Penny for Pasco referendum appreciation resolution
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It is a stretch of the recording that this archive identified as a separate matter — a call to order, a recess, or something taken up that the agenda does not list. There is no official title, no staff recommendation and no disposition, because the county never recorded one. Everything below is inferred.
The source document
The county’s agenda for Board of County Commissioners, Jan 24, 2023
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The county’s minutes for Board of County Commissioners, Jan 24, 2023
The published PDF, as served by the county. This item is one entry in it.
What was said
Machine transcription of 15m of recording, with speaker names inferred from voice matching. 68% of 66 lines carry a name. It shows what was said, not what was decided, and both the words and the names can be wrong.
And Madam Clerk, the next resolution?
University of Washington.
So
Is anyone here? Uh Pasco Citizens Committee?
Come on up.
All right, Penny for Pasco referendum. If you're here, please step up to the podium.
Mm-mm.
Well.
Oh no brave soul to be at the front.
All right.
Well I'll go ahead and read the resolution you guys can work out who's gonna stand at the mic.
Resolution number twenty three dash zero five nine a resolution by the board of county Commissioners of Pasco County, Florida, expressing appreciation to the Pasco Citizens Committee for their efforts and hard work promoting the Penny for Pasco referendum. Whereas the Pasco Citizens Committee is a group of volunteers from across Pasco County from every political affiliation, each with a long-term commitment to and involvement in civic and charitable activities, who bonded together for love of the Pasco County. Community with the vision of ensuring
that the high quality of life for existing and future residents of Pasco County will be secured. And RAS, to accomplish this purpose, the Pasco Citizens Committee dedicated itself to the issues related to the Penny for Pasco referendum and educated and informed the citizens of Pasco County on the need for improved educational opportunities, new schools to reduce overcrowding. Transportation improvements to address traffic congestion, improving tr public safety, acquiring environmentally sensitive lands, and building new
infrastructure. ANRAS, the Pasco Citizens Committee, lead the effort to promote the Penny for Pasco referendum by fund uh by fundraising, writing, publishing, and distributing educational literature, and attending and speaking at public meetings and discussion forums, and whereas collectively the following members of the Pasco County Citizens Citizens Committee spent countless hours working on the Penny for Pasco initiative, Michael Cox, Ray Gadd, Bruce Mills, Beth Frager, David
Grooms, Diane Jones, Betsy Kuhn, Jennifer Motzinger, Stu Gibbons, Jennifer Sen Sene, Sene? Seney. I knew I had that wrong. Jennifer Seney. Chris Williams. Oh. Bill Setowski?
Steve Haggerty, Barbara Wilhide, Ralph Lair, and Francis Warner Watkins. Hmm, I did it. Whereas the electors of Pasco County approved the Penny for Pasco referendum on November eighth, twenty twenty-two, and therefore the quality of life in Pasco County will be greatly enhanced for present and future Pasco County residents. Now, therefore, be it resolved by the Board of County Commissioners of Pasco County, Florida, in regular regular session, duly assembled, that said board hereby expresses their gratitude. And appreciation
to the members of the Pasco Citizens Committee for their efforts, time, energy, and spirit, resulting in the successful. Penny for Pasco referendum. Dunna resolved this twenty fourth day of January twenty twenty three.
Move from
Oh yeah. Second.
All in favor say aye. Aye. Well good morning everybody. Um It's really uh an honor to be sponsoring this resolution and I know all of you and know uh all the hard work you did to uh make this come to fruition and I don't think the citizens of Pasco County can truly appreciate how important this is for all of us, for the school district, for the cities, for the county. Um the work that's done with
this money. Definitely uh highly increases our quality of life and we are just so grateful that you private citizens stepped up and um and helped make this such a great success. So I'm sure my fellow commissioners have words as well. Commissioner Oakley.
Um Well job well done guys 'cause uh at look looking when you start a campaign like you did, you you never know the result, but This is one of the best. tax issues that we have in Pasco County. It does so much for our county and infrastructure and other things for for all of us, all of our citizens. So we've got to be very thankful for all of our citizens actually voting this in. in in that election. So Uh but a job well done from your committee
and we certainly appreciate all you do. Okay. Commissioner Weightman?
Thank you.
Like Commissioner Oakley said, campaigns are never easy. And every single one of you come from a different background and expertise. And thank you all for lending that to such an important initiative. Uh we see other counties that aren't as fortunate to have the support that our Penny does. And you can see a difference in a quality of life that's there. So thank you all for for being passionate and getting getting behind and supporting such an important issue, a quality of life issue for our county and uh
thank you all for for joining the campaign circuit like we do and um congratulations, thank you. Okay. Commissioner Bradford.
Well done. Well done.
You all did an incredible job and to echo my fellow commissioners' uh sentiment down there uh campaigning's never easy. But uh unit guys did a dr great job. And what I like about How we structure this is it's accountable to the taxpayers. We know where the money's raised from and we know where it's going in. We and it's our responsibility to spend it wisely. So I just wanna say thank you again and appreciate each and every one of you.
Yeah. I like to say again, great job. Um and you know, it it came from the campaign, but I think the base work that was done for spending the money the right way, putting the right projects in from environmental, uh first responders, economic development now for the past two I think we had we hit all the chords that the people want us to to go. And I think as long as we keep working together to spend it the right way, doing the right things it'll keep going. But again it always takes a great campaign and kudos for you guys for stepping up and and helping make
it happen.
Yeah, so last night I passed by um Golf High School. And the uh elementary school, I can't remember which one it what is is it Ritchie Elementary which is the one out there by the hospital? Yeah, so I I passed by um the schools that one that was renovated and one that is being renovated. And Um it's it's just such a good feeling to drive by those schools and see them getting updated like that.
part of the school district money has gone to is renovating those schools. And of course, y'all know I love my trails. And um the enjoyment that and and the relief that our county got during COVID to be able to get out on those Penny for Pasco funded trails. was Immense. I mean we had people coming here from other counties to be able to get out and and recreate um freely and safely. And of course transportation. And the uh the improvements
that we've made with this penny on transportation. Um I'm not sure everybody has has touched uh uh understands all those intersections and improvements that we made. Um and of course the environmental lands acquisition. But I I did want to answer one thing because we we've been getting requests about oversight committee, and I know we have an oversight committee at the school district where I I used to be there. But I just wanted the public and you all to rest assured that we do have oversight committees. We don't have one big one. but we have
one for each pot of money. And so we we are making sure that our money is being spent um the way it was intended and just want you to be comfortable knowing that we we have our committees. So Okay, shall we hand these out? Yeah. Oh yeah, you guys can speak for sure. All of you, three minutes. Now you
want to get to the
mic.
Well good morning commissioners and uh wanna s first say thank you to the committee for everything that they did. They worked very, very hard in this campaign. And um You know, there was a time when having lived in this county for fifty three something years, um I remember when the first half cent penny was proposed and it failed. And when the f the current penny, actually the f very first penny. um past
very slim margin. Because there was a lot of opposition to that penny. When it came up for renewal that first time There was a theme, and that was the fact that the school board, the cities, and the county made a promise to the citizens, and that promise was kept on how they were going to spend that money and they were very, very good stewards of those dollars. That continued through what is now the
current penny and the renewal that will take in effect in a few years. We hope that that's a good idea. that promise is kept and it continues to to be there. Um I also wanted to recognize Ralph Lair. He he wasn't on the resolution because he's w one of your uh indentured servitudes here working for the county. But um he was it played a big part in it and I wanna thank him very much. Uh You know what Commissioner Starkey, you mentioned the Oversight Committee. As
a committee, um we met and decided that, you know, because we renewed the penny for fifteen years that um it was probably a good idea to shut it down, shut our committee down, stop having to m file all the reports for stuff that, you know, we're not raising any money at this point or anything like that. And basically be prepared to hand the torch off to that next generation of folks that are gonna step up. Um, all of us here other than a couple of of them, the we're getting
old and we're probably o we're probably over this, right? These this campaign stuff. We're gonna leave it to these younger folks. But we need to develop uh that next group of advocates for the for the penny. Right. And that was the impetus of the letter that I sent to Chairman Mariano and copied you all on uh requesting that you really focus on doing three things. Uh the first thing is to develop The staff Yeah. Advocates. That
you don't let the staff take it for granted that that funding source is always going to be there because there's a chance that it may not. Um But the staff does a good job. We want them to continue to do a good job and that the there's good advocates there that are telling the public about it. Uh we do believe that there should be a specific oversight uh of the penny for the the dollars that are spent in the county similar to what The uh the school board does. I've actually heard from a couple of cities that are looking to maybe put
something like that in place as a result of that. Because we sent this the exact same letter to the cities as well and also the school board. And then the third thing is that we would advocate that you do is to put a sign on everything that the penny pays for. You know whether it's a building. A sheriff's deputy's car or an ambulance, let the public know that their penny is paying for that very important thing. because, you know, I will tell you, I held elected office before the penny came
in. to to the county when I was at the city. And there were times when the police cars wouldn't work because they were old retired F H P cars. So the penny made a world of difference for the quality of life in Pasco County. And we just want to educate the people of that. So thank you for your leadership. Thank you for what you personally did for us, helping us have a successful campaign. And um You know, a big special thanks to the citizens of Pasco County for for approving it and putting
their faith and trust that you'll spend the money wisely. Thank you.
Thank you. I I just wanted to make one more comment, someone that doesn't often get recognized. And long before this penny started, um, I came over here and met with David Goldstein because it's really important to get the technical aspects of a ballot initiative right. As you know in Hillsburg County there's got a challenge. And it's because of this fine attorney that we we tear out the statute books and we make sure that we get the language right, that we got um statutory guidance and uh
that's a credit to David Goldstein for his hard work on behalf of the county. Thank you. Right here, thank you.
Nice. Anyone else? Yeah. Okay, I left out economic development. I don't want Dave Engel to I'm sorry, David. And we love our economic development money and Bill Crown it. And we they've done wonderful things with it.
Yeah, it's all been good. All right. Uh do you want to go down there? We'll stay back up here with so many? Yeah. Okay.
I have only one brain to you. That's gonna go to Michael Cox or
Thank you. Thank you so much.
Hi guys. Good to see you how I'm seeing you.
Jack is still
in the middle of the day.
Yeah,
good to see you.
Oh well, we have more we have more money than we do.
Okay, uh we're getting two. Oh we get here.
Everybody one, two, three, One more. Thank you.
Mm. Okay.
It's impossible.
Speak for yourself, yeah.
Thank you all. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you for
Yeah, well hey you hey you know they have their own.
think
two