City Council Meeting

Gulfport City Council Agenda Template

City of Gulfport Florida

City Council Meeting Notice

Tuesday, January 17, 2023

Gulfport City Hall, 2401 53rd Street South Gulfport, FL

6:00 PM

AGENDA

Call to Order.

Invocation given by Councilmember Paul Ray.

Pledge of Allegiance.

Roll Call.

Presentations:

Oath of Office: Rene Fernandez, Fire Chief

Holiday Decoration Contest Winners

1.

Public Comment.

2.

City Manager Report.

3.

City Attorney Report.

4.

City Clerk Report.

5.

Consent:

5.a.

Consider approval of the Council Meeting Minutes of November 15, 2022, December 6, 2022 and December 20, 2022.

EXHIBIT: Item 5.a - Minutes 11-15-2022.pdf

EXHIBIT: Item 5.a - Minutes 12-06-2022.pdf

EXHIBIT: Item 5.a - Minutes 12-20-2022.pdf

6.

Ordinances: None.

7.

Resolutions.

7.a.

Resolution No. 2023-01: A Resolution authorizing the City Manager to enter into a contract with Wetter Solutions, LLC., for the purchase and installation of a keyless access system for the marina north and south basin.

EXHIBIT: Item 7.a - Memorandum.pdf

EXHIBIT: Item 7.a - Resolution No. 2023-01.pdf

7.b.

Resolution No 2023-02: A Resolution authorizing the City Manager to amend the Fire Department's Personnel Summary and the City of Gulfport's Pay Plan to implement a restructuring of the Fire Department and approving an associated budget amendment.

EXHIBIT: Item 7.b - Memorandum.pdf

>>> Welcome everyone to the January 17 2023 regular council meeting for the city of Gulfport Florida. The invocation is given by Councilmember Paul Ray tonight followed by the pledge of allegiance. >> I pledge allegiance to 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. >> Welcome everybody. If there's a fire in this building right now, you are in the safest place you could be. Roll call, please. >> Councilmember Ray. >> Here. >> Council memberThanos. >> Here. >> Vice mayor Brown. >> Here. >> City clerk present. >> Got a couple of presentations this evening, first off a really important one for us here at the city. Someone we're very proud of and happy to see them moving up. We're doing the oath of office for Captain Rene Fernandez who's going to be our new fire chief. We're very happy about that. >> I swear that I am a citizen of the United States of America and resident of the State of Florida. I am duly qualified to hold office under the constitution of the state and the charter of the city. And that I will well and faithfully perform the duties of fire chief. I will support the constitution of the United States of America and the constitution of the State of Florida. And that I will in all respects -- and the ordinance of the City of Gulfport. [ Applause ] >>> Moved here, loved it. It's an honor to be able to work in this community. If anybody ever wants to stop by the office and have a chat, you're more than welcome to come by. I'm honored for this and thank everyone. [ Applause ] >>> Congratulations, Chief. Thank you very much. Our next presentation this evening is for our holiday decoration contest winners. So we have a general theme and a commercial theme for the holidays and our commercial theme winner this year was the Shell station up on Gulfport Boulevard. But we do have Christopher Feltman here who lives on 57th Street south and we'd like to present this to him. Thanks for your holiday spirit. [ Applause ] >>> This brings us to our open public comment tonight. This is for any item not on the agenda. With that in mind we have two discussion items tonight. We will do public comment on those items where you can address either or both. This is for anything that doesn't addresser our resolutions, anything else on the agenda. If you have public comment, we'll go with a show of hands, please use the microphone so folks at home can hear. Give your name and address if you're comfortable with it and we'll go with the first person to get that hand in the air. Ms. Love. >> Karen Love, South 23rd Avenue. Thank you. The public comment was so quick at the last meeting, none of us had an opportunity to thank the council for another year of service so I'll say it now. I also would like to say thanks for the clean up at the waterfront. I'd like to believe that some of the services of Gulfport was able to help some of our people in need and maybe got them some additional services with the county because you definitely can see somewhat of an improvement at the waterfront now. So that's good and I'm hoping it's for good reasons. I wanted to ask just to see if I have correct information, I believe that a code enforcement officer was hired and I believe that the software was purchased to address the short-term rental scenario. What I'm not clear on and I'm hoping somebody will maybe just give a quick answer back is does that then mean that we the residents don't have to call in complaints about illegal short-term rentals? Is it no longer going to be complaint driven? Is the software going to take care of that or do we still have to initiate something to get it going? It's on the news right now and we're missing the whole thing but we all know it that they just identified nine of the top inflated rent areas in the country, I'm not saying they've only identified nine, but nine of the most inflated rental areas are in Florida and of course one of them is the Tampa Bay area. And of course they went on to say that there's two main reasons for it, and one is the great influx of short-term rentals and AirBNBs in our area. So I really think that we could nip this in the bud. I know the market is changing a little bit already, but the next time it goes soaring and even at this point I think, eliminating so many of our short-term rentals will help with long-term control for our residents in the area. Thank you. >> Thank you. Since we have so many folks in here tonight I'll defer for any of those you want to answer on the spot during your city manager report. Anyone else for open public comment? Yes, how are you doing? >> Hello. My name is Melissa Humbolt, I am the president of the Gulfport's Merchants Chamber. We concluded 2022 with a wonderful shop local campaign. We were able to get a ton of businesses a lot of exposure with local shoppers, people who live and play in Gulfport. And we were really excited. It was one of our most successful to date. We are also having our strategic planning meeting this Thursday to prep for the next year so we can really be more strategic with what we're doing at the chamber. And we're really excited about it. We have also been able to hire on an event coordinator for all of our events. The chamber is growing and we're putting that money back into local businesses and we're very excited about it. >> Fantastic, thank you for coming to speak with us. Anyone else for open public comment? Yes, sir. >> Hi, I'm Tommy Bixler on 59th Street South. I'm the president of the Alliance Foundation, I thought what a great opportunity look at all of the people here. We're having a pancake breakfast Saturday, $9 all you can eat, sausage, scrambled eggs, pancakes. We do a lot of stuff for Gulfport. We try to find ways of spending the money we can raise. But if you're not doing anything Saturday, come over to the Lion's Club, it's by the arena. >> What time does it start? >> 8:00-11:00. >> Fantastic. Thank you. Anyone else for open public comment? Seeing no one that takes us to our city manager report. >> Yes, the short-term rental complaint would still need to be initiated by the resident, but at that point we can use the software and the enforcement tools that we have implementing 1st of February approximately. But it does have to be initiated by the resident. >> Okay, thank you. >> I'm sorry, I know we're not supposed to interrupt but I didn't want to wait until the end. Is there anything we can do to inform people of that? Like Karen didn't know and I think it's a question on a lot of people's minds. Could it be in our email or something? >> Sounds good. Anything else for your report? >> No, sir. >> All right. City attorney? >> No report. >> City clerk? >> No report, Mayor. >> That brings us to our consent agenda. >> 5A, consider approval of the council meeting minutes of November 15, 2022. >> All in favor signify by saying aye. >> Aye. >> Carries unanimously. No ordinances this evening so we go right to agenda item seven. >> Resolution 2023-01, resolution authorizing the city manager to enter into a contract with Wetter Solutions LLC for the installation of a keyless access system for the marina north and south basin. >> Motion. >> Second. >> Mr. City manager? >> This is switching away from an original key lock that we've had for 100 years, wouldn't you say, Dennis? >> All right. >> Any questions? >> I do want to ask a question. It just seems like 100 years. I was wondering if it's keyless entry, so is it tracked who comes in when and -- >> Absolutely. So it will be on your phone or a key fob. We can see who comes in, who comes out. We can also cancel their access to the marina. And we'll be able to specifically for that pier. So if you're on pier 5 you don't have access to 2, 3, 4, so on. We're kind of behind the times in that sense. Most marinas do have keyless access. But we're at the time where we're getting really popular. >> People have it at their house now. I just want to point out also we have the employee appreciation luncheon and Dennis has been here longer than anybody, 39 years with the city. >> Congratulations. >> Thank you. >> I just want to say I think it's a great idea because the whole key issue when somebody didn't pay their rent is kind of difficult. The keyless means that we can disable somebody's access right away. >> Any other council questions or comments on this item? Public comment on this item? Seeing no one, we'll call the vote. >> Councilmember Ray. >> Yes. >> Council memberThanos. >> Yes. >> Mayor Henderson. >> Yes. >> Carries unanimously. >> Resolution 2023-02 resolution authorizing the city manager to amend the fire department personnel summary to implement restructures of the fire department and approve an associated budget amendment. >> I'll entertain a motion. >> Motion we accept resolution 2023-02. >> Second. >> First and a second. City manager. >> Mayor, very simply, this is restructure in the addition of a paramedic position within the fire department. It also creates the position of deputy chief which we have to have a chief before we can install deputy chief next week at your next meeting. And hopefully we'll offset some of the huge overtime costs we have by bringing on an additional paramedic physically. >> Fantastic. Council comments or questions on this item? Yes? >> I know I asked you before. But in the budget thing it shows having two people, you said we're only adding one? >> Adding one physical body. The other is a reclassification. >> But it didn't take them out of the other one. >> We just left them captain's positions, they're in there. We're not filling those at this point. >> So we're adding one person so there will be extra money in the budget for the person that we're not filling right now? >> Right, that's correct. >> Okay, thank you. >> I was going to ask, what was I going to ask? Oh how is the market? Is there a lot of people, have you opened it up for employment yet? >> We can't do that until we do this. >> All right, thanks. >> Public comment on this item? Seeing no one, we'll call the vote. >> Councilmember Ray. >> Yes. >> Councilmember Thanos. >> Yes. >> Mayor Henderson. >> Yes. >> Carries unanimously. >> Resolution 2023-03, resolution authorizing the city manager to purchase replacement police department vehicles and the associated emergency equipment. >> Entertain a motion, council. >> I'll make a motion on 2023-03. >> Second. >> City manager. >> Mayor, this is the annual purchase of police vehicles. The chief is here to answer any specific questions you may have. >> Anyone have questions for the chief on this item? >> I just want to clarify something and the chief doesn't have to come up. But I just want to let people know that we did look at buying hybrids, there are currently no electric vehicles that are authorized for police pursuit use, and the hybrids were not available. Having just bought a hybrid, I know how hard it is to find them and so that's why we're not buying an electric or a hybrid this time. >> Anyone got questions for the chief? Okay. Public comment on this item? Seeing none, we'll call the vote. >> Council member Ray. >> Yes. >> Council member Thanos. >> Yes. >> Vice mayor Brown. >> Yes. >> Mayor Henderson. >> Yes. Carries to passage. >> Resolution 2023-04, this is a public hearing resolution proving application C2204, a conditional use application to allow a mixed use development of a church and academy at 54th street South and providing for conditions. >> Make a motion we accept resolution 2023-04. >> Second. >> City manager, any comments to add to this? >> No, Mayor. It's pretty self-explainatory in your memo. It's a five day a week program, a preschool. >> That's great. It's right down the street from my place and we've got a park right across the way. Not a bad location at all. Any comments/questions on this item, council? >> I just wanted to make clear it's not a charter school, it's purely private? >> A private preschool. >> What was the total number of students that they're looking -- >> They were looking at ten. >> Are they special needs? >> That's what we've been told. >> That's great. >> Public comment on this item? Seeing no one, call the vote. >> Councilmember Ray. >> Yes. >> Council member Thanos. >> Yes. >> Vice mayor Brown. >> Yes. >> Mayor Henderson. >> Yes. Carries to passage. This brings us to our discussion items. First one we'll go through is the recreational vehicle storage in residential areas. The second is regulation of motorized scooters. I'm going to open public comment for both of those now. We're going to do one public comment up front. We'll start with a show of hands and you can speak on both or either of these. Who'd like to go first? Yes. >> I've had an RV for four years. Presently it's almost impossible to find a place in Pinellas County. Especially if you come back later in the year. We come back in November. I have to store my vehicle down in Manatee County, drive over the bridge and store it there which is extremely inconvenient and it's becoming very expensive. By modifying rules like being able to put it in my backyard would save me a big inconvenience and a lot of expense. This year in particular, our plans are to come back mid-year so now I have to rent a spot for the entire year which again doubles the price of what I'm paying now. And there's also the inconvenience of having to go when I need to repair it, fix it, clean it. I have to drive all the way to Manatee County now. The only other places I've found are out over by Tampa. It's almost impossible to find a place in Pinellas County. Two years ago I was able to find a couple of spots, but now we have to expand out. I had to look all the way out into past Tampa. But I found the one in Manatee. There were two spots left this year. It would be a big benefit to the people in the town who have RVs to be able to just put them in their yard somewhere. Thank you. >> Thank you. Anyone else with public comment on these two discussion items? Bear in mind there won't be a vote cast tonight. There will be other opportunities if we decide to move ahead with public comment as well. But we want that hear public comment for discussion. >> Hi. My name is Kate Sideman. I live on Beach Boulevard. I'm very interested in buying an RV, but I don't want to buy it and then not have a place to put it like this gentleman that just spoke. I'm hoping that we'll change the rules. I heard boats can be in backyards so I don't understand why RVs, what the problem is with RVs. So thank you. >> Thank you. Yes. >> Jolene Weeks, 17th Avenue South. I've lived in Gulfport since 19 which makes it 29 years. I have a very small camper which is an A-frame that folds down with a beautiful cover and I can't keep it in my yard. It's very frustrating. I'm lucky to have a neighbor that lets me keep it in her yard which has got approval by the code enforcement. But I would really like to have it in my yard. Gulfport is a very boat friendly town but it's not a camper friendly town. And I understand that some are grandfathered in, I have neighbors that have campers on their property that have lived there a lot less time than I have and they're very unsightly and they are there for years and years and I don't understand the difference. What's it take, I have a huge front yard that has plenty of room. I've had my boat there for ten years and now I can't have my camper there. I would like to see something change for that as well. >> Thank you. We'll have Mr. Metcalf come up for a little while and he's going to go through the history of how we've addressed this in the past and how those changes have gone. Of course after public comment since this was your discussion item, you'll lead us off for that. Anyone else for public comment on these? Yes, in the back row, how are you doing? I'll get you next. Then you, Ms. Love. Hi. >> My name is Sheryl. I live in Gulfport and I walk everywhere all the time. I'm always walking and I've noticed that there are more and more and more recreational vehicles which I've read what the current rules are and a lot of them are not abiding by them. So I just think that it's probably very difficult kind of like with the rental to actually enforce the rules that are set for them. And I mean I don't have a problem, like I said we had a boat forever that was in our driveway, we sold it. And there's no problem with boats being wherever. But I know the rules are kind of strict on the recreational vehicles, but yet there are many and it seems like they've been growing over the past couple of years when I walk I can say there's another one. There's another one. They're in places where I don't think they're actually meeting the current rules which is fine with me. I just think it would just be like for the people that want to get one or whatever easier for them if they didn't have to go through so much red tape I guess to have one. Since there are so many here. There are already a lot here. I walk all over and I see tons of them. And so I just think that it would be better to just make it easier for everybody that already has one or somebody that wants to get one and everybody would be okay with and it nobody has to go try to enforce the rules that we currently have. >> All right, thank you. >> Good evening, council. I go by Leo, I live on Upper Marion Street. I have an RV like this gentleman, it's about a 26-foot motor home. Sadly due to the way that the code is written with my house, there's a 45.5-foot width of what my property stands on and everybody else is roughly about 50 feet. So it's not conducive for me to actually have it on the side of my home due to the decking that we have and the permanent fence. But it fits perfectly right in the driveway that we have in the front of the home. We're currently spending about $2,600 a year just on storage fees and that's strictly just a parking lot with no cover, no electric. And I just don't understand the reason why I really have to spend all of this money when it fits perfectly fine right in the front of my house. So I'm definitely in favor to hoping that you guys reconsider changing those laws. We do a little bit of traveling, we're out about four months out of the year and come back. But it's the same situation if we have to get it fixed or just wash it alone, it would just benefit us tremendously. Appreciate your time. >> Thank you. Ms. Love. This is for both, yes. >> So I wanted to address mobility scooters, but it's kind of hard to address because I don't know how we're defining a mobility scooter. I walk on the sidewalks, I ride my bikes on the sidewalks, I get cussed out a lot, even though I follow the rule heels before wheels. But when it comes to mobility scooters, I'm hoping this conversation will really entail and breakdown what is a mobility scooter. On my one block, I live on a very short block, we have three e-bikes, one electric wheelchair and my 91-year-old mom in a mobility scooter. Now that mobility scooter maxes out at seven miles an hour. So I don't think that she or they should have the same set of rules as some of the scooters I see on our roads that might be going on our sidewalks that might be going 25 or 30 miles an hour. And even though I think those people should have helmets on, I don't think the old grannies should have to wear helmets if they're going 5 or 6 miles an hour. So I'm hoping that we get into that and what is the difference between an electric bicycle versus a trike you know where they're carrying passengers as well. And then the scooters with the big, wide tires versus the little, there's just a lot of variables in there. So I hope that all of that is considered. And then it comes back to as always how would anything be enforced, thanks. >> Thank you. When we get to that discussion, the city attorney will get you the definition of what we're talking about. Anyone else for public comment? Yes. >> Again, Tommy Bixler, 59th Street South. I own a camper and I'm just like the gentleman back there looking for a place to store it. I take it all the way to Wildwood, it's $200 a month up there. I look around Gulfport and I see all kinds of boats. They're in the front yard, the side yard, they're not anymore attractive than my camper. Actually my camper looks pretty doggone good. But they have gas on them, so I would think from the fire standpoint, they hold gas, they also have a place in them a lot of them do that you can sleep in them just like a camper. So I'm sympathetic towards allowing them. You pay the taxes on a property, people should be allowed to have their personal belongings there. If you're going to visit the camper regulation, you should also look at the boat. But I'm not opposed to the boats being there, my point is I'd like to see both. So thank you. >> Thank you. Anyone else? Yes. How are you doing? Good. >> Thank you for reminding me, I forget that sort of thing. I get nervous when I get up here. My name is Marlene Shaw and I live on 23rd Avenue South. I bought an RV in 2020. My original intention was to park it in my backyard which was inside the fence on a preexisting driveway next to an alley, no structures which would provide security and obviously convenience to me. Would not affect anybody. I received a citation and was made aware of the ordinance that was adopted a few years earlier. Ultimately the only option I had was to move my fence back and my gate back at great expense and to park it in the front yard where ingress and egress is difficult. It really wasn't a sensible solution, but that was the only option I had as no variance was permitted which in itself did not make sense to me. I understand there's some history to this and to me I'm sorry but that history is not relevant because this whole situation is not sensible in my opinion. The amendment will return to property rights to owners and will return RV parking to a place where it would again be consistent with boats and construction trailers. And I would like to point out that the concerns of maintenance were the predominant remarks and feedback I've received regarding this topic. I thank you for your time and consideration on this and hope that you do adopt an amendment to this. >> Thank you. Anyone else to speak on this? All right. Seeing no one, so at this point I'm going to go ahead and take some time to explain your reasons for bringing it up and what you're looking for and then we'll have Mr. Metcalf explain and summarize the history of where we've been with this and where we are now and maybe give people a better understanding of the current ordinance and answer a lot of the questions that we already have. >> Thank you. I sat and watched the old discussions back in 2013. I think people basically outlined kind of the reason for why I brought this up is this does, the way the ordinance is written, by the way nobody else, I went through a bunch of different cities and none had the strict rules that we have. And I went through Clearwater, St. Petersburg, Lakeland, Safety Harbor. So I tried to pick varying degrees of communities that reflect the area. Not all of them, they don't have the setback which is what's creating the hardship for most everybody here. When people talk about boats, I have a boat not too far from me with a tree growing out of it and there's no rules against it. I drove a boat that was in somebody's front yard that had to be at least 30 something feet. And I saw somebody it looked like maybe they were living in it. But so it's kind of like I understand the concept between the boats and the RVs. But it seems like the ordinance was written to basically just get rid of RVs. And I understand that the time that that was written in was a lot different than when people paid $600,000 for their houses and are taking really good care of them. One of my pet peeves was not having designated driving parking spots in