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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1745 - MINUTES - City Commission MINUTES DANIA BEACH CITY COMMISSION WORKSHOP MEETING AUGUST 27, 2001 1. Call to order— Mayor Flury called the meeting to order at 4:00 p.m. 2. Roll Call: Present: Mayor: Pat Flury Vice-Mayor: Robert Chunn Commissioners: John Bertino C.K. McElyea Bob Mikes City Attorney: Tom Ansbro Acting City Manager: Jason Nunemaker Acting City Clerk: Charlene Johnson 3. Discussion of city-wide master plan improvements for Parks & Recreation. Randy Wilkinson, Parks & Recreation Director, explained that the City has three FRDAP (Florida Recreation Development Assistance Program) grants for improvements to the City's three parks. The Frost Park grant runs until September 2002 and the grants for Thomas and Meli Park begin October and end September 2003. He advised that $300,000 has been budgeted to cover the City's match for two of the FRDAP park grants and that another $1,150,000 has been budgeted for other park improvements for fiscal year 2001-2002. Mr. Wilkinson presented his recommendations for capital improvements at the three parks. Commissioner Mikes mentioned the need to provide funding for improvements to community neighborhood parks and to replace items like tennis courts all on the same schedule plan to obtain the best price possible. He stressed the need to properly plan the improvements and to be careful not to change any uses in unsupervised parks during the Master Plan process that would cause policing problems for local residents. Commissioner Bertino agreed that a Master Plan was needed for the parks and thought staff, civic associations and local residents would be able to provide the necessary input on improvements with very little professional assistance. He recommended that the majority of the $50,000 be used towards facilities and parks. He also inquired as to whether some of the funding would be available for the newly annexed areas. MINUTES 1 AUGUST 27, 2001 WORKSHOP MEETING ® Mayor Flury agreed that a good Master Plan is essential and that the needed input could come from staff and the community so that a Master Plan could be developed for under $20,000. Acting City Manager Nunemaker expected the Master Plan to be a substantial work product that would set forth a Capital Improvement Plan for the parks over the next five years. Mr. Nunemaker advised that the $50,000 would cover surveying and architectural design services for reconstruction of the recreation buildings and that one master design could be used for all of three buildings to save on architectural costs. Mr. Nunemaker suggested that the Master Plan might have the potential for being used as a strategy tool for attracting more grant opportunities and advised that services through FAU on the SeaTech Lease could possibly off-set costs for the visioning process but not for the actual development of plans, which requires more technical expertise. Commissioner Mikes recommended that the City take action to design buildings with a historical theme representing the City's history as a way of being architecturally unique from other cities. In addition, he stressed the importance of providing funding to replace playground equipment at all of the parks to reduce the City's liability exposure. Discussion followed on the need to bid out projects for irrigation, lighting and replacement of tennis and basketball courts all at one time to get a better price ® and a general consensus that all parks be brought up to first quality condition so that improvements would last for some 10 years. The City Commission generally agreed to move forward with improvements, as presented, for Frost Park with the understanding that staff would obtain input from the Optimist Club. In addition, it was agreed that staff would proceed with a master planning process on a smaller scale with assistance from FAU and the members of the Parks, Recreation and Community Affairs Board. Acting City Manager Nunemaker was asked to contact the homeowner associations from the newly annexed area to encourage appointments on City boards. 4. Continued discussion on the City Manager's Proposed FY 02 Operating Budget: a) Report on revisions from second Budget Workshop Dave Keller, Finance Director, explained that action by the City Commission in the first two budget workshops reduced the proposed General Fund budget to $1,146,000.00 with smaller amounts in the Water and Sewer Fund Budgets for a total reduction of$1,183,000. The reduction changed the proposed millage rate from 6.815 to 6.1999. MINUTES 2 AUGUST 27, 2001 WORKSHOP MEETING b) Capital Improvement Projects Dave Keller, Finance Director, explained that the $1,150,000 was the amount to cover the outlay of funds upfront for the Swim Central Grant pool at Patrick J. Meli Park and other significant improvements at all of the parks. Mr. Keller explained that the City was able to determine with Broward County that grant funds can be obtained on a partial draw down or reimbursement basis. Mr. Keller explained that the amount budgeted could be used for reconstruction of the recreation buildings at the three parks. In regards to funding the debt service, Mr. Keller mentioned that he contacted two banks about obtaining a Line of Credit that could be extended for one year. After one year, the City would refinance a long-term debt loan with the bank. The City Commission was not favorable to the Line of Credit and Mr. Keller advised that there were many financing options available. Commissioner Mikes recommended that the City operate more like a business and that employee benefits provided for the Fire Department need to be carefully reviewed because costs for the department appear to be 50% higher per capita compared with Hollywood. Commissioner Mikes mentioned that State mandated pension benefits also impose a financial burden on the City and the City must be in the financial situation to fund the benefits in the future. He stressed the importance of ensuring that efficient service is being provided to taxpayers based on the high costs. Mr. Keller clarified that the City must pay a percentage of the amount of total employee salaries in both pension funds regardless of how well or how poor the stock market does with the pension investments and that payment is also determined by the results of the annual actuarial reports that are completed on each pension plan. Commissioner Mikes was concerned that the City would be in a serious financial situation should there be a recession and mentioned that benefits provided to the Fire Department pose a greater impact on the City's financial future compared to the General Employees Pension Fund. Mayor Flury mentioned that costs per capita would go down after the newly annexed area comes into the City September 15. Mr. Keller was asked to provide a report on the fire costs over the past three years that would include this year's and next year's projections for the Executive Session on Union Negotiations scheduled tomorrow evening. Mr. Keller mentioned that another budget concern was insurance costs that are going to be presented at the regular meeting tomorrow night. In addition, he MINUTES 3 AUGUST 27, 2001 WORKSHOP MEETING expected the results of the User Fee Study to be completed soon and study results on FPL payments to be finished a short time later. Commissioner Mikes asked Mr. Keller to obtain a copy of the Margate Settlement Agreement for a triple cell phone tower so that it could be compared with the City's offer. Mr. Keller advised that a Proposed Budget Hearing.is scheduled September 12 at 7:00 p.m. and a Final Budget Hearing is sch"eduled September 26 at 7:00 p.m. At this time, Mayor Flury held a 20-minute recess while awaiting the arrival of Dr. George Hanbury. 5. Discussion with George L. Hanbury, II, Ph.D., ICMA, on selection process for city manager position. Dr. Hanbury, ICMA, presented a report recommending 12 candidates from the 69 applications received up through August 23rd for the city manager position. Dr. Hanbury advised that his recommendations were based on the criteria established June 7th with the City Commission and the City Commission was encouraged to include their own recommendations. Dr. Hanbury stressed the importance of the individual meeting the requirements expected of the City Commission for a team building relationship to be established. The City Commission individually reviewed the applicants with Dr. Hanbury and the names of Susan Boyer, Henry Dunn, Michael Leavitt, and Bonilyn F. Wilbanks-Free were removed from the list. Commissioner Mikes suggested a better review of all the resumes of the remaining candidates as recommended by Dr. Hanbury and suggested that Mr. Sizemore and Mr. Shepherd also be included to the list. The City Commission generally agreed to allow time for the City Commission to review the resumes of the following 10 candidates and to schedule another meeting next week to further shorten the list of the candidates to be interviewed. Paul E. Brandenburg Donald Giancoli Rod Irwin Terry Leary Horace A. McHugh Jason Randall Nunemaker John M. Shepherd Henry D. Sinda William E. Sizemore James K. Whitlock, Jr. MINUTES 4 AUGUST 27, 2001 WORKSHOP MEETING 6. Adjournment. This meeting adjourned at 7:15 p.m. PAT FLURY, MAYOR CHARLENE jo NSON ACTING CITY CLERK APPROVED: September 12, 2001 MINUTES 5 AUGUST 27, 2001 WORKSHOP MEETING