Presentation - Kelly Funk - West Market Action Committee Update - No Funding Required

1:33:07Thanks, Chuck. All right, next we have uh Kelly Miller-Funk. My numbers here. Um is that right?

1:33:17Yes, R fifty

1:33:19good morning. R fifty nine. We have a time starting at eleven forty-five, so

1:33:22yes.

1:33:24Okay.

1:33:28Okay. Good morning, Commissioner. It's Kelly Funk with the Pasco County Administrator. Excuse me. I'm here to talk to you today about the West Market area, formerly known as the Harbors. If you remember back in 2021, the Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council developed a plan for the West Market. The commissioners believe that someone other than just the planning department was needed to use to put all the stakeholders, departments, and agencies together for

1:33:59a workable plan of the West Market area. I was brought into county administration at the beginning of this year to be the conduit of the citizens and the internal team. The goal is to obtain actionable items from the West Market Action Committee so that citizens have an elevated voice and the team works in a unified way. This is the West Market. It is consisted of 12 districts. It covers over three commissioner districts. As you can see, we've got current

1:34:29population statistics from the 2020 census.

1:34:36We go from Arapeka to Sunwest Hill to Hudson, Gulfview, Embassy River, Central Spring, Elfers, and then Antlote East and Anclote West. You can see that the river districts and the embassy districts have the highest population. And they did it as well in twenty ten. However, we got an increase of population of about twenty eight thousand seven hundred and eighty four people. So it's a lot of people on the West Side. It's a lot of people that um we

1:35:06service

1:35:09in the county. So this is citizens' concerns from the West Market. These came from our listening sessions that I've held with the citizens and our first meeting from the WMAC.

1:35:22As you can see, one of our biggest concerns is the homeless camps and the pr and mostly on absentee landowner properties. A lot of difficulty there getting it through with the landowner. We have a lack of affordable and workforce housing. We are also fighting against the slum and blight ordinances that were placed last year under S B sixty, which does not allow anonymous calls anymore. So Um we have a need for pocket parks and connectivity,

1:35:53especially to the Anclote River in the E Elfers and the Anclote East Districts, and a cry for quality of life improvements such as more walkable communities, sidewalks, lighting and safety.

1:36:09Challenges in the West Market are very clear when you look at these pictures. Many, many departments are included to solve just this issue. And can not mention state roads. So

1:36:20this picture was taken last

1:36:22month? It was taken last month. And this

1:36:24is off of State Road

1:36:25fifty four. Yes, ma'am.

1:36:26Yeah.

1:36:27There are many other agencies that are also needed just to help the people who have been living on this site. And I do need to interject just here too. Um I had opportunity to travel with Commissioner Mariano and we toured some different types of sites, ones that are actually taking over buildings now, where they uh will go in and turn on the electricity and the water and set up shop in an absent landowner building.

1:36:57This is just a few of the departments that I've worked with so far. About 17 of the county departments and six plus major stakeholders that have come to the table already to volunteer their services. A huge shout out to Code Enforcement and Community Development. They have both been working tirelessly with me to try and get to some of these issues. My role here as the project specialist is to facilitate the interaction of all these departments and stakeholders to create

1:37:27the actionable items and solutions to these issues.

1:37:35So the West Market Action Committee is comprised of volunteers that live here and work here in the West Market. They're community leaders of not-for-profit organizations, HOAs, civic associations, business owners, mental health, real estate, department health, and the sheriff's office. They have to have completed or are enrolled in the Pasco Citizens Academy. We hold our m meetings right now between the Hudson and the Centennial Park

1:38:05Libraries. They are alternating on the second and fourth Wednesdays of the month. At three PM, they are are open to the public. Uh your assistants and aides have already attended a few and are encouraged to continue. And I will be bringing you back a quarterly report when you're here on the west side. So this is the highest calls of service right now. This is what's been going on this year. Um when your office gets a phone call or code enforcement

1:38:35gets a phone call, because of SB60, we can't remain anonymous anymore. So it generates uh what's considered a code sweep. So code sweeps were currently conducted earlier this year in the Hudson and the Anclode East areas, and right now they're concentrating on the embassy and the Alphers districts. These will be where some of the planning department is working in the historical departments or the historical part of the Alphers, and

1:39:05new sidewalks and improvements in such are are also happening. Mm-mm. So we set up a new map. The harbors map isn't really indicative of what's happening at this time, so we've changed it around a little bit. It will show all twelve districts. It's gonna have an overlay layer of project pipeline, all the roads and sidewalks, the trails, the blue ways and the boat ramps, the Go Pasco bus routes. And capital

1:39:36improvement projects are coming soon. They may even already be on there right now. I know he was working on that yesterday.

1:39:45So I look to you if you have any questions or direction.

1:39:49Um

1:39:50does

1:39:51anyone have any questions? I have

1:39:52comments. Go ahead, Commissioner Oakley. Um I got a couple of pictures to show you too. Kelly, this is a business. Matter of fact, uh Harry from from Local Raps is here today.

1:40:03Well we were Over in Leisure Lane. There's an area right on US this right on US nineteen, an old Aaron's furniture place. And take a look at There's activity going on the back side of this here?

1:40:16Is this where we cut down all the trees and stuff in their back?

1:40:20Uh this was an area but this is like this is right on US nineteen. This is an area up beside the local reps business that's a very good thing. Taking over the old minus building from years ago. So th look at all the stuff that's right there. Go ahead and take the next couple of pictures. god. See more more stuff there. What

1:40:35is what is circled in on? I can't tell you. That's a person. That's a person?

1:40:41Yeah, you can see its head.

1:40:46just

1:40:46illustrate that it's it's an active site. People are on a daily basis. Uh

1:40:52Well you can't it's uh public comment. So

1:40:54Yeah, that's okay. Um Kelly you

1:40:56Harry was trying to make it here for public comment, but

1:41:02we get what you're showing.

1:41:03So sh show the next picture I think tells you even more. I mean all the so all the trash there. So they're coming from US nineteen, they're going in the back. Not only this side here, but on the other side. I don't know if you have the other pictures from Leisure Lane as well. Uh it shows where we cleaned out the backside of Lee's Lane on first aisle. They actually come in. Um I had some pictures taken from Tower Drive looking across the water, across Scuba West. And you could see all the burnt out of the easy. Pine trees that are there. So it tells you how close to businesses uh as as well as homes that are out there where

1:41:34the fires were going on that the firefighters had to go out there. So It's a problem of health safety going on. And as everyone remembers from the You know, littering is illegal. Zoning violation is letting anyone used to camp on their property is illegal. uh if you leave any unlawful solid waste Uh it's an unlawful act. Use of public sewers are re public sewers are required, so you can't uh dispose of your a treatment anything but a toilet. accumulated debris and the opening burning is permitted uh is prohibited.

1:42:04So all these violations are going on and on and on and and Kelly I think I thank you for coming out there taking a light uh taking a look at what what was going on to have a little bit of perspective that you had down in the holiday to to see this up here. Um

1:42:19Called me on this when the f when the fires were going on. Uh I just had a conversation with Bird. He owns a vacation lot vacant lot on First Isle South. Meaning the total line at the very end is on Bear Creek. He showed us help publicly in February. Although he is very concerned about the after effects of the trash left behind, His big a concern is how do we stop it? How do we stop the homeless cluster between US nineteen and first owl? Their trespassing and drug use is a great concern to him. He's willing to go to clean up his land once again. He is Orlando feels a

1:42:49victim of all this. How many times do you clean up and post no trespassing signs and have the homeless just do it over and over again? This has been going on for at least ten years. Uh Scott Koeniger lost close to a hundred thousand dollars on his fish farm due to vandalism. Bird showed us the area of the day to cleanup. Bird is in a log knowledgeable about the area. He is hearing, impaired, and talking. The phone is challenging. He would like to speak to you if he could. Um If you can help. And they thank us for help for all the help we're trying to do. But It it it is a problem that we've got to address. Um Tonka to Pat

1:43:19Phillips, one thing we can do is if we do see a violation, uh Pat looked at the law that was passed, Senate Bill sixty, uh and it says that a commissioner can actually put a complaint in. So we can go back to that scenario. But again, for this thing here, we need to find a way to go in there. Get the stuff cleaned up and keep it out. Maybe we look at laws where if you do have violations like this, we we make you remove invasive plants, uh which make it easier from the c to camp in there. Let them go clear out their lots. Uh maybe we need to go put a fencing up there if need

1:43:50be. Uh but maybe Sally, if you want to talk to this, if there's some way we can strengthen our own code team to go out and take care of these issues. I mean we've got some great people on there. Do you have any recommendations of how we can go get this cleaned up and gone?

1:44:06Right. I I do have a time certain. Yeah. Um so we may have to continue this till after lunch. But

1:44:11please Commissioner Sally Sherman, Assistant County Administrator, Development Services. Please know that we are looking, Commissioner, as you know, at the laws and regulations in which we can operate under and we will continue to do that and and bring more focus to, you know, some of the issues you brought out in some emails that were corresponding yesterday. So we will continue to explore and see how we can effect a change in this. area. It is a great concern for all parties involved.

1:44:42Um uh I did want to suggest as we go through our budget, and I can't recall if I brought this up in my budget meeting, but we had talked about maybe a couple of code enforcement officers that were dedicated to commercial Versus residential. Mm might might help maybe. But I don't want um Kelly's work to be only you know dealing with this, so this is a big issue. And um so but we'll we'll talk about this more. Um I did see in that email that discussion um

1:45:12about the contract with the landowners expires every year. I wanna s see if we can't talk with the Sheriff's Office about maybe getting that to three years. Um So um maybe uh one day we'll talk about the rental registry again and and other things. But Kelly, I I'm just so glad we have this effort going. You know, Mary Helen when she was here um was working on this, but it's really too big for one department. Um it's a good idea. the issue of of bre lifting up the West

1:45:43Harbors is got to be a collaboration of our citizens and all the different departments that need need to be involved. So Um really glad for your work.

1:45:53Madam Chairman just a comment before I know we have a time turned. Quick comment. I may talk about this later. I may not, depending on how our our day goes, but We talk about code enforcement. You know We're not always and this is my opinion. We're not always using code enforcement properly. And if we focus on things like this What you just saw there and using code enforcement for that versus what I consider some silly things sometimes we're using code enforcement for. Um and that having to put the sheriff's

1:46:23office out there in certain situations. I don't think they should be in either. We can obviously focus more on on issues just like this. We gotta be more focused and not utilize code enforcement or the Sheriff's Office in ways where that could be taken care of more internally or with staff and other departments itself.

1:46:42The citizens are ready, Commissioner. The citizens are ready. They've stepped up and we've got a nice cross section of people who are, you know, from different viewpoints.

1:46:57So it's really a a tremendous effort uh on this end. Thank you. Thank you.

1:47:01Madam Chairman

1:47:02Mariano

1:47:03because Kazakh in K she doesn't make it back then for later on today, which I will want to discuss this further. Uh Mr. Steinsteiner. These trespass agreements uh right now they're written as a one year. Contract. that expires and then they have a conversation about redoing again, which I think is a A waste of time. It should just be something that we put it in place. It stays in for a no press no trespass agreement. The only change would be if the person reconsiders and doesn't want to do it, or if the property sells.

1:47:32Rather than the other.

1:47:32Or opt out. Let them opt out afterward, or just or if they sell the property, obviously it stops. Is there a way that we, as the code enforcement, can go out there and do these trespass agreements without having the Sheriff's involvement.

1:47:46No.

1:47:46No?

1:47:47Okay. We gotta move on. Okay.

1:47:51So Kelly I'm gonna bring it up later on in my committee report, so if

1:47:54you want to hang out

1:47:55for

1:47:55that

1:47:55afterward,