Commissioner Fitzpatrick Ridge Road and water workshop

1:24:36Thank you. I as I did take a tour as well with David Engelman, um, of District Four Engels. It's been a long day already. Um so I have follow I have followed up with some businesses, visited some businesses and followed up with the landscape grant with some of them as well. I did want to bring up the Ridge Road extension and I think we have some photos as some are aware and hopefully everyone else is aware that the Ridge Road extension ha is open as of New Year's

1:25:07Eve. It's very nice and a very quick drive and the speed limit's about thirty five miles an hour, I believe.

1:25:17Speed limit. That's a construction speed limit. There will be another speed limit once we're done with construction.

1:25:22Speed limit as for now.

1:25:25Um it's a one lane each direction all the way into the Sun Coast Parkway up until the summer of next year. Then it will be a four lane highway, two lanes each direction all the way to the Sun Coast Parkway and then to Sun Lake and then hopefully well then by twenty twenty five. It will go all the way to 41. And then, of course, with the funding request with from the board and Commissioner Moore and myself and everyone. the $14 million funding request. Hopefully we can get the Ridge Road

1:25:56extension completed by twenty twenty four. If you go back to the one Of course, we have the county has taken precautionary measures and to help accommodate the wildlife and there are the trails that you can sit and observe the scenery. And if you can go back to the other one.

1:26:20There are many

1:26:23Um crossings right back there. Um, where the wildlife can cross underneath and there was a lot of mitigation of the wetlands to make sure that they were not disturbed going through this process. And I believe we will be having a news release to go out. to talk about the conservation of the land. Next, I would like to mention the light of the night.

1:26:55That was a human trafficking event on January 22nd from 6 to 8 at the Shops of Wiregrass. That is an annual event to help raise awareness for human trafficking. And lastly, I would like to acquire inquire about workshops. There are some items that have been brought up previously and I would like to discuss those. And I know I cannot discuss them behind the scenes due to sunshine.

1:27:26So I would like to know how we can

1:27:35What's the subject matter?

1:27:38Well we have

1:27:41Because I do plan to have some.

1:27:43We have septic to sewer. And if we have septic to sewer and that specific community that benefits from septic to sewer is the one that has to take the burden and pay. Then if septic to sewer, if they are going from another water system to sewer, then that community should be. still having to cover the cost. And I'm concerned with if we're

1:28:13gonna buy out certain water systems and it's gonna go from a hundred dollars a month down to sixty dollars a month, then I don't feel the whole county should have to cover the costs for their water bill to drop $40 when the average water bill for the county is eighty-three dollars and fifty cents. At least the community should have to cover a portion of the costs to acquire, at least so they're paying the average water bill of the county.

1:28:40Well uh let's not get into specifics, but let's I think um when it comes back to me

1:28:49um s maybe generate some um ideas amongst us of I mean I don't wanna have one every month but there's a few that I'm interested in having and And maybe what I'll do is have you guys give me a list of subjects that you would like to dive in deeper and See if we can Um go forward.

1:29:11It's really this specific topic because it's also within the city of Newport Ritchie servicing area.

1:29:17I think that's a big topic. And I think the legislature's taking that up. And I think the federal government's taking it up.

1:29:22See, Madam Chair, yeah, see what happens, Commissioner. Just See what happened there's a bill out there, a subject to sewer bill. Might be good to see what the outcome of that is because that's going to obviously drive what we do here probably as a body in the future to see what the outcomes are

1:29:38of that bill. And I would say I would want to bring it um that's also a federal issue. And there's federal money, so that's One of the workshops I am interested in having is you know, maybe some some ideas on uh And using our federal lobbyist better. And so maybe that gets lumped into as one of the topics after the session. I agree. that we talk about. So Um

1:30:04But how many water systems are failing that the counties are gonna have to acquire and then the What the all of the county citizens are gonna have to increase their water bill to compensate.

1:30:18Yeah.

1:30:19So septic to sewer wouldn't be potable water

1:30:24Okay, I was using as an example from septic to sewer as a basis. If you're doing I was using as an analogy, if you have septic to sewer or a failing water system to sewer, it's really kind of the same concept. We're still converting from one water system to a different water system.

1:30:48But your concern is po potable water systems, not

1:30:52My more my concern is purchasing this water system. And then of course it's going to be another precedent. So we purchase this water system. And then there's two more. If we increase the Rate of the water bill two percent now, and then there's two more water systems we're gonna have to buy out and then increase everybody's water bill another two percent, and then continuously how many more water systems in the county are we gonna have to continuously buy and increase everybody's water system in the whole county? Yeah,

1:31:22yeah.

1:31:22I know you weren't here on the board when we went through this um

1:31:25quite a bit. It's the thirty million dollars. I'm concerned about that that we're spending. With the ARP funds.

1:31:31Yeah. I I will tell you if you go back to two thousand four when I was first elected, we had all Alohao, Lindrick, um other water companies that were just citizens came forward showing black baby tubs loaded with silt. They showed us the with the water they had to deal with. Never mind the chemicals that were in there and then maybe the the health issues that were for these people uh that we went through. And frankly we set up a committee. And I was M M F Commissioner Oakley, I was gonna be on that committee. I wasn't there

1:32:01for one meeting We had people from the private industry, private. public industries, uh, even the water companies themselves. We walked in and after the first meeting gets started. Um Michelle Baker was the assistant county administrators of Michelle. I said, I think you get the right people in the room. I want these people to go talk about what solutions they can come up with and bring us back a recommendation. That's how the committee was set and gone. And I stepped away. They came back with the recommendation for the FGUA to be the one system that could work. It's good possibly

1:32:31make this happen. So our people. The way the laws are written uh it's very hard for utility. I mean part of the reason these people are paying super high rates Is the PSC, the Public Service Commission, up in Tallahassee, is allowing these rates to go up and up and up. They're saying they were entitled to a rate of return. They have these standards that are in place. that you could have terrible water and still get a good rate of return. The penalty's like one percent? you know, on different things. Uh to get something unsatisfactory

1:33:01was brutal for these people. So the reason they're in these situations is 'cause the county didn't, frankly, and we couldn't have at the time because we were still growing utilities, but we didn't We're not able to take over all the systems from the get go. Hillsboro County had a whole bunch of them that they they they had troubles with. They went through and they took them all over. And those people are in great shape now. I think with some company on us to protect the people that we serve. I mean with people down And holiday that I have. Commissioner Starkey I know you're working on the poisonous water down there that's going through

1:33:32that that got bad wealth. So I will tell you for the people that have suffered, that are paying high rates, et cetera, I am s so proud of what this commission has done to make these steps. I'm so thrilled with our legislators getting behind us to help take take these systems over. And the ones we haven't taken over, at least we've helped them like we did with SummerTree, where they were gonna get in slammed with more rates. So I'm gonna tell you the approach we're taking is good for all the citizens because when you've got one area of a county that is getting hammered, it makes it look bad for the rest of us.

1:34:02Why would we let that happen? So I think what we've done and what we're doing is the right approach. And I think we need to stay the course as far as let's keep on making this better for everybody.

1:34:11Yeah, and I agree, Commissioner Mariano, and I you know, I wasn't on board at first. Um But um and I had Aloha Water. Uh, I would turn on the bathtub and black rocks would come out when I went to give my kids a bath. My my my twins. It was horrible. Um and um and I know uh Senator well Um I don't know what we should call him. Mr. Fasano, he has a lot of titles. Uh, you know, was instrumental in help setting up FGUA.

1:34:42Um, and that is one route that many areas took to purchase these private Water companies. Um took on a lot of debt and And um those citizens have extremely high water rates. And um we we've ha we have some residents here in the county that have the higher squater rates in the state of Florida. And and m my issue with some of these um And it eases that They get to go raise their water rates, but they don't have to put

1:35:13the money into into the capital. So it's just this. ongoing. hole that these people are in. So this board after a lot of deliberation, a lot of study, Decided to embark on a path. of slowly purchasing out the pri these utilities from FGUA. And if you look around the state And when you go to FAC, you can talk to different counties, Sarasota, Manatee, others who have didn't

1:35:43even go the FGUA route and just went ahead and bought the bulletins, bought them up. Uh you know, every few years they would buy one and they don't have any of these private water utilities in their counties anymore. But We have um I think five. Does FGUA have five?

1:36:00Well right now they're still Lindric. There's

1:36:02because we we bought one. We already that this board um took, and I don't know if Mike wants to speak to this, but was to um I think we took we started with the smallest. And we were gonna work our way up. And the thought was we start with the smallest. Um and the residents would help absorb um the costs. And as we grew, that um that um absorption rate was was uh

1:36:32helped by more residents, and so the impact was. Um do you want to speak, Mike? This is your department. So we we really did a lot of work on this. And we said we were gonna do one about every two or three years. And frankly, we're behind on the Lindric. Go ahead. Yes.

1:36:49Just for the edification of the board, we are bringing the Lindric item forward at the next board meeting in New Board Ritchie. So the the the direction that the board gave to the utility team was Um up to a 2% increase, rate increase to absorb these systems and and or find new money. Because as you point out, the the issue is with the debt.

1:37:10Yeah.

1:37:11Um, you know, not necessarily the operations and maintenance. Those things can kind of be worked out, but it is the debt. Well.

1:37:17Okay. So while you're up here. So we've already acquired Jasmine and there was an increase in two percent. of the water bill. And then next is the Landric property. And then probably eight to ten years they were looking to Trinity. And then after that was Lando Lakes. Right now we're looking at

1:37:37Yeah. Can you please tell me what the four um suggestions, the four original recommendations, and then tell me what the staff recommendation, what final staff recommendation was?

1:37:50So I I mean certainly, I mean that was uh you know part of the part of the board record.

1:37:55I know what they are. Okay. So

1:37:57yes, they were they we we we recommended a rate increase. There was a the the four four options I think that were brought to the board and I'm going from memory here. One was uh the two percent.

1:38:08Yeah. You know what? Priscita wants to go over this information that's already been voted on and approved on, et cetera. Let her have a one on one. I agree.

1:38:15I already know the information because this is what I need a workshop on. So

1:38:18this is really not the time or place to have this um discussion so we can bring it back Um, but we're not gonna get to our commissioner items and we're getting way into way too much detail on something that we weren't scripted to talk about today. So if you wanna have a discussion. Um, we can bring this back under an R item.

1:38:39Well there is a item on the 25th agenda.

1:38:42I would like to have this discussion or a workshop prior to that meeting. Well that's

1:38:47that's a no for me.

1:38:49Yeah.

1:38:50You can ask him any

1:38:51questions you want at the meeting.

1:38:59Do

1:38:59you

1:38:59have an anything else? Thank you. We'll we'll get into it

1:39:01next

1:39:01week. Um do you have anything else under Commissioner?

1:39:04Well, I do know I would like to discuss there were the of four options. There was a two percent increase, there was a one percent increase and a twenty five percent surcharge. There was a capital investment or infrastructure investment.