Mayor John Dailey presented a proclamation recognizing Hispanic Heritage Month beginning September 15th through October 15th.
The item on the resolution supporting reproductive healthcare was pulled from the Wednesday September 22, 2021, meeting.
William Landing and William Leseman were appointed to the Science Advisory Committee. The Science Advisory Committee is comprised of nine members with seven appointed by the Board of County Commissioners and two appointed by the city. The purpose of the Committee is to safeguard the area’s natural resources and the public health and safety
Nicole Nicolas, selected by Commissioner Jeremy Matlow, and Inika Williams, selected by Commissioner Diane Williams-Cox, as well as Cicely Brantley, Wachell McKendrick, and Marcella Torres were appointed to the Tallahassee-Leon County Commission on the Status of Women and Girls.
Agustin G. Corbella was appointed to a vacant Downtown Improvement Authority seat. The primary function of the Tallahassee Downtown Improvement Authority is to preserve property values and prevent deterioration in the downtown area by a system of self-help.
The Citizens Police Review Board has recently had two board members resign, one is the mayor’s appointee, and the other is Commissioner Matlow’s appointee. During the meeting the commissioners appointed Adner Marcelin to fill one of the vacancies. Marcelin serves as the Communications Director for the Tallahassee law firm, Ben Crump Law.
The commissioners approved the Griffin Heights Neighborhood First Plan and funding in the amount of $2,250,000. Griffin Heights neighborhood is located northwest of downtown Tallahassee. The Griffin Heights Neighborhood First Plan has five priority areas including community beautification, economic development, neighborhood infrastructure and land use, neighborhood safety/crime prevention, and funding.
The Land Development Code exemption for a certified affordable housing project on property owned by Abundant Life and Restoration Ministries International was approved. Currently, zoning designation for the property allows for a maximum of 20 dwelling units per acre, which would allow for up to 79 dwelling units. However, with the approved exemption and 25 percent density bonus, 99 dwelling units will be allowed.
The Interlocal Agreement regarding the provision of fire services was approved 5-0.
The city approved in a 4-1 vote, with Mayor Dailey in dissent, for the contract negotiations with the Legal Aid Foundation of Tallahassee to administer a resident ID card program for two years, for a cost of $75,000 for each year. The item was amended slightly, to require an update on the programs status after six months of implementation. The ID cards will be used as an alternative to State of Florida ID cards or Driver’s Licenses.
The commissioners heard an update on the Southside Action Plan. For the past five months, staff has engaged members of Southside neighborhood communities to identify their needs and vision for the Southside. Areas of focus, include beautification, investment, and engaged and active citizens.
The city heard comments by some citizens regarding the budget, specifically the Ordinance number 21-O-29, which will change the water and wastewater rates, fees, and charges. The change will result in an estimated increase of $0.85 cents per month per household. The ordinance was passed unanimously.
The city commissioners unanimously approved the FY22 millage rate and budget for the city of Tallahassee.
During the sharing of ideas at the end of the meeting, Commissioner Matlow made comments after hearing a presentation by a concerned citizen on the recent corruption trial and ethics of the government officials. Matlow said that he agreed with some of the points in the presentation and he told the room, “If I do anything in elected office, it’s going to be to fix this system and the City of Tallahassee.”
Matlow said he would make a motion, if supported by his colleagues, to have an item brought back to establish a Citizens Committee to make additional recommendations to protect the public interests of the citizens of Tallahassee. The motion was not supported nor made.
City Commission Meeting Briefs: September 22nd added by Lynsey Kirk on
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@ Terry… with respect, and by virtue of your own comments… clearly neither consent decrees, financial penalties, nor annual increases in fees have had the desired impact on the problem you outlined.
“Always More; Never Enough” is the long-standing premise of the tax man. The Health Department, various non-profits and NGO’s, the Public Indoctrination System, and most recently the CSC… all declaring their goal (in part) is to “feed the hungry children”. Millions upon million annually… and yet it is not enough and the children still go hungry.
Millions upon millions upon billions upon billions to “end homelessness and poverty”… and yet it remains, and grows even worse. Heck, the current occupant and his Sadministration is even importing more of it.
Mark my words, as I have seen it first hand… “Always More; Never Enough”
@ Terry,
Thank you for the info it is fascinating! Thank you for what you do and please keep us updated on all of this.
@Edward Lyle: Regarding taxes, sorry, it’s already has happened.
In 2011, an amended FDEP enforcement consent order (required by EPA when it discovered the 2009 consent order had little financial penalties to incentivise the City to fix its sewage system) was signed by department staff whereby the City agreed to spend $3 million per year until 2022 to correct identified issues. This continued a sewage fee increase that started in 2010 and through 2020 resulting in an 80% increase in residential rates – I have not reviewed increases for small and large businesses.
All increases were included in budgets, however, no mention in public proposed budgets the city was under serious enfircement consent orders.
Lastly, since 2011, the city has been penalized over $150,000 due to continuing sewage spills; naturally, paid by citizen sewage fees and taxes.
Something tells me there s new tax a’comin… likely at the countywide level. The goal will be to “clean up” the polluted natural “brackish water” and fertilizer runoff ponds to the level of pristine spring water via extremely expensive filtration and sludge-bottom dredging operations… neither of which can achieve the goal. But someone’s gonna make a bundle.
Not to mention the cost of unnecessarily treating millions of gallons a year of infiltration which is passed on to those served by sanitary sewer service.
@ Terry… it begs the question; If not maintenance, upkeep, and upgrades… where are the millions in charged and collected Sewer Fees going?
… one wonders if this is yet another “fire fee” dilemma… hmmmmm
No wonder there’s zero support for, and so much push back on, Matlow’s “Corruption Hunt”
@Hope- After personally spending over $60K for PRR’s, attorney and consultant fees, the Tallahassee Sewage Advocacy Group concluded, first, transparency of sewage issues did not exist at the City Commission level, (i.e. where the public typically gets information), since at least 2009. For example, FDEP/EPA enforcement consent orders starting in 2009, amended in 2011 and 2020, were not policy/ordinance required to be reviewed and approved by the Commission but instead simply approved at department levels, i.e. out of public knowledge and scrutiny. Water quality tests are routinely done, however, only to determine that our drinking water is ok and the new waste water treatment facility is releasing treated effluent at regulatory levels. Storm water ponds are not required to be tested as they are built to receive polluted storm water and, hopefully, adequately filter it into the ground.
In 2019, the City agreed to conduct an infiltration study to address numerous and voluminous spills and found numerous areas where storm water and other water bodies (lakes, ponds, streams, etc.) where aging sewage pipes existed were infiltrating into the sewage collection system daily. At times, it overloaded the system, resulting in spills. Additionally, the public flushes inappropriate things into the sewage system, causing blockages. A number of generators were not coming on when needed, and maintenance issues were occurring.
Thankfully, in the last few years, the City has addressed many of these issues and continues to work on numerous infiltration issues resulting in our aging clay vitreous pipes. But a lot of work remains to be done to prevent future spills into our environment. Luckily, we have been under drought conditions for the last few years. However, we feel BP funds should be used to expedite these fixes quicker and reduce treatment costs in the millions of tax payer dollars.
Next, with aging leaky clay pipes came the question of exfiltration (i.e. sewage leaking outside the pipes). We have recently established sewage existing in almost 80% of 40 water bodies tested. A project to determine volume and direction of sewage flows is getting underway with a prominent FSU hydrologist and his grad students; yes, certain expenses are privately funded but that’s ok in order to remain independent.
Next, addressing increasing transparency, at our urging, the City provided a brief review at its July 7th commission meeting of outstanding enforcement consent orders, status improvement reports over the last 10 years and expectation/hope they were be completed in January, 2022. A very brief summary was provided on over 240 contaminated sites across the city. (Nothing was mentioned about the FSU radioactive dump site revealed at the end of 2020 which had been in existence for decades; yes, leaking into the underlying water cavities south of Tallahassee.)
As such, our goal is the create a city policy/ordinance requiring future enforcement DEP/EPA consent orders be approved by commissioners in public meetings, provide quarterly status reports on ALL existing consent orders (consent orders have existed for the power station and airport), summarize sewage spills over 1000 gallons, quarterly status reports on contaminated sites, and require the media be alerted for spills over 500 gallons for improved public transparency of their sewage collection system. Again, an agenda item was approved Wednesday night for staff to create such a policy/ordinance to improve public transparency. We hope something will be available to discuss at the next city commission meeting after we developed and forwarded our list of transparency concerns.
Thanks Hope for your interest.
@ Terry,
Shouldn’t you be able to go to the city and they should be able to furnish you with all this information? Aren’t the engineers on top of this and able to give you the history and current information and even archived information? The city engineers should be one step ahead of you not the other way around?
Is this current city manager helpful or obfuscating his responsibilities from failing to furnish information to ensuring all is well and are well within the regulatory guidelines.?
I hope we are not cooking up the next local government fleecing of the taxpayers by encouraging Wakulla County to sue us for polluting Wakulla Springs and basically the entire water system in Wakulla County.
Just imagine the tax and spend fest our corrupt Nannies will have getting usual suspect favorites to accept huge amounts of money to study and do bogus construction projects build huge treatment plants ban septic tanks and put the whole of Leon County on a massive sewer system.
All the while generating ill gotten gain in the form of kickbacks and contributions back to our political nannies.
Scott in his country club prison is going to be so jealous of you nannies still un-indicted out here making all that money.
None of you nannies deserve any public trust at this time. You are all to be held to a higher standard because of all the dirt you did or winked and nodded at in the past.
@Edward Lyle: septic tanks are definitely on our radar and attempts to get locations of them in the City are being made with DoH by our attorney. Ion tests are being considered to tell if septics are the source of sewage vs sewage collection lines. Industry accepted tests for sucralose, likewise, determine existence of human sewage. SGS in British Columbia confirmed the existence of sewage in 6 out of 6 water samples provided. Initial tests of 40 water bodies earlier this year found about 80% very likely had sewage. Also, majority of tests are being run where septics either were never used or have been unused in decades. Likewise, dye tracers will be used in sewage lines to provide yet another layer of confidence in sewage lines leaking or not. But, septics will remain on our radar. Thanks
@ Terry Ryan… be sure to tell your friend, the “noted FSU hydrologist”, to research the history of septic tanks and leach fields that existed in the areas they plan on testing.
Disappounting TR omitted Comm Mattlow’s motion for staff to bring back an agenda recommended ordinance/policy to increase transparency on the City’s leaky sewage collection system. Recent reports and tests found sewage in local ponds. A noted FSU hydrologist will be conducting trsts with graduate students to determine volume and direction of flow. Come on TR!
“Matlow said banning campaign consultants from engaging in public-sector work was a common sense fix.”
Mayor Dailey’s campaign manager/PR hack is heavily entrenched in city and county contracts so his response was vested in his own special interest and not based on the people he took an oath to serve. It was actually quite disturbing…”Mayor John Dailey said he wasn’t immediately open to discussing the intersection of campaigns, private and public business at the meeting.”
Mayor Dailey continued, “I’m very hesitant to have conversations and get into details about campaign consultants, impacts on public and private and business relationships right now,” he said.
There is a culture in Tallahassee where elected officials give contracts to their campaign managers… just look at our Sheriff gives large he gives large contracts to his campaign manager, Sean Pittman. I don’t know how they get away with it and it has put us in a situation where we have a high crime rate and we are the laughing stock of the state. Our only Saving Grace is that we have a credible intelligent awesome governor.
So let it be noted and let it be said that we heard it from Mayor Dailey himself that he wishes to continue the corruption for his own selfish self serving needs.
@ Jon …… If I remember right, it does no more than what your Drivers License will do.
Tell me more about the citizen ID card. Is there a citizenship check? What will it allow people to access?
“Gentleman, we have to save our phoney baloney jobs… I didn’t get a harrumph from that guy.”
Mayor Dailey is a slightly less abrasive Scott Maddox. And that means he’s worse than Scott Maddox! I can’t get outta here fast enough…
@ Old Cop… Excellent question. Perhaps TR will follow up on that
@ WTF… I believe you’re correct
The double talking mayor tries to act like he is a big supporter of ethics, then shuts down discussion on ethics when it focuses on his campaign manager??? We’re starting to see the real Mr. Dailey.
I want to know why the two members of the Police Review Board resigned. Internal strife? Political pressure? Disillusionment?
Anybody know?
What is the Tallahassee-Leon County Commission on the Status of Women and Girls? It seems to me women and girls have been greatly empowered over the last few decades thereby making the Commission outdated. I know there are some disadvantaged women and girls in our area but I also know there are disadvantaged men and boys in our area as I see them on the streets all the time.
Additionally, the name implies a commission on the status of women and girls in general not women and girls suffering from injustice (which generally they are not). Do we have a Commission on the status of Men and Boys?
Of course, there is a large number of downtrodden women and girls at the southern border and there are downtrodden women and girls among the newly arrived Afghan refugees. But, both of these situations have been created and are sustained by our unelected President and his regime. I guess the Commission in Tallahassee can help the ones who make their way here to our community.
Ahhh yes the “resolution supporting reproductive health care” nice words in case any sensitive liberals are reading. Its more basically a resolution supporting the massive slaughter of human babies.
White liberals in charge think supporting abortion still buys them black votes. Yes that used to be the case but not so much any more. Who do you see publicly supporting abortion for the past several years? Unattractive white folks that is the only demographic still willing to put their name and face on the line in support of killing human babies. OK thats my rant.
Preston spanked your Mayor Daily so hard on his morning show yesterday that your Mayor left crying like a baby that somehow was not aborted and thats why your Mayor pulled the resolution.
Thanks for kicking Daily’s Fat Liberal @ss Preston…you are The Man!
What is the purpose of these residential ID cards? Florida already has a non-drivers ID card program which been around for years. This Legal Aid Foundation of Tallahassee entity according to there website has four employees and some attorneys that provide pro bono legal aid. Are they all of a sudden supposed to be in the identity verification business. What a waste.
@ Tony,
We need to “Circle Back” with Griffin Heights for them to show an accounting how the $2,225 was spent.
@ Ted & NE,
Well, at least it’s on video of the mayor gaveling down talk on ethics reform when the mayor’s campaign manager’s name was brought up and in that was involved in the recent local Federal corruption case court documents.
The mayor’s opponent in his next election was just handed a gift.
ANY member of the Tallahassee law firm, Ben Crump Law is a BAD choice for the Citizens Police Review Board.
You’re going to spend $2,250.000 for community beautification, economic development, neighborhood infrastructure, land use and FUNDING? Funding WHAT? What will you be spending spend $2,250.000 on, Landscaping? Rebuilding other peoples property?
Why was the resolution supporting reproductive healthcare pulled from the Wednesday September 22, 2021, meeting, because it goes against you loving to kill Unborn Babies?
Why does the Legal Aid Foundation of Tallahassee need to administer a resident ID card program, Drivers Licenses hold a lot of information in them. ………… This is a huge waste of Money. It would be a lot cheaper to just get those few people without an ID an ID. Last I checked (2016) The Drivers License place can do it for just $25, $6 if you are poor.
Southside Action Plan identified their needs and vision for the Southside, Areas of focus, include beautification, investment, and engaged and active citizens. ……… I noticed that CRIME was NOT mentioned.
“IF supported by his colleagues, to have an item brought back to establish a Citizens Committee to make additional recommendations to protect the public interests of the citizens of Tallahassee. The motion was not supported nor made.” ……… WELL DUH. I could have told you NONE of them would want that as they would be exposed.
THERE IS MORE COMING………
Excellent info, Ed!
I wondered how illegals were facilitated in obtaining voter ID cards.
Every concerned citizen needs to contact every major news publication, news show, congressman, and senator to bring light to this illegal voter ID scam being facilitated by elected officials and taxpayer dollars.
There needs to be safeguards put in place so illegal voting can’t be facilitated. Perhaps there needs to be two levels on the ID card. And anyone from a Supervisors of Elections Office facilitating such should be prosecuted.
Another illegal scam our governor needs to shut down.
Just a few comments… if I may…
* Appointing someone from Ben Crump Law to serve CPRB just formally delegitimized it’s creation, existence, and opinions.
* “… the Tallahassee-Leon County Commission on the Status of Women and Girls.” Given our local clowns propensity for weigh in in on State and Federal issues, I wonder why this particular body has to say about Dementia Joe Biden’s Open Border Sex-Trafficking Operation?
* $2,250,000 for the Griffin Heights Neighborhood First Plan. Also known as vote buying and graft for the local gatekeepers.
* “The Land Development Code exemption for a certified affordable housing project…” Another campaign contributor payback guised with meaningless semantics.
* “… negotiations with the Legal Aid Foundation of Tallahassee to administer a resident ID card program for two years, for a cost of $75,000 for each year.” The only purpose of a “resident ID” card is to allow illegal aliens to slip onto the taxpayers dime. And make no mistake, although it won’t be publicized, they will be used to register them to illegally vote as well.
* “Matlow said he would make a motion, if supported by his colleagues, to have an item brought back to establish a Citizens Committee to make additional recommendations to protect the public interests of the citizens of Tallahassee. The motion was not supported nor made.” And that’s all you need to know about the local cabal’s true interest in stemming government corruption… and so I shall continue… so say’ith them all.
I’m not sure the police review board is going to make it. I believe it is political and racist… and I’m not sure someone from Ben Crump’s office is the way to go on this one. My concerns over someone being affiliated with Benjamin Crump is that I have never ever heard Benjamin Crump advocate for educating youth to respect law enforcement number one, and number two,
to not commit crimes. Commissioners, if they’re going to appoint people need to be diverse and instead of making it political appointees perhaps should go appoint a conservative or someone who is a well-known conservative. I never see anyone ever Reaching Across the aisle…it is always a political show.
And I am concerned about our police chief jumping on the band wagon with State Attorney Jack Campbell who publicly intimidated, bullied, and disparaged a citizen. I believe the police chief owes the citizen and public an apology and Jack Campbell should be fired immediately.
If the police chief doesn’t apologize it concerns me that he has a lack of discernment.
We have good police officers and perhaps the problem isn’t with them the problem is that the person who oversees the police officers at the city who has no law enforcement experience.
You missed where Dailey abruptly adjourned the meeting by gaveling down further conversation about ethics.
Jeremy started talking about Drew Jones, John Dailey’s unregistered lobbyist campaign manager and Mayor Flintstone gaveled out the meeting before Jack Porter could even say she supported Erwin Jackson and ethics reform. What a joke.