Commissioner District 1 Katie Delaney , Commissioner District 3

Kim Adkinson, and Commissioner District 4 Rob Feltner

Commissioner District 2 Tom Goodson, and Commissioner District

5 Thad Altman

Present:

Absent:

CALL TO ORDER 1:00 PM

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE

Commissioner Adkinson led the assembly in the Pledge of Allegiance.

chairman Feltner advised Commissioners Goodson and Altman would not be present today.

Commissioner Adkinson stated she would suggest the Board do four hours and end at 5:00

p.m. today.

C.1. Natural Resources

Amanda Elmore, Natural Resources Management Deputy Director, stated she will be

presenting the other environmental programs in their Department; Virginia Barker, Natural

Resources Management Director, ended the last budget workshop with an overview of one of

the Department’s programs, the Save Our Indian River Lagoon (SOIRL) Program, that the

Board sees on the right in green; she will be giving the Board the overview of the programs in

blue and their associated funding and expenditures; recognizing that there are 13 other

Departments eager to present after her, she will move very quickly; she will apologize in

advance for the pace of her presentation; and if time runs out for questions, she will be happy

to get the Board more information at break or at its convenience.

Chairman Feltner stated it is just his opinion, but he has noticed the number of slides keep

going down.

Ms. Elmore advised she is 16 minutes all in.

Chairman Feltner stated for Ms. Elmore not to rush herself unnecessarily, as he feels optimistic

about things today.

Ms. Elmore stated she would like to provide some fast facts; they provide varied services over

the five programs, the budget is about $50 million; this year they have had about $10 million in

grant funding, and an additional $8 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) dollars that

they encumbered before the end of last year for stormwater projects; they have 75 positions

and they enjoy a pretty low vacancy rate with six vacancies; their employees are geologists,

engineers, and environmental specialists that are absolutely dedicated to their mission; all of

the program managers have been with the County for more than 20 years; they are experts;

and she is honored to work with them every day, and all of their employees. She went on to say

they provide thousands of environmental reviews; they oversee environmental cleanup,

manage Brevard’s beaches and waterways, and they build stormwater projects for flood

mitigation and water quality; they also have a support services program that keeps all of that

moving forward; very importantly, they partner with Public Works for ESF3 and serve the

community before, during, and after storms; and Ms. Barker presented the overall budget at the

last workshop that included SOIRL, but today she wanted to focus on the $50 million that

comprise the programs previously mentioned. She noted almost 99 percent of that funding is

restricted, stormwater, assessment, grants, permitting fees, and contracted charges for

services; they have a small amount of General Fund that the Board can see in green,

$687,000, for environmental Code Enforcement, and boating and waterways; she will provide

more detail on those sections and services in slides to come; and they largely spend their

dollars on capital improvement projects, compensation and benefits, and operating, and their

restricted revenues for reserves for multi-year projects, the Board will see this pattern in all of

the program expense pie charts. She mentioned the first item she would like to highlight is

Environmental Resources Management; this program primarily provides permitting and policy

implementation, Environmental Code Enforcement, and resilience efforts; the budget is $2

million, mostly permitting revenue, but the Board will see the largest portion of their General

Fund allocation is $541,000; that General Fund supports the Environmental Code Enforcement

section; for the last four decades environmental specialists have implemented the Board’s

Policies and land development regulations; typically, they review all permits that affect

horizontal or vertical development for impact on the County’s environmentally-sensitive areas,

like wetlands, coastal dunes, aquifer recharge areas, and surface water buffers; their

regulations are typically more stringent than the municipalities; for instance, they require tree

and canopy preservation, depending on lot size and use, and additional coastal setback from

the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) coastal construction control line;

and they also provide incentives that encourage the use of Low Impact Development (LID)

principles. She continued by saying Natural Resources is one of the reviewing agencies

coordinated by Planning and Development for zoning and land use changes, commercial,

industrial, and residential development; they also capture environmental reviews where there is

no vertical construction, or Planning and Development trigger for permit; for projects like rock

revetments, filling and excavation, also called land alteration, they issue natural resource

specific permits; they carefully monitor monthly permit numbers and revenue; and what they

are seeing is although permit revenue are down over the last couple of years, those reviews

are taking longer as development pushes more and more into marginal properties, because

there are more environmental issues that they need to review for compliance. She stated like

Planning and Development Code Enforcement, they are reactive when it comes to

environmental violations; their three natural resources officers, together with their

environmental specialists, work to educate property owners and formulate restoration plans, but

these cases tend to be complicated, involve multiple Departments and State agencies, and

therefore, can take a little longer to resolve than other Code Enforcement cases; this program

is also forward-looking, always seeking to propose policy and ordinance improvement, when

necessary and appropriate; they have worked collaboratively with Planning and Development to

formulate and implement the peril of flood Policies, Evaluation and Appraisal Review (EAR) and

the barrier island area of critical State concern that Billy Prasad, Planning and Development

Director, detailed for the Board in his presentation; and they also partner with other regional

and State agencies on funding and initiatives. She noted the remediation and compliance

program focuses on safeguarding the drinking water; starting with the fuel storage tank and

hazardous waste sections, they provide the first line of defense compliance inspections to

prevent pollution and leaks; their geologists and engineers oversee cleanup sites as well, under

State Contract; this is a $3.6 million program entirely funded through State Contract or charges

for services, and business tax receipt fees for hazardous waste; and there is a $50 surcharge

per Florida Statute on hazardous waste generators. She pointed out the petroleum,

remediation, or cleanup section is the largest section in this program, and doubled in size last

year when FDEP asked staff to expand the oversight to a sixth County, Volusia; that board

approved expansion means that staff now oversees this program for the entirety of the Indian

River Lagoon and Okeechobee; local staff manages multi-year cleanup plans for more than

500 sites; they also provide fuel tank compliance inspections for 350 sites in Indian River and

Brevard Counties; they inspect hazardous waste generators in Brevard; this is an unfunded

State mandate; but they collect a hazardous waste assessment fee in conjunction with

business tax receipts. She went on to say now turning to the small, but mighty program,

beaches, boating, and waterways; this program provides a variety of management and services

but is just three employees strong; the Board will see that their other portion of General Fund

shows $146,000 of the $771,000 budget; there is also a Tourist Development Council (TDC)

transfer for the beach program of $280,000, and grants of $227,000 for reef creation and

derelict vessel removal; the boating and waterways coordinator oversees derelict vessel

removal; she is going to spend a little time here as staff fields a lot of questions about derelict

vessels; and everyone sees them, they seem to take longer than they should to remove, and

that is because they are waiting for them to be designated as derelict by law enforcement. She

advised the owners have to be afforded due process and have to be allowed the opportunity to

remove the vessel.

Chairman Feltner noted the County does get some State grant money toward that; and he

asked if that is right.

Ms. Elmore replied yes, she is about to cover that; they have the $150,000 TDC grant where

the County is removing some of these derelict vessels, but Florida Wildlife Commission (FWC)

also has a storm-related derelict vessel removal effort right now; once the vessels are

designated by law enforcement, the County is given permission to then remove them, it cannot

touch them until then; once the County gets that permission, it typically takes about one to two

days to get a quote; then if it is a smaller boat, one to three weeks to remove; if it is a larger

boat, it takes one to three months, so staff has kind of looked at the pattern of the last vessels

that was allowed to be removed, and that is what staff is seeing; and that is once the County

has been given permission to remove them.

Commissioner Delaney asked if that is a large portion of the issue that it takes such a long time

to get that permission.

Ms. Elmore responded right, and that is not something staff can control, but they have removed

more than 300 in the last 17 years; they also have this program that works on waterway

markers, navigational dredge priorities, and that donation and grant-funded reef creation

offshore; the boating and waterways coordinator also manages the Griffis Landing site on State

Route (SR) 520 that Larry spoke of in his presentation; the site was acquired through the Stan

Mayfield Working Waterfront Grant Program in 2009; and redevelopment has been

grant-funded. She continued by saying this year they have an $890,000 grant to reconstruct

Ms. Apple’s Crab Shack that was heavily damaged during the last storm; they are fortunate in

Brevard to have a Federal beach re-nourishment project, and are halfway into the 50-year

cooperative Agreement the Army Corps of Engineers; the Army Corps manages the project

and Brevard is a local sponsor; the Federal project is comprised of the North Mid-Reach and

South Reach; and she will be providing an update on the most recent re-nourishment efforts.

She stated they administer beach restoration projects to protect upland infrastructure and

property, and maintain healthy, vegetative beaches to be enjoyed by residents, tourists, and

wildlife; she provided the Board with a slide that show the dollars spent on beach construction

over the last 25 years, of which the County’s cost-share has ended up at eight percent after

reimbursements; there needs to be about 25 percent of share available on hand before getting

those reimbursements back; the south beaches are not part of the Federal project; the south

beaches represent world class turtle nesting habitat; and because this area is not a part of the

Federal project, staff is limited to usually managing dunes after storms with Federal Emergency

Management Agency (FEMA) and State dollars supplementing the County’s local share. She

noted Peter fielded some turtle nesting questions during his presentation, so they have

therefore added a few slides to address the questions; although Natural Resources does not

oversee any protected species, staff obtained data from the FWC contacts that show strong

nesting over the last 25-plus years; the grafts being provided to the Board are specific to

Leatherbacks on this particular slide, which are at the top of their range, so the Board will see

low numbers because of that, but there is an increasing trend line when comparing it with other

Florida core beaches; the County has far greater numbers of Green and Loggerhead Turtles;

from both this slide and the next, the Commission will see that Brevard County nesting trends

follow that of Peninsula, Florida, and represents about half of all nesting data; and again, here

with Loggerheads, about half of the measured nesting is in Brevard, which follows the State in

trends. She stated turning to tourism and recreational benefit, there is no more recognizable

example in Brevard than the Cocoa Beach Pier; in the top image, the Board can see that there

was practically no beach at high tide or opportunity for recreation pre-Federal project; the

middle image is after sand placement; the bottom image is post-storm, still with a wide beach,

plenty of tourism and recreational value; she provided the Board with another slide showing

another set of pre and post project images in Cocoa Beach; she advised again, there was no

beach at high tide as evidenced by the rack line by the seawall; and in the bottom image, the

seawall has been covered by sand and the beach revegetated. She remarked moving south to

the Mid-Reach, this is a more narrow area of managed beach to avoid the rock outcroppings in

this area; the Board can see Oceanana Condo in the City of Satellite Beach on the left that has

been undermined; the property owners in this condo were very nervous and placed some sand

and vegetation at their own cost, so in this slide the Board can see the same edge of that same

condo on the left, that is that beige wall, and sand has been placed and staff is undergoing

revegetation efforts; sand placement is only part of the beach management equation; and staff

also replants the dunes to hold the sand in place an encourage the residents to do the same

with the annual sea oats sale. She commented this is the rock reef habitat that staff endeavors

to avoid when placing sand in the Mid-Reach; they are permitted up to three acres of impact or

10 percent, and have mitigated that impact with a 4.7-acre mitigation reef being utilized by

Green Turtles and other marine life; the mitigation reef has been deemed successful by FDEP;

here is an example of pre and post project on the left and in the middle in the South Reach; the

picture on the right shows the Board, again, a healthy, vegetated beach and how that performs

post storm; in the South Beaches the County has seen some failure with armored shorelines

and minor structures; this pool was removed, but the primary structure remains; no primary

structures were lost during the last storms; and this just shows that armored beaches are not

preferable. She went on to say regarding current project status, staff completed South Beaches

sand a vegetation, Mid-Reach sand placement is complete and they are finishing plantings;

North Reach will be complete next month; the South Reach was partially re-nourished this year,

and will be fully-re-nourished next year; and detailed project status reports are available for the

public on the County’s website, as well as a lot of historical information on the Federal project

and the South Beaches. She noted turning from their smallest program to the largest,

stormwater management is primarily responsible for projects that can control flooding and

improve water quality; this is a high-dollar program because of the Capital Improvement

Projects (CIP); the County collects about $6.3 million in stormwater assessments per year; this

year it had $10 million in grants to leverage its funds; the Board will see a lot of balance forward

here for multi-year projects; this graphic represents various project types per District, so the

Board will see a mix of master planning, flood mitigation, water quality, and hybrid projects; and

the yellow dot near the Max Brewer represents an innovative waive attenuation device project

that she will highlight in a few slides. She provided the Board slides of some completed projects

that she will go through quickly; she advised this slide and the next two represent completed

projects that eliminated flooding for 800 homes, treated water quality and worked

collaboratively with Environmentally Endangered Lands (EELs) on conservation, and

incorporated LID principles here to avoid wetlands and specimen trees, and enhanced habitat

and recreational opportunities; here are a few of the current nutrient reduction retrofit projects

in various Districts; District 1 is Flounder, District 2 is Pioneer, and District 4 is for Arlington;

and here are current culvert and channel upgrades in Micco and a gabion system installation in

Sand Dollar Canal in District 5. She pointed out on the current slide that this is the Titusville

Multitrophic Wave Attenuation Devices (WADS) project, south of the Max Brewer that has

gained Statewide attention for is innovation; this project is just finishing up; the WADS

structures will help dissipate wave energy and storm surge; the beach will be renovated and

replanted to protect the Causeway, and seagrass will be planted and clam seeded as well; the

stormwater program is also completing a Countywide grant-funded vulnerability analysis that

looks at various rainfall and storm surge scenarios, this analysis is statutorily required, and it

keeps the County eligible for resilience funding opportunities; staff monitors their projects to

make sure they are well-placed, designed, and working as they should; and they comply with

State recording requirements. She explained lastly, staff is always seeking ways to reduce

nutrients while eliminating herbicide usage and have drastically increased the mechanical

aquatic vegetation harvesting program, adding grant-funded equipment and a second crew;

this year, to date, in 2025 they have harvested three million pounds, so staff is well on track to

exceed last year’s total of over 7.4 million pounds; and she is happy to answer any questions

the Board may have.

Chairman Feltner asked on the last thing there, when the vegetation is harvested from the

waterways where does that go.

Raleigh Berry, Senior Environmental Scientist, Natural Resources Management, replied it goes

to the landfill.

Commissioner Adkinson stated derelict vessels are talked about constantly, so the time

consumption seems to be getting it called a derelict vessel; and she inquired how long that

normally takes, and why is it so time consuming.

Ms. Elmore responded it is due process, as the owners have to be afforded that opportunity to

claim and remove their boat; and it is usually three to six months to get that designation.

Commissioner Delaney advised she did not realize Brevard helps other counties with the

petroleum remediation; she asked one, if the County has the resources for that; and two, is the

payoff worth it, because she is assuming they pay the County for its services.

Ms. Elmore replied they do, they entirely cover the cost, no County funds are expended for

those programs; when having a local program like that, there tends to be more care, as the

folks live here and care about the drinking water and groundwater; if a good job is done, there

is more work; the County started in the ‘80s with one county; they have continued to ask

Brevard to take on more and more counties; with Volusia County, Alachua County was

providing those services; and Volusia asked Brevard to provide them instead of Alachua.

Commissioner Delaney exclaimed awesome, and good job to Natural Resources Management

for doing such a great job on that. She stated it is not in the presentation, but she has been

getting a lot of questions about Parrish Park; and she asked if Natural Resources Management

was involved in the engineering or planning of that park renovation.

Ms. Elmore advised typically they review all park plans, but she does not have specific

information on that.

Commissioner Delaney stated the reason why she was wondering is because Natural

Resources Management staff had so much in the presentation like how hardening of the

shoreline and things like that end in disaster; it is almost like what Parrish Park looks like; it did

not even get to open; and now it is just sitting there after millions of dollars being spent.

Ms. Elmore stated she can try to get Commissioner Delaney more information on that review.

Chairman Feltner asked what Natural Resources Management’s biggest challenge is in the

next year or two.

Ms. Elmore replied for the projects, inflation, just as all of the other Departments have . . .

Chairman Feltner asked construction specific.

Ms. Elmore replied affirmatively.

Commissioner Delaney asked what about vacancies or anything like that; and are they having

issues with that as well.

Ms. Elmore responded they were, and over the last couple of years, they do not let the grass

grow on the applications they get, they call in applicants immediately, very quickly, to interview;

they have been really successful in attracting folks and retaining them, so they are lucky in that

regard; but most of them come for their mission, and they are lucky they are willing to come,

stay, and make a home with the County.

C.2. Housing and Human Services

Juanita Jackson, Housing and Human Services Director, commented she has with her this

afternoon the Assistant Housing and Human Services Director, Linda Graham, Housing and

Human Services Finance Officer, Dave Romero, and Housing and Human Services Community

Action Agency Program Manager, Stephanie Bryant; she is going to give the Board an

overview of Housing and Human Services; their budget is about $41.8 million, they have about

48 positions, and the Department is split up into three distinct programs, which she is going to

go over this afternoon; she provided the Board with a slide showing an overview of the

Department’s budget of $41.8 million; and she noted she will go into detail later in the slides.

She went on to say this is an overview of expenses of her Department, which she will go over in

greater detail in later slides in each program; she showed the Board a snapshot of their

General Fund dollars and where it is spent within the Department; she stated again, she will go

over that in greater detail later in the presentation; Housing and Human Services has the

privilege of serving the extremely low, low, and moderate income individuals and families in

Brevard County; how they serve them is tied to various revenue sources; the first program they

are going to discuss is community resources, which is about $20 million; of that $20 million is

$2.4 million in General Fund transfer; they have about $7.5 million in balance forward; and $9.9

million in special revenues, which is their grants. She explained community resources is where

the Community Development Block Grant sits, or CDBG and the Community Action Agency;

with those grants, they have various mandatory advisory boards, reporting, and monitoring;

CDBG is community-driven by their neighborhood strategy areas, which are listed on the slide;

through CDBG, they did impact about 8,160 Brevard County residents; they were impacted

through various projects, and their community-based organization public services program; also

through CDBG, they can provide demolition in the slum and blight areas, which is not

income-driven; and if they do provide that service, a lien is placed on that property. She

mentioned the next couple of slides show a couple of pictures of projects that was completed

with the CDBG dollars; this is West Cocoa Community Center, Schoolhouse Street, Merritt

Island, infrastructure; within community resources is the Community Action Agency; it serves

directly the low and moderate-income individuals; they are able to serve them with their water,

rent, mortgage, and self-sufficiency assistance; the County is also mandated to provide burials

and cremations for indigents, and Individual Coverage Health Reimbursement Arrangement

(ICHRA), which is healthcare reimbursement account assistance; the Community Action

Agency provides eligibility for all of those services for Brevard County; and again, they

impacted about 4,951 direct residents. She continued by saying within community resources,

they have aid to private organizations, which is funded by General Fund dollars; 211 Brevard is

one of those organizations, and impacted 14,629 residents; Meals on Wheels impacted 671

residents; the Fire Watch program is a brand new program that was started this Fiscal Year,

and it is estimated to impact about 600 residents; and funding within the Health Department is

within the Housing and Human Services Department, they oversee that Contract, and 1,713

services were provided.

Chairman Feltner asked Ms. Jackson to describe the Fire Watch for other folks who maybe are

at home, and just for the Board’s education, what that program is.

Ms. Jackson replied the Fire Watch program is basically to provide training for Brevard County

for those veterans; veterans have a high suicide rate, so this agency’s plan is to come in and

provide training so one can be aware of the signs of suicide in Brevard County’s veterans, and

when someone sees those signs, how to act; it is like first aid, but it is first aid for Brevard’s

veterans; they are going to provide training online and in person; staff just contacted him; they

will come out to various organizations and churches to provide that training; and a person will

get a certificate and everything to go along with it. She stated Housing and Human Services

(HHS) also develops and manages the Contracts for the County’s unfunded State mandates:

Guardian Ad Litem (GAL) is one of those; they are mandated to provide facility needs and

communication services; the Department oversees the Baker Act, through Circles of Care; they

impacted 15,865 residents this past Fiscal Year; the Child Protection Team (CPT), 155 of

Brevard’s youth was impacted; and Brevard County Legal Aid, that Contract is managed by

Housing and Human Services, and it impacted 204 Brevard County residents. She noted also

contained in the community resources program are some various discretionary grants; the

largest of those grants is a behavioral health expansion grant that is funded through Substance

Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SMAHSA); that is a $4 million grant, and

they are in year one, so the first millions dollars of the $4 million, is a SMAHSA grant that is

going to be contracted out to Family Partnerships of Central Brevard; the Housing and Human

Services Department provides oversight for that contract; they also have oversight for the

Board-approved Brevard County Opiod Program; there is a review committee and

recommendation sub-committee that they manage; and so far they have contracted for

marketing and education strategies, mobile medication assistant treatment programs, and they

are working with Purchasing to issue an Request for Applications (RFA) to support people in

treatment and recovery, address the needs of criminal justice-involved persons, and

evidence-based programs in schools and community education programs. She pointed out the

next program is the housing program, which is a little over $20 million; within there, they have

$8.2 million in balance forward and $11.9 million in grants; the balance forward are those grant

dollars the Department has received up front; the details of the housing program is where their

affordable housing areas sit; with each one of those, they have plans; they have to report on

how they plan on spending the dollars, and after the dollars are spent, how it is actually spent;

and all of those reports come to the Board for its approval. She went on to say within the

affordable housing programs, they have the first-time homebuyer program; also in there they

have their rehab/repair/replacement program, which is done in-house from beginning to end,

from eligibility to bidding out the individual projects with outside contractors; all oversight is

provided by HHS inspectors; and this program allows Brevard County homeowners to remain in

their homes for longer periods, which then maintains that affordability for them. She explained

they have the home art program, which is an exciting program HHS has received, and now 11

single-family rental homes are going to be able to be built on Houston Lane in Merritt Island;

with those rental homes, they are going to provide those wraparound services, so they are

looking forward to that; they are working with Purchasing to get that Request for Proposal

(RFP) out; staff is also working to put out the RFP on the other side, they are going to have

three affordable home ownerships, and rental on the other side; and within Housing is their

weatherization program, this is a Federal pass-through State program where they are able to

come in and weatherize homes in Brevard County to make them more affordable. She added,

the next couple of slides are a couple of their projects; when going in to rehab the kitchens and

bathrooms, they are able to make those American Disabilities Act (ADA) compliant, which also

means that the homeowners are able to stay in their homes for longer periods of time because

they now have full access to their kitchens, and all of their resources inside their house, so they

are able to stay there instead of having to go other places; their last program is veteran’s

services; veteran’s services is made up of General Fund dollars and charges for services,

approximately $613,000 in General Fund and $87,000 in charges for services; the charges for

services is with the City of Palm Bay; Housing contracts with them to provide an Facilities

Service Officer (FSO) in Palm Bay; their Veteran’s Services Officer (VSO) are all accredited by

the United States Department of Veteran’s Affairs, the Florida Department of Veteran’s Affairs,

the American Legion, Disabled American Veterans, and Veterans of Foreign Wars; the County

VSOs have had over 14,609 contacts with Brevard County; and they have offices in Viera,

Palm Bay, and Merritt Island. She went on by saying they were able to bring in the third largest

in pension benefits and compensation benefits for Brevard County veterans at $672 million; the

paperwork, Brevard’s veterans have to go through is difficult to navigate; Housing’s VSOs are

certified and trained in how to navigate that process; they help veterans and their families so

they are able to get the benefits that they deserve; and they even retro it back, and that brings

it forward, which is why they were able to do the $672 million. She advised the trends and

issues within the Housing and Human Services Department is that, of course, they are seeing

in Brevard County an increase in residents seeking assistance; grants do drive their

Department and staffing; as more funding becomes available, they are going to advance their

efforts to build more affordable housing within Brevard County; some of the issues they are

experiencing is with construction costs, because as those costs go up, it is harder for the

affordable housing to be built; with the Federal funding, they are not sure how that will impact

their grants, right now they are not seeing any impact at all; that is her presentation; and she is

available for any questions the Board may have.

Commissioner Delaney stated she has a question about the affordable housing; and she asked

what the process is of filling those homes, how the County chooses who gets to live in those

homes.

Ms. Jackson inquired for the ones being built for new homeownership or the rehab, repair, and

replacement of homes.

Commissioner Delaney advised she is talking about the American Rescue Plan program, which

says 11 single-family home rentals, and then the three homeowners as well; and she asked

how those are picked.

Ms. Jackson replied with the affordable housing dollars, the Housing and Human Services

Department contracts with Community Housing Initiatives, the first-time buyer program, so they

plan on partnering with them; they have a wait list of residents that are going through the

certifications, the budget training, and it will help ensure that they are able to remain in their

homes, because they already know the things that it takes to be a homeowner.

Commissioner Delaney advised land lording is a pretty extensive thing; and she asked what

that looks like for the County.

Ms. Jackson responded it will be contracted out, that is part of the RFA; they do not do that

within Housing, as they just provide the monitoring and oversight, so they will go in every year,

look at the rent they are charging to make sure it is within those guidelines that they receive;

and they do check on each file, so they just provide the oversight, but they contract it out.

Commissioner Delaney stated God forbid, some people move in, things happen like holes get

in walls, doors get torn up, floors get destroyed, appliances get worn out, and things like that;

and she asked do the people living in those homes become liable for those things, or how does

that work for the County.

Ms. Jackson replied if it is a rental, that is part of when it is contracted out, they have to set

aside dollars with the dollars provided, the rents being collected have to be set aside in

Reserves, so when those things happen, those repairs are able to be made.

Commissioner Delaney inquired if it is not over and above their rent.

Ms. Jackson responded no, it is not.

Commissioner Delaney asked why there are no grants for veteran’s services, and why it is all

General Funds, and are there grants out there that the County would qualify for.

Ms. Jackson advised she does not know if staff has ever tried to apply for grants within

veteran’s services.

Jim Liesenfelt, Assistant County Manager, stated he is not unaware of grants; and Ms. Jackson

put in the Florida Statute 292, which he is really lightly paraphrasing here, that under Florida

Law the County is required to maintain a veteran’s services office and use the local funds.

Commissioner Delaney remarked she is not opposed to that.

Mr. Liesenfelt pointed out he is sure staff could look for grants, but at a minimum, the County is

required to provide the service, so that is how it gets generated.

Commissioner Delaney asked if that is something the County could do, she would love to see

this expanded, because Housing and Human Services does a great job.

Ms. Jackson responded their veteran’s services manager, Dennis, will work with her and do

some research and bring the Board back some information.

Mr. Liesenfelt noted not technically a grant, but the City of Palm Bay is funding that position in

the office space in Palm Bay to help expand the service, so they have gone out a little bit to

look for other funds.

Ms. Jackson explained the City of Palm Bay contacted Housing, they wanted to provide a Food

Security Officer (FSO) in the City; now, whoever comes in is not just limited to Palm Bay; but

instead of trying to get someone and do the training and certification, the County assists and

partners with that and they totally fund the position.

Chairman Feltner stated he appreciates the Housing and Human Services Department; and

every time he walks over there, staff is always very helpful to him. He advised he sees Linda

out and about very regularly.

C.3. Transit Services

Terry Jordan, Transit Services Director, stated as he has the opportunity to present to the

Board almost on a monthly basis, he is going to focus on the budget since it frequently sees

him at the Transportation Planning Organization (TPO) meetings; as the Board sees on the

screen, there are some fast facts about transit; he will not get into too many of them, but one

thing he wants to make sure he does point out is that they operate their services for 122

operators, 30 support staff and 18 contracted staff; currently they are providing about 64,000

passenger trips a month and their fixed-route service; in addition to that, they do about 360

paratransit trips on a daily basis, that is for individuals who are unable to use the fixed-route

service; their 2025 budget is approximately $47 million; a large part of that, as the Board can

tell on the graph, is split into two areas being the operating and the capital, of that which 56

percent is in the attributed operating of the overall budget, and the remaining 44 percent going

to capital; and like Ms. Jackson, he will get into more specifics later. He continued by saying

their revenues, as the Board can see here, are derived from multiple sources; however, with an

overwhelming portion of that being from their Federal Transit Administration budget, which says

82 percent of the funds, and another 13 percent of those funds being derived from State

funding; the General Fund portion is about four percent of their overall budget; this slide shows

how revenues are utilized and the sources where they go to; once again, the Board sees the

capital portion of the operations is primarily funded by Federal revenue; then, in their

operations, another significant portion is Federal revenue, which typically applies to their

vehicles and facilities; and operations is still comprised of significant portion of Federal dollars,

along with a combination of General Fund dollars, charges for services, and other revenues the

Board can see on the graph. He noted operating expenses primarily go to their preventative

maintenance, which is 38 percent of their expenses; this is used specifically to keep their

vehicles in good operations and to make sure they are providing that service to their

passengers; the next greatest portion is for compensation and benefits for their employees;

capital expenses, as the Board sees, the primary area is for their vehicles to make sure they

are operating at optimal service, making sure the vehicles are in good operation for

passengers, then they have their capital improvement projects, such as parking lot repairs, fuel

tank replacement, and other items like their public restrooms; and the last part is the capital

equipment, which a major portion of that is for technology in the vehicles like the bus cameras

and Information Technology (IT) software and radio equipment. He pointed out this is the most

significant slide in his presentation; it shows that the General Fund portion, which is the back of

the bus where typically their engine is, is driving how they operate, so this General Fund the

Board sees that $200,000 is matched to their intermodal grant of $100,000, which is half of

that; the next portion is their block grant funds, which is 50 percent of their block grant; the last

portion is $226,000, which the Board does not see there, but it sees $2 million, so that is 10

percent of the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) funded; then they can leverage an

additional $2.3 million in Federal funds to purchase vehicles and other things of that nature; if

they have any issues with their General Fund, all of these items in this area will be significantly

reduced; and right now the total required match is $2.4 million, they have a shortfall of

$183,000, and that shortfall is made up of things like their sale of surplus vehicles, balance

forward, advertising funds that are received, and charges for services. He stated in addition to

that, using the funds seen in the previous slide, are also allowed to leverage additional funds

with no local match requirement; they have $465,000 for their corridor and SR A1A corridor

grants; in addition, they can also leverage $8.7 million in Federal Transit Administration (FTA)

capital grant that is used for preventative maintenance and capital equipment; and once again,

with no local match to the County. He commented this next slide talks about their capital

improvement plan; various areas that they are looking into making improvements on is Cocoa

terminal, learning center, ramp, and areas for their passenger restrooms, once again, approved

in the existing budget; in addition to that, they do not just focus on their employees, staff, and

equipment, they also make sure they focus on their passengers; one of the current and

continuous requests they get are for amenities at their transit stops; as the Board can see on

the slide, they have $1.6 million allocated toward amenities to be installed throughout the entire

County throughout the next five years; typically, they partner with FDOT on roadway projects

when they are doing any resurfacing projects and the County has the pads built; however, in

some cases, they go through the process themselves completely, beginning to end. He

mentioned they have a need for transit vehicle replacements; right now there is $23 million

allocated for replacement of vehicles over the next five years; currently, and this number is

always subject to change, a bus of this style costs about $600,000; right now Transit has about

20 buses that date back as far as 2007, some with over 600,000 miles; they have vehicles that

are nearing almost a million miles; and it goes to the statement of how staff keeps the vehicles

in good repair, and continue to utilize them way beyond their useful life.

Chairman Feltner inquired when Mr. Jordan said it was $600,000 to replace a bus today, how

much of an increase is that over say five years ago, just to give the Board an idea.

Mr. Jordan replied last year they were probably at about $550,000; those numbers, he cannot

say fluctuate incrementally, but he could probably get with Mr. Liesenfelt to see when he

bought a bus how much it cost.

Mr. Liesenfelt advised he has not been there in eight years, but the last time he was spending

about $330,000 a copy; and the drivetrain, engine, and transmission, they are over $100,000

now.

Chairman Feltner asked almost one manufacturer, or are there two, do they buy from, do they

try to keep them all the same.

Mr. Jordan responded there are several manufacturers; however, they primarily purchase their

vehicles from Gillig; one of the benefits of doing that is their mechanics are trained and

knowledgeable about this specific bus; there are a couple of others like New Flyer, Neoplan, or

others; but there are many difference in, of course the equipment, components, and parts, so

they will be trying to get parts from different people, different vendors; they have primarily went

with Gillig, one of the vendors on the State contract; Transit is required to purchase off of the

State Contract; and if the vendor is not on that Contract, they would not be purchasing buses

from someone outside of the State Contract.

Chairman Feltner advised he appreciates the same when it comes to these things; and he had

a conversation over Fire Rescue vehicles, and how they try to purchase those also.

Mr. Jordan stated there is an advantage, and one of the major advantages of the State contract

is that they do all of the leg work to make sure the County is getting the best price, so the bus

is not just being bought because it is liked, the County is getting one of the best prices for the

equipment purchased; that completes his presentation; and knowing there are eight others

behind him, he wanted to make it as quickly as possible, so he wanted to continue to give his

thanks to the Assistant County Manager, County Manager, and the Board for the dedication

and support provided to Transit Services.

Chairman Feltner inquired what it costs a typical rider if they use Transit Services almost

exclusively; do they get a pass for a month; what does that cost; and does it work that way.

Mr. Jordan replied yes, it does; currently, for one ride fair it is $1.50 each way; they can buy a

30-day pass, it is just about $46; they can use that pass from the time it is initiated to 30 days

later, as many times as they want to, with no restrictions; there is also a 10-ride pass which

gets punched at each time a person uses that pass; but primarily their passengers pay for the

single ride or they buy a monthly pass.

Chairman Feltner noted he thinks he saw a Quick Response (QR) Code the other day, so one

has a way to pay with a mobile device these days; and he asked if that is right.

Mr. Jordan responded affirmatively; he stated one of the things they have implemented recently

has been a myriad of technology, and one of those is the opportunity for the passengers to

purchase a pass on their phone; once they get on the bus they are going to show that pass to

the operator; they are looking at ways to even increase the technology; and then, there will be a

scanned pass on a device on the bus and minimize the amount of cash they take in, which will

also allow staff to recoup costs because of the cost in counting the money, the armored truck

services, and those things, so he reiterated they are looking to implement even more

technology to allow them to save more.

Chairman Feltner asked when a person gets on the bus, does he or she somehow show their

mobile device that interacts with the bus when one gets on, and it shows it was, for instance,

their ninth ride, or something else.

Mr. Jordan replied currently, it is what is called a flash pass, so the passenger purchases the

pass in advance; when they get on the bus, they activate it; there are three mechanisms that

shows it is actually an active and real pass; it pulses, shows the time and date of the current

time, and it also has a color that the operator knows to differentiate; and once they hear the

pulse, they look for the current time, so a person cannot use a video unless they are using a

video and taking the exact time that they are riding the bus tomorrow, they would not be able to

duplicate it and use it without it being an actual pass that is being applied. He mentioned

typically, those are going to be monthly passes anyway, so just as long as it is within a 30-day

range, they can use it as much as possible; there are a couple of individuals that they see

using a single ride; but that is just for one trip, and they can get a transfer to continue a trip if

they are going to another route.

Chairman Feltner asked if there is an ability to give a gift card to someone for them to ride the

bus for the day, and does Transit Services have something like that currently; and would he be

better off to just hand them $3 for a roundtrip.

Mr. Jordan explained not a gift card, but one can purchase the pass for anyone they want if

they have a telephone number; a person can purchase a pass and then send it to that

individual, which would show up on their phone; and they would have to have the app activated.

C.4. Information Technology

Jeff McKnight, Information Technology (IT) Director, commented he has been honored to be

part of the best team in Brevard County for about 13 years; he could go on and on about the IT

Department because he is very proud of them, and he is a geek; and he is going to breeze

through this at about 150 kilobits a second to be respectful of the Board’s time. He advised this

slide shows the last year’s budget; they are sitting at about $11 million; this is a little bit higher

than their normal budget; it increased this year significantly this year because of the SAP

upgrade; most of the Board is probably aware of that, they just finished that last week; they are

very excited about that; and that was about a six-year project, with it ramping up in the last

three years, so they are very proud to get that done. He stated they are about 27 percent

General Fund in their funding, which has been pretty flat over the last few years; they have had

changes in the charges for services, they had a true up, that helped out their Department quite

a bit, but the General Fund has stayed pretty flat; this slide shows five groups that they have;

the biggest groups are systems and software; he will go on to administration; the one thing that

was changed was in their comp and benefits, they added an accountant to the payroll for

secession planning; and they also assumed a mail clerk to take over for an outside vendor that

was handling a courier on campus, and it has worked out very well.

Chairman Feltner asked if that is Gabe.

Mr. McKnight replied affirmatively. He stated their systems group is comprised of network

systems and cyber security; cyber security is a relatively new position for them; they have nine

staff in that, as listed there; as the Board can see, the top line is operating; for the operating,

the dip they had was the result of a Request for Proposal (RFP) for their communications,

circuits, and internet; they had a significant cost savings by moving to the current vendor; and

the bump they have in the comp and benefits is just like he said, they added the cyber security

officer, and also for secession planning, they promoted an internal to assistant department

director. He explained software is basically software; they have 12 staff; as the Board can see,

pretty significant jumps in both operating and capital expenditures that is all Systems,

Applications, and Products (SAP); that was a huge undertaking for them; they were very proud

to have that done; they have payroll day after tomorrow, so they are crossing their fingers; but

that is another milestone they are reaching. He stated the service desk is their face to the

customers, which their customers are County staff; they are very important to them; they have

seven staff; in the slide provided to the Board, the top line, which is the most predominant and

expensive line, is almost all Microsoft licensing for all of the computers and servers in the

County; one of their concerns, which he will get into in a little bit, the bottom line where there is

a jump is in their capital; last year they started taking over seven Departments in their computer

management, they were buying their own computers, and not necessarily consistent about the

models and types, so IT took that over at their request; and they moved money from their

Department to IT, and IT took care of that for them. He continued by saying their Geographic

Information Systems (GIS) Department is the smallest Department, with three staff; the line

there, as provided on the slide, is very inconsistent on the top on comp and benefits, because

they have had a very hard time keeping a couple of those positions filled; this is by far the most

difficult they have had; and it is the smallest group, but also the most difficult to keep someone

in those positions.

Chairman Feltner asked who IT competes with when it comes to GIS folks, as he is just

curious.

Mr. McKnight replied almost everyone uses GIS to some form; and marketing agencies use a

GIS, IT companies use GIS, and everybody uses GIS.

Chairman Feltner inquired if it is not just other municipal governments.

Mr. McKnight responded no, not at all; from a marketing standpoint, GIS is very important; it is

not really his wheelhouse as far as what other companies use GIS for; geocaching and stuff

like that, Tourism uses a lot of marketing; it is not just maps; and it is not just planning and

development.

Chairman Feltner noted he is sure utilities are using a lot of that these days.

Mr. McKnight advised other Departments have their own GIS super users that they use in their

own Departments; and he thinks E911 also has some dedicated people that are GIS. He went

on to say he is not going to go through all of the recent accomplishments; they have been quite

busy and they stay busy; he thinks he went through most of these financial impacts; threats, all

of these are valid threats; the County has highly-trained, highly-skilled staff, and they are

constantly getting headhunted; they try to create an environment where these people want to

stay; they have been pretty successful, especially in the last year or so, and they are crossing

their fingers and hope they stay; but they make sure that their staff is trained up; and when

training staff to keep up with technology, one is also making them more marketable to other

corporations and other opportunities out there, so it is a catch-22 in that situation. He stated

security concerns is a major threat to the County because it can never stay ahead of the game,

it is impossible; staff is always playing catch-up with that, they get annual audits now for PCI

compliance, they have several Departments that take credit cards, and they have to make sure

that the framework behind that meets all of the requirements; they get audited every year, and

they have a difficult time implementing all the findings before they get the next audit; that is a

moving target; and every year the requirements get more stringent. He went on by saying he

already mentioned kind of the advancing technologies, the County has to stay trained or it just

does not stay ahead of that, it is going to be left behind; software subscription trends, he

already showed the Board the Microsoft trend, how that is going up; everybody is going to the

subscription trend and it is really out of their control once they get on that subscription train

because they are in charge of the pricing; very few of them will give multiple-year contracts; it is

like a year-by-year basis, another thing that goes for all those companies listed there and more;

even the hardware is now going to subscription-type services; and they will get to a certain

point where they will say they will give these, keep giving these updates until the device is no

longer compatible with the updates, and then they have to be replaced. He stated another

difficult and complex thing is the way they do some of the licensing on these things; sometimes

it is about users, end-users, about the amount of data being used, the amount of cores in the

processors and computers, so it gets really complicated; it is hard to keep track of all that on a

global basis with thousands of computers; and he asked if the Board has any questions.

Commissioner Adkinson commented IT is like the bane of her existence; and she is glad there

are people like Mr. McKnight who are doing it for the County.

Chairman Feltner asked Mr. McKnight, for the people who are watching at home, to give a

quick description of SAP just for layman.

Mr. McKnight responded it is the County’s financial system; basically, without it, one does not

get a paycheck; it handles all of the invoicing, purchase requests, receivables, asset

management, Human Resources (HR) components, recruiting, onboarding, and there is a lot of

layers to it; there is different modules for Public Works and the Procurement Office; and he

reiterated there are a lot of layers to it. He pointed out to sum it up, it is a financial system, the

County’s core financial system; it is a huge system that staff has looked at replacing in the

past, and it is just too big to replace; it just does too much; and it involves the Clerk’s Office,

Finance, so it is not just the County.

Chairman Feltner stated it is fair to say that every County employee has interaction with SAP.

Mr. McKnight advised he would say yes, if they get a paycheck, they have some type of

interaction.

*The Board recessed at 2:03 p.m. and reconvened at 2:10 p.m.

C.5. UF/Extension Services

Jim Liesenfelt, Assistant County Manager, stated Beth Shephard, UF/Extension Services

Director, sends two apologies; her first apology is she is not here because she is at the

Association for International Agricultural and Extension Education’s annual meeting; and her

second apology is the Board has him. He went on to say he is going to do a quick review of the

University of Florida IFAS, which stands for Institute for Food and Agricultural Sciences

Extension Services in Brevard; their main mission is education; the Board can see the number

of different things they do; they do provide basically two events a year; they have

multi-thousands of people coming in and out of the building every year; they go out and do field

visits, that would be agricultural; and then in class participation, they have over 16,000

participating in classes throughout the year. He noted the Extension Services is a unique

structure for Brevard County, as they have two funders and two managers of the services; as

the Board looks at the charts, the dark pink, magenta, and the dark blue colors, that is the

Federal and State funding they received; neither one of those will be in the County budget; that

is the U.S. budget, they fund it, and they provide their own services and have different

requirements, for example, Ms. Shephard representing UF today; then on the left hand side,

the green and the pink, those are the budgets for the County where it has their General Funds;

they have a number of extension agents; UF pays anywhere from 33 percent to 60 percent of

the County’s agent salaries; and the interesting thing is since it is UF and are with their agents,

they have to follow a tenure track, so if the Commission is familiar with tenure for professors

and doctoral ships, they have to provide their standards every year, move their way up, and if

one does not get the proper tenure, then he or she has to basically go find another position, so

they are also County employees and UF employees at the same time. He continued by saying

there are three different areas that the Extension Service provides; the first one is the

Agriculture, Horticulture, and Sea Grants; the County has four agents who provide the services;

the Board can see it covers livestock, sod management, and pasture management; they are

also with flooding, adaptation, and mitigation; they have done a lot of studies over the past

couple of years of how to reduce watering in the different farms; the drones try to make things

a little bit more efficient; they also spend a lot of time with the coastal marine environmental

education; and the one most people know about is the master gardeners or citizen sciences

who go out and volunteer to help the community. He stated Family and Consumer Sciences is

actually where Ms. Shephard specializes, which is pretty self-descript; the Board can see a little

over half of it comes from the General Fund and User Funds; that is financial management,

nutrition, canning, and a bunch of the County’s classes; Ms. Shephard teaches classes, along

with two other agents; and there is the food and nutrition, and then underneath the County is

where the Citizen Academy is ran through, so Extension is in charge of that. He pointed out

last, but not least, is the 4-H Youth Development, the life skills, Science, Technology,

Engineering, and Math (STEM), healthy living, and the 4-H volunteers; this entire program is

ran through one agent; last weekend was the big 4-H fair and market, or as his family calls it,

the chicken auction; it is amazing stuff; the kids are anywhere from five years old up to 15 or

16; watching those five year old kids bringing their chickens inside to be auctioned, the

chickens are half of the size of the kid, but they have them well-maintained; they are teaching

the kids how to manage, how to budget, what they need to properly grow their animals; but they

also maintain goats and turkeys; one will see, if he or she goes to Wickham Park at the old

horse stalls, they will see the different farm animals, the ducks, and that is the 4-H program;

and it is the traditional 4-H program found throughout the country. He added, there are tons of

volunteers; if one goes into the Extension building, he or she will probably find more volunteers

in the building, almost at any time, than total employees; the one that he is sure all are familiar

with is the master gardeners; again, from personal experience with the gardeners, they had

their plant sale the last couple of weekends, and he had a nice lady, Sandy, leading him

around; they had three requirements, to give him something green, something difficult to kill

that is not a weed, so she set him up; his back porch is looking pretty green, they were able to

redo their flower garden in the backyard; but there are a number of different things; they have

the interns with the food nutrition; and then there are the parents for the 4-H program. He

stated Capital/Building Improvements, is just like every other Department; they have doing a lot

of investing and pay attention to a lot of the facilities; as the Board can see the number of

repairs that they put through all of their different facilities in West Cocoa; last, but not least,

there is a roof replacement scheduled; that building, when he was fairly new, it was a new

building built in 1988, so it is getting to the end of some of its life cycle; they have a big roof;

they made the front doors accessible, they worked on the parking lot, the irrigation, so a lot has

been invested; as long as the Board allows them, they will continue to invest in the facilities for

Extension; they focus on education, they are out there in the community; and he reiterated they

are UF and County employees, which leads to some interesting situations. He advised Ms.

Shephard gave her presentation this morning, probably about seven hours ago, because she is

in Scotland right now, so she worked all weekend on the 4-H fair, had to fly out Sunday

morning, sleep yesterday, and she gave her presentation about 4:00 a.m. Brevard County time;

they do a lot of different things, and are out there helping agriculture; they are helping the

locals; and they are also helping the County’s 4-H and helping with the kids.

C.6. Mosquito Control

Joseph Faelia, Mosquito Control Director, stated they operate Countywide, they have three

offices, their headquarters are in Titusville, and they have another office in Valkaria, both

adjacent to airports; they have airport operations, laboratories, ground operations, and shop

and vehicle maintenance in the Ag Center of the County; and they have a small office near the

center where they have watercraft operations and also do some maintenance there. He went

on to say they were established as a Mosquito Control District in 1937, State approved; they

work to maintain that certification under Florida law in order to protect public health; they are

completely funded by special revenue funding via ad valorem taxes; he showed the Board on

the slide, the revenue; he stated obviously ad valorem taxes are $8.8 million out of their nearly

$14 million budget; the balance forward is approximately $4.7 million; this is their laboratory

that they are looking to construct in the next Fiscal Year; and they have money saved for that

and have shifted forward, over $3 million, as well as some operating funds that can be carried

over to help with the transition. He stated beyond that, there is miscellaneous interest, a few

services that they provide to other agencies, grants, and just regular transfers; as far as

expenses go, basically comp and benefits are at $4.3, almost $4.4 million, about the same for

operating expenses; this operating category is everything from repair and maintenance, to

pesticides, fuel, and just everything to really keep the Department going; the insurance

captures a lot of different things; the capital improvement projects, that $3 million that again, is

the laboratory they have been saving up for; they have just in the recent balance forward added

some more; capital outlay, $765,000, is their equipment, so obviously, there is a lot of

equipment involved in Mosquito Control; and some of that, a couple of hundreds of that, are

grants, excavators, vehicles, computers, and things like that. He noted the Reserves are in

case they have a real outbreak, a real public health emergency, since that is what they are

there for, they have that ready to go; and then, just transfers for the Tax Collector, Property

Appraiser, and annual payments. He stated this is what their team looks like, as shown on the

slide provided to the Board; there are 51 positions, nine of which are administrative, customer

service, and support staff, four biology, environmental technician-types, and six heavy

equipment operators and impoundment technicians; he will talk about the impoundment in a

minute; now, this is their largest kind of section, which is their ground operations section; this is

where they are on the ground doing the inspections, treatments, and the spraying, which there

are 22 people that are involved in that; there are four people involved in their manned and

unmanned aircraft operations, including drones; and their shop maintenance, calibration, and

safety staff are at six people. He went on to say the reason why they have such diverse staff,

usually people think of Mosquito Control pretty much be about spraying as they have a lot of

habitats, challenges, and nooks and crannies, which is everything from the Salt Marsh

associated with the Indian River Lagoon to the waters of the St. Johns River, and all of the

lakes, ponds, and wetlands in between; that gives them over 40 species of mosquitoes to deal

with in Brevard County; not only does staff have to deal with all of the different species, decide

what they are seeing, how much they impact humans, what types of habitat they prefer,

diseases they may transfer, but they also have to deal with them in their different lifecycle

stages; there could be an aquatic stage as eggs, larvae, pupal, and they can be adults where

they are biting, flying mosquitoes, which, again, is what one would think of; and some of them

are the size of a gnat and some are pretty big, like the size of a wasp. He advised the list

provided on the left side of the slide shows there are 11 diseases, and these are the ones that

they have to pay attention to, they see these regularly; this is why they were historically part of

Mosquito County, he would say between the mosquitoes and the diseases; but the ones in

these red boxes, he would say they expect to see every year; outside of the box, it depends, as

they are seeing more of the tropical viruses like Dengue and Malaria cases; what happens is

there are people traveling out of the area, often out of the country, and they will come back,

feel ill, go the medical center, where they pick up on key words; the Health Department

contacts the County; they then address that; and they basically keep that from spreading to

others, because they have the mosquitoes to transmit the diseases, they just try to keep them

away from the diseases. He mentioned they follow an integrated approach to mosquito

environmental management; he thought it would be a good way to go through what Mosquito

Control does as a service, because it is really an ecological approach; the first thing they do is,

they receive phone calls from people who would like to have them come and spray; they do not

necessarily spray without justification; they will go out and look for a source; they may go out to

a house and see a birdbath, buckets, abandoned swimming pools, and tires full of mosquitoes;

they get rid of the source and the job is done; they may not have to even spray beyond that;

they removed about 60 tons of tires every year just picking up waste piles; and now with this

new program, they are hoping to get some more. He pointed out tires are a mosquito habitat,

along with other containers; thinking about habitat on a larger scale, salt marshes are known to

produce up to two billion mosquitoes per acre, that is not just once per year, it is every time the

tide comes in, the wind blows the tide in; they address that in a unique way; then these

mosquitoes, the salt marsh mosquitoes, can fly 25 miles, pretty much go across the County;

other 40-plus species may not go beyond a mile or even a few hundred feet; and it really

varies. He stated this is what they call their mosquito impoundments, which a lot of people have

heard of; back in the 1950s and 1960s, these were built with the understanding that these salt

marsh mosquitoes, unlike a lot of the other mosquitoes, will only lay their eggs in the sediment,

not in the exposed sediment or in the water; every time the wind blows the water out, the tide,

they will lay these billions of eggs; the water comes back in, and within a week they are

producing all of these flying, biting mosquitoes; then it keeps happening and happening, so

what they realized is if they build these urban dikes around these acres, they are managing

28,000 acres, they are able to capture that water the first time in the beginning of the mosquito

season and hold that; and they go through a lot of trouble to keep that water up to level, and it

reduces the mosquitoes opportunity to lay eggs. He continued by saying it is enhanced by 110

culverts, 15 pumps Countywide, plus several more culverts in the Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge;

they partner with them for the management there; this allows staff, when the mosquito season

is not as active, to open everything up, let the water and the fish exchange between the outside

Lagoon, and inside the impoundments, so that gives them all kinds of opportunities to not only

manage for mosquitoes and public health, but due to the environmental projects, they get

involved in the Indian River Lagoon restoration; they have seagrass projects where they are

trying to use the impoundments as a nursery; when they do shoreline work, instead of a

hardened shoreline, they are putting native plants and oysters; and they are getting grants for

that, so it all works out as a win-win. He noted they also get a lot of opportunities to partner with

people with different agencies, not only in the County, other than County Departments like

Natural Resources Management, but outside the County; they have a water quality program as

well; they are looking at water quality inside and outside of the impoundments; they are trying

to make sure they do not impact the environment any more than needed; one mosquito fish is

known to consume about 100 mosquito larvae per day, so they built and expanded their

hatcheries in 2020; they have one north and one in the south office; they are able to use those

fish not only for ditches and small ponds, but they are able to do some largescale stocking,

because they have this impoundment program which is very unique; and they are pumping that

water in, so why not stock some fish, because even though they are native, mosquito fish or

Gambusia that would be found in the area, they are not necessarily there yet, so mosquitoes

are producing a new brood, new generation within a week, sometimes less than a week, five

days. He stated the fish take a while to get in there; they are already going to have to start

spraying if they do not figure out a different way, so they have really been perfecting that

system of utilizing the fish stocking program, especially like in this timeframe in the beginning of

the season; they have also been doing mosquito fish giveaways for residents at outreach

events; and if the Board ever has any residents inquiring, to send them Mosquito Control’s way,

and they can either go and stock or they can pick some up. He advised the vast majority of

their operational staff are out there checking any nook and cranny they were talking about; they

are inspecting seeing if there are opportunities to stock fish; sometimes one will have an inch of

water, so he or she will not be able to throw those fish in there right now, but it is still enough

for mosquitoes to breed; staff has to consider what pesticides they might use; their goal is to

save the actual nighttime spraying as the very last resort, as they have options; they have

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) tested and approved materials, most of which are

derived from natural materials, such as soil bacteria, Bacillus Thuringiensis Subspecies

Israelensis (BTI), and that kind of stuff; and not only are they more environmentally-friendly

products, but they can also target just where they find those mosquitoes, so instead of treating,

just mass, treating broad scale, they can actually just treat where the mosquitoes are before

they start hatching out and going through and flying away. He pointed out once they are flying,

it takes a lot more pesticides to catch up with them; all of their applicators are licensed in public

health by the State of Florida, Department of Agriculture (FDA); in getting this material out

there, including the fish, they have developed many retrofits, innovations; they have taken their

amphibious eight-wheelers, four-wheelers, airboats, other boats, and side-by-sides; and they

take all of these vehicles and make sure they can take out their dry granules for these kinds of

products, liquids, and fish, and take them right out where they are needed, so that is where

drones come in. He mentioned they were really working on all of these different ground

vehicles, but they have different habitats out there, some are so thick with mangroves, one

cannot really get those ground vehicles out there; they started off thinking drones will be the

small niche, they are just going to hit these small areas where larger aircraft are not needed to

just buzz these homes, like the Board can see in the clip; some of these areas, they just could

not keep up with the treatment; even having people out on foot would be rough on the

environment; they have drone pilots that are licensed by the Florida Aviation Association (FAA)

and FDA; and they are at a point where now the drones are capable of doing all of the daytime

treating, basically, so they have a fleet of drones. He went on to say a lot of it has to do with

grant funding they have received, and accessories to lifts and things to get them to where they

can get a line of sight; their largest drone is 13 feet across in diameter and can handle over 200

pounds just as an example; he provided the Board with a slide showing what a typical drone

mobilization looks like when they are set up; and he stated there are battery charging stations,

they mobilize, and then they can do hundreds of acres if needed. He noted here they are at a

point where they have talked about the habitat, source reduction, larvae control, biological

control, larvae treatments, and they are at a point now where some mosquitoes are going to

get away, they are going to be flying around, and now something has to be done with them,

because these are the ones that can transmit diseases; they have a trapping, a surveillance

program of 50 traps per week; they check around the County; most of them are Center for

Disease Control (CDC) traps, they have others that are standard equipment in the industry;

they check these, their biologists go through and look at everything in those for the species, the

number of individuals in there, because they may get a couple of hundred mosquitoes that are

known to bite earthworms and frogs, as they are not even interested in humans; there may be

some that are not known to transmit diseases, so they know that hundreds of mosquitoes, they

met the threshold, but they are not going to spray; they are going to leave them along because

it is just part of nature at this point; but if they find disease threats, that is another story. He

stated in the case of their Sentinel Chicken Program, chickens are immune to these viruses, so

it is kind of a good situation; they get spoiled, taken care of, and there are 12 coups around the

County; they draw their blood, send it to the Health Department every week, they get those

results, they look at Brevard County’s results, as well as the neighboring counties, and together

they can make decisions; if they see a cluster of West Nile Virus kind of heading the County’s

way, from out of the County even, they will start looking in those areas more closely and

prioritizing; it may be even prioritizing over the telephone calls they are receiving regarding

some species that maybe are not transmitting viruses; and that is the decisions they have to

make between the mosquito trapping and disease monitoring. He continued by saying this is

where they are doing what most people think of, they are spraying; they choose their

equipment accordingly; they can spray by ground or air; again, the EPA-approved pesticides is

all they would use; they actually wait until after sunset; normally, the vast majority of time, 30

minutes after sunset, they want those pollinators to get in their shelters and go in for the night;

there are also people walking their dogs and kids coming home from school; they want to delay

a little bit, but that is actually the most critical timeframe for mosquitoes, so it is really tricky as it

has to be balanced; they are most active at dawn and dusk; he reiterated they are trying to get

out there and not interfere with people and pollinators; but at the same time, they want it to be

effective. He explained luckily with all of the technology Mosquito Control has, such as

atomizers and mist droplets that they measure under the microscope to make sure they are in

specification with the product labels; the droplets are in the range of one to two tablespoons for

an acre of treatment, so very little goes a long way; it is not like the old days where one pictures

this big cloud of smoke; they receive a lot of calls saying it is not working, and no, it is working

as they can see it in the traps; but it just does not look like it is working. He remarked

emergencies like hurricanes, all of these things come together; when a hurricane is

approaching, they coordinate closely with the Emergency Operations Center (EOC), watching

those updates, and when it becomes the real thing, they save themselves a couple of days to

go out there to protect their resources, make sure the chickens are safe and tied down, make

sure their traps are pulled in, because they do not want them to become flying objects, or

attach to downed trees they cannot get to, and heavy equipment; they want to make sure

everything is safe; as soon as that storm passes, they are out there soon as they can get out

there making sure their facility is ready for them to work out of, checking around the different

habitats; now they do their thing, basically everything he has been talking about; they are

checking the new water for mosquitoes; normally, one does not see it kicking in for a couple of

weeks, so it is not instant unless they happen to have an influx just before the storm; and they

conduct larvae treatments, fish stocking, and nighttime spraying as needed. He stated if the

County is in a declared emergency, Mosquito Control staff may get the opportunity to utilize

Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) funding, as they work with the EOC on that

procedure; this is where their data collection comes in really handy; they have to submit three

to four years of trap data, show that it is a significant increase; they have to get support letters

from County Management and the Health Department, then design some spray maps, and

once they release it, they have to do their internal spraying in different areas; they try to

prioritize staying out of those areas while they process it and they are dealing with all of the

different counties; as an example, with Hurricane Milton they had quite an influx; they thought

last season was never going to end; then they came out and did 140,000 acres in the critical

areas where lots of mosquitoes were seen and viral rates were rising; sure enough, it yielded a

98 percent reduction in the mosquitoes, and they were good; and the same thing happened

with Ian before that. He went on to say when they are not dealing with emergencies, they are

always trying to do some testing and development of their processes, improving everything

along the way; they came across some methodology that they wanted to try, enhancing their

pumping in these impoundments and stocking fish together; normally, they expect over the

years, over the decades, everybody who has been there a long time expects that first brood of

mosquitoes that come and just really hits the County hard, there is a spike, and they are just

going to have to do some treatment; after that, they hold; but what they found was watching

what happens, sometimes when these storms come in, there is this influx; and the fish spread

around naturally and the Department does not have to treat in certain areas, actually around

the Salt Marsh. He advised they started that, they started with a small impoundment, about 50

acres, and then they let it go as long as they could; sure enough, they saw the fish, they saw

the larvae, they were not connecting, they were about to the point where they needed to maybe

treat, and then they started a feeding frenzy, so this might just work on a larger scale; in 2024,

they did this on 1,000-acre impoundments where they had some success; sometimes they had

to treat certain areas, but it was just little spot treatments; ultimately, they have reduced the

need for as much pesticide applications; they had no significant emergence of mosquitoes,

they had traps all around there, so it was a full-blown test; they had people working seven days

a week making sure it did not get away from them; and now in 2025, they have implemented it

even further. He stated this is what their trap counts look over the last 10 years, as provided in

the slide; as the Board can see, it is a downward trend overall, so they have had a lot of

historical sites that are in approximately the same place all of those years; they are running

about one-half of the amount of the mosquitoes in their traps, so definitely these new, improved

methods are working; there is a similar-looking trend regarding acreage of pesticides; again,

they are getting those results of fewer mosquitoes by using the new and improved technology,

the drones, impoundment methods, and everything else; and they are actually getting lower

trap counts. He continued by saying as far as testing goes, that is why they are planning on

building a lab this next fiscal year; they have really expanded their in-house resistant efficacy

disease testing; they were awarded $300,000 in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds for

lab equipment; they are now trying to wrap up the design and build the lab, so they can spread

out instead of shoving equipment here and there in these buildings; and then, they can really

do some more testing and improve their processes further. He commented as a quick review of

some of the grant funding, with FDEP they are typically able to get wetland restoration grants;

each year with culverts, with living shorelines, they have two of them awarded, a couple of them

are pending; US Fish and Wildlife, with Ducks Unlimited, they are actually looking at a

partnership with Natural Resources Management, and they are waiting to buy some acquisition;

a lot of the impoundments are privately-owned, or at least portions are, so it limits how much

they can improve those areas, and when somebody wants to consider selling, they have

incentives like this; the last thing on this page is the tire amnesty events, which were recently

approved; and they already ran one big event at the Health Department, they took six tons of

tires to the landfill, and they have more planned. He stated a really important source of funding

was CDC funding that was administered through the FDA, $861,500; all of this surveillance

equipment treatment; this really got the Drone Program up and going; they are just wrapping

up; they just made the remaining purchases on this grant, and getting close to closeout; this

originated from Hurricane Ian incentives; and they are basically trying to make sure they

address any shortfalls or anything they saw that could have helped the Department get through

the hurricane. He advised he is not going through all of the next slide, but essentially, this is

their partnerships; a lot of these are tied to grants; a lot of these environmental agencies

outside of other Departments that they work with, FEMA, National Fish Hatchery, they

coordinate with Merritt Island Refuge, Brevard Zoo, and just various projects to help make their

processes better and improve things like he just talked about; finally, their most important

resource are their employees; they are always looking for opportunities for employees to

develop; they work very closely with Human Resources; in the last few years they developed

three new career ladders and multiple updates on job opportunities; they have had some

people retire, so it is an opportunity to look at the latest technology and what the Department

really needs right now; incorporated in those ladders, they have incentives for people to

participate in the Employee Development Program, the Executive Leadership Institute (ELI),

and these same employees represent the County, so they are out doing local outreach events,

talking to the community, and even at State events, they are definitely at the point where they

are one of the largest mosquito districts in the State, and they have a lot of resources and

things to share; and if they can help the other districts with some of the environmentally-friendly

measures that they take to control mosquitoes, they are taking notes and contacting the

Mosquito Control Department. He provided the Board with the last few slides showing Career

Days, a Parks and Recreation event, libraries, open houses from time-to-time with different

groups coming in, and professional participation; he stated they are going to these events

mostly in Gainesville, and not only attending for Continuing Education Units (CEU), but they are

teaching classes; that is the best way for employees to learn; and he asked the Board if it had

any questions.

Commissioner Delaney expressed her appreciation to Mr. Faella and his team for all they do;

she stated after she was elected, she did a tour with Mosquito Control; it was a really cool day;

and it blew her mind how expansive the Department is, and all of the different things they are

doing, not only for health and safety, but how conscious they all are about the environment.

Mr. Faella advised that is one of the things that had him really interested in coming to Brevard

County; he came in actually to Natural Resources Management, and then went to Mosquito

Control after a year; but the environmental focus was very unique; and they keep up with that

tradition as much as they can.

Commissioner Adkinson inquired how many impoundment areas the County has.

Mr. Faella replied technically, they have over 100, but there were a lot of impoundments built in

the 1950s and 1960s that are not functioning; most of those are in the refuge; but they also

have about 25 that they actively manage out of that; that is where they share the management

in the refuge; in Central Merritt Island, there is a cluster there that they manage; then South

Melbourne Beach area is another cluster; and then there are a couple in the Scottsmoor area,

so 25 they actively manage, and some of them they monitor, but it is such a vast Indian River

Lagoon.

Chairman Feltner stated Mr. Faella did a great presentation, it was very thorough; he is very

interested in the amnesty event they did; he joked with Mr. Faella before saying there is a need

for couch amnesty in this County; they have shown that was successful, six tons of tires, and

that is 12,000 pounds; and he asked if people brought the Department 12,000 pounds of tires,

or did they have to pick them up, were there dumpsters they dropped them in, or how did that

happen.

Mr. Faella responded it was a combination; they were at the Health Department parking lot; it

was a Saturday, people were kind of trickling in; they did not really know how to judge and plan

for it, but it seemed they had enough people to say they knew of a close tire pile, so they sent

half of the people out to pick up those tires at the same time; they did not have so much of an

influx that they could not handle it; they pretty much doubled the count by going out; he

checked with FDEP ahead of time to see if that could be done; and they were fine with that, so

it was half and half. He stated they found, he thinks on State Road (SR) 528 on the ramp going

on, a lot of truck and tractor tires, and those were really heavy, so they got a lot of weight just

from those tires.

Chairman Feltner stated to tell him if he is wrong, but that is 12,000 pounds of tires.

Mr. Faella advised that is right; this past weekend there was another event that Virginia Barker,

Natural Resources Management Director, put them in touch with the Pineda Warrior Waterway

Group; they were cleaning up Tire Island, so they did the trucking, and it was probably about

the same amount of tonnage; and they would have to look at the numbers as they just did that.

Chairman Feltner asked if rain barrels are a hatchery for mosquitoes; he stated they are

becoming more popular, and he thinks that is great, trying to keep the water out of the Lagoon;

and he asked if it had a long-term consequence when it comes to mosquitoes.

Mr. Faella replied they could, but people need to keep a screen . . .

Chairman Feltner stated a screen keeps them from getting . . .

Mr. Faella stated one could take the BTI dunks, it is the same material they use, but break off

little pieces if for some reason it is not secure and sealed up; but just to keep up with the

screen is the main thing for the maintenance of it so there is not a problem.

Chairman Feltner commented when he thinks of the many retention ponds in the County,

typically those are in Homeowners Associations (HOA); he asked if HOAs contact him for

mosquito fish; and he stated Mr. Faella talked about that, people could contact them.

Mr. Faella advised a lot of times open ponds are not really generating mosquitoes, so unless

they are just clogged, wall to wall vegetation, people often think that is part of the problem; they

will often go out and figure out where it coming from; but that is where is more of an issue of

non-biting midgets that are attracted to lights and homes; they are called blind mosquitoes, so

people get mixed up and think that may be what is biting them, so they do education and work

with the people on that; often, it does not require the fish stocking; and sometimes they do find

areas that are pretty heavily vegetated and they will stock fish.

Chairman Feltner asked if bat boxes are something he promotes; he stated it used to be a

thing; but he has not heard that in a number of years.

Mr. Faella responded not bat boxes; at some point there was some research in a laboratory,

and bats eat mosquitoes like crazy in that lab; out in the wild there have been studies, including

a recent one from the University of Central Florida (UCF) where that they are finding that they

would prefer moths or larger insects; mosquitoes are pretty hard to catch, where a moth will fly

right in ones face; there are different species of bats, so they have found that the Seminole Bat

was one of the key species there; and they do not prefer structures like bat boxes, they prefer

Spanish Moss and hanging Palm fronds, so all of the conservation, like the EEL Program,

Natural Resources Management, and the impoundments Mosquito Control manages that is the

best way to have bats do their thing, because the bats that are consuming the most mosquitoes

are those bats and not so much the ones that are attracted to the bat houses.

Chairman Feltner pointed out once and a while a lizard is in his house and he can hear it

making noise in the middle of the night, and he hopes the lizard gets that mosquito that he saw

earlier; and he asked if that is realistic.

Mr. Faella replied probably not, it is hard to catch mosquitoes.

Commissioner Delaney asked what the best situation would be for those fish, where they are

most useful.

Mr. Faella responded they are most useful in new ponds that do not already have an

established, native population, and in flood water areas, as it is the beginning of the flooding

season; that is why when they are artificially flooding an area, they can then add fish, because

they know they are pumping; but if not that, when the rainy season picks up, and there are

ditches that are full of water only from that point on, that is a good time to stock fish; anything

that is pretty established, they will go out and actually see that they already have the mosquito

fish and everything under control; and the exception is if they are clogged with vegetation and

maybe need a little more help.

C.7. Library Services

Wendy Bost, Library Services Director, commented she is proud to be Brevard County’s Library

Services Director; what the Board sees on the first screen is the nature and variety of the

libraries, they are all very different; libraries are great buildings, but they need to have the right

staff in order to be the most successful; she wants to start with some key performance

indicators of libraries; she does not know if the Board realizes this, but 1.6 million people visit

the libraries each year; and their circulation is over 4.3 million items. She stated they see

certain things going up, their volunteer hours, they love their volunteers; a lot of people are

coming to them for programs; she always says the library is like a hidden jewel; one comes with

a specific need and someone asked if he or she have tried the library, they get to the library,

and they are amazed by all of the things that they offer; and she wanted to point out they are

required by law when someone registers for a library card, to update their voter registration, or

one because it is a mobile library; they stem from the Mims Scottsmoor Library all the way

down to the South Mainland Library; they manage four of the buildings they do not own, that is

Merritt Island, Mims Scottsmoor, Eau Gallie, and Cape Canaveral; Mims Scottsmoor is on

school property; they have a mobile library; their newest addition is the Riverhouse; the

Riverhouse was built in 1924, this year the first floor has been renovated so that it is American

Disabilities Act (ADA) compliant, and they are holding a lot of interesting programs there; it is

about a 338,000 square foot library; no two are the same, all of them are aging; and they also

give about $300,000 to the Law Library here for them to maintain their collections. She stated

their revenue is simple and straightforward; they are a dependent taxing district; in 1972, the

taxpayers approved a referendum and they became an independent taxing district, so they

receive that revenue; and they do get State aid to libraries; and they have fines and fees, those

are the main things, and a balance forward. She noted for their expenses, library media, they

have various transfers they give; they also have a lot of capital projects; she gave a shout out

to Skip Bell, Public Works, and his team who are incredible; they work with them regularly; they

help manage the projects and get them done; operating expenses are about $7 million, $14

million in salaries, and they have endowment money where people have donated money to the

library, which is very lovely; and she would like to have a process where they can let the

community know it is a great resource and for them to think about. She went on to say they do

have the $2 million in Reserves, that is there to kind of get them through the beginning of the

next Fiscal Year as the Tax Collector is collecting the funds; Library Revenue, and she has to

shout out to Marc Bernath, Public Works Director, and Mr. Bell; as the Board can see, there

was a kind of increase there; and by looking at the next project, they will be a little bit down,

because they have gotten some of their projects done, so some of that balance forward has

gone down. She commented like she said, they could not do what they do without their staff; in

2001, they had 307 library staff; but as the Board can see, the majority of them are part-time,

and then they had some full-time; now, they are moving towards adding full-time staff; slowly

but surely, they call it creating snowmen; when someone leaves, they piece things together, so

they can have some additional positions that are full-time and dedicated to service; they have

had 100 staff get promotions since 2021; some of those positions are from full-time to

part-time, sometimes from an entry-level position to a more senior position, so it is all within the

system; they try to promote from within; and they have had staff that go out and get their

Master’s Degree in Library Science, they will help them with that, and they will get promoted

and move up. She continued by saying when she talks about Capital Improvement Plan (CIP)

projects, just some ideas of what they are actually spending, they had budgeted this year she

thinks close to $5 million, and they are working their way through it; there are some challenges,

pipes break; she will show the Board that in a minute, she will show some examples of some of

their projects; this is kind of some history; with 18 locations, someone is going to need a roof

every year; they have not had new flooring in the Catherine Schweinsberg Rood Central Library

for quite some time, so they are looking at ways to get these things done, make them fresh,

make them look good, but being mindful; and again, they focus their funds on the envelope of

this building, plumbing, air conditioning, those are all of the things that their dollars are focused

on. She pointed out budget priorities are staffing, security, which she will talk about, and

maintaining buildings; even windows, they have to replace all of the windows on the north side

of the Melbourne Library; they were looking to do it in sections, but they learned the windows

will not be the same, so they are going to start saving now so over time so they will be replaced

all at the same time to have the same look; she explained to and showed the Board pictures on

either side of the slide being the mobile library; she stated it is not just a bookmobile, they do

technology and all kinds of different things; and kids are coding ozobots, playing with Makey

Makeys, making instruments, and there are all kinds of things the libraries do that would

surprise the Board. She advised this is one of her favorites; they do a lot of renovations, they

have a lot of facilities that they want to make sure are welcoming to the public, and they are

working on a more central theme going forward where they will have a similar-feeling

experience when entering each library; right now when one enters them they are all different;

they are trying to make them look the same, painted the same colors; and they are not

identical, but to give them that same feel. She provided the Board with pictures of a project she

is very proud of; she stated they got a new roof, had it painted, and they refreshed the Cocoa

Beach Library, so it is looking much cleaner and nicer; bathrooms are a big deal in public

libraries; anyone is welcome in a public library, and they will talk to a person, but they have to

maintain those facilities as well; this slide shows an older bathroom that they renovated; her

favorite project, which is at the Catherine Schweinsberg Rood Library, they have an old drain

system on the roof, they had pipes crack, they understand they have other pipes that need

replaced; when the pipes crack, the water flows down; they had water on the first, second, and

third floors; and in their IT room on the third floor, she has a video of puddles of water. She

stated they spent this money, the $87,000, to fix the cracked pipe shown on the far left of the

slide; they have more pipes that need to be fixed; then when they are done, all that is seen are

ceiling tiles, so it is pretty uneventful, but they know it is fixed; some more examples are the

Cape Canaveral Library bathrooms that were just updated and renovated; they did the adult

and youth bathrooms; and they are going with the same bathroom with the same look and feel

as they renovate other bathrooms, so everything has a similar feel. She went on to say this is

the Riverhouse; she does not know if the Board saw, but it was recently featured in Florida

TODAY, Viera Voice, and some other locations; they are doing all kinds of creative activities in

this house for the community; someone very wise said to her that during their campaign they

were knocking on doors, and people were lonely, so one of the things they focused on here is a

place where people can come together and serve the community; they have things like knitting

with a purpose so one will knit maybe baby caps for kids in a hospital, or scarves for veterans;

what is in the two bottom right pictures is a book club that they have on Thursday mornings

called quiet reading on the river; a person will come in with their book of choice; at the end,

some people choose to talk about it, some do not; and they also bring in service dogs, service

animals the last Thursday of every month, so if people are lonely or they are companionship,

maybe they cannot have a dog where they live, but they the get the opportunity if they want to

meet with one of the space coast dogs. She noted she did want to mention safety; they do

have a code of conduct, and all kinds of training for their staff from de-escalation seminars to

on-site seminars; they do crowd control webinars, they have monitors, they have alerts, and all

kinds of different things; they had over 360 events at the library that required some more

significant intervention; and that is important because as they move forward, they want to make

sure the buildings are safe. She commented by looking at the chart, one will see they do have

off-duty officers at a few locations; one of them is the Melbourne Library on Fee Avenue where

one would be aware that they have the Daily Bread and some other things; hopefully, there

might be a turnaround in that community, but more importantly, they have security guards at

other locations; Titusville, and they have a few locations that need some security; and Eau

Gallie and West Melbourne are coming up. She explained they talk about visits to the library;

they had 511,000 people visit their website; the first quarter was not available last year because

Google made some changes, but using their online resources are critical to the community;

they always say the library is available 24/7; and one can check out books, stream videos,

there is a lot one can do in the libraries, and a person does not have to come in every time. She

stated technology, over 450 public access computers, so just some fun here; again, the slides

show some kids on the mobile library, but the bottom right hand corner of the slide shows their

cyber patriot team, so when people are speaking, this is hacking for good, and it is part of the

national program; four of their students this semester, they will end in April, are in the top 10

percent of the 10,000 students participating across the country; this is a grant they are doing

with Northrup Grumman and Codecraft Works; and they have been a tremendous partner for

them. She pointed out with their app, one can carry his or her library in their pocket; if the

Board does not know, he or she can have a bookmark for that; this app can be downloaded,

items can be checked out, and a person can even go to a bookstore; if a person sees a book

they like, they scan the International Standard Book Number (ISBN) to see if the library has it;

they have a lot of exciting resources that way; for example, it will take a person to Libby and

Hoopla, if one has never done those before; those are online e-book resources; and of course,

there is LinkedIn Learning, she does not know if the Board is familiar with that. She advised a

lot of the veterans that she has talked to, when one is in the military, they can get LinkedIn

Learning, certificates, and all kinds of things to help oneself, but also learning in small

increments, so LinkedIn Learning is a product of LinkedIn and one can get access at the library

for free; if a person has a child that needs tests prep, it is a good thing; if one needs to see an

attorney, she always recommends going to the legal forms just because what it will do is one

can look at what a lease or will should look like, so when a person goes into see an attorney,

he or she could have some preconceived notion of what they may be looking for; and the Wall

Street Journal is usually a big hit for people, along with other newspapers, that one can look at

for free. She stated they are in trend to beat the numbers next year; there were 846 electronic

e-books checked out online with just Libby and Overdrive; the app is called Libby, the website

is Overdrive; that is books that one may want; they can review them if they are available; they

can be reserved; and a person can go online and ask what is available now. She noted they do

a lot of small grants in the community; she was just awarded this week a grant from the Eau

Gallie Rotary Club for summer reading; their theme for this summer is ‘A Summer on the Space

Coast’; and they will be having a lot of fun with that, and the kids that win the award at the end

of the summer will be getting space telescopes, informational telescopes, and it is kind of going

to be fun. She commented finally, young storytellers is a grant that they have with the Florida

Humanities Council; it is a wonderful thing; these kids wrote all summer long with authors they

brought in; they did it all online in a contained environment; they published this book at the end

of the summer; they just recently spoke at Library Con, and they asked if their fans would be

there would they be signing things, because they wanted to know that their fans would all be

there; they are doing this again next year; and they have some other tricks up their sleeves.

She went on to say there is a celebrity on this page, it is someone the Board may know, but

she wanted to mention this is summer reading; if the Board will look at this, they had a 30

percent increase in attendance in summer reading, it is their busiest time of the year; where

everyone else is busy during retail, they are busy during the summer; they had over one million

minutes of reading in two months last summer; and that is tracked on an app they call ‘Bean

Stack’. She explained their Friends of the Library are very important, they have many locations

that have Friends groups; they are separate 501c3 organizations, they all volunteer, and they

all support the libraries and raise funds to help them do more; they are always evolving to

serve; and she does not know if the Board recalls, but they have added on January 1st at least

one hour to every library almost every day, because they are opened now until 6:00 p.m.

instead of 5:00 p.m., so unless it is a day a library is open until 8:00, they rotate evenings, they

are opened later, and they did answer over one million reference questions. She stated it is

really important to recognize that 1.6 million people visited their locations last year; they provide

a lot of things like tech help, programs, classes, community spaces, and e-books; there was a

survey done recently where about 2,000 people were evaluated about the library; she thinks

they feel more peaceful after being at the library, it positively affects their ability to cope with the

world, they have used it for personal growth, and they are feeling more of the community if they

use their library; they do have something for everyone; and the slide provided just gives one an

idea of some of the things the libraries have.

Chairman Feltner asked if any Commissioner has a question for Ms. Bost.

Commissioner Delaney expressed her appreciation to Ms. Bost for all that she does for the

community.

*The Board recessed at 3:10 p.m. and reconvened at 3:16 p.m.

C.8. Valkaria Airport

Adam Hied, Valkaria Airport Manager, advised Valkaria Airport was built back during the war

effort, World War II, as a naval air station; it was used as a training base; over the years, it was

deeded to Brevard County to be used as a general aviation airport; in the last 20 years or so, it

has really been polished into the gem that it is today; it covers 670 total acres, about 190 acres

of that is a golf course, and the rest is used as an airfield or other operational uses; this past

year they have done just a smidge over 100,000 aircraft operations, which is huge, and up from

what their estimates used to be; and now they actually have a system in place to accurately

count that. He mentioned they have two 4,000-foot runways; they recently had a Global

Positioning System (GPS) safety for instrument traffic; they have 95 hangars, 94 of them are

available for lease, and the other one they actually keep for themselves to use; they have a

fixed-wing and ultralight flight school; an airport is almost like an on-ramp; any time there is

something like that, other things get built up nearby, so services, things like that; and they have

an airframe power plant, fuel, and builder’s assist. He stated all of this is actually managed by

three full-time people and one part-time person, so he thinks that is pretty impressive and a

great feather in the cap for staff; their operating revenues are $1.5 million, on the slide it is all

the color of pink; most of that revenue comes from charges for services, such as fuel sales,

land leases, hangar rent, and things like that; and then some of the rest is just

intergovernmental revenue from their grants that they get from Florida Department of

Transportation (FDOT) or Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). He went on to say the first of

their two largest leases is the Habitat Golf Course; their current annual rate is $150,000; this

lease was reevaluated in 2022 and brought to 7.9 percent of fair market value from what it was

originally concepted in 1992; Mosquito Control is their other large lease that they have at the

Airport; they use that as an unmanned aerial system base, and a variety of other uses; and

they just had an increase by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) to $53,000. He commented the

final, largest revenue producer at the Airport is actually their hangars; the majority of the

hangars they have are T-hangars; the slide provides a lot of information, but he will draw the

Board’s attention to the CPI column; they generally have just gone up with CPI over the years,

so right now they have gone from $251 in Fiscal Year 18 to $335.09 for this year; the nearby

airports that are comparable to Valkaria do charge a little bit more to a lot more; and the ones

that charge a little bit more are also run by the governmental entities, so Arthur Dunn in Merritt

Island are run by airport authorities, Sebastian Airport is run by a city, but their hangars are run

by a private entity and that is the largest difference right there. He pointed out their operating

expenses, the vast majority of that is maintenance and fuel purchasing, followed up by comp

and benefits, CIP, that is the total for one of the projects they have going this year, and then

debt service that will be retired in 2030; their largest and major CIP project right now is the

development of a large hangar facility; it will house approximately 75 hangars total; right now

they are in an environmental assessment phase; FDOT is funding that, and of course, the rest

of it as well at $160,000; and they are responsible for the match at 20 percent. He noted

looking a little bit more towards the future, this is the part he is most excited about, he did say

the new hangar construction, but they did purchase some property in 2018 or 2019, and that is

a piece of property that they are hoping to use as private hangar development; if people want

to build their own personal hangar, or a business wants to build a hangar for their own business

uses, they can; this photo provided on the slide shows a conceptual drawing that was provided

to him by their flight school; they are hoping to build that in the next couple of years at the

Airport; that is a big deal for them; it is a big shift from what they normally have done; they will

need taxiways to do that, and the Airport Master Plan is coming up to its midlife point, it is a

20-year document; usually around the midpoint of that, they see how much things have

changed over the years, and start doing a new one; and finally, they will actually need some

additional staff to meet that growing aviation demand. He went on to say an airport budget

presentation really is not complete without talking about the Federal regulations that govern

airport revenues; the real essence of it comes down to Grant Assurance 24 and 25; Grant

Assurance 24 basically says the Airport has to have a fee and rental structure that helps the

Airport be as sustainable as possible; Grant Assurance 25 basically says any revenue

generated at the Airport has to be spent at the Airport; he knows this was quick, he wanted to

be conscious of everyone’s time; and he asked if there are any questions.

Chairman Feltner asked how the relationship is with Town of Grant/Valkaria; and he stated in

years past there was some friction but he has not heard that in many years.

Mr. Hied replied it has changed quite a bit, especially over the last couple of years; he meets

fairly frequently, and just randomly will stop in and talk to the Town and some members of

Town Council; in fact, one of the tenants is actually on the Town Council now; they rarely get

noise complaints; and when they do, the majority of them are so far from the Airport that there

is nothing the Airport could even consider doing, so it has been really good.

C.9. Central Services

Kathy Wall, Central Services Director, stated she brought staff with her today, and she

introduced Merrill Vincent, Asset Manager, Mary Bowers, Purchasing Manager, and Carl

Cottner, Fleet Manager; the Central Services Department is responsible for the procurement of

goods and services providing for the accountability of County assets, the maintenance and

repair of County vehicles and equipment, the maintenance of the County’s fuel sites for the

County, and to provide Clerk to the County’s Special Magistrate; Central Services strives to

provide excellent support to County Departments, Charter Officers, and at times, local agencies

through its core functions as Purchasing, Fleet Services, and Asset Management; and the

additional services that they provide are Clerk to the Special Magistrate and they also manage

the Advisory Board database maintenance. She went on to say the majority of the County’s

funding sources are $4.9 million; those are for Fleet Services for parts, fuel sales, and vehicle

repairs; the General Fund support is $1.4 million; they have miscellaneous revenue of $90,000,

which is the sale of surplus assets; and then they have a small balance forward of $79,000 for

Asset and Fleet. She advised they have a total of 28 positions, nine in Purchasing, nine in Fleet

Services, and eight in Asset Management; and they have two administration positions, her

position, as well as an administrative assistant who also is the Clerk to the Special Magistrate.

She noted Purchasing Services, they accomplished $116.9 million in solicitation of the

American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), which were required to be, and they did encumber those

by December 31, 2024; they are required to be spent by December 31, 2026; significant

changes they made to Board Policies BCC-25, BCC-26, BCC-27, BCC-28, and Ordinance No.

98-37; they also consolidated the bidding platform; they used to have two bidding platforms,

one was Demand Star, and one was Vendor Link; they found with Demand Star the contractors

or vendors had to pay for that; and Vendor Link the County paid for, so they encouraged more

people to go on Vendor Link, they stopped Demand Star and only use Vendor Link. She

pointed out Asset Management is responsible for annual physical inventory supporting Charter

Officers and judicial functions with regard to assets; they also collect and redistribute assets

that are turned in, as well as auctioning the assets; they were found in full compliance in the

2023 annual Comprehensive Financial Report; part of the work that Asset Management does

actually is recorded on the County’s Financial Reports as assets; they are working right now

with the external auditors on the 2024 Annual Comprehensive Financial Reports (ACFR); they

conduct inventories of Board agencies, Charter agencies, State Attorney’s Office, Public

Defender, Court Administration, Law Library, and Guardian Ad-Litem; they had a total inventory

of 29,000 items; and they collected over a million dollars in surplus sales of which $894,000

went back to Departments, so they reuse their equipment or sell it. She commented Fleet

Services is responsible for vehicles, heavy equipment, generators, acquisition, replacement,

and disposition, monitoring fuel usage, billing, operational efficiency, maintenance, and they

are helping to work on a new heavy equipment building that will be at the Wickham site; and

they manage nine fuel sites, they have distributed 377,000 gallons of diesel fuel, 484,000

gallons of unleaded fuel, 557 vehicles repaired, 220 heavy equipment items repaired, 255

generators maintained and repaired, and 53 replacement vehicle purchases. She mentioned

the Clerk to the Special Magistrate, they are required to provide services to the County Special

Magistrate for Code Enforcement, dangerous animals, and contractor licensing; they

coordinate and schedule the meeting, they take the minutes, order filings at the Clerk’s Office,

and they provide informational support; they maintain the database for the Advisory Boards;

they have 44 Advisory Boards; and the appointments are maintained online through the

County’s webpage.

C.10. SCGTV / Communications

Don Walker, SCGTV/Communications Director, commented he has the smallest budget in the

County department wise; he would like to talk briefly about staffing and funding; Rachel Horst is

his Public Information Officer, and 50 percent of her salary is funded through a grant from

Emergency Management and 25 percent is funded through Fire Rescue, so she handles a lot

of public information through those two Departments; he also has Logan Hemenway, his

Production Manager and Anda Skambraks who does programming; and five percent of their

salaries are funded through Planning and Development. He went on to say Vonte Osborne who

is his legal ads specialist, 50 percent of his salary is funded through Information Technology;

when he is not doing legal ads, he is helping keep the County’s webpages up to date; then they

have Michael Isnardi who is funded at 100 percent through Utility Services, because he is

funded through a grant through their office for outreach; and he does wetlands, public

information, schools, and things like that. He stated as far as their budget, they are just around

$500,000; the majority of that is for salary and benefits; $47,000 of that they brought in last

year through legal ads, and he will talk a little bit more about that; $25,000 of that they spent

through a Contract through Column Software, which is a Miami-based company that helped

them formulate their legal ads page; one of the main things he does in his office is public

outreach, and it is all about transparency; he wanted to give the Board an idea of the types of

things his office produces; they do a quarterly newsletter that they post on the County’s

webpage that highlights achievements that County Departments have made over the course of

the quarter; they do a monthly employee newsletter, which is available not only to the

employees but to the public; and they did 217 press releases in 2024, and so far this year they

have done 70. He pointed out they are big on social media, especially during hurricanes; last

year during the hurricane season they posted 1,014 social media messages just letting people

know where they can get sandbags, things they need to do to protect themselves; they did 33

prescribed burn notifications last year and have done 19 so far this year; they also post road

closures, 44 last year, 32 this year; anytime there is an extreme weather event, potential

tornadoes, severe thunderstorms they work with Emergency Management to also send

information out on those; they activate for every rocket launch, with 112 last year and 34 so far

this year; when activating for a launch it includes launches that have been scrubbed, so there

may be 114, but they may have activated 150 times; the reason they activate for those is

because if there is ever an anomaly with a rocket the public is going to want to know what to do

for safety reasons; and also last year, they did 28 cold weather shelters, and they have done 24

this year. He explained he mentioned legal ads, so Brevard County gets to tout itself as being

the first County in the State that started posting legal ads on its webpage; two years ago,

Florida House Bill 7049 went into effect, which allows counties to post legal ads on their

webpage instead of a newspaper publication; not only are they able to post the County’s legal

ads on the webpage, but they are also allowed to post ads for municipal and Charter offices if

they desire to do so; the County cannot force them to put ads on its webpage, but it has put out

the welcome mat, met with all of the clerks of these cities, and sent out letters letting them

know the County is open for business; Chairman Feltner joined them on many of the meetings

they had with the clerks of the cities; right now out of the 16 municipalities, there are five doing

legal ads with the County; they also have one Charter office, the Sheriff’s Office, that has

posted some ads; last year the Department did 442 legal ads on the Brevard County webpage;

and again, six of those were from municipalities and a Charter office. He mentioned their goal

at SCGTV is to try to reach people where they are at; one of many ways they do that is when

they have a meeting like today, this is being broadcasted right now on SCGTV, it is being

live-streamed on the Florida Today website, it is live-streamed on Space Coast Daily, it is also

on YouTube, and it is closed captioned on the County’s webpage and on YouTube; they started

during COVID putting the meetings on YouTube; they have been able to backlog previous

meetings before 2020 on YouTube as well, so right now on YouTube, one can look back to

meetings dating back to 2017, which can be shared with people; there are 309 meetings

currently listed on YouTube from Brevard County; and those are zoning meetings, budget

workshops, and Commission meetings. He stated to give the Board an idea of SCGTVs

programming, they are a 24/7 TV station, so they do live broadcasts like this one, then they will

roll this into their programming; of course in a week one will be able to watch this budget

workshop today as many as five or 10 times during the week; they do Board meetings, zoning

meetings, workshops, Transportation Planning Organization (TPO), and Save Our Indian River

Lagoon (SOIRL); that amounts to 49 percent of their content on SCGTV; they also do a

recorded broadcast, so municipalities like Barefoot Bay, the Cities of Cocoa, Cocoa Beach,

Melbourne, Palm Bay, and Titusville, and Brevard Public Schools; they record their own

meetings; but then they provide them to the County and SCGTV factors them into their

programming. He pointed out when they are not showing the County’s meetings, and other

municipal meetings, they show the Florida Channel, especially during the legislative session;

and they do public service announcements, things that they produce in-house that they think

are interesting like the Lagoon, things like that, and they put that on the County’s website as

well; if people want to know where to find them, they are on Spectrum Channel 499; if one lives

in North Brevard, he or she can find them on Comcast Channel 51; if a person lives in South

Brevard, they are on Comcast Channel 13; they are also on ATT U-Verse Channel 99; and one

can watch the meetings live on the County website, www.BrevardFL.gov, YouTube,

@SCGTV499, and Facebook, @BrevardCountyGovt.

Commissioner Delaney stated one of the things she really appreciates that SCGTV does is how

much content is available online, that is extremely helpful; she knows so many people who

watch these meetings online from the comfort of their own homes; later on she will get

messages from people asking her questions, so she knows that the community really

appreciates that; one of the things that she knows she and Mr. Walker have talked about a lot

is she was at a Chamber meeting, it was the government affairs one, and some of the

feedback that she got back, and this is really for the other Commissioners, is when looking at

the County’s Facebook page, the Brevard County government page, there is not really a whole

lot of story-telling, so when businesses or executives are looking at the Facebook page, they

were hoping to see what is going on in the County, what the community is like, and all that kind

of stuff; and since she and Mr. Walker have talked, there has been more sharing between

Departments and that kind of stuff, so she is excited to see how that is going to grow in the

future.

Mr. Walker explained Brevard County has a good story to tell; they try to make it clear to all of

the County’s Directors that if there is positive information that they want to put out there, that

SCGTV is a good avenue to get that out for them; he wanted to mention about the meetings;

and the good thing about the meetings being on YouTube and on the County’s website is if one

calls up this meeting tomorrow, does not want to hear the Valkaria Airport presentation, but

does want to hear the SCGTV presentation, he or she can go directly to that on the webpage

and listen to him all over again.

Chairman Feltner advised the SCGTV office is next door to him, so they talk to the staff a lot;

from time to time he will remind the Commissioners to speak into the microphone and all that,

because they are over there trying to adjust as people are too far away, they do not turn it on,

and all of those kinds of things; think of that when one is sitting in a meeting like this that

people are trying to sort of keep up with the Board in real time; and he appreciates what they

do.

Mr. Walker stated he would love to have his staff here to introduce, but they are here.

C.11. County Attorney's Office

Morris Richardson, County Attorney, stated most of the Commissioners know what the County

Attorney’s Office does; they act as legal advisor to the Board; they are also Brevard County’s

records management liaison officer; they handle public records requests through his office;

much like some of the other Directors presented before, the County Attorney’s Office supports

all of the good work that the Departments who have gone previously do here; they provide legal

support for all of the Departments; he spent yesterday afternoon in court in a hearing to help an

important drainage project go forward that Public Works is doing; and it is an example of some

of the things they do to support Departments in addition to contract work. He went on to say

Ordinances, Statutes, and Board Policy, they assist in doing those, applying them, helping the

Board draft, create, and move ordinances through the process, as well as staff; they assist in

updates in Board Policies; last calendar year they assisted in drafting, drafted entirely, and/or

reviewed 610 Agreements or Contracts; they responded to 1,988 public records requests in

calendar year 2024; they support all meetings of the Board, staff meetings at the Planning and

Zoning Board, Merritt Island Redevelopment Agency (MIRA), North Brevard Economic

Development Zone (NBEDZ), and various other boards; they provide staffing for each of those

meetings; and they also do the review and legal work for all of those boards. He commented at

the Central Library, the entire third floor, where the Board saw the pictures of the leak before,

they have tons of records there that his office maintains; Jackie, in his office, pulls records from

there when needed, she manages record retention and destruction Policies, and again they do

that public records function; they help coordinate among Departments’ various records

coordinators when there are requests that cover multiple Departments; he referenced litigation,

they oversee all of the litigation handled by outside counsel on behalf of the County, so things

like tort litigation, slip and fall, they do not do that in-house, that is covered by the County’s

insurance and outside counsel, but they oversee the work of those attorneys; more and more

he is keeping in-house, and they are doing a larger share of that than they have done

previously; and when he sees it will be a better outcome for the County, that is always

important, but also to be cost-sensitive where it makes fiscal sense, and to try to save money

by using in-house services. He mentioned they have 15 positions in his office, two vacancies

currently; basically, all of their funds go into direct service of the attorney’s and their support

team, with a very small amount of the budget for things like necessary continuing legal

education, licensure, and things of that nature; and that is pretty much it.

Chairman Feltner asked what vacancies he has.

Attorney Richardson replied Attorney I and Legal Secretary I, so they need someone in admin

and they are looking to bring on an attorney.

Chairman Feltner asked if a Legal Secretary I is not necessarily a Paralegal.

Attorney Richardson responded not necessarily, but it could be.

Chairman Feltner noted Attorney Richardson would like that.

Attorney Richardson advised potentially, yes, and certainly someone who could learn and train

in that capacity if they do not bring that already.

Commissioner Delaney asked if Attorney Richardson knows about how much money his office

takes in for public records requests each year.

Attorney Richardson replied he does not, he does not see that as part of their budget; but they

can get it certainly.

Jill Hayes, Budget Office Director, stated those revenues go to those individual Departments

that are fulfilling those public records requests, so that would be something staff could work

with the County Attorney’s Office to track down what that revenue is.

Attorney Richardson remarked he thinks they did compile a request not that long ago that

sought all of the charges for records for some past period, so they should have that readily able

to provide; but that is not incorporated in their budget.

C.12. County Manager's Office

Frank Abbate, County Manager, stated the County Manager’s Office role is to provide

leadership to implement Board Policies and directives to the whole organization, and to

strategically plan for the future to ensure the high quality of life for the residents, visitors, and

the businesses in the community; their focus is to deliver responsive services and be

responsive to the Board, and individual Commissioners; they focus on that every meeting with

staff; it is about staff and how they interact with other staff and being responsive to members of

the community; and being responsive to the members of the community means to respond in a

timely manner, it does not mean they are going to hear necessarily what they want to hear, but

it is showing respect by being responsive. He continued by saying outside of that, County

infrastructure improvements has been a key focus and continues to be in a variety of areas;

they have tried to incrementally improve many areas of Public Works, specifically roads, and

the Board has heard that in the presentations, in County buildings; the Board has heard a lot of

criticism over time, but he can tell it they have been incrementally increasing maintenance and

efforts to upgrade different facilities for the last eight years; the same goes for Parks and

Recreation; they are doing that at a variety of parks; the Board has seen Library talking about

what they are doing at their restrooms, upgrading; he can tell the Board that there has not been

a lot of attention focused in Parks, but they have been doing that the last couple of years; and

they are now starting to try to do it in County buildings as well. He noted that is based on some

Board input they have received to try to focus on those kinds of things; they will continue to do

that; there are other areas, though, that that is happening too, such as Utilities; it is a very

aging infrastructure; there are different revenue streams that are doing that for there; the big

issue is Solid Waste and a variety of different facilities; in North Brevard, the new transfer

station, US 192, and these are all very big, significant projects that they have pushed very hard

for; and those are some of the things they are focused on as a leadership team trying to

support staff with. He mentioned another key area for them is dealing with Agendas for the

Board, preparing them, making sure the Agendas give the Board and the public the information

that the Board needs to move things forward, and give staff direction to help them to develop

the upcoming budget; and that is really what it is about for them, and following the Board’s

Policies and directives that it has given to them and then developing the budget based on the

parameters the Board has established. He pointed out the last two areas listed on the first page

is the enhancement of Public Safety services; they have done that over the past several years;

they did a seven-year plan as it dealt with Public Safety; they are in the process of upgrading

that; they are obviously looking for Board direction; he thinks, hopefully, that the Board will be

getting that next Tuesday when updating the seven-year plan is talked about as to where it

wants to see the future; that is a roadmap for what could potentially happen in terms of how

staff addresses public safety issues that are out there; the last one the Board sees is investing

in employees, and he hopes that is what the Board has gotten out of what it has heard these

last four sessions; the Board has a lot of employees in a lot of different areas who provide a lot

of critical services; there are organizational-wide challenges, both in recruiting and retaining;

and that is why they shared with the Board the vacancy rates, it is organization wide. He

advised the leadership team tries to provide the best support they can, within the parameters

that the Board establishes, because it establishes for staff what their resources are going to be

and where it wants those resources allocated; they provide executive leadership, but it is to

fund Board-directed priorities, and that is what staff will do; in the County Manager’s Office, that

is done with a budget of $1.5 million and eight full-time employees, the County Manager, two

assistants, three support staff for those assistants, one person who is the Assistant to the

County Manager, and that position has been vacant since January; one of the reasons is

knowing he was going to be transitioning, and whoever the new County Manager is, that is an

important position, a right-hand person for the new County Manager; he left it open for that

person to make the selection to move things forward; and then an Agenda Coordinator who is

responsible for making sure that all of the attachments to the Agenda, and everything the

Board wants to see, are done. He noted they get the Agenda out on a timely basis on

Thursdays; they have support staff in Planning and Development that does the same thing for

the Planning and Zoning meetings; very simply, that is the County Manager’s Office that is

funded through the General Fund; and they look forward to the continued direction of the Board

relative to how to fund the priorities it determines are the most important that they should focus

the resources that are available for.

C.13. Commissioners Offices

Jill Hayes, Budget Office Director, commented this is an overview for the Commission District

Offices, so these are the Commissioners’ offices that he or she manage and operate within his

or her individual Districts; in 2021, the Board adopted Board Policy BCC-43, establishing a cap

for each District office; there is a separate cost center for each office; that initial cap amount

was $380,000 per office; and that includes the compensation benefits for the employees within

Board’s offices, as well as travel expenses, memberships, operating supplies, and things of

that nature, such as copy machines and certain office supplies. She went on to say they adjust

that cap every year for organizational wide increases, if there is a Cost of Living Adjustment

(COLA), or if the Florida Retirement System (FRS) rates change, which they do every year, and

if there are changes for other employee benefits like the health insurance rates; that cap gets

adjusted every year, so for the current Fiscal Year, that cap is $443,525 per District office; as

Commissioners, he or she each have discretion over that budget within his or her office, so as

long as he or she stays within that amount, he or she have the flexibility to use those dollars as

seen fit; and these office budgets do not include facilities costs, such as rental expenses or

electricity, water, and things of that nature; those are all paid out of the Facilities Management

program. She advised the slide shows the Board the total is just over $2.2 million for all five

offices; primarily that goes to compensation and benefits for Commissioners and staff within

those offices, which is about 93 percent; and seven percent is for those operating expenses.

Chairman Feltner stated he thinks there is only one office currently that even has a rental fee

for their building.

Ms. Hayes advised she believes so, yes.

Chairman Feltner pointed out it is better than it had been in the past.

C.14. Fire Rescue

Chief Patrick Voltaire, Fire Rescue Director, expressed his appreciation to the Board for the

meetings it has had in the past few weeks and what it is about to hear in the coming week, as

the County Manager referenced the fire assessment; he advised as long as nothing changes,

the Board will see that next week at the Board meeting; this being the last budget presentation,

there is a part one and a part two, which will roll into what the Board is going to see next week;

and this is a very small snapshot because of part one and part two. He stated just as a general,

real broad brush financial overview of the Fire Rescue and Multiple Services Taxing Unit

(MSTU) revenues, personnel, infrastructure, equipment they purchase on an annual basis,

lifeguard services, resource divide, that is the 55/45 split, and fire assessment impacts; he does

not want to spoil too much of the surprise on that, but they will definitely look at that chart as an

overview; fire assessment and MSTU, the revenues of the Fire Department is around $54

million between the two streams; the green line is their Reserves; if that chart went back to

about 2007 or 2008, the Board would actually see those Reserves up close to the revenues,

they were around $20 million, so that is the history of Fire Rescue going back that far; they

basically lived on Reserves for quite some time; and that allowed them to work through the

increases in equipment and not go for those fire assessment increases. He went on to say in

2020, their Reserves got down to $1.16 million, so staff knew something had to be done; their

savings account had run dry; that was actually the second fire assessment increase; but that

was the first really big one of 29 percent, plus American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) and

Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act infusion; that was the inception of

their seven-year plan they currently sit in; the Board will see more details about that when they

move forward; in the past couple of years they have brought those Reserves back up, but

certainly not to the level they had hoped; when that seven-year plan was gone into, no one

predicted COVID and the increase of goods and services, and just the absolute increase of

prices of fire trucks and all equipment that they saw; nobody could have predicted that; and that

is what those 2021 numbers from that seven-year plan are built off of and around. He

mentioned their personnel, there is a lot of charts on this page, but he will summarize the real,

big picture; they have done excellent on recruiting efforts and their sponsorships; there is

nothing more fun and exciting in his job than to get to give the opportunity to the young folks in

the community, it is fulfilling, and it will turn a bad day into a good day when he sees the smile

on their faces; by referring to the chart, the Board will see some of those negative numbers, so

not to talk about what has been lost, but their total PCN count in the field is 91; that is just the

raw truth of the data, and that is where they sit today; with one more retirement this week of a

fire prevention personnel, inspectors have become another trade that they are losing those

senior people to that have also become hard to replace; and he thinks that is a common theme

being the last one, the trades and the experience leaving the fields is a common theme

amongst all; the only difference, and he knows the Board knows this, the fire prevention folks, if

they are not in the seat, they get behind on inspections, which is definitely detrimental to public

safety; but when the firefighters, paramedics, and lieutenants are not at work, when they have

those empty seats, they still have to fill them; and that creates the overtime everyone hears

about that staff is trying to combat when they come to see the Board next Tuesday. He advised

the infrastructure, prior to that seven-year plan, the first year he referenced, before that plan

got put into place, their total budget for this was around $600,000; into that new plan, the Board

directed them to build those fire stations and make them better; again, no one planned for

COVID or the price increases; the Board will see at the bottom of the chart that at that time

when they were building out, the price per square foot was anywhere from $200 to $400;

currently, the most recent station built, Station 49, was $600 a square foot to build, so they are

still doing the best they can in pushing that and meeting all of the requirements and things they

have to do to keep that infrastructure going, but it is getting tough; and that is another reason

why the Commissioners will hear from them next Tuesday. He stated just so the Board knows,

the stations on this chart, the green ones are in the 55/45 split, so they are funded by both the

fire side and the General Fund side; the red ones are fire only; and the blue ones are

Emergency Medical Services (EMS) or General Fund only. He continued by saying regarding

capital, he will go ahead and skip down to the bottom; again, he keeps harping on the

increases, but that is really what has made it tough; overall of all the projects, there was a 39

percent increase in the prices; 39 percent may not sound like a whole lot, but it a lot when

talking about $600,000; the fire trucks have gone from about $500,000 to $900,000, along with

the lead times of two to four years to build a firetruck; as the Board may remember a few

meetings ago, those lead times made him buy a firetruck from somebody else; they found a

great price on it; and it allowed them to buy four trucks, so that is one of the ways they have

survived through all of this inflation, by looking for the best value of getting the equipment for

the guys and girls, but the value for the Brevard County as a whole. He noted buying that extra

firetruck and getting it in the County, right now it will be going in service within the next couple

of weeks, it is huge because one of those trucks is replacing a firetruck that is actually older

than a lot of the new hires they have coming on to the field; and it is a very good to be replacing

those firetrucks and getting them into something new. He commented two key points on the

slide regarding the lifeguard program that he would like to bring to the Board’s attention, Cocoa

Beach, the almost $170,000, is a double payment from them, because the County allowed

them to forego their payment and pay two years as a one-time payment; that is why the Board

sees that number that is so off base of everyone else’s, as well as the Tourism funds, the $1.5

million at the bottom of the slide, that is what allows them to run the staff of the seven full-time

and 11 seasonal towers; and if the tourism is not available coming the next year, they will have

to look in the General Fund, or change around how they operate.

Chairman Feltner advised he does not think it will be there.

Chief Voltaire stated there were two things he wanted to mention, and that was one of them.

Chairman Feltner pointed out he was just going to own that one.

Chief Voltaire explained the divide of Brevard County Fire Rescue (BCFR), how they collect

and fund things, the 55/45 split, is what they refer to it as, and what that is 55 percent of the

personnel are riding on firetrucks; 45 percent are riding on ambulances; that is how, as a

general term, they derive from that number in funding the Fire Department to keep it funded

well; the fire side is fire trucks and hazmat; the blue side, or the EMS side, would be just those,

the ambulances, rescues, and all of the EMS equipment that would help them to do their job;

and that is important, because when going into the next slide, and going into next Tuesday, for

every fire assessment impact they have, there is a General Fund impact that goes along with it.

He stated they have gone over this pretty well, and he thinks between the meetings with the

Board the last couple of weeks and executive sessions, everyone understands that pretty well;

he will not go into this chart in too much detail, because there is more to come; for options,

here is a chart for the Board to look at; per one percent, those are the increases from the fire

assessment MSTU side, as well as the General Fund and how those are proportionate; and he

asked if the Board has any questions.

Commissioner Delaney stated she was wondering about Station 49, the $600 per square foot;

and she asked what the hurricane rating is on that building, and can it survive a Category 5.

Chief Voltaire replied affirmatively.

Commissioner Delaney asked with it being an inland fire station if it is totally necessary.

Chief Voltaire responded they do not want those fire stations to have an issue; when crews are

having to live in there during the hurricanes, they need to be built as strong as possible; same

thing for their plan for Station 64, it has a big price tag on it, because that one sits on A1A; their

plan for that one is to build everything above grade; and the lessons they learned from the

West Coast folks, to lift the bays, no electrical on the first floor, the computer and server rooms

are on the second floor, the ocean goes over to the river, and in theory, hopefully, it gets

squeegeed out and they can start running calls again.

Commissioner Delaney stated Station 23 being a mobile home just totally kills her on spending

$1.3 million on that; she is going to get a lot of questions about that; and she does not know

how to defend that.

Chief Voltaire advised he does not like it either.

Commissioner Delaney asked how that came about.

Chief Voltaire replied what he can say is the $1.3 million is not all the station itself; there is site

work and prep, and honestly, the price of that stuff will surprise a person, it surprised him; he

reiterated the price of the trailer is not $1.3 million; but the site work setup is the majority of that

cost.

Commissioner Delaney stated Chief Voltaire said there are 91 vacancies; she asked what that

looks like for his day to day for the people for filling mandatory overtime, filling those slots to

keep stations open; are they at risk of having to close stations; and what the tipping point is of

that.

Chief Voltaire responded he does not have an exact tipping point number; does he look at it if

things do not turn around if they could be close to a tipping point, he would say yes; the

mandatories definitely are dependent on the day of the week and things like that; but they do

have 18 spots that are floaters that are built in, those are far and gone, eaten up in that 90;

there is a lot of overtime filling those slots; and the math is pretty simple.

Commissioner Delaney explained she just wants to put this out there, just for the dire situation

the County is in with its Fire Department; she is not saying which fire department this is, but

there are fire departments out there in the State of Florida that are doing some major things

with their contracts; there are multiple places out there that are on a 24/72 schedule; this one,

in particular, pays $30 an hour with medical benefits paid for, for not only themselves but there

family members; to be able to fill this need of the 91 slots, the County is going to have to

recruit; and just from the presentation the Board was briefed on, Chief Voltaire and some of the

others came to the Commission offices, which she is assuming each Commissioner received

the same presentation, she does not foresee the County being able to fill that gap with what

she was presented with, because if the County does not deal with not only the wage gap it has,

but the work life balance issues, the people will not be able to be recruited to come to Brevard

County. She advised she just says that in preparation for next week.

Chief Voltaire noted he does not want to ruin too much of the surprise on the Agenda because

it does not come out until later in the week, but there is going to be an option 3, and that is

Board direction.

Chairman Feltner stated he spent yesterday, as Chief Voltaire knows, up there with the fleet

gentlemen and lady, he appreciates that, and there are good folks there; the Chief was talking

about older vehicles, and he has a car that is 20 years old, one that is 48 years old, and he has

an old Honda Cub that is 63 years old, so when one tries to work on older vehicles, he or she

has to be resourceful; there are some resourceful folks up there who are making it happen; and

he wants to give kudos to them.

Chief Voltaire advised their firetrucks that are still in service, the American Le Frances, went

out business in 2006, so talking about those guys being resourceful, they find junkyards, and

do a lot of special things to keep the Fire Department in service; and almost 20 years American

Le France has been out of business, not making any parts, and those people keep things

going.

Chairman Feltner pointed out he had a really good conversation with Don who runs the facility

up there, and he thinks he may bring a couple of items to try to make it easier for them; they

just talked about some of the bureaucratic things that he deals with; and he is going to do his

best to make it a little better for Don. He stated for the public’s sake, this concludes the

County’s budget workshops; and this was the fourth and final one.

Commissioner Delaney stated at the first budget workshop the Board talked about as a group it

would kind of go over some of the different revenue options that were presented to it and what

not; and she asked when Chairman Feltner foresees the Board having that conversation.

Chairman Feltner stated he is open, he thinks it is at the pleasure of the Board; and he asked

Jill Hayes, Budget Director, what the practical way would be for the Board to do that having all

of the right information.

Ms. Hayes replied the Budget Office is working with Departments now to develop their budgets,

then when the Board takes a break in June, staff will be meeting with him or her and preparing

all of that so they can bring a proposed budget to the Board in July, set the tentative millage

rates and move forward from there, so as much direction as they can get, the sooner the

better.

Chairman Feltner commented the Board can discuss that at the next meeting to see what the

pleasure of the Board is; and he thinks May makes sense before the June break. He stated

County staff did a great job on their budget presentations at all four workshops.

Upon consensus of the Board, the meeting adjourned at 4:18 p.m.

ATTEST:

_________________________

RACHEL M. SADOFF, CLERK

__________________________________

ROB FELTNER, CHAIRMAN

BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS

BREVARD COUNTY, FLORIDA