CA-26-5014

Every appearance1 of 1 are in a recording

TranscriptWhat was said at each appearance is below it. Machine transcription, with speaker names inferred from voice matching. 45% of 40 lines carry a name. It shows what was said, not what was decided, and both the words and the names can be wrong.

1. 1Mar 10, 2026
   Board of County CommissionersR47Regular businessNo disposition in the minutes

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   Jack MarianoChair

   48:10Now we'll go to the regular agenda, R47.

   Seth WeightmanVice Chair

   48:20Here, I feel like we need to leave this item with some music.

   Jack MarianoChair

   48:24They're gonna get

   Seth WeightmanVice Chair

   48:25your music set?

   Jack MarianoChair

   48:27Mm-hmm. Leave it with the Battle of the Bands without music? Music to kick this out in mind. I can

   Unidentified speakerVoice A

   48:33only

   Jack MarianoChair

   48:33do so much.

   Unidentified speakerVoice B

   48:37He's he's on to that with cannons. Uh good morning, Commissioners. Uh Sean McGarvey, Libraries Director. I am joined today by some of the representatives from the county who have worked on this. If you will recall, a few sessions ago, uh you had asked to see the slate of events that we would be doing for the 250th celebration of America. Uh we're proud to stand before you and uh show you this. So I'll go over some of this in this slide. I would also like to thank some of the members of this team that

   49:07are here today. One behind me, Elaine Smith. Uh second, Christina Cordon with Parks. Behind them, Our city manager for Dade City as one of the members and the Daughters of the American Revolution who have been instrumental in helping put this on. So they told me you're not supposed to put a lot of words in PowerPoints, but they didn't say you can't put pictures with a lot of words in there. So uh what we plan to highlight in these events are fireworks. We plan to have a speaker series as well as live music, food vendors,

   49:37and games and prizes across all of them. These are all free to attend. Parking may be charged at certain locations depending on the location, but all events are free to the public. Yeah. So What we plan to do to advertise and get the word out. Social media, local radio, our website will be featuring these events starting actually as soon as this presentation is finished. And podcasts as well as physical media at all of the events leading up to the next events.

   50:10We're going to kick off the events by starting with our library's Great American Farmers Market at Starkey Ranch. I'm very excited about this one. This is the first year we've ever participated. We plan to have many vendors as well as an entire agricultural theme, presentations from Cooperative Extension, as well as multiple vendors and More giveaways and prizes than I could shake a stick at. Secondly, we plan to do fan uh Starkey Ranch Family Day, which is our major touch-a-truck event

   50:41with a special uh piece that has just come into this, which is We have just been notified that we will be one of the recipients of the Freedom Truck, which is an Institute of Museum and Library Science Mobile Museum celebrating America's birth. Yes, that is going to be stationed at our Family Day. We are one of two or three locations in the state of Florida that is hosting this. We're very excited about it. And then our Orlando Lakes. Library

   51:11will be having our America's Birthday Bash, which on July 1st, which will be vendors, games, food trucks, prizes, story times, uh in that rec complex and library. So Parks and Recreation is putting on two major events. We are having the Great American Backyard Bash at Wesley Chapel Library with bands, food, district park, sorry. It just opened. Uh with bands and food and other uh and other amenities,

   51:42as well as Scallop Fest at Sunwet's 4th of July celebration. Uh that's going to have fireworks, bands, and uh different booths across the board. We have been planning that with Commissioner Mariano and Sir Toma. Uh we're very excited about that one as well. The city of Zephyrhills is holding two events and working with us. They're having their Kids Fest 250th celebration and their Summerfest on June 27th. This is going to take place in Main Street and then

   52:12Zephyr Park. They plan to have fireworks at these locations or at one of these locations for the Summerfest. We are very excited to be working with them on this. Uh the city of Newport Ritchie is holding their annual June 27th Red, White, and Blue Hometow Extravaganza. That is in Sims Park. It is a big thing they do every year. We are planning to advertise and work with them. They're working with us on this one. We're very excited about that. Dade City is doing an East Pasco celebrates America's 250th

   52:43birthday, and this one's going to be fun. So the Daughters of the American Revolution is planning to put on uh readings of the Declaration of Independence from the local school children, as well as having bands and contests, as well as a fife and drum core in period costume. God help those people wearing wool in June or July. We're also going to have fireworks with them. This has been worked out today that we'll be having fireworks nearby in Burks Park, and that will allow us to have two simultaneous

   53:14events for Dade City. We thank the city manager and the team for working with us on that. We're also having a speaker series at our theater in Starkey Ranch. We are going to feature three major speakers who have spoken with us before, but have always been really amazing and kind of sum up a lot of the greatness of America. We are having Nicole Stott, who is a local astronaut. She lives in St. Pete. She's also an artist. She's the first one who ever painted in space, which is really amazing. Max Stone, who Is a

   53:44wildlife photographer and National Geographic explorer and author, as well as Connor Knighton, who is a CBS Sunday morning correspondent. Connor has visited every national park in America. He wrote a really amazing book about it. You'll see a theme that they're all authors at the library. And we are really excited to have all of these over the month of June.

   54:06Following up is just basically this list of events. As you can see, we've pretty much stacked the deck starting in May, running all the way up to July fourth, where there will be two events, one on the east side and west side of the county, to make sure that we have fireworks across the board for all of us. Uh I cannot thank and this we, the department cannot thank enough the civ city of Zephyrhills, Dade City, Newport Ritchie, Wesley Chapel, the DAR, the Friends

   54:37of the Library who are helping sponsor a lot of this, Surtoma, the Sheriff's Office who has been helping us with uh lots of vehicles for touch-a-trucks and also security, as well as the county's chief of staff. over there who has been instrumental in helping us uh put together the pieces for all of this. So with that presentation complete, are there any questions we can answer about current upcoming events? Mr. Stark.

   Kathryn Starkey

   55:01I'm I'm really glad that we got this going. Couple of questions. You know, we're an unincorporated county pretty much. We don't have the big cities. I love it in the cities when they put out the banners, you know, on Main Street and whatever the little flags. Is it possible we could consider putting some flags on Major intersections on some of the poles that commemorate

   Unidentified speakerVoice B

   55:28I can speak to Roden Bridge about that, ma'am. I do not know the legality or rules on that, but I can get back to you.

   Kathryn Starkey

   55:36But you can't do it from there.

   55:40But I I I would love that ability to to uh As long as it's in our

   Unidentified speakerVoice C

   55:45right-of-way, I wouldn't see a problem with it.

   Kathryn Starkey

   55:48You know, maybe I know we can't line all the streets, but maybe some of our major intersections we can celebrate 'em. It's a big deal, two hundred and fifty years. I think we should put some flags out. I love that. And w and we should go ahead and put 'em out so everyone knows it's coming.

   Unidentified speakerVoice D

   56:03I'm Karen Gaskin. I am the chair of the Ukabuk Sassa Chapter DAR America 250 Committee. And I live in Dade City, [address removed]. Anything else I'm posted? You want my name, rank, and serial number right. The Echo Books Asset Chapter has sponsored twenty flags to be hung on the lampposts on down Meridian Avenue in Dade City. Yeah to feature

   Kathryn Starkey

   56:32but the county doesn't

   Unidentified speakerVoice D

   56:33to to feature our Patriots as well as around the courthouse. We are working with the city and hopefully with the county to get flags and lamppost decorations for that as well. We have submitted a um permit request to use the courthouse steps for our celebration on the fourth of July. July. So we intend to decorate all of that stuff.

   Kathryn Starkey

   56:58And I I'm sure I would think New Port Richey, I would think Zephyrhills is, but we need to do something.

   Jack MarianoChair

   57:05I will agree with that and I think it's something we should probably not only do for this year, but for future years around the fourth of July anyway. I mean we're a big veterans community. We're very patriotic. I think it's something we can start this to be the trend, but I think You know, especially our materials coming in, maybe some certain areas like into the New Portie Government Center coming in, as well as around here especially. But uh I d I think it's definitely something maybe Mike could put a plan together and bring something back for us. But I think it'd be a great way to do what you what you've done here is is phenomenal. Yeah. Um I I I greatly appreciate

   57:36we had had the this is the third year of the Scarlet Fest, so we had booked for the first time to do it right before in the start of the season. Um and in doing so they said we want to do the two hundred and fifty celebration. So I will say that we're still gonna be funding everything that we do out there other than the fireworks or taking care of that and the team. So with that said, it's very inexpensive to add this into that mix and we're very very delighted. I believe it's gonna be just phenomenal. We got Beach volleyball, sand soccer. Um it's gonna be a phenomenal phone event out there.

   Unidentified speakerVoice D

   58:06I have I have an America 250 pen I'd like to give each of you if that's a good idea.

   Unidentified speakerVoice C

   58:14Yeah then it goes in the record.

   Kathryn Starkey

   58:18Thank you so much. Thank you.

   Unidentified speakerVoice B

   58:21As for the ban uh the banners on roadways, we will talk with the County Chief of Staff and our Road and Bridge Director and see what we can do.

   Kathryn Starkey

   58:28And certainly at every library.

   Unidentified speakerVoice B

   58:30Yes ma'am. Very good.

   Jack MarianoChair

   58:33Very cool. Any thoughts, questions? Well fantastic. Thank you very much. And um, you know, only thank you for close closely what you do with the county, but work with Surtoma. They made the Scholar Fest happen, so their participation is great. And uh In my committee reports, I'm going to talk about the steps for recovery. They're so close to opening that building up, it looks phenomenal out there.

   58:56Thank you all very much. Appreciate it.