Next City Council Mtg on Thursday, December 3rd

The next City Council Meeting will be this Thursday, December 3rd, at 7pm in City Hall. This will be the final City Council meeting of 2015.

Presentations: Presentations by the principals of Howell Watkins Middle School, William T Dwyer High School, and Allamanda Elementary School outlining programs for the upcoming school year.

Consent Agenda includes:

• Resolution 59, 2015 appointing the Deputy City Clerk and the Assistant to the City Clerk to the City Canvassing Board for the March Municipal Elections. The third member will be appointed by the SOE.
• Resolution 64, 2015 amending certain provisions regarding the North Palm Beach County Airport to read: Exhibit “B” to the Agreement is amended to strike the last sentence of Paragraph 1 in its entirety and replace it with the following: THE CROSSWIND RUNWAY WILL BE LIMITED TO 6,000 FEET IN LENGTH. THE AIRCRAFT APPROACH CATEGORY FOR RUNWAY 13/31 WILL BE A CATEGORY C (APPROACH SPEED 121 KNOTS OR MORE, BUT LESS THAN 141 KNOTS), AND THE AIRPLANE DESIGN GROUP WILL BE GROUP II (WINGSPAN OF 49 FEET OR MORE, BUT LESS THAN 79 FEET).
• Purchase award for urgent repairs to the synthetic turf at the play ground at the Burns Road Recreation Center – this is a piggyback contract for 1 year of around $115K and was not competitively bid.
• Purchase award for MY 2016 vehicles via a piggyback contract for $472K and was not competitively bid. Vehicles are being purchased for the Police Department, the Fire Rescue Department, and the Public Services Department as replacement vehicles.

Public Hearings and Resolutions:

• Ordinance 15, 2015: “….is a City-initiated request to update the Capital Improvements Element (CIE) to the City’s Comprehensive Plan. The Five-Year Schedule of Capital Improvements and Summary of Capital Improvements Program, Tables 9A and 9B of the CIE, are required to be updated annually in accordance with Section 163.3177(3)(b), Florida Statutes. The update is primarily housekeeping in nature and will provide for consistency with the City’s budget and Comprehensive Plan.”
• Resolution 58, 2015: Amending the Banyan Tree PUD approved Master Signage Program; the PUD is located at Northlake and MacArthur
• Resolution 61, 2015: Upon reaching the 50,000 population level, Palm Beach Gardens applied for a Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) from HUD. There are 3 parts of the application and this resolution contains the 3rd part – “The last component of the application process is the Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing, which must be submitted to HUD by December 31 , 2015.” The resolution details include some interesting demographic analysis of our city which residents might find interesting to review.
• Resolution 63, 2015: “The subject petition requests approval for a Miscellaneous Signage Amendment to relocate the existing Principal Structure Identification Sign for Fidelity Investments on the north elevation of Phase II of the Grand Bank Center within the Regional Center PCD.”
• Ordinance 14, 2015 (First Reading)/Resolution 65, 2015 – Mary Circle Commercial Rezoning regarding ” A request from Sea Ya Holdings, LLC for a rezoning from General Commercial (CG-1) to Professional Office (PO) with a Planned Unit Development (PUD) Overlay in order to develop a new 3,560-square-foot office building. The subject site is located on the east side of Military Trail, 1/4 mile south of Northlake Boulevard.”
• Resolution 56, 2015: updating the contract between the Supervisor of Elections and the City “Although the Agreement for Vote Processing Equipment Use and Election Services by and between the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections (SOE) and the City of Palm Beach Gardens (City) does not exceed the threshold requiring Council action, staff deemed it necessary to bring this item before Council this year to inform Council of the continual changes made by the SOE. “
• Resolution 62, 2015: “The Emergency Services Agreement for Mutual Assistance, Automatic Aid, and Dispatch Services provides for the closest unit response for emergency services. This Agreement will be reciprocal between Palm Beach County, the Village of North Palm Beach, and the City of Palm Beach Gardens. Based on this information, we have agreed to renew this Agreement for a period not to exceed ten (10) years and will expire on October 31 , 2025. “

There are no items listed for Council Discussion or City Attorney Report.

The agenda (with links to full detail) can be found here. Check the agenda to see if any additional items have been added before the meeting.

‘Justice for Corey’ Dominates City Council Meeting

The scheduled agenda for the Nov. 5th meeting was a light one – two items on the Regular Agenda, and two presentations. But on entering the Council Chambers, it was apparent that Public Comment was going to dominate: Media vans outside, cameras inside, along with fairly full chambers (usually sparsely populated for the average Council meeting).

The Palm Beach Post’s article sums up the justified concerns by those seeking ‘Justice for Corey Jones’, along with commentary by the Council and City Manager Ferris. The thirteen people who spoke were respectful, eloquent but adament that action be taken on the paid leave status of Officer Raja who they said clearly did not follow Policies and Procedures. Watch the video to hear the comments.  Here is a link to the City’s web-page for updates on the shooting.

Mayor Jablin called a brief recess after which normal city council meeting process resumed.

The scheduled Presentations were rescheduled to the January 7th City Council Meeting. During Items of Resident Interest, Vice Mayor Levy briefly mentioned the proposed Fire/Rescue Sales Tax Sur-tax of 1% that would replace the current ad-valorem tax. Watch for this – as it, along with other sales tax increase proposals are in the offing for the November 2016 ballot.

Public Comment included Kevin Easton, talking about the water hook-ups in Sunset Terrace, Maria Marino spoke on being Principal for the Day, two folks spoke against the proposed Shady Lakes road extension – and staff listed upcoming neighborhood meetings. Nothing has been decided yet on the extension. The final speaker from Jupiter primarily spoke against the Briger tract development which got a fairly testy reply from Levy.

There was no City Attorney report, and the two agenda items passed 5:0.

Next City Council Mtg on Thursday, November 5th

The next City Council Meeting will be this Thursday, November 5th, at 7pm in City Hall.

Presentations: Presentations by the principals of Palm Beach Gardens Elementary and Palm Beach Gardens High School outlining programs for the upcoming school year

Consent Agenda includes:

• Resolution 35, 2015 creates an Economic Development Incentives Agreement with Zimmer Inc. In June, 2015, the Council approved Resolution 29, 2015 conceptually approving $350,000 as the local contribution to the Governor’s Quick Action Closing Fund for Project Bruin – now known to be Zimmer, Inc. This resolution formalizes the agreement.
• Resolution 50, 2015 creates an Economic Development Incentives Agreement with Carrier Corp aka Project Diamond. In March of 2015, the Council unanimously approved Resolution 14, 2015, conceptually approving an Economic Development Employee Incentive Grant for “Project Diamond” in the award amount of $1,400 per employee for both the 70 local jobs retained and the 380 new jobs created based on the average minimum wage of $85,000. The City Council also conceptually approved “Project Diamond” for the Ad Valorem Tax Exemption Program for 100% exemption for 1-5 Years and then 50% exemption for 6-10 Years, provided the company completes the application process for the tax exemption that will come before the City Council for final approval.
• Purchase award for Continuing Contracts for Professional Services for the Planning and Zoning Department in the amount of $550K over 5 years. This was competitively bid.
• Several proclamations are also on Consent, along with a resolution approving the Alton Pasteur Plat One for the United Technologies Carrier Corporation Center for Intelligent Buildings development.

Public Hearings and Resolutions:

• Ordinance 13, 2015 – 2nd Reading and Adoption of A City-initiated text amendment to Code Enforcement Procedures, Administration Fines, giving the Code Enforcement Special Magistrate authority to impose fines in excess of the limits set forth in Paragraph (2)(a) of Section 162.09, Florida Statutes, approved on 1st Reading unanimously.
• Resolution 55, 2015 – a signage size amendment for Nova Southeastern University.

See our summary of the October 8th City Council Meeting here. For the latest Martino Minute, click here.

The agenda (with links to full detail) can be found here.   Check the agenda to see if any additional items have been added before the meeting.