Virginia Key Beach Advisory Board

good evening. Any person who receives compensation, remuneration or expenses for conducting lobbying activities is required to register as a lobbyist with the city clerk prior to engaging in lobbying activities before city staff boards, committees or the city commission. A copy of the applicable ordinance is available at the office of the city clerk miami city hall located at 3500. Pan american drive, miami, florida 33133. Thank you chair. Thank you very much. I will do the pledge of allegiance for discussion. The flag of the united states of. America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under GOD. Indivisible. >> with liberty and justice for all. Rafael, do you have to do a formal roll call or just obvious that there's only four four people here tonight? Okay. >> um, just to note that christopher norwood who was appointed by the mayor. >> he's here. He's just I think he stepped out for a second but he's going to be sitting right here. Oh great. Thank you. And how many people do we need for quorum? Eight people would be needed for quorum. Okay so we're we're only we only have five. Assuming with chris. >> norwood we have five. So yes with christopher norwood it's five. Okay. MR. Norwood thank you very much for joining us. Peter. So I'm just going to. >> do the the roll call. >> for for. >> to be on the record. Okay. Peter erlick here. Nicholas lopez jenkins. Luis casamayor. stephen lightner. Gary milano. Christopher norwood. Monte traynor. Daniel lopez. Alejandro martinez. Steve. And if we can just have everybody speak on the mics just so everybody. >> can hear. Thank you. All right. Any requests. >> for absence waiver? No I had didn't receive any. So we're going to move on to the discussion items. Um taking them slightly out of order if you don't mind. From the city attorney would like an update on the city commission agenda item that a resolution that we. Provided last year about changing. >> the quorum. Can we have a status for that item that. Yes. So the resolution passed. Um now the resolution essentially provides that the city manager will come back and bring an ordinance which would require two readings that city commission. So the next step is for the city manager to bring an ordinance consistent with what you guys have passed, which was attached to. >> the to the. Resolution and then that would require two readings. Oh, I was under the impression that was being taken care of when we submitted our. Resolution to the city commission to be approved. No, the resolution that was passed by commission essentially provides that the. >> manager will bring back an item. So that. >> wasn't completed at that time. So when will that item be back in. >> front of commissioners? I don't have that information would be the manager who brings the item. Can you can you follow up with the manager so it can be heard. >> in the next two or or at best three. Meetings I can have I can. >> have I can reach out to rafa rafael to reach out to the manager rafaela because we've been waiting on 12 or 18 months for this one item to go through the city commission. It's a shame there's still a delay. Parks will follow up. We will follow up. Will you? Yep. Thank you very much. We appreciate that. Any questions from any board members on that everybody familiar with that item how that item works? We have it for those that are in the audience. We submitted an item resolution last year to change our quorum requirements. It's very hard to get eight people almost from any board to show up for meetings like this. We often get sick sometimes seven five to night and our our item would change the quorum requirements to only require three three people to show up to conduct business. Luckily we often have five, 6 or 7 but the new legislation would let us go forward with three. So we hope that gets. >> gets. >> passed by the city. Commissioners as soon as possible through the chair. Yes. Just to clarify, the. Resolution provides for five voting members to constitute a quorum. Does it? Yeah. All right. Well it's still better than 7 or 8. Thank you very much. Um so then we're going to quickly go to the um the miami marine. Stadium basin mooring field. Is there rafael is there anybody from the. Administration here to speak on that or present on that item and the status of the miami marine stadium basin field. So alejandro is here from the dream department but they requested to provide updates in the. >> OCTOBER meeting um, when there will be better updates. Okay. Um then we we will we are going to hear from the public tonight on that item and we can also um continue that item until the next meeting in two months. And so we will be hearing from. Alejandro in in more detail in two months unless he wants to add some. Comments tonight. After he hears from the public and we would like to hear from the public. There's some wonderful. Advocates I know in the room tonight who have great information and have been attending meetings for years. You can speak in any order. Any . >> microphone that's working. Excuse me. Clearly the microphone works. I'm sorry ma'am. Um, I'm I'm new here and, uh but there's an item on the agenda and there's no one here to speak about what the item is or is anybody going to speak as to what what you know what the item. Even as a discussion item? Uh, that's a great question. The board's been discussing this particular item for three or 4 or 5 years. So I understand you're new to the you're new to the to the board there we requested somebody from the administration to speak on this specific item tonight, but nobody from the. Administration wants to go into detail tonight. Unfortunately there are members of the public that have a massive amount of. Information and some information that hasn't even been. Distributed to the board. They've been attending some. Meetings with government officials that we have not been attending, and they're going to be updating us on what they've heard. So if you if you like, we're going to hear from some members of the. >> public and I think you'll you'll learn a lot fairly quickly. MR. Chair, I would love to hear from the and we will hear from the public. But first I would like to hear who from the. Administration is attending this meeting. >> right now. Two members. >> gentleman on your left. Yeah. >> so director danny lopez acting parks director okay. And alejandro martinez. I'm the director of the dream department. Of the marine department. Dream department of real estate and asset management. Got it. And so can someone explain to me what the miami marine stadium basin mooring. Field is? What exactly is it? Why don't we let. Alejandro handle that question? Yeah. So I think the better way to probably to handle it. So go ahead and listen listen to the public give their presentation because like the chair mentioned this this project has a long standing history. Um, you and I can probably meet offline as well and I can give you a better summary of what the project is. Um, so so a lot of the topics on this there's going to be a more formal. Presentation made in OCTOBER. I would like the benefit of listening to the public because then maybe we can incorporate some of their points in that presentation and address some of their concerns. So I think the best course of action is to go ahead and listen to the public and then we can I can provide comments as appropriate and if not we can give you, you know. Documentation onto the project itself because it's it's it's a pretty. >> significant project with a pretty significant history. Um, if you don't mind, MR. Chair. No, not at all. Uh, I'm new to this committee but I'm not new to serving on. Committees and boards and I've never sat on a committee or board when there's an item on the agenda that there's not somebody from the. Administration who. Presents what. Exactly the item is. And so I definitely want to hear from the public and I'm sure they can add to whatever the later. Presentation MAY be by whomever from the administration. I just want to know what is the miami marine stadium basin mooring field and why is it on the agenda? And I would like to hear from staff to explain that so I can provide a little bit of insight on on this I why is it in the agenda I don't know right. But um the. Basin mooring field basically there for years folks have been able to you know, go to the basin anchor and completely neglect their boats. And so now the city has worked through a process of creating a mooring field there to now create rules and. Regulations for folks to come and. Properly. >> uh, you know, secure their boats and also pay a fee to the city for for for that. And then you know, with that comes. Services. >> uh, from the marinas also the marinas uh, division. Itself used to be under the dream department and now it's under the gsa department. Uh, so that that change just just happened not too long ago. That's a little bit of insight, you know, on on that, but that's basically what the mooring field is. Uh, you know, I don't know as. >> far as it being in the agenda this is my first meeting. So so just to clarify the the the the marine, the I'm sorry, the. Stadium basin field is a is a is a is out in the water. Yes. Okay. So it's. >> a it's it's it's near the marine stadium. Yeah. So basically. >> you have the marine. >> stadium and then. >> you have the basin right in front of it. >> so it's a body of water. It's a body of water. It's called the basin mooring field. The basin is called the marine basin uh the marine the marine stadium basin that's what it's called. And a mooring field is going to be. >> implemented in that basin. Thank you. All right. Thank you very much. Um you asked very good questions, MR. Norwood. you're absolutely right. Normally and it's completely appropriate for an expert from the city or the county or whatever government entity we'd like to in front of us to give us a background information on a particular item. The the mooring field that we're. Discussing will be in the miami marine stadium. Basin. >> which I believe is approximately 45 acres. Is that correct? And it's also. Designated historic. Um everybody's. Familiar with that. Gary milano you recall the designation of the miami marine basin as historic. Okay. Um, which which means it has a whole whole different set of. Requirements. >> that should be honored. Uh, anything historic should be should be reviewed. Um. I have a for for chris norwood to review quickly. There's an article there's a publication here. This is from dade heritage trust. Independent called. Preservation today. Historic miami marine stadium rebirth of an icon. This is. 1617 years ago. This is from 2009. Gary can you hand this to chris to [Laughter] Look at the pictures? I'm I'm fine. I I would love to review this absolutely absolutely. I just wanted to understand just what what it is and and it's on the agenda. It's on the agenda. >> because we're. Reviewing what about it? Oh we've been we've had we've heard a lot of comments from. Constituents taxpayers. Residents um. Rowers dragon boat rowers about the. Future of marine stadium basin and they they been asking for an. Update on the. >> status of the proposed mooring field. Perfect. I'm good I'm ready all right thank you thank you thank you your comments are excellent. Questions are excellent. Um leah would you like to speak first? Thank you, MR. CHAIRMAN. My name is leah kennard and I am a very frequent user of the basin and I thank you MR. Norwood for asking those questions. Um and I also am just going to state the value of this this board. >> for the involvement of the public has renewed my belief in democracy. Um it's really it's a vibrant opportunity for the public to participate in city decision making. And so I'm very grateful that we can talk about what's happening in the basin tonight so that the people who are here are all people who are interested either because they're out there rowing or paddling or because they're concerned about the environment and what happened. And the reason we are all here is because like you, we did not know what was happening in the basin and the city was moving forward with a full permitting process to put in 195 healix anchors into the floor of the basin that literally covers the acreage of the basin. Some changes were made initially um to what the city's plan would be, but it was never brought to this board to discuss this. And so we have not had an opportunity as paddlers as the community of paddlers, uh, to be able to react to what the plans were. So it is something that is discoverable through all of the permitting process with diagrams of what the anchorage will look like. And the city's plan has been a very good idea that we don't want boats to just be dropping anchors in the basin and and dragging the anchors around. And so the idea of having a mooring field would be that boats would come in and they would connect to boys that are anchored in the bottom of the basin. And that would be a better idea for preserving the environment. Uh, it also is um it would take care of the derelict boats. There used to be a number of derelict boats sitting in the basin. Um and then after covid began, uh, people discovered that the best way for me to live is on the water in the basin or all around miami on a boat. And so there were close to 200 boats that were parking in the basin and we were all out there paddling around them. All these people know that um and it was very uncomfortable because there was a lot of sewage in the water as well. It used to be that the miami marine stadium basin was a place for manatees. We would see them frequently for dolphin sometimes stingray. I even remember seeing a baby shark out there one time from the boat. When you're paddling or rowing you are touching the water so you understand the water. It's not like being in a motor boat where you're looking down at the water. I mean we experience what the marine stadium basin is. And so when I became aware through the um friends of biscayne bay that the permitting process was process was going on, I read every single um permit and I was shocked and so I prepared this document that highlights what I think the real issues are so that you have some background information to be able to um to consider and so you can read through the document. I'm just going to hit the high points of this and that is that um the first item number one says the current proposal represents a dramatic expansion beyond previous public discussions and ignores the long standing concerns of long standing stakeholders. And I know that roger bernstein and I have been talking at this microphone since 2018 about mooring fields. Roger is very familiar with mooring fields. I'm I'm familiar as a user of the basin and so um, something that is of interest to me is that the virginia key advisory, the virginia key master plan that dates back to 2010. And this is also for those of you who are newer in this group, it is it was developed by city charrettes that went on for a long period of time and the public actually designed what they thought the master plan for virginia key should be. And the master plan is still being used. And one of the reasons that that got my attention is because it was used as an argument to build the boat ramp and we were not people that were really in favor of the boat ramp because we weren't sure how the parking was going to occur, how the traffic was going to exist, what the traffic on rickenbacker was going to be. But in the meantime the city used the virginia key master plan and one line that said boat ramp. And so I point that out now that the virginia key master plan has no lines about a mooring field, it does not exist in the master plan. And so if we're going to use the master plan, I would put that out there that it doesn't exist in the master plan. Secondly, the current proposal is not consistent with the long term vision for virginia key and that's where I was that's I read that instead I need to go back to the first one because the argument for the first statement is that the city commission has approved 75 mooring buoys for a mooring field. There has been no conversation about 195 anchors in the basin anywhere in in the public in a general public meeting that I'm aware of. Um and so we jump from 75 buoys to 195 anchors which are also potential buoys. Number three the mooring field must not be planned in isolation. And that's because all of the projects that are going on on virginia key right now have interaction they intersect with each other and um and I find it sort of interesting that when it comes to traffic, there's traffic that all of these projects create, there's parking needs that all the projects create and there's also traffic in the basin as well and and the permitting process. There's no consideration of any traffic in the basin. Um. Going on the current proposal falls a fails to account for the basin's daily recreational use by the paddling community who are represented here. I know here we see outriggers the outrigger community is represented the paddling teams uh dragon slayers who've been out there for at least two decades. Um I don't know that there are any puff representatives here tonight and the sos are the dragon boat team that I'm a member of um is currently competing in [Laughter] France. That's why none of my friends are here. I stayed back [Laughter] And um but oh thank you but so they I mean and it's a statement that all of these teams are internationally known. The coaches for our teams are people that are recognized around the world. They're usa certified quite a number of them are they offer training and so the basin is not only a place for competition it's also a place for practice um public input and changes in state and county laws are helping to support the basin as a safe place for marine life and the reputation and attraction for miami for water sports. And I'm going to refer here to and have roger bernstein talk because um, in going back through my notes, I realized that in 2018 we were already talking about anchorage limitation area. We ourselves had talked to an attorney who was knowledgeable about that and roger has kept up with that all along and he can speak in a much more intelligent way about it than I can. But that's referenced in the last part. So I have two things that I would like to see happen that the city discontinue the committing the current permitting process. That's why to meet tonight rather than waiting until there's a quorum until OCTOBER because if the city could get serious about involving the community about this, we can avoid making a lot of mistakes. So that's one of my asks. The second one is to engage the public in the planning committees and workshops to consider all the factors associated with the mooring field. And so we're ready to help. I mean I think the city could come up with a much better plan if we are involved in doing that. But roger can explain a lot more about the laws and policies. Before you sit down for a quick question if there were I mean this this board did was aware of the legislation pending for I think it was 50 mooring that I believe. It's turned into 75 at a city commission meeting. >> I believe it went to the city commission with 50 and during the meeting commissioners suggested through the interest of some of the boating lobbyists that it go from 50 to 75 and I think it's 75 past. 75 past. 75 didn't I believe come to this board? But my question is if there were 100 or 195 mooring in the basin, what would that do to people's ability to grow cruise shells or dragon boats or triathlons or use the basin for recreation and and non-motorized boating? My opinion is it would basically put us out of business because we have a need for events. Uh, i know that the permitting process includes the estimate that the marine stadium might have five events in a year that would require moving vessels if the basin was filled up with vessels on those mooring, the marine stadium would not be able to have events. Um because you cannot move we can tell you it's tough to move any vessel because we tried to do that before. Okay, so I guess we're going to hear from roger and anybody else that wants to speak. Does anybody else have a question for leah I do jerry. Um you said that they're in permitting right now. Do they have not obtained a permit for the project yet? Correct. So they're not amending an existing permit. They're requesting a new permit. Actually, uh julia and I can explain more about that. Um that's how I became familiar with the process was because of the work that they were doing. And the other thing is the objective the objective of the mooring field originally was to get rid of the derelict vessels that were anchoring in the basin, correct? Correct. >> and right now all of those boats derelict vessels have moved out of the basin and they're on the south side of the causeway at this point. Correct. >> do you know why and how that occurred since the original objective of the mooring field was to provide a mechanism to regulate the area within the marine stadium basin? That's a wonderful question, gary. Um, for those of us of us that have been out there watching vessels disappear, it was a mystery where all at once the vessels are gone, the the dolphin are coming back. Um we can only um you know, think that it was because of enforcement and we can say that enforcement worked for calming down the jet skis. We had a horrible jet ski problem in the basin. Um and in fact caesar is here tonight and. So you'd have to you have to speak on the microphone. >> yeah. Why don't you come up and. Talk and I'll step away. Thank you. >> very much. >> I'll introduce andre. Or do you want excuse me. My name is andres sosa. Andres sosa. I'm also part of this community. It's that we use the basin what I see in the proper way like the basin historically we have the marine station. I think it's a purpose that we are spending money renewing the marine stadium and at the same time we're discussing something that is going to block the purpose of the renewal of the marine stadium. In my point of view marine stadium the basin was built for sports yes motor sports water sports but it was sports and we want to keep it that way. We have the mrc here that we have a growing community over there. We have dragon boaters, we have paddlers. That is the only spot one of the few spots that we have in miami with access to the water for small watercraft not suffering dangers like crazy people driving jet ski and run over the. I saw this personally both friends of mine run over by jet ski. I saw people dying in the marine stadium with jet ski because in miami it's really easy to rent a boat. You don't need a license or nothing. Anyone can have a boat in my opinion transforming as you ask you ask the most crucial question. The purpose of the mooring fields was to block people from sleeping with boats over that and control that from the past year and a half this is not happening and I have an answer for that because cesar put a race over there every year I put an event every day every year that is a polynesian festival that I bring people from french polynesia, from hawaii, from rapanui, from brazil and I do a festival polynesian festival. So we have to deal with the police requesting to move those boats. They move those boats. So on my point of view I think it's like they understand that it's better to take care or have suffering three months we are taking more of the marine stadium so the law enforcement is working right now. We just need to keep the law enforcement running and we don't need to spend money putting more infields over there that is going to cut the purpose. Maybe we can put sports again in the basin using the marine stadium. You know, with that beautiful skyline of miami that's one one we can work together as a community if you guys allow us to participate and help you guys to restore that the amazing place that is the basin, you know the marine stadium that's our only access to the water safely. You know to put like you have like a ladies here dragon boaters for from 15 years old to 80 using that basin you know and you don't know how dangerous it is sometimes people in the boat they don't have the knowledge and the view and the perspective of being in a small watercraft in the ocean with a 55 foot boat they come close to you, they make waves. You can you can go down in the water if a person that already has a certain age turns like a death and life in that moment, you know? So it's a very crucial point this this discussion here and we want to be involved. It's not about oh we're here to block this or block no, we want to get involved to ban better for everyone. That's the whole point of we are. Here staying on second. Gary do you have a follow up question? Thank you. Um the other thing I see is that the marine stadium restoration just passed through the referendum. So the marine stadium is going to happen. So the marine stadium to have venues needs to have the basin available to be able to provide a variety of different. Exactly. >> so I see the mooring field conflicting with the marine stadium venues in the future as well. Exactly. So at this point I think it's important you know again we're going to hear a formal presentation on OCTOBER 27th here at 530 and we'll hear from the city and we'll be able to ask them questions and find out where the permitting is and where the funding is. The biggest problem we as a board have seen through the years is that the city provides they put together these projects, they go to the funding source, they obtain the funding without coming to us and I've got documentation here that any project on virginia key is supposed to come before this board before it goes forward and that's something that the city has failed doing and because of that they get project funding which they don't want to return. They've got you know, a gazillion dollars and they go oh, but we got this money now we we just can't turn away from it. But that's the thing the city needs to do to provide the proper to follow the master plan. Exactly .And that's something that this board was put together to oversee the implementation of the master plan. And that's what we do every day on this board is basically look at projects and hopefully this project will be reviewed, you know by you you know once we get a formal presentation we'll be able to ask questions. But permitting is one thing and funding is the other. And that's the thing that we need to kind of see where that's at and see if there's a way that through community involvement we can maybe change the course the direction of this mooring field project. Thank you so much. And I just want to point out that this amount of people that you see here actually I wouldn't say there's not 110% of what we have of paddlers over there, but it's a huge community that we if we bring everyone we're going to load this like three times. It's a big community that enjoys the basin and we just keep continuing enjoying and we don't want to stop progress. I'm not here we know that progress but like as you said we can use the money properly maybe make the basin better for everyone really better for everyone. >> well thank you for taking the time to come. Roger bernstein and anybody else that wants to speak and we'll be able to get up after roger speaks. Hi there, I'm roger bernstein. I live in the city of miami. I've rowed in the marine stadium basin for over 30 years and I've seen it change. I've seen it deteriorate and I've seen it improve this proposal for mooring field and this is a proposal that doesn't exist at this point. Proposal for a mooring field is a solution in search of a problem that no longer exists. The problem was that the basin had over the years accumulated all kinds of vessels including derelict vessels at risks of sinking boats that were anchored out there as the rate for wet storage docks went up and up. People said I'm not going to pay $3,000 a month for my 30 foot sailboat. I'll find a place to put it. And the marine stadium was fairly accessible from the shore and it became covered with these things. Now these boats would sit out there and not be used. I would row at 6:00 in the morning. It was pitch dark by law they're supposed to have lights on them. They had no lights. They were improperly anchored. They drifted all over the place. You had no idea where the boat was here yesterday and today it's over there. It was horrible. So the city of miami said we under florida law do not have the authority to regulate our own water. It has to come from fwc and tallahassee by law they regulate the waters of the state of florida and the one solution the city came up with they said if we applied fwc and we get a permit for a mooring field, we can put that mooring field in the basin and then we will displace all of these garbage boats that are anchored there. And that was the idea. So originally it was 50 mooring .Then the commission passed 752 years ago they came up with this plan for 195 and I've asked that it be circulated here. It covers the basin from top to bottom side to side. That's it. No more public use. Why did they do that? I sat with them at dream and they said we're doing this because the mooring field by law will prohibit anybody from anchoring their boat there. And in addition the law says 100ft perimeter beyond that mooring field they can't anchor their boat so mechanically to fill up the basin. That's what we do. So that plan is two years old. Guess what the last session of the florida legislature they extended the 100 foot perimeter to 300ft. So that's 600ft from side to side and top to bottom. You don't have to put mooring there because you can't anchor there by law that plan does not anticipate that. The second thing that has happened is I told you that the state had authority to regulate anchoring in the county's and they were very jealous about that authority and they would not let the counties do very much. The legislature recently passed a law and the beginning of it says previously florida statutes generally preempted local governments from regulating the anchoring of vessels outside the mark boundaries of mooring field. Section 327.4 e108n2 of the florida statutes provides a limited exception to the anchoring preemption under which a county could establish a 45 day anchoring limitation area under certain conditions. With that 45 days means is if a boat is anchored in the marine stadium, it can be there for no more than 45 days. Then it has to move. So the idea of derelict vessels sitting there for years until they sink is finished. This is a county ordinance. It has gone through all of the procedures. I believe the final reading is on OCTOBER uh it will create. Section 7-40.1 of the of the code of miami-dade county. This means that the county can working with the city designate any portion or all of the marine stadium basin as an anchoring limitation area and boats can't go in there. So this ridiculous 195 ball mooring field made the plan made two years ago does not take account of the 300 foot perimeter does not take account of the anchoring limitation area. It can't go forward. We need to look at this and say hey there's been enforcement. The basin is clear. We don't need 195 ball mooring field to clear the basin. We MAY not need any mooring field in the basin. And. As leah said, they can't blindly move forward with this thing when the circumstances have changed. The basin is empty of derelict boats. There's a 600 foot area 300ft on each side top and bottom around a mooring field and the county has the ability to create an anchoring limitation area for some or all of the basin. So this idea of 195 ball mooring field is a solution to a problem that no longer exists. Questions? Roger . >> yes. Quick question. Thank you. I know you've been working on this issue for for years many years and you've been wonderful coming to the meetings and educating all of the board members and city staff. And in the next few weeks can you reach out to alejandro on my right who is the director of dream and um maybe have a meeting with him and and share your ideas. A question is this under dream or capital improvements or what? Um, I think daniel lopez said can you can you enlighten us daniel and who's in charge of this project now? Yeah. >> so my understanding is that mooring fields are within the marinas division and the marinas division is now under the gsa department. Now I can't speak to specifically you know how that has transpired but that that's the best information I can provide at the time. You can go ahead and reach out to me and then I'll make sure that the appropriate people are part of the discussion because it's going to be multifaceted, right? So it's obviously a very complicated project. It has a lot of moving pieces. So I'll make sure that the right people are in attendance to this discussion. Good. >> uh certainly we will do that and. I think everybody has the same intention here which is to keep the basin open and free of derelict vessels and available. Well roger that's that's not an accurate statement. Since you've got a drawing here with 195 mooring, you cannot say that everybody is in favor of keeping the basin open. Somebody is working diligently and incredibly detail and putting in dozens or hundreds of hours to achieve achieve this goal. >> yeah. But the expressed reason for that horrible thing is to displace the illegally anchored boats. I believe I hear you and I understand. And I'm not going to question the intention of whoever is behind this yet all I'm saying is the the problem has been solved by enforcement. And by the way, if you put a mooring field in without enforcement guess what happens? You get illegally anchored boats. Gary do you have any questions? Roger chris norwood roger bernstein for roger. Yeah, I do I not necessarily from the gentleman at the microphone but. Is your microphone on? Oh I'm sorry. Yeah I do have some questions but perhaps for the gentleman but not necessarily um you mentioned before someone mentioned before that there has been a project that has uh not gone before this board relating to virginia key. What what is that exactly? Is it is it the the subject matter that we're talking about right now? Well, essentially by charter and the city attorney can opine more accurately than I can but items that affect virginia key park that are substantive and might be changing the park are supposed to come before this board before moving on to the city commission and we're supposed to hear the items in detail and vote. We can vote. We only vote as recommendations. We can vote yes or no. It doesn't have to have any impact whatsoever on the city commission. No, I understand that, MR. Chair. My question was what has gone before the city that has not come before this board? What exactly are we talking. >> about this we did hear this item as it pertained to request for 50 more moving it up above 50 to 75 which was occurred during the course of a commission. We haven't seen any item or any information whatsoever about the mooring fields going up from 75 to 190 100 or 195.. >> got it. And then um I'm hearing from some of the members here some of the people from the public I I'm the question just keeps popping in my mind what is it that we're trying to accomplish that can't be accomplished through enforcement? What exactly are we trying to accomplish with the more info that cannot be accomplished with proper enforcement under the current policies or codes of the city? Roger, do you want to answer that? Well, I would like to know from the parks like or dream what exactly are we trying to do that cannot be done by proper code enforcement? So that's one of the items that that we need to circle back. So so obviously a lot of the information that's presented to here is very valuable. I don't want to give an incomplete answer. So I want to circle back with staff and in the OCTOBER presentation that's obviously going to be you know part and parcel of what's presented to the group. >> thank you very much. And that that's going to be a big question for me at that meeting because I I really need to understand, uh you know, what is it that we're trying to do that just simply cannot be done through proper enforcement? And then lastly, um, my last question is, um, give me one second the um. If and this is actually to the question that I had because as I read the the code, you know, the in 50-2 it talks about the marine stadium prohibitive anchorage area and so what additional regulatory authority does establishing a permitted mooring field give us that we do not presently have? And again I know that's going to be a question I'm going to ask in OCTOBER and I would really like an answer, uh, to that to that question. And then this is someone who doesn't know too much about rowing or anything like that, but I'm assuming the basin is important again, I, I offer that clearly I don't know a lot about rowing and things of that nature, but I'm assuming this is attractive because it's calm water. Is that why it's attractive to boating and boats wanting the more that and so on and so forth. It's attractive because it is protected on three sides but it doesn't not have the infrastructure that you would want in a mooring field. In other words, if I'm coming here from connecticut on my 40 foot sailboat and I want to come to miami and spend 2 or 3 weeks here getting my boat ready to go to the bahamas, I want a place where I can safely attach my boat which you can to a mooring. I want ready access to. Grocery stores, marine supply stores, parking restaurants none of that exists around the marine stadium. If I put my boat there now I'm taking taxis and ubers and busses to get all this stuff. If I put my boat in dinner key in coconut grove, all of that infrastructure is available and my understanding is that there are unused mooring ball permits for dinner key you could put another 100 or 150 boats there where they already have parking showers, trash walking to stores, marine stores there is no need from a boating community point of view to put this thing in the marine stadium. I understand but I guess my question was way more basic than that. The reason why these boats want to go there is because it's calm water. Yes, and the reason why people row and paddle and all these things because it's very calm water is that not duplicate is I guess it's not not necessarily duplicated in too many places. No like that. There there are plenty there are better places to put a mooring field if you want. I'm talking. >> about one. I'm talking about just why all people whether you want to put a boat there, whether you want a paddle boat, whether you want a row I'm just saying in general the reason why we're having this discussion is because you guys like it to be there because it's calm water and it's attractive to what you're doing. Yeah, but I'm saying there are better places to put a mooring field in the county than the marine stadium. There are not a whole lot of other places where the water is calm to row, to paddle, to swim and to do water based activities. Got it. So if you put 195 mooring in there, you basically kick the people out who are doing passive water sports. Mhm. Roger quick question. There's rowing now at the on indian creek at the indian creek rowing club. Yes miami beach rowing club. Miami beach rowing club yes. That's uh what is it? 70s and 70s yes on indian creek. What are the complications or benefits and problems with rowing and I know a lot of college teams come down to florida and train there during the year to prepare for their spring season. But are there problems um practicing on indian creek hurdles from jet skis and motorboats and. The city of miami beach has embraced the rowing club there from the beginning and provided space for it, provided enforcement provided facilities. Uh, that's not exactly the way things have worked in the city of miami and miami rowing club is here to talk about that. But mrc is operating without a lease. From the city. Um do do the rowers on indian creek have have to stop a practices because there's a bridge is down or a bigger boat coming towards them. They don't have problems um. They don't have jet ski problems they don't have speeding boat problems because number one there's enforcement and number two from what I understand of the setup there they're not a lot of places or any places nearby where you can drop a boat into the water. Okay. >> so you can go to you can go to virginia key, throw your jet ski in the water and you're off. So looking at your drawing that you've provided of 100 is this 195. >> that's 195. Where'd you get this drawing. From the that's the city plan. So if this was executed and there were close to 195 yachts or boats tied up, what would that do to people that wanted to row? It would be over there would be no room there. Plus in that same basin with the proposal for a new lease on the rickenbacker marina there would be what, another 600 boats that'll be launched into that basin from dry storage force force into a little corridor on the south side of the mooring field to get in and out. Okay. Um leah said you can't look at this proposal for mooring field without looking at the seaquarium proposal without looking at the marine stadium proposal without looking at the rickenbacker marina proposal. Um, I noticed that our esteemed board member steve steve leibner is in the room. To my right. Thank you so much peter. I apologize for my tardiness. Tardiness? I was actually on a trolley at 5:00 but the driver decided to take a very long break. Oh so so roger, I appreciate all the all the investigation and all the information you provided for us. What I'm hearing is there is absolutely no justification for this mooring field and I take it we don't have a quorum tonight but I certainly would support, uh, a resolution opposing a mooring field in the marine stadium basin. So I'm waiting to hear justification for mooring field of which I haven't heard maybe in OCTOBER I doubt it. Um that's my $0.02. Thank you very much, board member. Could I just add to the record that we do have a lease agreement with the miami rowing club? The city does have a lease agreement with the miami rowing club. It's a license agreement but it's yes. Peter if I MAY add have we have we passed any resolutions regarding the mooring field, the marine stadium basin? No we haven't discussed the item. The item hasn't been brought to us by city staff and several years we did get an a um some information when it was headed to the commission for 50 votes a 5050 ball mooring field which got expanded to 75. Nobody as far as I know nobody from the administration has come back to update us on the plans to go from 75 to 195, which is shown in this drawing. Thank you. Thank you thank you very much roger bernstein. MR. CHAIRMAN, I want to I wanted to address the question of why the mooring field is so important to the people that are in this room and that is because of the the use by human powered boats. All of us are human powered and the likelihood of tipping or hooting as we would say in open water is so much greater than it is in the quiet, uh the quiet gentle waters of the basin. So the basin is the favored place for rowers to learn how to row in their shells and for paddlers and we're all very specific about that. Some of us are paddlers and some of us are rowers, but it's a big deal for us to get out in the open water of biscayne bay. Now that's not the case with the outriggers the outrigger paddlers who are here tonight these are very strong individuals who paddle for miles and they use the basin as their launching place. They cover a lot of territory and they train in the basin and there is no other place like when you ask about other places during covid we tried to use the miami yacht club uh very difficult. We could not get boats there. There's very limited space for sharing but we had to alter our schedule. Um it it was not ideal at all. Sometimes we've gone up to broward county and we actually have people who um in our team in the sos team we have people from the keys and people from broward county who come and so virginia key serves as a great meeting place for such a wide audience of paddlers. So and I don't want to take any more time because I know all these people are trying to burst their bursting their themes and [Laughter] Talking about why the basin is important. Who who else wants to talk? You do a great fantastic job. Leah chair I just have a question. Yes. >> chris norwood. Uh, the people here, uh, just to talk about the basin are some of the other items that we have on the agenda. That's a that's a good question is is everybody there's a few people in the room that that would like to talk about other items. So we'll we'll finish up with this item soon and we'll move to finish up the other items. Peter just to let you know also you requested that the miami rowing center have a representative to provide an update on their activities and since that is here. Wonderful and we'd love to hear from that person. Good evening. I don't mean to interrupt you because it's just a I'm just trying to understand how we function. Um we take items and have public comment after each item. Is that how this board functions? Yes. >> normally there's a presentation from the administration and then we hear from the public afterwards. For every item. So so we have a presentation a discussion and then public comment and then the next item presentation discussion and public. Yes but often in our meetings we only have 3 or 4 people in the room from the public. Tonight is one of the largest gatherings of the public that I've ever seen. Got it. I'm sorry sir. Sure. >> thank you. Good evening. I'm leonard levy. Uh, I'm a lifelong resident of south florida, having grown up in south beach living in key biscayne, active in all kinds of paddling and boating activities. I've been boating in these waters since I'm 14 and 15 years old. I remember the miami marine stadium activities in the 60s. They were just fantastic the concerts, the activities we had on the barge it was wonderful. One thing we're not talking about here is the ecology and the effect of these mooring fields on marine life in those waters. This was addressed I think we had meetings about 7 or 8 years ago in which somebody went to the extent of having a scuba diver going through the waters of the marine stadium, taking videos of the marine life and there was shown to be active marine life all kinds of fish, crabs, all kinds of fish. We enjoyed seeing the beauty of tarpon, manatees, dolphin, even crocodiles in our waters. It's fantastic. It's beautiful to see. It's wonderful to have this. How durham would ever let this happen is beyond me. Durham is there to protect marine life. You know we have so many condos going up along brickell avenue and downtown miami, edgewater everywhere all these places want a marina, a dock space for boats to make their developments more attractive to people. Durham has been tough on those people. they're not letting them have those marinas. How could they let this happen really a density that we're seeing of all these 195 mooring fields with the boats, those are casting great shadows over the bottom of the water. These are shallow waters. It would destroy the seagrass. You don't have the crabs. You don't have the fish to for the other fish to want to come in and feed it would be a disaster. So you know to preserve and I think that this is not just applicable this argument to the marine stadium, but I'm sure that you have the bailiwick of considering what's going on with some other projects in our waters like buy this aquarium and whatever nearby this is all going to be affected. The waters are not the same as what they used to be. Believe me, you talk to any old person who grew up in miami out in the bay catching grouper, catching you know, diving for lobster. You can't do that anymore. You know it's just too much boat traffic, cruise ships, all kinds of stuff. We have to sort of put the brakes on it at some point. Thank you. Thank you sir. We have a speaker with a colorful shirt on. Yes thank you. My name is balazs vandor uh, resident of the city of miami for about 15 years now. Uh, I've been paddling at the at mrc for about 20 years before I you know, I was coming down from broward, you know, before I moved to miami. Uh, you know, it's such an important, uh, place for paddling and rowing in south florida. Uh, just one quick comment, uh, additional answer to the question of why this is so important, you know, for paddling. Yes, it is a protected area and why a protected area is important is because these are racing teams competitive teams. So it's not like oh let's go out for a sunday evening paddle. No I mean there's a coach this practice plans that need to be followed without interruption. You can't just stop for somebody doing it or a couple of dinghies to cross your path and you know, wait on your recipes. No, I mean these these these are serious teams as leah was saying, you know her uh, cancer survivor team that my wife is also a member of you know, they are in france right now competing. You know, my team also goes and competes. So that's why it's very important to have, you know, a large flat body of water that's available for these sports. The you know, my other comment is that you know, if you want to see what this really means, just come out to mrc on a saturday morning, you know, see the number of people you know, the number of teams and what you will see is just a fraction. I mean my team has probably about 80 members probably 30 or 40 will come out for us today morning practice. But there's a lot you know it's not always the same people. It's a lot of people who are connected to this space in spite of the fact this is a very limited space. I mean there could be a lot more rowing, a lot more paddling in miami if we had the space. But you know, that is just you know, the facilities are very limited. I like to give the example you know andre is from brazil. Outrigger paddling for example started in miami in the early 2000. My team was founded around 2003 in brazil in rio started around the same time after 23 years in miami. Now there is two teams for outrigger paddling in rio about 4087 teams in rio they they organize world championships thousands of visitors coming in for that impossible in miami. So thank you thank you very much. Okay and do we have a representative here from the miami rowing club? Would you would you like to speak. We'd love to hear from you. And we notice we're we are provided with a I think a six page six page summary from the miami rowing club. Thank you very much for putting this together for for our board and we'd love to hear your comments on your activities. Hi. >> good evening. My name is cesar herrera. I am the head coach and operations director in miami rowing center. So in this moment we have a lease agreement with this regulation that uh we are running several programs under the umbrella of miami rowing club, the principal program or one of the principal program is the youth program. We have a program that we have been the in the in the same place for more than 50 years. Uh, I wonder you know that in this moment the the youth program in miami rowing club is the most important program that we have in the country and they are in the top in the in the state. Uh, at the same time we have different programs that they are under the umbrella of miami rowing club. We have several programs of the dragon boat and other paddle program program that also we have in this moment also we have one small youth sailing program. Um that that's that's our principal activity in miami rowing club. I wonder you know that also during the last uh I am talking about the last 20 years that I have been working there, you know, so uh, the program has been winning more than 17 state championships, the youth program we have been that they have participated in the usa national team in different category of the 23 on the 19 and also we have the master program that they we have a group of members that they have. They are training consistently all the time in the [Laughter] In mrc really the the beautiful place that we have in the basin and supporting the everything that we have been talking here. So the miami the in this moment that we have is a beautiful place and the only place in miami that we have to running our program. Um really I we have been the support I want to to say that one I have I have been receiving the support of the miami police and the marine patrol from the miami city miami and really the last year and a half they they were measured the vaccine has been safe for the first time really in the past. We have one coach that that she is a woman that she was in reach of the half a serious injury of maybe losing her life because we have five jetski running around her for more than ten minutes and in one moment also one guy he showed me one agung uh we have in this moment one coach that is still in court because for one situation that we have with the uh with one uh girls boat and he was in the front of between the the girls and the guy that was in the boat drunk and we I call the police in that moment the police arrived immediately and they stopped the situation this guy was in jail was under arrest and this coach is in still in the court. But really I wonder you know that in this moment the the most important activity that we have in the in the mrc uh are all the partners that we have we have today that we have more than 300 people at the same time on the water the day that we have more traffic is saturday and sunday that also we use our flow in the in the flexi park sometime during the week that according to the schedule that they have the different dragon boat. Uh also we have more people in traffic around the the area. MR.. >> MR. Herrera um, I don't know if you've seen this drawing with 195 mooring in the historic marine stadium basin, but what would this do to the ability of paddlers and rowers or anybody that wants to use the basin if there are 195 yachts and boats. This situation with the mooring field is nothing new that is coming for a while and you have some information that I know that this is coming from 2017 or before that a year the mooring field was a solution that the city was giving us to try to keep safe the the the basin and all the problem that we have really that's what the principal goal in that moment many years ago I was part of that conversation with the um in that moment with the director of the department and and other people that were involved in this, uh, in this job, uh, that was here also he was in this, uh, in this group. Um, we found in that moment like the principal solution for for the situation that we have in the basin for the for the on board and all and everything that you know that we have in the, in the past, uh, we have been several meetings. Um facundo is the board PRESIDENT. We have been several meetings with with the city, uh, including the uh, the the commissioner of the district about [Applause] This situation with the mooring field and really what we needed to continue running the program because we need to be sure that we can continue running our program because. Well, this is this is 195. That is. >> what would what would that do to your programing your ability of people to use the basin? The problem that the combination field. Yeah. So this I'm. Facundo barrera I'm a PRESIDENT Of the miami rowing club PRESIDENT Of the board. I work with cesar every day. So we've been in conversations with uh city staff in preparation for a previous version not this exact version the previous version of the mooring field. We gave some feedback to the city staff of how the mooring field would have to be adapted for us to be able to operate if a mooring field with 195 boys and 195 boats is established in the basin, we will not be able to operate. That is very clear now we've also been assured that it's. Do you mind repeating that? I will repeat it but I will repeat it for 195 mooring fields with 195 yachts would not let us operate. However I need to finish the sentence the city has promised us that there will be not 195 yachts nor 195 more that there will be 195 anchors only. So if it's only anchors we can operate above the anchors. That's all. So and what we gave the feedback on is we need whatever the number of anchors anchors don't interfere with our rowing. What interferes with our rowing is the number of mooring boats and yachts. So please keep in mind if the plan is to put in 195 anchors, there is no problem with us for operating if their plan is to putting 195 mooring and 195 yachts yes there is okay. Thank you. Anybody any board members have any questions? Steven I'd like to know what what damage 195 anchors are going to do to the floor of the basin. So we might need a representative from durham to help us with that. This item will be heard again in two months. So maybe somebody from durham can request somebody from durham to show up any other any other anybody else like to speak on this item? I'd just like to. Reinforce one thing that we are going to be in circles here. I didn't participate in any of those meetings before I for my understanding, if the mooring field is to block people from coming and stopping your boats in the basin, we don't have them. We don't need one more field. We don't need zero morning field over there. We need that water clear to to be doing our sport with that safely. As soon as you put one anchor over there and you don't put law enforcement it's done. We're talking about miami. We have people here from different I'm from brazil. I'm like cubans. We have we have people from different countries here. It's difficult to control these people. You guys saw what happened on the world cup here the year before they did like thank GOD they did the world championship here and they saw what like different people from different countries they can do right when you it's difficult to follow rules. You know here in miami what I see if you put one anchor over there and you don't put law enforcement has no purpose and if you're going to put an anchor and put law enforcement. The law enforcement is doing their job. It's not it's doing their job. It's avoiding people to go crazy in the water. It's not only about the anchors. It's not only about the morning. We're talking about people coming to party crazy party in places that with people doing sports. >> all right. In conclusion in conclusion. In conclusion I'm point my point is this it's like we don't need a mooring florida we did zero morning I don't know whether it was discussed before but if the purpose was to not bring boats over there the purpose is already done for last year and a half we don't have boats over there. Thank you so much for for speaking. Do we have a young lady? Good evening. I'll make it quick. Hi, my name is julia. Good evening everyone. I'm the executive coordinator for the friends of biscayne bay. We've actually been holding a citizen meeting every friday at 11 A.M.. We'd love to have you so that you can continue to gather information on everything that we've been researching not only for the mooring field but everything that's going on on key biscayne. I think everybody already expressed everything that I was going to comment on, so I'm not going to repeat myself, but I think it's clear the community is very opposed to the mooring field for reasons of the rowers, the businesses, the ecological life and everythi