Next City Council Mtg on Thursday June 4 at 7pm

The next City Council meeting will be on Thursday, June 4.  One may assume that social distancing will be maintained in Council Chambers, the meeting will be streamed with minimum staff present and some of the Council attending via video conference. The agenda includes the annual City Manager Evaluation at the end of the meeting.

(In order to watch the meeting live or any past meeting as an archived video, one can always go to  Livestream.)

Consent Agenda

• Purchase Award – Prefabricated Metal Buildings for Logistics Center – Openly competed – no option to renew – $372K
• Resolution 39, 2020 – A City-initiated request to approve an AlPP-funded bronze sculpture for the Miracle League baseball fields at the City’s Gardens Park located on Burns Road.

Public Hearings – Ordinances and Resolutions

• Ordinance 5, 2020 – First Reading – A request initiated by Roan Lane LLC to amend the Northlake Boulevard Overlay Zoning district (NBOZ) section of the City’s Land Development Regulations, Chapter 78. The proposed amendment will provide for a new use of Self-Service Storage within the west, central, and east districts of the NBOZ. “The Applicant, Roan Lane LLC, is seeking to demolish the existing Crunch Fitness gym building located at 9055 Roan Lane and redevelop the site with a self-service storage building with an accessory office which is being reviewed concurrently with this petition.”
• Ordinance 6, 2020 – First Reading – A request from Roan Lane LLC to rezone one parcel of land totaling approximately 1.66 acres from General Commercial (CG-1) to Planned Unit Development (PUD) Overlay with an underlying zoning designation of General Commercial (CG-1), along with Site Plan and Major Conditional Use approval for a 74,936-square-foot self-service storage facility with a 1, 129-square-foot accessory office. The subject site is generally located on the northeast intersection of Interstate 95 and Northlake Boulevard.
• Resolution 35, 2020 – Avenir Site Plan #3 Site Plan Approval – A request for Site Plan approval for a 390 – single-family unit residential subdivision within Parcel A (Pod 6, Pod 7, and Pod 8) of the Avenir Planned Community Development (PCD). The subject site is approximately 152.55 acres and is located in the northeastern portion of the development area within the Avenir PCD. The Avenir PCD is generally located on the north side of Northlake Boulevard, east of Grapeview Boulevard, west of Bay Hill Drive, and south of Beeline Highway.

Items for Council Action/Discussion and Items of Interest

• Appointments to the Local Workforce Development Board
• City Manager Evaluation

Please check the agenda for any changes or additions prior to the meeting.

Martino: Local Government At Its Best

Once again, the City Council of Palm Beach Gardens along with its Administration has embraced the mantle of Leadership when its residents and business community are most in need of it. At its May Council meeting, to combat the coronavirus contagion with a unified response of care, concern, and compassion, Mayor Carl Woods, Vice-Mayor Maria Marino, Council members Mark Marciano, Rachelle Litt, and Chelsea Reed, created the Palm Beach Gardens Economic Recovery Act Grant Fund. This Act will provide financial assistance to our unemployed residents and small businesses that have been directly affected by the personal and economic devastations of the Covid-19 epidemic.

The Palm Beach Gardens Economic Recovery Act Grant Fund will be funded with $1,300,000 from the City’s budgeted Economic Development Fund. It consists of two Relief Funds to provide help and support to our jobless residents and struggling businesses.

The Palm Beach Gardens Unemployed Residents Relief Fund is designed to assist residents who have lost employment due to the coronavirus pandemic. The Unemployed Residents Relief Fund will receive $300,000. The fund will provide a one-time Publix gift card worth $250 to a limited number of residents to counterbalance daily living costs. A complete list of criteria is available on the City’s website.

In a further demonstration of their leadership and conviction that the defeat of Covid-19 will take a collective force, Mayor Woods and the City Council have joined with the Palm Beach North Chamber of Commerce and the PGA Corridor Association for the inspiration and implementation of the Palm Beach Gardens Small Business Relief Fund. It will be funded with $1,000,000. The Small Business Relief Fund will provide one-time grant payments of $20,000 to 50 small businesses within the city affected by the Covid-19 shut-down. For eligibility businesses must be locally owned or independently operated. Businesses must have been licensed in Palm Beach Gardens for 18 months or more, and have 25 employees or fewer. Businesses may not have already have been approved or received Covid-19 relief funds from other sources, such as, the SBA Paycheck Protection Program. A complete list of criteria is available on the City’s website.

From my perspective, Mayor Woods, the City Council, and the Administration should be applauded and congratulated. They have recognized constituent needs, deliberated to understand them, offered solutions to fix them, and implemented actions to remediate them. That is local government performing at its best; we in Palm Beach Gardens should be proud and appreciative.

Council Moves to Assist Residents Impacted by Covid-19

The City Council once again conducted the May meeting via Zoom – with Mayor Woods, Vice Mayor Marino, Council Members Marciano and Reed in attendance but socially distanced in chambers, and Council Member Litt via videoconference. Unlike last month, we were unable to determine whether there were any physical presentations as there was no split screen either on the Youtube or Livestream recordings of the meeting. (We hope that in June, split screens will resume – otherwise this may well simply have been an audio recording).

Presentations – Michael Futterman of Marcum LLC spoke to the external audit of the Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) for 2019 – the CAFR (including the auditors’ summary on pages 1-3) can be found here.

Mayor Woods initiated a change, approved by the Council, to move Items of Resident Interest and Board Committee Reports, to the end of City Council Meeting Agendas every month. He’d received feedback from business attendees concerned that they have to sit through 45 minutes of reports while waiting for the business for which they came to being. (PBG Watch has always been for moving this portion of the meeting to the end, and former Council Member Lane, when he made a similar proposal in May 2017 to move both this section and City Manager’s Report to the end, was soundly rebuffed by then Mayor Marino and City Manager Ferris – see New Council Asserts Itself 

Resolution 37, 2020 was added at the beginning of the meeting and is entitled “Creating the Economic Recovery Act ‎(ERA)‎ Grant Fund”. City Manager Ferris described the intent, the procedures and the joint effort with Palm Beach North Chamber of Commerce, PGA Corridor, Palm Beach Chamber of Commerce and staff to brainstorm and come up with both the Palm Beach Gardens Small Business Relief Fund  and the Palm Beach Gardens Unemployed Resident Fund.  Both are intended to provide assistance to those who are suffering as a result of the Covid-19 shut-down and who have not qualified for other relief (such as the federal PPP). The $1.3 million for the grants are funded directly from the City’s budgeted Economic Development Fund (which will have a balance of $1 million remaining). See the Palm Beach Post coverage of the press conference that announced the effort last Friday, May 8, here.  There were further comments and discussion and the Council agreed to move to the Resolution immediately after the City Manager report and it was passed 5:0.

The Consent Agenda passed 5:0 after Council Member Litt requested that Resolution 31, 2020 Amending the Procedures for Quasi-Judicial Hearings and Ex Parte Disclosures be pulled from Consent; and Vice Mayor Marino pulled item S – Proclaiming Municipal Clerks Week. Resolution 31 resulted in a lot of discussion. Section B of the attachment formalized changes that were simply updates, as explained by City Attorney Max Lohman. However Section A 1 and 2 were new and were viewed as limiting and problematic by Litt and Marciano.

Section A 1 and 2 are as follows:

A. Pre-Hearing Procedures
1. All discussions between a Councilmember and an applicant or applicant’s representative about development proposals shall be held in the presence of the City’s professional staff.
2. Information about any private written, telephonic, or electronic communication received by a Councilmember about a development proposal shall be forwarded to the City Manager for inclusion in the official file in the Planning and Zoning Department.

The final motion was to pass Section B of the resolution, and Section A could be modified and discussed at a future Council Meeting to alleviate concerns but to still provide for the transparency that the City Manager and Attorney were trying to accomplish by the proposal. The final vote was 3:2 with members Woods and Marino objecting.

The proclamation was pulled in order for the Council to thank Clerk Snider for her service to the City.

Ordinance 4, 2020 (2nd reading and adoption of Land Development Regulations) and Resolution 17 – Reappointing members to the Budget Oversight Review Board – passed 5:0.

City Attorney Lohman said that due to Covid-19, the actions of the courts are moving at a glacial pace and Rustic Lakes and Sear related lawsuits were moving slowly.

Public Comment was made by resident Ed Dolezal – speaking about 5G technology. He has made comment on the topic before.

Next City Council Mtg on Thursday May 7 at 7pm

The next City Council meeting agenda doesn’t specify whether the protocol will be the same as in April; one can only assume that social distancing will be maintained in Council Chambers, the meeting will be streamed with minimum staff present and some of the Council attending via video conference. The agenda is a light one.

(In order to watch the meeting live or any past meeting as an archived video, one can always go to  Livestream.)

Announcements/Presentations: FY 2019 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR)

Consent Agenda:

• Purchase Award: Annual Asphalt Milling and Resurfacing (2020), Piggyback/Access Contract, no option to renew, $394K
• Purchase Award: Renovation of Fire Rescue Station No. 1, openly competed, no option to renew, $462K
• Purchase Award: Construction of Fuel Stations, openly competed, $243K, description: The City owns property at 3704 Burns Road that is being converted to a new Logistics Center. The location also houses the main fuel station for City vehicles. Funds have been budgeted to upgrade the facility, and part of those plans involve renovating the existing fueling station. The current station has its dispenser on the outside of the property. The plan is to construct a new fuel station inside the property, with new dispensers, utilizing the existing underground tank. The City recently completed the construction of a new Operations Center at 4050 Johnson Dairy Road. Part of the development plans for this location is the construction of an above-ground tank for diesel fueling.
• Purchase Award: Emergency Operations Center Roof Restoration Project, Piggyback/Access Contract, no option to renew, $117K
• Purchase Award: Lease of Multifunction Copiers and Printers, Piggyback/Access Contract through June 30, 2022, $180K
• Purchase Award: Ancillary Health Benefit Plans – Dental Insurance & Employee Assistance Program, openly competed, 3 yr contract with option to renew for another 3 yrs, $30K/year.
• Resolution 27, 2020: Approving the Costco Wholesale Club Planned Unit Development plat. The proposed plat is consistent with the approved PUD plan for the project. Staff is recommending approval.
• Resolution 28, 2020: Downtown Palm Beach Gardens – A request by Excel Gardens LLC to exceed the maximum number of special events permitted by Section 78-187 of the City’s Code. Summary: The maximum permitted by the City of Palm Beach Gardens Code Section 78-187 for commercial/office plazas with 11 tenants or more is 12 special events per calendar year. This request is effectively increasing the number of special events per calendar year by 24, for a possible total of 36 special events.
• Resolution 31, 2020: Amending the Procedures for Quasi-Judicial Hearings and Ex Parte Disclosures. Background: The City Council is required by law to conduct certain development petition public hearings quasi-judicially. These hearings require the City Council to base its decision on the evidence contained in the record of the proceeding, which consists of the testimony adduced at the hearing and on the material contained in the official file of the City. Procedures have been developed to ensure that the City Council quasi-judicial hearings are conducted in accordance with the law. The City Council has determined that it is appropriate to incorporate additional disclosure requirements into the review process preceding a quasi-judicial public hearing. See Attachment A in the resolution for changes to the procedures.

Public Hearings and Resolutions

• Ordinance 4, 2020: Amendment to the City’s Land Development Regulations – Second and Final Hearing
• Resolution 17, 2020: Approving appointment of regular members to the Budget Oversight Review Board. For more details see the resolution.

Please check the agenda for any changes or additions prior to the meeting.