Transcript

Event transcript
OK. Good evening. I'd like to call the quarterly town hall meeting for. 00:00:03
This corner to. 00:00:09
To order. 00:00:11
If you would like to make some comments, ask questions, share anything with the. 00:00:13
City Council, please come to the podium and give us your name and address. 00:00:19
And try to respect the. 00:00:23
5 minute time limit. 00:00:25
Please. 00:00:26
Valerie Fouts, 310 W Bryant St. 00:00:34
I'm, I'm curious and I have a question to ask You all touched on it the other night with part of your agenda. 00:00:38
And it had to do with the exit 1. 00:00:45
And I guess the question I have is about two years ago when we actually. 00:00:47
The community actually was aware. 00:00:54
Of Exit 1 and the Sparkle project. 00:00:57
Do what? Oh. 00:01:01
Never mind, I'm sorry, I thought I had feedback. 00:01:03
At the time, I was under the impression that we had several public comments as well Opportunities. 00:01:06
That it was an open concept. 00:01:12
Project. 00:01:15
Basically along the lines of. 00:01:16
The one in Yulee. 00:01:19
The wildlife. 00:01:20
Which had, you know, open. 00:01:21
And and various houses and apartments and whatever. 00:01:23
And businesses that were going to be there. 00:01:26
And, and probably we would have been able to utilize that as the citizens as well if and. 00:01:28
Eye doctor was over there. 00:01:34
Or if someone wanted to walk their dog around a walking path. 1 evening. 00:01:35
So at one point I need to ask you all. 00:01:40
When did it go from that concept? 00:01:44
And of course, this was after the bond was set or, you know, for 35 million. 00:01:47
And there was a lot of talk about that as well. 00:01:52
And I do understand and remember that Mayor Morrissey. 00:01:55
He he gave, you know, he basically said, you know this. 00:01:59
May not be such a great thing and I cannot support this, but. 00:02:03
He got over, wrote twice, vetoed. I think we were all there. 00:02:07
But by the same token. 00:02:11
When did it become? 00:02:13
A gated community golf resort. 00:02:16
And I want to know, it kind of came on as a surprise to me because I came to a council meeting and you all had a representative 00:02:19
here talking about it. 00:02:23
And I remember thinking, wait, what? 00:02:27
This doesn't sound the same. 00:02:29
And I think even at one point. 00:02:31
Umm, they're talking about possibly down the road, umm. 00:02:34
Building an extra school. 00:02:38
And that was kind of brought up. And that was like, oh, yeah, that may be, you know, a thing down the road. 00:02:40
But by the same token, I'm just kind of curious as. 00:02:45
How a project? 00:02:49
Went from. 00:02:51
This one. 00:02:52
To that one. 00:02:53
And the public wasn't aware of it until it was presented by the gentleman who represented the new project. 00:02:54
And again, it's gated. 00:03:01
And it's private. 00:03:04
And it's exclusive. 00:03:06
And I'm paying for it. 00:03:08
So I guess The thing is, when did this change? How did it change? 00:03:10
Was the public made aware of it? 00:03:14
Is there something on the contract? 00:03:16
That basically hopped from one project to the other. I mean, I'm just wondering is that not something that should have been made? 00:03:20
Public. 00:03:27
So if anybody could answer that for me and Lynn, I do appreciate your fiscal responsibility on a lot of the things that come up as 00:03:28
far as the budget. 00:03:32
And then speaking the other night about. 00:03:36
That leaves us what with 14,014 million then to kind of play with before we have to come back and ask for the other $60 million 00:03:39
that is going to probably come up. 00:03:44
In 2026. 00:03:49
And I'll be honest with you when I get off exit 1. 00:03:51
And I see the land now that is completely clear and void of the trees. 00:03:54
It gives me heartburn. 00:03:59
And, and I kind of feel like we just kind of got shafted. 00:04:02
Without knowing it. 00:04:05
So I would like to understand what happened, when it happened, and can this possibly not ever happen again without the public 00:04:07
knowing? 00:04:10
Happening. 00:04:14
Thank you very much. 00:04:15
So I'll speak to a couple of things. I mean, obviously some of this. 00:04:18
You know, predated. 00:04:21
Me being on council but the. 00:04:22
Wind radiant. 00:04:26
The developed or the property owner sold. 00:04:27
The property to Taylor Morrison. 00:04:30
You know they came forth with. 00:04:34
Their concept, which was. 00:04:35
A gated community with a golf course and and whatnot so. 00:04:37
I suppose that was at the time that. 00:04:41
You know it became gated. 00:04:43
You know there are commercial out parcels up front that will not be behind the gates that will. You know, if they put in a new 00:04:45
grocery store, doctor's offices. 00:04:49
Those kinds of things, those will be accessible to the public. 00:04:54
The north side of the. 00:04:58
Saint Mary's. 00:05:01
Street in Saint Mary's Road there. 00:05:02
You know, from what I've heard, as far as what they're playing on there, you know, is not to be a gated community. There would be. 00:05:07
Potential housing and townhomes and. 00:05:13
Additional commercial retail there. 00:05:16
That, uh. 00:05:18
Would not be in a gated community, so there will certainly be a mixture of that. 00:05:19
Umm, I do want to kind of also clarify that. 00:05:25
The You know we're not. 00:05:27
Specifically paying for what's happening out there. You know there is a tad district. 00:05:30
And the people who pay property taxes out there on that property are the ones that are paying for. 00:05:36
That Chad at this point in time. 00:05:43
Now yes, if the. 00:05:45
Property, uh. 00:05:46
If the development went belly up. 00:05:47
And uh. 00:05:50
You know, there were no property taxes coming in. The loan came due. 00:05:52
Then it would, yes, fall back to taxpayers. But. 00:05:55
That is not currently. 00:05:58
What's happening the development out there? 00:06:00
Is well ahead of schedule and so the property values. 00:06:04
Rising already. 00:06:08
Umm, and. 00:06:09
It is set to generate enough. 00:06:12
Property tax and TAD revenue. 00:06:17
To pay the. 00:06:19
The bond. 00:06:20
And uh. 00:06:21
In fact, the way it's designed and the length of the TAD. 00:06:23
That it should generate those excess revenues above the original TAD. 00:06:27
Bond payment. 00:06:33
To make the infrastructure improvements. 00:06:34
On the Northside and that type of thing as it continues so. 00:06:37
Hopefully there will not have to be another bond for the additional infrastructure. 00:06:41
It'll be able to be paid from. 00:06:46
The increasing CAD revenues. 00:06:48
From the property tax. 00:06:50
You know, obviously that was Mayor Marcy's. 00:06:52
Concern was. 00:06:55
You know if it doesn't happen. 00:06:57
Then we would the city would be stuck with that. We the taxpayers. 00:06:58
Uh, but what's currently happening and? 00:07:02
The progress is well above well ahead of schedule that was originally laid out for the bond repayment. 00:07:05
The valuations are increasing faster than the original. 00:07:11
Computations that the repayment schedule was created under. 00:07:16
So we're right now well ahead of schedule and. 00:07:20
But who knows what will happen next year? I can't speak to that, you know, but. 00:07:24
That's where we are now. So right now it's not. 00:07:29
Other than ours, we have staff time and. 00:07:31
Those kinds of things that are involved in any development. 00:07:33
That we as taxpayers, you know, support, but the direct infrastructure and the things that are going on out there. 00:07:36
You know, are not coming out of taxpayer dollars specifically so. 00:07:44
I don't know if I answered all your questions or not, but. 00:07:48
German and I do understand as well. 00:07:51
Yeah, that is the bond, excuse me, that we be paying the interest on. 00:07:54
And when you when you're saying that that property taxes are there, I guess? 00:07:58
That's one way to look at it, but I'm thinking that, Chad the other night said at one point. 00:08:03
That you were thinking that they were going to be building businesses first so that we could start getting that revenue. 00:08:08
We don't know. Like you said, the economy could turn in 5 minutes. It happened in 2008. 00:08:16
OK. When we had that housing issue. 00:08:21
At that point, we're not making any money to pay on a bond. 00:08:25
So that's my concern. I mean, I know it's not tax money. 00:08:28
It's a bond and we the interest is going to be coming in on it is going to be due. 00:08:32
Can you alltel me when it's due the first installment? 00:08:37
One of the things to understand as we did take the $35 million revenue bond, the 1st. 00:08:39
Few years we have set aside $5,000,000 out of that. 00:08:48
To pay the early years. 00:08:53
To help us. 00:08:55
You know, build some momentum on the development and you did explain that the other evening. I appreciate that. 00:08:56
Greg's point? 00:09:02
In the financial projections that I've looked at. 00:09:04
We are setting aside. 00:09:07
From the tax revenues and right now that would be, you know, the owners of the land are Taylor Morrison and Radiant until they 00:09:10
sell it to somebody else. So they're going to have to. 00:09:14
Pay the tax. 00:09:19
I think we are setting aside. 00:09:20
A reserve out of. 00:09:24
Money that we get for the phase two development and that's fiscally responsible. 00:09:27
I think the thing that I'm concerned about. 00:09:32
We look at the Jacobi project. 00:09:36
You know at this point. 00:09:38
Yeah, it's not going to be anything right now. It's not what it was supposed to be. 00:09:40
So I think that the JDA has paid. 00:09:46
To tax payments, to tax bills, that's my concern. 00:09:49
And again, that's where the heartburn comes. So, you know, I just. 00:09:53
We gotta yeah, doesn't have to pay close attention to it, and I think that we are now. 00:09:58
But, you know, as Greg points out, nobody can predict the future. So absolutely thank you. 00:10:04
And thank you, Amy, could you? 00:10:10
Please address the multimodal. 00:10:12
Paths and where those will be located and whether or not. 00:10:15
They're open to the public. 00:10:19
Can you hear me? 00:10:23
Yeah, OK, great. Thank you. Thank you very much, Council and members of the public. 00:10:32
I did want to address some of Mrs. Spouses concerns in addition to speak to some of the public improvements. 00:10:37
That are in the Exit 1 development. 00:10:45
So, uh. 00:10:47
If you've noticed, at the bend of Saint Mary's Road as you're traveling. 00:10:48
East. 00:10:53
They have started the beginning of what will be Esplanade Blvd. which is the major intersection that will run. 00:10:54
South and north. 00:11:02
In that area. 00:11:04
Right there, there will be a gross a grocery. 00:11:06
Tenant. It is my understanding that that letter of intent. 00:11:10
Has if not been signed as in the works between radiant to still. 00:11:14
Both the master development of the land that is not Taylor Morrison's. 00:11:18
On the north side of there, there will also be commercial pods. All of that will be. 00:11:23
Designed in a way that. 00:11:28
Still keeps a. 00:11:30
A minimal. 00:11:32
A bit of a tree cover similar to what we see in front of Osprey Cove. So those commercial office spaces, those are open to the 00:11:34
public. 00:11:38
But they're designed in a way that is off the road, so you'll see that similar. 00:11:41
Design pattern for the commercial. 00:11:46
Along the southern. 00:11:49
Part of Saint Mary's Road. 00:11:52
Beginning at just a little bit off of the Haddock Rd. intersection. 00:11:53
We will be doing a multimodal path. 00:12:00
This will be within the city's right of way. 00:12:02
So you look at the edge of pavement. 00:12:05
26 feet in to try to shelter it a little bit from that fast moving traffic. 00:12:07
Will begin a series of. 00:12:13
Very beautifully designed and planted. 00:12:15
Shrubs and vegetation. A winding multimodal path that will be 10 feet wide. 00:12:19
With a series of pocket parks. 00:12:24
The idea is to go all the way up to the edge of the Osprey Cove. 00:12:27
Land and then work with. 00:12:32
Asperico residents and the tag funding to continue that multimodal path. 00:12:34
Over I mean. 00:12:39
You know, big picture, at some point we come down off of Saint Mary's Road, we pick up the interchange and look, we're on Osborne 00:12:41
and maybe we can get ourselves to Midtown. So that's the multimodal path. Thank you. 00:12:47
How you doing? 00:13:17
Richard Gamble, 107 Dilworth Street, Saint Mary's, Georgia. 00:13:18
Dear Mayor. 00:13:23
Adi, I like your song, Jones. 00:13:27
And lean, clean and lean king. 00:13:31
I was contacted by. 00:13:35
As a coach, so I. 00:13:40
I was contacted by. 00:13:43
Dependable, Mr. Ma. 00:13:44
The next day. 00:13:46
After I appeared here before you about the city right away ditches. 00:13:47
It gave me a warm feeling that I had achieved one of my 2 objectives. 00:13:51
I would later discover I was wrong. 00:13:56
I think you should know my motivation so you can gauge the fight in me. 00:14:00
If needed. 00:14:04
As an unbaptized Jehovah Witness, a recent lesson said. 00:14:06
Love and do for others. 00:14:11
And Jehovah God will love and do for you. 00:14:13
I walked that path. 00:14:16
I revisit Billy Wilson. 00:14:19
And also met his. 00:14:21
His wife, Hattie. 00:14:22
With a pretty smooth skin. 00:14:24
She was seated in some type of mobile device. 00:14:26
I inquired about the tree. 00:14:29
And was told. 00:14:31
Had it cut it down. 00:14:33
Heavy cut it down. 00:14:38
My heart sank. 00:14:41
Headed to stride how she cut most of the tree using. 00:14:43
Heads close. 00:14:47
She then hired someone with a chainsaw. 00:14:50
To cut the remainder. 00:14:53
I focused on having. 00:14:55
As she spoke and tried to visualize. 00:14:57
How this frail appearing? 00:14:59
Woman cut down the tree. 00:15:02
Billy is 92. 00:15:05
And I'm gonna give them. 00:15:06
Minds and Denise relationship 10 years. 00:15:08
Let's say hat is 82. 00:15:11
I. 00:15:19
Hattie was stimulated by anger. 00:15:21
I believe had embedded. 00:15:25
Billy thought as I. 00:15:26
That the tree was finally going to be removed. 00:15:28
Only later to learn differently. 00:15:31
Let me say something about Mr. Ma. 00:15:36
He's done 4 things for me. 00:15:38
And I'm gonna just tell you about 1. 00:15:40
When my truck motor was being rebuilt. 00:15:43
I went six weeks without a vehicle. I had to ride my bicycle to the base to swim. 00:15:46
And a tree. 00:15:51
We had a storm and it blew the tree over there. 00:15:52
Sidewalk. I contacted Mr. Ma. 00:15:55
And I say now. 00:15:58
This, this ain't no danger. 00:15:59
I said just something. 00:16:01
My ride better. 00:16:02
Which removed the treatment. 00:16:04
It was gone the next day. 00:16:05
Day I was so shocked you when I wrote by and saw that tree gone. 00:16:07
I had a great swim that day. 00:16:13
Well, anyway, let's let's get back to the subject. 00:16:15
So when when Mr. Mark called me and told me, he was going out there to look at it. 00:16:19
I thought they were going to cut the tree. 00:16:25
I have two chainsaws. I could have cut the tree down. 00:16:26
My request was on behalf of Billy and Hattie. 00:16:30
Someone failed me in two ways. 00:16:34
By not fulfilling the test. 00:16:37
And more importantly. 00:16:39
Not communicating a no reply and the reason why? 00:16:41
Communication. 00:16:46
We should never. 00:16:49
No, I want to define we. 00:16:50
We meaning me. 00:16:52
You, the audience. 00:16:55
The citizen of Saint Mary's. 00:16:56
We should never forget. 00:16:58
That you. 00:17:00
Work for us. 00:17:01
Tonight, I'm here remind you. 00:17:04
I again ask that you feel. 00:17:07
Randall and Kimberly Hendricks *****. 00:17:09
At 7:09. 00:17:11
West Dillingham St. 00:17:13
Randall and Kimberly Hendricks ditch at 7:09. 00:17:16
West didn't have St. the Super ditch. 00:17:21
You have 30 days for replying. I'm not asking for a reply. I demand a reply. 00:17:27
You work for us. 00:17:32
Billy and Hattie. 00:17:36
OBE. 00:17:38
But we can ensure. 00:17:39
That nothing like this. 00:17:41
Happen again as a deterrent sort of thing. 00:17:42
Imagine you are amongst A diverse group that pay for something and everybody got it but you. 00:17:45
Some of us know that song all too well. 00:17:58
We don't get it or we pay more for it. 00:18:01
I learned as a teacher. 00:18:05
Students treatment toward you. 00:18:08
Mirror that same behavior. 00:18:10
That they exhibit toward their parents. 00:18:12
There's someone who worked for you. 00:18:15
Who will not listen? 00:18:17
To us. 00:18:19
I surmise. 00:18:22
That person don't listen to you either. 00:18:23
It's time for a change. 00:18:27
Fire a city meant. 00:18:31
Yes. 00:18:32
Fire the city manager. 00:18:33
And his replacement be for all Saint Mary's. 00:18:37
One Saint Mary's will make Saint Mary's number one. 00:18:41
Immediately upon his approach. 00:18:46
As appropriate. 00:18:48
Do a thoracic audit. 00:18:50
While my request is void of accusation, there's no accusation here. 00:18:52
It's on verification. 00:18:57
President Reagan said trust. 00:18:59
But. 00:19:01
Verify. 00:19:02
See something? 00:19:07
Know something, Say something please. 00:19:08
Then clean and lean king, do your job. 00:19:12
And if he was here? 00:19:16
Chief Galloway. 00:19:17
Release the arms. 00:19:19
Thank you. 00:19:21
Mr. Gamble, I do want to address. 00:19:24
The Wilsons real quickly. 00:19:26
Umm, you know I had followed up after your last. 00:19:29
You know, uh. 00:19:31
Presentation about. 00:19:32
That fig tree. 00:19:34
And I was. 00:19:35
Told, and I will admit I did not speak directly to the Wilson's myself. 00:19:37
But I followed up and I was told that public works went out there within a day or two of. 00:19:41
The last time you were here. 00:19:46
And spoke to them. 00:19:47
And uh. 00:19:49
Found out that they had planted that tree from a cutting. 00:19:50
From down here. 00:19:53
Downtown, a historic fig tree. 00:19:55
That they themselves, that actually. 00:19:57
Planted that tree. 00:19:59
Years ago and didn't realize, you know that it was an issue and. 00:20:01
I'm not exactly sure you know what. 00:20:07
Transpired after that, but obviously the fact that she cut it down disturbs me. 00:20:09
That she had to do that if they really wanted it cut down. But. 00:20:14
I was told that. 00:20:18
You know that they had not necessarily initially asked. 00:20:19
To have the tree cut down. 00:20:23
But maybe she thought that the city wanted it down because. 00:20:25
And that they had planted it. So that does concern me and I'd like to kind of talk to her and get to the bottom of that, but. 00:20:28
OK, let me clarify something. 00:20:33
How did I know that they wanted that tree down? 00:20:36
I don't live in that neighborhood. 00:20:39
I don't know them. 00:20:40
Right, so. 00:20:41
I was told they wanted it gone. 00:20:43
And before I came to you. 00:20:45
I went to them and I took a picture of him when I talked to him. 00:20:46
Right. And he said he wanted it done. 00:20:50
He said he had wanted to gone all alone. 00:20:53
But the thing that I saw was still. 00:20:55
That neighborhood gets no. 00:20:57
Nope, no lawn service. 00:20:59
That entire neighborhood. 00:21:01
But I'm not here to fight that. 00:21:02
I'm here to say. 00:21:04
And then when y'all decided y'all were not going to do it, I just think that I should have been told. 00:21:05
I came before you. 00:21:10
I took my time out like tonight. 00:21:11
Yes, you know how long I had prepared to do this. 00:21:13
You know so. 00:21:16
It's not like I just came in here off the farm, I think. 00:21:17
And so. 00:21:21
I'm going to tell you something about. 00:21:22
Real elderly black people. 00:21:25
They are not aggressive. 00:21:28
When I went to her and I asked him, I just followed up on. 00:21:30
Because I saw the tree was going and when she told me. 00:21:34
Who she was telling about. 00:21:36
She said please don't say nothing. 00:21:37
So if you go out there as authority. 00:21:40
They're not going to challenge you. They're not going to do anything. 00:21:42
Just do your job. 00:21:46
You know, if they how, how did I know that that tree was gone? 00:21:48
I mean that tree needed to be gone. 00:21:52
So I stand by there and I stand by my request. 00:21:54
And I and I stand by that I should get an answer back. 00:21:58
Yes, Sir, And if not, I'm not violent. 00:22:02
But I do have a fence. 00:22:06
If you know what I mean. 00:22:08
Yes, thank you. 00:22:10
Tom Canning, 410 Point Peter Place. 00:22:21
I've got 2 items. 00:22:24
Raise the first one. 00:22:26
Is an observation. 00:22:30
That if it resonates with you. 00:22:32
I ask that. 00:22:35
The property authority, whether it be the police chief or someone. 00:22:39
Brave our community on the subject, and that is. 00:22:44
Drugs in our community. 00:22:47
I have a very limited view and understanding of. 00:22:49
That issue. 00:22:53
I live a quiet life in a quiet neighborhood. 00:22:54
But when you read the newspaper. 00:22:58
And I don't have a number off the top of my head, but I. 00:23:01
Eventually, 90% of the items of arrest reports. 00:23:04
Have directly or indirectly have to do with drugs. 00:23:08
And I don't see that that is doing anything but increasing. 00:23:11
Whether it's the. 00:23:15
I 94.5. 00:23:16
Carter arrests. 00:23:18
Or just arrest within our community. 00:23:20
So. 00:23:23
I'd like to get a more comfortable feeling on whether or not. 00:23:25
This is a growing power problem. 00:23:29
In our community more so than maybe other communities. 00:23:32
And what is being done about the source of the problems? 00:23:36
That I'm not talking about. 00:23:39
The drug abusers as much as I'm talking. 00:23:41
About the source. 00:23:43
So I don't know where to take that any further other than an observation that I'm sure. 00:23:45
Those of you that read the. 00:23:50
Newspaper. 00:23:51
You could probably do your own head count and you know. 00:23:52
At least 6 out of 10 or 7 out of 10 of those items. 00:23:58
Had to do with friends. 00:24:02
Even if they're violent related items. 00:24:04
OK. 00:24:06
If you could just take that down and think about it and. 00:24:07
Figure out some way. 00:24:10
Address that the other item. 00:24:12
I know a subject nearing data your hearts. 00:24:14
Is storm water management. 00:24:17
Let's come up. 00:24:19
Over the years, as many of you know, many, many times. 00:24:20
Most recent discussions. 00:24:25
You've, I believe you either. 00:24:28
I may have missed a one or two. You might either a work session or. 00:24:31
You plan on having more and what have you. 00:24:35
My concern remains what it was, what I expressed in the past. 00:24:38
We all know that we have an ordinance on the record. 00:24:42
That's been there for a number of years. It's been completely ignored. 00:24:45
We have. 00:24:50
Been using general funds. 00:24:52
To deal with. 00:24:55
The loudest. 00:24:56
Maybe even the biggest. 00:25:00
Storm water issues in our community, but we continue to. 00:25:01
Piece meal it. 00:25:05
And using general funds to do that. 00:25:09
I don't know whether you intend to rewrite the ordinance and come up with a completely different plan. 00:25:12
Or not. 00:25:19
If you intend to stay with the ordinance, I respectfully suggest. 00:25:20
We need to start to implement. 00:25:24
The fee structure, the revenue stream. 00:25:27
So we have the source of the funds. 00:25:29
To hire the labor. 00:25:32
Get the workforce. 00:25:34
And get the planning done. 00:25:35
This isn't a switch that you're just going to turn on and tomorrow. 00:25:37
Everything now we got management. 00:25:41
Stormwater management across the board. 00:25:42
We need but. 00:25:45
Everything starts with money. 00:25:46
So we've got to stop using our revenue a general revenue funds. 00:25:48
For doing something that we've said years ago. 00:25:52
That we were going to collect fees and. 00:25:55
And appreciate it if you would. 00:25:58
Whether you discuss it now. 00:26:00
Or you have a work session. 00:26:01
But please move it along, whatever you decide to do. 00:26:03
Thank you. Thank you. 00:26:07
I'll address my thoughts on the storm water management in the timeline. 00:26:12
Yeah, you know. 00:26:18
Does not. My line is on. 00:26:21
I mean, go ahead and talk. I'll just get right up on it. 00:26:26
Yeah, my thoughts on a timeline for the storm water utility management, you know. 00:26:31
We I know it's been on the books for a long time. 00:26:36
But you know. 00:26:40
As far as? 00:26:41
This council, you know, it's really been a couple months and I know years were spent on the storm water management utility plan. 00:26:42
We did have a work session. 00:26:46
But you know, it does affect. 00:26:49
You know our budget pretty significantly as far as. 00:26:51
What's going to be covered for workers under the storm water fund and equipment? 00:26:54
And then what's still going to be in our, you know, our regular fund? 00:26:59
So. 00:27:03
Unless we. 00:27:05
Pushed along further. 00:27:07
Sooner than that, I do feel that within you know, it should be something we can have done by. 00:27:08
But within the year for our next budget and whether we start the utility fund before we. 00:27:13
You know, factored in the next year's budget or we. 00:27:18
Kind of roll it in at the same time, but I would say within the year. 00:27:20
I think that's a reasonable time based on how many years were spent on the plan initially. 00:27:25
But uh. 00:27:29
You know and. 00:27:30
If anyone else has another idea, you know, maybe we try to get it done. 00:27:31
You know, before we set the mileage rate and do it sooner. 00:27:36
But it does affect. 00:27:38
You know the annual budget pretty significantly. 00:27:39
I think we did say that we wanted to have a storm water. 00:27:43
Or accession that hasn't been. We asked for that to be scheduled. 00:27:47
Have continued. Yeah. 00:27:52
Right at the last one we were gonna. 00:27:53
Right, keep working. 00:27:56
Yes. 00:27:58
Good evening. 00:28:03
Nick Harris, 102 Hamlet. 00:28:04
Circle Saint Mary's. 00:28:06
This is just a perception in overall listening. 00:28:08
To what everybody here? 00:28:13
Has said tonight. 00:28:14
We moved from Atlanta to Saint Mary's because of the smallness. 00:28:17
In the community aspect. 00:28:22
Of this. 00:28:25
And I grew up in a town smaller than Saint Mary's. 00:28:25
And this past week I spent a week out West. 00:28:29
In a very small town. 00:28:33
In Wherever I Go, I traveled to gay with Candace and a group. 00:28:35
Went out West in. 00:28:39
When I'm traveling, I'm walking into businesses. 00:28:41
And I'm talking to local people. 00:28:44
And the disconnect, I think. 00:28:47
Of Saint Mary's, at least in my world. Nick's world. 00:28:50
Is. 00:28:53
When I was a teacher. 00:28:54
And I still work special Ed. 00:28:56
There's three components of a community. 00:28:58
Family, school and community. 00:29:00
You can't, and those pillars are the foundation. 00:29:02
You cannot have a successful community. 00:29:05
With only two or one. 00:29:08
Or put more emphasis. 00:29:10
On a particular one. 00:29:12
Our community seems like. 00:29:14
We're doing more fighting. 00:29:16
And like good old boy projects versus just. 00:29:18
What's best for the community if we do what's right? 00:29:21
Our communities. 00:29:25
Gonna be vibrant. 00:29:26
I compare it to. 00:29:29
You look at certain venues. 00:29:30
They're like vending machines. You walk in, you pay, you get a service, and boom, you walk out. 00:29:32
The true communities. 00:29:37
The barn building. 00:29:39
Community where everybody comes together, even a local businesses. 00:29:41
And I'm a new business owner with my wife. She does more of it. 00:29:45
But I'm of the business savvy. 00:29:49
Side of that business. 00:29:51
And instead of working and enhancing other like. 00:29:53
Businesses, it's like competition. 00:29:57
And it shouldn't be like that. We're a small town. 00:30:00
Everybody should be working. 00:30:03
To benefit everybody else. 00:30:06
And whether your government. 00:30:09
Or whether you're a constituent resident. 00:30:10
We're not working. We see the government not working. 00:30:13
In true communities. 00:30:16
When you get the government environment. 00:30:18
Crap just happens. It doesn't happen. 00:30:20
You get into the bureaucracy. 00:30:22
But even in our community, people are. 00:30:24
Either a free. 00:30:26
To step up so. 00:30:28
When the grass isn't cut in front of a business. 00:30:29
Don't go to the city and gripe. Why aren't you cutting my grass? 00:30:32
Be the business owner and go out there and cut that grass. 00:30:36
Make a bill when you look at the blight here. 00:30:38
We need to put more pride into the businesses, say hey, look at your business. 00:30:41
Put a coat of paint on it. 00:30:46
But if we started all talking like that. 00:30:48
I think it would be infectious. 00:30:51
And catch on. So when we look at. 00:30:53
The majority of things here. 00:30:56
Let's start. 00:30:58
Family, school and community. 00:30:59
And do what you say you're gonna do. And I think people don't have a problem. 00:31:01
If you can't do it, just tell us you can't do it. 00:31:06
And then the community will step up if they want it bad enough. 00:31:08
And they will do it. 00:31:12
I think it's time for Saint Mary's to really. 00:31:13
And everybody here when you go home. 00:31:16
Self reflect. Look at yourself in the mirror. 00:31:18
And say, what did you do for Saint Mary's today? 00:31:21
Instead of. How did I benefit? 00:31:23
From Saint Mary's today. 00:31:26
Thank you. 00:31:28
Thank you. 00:31:29
That's cool. 00:31:33
Good evening. I'm Mark Fouts at 3:10. 00:31:39
West Branch St. 00:31:42
Just got a couple of concerns. 00:31:44
One of them is the new bulk. 00:31:46
Item The Cumberland services are supposed to be taken care of during our regular garbage pickup. 00:31:49
And I was wondering if someone could give us a definition of what those items are. There was a. 00:31:55
A piece in the city website that. 00:32:00
That kind of talk to it. 00:32:03
I didn't really tell what items are out, what items should be put out there, You know, whether it's a mattress or a stove or 00:32:05
whatever. 00:32:08
And I went on to the Cumberland Cumberland Services website. 00:32:12
They didn't address it at all. 00:32:16
So I'd like for somebody to address that to the public tonight. 00:32:17
The second thing. 00:32:22
Has to do with the the exit 1. 00:32:24
Building that's going on. 00:32:31
Back in 2022. 00:32:35
During some of our. 00:32:38
Citizen meetings that we had with the city. 00:32:41
There was a contract with Rainier that was afforded to everybody. 00:32:44
And it spoke specifically about what the. 00:32:48
What the expectations were from the city and what the expectations were from Rainier. 00:32:51
I can't find my copy of that contract. 00:32:57
And I can't find it anywhere on city website. 00:33:00
But there is very specific information in there about what's expected. 00:33:03
And I'd like to see that contract put back up on the city website so that people can reference that. 00:33:07
Because that's where your 30 million or $60 million bond information comes from. 00:33:13
The second thing. 00:33:18
On April the 17th, 2023. 00:33:20
There was a council work session. 00:33:24
It was called the City of Saint Mary's TAD 2 project. 00:33:26
Project financing overview. 00:33:30
And there was a representative from the financing establishment talking about Exit 1. 00:33:32
And what was expected or what? What? 00:33:39
What could be expected as far as the financing on it? 00:33:41
I would like to see. 00:33:45
Pages 10 and 14 out of that session. 00:33:47
Those particular pages one of them dealt with. 00:33:52
The payback? 00:33:55
And it was basically a set of milestones. 00:33:56
On a year by year basis that that. 00:33:59
Defined the expectations of what the principle was. 00:34:02
What the interest was. 00:34:06
What the TAD payment was? 00:34:07
And what the overage was going to be. 00:34:09
As a former project manager, we use those kinds of milestones to determine whether the project was on track or not. 00:34:13
You said tonight that what's going on right now, that the project is ahead of schedule. 00:34:20
What I'd really like to see is. 00:34:26
The document on pay on on pages. 00:34:28
10 and 14. 00:34:32
From that work session put up on the city website. 00:34:33
And actuals put on there for the people to see exactly just how this process is unfolding it from the financial standpoint. 00:34:36
And it also has talks about phase one and Phase 2. 00:34:44
The expectations and the time periods involved with those things. 00:34:47
Those are things that citizens want to see because they affect us. That's our money. Don't talk. And now. 00:34:51
And this is a good way to do it. 00:34:57
Most of you all weren't. 00:34:59
During that time period. 00:35:01
Absolutely. 00:35:03
I think you should look at these documents. 00:35:06
And put them as part of the city and put them on the website so that you can see what's going on with it. 00:35:10
The third thing I wanted to talk about? 00:35:16
There was a lady here that was, I guess she was with the airport to the film company that was buying something in the airport. 00:35:19
On Monday. 00:35:26
And she was talking about the electricity problems that they're having over there. 00:35:27
5 megawatts is what she said they needed. 00:35:33
And she wanted to look at solar and wind and gas. 00:35:36
Just for your information. 00:35:40
To create a MW of electricity for solar. 00:35:42
It takes about four to five acres. 00:35:46
So you know. 00:35:48
If she's going to do, she's going to do solar. 00:35:50
Somebody better figure out where she's going to get 20 acres of land to do it with. 00:35:53
The second thing that she said? 00:35:58
She used the word. 00:36:00
The land is under contract. 00:36:01
And my question is, has that land been closed on yet or not? 00:36:04
Because if I'm somebody that's got to put in that kind of money. 00:36:08
On a project. 00:36:12
That I didn't know I was going to do, and I haven't closed on that land yet. 00:36:14
I wouldn't be closing on it at all. 00:36:18
So you all can ask it can can address that tonight. 00:36:20
Has it been closed or not? 00:36:23
And is that their problem, or is that Saint Mary's problem? 00:36:25
Thank you. 00:36:28
Charlie, can you speak to the what bulk items are included in that? 00:36:30
For Cumberland Services. 00:36:34
Yeah. So to be quite honest. 00:36:37
To provide a list of what can be picked up would be. 00:36:39
A huge list, so I don't think I can really provide specifically what. 00:36:42
But I can tell you what. 00:36:45
Would be and that information I'll make sure it gets on the Cumberland website. 00:36:47
If it's not on there. 00:36:52
So my understanding it should have been posted on that site. 00:36:53
But it is on the Camden County dump site. 00:36:56
If you go into the Camden County site. 00:36:59
Because our regulations are based on what the county says we can. 00:37:01
Bring to that dump site so. 00:37:05
That is your liquid waste, your lead batteries you can't pick up. 00:37:06
Untreated, non residential. 00:37:10
Biomedical waste we can't pick up. 00:37:12
On petroleum products, we can't pick up tires. 00:37:14
Pesticides. Herbicides. 00:37:17
If you've got a refrigerator. 00:37:19
Can't be picked up unless it's got a special tag on it that says the coolant's been removed. It's things like that. 00:37:21
But your everyday dump stuff. 00:37:26
Mattresses changing out your cabinets. 00:37:29
As long as it's done by the resident. 00:37:31
They can pick it up. 00:37:33
What they don't pick up is if it's a. 00:37:35
They call it a move out. 00:37:37
If you got a renter that didn't pay the rent and they get evicted. 00:37:38
And then our product sits in the house and then. 00:37:42
You know, you see on the corner, all of a sudden they've done all of their furniture on the corner. 00:37:44
Government loan services won't pick that up either. That. 00:37:47
Falls on the. 00:37:50
Property owner and they can. 00:37:51
Get a private dumpster delivered there and all that stuff will be picked up. 00:37:53
The other things that won't pick up? 00:37:56
Umm is if you're doing. 00:37:58
Commercial yard waste or commercial. 00:38:00
Construction. 00:38:02
So the vendor is responsible for removing this stuff, but pretty much government will pick up anything. 00:38:03
Except anything that's considered hazardous to the dump. 00:38:08
Like I said, it's a vast but if you have any questions I mean I'll be more than happy to supply. 00:38:13
That if you have something you've got to put out with. 00:38:16
It's pretty vast. They'll pick up almost anything. 00:38:18
Thank you. 00:38:22
So as to the. 00:38:23
Property that. 00:38:25
Marina Martens and Pigmental Studios. 00:38:26
They have purchased and closed on. 00:38:29
I believe it's 3 parcels. 00:38:33
That they purchased from the city through JDA. 00:38:34
Umm, they were also acquiring private land that was outside of the Commerce Park. 00:38:38
From a private individual and I'm not 100% sure whether that piece of property is. 00:38:44
Completely closed or not, but I thought she said that it was. 00:38:48
And she also acquired. 00:38:52
A piece of land from SG blocks that had formerly been sold. 00:38:55
By the city. 00:38:59
And JDA to SG blocks that. 00:39:01
And so she has acquired that land as well. 00:39:04
Like I say once again, that was. 00:39:07
A private transaction between her and SD blocks. 00:39:09
And. 00:39:13
That one may be the one. 00:39:15
If I had to guess, that might not be fully closed yet, but I think. 00:39:16
Because that company, SG Blocks, has had some. 00:39:20
Change over from reorganization and some different things that I think slowed that process down, but. 00:39:23
I think she did finally get. 00:39:28
Closed on that but. 00:39:30
She has, I believe, well over 100 acres. 00:39:32
That she has acquired out there so. 00:39:35
She has the land. 00:39:38
To do. 00:39:39
A full solar. 00:39:40
If. 00:39:41
If she goes that way and on that property center. 00:39:42
Larry White, 102 Assemblies. Gordon, St. Marys. 00:40:08
Got basically three items. 00:40:12
1 is a follow up on exit 1. 00:40:14
And that's more of a. 00:40:17
I brought this up before. 00:40:18
They've been putting flags down on Liquor Drive. 00:40:21
For the proposed sewer line. 00:40:24
Coming from. 00:40:26
Exit 1 Development. 00:40:28
Down to the point. 00:40:29
Down to the lift station down there. 00:40:31
At the corner of a. 00:40:33
The Colerain. 00:40:35
And. 00:40:38
My mind's going. 00:40:40
Anyway, Rd. 00:40:42
No, not Saint Mary's Road. 00:40:43
Sugar Miller Sugar Mill Blvd. 00:40:45
You're supposed to attach it to that legislation. 00:40:48
And I'll ask the question again. 00:40:50
When are they going to be completing? 00:40:52
That sewer line or still in the design phase? 00:40:54
That's a question I have. Can that be addressed? 00:40:59
I'm pretty sure the engineering is still going on. 00:41:02
Well, my concern is. 00:41:06
Once they get the design done and they want to start their construction. 00:41:08
Is going to be during the school year. 00:41:11
You got Marley Clark Elementary School. 00:41:13
Right there on Nuclear Drive. 00:41:16
And if they're going to be laying sewer lines? 00:41:17
Long drive. 00:41:20
Play havoc. 00:41:22
With the school traffic there from. 00:41:23
Myrtle Clark. 00:41:25
The other thing too is I want to know. 00:41:26
I've seen drawings. 00:41:28
Preliminary drawings. 00:41:30
That they're going to complete their cut through. 00:41:31
From Saint Mary's Road to Nicola Drive. 00:41:34
Are they going to do that or not? 00:41:37
OK, good. 00:41:39
The other item is I want to bring up the. 00:41:42
Again, I'm like a broken record. 00:41:44
Speeding. Speeding. 00:41:46
On Nuclear Drive. 00:41:49
They're by the school. 00:41:50
It is not a 25 mile per hour. 00:41:52
Speed limit for school zone. 00:41:57
Is a permanent 25 mph. 00:41:59
Speed limit on nickel drive. 00:42:02
From one end to the other. 00:42:04
And I've had more people come up on my rear end. 00:42:06
When I'm doing this feeling and I make a drive driving home. 00:42:09
Because I live down on the end of my record drive. 00:42:12
Whenever the item I can't remember what it was, give me a second. 00:42:17
I've forgot 5 minutes I guess. 00:42:20
That's right, because I. 00:42:29
You forget my age, you can't remember everything. 00:42:30
Never mind, I can't. 00:42:34
What was again? 00:42:36
Never mind. 00:42:38
Ken Jolly 102 Saltgrass Trace here in Saint Mary's. 00:42:51
Mr. Mayor, Council members. 00:42:55
Mr. Williams response regarding the. 00:42:58
Bolt pickup was excellent. 00:43:02
I had the opportunity to speak with. 00:43:05
Employees of. 00:43:08
Cumberland. 00:43:11
Waste Management. 00:43:12
And we discovered that. 00:43:14
In addition to the recycling truck that comes through. 00:43:16
In addition to the regular trash cup. 00:43:20
Truck that comes through. 00:43:22
There are two other trucks. 00:43:24
That are available. 00:43:27
For bulk pickup. 00:43:28
The first is manned by a driver and a writer. 00:43:30
And if the bulk can be picked up by this one individual? 00:43:35
Then it's done. 00:43:40
If the item is too large. 00:43:42
Then that gets. 00:43:44
Indicated umm. 00:43:46
And fed back to. 00:43:47
The. 00:43:49
Company and they dispatch. 00:43:51
A larger truck that has. 00:43:55
The grappling hook on it. 00:43:56
And as Mr. Williams pointed out. 00:43:59
If you have items that have a refrigerant in. 00:44:02
Whether it be a small refrigerator. 00:44:06
An air conditioner. 00:44:09
A freezer or a larger refrigerator. 00:44:11
Or any other item that has a refrigerant in it. 00:44:14
It will not be picked up unless it has that special yellow sticker on it. 00:44:19
This is a Georgia State long. 00:44:24
The refrigerant gets recovered. 00:44:27
By individuals companies who are licensed to do so. 00:44:30
And that refrigerant? 00:44:34
Can be reused. 00:44:37
Either in your own equipment or maybe someone elses. 00:44:39
So it. 00:44:44
Refrigerant, generally speaking. 00:44:45
Doesn't deteriorate overtime. 00:44:47
It is, however, a tremendous hazard to the atmosphere. 00:44:50
Tremendous hazard. 00:44:54
To human life. 00:44:56
And extremely dangerous if you try to release this refrigerant for the atmosphere yourself. 00:44:57
It's under high pressure. 00:45:03
And it can do an awful lot of damage to you. 00:45:05
The businesses that are licensed. 00:45:10
To recover the refrigerant. 00:45:13
Also are issued the special little yellow stickers. 00:45:16
If that yellow sticker is not on the item, that. 00:45:19
Would have had refrigerated in it. 00:45:22
That it will not get picked up. 00:45:25
And. 00:45:27
It's unfortunate that. 00:45:30
When that happens. 00:45:32
People then decide I'll just throw it in the back of my pickup truck and some light just dump it someplace. 00:45:34
So. 00:45:41
It certainly is helping. 00:45:43
The city, it's helping the environment. 00:45:44
And it's not a very expensive process to have a licensed company come out and recover that refrigerant for you. 00:45:47
So let alone my experience with Cumberland Services has been nothing but. 00:45:53
Awesome. Thank you very much. 00:45:58
Some of you were. 00:46:18
All of you actually were emailed to a copy of this particular domain, and your name is Andrew. 00:46:19
Oh, Robert Whitley. 00:46:24
1601 Highway 40 E, Kingsland. 00:46:26
People with microphone up to your mouth please. 00:46:29
OK, I have two extra copies if someone would like a hard copy. 00:46:32
Takers, OK. 00:46:37
But this is a story regarding the. 00:46:40
The floating docks at. 00:46:46
Wheeler St. Wheeler St. Ducks. 00:46:47
The I live on a boat on the water. 00:46:49
And I've been there. 00:46:52
Along since July. 00:46:53
2022. 00:46:55
And. 00:46:57
This is my home, my city, my everything. 00:46:58
I've been a resident of Georgia since 1991. 00:47:00
But we moved down here. 00:47:04
Just a few years ago. 00:47:06
And over time, I got here just the time. 00:47:08
Or Hurricane Irma to wipe out the docks. 00:47:11
So it kind of leaves you in limbo with where you're going to live. So we enjoyed. 00:47:14
Being on an anchor in the river. 00:47:19
For the longest time, we've traveled up and down the coast. 00:47:21
To Key West and to Bahamas and stuff like that. 00:47:24
But we're this is still our home. And with that said. 00:47:29
We live on an anchor. 00:47:33
On the boat and we do come to the dinghy, dot or not. 00:47:35
Is that the dinghy dot but? 00:47:38
The floating docks every day. 00:47:39
We have a car here that's. 00:47:42
Storage units just like any other household. 00:47:44
And it's come to mind recently that. 00:47:49
After Hurricane Irma. 00:47:52
Blew away the. 00:47:54
The. 00:47:55
Replacements came along a couple. 00:47:57
2 1/2 years ago. 00:47:59
I used to work with Jim Samson a lot regarding code enforcement regarding. 00:48:01
The time limits on the dot. 00:48:04
I was One of the earliest things I learned was the time when. 00:48:06
There's some people. 00:48:11
Really picky bat and some people not. 00:48:13
It turns out that the way the code is written. 00:48:15
Umm. 00:48:18
One doc has a 15 minute time limit. The code actually says 30, but some I know that the signs ended up saying 15 minutes. 00:48:21
The other doctor 6 hour. 00:48:29
Maximum umm. 00:48:31
No overnight. 00:48:32
Dockages if you were. 00:48:34
Planning to live there? 00:48:36
You know, reside on the dock. 00:48:38
With that said. 00:48:40
All of it is first come, first serve. 00:48:45
Over the course of time. 00:48:47
The left hand, Let's call it East. 00:48:52
Which is listed in the document. 00:48:55
But the stock was intended to be a 15 minute. 00:48:57
Quick, quick and dirty launch your boat. 00:49:00
Put your put your bed over there and go. 00:49:03
Parker Trailer come back and go fishing. 00:49:05
The other side. 00:49:08
If you come to come to shore. 00:49:09
From a dinghy. 00:49:11
Or any visitor that goes up down the inner coastal that ends up swinging into Saint Mary's and resigning for. 00:49:13
A few days, a few weeks. 00:49:19
All Thanksgiving, any of those. 00:49:21
Reasons for a lengthy stay. 00:49:23
They have to come to the. 00:49:26
Floating docks that ends up being. 00:49:28
A reason to if they come to town and anybody, including myself. 00:49:31
It's not a 15 minute stay. 00:49:35
That's gonna lean in so we don't go to the 15 minute dot, we purposely go to. 00:49:37
The longer time lapse. 00:49:42
So 6 hours. 00:49:44
Usually you get all your business done in six hours. 00:49:46
But it used to be a. 00:49:48
Jim Sampson would remind me when I was. 00:49:50
Into my 7th hour and I would. 00:49:52
Go away, you know, go ahead and leave. 00:49:55
The umm. 00:49:58
So recently. 00:50:00
That's not been adequate, somebody. 00:50:02
Wanted. 00:50:04
Natural attrition had all the dinghies. 00:50:06
Accumulating on one particular finger. 00:50:10
And then the number of things group. 00:50:13
Partly to the second finger. 00:50:14
Umm, so that ends up putting a little bit of a crunch on the right hand dock. 00:50:16
Let's the West dot. 00:50:22
That makes it tough for some of the motorboaters when when the West dot gets full, you just look out across the. 00:50:27
Water from the parking lot and you say it's full? 00:50:34
And the other dock is empty. 00:50:37
There might be 1 but. 00:50:39
And he's theoretically only there for 15 minutes and he's moving on. 00:50:41
But so the busy dock, the slightly larger dot. 00:50:45
With the. 00:50:48
The kayak. 00:50:49
Launching. 00:50:50
Ramp platform. 00:50:51
That's getting to be quite a busy dog. 00:50:55
It's been made mentioned. 00:50:58
If we got rid of all those things, there'd be room for more motorboaters. 00:51:02
The Fisherman. 00:51:08
So with. 00:51:09
So when? 00:51:11
Just back stepping just a little whenever a Hurricane Irma came along and took away the docks. 00:51:12
When the new ones came. 00:51:17
They were very different the document that I provided. 00:51:18
Has the pictures on it from. 00:51:22
2017 and today. 00:51:24
And you can tell by looking. 00:51:27
We no longer have a concrete power. It's not. 00:51:29
We no longer have the dot down the middle of the. 00:51:31
Ramps. 00:51:34
It it two of the dinghies of myself speaking to all of the guys that are out there right now. 00:51:36
We are all perfectly happy with. 00:51:44
Some sort of a shift? 00:51:48
To where we end up on the other dock. 00:51:49
We don't care. It's. 00:51:53
So if we were to merely change those time limits things. 00:51:54
To where? 00:51:59
The stock was. 00:52:00
More than. 00:52:01
15 minutes. 00:52:03
And change it to. 00:52:05
And here I'm actually proposing 12 and I'll give you that backup story. 00:52:07
But if the left hand. 00:52:11
East dot was had a longer time limit. We would attrition over there and this and the one with. 00:52:13
Short term duration after launching your boat would be. 00:52:19
On the West Dock. 00:52:22
And that would occur. There would be more room for the larger hard shell boats. 00:52:23
And having spoken to all of the. 00:52:29
The guys that are here now. 00:52:34
They don't care the people that come in from out of town, they want no one from the other. 00:52:36
Won't care because the signage would be correct. It says. This one is short term, this one is long term. 00:52:39
And so we can handle that with just a simple. 00:52:45
Minor change in the. 00:52:47
Signs with one of them being longer, the other one being shorter. 00:52:49
So that. 00:52:56
Is the biggest proposal in my thing about regarding trying to update the MO U. 00:52:58
Between the city and the DNR, so everybody's on the same page. 00:53:03
And then? 00:53:07
A little bit of natural attention just because the time limit changed. 00:53:09
Will unclog. 00:53:13
The favorite doc. 00:53:15
And the rest of us, the little bit. 00:53:18
Doesn't matter, because you know what I mean? It's just a little. 00:53:20
A way to get to shore and go do your business. 00:53:24
Everybody else that they're getting ready to go fishing, but. 00:53:27
The short duration they load up. 00:53:29
And bag of fish. 00:53:31
So that is the proposal in this. 00:53:35
The actual times are listed. 00:53:37
On my document on page 10. 00:53:40
Stating that there's a there's a reason for Kate to. 00:53:47
Everything you do, there's a reason for exceptions. 00:53:52
But umm. 00:53:54
The basically switching the long term. 00:53:56
Term stay to maximum 12 hours. 00:53:59
Lends itself to more possibility to people that actually have a job that might be in Jacksonville, it might be in. 00:54:03
Brunswick, or it might be in Savannah. 00:54:10
12 hours gives them a chance to go through their employment and come back and still. 00:54:12
Not have to be. 00:54:16
Challenged by code enforcement because. 00:54:17
We went across the time limit. 00:54:20
Extend the time limit a little bit. That's all we're doing there to make it. 00:54:22
Work for them. 00:54:25
That applies also to doctors appointments. 00:54:26
For a lot of. 00:54:29
Almost every all the two people out there now. 00:54:31
Our senior. 00:54:34
Some of them closer to 80 years old. 00:54:36
And so doctor's appointments, whenever they occur, they could. 00:54:40
But it's always by surprise. But they may last longer than the time limit. 00:54:44
And there's no need to. 00:54:48
If we extended the time limit, there's no need for a challenge just to go to the doctor. 00:54:49
And so that's some of the support. 00:54:54
We're kind of going to. 00:54:56
Past 7 minutes here now, but. 00:54:57
I did have a question because I'm not a voter. 00:55:00
Maybe or. 00:55:03
Someone else here can answer for me? 00:55:04
This does Fernandina have. 00:55:07
Any free docking like? 00:55:10
Like this? 00:55:11
No. So I was just curious about that. 00:55:13
The a certain. 00:55:17
Huh. 00:55:19
OK. 00:55:23
That's incorrect input. 00:55:35
They don't have any more wings in the river. 00:55:36
At Carnitine for people's eyes. 00:55:38
Morning, yes, but anchoring is living as well. 00:55:41
So if you look up to a boring. 00:55:44
You're paying city parking. 00:55:45
OK, I am like you said past my. 00:55:50
7 minutes. 00:55:52
This document still is not quite through but. 00:55:54
Very carefully arranged that. 00:55:58
Portion coming up regarding the kayak launcher on the. 00:56:00
On the West dot. 00:56:04
And safety items and. 00:56:05
Cameras. I found the. 00:56:09
Is on here as well and a discussion on. 00:56:11
A water faucet. 00:56:14
So at this point. 00:56:15
I can step down and. 00:56:19
And let. 00:56:21
Karen White. Disgusting. 00:56:23
Kayak Launcher. 00:56:24
And then after that. 00:56:26
Stephen Birch will talk about safety and cameras. 00:56:28
And go from there. 00:56:33
And. 00:56:34
To me, we've already had a little bit of discussion on my part, but once you hear all 5 pieces. 00:56:35
It's probably a good time for a conclusion. 00:56:42
And had it all together. 00:56:45
Thank you. 00:56:48
Thank you. Thank you. 00:56:49
Karen White. 00:56:53
609 Margaret St. 00:56:54
I became part of this. You guys know me as the tennis court person, but now I'm on to kayaks. 00:56:56
Anyway. 00:57:02
I'm just really part of this because I'm the person they know that kayaks. 00:57:03
And I like our kayak launch. And I was shocked to read a note that you guys received from. 00:57:08
One of my neighbors saying that. 00:57:17
The kayak launch never gets used, that he's down there all the time and nobody ever uses it. Well, I don't think that's true. And 00:57:20
furthermore. 00:57:24
The town could stand. 00:57:29
To have a sign up. 00:57:31
Wherever there's a nice kayak launch, it's usually there's usually a sign. 00:57:33
To let people know. Now we all know that there's many kayaks that come into this town. You see them on people's cars. 00:57:39
I think if that kayak launch had a sign up. 00:57:45
People would know about it. 00:57:48
And it's, you know, it wasn't a cheap. 00:57:50
Thing to build. 00:57:54
So when somebody says they think we should get rid of it because it's not being used, you know, I tend to disagree with that. 00:57:55
So I think it would be a great asset for the town to put some signage up. 00:58:03
To let people know. I've told 3 or 4 different people that that's there. They had no idea it was there. 00:58:08
I don't use the launch. 00:58:13
Because I have a fiberglass boat. 00:58:16
So I don't want it to get scraped. 00:58:18
Anyway, we are a boating community and that is a boat. 00:58:21
So, uh. 00:58:24
We can't just disregard that now. 00:58:25
Let's move on to something more important is the safety. 00:58:28
Of uh. 00:58:33
Being down on those. 00:58:34
It's kind of interesting to me, I. 00:58:36
You know, I've often thought, what if I fell off the dock? 00:58:38
How would I get back on the? 00:58:42
I wouldn't. I'd have to swim to shore. 00:58:44
Lucky for me, I'm a good swimmer. Not everybody is. 00:58:47
So I think we need to address that. 00:58:50
We should have a ladder. 00:58:52
We should have. 00:58:55
And we have nothing. 00:58:57
At least something to toss to somebody if they fall off the dock. 00:58:59
And I will follow it up with. 00:59:03
We need to have some cameras. 00:59:05
Because you guys know that the last time I was at the meeting, I brought up the the fact that somebody got attacked down on the 00:59:08
dock. 00:59:11
I don't think anything's ever happened with that. I don't think anybody's ever been charged. 00:59:16
But had we had a camera? 00:59:21
I mean, there's only two ways out of town. 00:59:24
You know, they had to go one way or the other. 00:59:27
And we could have gotten a license plate. 00:59:30
And I was very upset about that happening. 00:59:33
But uh. 00:59:35
The gentleman that was attacked is here. 00:59:36
So I'm hoping he will come up and discuss. 00:59:38
What that was all about. 00:59:41
And how we need to have. 00:59:43
More cameras. 00:59:46
In areas. 00:59:48
Where there's people meeting. 00:59:49
Things happen. 00:59:51
All right. 00:59:54
I'm Steve Birch. 01:00:02
Durden St. Saint Mary's. 01:00:05
I'm a boater also and it was my son that was attacked. And your name and address please. 01:00:08
I did OK. 01:00:13
Miss. 01:00:15
Couldn't hear you. Could you repeat that? Can you bring the mic up? 01:00:16
That's about as close as I'm right now. 01:00:21
Bring up your mouth. There you go. 01:00:23
That's good. Thank you, Steve Birch. 01:00:25
Turdin St. Saint Mary's. 01:00:28
Anyway, my son was a tech so I know what's going on there. 01:00:31
And as far as the safety issue? 01:00:34
You see little kids down there without their parents all the time if they fell off the dock. 01:00:36
There's no way for them to get. 01:00:40
So safety is an issue. 01:00:43
When we go down there at night. 01:00:45
There are a lot of people doing drugs on the dock Which? 01:00:47
You know, and in the park, sitting on the benches there, which is kind of uncomfortable for people that don't need drugs. 01:00:50
If you don't mind me asking, sure. 01:00:56
Seen it or smelled it? 01:00:58
Oh, no, more than every day. I mean, you know, like. 01:01:01
There might be some nights four or five people down there. 01:01:06
You know, couples or whatever doing it. 01:01:09
Sunlight, Sir, may only be 1. 01:01:11
Some lights are maybe none, but it's pretty. 01:01:13
Consistent, uh. 01:01:16
And it's never the same people. It's always different people. I don't know if they're from out of town or what. This. 01:01:17
Sure, because this is a problem. 01:01:22
And when you walk through the park at night? 01:01:24
And sometimes the lights are out and you smell the drugs, everything it's. 01:01:26
And especially after my son got attacked, we're a little. 01:01:31
You know, worry about that kind of thing. 01:01:34
But anyway, getting back to the Dingy Duck. 01:01:36
One thing you all may not know about. 01:01:39
People like us that come in on dinghies. 01:01:41
Is we don't. 01:01:44
Take up like this is the dock we. 01:01:45
Park like this long ways. 01:01:47
We tie the front rope. 01:01:49
To the cleat. So when you have 6 cleats. 01:01:52
You can get at least six dinghies, but usually if it's crowded, we'll get. 01:01:54
10 or 12 dinghies because we'll double tie on people that we know. 01:01:58
So if you put just one boat there, like a fishing boat. 01:02:01
You only get one vote there, but with the dignity you get a bunch. 01:02:05
So we're trying to be. 01:02:08
You know, at least the people that are here all the time now. I know some people that come in from out of town. 01:02:09
They might tie up differently and take up more space than they should. 01:02:15
But the people that are conscientious about this? 01:02:19
You know, be very careful and take up the little room as possible because we know fishing boats want to be there. 01:02:21
And there are many times when we come in and one vote. 01:02:27
Will park in the middle. 01:02:30
Of the dot when they could have either pulled forward or back. 01:02:32
And there's no ring for the dinghy without your dinghy swinging and hitting them, and they don't like that, so we don't want to 01:02:34
hit their boat. 01:02:37
But as far as my son being attacked, that son. 01:02:41
Something that, you know, the cameras really bother me because. 01:02:44
The way the guy went out of the park. 01:02:48
His face was never seen. 01:02:51
As vehicles never seen. 01:02:53
You know my son's got. 01:02:56
Steel plate and his jaw. He had to have emergency surgery. 01:02:57
Bleeding all of the duck. 01:03:00
His face was shattered. 01:03:02
Just some random idiot coming up. Just. 01:03:05
Punching the hell out of him. 01:03:07
You know, 7:00 at night. 01:03:09
Sheila, I mean June. 01:03:12
13th Friday 13th. 01:03:14
My son had done nothing to the guy, didn't even know who it was, The witnesses said they saw him just. 01:03:17
Screaming and running over to my son who was standing by the Dean. 01:03:22
With his arms to his side. 01:03:25
And the guy just. 01:03:27
Not them as far as it could. Knocked him out. 01:03:28
So it would be nice to have some cameras to see. 01:03:32
You know, people like that. 01:03:34
So that's pretty much all that site. 01:03:36
I just appreciate it. Thank you. Certainly sorry, but your son's. 01:03:38
Jerry Brown below 805 Riverview Dr. West. 01:03:48
I thought I'd get up here and talk tonight because we had all this. 01:03:52
Talk about boats and everything, but I want to kind of talk about the big picture. First one is. 01:03:55
Like Karen said, you know. 01:04:00
We try to. 01:04:02
Name ourselves, I think Candace was asking us not too long ago to. 01:04:03
Come up with something and everybody says Gateway to Cumberland Island. We're a boating committee. 01:04:07
We don't have a beat. 01:04:13
But we got lots of bugs. 01:04:14
And not just for people that live here. 01:04:16
The whole surrounding Southeast Georgia comes to these boat ramps. 01:04:19
And they bring a lot of money here. 01:04:23
And what I've noticed over the last 12 years watching all the stuff go on. 01:04:26
Because I'm down there every day, almost. 01:04:31
Is that we not only got more boats. 01:04:33
We got bigger butts. 01:04:36
And some of these bigger boats can't fit in the boat. 01:04:38
Parking areas. 01:04:41
So we need to have. 01:04:43
Develop a master plan. 01:04:45
For parking. 01:04:48
And it needs to be for all kinds of parking too, but the boat parking in particular, because a lot of people. 01:04:49
Won't come to Willow St. boat ramp anymore because they can't find a. 01:04:55
Placed a partner trailers. 01:04:59
And they go to Meeting St. which means Meeting St. gets over. 01:05:01
Book for Parking is on a busy weekend. 01:05:05
So what I'd like to, not me, but people that talk to me and tell me all these issues would like to see is. 01:05:08
As a capital improvement plan. 01:05:15
That. 01:05:18
That deals with parking for trailers. 01:05:19
And adds more parking space. 01:05:22
Because. 01:05:24
You know, we got a nice little island downtown where Greg plants flowers. 01:05:25
That used to be 21 boat and trailer parking places. 01:05:30
Until it became an island. 01:05:34
With trees and then we redid downtown and lost another 15 boat and trailer parking. So over the last 15 years we've lost 35. 01:05:35
The trailer parkins downtown. 01:05:44
So anyway, I'd like to see. 01:05:46
And, and part of that could be like where we're parking the Park Service people over there now by the cemetery. That would be a 01:05:47
great place to make a lot more boat and trailer parking over there. But I like to see it put in some kind of plan. 01:05:52
For Wheeler St. and for Meeting St. 01:05:58
And So what we'd also like is a capital improvement plan. 01:06:02
Additions to our CIP that we're doing. 01:06:06
That adds. 01:06:08
That adds to the West. 01:06:10
Back making it bigger. 01:06:12
And adds to the meeting St. doc. 01:06:15
Making it bigger. 01:06:17
And what we'd like to see you guys doing when we ever resolve this Jacobi thing. 01:06:19
Is that? 01:06:24
We've put ourselves in a box over there on Meeting St. because we don't have room to expand the parking. 01:06:25
Ought to build the restroom that needs to be there. 01:06:32
So we need to acquire that little chunk of land. 01:06:35
Where we dug up the dirt. 01:06:38
When the governor was here. 01:06:40
And make a restroom there and double the size of the parking lot at Meeting St. 01:06:41
Just for the future of the community, you know, when all these people X1 come and get their boats and move in here and like I 01:06:47
said, we got way more boats than we had 10 years ago. 01:06:52
And they're getting bigger and bigger. 01:06:56
So I'd like to say that kind of a comprehensive thing, but I'm the. 01:06:59
Current situation downtown. 01:07:02
I think that. 01:07:05
What we don't want to do? 01:07:08
Is charge people to come here and park? 01:07:10
Because you got a lot of people come over here from Fernandina. 01:07:13
And those people drive over here in a big boat. 01:07:17
Park four or five hours. 01:07:19
And go to locals. 01:07:21
Signals or wherever and have dinner and spend a lot of money here. 01:07:23
And there's more and more of that going on. 01:07:26
And if you provide. 01:07:28
That dark space, so they can do that. 01:07:29
There will be more of that. 01:07:32
You'll probably get more money in the Saint Mary's from that than you will. 01:07:33
The ferry. 01:07:37
That we may or may not ever do. 01:07:38
But, and that's why you need to expand that box space downtown. 01:07:41
And over at meeting St. is to accommodate those kinds of things and for future growth and that. 01:07:45
Part of our boating community. 01:07:50
So anyway to address the current issues down there? 01:07:53
There's not a major problem there. 01:07:57
But. 01:08:00
You I think you need to set aside. 01:08:00
A certain area of one of those dots for me. 01:08:04
And have different rules for the dinghy dock. 01:08:07
Then you do the boat. 01:08:09
And then, and then, then you're, then you've got the dinghies where they need to be. 01:08:11
And the boats where they need to be and the days need something different. 01:08:16
Then somebody from Fernandina parking for six hours and having dinner. 01:08:20
The beings have an issue. 01:08:24
With time. 01:08:25
And I would like to see the city just turn the water back on to the dock out there so they can get water because I don't believe 01:08:27
that's a big expense for the city compared to the revenue that's generated by those people. 01:08:32
I know what. 01:08:38
So I probably forgot something, but that's my main thing is that we need to look. 01:08:42
That, like I said, supporting. 01:08:49
Voting in this community. 01:08:51
With parking and docking space. 01:08:53
I have a question for you. 01:08:57
Umm, do you think there's any appetite for dry storage? 01:09:01
Of boats that would alleviate so we have more parking for. 01:09:04
Guessed the people who bring. I think we need a dry storage here especially. 01:09:09
Like, I think like, come on, Harvey, Iceberg Cove and then the new development out there probably too, won't have enough space to 01:09:15
accommodate people's boats and trailers inside those communities. 01:09:20
And, and that would have been a great thing to have over here on meeting St. like it was originally planned. It's a story story. 01:09:25
So the dry the stack storage. 01:09:31
Where you could actually get your boat. 01:09:34
Yeah, you go in. 01:09:36
Yeah, we definitely need that, especially if we ever develop that like. 01:09:38
Like was playing with a Marina over there. You need that dry storage and you got the place to do it, but you still need. 01:09:43
The more parking and the restrooms. 01:09:49
At Manning St. 01:09:51
Thanks. That was for the Jacobi plan for that area. 01:09:54
OK, good evening. My name is Jeff Myers. I'm at 306 W Weed St. 01:09:57
I'm the one guilty for stirring up the hornet's nest on all the dock issues. 01:10:09
And. 01:10:15
I really hate it that I had to be the one to do it. 01:10:17
I want to start off by something positive though, so this winter. 01:10:22
A bunch of seasonal birds decided they wanted to take the East Dock and make it their living room. 01:10:27
And it became really, really nasty. And I sent a note to Robbie about that. 01:10:32
And within just a few days. 01:10:37
He had somebody out there pressure washed the dock and got it all cleaned up, so that was great. 01:10:41
But back to what I brought up a while back. 01:10:48
My wife and I. 01:10:53
Two very significant investments in downtown Saint Mary's. 01:10:55
With our first home and then a couple years ago completing. 01:11:00
Construction of a Brandy home on Weed St. 01:11:04
The reason? One of the primary reasons. 01:11:07
We decided to build in downtown Saint Mary's. 01:11:11
Was access to the water with our boat. 01:11:15
A beautiful public doc. 01:11:20
And hate to say it, but we love Jerry. 01:11:24
We love, you know, knuckleheads being right there and. 01:11:27
And you know, he's a huge asset. 01:11:30
The fact that he. 01:11:32
Is working so hard in retirement to keep that bait shop up and going, That's awesome. 01:11:34
So access to the water was. 01:11:40
The primary reason we invested in downtown Saint Mary's. 01:11:43
And. 01:11:47
Ever since the docks were rebuilt. 01:11:49
I have seen overtime. 01:11:52
Deterioration of the web rails. 01:11:55
And all that and so. 01:11:57
I guess you know, about a month and a half ago I was like, OK. 01:12:01
So we have very little rub rails left. We've got. 01:12:05
One thing that has been tied up to this doc for at least two years. 01:12:09
And has not moved other than. 01:12:14
When somebody used it to go out to. 01:12:16
The sailboat and then it was tied back up in the same place. 01:12:18
Which does not follow our six hour rule. 01:12:22
Then I when I started asking a couple local. 01:12:25
Sailboat. 01:12:29
People that live aboard their sailboats. I was like. 01:12:31
Whose thing is this that's been tied up for the last couple weeks? 01:12:34
Filled with trash and water. 01:12:38
And they said I gave that to somebody that lives in the area. 01:12:40
And they haven't done anything with it. And then asked about another Dean that was tied up at the end of the six hour dock. 01:12:44
That had been there for. 01:12:51
I believe somewhere around two months. 01:12:53
And I was told that it was a. 01:12:56
Elementary school teachers boat. 01:13:00
That had a sailboat or a power boat or something mowed out on the water. 01:13:02
And you know, at some point you just reach a breaking point. It's like. 01:13:07
I I follow the rules and everybody this so I will say I bet nobody's really counted this if you. 01:13:13
Go look at. 01:13:20
All of our what I'm going to call slips, which are fingers. 01:13:22
Of all of our floating docks between St. 01:13:25
And the docs that we had downtown, the 15 minute dock and the six hour dock. 01:13:29
If you're if you assume a 17 foot boat to 25 foot boat. 01:13:34
In that range, which is the majority? 01:13:40
Of what the citizens of Saint Mary's and. 01:13:43
Our guests from North Florida, it's not just South Georgia that comes and uses the boat ramp. 01:13:46
Those are the general sizes that most people have. 01:13:52
You basically have space to tie up about. 01:13:55
13 boats. 01:13:59
And all of downtown Saint Mary's. And that doesn't even include the demise. 01:14:01
So literally 13 votes. 01:14:07
And so I reached out to. 01:14:11
To Greg and city management. 01:14:14
A while back about some of these issues. 01:14:17
I had 3-4, four issues. One. 01:14:19
Maintenance of the docks. 01:14:22
To Denny's and commercial contractors. 01:14:23
They were tying up boats overnight, sometimes weeks on end. 01:14:29
The billionaire that just rebuilt his dock, his contractors kept one of their work boats tied up on the six hour dock for weeks 01:14:33
and weeks and weeks. 01:14:37
And it shouldn't be me as the citizen. 01:14:42
Going to you guys and management. 01:14:46
You guys need to manage this, not. 01:14:49
Not me. I love living here and I hate. 01:14:51
The fact that I know a lot of these people don't like me. 01:14:54
Because I brought up issues and I started challenging status quo. 01:14:58
It's and at the end of the day, it's about respect of all of our fellow neighbors. 01:15:03
And honoring our rules. 01:15:08
And it's up to the city to manage that. 01:15:11
And so. 01:15:15
Yeah. 01:15:19
We have the gateway Marina now. 01:15:23
The last time I heard we were running about $100,000 deficit on that. 01:15:25
We now have a solution for people that live on the water. 01:15:31
For their needs. 01:15:34
If they need water, we have it. 01:15:36
Now, I don't think that our fee structure is correct on that based on what I've seen. 01:15:38
If they need to leave their boat in their dinghy in the water for more than six hours, we're distribution for that. It's $5 a day 01:15:43
to tie up a dingy over at the Gateway dock. 01:15:49
And if you if you rent it by the week, it's $4.28. 01:15:54
And you know, we as citizens and leadership of this community. 01:16:02
We have a big deficit on that. 01:16:08
We need revenue sources. 01:16:10
Well, some of that can. There's some revenue source right there, commercial contractors that are working on the island. 01:16:12
Literally I had to send you all an e-mail the other day about that as an example. I shouldn't have to do that. 01:16:19
You know, we, you know, if they don't want to take their boat on and off the trailer, we've got a solution for that. It's called 01:16:26
the Gateway Marina. 01:16:30
For overnight. 01:16:34
Tying up of your boat. 01:16:36
So if you know. 01:16:37
We can very easily start chipping away at that deficit. 01:16:39
On that SO. 01:16:44
You know the Gateway Marine? It offers water, it offers power, it offers pump out service. 01:16:47
It offers a place for denies. 01:16:54
It's it's, it's, it's the facility you need if you live on the water. 01:16:58
The only thing it doesn't have is fuel. 01:17:02
So. 01:17:05
You know, and as far as the the kayak dock. 01:17:07
With there being basically 13. 01:17:11
In Saint Mary's. 01:17:15
I was just trying to look at. 01:17:16
Where do we have? 01:17:18
With what we currently own. 01:17:20
How can we better utilize the space that we have? 01:17:23
And there was nothing personal against you. I did not know you were a kayaker. I did go to Jerry and I asked him. I was like, is 01:17:27
there anybody that I've never seen anybody use it? 01:17:32
Ever and he was like the only time he ever uses it is when he rents A2 person kayak. 01:17:37
And he'll put him in the kayak launch there. And I said, I asked him, I said. 01:17:45
Well, if that wasn't there. 01:17:50
Could you roll that that kayak down to the dock? 01:17:52
And have them get in the kayak. 01:17:56
On the floating dock and he said yes. 01:17:58
So I will tell you that that that kayak launch. 01:18:01
It will hold seven days in that space and you cannot put a power vote in there because of the side current. It's it's impossible. 01:18:05
But if you guys go watch how maneuverable a dinghy is, most of them. 01:18:12
They can literally do 360° turns they can turn on. 01:18:19
So it may be. 01:18:25
The worst idea ever. 01:18:26
But it was an idea. 01:18:28
To better utilize what we have. 01:18:30
The last point that I want to make is those 13 spaces. 01:18:33
I took it upon myself today and I called DNR. 01:18:37
Took me about two minutes to get in touch with the guy. 01:18:41
That's responsible for all the public boat ramps. 01:18:44
In coastal Georgia and all the public docs that they helped fund. 01:18:47
And. 01:18:52
To confirm, just so everybody in here knows. 01:18:53
The city owns those. 01:18:56
And the city is 100% responsible for managing and maintaining the docks. And I'm Speaking of the Wheeler St. dock and I'm Speaking 01:18:58
of the Meeting St. **** So. 01:19:04
And and if we want to make changes to how those docs are used, he said it is very simple because I brought up the kayak launch as 01:19:11
an example and I told him I was like, I may be the only person that likes this idea, but if people do like the idea and we want to 01:19:17
move forward with it, how big of a deal is it? 01:19:23
He said all you guys have to do is send me a letter in writing of what you want to do and it's called a letter of permission LLP. 01:19:30
And he said it's very simple because you guys aren't changing the footprint. 01:19:37
Of the docks. 01:19:42
It's literally you just want to better utilize the space you have so. 01:19:44
That literally took me about 5 or 10 minutes. 01:19:48
And I think it's sad, I heard. 01:19:52
That there was leadership in our city that didn't even know. 01:19:55
Whether or not we could do that. 01:19:59
That's one of the biggest assets we own people. 01:20:01
Don't know. 01:20:05
That we own it. 01:20:07
We manage it. 01:20:08
We make the rules, I will tell you. So right after that dock was built, that kayak launch got destroyed. You got, do you all 01:20:09
remember that We had a very small storm and it destroyed the dock. It's going to happen again. 01:20:15
That little kayak launch is going to be among pit. 01:20:22
All it's going to take is another. 01:20:25
Brush of. 01:20:27
And it's going to be gone again. 01:20:29
So, umm. 01:20:31
That's thank you. 01:20:32
Thank you. Thank you. 01:20:34
I would like to say. 01:20:37
Steve Birch again. 01:20:41
Could you tell me how much revenue? 01:20:42
The swing set. 01:20:44
And the Merry Go rounds bring in the Saint Mary's. 01:20:46
Free public parks and stuff. 01:20:49
I mean, does everything have to be about money? 01:20:51
Are there no services that can be provided for free? 01:20:54
I mean. 01:20:57
If this gentleman thinks that people should go to the Marina, maybe he should take his big boat to the Marina. 01:20:58
You know what I'm saying? And pay for that. 01:21:03
Not everybody can afford that, especially somebody like me that's on Social Security. 01:21:05
I mean, I don't even get $1000 a month. 01:21:09
You know, so it makes it a little harder on the people like us. 01:21:12
You know other people, you know some of these people that come in from out of town. 01:21:15
Like the billionaire. 01:21:18
Hey, you know, $100 a night is nothing to these people. 01:21:20
$5 a day would kill me. 01:21:24
So I think you ought to just. 01:21:27
Think about. Not everything has to be about. 01:21:29
Prophet now does the. 01:21:31
Does the Marina have to make a profit? Does everything that the city owns? 01:21:33
Make a profit, Should it make a profit or y'all business people? 01:21:38
Or you leaders? 01:21:42
And providing services for people. 01:21:43
So let's not get tied up with all this money issue, I mean. 01:21:46
Come on, have a little. 01:21:49
Heart, you know, this is, that's why we came to this town. It was like Mayberry. 01:21:51
You know, hell, if we want to be in Mount Pilate, we'd leave. 01:21:56
Now let's keep it like may bear, let's keep it friendly and. 01:21:59
And when people have complaints and stuff, they should come to people like us instead of. 01:22:02
You know, going behind somebody's back and going to the city and complaining and. 01:22:06
You know, threatening people. You know things should be. 01:22:10
Held a little more. 01:22:12
You know, neighborly. 01:22:14
So if there's, you know. 01:22:16
Again. 01:22:19
Do we have to make a profit on everything, Mayor? 01:22:20
Well, you obviously haven't been watching many meetings because I've been having that same argument about the other things. There 01:22:24
are people in the audience that think we should. So I just want to say we all have different opinions, obviously. 01:22:30
Rob Whitley again, just to remind us that. 01:22:37
In my portion of it when I discussed the favorite dock. 01:22:40
Is the West Dock. 01:22:45
The other one is. 01:22:47
Highly unused. 01:22:48
It's not the favorite doc. 01:22:50
So merely assigning. 01:22:53
The time limits will do some natural attrition. 01:22:55
And the people that he's worried about. 01:22:58
Will be out of his way. 01:23:01
And I'll be on the different. 01:23:03
And will still be clustered up into a small group. 01:23:04
And that does. 01:23:07
Truly leave room for the physical. 01:23:08
14 to 26 foot. 01:23:11
Fishing boats to be all around that. 01:23:14
I mean, that's their favorite, they go there either way, but merely changing the. 01:23:17
Time limit. 01:23:22
Does not say who goes where. It's how long you do whatever you are, how long you going to be there. 01:23:23
That's all it means. 01:23:28
And natural. 01:23:30
If somebody's got employment, they need the longer term if they're going fishing. 01:23:32
Correct the signs from 50 minutes to 30, even an hour, whatever you want, but it would allow. 01:23:37
More 15 to. 01:23:43
Umm 15 to 30 foot boats like his. His is 32. He needs a lot of room. 01:23:45
And in particular, he's asked. 01:23:52
That we clear off. 01:23:54
The part of the. 01:23:55
Right hand dock that the West on so his boat could go. 01:23:57
It's taken a couple of our guys down there to discuss that more than one time, so he wouldn't have room for his vote. 01:24:02
And he's willing to push us all the way off of our for the solution where we take ourselves off. 01:24:08
I'm gonna go over there and. 01:24:14
And nobody will miss us. We'll be over there. 01:24:15
Still spending our one to $2000 each in. 01:24:18
City of Saint Mary's every month. 01:24:21
And because we're not there, that if that's the only part that's free, that's the only part that's free. We still got to eat, 01:24:24
spend money, everything else that happens in the city of Saint Mary's. 01:24:28
So we are not nobody. We are we do spend money. 01:24:34
Thank you. 01:24:37
Larry White, 102 Suvies Court. 01:24:48
I promise to be brief. 01:24:50
OK, not like everybody. 01:24:52
The last point I forgot to mention. 01:24:55
Was everybody that lives. 01:24:58
West of Spur 40. 01:25:01
And north of 40. 01:25:03
In Saint Mary's. 01:25:06
Cannot drive a golf cart downtown. 01:25:07
I will bring it up again. I brought it up before. 01:25:12
You need to have a crock because I used to come downtown on our golf cart. 01:25:15
And since. 01:25:18
The law was changed. 01:25:19
That we couldn't take it down to sell it. 01:25:21
Right, So what I'd like to know is, is there a way? 01:25:23
You get a crossing. 01:25:27
And Doug, 'cause we used to come down Dulles Drive. 01:25:28
Cross Spur 40. 01:25:31
Go down Douglas drives and go downtown on our golf cart. 01:25:33
It's not possible anymore. 01:25:36
Because it's illegal. 01:25:37
To cross Spur 40 on Douglas Drive. 01:25:39
However. 01:25:43
I've seen golf carts. 01:25:44
Driving on the sidewalk. 01:25:46
On a spur of 40. 01:25:48
Coming down, down. 01:25:50
Huh. I know it's a no no. 01:25:54
But they still do it. 01:25:55
And they don't care. 01:25:57
I've also seen young kids. 01:25:59
Driving golf carts. 01:26:01
In my neighborhood. 01:26:02
You're supposed to have 16 years old. 01:26:04
Have a license or being. 01:26:06
Supervised by. 01:26:08
Licensed Adult. 01:26:09
To operate a golf cart. 01:26:11
So I'd like to know. 01:26:12
If the city is going to try. 01:26:14
To come up with a plan. 01:26:16
For allowing golf. 01:26:17
To get downtown from where I live. 01:26:19
Yes. 01:26:22
Yes, yes. All right. Thank you. 01:26:24
I too will be brief on this one. Valerie Fouch, 310 W Bryant. 01:26:34
I think I would like to address the. 01:26:38
$300 billion. 01:26:41
Elephant in the room? 01:26:43
You know, we're sitting here and we're talking about we need to do this in the future and we've got to have this much more. 01:26:46
We don't even know what our future is going to be right now. 01:26:51
With the fact that we have Mr. Walter buying. 01:26:54
Pretty much all of downtown. 01:26:57
I hope he's going to be a good steward. 01:27:00
I have asked the city manager. 01:27:02
Does he have any buzz? Does he know what's going on? Can you throw me a bone? 01:27:06
And he said absolutely not. 01:27:10
As of when I spoke to Mr. Horton. 01:27:12
About six weeks ago. 01:27:15
He had not gotten heard any information back from Mr. Walter at that point, nor any of his associates. 01:27:19
So we can sit here all night long and talk about what we're going to do. 01:27:26
When, where and how and how much and what we're going to get. 01:27:30
We really don't know what we're gonna get. 01:27:33
I don't know how we can find out because he's a private businessman. 01:27:36
Private businessman can do what he wants. He can buy what he wants as long as he follows the rules and ordinances. 01:27:41
He can do it. 01:27:46
But are we still going to be? 01:27:48
The Saint Mary's that we all want to be. 01:27:50
I don't know. 01:27:53
I honestly do not know. I don't know anything about this gentleman. I've tried going down the rabbit hole. 01:27:56
All I'm getting is this. 01:28:00
Basic, you know, business investments and and he owns this, that and whatever. 01:28:02
Is anyone in the city trying to figure out who this gentleman is? 01:28:07
I hope so. 01:28:12
And I think and, and I think as business owners, I think as stakeholders, I think as citizens that live here. 01:28:14
I live 1 block from everything he's playing. 01:28:20
I have no idea what he's going to do. Is he going to make it into a little St. Simons? 01:28:23
I love Saint Simons. I spend a lot of time and money at Saint Simons. 01:28:28
Do I want to live in Saint Simons downtown? No. 01:28:32
I like my little corner across from the cemetery. It's all quiet over there. 01:28:36
And that's the way I like to keep it. 01:28:41
But if it becomes something that is not right now and it could be in 10 years. 01:28:43
We're going to have a constant. 01:28:48
This. 01:28:50
All the way around with traffic and people. 01:28:51
I don't like traffic and. 01:28:54
I mean, let's face it, I'm getting older. I'm getting real impatient with people in general, but. 01:28:56
Yeah, I don't know. I just don't know who in the city is reaching out and who in the city can give us a report. 01:29:02
Can they give us a report every day? 01:29:09
Six weeks. 8 weeks. 01:29:12
Can we even get our legal organ who's not even here tonight? 01:29:14
To do a series. 01:29:20
On Mr. Walter. 01:29:23
To do a series on what he. 01:29:25
I have heard I talked to a gentleman that lived in Colorado and he frequented Crested Butte. 01:29:27
It's great town. 01:29:32
But I don't know what the town was before it was great. 01:29:34
I mean, I honestly, we, we need to figure this out because right now we're just kind of throwing stuff at a wall and see what 01:29:37
sticks. 01:29:40
Until we get to the next election or the next budget. 01:29:44
We've got to have blonde, not blinders, but we've got to be focused. We have to be focused. We can't keep getting distracted by 01:29:47
the shiny objects. 01:29:51
Frankly, you know my discernment is telling me. 01:29:56
I'm not. I don't know if I'm gonna like what's coming and. 01:30:00
And and you know, we're talking about we have one fuel pump. 01:30:03
In town. 01:30:07
When Mr. Walters coming in and he's built this huge Marina. 01:30:08
It's going to have some great boats coming in. 01:30:12
But he. 01:30:14
Doesn't have access to that fuel pump. 01:30:15
So what's going to happen? Is he going to buy that fuel pump? Is he going to buy? 01:30:18
Honestly, I don't know. 01:30:23
And but I think as a citizen. 01:30:24
Citizens, we deserve to kind of get a heads up. 01:30:27
Maybe again, the legal organ can kind of lay the foundation and start having maybe a series of. 01:30:33
Interviews. 01:30:40
I don't know. 01:30:41
I'm just a citizen. I'm a very concerned citizen right now because when I. 01:30:42
Here full time. Eight years ago it was. 01:30:46
Mayberry and now I don't know what it's going to be. 01:30:49
And you know, I had planned on retiring here forever. Well, if it becomes something that I actually left. 01:30:53
After we before we retired, I don't know. 01:30:59
So if we can get a little information that would be awesome. 01:31:02
Thank you. 01:31:06
I want another 15 minutes. 01:31:11
You know, like you said, he's a private gentleman. He's done. 01:31:14
His private transactions with other private individuals. 01:31:18
The city has not been involved. 01:31:21
These not, you know. 01:31:24
Communicated to us at all and. 01:31:26
You know we've. 01:31:29
Speaking to his representatives and they have not told us anything about any kind of ideas or plans. 01:31:30
That he has. 01:31:36
You know so. 01:31:37
We don't know anything more than what you know. 01:31:38
All we know is that you know we have. 01:31:40
Our planning department and the policies and the ordinances that we have in place to control. 01:31:43
You know. 01:31:49
As much as we can, you know. But. 01:31:50
That's what we have, you know, and that's unfortunately but. 01:31:52
That's all we have and. 01:31:54
If the newspaper can get something out of it. 01:31:55
Great, you know. 01:31:58
And Dallas we loved in that. 01:32:00
To the best that. 01:32:02
I can get out of somebody that works for the organization. 01:32:04
You know, it's not a plan by any means. 01:32:08
But you know, for the short term plan. 01:32:10
Is just he does want the buildings and businesses that they to remain open. 01:32:13
You know. 01:32:18
He does want it to have the local flair, so if the. 01:32:18
Business that is still there, he's leasing it back to him for. 01:32:21
Reasonable. 01:32:24
Rent, I guess you'd say. 01:32:26
As he leases them back. 01:32:28
And if the business owner you know if their existing lease expires. 01:32:29
You know, it is what's been told to me that he does desire to keep the businesses open. If it's with the current ownership, great. 01:32:33
If a local person comes to if a building comes open or vacant, that he would. 01:32:39
Entertain that. 01:32:43
And wants it to have local flair. 01:32:44
And that's a short term plan. I don't know what the long term plan is. 01:32:47
If for some reason it becomes vacant. 01:32:50
And nobody steps up. 01:32:53
Based off his you know. 01:32:55
Investments in business partners he has. 01:32:56
Nationally, he does have. 01:32:59
People in the restaurant business that he could bring in, he does have people in retail that he could bring in if needed. 01:33:01
But uh. 01:33:06
It seems based off the information that I've been given from one of them. 01:33:07
Employees that. 01:33:11
He does want it to stay like it is for the for the now. 01:33:12
And that's the best I can give you that have conversations that I've had. 01:33:15
And I would point out as well that he did rebuild the Marina in the exact same footprint that. 01:33:20
Was previously there. 01:33:26
So. 01:33:27
Well, he could have applied. Good evening. My name is Jeff Berg. 01:33:32
Citizen, Saint Mary's and Live with 11. 01:33:36
15 Colerain Rd. Saint Mary's. 01:33:38
A couple things I'd like to say. 01:33:41
As a citizen. 01:33:43
The kayak dock. 01:33:46
I used to use it a whole lot. 01:33:49
I don't use it as much now. 01:33:52
And it's, it's, it's an awesome thing down there. 01:33:53
Along with the standard paddle board. 01:33:57
Launch. That's right next to that. 01:33:59
Now as far as the. 01:34:01
Thing you just been there for two years? 01:34:03
I rescued that thing. 01:34:06
It was from that. 01:34:08
Sailboat that sunk out there in the river. 01:34:09
It was left there, left there, left there. 01:34:12
I bailed it out every time it got. 01:34:14
Almost long if I let that thing sink. 01:34:17
Nobody would even have known about it. 01:34:20
You know, except maybe general. 01:34:22
And so I I bailed that thing out. 01:34:24
Multiple times. 01:34:26
Before I. 01:34:28
Took ownership of it. 01:34:28
OK. 01:34:30
So we don't take a lot of spots. I mean, we take up to one side. 01:34:31
Best remarks wouldn't even think about putting his boat on that side of the. 01:34:35
Of the dark. 01:34:38
Because the mud. 01:34:39
Of shallowness. All that stuff you wouldn't even think about. 01:34:41
But he brings up the issues of all the. 01:34:44
OK, now as far as. 01:34:47
Safety. 01:34:49
Yes, rings. 01:34:51
Absolutely life. 01:34:53
Some little kid falls in over there. 01:34:55
He's gone. 01:34:57
Him or whatever, they're gone. One way or the other, they're gone. They're going under the die. 01:34:58
They're gonna die. 01:35:02
So many catches, you know, catches both of them. 01:35:04
And if there's no life brings? 01:35:06
They're not. They're not going to be saved unless somebody's. 01:35:08
Brave enough or able to? 01:35:11
Go and get them. 01:35:13
OK, personally. 01:35:15
Our old writer. 01:35:18
Helen and her husband like Ty Yakin. 01:35:19
They left. 01:35:22
The dock behind knuckleheads. 01:35:23
They went out. 01:35:26
They got about. 01:35:28
10 feet out. 01:35:30
In the dock, they flipped over. It was cold. It was like. 01:35:31
Early in the year it was like February or something, I don't remember exactly what, but it was cold. 01:35:35
What leader was the gentleman? 01:35:40
At the dock from Fernandina that had his boat. 01:35:43
I went down to him. He was there ready to help. 01:35:47
To help help them out. 01:35:50
I ran down to help him to help them get out. 01:35:51
They floated. 01:35:54
All the way down. 01:35:56
Past the new Marina that was built over the billionaires. 01:35:57
Marina, OK. 01:36:02
The husband. 01:36:04
Was almost unconscious from being cold. 01:36:05
But if? 01:36:08
I watched him flip over in the kayak as close as they were. 01:36:09
There was nothing to throat me. 01:36:13
To help them out. 01:36:15
You know, and that and her husband. 01:36:16
He could have died. 01:36:18
I mean, he almost passed out. 01:36:19
And he was act close. 01:36:21
You know, umm. 01:36:22
So as far as the safety part, absolutely speed safety rings. 01:36:23
Down there. 01:36:27
And as far as the rub rails on the outside. 01:36:29
The voters keep crashing into them. 01:36:32
The power boaters, not the dinghies. 01:36:33
The power builders crashed into these damn things and I'm sorry and. 01:36:36
Destroying all the rub rails over there. 01:36:41
You know. 01:36:43
They need to learn how to drive their bones. 01:36:45
Mr. Myers wouldn't be caught dead. 01:36:48
Talking his boat where the dinghies parked right now, that's such a problem for him. 01:36:50
But he wouldn't be caught there parking his boat. 01:36:55
And that side of that. 01:36:58
Back, especially at a low tide. 01:37:00
He's both 30. 01:37:02
You know it's. 01:37:03
It's crazy, some of this stuff. 01:37:05
But that's what I have to say and that's mostly on the safety side and. 01:37:06
Just a little insight on the. 01:37:10
Through digging dock and the safety part of it. 01:37:13
Thank you. Thank. 01:37:16
Hello. 01:37:24
Good evening. My name is Stephen Birch, 3 to 5 Jordan St. St. Mary's. 01:37:30
I also live on a boat. 01:37:35
And I was the one that was attacked on the dock. 01:37:37
On June 13th. 01:37:39
And I'm still recovering from the jaw surgery so I can't quite talk right. 01:37:41
But I just want to say that when I was attacked. 01:37:45
The man that attacked me, I didn't recognize him. I still to this day have no clue who he was. 01:37:48
Multiple witnesses saw the attack. 01:37:53
Multiple witnesses saw him leave. 01:37:55
Nobody recognized me. 01:37:57
Was probably from out of town. 01:37:59
The problem is. 01:38:01
There were no cameras. 01:38:02
That saw him come. 01:38:04
To the park. 01:38:05
Or leave the part. 01:38:06
If there were. 01:38:08
Working cameras. 01:38:10
Someone would have been able to. 01:38:11
Get a description of him. 01:38:14
And find out who he was. 01:38:16
As of now, I've been told by the. 01:38:18
City of Saint Mary's Police Department. 01:38:20
Who did a spectacular job? 01:38:22
Investigating the case. 01:38:25
That they're on a standstill. 01:38:26
And the case has been marked as inactive. 01:38:28
So that's very frustrating to me because. 01:38:31
You know I am the victim of a. 01:38:34
Brutal assault. I still have no idea who the guy was, why he did it or anything. And he's running free. 01:38:36
But I just wanna. 01:38:42
Suggest maybe better cameras would be good for the heart. 01:38:43
For safety purposes. 01:38:46
And I just want to say as a boater. 01:38:49
We try to get along with everybody. We. 01:38:52
You know, we're trying to stay out of people's way, double tie the dinghies when we need to. 01:38:53
Especially like on events like Thanksgiving. 01:38:57
You might have them triple time have 20 dinghies on one side. 01:39:00
So we all try to get along. 01:39:03
And that's just all I want to say. 01:39:06
Thank you. 01:39:08
Thank you. Thank you. 01:39:09
Jeff Myers 306 W weed I've got one other thing has nothing to do with the docs that I wanted to. 01:39:14
Bring up with City Council and. 01:39:20
City leadership. 01:39:23
This past winter I noticed. 01:39:25
On several occasions over several weeks in the winter time. 01:39:28
People camping. 01:39:33
In trucks and campers. 01:39:36
On Saint Mary's Road, like near the waterfront. 01:39:38
Over by the parking that's really close to the gateway property. 01:39:42
And the reason that I noticed them is. 01:39:47
They were bold enough to be setting up like camping kitchens. 01:39:49
In gorillas and oil pots. 01:39:54
Dish cleaning supplies and a parking spot next to. 01:39:59
Where they were. 01:40:03
Camping. 01:40:05
And so I called the chief of police about it. 01:40:06
And he said there's absolutely nothing I can do about that. 01:40:10
There is nothing illegal as our laws are written in Saint Mary's about camping on our public streets. 01:40:15
So you know as a. 01:40:23
Citizen that lives downtown. 01:40:26
I don't want to be looking at people camping on the streets that we're walking on and. 01:40:28
And riding our golf carts on, it's just not, you wouldn't want that in a traditional suburban neighborhood and just because we're 01:40:33
a very, very small little urban community. 01:40:38
We don't need that either. 01:40:44
I actually think I did find something in the ordinance and and talk with. 01:40:46
She got away about this several months ago so. 01:40:50
I haven't noticed it. 01:40:54
Recently. 01:40:55
Yeah, I haven't either. Hopefully. 01:40:55
You know what I found gave him enough. 01:40:57
Teeth to do something about it. So OK, good. Thank you. 01:41:00
I'm going to make this short like Larry. One more thing. Mark Bouts, 310 W Bryant St. 01:41:12
I referenced a contract between Rainier and Saint Mary's from 2022. 01:41:18
And the 30 to $60 million bonds were predicated. 01:41:22
On retail and housing in that particular area out of the exit 1. 01:41:27
The golf course. 01:41:32
Is now in construction. That wasn't considered in that contract. 01:41:34
And. 01:41:38
I don't know how many acres a golf course takes, 23400, something like that. 01:41:39
But what I wanted to ask was. 01:41:43
Has the infrastructure that was planned. 01:41:46
At that time. 01:41:49
Needing the 30 to $60 million financing. 01:41:50
Has that been revisited to reflect the change in the use of the land from? 01:41:53
Housing and retail into a golf course. 01:41:57
In my mind, we don't need that much infrastructure, so. 01:42:02
Probably we should be. 01:42:04
Considering. 01:42:06
Revising that $60 million bond issue is coming up. 01:42:08
Well, the infrastructure is not. 01:42:11
On their property. 01:42:13
Yeah, Susan Lines leading to that, it's the Entrance Rd. those kinds of things. The Fire Station Rd. 01:42:15
The water treatment plants not. 01:42:20
On their property. 01:42:22
Per se. 01:42:24
And of course, by having the golf course, it increases the. 01:42:25
Property values of the homes that are there, I believe they're starting in the 600's. 01:42:29
Is what you know. 01:42:33
That what I've heard. 01:42:34
You know, and so. 01:42:36
In the property in the golf course itself does have a property value. 01:42:38
I think the estimate it was $13 million or something in that range, but I don't know where it's at now with. 01:42:42
That was an original paperwork. 01:42:48
You know that. 01:42:50
But yes, I mean. 01:42:51
Yeah, well, for storylines and things like that, if you've got a 200 acre golf course. 01:42:54
And you've got, let's say. 01:42:59
4 houses per acre. 01:43:01
There's 800 housing units that don't need the sewer. 01:43:04
OK. So you can, you can downsize your infrastructure a little bit because you're not using so many. 01:43:07
Our engineers have reduced the estimated cost from I believe or the original 60 million got it down into the 40 million. 01:43:12
Dollar range. 01:43:21
Yeah, I'm glad to hear that. Thank you. 01:43:22
Stephen Birch again, 305 Burton Street. 01:43:34
Umm, Mr. Myers brought up the issue of campers. 01:43:37
Parking downtown. 01:43:39
These are people that are just traveling through. Some of them are visiting the Cumberland. 01:43:41
National Parking. 01:43:45
Or visiting our city. 01:43:46
And, umm. 01:43:48
They stay overnight and they leave. They don't bother anybody. 01:43:49
There's nothing illegal about it, there's nothing intrusive about it. 01:43:53
And quite frankly, I like seeing them. It's umm. 01:43:56
Just shows that people. 01:43:59
Found our town worthy of a visit. 01:44:00
And I would say if Mr. Myers doesn't like looking at them, we'll. 01:44:03
Don't look at them. 01:44:06
Thank you. 01:44:07
They bring money to. 01:44:11
And maybe too short all the way around. 01:44:23
My name is Yvonne Whitley. 01:44:25
And we have a mailbox in Kingsland 1601 Highway 40 E. 01:44:26
We do live on our boat. 01:44:31
Out here we chose this lifestyle a few years back. 01:44:33
Sold the house, got rid of all the stuff. 01:44:35
And decided this was how we were going to travel. 01:44:38
And live the rest of our lives. 01:44:40
So. 01:44:42
When we came to Saint Mary's. 01:44:43
It was. 01:44:46
Mayberry. 01:44:47
It was so cute. Everybody was so nice. 01:44:47
We say, yeah, well. 01:44:50
We'll call this home. 01:44:51
So as we travel. 01:44:53
We admit. 01:44:54
Girls of people. 01:44:56
Canada. 01:44:57
Everywhere. 01:44:58
And anytime that they've asked about where we stay, we tell them. 01:45:00
And we've had. 01:45:04
Numerous people come into this town. 01:45:05
Because of just meeting them on the usual. 01:45:07
Sailing. 01:45:11
Because you go up and down the coast and meet each other over and over again. 01:45:12
And one thing I was thinking about the other day. 01:45:17
Is. 01:45:20
And this could come in good for Saint Mary's if we could plan to it. 01:45:22
Most of the boats. 01:45:27
Because of insurance. 01:45:28
Cannot be. 01:45:30
Hello, Florida. 01:45:31
Before November 1st. 01:45:32
And they have to be out of Florida or anything, so. 01:45:35
They have to be back up. 01:45:37
Before. 01:45:39
June 1st to go back home. 01:45:40
Because of hurricane season. 01:45:42
At that time. 01:45:44
Numerous ones would come in here and we could make the. 01:45:45
Money from them. 01:45:48
If we because one of our friends came and stayed. 01:45:49
She's going to stay a couple days. She stayed two weeks. 01:45:52
You know, and it's going into town, it's. 01:45:54
Enjoying. 01:45:57
The hometown feel. 01:45:59
So I was thinking we could do something. 01:46:00
Somehow, you know, to encourage more than just the Thanksgiving thing. 01:46:03
You know, work around the times prior to and after hurricane season, you know, do something like that. 01:46:07
Umm would be of good use to Saint Mary. 01:46:13
And in another thought was. 01:46:16
Which especially, unfortunately, Mr. Myers is getting a beaten. Umm. 01:46:20
It's like if. 01:46:26
It came to our attention as the voters out there, you know, it was about. 01:46:28
The use of water. 01:46:32
In the waste of water and such like that. 01:46:33
And so I was thinking, as other places, do you put a meter? 01:46:36
On the water, and that's for the guys who come and wash their boats. 01:46:39
And be there. 01:46:42
A lot of They wash their boats, they wash their car, they do. 01:46:44
You know, a big time. 01:46:47
And they're not being charged anything to do so. 01:46:49
Which is a nice courtesy from Saint Mary's, but you can't on the other side. 01:46:52
Punishable people out there that are just trying to live their lives. 01:46:56
You know not. 01:47:00
Got to be millionaires and stuff, so we're all just trying to live our lives out there. 01:47:01
So we shouldn't be cut off from. 01:47:06
Something that that's so important to us all. 01:47:08
Those folks who are going out fishing and coming from God knows where, not even Saint Mary's. 01:47:11
Well, we do too. 01:47:18
We have property tax on our boats. 01:47:19
So we pay taxes. 01:47:22
We pay county taxes. 01:47:24
You don't get right now city taxes, which we wouldn't mind. 01:47:25
But it is our. 01:47:29
We pay taxes. 01:47:30
You pay taxes on your vote, but you don't pay taxes in the city or. 01:47:32
No, we pay taxes and account. 01:47:36
Yeah. So we're not. 01:47:38
Riff raff so much that's out there. 01:47:40
You know by number means. 01:47:42
Yeah. So we're not. 01:47:47
Complaining or trying to be anything. 01:47:49
You don't want to get rid of. 01:47:52
You know, but it is. 01:47:54
You know, it is important to us and. 01:47:55
We all try to increase. 01:47:57
Encouraged use of Saint Mary's. Encouraged visitations we've brought. 01:47:59
Hurdles of boats. 01:48:03
Because of. 01:48:05
Meeting them and they'll come in and stay. 01:48:06
Or use it as a place to be during a storm. 01:48:08
You know if it's. 01:48:11
Getting bad out on the ocean, they'll come in and. 01:48:12
You know, hideout. 01:48:14
And uh. 01:48:15
We're showing at the town. 01:48:17
And one thing we do is we meet, you know when. 01:48:18
Meet them or remade them. 01:48:20
We have a car here, so we. 01:48:22
Take them to the grocery store and get fuel and things like that so we're aware of the things that they will come in here for. 01:48:24
You know, and if we could just make it more accessible. 01:48:31
There would be far more. 01:48:34
And it would be more than just the Thanksgiving thing if we could work around these areas. 01:48:35
Thank you. 01:48:42
OK. 01:48:50
All right, Thank you. We close this works this. 01:48:52
Down quarter down. 01:48:56
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Transcript

Event transcript
OK. Good evening. I'd like to call the quarterly town hall meeting for. 00:00:03
This corner to. 00:00:09
To order. 00:00:11
If you would like to make some comments, ask questions, share anything with the. 00:00:13
City Council, please come to the podium and give us your name and address. 00:00:19
And try to respect the. 00:00:23
5 minute time limit. 00:00:25
Please. 00:00:26
Valerie Fouts, 310 W Bryant St. 00:00:34
I'm, I'm curious and I have a question to ask You all touched on it the other night with part of your agenda. 00:00:38
And it had to do with the exit 1. 00:00:45
And I guess the question I have is about two years ago when we actually. 00:00:47
The community actually was aware. 00:00:54
Of Exit 1 and the Sparkle project. 00:00:57
Do what? Oh. 00:01:01
Never mind, I'm sorry, I thought I had feedback. 00:01:03
At the time, I was under the impression that we had several public comments as well Opportunities. 00:01:06
That it was an open concept. 00:01:12
Project. 00:01:15
Basically along the lines of. 00:01:16
The one in Yulee. 00:01:19
The wildlife. 00:01:20
Which had, you know, open. 00:01:21
And and various houses and apartments and whatever. 00:01:23
And businesses that were going to be there. 00:01:26
And, and probably we would have been able to utilize that as the citizens as well if and. 00:01:28
Eye doctor was over there. 00:01:34
Or if someone wanted to walk their dog around a walking path. 1 evening. 00:01:35
So at one point I need to ask you all. 00:01:40
When did it go from that concept? 00:01:44
And of course, this was after the bond was set or, you know, for 35 million. 00:01:47
And there was a lot of talk about that as well. 00:01:52
And I do understand and remember that Mayor Morrissey. 00:01:55
He he gave, you know, he basically said, you know this. 00:01:59
May not be such a great thing and I cannot support this, but. 00:02:03
He got over, wrote twice, vetoed. I think we were all there. 00:02:07
But by the same token. 00:02:11
When did it become? 00:02:13
A gated community golf resort. 00:02:16
And I want to know, it kind of came on as a surprise to me because I came to a council meeting and you all had a representative 00:02:19
here talking about it. 00:02:23
And I remember thinking, wait, what? 00:02:27
This doesn't sound the same. 00:02:29
And I think even at one point. 00:02:31
Umm, they're talking about possibly down the road, umm. 00:02:34
Building an extra school. 00:02:38
And that was kind of brought up. And that was like, oh, yeah, that may be, you know, a thing down the road. 00:02:40
But by the same token, I'm just kind of curious as. 00:02:45
How a project? 00:02:49
Went from. 00:02:51
This one. 00:02:52
To that one. 00:02:53
And the public wasn't aware of it until it was presented by the gentleman who represented the new project. 00:02:54
And again, it's gated. 00:03:01
And it's private. 00:03:04
And it's exclusive. 00:03:06
And I'm paying for it. 00:03:08
So I guess The thing is, when did this change? How did it change? 00:03:10
Was the public made aware of it? 00:03:14
Is there something on the contract? 00:03:16
That basically hopped from one project to the other. I mean, I'm just wondering is that not something that should have been made? 00:03:20
Public. 00:03:27
So if anybody could answer that for me and Lynn, I do appreciate your fiscal responsibility on a lot of the things that come up as 00:03:28
far as the budget. 00:03:32
And then speaking the other night about. 00:03:36
That leaves us what with 14,014 million then to kind of play with before we have to come back and ask for the other $60 million 00:03:39
that is going to probably come up. 00:03:44
In 2026. 00:03:49
And I'll be honest with you when I get off exit 1. 00:03:51
And I see the land now that is completely clear and void of the trees. 00:03:54
It gives me heartburn. 00:03:59
And, and I kind of feel like we just kind of got shafted. 00:04:02
Without knowing it. 00:04:05
So I would like to understand what happened, when it happened, and can this possibly not ever happen again without the public 00:04:07
knowing? 00:04:10
Happening. 00:04:14
Thank you very much. 00:04:15
So I'll speak to a couple of things. I mean, obviously some of this. 00:04:18
You know, predated. 00:04:21
Me being on council but the. 00:04:22
Wind radiant. 00:04:26
The developed or the property owner sold. 00:04:27
The property to Taylor Morrison. 00:04:30
You know they came forth with. 00:04:34
Their concept, which was. 00:04:35
A gated community with a golf course and and whatnot so. 00:04:37
I suppose that was at the time that. 00:04:41
You know it became gated. 00:04:43
You know there are commercial out parcels up front that will not be behind the gates that will. You know, if they put in a new 00:04:45
grocery store, doctor's offices. 00:04:49
Those kinds of things, those will be accessible to the public. 00:04:54
The north side of the. 00:04:58
Saint Mary's. 00:05:01
Street in Saint Mary's Road there. 00:05:02
You know, from what I've heard, as far as what they're playing on there, you know, is not to be a gated community. There would be. 00:05:07
Potential housing and townhomes and. 00:05:13
Additional commercial retail there. 00:05:16
That, uh. 00:05:18
Would not be in a gated community, so there will certainly be a mixture of that. 00:05:19
Umm, I do want to kind of also clarify that. 00:05:25
The You know we're not. 00:05:27
Specifically paying for what's happening out there. You know there is a tad district. 00:05:30
And the people who pay property taxes out there on that property are the ones that are paying for. 00:05:36
That Chad at this point in time. 00:05:43
Now yes, if the. 00:05:45
Property, uh. 00:05:46
If the development went belly up. 00:05:47
And uh. 00:05:50
You know, there were no property taxes coming in. The loan came due. 00:05:52
Then it would, yes, fall back to taxpayers. But. 00:05:55
That is not currently. 00:05:58
What's happening the development out there? 00:06:00
Is well ahead of schedule and so the property values. 00:06:04
Rising already. 00:06:08
Umm, and. 00:06:09
It is set to generate enough. 00:06:12
Property tax and TAD revenue. 00:06:17
To pay the. 00:06:19
The bond. 00:06:20
And uh. 00:06:21
In fact, the way it's designed and the length of the TAD. 00:06:23
That it should generate those excess revenues above the original TAD. 00:06:27
Bond payment. 00:06:33
To make the infrastructure improvements. 00:06:34
On the Northside and that type of thing as it continues so. 00:06:37
Hopefully there will not have to be another bond for the additional infrastructure. 00:06:41
It'll be able to be paid from. 00:06:46
The increasing CAD revenues. 00:06:48
From the property tax. 00:06:50
You know, obviously that was Mayor Marcy's. 00:06:52
Concern was. 00:06:55
You know if it doesn't happen. 00:06:57
Then we would the city would be stuck with that. We the taxpayers. 00:06:58
Uh, but what's currently happening and? 00:07:02
The progress is well above well ahead of schedule that was originally laid out for the bond repayment. 00:07:05
The valuations are increasing faster than the original. 00:07:11
Computations that the repayment schedule was created under. 00:07:16
So we're right now well ahead of schedule and. 00:07:20
But who knows what will happen next year? I can't speak to that, you know, but. 00:07:24
That's where we are now. So right now it's not. 00:07:29
Other than ours, we have staff time and. 00:07:31
Those kinds of things that are involved in any development. 00:07:33
That we as taxpayers, you know, support, but the direct infrastructure and the things that are going on out there. 00:07:36
You know, are not coming out of taxpayer dollars specifically so. 00:07:44
I don't know if I answered all your questions or not, but. 00:07:48
German and I do understand as well. 00:07:51
Yeah, that is the bond, excuse me, that we be paying the interest on. 00:07:54
And when you when you're saying that that property taxes are there, I guess? 00:07:58
That's one way to look at it, but I'm thinking that, Chad the other night said at one point. 00:08:03
That you were thinking that they were going to be building businesses first so that we could start getting that revenue. 00:08:08
We don't know. Like you said, the economy could turn in 5 minutes. It happened in 2008. 00:08:16
OK. When we had that housing issue. 00:08:21
At that point, we're not making any money to pay on a bond. 00:08:25
So that's my concern. I mean, I know it's not tax money. 00:08:28
It's a bond and we the interest is going to be coming in on it is going to be due. 00:08:32
Can you alltel me when it's due the first installment? 00:08:37
One of the things to understand as we did take the $35 million revenue bond, the 1st. 00:08:39
Few years we have set aside $5,000,000 out of that. 00:08:48
To pay the early years. 00:08:53
To help us. 00:08:55
You know, build some momentum on the development and you did explain that the other evening. I appreciate that. 00:08:56
Greg's point? 00:09:02
In the financial projections that I've looked at. 00:09:04
We are setting aside. 00:09:07
From the tax revenues and right now that would be, you know, the owners of the land are Taylor Morrison and Radiant until they 00:09:10
sell it to somebody else. So they're going to have to. 00:09:14
Pay the tax. 00:09:19
I think we are setting aside. 00:09:20
A reserve out of. 00:09:24
Money that we get for the phase two development and that's fiscally responsible. 00:09:27
I think the thing that I'm concerned about. 00:09:32
We look at the Jacobi project. 00:09:36
You know at this point. 00:09:38
Yeah, it's not going to be anything right now. It's not what it was supposed to be. 00:09:40
So I think that the JDA has paid. 00:09:46
To tax payments, to tax bills, that's my concern. 00:09:49
And again, that's where the heartburn comes. So, you know, I just. 00:09:53
We gotta yeah, doesn't have to pay close attention to it, and I think that we are now. 00:09:58
But, you know, as Greg points out, nobody can predict the future. So absolutely thank you. 00:10:04
And thank you, Amy, could you? 00:10:10
Please address the multimodal. 00:10:12
Paths and where those will be located and whether or not. 00:10:15
They're open to the public. 00:10:19
Can you hear me? 00:10:23
Yeah, OK, great. Thank you. Thank you very much, Council and members of the public. 00:10:32
I did want to address some of Mrs. Spouses concerns in addition to speak to some of the public improvements. 00:10:37
That are in the Exit 1 development. 00:10:45
So, uh. 00:10:47
If you've noticed, at the bend of Saint Mary's Road as you're traveling. 00:10:48
East. 00:10:53
They have started the beginning of what will be Esplanade Blvd. which is the major intersection that will run. 00:10:54
South and north. 00:11:02
In that area. 00:11:04
Right there, there will be a gross a grocery. 00:11:06
Tenant. It is my understanding that that letter of intent. 00:11:10
Has if not been signed as in the works between radiant to still. 00:11:14
Both the master development of the land that is not Taylor Morrison's. 00:11:18
On the north side of there, there will also be commercial pods. All of that will be. 00:11:23
Designed in a way that. 00:11:28
Still keeps a. 00:11:30
A minimal. 00:11:32
A bit of a tree cover similar to what we see in front of Osprey Cove. So those commercial office spaces, those are open to the 00:11:34
public. 00:11:38
But they're designed in a way that is off the road, so you'll see that similar. 00:11:41
Design pattern for the commercial. 00:11:46
Along the southern. 00:11:49
Part of Saint Mary's Road. 00:11:52
Beginning at just a little bit off of the Haddock Rd. intersection. 00:11:53
We will be doing a multimodal path. 00:12:00
This will be within the city's right of way. 00:12:02
So you look at the edge of pavement. 00:12:05
26 feet in to try to shelter it a little bit from that fast moving traffic. 00:12:07
Will begin a series of. 00:12:13
Very beautifully designed and planted. 00:12:15
Shrubs and vegetation. A winding multimodal path that will be 10 feet wide. 00:12:19
With a series of pocket parks. 00:12:24
The idea is to go all the way up to the edge of the Osprey Cove. 00:12:27
Land and then work with. 00:12:32
Asperico residents and the tag funding to continue that multimodal path. 00:12:34
Over I mean. 00:12:39
You know, big picture, at some point we come down off of Saint Mary's Road, we pick up the interchange and look, we're on Osborne 00:12:41
and maybe we can get ourselves to Midtown. So that's the multimodal path. Thank you. 00:12:47
How you doing? 00:13:17
Richard Gamble, 107 Dilworth Street, Saint Mary's, Georgia. 00:13:18
Dear Mayor. 00:13:23
Adi, I like your song, Jones. 00:13:27
And lean, clean and lean king. 00:13:31
I was contacted by. 00:13:35
As a coach, so I. 00:13:40
I was contacted by. 00:13:43
Dependable, Mr. Ma. 00:13:44
The next day. 00:13:46
After I appeared here before you about the city right away ditches. 00:13:47
It gave me a warm feeling that I had achieved one of my 2 objectives. 00:13:51
I would later discover I was wrong. 00:13:56
I think you should know my motivation so you can gauge the fight in me. 00:14:00
If needed. 00:14:04
As an unbaptized Jehovah Witness, a recent lesson said. 00:14:06
Love and do for others. 00:14:11
And Jehovah God will love and do for you. 00:14:13
I walked that path. 00:14:16
I revisit Billy Wilson. 00:14:19
And also met his. 00:14:21
His wife, Hattie. 00:14:22
With a pretty smooth skin. 00:14:24
She was seated in some type of mobile device. 00:14:26
I inquired about the tree. 00:14:29
And was told. 00:14:31
Had it cut it down. 00:14:33
Heavy cut it down. 00:14:38
My heart sank. 00:14:41
Headed to stride how she cut most of the tree using. 00:14:43
Heads close. 00:14:47
She then hired someone with a chainsaw. 00:14:50
To cut the remainder. 00:14:53
I focused on having. 00:14:55
As she spoke and tried to visualize. 00:14:57
How this frail appearing? 00:14:59
Woman cut down the tree. 00:15:02
Billy is 92. 00:15:05
And I'm gonna give them. 00:15:06
Minds and Denise relationship 10 years. 00:15:08
Let's say hat is 82. 00:15:11
I. 00:15:19
Hattie was stimulated by anger. 00:15:21
I believe had embedded. 00:15:25
Billy thought as I. 00:15:26
That the tree was finally going to be removed. 00:15:28
Only later to learn differently. 00:15:31
Let me say something about Mr. Ma. 00:15:36
He's done 4 things for me. 00:15:38
And I'm gonna just tell you about 1. 00:15:40
When my truck motor was being rebuilt. 00:15:43
I went six weeks without a vehicle. I had to ride my bicycle to the base to swim. 00:15:46
And a tree. 00:15:51
We had a storm and it blew the tree over there. 00:15:52
Sidewalk. I contacted Mr. Ma. 00:15:55
And I say now. 00:15:58
This, this ain't no danger. 00:15:59
I said just something. 00:16:01
My ride better. 00:16:02
Which removed the treatment. 00:16:04
It was gone the next day. 00:16:05
Day I was so shocked you when I wrote by and saw that tree gone. 00:16:07
I had a great swim that day. 00:16:13
Well, anyway, let's let's get back to the subject. 00:16:15
So when when Mr. Mark called me and told me, he was going out there to look at it. 00:16:19
I thought they were going to cut the tree. 00:16:25
I have two chainsaws. I could have cut the tree down. 00:16:26
My request was on behalf of Billy and Hattie. 00:16:30
Someone failed me in two ways. 00:16:34
By not fulfilling the test. 00:16:37
And more importantly. 00:16:39
Not communicating a no reply and the reason why? 00:16:41
Communication. 00:16:46
We should never. 00:16:49
No, I want to define we. 00:16:50
We meaning me. 00:16:52
You, the audience. 00:16:55
The citizen of Saint Mary's. 00:16:56
We should never forget. 00:16:58
That you. 00:17:00
Work for us. 00:17:01
Tonight, I'm here remind you. 00:17:04
I again ask that you feel. 00:17:07
Randall and Kimberly Hendricks *****. 00:17:09
At 7:09. 00:17:11
West Dillingham St. 00:17:13
Randall and Kimberly Hendricks ditch at 7:09. 00:17:16
West didn't have St. the Super ditch. 00:17:21
You have 30 days for replying. I'm not asking for a reply. I demand a reply. 00:17:27
You work for us. 00:17:32
Billy and Hattie. 00:17:36
OBE. 00:17:38
But we can ensure. 00:17:39
That nothing like this. 00:17:41
Happen again as a deterrent sort of thing. 00:17:42
Imagine you are amongst A diverse group that pay for something and everybody got it but you. 00:17:45
Some of us know that song all too well. 00:17:58
We don't get it or we pay more for it. 00:18:01
I learned as a teacher. 00:18:05
Students treatment toward you. 00:18:08
Mirror that same behavior. 00:18:10
That they exhibit toward their parents. 00:18:12
There's someone who worked for you. 00:18:15
Who will not listen? 00:18:17
To us. 00:18:19
I surmise. 00:18:22
That person don't listen to you either. 00:18:23
It's time for a change. 00:18:27
Fire a city meant. 00:18:31
Yes. 00:18:32
Fire the city manager. 00:18:33
And his replacement be for all Saint Mary's. 00:18:37
One Saint Mary's will make Saint Mary's number one. 00:18:41
Immediately upon his approach. 00:18:46
As appropriate. 00:18:48
Do a thoracic audit. 00:18:50
While my request is void of accusation, there's no accusation here. 00:18:52
It's on verification. 00:18:57
President Reagan said trust. 00:18:59
But. 00:19:01
Verify. 00:19:02
See something? 00:19:07
Know something, Say something please. 00:19:08
Then clean and lean king, do your job. 00:19:12
And if he was here? 00:19:16
Chief Galloway. 00:19:17
Release the arms. 00:19:19
Thank you. 00:19:21
Mr. Gamble, I do want to address. 00:19:24
The Wilsons real quickly. 00:19:26
Umm, you know I had followed up after your last. 00:19:29
You know, uh. 00:19:31
Presentation about. 00:19:32
That fig tree. 00:19:34
And I was. 00:19:35
Told, and I will admit I did not speak directly to the Wilson's myself. 00:19:37
But I followed up and I was told that public works went out there within a day or two of. 00:19:41
The last time you were here. 00:19:46
And spoke to them. 00:19:47
And uh. 00:19:49
Found out that they had planted that tree from a cutting. 00:19:50
From down here. 00:19:53
Downtown, a historic fig tree. 00:19:55
That they themselves, that actually. 00:19:57
Planted that tree. 00:19:59
Years ago and didn't realize, you know that it was an issue and. 00:20:01
I'm not exactly sure you know what. 00:20:07
Transpired after that, but obviously the fact that she cut it down disturbs me. 00:20:09
That she had to do that if they really wanted it cut down. But. 00:20:14
I was told that. 00:20:18
You know that they had not necessarily initially asked. 00:20:19
To have the tree cut down. 00:20:23
But maybe she thought that the city wanted it down because. 00:20:25
And that they had planted it. So that does concern me and I'd like to kind of talk to her and get to the bottom of that, but. 00:20:28
OK, let me clarify something. 00:20:33
How did I know that they wanted that tree down? 00:20:36
I don't live in that neighborhood. 00:20:39
I don't know them. 00:20:40
Right, so. 00:20:41
I was told they wanted it gone. 00:20:43
And before I came to you. 00:20:45
I went to them and I took a picture of him when I talked to him. 00:20:46
Right. And he said he wanted it done. 00:20:50
He said he had wanted to gone all alone. 00:20:53
But the thing that I saw was still. 00:20:55
That neighborhood gets no. 00:20:57
Nope, no lawn service. 00:20:59
That entire neighborhood. 00:21:01
But I'm not here to fight that. 00:21:02
I'm here to say. 00:21:04
And then when y'all decided y'all were not going to do it, I just think that I should have been told. 00:21:05
I came before you. 00:21:10
I took my time out like tonight. 00:21:11
Yes, you know how long I had prepared to do this. 00:21:13
You know so. 00:21:16
It's not like I just came in here off the farm, I think. 00:21:17
And so. 00:21:21
I'm going to tell you something about. 00:21:22
Real elderly black people. 00:21:25
They are not aggressive. 00:21:28
When I went to her and I asked him, I just followed up on. 00:21:30
Because I saw the tree was going and when she told me. 00:21:34
Who she was telling about. 00:21:36
She said please don't say nothing. 00:21:37
So if you go out there as authority. 00:21:40
They're not going to challenge you. They're not going to do anything. 00:21:42
Just do your job. 00:21:46
You know, if they how, how did I know that that tree was gone? 00:21:48
I mean that tree needed to be gone. 00:21:52
So I stand by there and I stand by my request. 00:21:54
And I and I stand by that I should get an answer back. 00:21:58
Yes, Sir, And if not, I'm not violent. 00:22:02
But I do have a fence. 00:22:06
If you know what I mean. 00:22:08
Yes, thank you. 00:22:10
Tom Canning, 410 Point Peter Place. 00:22:21
I've got 2 items. 00:22:24
Raise the first one. 00:22:26
Is an observation. 00:22:30
That if it resonates with you. 00:22:32
I ask that. 00:22:35
The property authority, whether it be the police chief or someone. 00:22:39
Brave our community on the subject, and that is. 00:22:44
Drugs in our community. 00:22:47
I have a very limited view and understanding of. 00:22:49
That issue. 00:22:53
I live a quiet life in a quiet neighborhood. 00:22:54
But when you read the newspaper. 00:22:58
And I don't have a number off the top of my head, but I. 00:23:01
Eventually, 90% of the items of arrest reports. 00:23:04
Have directly or indirectly have to do with drugs. 00:23:08
And I don't see that that is doing anything but increasing. 00:23:11
Whether it's the. 00:23:15
I 94.5. 00:23:16
Carter arrests. 00:23:18
Or just arrest within our community. 00:23:20
So. 00:23:23
I'd like to get a more comfortable feeling on whether or not. 00:23:25
This is a growing power problem. 00:23:29
In our community more so than maybe other communities. 00:23:32
And what is being done about the source of the problems? 00:23:36
That I'm not talking about. 00:23:39
The drug abusers as much as I'm talking. 00:23:41
About the source. 00:23:43
So I don't know where to take that any further other than an observation that I'm sure. 00:23:45
Those of you that read the. 00:23:50
Newspaper. 00:23:51
You could probably do your own head count and you know. 00:23:52
At least 6 out of 10 or 7 out of 10 of those items. 00:23:58
Had to do with friends. 00:24:02
Even if they're violent related items. 00:24:04
OK. 00:24:06
If you could just take that down and think about it and. 00:24:07
Figure out some way. 00:24:10
Address that the other item. 00:24:12
I know a subject nearing data your hearts. 00:24:14
Is storm water management. 00:24:17
Let's come up. 00:24:19
Over the years, as many of you know, many, many times. 00:24:20
Most recent discussions. 00:24:25
You've, I believe you either. 00:24:28
I may have missed a one or two. You might either a work session or. 00:24:31
You plan on having more and what have you. 00:24:35
My concern remains what it was, what I expressed in the past. 00:24:38
We all know that we have an ordinance on the record. 00:24:42
That's been there for a number of years. It's been completely ignored. 00:24:45
We have. 00:24:50
Been using general funds. 00:24:52
To deal with. 00:24:55
The loudest. 00:24:56
Maybe even the biggest. 00:25:00
Storm water issues in our community, but we continue to. 00:25:01
Piece meal it. 00:25:05
And using general funds to do that. 00:25:09
I don't know whether you intend to rewrite the ordinance and come up with a completely different plan. 00:25:12
Or not. 00:25:19
If you intend to stay with the ordinance, I respectfully suggest. 00:25:20
We need to start to implement. 00:25:24
The fee structure, the revenue stream. 00:25:27
So we have the source of the funds. 00:25:29
To hire the labor. 00:25:32
Get the workforce. 00:25:34
And get the planning done. 00:25:35
This isn't a switch that you're just going to turn on and tomorrow. 00:25:37
Everything now we got management. 00:25:41
Stormwater management across the board. 00:25:42
We need but. 00:25:45
Everything starts with money. 00:25:46
So we've got to stop using our revenue a general revenue funds. 00:25:48
For doing something that we've said years ago. 00:25:52
That we were going to collect fees and. 00:25:55
And appreciate it if you would. 00:25:58
Whether you discuss it now. 00:26:00
Or you have a work session. 00:26:01
But please move it along, whatever you decide to do. 00:26:03
Thank you. Thank you. 00:26:07
I'll address my thoughts on the storm water management in the timeline. 00:26:12
Yeah, you know. 00:26:18
Does not. My line is on. 00:26:21
I mean, go ahead and talk. I'll just get right up on it. 00:26:26
Yeah, my thoughts on a timeline for the storm water utility management, you know. 00:26:31
We I know it's been on the books for a long time. 00:26:36
But you know. 00:26:40
As far as? 00:26:41
This council, you know, it's really been a couple months and I know years were spent on the storm water management utility plan. 00:26:42
We did have a work session. 00:26:46
But you know, it does affect. 00:26:49
You know our budget pretty significantly as far as. 00:26:51
What's going to be covered for workers under the storm water fund and equipment? 00:26:54
And then what's still going to be in our, you know, our regular fund? 00:26:59
So. 00:27:03
Unless we. 00:27:05
Pushed along further. 00:27:07
Sooner than that, I do feel that within you know, it should be something we can have done by. 00:27:08
But within the year for our next budget and whether we start the utility fund before we. 00:27:13
You know, factored in the next year's budget or we. 00:27:18
Kind of roll it in at the same time, but I would say within the year. 00:27:20
I think that's a reasonable time based on how many years were spent on the plan initially. 00:27:25
But uh. 00:27:29
You know and. 00:27:30
If anyone else has another idea, you know, maybe we try to get it done. 00:27:31
You know, before we set the mileage rate and do it sooner. 00:27:36
But it does affect. 00:27:38
You know the annual budget pretty significantly. 00:27:39
I think we did say that we wanted to have a storm water. 00:27:43
Or accession that hasn't been. We asked for that to be scheduled. 00:27:47
Have continued. Yeah. 00:27:52
Right at the last one we were gonna. 00:27:53
Right, keep working. 00:27:56
Yes. 00:27:58
Good evening. 00:28:03
Nick Harris, 102 Hamlet. 00:28:04
Circle Saint Mary's. 00:28:06
This is just a perception in overall listening. 00:28:08
To what everybody here? 00:28:13
Has said tonight. 00:28:14
We moved from Atlanta to Saint Mary's because of the smallness. 00:28:17
In the community aspect. 00:28:22
Of this. 00:28:25
And I grew up in a town smaller than Saint Mary's. 00:28:25
And this past week I spent a week out West. 00:28:29
In a very small town. 00:28:33
In Wherever I Go, I traveled to gay with Candace and a group. 00:28:35
Went out West in. 00:28:39
When I'm traveling, I'm walking into businesses. 00:28:41
And I'm talking to local people. 00:28:44
And the disconnect, I think. 00:28:47
Of Saint Mary's, at least in my world. Nick's world. 00:28:50
Is. 00:28:53
When I was a teacher. 00:28:54
And I still work special Ed. 00:28:56
There's three components of a community. 00:28:58
Family, school and community. 00:29:00
You can't, and those pillars are the foundation. 00:29:02
You cannot have a successful community. 00:29:05
With only two or one. 00:29:08
Or put more emphasis. 00:29:10
On a particular one. 00:29:12
Our community seems like. 00:29:14
We're doing more fighting. 00:29:16
And like good old boy projects versus just. 00:29:18
What's best for the community if we do what's right? 00:29:21
Our communities. 00:29:25
Gonna be vibrant. 00:29:26
I compare it to. 00:29:29
You look at certain venues. 00:29:30
They're like vending machines. You walk in, you pay, you get a service, and boom, you walk out. 00:29:32
The true communities. 00:29:37
The barn building. 00:29:39
Community where everybody comes together, even a local businesses. 00:29:41
And I'm a new business owner with my wife. She does more of it. 00:29:45
But I'm of the business savvy. 00:29:49
Side of that business. 00:29:51
And instead of working and enhancing other like. 00:29:53
Businesses, it's like competition. 00:29:57
And it shouldn't be like that. We're a small town. 00:30:00
Everybody should be working. 00:30:03
To benefit everybody else. 00:30:06
And whether your government. 00:30:09
Or whether you're a constituent resident. 00:30:10
We're not working. We see the government not working. 00:30:13
In true communities. 00:30:16
When you get the government environment. 00:30:18
Crap just happens. It doesn't happen. 00:30:20
You get into the bureaucracy. 00:30:22
But even in our community, people are. 00:30:24
Either a free. 00:30:26
To step up so. 00:30:28
When the grass isn't cut in front of a business. 00:30:29
Don't go to the city and gripe. Why aren't you cutting my grass? 00:30:32
Be the business owner and go out there and cut that grass. 00:30:36
Make a bill when you look at the blight here. 00:30:38
We need to put more pride into the businesses, say hey, look at your business. 00:30:41
Put a coat of paint on it. 00:30:46
But if we started all talking like that. 00:30:48
I think it would be infectious. 00:30:51
And catch on. So when we look at. 00:30:53
The majority of things here. 00:30:56
Let's start. 00:30:58
Family, school and community. 00:30:59
And do what you say you're gonna do. And I think people don't have a problem. 00:31:01
If you can't do it, just tell us you can't do it. 00:31:06
And then the community will step up if they want it bad enough. 00:31:08
And they will do it. 00:31:12
I think it's time for Saint Mary's to really. 00:31:13
And everybody here when you go home. 00:31:16
Self reflect. Look at yourself in the mirror. 00:31:18
And say, what did you do for Saint Mary's today? 00:31:21
Instead of. How did I benefit? 00:31:23
From Saint Mary's today. 00:31:26
Thank you. 00:31:28
Thank you. 00:31:29
That's cool. 00:31:33
Good evening. I'm Mark Fouts at 3:10. 00:31:39
West Branch St. 00:31:42
Just got a couple of concerns. 00:31:44
One of them is the new bulk. 00:31:46
Item The Cumberland services are supposed to be taken care of during our regular garbage pickup. 00:31:49
And I was wondering if someone could give us a definition of what those items are. There was a. 00:31:55
A piece in the city website that. 00:32:00
That kind of talk to it. 00:32:03
I didn't really tell what items are out, what items should be put out there, You know, whether it's a mattress or a stove or 00:32:05
whatever. 00:32:08
And I went on to the Cumberland Cumberland Services website. 00:32:12
They didn't address it at all. 00:32:16
So I'd like for somebody to address that to the public tonight. 00:32:17
The second thing. 00:32:22
Has to do with the the exit 1. 00:32:24
Building that's going on. 00:32:31
Back in 2022. 00:32:35
During some of our. 00:32:38
Citizen meetings that we had with the city. 00:32:41
There was a contract with Rainier that was afforded to everybody. 00:32:44
And it spoke specifically about what the. 00:32:48
What the expectations were from the city and what the expectations were from Rainier. 00:32:51
I can't find my copy of that contract. 00:32:57
And I can't find it anywhere on city website. 00:33:00
But there is very specific information in there about what's expected. 00:33:03
And I'd like to see that contract put back up on the city website so that people can reference that. 00:33:07
Because that's where your 30 million or $60 million bond information comes from. 00:33:13
The second thing. 00:33:18
On April the 17th, 2023. 00:33:20
There was a council work session. 00:33:24
It was called the City of Saint Mary's TAD 2 project. 00:33:26
Project financing overview. 00:33:30
And there was a representative from the financing establishment talking about Exit 1. 00:33:32
And what was expected or what? What? 00:33:39
What could be expected as far as the financing on it? 00:33:41
I would like to see. 00:33:45
Pages 10 and 14 out of that session. 00:33:47
Those particular pages one of them dealt with. 00:33:52
The payback? 00:33:55
And it was basically a set of milestones. 00:33:56
On a year by year basis that that. 00:33:59
Defined the expectations of what the principle was. 00:34:02
What the interest was. 00:34:06
What the TAD payment was? 00:34:07
And what the overage was going to be. 00:34:09
As a former project manager, we use those kinds of milestones to determine whether the project was on track or not. 00:34:13
You said tonight that what's going on right now, that the project is ahead of schedule. 00:34:20
What I'd really like to see is. 00:34:26
The document on pay on on pages. 00:34:28
10 and 14. 00:34:32
From that work session put up on the city website. 00:34:33
And actuals put on there for the people to see exactly just how this process is unfolding it from the financial standpoint. 00:34:36
And it also has talks about phase one and Phase 2. 00:34:44
The expectations and the time periods involved with those things. 00:34:47
Those are things that citizens want to see because they affect us. That's our money. Don't talk. And now. 00:34:51
And this is a good way to do it. 00:34:57
Most of you all weren't. 00:34:59
During that time period. 00:35:01
Absolutely. 00:35:03
I think you should look at these documents. 00:35:06
And put them as part of the city and put them on the website so that you can see what's going on with it. 00:35:10
The third thing I wanted to talk about? 00:35:16
There was a lady here that was, I guess she was with the airport to the film company that was buying something in the airport. 00:35:19
On Monday. 00:35:26
And she was talking about the electricity problems that they're having over there. 00:35:27
5 megawatts is what she said they needed. 00:35:33
And she wanted to look at solar and wind and gas. 00:35:36
Just for your information. 00:35:40
To create a MW of electricity for solar. 00:35:42
It takes about four to five acres. 00:35:46
So you know. 00:35:48
If she's going to do, she's going to do solar. 00:35:50
Somebody better figure out where she's going to get 20 acres of land to do it with. 00:35:53
The second thing that she said? 00:35:58
She used the word. 00:36:00
The land is under contract. 00:36:01
And my question is, has that land been closed on yet or not? 00:36:04
Because if I'm somebody that's got to put in that kind of money. 00:36:08
On a project. 00:36:12
That I didn't know I was going to do, and I haven't closed on that land yet. 00:36:14
I wouldn't be closing on it at all. 00:36:18
So you all can ask it can can address that tonight. 00:36:20
Has it been closed or not? 00:36:23
And is that their problem, or is that Saint Mary's problem? 00:36:25
Thank you. 00:36:28
Charlie, can you speak to the what bulk items are included in that? 00:36:30
For Cumberland Services. 00:36:34
Yeah. So to be quite honest. 00:36:37
To provide a list of what can be picked up would be. 00:36:39
A huge list, so I don't think I can really provide specifically what. 00:36:42
But I can tell you what. 00:36:45
Would be and that information I'll make sure it gets on the Cumberland website. 00:36:47
If it's not on there. 00:36:52
So my understanding it should have been posted on that site. 00:36:53
But it is on the Camden County dump site. 00:36:56
If you go into the Camden County site. 00:36:59
Because our regulations are based on what the county says we can. 00:37:01
Bring to that dump site so. 00:37:05
That is your liquid waste, your lead batteries you can't pick up. 00:37:06
Untreated, non residential. 00:37:10
Biomedical waste we can't pick up. 00:37:12
On petroleum products, we can't pick up tires. 00:37:14
Pesticides. Herbicides. 00:37:17
If you've got a refrigerator. 00:37:19
Can't be picked up unless it's got a special tag on it that says the coolant's been removed. It's things like that. 00:37:21
But your everyday dump stuff. 00:37:26
Mattresses changing out your cabinets. 00:37:29
As long as it's done by the resident. 00:37:31
They can pick it up. 00:37:33
What they don't pick up is if it's a. 00:37:35
They call it a move out. 00:37:37
If you got a renter that didn't pay the rent and they get evicted. 00:37:38
And then our product sits in the house and then. 00:37:42
You know, you see on the corner, all of a sudden they've done all of their furniture on the corner. 00:37:44
Government loan services won't pick that up either. That. 00:37:47
Falls on the. 00:37:50
Property owner and they can. 00:37:51
Get a private dumpster delivered there and all that stuff will be picked up. 00:37:53
The other things that won't pick up? 00:37:56
Umm is if you're doing. 00:37:58
Commercial yard waste or commercial. 00:38:00
Construction. 00:38:02
So the vendor is responsible for removing this stuff, but pretty much government will pick up anything. 00:38:03
Except anything that's considered hazardous to the dump. 00:38:08
Like I said, it's a vast but if you have any questions I mean I'll be more than happy to supply. 00:38:13
That if you have something you've got to put out with. 00:38:16
It's pretty vast. They'll pick up almost anything. 00:38:18
Thank you. 00:38:22
So as to the. 00:38:23
Property that. 00:38:25
Marina Martens and Pigmental Studios. 00:38:26
They have purchased and closed on. 00:38:29
I believe it's 3 parcels. 00:38:33
That they purchased from the city through JDA. 00:38:34
Umm, they were also acquiring private land that was outside of the Commerce Park. 00:38:38
From a private individual and I'm not 100% sure whether that piece of property is. 00:38:44
Completely closed or not, but I thought she said that it was. 00:38:48
And she also acquired. 00:38:52
A piece of land from SG blocks that had formerly been sold. 00:38:55
By the city. 00:38:59
And JDA to SG blocks that. 00:39:01
And so she has acquired that land as well. 00:39:04
Like I say once again, that was. 00:39:07
A private transaction between her and SD blocks. 00:39:09
And. 00:39:13
That one may be the one. 00:39:15
If I had to guess, that might not be fully closed yet, but I think. 00:39:16
Because that company, SG Blocks, has had some. 00:39:20
Change over from reorganization and some different things that I think slowed that process down, but. 00:39:23
I think she did finally get. 00:39:28
Closed on that but. 00:39:30
She has, I believe, well over 100 acres. 00:39:32
That she has acquired out there so. 00:39:35
She has the land. 00:39:38
To do. 00:39:39
A full solar. 00:39:40
If. 00:39:41
If she goes that way and on that property center. 00:39:42
Larry White, 102 Assemblies. Gordon, St. Marys. 00:40:08
Got basically three items. 00:40:12
1 is a follow up on exit 1. 00:40:14
And that's more of a. 00:40:17
I brought this up before. 00:40:18
They've been putting flags down on Liquor Drive. 00:40:21
For the proposed sewer line. 00:40:24
Coming from. 00:40:26
Exit 1 Development. 00:40:28
Down to the point. 00:40:29
Down to the lift station down there. 00:40:31
At the corner of a. 00:40:33
The Colerain. 00:40:35
And. 00:40:38
My mind's going. 00:40:40
Anyway, Rd. 00:40:42
No, not Saint Mary's Road. 00:40:43
Sugar Miller Sugar Mill Blvd. 00:40:45
You're supposed to attach it to that legislation. 00:40:48
And I'll ask the question again. 00:40:50
When are they going to be completing? 00:40:52
That sewer line or still in the design phase? 00:40:54
That's a question I have. Can that be addressed? 00:40:59
I'm pretty sure the engineering is still going on. 00:41:02
Well, my concern is. 00:41:06
Once they get the design done and they want to start their construction. 00:41:08
Is going to be during the school year. 00:41:11
You got Marley Clark Elementary School. 00:41:13
Right there on Nuclear Drive. 00:41:16
And if they're going to be laying sewer lines? 00:41:17
Long drive. 00:41:20
Play havoc. 00:41:22
With the school traffic there from. 00:41:23
Myrtle Clark. 00:41:25
The other thing too is I want to know. 00:41:26
I've seen drawings. 00:41:28
Preliminary drawings. 00:41:30
That they're going to complete their cut through. 00:41:31
From Saint Mary's Road to Nicola Drive. 00:41:34
Are they going to do that or not? 00:41:37
OK, good. 00:41:39
The other item is I want to bring up the. 00:41:42
Again, I'm like a broken record. 00:41:44
Speeding. Speeding. 00:41:46
On Nuclear Drive. 00:41:49
They're by the school. 00:41:50
It is not a 25 mile per hour. 00:41:52
Speed limit for school zone. 00:41:57
Is a permanent 25 mph. 00:41:59
Speed limit on nickel drive. 00:42:02
From one end to the other. 00:42:04
And I've had more people come up on my rear end. 00:42:06
When I'm doing this feeling and I make a drive driving home. 00:42:09
Because I live down on the end of my record drive. 00:42:12
Whenever the item I can't remember what it was, give me a second. 00:42:17
I've forgot 5 minutes I guess. 00:42:20
That's right, because I. 00:42:29
You forget my age, you can't remember everything. 00:42:30
Never mind, I can't. 00:42:34
What was again? 00:42:36
Never mind. 00:42:38
Ken Jolly 102 Saltgrass Trace here in Saint Mary's. 00:42:51
Mr. Mayor, Council members. 00:42:55
Mr. Williams response regarding the. 00:42:58
Bolt pickup was excellent. 00:43:02
I had the opportunity to speak with. 00:43:05
Employees of. 00:43:08
Cumberland. 00:43:11
Waste Management. 00:43:12
And we discovered that. 00:43:14
In addition to the recycling truck that comes through. 00:43:16
In addition to the regular trash cup. 00:43:20
Truck that comes through. 00:43:22
There are two other trucks. 00:43:24
That are available. 00:43:27
For bulk pickup. 00:43:28
The first is manned by a driver and a writer. 00:43:30
And if the bulk can be picked up by this one individual? 00:43:35
Then it's done. 00:43:40
If the item is too large. 00:43:42
Then that gets. 00:43:44
Indicated umm. 00:43:46
And fed back to. 00:43:47
The. 00:43:49
Company and they dispatch. 00:43:51
A larger truck that has. 00:43:55
The grappling hook on it. 00:43:56
And as Mr. Williams pointed out. 00:43:59
If you have items that have a refrigerant in. 00:44:02
Whether it be a small refrigerator. 00:44:06
An air conditioner. 00:44:09
A freezer or a larger refrigerator. 00:44:11
Or any other item that has a refrigerant in it. 00:44:14
It will not be picked up unless it has that special yellow sticker on it. 00:44:19
This is a Georgia State long. 00:44:24
The refrigerant gets recovered. 00:44:27
By individuals companies who are licensed to do so. 00:44:30
And that refrigerant? 00:44:34
Can be reused. 00:44:37
Either in your own equipment or maybe someone elses. 00:44:39
So it. 00:44:44
Refrigerant, generally speaking. 00:44:45
Doesn't deteriorate overtime. 00:44:47
It is, however, a tremendous hazard to the atmosphere. 00:44:50
Tremendous hazard. 00:44:54
To human life. 00:44:56
And extremely dangerous if you try to release this refrigerant for the atmosphere yourself. 00:44:57
It's under high pressure. 00:45:03
And it can do an awful lot of damage to you. 00:45:05
The businesses that are licensed. 00:45:10
To recover the refrigerant. 00:45:13
Also are issued the special little yellow stickers. 00:45:16
If that yellow sticker is not on the item, that. 00:45:19
Would have had refrigerated in it. 00:45:22
That it will not get picked up. 00:45:25
And. 00:45:27
It's unfortunate that. 00:45:30
When that happens. 00:45:32
People then decide I'll just throw it in the back of my pickup truck and some light just dump it someplace. 00:45:34
So. 00:45:41
It certainly is helping. 00:45:43
The city, it's helping the environment. 00:45:44
And it's not a very expensive process to have a licensed company come out and recover that refrigerant for you. 00:45:47
So let alone my experience with Cumberland Services has been nothing but. 00:45:53
Awesome. Thank you very much. 00:45:58
Some of you were. 00:46:18
All of you actually were emailed to a copy of this particular domain, and your name is Andrew. 00:46:19
Oh, Robert Whitley. 00:46:24
1601 Highway 40 E, Kingsland. 00:46:26
People with microphone up to your mouth please. 00:46:29
OK, I have two extra copies if someone would like a hard copy. 00:46:32
Takers, OK. 00:46:37
But this is a story regarding the. 00:46:40
The floating docks at. 00:46:46
Wheeler St. Wheeler St. Ducks. 00:46:47
The I live on a boat on the water. 00:46:49
And I've been there. 00:46:52
Along since July. 00:46:53
2022. 00:46:55
And. 00:46:57
This is my home, my city, my everything. 00:46:58
I've been a resident of Georgia since 1991. 00:47:00
But we moved down here. 00:47:04
Just a few years ago. 00:47:06
And over time, I got here just the time. 00:47:08
Or Hurricane Irma to wipe out the docks. 00:47:11
So it kind of leaves you in limbo with where you're going to live. So we enjoyed. 00:47:14
Being on an anchor in the river. 00:47:19
For the longest time, we've traveled up and down the coast. 00:47:21
To Key West and to Bahamas and stuff like that. 00:47:24
But we're this is still our home. And with that said. 00:47:29
We live on an anchor. 00:47:33
On the boat and we do come to the dinghy, dot or not. 00:47:35
Is that the dinghy dot but? 00:47:38
The floating docks every day. 00:47:39
We have a car here that's. 00:47:42
Storage units just like any other household. 00:47:44
And it's come to mind recently that. 00:47:49
After Hurricane Irma. 00:47:52
Blew away the. 00:47:54
The. 00:47:55
Replacements came along a couple. 00:47:57
2 1/2 years ago. 00:47:59
I used to work with Jim Samson a lot regarding code enforcement regarding. 00:48:01
The time limits on the dot. 00:48:04
I was One of the earliest things I learned was the time when. 00:48:06
There's some people. 00:48:11
Really picky bat and some people not. 00:48:13
It turns out that the way the code is written. 00:48:15
Umm. 00:48:18
One doc has a 15 minute time limit. The code actually says 30, but some I know that the signs ended up saying 15 minutes. 00:48:21
The other doctor 6 hour. 00:48:29
Maximum umm. 00:48:31
No overnight. 00:48:32
Dockages if you were. 00:48:34
Planning to live there? 00:48:36
You know, reside on the dock. 00:48:38
With that said. 00:48:40
All of it is first come, first serve. 00:48:45
Over the course of time. 00:48:47
The left hand, Let's call it East. 00:48:52
Which is listed in the document. 00:48:55
But the stock was intended to be a 15 minute. 00:48:57
Quick, quick and dirty launch your boat. 00:49:00
Put your put your bed over there and go. 00:49:03
Parker Trailer come back and go fishing. 00:49:05
The other side. 00:49:08
If you come to come to shore. 00:49:09
From a dinghy. 00:49:11
Or any visitor that goes up down the inner coastal that ends up swinging into Saint Mary's and resigning for. 00:49:13
A few days, a few weeks. 00:49:19
All Thanksgiving, any of those. 00:49:21
Reasons for a lengthy stay. 00:49:23
They have to come to the. 00:49:26
Floating docks that ends up being. 00:49:28
A reason to if they come to town and anybody, including myself. 00:49:31
It's not a 15 minute stay. 00:49:35
That's gonna lean in so we don't go to the 15 minute dot, we purposely go to. 00:49:37
The longer time lapse. 00:49:42
So 6 hours. 00:49:44
Usually you get all your business done in six hours. 00:49:46
But it used to be a. 00:49:48
Jim Sampson would remind me when I was. 00:49:50
Into my 7th hour and I would. 00:49:52
Go away, you know, go ahead and leave. 00:49:55
The umm. 00:49:58
So recently. 00:50:00
That's not been adequate, somebody. 00:50:02
Wanted. 00:50:04
Natural attrition had all the dinghies. 00:50:06
Accumulating on one particular finger. 00:50:10
And then the number of things group. 00:50:13
Partly to the second finger. 00:50:14
Umm, so that ends up putting a little bit of a crunch on the right hand dock. 00:50:16
Let's the West dot. 00:50:22
That makes it tough for some of the motorboaters when when the West dot gets full, you just look out across the. 00:50:27
Water from the parking lot and you say it's full? 00:50:34
And the other dock is empty. 00:50:37
There might be 1 but. 00:50:39
And he's theoretically only there for 15 minutes and he's moving on. 00:50:41
But so the busy dock, the slightly larger dot. 00:50:45
With the. 00:50:48
The kayak. 00:50:49
Launching. 00:50:50
Ramp platform. 00:50:51
That's getting to be quite a busy dog. 00:50:55
It's been made mentioned. 00:50:58
If we got rid of all those things, there'd be room for more motorboaters. 00:51:02
The Fisherman. 00:51:08
So with. 00:51:09
So when? 00:51:11
Just back stepping just a little whenever a Hurricane Irma came along and took away the docks. 00:51:12
When the new ones came. 00:51:17
They were very different the document that I provided. 00:51:18
Has the pictures on it from. 00:51:22
2017 and today. 00:51:24
And you can tell by looking. 00:51:27
We no longer have a concrete power. It's not. 00:51:29
We no longer have the dot down the middle of the. 00:51:31
Ramps. 00:51:34
It it two of the dinghies of myself speaking to all of the guys that are out there right now. 00:51:36
We are all perfectly happy with. 00:51:44
Some sort of a shift? 00:51:48
To where we end up on the other dock. 00:51:49
We don't care. It's. 00:51:53
So if we were to merely change those time limits things. 00:51:54
To where? 00:51:59
The stock was. 00:52:00
More than. 00:52:01
15 minutes. 00:52:03
And change it to. 00:52:05
And here I'm actually proposing 12 and I'll give you that backup story. 00:52:07
But if the left hand. 00:52:11
East dot was had a longer time limit. We would attrition over there and this and the one with. 00:52:13
Short term duration after launching your boat would be. 00:52:19
On the West Dock. 00:52:22
And that would occur. There would be more room for the larger hard shell boats. 00:52:23
And having spoken to all of the. 00:52:29
The guys that are here now. 00:52:34
They don't care the people that come in from out of town, they want no one from the other. 00:52:36
Won't care because the signage would be correct. It says. This one is short term, this one is long term. 00:52:39
And so we can handle that with just a simple. 00:52:45
Minor change in the. 00:52:47
Signs with one of them being longer, the other one being shorter. 00:52:49
So that. 00:52:56
Is the biggest proposal in my thing about regarding trying to update the MO U. 00:52:58
Between the city and the DNR, so everybody's on the same page. 00:53:03
And then? 00:53:07
A little bit of natural attention just because the time limit changed. 00:53:09
Will unclog. 00:53:13
The favorite doc. 00:53:15
And the rest of us, the little bit. 00:53:18
Doesn't matter, because you know what I mean? It's just a little. 00:53:20
A way to get to shore and go do your business. 00:53:24
Everybody else that they're getting ready to go fishing, but. 00:53:27
The short duration they load up. 00:53:29
And bag of fish. 00:53:31
So that is the proposal in this. 00:53:35
The actual times are listed. 00:53:37
On my document on page 10. 00:53:40
Stating that there's a there's a reason for Kate to. 00:53:47
Everything you do, there's a reason for exceptions. 00:53:52
But umm. 00:53:54
The basically switching the long term. 00:53:56
Term stay to maximum 12 hours. 00:53:59
Lends itself to more possibility to people that actually have a job that might be in Jacksonville, it might be in. 00:54:03
Brunswick, or it might be in Savannah. 00:54:10
12 hours gives them a chance to go through their employment and come back and still. 00:54:12
Not have to be. 00:54:16
Challenged by code enforcement because. 00:54:17
We went across the time limit. 00:54:20
Extend the time limit a little bit. That's all we're doing there to make it. 00:54:22
Work for them. 00:54:25
That applies also to doctors appointments. 00:54:26
For a lot of. 00:54:29
Almost every all the two people out there now. 00:54:31
Our senior. 00:54:34
Some of them closer to 80 years old. 00:54:36
And so doctor's appointments, whenever they occur, they could. 00:54:40
But it's always by surprise. But they may last longer than the time limit. 00:54:44
And there's no need to. 00:54:48
If we extended the time limit, there's no need for a challenge just to go to the doctor. 00:54:49
And so that's some of the support. 00:54:54
We're kind of going to. 00:54:56
Past 7 minutes here now, but. 00:54:57
I did have a question because I'm not a voter. 00:55:00
Maybe or. 00:55:03
Someone else here can answer for me? 00:55:04
This does Fernandina have. 00:55:07
Any free docking like? 00:55:10
Like this? 00:55:11
No. So I was just curious about that. 00:55:13
The a certain. 00:55:17
Huh. 00:55:19
OK. 00:55:23
That's incorrect input. 00:55:35
They don't have any more wings in the river. 00:55:36
At Carnitine for people's eyes. 00:55:38
Morning, yes, but anchoring is living as well. 00:55:41
So if you look up to a boring. 00:55:44
You're paying city parking. 00:55:45
OK, I am like you said past my. 00:55:50
7 minutes. 00:55:52
This document still is not quite through but. 00:55:54
Very carefully arranged that. 00:55:58
Portion coming up regarding the kayak launcher on the. 00:56:00
On the West dot. 00:56:04
And safety items and. 00:56:05
Cameras. I found the. 00:56:09
Is on here as well and a discussion on. 00:56:11
A water faucet. 00:56:14
So at this point. 00:56:15
I can step down and. 00:56:19
And let. 00:56:21
Karen White. Disgusting. 00:56:23
Kayak Launcher. 00:56:24
And then after that. 00:56:26
Stephen Birch will talk about safety and cameras. 00:56:28
And go from there. 00:56:33
And. 00:56:34
To me, we've already had a little bit of discussion on my part, but once you hear all 5 pieces. 00:56:35
It's probably a good time for a conclusion. 00:56:42
And had it all together. 00:56:45
Thank you. 00:56:48
Thank you. Thank you. 00:56:49
Karen White. 00:56:53
609 Margaret St. 00:56:54
I became part of this. You guys know me as the tennis court person, but now I'm on to kayaks. 00:56:56
Anyway. 00:57:02
I'm just really part of this because I'm the person they know that kayaks. 00:57:03
And I like our kayak launch. And I was shocked to read a note that you guys received from. 00:57:08
One of my neighbors saying that. 00:57:17
The kayak launch never gets used, that he's down there all the time and nobody ever uses it. Well, I don't think that's true. And 00:57:20
furthermore. 00:57:24
The town could stand. 00:57:29
To have a sign up. 00:57:31
Wherever there's a nice kayak launch, it's usually there's usually a sign. 00:57:33
To let people know. Now we all know that there's many kayaks that come into this town. You see them on people's cars. 00:57:39
I think if that kayak launch had a sign up. 00:57:45
People would know about it. 00:57:48
And it's, you know, it wasn't a cheap. 00:57:50
Thing to build. 00:57:54
So when somebody says they think we should get rid of it because it's not being used, you know, I tend to disagree with that. 00:57:55
So I think it would be a great asset for the town to put some signage up. 00:58:03
To let people know. I've told 3 or 4 different people that that's there. They had no idea it was there. 00:58:08
I don't use the launch. 00:58:13
Because I have a fiberglass boat. 00:58:16
So I don't want it to get scraped. 00:58:18
Anyway, we are a boating community and that is a boat. 00:58:21
So, uh. 00:58:24
We can't just disregard that now. 00:58:25
Let's move on to something more important is the safety. 00:58:28
Of uh. 00:58:33
Being down on those. 00:58:34
It's kind of interesting to me, I. 00:58:36
You know, I've often thought, what if I fell off the dock? 00:58:38
How would I get back on the? 00:58:42
I wouldn't. I'd have to swim to shore. 00:58:44
Lucky for me, I'm a good swimmer. Not everybody is. 00:58:47
So I think we need to address that. 00:58:50
We should have a ladder. 00:58:52
We should have. 00:58:55
And we have nothing. 00:58:57
At least something to toss to somebody if they fall off the dock. 00:58:59
And I will follow it up with. 00:59:03
We need to have some cameras. 00:59:05
Because you guys know that the last time I was at the meeting, I brought up the the fact that somebody got attacked down on the 00:59:08
dock. 00:59:11
I don't think anything's ever happened with that. I don't think anybody's ever been charged. 00:59:16
But had we had a camera? 00:59:21
I mean, there's only two ways out of town. 00:59:24
You know, they had to go one way or the other. 00:59:27
And we could have gotten a license plate. 00:59:30
And I was very upset about that happening. 00:59:33
But uh. 00:59:35
The gentleman that was attacked is here. 00:59:36
So I'm hoping he will come up and discuss. 00:59:38
What that was all about. 00:59:41
And how we need to have. 00:59:43
More cameras. 00:59:46
In areas. 00:59:48
Where there's people meeting. 00:59:49
Things happen. 00:59:51
All right. 00:59:54
I'm Steve Birch. 01:00:02
Durden St. Saint Mary's. 01:00:05
I'm a boater also and it was my son that was attacked. And your name and address please. 01:00:08
I did OK. 01:00:13
Miss. 01:00:15
Couldn't hear you. Could you repeat that? Can you bring the mic up? 01:00:16
That's about as close as I'm right now. 01:00:21
Bring up your mouth. There you go. 01:00:23
That's good. Thank you, Steve Birch. 01:00:25
Turdin St. Saint Mary's. 01:00:28
Anyway, my son was a tech so I know what's going on there. 01:00:31
And as far as the safety issue? 01:00:34
You see little kids down there without their parents all the time if they fell off the dock. 01:00:36
There's no way for them to get. 01:00:40
So safety is an issue. 01:00:43
When we go down there at night. 01:00:45
There are a lot of people doing drugs on the dock Which? 01:00:47
You know, and in the park, sitting on the benches there, which is kind of uncomfortable for people that don't need drugs. 01:00:50
If you don't mind me asking, sure. 01:00:56
Seen it or smelled it? 01:00:58
Oh, no, more than every day. I mean, you know, like. 01:01:01
There might be some nights four or five people down there. 01:01:06
You know, couples or whatever doing it. 01:01:09
Sunlight, Sir, may only be 1. 01:01:11
Some lights are maybe none, but it's pretty. 01:01:13
Consistent, uh. 01:01:16
And it's never the same people. It's always different people. I don't know if they're from out of town or what. This. 01:01:17
Sure, because this is a problem. 01:01:22
And when you walk through the park at night? 01:01:24
And sometimes the lights are out and you smell the drugs, everything it's. 01:01:26
And especially after my son got attacked, we're a little. 01:01:31
You know, worry about that kind of thing. 01:01:34
But anyway, getting back to the Dingy Duck. 01:01:36
One thing you all may not know about. 01:01:39
People like us that come in on dinghies. 01:01:41
Is we don't. 01:01:44
Take up like this is the dock we. 01:01:45
Park like this long ways. 01:01:47
We tie the front rope. 01:01:49
To the cleat. So when you have 6 cleats. 01:01:52
You can get at least six dinghies, but usually if it's crowded, we'll get. 01:01:54
10 or 12 dinghies because we'll double tie on people that we know. 01:01:58
So if you put just one boat there, like a fishing boat. 01:02:01
You only get one vote there, but with the dignity you get a bunch. 01:02:05
So we're trying to be. 01:02:08
You know, at least the people that are here all the time now. I know some people that come in from out of town. 01:02:09
They might tie up differently and take up more space than they should. 01:02:15
But the people that are conscientious about this? 01:02:19
You know, be very careful and take up the little room as possible because we know fishing boats want to be there. 01:02:21
And there are many times when we come in and one vote. 01:02:27
Will park in the middle. 01:02:30
Of the dot when they could have either pulled forward or back. 01:02:32
And there's no ring for the dinghy without your dinghy swinging and hitting them, and they don't like that, so we don't want to 01:02:34
hit their boat. 01:02:37
But as far as my son being attacked, that son. 01:02:41
Something that, you know, the cameras really bother me because. 01:02:44
The way the guy went out of the park. 01:02:48
His face was never seen. 01:02:51
As vehicles never seen. 01:02:53
You know my son's got. 01:02:56
Steel plate and his jaw. He had to have emergency surgery. 01:02:57
Bleeding all of the duck. 01:03:00
His face was shattered. 01:03:02
Just some random idiot coming up. Just. 01:03:05
Punching the hell out of him. 01:03:07
You know, 7:00 at night. 01:03:09
Sheila, I mean June. 01:03:12
13th Friday 13th. 01:03:14
My son had done nothing to the guy, didn't even know who it was, The witnesses said they saw him just. 01:03:17
Screaming and running over to my son who was standing by the Dean. 01:03:22
With his arms to his side. 01:03:25
And the guy just. 01:03:27
Not them as far as it could. Knocked him out. 01:03:28
So it would be nice to have some cameras to see. 01:03:32
You know, people like that. 01:03:34
So that's pretty much all that site. 01:03:36
I just appreciate it. Thank you. Certainly sorry, but your son's. 01:03:38
Jerry Brown below 805 Riverview Dr. West. 01:03:48
I thought I'd get up here and talk tonight because we had all this. 01:03:52
Talk about boats and everything, but I want to kind of talk about the big picture. First one is. 01:03:55
Like Karen said, you know. 01:04:00
We try to. 01:04:02
Name ourselves, I think Candace was asking us not too long ago to. 01:04:03
Come up with something and everybody says Gateway to Cumberland Island. We're a boating committee. 01:04:07
We don't have a beat. 01:04:13
But we got lots of bugs. 01:04:14
And not just for people that live here. 01:04:16
The whole surrounding Southeast Georgia comes to these boat ramps. 01:04:19
And they bring a lot of money here. 01:04:23
And what I've noticed over the last 12 years watching all the stuff go on. 01:04:26
Because I'm down there every day, almost. 01:04:31
Is that we not only got more boats. 01:04:33
We got bigger butts. 01:04:36
And some of these bigger boats can't fit in the boat. 01:04:38
Parking areas. 01:04:41
So we need to have. 01:04:43
Develop a master plan. 01:04:45
For parking. 01:04:48
And it needs to be for all kinds of parking too, but the boat parking in particular, because a lot of people. 01:04:49
Won't come to Willow St. boat ramp anymore because they can't find a. 01:04:55
Placed a partner trailers. 01:04:59
And they go to Meeting St. which means Meeting St. gets over. 01:05:01
Book for Parking is on a busy weekend. 01:05:05
So what I'd like to, not me, but people that talk to me and tell me all these issues would like to see is. 01:05:08
As a capital improvement plan. 01:05:15
That. 01:05:18
That deals with parking for trailers. 01:05:19
And adds more parking space. 01:05:22
Because. 01:05:24
You know, we got a nice little island downtown where Greg plants flowers. 01:05:25
That used to be 21 boat and trailer parking places. 01:05:30
Until it became an island. 01:05:34
With trees and then we redid downtown and lost another 15 boat and trailer parking. So over the last 15 years we've lost 35. 01:05:35
The trailer parkins downtown. 01:05:44
So anyway, I'd like to see. 01:05:46
And, and part of that could be like where we're parking the Park Service people over there now by the cemetery. That would be a 01:05:47
great place to make a lot more boat and trailer parking over there. But I like to see it put in some kind of plan. 01:05:52
For Wheeler St. and for Meeting St. 01:05:58
And So what we'd also like is a capital improvement plan. 01:06:02
Additions to our CIP that we're doing. 01:06:06
That adds. 01:06:08
That adds to the West. 01:06:10
Back making it bigger. 01:06:12
And adds to the meeting St. doc. 01:06:15
Making it bigger. 01:06:17
And what we'd like to see you guys doing when we ever resolve this Jacobi thing. 01:06:19
Is that? 01:06:24
We've put ourselves in a box over there on Meeting St. because we don't have room to expand the parking. 01:06:25
Ought to build the restroom that needs to be there. 01:06:32
So we need to acquire that little chunk of land. 01:06:35
Where we dug up the dirt. 01:06:38
When the governor was here. 01:06:40
And make a restroom there and double the size of the parking lot at Meeting St. 01:06:41
Just for the future of the community, you know, when all these people X1 come and get their boats and move in here and like I 01:06:47
said, we got way more boats than we had 10 years ago. 01:06:52
And they're getting bigger and bigger. 01:06:56
So I'd like to say that kind of a comprehensive thing, but I'm the. 01:06:59
Current situation downtown. 01:07:02
I think that. 01:07:05
What we don't want to do? 01:07:08
Is charge people to come here and park? 01:07:10
Because you got a lot of people come over here from Fernandina. 01:07:13
And those people drive over here in a big boat. 01:07:17
Park four or five hours. 01:07:19
And go to locals. 01:07:21
Signals or wherever and have dinner and spend a lot of money here. 01:07:23
And there's more and more of that going on. 01:07:26
And if you provide. 01:07:28
That dark space, so they can do that. 01:07:29
There will be more of that. 01:07:32
You'll probably get more money in the Saint Mary's from that than you will. 01:07:33
The ferry. 01:07:37
That we may or may not ever do. 01:07:38
But, and that's why you need to expand that box space downtown. 01:07:41
And over at meeting St. is to accommodate those kinds of things and for future growth and that. 01:07:45
Part of our boating community. 01:07:50
So anyway to address the current issues down there? 01:07:53
There's not a major problem there. 01:07:57
But. 01:08:00
You I think you need to set aside. 01:08:00
A certain area of one of those dots for me. 01:08:04
And have different rules for the dinghy dock. 01:08:07
Then you do the boat. 01:08:09
And then, and then, then you're, then you've got the dinghies where they need to be. 01:08:11
And the boats where they need to be and the days need something different. 01:08:16
Then somebody from Fernandina parking for six hours and having dinner. 01:08:20
The beings have an issue. 01:08:24
With time. 01:08:25
And I would like to see the city just turn the water back on to the dock out there so they can get water because I don't believe 01:08:27
that's a big expense for the city compared to the revenue that's generated by those people. 01:08:32
I know what. 01:08:38
So I probably forgot something, but that's my main thing is that we need to look. 01:08:42
That, like I said, supporting. 01:08:49
Voting in this community. 01:08:51
With parking and docking space. 01:08:53
I have a question for you. 01:08:57
Umm, do you think there's any appetite for dry storage? 01:09:01
Of boats that would alleviate so we have more parking for. 01:09:04
Guessed the people who bring. I think we need a dry storage here especially. 01:09:09
Like, I think like, come on, Harvey, Iceberg Cove and then the new development out there probably too, won't have enough space to 01:09:15
accommodate people's boats and trailers inside those communities. 01:09:20
And, and that would have been a great thing to have over here on meeting St. like it was originally planned. It's a story story. 01:09:25
So the dry the stack storage. 01:09:31
Where you could actually get your boat. 01:09:34
Yeah, you go in. 01:09:36
Yeah, we definitely need that, especially if we ever develop that like. 01:09:38
Like was playing with a Marina over there. You need that dry storage and you got the place to do it, but you still need. 01:09:43
The more parking and the restrooms. 01:09:49
At Manning St. 01:09:51
Thanks. That was for the Jacobi plan for that area. 01:09:54
OK, good evening. My name is Jeff Myers. I'm at 306 W Weed St. 01:09:57
I'm the one guilty for stirring up the hornet's nest on all the dock issues. 01:10:09
And. 01:10:15
I really hate it that I had to be the one to do it. 01:10:17
I want to start off by something positive though, so this winter. 01:10:22
A bunch of seasonal birds decided they wanted to take the East Dock and make it their living room. 01:10:27
And it became really, really nasty. And I sent a note to Robbie about that. 01:10:32
And within just a few days. 01:10:37
He had somebody out there pressure washed the dock and got it all cleaned up, so that was great. 01:10:41
But back to what I brought up a while back. 01:10:48
My wife and I. 01:10:53
Two very significant investments in downtown Saint Mary's. 01:10:55
With our first home and then a couple years ago completing. 01:11:00
Construction of a Brandy home on Weed St. 01:11:04
The reason? One of the primary reasons. 01:11:07
We decided to build in downtown Saint Mary's. 01:11:11
Was access to the water with our boat. 01:11:15
A beautiful public doc. 01:11:20
And hate to say it, but we love Jerry. 01:11:24
We love, you know, knuckleheads being right there and. 01:11:27
And you know, he's a huge asset. 01:11:30
The fact that he. 01:11:32
Is working so hard in retirement to keep that bait shop up and going, That's awesome. 01:11:34
So access to the water was. 01:11:40
The primary reason we invested in downtown Saint Mary's. 01:11:43
And. 01:11:47
Ever since the docks were rebuilt. 01:11:49
I have seen overtime. 01:11:52
Deterioration of the web rails. 01:11:55
And all that and so. 01:11:57
I guess you know, about a month and a half ago I was like, OK. 01:12:01
So we have very little rub rails left. We've got. 01:12:05
One thing that has been tied up to this doc for at least two years. 01:12:09
And has not moved other than. 01:12:14
When somebody used it to go out to. 01:12:16
The sailboat and then it was tied back up in the same place. 01:12:18
Which does not follow our six hour rule. 01:12:22
Then I when I started asking a couple local. 01:12:25
Sailboat. 01:12:29
People that live aboard their sailboats. I was like. 01:12:31
Whose thing is this that's been tied up for the last couple weeks? 01:12:34
Filled with trash and water. 01:12:38
And they said I gave that to somebody that lives in the area. 01:12:40
And they haven't done anything with it. And then asked about another Dean that was tied up at the end of the six hour dock. 01:12:44
That had been there for. 01:12:51
I believe somewhere around two months. 01:12:53
And I was told that it was a. 01:12:56
Elementary school teachers boat. 01:13:00
That had a sailboat or a power boat or something mowed out on the water. 01:13:02
And you know, at some point you just reach a breaking point. It's like. 01:13:07
I I follow the rules and everybody this so I will say I bet nobody's really counted this if you. 01:13:13
Go look at. 01:13:20
All of our what I'm going to call slips, which are fingers. 01:13:22
Of all of our floating docks between St. 01:13:25
And the docs that we had downtown, the 15 minute dock and the six hour dock. 01:13:29
If you're if you assume a 17 foot boat to 25 foot boat. 01:13:34
In that range, which is the majority? 01:13:40
Of what the citizens of Saint Mary's and. 01:13:43
Our guests from North Florida, it's not just South Georgia that comes and uses the boat ramp. 01:13:46
Those are the general sizes that most people have. 01:13:52
You basically have space to tie up about. 01:13:55
13 boats. 01:13:59
And all of downtown Saint Mary's. And that doesn't even include the demise. 01:14:01
So literally 13 votes. 01:14:07
And so I reached out to. 01:14:11
To Greg and city management. 01:14:14
A while back about some of these issues. 01:14:17
I had 3-4, four issues. One. 01:14:19
Maintenance of the docks. 01:14:22
To Denny's and commercial contractors. 01:14:23
They were tying up boats overnight, sometimes weeks on end. 01:14:29
The billionaire that just rebuilt his dock, his contractors kept one of their work boats tied up on the six hour dock for weeks 01:14:33
and weeks and weeks. 01:14:37
And it shouldn't be me as the citizen. 01:14:42
Going to you guys and management. 01:14:46
You guys need to manage this, not. 01:14:49
Not me. I love living here and I hate. 01:14:51
The fact that I know a lot of these people don't like me. 01:14:54
Because I brought up issues and I started challenging status quo. 01:14:58
It's and at the end of the day, it's about respect of all of our fellow neighbors. 01:15:03
And honoring our rules. 01:15:08
And it's up to the city to manage that. 01:15:11
And so. 01:15:15
Yeah. 01:15:19
We have the gateway Marina now. 01:15:23
The last time I heard we were running about $100,000 deficit on that. 01:15:25
We now have a solution for people that live on the water. 01:15:31
For their needs. 01:15:34
If they need water, we have it. 01:15:36
Now, I don't think that our fee structure is correct on that based on what I've seen. 01:15:38
If they need to leave their boat in their dinghy in the water for more than six hours, we're distribution for that. It's $5 a day 01:15:43
to tie up a dingy over at the Gateway dock. 01:15:49
And if you if you rent it by the week, it's $4.28. 01:15:54
And you know, we as citizens and leadership of this community. 01:16:02
We have a big deficit on that. 01:16:08
We need revenue sources. 01:16:10
Well, some of that can. There's some revenue source right there, commercial contractors that are working on the island. 01:16:12
Literally I had to send you all an e-mail the other day about that as an example. I shouldn't have to do that. 01:16:19
You know, we, you know, if they don't want to take their boat on and off the trailer, we've got a solution for that. It's called 01:16:26
the Gateway Marina. 01:16:30
For overnight. 01:16:34
Tying up of your boat. 01:16:36
So if you know. 01:16:37
We can very easily start chipping away at that deficit. 01:16:39
On that SO. 01:16:44
You know the Gateway Marine? It offers water, it offers power, it offers pump out service. 01:16:47
It offers a place for denies. 01:16:54
It's it's, it's, it's the facility you need if you live on the water. 01:16:58
The only thing it doesn't have is fuel. 01:17:02
So. 01:17:05
You know, and as far as the the kayak dock. 01:17:07
With there being basically 13. 01:17:11
In Saint Mary's. 01:17:15
I was just trying to look at. 01:17:16
Where do we have? 01:17:18
With what we currently own. 01:17:20
How can we better utilize the space that we have? 01:17:23
And there was nothing personal against you. I did not know you were a kayaker. I did go to Jerry and I asked him. I was like, is 01:17:27
there anybody that I've never seen anybody use it? 01:17:32
Ever and he was like the only time he ever uses it is when he rents A2 person kayak. 01:17:37
And he'll put him in the kayak launch there. And I said, I asked him, I said. 01:17:45
Well, if that wasn't there. 01:17:50
Could you roll that that kayak down to the dock? 01:17:52
And have them get in the kayak. 01:17:56
On the floating dock and he said yes. 01:17:58
So I will tell you that that that kayak launch. 01:18:01
It will hold seven days in that space and you cannot put a power vote in there because of the side current. It's it's impossible. 01:18:05
But if you guys go watch how maneuverable a dinghy is, most of them. 01:18:12
They can literally do 360° turns they can turn on. 01:18:19
So it may be. 01:18:25
The worst idea ever. 01:18:26
But it was an idea. 01:18:28
To better utilize what we have. 01:18:30
The last point that I want to make is those 13 spaces. 01:18:33
I took it upon myself today and I called DNR. 01:18:37
Took me about two minutes to get in touch with the guy. 01:18:41
That's responsible for all the public boat ramps. 01:18:44
In coastal Georgia and all the public docs that they helped fund. 01:18:47
And. 01:18:52
To confirm, just so everybody in here knows. 01:18:53
The city owns those. 01:18:56
And the city is 100% responsible for managing and maintaining the docks. And I'm Speaking of the Wheeler St. dock and I'm Speaking 01:18:58
of the Meeting St. **** So. 01:19:04
And and if we want to make changes to how those docs are used, he said it is very simple because I brought up the kayak launch as 01:19:11
an example and I told him I was like, I may be the only person that likes this idea, but if people do like the idea and we want to 01:19:17
move forward with it, how big of a deal is it? 01:19:23
He said all you guys have to do is send me a letter in writing of what you want to do and it's called a letter of permission LLP. 01:19:30
And he said it's very simple because you guys aren't changing the footprint. 01:19:37
Of the docks. 01:19:42
It's literally you just want to better utilize the space you have so. 01:19:44
That literally took me about 5 or 10 minutes. 01:19:48
And I think it's sad, I heard. 01:19:52
That there was leadership in our city that didn't even know. 01:19:55
Whether or not we could do that. 01:19:59
That's one of the biggest assets we own people. 01:20:01
Don't know. 01:20:05
That we own it. 01:20:07
We manage it. 01:20:08
We make the rules, I will tell you. So right after that dock was built, that kayak launch got destroyed. You got, do you all 01:20:09
remember that We had a very small storm and it destroyed the dock. It's going to happen again. 01:20:15
That little kayak launch is going to be among pit. 01:20:22
All it's going to take is another. 01:20:25
Brush of. 01:20:27
And it's going to be gone again. 01:20:29
So, umm. 01:20:31
That's thank you. 01:20:32
Thank you. Thank you. 01:20:34
I would like to say. 01:20:37
Steve Birch again. 01:20:41
Could you tell me how much revenue? 01:20:42
The swing set. 01:20:44
And the Merry Go rounds bring in the Saint Mary's. 01:20:46
Free public parks and stuff. 01:20:49
I mean, does everything have to be about money? 01:20:51
Are there no services that can be provided for free? 01:20:54
I mean. 01:20:57
If this gentleman thinks that people should go to the Marina, maybe he should take his big boat to the Marina. 01:20:58
You know what I'm saying? And pay for that. 01:21:03
Not everybody can afford that, especially somebody like me that's on Social Security. 01:21:05
I mean, I don't even get $1000 a month. 01:21:09
You know, so it makes it a little harder on the people like us. 01:21:12
You know other people, you know some of these people that come in from out of town. 01:21:15
Like the billionaire. 01:21:18
Hey, you know, $100 a night is nothing to these people. 01:21:20
$5 a day would kill me. 01:21:24
So I think you ought to just. 01:21:27
Think about. Not everything has to be about. 01:21:29
Prophet now does the. 01:21:31
Does the Marina have to make a profit? Does everything that the city owns? 01:21:33
Make a profit, Should it make a profit or y'all business people? 01:21:38
Or you leaders? 01:21:42
And providing services for people. 01:21:43
So let's not get tied up with all this money issue, I mean. 01:21:46
Come on, have a little. 01:21:49
Heart, you know, this is, that's why we came to this town. It was like Mayberry. 01:21:51
You know, hell, if we want to be in Mount Pilate, we'd leave. 01:21:56
Now let's keep it like may bear, let's keep it friendly and. 01:21:59
And when people have complaints and stuff, they should come to people like us instead of. 01:22:02
You know, going behind somebody's back and going to the city and complaining and. 01:22:06
You know, threatening people. You know things should be. 01:22:10
Held a little more. 01:22:12
You know, neighborly. 01:22:14
So if there's, you know. 01:22:16
Again. 01:22:19
Do we have to make a profit on everything, Mayor? 01:22:20
Well, you obviously haven't been watching many meetings because I've been having that same argument about the other things. There 01:22:24
are people in the audience that think we should. So I just want to say we all have different opinions, obviously. 01:22:30
Rob Whitley again, just to remind us that. 01:22:37
In my portion of it when I discussed the favorite dock. 01:22:40
Is the West Dock. 01:22:45
The other one is. 01:22:47
Highly unused. 01:22:48
It's not the favorite doc. 01:22:50
So merely assigning. 01:22:53
The time limits will do some natural attrition. 01:22:55
And the people that he's worried about. 01:22:58
Will be out of his way. 01:23:01
And I'll be on the different. 01:23:03
And will still be clustered up into a small group. 01:23:04
And that does. 01:23:07
Truly leave room for the physical. 01:23:08
14 to 26 foot. 01:23:11
Fishing boats to be all around that. 01:23:14
I mean, that's their favorite, they go there either way, but merely changing the. 01:23:17
Time limit. 01:23:22
Does not say who goes where. It's how long you do whatever you are, how long you going to be there. 01:23:23
That's all it means. 01:23:28
And natural. 01:23:30
If somebody's got employment, they need the longer term if they're going fishing. 01:23:32
Correct the signs from 50 minutes to 30, even an hour, whatever you want, but it would allow. 01:23:37
More 15 to. 01:23:43
Umm 15 to 30 foot boats like his. His is 32. He needs a lot of room. 01:23:45
And in particular, he's asked. 01:23:52
That we clear off. 01:23:54
The part of the. 01:23:55
Right hand dock that the West on so his boat could go. 01:23:57
It's taken a couple of our guys down there to discuss that more than one time, so he wouldn't have room for his vote. 01:24:02
And he's willing to push us all the way off of our for the solution where we take ourselves off. 01:24:08
I'm gonna go over there and. 01:24:14
And nobody will miss us. We'll be over there. 01:24:15
Still spending our one to $2000 each in. 01:24:18
City of Saint Mary's every month. 01:24:21
And because we're not there, that if that's the only part that's free, that's the only part that's free. We still got to eat, 01:24:24
spend money, everything else that happens in the city of Saint Mary's. 01:24:28
So we are not nobody. We are we do spend money. 01:24:34
Thank you. 01:24:37
Larry White, 102 Suvies Court. 01:24:48
I promise to be brief. 01:24:50
OK, not like everybody. 01:24:52
The last point I forgot to mention. 01:24:55
Was everybody that lives. 01:24:58
West of Spur 40. 01:25:01
And north of 40. 01:25:03
In Saint Mary's. 01:25:06
Cannot drive a golf cart downtown. 01:25:07
I will bring it up again. I brought it up before. 01:25:12
You need to have a crock because I used to come downtown on our golf cart. 01:25:15
And since. 01:25:18
The law was changed. 01:25:19
That we couldn't take it down to sell it. 01:25:21
Right, So what I'd like to know is, is there a way? 01:25:23
You get a crossing. 01:25:27
And Doug, 'cause we used to come down Dulles Drive. 01:25:28
Cross Spur 40. 01:25:31
Go down Douglas drives and go downtown on our golf cart. 01:25:33
It's not possible anymore. 01:25:36
Because it's illegal. 01:25:37
To cross Spur 40 on Douglas Drive. 01:25:39
However. 01:25:43
I've seen golf carts. 01:25:44
Driving on the sidewalk. 01:25:46
On a spur of 40. 01:25:48
Coming down, down. 01:25:50
Huh. I know it's a no no. 01:25:54
But they still do it. 01:25:55
And they don't care. 01:25:57
I've also seen young kids. 01:25:59
Driving golf carts. 01:26:01
In my neighborhood. 01:26:02
You're supposed to have 16 years old. 01:26:04
Have a license or being. 01:26:06
Supervised by. 01:26:08
Licensed Adult. 01:26:09
To operate a golf cart. 01:26:11
So I'd like to know. 01:26:12
If the city is going to try. 01:26:14
To come up with a plan. 01:26:16
For allowing golf. 01:26:17
To get downtown from where I live. 01:26:19
Yes. 01:26:22
Yes, yes. All right. Thank you. 01:26:24
I too will be brief on this one. Valerie Fouch, 310 W Bryant. 01:26:34
I think I would like to address the. 01:26:38
$300 billion. 01:26:41
Elephant in the room? 01:26:43
You know, we're sitting here and we're talking about we need to do this in the future and we've got to have this much more. 01:26:46
We don't even know what our future is going to be right now. 01:26:51
With the fact that we have Mr. Walter buying. 01:26:54
Pretty much all of downtown. 01:26:57
I hope he's going to be a good steward. 01:27:00
I have asked the city manager. 01:27:02
Does he have any buzz? Does he know what's going on? Can you throw me a bone? 01:27:06
And he said absolutely not. 01:27:10
As of when I spoke to Mr. Horton. 01:27:12
About six weeks ago. 01:27:15
He had not gotten heard any information back from Mr. Walter at that point, nor any of his associates. 01:27:19
So we can sit here all night long and talk about what we're going to do. 01:27:26
When, where and how and how much and what we're going to get. 01:27:30
We really don't know what we're gonna get. 01:27:33
I don't know how we can find out because he's a private businessman. 01:27:36
Private businessman can do what he wants. He can buy what he wants as long as he follows the rules and ordinances. 01:27:41
He can do it. 01:27:46
But are we still going to be? 01:27:48
The Saint Mary's that we all want to be. 01:27:50
I don't know. 01:27:53
I honestly do not know. I don't know anything about this gentleman. I've tried going down the rabbit hole. 01:27:56
All I'm getting is this. 01:28:00
Basic, you know, business investments and and he owns this, that and whatever. 01:28:02
Is anyone in the city trying to figure out who this gentleman is? 01:28:07
I hope so. 01:28:12
And I think and, and I think as business owners, I think as stakeholders, I think as citizens that live here. 01:28:14
I live 1 block from everything he's playing. 01:28:20
I have no idea what he's going to do. Is he going to make it into a little St. Simons? 01:28:23
I love Saint Simons. I spend a lot of time and money at Saint Simons. 01:28:28
Do I want to live in Saint Simons downtown? No. 01:28:32
I like my little corner across from the cemetery. It's all quiet over there. 01:28:36
And that's the way I like to keep it. 01:28:41
But if it becomes something that is not right now and it could be in 10 years. 01:28:43
We're going to have a constant. 01:28:48
This. 01:28:50
All the way around with traffic and people. 01:28:51
I don't like traffic and. 01:28:54
I mean, let's face it, I'm getting older. I'm getting real impatient with people in general, but. 01:28:56
Yeah, I don't know. I just don't know who in the city is reaching out and who in the city can give us a report. 01:29:02
Can they give us a report every day? 01:29:09
Six weeks. 8 weeks. 01:29:12
Can we even get our legal organ who's not even here tonight? 01:29:14
To do a series. 01:29:20
On Mr. Walter. 01:29:23
To do a series on what he. 01:29:25
I have heard I talked to a gentleman that lived in Colorado and he frequented Crested Butte. 01:29:27
It's great town. 01:29:32
But I don't know what the town was before it was great. 01:29:34
I mean, I honestly, we, we need to figure this out because right now we're just kind of throwing stuff at a wall and see what 01:29:37
sticks. 01:29:40
Until we get to the next election or the next budget. 01:29:44
We've got to have blonde, not blinders, but we've got to be focused. We have to be focused. We can't keep getting distracted by 01:29:47
the shiny objects. 01:29:51
Frankly, you know my discernment is telling me. 01:29:56
I'm not. I don't know if I'm gonna like what's coming and. 01:30:00
And and you know, we're talking about we have one fuel pump. 01:30:03
In town. 01:30:07
When Mr. Walters coming in and he's built this huge Marina. 01:30:08
It's going to have some great boats coming in. 01:30:12
But he. 01:30:14
Doesn't have access to that fuel pump. 01:30:15
So what's going to happen? Is he going to buy that fuel pump? Is he going to buy? 01:30:18
Honestly, I don't know. 01:30:23
And but I think as a citizen. 01:30:24
Citizens, we deserve to kind of get a heads up. 01:30:27
Maybe again, the legal organ can kind of lay the foundation and start having maybe a series of. 01:30:33
Interviews. 01:30:40
I don't know. 01:30:41
I'm just a citizen. I'm a very concerned citizen right now because when I. 01:30:42
Here full time. Eight years ago it was. 01:30:46
Mayberry and now I don't know what it's going to be. 01:30:49
And you know, I had planned on retiring here forever. Well, if it becomes something that I actually left. 01:30:53
After we before we retired, I don't know. 01:30:59
So if we can get a little information that would be awesome. 01:31:02
Thank you. 01:31:06
I want another 15 minutes. 01:31:11
You know, like you said, he's a private gentleman. He's done. 01:31:14
His private transactions with other private individuals. 01:31:18
The city has not been involved. 01:31:21
These not, you know. 01:31:24
Communicated to us at all and. 01:31:26
You know we've. 01:31:29
Speaking to his representatives and they have not told us anything about any kind of ideas or plans. 01:31:30
That he has. 01:31:36
You know so. 01:31:37
We don't know anything more than what you know. 01:31:38
All we know is that you know we have. 01:31:40
Our planning department and the policies and the ordinances that we have in place to control. 01:31:43
You know. 01:31:49
As much as we can, you know. But. 01:31:50
That's what we have, you know, and that's unfortunately but. 01:31:52
That's all we have and. 01:31:54
If the newspaper can get something out of it. 01:31:55
Great, you know. 01:31:58
And Dallas we loved in that. 01:32:00
To the best that. 01:32:02
I can get out of somebody that works for the organization. 01:32:04
You know, it's not a plan by any means. 01:32:08
But you know, for the short term plan. 01:32:10
Is just he does want the buildings and businesses that they to remain open. 01:32:13
You know. 01:32:18
He does want it to have the local flair, so if the. 01:32:18
Business that is still there, he's leasing it back to him for. 01:32:21
Reasonable. 01:32:24
Rent, I guess you'd say. 01:32:26
As he leases them back. 01:32:28
And if the business owner you know if their existing lease expires. 01:32:29
You know, it is what's been told to me that he does desire to keep the businesses open. If it's with the current ownership, great. 01:32:33
If a local person comes to if a building comes open or vacant, that he would. 01:32:39
Entertain that. 01:32:43
And wants it to have local flair. 01:32:44
And that's a short term plan. I don't know what the long term plan is. 01:32:47
If for some reason it becomes vacant. 01:32:50
And nobody steps up. 01:32:53
Based off his you know. 01:32:55
Investments in business partners he has. 01:32:56
Nationally, he does have. 01:32:59
People in the restaurant business that he could bring in, he does have people in retail that he could bring in if needed. 01:33:01
But uh. 01:33:06
It seems based off the information that I've been given from one of them. 01:33:07
Employees that. 01:33:11
He does want it to stay like it is for the for the now. 01:33:12
And that's the best I can give you that have conversations that I've had. 01:33:15
And I would point out as well that he did rebuild the Marina in the exact same footprint that. 01:33:20
Was previously there. 01:33:26
So. 01:33:27
Well, he could have applied. Good evening. My name is Jeff Berg. 01:33:32
Citizen, Saint Mary's and Live with 11. 01:33:36
15 Colerain Rd. Saint Mary's. 01:33:38
A couple things I'd like to say. 01:33:41
As a citizen. 01:33:43
The kayak dock. 01:33:46
I used to use it a whole lot. 01:33:49
I don't use it as much now. 01:33:52
And it's, it's, it's an awesome thing down there. 01:33:53
Along with the standard paddle board. 01:33:57
Launch. That's right next to that. 01:33:59
Now as far as the. 01:34:01
Thing you just been there for two years? 01:34:03
I rescued that thing. 01:34:06
It was from that. 01:34:08
Sailboat that sunk out there in the river. 01:34:09
It was left there, left there, left there. 01:34:12
I bailed it out every time it got. 01:34:14
Almost long if I let that thing sink. 01:34:17
Nobody would even have known about it. 01:34:20
You know, except maybe general. 01:34:22
And so I I bailed that thing out. 01:34:24
Multiple times. 01:34:26
Before I. 01:34:28
Took ownership of it. 01:34:28
OK. 01:34:30
So we don't take a lot of spots. I mean, we take up to one side. 01:34:31
Best remarks wouldn't even think about putting his boat on that side of the. 01:34:35
Of the dark. 01:34:38
Because the mud. 01:34:39
Of shallowness. All that stuff you wouldn't even think about. 01:34:41
But he brings up the issues of all the. 01:34:44
OK, now as far as. 01:34:47
Safety. 01:34:49
Yes, rings. 01:34:51
Absolutely life. 01:34:53
Some little kid falls in over there. 01:34:55
He's gone. 01:34:57
Him or whatever, they're gone. One way or the other, they're gone. They're going under the die. 01:34:58
They're gonna die. 01:35:02
So many catches, you know, catches both of them. 01:35:04
And if there's no life brings? 01:35:06
They're not. They're not going to be saved unless somebody's. 01:35:08
Brave enough or able to? 01:35:11
Go and get them. 01:35:13
OK, personally. 01:35:15
Our old writer. 01:35:18
Helen and her husband like Ty Yakin. 01:35:19
They left. 01:35:22
The dock behind knuckleheads. 01:35:23
They went out. 01:35:26
They got about. 01:35:28
10 feet out. 01:35:30
In the dock, they flipped over. It was cold. It was like. 01:35:31
Early in the year it was like February or something, I don't remember exactly what, but it was cold. 01:35:35
What leader was the gentleman? 01:35:40
At the dock from Fernandina that had his boat. 01:35:43
I went down to him. He was there ready to help. 01:35:47
To help help them out. 01:35:50
I ran down to help him to help them get out. 01:35:51
They floated. 01:35:54
All the way down. 01:35:56
Past the new Marina that was built over the billionaires. 01:35:57
Marina, OK. 01:36:02
The husband. 01:36:04
Was almost unconscious from being cold. 01:36:05
But if? 01:36:08
I watched him flip over in the kayak as close as they were. 01:36:09
There was nothing to throat me. 01:36:13
To help them out. 01:36:15
You know, and that and her husband. 01:36:16
He could have died. 01:36:18
I mean, he almost passed out. 01:36:19
And he was act close. 01:36:21
You know, umm. 01:36:22
So as far as the safety part, absolutely speed safety rings. 01:36:23
Down there. 01:36:27
And as far as the rub rails on the outside. 01:36:29
The voters keep crashing into them. 01:36:32
The power boaters, not the dinghies. 01:36:33
The power builders crashed into these damn things and I'm sorry and. 01:36:36
Destroying all the rub rails over there. 01:36:41
You know. 01:36:43
They need to learn how to drive their bones. 01:36:45
Mr. Myers wouldn't be caught dead. 01:36:48
Talking his boat where the dinghies parked right now, that's such a problem for him. 01:36:50
But he wouldn't be caught there parking his boat. 01:36:55
And that side of that. 01:36:58
Back, especially at a low tide. 01:37:00
He's both 30. 01:37:02
You know it's. 01:37:03
It's crazy, some of this stuff. 01:37:05
But that's what I have to say and that's mostly on the safety side and. 01:37:06
Just a little insight on the. 01:37:10
Through digging dock and the safety part of it. 01:37:13
Thank you. Thank. 01:37:16
Hello. 01:37:24
Good evening. My name is Stephen Birch, 3 to 5 Jordan St. St. Mary's. 01:37:30
I also live on a boat. 01:37:35
And I was the one that was attacked on the dock. 01:37:37
On June 13th. 01:37:39
And I'm still recovering from the jaw surgery so I can't quite talk right. 01:37:41
But I just want to say that when I was attacked. 01:37:45
The man that attacked me, I didn't recognize him. I still to this day have no clue who he was. 01:37:48
Multiple witnesses saw the attack. 01:37:53
Multiple witnesses saw him leave. 01:37:55
Nobody recognized me. 01:37:57
Was probably from out of town. 01:37:59
The problem is. 01:38:01
There were no cameras. 01:38:02
That saw him come. 01:38:04
To the park. 01:38:05
Or leave the part. 01:38:06
If there were. 01:38:08
Working cameras. 01:38:10
Someone would have been able to. 01:38:11
Get a description of him. 01:38:14
And find out who he was. 01:38:16
As of now, I've been told by the. 01:38:18
City of Saint Mary's Police Department. 01:38:20
Who did a spectacular job? 01:38:22
Investigating the case. 01:38:25
That they're on a standstill. 01:38:26
And the case has been marked as inactive. 01:38:28
So that's very frustrating to me because. 01:38:31
You know I am the victim of a. 01:38:34
Brutal assault. I still have no idea who the guy was, why he did it or anything. And he's running free. 01:38:36
But I just wanna. 01:38:42
Suggest maybe better cameras would be good for the heart. 01:38:43
For safety purposes. 01:38:46
And I just want to say as a boater. 01:38:49
We try to get along with everybody. We. 01:38:52
You know, we're trying to stay out of people's way, double tie the dinghies when we need to. 01:38:53
Especially like on events like Thanksgiving. 01:38:57
You might have them triple time have 20 dinghies on one side. 01:39:00
So we all try to get along. 01:39:03
And that's just all I want to say. 01:39:06
Thank you. 01:39:08
Thank you. Thank you. 01:39:09
Jeff Myers 306 W weed I've got one other thing has nothing to do with the docs that I wanted to. 01:39:14
Bring up with City Council and. 01:39:20
City leadership. 01:39:23
This past winter I noticed. 01:39:25
On several occasions over several weeks in the winter time. 01:39:28
People camping. 01:39:33
In trucks and campers. 01:39:36
On Saint Mary's Road, like near the waterfront. 01:39:38
Over by the parking that's really close to the gateway property. 01:39:42
And the reason that I noticed them is. 01:39:47
They were bold enough to be setting up like camping kitchens. 01:39:49
In gorillas and oil pots. 01:39:54
Dish cleaning supplies and a parking spot next to. 01:39:59
Where they were. 01:40:03
Camping. 01:40:05
And so I called the chief of police about it. 01:40:06
And he said there's absolutely nothing I can do about that. 01:40:10
There is nothing illegal as our laws are written in Saint Mary's about camping on our public streets. 01:40:15
So you know as a. 01:40:23
Citizen that lives downtown. 01:40:26
I don't want to be looking at people camping on the streets that we're walking on and. 01:40:28
And riding our golf carts on, it's just not, you wouldn't want that in a traditional suburban neighborhood and just because we're 01:40:33
a very, very small little urban community. 01:40:38
We don't need that either. 01:40:44
I actually think I did find something in the ordinance and and talk with. 01:40:46
She got away about this several months ago so. 01:40:50
I haven't noticed it. 01:40:54
Recently. 01:40:55
Yeah, I haven't either. Hopefully. 01:40:55
You know what I found gave him enough. 01:40:57
Teeth to do something about it. So OK, good. Thank you. 01:41:00
I'm going to make this short like Larry. One more thing. Mark Bouts, 310 W Bryant St. 01:41:12
I referenced a contract between Rainier and Saint Mary's from 2022. 01:41:18
And the 30 to $60 million bonds were predicated. 01:41:22
On retail and housing in that particular area out of the exit 1. 01:41:27
The golf course. 01:41:32
Is now in construction. That wasn't considered in that contract. 01:41:34
And. 01:41:38
I don't know how many acres a golf course takes, 23400, something like that. 01:41:39
But what I wanted to ask was. 01:41:43
Has the infrastructure that was planned. 01:41:46
At that time. 01:41:49
Needing the 30 to $60 million financing. 01:41:50
Has that been revisited to reflect the change in the use of the land from? 01:41:53
Housing and retail into a golf course. 01:41:57
In my mind, we don't need that much infrastructure, so. 01:42:02
Probably we should be. 01:42:04
Considering. 01:42:06
Revising that $60 million bond issue is coming up. 01:42:08
Well, the infrastructure is not. 01:42:11
On their property. 01:42:13
Yeah, Susan Lines leading to that, it's the Entrance Rd. those kinds of things. The Fire Station Rd. 01:42:15
The water treatment plants not. 01:42:20
On their property. 01:42:22
Per se. 01:42:24
And of course, by having the golf course, it increases the. 01:42:25
Property values of the homes that are there, I believe they're starting in the 600's. 01:42:29
Is what you know. 01:42:33
That what I've heard. 01:42:34
You know, and so. 01:42:36
In the property in the golf course itself does have a property value. 01:42:38
I think the estimate it was $13 million or something in that range, but I don't know where it's at now with. 01:42:42
That was an original paperwork. 01:42:48
You know that. 01:42:50
But yes, I mean. 01:42:51
Yeah, well, for storylines and things like that, if you've got a 200 acre golf course. 01:42:54
And you've got, let's say. 01:42:59
4 houses per acre. 01:43:01
There's 800 housing units that don't need the sewer. 01:43:04
OK. So you can, you can downsize your infrastructure a little bit because you're not using so many. 01:43:07
Our engineers have reduced the estimated cost from I believe or the original 60 million got it down into the 40 million. 01:43:12
Dollar range. 01:43:21
Yeah, I'm glad to hear that. Thank you. 01:43:22
Stephen Birch again, 305 Burton Street. 01:43:34
Umm, Mr. Myers brought up the issue of campers. 01:43:37
Parking downtown. 01:43:39
These are people that are just traveling through. Some of them are visiting the Cumberland. 01:43:41
National Parking. 01:43:45
Or visiting our city. 01:43:46
And, umm. 01:43:48
They stay overnight and they leave. They don't bother anybody. 01:43:49
There's nothing illegal about it, there's nothing intrusive about it. 01:43:53
And quite frankly, I like seeing them. It's umm. 01:43:56
Just shows that people. 01:43:59
Found our town worthy of a visit. 01:44:00
And I would say if Mr. Myers doesn't like looking at them, we'll. 01:44:03
Don't look at them. 01:44:06
Thank you. 01:44:07
They bring money to. 01:44:11
And maybe too short all the way around. 01:44:23
My name is Yvonne Whitley. 01:44:25
And we have a mailbox in Kingsland 1601 Highway 40 E. 01:44:26
We do live on our boat. 01:44:31
Out here we chose this lifestyle a few years back. 01:44:33
Sold the house, got rid of all the stuff. 01:44:35
And decided this was how we were going to travel. 01:44:38
And live the rest of our lives. 01:44:40
So. 01:44:42
When we came to Saint Mary's. 01:44:43
It was. 01:44:46
Mayberry. 01:44:47
It was so cute. Everybody was so nice. 01:44:47
We say, yeah, well. 01:44:50
We'll call this home. 01:44:51
So as we travel. 01:44:53
We admit. 01:44:54
Girls of people. 01:44:56
Canada. 01:44:57
Everywhere. 01:44:58
And anytime that they've asked about where we stay, we tell them. 01:45:00
And we've had. 01:45:04
Numerous people come into this town. 01:45:05
Because of just meeting them on the usual. 01:45:07
Sailing. 01:45:11
Because you go up and down the coast and meet each other over and over again. 01:45:12
And one thing I was thinking about the other day. 01:45:17
Is. 01:45:20
And this could come in good for Saint Mary's if we could plan to it. 01:45:22
Most of the boats. 01:45:27
Because of insurance. 01:45:28
Cannot be. 01:45:30
Hello, Florida. 01:45:31
Before November 1st. 01:45:32
And they have to be out of Florida or anything, so. 01:45:35
They have to be back up. 01:45:37
Before. 01:45:39
June 1st to go back home. 01:45:40
Because of hurricane season. 01:45:42
At that time. 01:45:44
Numerous ones would come in here and we could make the. 01:45:45
Money from them. 01:45:48
If we because one of our friends came and stayed. 01:45:49
She's going to stay a couple days. She stayed two weeks. 01:45:52
You know, and it's going into town, it's. 01:45:54
Enjoying. 01:45:57
The hometown feel. 01:45:59
So I was thinking we could do something. 01:46:00
Somehow, you know, to encourage more than just the Thanksgiving thing. 01:46:03
You know, work around the times prior to and after hurricane season, you know, do something like that. 01:46:07
Umm would be of good use to Saint Mary. 01:46:13
And in another thought was. 01:46:16
Which especially, unfortunately, Mr. Myers is getting a beaten. Umm. 01:46:20
It's like if. 01:46:26
It came to our attention as the voters out there, you know, it was about. 01:46:28
The use of water. 01:46:32
In the waste of water and such like that. 01:46:33
And so I was thinking, as other places, do you put a meter? 01:46:36
On the water, and that's for the guys who come and wash their boats. 01:46:39
And be there. 01:46:42
A lot of They wash their boats, they wash their car, they do. 01:46:44
You know, a big time. 01:46:47
And they're not being charged anything to do so. 01:46:49
Which is a nice courtesy from Saint Mary's, but you can't on the other side. 01:46:52
Punishable people out there that are just trying to live their lives. 01:46:56
You know not. 01:47:00
Got to be millionaires and stuff, so we're all just trying to live our lives out there. 01:47:01
So we shouldn't be cut off from. 01:47:06
Something that that's so important to us all. 01:47:08
Those folks who are going out fishing and coming from God knows where, not even Saint Mary's. 01:47:11
Well, we do too. 01:47:18
We have property tax on our boats. 01:47:19
So we pay taxes. 01:47:22
We pay county taxes. 01:47:24
You don't get right now city taxes, which we wouldn't mind. 01:47:25
But it is our. 01:47:29
We pay taxes. 01:47:30
You pay taxes on your vote, but you don't pay taxes in the city or. 01:47:32
No, we pay taxes and account. 01:47:36
Yeah. So we're not. 01:47:38
Riff raff so much that's out there. 01:47:40
You know by number means. 01:47:42
Yeah. So we're not. 01:47:47
Complaining or trying to be anything. 01:47:49
You don't want to get rid of. 01:47:52
You know, but it is. 01:47:54
You know, it is important to us and. 01:47:55
We all try to increase. 01:47:57
Encouraged use of Saint Mary's. Encouraged visitations we've brought. 01:47:59
Hurdles of boats. 01:48:03
Because of. 01:48:05
Meeting them and they'll come in and stay. 01:48:06
Or use it as a place to be during a storm. 01:48:08
You know if it's. 01:48:11
Getting bad out on the ocean, they'll come in and. 01:48:12
You know, hideout. 01:48:14
And uh. 01:48:15
We're showing at the town. 01:48:17
And one thing we do is we meet, you know when. 01:48:18
Meet them or remade them. 01:48:20
We have a car here, so we. 01:48:22
Take them to the grocery store and get fuel and things like that so we're aware of the things that they will come in here for. 01:48:24
You know, and if we could just make it more accessible. 01:48:31
There would be far more. 01:48:34
And it would be more than just the Thanksgiving thing if we could work around these areas. 01:48:35
Thank you. 01:48:42
OK. 01:48:50
All right, Thank you. We close this works this. 01:48:52
Down quarter down. 01:48:56