when the violations are issued,
the data won't match exactly. A violation
could have occurred back in 2019 and
is not paid until the period
and if it's only recorded during the
reporting period
it won't show up. The numbers won't
match. The table shows
how the funds
collected
$9,444,436 were distributed and their
amounts. The
general revenue fund received
$3,453,700. Department of health
emergency mel services trust fund
received
$493,610, the
brain and spinal cord injury trust
fund
received
$147,993 and the orange county
revenue was
5,339,673. Orange county's revenue
was allocated as follows,
2,364,560 was paid for vendor
services, 150,000 of that covered
costs
and salaries for contract
administration, $1. 2 million was
used for
contract enforcement, the orange county sheriff's
office
and $50,000 spend on
miscellaneous equipment and items for
the program costs.
the remaining orange county revenue
and the amount of
1,575,113
was placed in public works budget
and used
for multiple traffic related safety
prompts to achieve zero vision goal,
performing studies, pedestrian
crosswalk improvements and new
signal installation at intersections
and
saw some of those on the slide that
was
the traffic de vices there. Data shown
and --data shows a reduction of approximately
36% in total crashes at
intersections monitored by red light
cameras since
the program's inception since 2013.
with that,
that concludes the report mandated by the state.
>> any questions? >> stand by. I'm
going to open it up for public comment
before we go
to the board of county
commissioners for any questions or comments.
do we have members of the public
present who wish to be heard on this
item?
it appears there are none. With that
we
go to commissioner wilson
followed by commissioner uribe.
>> thank you. I thank you. This is
interesting for me because this is
a
requirement under state law. I think
it's important for
us to share this interestingly enough,
the
investment that were made because, you
know, what I would believe is something we
would like to
see a shrinking amount of people to
continue
to obey the traffic laws. Hopefully
after
being cited. To see the intersections
invested in
in both of those to me look like the
ideal
intersection the raised crosswalk,
the things the investments
we struggle to finance, and so having
that
is something that we can discuss with
the public if they have concerns.
I appreciate the information and I
know it's
a strange mandate from the state,
but, you
know, I think silver lining here I
think it's a really
good thing for us to take back to
the public and appreciate the efforts
by you and your team.
>> thank you,
commissioner.
>> commissioner uribe.
>>
I appreciate the update and I know
we've spoken
on this before and what I'm going
to share is not new to
you. Have there been any new installations
of
red light camera locations around
the county?
>> not that we have since 2019 was
the last one at university and sundry
was the last
one.
>> all right. And if
possible, I would like to
see a map because one of the things you and
I discussed it tends to
be in working class areas a lot.
and district 3 we have them in taft
and pine
castle, we have them all
very dense in areas very specific
and I would think
that now with the different traffic
patterns and the
growth, there would have been an an
laization to really explore at other
locations
instead of isolating them all in certain
communities which I think needs to
be looked at. If you
could, I would love to see when is
the last time we've
done a study of these and --
>> okay.
>>
of locations and traffic. When I was
told --I got this
information when I was first elected.
it was 2018.
that when I asked why are there so
many in
district 3 and district 6, I was told well,
that's
where all the traffic patterns are.
well, we've known in seven and a half
years there's been
tremendous amount of growth, but when I look
at
taft, mine castle I've got so many
red cameras around
my home, I love off boston trail,
my cartels
me, warns me, red light camera approaching,
red light
camera approaching, that's how dense
they are in certain
areas. I don't think that's fair and
you look
at the county as a whole if we're
and see what and it's
been 2016 you said or 2017?
>> when
we did the
last study 2018, correct.
>> okay.
then where are we now? Because it's --
>> right
now the red light camera the rfp about
to
go up for advertisement and part of
that is that
the vendor we work with the vendor
to look at areas of traffic concerns
and so we work
with the sheriff's office, we work
with signal 4
and look at the areas where the commuters
are coming in and going
to and look at where the accidents
are happening and so
we take that into account and use
that
for our data for our red light camera
analysis when we look
for new locations for
red light cameras. With this new contract
advertised and new vendor or
existing whomever wins the contract
is an opportunity to
look at new areas and apply
these counter measures for running
red lights.
>>
how many cameras are there
in whole across orange county.
>>
57 cameras.
>> yeah. If I could.
I remember when I saw this when I was
first
elected there was a dense
in my area. You know
and also district 6 and 3
butt against each other, there was
a bunch in that area right
there. I would love to see this broken
down further.
thank you. Thanks for your data and
updates.
>> thank
you,
commissioner.
>> commissioner
maribel gomez cordero.
>> thank you.
>> I have simple question.
the first one
is, does the county has any
new intercession plan for new red
light cameras?
>> so with
the new contract we plan on we can
get expanding the program.
currently right now there is over
about
650 intersections signalized, only
35
have cameras with the 650
plus
intersections, more than 1200
approaches and we will
look at those within the next
rfp intersections to apply
these counter measures to.
that's based off the data I was talking
about, the
crash data, the growth in the area
and things of that nature as well.
>> I'm going to the data. Nynex question
is, is
there any data on how many violators
are
cars from out of
state versus cars here locally?
>>
we
don't have that data. We can definitely look
at it.
like the camera doesn't track whether
it's out of state
or in state. It just tracks
the violations. I believe there's
a way within the system we can
tell how many are florida addresses
and where the addresses are coming
from.
a lot of times when people move to
florida they don't change
their addresses so it's still registered
to an out-of-
state place. That's something that we can
look at as well
how many are local versus how many are
out of the area.
>> thank you. Thank
you so much.
>> commissioner moore. >> good morning.
the revenue that has come in,
$5 million, we can track that right
back to improvements made in
that area or near there for safety?
>> yes. >> okay.
all right. That was my question. Thank
you.
>> all right. With that, mr.
marks,
the general direction is if you can
provide the board with information about
the specific
locations where the cameras are located
and we look forward to
the rfp learning more about
the incidents and the
data. Perhaps to include whether they
are out of state or
locals, et cetera to the extent you
can. We
look forward to that in the next update.
with that
I thank you very much for your time.
we're going to move forward
on our
agenda. The next item mr.
glenn kramer, manager
of our utilities support dives will
be coming forward to present
the water and waste water
rate study and this will apply
an actionable item. You are recognized.
>> thank you, mayor. Good morning.
good morning
commissioners. Comptroller diamond, mr.
brooks. I will
be presenting our water and waste water study for you.
we'll talk
about background on our utilities
finances
and look at fiscal initiatives we
have implemented to
address improving the finances, and
then I'll
turn the presentation over to andy
burnham with our rate consultant to
present
the results of our water and
waste water study and the customer
impacts.
after that come back and briefly talk
about a few
other rate changes we would like to
make to
our
wastewater rate schedule while we're
considering
and changing it and talk about the
next
steps and requested
actions. In our background
we wanted to go over the current utilities
finances and basically we are on a
five-year
rate plan that was developed back
in
2022. This was developed to
achieve a parody between our residential
and commercial effective rate. They
were out of
balance and a subsidy from the residential
side to
the commercial side. After implementing
this rate plan it was designed to
go
for five years from fiscal year '24
through fiscal
year '28. We're in the third year
of
this plan. At the time it was projected
to provide
sufficient revenue to cover our
future expenses
and, in fact, it was designed to be
revenue positive taking more revenue
from
the commercial side. While looking
at our rates and that plan and in the current
plan we'll
be proposing today, we
always strive to consider
our
customers and our residents that have
to pay these rates. We're
proud to keep them low even with
our proposed rate plans we're not
proposing to go high compared to our
neighbors in the area or compared
to
counties around the state. That will
be
more explained in detail after we talk
about
the customer
impacts. What has happened
since we established this 2022 rate
plan which began in fiscal year '24
is we had some
unprecedented inflationary pressures on
the
system that came as part of the post-pandemic
economic
conditions.
they turned out to be at first
tried to absorb them but unsustainable.
demonstrating the rate plan is no
longer sufficient
to meet
our financial needs. I had briefings
with you about a year ago to discuss
the utility
finances and some of the things we
wanted to
do to addresses the
new environment we're operating in.
some of these cost increases I
have several metrics from the operations
side and our capital
improvement side. The table shows
four metrics or categories
on our operating side that feed directly
into producing water, treating waste
water,
reclaimed water,
and they are just integral to the
costs of our system. Those
are electric, maintenance, chemicals,
and biosold
lids disposal. In fiscal year 2020 on the chart
we have
our expenditures from that area, from
that time.
we also have our actual
expenditures from fiscal year 2025
to compare to
them. So it shows that electricity
has had
an annual average growth rate of
8. 6% across this five-year period.
maintenance has
gone up by 9%9% then chemicals and
biosolids up double-digits as
an annual average increase. This is
despite the fact
that we have competitively bid contracts,
purchased
chemicals and disposed of the biosolids.
with trying to get the best prices
available these are going
up dramatically. Our capital improvement
program is likewise seeing these
increases. We're installing one of
the metrics we use to cost and estimate
the cost of
it is how many dollars per
inch diameter per linear foot of the
pipe is
being installed, and so the cost metric
in 2020
were usually ranging from
10 to $20 that would --was being
determined in that range based on
the actual condition in the field.
in
2025, this cost has gone up close
to $40 per
inch diameter
which ranges annual
average --average increase. We
had actually been able to
identify a couple
replacement
projects --that was cost of it
$19 per inch diameter
installed and the one we did in 2025
was
$78 per inch
diameter per foot installed, 32, almost
33%
annually for each of those five years.
we also looked at a couple of pump
stations
for master pumppump stations, large and
expensive, back in 2020 we could install
one for $5. 8 million, for
2025, we are looking at a cost
the $13.3 million. Likewise with our
duplex
stations these are smaller, able to
identify a couple rehab
projects in
2025, pump
station costs --and to
further illustrate the point we have
two
data points in this area
for building a new waste water facility
back in
2026, we built
the reclamation facility that was a five facility and
cost
$111 million to build at that time.
we're now
planning to expand on that into
double the size of it to
10 mgd
where the first five cost
$111 million, second five years later
is going to
cost
$184 million.
our current rate structure.
this is an output of one of our financial
models and demonstrates this point
and goes back to fiscal year
2011 up through the current fiscal
year and
then projects our results for fiscal year '26.
the blue line is the operating revenue that
is generated from operating our
water and waste quarter system, the red line
represents
the expenses incurred to operate
that system. As you can see they've
gone up
over time and had increase in customers
over time and
with rate increases and customer
increases expected to go up
however the increase in waste water --
excuse me in the expenses has been
particularly higher especially in
years
after covid. It's
very noticeably going up from
2022 to 2023 to years not captured
in our
rate study. So the --
that operating revenue is represented on
the green line and that is just the
operating
revenue subtracting out the operating expenses.
net operating
revenue basically is what is left
over after we
paid the bills to operate the system.
and
that revenue is generally applied
in three
areas. First and foremost it goes
to paying debt service.
second used for nets operating revenue
is to
pay for the annual transfer to the
general
fund based on a payment of
taxes calculations. Then the third
use would
be to help fund our capital improvement
program. So that purple line represents
our net operating
revenue that is available for capital
improvements. Back in
2011 to 2015 the line was $40 million or
so
and back then that was a substantial
contribution to our improvements because
we
only spent about $80 million at that time.
since then
it's gone down and our capital improvements
as
a program has gone up as far as how much
we're having to spend on
it. We're implementing more and
larger projects, there are several
large
projects that began at the beginning
or
were supposed to begin sometime during
earlier in the
pandemic that had to be delayed until
now and we are
simultaneously executing those and
delivering on
these projects while delivering on
the projects that
needed to be started about now. As a
result,
in 2025, our
overall expenditures for the capital
improvement
program were $180 million. In fact,
we're expecting 2026 to surpass that
and be over $200 million.
so when we talk about having
an extra 25 to $30 million of
net operate revenue available to help
with the
cip funding, that not near as significant
now as
it used to be. This
is why we're getting into what we
have begun
calling a debt cycle to where
we don't have the net operating revenue
to pay for a cip, and
then have to borrow more
money to find the cip for all the
necessary projects
that raises our debt service and means we
have more debt service
to pay out of our net
operating revenue which leaves less
money for the
next round of expenditures. It goes
in this cycle
and we are trying to break that cycle
and get out
of it.
that brings me to our
fiscal initiatives. We wanted to get
out of this debt cycle where we
are borrowing increasing amounts of
money. We're approaching
it several
ways. Some were from the revenue side.
before I get
into the slide on the expense side
one thing that
I wanted to mention is that our
budget process is helpful in
obtaining our costs. It wasn't listed
as
a fiscal initiative we came up with
new to address this
problem because we've had this budget
process in place
for many years. Basically
every division in the utility is expected
to start at
a 0% increase with our budget.
sometimes we --we are in costs that are
nondiscretionary and they have to
go up
and we can't
control
that. And prioritizing what
needs to be spent. Sometimes that
works. Other times
we
just have to raise the budget some.
when it
comes to expanding on
a program or when we have to do things
that
don't happen every year like purchasing
equipment through a capital
outlay section of the budget
or making major repairs on some of
our
infrastructure, these things get
reviewed individually and sometimes
they're approved if super important
and they have to be done, other times
they're
delayed, sometimes downside and other
times the answer is
just no. We aren't going to
do that at this time. This budget
process before
it comes to the board for review
and budget work sections we're working on
cost
constainment. Back to
the fiscal initiatives last year,
we find our cfp approval process.
in prior years our engineers would
analyze the
projects that need to be done and
analyze the system,
what refurbishments and rehabilitations
to
infrastructure needs to be made and
also look at what projects
need to be in place to meet growing
areas of the
county and make sure that we are able
to
serve those areas as the growth happens.
they would come up
with a list of projects,work
with consultants on estimating how
much
those projects would cost and
put all of these vetted and legitimate
projects into
our budget. Since that time, that's
what we
used to do. In recent years we've
been refining this process
going through a second level
prioritization. We realize now we
can't afford every
project
that needs to be done. We have had
the second level of prioritization
review added to
the process so we're pushing out projects
and
delaying projects and sometimes just
saying that's a good project to do, but
we don't have the funding so it's
on hold indefinitely.
the other thing we did to work on
our costs we
arranged with the comp
trollers office to supplement our
debt service payment with capital
charge
revenue. Now as you probably recall
chapt charges
can only be spent on expansion projects
but
if those projects are debt
funded, then they --
debt service portion that goes to
the
expansion projects can then be paid
through
capital charge revenue. Making this
change was
helpful it saved our reserve revenue to
be used
for other needs, delayed our bonds
issue by several months and it created
a savings of
not having to pay that extra interest
on
bonds by delaying their issue. The
third thing
that we did was limited credit card
payments to $2500. We
have several large customers that
have utility bills in the tens
of thousands of
dollars each month. They
are in the habit of using corporate credit cards
to
pay for these utility bills. They
get the benefits and
perks and points and cash back dollars
that come
with those cards they use and that
benefit gets paid for through bank
charges that
come to the utility to
pay. We were able to limit how much
we would
allow them to
pay on credit card to
$2500
so it doesn't affect our residential
or commercial customers. It's
an annual savings of over $6,000.
we did a few things to
work on the revenue side. Last year we came to
the board --early this year
in january came to the board with
meter charges that
became effective on february 1st.
we adjusted the charges to recover
the current cost that we have
of purchasing a meter and the cost
of the
labor and other materials to install
the meter. This
is going to be providing an estimated
$900,000 annually now that we're fully
covering the cost of
our meter installations. We came to
the
board in february with updated reclaimed
water
rates. These were effective on october
1st of this year. We
established conservation tiers for
rates for the first
time on our reclaimed water
side but for the purposes of this
presentation, the important thing
that we did was that we based
the rates on full cost recovery. Up
to that
point reclaimed water was recovering
about 72 to
73% of the rates or excuse me of
their expenses of producing and
distributing the reclaimed water,
so we wanted
our rates to cover that full cost so
it wouldn't be subsidized by waste
water rates achieved with our new
rates
and projected increase in revenues
is $5.
3 million annually. Last thing we
did on the revenue side was to update
our
capital charges directed by the board
to update them every
four to five years to make
sure they are capturing our current
and future costs in the five-year
cip and wanted to make sure that
we're capturing all the cost increases
in the new projects so
that we can try to make sure growth
is paying its
own way. The capital
charge revenues could increase as
much
as 17 to $18
million if the
development activity fiscal year
2025 continues into fiscal year 2026
and they became effective
on april 1st of the year. Last thing
I wanted to mention is that we
issued bonds $450 million that was done
in may of this year and that
is an additional $150 million that is
available for cip funding now.
this chart has been updated
to show what effects
of these cost saving initiatives and
revenue
initiatives will be on our finances.
we
restate the timeline at the
bottom to cover fiscal years 2016
through 2031. The green line
represents our net operate revenue
and with the
revenue initiatives that we've already
put in place it goes
up more, which is a good thing.
we need
the additional revenue. But the interesting
part the
revenue for the cip doesn't go up
along with the debt operating revenue
it continues
to go down
from fiscal years '27, '28,
'29, '30 because still issue
more debt. We haven't produced enough
net operating revenue
to make a
significant impact on, so
more debt service represented by the
purple line continues to
go up dramatically and because that
continues to go
up we don't have any additional revenue to
contribute to the cip.
sorry. Forgot one
thing I wanted to mention on this
current plan
because we are issuing a lot of debt we
are
falling below our target minimum metric
for
debt service coverage. The target
is
two times to have make sure that the net
operating revenue we
produce is twice the amount of our
debt
service. On this plan it falls below
that which
would make issuing debt more expensive
and the
market might not support it because it
would mean that our
utility is getting less and
less
financially
sound. A
few examples of projects that are
currently delayed or not
fully budgeted in our five-year
cip because of the cost constraints.
the first one
the hamlin water reclamation
and master pump station. That prompt
is the one I referred to costing
$184 million. It's currently should
have started
now and should be in our
five-year budget, but we can't afford
the
$97. 4 million that
would incur in this first five years
in our five-year cip and that's been pushed out.
our southern
water reclamation facility phase 6
a, another project we should be starting
soon and we can't afford
it so that $72 million has to be pushed
out into the future. Same situation
with the
eastern regional water supply facility
lab improvements, needed for many
year, but we
need to push that out. We also have
several new
projects that have come up that we
can't add to the
five-year cip at this
time, improvements to our water supply
facility, $23 million is
unaffordable so we pushed it
out, we like to start planning
for future pump station renewal and
replacement
projects and can't afford that so we're pushing it out.
improvements to ground storage tanks
and facilities we need
to push out as well as the new
structure at our southern water reclamation
facility. So this gets us to the water
and
wastewater rate study and turn this
over
to andy to walk you through the study.
. For the record,
andy burnham. I've had the opportunity
to support the
utilities on occasion over the past
20 years now
in financial planning and rate
related endeavors. I would like to
go through the
fundamentals we conducted with orange county staff,
and put context to it
in terms of understanding how that
translates to customer
impacts but also give you information
about other
utility rates to compare that again
their
increases and how your cost of service
compare to
theirs for residential and commercial
customers.
when we embark on rate studies for
communities throughout
florida and the country we start with understanding our
goals
and objectives. It's pretty
simple, build upon the financial foundation
the utilities have
and recognize our
paradigm costs to make sure we're
operating sufficiently, revenues
covering expenses to maintain a high
level of service
at the lowest possible prices that we
can for
that high level of service and we're
doing
so equitably and building on the plan that
glen
mentioned previously that sought to
establish equity between the
effective rates per thousand gallons
for residential and commercial customers.
we evaluated existing data of the
system,
current fund
balances, revenues and expenses and
key assumptions
that would drive rates and revenues
needed over the next
few years and key assumptions that
affected that.
those being the capital spending that
was included and the
timing of that spending. We've spent
a lot
of time looking at historical trends
and how you execute
your capital plans to factor in the
cash
flows of those capital needs adequately in
the study
and reviewing the historical
information on trends and operating expenses
to make sure we're comfortable with near
term and longer
term projections of those amounts.
and we also identified
and established the financial pillars
as glen mentioned
from a debt perspective making sure we
have
adequate ratios of our net revenue
to
our principle and
interest payments are important as
how we leverage debt and what
are the terms of that debt. The higher
those
ratios the less debt we issue and the
debt that we issue is going to be at
the
most favorable rate in terms, and
we want
to make sure we have adequate liquidity
reserves
for unplanned events or emergency
conditions that may occur,
especially in our environment in florida,
to mitigate our
risks and manage our cash flow during
the challenges that
could emerge and make sure we manage
that. And one of the first things
we do is a
diagnostic assessment when we put in
the data these assumptions
and key financial pillars what do
we see. These
two charts depict a couple key metrics.
the one on the left our debt service
ratios
of net operating revenue to our
annual principle and expenses on our
debt. The
black line represents that
target we would like to
achieve. The information we have for
the utility we fall below that. You
can
see the numbers for
28' through 31
'about 1.5. Let alone trying
to get to that 3. 0
target that's consistent
with many of our past coverage ratios
investors
are used to seeing. We have
challenges there. Because of the challenges
we see on coverage it's in
part because we don't have revenue
generation to fund
enough of our capital, which means
we're having to increase our reliance
on debt. If we kept with the status
quo
rate plan chart on the right shows how
much of our
five-year capital plan by year we
would need to support debt
so by the time we get to
2031 talking about issuing almost
$600 million of debt
over just that five-year time period which
is
double what we have on the system
today in terms of
outstanding bonds. So it's a
significant shift and change
in
highly veraged system. What we did
is
developed a plan of increases consistent
with those objectives
to make sure we had adequate coverage
on our rates, revenue to support our
capital needs but
also did so with equity in mind between
the effective
rates per
thousand gallons of residential and
commercial customers.
modifying the rate plan in place today
to adjust the
fixed and variable
charges for commercial and residential
customers for water and sewer service
and this
table presents the detailed plan of
increases for
27 to 2031 in the first column,
middle column shows and compares that to
the current level
of increases identified in the existing rate
plan approved
today and the column on the right
shows the variance
or incremental amount of the recommended increases
what
that represents above what's
been approved if the five years rate
plan. For some there's
not a change. For residential
water metric rates no change recommended
for that rate.
or for commercial volume metric charges
for
waste water a 1% increase above what's
been improved. The net impact of these
adjustments we'll get into a moment
but for the average residential customer
it means
over
5% a year for the next few years.
for the entire
system on average this represents
about a
7. 7% increase
in revenues each year. We're not alone
in terms of that level of increase
in rates
being needed to cover our current
costs in today's environment.
as I mentioned we do this work
throughout florida as well as across
the country and grab some recent
examples of agencies, you know, either
locally
or other join systems in florida that
have done rate adjustments to give
you a sense
other agencies are looking at similar levels to
address fundamentally challenges in terms
of
increased costs of operations and
capital and addressing those needs over
the next few years. Again, you can see
many of
these increases are comparable to
or if not higher
than the 7. 7% increase that I was talking
it was
done based on your needs. To make
sure we had adequate revenue to immediate
the
capital needs, fund in sustainable
way, the
recommended rate plan would avoid
about $250 million
of additional borrowing versus the
status quo.
think about the interest expenses you
would pay
on that $250 million that's
a phenomenal amount of savings associated
with this plan. You can see
the orange bar that debt service levels
off.
it doesn't
continue to increase. It levels off
at 2031
and we create capacity for that
blue line at the bottom to cash more
of our capital
in a sustainable manner going forward
to
help us ensure long-
term affordability. The plan was developed
to ensure or try
to achieve the equity in terms of
effective rates
per thousand gallons comparable
for residential and commercial customers
over time.
this chart depicts where we are today
when you
take the bill and --for
waste water and divide it by the
volumes, the effective rates and the
black
lines the system average and we get on
the
target in 2030, and 2031 and for water
close to having that equity achieved
by
2031 and this plan builds on
that goal or objective established in the existing rate
plan we have today.
. This
plan would meet the needs of the utility
system and
understand what impacts would be to
customers and how it
is this compare relative to other
utilities
not that it drives your decision, but
it's important to understand the context.
built out a table that shows for low
volume
user a typical high
volume user what would be the impacts
on their water bill
by the recommended adjustments. For
that
lower volume user at 4,000 gallons
of water use you can
see that increase would be less than
$3 and by
2031 less than $4. About a
3 to $4 increase for the lower
volume user. The typical would see
less than
$4, by 2031 that increase $4. 65
on their bill. For the typical user
about a 4
to $5 increase. For higher
volume users it would be 5 to $6 increase
on their bill over
time. And while the percentages may
seem larger we
have to appreciate that we
have the lowest rates in the area
and even when
you consider county systems across
the state. We did a lot
of benchmarking to show that, so we
did aa comparison of neighboring or
regional cities to say what's the
water bill at
7,000 gallons for a typical residential
customer
the blue bar, corresponding sewer
bill
and identified the average
with the orange line running
across. Where we would be in
'27 with the proposed increase. For
all these agencies this
is a snap shot of their 26' rates.
for winter garden, recall from the
table
I flashed they have a 20% increase next
year.
we're likely not going to change our
position on the survey because that
bill
for winter garden will increase
in '27. We're trying to give you a
snapshot of where you
stand today and how you might move
but there's a lot
of movement in utility rates in subsequent
years that would
affect that. We're comparable locally.
when we
look to other county systems throughout
the
state, we see that we have some of
the lowest, if
not the lowest bills for
residential customers at 7,000 gallons
amongst other county
systems throughout florida. I think
there's an update to this.
we are the lowest. Broward
county is higher than shown here.
we
looked at commercial customers and
found similar results
for a 2
inch
commercial customer, versus
where we stand for local cities. This
doesn't
factor in anticipated increases for others
next year. We're among the lowest
in
the area. Locally for
commercial customers and if we take that again
a
broader cross section of similar sized
agencies generally speaking we have
amongst
the lowest rates amongst those types
of systems in
florida as well. And if it's of interest
we did,
there's not many of these, kind of
a large bill
comparison for an 8 inch customer
with a significant water
use and, again, very similar findings
locally we have some of
the lowest bills in the area and then
as we look
at the county systems again we are
among
the lowest across florida
for the county utility systems. A lot
of information at you and I
will be happy to come back to this
but glen wanted to
touch on other related items before we
get to the question and answer portion.
>> just
to conclude the
presentation and get to the very end
of it
we wanted to talk about three rate
changes that we would like
to make on our waste water
scale. The first one is to update
our
wastewater environmental sur charges.
these are sur
charges paid by customers that have
specific
nutrients listed here in
abbreviated
form that are, can be accepted up to
a certain level but after
that level we need to charge them for
the treatment they require.
the charge is expressed
in dollars per 100
pounds of the nutrient sent to our
waste water for treatment.
these charges were being updated at
the
instigation of an internal audit from
the comptroller's office looking at
our environmental compliance program
and one of the things they pointed
out was
that the revenue generated by these
charges
do not pay the entire cost for the
environmental compliance program.
therefore, the suggestion
was either reduce the activity to
lower costs
which was not the way we wanted to
go
with environmental compliance or reallocate
and look
at the cost structure and recalculate
the
rates. We engaged our
engineering consultant to
reanalyze and recalculate these
nutrient levels and how much they
are costing from the
treatment. You can see from the chart
the fire, chemical
oxygen demand is going up about
20% with new updated charge total
suspended solids up 9%,
total nitrogen didn't need much adjustment,
only going
up 1. 5%, and total phosphorous
charge needed the greatest adjustment at 45%.
the second change we would like to
do is include a new fee
for a lateral installation or repair,
this
fee listed at cost. What happens occasionally
is
that a developer might ask our field
services division
to install a lateral from our waste
water force main to their plumbing
for their
development. That's not part of our
responsibility, but
we wanted to be cooperative
and helpful and make sure we can recover
our costs for that.
our business practice is to build
back for that cost when
this happens, but we wanted to insert
a
fee into our rate schedule so it can
be a
board approved fee
we're charging to them. Because the
conditions in the
field vary job to job not a way to establish a specific fee for
costs.
third create a new environmental program
reinspection fee. We have technicians
that go
to restaurants and other customers
that have grease traps and inspect
them to
make sure they're cleaned out. If
it's not cleaned out they would
go back a second time to inspect it
and if it's not
cleaned out they would
go back a third time
and if not cleaned out at that point they would
be issued a fine of $500.
we're incurring costs to have that
inspector go out
a third and second time so in
order recover that cost and perhaps
provide a little bit of
financial incentive to our customers
to get the
grease trap cleaned the first time, we
would like to have
a reinspection fee
so that when we have to go
out, we would charge them $48 based
on our 2025 costs
and charged at one hour minimum.
for our next
step --part of the
state of florida process
for us to increase our rates. The
first step
is going to be
just to be approving preliminary rate
schedule. With
your vote today if everything is passed
nothing will
change.
it's only going to be
after a public hearing that the rates
would
change. Therefore, we have scheduled
a public hearing or will be
on january 27th of next year.
and that would be for the
final adoption if the board
chooses to do so. We would conduct
customer outreach. We found that this
is very
effective in prior rate
changes, especially ones where
they go up more than the 3% indexes
we might do and do several things
to reach out to the
customers and one we can include is
communicating what mr. Burnham has
shown you we
have some of the lowest rates for
water and waste water in
the area and even though no customer
wants to receive
a rate increase and we don't want
to give them
a rate increase to help them understand
it is
necessary and they're getting one of
the best deals
in central florida. Finally the if
everything
is passed the rates would become effective
october 1st of next year. We found
many commercial customers especially
appreciate the long
runway leading up to the rate increases
to plan their
budgets and get ready for the adjustments
that they need to make. That
brings us to
the requested action. We have two
resolutions for your
consideration. One is a resolution
with
a preliminary water charge schedule
and the second
is a resolution with a preliminary
waste water charge schedule. So this
concludes
our presentation. Mr. Burnham and
I are available for
any questions you may have.
thank you.
>> all right.
I'm going to start
off, if I --I think slide
12st and maybe
22 showed different
costs between the municipalities
within the areas compared to orange county
and the way I
read it,
the average residential customer
uses 7,000 gallons during the billing
cycle, is
that correct?
>> that's
correct. Per month.
>> and if
I look at this chart, orange
county average cost
is somewhere around 0
bucks for that person?
>> that's correct.
>> I live
in unincorporated orange county
but I don't have orange county water I
have orlando utilities
and for me, the chart says
because I have orlando
utilities, I pay more. It
looks like slightly 80 bucks.
>> correct. >> so I pay basically
if I
was using the average gallons per
month paying about
$10 more a
month or 10% more. Thereabouts
for what I'm use in unincorporated orange
county.
so even
with the rate increases that orange
county
is proposing
today, it still will be below I'm
going to
say orlando utilities commission,
right?
>> that's correct. >> I feel like I'm paying too
much.
I'm going to
open it up for questions.
commissioner wilson and moore and
uribe
and commissioner semrad, commissioner maribel
gomez
cordero cordero.
>> thank you. Thank
you so much for
this comprehensive amount of information.
I am so sorry I didn't
make it to the briefing but did get
this wealth of
information because that's what you
all always
do and I'm grateful for the work.
I think my first meeting
with utilities may have said are we
short changing ourselves? I said I
think we're short changing ourselves.
I'm concerned about this.
and there was a look amongst like
we've been talking about
it. I
understand this is an uncomfortable
conversation but seeing
the costs impose on the utility that
is not something that we
have control of. Right. What do we
do then? Do we
take a shortcut shortcutsomewhere?
those of us who studied what happened
in flint, michigan,
know you don't take shortcuts when
it comes to
water. I think, you know, I support,
obviously, this incremental resolution
in moving forward
with this. I do always also have that
glint on it about conservation and
see opportunity
there for greater conservation and
would like to say
that as we continue to move this conversation
forward with the
public, let's really lean on
that because, you know, talking about
native plantings and how we
can decrease our reused water, talking
about what we can do, you know, even
with adapting our
shower head, those are the things we
can
provide as an education professionally
as an easy
investment in going out to the public that
will then say, you
know, this will help. This will help
your
bill, us overall as a
community, and I do think
that --I
think it's important also because of
the crazy doge stuff
was there any inspection into these
costs
we're incurring from chemicals
and potentially equipment things that we
have no ability
to try to shortcut on? Was
there any inspection of that during
the doge?
>> none to my knowledge. The only
thing is when they
were asking for contracts and
purchasing information that we provided.
>>
just wanted to make sure you weren't
doing minority and women
owned businesses with that. The
part that is important to understand we
are trying much like any business in
the utilities division is a business,
in that it's covering
its expenses in the west way it can t
and that the reinis vestment
into its those cips, that
is why orange county utilities has
been the best and
I do have my --I get my orange
county water. It's in this cup right
here.
I just want to tell you that I support
the
way that you're approaching this and I
believe that it's a reasonable
ask and I support it.
>> thank
you, commissioner.
>> commissioner
moore.
>> yes. It seemed
like a lot of your expenses
were adding towards 50% more, if I
was doing a
quick rounding, but if you can go
back to
the rate, the
customer impacts which I believe is
on
page 20. I'm
trying to understand then exactly
how you got to
that amount. Those amounts look --
listen, I'm not happy about
this for our people at all, but --
so
I don't want this comment
misconstrued but seems those
increases maybe don't cover the
increasing costs.
>> this is on a
monthly
bill and so it depending on how much
water is used, to commissioner wilson's
point, if we have effective
outreach for the environmental conservation
water conservation, then the bills
can be
lower closer to that 4,000 level that's
listed at
the top versus the 7,000
gallon listed in the middle or the
12,000 for a
high user.
>> I understand. Is
it because your operational costs
have not gone up as much as when you're
having to hire companies on the capital
side? The operational hasn't gone
up
as much as the capital?
>> they've
both gone up
tremendously. The fact that this looks
like in one respect
a small
increase, compared to the huge increases
we're having on operations, just
the fact that we have so many
customers. 150 to 200,000 customers
so a little bit from
everybody contributes to the capturing
of those costs and being
able to pay for them.
>> there's nothing
more important than
water. After a hurricane, you know,
we
survive barely without power. But
you can't go
very long without water. So that day
that
water is being a cheap commodity seems
like it's going
away. There is an
easier way to explain to the public
you took a
deep dive, which we need because we're
responsible to look at that level,
but is there an easier, quicker way
to explain to them why the increase
in these costs?
>> I
think the costs have increased mainly after
the pandemic because there were a
lot
of supply chain issues and so it was hard
to get
materials. It
was hard the shipping with the increasing of
the
gas prices since the pandemic
distributed to the shipping costs
getting
materials to the site. The fact is
that in
our industry the cost we are facing
is not the same
costs that a consumer faces.
we did look at
the cpi, one year of
inflation, and coming back down since
then, now it's
around
3% or so, so
what their experiencing for
purchasing food and services for their
household is a separate
set of costs we have to purchase for
the production
of water, the treatment of waste water,
given
the chemicals, the regulatory requirements we
have to follow to dispose
of biosolids, all of the distribution
system that is buried under the ground
an nobody
sees, but needs to be maintained and
then just to
be building the expense of
water and waste water facilities needed
to serve our
current customers to make sure it
stays good working order but
then also to serve the new customers
coming out and --
>> aren't there labor
costs as
well? When you look at the cost for
your
5 million gallon a day plan from
110 going from memory 168, that
is a tremendous increase. You're saying some
of that is parts but there is a labor
component to this
as well?
>>
yes. It all works
together to increase costs and these are
the estimates and
bids we're getting from our contractors,
so they're
trying to cover their costs and of
course this is
a capitalistic society so they're
going to try to make money
doing it. At the end of the day since
competitively
bid they're going to try to put one
of their best cost forward to get
the job
versus trying to make money and not
get the job if their cost estimate
too
high.
>> we competitively bid these
projects.
a lot of this coming from the private
sector
side, perhaps labor short
ams,
inflation, supply chain. I heard yesterday
a comment there was so much more money
coming from
the federal government in terms of
infrastructure
that you think that any kind of impact
in
driving these costs up?
>>. >> when the money was coming in
in the form
of grants, like arpa,
that did help to fray some of the
costs over time. Now most of
that money has dried up and it's harder
to find grant money to do some of
the projects we would like to
do. We look hard, but
we have challenges in that area.
>>
well, to go back to
the conservation side, you briefed
me yesterday and I
was in complete shock and so you modified
my behavior already when I turned the
water onto make
the coffee this morning, I said I
am
not wasting water until this gets
hot so I
had my jug to water my plants outside.
I didn't
want to waste one drop after I heard
this situation and made me start thinking
about all the ways I
could personally save. I don't think
there's
a family out there this is going to
be easy
on. I was curious if there'sthere's
any, you know, body of work that could
help us understand the whole family
took five minute showers, you know,
how many in your
household, how many gallons you would
save. I think we
owe it to the public to help
them quantify how to save money and
usage and, of course, water is not
an unlimited commodity. We
know you're looking at brackish water
conversions. Is there any --
you've got a consultant. Anything
out
here when you tell people look, if
you, you know, do this, that
and the other we can get the use
down to then accommodate for this
increase?
>>
commissioner, I'm sure there is and I
know we have a water conservation
group better
in touch with that body of work than I
am and that is something we can look
into with the messaging
we're doing as we're doing customer
outreach to
provide more of those ways to conserve
water and lower bills and the impact of the
rate
increases.
>> I can think of several
that
I do at home with --I was telling
commissioner wilson no more saint
augustine grass and I don't have an
irrigation system. Everybody is like
are you going to do it? No. I am
happy to not have that bill. Simple
thing when watering
my plants I have no irrigation system I
have a nozzle on it and so I don't
waste
the water in between the plant. I
think
we need to help people because they're
going to suffer and the bills that
are going up at the grocery
store and everywhere else is tough
on our people. I think we
owe it to them if we're
going to have to do this, then we
owe it to
them to figure out how to
conserve. Thank you.
>> thank you. >> all
right. Commissioner uribe.
>> so I
wanted to expand
on that education part. What we do
always see is --I'm
also a victim of ouc, I said that
out
loud, when we talk about electricity,
saving electricity all the time, insulating,
doing all
these things and we need to be more
proactive.
this is a hard wake-up call and I
think we've all sat here
and realized we had a great deal for
a
long time, and I kind of want press
a little bit more
on that because I
think a lot of times educating I bet
most people don't
realize, I've heard people who have
ouc like I
do, how is it our tax and fees are higher
than what we spend on water. We're
always saying that. It is much more
inflated. Do people realize what --
have
you analyzed your family and looked
at educating this is your trend of
what your family does.
these are good times, hard times,
to help? It seems like if you're going to
be a high
user you're going pay more.
>> correct.
>> I
think a lot of times, that message
is great
way for you guys to do some of your
outreaches to kids, education. Because I
always guilt my son as he leaves the
water on when
he brushes his teeth. So --but I tell
him differently, he's taking the food for
the fish away by leaving
the water on so
long. But when we talk about --when
you've talked about getting bids
and I understand traditionally that
people always say, you know, whenever
you look at a government bid
it's higher than what the private
market
is, has your team or a consultant
looked at what the trend is
on a private sector as far as public
contracts and private sector contracts?
are
we really in there. Granted I do
understand that there is a much more
bond requirement and
liability and all that, but is there
a --
is there a point that people or
bids are taking advantage of the private
sector versus the public
sector when it comes to funding? I
would love for us
to look at that because it seems that
we just end up --
this is coming from a contractor's
wife,
that you end up paying more when you
look at it one way and look at it another.
we weren't charging for inspections before?
>> that's correct. >> we never were
charging?
>> for that
program there was not a fee for the
inspection however there was
a fee to be part of the program that
was part of their monthly
bill.
>> okay. Now I think that's
good because
if a lot of time if they're not in
compliance and we have
to go back out, certainly I mean there's
a
cost to us. We're paying the worker.
he's not
going out for free. We're paying the
workers or should
be. My last thing is, and you
all know this, pump stations.
when doing development, we realize there
was a
particular project in my district
where they
were going to connect to the big sewage
and so
forth and it was going to be more
cost efficient for them
and us, but ultimately they weren't
able to connect to
obt. What happens is it ended up putting a lot
of
pressure on a pump station outdated
from the '70s or '80s which is being
done
because our roads are blocked off,
but my
whole point is, financially we end
up incurring a lot of
that and how is that analyzed? Is
there a
way to analyze in the predevelopmental stage to have
some accuracy on that? Because
it ended up being a cost, a burden cost on
the county, much sooner than expected, it
was on
the five-year, ten-year
plan, but because of the amount of
putting
in 112 more units to a pump
station over 30 years old, where did
that
cost get absorbed?
financially, are there times we are
incurring costs that should
not be our costs or some of
that costs should be deviated
to the development being put onto
us and causing us a lot more cost
and
water pump stations and utilities?
if I could get
a response?
>> commissioner, I know
that that may be a misconception, but
I think in
that particular case, in your district there was
a
development that connected into an
existing system, there was a system
of
initial capacity in that case and they
were
allowed to connect and the rest of
the infrastructure
was built out. That
was not an issue. Pretty
much development wise
speaking orange county utilities development
pays its own way for all of it. They
pay capital charges with those capital
charges which are similar
to impact
fees, build a water treatment expansion
and we
build the infrastructure that they're connecting
to. For instance,
a new
subdivision has to build all of
the pipelines within the subdivision
like they build the roads and
build into our standards and we inspect
those
pipelines and donate those to us with
a one-year
warranty for any repairs or anything
that has to happen
during that year after we receive
them. So then we
operate those pipelines
and they also if they have to connect
to our system
we evaluate the
capacity at the connection point
and unless we have capacity that is
success capacity at a
connection point, we do not tell them you
have to
extend the pipeline further down sometimes
beyond one
mile or up to one mile in
those subdivisions. Places like
horizon, master
plan, big
village, the developer
build subdivision they would have
to build not only the pipeline, they
would
have to build the pipeline to the
size of the village size so sometimes
it's like chicken
or the egg. One developer wants to
go
first, and he doesn't want to build
a mile pipe because
he has to
build that full size development so he's
going to have
to collaborate
with the neighbors, among
themselves three or four or five build
a larger pipeline or
the first one because of tunes builds
a pipeline at
a higher costs and then the others
connect to the pipeline. But we don't
pay for that.
some cases beyond that when the developer
is
building the pipeline at their own
cost we
actually come here with development over
sizing
agreements and in a way it is us who
take advantage of
the developers. They're building a
12
inch pipe and we know that down the
road
10, 15 years, we need --there's going to
be
more development down the road and
instead of a 12 inch pipe
put a 16 inch pipe. Doesn't seem like
much
but the difference in cost is from
12
to 16 the difference in cost is 33%
because
it's based on the diameter. The difference
in capacity is double. So we pay an
incremental cost of 33%
and we get double capacity
in four additional subdivisions or
things to come down
the road. Bottom line from
our
utility, I can tell you in our case
development pays
its own way. It is not this increase
in my opinion are not due to development.
we
just increased our capital charges
last
april effective last
april and I believe the increase is
almost 50%.
like 40% it went up for development
to
pay their own way. Mostly the
operations that we have because operating
costs
went up a
lot, certain amount of
money for projects we needed, existing
customers we serve
a million people so we need
additional electriciticle pumps that
go bad,
old, we have to repaint the
tanks, refurbish tanks, refurbish
all kinds of things. We used to have
say
$80 million for projects or $60
million but as operation costs go
up, then instead
of 80 we have 60, then we have 50,
40.
we keep going down in the amount
of money we have left for projects.
we sill have to let's say
our
projects were $80 million. Instead
of going down
going 80 to 100 last year,
$200 million worth of projects, they
have
been going on in construction but
the amount left from the operation
cost,
the operation revenues is less and
less and it's every year
going diminishing that amount whereas
the projects are
increasing. Because of that we borrow money
and we figure okay, we'll pay down
the
road when
we increase the rates. For a while
not only have to do
that, we do a little bit of catch-up.
we
had the lowest rates
among counties in florida, the bottom
3% of counties.
>> okay.
I had another follow-up question.
so you
put this chart out that gets
us through 2031. Do you feel that it
will sustain where we're going? Do we see
supplies
and materials have leveled off? When
you look at the other part
of construction, things have leveled
off pretty
much. There was a time it was growing
and it seems like it's
still high, but it doesn't seem like
it's continuing to increase.
do you guys feel that we're going
to --the
last thing you want to do
is get to a point where we're back
in this
place five years from now.
>> I think
construction
costs like you saw the
cpi he was
staying there was a significant inflation in
the cpi.
some of that had to do with housing, some
of that had to do with components of
the price index, but
the construction cost was much higher
than normal inflation.
>> right. >> if
you saw 9%
on the cpi on the construction it
was a higher
price. Commissioner moore hit it on
the nail. There was a lot
of incentives from the federal government
a
lot of those things because of maybe
post
pandemic, because there was so many
projects
nationwide, here we have housing,
house prices went
up a lot, there was all kinds of housing
construction, there was all
kinds, and the labor and the materials
for
construction went up a lot. That is
not the
case anymore, so those increases
year to year, were much higher in
the
last five years than they
have been in the 20-some years I've
been here at the county.
we've seen them
stabilizing now, so I think we
need to catch up. Those prices
haven't come down.
>> my
question goes back to you're doing
a
prediction, asking for reoccurring
increases over the next
five years, my biggest question to
you, by
making this commitment now, and I
believe we have to get ahead of
this, we have 11
months, yeah, okay. We really have I
believe this is
a perfect time to really take and
educate because if you continue your
trends of using water the way you
do
now, one, it's running short, two,
you're going to see this increase
hit you in october of 2026. I'm going
to sign up
to come out to my community so we
can start educating and
learning how to read their bill and
how they
can do this. The question goes back
to five years down the
road are we back here saying oh, we
just didn't
have enough come in so this commitment
we make
as a board, will be able to sustain
and
help us continue with those costs
and project
improvements over the next five or
ten
years?
>>
that's
correct. We
have inflation factors built into the
model.
we aren't expecting the costs to remain
flat. They should
be sufficient to fund everything for the next
five years.
>> okay.
>> caveat that is your best estimate.
>> yes. >> I won't be here but you'll
be here.
>> yeah. We can never
say what the world will happen.
>>
correct.
>> if it stands
as we look today, you feel comfortable
with this?
>> yes.
if we get back to a normal
economy, normal inflation for the
next five years, this plan
should be sufficient.
>> understood.
thank you. Thanks
for all the data. I would love to
see that market rate information just
to have some knowledge on it would
be great. Thank you.
>> commissioner
semrad.
>> thank you, mayor.
I am a little hoarse, so one, I just
thank you
to your team. You guys, I always ask
a bunch of questions
and you have the answers and I appreciate
that. Just
a reminder to the board like how great it
is to
have a public asset in
water, waste water, because [ inaudible ]
and they pay four
times the rate of others and their
sewer system
is a mess. Those people are begging to
be in orange
county utilities. So thank you for
all that
you do. I talked to you briefly yesterday
I'm a little perplexed
by the model the forecasting
model of the five-year plan. I understand
that there was an external factor
with the
pandemic, but I --in terms of looking
forward, because
we know external factors are always
going to shock a
model, you know, is there hoy can
we improve that model?
do we need to forecast different indexes?
do
we need to do different supplies?
we
can have a base scenario
forecast, stress case and the black
swan the
pandemic, do we have multiple versions
of models
to deflect to so that
we can try to stabilize, you know,
it's just do we have -- I'm --I just
don't understand the model.
>> I will
defer
that part of the question to mr.
burnham to discuss his company's model that
was
used for the rates development, but
before he answers
that I did want to say
that we did run several
scenarios for what it would take to
meet the
needs of the utility, looking at
what those rate increases might be
and we tried
not to take the highest, best
scenario for the utilities, meaning we
would be flush with cash
and spend it on whatever we wanted.
we want to
be sensitive to the community and
the rates that they have to pay, so
leading into
that one of the models we ended up
going with did not
have the highest rate increases
on it, and it does make sure we are
not
overcorrecting here by raising the
rates too much to where we are just
flush
with cash. This will be a bit tight
going through it, as I said so commissioner
uribe,
we do have confidence that outside
of
another black swan event, that the
inflation factors built in should
be sufficient to cover
the rate requirements for the next
five years.
but at the same time, we still want to
be sensitive to our end customers
and
not raise the rates too much to the
effect
of as mr. Burnham was pointing out
in his part
of the presentation, that
our ultimate goal would be to get
back over 3. 0
as a debt service coverage. This rate
plan
does not get us there in the five
years. We have to go
out one more year to the sixth
year before we can achieve that.
we stay above our minimum requirement
of
2. 0, which is very good, but it comes
back to we didn't want to present
a
rate plan to the board that would
be too generous to the utility and
not
be sufficiently considering the
outcomes to
our community.
>> and relative to
your point
about the modeling and stress tests
and scenarios and I think
it also goes back to
commissioner uribe's point. We have
macro economists that
do inflation forecasting for operations
and
maintenance expenses and construction
expenses an
within an 18 month forecast period
they've got a high accuracy rate.
the
inflation assumptions that staff has
used are based
on comprehensive growth rates from
your recent history
adjusted for known and measurable
changes and we
compare that against our forecast
for inflation that over the near
term, we feel very confident about
our ability
to work within this plan. As you go
further out in time
that cone of variability starts to
widen and so
that's where we start to look at stress
tests
and assumptions but where part of
this comes back to your utility staff
to
stay on top of changing conditions
and monitor
events no one could have
predicted the pandemic and
outcomes. We had to respond to it.
we qualified data and feel as confident
as we can for
our projections for the near term
used averages for longer
term assumptions but made sure
we identified the mechanisms to make
changes if things
don't occur as projected. Potentially
coming back
and the rate plan or
potentially adjusting your capital spending plan
or how
you fund capital or looking at other
financing or funding mechanisms.
you have a number of different
levers you can pull to help
make sure this financial plan
meets your bottom line financial requirements.
the rating agencies
an investment community loves to see certainty and the
indications of adopting a five-year
plan signifies strong
proactive financial management but
doesn't mean if things go different
than projected that you don't have
the ability to come
back and amend things. I think the
commitment here is
trying to adhere to the plan as much
as reasonably possible, but again
not precluding
a conversation to come back if it's
appropriate to have
a conversation about adjusting rates
if things
occur materially different. In the
past years where the
3% indexing we haven't exercised that
as a utility because we didn't need
it. This could go both ways. I think
it's part
of your financial management practices
are going
to mitigate that risk.
>> I heard
you say that
you use averages, but I teach statistics,
so when
we use an average we can say a swimming
pool has an
average depth of 3. 5, but I might
jump in the
part of the pool where I can't swim
and it's 20 feet
but the average is this.
do you do modeling using your terms
because the year
of '21, '22 presented much
different inflationary data, so do
you take into consideration the terms
to make the model
more accurate? I don't know how we
got so
far off?
>>
the conditions and the outcomes in
the
data measure after the pandemic that
reflect the supply
and demand changes as a result of the
pandemic we took that data with
grain of salt and looked at what caused
those variances and
made sure to normalize those parameters
when we do
our regress model. This is getting
technical, but we
looked to normalize what are the causes
and trends that drive those costs
and predict those drivers
going forward as a measure of estimating
those inflation
factors. We tend to normalize the
periods with looks even in cash flow
model
a normalization period that takes
out outliers of
periods that reflect nonstandard or
atypical conditions to normalize
those used for forecasting and done
at a specific level. By category,
by department,
and in some cases look at specific
type
of expenses like chemicals different
than labor and other
components. There's a fair degree
of analysis done. It's not
just a simple overall average. It's
categorical and targeted to line items
when we look at those trends.
>> I hear normalizing so smoothing
the data.
smooth the behavior --
>> smooth the
data,
adjust for known and measurable changes.
>> when we smooth the data we
get more errors in the forecast. That's
what my point is. I think we need
to --my team and
I will dig more into that. I had
another
question pertaining to
impact fee. So I hear development
pays
for itself today, but there's
operational costs on those pipes put into
the ground. And
so over the course of time, we see
that those need repair.
today it pays for the pipes but eventually
there
needs to be improvement. Do we have
any such model in the industry
of utilities where we take
into consideration long-
term operational costs through the
developer?
>> in the practice of
utilizing capital charges for those
investments
they're limited to the capital facilities
themselves
whether existing assets previously
built
or new assets being constructed and
the replacement
of those assets and maintenance of
no those assets are done through
rate related mechanisms. There have
been
some communities that have availed
themselves of service availability
charles that try to capture some of
the
maintenance costs of keeping capacity
in a state of readiness
for development when it occurs but
those aren't as
common in industry practice as are
the defaults
of leveraging capacity charges for
cost of infrastructure and rates for
recovering costs
and operating costs.
>> okay.
>> predominant industry model. >> I
will ask my team to
follow up with you on the information
of
those communities.
and then the other thing I just wanted
to kind
of emphasize is,
when you talk about affordability
I hear we're the
lowest but when we talk about cost
of living that's
a construct that includes many aspects
of a
person's life and what they spend
their money on.
I know the utilities is low, but there's
a lot of other things that are high.
so it's not in reference to your
study or this
rate, at some point of the county we
should do an
affordability analysis to look at
what small little we've
had trash go up, storm water, we've
had now
wastewater, reclaimed water and little
by little,
things start ticking up
and orange county becomes less affordable
for people to
live
in. One
last question. These are in reference to
the other
two action items on the
screen. The
environmental program reinspection
fee, I
worked a lot of years in restaurants.
grease trap
does heavy duty damage on sewer lines
when
not maintained. I don't think
that we should be giving grace to, you
know,
you go out and get maybe one warning,
right.
shouldn't be like one warning a
year. You get one warning of business
existence. That's just passing the
burden
onto the taxpayer the rate user as
well. I think that
we need to be more strict than just
charging for the
inspection. Yeah, charge for the inspection
county
is sending somebody out there to do
a
job, but I don't support giving waivers
to violations particularly when passing
the buck onto taxpayers.
>> thank
you. We discussed this yesterday in
the briefing and
we're compiling information for you
on that. It looks like it is common
to offer a charge for a
reinspection and not do
a fine of a magnitude of
$500 up front. We'll
finish getting that information for you.
>> I get it. It's
not common but in this condition right
now, it's
also not common to raise trash, storm
water,
reclaimed water,
wastewater, you know, it's --there's --
you
know, I mean situations change. External
shocks
happen and I think that we need to
be diligent in making
sure businesses are responsible for
maintaining their
pipes, but it's not people picking
up
that bill.
thank you.
>> commissioner gomez corridor.
--cordero.
>> thank you.
for you, your team and all
the things that you all do, services
and always available
to us, you know.
getting the services to the resident.
I have three questions, these are
like straight to the point.
you know, answer it and then the residents
will
know that's what you mean. I just
wanted to
know, what is the
overall impact for the average resident of orange
county. How
many extra money will they have to
pay? Is
that what we have here in slide number
20?
>> that's correct. >> okay. >> depending
on their usage.
if they use more water and
wastewater services they will have higher impact.
overall it's an average of
5. 2%
increase per year on the water
and
wastewater bill.
>>
and then if this is approved, it
will start in october of 2026? Right?
>> basically yes. In answer to your
question.
one point is that what is being asked to
be
approved today is just the preliminary
rates. Nothing will
happen with today's approval. It's
only after we
have the public hearing and we have
a final approval the rates will
change. Yes, they will be effective
october 1st, correct. That's what
public
wants to know. Saying that I wanted
to also ask you, what is the plan
to explain
and inform the residents about what's
going to happen? Because they have --
I mean there is
enough time. But, you know, they
have been a skin here and conscious of
the wastewater, you know, how the
misuse of it. How d what is
the plan?
what will you do in order to
continue educating
our residents to save water and
be in a better --
>> we have several
things we commonly do for
rate increases. When they're not the
normal
just 3% indexing. We sent
out postcards to customers to let
them know what's going on. There can
be additional letters and e-
mails, customer contact for our top
customers. They
will be getting the highest increases
because they
are our
highest
users. We
have notification
of rates going up and what we've done in
the past is have
a dedicated phone number that customers
can
call specifically asking questions about
the rate increase
and we've also set up a
bill calculator on the website so
that a customer can go in and
type in their usage and see what the
change in their bill would be. On
top of that we can
look into things we've discussed here this
morning like customer
outreach for the environmental concerns
as far as water
conservation and do more of an educational
job
there to help our customers learn
ways to cut their
water bill and
wastewater bill.
>> I was just thinking
like, you know, I know you all send
postcards and e-mails
and letters and people do boom and
that costs a lot of money.
we know that,
right. I was thinking I think said
it as well, things that you can come
and talk to the people,
people have questions, you can answer
right there, and how to read a
bill, which is one that
commissioner wilson said. Sometimes -- I
know we
can go one on one and call and they
will explain or
whatever but I'm saying just to, you
know,
develop that good relationship with
the residents in
the community better because you all
have a good relationship, I
just think that we should
be a little bit more, you know, one-on-one.
I'm just thinking
postcardpostcard letters --I'm just
saying.
>> thank you for
the suggestions. That's something we
can workshop and
look into.
>>
my last question is, how will other
counties and cities react
to price pressure? Are all
counties expected to increase prices
soon as well?
>> as we displayed the
chart on the screen there are actual
several that have
published rates with multiple rate
increases, multiple years
of rate increases
and they are higher than 6%. We
didn't try to put all of the ones increasing
on there,
just the ones hitting 6%
or higher.
the rate increase
is fairly common right now.
>> as
I mentioned
a lot of conversations are about similar
challenging circumstances about increased
costs significantly greater
than what was in the past. Many communities are looking
at similar levels of rate adjustments.
I will run back to that slide quickly
here to give
you a sense. Hillsborough county they
have a multiyear ordinance approved
that
has a 5% increase plus an inflation
adjustment and pass through increase
in purchase water costs.
so that was a
proved a few years ago. Toho
approve 7. 5% for the nexty years
and 4% thereafter and so as you kind
of
look around at other utility systems
especially ones in high
growth areas, jea for duval has had
a rate adjustment approached for
the last two years they're having
similar
conversations about similar levels
of increases because it's not that
a
utility is uniquely necessarily incurred
different levels of cost increases.
we're all
grappling with the same levels of
increases in costs and the numbers
are comparable but not altogether
different.
indian river county another example
last year had to
do a 20% increase. This year 12% and
then
their outlook for 5 to 7.
5% increases thereafter. These increases
are very common right now and really
necessary to maintain utility
service provision. In today's cost
environment we're not necessarily
assuming it's going to continue to
increase significantly like it
has in the past, but it's not coming
down. We have
to reflect the cost of doing business
in our paradigm.
>>
my last
question, this is --I think --
you know that
also things as commissioner uribe
said, things sometimes --
no, it was wilson, that we don't think
about like when you have a break in
equipment or you have
to replace and
so do you have like those funds, you
know, separated just for that? If you have
to replace
something, are you going to buy it
new? Replation it?
how do you manage
with that
when --
>> so as far as breaks in the
equipment or things that need to be
replaced or
prepared, when it comes to forecasting
plan
maintenance, we have budgets
planned for that and include contingencies.
we
never know what's going break and
need to be
repaired. We handle most of that in
our operating
budget for repairs that come up
and then for long-term planning that's
when we look at
doing things in the cip when a
portion of the plan, maybe the entire
plan, needs an overall refurbishment
where we
can be proactive about planning those projects
in advance. Yes,
carry contingency money in the budget
and when that
is not enough for handling some of
the repairs we
cut back to make sure we can keep
the system repaired and
running and
in good condition.
>> thank you.
>> commissioner scott.
>> thank you. Going back
to commissioner
cordero's question when you talk about
you forecast, you know, your operational
repair, are you guys forecasting with
a specific number of years,
five years, ten years, or forecasting to
the equipment life
cycle?
>> it's many of it is
done to the equipment life cycle.
for
example, with large pieces of equipment this
is more on the
solid waste site but
not in the water waste water system
as much, but they have a plan to where they
will
purchase a piece of equipment, very
large or expensive,
hundreds of thousands of dollars for
the equipment, after a certain amount
of
time when it ends the life cycle they
will plan
for refurbishment of that equipment to
be recapitalized and work for another
five years or so and after
a certain number of
refurbishments it would be considered
not worth the repair
and refurbishment anymore and disposed
of
and replaced with new equipment that would
be
similar is.
>> on slide
28, you were talking about the installation
at cost. I
want to make sure I understand what
you're saying.
you didn't quantify a dollar amount
because it
changes on the scope of work and scale of
the project, right?
>> that's correct. And the conditions in the field.
>> so it's also logistically from
a time
management standpoint allows you guys
greater flexibility not having to
schedule a rate hearing with
us and go back and forth, right?
>> that's
correct. We wouldn't also want to
put forth
a generic rate to do the service that would
be an
average because in some cases it would
not cover its cost
and other cases it would be more over
recovering
the costs. So
the most fair thing to do for the
developer who is asking us to do this
work is build them for the cost of
that
specific project.
>> so what is
the contingency if I'm a developer
of, you
know, let's just say maybe a two
or three apartment units, right, and
then I do not agree with the
costs that you have provided me and
maybe I
might have a reference for what I
believe is a similar project
with another developer? How do you
mitigate that? Come
back to us or try to negotiate?
>> we
would work
it out with the developer. That wouldn't
be something we
need to bring back to the
board. Basically just to reiterate
these are not
common occurrences. It's something
that occasionally happens. It's
a responsibility of the developer
to put
the lateral in any, so
it's unusual circumstances they might
ask our
field services staff to do it.
>> okay.
I'm good.
>> all right. With that just
as a
reminder, we'll be having the public
hearing
in january 2026. That
is when we'll take the final action.
but today, there is a
requested action on the screen. We
have a motion
by mr. Scott.
>> second. >> second
by commissioner gomez
cordero. All in favor let
it be known saying yea. Yea. Opposed
no.
>> if I may real quick should
be
approval and execution as opposed
to what's says
just approval.
>> no. I said
move requested action should cover everything you
have up there.
>> that doesn't
say approval and execution. It just
says approval.
>> all right.
approval and execution.
>> that was on
our
end.
>> approval and? >> execution.
>>
it's noted.
>> move revised requested
action.
>> yeah. Go ahead. >> technical
error. All right. We have the correction.
all
in favor let it be known saying yea.
opposed no. Motion passes and it is
unanimous.
all right. Thank you all. We're
going to move to
the final item this morning. I'm going
to
get this one done and be done before
noon.
commissioner wilson.
>> we got this.
we can do
it. I believe in
us. So very briefly, because that's
something I have
to say to myself in order to stay
brief, this request you all got the
memo
it lays out sort of
a starting point.
understanding that we have committed
sewer, we are fulfilling that in ways
big and
small. I believe we are looking at
potentially updated added new
or opportunities to address micro
mobility devices and micro mobility
usage in the
county, that the timing is
now. So I believe that
ebikes, e-scooters, I think anything
motorized
you can use on a trail hasn't been contemplated
in our ordinances. We did do the pilot
program for
the vendors several years ago, but
it
didn't address the everyday usage
we're seeing
from scenarios sort of across the
county. Basically
what my ask is, is to get
your feedback on this and understanding
and then direction
for staff understanding this is
a very complex issue and that we need
to
get data. We have to start every ordinance
a good amount
of data. Having an understanding of
what's going
on out there with crashes, hospital
responses, law enforcement reports.
I know law enforcement hasn't
been required to distinguish whether
a bicycle accident
was an ebike, but, you know, if there's
another
source of data we can
draw from I believe that it would
be
the best for any safety
measure
. The where who and what.
the areas we're hearing the difficulty.
orange county
public schools had a discussion about
the
usage coming to and from school. I
will tell you I
think that there are tremendous mobility
benefits
in the usage of
micromobility devices. Anywhere you
see kids using micromobility devices
to get to school they're not sitting
in a car
by themselves or with one other person
that gets them
out of the car line. I don't want
to inhibit that
usage. But I think we have to figure
out how to make
sure everyone that's out there on
our
trails, sidewalks and
other spaces feels safe.
so the other
piece I wanted to
make sure we
were looking at
is the state, several proposals, having an
understanding
of where state law
is, going, and
hopefully to be able to work in conjunction.
I know there
had been discussion about a bill that
required
a minimum age and minimum speed limit.
if the state takes that up as
a preemption I will cheer them
on. This is a place where preemption
makes sense,
minimum age, minimum speed and we
can, you know,
help potentially build upon that for whatever other
safety
measures might
be necessary.
I've heard from people who --
educational opportunities, something
ops would
work through with them. Helmets are, obviously,
an issue for I believe anybody that
is on a device and think about the
speed of
these devices it makes the most sense that would
be a
requirement. I have mixed feelings
about the
minimum age thing and I would be curious
to hear
your thoughts on it because someone
with a
learner's permit to me should be able to
use a scooter. Should it go 30 miles
an hour. No. The idea of making sure that
that
those modifications that take the
scooters, e-scooters and bikes up
above
a certain speed is part of the research
and consideration.
but it's really very --as far
as what types of modifications
or what kinds of measures we
could or should take first.
I understand some research required
will take a lot of
time. I'm glad to see
ops representative still in the
room. I think if you have the ability
to tap into the
brilliant people in
our public works right
now working on zero emission initiatives
get them engaged in this we may be
able to get to some of
these things soon enough. Whether that
is educational or
outreach, whether that is additional
signage in places we need to have
some information from staff about
what, where that would be the most
beneficial.
obviously, we would look towards our
school
districts, school areas. I know one of
the frustrations we
heard this morning from
somebody who wanted a school zone
near a high school. There are no high
schools with school
zones. They don't get the same designations.
that
doesn't mean we can't
exanother opportunities to provide
shire visibility better
crossings and if you're adding something
that's motorized whatever level that
motorization is, possibility for that to
be
safer in and out from a school.
I want to get feedback from you all
and potentially
give direction to staff about what
we want to see
come back in research in the next
steps. Looking
for opportunities
in things such as the data behind
where
the collisions are happening and what
we think would help and benefit prevent
that in the future.
>> all right. There are
questions or comments by members of
the board.
we'll start with commissioner uribe
followed
by commissioner
scott, gomez cordero, moore and semrad.
>> commissioner wilson
you wrote this. I've been talk about
this for a long time when
we did the ucf overlay. I've done
a little research
on this. I would guess, yes, we need
to
move forward. Number one, I'm worried
there
may not be a lot of data. I recently
saw someone
get hit by a car, but they
exchanged insurance, the guy gave
him --and no
policeman ever came. So I would be
curious to
see how that data will come up.
but ultimately, we --
enforcement, how do we get --I remember
when we did
the golf carts which was was that
like
six years ago when we did the
golf carts, and it's been some time
and we
had difficulty getting
enforcement and law enforcement to
take on something else
like golf carts that are very
predominant now in our neighborhoods.
I believe that if we don't get enforcement
these
great intentions go nowhere. Of course
that starts
with parents and children and so forth.
when you talk about
speed, obviously, a maximum speed
and I would love for us to look at
other cities and states around the
country doing something
like this. I was recently in
miami for a florence and
was stunned that the scooters are
on
roads with cars and they act like
they're in a vehicle
the way they ride their scooter. I
was terrified. With
no helmets. In business clothes, I mean this
is
how people get aroundaround
miami because of the amount of
traffic but I was almost terrified for
the people I
had to go around who are just driving
these scooters like they're a car.
there's a lot
of mindset about
that. I do
worry that younger people,
right, so they don't think it can
happen to them and it
would be nice to see some sort
of structure but ultimately if we
can't
enforce it or cause machines to have
a maximum speed, we're kind of like
great
intended leaders but not able to do
anything. I would love to
see something like that happen. Again, I
would love
the legislature to take the lead on
this so it could be
statewide as opposed to you can do
it
in oceola but can't do it in
orange. Lastly I have a big issue
with
the school zones and high schools and
not to put a lot of pressure on
ocps who is here, I had
a student die at 16 at roque
ridge and we learned the hard way there
was
none. I will give credit to orange
county putting up
the beacon with the speed and got
hit by a car and
we had to get it
replaced. But they are the ones
that walk a lot because busses are
harder to maneuver kids in high school
than
in elementary school, much more
compact and kids are going to magnet
programs and going to
schools not necessarily in their jurisdiction.
I
didn't realize how much that's changed and commissioner
moore you'll realize this, I was
watching peanuts the movie and the
kids would go outside and play
with the kids from school
and my son said man I
wished I lived near kids who went
to my school.
that's no longer. We see
kids walking bikes and more. We should
really look at high schools
becoming the high schools being a
zone because you
have a major school olympia, I have
a major score school oak ridge, and we
have a
ton that are growing and we don't
want to see
a fatality or injury.
>> really the latest information,
this sort of bubbled up in my district
at horizon
which interestingly the design there
was to allow
more people to be able to bike and
walk to
school because every village has its
own school
structure, but we know how this works.
particularly
in a rush and high school students
so they try to get
there as fast as they can. It's dark
often in
the morning. The safety thing is paramount.
I think interestingly so that you're
like went
down my checklist of the same sort of
things
I felt like were important which included
that rules on
riding them on sidewalks versus streets
for
these motorized devices, education
and signage are things we can tackle.
>> my last thing maybe we can roll
in
dot because they tend to have pedestrian
with the vision zero
and instead of waiting for someone
to do home rule maybe we
could advocate and I would be happy
to gets somebody to put
in legislation that would help us
make this a
state issue and no more fatalities
because of this. I
think it's great. Thank you. Good
job.
>> commissioner scott. >> thank
you, mayor. Thank you, commissioner
wilson for this topic. I
agree with what you say as it relates
to safeguards
around other high school students,
more
so because we have crossing guards
and school
busses for our younger people,
but when you talk about the high school
students no one is
looking out for them even when they
should be looking out for
themselves. Kids have the headphones
on or on their phones
or do both and then boom you get
in a car accident. Just one thing
I wanted to share with
you, I don't know how we're able to
do
this here locally, but I
think figuring out ways that
we partner with the school district
to provide education on the short
term and looking more long term what would
we
do from an
advocacy level, perhaps something
with --for
children in terms of the speed these
kids
can jail break the scooters. I don't know
how they do
it. It takes like five minutes. They
take off any
speed safe guards and get them toes
go a fast
as 40 miles per hour. These are kids
right here.
how does it go so fast. That's easy.
dah-dah-dah. Boom, took off. Okay.
I thought they were set at 10 or 15
but they're able to do technology
and make them go
way faster than they should be. Thank
you for
bringing up the topic and look forward
to
whatever solution staff comes up with.
when I say short
term, maybe six months to a year, we
can figure out how we through our
children and family
services departments, citizens commission
for children with our
partners, develop some type of educational
program
either directly with our staff through
partners or
in conjunction and talk wit the kids.
they
ignore the signage. Have one ear out.
what we can
do to actively engage these kids when they
are
going to school in the scooters in
the wee hours of the morning they
know to slow down and look and cross
the street. Things that we remember.
look
twice and cross. Walk your bike across
the street.
all those things we remember growing
up.
thank you for the topic.
>> commissioner
gomez cordero.
>> thank you. I wanted
to say commissioner that one of my
initiatives, because it happens in
my
district a lot,
boulevard, is the kids, you
know, riding the scooter to school
and so on, sometimes they are distracted,
they hit the car
or the car hits them. It happens a
lot.
what I did I didn't wait for anything.
I called
public works. I called metro plan.
I
called ebike.
I call the school member and so --
residents very concerned about it
and
now we coordinating the campaign,
but in
that area. To see how we can alleviate
but also educate especially the parents
because
the parents buy a scooter like commissioner
said,
here you go. Go to school. No instruction,
no direction, no nothing. And then
they
just, you know.
>> one of the things
I wanted to
ask, did you all ever discuss a registration.
that was one of
the things that came up in some of
the
conversations with residents
should there be a registration where
you fill out
who thor on
is, the person operating it and your
device gets a
sticker to indicate registration.
did you talk
about that?
>> no, we haven't talked
about that. I think that would
be through the school right?
>> no.
I don't know. I don't know this is --
this is why we need help.
I was going to say why we would need
help getting that information what things
fall into
which jurisdiction. The other with
an educational campaign we would
have to work with our partners at
ocps. Understanding better what you're
hearing in your community is
really
helpful.
>>
yeah.
>> commissioner moore.
to add to some of the things you've
already brought up
it's massive conversation. I went
to a
bike walk conference in winter garden
couldn't go this year
and what I was stunned about was that some of
the state
laws are not even there to
protect cyclists when they're hit.
so
they can't put a claim on
the insurance, the car insurance,
the auto insurance, for any offer
that medical bills. It has to
go back on their own personal insurance.
that
is something that really has to be
addressed
as well and it's a state issue. This
is not
at our jurisdiction. I remember back it
was probably around 2012 I
was on the school board that it was
haled as the best advent ever that
driver's education was
taken away from the schools and given to
the safety
council.
well, I don't think it was. Because
now when you
see the students are accessing more
driver's ed and
training,
it's the ones whose parents have the
greatest needs and
we can't get to don't get the driver's
ed
training. I had five fatalities in
district 2 with teen drivers just
in november and it's just absolutely, you
know, heartbreaking. And then another
piece that I think we
have to bring up here is, you
know, humberto, sitting back here,
your staff,
is struggling to keep up with what
we need to do
to make our roads safer and I know
there's probably
a whole body of work that must be
done to what the sidewalks potentially
would be
changed, pavement markings dealing
with
scooters, what have you. If
we're going to givego this route we
have to give him adequate support
and staffing and
financing because he's already got
a job that's incredibly
difficult. I'm assuming that a lot
of the standards
are going to have to be derived and
developed from the federal government
and
so I don't know if it's in the uniform
code or any of the green books
or any of those things those documents
you
use, so there's just so many pieces
to this.
you've got school board to public
works and what have you. I wish
the legislature maybe we can go up
and lobby.
we used to do that as a school board.
it would be
fun to go up with you all. Could
we at least have helmets, at least
that
insurance side fixed.
and then the school board, you know,
we're going to
need some education coming from the
schools. I know
they don't want to take responsibility
for anything
outside that school property. They're -- the school
board
is going to consider it ourour
responsibility the minute that scooter
is off their property. We have to
work
together. We have to have more of
a collaborative
approach because they're all of our
children.
they don't just belong the school board on their
property or a county or city road.
I
hope you're considering this being
county wide.
if we have to do some ordinance changes
let's have a comprehensive orange
county structure not have it different
in every
one of these municipalities because that
is not a good --
>> that would make it difficult for the school
board and
everyone else it has to be county wide.
I hope when we get to
that. I'm not sure that's a question
for
buy ram.
>> county wide was the goal.
I think it's
something what does that look like
and, you
know, we would need to rely on of
not just
our departments but start there. But
then
also law enforcement and our school
partners.
>> clearly
what I'm seeing in my
district is I'm particularly
the boys 8th through juniors
in high school have this newfound
freedom and you're
seeing them going out in packs trying
to get to the
state parks and I see them riding down
the
roads. I'm excited for them because
now
you're not waiting on mom to
drive you. It's exciting but at the
same time
I'm not seeing any helmets and not
seeing any of them paying particular
attention to rules and
those sorts of things.
so that's where --and
you're a former school
board member but hope that first week we
can develop
a module about safe walk and biking
to school and the more
of them that do this, this is good,
right,
not so many parents in the pick-up
line. It's
better for us with road capacity
and congestion and mornings and afternoons.
it's a good
thing. This is a good thing if we
can impress on these young people
the importance of
being safe. You know that's tough.
again my
two that died, it was
a 17-year-old driver, three fatalities
on welch road and 18-year-old
driver who killed two people, one
in their
80s and one in the 90s. They were
both young
male drivers in that range. I
hope we can go back and talk about
driver's ed coming back to the high
schools and this is
a comprehensive conversation. Byrum,
I hope there will
be a champion here because there's
so many
tentacles and aspects it's something you
can handle staff can handle with all
of our other responsibilities and I
will be curious to hear the response.
this is
a massive undertaking.
>> I want to
be clear this is
a two-step process. This is very
broad. The thought was
today interest and support.
we would now begin to actually go
through it and identify who is responsible
for what
and begin to gather a clear sense
of
what might fall under state, what
might fall under the sheriff's office,
ocps and
orange county and then come back in the
spring and have
a conversation with the board about
those
efforts, what specifically areas that would
be under
the purview of the board, other areas
you may
explore, and then begin to develop
and work
on those specific issues that may
be
policy related.
this is, obviously, of great interest,
significant interest, important, but it
is --
I mean this is very comprehensive
in its reach.
that's the first
step and a conversation we've asked
commissioner wilson after this
step we go to the next step
which is to begin to organize this
in a fashion what falls
under which area. That would be done
in
conjunction with
conversations working with orange
county
sheriff's office. We would all take
notes. I heard a few others you mentioned
as well. But that would
be done in
conjunction in discussions to help
this out so
when we come back to the board it's
a
comprehensive approach not just one
perspective but others who need to
be at the table.
>>. >> commissioner semrad. >> thank
you, mayor. Thank you, commissioner
wilson. This is
an important topic and our --
we've got two school board members
and district five member gallo
and vanos both have come to
district 5 and expressed a lot of
concern
regarding the school zones and the
kids' usage and safety features as
well. I'm grateful the school board
was here and I
have the two e-mails
from
stephanie and
angie making sure orange county has
a seat at the table. One
thing we haven't talked
about so far is
that I've
almost been hit by my kid riding
an ebike on the sidewalk going more
than
20 miles per hour. It's --and we have
to talk about
our shadow population which is about
210,000 tourists a day and that they're
coming
in from all these different locations
from around the
state and outside the state and country,
so being able to create some type
of a safety framework
where we can communicate to those
tourists, and
I see the tourists on international
drive and
other areas by the convention center
where some of them don't know how
to safely operate them and they don't
know how to brake, not break the machine,
but
to stop the machine so they kind of
hop off and
it goes into the grass. So we have
to, you know, like it is a comprehensive
approach but we have
to also consider we have a very large
shadow population that doesn't live
amongst us
to receive those mainstream lessons
that we could do in the schools or
do
through the sheriff. Somehow we have
to communicate with
our tourism stakeholders as well these
are
presenting issues that are dangerous
for them and dangerous for the people
who live
here as well. Thank you.
>> thank
you so much
commissioner for bringing that up I
think you may
have been copied on it some
communication from the idrive chamber
that
articulated what you're saying and
supportive
of any movement
towards, you know, some more guidelines.
they're
different because those are vendors
and we have
an ordinance we adopted in '22 to
regulate the vendors for
those residential micromobility devices.
and so I will kind of
defer to byrum on whether we can get
separate information.
that was a pilot program. You should
have
some information become from that.
>> actually a
meeting tomorrow I believe or this
week later this week thursday
with the idrive areas to those areas
where we are
tracking those experiences. That is
a very I would
say very specific stage of discussing.
there's overlap with some of those
concerns and that could be
very informative to this effort as
well. I want you
to know we are specifically working
with tracking
on those matters concerning the program
down in idrive area.
>> that's great to know. I will say
you're right. It does
have the overlap and if I had a dry
erase
doing a diagram here the descriptions
of the things that concern those businesses
have
been similar to the concerns that
we hear from
residents about drives that are
exceeding speed strollers or wheelchairs
or weaving in and out
of pedestrians. Stopping and leaving
a device, specific to
the rentals just wherever it can be
an
impediment for somebody
who needs access. Leaving it on a
ramp for a crosswalk can keep
somebody else from using that crosswalk.
it will be interesting to see the
outcome and help
inform.
>> byrum, I think there's quite
a bit of
work to be done here and sometimes
when we've had difficult issues or
complex
issues as a community, we've created
these
task forces, but whenever we
do that, because of sunshine
laws et cetera, sometimes it inhibits
the free flow
of information. I
do believe that this is
something that law enforcement really
needs to
be significant part of and
perhaps thethe orange chiefs' group can
be part of those
conversations, especially if we're talking
about doing something that
is as county
wide implications.
also, we have wonderful asset in our
chance the
okay children's safety
village, that does a lot
of training and awareness
of bicycle safety and pedestrian safety
and a number
of things on the campus that they
have so I believe that it's probably
most appropriate at this point to
keep
the conversations
at a staff level
and look
within, you know, public works perhaps
even with public safety
where deputy county
administrator danny banks
to maybe help pull this together
and reach across different
disciplines that may have
some to hear and let
the work group, we heard a representative
from
the school district here earlier
today, that clearly they wanted to be
a part of the conversation so it's
multiple disciplines involved in this
conversation, but I think we'll continue
to have some conversation at the
county administration level about
how to engage
the groups, take the wisdom
of the board
here today, and let's try
to move the needle. This isn't something I
think can
be done in the short term, but it
will take
some time. There are,
obviously,
legislative considerations, we do
here, other jurisdictions around the
state is experiencing
the same thing and thethe is going
to
believe they have some regulatory
authority in
this to make sure that there's standard,
a
standard across the
state, on how this could be
addressed proactively. We know there
may be
an
enforcement component to driving
compliance to
reducing injuries and improving safety at
the same
time but I would hate to
see it so punitive
to where youth children
are getting citations and those types
of things. We
have to think through that.
there are as I see
as many
adults who are out around
here in downtown I
see them drive these micromobility
devices with a lot of risk
and a --it's like a thrill ride
for them.
I've seen on several occasions on
I drive where it
appears it's a parent riding, you
know, standing up on a
micromobility device an they have
a one
or two, sometimes
three, riding these micromobility
devices it's like
a thrill ride and no one has on a
helmet
any kind of safety, associated.
I look at the parent and say
wow, a
parent is really taking quite a
risk with a child.
I think there's a lot of work
here
as we move forward.
we'll roundtable it and look to danny
and others
to take the lead on this and get
it to a point where --with
some recommendations about how we
move
forward. Great conversation today.
11:59. We
beat the noon deadline. We're going to
go
into recess and we will reconvene
at
2:00 p.m. For the afternoon portion
of
our meeting. I thank you all.
>> thank you all very much.
>>> good afternoon, everyone. Let me
welcome you back to
the meeting of december 2nd, 2025.
as we begin this afternoon, we will
start with
our landland
issues. We're up to item regarding
planning
ask zoning.
and ms. O'hara is
going to
lead us off.
>> good afternoon, mayor and commissioners.
on november 6th, 2025, the board
of zoning adjustment heard 12 cases.
ted were recommended
for approval. One was recommended for denial.
and one case was continued to the december 4th public hearing.
the appeal deadline was november 21st, and
no
appeals were received. It's my understanding that
commissioners would like to pull the
case
2511 for
a board called hearing. This zoning division is working
on scheduling that for a separate public hearing.
so with
the exception of case ba 25
pulled,
2508033 which was continued, we request that they
accept the recommended action and findings.
>> we have
a motion for approval. Do
I hear a second? Second.
all in favor let it be known by
saying aye? Motion passes.
it is unanimous. Thank you. We're
going to move to the next
item on ourour
agenda. This is a-1 for this afternoon.
this is the
public hearing. This is a petition
to vacate. Deputy director of public
works to frame this item. You're recognized.
>> thank you, mayor. This
is a petition to vacate
ptv
25-08022 from jonathan on
behalf of
88 magnolia and charles
wolsonovich. That request they vacate a
portion of the unopened and
unapproved broadway known as palm
avenue that lies between
three residential lots
located within the subdivision
containing approximately 0.258 acres.
the property
lies south of west
colonial drive. The real estate
management, environmental protection,
jerg, transportation planning and
roads
and drainage divisions
have no objections to the request.
all utility providers have
provided
letters of no objection. Approval will have no adverse
affect on orange
county and staff has no objection to the
request. The requested action is approval
of
ptv-25-08-022. The parcel is located in
district 1 and I'm here to answer any questions.
>> thank you. Is
the
applicant present? Would you like to come forward
and make any comments? Okay, no
comments. Do we have members of the
public present
that
wish to be heard on this item?
>> we have no speakers on this
item.
>> we'll close
the public and going to potential
motion.
>> I'd like to make
a motion to approve.
>> second. >> we
have a motion and
a second. All in favor
let be known by saying aye? Motion passes.
it is unanimous.
with that, we'll
move to the next item on our agenda
b-2, shoreline alteration.
item will open the public hearing
on this item and
call on our environmental programs
administrator
to frame this item.
>> good afternoon,
mayor and commissioners.
today I'm presenting after the
fact
shoreline alteration application
sadf-25-02-006. S had this is
for replacement vinyl sea wall.
here is a location map of the property.
it's shown in red for you.
the property is at 3513
tcu boulevard on the western shoreline
of
lake
irma. Here's anner y'all photo outlined in yellow.
june 14th of 2024, epd received a
complaint that a
new sea wall was being constructed
at the property
without a
permit.
staff determined that the property owner had constructed a
replacement seawall directory waterward
of
an existing
seawall, which requires a permit.
the existing concrete seawall was
constructed
under 2006 and
2007, however, we did not find a permit for that existing wall.
accordingly on
june 21st,
2024, epd issued a notice of violation
for the
unorzed
seawall. It required the property owner
reert remove the seawall or submit an application
for
the shoreline dredge and fill permit
to I attempt the permit after the fact.
december 9 theth of 2024, the case
was
presented to the special magistrate due to lack
of response from the property owner.
the special
magistrate issued an order that the unauthorized
seawall either be removed or a permit be
I applied for after the
fact. There was a penalty of
$4,871.
75 assessed. However, the special
magistrate ruled not to apply the penalty
in their order. On february 20th of this
year, epd received the
application for shoreline
alter
ration and dredge film permit. Here are the existing conditions
with the vinyl seawall.
as you can see being
installed on the photo on the left,
there's a concrete seawall.
that's the old wall. And you
can see they have also put in some
new
plantings that
installed on the right. Here is the site
plan.
the applicant is requesting authorization for after the fact
of approximately 34 feet of replacement vinyl
seawall, which is shown in red. The southern end of the seawall
abuts an adjacent wall to the south.
the northern end of the wall ends
approximately 11 feet from the property
line at an existing boat ramp that they have.
here
is a cross section of the seawall.
some considerations for
you. Chapter 15, article
vi, notification of the public hearing
was sent to property
owners within
500 feet and we received no objections.
our finding is
pursuant to code, epd has evaluated the permit
application and required documents and has made
a
finding that the request is consistent
with section 15-218. And finally, our
action requested is acceptance of the
findings and recommendation of the epd staff and approval
of after
the fact shoreline alteration
sadf-25-02-
006, subject to the conditions listed
in the staff report. That concludes my presentation.
>> thank you.
>> with that, is the aptly kabt present?
would you like to
nak
make any comments? So because we
had to take that as no comments unless you
want to make them, you'll have to
come to the podium.
so that do we have members of the
public present that pish to
be heard?
>> we have no speakers for
this item.
>> then
we'll close the public hearing at
this time. We'll go to the district
commissioner. Commissioner?
>> thank you,
mayor.
I move for the requested action.
>> we
have
a motion and a second. All in favor
let it be known by
saying aye? Opposed, no.
motion
passes. It is unanimous. All right.
we'll move
to the next item. We'll
open the public hearing on item
c-3. Our planning administrator will
be framing this item. You are recognized.
>> thank
you, mayor. This item is case
dp-25-03-057. Property is in
the quadrangle planned
development track 16w student housing
development plan.
request here is to develop a roughly
2.
38 acre site located to construct
a
student housing development with
approximately 447 bedrooms. Here we
have
the property and the map. It's a high density
residential, which allows student
housing
the property is zoned pd district.
the planned development
land use plan for this
property
specifically allows and recently approved I by this board for a
student housing development of this
size and scale. Here we
have aerial map showing the property
or subject
parcel is currently undeveloped surrounded
by a mixture of commercial,
office, and other student
housing uses
in the area. University of central florida
just off site to
the east there. Here we have the general site
plan. Again, request is for approval
of this
site
plan. This is coming to the board due
to the code requirement that all
student housing development plans
receive
final consideration
of approval by the board of county commissioners.
however, again, this board has previously
proved the land use and zoning changes to allow for
this specific development.
so with that,
recommendation is to make a consistency with the
comprehensive plan
and approve the tract 16ben
student housing development plan subject
to the
conditions listed under the recommendations
of staff. They are available for questions.
>> all
right.
thank you, sir. Is the applicant on this
item
present? All right. She's coming forward.
>>
rebecca wilson, here on behalf of
the applicant. Happy
to answer any questions you all may
have.
nick is right. We have to bring each
one of these student housing projects
three times. That's why you keep
seeing me up here. I appreciate it.
>> all right.
if you'll standby for a moment.
do we have
members of the public present that wish to be hear on
this item?
>> we have no speakers.
>> we'll close the public hearing.
we'll go to the district
commissioner, commissioner
wilson for a potential motion.
>>
I would be happy to
second.
>> thank
you, mayor.
thank you.
I just need to say on the record for
our quad rang until that
area. We
have businesses that
are there. If you speak to research park,
they are not
digging all the student housing. I know there's a lot of
variables that play
into a company
choosing to relocate, but it was an area that's for
mixed use. I know I said
this last
time. I want to say it again. We have to move away from the
concrete block of student housing and use
the
land in the most economically impactful
way. Losing businesses because of
student
housing moving in is --
they are moving.
so it's concerning. I'm looking forward to
seeing mixed
use coming in in the future. I
have communicated that with nick and team and everybody.
I move for requested action. Thank you.
>> all right.
we have a motion I
by
commissioner. Seconded by scott. All in favor let it be
known by saying aye.
motion passes. It is unanimous. All
right. We'll move to the next sum.
this is d-4. We'll open the public
hearing on this item.
we're going to call on
the assistant project manager from
our zoning division.
he'll come forward to frame this item.
you're
recognized.
>> thank you, mayor.
I'm james gray, assistant project
manager
with
the zoning division.
here today with the zoning manager.
ift of
representatives from the florida association
of ror ri here
as well. And representatives from
code compliance. I don't
know if we have a representative
from orange county sheriffs office here, but
all
of us are available to answer questions later on.
looking today to propose some chapter
38
zoning code
amendments to bring the county into
compliance
with the senate bill 564,
which requires the county and all
counties and
jurisdictions within florida
to adopt a standard process for reasonable accommodation
requests.
just looking for that power point.
>> so james, is this
the first time --
>> I have, yes.
it's my first time here in front of
the bcc.
>> that's what I thought.
welcome, james.
>> thank you. >> it won't be your last.
it has nothing to do with the fact that the powerpoint won't
come up.
how long have you been in
zoning?
>> zoning, about three and a
half years.
>> so you've been around.
>> then I was in planning for about six months.
>> all right.
you're relatively poised. Usually the first time
people come to
the board of county commissioners, they
are really
nervous.
>> I will say I'm not nervous.
>> all right.
so there we go. We have
a
powerpoint.
>> okay. Once again, just to
address the requirements
of senate bill 954
reasonable accommodations that was
effective
as of july
of this year. So
we'll look at some
background of senate bill 954 requirements.
proposed chapter 38 amendments to
meet those
requirements, and then the requested
action. Senate bill 954
was
effective on july 1st of this year.
it amends section 397. 487 of
florida statutes, which deal with
substance abuse services.
it requires jurisdictions to
adopt an ordinance to establish proceed
juries for the
review and approval of reasonable
acome requests for
certified recovery residences
by january 1st, 2026.
it's important to note here that the
senate bill
is
addressing reasonable accommodations and
only addresses them with regard to
certified recovery residences.
but what you're going to see here
is there's two
distinct concepts at work. There's
that of the
reasonable accommodation and that of
recovery of residences.
so what is a recovery residence?
commonly referred to as a sober living
facility,
where individuals live together as a
family and receive off-site treatment for substance
abuse disorders.
they provide housing to a protected
class, so
all residents are considered to have
a disability under the
fair housing act and the americans
with disabilities act, ada.
so they get all of the same
rights, all of the same
considerations that somebody who
relies on a wheelchair for
mobility, somebody on dialysis, somebody
with
vision impairment, all of those same rights.
local jurisdictions under this bill
are limited in how
they regulate and we're limited because
you're dealing
with a protected class here. And these
facilities
are commonly located in single-family
homes in
residential areas
and neighborhoods. Contrast that against a
certified recovery residence, a recovery
residence
that holds a
valid certificate of compliance and is actively managed by a
certified recovery
residence administrator.
certification is encouraged by the starkts but it is
not mandatory. Certification
is
also conducted through the florida association
of recovery residences.
and farr is the sole
organization that certifies recovery
residences in
florida. With regard to reasonable
accommodation requests, these requests
can cover a
variety of circumstances. We have the one for recovery
residences, which address how the residents
of a ror ri residence are a family
despite
not meeting
the code definitions. A code definition
provides that a family is
two or more related people related
through
blood, marriage, adoption, or no more
than
four
unrelated
people.
typically, the request for accommodation in these
situations is to treat the residents as a family the
same way we would address
any other single family. It allows
a a
greater number of unrelated people
to dwell together in
a single home than would otherwise
be permitted by code. We also get requests for
emotional support
animals,
which allows for types of animals to
be located on a property where they
may not be otherwise be permitted by code.
this applies also
to development standard variances.
if somebody needs to put
up a
wheelchair ramp it might encroach into the setback, a
reasonable accommodation would cover that as well.
the current process, which is not
codified, but it is the
process that we currently have requires a cover letter
that
states the nature and purpose of the reasonable accommodation.
what is it and why do you need
it. Depending on the request, there
might be additional
documentation such as a floor plan, a letter from a health
care practitioner, proof of compliance
with the state and
local requirements for licensing and
vaccinating
each emotional support
animal.
those requests then go to the zoning
manager or the county attorney's office
to review the
request and for compliance with the fha and ada.
the zoning manager then issues a letter approving or denying the
request.
senate
bill 954 requires the
county to adopt an ordinance establishing procedures for the
review and approval of reasonable
accommodations. It
only addresses certified
recovery residences only.
it must through this bill establish
a
written
application process. The process may not require
public hearings required by law and
requires kipt sit
with the fair housing amendments act and
the ada.
so here
are the proposed chapter 38
amendments. To amend section 38-140
, which is reserved vacant, to add
a reasonable accommodation process,
which
includes recovery residences, emotional
support animals, and any other
requests for reasonable accommodations.
so the proposed ordinance does not
only address those certified recovery
residences.
it does require certificate fate fist indication or documentation
for recovery residences.
it prohibits fees associated with the request or appeal, but
it does
establish an appeal process because
it's a zoning manager determination
that would go through the board of
zoning adjustment
that
would be a public hearing, but for the
appeal only. The process would largely follow
our existing unofficial
process. So this is not adding a
new use or anything like that. It's just codifying what we're
already doing.
pzc hearing on november 20th, there was
the
ordinance recommended for approval
unanimously
with no changes. And the next steps,
january
1st, 2026, is the effective date of
the ordinance. That
concludes the presentation. I am here and everybody else I
mentioned before is also here to
answer any questions you may have.
>> all right.
standby, james. Do we have anyone
from the public present?
>> we have no speakers registered
for this item.
>> all right. Then
we'll close the public hearing
portion. Before I
go to commissioner for a
motion,
I'll entertain questions or comments from
the board.
>> thank you.
I have a question. Thank you so much
for
the presentation.
I have a
simple question. Okay. How is the county working to
make sure these changes don't cause
any delays to project
getting approved since there are
already developers feel like it takes too
long?
>>
I don't know I understand the question.
>> with
all the
changes, will this be --what will
cause
delay in the projects?
>> so commissioner,
I think that your question is maybe
somewhat
unrelated to the ordinance
itself. So this isn't really going
to impact any
developers at all. Typically what
we get for reasonable accommodations
are
existing single-family homes wrrks a business just want thes
to move in and operate a
recovery residence in those single-
family
homes. This actually is an administrative process.
so if anything, it's going to make the process
faster. There's no
public hearing process. All of that.
does that answer your question?
>> yes, thank you.
>> all right. Commissioner?
>> how are we currently
handling these? We have always been
very
responsive to assist people who may
need
help.
I have known you fwies have got on the phone with
applicants and people. Is this
something extraordinary for us.
I know someone with an emotional animal and they got help.
currently, we're already
helping individuals that may need
some
additional systems who are like that.
if you could share more.
>>
yeah we are. In the last three
years, we have had 12 or 13 requests
for reasonable accommodation for
certified recovery residences. We're
also evaluating the reasonable accommodation
request
for the emotional support animals.
those don't always get approved depending
on the
animal, but with
the
certified
recovery residences, 13 approved in the
last three years.
there are the not certified recovery residences as well.
sometimes they don't come in the way they should depending on how
the house. This is something we're
already doing.
all this bill is requiring is to actually
put it in
the code the process.
>> that's what I
was getting
at. I was always known us to be very
responsive to
people who need assistance. And
I know the commissioner asked if it's going to change
anything in the process. You said it
actually would help move this along.
so would a
person have to come and identify themselves
as
needing
special accommodations? Can you run us through a
typical scenario of a constituent
that would
be coming in?
>> sure. The only ones that I
have received since I have worked
here a little
over eight years are requests
for emotional support animals or requesting
for
recovery
residences. And usually it starts
with the code
of compliance. Someone calls in and says my
neighbor has a goat or a chicken or
whatever.
and they say this is my emotional
support
animal. If you're asking
for reasonable accommodation, you
need
to submit the documentation as a result of that.
so we ask them to send a letter in
to
me explaining
what they are asking for in the case of
emotional support animals, we ask
that they identify what
each animal -- we ask that a health
care practitioner identifies what
each animal does
for the individual. Each animal has
to be an
emotional support animal for that
person. It
can't
just be I have 50 chickens and I want to have them
all. So the practitioner has to specifically
outline
typically the animals have
names. Usually they are cute. And
so
they outline what chuck does for the individual, and
then I consult with the county
attorney's office to confirm they
are meeting those
standards of the fair housing act.
and then I write them a letter
back saying we're giving you this reasonable accommodation.
with recovery
residences, it's typically a similar
thing where either
someone
just knows if it's a company that's done it
before
they come in and ask. Then it's a similar thing.
they provide a letter. They provide
us documentation. And then I consult
with the county attorney's
office and we write them
a letter backing. The difference here is we're
codifying the process so that people actually know there is a
process.
so before it was kind of like, oh,
I don't know what to do or how to
do it
or whatever. We're actually putting it in
the code
now so it's clear for anyone who might
want the to
utilize that process.
>> perfect.
thank you.
>> just while I'm here, one point of clarification.
the effective date of
the ordinance is not january 1st.
it will
likely become effective prior to january
1st. I'm guessing
about 10
to 15 days after the adoption of the public
hearing. Once we receive it from the
state,
but I think it's about 10 to 15 days.
>> commissioner scott?
>> I just had a quick question. If
someone made a
complaint reference to
code violation,
you were going to investigate and
meet with the practitioner or thought
the appropriate paperwork gets approved.
what
follow-up is done with me as the complaint and what is
shared with me? Do I know they have
an accommodation?
how does that work? I'm just trying
to
understand from a hipaa stand point.
I
make the complaint.
>> point of clarification. I do not go
and investigate. I'm looking
back to
them because I'm not sure what they do when
they close out complaints if they
notify
the
applicant or not megan, would you mindment coming
and speaking to that and what it is they notify?
>> I did know you were going to
come up here today.
>> megan
marshal. Your question was if the --
>> I made
the complaint -- in team you get notice
from a
health provider they have accommodation.
what's being told?
>> as the person
that made
the call, you would be told that the
property was placed based off a
reasonable accommodation. We're not
getting into any of
the
hardship a pa rules rules violations.
everything we do is public
record, so the letter that the county attorney's
office writes
is --I don't want to say
vague, but you're
stating that the information provided by the
health provider was found to be in
conjunction with
the law, so tlrvegs there's a reasonable
accommodation for the goats, chickens,
that would be
at that specific property. That's why we'd close the case
based on that.
>> with
this ordinance, does it apply
county wide inclusive of
the municipalities?
>> no,
it does not. Is and you
may -- I don't know if you get other municipalities
or not,
but I have been
seeing quite a few agendas of
local municipalities adopting a similar ordinance
because state law requires them all to be
effective by january 1st.
>>
okay. All right. Any other questions
or
comments? If there
are
none.
>> so moved. >> second. >> all
right.
commissioner made the motion.
all in favor?
>> aye. >> motion passes.
it is unanimous.
all right. With that, we
really do not have any other business before us
this afternoon.
so we stand adjourned.