TAMPA CITY COUNCIL
Thursday, September 3, 2015
9:00 a.m. Session

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>>FRANK REDDICK: Good morning.
We're going to call this City Council meeting to
order.
I'll yield to councilman Mr. Miranda.
09:07:12 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
It's my pleasure to introduce Steve Michelini who
will say the prayer this morning.
Please rise for the prayer and remain standing for
the Pledge of Allegiance.
09:07:25 >> Good morning, Council.
Dear Lord, we thank you for this day and we ask
that you bestow your blessings upon the Logan
family for their loss.
We are reminded, Lord, to keep the book of law
ever mindful upon our lips, in our hearts and

meditate upon it day and night so that we will be
careful to do what is right and how it is written.
We then will be prosperous and successful in all
that we do.
Serve him who has been so gracious to us with
faithfulness.
Let courage of the Lord be with us.
We will not be afraid nor discouraged.
We will be strong in our convictions and we know
that you, Lord, are with us.
We ask that your shield of justice be bestowed
upon, protect and guide your public servants,
elected officials, police and fire rescue, armed
forces and teachers.
We recall in your name, Lord, that you are the
greatest teacher of them all and ask that your
blessings upon them -- upon all those be assembled
here and far away.
In your holy name, Lord, amen.
[pledge of Allegiance]
09:08:41 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Roll call.
09:08:50 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Here.
09:08:52 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Here.
09:08:53 >> Capin?
09:08:54 >>HARRY COHEN:
Here.

09:08:56 >>GUIDO MANISCALCO:
Here.
09:08:56 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Here.
09:08:58 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Here.
Thank you.
Could we get approval of the agenda?
Motion from Mr. Cohen.
Seconded by Mr. Miranda.
All those in favor of the motion, aye.
09:09:18 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Before we approve the addendum
to the agenda, I would like to reschedule item
number 2.
I sent a memo late last night.
I apologize if you didn't see it, Mr. Snelling's
report to be delivered at 9 a.m. on
September 17th.
09:09:35 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Second.
09:09:36 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion from Ms. Montelione.
Seconded by Mr. Miranda.
All in favor, aye.
Motion carries.
September the 10th?
09:09:45 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
No, September 17th.
09:09:47 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Okay.
09:09:48 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I would also like to pull items
number 13 and 17 for discussion.

09:09:57 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Item 13 and 14?
09:09:59 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
17.
09:10:01 >>FRANK REDDICK:
17.
09:10:03 >> Second.
09:10:03 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion by Ms. Montelione, second
by Mr. Cohen to pull 13 and 17 for discussion.
Pulled.
Motion carried.
09:10:17 >>THE CLERK:
You still have the vote on the floor
for approving the agenda and the addendum.
We have not voted on that yet.
09:10:27 >>FRANK REDDICK:
We have a motion for approval.
All those in favor, aye.
Opposed?
All right.
Here's what we're going to do at the very
beginning under public comments.
We're going to take up items 6 through 28, accept
public comments for 6 through 28.
After that, we'll come back to public comments for
any other items on the agenda except those set for
public hearing.
We want to clear up some of the other items on the
agenda so we know a lot of people are speaking on
item number 1.

If you can be patient with us until we get that
done, we'd appreciate it.
At this time, we'll take any public comments on
items 6 through twenty --
09:11:25 >> Since I just pulled 13 and 17, it will take a
while for staff to come to speak on that.
09:11:32 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Okay.
We'll hold it.
Items 6 through 28.
09:11:47 >> I'm Ed Tillou from Sulphur Springs.
How will you handle us?
Just speak about 6 to 28, because I wanted to
speak about something in there.
I wanted to speak about item 10.
10 and 4.
Now, do I just start with 10 and just continue?
I get my three minutes.
Gee, I've lost half of it.
Shouldn't have started.
With respect to item 10, yeah, I hope you pass
that, because I want to right Chick-Fil-A about
taking that across the street which was a good use
of the parking garage.
The thing is, I had to leave before the stormwater
presentation last time to get breakfast.

I haven't had breakfast yet.
One of the reasons is Quizno's went out of
business.
Then Desoto came and then they are out of
business.
There actually is still a place down at Morgan and
Kennedy, Jackson.
Okay.
But the thing is, it's magical thinking at work.
Oh, the food trucks work so well that we're going
to extend them to Ybor City.
But the reality is that a lot of small restaurants
are going out of business around town.
I have to go miles and miles to get my breakfast.
That's why I had to leave last time.
Fortunately, you only spoke about the maintenance
issues.
The use of the word "assessments" was misused
because it's a thing that should go into the
millage, but it doesn't go into the millage.
09:13:31 >>FRANK REDDICK:
I'm going to stop the clock.
The assessment issue is a public hearing, so you
cannot speak on that issue until we open up the
public hearing.
09:13:44 >> To advance -- public hearing when?

Today?
09:13:48 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Today.
09:13:49 >> Anyway, with respect to item four, I'm very
much in favor of that ferry.
I think Mr. Turanchik will, as he often does, come
in concrete information and proposals on it like
he did yesterday to the county commission about a
drainage issue.
The thing is, the nitwit journalist establishment
of when he ran for Mayor, the nitwit journalist
establishment of Tampa labeled him as a dreamer
which has a bad connotation.
The thing is, the Hart bus stations and the
improvements at College Hill are very concrete
kind of things.
This is no dreaming.
The word to be used is "visionary."
Anyway.
That's item 4.
I have this about drainage that I wanted to go
into last time because that was my specialty.
Stormwater Management is what I worked with with
the state of Maryland, sewer, water, and storm
drain, but I'll pass this along because apparently
that's what there is going to be a hearing about,

you say item 1.
09:14:55 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Yes.
You can speak on the stormwater once we open it up
for a public hearing later on, you can speak on
that issue.
09:15:03 >> Okay.
Thank you.
09:15:05 >> Let me give these eight copies.
09:15:08 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next.
09:15:12 >> I wanted to put something into the record and I
wanted to speak on stormwater.
Is that not right now?
Later?
09:15:19 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Yes.
Anyone else wishing to speak on items 6 through
28.
Seeing none, we'll go to item number 6, committee
reports.
Mr. Miranda.
09:15:33 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I move resolution item number 6.
09:15:38 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion by Mr. Miranda.
Seconded by Mr. Cohen.
All in favor of the motion say aye.
Opposed?

Motion carried.
Item number 7, Mr. Maniscalco.
09:15:49 >>GUIDO MANISCALCO:
I move items 7 through 11.
09:15:52 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion by Mr. Maniscalco,
seconded by Mr. Cohen.
All in favor, aye.
Those opposed?
Items 12 through 19, public works, Mr. Suarez.
I thought he was still here.
Mr. Maniscalco.
09:16:08 >>GUIDO MANISCALCO:
I move items 12, 14 through
16, then items 18 and 19.
09:16:17 >>FRANK REDDICK:
We have a motion from
Mr. Maniscalco, seconded by Ms. Montelione.
All in favor of the motion, aye.
Opposed?
Finance Committee, Mr. Cohen.
09:16:27 >>HARRY COHEN:
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I move items 20, 21, 22.
09:16:32 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion by Mr. Cohen.
Seconded by Ms. Montelione.
All in favor, aye.
Opposed?
Motion carries.
Building, zoning, preservation committee,

Ms. Montelione.
09:16:40 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I move items 23 through 25,
sir.
09:16:44 >> Second.
09:16:44 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Got a motion from Ms. Montelione,
seconded by Mr. Cohen.
All in favor of the motion, aye.
Opposed?
Motion carries.
Transportation Committee, Ms. Yolie Capin.
09:16:54 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Move items 26 and 27.
09:16:57 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion from Ms. Capin, seconded
by Mr. Miranda.
All in favor of the motion say aye.
Those opposed?
Motion carried.
Item number 28 just for a public hearing to be
set.
09:17:12 >> I move the substitute resolution, sir.
09:17:14 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion from Ms. Montelione,
seconded by Mr. Miranda.
All in favor, aye.
Opposed?
Motion carried.
Thank you.

Now we come back to public comments anyone wishing
to speak under public comments on any remaining
items except those set for public hearing, you may
come forward now.
09:17:48 >> Hello.
Jean-Paul Nicophene.
I live at 1701 East Cayuga Street.
I'm here on behalf of Tampa for Justice.
We've been out in the community for the past week
or so being supporters to support what we're
trying to propose today.
People within our neighborhoods, people friendship
we have with, also different religious
organizations and organizations in general.
We have over 500 signatures on this form here.
I'll read to you what it says.
Tampa for Justice rejects Mayor Buckhorn's
decision to establish the civilian review board
that is not independent from the City of Tampa's
police department and does not support subpoena
power.
We urge City Council Chairman Frank Reddick and
his colleagues to establish an independent
civilian review board with subpoena power.
The below signed citizens of Tampa hereby call for

the creation of a civilian review board City of
Tampa Police Department in order to foster
relationships in the community based on mutual
respect and understanding.
The creation of this civilian review board will
ensure that those who are charged with protecting
and serving our community have oversight from the
communities that they serve.
We call for the civilian review board to have the
authority to investigate allegations of police
misconduct and recommendations of appropriate
responses to new policies that impact our
communities.
All we are really asking for is accountability.
What's wrong with that?
Thank you.
09:19:13 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next person.
09:19:18 >>> Let's just be real.
The review board already been put in place.
The Mayor jumped the gun and decided to do his own
thing.
He didn't give a damn -- excuse my French -- about
what the constituents in this city had to say.
He didn't care about how many times racially
profiled by police.

09:19:36 >> Please state your name.
09:19:36 >> My name is Ali Mohammad.
He didn't care about the cries that we cried
against the Tampa Police Department.
He jumped the gun and decided to do his own thing.
We ask for independent, know what I'm saying?
We ask for representation from ourselves on the
board.
He wants to do his thing and it's just not
accepted.
I object to his plan.
We ask for a board to be put together by us for
us.
We the ones that's having problem with the police
department.
Mayor Bob Buckhorn don't live in East Tampa.
He done stay in West Tampa.
We're going through these daily problems with the
Tampa Police Department.
It's beyond biking while black.
It's a far more outcast of problems dealing with
the Tampa Police Department.
The federal government needs to be on the TPD
headquarters right now overseeing files and other
things about police misconduct, police brutality.

They beat us up.
I got people that call me day in and day and night
about complaints about Tampa Police Department.
It does not stop.
This is a troubled police department.
It been trouble since Bennie Holder left.
This police department been in trouble since
Bennie Holder left.
It's not just the police department.
Like I said, it is the School Board.
The School Board created the problem.
The Tampa Police Department, they took it on.
The Mayor, he don't care about us.
If he did, he would listen to what we say.
A board put together by us for us not by him for
him.
He wants to do what he wants to do.
Time is now.
Time is now to really hear our cry.
We'll go to a higher level.
I'm talking about way farther than Washington,
D.C.
We have to put a picket line all around this
courthouse, City Hall, School Board to get
attention to these buildings that affect them

black lives in Tampa, something will get done.
I'm tired of getting up here crying, expressing my
feelings.
I don't even know how to express them no more
because it's so outrageous against the police
department, you all just don't know our feelings.
It's way more than a feeling of -- I've been a
victim of police brutality myself.
Police had me on the ground, punching my face.
I'm looking like why is this police officer doing
this.
I go to internal affairs, they sweep it under the
rug.
I come to Tampa Park and I can see the same thing,
police jumping on African-Americans just standing
on sidewalks talking.
It can be two people.
They harass them.
They ain't violating the law.
I'm so frustrated and tired of coming here begging
for something that we calling for, not what child
want.
It's what we want.
We are the constituent.
If Mayor Bob Buckhorn want to be the governor of

Florida, he better tighten up.
I know he's listening.
Take this for justice.
Black lives matter.
09:22:26 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Next speaker.
09:22:33 >> Good morning.
My name is Jerry Neeley, reverend Neeley.
Thank you for this time.
The imperative is central, the interest which
serves to protect the common good has reengaged to
bridge the several and various multifaceted vital
interests as determined from our own best
intentioned yet seemingly conflicted methodologies
and outcomes, our processes and our procedures and
their subsequent goals and objectives.
So, may I, in the Canterbury tale tradition,
invite you to this tale.
There was once a king, a general, and an aspiring
layman's priest, a cleric, an assistant to man's
God and God's man.
So he heard the clad from the king first.
I declare and require what is right, correct, and
appropriate.
In response and equal fashion, but with an eager

one-upsmanship.
I only, the general declared, I only give and
follow orders that are right, correct, and
appropriate.
Finally, after pause and reflection and unauthored
meditation he declared only the tale he had heard
once was said the king's kingdom, the general's
army as well as the Baptist church can go backward
almost as fast as it can go forward.
And as he pondered that he thought, how can that
be?
His oversighted insight let him realize that sure
as soon as one discovered that they are going in
the wrong direction, then they can admit the
truth, confess and turn right and do good.
Thank you so much.
09:25:45 >> Good morning.
My name is Jon Dengler.
I live at 908 East Lake Avenue.
Accountability in this city is a much deeper
question than a few bad apples.
The problem in this city has to do with power.
It's been a struggle for Tampa since its
inception.
We have a long history of concentrated wealth

which equals concentrated power with the ability
to buy results and use physical force and violence
to subdue the poor.
It is a question of power.
Who has it?
Who made it that way?
And who is doing anything they can to keep it that
way.
And the police in this city are fruit at the end
of a long chain of command.
The Mayor is just in need of accountability as are
his troops policing our neighborhoods.
You see what the Mayor just did with his
preemptive executive decision demonstrates the
very unilateral abusive power tactics that
characterize the values that manifest themselves
in abusive policing in our neighborhoods.
In fact, just yesterday, 10 squad cars descended
on homeless helping homeless to raid the place and
execute a search warrant for a tax record.
The question whether they are innocent or snot not
relevant to me as the unnecessary demonstration of
force and intimidation tactics used at the place
run by the guy who just sued the city, forcing
your hand to repeal the panhandling legislation

rather than defending it as constitutional.
Our police need accountability, yes.
But that accountability needs to be independent
and have the authority to follow the leads right
up that chain of command.
We need to take decisive legislative action so
that the few with concentrated wealth and power in
Tampa do not further enshrine their privilege in
policy.
In a democracy, power is supposed to be in the
hands of the people, but when the people of Tampa
organize to ask for accountability for forces that
seem to only act on behalf of the wealthy and
terrorize poor communities, what did we see?
Mr. Big shot power and himself making executive
decisions that mock the demands of the people and
was meant to put you, City Council, in your place.
Is that how power is supposed to work in our city?
Power has to be guided by conscience.
We cannot abide a strong Mayor with weak
character.
So we're here today putting the whole city on
notice.
The people of Tampa are united to take power back
from those that are abusing it, and we demand

justice.
Holding police accountable is just the start.
Attorneys are in here debating about the charter
and who actually has power to do what.
You can continue to have the argument but we'll
organize and demonstrate to you who has power in
democracy.
The people of Tampa, and we demand justice.
[ APPLAUSE ]
09:28:40 >> Good morning, members of City Council.
How are you doing?
My name is Idris Farrukh Muhummad.
I am the co-chair for the Tampa local organizing
committee for the mobilizing and organizing of the
20th anniversary of the million man march.
My concern and my address to you is to ask, first,
do we have your mental, emotional, and
intellectual attention?
Are you present here now while we address you?
Is your focus concentrated on the words of
individuals who advocate to you to use your moral
compass, to use your principles and your standards
that was given to you by your mothers, your
fathers, your sisters, your uncles, your brothers,
your pastors, your fathers, your rabbis to say to

yourself at this moment in time, will we elect to
rise up on the side of time to be on time at an
event that has implications that will be in effect
long after you have given up your seats on this
board, long after you retire into the convenience
of your life in retirement there will yet still be
the problem and the question you ask yourself,
were we better than those before us?
Were we courageous enough as men and women to
stand in a moment and an hour where consequence of
an agenda of time, which has caused many nations
before to implode on one another, will we stand in
the face yet being educated, yet having masters
and doctorate degrees in the various disciplines?
Will you not call and summon upon yourselves the
will to stand as men and women on the side of
those who wish to stand with you?
I have no desire to entertain the traditional
circus of the politics and agendas.
I'm asking for a time-out for you to take a
time-out in that game and look at the realities
around you that will be here.
The players are different, but the game is the
same.
Won't you change the game?

Won't you add up to the circumstances that are
prevailing your communities and listen to the
address of the people who are asking you to stand
as men and women on the principles and values that
your mothers and fathers and uncles and aunts and
the people who guided you, your mentors
embellished you, ordained you, became a princess
of whatever moral code you saw.
The question you have to ask yourself, would that
person be proud of you in this moment if you did
not stand boldly and say, no, Mr. Buckhorn, we
reject your strategy.
No, Mr. Buckhorn, we need transparency because
transparency is the foundation of trust, and trust
yields mutual understanding to work together.
I am not here against one or the other.
I'm asking you to be here for us, to stand at this
moment in time to make a decision based upon your
moral compass that guide the direction of the city
that is in bad situations.
You have the chance and the time.
The question is, men and women, will you take it?
Good day.
[ APPLAUSE ]
09:31:44 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next.

09:31:46 >> Hello.
I'm Terre Tulsiak.
I live in south Tampa in the area of the
privileged that have plenty of police presence,
but it's not in the same way.
I found out that Mayor Buckhorn had a closed press
conference when I showed up to City Hall the other
day on Friday, and then apparently he took off for
Ireland to try and get more business, more people
in Tampa instead of taking care of the ones that
are already here.
The people that live in the overpoliced areas are
correct.
They are treated differently.
I see how they're treated, and I see how I'm
treated when I get pulled over and I'm let go
because it comes from a place of fear, I have to
believe, with the police.
When they shoot somebody eight times, that's not
being in control.
It's being afraid.
And I understand that but we need to have a
conversation about what's going to solve these
problems instead of just reacting to them.
I have a few ideas about what we should do, but

that's not for now.
It's that there needs to be accountability and
representation of the people that elected you all.
Thank you.
[ APPLAUSE ]
09:33:22 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Next speaker.
09:33:26 >> Hi.
My name is Chynah McFadden.
I live at 907 East 22nd Avenue.
I don't have a huge speech prepared.
I really just wanted to reflect a little bit on
what Mayor Buckhorn is trying to mandate for a
review board, our demand for a review board.
I go into my neighborhood, I'm not afraid of any
of the people that I know on my street or my
block.
I know that my neighborhood is seen as a place
that's like bad territory or it's considered a bad
neighborhood.
I come off of campus at USF and go into a place
like suitcase city, and I know how people on
campus feel about those places.
They have this idea.
They have this stereotype that the people there

are bad people.
When I walk around and I see my neighbors, I see
regular people.
They are human beings.
They have dreams, aspirations, and they have
fears.
And I can say that the police department, the
military force that we in the neighborhood, the
occupation that we see in our neighborhood, is a
fear.
I really think that if we want transparency with
the police department, if we want transparency for
the community that what Buckhorn is trying to
establish is not what we're asking for.
We're not asking for 80% of the people he appoints
on the review board.
Like, how are we supposed to know that those
people aren't going to be biased?
How are we supposed to know that we'll have our
issues heard?
When those people are active in our community, we
don't know what they look like.
They don't look like people on my block.
When I sit down and talk to a 16-year-old about
how they feel about police, I mean, I was taught

that police were good people and people we should
aspire to be like.
He's 16.
He sees occupation in his school.
He sees how they treat White students.
He sees how they treat black and brown students
including himself.
He doesn't want anything to do with police
officers.
I think you have to earn respect to get respect.
I look at the police department and I think why do
we need to earn respect, why do they need to earn
respect when they have power.
You can subjugate them and put them in a place
where they don't feel they have a voice or
complain or they are going to be sympathized with.
I also have to say we're not a community.
A black and brown community, we don't need to have
sympathy.
We're not to be pitied.
We come from a long line heritage of people who
are powerful, proud and intelligent.
We need people to respect us, too.
We want independent investigation, we want
subpoena power.

That's all I have to say.
09:35:58 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Next speaker.
09:36:02 >> Hello.
Carissa step.
1501 East Chelsea Street.
I'm here to support again a civilian review board
that is not what Mayor Buckhorn just signed this
past Friday.
What he did this past Friday was deplorable.
It was not on behalf of the community.
It was not on behalf of the people of Tampa.
My experience has been very much like China's and
Terry's right before me.
I grew up in a neighborhood where I looked at the
place and thought safety.
I now live in a neighborhood where I see the
police and I see how it is an occupation and it
promotes fear in the hearts of my neighbors.
I'm here just to speak against that to say that we
need a civilian review board to keep the police
department accountable to their policies and
accountable to how they treat my neighbors and how
they street the homeless in Tampa.
It needs to be independent so that it's not filled

with people that the Mayor appoints that will be
his yes men.
And it needs to be independent, and it needs to
have subpoena power so it can actually do
something on behalf of the community.
I would encourage you all to do what you can,
please, on behalf of us.
Thank you.
[ APPLAUSE ]
09:37:20 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Next speaker.
09:37:24 >> Good morning, Council.
Thank you for holding this hearing.
I have individual copies for each one of you, a
brochure that is based upon --
09:37:36 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Please state your name for the
record.
09:37:41 >> Reverend Dr. Russell Myer.
5025 Southampton circle in Tampa Palms.
I am the Executive Director of the Florida Council
of churches and the pastor of St. Paul Lutheran
church in Seminole Heights, the oldest Lutheran
church in Tampa from which 11 other congregations
were spawned.
This brochure that you have received is a

summation of full-fledged civilian police review
board that the community has researched with great
depth from a lot of volunteer hours from several
lawyers, and I can tell you that over the past
week, many lawyers in Tampa have written to us and
have taken a completely different approach than
the City Attorney did on your legislative powers
to create a legislative based board with subpoena
power in order to establish something that creates
community trust.
As we move into this new era of the 21st
century, we have to move beyond centers of power
that are at conflict with one another.
Tampa, to be an excellent, great city, has to be a
place where anybody who comes in, wherever they
are on the ladder of socioeconomic progress can
say I know how to participate fully in that city.
I don't have a fear of moving about.
If I have goodwill, good intentions and good
actions, I can step up to the plate.
I will be respected for what I bring to this town,
and I know that there are ways in which I can
fully participate.
And what you are hearing today is a large portion
of the community is saying that simply isn't

available to us.
And one of the pinch points, this isn't the only
one, one of the pinch points is the policy around
policing.
And there will be other pinch points that come up.
What is happening is the community is getting a
consciousness, an awareness.
So the question is, where is your leadership going
to be to help create community goodwill rather
than this antipathy and this opposition?
We don't need power politics.
What we need is love.
The love that has character and the well-being and
respect of every Tampa resident in mind.
Thank you very much.
09:40:32 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Our next speaker.
09:40:34 >> Good morning, Mr. Chair, members of the
Council.
My name is Joyce Hamilton Henry.
I am the director of advocacy for the ACLU of
Florida.
I also live at 1621 palm royals drive.
The ACLU of Florida, we have been very concerned
about the problem of overpolicing in Tampa.
We are concerned about stop, frisk and search.

We have made it very clear that we feel that this
issue should be investigated by the Department of
Justice civil rights division, not the cops
division.
You have heard the problems clearly stated before
and again this morning, and you'll hear it again
repeated by others.
We want a civilian review board that responds to
the needs of the community, that is provided input
from the community.
What has been proposed by the Mayor is an
ineffective model and is a rubber stamp of
existing policies and practices that a community
is saying is problematic.
This is an opportunity for us to address these
problems.
We are calling upon you, our elected officials, to
do the right thing for our community.
We are also, it's important for you to know that
we all want the same thing.
We want transparency, accountability, and we want
improved relationships with the police department
so that we could have a safer community.
Thank you.
09:42:04 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.

Next speaker.
09:42:08 >> Yes.
My name is Mike Pheneger.
I live at 4219 Hollow Trail Drive.
I'm a retired Army colonel, and I chair the local
chapter of the ACLU.
The Mayor's preemptive strike is disturbing simply
because it lacks the authority to investigate.
It lacks the authority to hear witnesses.
It lacks the authority to subpoena people and
documents to investigate issues of police
misconduct and issues of police policy that affect
the community that has been eloquently described
by a number of speakers here today.
The worst part about it, it does not reflect the
community it is supposed to serve, and it will not
be respected by the community that it's supposed
to serve.
So far, Tampa has been lucky in recent years
because we have avoided a Ferguson moment, but we
have had an Arthur Green moment, and that's
disturbing.
The last time I was here, I quoted one statistic I
think that's really important.
And that is that in 2013, there were 250 black

arrests per 1,000 population.
Black arrests were over 55% of all the arrests TPD
made.
That's a statistic.
These folks are telling what you that actually
means in our community.
Now, the difficulty we run into here is that it's
difficult to reform police agencies from the
inside.
It's difficult to reform them with a review board
that is consecrated by and reports to the Mayor
and doesn't reflect the community it's supposed to
serve.
That's what we actually need.
At the last meeting, Councilman Miranda actually
made a comment about the number of police officers
who unfortunately have been killed recently, and
since then, we've had two more.
But it should interest you that we do not want to
see any policemen harmed or injured or killed on
the job.
We do want to make sure they are accountable for
their own actions when they misbehave and do
things that are wrong.
That happens all the time.

It should interest to you know that even at the
national level we don't very well correct at the
inside.
The FBI doesn't collect statistics on the number
of people who are killed by police annually
because it's optional.
Actually, the number as of yesterday was 799.
Since January 1st.
At the same time, we have had about the same
number of police officers killed on the job and
murdered on the job as we have always had.
The worst thing about the 799 is according to the
Washington post a little earlier in the year,
about 16% of those people were not armed.
And that's disturbing.
So we need an effective instrument to effectively
evaluate what's going on because police agencies
don't police themselves.
They don't correct problems internally.
It needs your help.
09:45:15 >>FRANK REDDICK:
We thank you.
09:45:17 >> Thank you.
09:45:17 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next speaker.
[ APPLAUSE ]
09:45:21 >> Hello.

How are you doing?
My name is Bleu Rainer.
I live on Hillsborough avenue.
I just want to tell you a little story.
One of my good friends, boyfriend was traveling in
her car.
Knew she had to pay rent the next day but she
ain't pay no attention.
Cop pulled him over.
Pulled him out of the car.
Say he was driving without a license.
Cool.
We understand.
In her glove compartment box which was looked was
$1,432.
So as they took her boyfriend into custody, he had
the car keys.
So they took the car keys, unlocked the glove
compartment box and got the $1,432 out of the
glove compartment box.
Now this friend of mine is homeless.
That was her rent money.
That's all she had to pay her bills, her light
bill and any other bills that she needed to pay.
But that's beside the fact.

I'm black first.
I have to fight for my black fellow people.
I have to fight for my black neighbors.
I have to fight for anybody.
We're standing here today.
We want a good citizens review board.
We want a citizens review board that we can look
straight through.
We want them to be transparent to us like we're
transparent to them.
We want them to be held accountable for their
actions like they are holding us accountable for
their actions.
Now, we all know that was wrong.
We all know that should have asked her or
consulted with her first before taking her money.
Now she's homeless.
I say again that's no good.
My name is Bleu Rainer.
I don't want to be walking down the street with a
hoodie on and bag of skittles.
I'll be the next one to get shot.
I don't want to be giving my brother a cigarette
and the police walk up and say you are selling
Lucys and now I'm in a chokehold.

I don't want these things happen to me or anybody
in the neighborhood.
We don't need a St. Pete model.
It's not working.
It's not working at all.
If it's working, we'll see the results.
We'll see something more of a Miami model, more of
like a Broward County model.
Something that works for the people, not just
Mayor Buckhorn because he doesn't know.
I never even saw this man walking down
Hillsborough avenue.
For him to say he knows what happens -- excuse my
language, he know what happens in my neighborhood,
I can't believe that.
I can't believe that at all.
Just because we may sag our pants a little bit or
turn our hat backwards a little bit, I'll talk
down the street tomorrow and have my pants
sagging.
Guarantee every cop that roll by me will look at
me twice.
Thank you.
My name is Bleu Rainer.
09:47:59 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next speaker.

09:48:01 >> I'll give my name and address at the end.
To the audience, I want you all to remember --
09:48:06 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Excuse me.
You have to state it at the beginning.
09:48:12 >> Michelle Williams, try me if you want to
boulevard.
I'm here this morning on agenda item number 1.
I want the audience to remember this word fast
because I'll represent at the end of my speech.
The black race can no longer afford to be silent.
There comes a time when every politician must put
principle over popularity.
It's a place where its constituents have to be at
the realm of problem solving.
The vast majority of us stood at the very same
podium a little over a month ago voicing concerns
regarding the civilian review board.
The Mayor with his fast self went and put forth
what he thought was going to be handpicked tokens
of the black community to run this review board.
We didn't ask for that.
We asked just as everyone else before me asked
for, we asked for transparency.
I have watched TPD gain access to federal tax
dollars.

All they've done was buy tonka toys to combat this
alleged terrorism that they say is over in East
Tampa and West Tampa and amongst the black
community.
I have yet to see it when the prior chief, chief
Jane castor, said that -- now, I'm just giving you
statistical reports from the FBI that the City of
Tampa had the lowest crime rate.
Why does the black community have all of the
despair?
You keep terrorizing us with illegal ticketing,
racial profiling, police brutality, targeting the
black lives just because you can abuse your power.
Lie on affidavits.
Huddle in the grocery store parking lot.
You gather there to get lives together.
You want to see an uprising, it's coming.
We're about to break every chain that has
oppressed the African-American race here in the
City of Tampa.
See, we're going outside of Tampa now.
We're taking this justice or else October the
10th, 2015.
That's where we're going to be at in Washington,
D.C.

We keep funding TPD with funds, what should be to
fight the war on poverty in this city, to fight
the housing crisis in this city but yet you keep
allowing this military style defense from the
Tampa Police Department to keep blacks scared and
afraid of them.
Is this what the City of Tampa represents?
You all allow Mayor Buckhorn to take something
away from you and that was your power.
That was your power.
You came to our communities, you sat and paraded
in our church.
You know what, I can't just blame Mayor Buckhorn
because I blame the black people.
We let him pimp us.
We cheer leaded and -- we allowed him to come
inside our churches to say we'll get you some
campaign funding and we'll do this.
I'll tell you one thing, don't meet me in
Washington, beat me in Washington.
That's where we are taking the message.
Washington, D.C. October the 10th, justice or
else.
[ APPLAUSE ]
09:51:18 >> Good morning, members of the Council.

My name is Laila Abdelaziz.
I'm the Legislative and Government Affairs
Director at CAIR Florida.
It's not unbeknownst to people that the Muslim
erican community faces discrimination with law
enforcement and profiling because of their racial
and ethnic backgrounds primarily with federal
government agencies such as the Department of
Justice, Homeland Security, FBI, CBP.
To combat these issues, the federal government and
Department of Homeland Security have created
community engagement roundtables.
I've been a part of the Homeland Security
community roundtable for years.
I have seen how community dialogue and community
input can help foster trust in a place where there
is no trust.
I have seen how community engagement can lead to
effective policing, to effective policing that
keeps communities safe and allows communities to
allow law enforcement into their communities with
trust.
There are officials in this city that have said
because of rising gun crimes and rising gun
violence they want the community involved, and

they want the community's help.
As a community advocate and a community organizer,
I have seen community power resolve and come to
surface around this issue like I have not seen in
my past six years in Tampa.
The community has stepped up and said this is a
solution that we can get behind, an independent
civilian review board with subpoena power to
foster trust, to create effective policing
policies, and to repair the local trust issues
that communities of color very seriously do have
with our law enforcement officers.
No one is blaming the current city officials for
these problems.
As Bleu just mentioned, there are decades of asset
forfeiture laws, decades of bad policing laws that
have fostered this distrust and that have left
low-income communities feeling hurt and
disadvantaged by police officers and law
enforcement.
But these kinds of issues must be solved on the
local level, and they must be solved with fair
community engagement.
We need an independent civilian review board that
is objective of the police department, objective

of the politics in the city and can create that --
be that conduit for trust for our communities.
Tampa is a very diverse city, and we need to
protect and create a legacy that will welcome the
diversity that we have in this state.
09:53:50 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Next.
09:53:51 >> Good morning, Mr. Chairman.
My name is Dr. Bennie Small.
I'm the president of the local branch of the
NAACP.
My address is 308 East Dr. Martin Luther King
Boulevard, Tampa, Florida.
I'm here to support a citizen review board.
I ask that the City Council consider that we have
more transparent, number one, more accountability,
and take more responsibility.
We at the NAACP get numerous calls each day, each
year from citizens in this community feeling that
they have been unfair treated that the message is
not being heard by the police department as well
as the City Council.
We are asking mainly the NAACP that you take a
look at the review board and make sure that the
representative of the community is involved

whenever you do make a decision as to which way
this should go.
We here, the citizens of the community think that
if we have more transparent and be more involved
in the process itself that it would be better for
the people in this community.
When we go around and travel throughout the
country, we feel that the individuals throughout
this country is looking to Tampa to make sure that
this is going to be a better place.
I know that part of the Chamber of Commerce is
saying that Tampa is the police for individuals to
come.
But how can it be a place when you don't have the
fairness treatment for those individuals here in
the community, especially the Afro-American?
I, therefore, recommend that the citizen review
board be more transparent and include more people
in this community.
Thank you very much.
09:55:25 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Next speaker.
09:55:34 >> Arthur Green the III, son of Arthur Green
Junior, who recently lost his life a year ago in
April, April 14th, due to misconduct by the

police and the Tampa Police Department.
I had a list of things that I wanted to say and
bullet points I wanted to make.
Continuously doing this time after time for this
past year and a half, it begins to feel demeaning
and disrespectful to my family to have to come and
speak to these people to see no results, to see no
type of give from the Mayor, from the police.
We consistently have an insensitiveness towards
our family, and I support this civilian review
board so other families don't have to go through
what we've been going through this past year.
We have not had a response from the courts.
We have not heard from the Mayor.
We have not heard from the Tampa Police
Department.
The only times we have heard from the people have
been lies.
We had to contact and continuously contact -- that
night, I had to go and identify my father dead
inside of a hospital room after being mistreated
by a police officer that thought he was drunk when
he was actually having a medical issue.
He was thrown to the ground, pushed on the ground.
In the midst of being handcuffed, he died right

there on the ground.
10, 15 minutes later, finally taken by the
bulance to the hospital considered dead at the
scene.
That night, the police officer who mistreated my
father got to go home to his family.
My father didn't get to come home to his family
and yet will not come home to his family.
What does it take?
Does it take for it to happen to one of the police
officers?
Does it take for it to happen to the Mayor?
Does it take for it to happen to one of you all?
I support the review board so it doesn't happen to
the people out here fighting for this.
They should not have to go through the things we
go through or be treated like we've been treated
by the Tampa Police Department and extension of
other families in the country gone through this.
This is plain disrespectful.
I'm getting to the point where I hate coming to
these things and talk about it because I have to
relive the moment continuously, continuously,
continuously.
I don't get to rest.

I don't get to go home and turn on my TV.
This is something I deal with every day.
I don't get the response, I don't get the coolness
to be around police.
My neighborhood is raided, infected.
It's terrorized by police.
I live in Robles Park area on Avon Street.
A few weeks after that, police were pulling people
over in my neighborhood four times a day.
I live on Avon Street, not Dale Mabry.
Why these people continuously treated like this?
Why we continuously treated like this?
This doesn't make any sense.
For you to do this and the Mayor to do this shows
his continuing disrespect to not care for people
in the community.
All he cares about are the people that live next
to him.
09:58:40 >>FRANK REDDICK:
We thank you.
[ APPLAUSE ]
Next speaker.
09:58:49 >> Good morning.
My name is Connie Burton, 4220 patsy court.
Much is being said about the charter.
I want to encourage this Council this morning to

take power that is in the charter that says when
the Mayor is not in place, it is the acting
Chairman of this Council that should be in charge.
And if that is so, we need the Chairman this
morning to declare by executive order that he
wants a citizen review board with power.
We want the Chairman, we want this board, we want
you to listen to the people in the direction we
continuously and constantly complain about the
ongoing issues.
What the Mayor has done is exposed himself to a
period of time when African people being
mistreated.
Abuse of the police and the Mayor is saying now
that we can have business as usual.
I'm a community organizer, and all over the world,
the people is making the same outcry, injustice.
It's not just in Tampa, but the Council and the
administrators and the politicians of Tampa has to
seize the time now because we won't be quiet and
we won't go back.
The injustice system is broken.
Law has been removed from every police car to
serve and protect because they serve as a military
occupation in our community that we don't need

them there, we haven't called them, they are
there.
There is no healthy respect from our community
because we don't see transparency.
Yet we go on with these slogans we feel for them.
No.
We need to you feel for all of the citizens.
We are on the move.
I am a community organizer and I could not have
passed out a million flyers in all of the United
States to get people on one accord.
That's where we are at.
We are calling for justice.
We have looked at the arch of injustice and see
that it is broken.
For people to take it personal that we are
demonizing the police, no, that's not what we're
saying.
What we are saying is we need accountability from
all sides.
We need a balance of power from all sides, and we
need for this Council to stand up against this
wannabe, longtime and he won't be the governor of
this great state.
He will not be.

Because his legacy will follow him.
But you have a responsibility to build your own
legacy based on truth.
Thank you.
10:01:47 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next speaker.
10:01:48 >> Hello.
My name is tiger.
I'm 19 years old.
I live in Pasco County.
I am a nursing student and I work full-time taking
care of a five-month-old baby.
I was in a car accident not long ago, and the
policeman that responded was very nice and helpful
to me although I did receive a ticket for the
accident.
This has not been the case for my boyfriend who is
also 19 years old.
Angel has a full-time job as well.
Comes from a hardworking abiding family who moved
here from Puerto Rico.
He was recently pulled over from the Tampa PD for
a case of mistaken identity.
They thought he was a father who had an unpaid
ticket which he did not receive in the mail.
Otherwise he would have paid.

The initial police officer pulled him over, asked
for his license and went back to his cop car.
At that point, two other officers arrived to the
scene and started questioning him, asking him why
he looked nervous, asking him all questions that
were irrelevant to the situation because he was
not the person they were looking for.
My boyfriend is also diabetic and has an insulin
pump.
The alarm on his pump was going off because he ran
out of insulin and he was due for a shot.
The cops made him turn the alarm off and acted as
though they were reaching for something even
though they were the ones who told him to turn it
off.
Because of this, my boyfriend is now scared of the
police and nervous while driving even though he's
never been in trouble and done anything wrong.
This experience makes me fearful for him whenever
he's driving alone.
It makes me feel like I have to drive when we're
going places.
It's because of this experience that I'm afraid
I'll get a call that he is in jail for something
he didn't do, he has died or is in the hospital

for his medical condition.
I strongly support a civilian review board with
subpoena power made up of everyday people from
diverse background who understands the importance
of holding the police accountable so no one
experiences what we have.
Thank you.
10:04:04 >> Hello.
I am Jason James.
My father lives in South Tampa south of Gandy.
I am here to implore you all to enact an
independent citizen review board with the power to
hire, subpoena and independently investigate the
Tampa Police Department.
It is more than -- as Ali said, police brutality.
Abusive overpolicing.
Stop, frisk and illegal search.
Illegal -- house searches.
This Mayor on Friday, you know, tried to usurp
your-all's power.
This Mayor does not care about the black
community.
He only cares about those from Palma Ceia,
Culbreath, Davis island, Bayshore, Harbour Island,
Tampa Palms, all of New Tampa, but East Tampa,

West Tampa, Sulphur Springs, Robles Park, nah, he
don't care about them.
The people from East Tampa, West Tampa, these
areas have been telling you all and the Mayor that
the police are running rampant.
They are militarized running tanks down streets,
breaking down houses for search warrant for $2 of
weed.
Like, for real.
I'm serious.
They are running rampant.
We need to reform the police department, one.
But I am here to support what the Tampa for
justice has put forward, a civilian review board
with teeth.
Power to hire.
Power to independently investigate.
The black community does not trust the police with
cause.
I'm tired of waking up every other day hearing
another black person was shot unarmed by a police
officer, and they almost never get held
accountable for what they do.
I'm tired of seeing my community oppressed by the
systemic White supremacy and forced by the police.

I've heard stories time and again of police
illegally searching people and their homes and
vehicles.
I am tired, and the community is fed up and we're
not taking any more.
10:06:43 >> Good morning, Council.
My name is Bishop Michelle B. Patty.
I live in Brandon, Florida.
However, that do not preclude me from seeing about
what is going on in the City of Tampa because when
I travel to the city, I don't get a pass from the
police officer if I commit a crime.
I'm here out of concern about the Mayor imbalance
of who he will choose to be on this board.
I don't come wasting my time.
I'm asking, do this board have power or does the
Mayor has the absolute power that he has alluded
to in the community?
We also need to have people on this board that is,
has a relationship with the community.
If they are hand picked and they have no
relationship to the community, then the community
will not trust them and the board would just be
that -- a board.
I'm asking that you look at who you're going to

put on the board, that the people, we should not
be able to be on the board because we live in
Brandon or whatever.
It should be people that have a relationship with
the people.
Also in 2015, I'm every day having to explain to
my 12-year-old grandson how this officer who is in
fear of his life and that's something that needs
to be taken out.
You're in fear of your life.
How can you be in fear of your life with an
unarmed person and you shoot this person down 12
times.
I'm having to tell my 12-year-old grandson that if
he is riding on the bicycle and someone pull him
over, keep his hand in the air.
He can't have a good time as an African-American
child.
There is something wrong in America that we are
dealing with these type of issues that we dealt
with in the 1920s.
I'm here asking this board if you don't have the
power, let us know now so we won't waste our time
coming down here to speak.
And the Mayor, I'm very disappointed that he would

once again say this is it.
This is the way it is not to us the taxpayer and
not to the people that we are voters.
You came to our community, you said what you would
do on behalf of the people.
Now the people are here speaking and we want to
see you rise up to the occasion and let the
community know that you stand behind what you
promised us, and that's fairness, equity, and
protection here in the City of Tampa.
Thank you so much.
10:09:14 >> Good morning.
Eugene Harrison, community member.
Over the last year, I have volunteered with SCIU
because I felt like it was time for me to stand
up, time for me to do something.
I'm one of those guys who don't like to say much.
But as I continue to see this happening in my
community, a lot of us sitting around and not
saying anything, today I feel that it is necessary
for me to step up and tell my story as well.
I once was Ybor City and picked up a metal pipe.
I got arrested for carrying a concealed weapon.
I almost had my arm pulled out of the socket.
I was choked.

After that, I had that charge on me for years.
Later when I went to court, they dismissed it, but
every time I still have carrying a concealed
weapon on my record even though I was innocent.
Again, every time I got pulled over, the police
would have their gun ready for me.
Every time they pulled over.
And it was a fear that I have.
As black men, we fear the police.
I'm telling you this from the bottom of my heart
out of fear.
I didn't think I would live to be 21.
I didn't think I would live to be 30, because
every time I got pulled over for some odd reason,
your light, your taillight is out, but it was
never out.
You look like someone or every time this continues
to happen over and over and never knowing if that
day I was going to be shot.
I now have a son that I have to prepare him how to
live day to day because I don't know if the
officer is going to shoot my child.
We see this time and time again, and there's no
accountability.
So we know if he's shooting my son, the odds of

something happen is very slim.
I stand here as a concerned parent.
I stand here for the people.
I stand here for every man that was silenced that
don't come out, that don't express their feelings
about what need to happen.
I'm here because I want to see change.
This citizen review board, it sounds like
something amazing, but you've got to make it work.
You've got a make it work for the people.
Once officers know they'll be held accountable for
their actions, things will change.
Please, do your jobs.
Thank you.
[ APPLAUSE ]
10:11:51 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
Next speaker.
10:11:53 >> Good morning, Council members.
My name is TJ Grimaldi.
I am an attorney here in Tampa.
It's an interesting analogy that somebody used a
$2 marijuana possession.
I represent Patricia Silliman.
She's the mother of the now deceased Jason
Westcott.

Jason Westcott lived in a home in Seminole Heights
and an army of police officers attempted to
execute a search warrant for what turned out to be
two dollars' worth of marijuana in the home.
He was brutally murdered while in the home.
There have been multiple news accounts as what
supposedly occurred, including a large article
that was in the Tampa Bay Times.
The Tampa Bay Times highlighted how the police
officers that were investigating the case took the
words of a confidential informant.
That confidential informant has a rap sheet longer
than I am tall.
They decided to take every word as it was and also
coached him on what he should say and how he
should say it, including according to this person,
manufacturing, a buy did not occur.
Meaning the confidential informant went into the
home to buy an amount of marijuana, $60, by the
way, and there was no marijuana to be found.
But the police officer -- according to this
confidential informant, the police officer told
him, don't worry, we'll take care of that.
They executed a search warrant upon execution of a
search warrant on approximately 700-square-foot

home with a bay window the size of the plaque in
front of me with absolutely no window dressings
could see directly in the home, stormed the home
with an army of S.W.A.T. officers.
As a result of what occurred, after supposedly the
loudest knock in police history according to
multiple police officers' testimony, they raided
the home.
Pulled him off the couch while they are supposedly
screaming police officers, police officers, opened
the door and shot Jason Westcott dead.
This is not a color issue.
This involves all members of this community, and
that's why something along the lines of the
citizen review board is something that can help
these officers be held accountable.
Jason Westcott respected police officers.
I respect police officers.
There are people in this room that respect police
officers.
Unfortunately, there are bad apples and there are
rogue police officers.
And an open citizen review board, not an
appeasement review board that has been passed by
the Mayor, but an open citizen review board with

actual control and actual power to suggest things
and review things would only help those rogue
police officers, and those police officers that
take the law into their own hands, perform their
duties as they are supposed to do.
They are hired to serve and protect.
They need to make sure that they are doing that.
Thank you.
10:14:44 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next speaker.
10:14:48 >> I am Patti Silliman.
Jason Westcott was my son.
I am tired of standing in front of the police
department holding a sign, asking who's going to
hold Tampa police accountable for killing my son.
My son was raised by a police officer.
As soon as this entire incident happened, I knew
it was a lie.
And I brought that out on several different
occasions.
A review board that works is definitely necessary,
and a review board coupled with the body cameras
that I've been advocating for on the police
officers will definitely deter police officers
that make bad decisions from making those bad
decisions.

I think that what I'm hearing in here today by
every single person that comes up here is
accountability.
They want accountability.
I want accountability.
Somebody needs to be held accountable for what
happened to my son, and that's why I am here
today.
Thank you.
10:16:02 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
[ APPLAUSE ]
All right.
Next speaker.
10:16:09 >> Hi.
My name is Israel Reyes.
On May 27th of 2014, the Tampa Police Department
raided me and Jason Westcott's home and shot and
killed Jason Westcott right in front of my own
eyes.
I was asleep on the couch as the officers came in
unannounced and threw me onto the ground and
slammed my face onto the concrete floors and
handcuffed me while I sat there and watched them
pull their guns and shoot at Jason Westcott.
I seen all the blood splatter on the bathroom

walls, and I am a victim of police brutality, just
like the people up on the podium before me.
And we need a civilian review board to police the
police because they lied ever since the get-go.
They didn't tell the truth.
The only person who ever came forward and ever
said anything was the confidential informant, the
one who led them to the house in the first place.
As a result, Patti Silliman had to stand outside
the police department holding a question, who will
hold the Tampa Police Department accountable for
killing her son?
That's something no mother should have to go
through.
That's why we are here today so we can have an
independent civilian review board for Tampa.
Thank you.
[ APPLAUSE ]
10:17:49 >> Good morning, City Council, everyone present.
My name is Preston Schofield.
This is my second time before this Council to try
to get you to do a citizens review board, one that
is transparent, accountable and responsible and
one comprised of people like me.
Not a person that has money or political clout in

the city but someone who will say enough is
enough.
When I came before you the last time, I asked that
you would please look at my car being stolen from
me by the Tampa Police Department and now being
driven by a Tampa police officer without any due
process in the court of law.
The 4th amendment of the U.S. Constitution
states -- search and seizures.
I am a victim of that not one time but two times
in the City of Tampa.
January 3, 2014, while I was stopped by an officer
because he said I was driving a car with tinted
windows, which belonged to my brother, who is a
witness, and it was filmed and documented.
They pulled me out of the car, threw me to the
car, handcuffed me, pulled my arms up behind my
back until my shoulder popped.
I had to have left shoulder surgery.
When I went to the police station, to the jail,
they gave me a CRA, which the police write.
When I came and did a report to try to get my car
back, they changed the CRA.
I tried to talk to Chief Jane Castor, Detective
Minello, like I said before, ran me out of the

police station with several officers so I couldn't
make a police report.
So I leave there and go down to U.S. District
Court on Florida and Cass and filed a civil
lawsuit against the Tampa Police Department.
I have it documented.
It's not me making up the story.
This is my shoulder that I'm always going to have
as long as I live with three scars from the Tampa
Police Department.
Not every officer here is crooked or corrupt, but
you have some who think they are above and beyond
the law.
If you have a citizen review board and it's
comprised of people handpicked by the Mayor,
nothing will get done.
You got people in this room that have -- in them
now.
See, America is supposed to be the greatest
country of all time.
I served the 82nd airborne division -- overseas in
every country, some of them you can't name because
my records are sealed.
How can I fight for the constitution but come to
Tampa Florida and can't get the same rights?

Something has to be changed.
I'm asking each and every Council member to stand
up to the Mayor and say, Mayor, enough is enough.
If you got a problem with interpretation of the
law, ask me, I can help you.
I'm not a lawyer but I can read very well.
Mr. Shelby, as the lawyer, you are fighting
against the Mayor's lawyer, if you need help, call
me.
I am the host of the WTMP, The Voice, with my
cohost Michelle Williams in the back there.
10:20:33 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next speaker.
10:20:39 >> Derek Chamblee, homeless network at large.
Google
D-E-R-E-K C-H-A-M-B-L-E-E.
The holy spirit speaks through the prophet Isaiah
in the 33rd chapter.
The Lord is our judge.
The Lord is our lawgiver.
The Lord is our king.
He will save us.
Jesus is king.
I don't remember his name.
He wrote it on a little piece of paper.
He's with the criminal intelligence bureau and

there were three agents after my last speech
trying to coach me on how to speak here.
I want to give you an update on this federal
investigation of Mayor Bob Buckhorn the City
Council, the City of Tampa and Tampa Police
Department.
In April, all when the times broke the story about
the bicyclist that there was possibly racial
profiling of a bicyclist, Mayor Bob Buckhorn and
police chief castor contacted the U.S. Department
of Justice and their investigative arm is the FBI,
the federal bureau of investigation to investigate
their own police department.
And at that time, the police chief, Jane castor
was quoted by the times as saying that their
operation was systematic, surgical, the Mayor said
that if there's racial profiling on the
bicyclists, over 80% of them happen to be
African-American, then, what he say, immoral
quoted by the times.
Illegal and no city department is allowed to do
that.
Oh, but I've spoken with many of the police
officers and all the way up.
They say that the orders are coming from the top.

Oh, Mayor Bob Buckhorn is contacting the U.S.
department of justice to investigate the Tampa
police as if he already doesn't know these things.
Because when he was an aide to Mayor Sandy
Freeman, he crafted this diabolical, systematic
program against the poor and the homeless.
The poor and the homeless come in all colors.
They are White.
They are black.
They are red.
They are yellow.
They are in wheelchairs.
Oh, it's diabolical, you laugh, but they are going
to jail all the time.
I've been in St. Pete for 50 days.
I come back, 7 of our people died on the streets.
They put them all in jail.
They repeal the panhandling thing.
Okay.
So what they have done here with the CIB, the
criminal intelligence bureau, is they are creating
a class of people in America that have no rights.
10:23:48 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
10:23:49 >> We're going to expand this federal
investigation to include St. Petersburg, Tampa,

Orlando, Jacksonville.
10:23:54 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you, sir.
Next speaker.
10:23:58 >> Federal middle district of Florida --
10:24:00 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next speaker.
10:24:01 >> Through every county --
10:24:07 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Remove him.
10:24:10 >> The federal Chief Justice.
10:24:10 >> My name is John Young.
I live in Hillsborough County.
I want to talk about the red light cameras.
Why do we have so many in our neighborhood and not
in my friend's neighborhood.
I have a friend that comes visit me.
Won't come visit me because he gets a red light
ticket.
You can't make a right turn no more.
Why is that, Mr. Reddick?
10:24:52 >>FRANK REDDICK:
What's the question?
10:24:53 >> That we have so many red light cameras in our
neighborhood and not across Dale Mabry, we don't
have any.
Davis island don't have any.
We know how to drive like everybody else.
We go to the same driver's license courses.

Why do we have so many red light cameras in our
neighborhood?
158 -- a man sitting behind a desk getting
disability, a lot of money, man.
You should be ashamed of yourself.
I used to put up red lights.
80% of the red lights I installed.
I know about the 10th of the second.
The secret that the city won't tell you all.
We need to stop it.
It hitting me in my pocket now.
I'll tell the secrets of how we can set the light
back a tenth of a second to get 158.
That's $70 million.
I got kids on Hillsborough.
We got potholes where you're getting all the red
light cameras in, we got all the potholes.
I'm not here on the review board.
I want to talk about the red light cameras.
Just said on the news, $70 million you collected
but we got 90% of the potholes.
Go to Palma Ceia, can't find a pothole.
Need to be ashamed of yourself.
You need to be ashamed of yourself.
When you get one, you don't have to come down

here.
I used to work for the city.
You know how that go.
Come on.
Talk to me.
You go to sleep and wake up tomorrow, think about
the little kids getting killed walking to school
that you can't put up a cross light but we can let
kids get killed by a red light.
The kids are not getting killed by people running
the red light.
They are getting killed by people trying to stop
from getting a ticket.
Wake up.
Sleep good, bro.
10:26:56 >> My name is Marquell Cooper.
10:27:03 >> And my name is Aaron Rubell.
10:27:03 >> I'm from 8106 North Marbury Street, Sulphur
Springs.
We support Tampa for Justice, but when I walked in
the room today, I was like kind of nervous to walk
in.
Literally, yesterday, a White boy got shot down
the street.
So I walked down the street and, like, he's on the

ground.
He was saying I want to live.
I want to live.
Nobody was outside.
It was only me.
Thinking about it, they are going to think I shot
him.
I called them.
As soon as they came, he was a White boy.
They came quick.
If he was black, they would have come 40 minutes
later.
Me being me, I want just for everybody, like, we
stop all the violence and stop killing each other.
Thank you.
10:28:07 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Before you speak, anyone else
going to plan on speaking need to get in line so
we know how many we've got left.
If you plan on speaking, you need to line up or
else we're going to stop with this young lady in
line.
10:28:22 >> There are a whole bunch of folks in the hall
that would like to speak as well.
10:28:25 >>FRANK REDDICK:
They need to come in.
10:28:30 >> Sir, can you let the people in the hall come in

because there are a lot of people in the hall who
would like to speak.
I'll go outside in a second and let folks know.
Thank you.
10:28:44 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Hold on, hold on.
We don't need you to go outside.
What we need are those who want to speak and they
are sitting out there in the hallway, they need to
come in right now or else the young lady standing
at the back of the line will be the last person.
10:29:04 >> Can you let folks know out there?
Thank you, Chairman.
10:29:17 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
Let's go.
10:29:19 >> Good morning, Council.
Thank you for initiating this robust discussion on
a very important issue here in the City of Tampa
that's been needing to be addressed for quite some
time.
I think it's incredibly important, and you can
tell from the passion in the room and the amount
of people who have come out to discuss this.
Accountability, transparency, respect, these are a
lot of the themes that we're hearing this morning.
I wanted to mention a couple of the points the

Mayor made last Friday during his press conference
because he was talking a lot about these problems
don't exist in Tampa, that these things happen in
other places.
This isn't Ferguson, he said.
This isn't Cleveland.
These are members of our community that all live
right here in Tampa.
Jason Westcott lived in my neighborhood.
Arthur Green was pulled over two blocks from my
house.
Andrew Joseph lived here in Tampa.
We do not need another name to add to this list.
I'll tell you, there's a lot of people who have
had issues like this that the media has not
reported on and there are a lot of people that
would be in this room right now if they knew about
City Council hearing this issue this morning or if
they had the opportunity to take work off to be
here to testify.
We're in this community every single day, in
people's houses, talking to them at their jobs, on
the street, this is a major issue of concern.
This is not about an ax to grind -- maybe it is
for a couple -- but this is really about creating

a healthy, mutual respectful relationship in the
community, and we want to work with the City
Council.
We want to work with the Mayor to create something
here that is going to change the dynamic because
this dynamic is incredibly unhealthy.
It cannot continue.
This is an historical moment here.
You can go down on the right side or the wrong
side.
We have seen that the Mayor is preferring to push
this issue under the rug.
Not let the citizens have their say.
What does it really mean when there is a citizen
review board and every member is appointed by him,
except for two.
You shouldn't be very happy as Council members on
that issue in particularly.
It also needs to have teeth.
If it's going to be legitimate and genuine and
actually solve the problems that we're talking
about here, even to begin to address it, it has to
be real.
Let's make it real.
Thank you for your time.

10:31:49 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Please state your name for the
record.
10:31:53 >> Kently Benjamin.
10:31:55 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Next speaker.
10:31:59 >> Good morning, Council members.
Christopher Connor for the record.
You know, you don't really believe a lot of these
things until it happens to you personally.
I was pulled over by police officers April of
2014.
Said I had a taillight out.
I said can I get out and look?
No.
Officer says, what is that smell?
I said, I don't smell anything.
Officer says, all right.
When my partner gets here, we'll search your car.
I said, sir, I won't consent.
He said that's fine.
We'll drag you out the window and search anyway.
All I could think of was the two weeks prior when
my good friend Arthur Green lost his father and I
thought wow, what if my mother reads in the
headlines that she lost me.

I realized all officers aren't necessarily good
officers, that a review process should happen.
I firmly believe that if Mayor Buckhorn cared
enough, we would already have a top-down review of
every single officer in the police department when
he appointed a new police chief.
In running an agency, Chief Ward should be doing a
top-down review.
Unfortunately, here we are today with the citizens
asking we'll review it if that's the case.
We have to review it after the fact.
The citizen review board will be reactive.
They hear cases, corrupt cases and have to deal
with it.
What I'm asking you as a Council is give it teeth.
Each of you should have your own appointments.
This citizen review board should have subpoena
power.
It should have power to regulate the agency that
our Mayor doesn't seem to want to regulate that
our police chief is failing to regulate.
Two explanations, either willful ignorance or
complicitness, and it can't be both.
I'm asking as a Council, pass a citizen review
board with teeth to deal with the unethical and

corrupt practices.
We're going on two police chiefs now that have
failed to do this and now we are an embarrassment
before the whole country because the federal
government breaks the story on us that we have
racial profiling.
That's nothing new to anybody who has been born
and raised here, especially from West Tampa or
East Tampa.
If you cross Kennedy, maybe you might not feel
that as much.
But I guarantee you, if you don't have the
complexion for the protection if you live on
harbor island, you will.
10:34:25 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next speaker.
10:34:26 >> Good afternoon.
My name is Daniel ROBLES.
I live near Seminole Heights.
I'm here in reference to my best friend Jason
Westcott who was killed on May 27th, 2014.
I want to bring up the question rather than
investigating everything that happened from when
he went into the house, the Tampa Police
Department raiding, I want to know what led up
into that.

Why isn't it being investigated -- why is it only
being investigated from the point they entered the
house and everything from way past before that the
seven months prior to when he called the police
department for his life.
He was afraid of his life because people said they
would come in, break in his house, tie him up,
kill him, take husband dog, TVs and other stuff.
Where was the Tampa Police Department then?
They were the ones who told him if anybody were to
come to the door to shoot to kill no matter his
mother, dog, regardless.
I know Jason Westcott, being raised by Patti
Silliman and a police officer at home, he would
have never raised a gun.
My question today is, who is going to be
accountable for my best friend?
Who will put Patti Silliman to rest?
This is ridiculous.
Every single day, there is someone else being
charged of a crime that they don't do.
People being pulled over.
They are scared just to see the police lights in
their rearview mirror because they don't want to
get shot.

This is ridiculous.
You guys here today, I understand you sit here and
listen to all of us but I don't think you guys are
taking anything we say into account.
If so, if this is any one of your family members
up here, I guarantee things would have been
changed from day one.
That's all I have to say.
10:36:10 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next speaker.
10:36:13 >> Sarah Marshall, 307 East Francis Avenue.
I think the point has been driven home that we
want an independent civilian review board with
subpoena power.
We don't want the crumbs.
We don't want to be appeased and patted on the
head with what the Mayor has preemptively
appointed.
The police tell us, if you're not doing anything
wrong, what's the problem, why can't we take a
look?
We're asking that of them.
If you're not doing anything wrong, what's the
problem?
10:36:56 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Next speaker.
10:36:59 >> Good morning.

Reverend Bernice Powell Jackson.
I'm here today as pastor of First United Church of
Tampa.
And I was standing outside for almost an hour,
really, listening to all of the testimony.
This is an amazing, amazing cross section of
citizens of this city, young and old, black and
White, just amazing cross section of people
sharing with you their stories.
And I think what their stories are telling all of
us, the stories of mothers who have lost sons, of
sons who have lost fathers, of fiancés who were
afraid of losing their loved one, of people
themselves who have been victims, police
harassment or brutality.
And we all know that it happens.
We also know that the majority of police officers
are not bad, but what I hear loud and clear across
this city and I think what many people are hearing
is the need for an independent civilian review
board with subpoena power that really has the
community input.
What we have heard so far does not include that.
So I think the City of Tampa is at a moment in
time where it can choose which way it wants to go

and you are in that position once again of trying
to figure out what is -- how you can live out the
authority that is given to you, and how you can
really represent all of the citizens of our city.
10:38:46 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Let me make this known again because I see
additional people have got in line.
I'll state this for the last time, if you plan to
speak and you have not spoken, you need to get up
there now or the gentleman in line now will be the
last person.
We're not going to sit here and let people keep
adding on to the line.
If you need to speak, stand in line now, if you
haven't spoken already.
Before you speak, we want to make sure there's no
one else out there.
10:40:37 >> My name Romy Russman.
I live off of 24th Avenue off of Nebraska.
I'm here to give a face to -- I know we hear a lot
of black men talking about racial profiling.
Face for black women who have been racial
profiling.
Not every black woman who walks on Nebraska is a
prostitute.

There are so many times I walked -- I grew up in
suburbia America, where I had cops in my school.
They were friendly.
I didn't have any problem with them.
Coming here in the inner City of Tampa choosing to
live in the inner City of Tampa and walking down
my own neighborhood being stopped and being
harassed, not even being spoken to as a human
being, yeah, you're doing your job, fine, yeah.
But I am a human being and would like to be treat
with respect.
That's all I'm asking for.
What does it look like?
I don't know what else, review board where I would
be able to express my feelings, express what had
happened to me to a review board that would be
able to do something.
Not just somebody that I can just talk to, but I
need a review board that has power, basically.
That's what I'm trying to say, subpoena that would
be able to look into stories like mine and be able
to do something.
That's where you guys come in and having that
power to do so.
I have so many stories living in the inner city

because I've had fear of cops here.
I didn't grow up with the fear of cops.
They were friendly where I grew up.
But here in Tampa, it is a completely different
situation where I could be -- I like to run around
my neighborhood just for exercise, and when I go
into the whiter areas in Nebraska, I'm afraid
somebody will call the cops on me because I'm a
black person running in a White neighborhood.
Why is that?
That is my neighbor.
It's like three blocks down from me.
I support Tampa for justice for that.
Thank you.
10:43:19 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Next speaker.
10:43:23 >> Hi.
My name is -- Scott.
About you all polices and stuff like that, like
all they do is harass people, saying you-all they
killin'.
I say you all ain't doing nothing about it.
There should have been a change, know what I'm
sayin'?
People talking and wasting their breath for no

reason because -- seem like you all ain't got no
power.
You all don't even --
You know what I'm sayin'?
We don't even call the police when something
happen to us, know what I'm sayin'?
Something going bad, I'm sayin', because we don't
know who.
We know what will happen.
They ain't coming there to protect.
They coming there to shoot or kill the first
person who they feel violent or whatever.
Know what I'm saying?
When we start protecting ourselves -- know what
I'm saying -- then it's a problem.
Know what I'm saying?
Somebody got to change so I'm saying somebody got
to make a move or something.
I'm saying you all sitting around listening
probably ain't taking nothing into consideration.
Know what I'm saying?
I just got to say something because I hope it gets
somewhere.
Know what I'm saying?
Peace.

10:44:36 >> Bob Gibson, 20318 Autumn Fern.
You guys have an opportunity to take the righteous
path.
I think we have listened to testimony.
You have statistics.
You have testimony.
You have firsthand testimony.
About what is happening in this community.
You had the police chief in here last session who,
quite frankly, disrespected their stories and
disrespected you as a board by showing up here
with absolutely nothing.
He choice the -- he chose the wrong path.
Last Friday, the Mayor decided to issue his edict
on what he feels the citizens review board should
look like, and in my opinion, he chose the wrong
path.
You guys have a real opportunity here to listen to
your constituents, to look at the statistics, and
I can tell you from what I have heard, from what I
have seen, there is smoke, and the fire is ready
to take over everything because this cannot
continue.
You are an independently elected board.
You have the authority to do this.

Do not hide behind the legal mumbo jumbo.
You are leaders.
Make a decision and do the right thing.
The legal stuff will sort itself out.
You have the authority to choose to do it, please.
This cannot continue.
Tampa cannot have this type of reputation if it
wants to be the city of the future.
So, please, take what your constituents are
telling you, what the statistics tell you, and do
the right thing.
What we are offering is not unreasonable.
This has been done in other cities.
You can do it.
I ask you to do it for me, for your constituents
and for the future of this city.
Thank you.
10:46:37 >> Hi.
Becky.
16393 -- village drive.
I'm here today not because I've been a victim of
police violence or because my family has, but
because it's the right thing to do.
I work in the community, in the Tampa community,
and it's incredibly integral that we create

something that will hold police accountable.
We also need the people who are on this board to
not be appointed by the Mayor or appointed by, you
know, people from places that live where I live in
New Tampa.
We need to be of the people.
The whole problem with the city and with the Tampa
Police Department right now is that the people who
are policing these neighborhoods are not of this
neighborhood.
They are not from this neighborhood.
So they have no idea what's going on, and they
have no idea that the population of the people
that are there.
So they assume, just as Lester just said, every
person, every woman who is black who is walking
down Nebraska is a street walker or every person
who is black who is walking down the street is
committing a crime.
We need police accountability, and we need for you
all to do the right thing.
Thank you.
10:47:46 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
10:47:49 >> Ashley Whitney.
703 East Forest Avenue.

I actually live right in a lot of these
neighborhoods that you're speaking of.
I'm also a community organizer.
By day I drive through the neighborhoods for
several hours.
I see people pulled over for what looks like
nothing or something minimal.
At night when it's dark on my way home, every
single night I see people pulled over and they
never look like me.
That's got to change.
Thank you.
10:48:26 >> Hi.
My name is Trisha Hodge.
1436 Heaven Sent Lane.
And I am a community organizer, and I'm not here
to bash police officers or say all of them are
negative or bad apples, because I've had
interactions with police officers myself, and I
won't sit here and say that they've all been
negative or anything like that.
They all went smoothly.
But I am here to stand on behalf of my community
because I have brothers and sisters who have been
pulled over for things, you know, that they have

not done or that they are innocent, and I've seen
it firsthand.
I used to live in the USF area, and that is an
area where there are a lot of police officers.
There's a lot of -- a lot going on in that area.
I've seen get pulled over just walking down the
street or riding their bike in.
You'll see the police cars aggressively turn from
wherever they are, just turn onto the sidewalk and
stop these people and you've got to wonder, you
know, what is going on.
I think we all as a community, we need to be on
one accord.
Everyone from the community, the children, the
parents, to law officials, everyone together, we
need to be on one accord and make this happen,
because it shouldn't really be this hard to get
something handled that's an issue, and I come here
to support it because I think it needs to be done.
There are a lot of police officers who are
positive for this community and then those --
there are others that, you know, need to kind of
be straightened out.
Like they said, there needs to be reform and I do
support that.

Thank you.
10:50:17 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Next speaker.
10:50:25 >> Good morning.
My name is Ali Shakoor.
I live in Brandon, Florida, 1311 Versant Drive.
I'm here to support the civilian review board.
I started becoming more active in my community.
I've been looking at news reports and talking to
people in my neighborhood, talking to people
around town about what's going on as far as police
harassment.
I've also been a criminal defense attorney here in
Tampa for over 11 years.
I love Tampa, I also as a criminal defense
attorney have encountered clients who have
encountered corruption with police officers.
Clients who have said, no, you can't search my car
and the police are searching the car anyway.
I've had clients say, no, you can't search my
person, you can't search my body, but police
officer search the person anyway.
This is not acceptable.
I'm not here to bash police officers.
There are some wonderful police officers.

I personally experience some wonderful, caring
police officers who do their job.
But the ones who don't do their job, the one who
use their authority to bully people and facilitate
corruption, they must be held accountable.
The people here aren't asking for too much.
They are asking for a civilian review board that
is representative of the community having the
Mayor elect nine out of eleven members.
Vast majority of the members sends the wrong
message.
By not asking the community, by not asking the
community to offer a representative or taking a
representative from the community, it seems like
the City Council that the Mayor is afraid of what
they might find out.
As opposed to when they need to find out.
Mayor Buckhorn, Mayor of all Tampa, not just the
nice areas.
I volunteer the boys and girls club.
I was asking, do you know who the Mayor is?
They had no idea.
They didn't know who Mayor Buckhorn was.
You can make that about ignorance.
You can make it about the fact that he's not in

the community.
He's not walking those streets.
It's not too much to ask.
Again, there is a great amount of excellent police
officers.
There are some flat-out corrupt.
They must be held accountable.
You as elected officials, you have the power to do
something about that.
I'm asking you respectfully to reject the Mayor's
proposal and put together a civilian review board
made up of the people, the communities most
affected by police because it helps everybody.
Thank you for your time.
10:52:53 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
All right.
We want to thank everyone who had the opportunity
to come here and speak during the public comment.
What we're going to do is, Ms. Montelione
requested two items to be discussed, 13, 17, then
item 5 and then we'll hear from the police chief.
If staff is here for items 13 and 17.
10:53:17 >> Yes, Ms. Duncan is coming to the podium.
Thank you, Ms. Duncan, for being here.
This is about as last-minute pull of an item we

get.
Item 13, $74,985.09 to be issued to Hillsborough
County for a payment on the parsons Brinckerhoff
contract for go Hillsborough, correct?
10:53:51 >> Actually, the dollars are going to our
consultant parsons Brinckerhoff directly.
10:53:57 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
We have parsons Brinckerhoff
under contract.
This isn't a contribution to the Hillsborough
County contract?
10:54:04 >> Correct.
It's an engagement of professional services with
parsons Brinckerhoff.
However, the work that they are doing is tied in
with the contract that the county does have with
parsons as well.
When it was determined by the policy leadership
group board that there was another series of
meetings, public engagement and project list
development that would be required to the tune of
about 55 more public meetings, the county reached
out to the city and asked if we could make a
contribution for the work that's being done for
the cities.
The services that they are performing for the

city, that is what this work order is covering
with the 74,000 plus dollars in this work order.
10:54:48 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
But it is a separate contract.
10:54:49 >> It is a separate contract.
10:54:51 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
So, how is the dollar amount --
because I've never seen an individual contract be
drawn up for such a specific dollar amount unless
it was construction related and materials were
involved.
It strikes me as odd.
10:55:06 >> There is a breakout in the scope that shows the
man-hours and how that dollar figure was arrived
at.
10:55:12 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Was this put out for bid by the
city?
10:55:16 >> No, the city has the opportunity through our
procurement regulations that if it's under the
threshold of $100,000, we go through a lesser
process of procuring the consultant.
We don't put it out through advertisement and RFQ,
so we use that standard process --
10:55:34 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I'm sorry.
Another 25,000 more or less and we'll be at the
$100,000 mark.
From what I understand, the parsons Brinckerhoff

contract at Hillsborough County is reaching
upwards of three-quarters of a million dollars.
10:55:47 >> Yes, it's actually about 1.3 million as of this
point.
10:55:51 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I was being generous.
I knew that.
1.3 is where they are at now.
10:55:59 >> Yes, correct.
10:56:00 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
What concerns me is the amount
of money this effort is costing.
I have never -- and I've been around the block a
few times -- I have never seen a contract for
public engagement, not even research, not any data
analysis.
There is some analysis of the outreach but the
bulk of the work is public outreach.
I've never seen $1.3 million being spent on such
an effort.
And I think that we have to be -- somebody else
going to speak?
10:56:46 >> [INAUDIBLE]
10:56:47 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Thanks, appreciate that.
So I'm very concerned that we're putting out
seventy four-nine now, and that we're going to --
somebody will come back to the well and ask us for

more.
And we'll get to that $100,000 mark and this
contract will not have been put out to bid.
You know, we could have constructed a road for the
ount of money this outreach is costing.
I want to let you know that I'm keeping an eye
out, and I don't want to see this balloon out of
control, and I would like to see the breakdown of
exactly what they are doing within the city limits
of the City of Tampa for the money that we're
paying.
10:57:32 >> We can certainly do that.
There are 22 meetings that are being held within
the city limits for our citizens, which are a part
of the money that's being spent.
Because of the fact that this go Hillsborough
initiative is going to be before the PLG board in
October for a decision, by November as to whether
or not it will be placed on the referendum,
there's at least a sense that it's coming to that
conclusion and it will not just continue to go on
and on.
10:58:05 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I think we started with that
conclusion.
I think we started with the conclusion that this

will go on the ballot for referendum.
And there is one other thing, because I know my
colleagues want to speak, on the cover sheet for
the item it says half percent sales tax funding as
part of the description.
We started out at 1% and went down to half and it
looks like we're back up to 1.
I would be caution about calling out a number when
it seems to be in flux.
10:58:35 >> Officially, the half cent was the direction
that the PLG board.
10:58:39 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
You just said cent.
I think it's percent.
10:58:43 >> Half percent, excuse me.
The PLG board gave the direction to proceed with
half a percent framework for the information to be
provided to the public, and there was an
administrative decision to provide 1% information
in those meetings as a comparative for the
citizens to see what those two different sets of
dollars would bring in terms of projects.
But we are very sensitive to our procurement
processes in terms of how we are engaging
consultants, and we appreciate your attention to
this and your comments.

We'll make sure that we are not violating any laws
in terms of contract procurement.
10:59:25 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Thank you.
10:59:26 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Mr. Suarez.
10:59:27 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Thank you, chair.
Let's be straight.
We have to make sure.
Jane are we paying $1.3 million, the city?
10:59:36 >> No.
10:59:37 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
The $900,000 was the original
contract that parsons Brinckerhoff had.
County paid for the full amount, is that correct?
10:59:45 >> Yes, sir.
10:59:45 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Now, when we were at the policy
leadership group, they asked for more money.
I think it may have been in the -- half a million
dollar range.
I can't remember what it was.
10:59:56 >> You're correct, yes.
10:59:57 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
This is just our portion of the
$500,000, correct?
11:00:00 >> Yes, sir.
11:00:01 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Is there going to be any more
dollars that will come out for that particular
half a million dollars?

11:00:07 >> Not that we're aware of.
Not that we're planning to contribute.
This is our contribution, and we believe that this
exercise will be completed and the board will make
a decision for the next steps.
11:00:18 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
That's why I wanted to talk.
The city is not spending $1.3 million.
11:00:22 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I know that.
11:00:23 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
No, no.
I know you know that.
When you throw out the number, a lot of people get
confused.
11:00:29 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I said very specifically
Hillsborough County is --
11:00:33 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
I want to make sure that the 74,000
is the only amount coming out of our pocket.
Secondly, this is the thing I have a problem with,
I don't think we should have done it as a work
order with parsons Brinckerhoff.
It should have been either a memorandum of
understanding between us and the county and have
it as a separate item so we can discuss.
Because the policy leadership group has no binding
power over this Council.
That is the thing that bothered me more than

anything else about this particular issue.
The discussion was that they wanted to have all
the other members put some money in in order to
help defray the cost that they would put forward.
I think that should have been put in a different
way.
I see the way you put it, when you do a work
order, it's usually attached to a specific
contract and this is something a little bit
outside the scope of what we have on the
particular contract.
Is that correct?
11:01:25 >> Well, I'm not sure --
11:01:27 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
We didn't sign up with parsons
Brinckerhoff in order to provide these particular
services.
What you put down here was it was a change order.
This is what it says in our packet.
I'm just saying it may be wrong, but this is what
it said.
Usually with change orders it's already an
executed contract that we have in relation to what
our scope of work is with the City of Tampa with
that particular vendor.
11:01:51 >> My understanding, this is a stand-alone work

order because parsons is already approved through
normal processes as a consultant we can engage --
11:02:01 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
That's my point.
The contract is with the county and Brinckerhoff.
We should have made an agreement with the county
directly to provide for that cost.
That's my point.
11:02:12 >> That was looked at, but because of the
logistics of the local funding agreement having to
be created and taken through the board of county
commissioners and City Council and the time line
of these meetings already being started, the
option to contract directly with them, with our
work order process seemed to be the best mechanism
to get the work underway.
That's why that was selected.
11:02:41 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
The only argument I have for you,
the differential is that the entire county
commission sits on that policy leadership group,
not the entire Council.
The only reason I'm there is because I'm the chair
of Hart, not as the representative of the City
Council.
I can't vote in order to have our Council approve
a contract.

So that's a little bit of a backwards thing.
They should have approved it to the county.
We should have had that come before us to approve
that also.
That should have been the process.
I'm not trying to beat you up, Jane.
I know it seems they wanted to try and get it
quicker, they could have taken time.
It's not the lion's share of the dollars and they
could have done it in a different way.
I didn't like the way it was put together because
it puts us under the gun as if this is a contract
that we initiated with parsons Brinckerhoff when
we did not.
We are asking -- the county is asking us to help
out, and we should have made an agreement between
us and the county, period.
11:03:34 >> Okay.
11:03:34 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Ms. Capin.
11:03:35 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'm going to refer to the numbers.
$1.3 million the last time I checked, the city is
in the county.
That money is from all the citizens in the county.
That the county is paying or the state paying, it

is the money of the citizens.
That's right there.
And then $74,985.09 and you stated that there are
22 meetings, but there's more.
I divided that.
It's $3,408.41 per meeting.
I expect there's going to be a lot more delivered
than 22 meetings.
That's all I have to say.
11:04:19 >> Yes.
There is a breakdown of the man-hours and dollars
at the back of the scope that should have been in
your packet.
If it's not, I'll certainly make sure you get
that.
There's other work they are doing besides just the
public engagement meetings themselves.
There were other public outreach things with
social media and the website, but there was also a
lot of data collection, cost estimation,
assimilation of information for development of the
project list, which is the technical part of the
work that they are doing.
11:04:49 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
Let me suggest, I think we probably need to meet

with Council when you put these type of items on
the agenda so we don't have these questions with
these type of agreements in the future.
11:05:03 >> Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I appreciate that.
11:05:05 >>FRANK REDDICK:
What's the pleasure?
11:05:09 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I don't want to be the one to
move it because I don't agree with -- it's
Mr. Suarez's committee.
I pulled the item for discussion because I have
issues with this contract, but it's under
Mr. Suarez's committee.
If he wants to move it.
11:05:24 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
If I could, chair, to me, I don't
like the process put forward.
It doesn't mean we shouldn't be involved in this
particular discussion with policy leadership
group.
I will move it but I don't think we should put it
in this way because it makes it seems like we
contracted with parsons Brinckerhoff when we have
not.
That's the difference.
We did not contract with those guys.
The county did.

The county wants to ask us for money, I have no
problem them asking for it.
It's a mistake to do it this way.
It's not your fault.
It's not the right way we should do things.
That's my personal opinion.
I'll move it chair.
11:06:07 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Do we have the time to modify
this agreement?
11:06:10 >> I would say that would be -- put us in a
difficult situation.
By the time it got modified this work would
essentially be done and information back before
the policy leadership board for consideration.
I think the next meeting is in October.
11:06:26 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Chair, if I could, there's no -- I
mean, the time frame between us repaying them or
agreeing to pay for the work, I don't think that
that's an issue.
I don't know what the county will do if we just
delay it.
I don't care either way.
I don't have a problem with us engaging and being
part of this.
I don't like the way the contract was written.

If it comes back with the same amount regardless,
we're not negotiating the contract.
We're just saying whether or not we'll give the
county money in order to be part of it.
That's all.
11:06:57 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Do we have a second to
Mr. Suarez's motion?
11:07:00 >>HARRY COHEN:
I'll second for the purpose of
keeping it on the floor.
I want to ask a question.
I understand the point that's being made.
If we were to do it the way that councilman Suarez
suggested, and if for some reason the work were
not completed prior to the policy leadership
groups making a decision, what would that mean in
terms of the substance -- what would they be
lacking in front of them for the $75,000?
What would they not have that is important for
them to make their decision?
11:07:38 >> Well, these dollars are supporting those, first
of all, meetings that are occurring within the
city limits and also the work that is supporting
the development of the project list, taking back
the comments and weeding through, screening
through the comments to make proper adjustments to

the lists that we have proposed that will go
before the board.
There is work that will not be done if this is not
approved and they potentially would have to find
another means.
11:08:14 >>HARRY COHEN:
When the policy leadership group
votes on October 1st, they'll be voting also on
the projects that be included in this plan,
correct?
That will be part of it.
We really run the risk if we delay that some of
our city projects might be shortchanged at the
expense of county projects that would have been
analyzed and included, notwithstanding the very
correct objections that I think I heard from
Council we might be shooting ourselves in the foot
as a city if we delay the contract.
11:08:47 >> Yes, the goal is to have the fully vetted list
of projects before the board with a full
completion of proper public engagement so the
board has all that information to make an informed
decision as to whether or not to proceed with the
referendum.
It would have an impact, but I don't know how
problematic it would become.

It would be somewhat problematic, certainly.
11:09:13 >>FRANK REDDICK:
We have a motion from Mr. Suarez.
Second by Mr. Cohen.
Any further discussion?
Hearing none, all in favor aye.
Those opposed.
The motion carries.
11:09:27 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Aye.
I'm voting no.
11:09:31 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion passes 6-1.
Item 17.
11:09:44 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Item 17 I pulled because when
we initiated this contract to -- I'm not sure it
was the same company originally, because I don't
recognize the name.
I didn't look back a couple of years ago when we
first let the contract, but there was a discussion
that took place with Mr. Baird at the time that we
were hoping and I think Mr. Suarez had brought up
an apprentice program to try and get some of our
citizens back to work, because it was the height
of the downturn in the economy.
We have a lot of people out of work in the city.
So I had had discussions with Mr. Baird at the
time about this company hiring and training people

from our community because from what I understood,
the people who worked -- and I'm not sure it's the
same company, but the people who work for the
original company we let the contract to were for
the most part coming from out of town.
And I wasn't comfortable with that.
He said that he would work with them and take a
look at their hiring practices and where possible,
have people from the community be hired to work
for the company.
So if you were in the city limits of the City of
Tampa, advertise for employees within the city
limits of the City of Tampa and not bring so many
people from out of town.
So that's why I've pulled this item.
Before I vote to let out, again, a half million
dollar contract, $499,200, I want to make sure
that people in Tampa are being employed by this
company because of the discussions that I had
several years ago with Mr. Baird.
11:11:47 >> I apologize.
I was unaware of the nature of your question, so I
can't really address --
11:11:52 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Would you --
11:11:56 >> Chuck Weber, Water Department.

11:11:58 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
We know who you are but not
everybody --
11:12:02 >> I wasn't aware of the nature of your question
so I can't really address what company you were
talking about with Mr. Baird.
This contract is a renewal of a contract that
started I believe in October of '14, just last
year.
So this is the first renewal period.
I don't know if what you're speaking about was
before that or not.
We read 145,000 meters every month.
We have 12 city employees, meter readers and 12
contract readers.
This contract allows us the flexibility to meet
more readers if we have problems with staffing,
with vacancies and absences.
So we've been very successful.
Our meter reader rate is in the high 90s as well
as our accuracy.
So this program is working well for us.
As far as the number of employees, at least half
of them are City of Tampa employees.
The contract workers, I can't address specifically
whether or not they are within the city limits.

11:13:02 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
The 499,200 is for 12 contract
workers.
11:13:10 >> Yes.
11:13:10 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
That's a lot of money.
11:13:14 >> My understanding is -- 52 cents to read the
meter, which is relatively cheap.
11:13:23 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
All right.
For the next renewal period, keep in mind, you
know, what we talked about here today, and then
when we go to let the contract again, maybe we'll
have online ordinance come forward about training
and citizens to work on contracts that are let
within the city.
Thank you very much.
I'll move the item, sir.
11:13:51 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
Got a motion.
Motion from Ms. Montelione, seconded by Mr. Cohen.
All in favor, aye.
Opposed.
All right.
Item number 5.
11:14:18 >> Good morning.
Mike Chucran, Contract Administration here for
agenda item number 5.

Resolution to approve the agreement between City
of Tampa and DPR Construction for design-build
services in the amount of 1,250,056 for the Hanna
Avenue municipal building renovations
design-build.
11:14:37 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Any questions from Council?
Need a motion?
Got a motion to move the resolution by Mr. Suarez.
Seconded by Ms. Montelione.
Any discussion?
All in favor, aye.
Thank you, sir.
All right.
The chief of police.
Good morning, sir.
Before you start, let me just say this.
All of this discussion and we're talking about
citizen review board is nothing personal against
you as the police chief.
Nothing personal against law enforcement in
general, and it was brought to my attention that I
may have made public comments in the public that
offended some of the law enforcement officers, and
if that's the case, let me just state for the
record, I apologize.

I'm not here to defend anyone and I'm not here to
make anything personal.
I'm just doing what I think is right and doing
what I think is right for the community.
By saying that, sir, you have the floor.
11:16:05 >>ERIC WARD:
Thank you.
Good morning, Council.
The last time I met with Council, we discussed
this citizens review board.
Over the last 30 days or so, I've researched
different agencies, not only throughout the nation
but locally as well.
I've looked at several different models to include
the model over in St. Petersburg.
I adopted that model and presented it to you and
Mayor Buckhorn.
The model that they have in place, looking at
their practice, it's very effective.
I know there are concerns -- I've heard the
public, heard Council, and I listened to all the
comments today, and the general theme is the
subpoena powers.
St. Petersburg's citizen review board doesn't have
subpoena powers, but they are very effective.
So we adopt that program.

That was one of the agencies that Council
suggested that I look at, along with the other
agencies throughout Florida.
None of those agencies have subpoena power.
And they are very effective.
They are still in existence today.
So we mirrored their program, put it in place and
would like to move forward.
11:17:24 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Let me make this clear.
We have speakers that are going to come before us
and they are going to speak, and they are going to
be respected.
Whether you like what they are saying or not, let
me put security on notice, law enforcement, if
we've got someone speaking out of turn with
outburst, they are going to be removed, because
we're going to respect the speakers.
Don't you be the person.
Anything else, chief?
11:18:03 >>ERIC WARD:
That's it.
11:18:05 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Any questions from Council?
Ms. Montelione.
11:18:09 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Thank you.
I'm sure there's going to be more than one round,
but my first -- yes, Chief Ward, you know it, too.

I would first like to hear what we had originally
requested of you, Chief Ward, at our last meeting
asking you to come forward today.
What we asked for -- and I have written down in my
own notes.
I'm not reading from the agenda item.
And this was I believe from Ms. Capin to put a
time line on the review and the presentation you
were going to make.
You had said you were in research mode.
We asked Mr.-- Mr. Cohen asked about the
differences between the other jurisdictional
approaches.
And that's what I would like to hear.
Because with the Mayor's announcement last Friday,
which is not the first time he's done that.
You and I spoke yesterday, and he did that with
the fire department as well when I brought up the
issues with the fire department and some
leadership and discrimination and harassment
issues, we got a memo and said the attached press
release would suffice.
And chief forward would not be appearing before
Council.
You, sir, are here.

Thank you very much for appearing, because I was
afraid we would get another memo that said, read
the press release from Friday, and that would be
all we would have to discuss.
So thank you for being here.
But I would like to hear what you researched, what
you found, what your comparisons were between the
different models, why beyond your saying just now
that the St. Petersburg model seems to be working
but why that model, why you think it works and
what other models did you look at and why were
they not considered to be a good fit for us?
So I would like to hear from you as we originally
planned before the Mayor came out with the press
release on Friday.
11:20:24 >>ERIC WARD:
As discussed at the last meeting,
when I mentioned looking nationally at these
different citizen review boards, it was suggested
I look local.
I did look at Orange County, Sarasota, Orlando,
St. Pete, and Fort Myers.
None of these boards are identical.
There are differences in each board.
Sarasota is a five-member board.
It's chaired by a Chairman, the city manager, the

City Attorney and the chief of police.
Orlando is a five-member board.
I don't have their breakdown with me in front of
me right now.
St. Petersburg is a nine-member board with two
alternates and all the appointments are appointed
by the Mayor.
Fort Myers, it's a nine-member board, each Council
member has a vote and the Mayor has a vote as far
as picking their members.
And then there were other agencies I looked at in
California, Michigan, Minnesota, Oregon, New York,
California, Arizona, Texas, and I don't have their
breakdown.
I just stuck to the local ones.
If you look across the board, they are all
different.
I adopted St. Petersburg's model because, one, it
was local.
We have similarities in our crimes, in our
citizens, our makeup of the city.
I thought that practice or that board would fit
best for our agency.
11:21:53 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Okay.
There seems to be a difference of opinion on

whether the St. Petersburg model is working.
How long ago -- and I have all this information in
the backup and I've done my homework, but maybe
some of the folks watching on TV or in the
audience are not familiar with the St. Petersburg
model.
How long has it been in place?
11:22:35 >> I don't have the date.
11:22:43 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I'm sorry?
Since the last riot.
I've got in the materials that were provided, I
believe, by your office or by the City Attorney's
office, established November 21st, 1991.
Which is from the city of St. Petersburg civilian
police review committee community information and
recruitment package.
So it's been quite some time, and I don't know
from the materials that were provided if since
1991 there have been any changes to the program or
if what we were provided in this packet still
stands today.
My concern -- let me get to a question, because
that was a statement.
Julia, we're not ready yet.
My concern is that this is something that so many

years ago was established, may or may not have
been modified, and we're starting this program in
2015, hopefully, maybe 2016, depending on how long
this drags out, and I think that there may be some
modernizations.
There may be some other circumstances or
particulars that need to be addressed in this day
and age that are different from the circumstances
of 1991.
11:24:25 >> The original board did start in 1991.
I believe it was 24 members.
And they did make modifications to it.
24 members was just too much.
And they reduced those numbers to 9.
That's where I come up with the 9 number.
They have 9 active members and two alternates.
They did make modifications to that board, and
those modifications made that board more
effective.
11:24:51 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Can you cite examples of their
effectiveness?
11:24:58 >>ERIC WARD:
I don't have them before me.
11:25:00 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Maybe not going back to 1991
but how many cases have come before the
St. Petersburg review board, how many changes?

11:25:07 >>ERIC WARD:
They just had a meeting last Tuesday
and it was --
11:25:13 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
The reason I'm asking you this,
chief, is because if we're saying that we're
basing our model on St. Petersburg's model,
because it has been effective, I would like some
examples of how it's been effective.
[ APPLAUSE ]
Thank you for that, but as the Chairman said,
outbursts would mean we would have to clear the
chamber and we don't want to do that.
We want this to be respectful of everyone who is
going to speak.
I don't believe there were a lot of outbursts when
the public was speaking.
Anyway --
Maybe during this discussion somebody back at
headquarters can pull this information and bring
it to us later on in the discussion.
But how many cases have they heard over the past,
let's say, I don't know, five years?
How many recommendations have been made to the
police chief and to maybe internal affairs or to
human resources on changes that should be made?
How many of those changes that were suggested by

the St. Petersburg review board have been actually
put into place?
So that would maybe give me a comfort level that
the St. Petersburg model actually does work.
Because without that information, I mean, I trust
your judgment, and I'm hoping that the information
that I'm asking for will prove that out.
11:26:47 >>ERIC WARD:
That's something I will have to
address with St. Pete and get that information
back to Council.
11:26:52 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Well, like I said, this is
probably going to be a long discussion.
Maybe somebody back at headquarters.
We have a lot of analysts in TPD that can perform
work pretty quickly.
So I would like those answers before we leave
chambers today if you don't mind.
11:27:08 >>ERIC WARD:
Do you want know leave now and go and
get it?
11:27:12 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
No.
I'm sure everybody at headquarters is watching.
So if we have a few assistant chiefs, I believe,
who can start working on that while you're here,
because I don't see the other assistant chiefs
here.

11:27:28 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Before we do that, Julia Mandell,
City Attorney.
In order for us to stop that conversation and have
some folks over there.
It wasn't part of the original motion to bring
that level of detail.
I think it would be appropriate to get a motion
that way we know that's something City Council
needs today or something they want to wait on.
11:27:47 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
As the maker of the motion,
nowhere in here does it say to just look locally.
It may have been mentioned, but in here it
reads -- this is my motion -- police Chief Ward,
Tampa Police Department, to appear and provide a
report regarding his findings of other
jurisdictions that he has studied, including
recommendations of how the city can implement the
best practices that fit the city concerning
citizens review board.
The motion initiated by Capin and Cohen.
August the 6th.
So we're talking about something that is an
assumption.
I'm looking at it, councilman Montelione brought
up, it's exactly what we asked for.

Because it was preempted by the Mayor, it's
assumed that this is what we want.
When what we wanted was a report.
I went over your program.
There are many, many valid and useful parts to it,
but we did not ask for a board.
We asked for a report and we are being presented
with a board.
At that point, chief, you did your work except it
was assumed that it would be local.
When you mentioned all those cities and states,
and I asked would 30 days be sufficient, you said
yes.
That is a concern for me that we're not getting a
report.
That we are being handed a board instead of a
report when the City Council did not ask for you
to come or anyone else to come and present us with
a board.
If we didn't ask for that line of detail, it is
brought enough, this motion, that all the cities
you stated that you looked at, I would say that
you looked at all those and not just local.
I'm with Councilwoman Montelione, and I think we
need the details of why this particular

St. Petersburg model is the best model.
We did ask you to come to us with the best model.
11:30:42 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Response, chief?
11:30:43 >>ERIC WARD:
No.
I'm sure like you said, someone is listening over
at the station and I'm sure they are trying to
gather that data for me.
As soon as they bring it over, we'll present it.
11:30:54 >>FRANK REDDICK:
[INAUDIBLE] [Microphone not on]
11:30:58 >> Yes, sir.
I move that we receive the information supporting
the statement that St. Petersburg model is working
and is the best fit for the City of Tampa.
And I would ask that we have the data to support
that being and not limited to the number of cases
that have been heard by the civilian review board
in St. Petersburg over the past five years, the
number of suggestions and what those suggestions
were to the police chief of the city of
St. Petersburg that arose out of their analysis,
how many of those suggestions made by the review
board have been made policy and put into place in
the city of St. Petersburg.
I think that covers it.
I need a second.

11:32:04 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Second.
11:32:05 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
May I speak to the motion,
Mr. Chairman?
I understand and appreciate everything that was
said.
However, it seems to me that no matter whether it
was St. Pete or somewhere in California or
New York or whatever state you want to chose or
whatever city you want to choose, it would be
somewhat difficult to understand because then you
have to check how they did it, who did it, who's
on the committee, what happened.
It will get to the point where you will be
studying these so-called committees throughout the
country for a long period of time.
I don't know if the chief -- I'm certainly not
speaking for the chief or anyone in the police
department or anyone but myself.
How many cases were heard?
Does that mean how many cases were heard in
St. Pete or throughout the country and how this
report is assimilated?
And what is the outcome?
How about if there were no cases heard because
there was no action taken.

That was never explained in that motion.
So we're making an assumption that cases were
heard.
Just because you have a committee doesn't mean
that you had cases.
It means you had a committee to hear the cases.
Whether it's here, locally or anywhere else in the
country, what is it that we're looking for?
That's what I want to know.
What is it that we're looking for?
I'm open to suggestions.
I'm finished.
11:33:39 >>FRANK REDDICK:
[microphone not on]
11:33:41 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
It was specific to
St. Petersburg because that is the model that
we're adopting.
That is the model.
Let me rephrase that.
That is the model that has been adopted.
According to the press release that went out or
the press conference that was held on Friday.
So it is specific.
My motion is specific to St. Petersburg because
we're basing or have based the model that we're
adopting, and I say "we" as the city not "we" as

the Council.
Because it's the best model.
And I'm referencing five years because I would
just assume with some of the news reports that I
have seen over the past five years coming out of
St. Petersburg that there have been incidences
that would have, in my mind, warranted such
review. And if there have not been any in the
past five years, if there have not been any cases
brought before the St. Petersburg CRB in five
years, I'm not so sure it would be the most
effective model.
It's not all of the country, and to say, you know,
that it might take a long time to do this
research, as Ms. Capin said, we asked for a report
and the chief has said that 30 days would give him
ple time because he had already started looking
into different models from different places.
So 30 days was enough to complete the research he
had already begun.
I don't care if it takes -- that's why I said 15
or 16, I guess I shouldn't say I don't care about
how long it takes, but I don't mind spending
enough time of thoughtful consideration to make
sure we get it right.

Because as you and I spoke yesterday, chief, we as
a Council and as a city are establishing a
procedure and a board that will be in place long
after we are gone.
As I said to Jane castor when chief castor was
standing in your place, we trust her.
We trust you.
But in 25 years, you're not going to be the chief
of police, and we're not going to be sitting in
these seats.
And the people who are sitting here may not even
be born yet, and I don't know if we can rush into
something that's going to stand long after we're
gone and trust people that I never met.
11:36:27 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Ms. Montelione, let me interrupt
for a second because I want to you keep the focus
on responding to his question.
11:36:33 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Sorry.
I thought that was -- that is a response.
To the amount of time it would take.
11:36:39 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Mr. Cohen, you had a comment.
11:36:43 >>HARRY COHEN:
I just wanted to make the
suggestion that we have so many issues that I
think we'll be talking about surrounding this
entire matter, and I have a feeling if we start

making motions and voting on them before we
actually get into the heart of the matter we're
going to end up, I think, confused.
Clearly, we want the information on
St. Petersburg, and I think we'll get to that, but
maybe if we could just continue the discussion on
the relative merits of what's been proposed,
what's been proposed by the public, it may clarify
what it is we want to ask for by the end of the
discussion rather than sort of lurching off in
different directions as we try to move through it.
11:37:28 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Let me just say this, we've still
got a matter, and I think the chief has made his
report available to us, but I think the bigger
picture we've got is what the City Attorney going
to bring for us and what our counsel is going to
respond to and what we ask the Council want to do.
Once all this is done, I have a motion that I'm
going to make pertaining to all of this that might
have some ramifications for all the things that
are going to be said.
When I spoke with the chief, I made it known to
the chief that I don't accept his recommendation.
I don't accept the Mayor's recommendation.
A nine-member board appointed by the Mayor and two

of this Council.
I don't know, Council members, when we're trying
to appoint people on these CRA boards that you've
got more than three or four on there what that
look like.
And you can imagine seven members trying to
appoint two people.
We would be all day.
11:39:00 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Can we take a vote on the
motion, sir?
I have a motion.
I made a motion.
I have a second, and I would like to call the
question and have a vote.
I'll hold off on calling the question.
11:39:18 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Thank you, Ms. Montelione.
It's pertinent this information to whatever
decision we move forward on.
It's very pertinent.
I would say waiting until the end to move these
things, we can move them as we move along.
I understand the issue, and I think we all
understand the issue.
So that was --
11:39:45 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Call the question, sir.

11:39:52 >>FRANK REDDICK:
[microphone not on]
11:39:55 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
I was going to say just for
Robert's Rules of Order, calling the question
requires a second, and then it requires a vote,
and then it ends the discussion.
Just so you know.
11:40:08 >>FRANK REDDICK:
[microphone not on]
11:40:14 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
All I asked for is to hear the
question.
It's been debated and different --
11:40:18 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
The clerk can read the
question.
We have to vote on calling the question.
11:40:24 >>FRANK REDDICK:
[microphone not on]
If you are in favor, you vote in favor.
If not, we continue discussion.
11:40:36 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I'm just calling the question.
11:40:37 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All in favor of the motion --
11:40:40 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
I don't even know what the
question is.
11:40:43 >>FRANK REDDICK:
The question is to stop
discussion and she want to get to the point of the
motion.
11:40:48 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
After we call the question.
Then the clerk will read the motion.

Thank you.
11:40:54 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All those in favor of the motion
by Ms. Montelione to call the question and second
by Ms. Capin, all in favor of that motion say aye.
11:41:04 >> No.
11:41:04 >> No.
11:41:05 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
11:41:06 >>THE CLERK:
[INAUDIBLE]
11:41:08 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Go back to the motion.
11:41:11 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Madam clerk, can you read the
motion?
11:41:16 >>THE CLERK:
-- statement that the St. Pete model
is working and the best fit for the city and that
you have the data, the number of cases heard by
the board over the past five years, number of
suggestions to the police chief of St. Pete and
how many of the suggestions have been made and put
into place by St. Pete.
11:41:39 >> [INAUDIBLE]
11:41:55 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
If they can't produce the
information, then we can continue to the next
discussion.
Chief, do you think that they can pull some
numbers?
Ah, assistant Chief Dugan.

Is that enough time, sir?
11:42:13 >> Good morning, Council.
Brian Dugan, Assistant Chief of Police.
As I was coming over here, I probably missed some
of the discussion.
What exactly are we looking for?
I was remiss not providing this information for
you today.
Let me make sure I understand completely what it
is that we're looking for.
11:42:32 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
As the clerk read the motion
correctly, the number of cases in five years that
have been reviewed by the city of St. Petersburg
citizen review board, the number of suggestions
that have come out of those reviews, and the
number of those suggestions that have been
implemented by the city of St. Petersburg police
department.
11:42:54 >> Okay.
Obviously, you know, I would get right on that.
I'll go back there right now.
But to tell you that I can provide that
information today, I don't even know if they have
that available.
I certainly don't want to make assumptions.

11:43:09 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Give it your best shot and let
us know by the end of the meeting.
11:43:21 >>FRANK REDDICK:
We have a motion by
Ms. Montelione, seconded by Ms. Capin.
Further discussion of the motion?
All those in favor of the motion, aye.
Those opposed.
11:43:33 >> No.
11:43:33 >> Nay.
11:43:34 >>THE CLERK:
Miranda and Cohen voting no.
11:43:38 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Thank you, members.
11:43:39 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Anything else, chief or from
Council?
11:43:44 >>ERIC WARD:
No.
I think it's a great model, bringing it to our
agency.
It's not the practice itself.
It's the model, the framework for it to set it up.
Coming to Tampa, we have an opportunity to make
this very successful.
It's just the framework that I adopted from
St. Pete.
I didn't adopt their practices or their policies.
I adopted the framework for their board to bring
to Tampa so we can put something in place.

The question is we have nothing now.
So we need to put something in place and that is a
great model to put in place.
11:44:22 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
11:44:24 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Just for the record, I met with
Chief Ward, and I really enjoyed the conversation
him and I had.
If I remember some of that conversation, I don't
know what this means, but bless you, too.
If I remember that conversation, chief, you said
that even before you were chief, if I recall, you
had already met with different groups about
forming a committee such as this.
I correct?
11:44:52 >>ERIC WARD:
Yes, sir.
11:44:53 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
So this wasn't really -- this
was something that you were already working on
before it was brought to your attention, am I
correct?
11:45:00 >>ERIC WARD:
Yes, sir.
11:45:03 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
I just wanted to put it in the
record.
Thank you very much.
11:45:10 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Let me at this time -- anything
else you want to say, chief at this time?

11:45:19 >>ERIC WARD:
No.
11:45:21 >>FRANK REDDICK:
We appreciate your thoughts on
this.
It's sad it was circumvented by someone else.
At this time, I'll ask Ms. Mandell.
11:45:37 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Julia Mandell, City Attorney.
I have provided you with a memorandum in response
to the questions that you posed at your last
proceeding.
I don't know how much further you would like me to
get into that specifically or if you would like me
to be available to answer questions.
I have now had an opportunity as well to review
the memorandum submitted by Mr. Shelby, which I
received yesterday afternoon, and happy to have a
conversation about that as well.
And also there obviously have been other issues
that have come up that I am prepared to respond
to, if Council so desires me to.
In terms of proceeding, I would ask the Council's
guidance on how they would like me to proceed.
11:46:23 >> Thank you, chair, since I was the maker of the
original motion concerning these issues, I would
like to ask a few questions.
First of all, let's get the third part of my

motion out of the way, which is a sunshine board.
11:46:35 >>JULIA MANDELL:
That's an easy one, yes.
11:46:37 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
That's an easy one, yes.
Anyone that is part of the sunshine board.
11:46:41 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Part of delegated board under
which something more than simple gathering
information, but actually will be doing any type
of analysis of the information, then, yes, it
would be subject to Sunshine Law.
11:46:54 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Since, you know, everything has
been preempted because an executive order has been
passed in order to set up this board, let's talk
about that in relation as opposed to directly what
my motion was about, if that's okay.
You didn't know and I didn't know that we would be
in this position at this point.
We were going to talk about the formation of a
board not the fait accompli where a board has
already been completed.
I know we both didn't know if there would be a
board created or not, so let's go forward from
there.
A couple of the issues that have been brought up,
first of all, I think there is a misconception in
terms of what maybe some of the folks in the

public or what we're able to do.
There's nothing in the charter that says
specifically that the Mayor has absolute power to
do any of these advisory boards.
Again, this goes back to my original motion about
an advisory board concerning gathering information
after the fact.
In fact, I will say that the draft that I have for
what I would see in terms of a board is pretty
similar to what the Mayor has brought forward.
But in terms of that, there's nothing that
precludes us from being able to put an ordinance
together to create a board, is that correct?
11:48:14 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Let me say it this way --
11:48:17 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Advisory board.
I want to reiterate that.
11:48:19 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I think I stated within the body
of my memorandum and it was also within the body
of Mr. Shelby's memorandum that there is nothing
in the charter that precludes this board from
creating this -- City Council from creating an
advisory board to them on matters, and has been
done, how it's accomplished, through a legislative
act or an act of resolution, would depend on what
it is you intended that board to do and how that

would be set up.
Also, it would obviously need to be reviewed
against the charter.
Not against what the Mayor has done, but against
the charter.
So I think that that would be part of the
analysis.
I give an example of your budget review advisory
committee.
That was created by resolution.
And there are other boards that have been created
by legislation.
There are several that are within Mr. Shelby's
memo.
I will say many of them are either set up pursuant
to a charter requirement or charter allowability.
Some are set up through federal regulation, and
some have been set up for -- prior to the charter
actually being enacted.
I don't know that it will get into that level of
detail at this time.
11:49:26 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Let me ask you a specific question
about executive orders.
Obviously, that is an action of the Mayor that is
separate from any action undertaken together that

we do when we pass an ordinance and then he either
signs or vetoes an ordinance.
It is something that is directed for what reason?
What do executive orders mean in relation to both
his power as Mayor and our power as Council?
11:49:51 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Executive order would be his
specific authority to have some kind of action in
a formal way.
I know that was kind of a long way to get there.
That's his ability to have a formal action.
He can't create an ordinance.
So it would be his act, if it's an official act,
done pursuant to an executive order.
That's within our charter as well.
11:50:13 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Does it have the power of an
ordinance?
11:50:16 >>JULIA MANDELL:
It's not a law general act --
11:50:19 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
What is the difference between
executive order and ordinance?
11:50:22 >>JULIA MANDELL:
The executive order would be
within his authority to direct in this case but in
other cases specific actions of different
departments, how different departments will be
managed or run, how maybe a certain process,
like -- I'll give you an example totally off

topic, but it informs how we handle a lot of these
things.
If you have a code enforcement matter and someone
wants to settle for a certain amount of money
below their lien, there is an executive order out
there that says because of my authority under the
charter to deal with enforcement issues, here's
how you are to process your lien lowering ability.
It's not it's for a variety of issues, but the
Mayor's formal action on a specific item within
his authority under the charter.
11:51:07 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Would it be fair to say it's
ministerial and administrative in some way,
meaning that he is executing certain things that
is already part of ordinances or ordinances that
we pass that he has to put into practice and he's
going to use an executive order in order to make
that process a smooth administrative way of doing
something that we've asked to be done.
11:51:30 >>JULIA MANDELL:
It's really factual.
Sometimes it might be ministerial action.
Sometimes it might be an administrative action.
Sometimes it might be an executive action.
There are nuances with different very few people
except lawyers and policy wonks.

11:51:44 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
The reason I'm asking all these
questions is because since he set a board in place
that is an executive order, in order for us to,
let's say as a hypothetical, we wanted to change
an executive order, you don't change an executive
order.
You can just pass an ordinance that overrides that
executive order, is that correct?
11:52:04 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I wouldn't even say it overrides.
11:52:07 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Ordinance has more power than
executive order?
11:52:10 >>JULIA MANDELL:
It's hard to answer that without
knowing exactly what we're talking about, but I
will say this.
His authority, the Mayor's authority --
11:52:17 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
If I can stop you a second.
Let me put it in perspective in terms of what I'm
asking you.
Let's say we make a decision that we want to have
a certain number of people that are on this board
that we select as opposed to what he's put in
place.
We could pass an ordinance that says we would like
an advisory board, let's say it's exactly the way
the Mayor has put it up, but we'll have certain

number of people that are selected as opposed to
the way he set it up, we could pass that ordinance
and he would either agree to that ordinance or
would veto that ordinance, is that correct?
I mean, is that the process?
11:52:53 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I would tell you from this
perspective.
The Mayor's authority to delegate anything for
executive order is what he has within the charter
and the ordinances.
If you give him additional authority that he needs
or she, this is really more of a generalized
conversation, that the Mayor would be obligated to
then do something proactive, that could be done
through executive order and that's something that
if you change your ordinance, that might change
his executive order.
That doesn't mean that you can override the
authority of the Mayor through an ordinance nor
can the Mayor override the authority of City
Council through an executive order.
There is a distinct, within our charter,
separation of powers and that gets directly into
that particular issue.
11:53:39 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
But again, this goes more directly,

not to separation of powers, because he's got to
either sign or veto an ordinance, is that correct?
11:53:48 >>JULIA MANDELL:
That's correct.
11:53:50 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
If we put it into an ordinance --
what I'm getting at, Ms. Mandell, there is a
political solution to any disagreements between
ourselves and the administration, it is not always
a legal decision.
My point is that he can't put into place something
that we can't undo.
We can.
We can attempt to undo it.
He can say no and if we do not continue to undo
it, then it doesn't matter.
It falls to the wayside.
11:54:15 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I simply can't answer that
question without knowing something more specific
and let me tell you why --
11:54:22 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Hang on.
Before you start.
I did give you a specific hypothetical.
If we pass an ordinance to change the makeup of a
board that he has already created and we said, no,
we want something that's different that has a
different makeup, because I'm making one specific

question, not the whole board itself, just the
makeup of the board.
We agree that we want to do this, but we want a
makeup that's different.
We're going to send it to you as an ordinance and
he can say, yes, I agree with you, no, I don't.
Here is a veto.
Come back to Council and then we have to override
with three-quarters of our members.
And that's the only question I'm asking.
Is that not a factual way of looking at it?
11:55:09 >>JULIA MANDELL:
What you're asking is, can City
Council direct the Legal Department to draft an
ordinance which obligates the Mayor to amend his
executive order or to otherwise change an action
that he's taken pursuant to his authority that
would in essence have City Council directing the
Mayor to take a certain action to change the way
the executive order reads.
One, I have to draft that ordinance, yes, I would.
I need to take this out to a logical conclusion,
if you don't mind.
11:55:43 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
You're going on a different
tributary than what I wanted.
But that's okay, continue.

I had a different question.
Please, finish, that's fine.
11:55:58 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Just getting to the point of what
I think the real conversation is that's happening,
which is where the Mayor's authority starts and
stops and where does City Council's authority
start and stop, so let's just take it out to its
logical conclusion.
There is an ordinance on the table that would have
the effect of either changing what the Mayor has
already adopted pursuant to executive order or
otherwise would impede into the authority of one
branch or the other.
You would direct the City Attorney's office to
draft that ordinance.
The City Attorney's office, probably me because --
would draft it.
I'm obligated under the ordinance to present you
that type of ordinance.
Then I'm obligated under my authority in the
charter to give you my legal opinion as to whether
or not that is a legally sufficient ordinance.
From there, if you pass it anyway, then, yes, it
would have to go to the Mayor.
I would probably advise the Mayor to go ahead and

veto it.
If he chose not to because, hey, lawyers give
their thoughts and recommendations and advice, but
that doesn't mean they are always taken.
He can do whatever he feels is necessary and yes,
it could come over here for a vote from there.
That's in essence the way the process would work.
11:57:12 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
I apologize.
One last question.
Whenever there is an executive order that's in
conflict with an ordinance, not that it's ever
happened.
I don't know if it has.
I don't know the history of these particular type
of proceedings, whether or not it has.
If there is a conflict between an executive order
and an ordinance, you're saying an executive order
and an ordinance are on an even playing field,
because if the Mayor is exerting that it is
executive power that he is putting forward, that
the legislative does not have the right to
override an executive power, is that correct?
11:57:46 >>JULIA MANDELL:
That's clear in the charter.
11:57:48 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
That's what I was trying to get at.
I want to make sure there's not really a process

to override an executive order.
It has to be done by ordinance and then some
discussion as to whether or not that ordinance
supersedes or is going over what the ordinance --
I mean, what the charter actually says.
That's what I was trying to get at.
I thank you very much for everything you put
forward.
I apologize.
Thank you.
11:58:13 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Before we go back to the
remaining Council members, what is your pleasure,
Council?
It's almost 12 noon.
Did we want to break?
11:58:26 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I don't necessarily myself need
a break right now.
I would extend till 1:00, and if we're not wrapped
up with this discussion by 1:00, then I would
suggest we take lunch at that time, just so that
everybody here -- I'm sure people in the audience
are going to want to at some point have lunch or
take a break.
That would be my suggestion.
I move for one more hour until 1:00 and then we

adjourn for lunch.
11:58:54 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion by Ms. Montelione,
seconded by Mr. Cohen.
Any discussion of the motion?
All in favor to extend to 1:00, say aye.
Opposed?
All right.
Ms. Capin.
11:59:06 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Thank you.
You used -- here is the thing, executive order is
not law.
11:59:15 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I would agree with you.
11:59:17 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Well, here is the thing.
An executive order can be rescinded or altered
without any notice whatsoever to anyone, not the
public and not here at City Council.
11:59:30 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I would absolutely agree with
that statement.
11:59:32 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
You would absolutely what?
11:59:34 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I would absolutely agree with
that statement.
11:59:37 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Just because there is an executive
order doesn't mean it will exist next year or the
year after.
It can be rescinded.

Where an ordinance doesn't -- that is something
that has to be done publicly.
This is not public.
This -- I want to hear opinion of our attorney,
but I'm going to tell you what is happening here
today.
It is really important for this Council --
important that's what we do.
That's our job.
You use the example of code enforcement ordinance,
and that he would have the executive power to
enforce that.
What he's enforcing is an ordinance that we put in
place, that this body put in place.
Now, a separate ordinance would not necessarily
undo his.
He can have the executive order, and we have an
ordinance and then that ordinance needs to be
either vetoed or signed and then come back, but we
absolutely, the obligation -- what we're doing
here is clarifying representative government.
If we do not have this discussion, we're depriving
the people of what they voted for.
12:01:20 >>JULIA MANDELL:
If I may speak -- I've been
around a long time, as you all know.

I've been with the City 11 years.
I have spent most of my career with the City
working directly with City Council on legislative
matters and on zoning matters.
Two years ago, I was appointed the City Attorney,
and my role did change.
My role is to represent the entire City of Tampa
corporate entity.
I take that role very seriously.
I'm sitting in this room and I hear the emotion in
this room, and I do not suggest on any level that
the emotion in this room isn't real or isn't a
fair representation of what people see that they
want to have changed.
However, my role as City Attorney, which really
isn't that dissimilar to my role when I was in
zoning hearings with many of you, is to tell you
what I see the law says, what I see your authority
is, and now it's to tell more where I see the
Mayor's authority is under the charter as well as
department heads, as well as all employees.
So I can only tell you, as I have in my memo,
where the role and the authority of the Mayor is
to execute any form of action, and in this
instance, the type of action that he has executed

falls squarely within thinks authority under the
charter.
The second question becomes, and that's what we're
talking about today, what is City Council's
authority, what is their role, and what is it they
can adopt either through a legislative act and
ordinance or through an administrative act, which
would be a resolution?
I set that forth in the memo.
It is my opinion, and I have stated this, that you
have the absolute authority under the charter to
set forth a board, which is advisory to you.
I do also want to talk about the subpoena power
issue because I did not spend a lot of time on
that in my memo and I think it is an important
issue for everybody.
And that has been done in the past.
It has typically been done by resolution for an
advisory board.
The budget advisory board is a perfect example, as
I have stated.
And if that's something City Council wants to
continue to have conversations about and direct me
to look at those issues or draft something for
you, that's what my job is.

I'm here to do that.
But I can only tell you that which is your
authority and City Council can only delegate the
authority that it actually has just as the Mayor
can only delegate the authority that the Mayor
actually has.
12:04:01 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Here is my question.
We received your opinion five minutes into the
press conference.
Why wasn't that opinion brought to us before?
Why didn't we have an opportunity to look at the
questions.
12:04:19 >>JULIA MANDELL:
If you see the opinion.
It actually went to both the Mayor and chair as
City Council as an item together.
Why I did it that way is because you were asking
as a board for me to be responsive today as to
this issue.
And I was being asked by the administration a very
similar question.
So I will say that it was submitted as part of the
fact that typically we submit our memos the Friday
before.
The timing of it was the timing of it.
I would also suggest to you that I did not receive

Mr. Shelby's memo until 4:00 last night and I like
to give a little more courtesy than that because I
needed time to be able to analyze the issues.
I would say to you, if you would like to typically
have more time on when you get legal memorandums
from the City Attorney's office, I would ask for
you to ask me for additional -- to be brought
sooner.
The Friday before the Thursday meeting has been
typical.
12:05:17 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Okay.
That's very fine.
Then how did the Mayor know to have this press
conference to introduce this executive -- I have
the power, how did he know that?
12:05:29 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Because he asked me the same
question that you all were asking me.
12:05:33 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Only you answered his and not
ours.
12:05:35 >>JULIA MANDELL:
No, I actually answered yours.
I included him on the memo so that you could see
the same opinion was going to everybody.
As my client --
12:05:43 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
He knew -- he called a press
conference, and it was out on Monday for Friday,

and the press conference, how --
12:05:56 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Let me take a step back.
You did not ask me for a written legal opinion.
I chose to provide one.
Here, there is not a request for a written legal
opinion.
Second of all, there's not.
Second of all, I actually had some conversations
ahead of time with City Council attorney prior to
me issuing anything, prior to me answering
anything, and he assured me he was bringing that
information to you.
As to what my position was.
So I think I'm a little confused why all of a
sudden this has become an issue because of the
timing of it.
When I answered the question that was asked of me,
I put it in writing which I was not required to do
or requested to do.
I chose to give it to everyone all at the same
time.
The Mayor has every right to ask me verbally what
my opinion is just like you all do individually,
and I have been -- I have never not responded when
I have been asked those kinds of questions.

I made the decision as the City Attorney to submit
this to everybody in a clear way so that everybody
understood what my position is.
He did not need me to put it in writing to him
prior to him issuing his executive order.
He could have relied on my verbal advice to him.
12:07:18 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
We didn't get the verbal advice,
but let's move on.
I'm done with this question for now.
12:07:26 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I did want to respond to and I
think it is an important question, the question of
subpoena power.
That is not something I spent a lot of time
addressing in the memo.
It is addressed but I did not address it very
extensively.
Since that could become a very, very significant
issue that I've heard today and I've been hearing
over the last few weeks, I thought it would be
appropriate for me to respond to that.
The opportunity for any municipality to have any
form of subpoena power, it is very extraordinary
in the law.
It is typically a judicial remedy.
There is the ability for municipalities to have

subpoena power.
But it needs to be derived not by an ordinance
created by a legislative body.
It is very clear in the law that that is not an
acceptable way to grant subpoena power.
For it to be delegated to a separate body or
granted unto itself.
It either has to come through a charter enactment
or federal law, state law or some kind of general
act -- special act of the legislature.
I apologize.
There is case law directly on point on that.
In fact, case law directly on point as it relates
to the creation of a civilian review board, police
review board.
I have heard many of the people who have been
involved in the conversation cite to the city of
Miami.
It is a very interesting example.
The City of Miami was involved in litigation under
which it had created a citizen police review board
via resolution granting subpoena power that in a
very specific way listed in their charter in a
manner very similar to the way you have subpoena
power within your charter.

The language is virtually identical.
That board was set up.
A police officer was subpoenaed.
The police officers challenged that subpoena.
The third district court found that the provision
in the charter, which allowed for limited
investigatory subpoena power could not be utilized
or delegated to the standing civilian police
review board.
The city of Miami ultimately amended their charter
and provided not only for the creation of a
civilian police review board, but also provided
for that subpoena power.
A second case was brought after that charter
change occurred, and after the ordinance was
ended to provide for that.
The third district court of appeals, who heard it
again after a police officer challenged it, said,
yes, this was the proper mechanism under which
that subpoena power could be delegated.
Within your charter, there is no authority for
City Council, nor is there authority for the Mayor
to have this kind of subpoena power, nor is there
any way for that to be delegated.
That is very clear within the law.

12:10:28 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
I'm going to ask you with each response to shorten
your responses so everybody can get a chance to go
around and we can get out of here with this
subject by 1:00.
Mr. Miranda.
12:10:43 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman, what I see here happening, makes no
difference who the Mayor is.
Makes no difference who the Council members are.
We're looking to change the charter without
changing the charter.
In other words, in order to change the charter,
the public has to take a vote and it's happened
various times in the City of Tampa.
So whoever the Mayor is issues an executive order.
And, by the way, this ain't the first Mayor that's
issued an executive order.
There have been others on different subject
matters.
So this Council or other councils in the future
don't like it, so they write an ordinance to
supersede that subpoena power.
In essence that's what they are doing.
That is then rejected by the person who sits in

the Mayor's office.
Comes back to that City Council and needs 5-2
vote, supermajority to pass that.
Let's say it happens.
What you've got is another chaos instead of
reality.
In essence, what you're doing without letting the
public -- this is the important part -- the
charter is not the one -- the constitution.
Not greater.
Not smaller, but it's equal to the constitution of
the way this country governs itself.
So then we're changing the constitution of the
city, still called the charter, without the public
having a right to vote.
That's my take on it.
That's what I've heard so far, so I have no one,
and I'll bring it up.
If you want to change something, change the
charter.
If you want to change from a strong Mayor form of
government, then change it to something else or
try to change it to somebody else because the
public is entitled to vote.
What's happening here goes back to we only have

one President of the United States of America.
Thank God we do.
We've only got one governor.
Only got one Mayor.
We have many opinions.
But at the end of the day, it rests with those
individuals that were elected to that higher
office to make a decision.
I can't tell you if it's the right decision or the
wrong decision, but at least that person made a
decision and you have responsible people being
looked at for what they did, rightly or wrongly.
They hold that to their hands.
What we're doing here in some form or fashion,
maybe I'm wrong, is saying no.
We want to have two city attorneys.
That's what I see, instead of one.
Because I see more interaction than I've ever seen
before.
It used to be prior to 2008, before the charter
was changed, that the City Council attorney was an
assistant City Attorney.
Had no problems ever.
Now you go back and you start having, I have the
right to do this, the Council has the right to do

that.
There are two interpretations of the charter,
there should only be one because it says that the
City Attorney is the only one that can issue those
opinions, not the City Council attorney.
So we're getting more and more into changing the
charter without changing the charter by a vote
than ever before.
I don't like to see this city fall apart.
I see the unraveling of a baseball that one of the
seams on it is not quite perfect.
Nobody is behind anytime this Mayor or any other
Mayor.
If I have to tell them to go to hell, I go tell
them personally and I've done that before in
different areas with different mayors.
If you want to change the charter then change it.
Put it down and let the public vote on it, but
don't kill it to death.
Don't kill this city by doing what we're I think
we're starting to do.
Little interaction squabbles.
Somebody wants to -- there is an election coming
up in three and a half years.
God bless you.

Go do it.
And see what happens when you get elected.
Somebody will get elected.
So whether it's this Mayor or another Mayor, it's
about getting it done right.
The only way you'll get it done right is change
the charter and take it to the people.
Start squabbling, hey, not entitled to this.
That person, whoever it is, entitled to do a lot
more than we are.
We are legislative and they are administrative.
You have to work in concert, and you have to
understand that that music must come out perfect,
not sharp and not flat, but on level so that all
the public gets a right to state their vote.
Again, if we want to mess around with the charter,
then let's change it.
Stop talking about it.
Face the facts and go do it.
Stop making this city look bad.
Stop making this city look something it ain't.
To me, it's one of the greatest cities in the
world.
Maybe I'm a little exaggerated.
But you know what?

I lived this city all my life and the only reason
I live here because I think it's the best city
around.
There are a lot of cities I could go to.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
12:16:00 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
We'll have comment from Mr. Cohen and then I think
once I make a few comments, I'm going to also make
a comment you can't consider two masters at one
time, and that's what we've got here.
Mr. Cohen.
12:16:20 >>HARRY COHEN:
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you for your comment at the beginning of the
meeting.
There is a lot of emotion on this dais.
There's a lot of emotion in the audience.
And these matters are not personal.
They are the business that we are put here to do.
I wanted to just start by quoting myself from the
last meeting that we had, a line that actually I'm
quoting it from the Tampa Bay times.
What it was that I said was, if we can come up
with a model that we all agree works, I think it
is incumbent on the Mayor and us to work together
under the terms of the charter to put the best

type of committee forward and not worry about
whose power it is to do it.
And the reason that I said that is because where I
see us going is a two-way power struggle between
us and the Mayor, and my concern is that in losing
that struggle, we will ultimately undermine what
it is the public asked us to do.
What I said again in our last meeting, what I
heard this morning is not just that people want a
committee.
They want a committee that actually makes a
difference, that actually has the ability to
foster dialogue, to be real.
People have come up to me in the community
recently and said, don't just create something
that's window dressing.
Create something real.
Well, under the terms of the charter, one thing is
for sure.
If we create a body -- and, by the way, I don't
see a conflict with what Mr. Shelby said and what
Ms. Mandell said.
In fact, we absolutely have the right to create by
ordinance an advisory committee.
But the question is, what does advisory mean and

who is it advising?
The problem here is that if we create something,
even advisory in nature, without cooperating at
all with the Mayor in doing it.
And let me just say this.
Obviously the Council was affronted by the fact
that the Mayor called a preemptive strike had a
preemptive press conference to announce the
formation of the board prior to us having this
meeting.
Granted that that was something that caused some
consternation among some of the Council members.
But the fact of the matter is -- the fact of the
matter is, if we insist on doing something that is
totally at odds with what he wants, under the
charter, he has the power not to cooperate with
it.
And at the end of the day, it will get us nowhere.
I'm looking at the charter itself, and it says the
Mayor, and this is exactly why I thought getting
into this matter was counterproductive.
Exercises direct control and supervision over all
departments and divisions of the municipal
government.
If a committee is put in place to advise him, it's

totally within his discretion whether or not he's
going to cooperate and listen to that committee or
not.
At least with the proposal that he put on the
table, there is an implication that he is going to
actually listen to what it says, and he's given
us -- and according to him, he doesn't have to
give us the two, two appointments to it.
You know, Ms. Patti, when she was speaking, said
if you don't have the power to create what it is
you're asking us to create, tell us the truth.
I think it's less about whether or not we have the
power to create something than whether or not we
can work toward creating something that is
effective.
And something that is effective has to involve
everybody.
It can't just be what we want.
It can't just be what the Mayor wants.
It has to be a collective effort.
We have a relatively new chief of police.
He is grappling with difficult problems where
there is a national conversation about these
issues that is going on in this country and that
is definitely rooted in real anxiety, fear, and

issues in our communities.
We also have a situation in the country that was
alluded to also by one of the speakers today where
we have law enforcement personnel being gunned
down twice this week in this country, basically
assassination style.
So there are really an awful lot of issues that
are in the backdrop of this matter.
To me, the only way that we're going to create a
real committee with teeth is to work together.
I think that if we go down separate roads from the
Mayor, we will either be tied up in litigation or
we will end up creating things that don't have the
effect that we desire.
So, you know, I am, quite frankly, I would like to
appoint the two members as a body to the Mayor's
proposed committee, and I will tell you, if he
makes his appointments first before we were to
make ours, we could give a lot of scrutiny to
making sure that our appointments did round out
and reflect the diversity of the community.
I've heard a lot of denunciation of his power to
appoint, but we don't even know who would
necessarily be appointed to it.
So, you know, I understand the Council members'

frustration in having asked for this and being
preempted by the Mayor.
I get that.
But at the same time, I don't think the substance
of what he's proposing, particularly given the
charter limitations, is not something we can work
with.
I just wanted to end by saying one last thing.
I saw the proposal that was put forward this
morning, and I have it here in front of me.
Here it is right here.
The justice accountability democracy Tampa for
justice civilian police review board proposal.
And I will tell you that there's plenty of good
stuff in here, but much of it is preemptive by
state law.
There is a state law that specifically proscribes
the way that police conduct shall be investigated
in the State of Florida.
So that entire matter is governed by state law.
Some of the other things mentioned in here,
particularly number 9, resources, independent
attorney, independent investigators,
administrative staff, funding, how are those
things going to exist if the Mayor is not

cooperating with us in the formation of this
thing.
We all know for a fact that we can pass anything
we want in the budget, but ultimately it is the
Mayor's administrative power whether to spend that
money, how to ultimately administer the city, and
he's backed up by the charter in exercising that
power.
So I would close by saying that for different
reasons but ultimately I came to the conclusion
and I believe Councilman Reddick and Capin and
some of the others have already initiated the
process of finding out what is necessary to have a
charter amendment.
I think that is the correct -- if you really want
the Council to be in charge of creating something
that does anything more than give advice, which
may or may not be listened to, you have to have a
charter change.
If not, there has to be cooperation between the
Mayor and the Council.
We cannot be at odds with one another or the whole
matter is going to be ineffective.
So that is my view on it.
12:24:09 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you, Mr. Cohen.

Anyone who hasn't spoken, wish to speak?
12:24:24 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
May I add one thing to the
conversation?
Mr. Cohen had referenced cooperating with the
Mayor's proposal, and let me just outline very
succinctly the problems I have with the Mayor's
proposal and wait until we get the St. Petersburg
information back.
But with an 11-member board, two alternates, so
that means the Mayor is appointing nine, the
Council is appointing two.
So I would assume the Council itself would decide
who the alternates are, because it seems a little
prescribed that there would be nine active members
works to alternates.
The Mayor appoints nine and we choose two.
That question would have to be answered for me?
Are we choosing the alternates or are we choosing
two of the permanent members?
12:25:26 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Chief Ward was available to
answer that --
12:25:29 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Let me tell you the other
issues I have.
The other issue is that there are -- serving
four-year terms, which would more or less coincide

with the four-year term of the Mayor, so whichever
Mayor is going to come in will have those nine
appointment and is able to choose who those nine
people are.
So whichever Mayor is then elected will have the
control of that board.
As I said earlier in this conversation, 25 years
from now, when this was still on the books,
hopefully the executive order isn't just abandoned
as Ms. Capin pointed out earlier.
We don't know how that -- how those appointments
are going to be doled out.
By having the Council appoint more members, you've
got seven different voices, you've got four
different distinct areas of the community
represented in addition to the citywide
individual.
You at least take out some of the risk factor that
this is going to be a homogeneous board, and
you'll have a variety of opinions represented.
I have discussed not publicly before but in
discussions with others, that I have a hard time
understanding why all seven Council members and
the Mayor are elected at the same time.
Potentially, you have a complete turnover, if

nobody runs for office for a second term or nobody
changes seats, like just happened with councilman
Miranda and councilman Maniscalco, you have
potential for entire turnover of government in one
election.
And if I have a problem with us doing that, I
certainly have a problem with the review board
doing that.
To have four-year terms and not staggered terms, I
also have a problem with.
Those are three basic components I discussed with
you yesterday.
Four-year term, not being staggered, and nine
members appointed by the Mayor and two by us.
Now, that being said, there is one opinion that I
received that was put out to the public on
Facebook, and it's from James Shaw, who is the
chair -- let me get the title right -- also
attorney in private practice but the legal panel
chair the greater Tampa chapter of the ACLU of
Florida.
He states, my examination of the case law leads me
to conclude that the City Council does, in fact,
have the power to create a civilian review board
with subpoena power by ordinance independently of

whether or not the Mayor also has the authority to
create the essentially powerless board he has
created.
Quote, except for those acts expressly prohibited
by statute or by the constitution, municipalities
have the same legislative powers for municipal
purposes.
And then he cites some of the casework D'Agastino
versus Miami, and then he states, Attorney
Mandell's opinion utilizes reasoning rejected by
the third district court of appeal in D'Agastino.
In her memo, she writes, quote, it is the Mayor
who has managerial control over the police
department and by process of elimination that the
City Council does not have such control precludes
it from having any managerial function when it
comes to the city department, closed quote.
Regardless whether that is the right answer, that
is the wrong question.
A civilian review board does not exercise, quote,
managerial control.
Instead it conducts inquiries on behalf of
outsiders to the police department and that
function is neither preempted by state law nor the
city charter.

D'Agastino court rejected a similar argument.
In that case, an officer served with a subpoena by
the Miami CIP argued that the investigative
function was preempted by state law.
Specifically he argued that the police officer's
bill of rights provides the sole method for
investigating police misconduct and that,
therefore, the City of Miami cannot exercise such
power.
Rejecting this, the D'Agastino court explained,
that the CIP was not exercising the power at all.
The court explained that it maintained, quote,
quite comfortable, it remains, quote, quite
comfortable with the observation made not long ago
by another panel of this court that chapter 112
concerns internal investigations conducted by a
police department of its own officers and the
police officers bill of rights sets forth
procedures to be followed by the police department
for interrogation of a law enforcement officer
under investigation by the police department.
The CIP's authority extends to independent
external investigation.
And then he cites the D'Agostino case.
The point is the City Council does not have to --

the City Council does not have to have
preexisting, quote, managerial authority over the
police department to create a civilian review
board with subpoena power because the civilian
review board will not be managing the police
department.
Hiring, firing, granting, denying, so forth.
They will instead be performing independent
external investigations.
It goes on, and I'm not going to read the
entire --
12:30:45 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Let me say to you, we also got
that information, so we're familiar with that.
And --
12:30:53 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
The public may not.
12:30:55 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I would also say I am not.
He's never contacted my office.
I have never heard from him.
12:30:59 >>FRANK REDDICK:
He was doing it independent of
you.
12:31:02 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I understand that.
12:31:05 >>FRANK REDDICK:
You want to hear from Mr. Shaw,
please call him.
At this moment, let me say this.
Let me say this at this time, when I made the

original motion for the chief to look at
establishing feasibility of establishment of a
citizen review board, the report was to come back.
I also put out a proposal that it was about each
member of the Council appoint a person to serve on
the board as well as two by the Mayor and two by
the police chief.
The Mayor had a chance to cooperate then.
The Mayor chose not to cooperate because when it
came out in the paper the next day, the Mayor
stood out there and made a public comment that
he's the one who can make that choice.
He's the one who appoints.
He was on TV talking about the same thing.
Ms. Mandell, you approached me because you didn't
like the direction I was going and you approached
me after agenda review.
To me, you already had your mind made up.
And, two, let me say this, I personally, when I
say you can't serve two masters, who hire you?
12:32:28 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I'm hired by the Mayor and
approved by City Council.
12:32:32 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Thank you.
And you think that you're going to be able to --

Mayor come out and make a comment that he has the
power and authority to appoint, you think the
person that hired you, that you're going to go
against the Mayor when you already made one
slip-up, now you already made one slip-up with the
Mayor, caused him to go out and get an outside
attorney.
You weren't about to make a second slip-up.
12:33:10 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Whatever remedies --
12:33:12 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Did I interrupt you when I was
talking to you.
I don't want to you interrupt me.
12:33:17 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Fair enough.
12:33:18 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Let me make this clear, I personally think you
have done a disservice to this Council.
It's a conflict of interest on your behalf, and
it's hard for any member of this Council to sit
here and judge that and trust what you shared with
us.
Because, let me ask you, how many Council members
did you meet with prior to Friday, this past
Friday?
12:33:52 >>JULIA MANDELL:
In terms of what?
12:33:54 >>FRANK REDDICK:
In terms of your position?

12:33:56 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I think I did speak with
Mr. Suarez because he came to my office.
I had some other conversations with a few of you
prior to this even coming up on City Council
agenda.
12:34:06 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Did you share your opinion?
12:34:08 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Yes, and I shared it with your
City Council attorney.
12:34:12 >>FRANK REDDICK:
So your opinion was already
established before the Mayor went to have that
press conference on Friday.
12:34:16 >>JULIA MANDELL:
My opinion was established based
upon the original motion that came to Council for
discussion.
12:34:22 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Let me tell you how this is a set
plan.
If you check the CCCTV log a week in advance, they
already knew about a press conference.
12:34:35 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I'm not going to be able to
respond to that.
12:34:38 >>FRANK REDDICK:
I don't care if you respond or
not.
The question is, is this: When I hear people sit
up here and talk about if they are satisfied with
the Mayor appointing nine people and this Council

is two, it basically remind me that we have been a
puppet for the administration.
And I'm past them days of being a puppet.
And I'm tired that we can be embarrassed,
overlooked, overshadowed, disrespectful when the
reporters have to call elected officials to find
out what's going on with a press conference.
Reporters have to call.
I thought you were talking about the storm brewing
in a press conference.
But I'll say this and in due time, because I want
to give Mr. Shelby an opportunity to respond, and
if we have a second round that goes, that will be
fine, but I'm going to stay within the time --
Mr. Shelby, he has about a 15 minute report.
And I would like for him to give his report
without being interrupted.
And when we finish the deliberation, I'll be
prepared to make a motion.
Mr. Shelby, you have the floor.
12:36:47 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I apologize.
I would like to receive a copy of whatever is
being given out or the memo from previous.
That's fine.
12:36:56 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
I just got mine.

I don't know what they are going to talk about.
12:36:59 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Mr. Shelby, is this the same
thing we received this morning on the dais and
same thing by e-mail from you yesterday or the day
before.
12:37:05 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Yes.
12:37:06 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Everybody received this.
12:37:18 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Mr. Chairman, I want to point out
and do I apologize to the City Council, the delay
in getting you this memo.
You got it the same time as Ms. Mandell did.

But let me do say that this morning I did forward
a substitute memo which you have before you now.
And the difference is a minor typo, and I added a
Supreme Court case in support of my position that
I had accidentally omitted.
So I would ask the council please to receive and
file the substitute by motion, please.
12:37:56 >> So moved.
12:37:58 >> Second.
12:38:01 >>FRANK REDDICK:
(off microphone) Motion by Mr.
Suarez, seconded by Ms. Capin. All in favor?
Opposed?
12:38:02 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
And, Mr. Chairman, if I can, I

going to ask for the courtesy of the council to
please refrain from your questions or comments
until I complete my report to you.
Thank you.
12:38:15 >> FRANK REDDICK:
(Off microphone)
12:38:21 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
I'm going to move as quickly as
I can, but I have to share with you, members of
the board, in my years as your City Council
attorney, one of the most significant items, if
not the most significant item dealt with, because
it goes beyond this issue.
And I understand, and I appreciate the fact that
you recognize that.
So please let me begin.
Honorable chairman, members of the City Council,
Martin Shelby, your City Council attorney.
And I am going to read from my memo because I
think it speaks very clearly and succinctly and it
allows the people as well who are watching and
listening to know my position.
I begin by letting you know that I provide this
opinion pursuant to my obligation as City Council
attorney under Section 2.04 of the charter as
directed by motion of City Council.
The power of the City Council under the charter is

succinctly encapsulated in one sentence in Section
2.01.
Quote: There shall be a City Council in which all
legislative power shall be vested.
Period.
End quote.
The Tampa City Council derives its legislative
authority from state statute from chapter 166
Florida statute, otherwise known as the Municipal
Home Rule Powers Act.
And Section 166.02 subsection 3 of Florida statute
states, and I quote: The legislature recognizes
that pursuant to the grant of power set forth in
Section 2-B, Article 8, of the state Constitution,
the legislative body of each municipality has the
power to enact legislation concerning any subject
matter upon which the state legislature may act,
except -- and it lists four.
The subject of annexation, merger and exercise of
extraterritorial power, et cetera.
B. Any subject expressly prohibited by the
Constitution.
C. Any subject expressly preempted to state or
county government by the Constitution, or by
general law.

Or D, any subject preempted to a county pursuant
to a county charter, such as the Hillsborough
County charter.
I point out that the Florida Supreme Court has
judicially affirmed this in its holding of City of
Boca Raton vs. State of Florida, which is found
cited at 595 Southern 2nd 25, a 1992 Florida
Supreme Court case.
Excuse me.
The question in this particular matter is whether
the City Council is prevented by the charter from
passing an ordinance establishing a citizens
police advisory board.
It is my conclusion that nothing in the charter
prevents the City Council from passing an
ordinance that establishes such a board.
Such an interpretation is consistent with the
plain reading of Section 1.04, which I have
highlighted for you in the copy of the charter
that I have provided.
That is a separation of power, and that states,
and I quote, except as otherwise herein expressly
provided, all legislative power shall be vested
and exercised by the City Council.
As stated in Section 2.05, quote: All legislative

powers of the council shall be exercised by
ordinance.
Now, there are limitations on legislative
authority in the charter, but, as I stated just
before, they are to be expressly provided.
And I'll give you two examples, which I believe
you are familiar with.
One is Section 2.04 which requires prior approval
of the mayor for legislative aides' positions and
salaries.
And the other one, which is going to be very
relevant this evening, is Section is 7.07 which
prohibits any City Council initiated budget
changes after the adoption of the annual budget.
Authority for City Council to take action, if it
so chooses, is unambiguously stated in the charter
by Article 5, departments, Section 5.03,
additional duties.
And I have taken the liberty of taking out the
clause involving the mayor in there, and replaced
by ellipses, dot-dot-dot.
It reads as follows, and I quote: Each of the
foregoing officers shall perform such other duties
as shall be directed by the council by ordinance
in furtherance of their legislative function. End

quote.
And I bring to your attention that the chief of
police is specifically identified as one of those
foregoing officers in Section 5.01-D.
Now, the Florida Supreme Court has held, quote,
the plain reading of statutory language is the
first consideration of statutory construction.
That's cited in State versus Branford, 787
Southern 2nd 811, at 817, a 2001 Florida Supreme
Court case which quotes Capers versus State at 678
Southern 2nd 330 at page 332 which is a 1996
Florida Supreme Court case.
Quote: When the statute is clear and unambiguous,
courts will not look behind the statute's plain
language for legislative intent or resort to rules
of statutory construction to ascertain intent.
End quote.
That is from Daniels versus Florida Department of
Health at 898 Southern 2nd 61, at page 64, a 2005
Florida Supreme Court case.
And finally, the Supreme Court says this in PR
versus State at 677 Southern 2nd 270, at page 271,
a 1996 case.
Quote: Where the language of the statute is plain
and unambiguous, there is no need for judicial

interpretation. End quote.
Now, members of the City Council, one need only
look to your code of ordinances, for example, an
ordinance enacted by City Council that exert
authority over departments and employees, and I
would like to share a few examples.
Section 2-46, duties of departments.
Section 2-116, transmittal of the annual budget
supplement.
Section 2-500 and what follows, the City of
Tampa's ethics code.
Section 2-1 and what follows, the City of Tampa's
human rights ordinance.
Section 2-128 and what follows, the criminal
history screening practices, which I'm sure you
are all familiar because it's otherwise known as
"ban the box."
And that's a situation where you directly,
specifically made -- imposed a duty on the HR
department.
And finally, Section 26.5-1, what follows the
equal business opportunity program.
Members of council, ordinances have also created
boards and commissions that exert authority and
create duties for city departments and employees.

For example, Section 2-650, the City of Tampa's
ethics commission.
Section 4-26 and what follows, the Public Art
Committee.
Section 12-5, Human Rights Board.
And Section 26.5-208, the Equal Business
Opportunity Advisory Committee, which,
incidentally, by the way, began as an executive
order and was ultimately converted to an ordinance
that is now on your books.
Based on my research and analysis, City Council
has two options.
One, it can move forward if it so chooses with a
process of creating a carefully crafted ordinance.
Two, City Council can make a public policy
decision to not take legislative action.
That is also City Council's prerogative, but not
because it can't legally, but because it chooses
not to.
It is my opinion that the wording of this charter
affords the citizens of Tampa the same rights to
full home rule legislative authority and true
representative government that every citizen of
every other city throughout this state enjoys
under chapter 166 of Florida statutes.

Members of City Council, it's a logical fallacy to
believe that a strong mayor must equal a weak City
Council.
It's just not true.
The power under your charter is not a portion --
it is not a balance of power, it is a separation
of power.
You can have a strong mayor and a strong City
Council, which working together creates a strong
representative government.
Which creates a strong citizenry; which creates a
strong city.
That's my opinion.
And I stand by it.
Thank you.
12:48:40 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Ms. Capin.
12:48:45 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Thank you for that.
This is exactly the reason that we have our own
City Council attorney, and it is for that very
reason.
I want to ask that the rules of conflict of
interest -- do you have those available?
12:49:08 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Is that something you are
requesting?

12:49:12 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
I would like to hear it.
12:49:13 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Is that Council's pleasure?
12:49:19 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Okay, you want me to make that as
a motion?
Okay.
I'm requesting it.
12:49:39 >> JULIA MANDELL:
I think at this point, given
the tenor of your conversation, it would be
appropriate for me to make the following
suggestion. Continue this item.
I will obtain through my office an outside legal
opinion on both my conflict of interest that has
been presented by Mr. Shelby and generalized
conflict of interest on this issue.
To take this conversation any further not only
puts the office, my entire office at risk, because
any conflict that I have, they have as well, and I
do not want to have other opinions given by
attorneys in my office tainted by the conversation
that could go on at this point in time.
So I am respectfully requesting this should be
continued so that I can obtain outside legal
opinion on what the conflict of interest for the
city attorney's office is.
Thank you.

12:50:31 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Thank you.
I still want to hear the rules of conflict of
interest.
12:50:33 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
As you well know, I stated earlier how this is
going to end.
I smelled it was going to happen this way.
It is happening this way.
Exactly what I said.
But I am going to go further because that's how I
.
Last week Mr. Shelby asked me if I wanted to meet
with him to talk about the charter.
What did I tell you?
12:50:55 >> Your exact words to me, sir, and I did write
them down, were: Tell them I don't want to meet
with you.
12:51:01 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
No, no, you asked me right
here face to face, sir.
I don't want to listen to that. I told you I
don't want to meet with you, that I can read it
and understand it by myself.
I correct or not?
12:51:12 >> If I can.
12:51:14 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Oh, you write it down.

I don't write nothing down.
Let me go further.
Let me go further.
Because I don't appreciate -- and I told him
before, and, in fact, I almost fired twice when I
was chairman.
I called him in the office twice and I told him,
Be an attorney, don't be a council member, don't
go -- whether the conversation was about the text
or not, I didn't care. It looks bad to the public
when every time somebody is going to say anything
he gets up and -- I don't know what they are
saying.
The public doesn't know what he's saying.
No one knows what he's saying.
So that myself is a conflict of interest.
When you work for the council you work for the
seven of us, not individual ones.
When you go meet -- and I don't want to meet with
you because I don't like anything in secrecy.
You meet with each other council member, I don't
know what you tell them.
And I don't care to know what you tell them.
But I think myself it's a conflict of interest.
When I was sick and dying you brought me a

milkshake.
12:52:17 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Yes, sir, I recall that.
12:52:18 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
You didn't bring me the
milkshake because you wanted me to drink it.
You brought me the milkshake because you wanted to
tell me what was happening, that the council may
not let me vote by telephone.
I said get the milkshake, get the hell out of the
house.
Oh, yeah, I remember everything. I don't forget
nothing.
Even when I'm dying I don't forget.
So what I am saying is you were a great actor at
one time.
You say you worked in the plays in New York. You
never did. I don't believe you did because I
didn't see your name nowhere in New York.
In 2002 you were commissioner --
12:52:51 >> MARTIN SHELBY:
Excuse me, chairman --
May I -- Mr. Chairman, I take my role here as well
very seriously.
12:52:59 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
So do I.
12:53:01 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
And I don't appreciate an attack
by any member of council and I respect -- and by
the way, I respect Mr. Miranda.

I provide him as much information as he requests
from me, and as much information as I am able to
offer him.
And I have spoken with each one of you, and I have
made the offer to talk with each one of you, and
on August 20th of this year, at 6:00 p.m.,
Councilman Miranda said to me regarding the
charter, quote, You can say I refused to meet with
you.
And that's the answer to your question,
Mr. Chairman.
12:53:40 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right, let me just say this.
And I think we have gone the direction more
personal than anything else -- and we have got
more important things to discuss here today than
getting personal, so I hope you all will move
toward that and not personal.
So anything else, Mr. Miranda?
12:54:07 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Well, I could speak for much
longer than that, Mr. Chairman, but I'll put it
out to the public.
I didn't make this up.
It's part of an interview that was done in 2002.
But I'll bring that later.
12:54:22 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Mrs. Capin.

12:54:23 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
You know, it was stated that this
could go down a slippery slope, and I just heard
it.
I just heard it.
You are our City Council attorney, and you can
talk to us anytime, and nobody has to know what we
talked about.
You are our attorney.
I correct?
12:54:44 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Mrs. Capin, let me share with
you that irrespective of what Mr. Miranda's
attempt to smear and destroy my reputation is, let
me share with you that it has been a great
privilege and honor to serve this City Council for
eleven years.
I have served 17 members of the Tampa City
Council.
I take my commitment to each of you very
seriously.
And even with Mr. Miranda, when I prevented him
from about to be voting on what would clearly be,
in my opinion, a conflict of interest, and I had
asked him with some trepidation to stop a meeting
to be able to protect a client who I believed
needed my protection even though he may not have

said he wanted it.
12:55:45 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Did you write it down?
12:55:48 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Okay, I have the floor.
12:55:48 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
If I could just say this.
I am here -- I am here just to provide you the
information which was made as part of a motion
which is my obligation to you under the charter.
That's all I am going to say.
12:56:01 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Thank you for that.
And when council members talk about this going --
being unraveled, I just heard it.
Nobody here did that.
Everybody here is looking at -- and it is very
important.
It is very important what's happening here today.
Because this affects this City Council and future
City Councils.
And, you know, when -- you know, we have to work
with the mayor.
I didn't hear from the mayor and I don't think
anybody else here heard from the mayor on what we
talked about.
Nothing.
So we need to work with the mayor.
Okay.

A strong mayor does not equal a weak City Council,
unless the City Council allows it.
I have been on this City Council five years and I
have seen it time and again.
The power that is exercised -- what the
citizens -- our legislative power has been
undermined.
So I want to say that, because it was stated that
we are unraveling the city.
We are not.
We are actually protecting what -- we are looking
at it and trying to clarify representative
government and not depriving the people of that.
They voted us in.
And we are the legislative body.
Therefore, your opinion is very important to us,
and what transpired with the mayor is also very
important to us.
I want to hear the rules of conflict of interest.
I want to hear it, please.
12:57:51 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Well, Mr. Shelby, let me ask you,
the city attorney --
Whoa, whoa, whoa.
I was making -- I was asking a question to our
city attorney -- our Council attorney, and the

question is, she has requested to have an outside
opinion to review.
What is the opinion of our Council?
12:58:19 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Can I ask you where these rules of
conflict of interest come from?
Where did you find them?
Where would you look for them?
12:58:28 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Those would be the rules that
apply to all attorneys under the Florida rules --
the Florida Bar rules, the rules of professional
conduct.
12:58:41 >>FRANK REDDICK:
So the question is on the table,
all right?
The question is on the table.
Mrs. Mandell requested that she should be able to
meet with her legal outside attorney and get
advice about this conflict of interest.
12:58:58 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
If I can.
I believe that she is correct, that ramifications
from this obviously do apply to her entire office,
and it may be ramifications that may come out,
that may have an unintended consequence.
And in that sense, it would be wise to probably
refrain from doing that.
But as to a conflict of interest generally, that

is between you as a client and your attorney.
You are her clients.
And there is a rule that applies specifically to
an attorney who is -- an attorney who has an
organization as a client, and that's rule 4-1.13
of the rules of professional conduct, and
obviously Ms. Mandell is the attorney for the
municipal corporation.
That is her client.
And then that will identify.
13:00:08 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Thank you for that.
13:00:09 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
I just want to make it clear.
Are we saying then that we want to investigate the
city attorney for rules of conduct in violation of
client -- I don't know.
I don't know.
13:00:32 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Respond to the question? Because
you raised the question.
13:00:34 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Yes, I did raise the question,
because I want to know.
I want to know where we stand on this and how we
were represented.
What was our representation?
And how were we represented in this?
So it's very important to me.

But I will take the recommendation of our City
Council attorney.
13:00:57 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Ultimately, though -- I'm sorry,
Mr. Chairman.
I'm sorry to interrupt.
13:01:03 >>FRANK REDDICK:
At this time, we stand at 1:00.
What time would you like to come back?
It's 1:00 now.
13:01:13 >> 2:
15.
I'll move for 2:15.
13:01:20 >>FRANK REDDICK:
We stand in recess till 2:15.
Thank you.
13:01:23 >> (City Council in recess.)


DISCLAIMER:
This file represents an unedited version of
realtime captioning which should neither be relied
upon for complete accuracy nor used as a verbatim
transcript.
The original of this file was produced in all
capital letters and any variation thereto may be a
result of third party edits and software
compatibility issues.
Any person who needs a verbatim transcript of the
proceedings may need to hire a court reporter.







TAMPA CITY COUNCIL
Thursday, September 3, 2015
2:15 p.m. Session
DISCLAIMER:
This file represents an unedited version of
realtime captioning which should neither be relied
upon for complete accuracy nor used as a verbatim
transcript.
The original of this file was produced in all
capital letters and any variation thereto may be a
result of third party edits and software
compatibility issues.
Any person who needs a verbatim transcript of the
proceedings may need to hire a court reporter.

14:17:54 >>FRANK REDDICK:
We are going to call this meeting
back to order.
Roll call.
14:18:24 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Here.
14:18:26 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Here.
14:18:29 >>HARRY COHEN:
Here.
14:18:30 >>GUIDO MANISCALCO:
Here.
14:18:32 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Here.
14:18:33 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Here.
All right.
Do we have any position or reports or comment from
staff at this time?
I was checking to see if we have any additional

comments from staff.
Any other comments from the legal department?
14:19:02 >>JULIA MANDELL:
City attorney.
Just to go back to where the conversation left off
at my suggestion, for an outside legal opinion as
it relates to the Florida Bar rules and conflict
of interest.
One thing I do want to say, and I think also for
the public, so they understand what we are talking
about, in terms of conflict of interest.
We are not talking about a political conflict of
interest and not talking about a voting conflict
of interest.
Than the conflicts of interest being brought up
and why I am requesting a continuance to be able
to deal with them relate to attorneys ethical
obligations under the Florida Bar rules and that's
why I say it's not just a simplistic question in
terms of any ethical obligation I may have, it's
really to our entire office and something that
needs to be looked at very carefully.
So that's my recommendation.
I am going to go ahead and seek that outside
counsel.
I'll ask for 30 days to continue the item in order

to have that conversation.
Because of course I would have to get that person
on board, about all of that.
I do have a couple of people in mind who could be
appropriate attorneys for that, including people
who are involved in Florida Bar issues.
So that's my request.
And I would ask for you to take action on that.
14:20:26 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
You are requesting a continuance for the conflict
much interest portion?
14:20:30 >> At a minimum the conflict of interest portion.
If you feel you still need to have a conversation
about the rest of it based on that conflict of
interest, if you feel you could separate the two
out with the conflict of interest, that would be
fine.
14:20:44 >> Ms. Montelione.
14:20:46 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I wouldn't want to continue
the entire conversation.
I would just be in agreement that we continue the
conflict of interest portion of this conversation.
But I think we have a good handle on the rest of
the topic in order to move on and do you want me
to make that in the form of a motion, sir?

14:21:09 >>FRANK REDDICK:
If you want to.
14:21:11 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I move that in 30 days the
legal department -- I'm sorry?
October 1st, come back to us at 9:00 a.m. with
a staff report on the hiring of an outside
attorney regarding the conflict of interest
question that has been raised here today.
14:21:26 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Thank you.
And for 30 days that's fine.
I just want to let you know in case it's difficult
for me to bring somebody on board that quick I
might ask for an additional --
14:21:37 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I didn't say for the opinion
to come back, I said for the attorney to be
selected for the --
14:21:45 >>JULIA MANDELL:
Well, I will go ahead and work
with Mr. Shelby on choosing someone.
I will try to get you an opinion within 30 days.
14:21:53 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
All right.
I thought you needed more time than that.
14:21:58 >>JULIA MANDELL:
I do feel of this is a very
important issue that needs to be resolved.
14:22:02 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
What is the opinion?
Because my opinion is than there's a conflict of
interest and I'm your client.

There's a conflict of interest.
14:22:09 >> No, ma'am, that's not how it works.
This is a determination under Florida bar rules.
So what that means, and how that all works,
because what we are talking about is our ethical
obligations under the Florida bar rules as
attorneys.
It's something that we need to deal with.
So in order to be able to know where our
arrangements are, and to be able to advise you of
that, I need to have that set forth.
And it is something that I am imploring council to
give me that opportunity, because again this is on
this one issue.
It impacts every attorney in the city attorney's
office.
So it's something that in order to be able to
serve you in all capacities, not one individual
issue, it needs to be something that is looked at.
That has now been raised.
14:23:01 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
I revise my motion then to state
that on October 1st, in 30 days, to have the
legal department return to us with the opinion of
an outside attorney to be selected to render an
opinion on the conflict of interest that was

brought up today, and further that the city
attorney and the City Council attorney work
together to select that individual.
14:23:32 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Does it have to be specific about
where you think the conflict of interest is or no?
I'm wondering about that.
I'm going to ask Mr. Shelby.
14:23:43 >> Can I just finish the statement in?
I personally did read the Florida Bar portion
referring to conflict of interest.
So if you want to reiterate, Mr. Shelby, the
ordinance.
14:23:57 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Actually, no.
I think if council wants to have -- to in a what
is being planned, why don't you make a motion, as
a suggestion, to come back, to be able to have the
report on the attorney that she intends to be
selected.
14:24:15 >> That was my first one.
14:24:17 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Not before the opinion is
issued.
To know who your attorney is before -- and I hear
them saying no over there.
So I guess you are asking for an authorization?
14:24:33 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
My motion was the city

attorney would have 30 days to bring back to us
who the outside attorney was that was chosen.
That was my first motion.
And then I revised it because Ms. Mandell said she
thought she wanted to bring back the opinion in 30
days.
So, I mean, I would take the -- neither one has
gotten a second, so I have made two motions.
14:24:57 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Well, let's get clear on what the
legal department is asking.
14:25:00 >>MIKE SUAREZ:

14:25:11 >>SAL TERRITO:
We looked at this issue.
Here is why have been we think there isn't going
to be a conflict.
It isn't going to be mine or Marty's opinion.
All that Mrs. Mandell was doing was your asking
her to look at the charter, see what her authority
was under the charter.
She was giving you have an opinion on what the
charter says.
Neither you nor the mayor has made a decision on
whether you agreed with that or not at that
particular point.
His position is you have a conflict built in
already.

No decision was made, so how can there be a
conflict?
Because the decision was only made on what does
the charter say?
14:25:47 >> You are making the argument --
14:25:51 >>SAL TERRITO:
You only heard one side of it.
We have a different perspective.
So the only way to resolve is it to get outside
counsel.
Somebody who is independent of both of us who has
a lot of authority a lot of experience, because
Marty and I are not going to agree, and you don't
want to have us fighting over this.
So the easiest way to do it is of to get somebody
on the outside who has the authority to do that.
14:26:12 >>FRANK REDDICK:
And let me say this.
You know, we have taken a separate issue now and
making it -- taken it where it shouldn't be.
Mrs. Mandell requested that we -- she wanted to
pursue an outside counsel prior to taking the
break.
Now we are just trying to get to the bottom of it,
how much time you want, and to do this, and we
have got a date set.
Now, all we need to know, and need at this time,

does she plan on coming back in 30 days with an
opinion?
Or is she coming back in 30 days with the name of
an attorney?
14:26:48 >> Going to come back in 30 days with an opinion,
unless it takes longer than that.
14:26:55 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Let me say this.
14:26:56 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Council, if I can, Ms. Mandell
does not necessarily have to get an outside
attorney for this opinion.
There are other avenues that she's able to take
this opinion from.
She can ask for an opinion from the Florida Bar if
she wishes.
I'm just concerned that this is a situation where
I was concerned in e-mails ---I'm sorry.
14:27:27 >> I'm sorry, Mr. Shelby, but I think I -- I think
I know where you are going, and I would prefer
that what needs to be said be said by a council
member.
14:27:38 >>MARTIN SHELBY:
Yes.
Okay.
14:27:41 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Thank you.
So the first motion I made was for Ms. Mandell to
come back with the name of the attorney that had

been chosen to render the opinion, and then she
said she wanted to have the opinion back in 30
days.
So to accommodate both, I would like to motion
that the attorney that is being recommended to
render his or her opinion on a conflict of
interest be brought back to us by September
17th at 9:00 a.m.
14:28:24 >>FRANK REDDICK:
30 days?
14:28:26 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
No, no, she said 30 days for
the opinion.
I would like to know who the person is on
September 17th.
14:28:31 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Just the name.
14:28:32 >>CHAIRMAN:
Just the name.
14:28:34 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Second.
14:28:35 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Mr. Cohen?
14:28:35 >>HARRY COHEN:
At the same time that she comes
back with a name, perhaps she can tell us the
scope of the question that she's asking the
attorney.
14:28:47 >> Is that a friendly amendment?
14:28:49 >>HARRY COHEN:
Yes.
So there's no misunderstanding about what it is
that we are asking to have back.

14:28:54 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I accept that.
14:28:57 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right, it's being done in
correlation with the Tampa attorney?
14:29:04 >> Yes.
That was part of the original motion as well, that
Ms. Mandell work with Mr. Shelby on selecting the
attorney which is going to be reported to us on --
14:29:18 >>SAL TERRITO:
I know you don't like to hear
this.
That decision is a city decision.
If you don't want to approve the contract that's
your decision.
It is her decision under the charter.
She makes all the legal decisions for the city.
If you don't like what she brings forward, turn
the contract down.
14:29:34 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
That's what we'll decide on
September 17.
14:29:37 >> Consultation with if city attorney is not part
of that.
14:29:40 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
In the spirit of working
together as Mr. Cohen said earlier, that we would
like to work with the administration on getting
some of -- to the bottom of some of these
questions.

We would appreciate working with our city
attorney.
I mean, you can bring it directly to the council
members individually if you so choose.
But we are trying to work together here.
14:30:06 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Well, I think you probably
misunderstood what Mrs. Mandell was saying, that
she wanted to meet with our attorney as part of
the process.
She suggested that.
All right, we have a motion on the floor, motion
by Mrs. Montelione, seconded by Mrs. Capin.
Any further discussion?
14:30:31 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
And the friendly amendment.
14:30:33 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All those in favor of the motion
say aye.
Those opposed?
All right.
Anything else from you?
14:30:48 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
The results hopefully from the
questions I asked earlier.
14:30:51 >> Chief Ward:
The contract with St. Pete PD,
some of the questions asked that you brought up.
Over the last six years, they have reviewed 208
cases, and in my time of six years had several

recommendations.
Watch we couldn't get from them is what were these
recommendations, and were they implemented?
Couldn't get that information from them at that
time.
14:31:19 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Okay, so I appreciate the
quick work, and I understand that it would have
been difficult to get all of the information.
So I am going to also make a motion for September
17th for the police department, for Chief
Ward, or Assistant Chief Dugan, to appear to
further answer the questions that were posed this
morning so we know there were 208 cases that were
brought forward in six years.
We know that there were seven recommendations.
I would like to know what those recommendations
were, and if they were implemented by the
St. Petersburg police department.
And that would be at 9:00 a.m. on the 17th.
14:32:02 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Second.
14:32:04 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right, got a motion from Mrs.
Montelione, seconded by Ms. Capin.
Any discussion on the motion?
14:32:15 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
I was just going to say that's
about two a month and that's about one seven a

year for the recommendations and has given four
indication vacation.
The judge says the NFL was wrong.
14:32:29 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Say that again?
14:32:32 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
I just wanted to sneak in it.
He played ball the deflate ball, remember?
The NFL was wrong.
Thought I would humor us up a little bit.
(Laughter).
14:32:45 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
So we had a motion by Mrs. Montelione.
Seconded by Mrs. Capin.
All in favor of the motion say aye.
Opposed?
All right.
Thank you, chief.
Council, anything else on item number 1?
I'm going to pass the gavel.
Mr. Chair, I would like to make a motion at this
time.
I would like to make a motion directing the legal
department to draft an ordinance creating a
citizen review board for the Tampa Police
Department and codify mayor's executive order
2015-4 with the modification that the composition

of the board will consist of seven members
appointed by City Council, two members appointed
by the mayor and two alternates appointed by the
mayor and the draft ordinance be brought back to
the City Council for discussion on September 24,
2015 workshop at 1:30 in the afternoon.
14:33:45 >> Second.
14:33:50 >>HARRY COHEN:
We have a motion by Councilman
Reddick, seconded by Councilwoman Capin.
Discussion on the motion?
14:33:56 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Just to clarify.
(off microphone) so that was adopting and
codifying the executive order issued by the mayor
with changes that -- changes to the makeup of the
board?
14:34:17 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Right.
14:34:18 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Can you repeat?
14:34:21 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Modification, composition of the
board, consisting of seven members appointed by
the City Council, two members appointed by the
mayor and two alternates appointed by the mayor,
and move that a draft ordinance be brought to City
Council for discussion at the September 24, 2015
workshop at 1:30 in the afternoon.
14:34:38 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
You didn't mention some of the

other terms that the mayor has issued.
14:34:47 >>FRANK REDDICK:
That's why I say --
14:34:49 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I have an issue with the four
year terms.
14:34:52 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Well, that's what we'll have
discussion at the workshop on.
14:34:55 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
Okay.
14:34:57 >>FRANK REDDICK:
That's the reason why I
recommended at the workshop, so we can discuss
this at the workshop, and make any modification we
would like to do be at the workshop.
14:35:07 >>HARRY COHEN:
Further discussion?
Councilman Miranda.
14:35:11 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
I am just going to say this.
This is again the start of -- whoever the mayor
is, they have the right to have do what they do,
we have the right to do what we do, but it's going
to start something in the future that will be the
tearing of the government in the future.
And I'm not going to support that, whether the
mayor is right or wrong, that's up to the public
to decide.
I can tell you that the position of the mayor in
this city, unless you want to change the whole
charter -- and I'm not opposed to putting it

before the people if you want a different form of
government, so be it.
Let the people decide.
I'm not going to tear apart this government so I
will not be supporting it, sir.
14:35:56 >>HARRY COHEN:
Councilwoman Capin.
14:35:59 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
And I am going to support it
because again clarifying the representative
government of the people.
So I will be supporting it.
Thank you.
14:36:07 >>HARRY COHEN:
Anyone else?
14:36:11 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
And I want to be very clear about
all this.
And as I mentioned earlier, I had actually put
together a draft very similar to what the mayor
had except for the composition of the board.
I do think that when we look at trying to put some
of these boards together, it should be fair based
on what our representation is and what the mayor's
is.
Three of us are elected city-wide just like he is.
He has the specific job as do we.
And for me, I think that if the mayor would have
consulted with us, I don't think that we would

have had much of a problem right now.
I think of that we would have had no problem with
the review board as put forth.
There are limitations that we have when it comes
to subpoena power and other things.
I think that everyone has seen that, and that we
have to begin somewhere.
And I agree with Councilman Miranda to a certain
degree, which is we want to see our city go
forward together.
We don't want to see us fighting amongst
ourselves.
It does nothing for the public at large.
It does nothing for the communities who come to
complain to us physically when we fight tooth and
nail on something that we should start trying to
figure out how to come together.
Again, I'm not going to get into who started this
or who didn't start it, but I do think that when
we do our workshop, I think that we should
concentrate specifically on how we make it a
doable document so that the mayor can sign onto
it, so we don't have to worry about whether or not
we have five votes to go forward or only four,
because if we get into that situation, we may have

to go and override a veto on the particular
ordinance.
I appreciate the fact that we are going forward.
I think that we are finally going the right
direction so that we can figure out the next step.
So thank you.
14:38:01 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Mr. Suarez, I agree with
everything you just said, and the same thing, in
the workshop we can have open discussion.
Maybe it goes nowhere at that workshop but at
least we have a dialogue.
14:38:16 >>GUIDO MANISCALCO:
Asking for a legitimate voice
in regards to this advisory board.
We as counsel should have that voice by being able
to appoint who we choose to appoint.
Four of us represents districts, three are
city-wide.
I have faith in this council that whoever is
appointed should go forward that there are good
people that will be vigilant, that will do their
job correctly, and moving forward I think this
will be a positive thing.
14:38:45 >>HARRY COHEN:
I would just like to say before we
vote that I am skeptical of whether or not going
forward as council is such a good idea, because of

the issues that I brought up earlier.
However, because you have asked to have it brought
back in a workshop, and because that's simply
something to discuss, I will vote for the workshop
but I want to make very clear that I'm doing that
without committing how I am ultimately going to
vote on the matter, because like I said earlier, I
have great concerns about us pointing any sort of
board that doesn't ultimately have the ear of the
mayor and the cooperation of the mayor, and the
support of his powers under the charter.
Anyone else?
14:39:51 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
I just want to say that I am
in favor of converting, for reasons Mrs. Capin
brought up earlier, the executive order to an
ordinance, because as you pointed out, the
executive order can be rescinded, changed at any
time, but with an ordinance, there has to be
public input, and has to be a public hearing.
So, you know, I'm in favor of converting that
order to an ordinance.
And as we have done it before.
Maybe not this council sitting here, but with the
equal opportunity, started out as an executive
order as Mr. Shelby pointed out and it was

converted to an ordinance.
So I think that is a mutually agreeable solution,
and it has been done before, and we can do it
again.
14:40:43 >>HARRY COHEN:
Councilwoman Capin.
14:40:48 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Thank you.
I just want to say that a powerful mayor and a
powerful City Council makes for a better
democratic government.
Representative of the people and by definition
forces those branches of city government to
negotiate, collaborate, and compromise.
The public wins by having a true representative
government base, a true representative government.
And that's why I'm moving for a workshop and
discussion.
Thank you.
14:41:18 >>HARRY COHEN:
Anyone else?
With that we have a motion on the floor from
Councilman Reddick.
Seconded by Councilwoman Capin.
All those in favor please indicate by saying aye.
Opposed?
14:41:30 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Aye.
14:41:34 >> Miranda voting no.

14:41:35 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
We go to item number 3.
14:41:37 >>HARRY COHEN:
There has been a request for a
continuance, I believe, on item number 3.
The red light camera discussion.
14:42:06 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
I made that motion.
14:42:07 >>JULIA MANDELL:
As you can see by the
memorandum, I have reviewed the documents you
requested, but we just began a new round of
litigation in this manner so I'm requesting that
be conned for 60 days to determine where that
litigation is going so we don't end up going into
items that would have an impact on that litigation
as well as litigation we have pending in our
traffic courts.
Thank you.
14:42:30 >>HARRY COHEN:
Okay.
When is that being continued to?
14:42:35 >> (off microphone).
14:42:41 >>HARRY COHEN:
Mrs. Capin?
14:42:45 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
I would be agreeable to that.
This report that we got --
14:42:53 >>JULIA MANDELL:
If you would like more
information I think it would be appropriate to add
that in as well.

I just was really more concerned with than the
discussion.
14:43:00 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Yes, and I also want to ask, would
you be calling for a shade meeting, City Council?
14:43:12 >>JULIA MANDELL:
If you call it a shade meeting,
Rebecca Kert will -- (Laughter)
That's one of the reasons -- that's one of the
reasons I am asking for this amount of time so I
can have a better understanding's where we need to
go from here in closed session.
Thank you.
14:43:41 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Item number 3?
14:43:43 >> (off microphone).
14:43:48 >>FRANK REDDICK:
We have a motion from Mrs.
Montelione.
Seconded by Mr. Suarez.
All in favor of that motion?
Okay.
All right.
We open up items 29 through 33.
14:43:59 >> So moved.
14:44:00 >>FRANK REDDICK:
I have a motion from Mr. Suarez.
Seconded by Mrs. Capin.
All in favor of the motion say aye.
Opposed?

All right.
If anyone wants to speak on item 29, 30, 31, 32 or
33, please stand to be sworn in.
(Oath administered by Clerk).
14:44:29 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Item number 29.
MARY SAMANIEGO: All the required site plans have
been certified with the clerk.
Thank you.
14:44:38 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Okay.
Petitioner?
14:44:45 >>JOHN GRANDOFF:
Suite 3700 Bank of America Plaza.
Here this afternoon on behalf of 7venth Sun
Brewery requesting your approval on second reading
of the ordinance approving the site plan.
14:44:57 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right, any questions from
council?
Anyone in the audience like to speak on item
number 29?
Motion from Mr. Miranda, seconded by Mr. Cohen.
All in favor of that motion?
Opposed?
All right.
Number 29.
Mrs. Montelione, are you ready for that?
14:45:13 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
No, sir.

14:45:17 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Chairman, item number 29, file
AB 2-15-15, present an ordinance for second
reading and adoption, an ordinance approving a
special use permit S-2 for alcoholic beverage
sales, large venue consumption on premises and
package sales, consumption off premises, and
making lawful the sale of beer and wine at or from
that certain lot, plot or tract of land located at
6809 north Nebraska Avenue, Tampa, Florida as more
particularly described in section 2, that all
ordinances or parts of ordinances in conflict are
repealed, providing an effective date.
14:45:49 >> Second.
14:45:51 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Got a motion from Mr. Miranda,
seconded by Mr. Suarez.
All those in favor please record your vote.
14:46:08 >>THE CLERK:
Motion carried unanimously.
14:46:12 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Number 30.
14:46:12 >>STEVE MICHELINI:
Representing petitioner.
We made the corrections to the plan as indicated
by the staff.
The new site plan has been certified and we
respectfully request your approval.
14:46:30 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Any questions from council?
Anyone in the audience like to speak on item

number 30?
14:46:43 >> Good afternoon.
Phil Schlossagle, San Pedro street.
I understand the site plan has been revised but
nothing has been posted on the website.
I am not aware of what has been changed on it.
Again, the last meeting was August 20th, and
you heard a lot of the neighbors concern about
ingress onto or from San Pedro street, and traffic
down our street.
And here is the property here.
[Off microphone.]
14:47:24 >> Can you move that up a little?
Or just shift the page.
14:47:29 >> Thank you.
As you can see, it's here.
This is an 80-foot long lot, mostly up in that
area.
And when this property was rezoned from RS-50 to
PD, one of the comments from council was this
property wasn't large enough to hold anything more
than two full-time employees and their clients.
Now, it's being proposed 4,000 square foot
building which is outside of the typical setback
for Dale Mabry.

Also 3 feet closer to my house than the code
allows.
And again, current ingress and egress is from Dale
Mabry, not from San Pedro.
I guess the size of the property, the size of the
proposed structure is kind of warranting onto San
Pedro.
I got this graphic for you.
If the boundaries of the structure were moved
within the 45 feet of Dale Mabry, 15 fate off the
property line here, you would only lose 800 square
feet of the structure.
He would be able to maintain Tampa tree here which
Mary was concerned about retaining.
There's also an oak tree here and that would be
retained as well.
And two trees on the property.
As it is now, both of those trees are set to be
removed.
Again, this area of Dale Mabry from Plant High
School to about half mile south of where this
property is, you know, is kind of the last
remaining canopy area of Dale Mabry.
This is the tree here that will be removed.
Again, if possible, that the site plan be

modified, restrict the building to typical
setbacks.
We might be able to redirect the traffic, keep it
on Dale Mabry instead of San Pedro.
Thank you.
(Bell sounds).
14:49:50 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right, thank you.
Anyone in the audience?
That's what we just did.
Petitioner?
14:50:00 >>STEVE MICHELINI:
Council, there's nothing we
can do about changing the access from Dale Mabry.
We followed the staff's direction.
We have no objections from them.
And we made the corrections per your instructions.
And now we are back before you requesting
approval.
14:50:15 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Any questions from council?
14:50:17 >>HARRY COHEN:
Just for clarification, the
speaker asked what had changed on the site plan we
first directed from first reading.
I know I asked about changing where the garbage --
14:50:32 >>STEVE MICHELINI:
We relocated the dumpster.
14:50:35 >> Is that the only thing that changed?
14:50:37 >>STEVE MICHELINI:
No, sir, you asked us to

change the setback on the side of the building
which we did.
We gave them a greater setback on the east side of
the building.
Which reduced the setbacks that we needed on the
north side of the building but it's adjacent to a
commercial property.
We also -- and we said we would look at removing
any windows on the east side, although it was not
part of your motion.
We put in all transom windows which are high
skylight windows.
There are in a direct windows looking out over the
property.
You asked us to exam the access of the driveway
and what could be done to minimize the impact on
the neighborhood.
We submitted a site plan for the city staff, which
they asked us to revise again, which we did.
And then we placed a note on the plan indicating
that the driveway's location and design would be
determined by transportation with the
understanding that we are trying to minimize any
impact onto San Pedro.
14:51:39 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Any other questions from council?

All right.
Is there a motion?
14:51:44 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Move to close.
14:51:46 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion from Mr. Miranda, seconded
by Mr. Suarez.
All in favor of the motion say aye.
Okay, Ms. Capin, would you read 30?
14:51:57 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Yes, Mr. Chairman.
I would be glad to.
An ordinance being presented for second reading
and adoption, an ordinance rezoning property in
the general vicinity of 3110 South Dale Mabry
Highway in the city of Tampa, Florida and more
particularly described in section 1 from zoning
district classifications PD planned development,
office, business, professional, to PD, planned
development, office, business, professional,
providing an effective date.
The revisions -- do I need to say that?
No, thank you.
That's it.
14:52:29 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Got a motion from Mrs. Capin.
Second by Mr. Cohen.
Please record your vote.
14:52:33 >>THE CLERK:
Motion carried with Maniscalco and

Suarez voting no.
14:52:51 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Item number 31.
14:52:57 >>MARY SAMANIEGO:
Land Development Coordination.
I do know that the applicant for 31 was here
previously this morning.
I don't see her now.
I respectfully request that you open it for second
reading.
14:53:10 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
Anyone from the audience like to speak on item
number 31?
14:53:17 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Move to close.
14:53:18 >> Second.
14:53:19 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion to close by Mr. Miranda.
Seconded by Mr. Cohen.
All in favor of the motion say aye.
All right.
Mr. Suarez.
14:53:25 >> I move an ordinance for second reading and
adoption, an ordinance rezoning property in the
general vicinity of 308 East 7th Avenue in the
city of Tampa, Florida and more particularly
described in section 1 from zoning district
classifications PD planned development,
professional office, medical office, residential,

mixed use professional/medical, to PD, planned
development, place of religious assembly,
multifamily residential, and office,
business/professional, providing an effective
date.
14:53:54 >>HARRY COHEN:
Second.
14:53:56 >>FRANK REDDICK:
A motion from Mr. Suarez.
Seconded by Mr. Cohen.
Please record your vote.
14:54:00 >>THE CLERK:
Motion carried unanimously.
14:54:12 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Item number 32.
14:54:13 >> Truett Gardner, north Ashley.
All of our changes have been made to the site plan
and we thank you for your time and look forward to
building this project.
14:54:29 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Okay.
Anyone from the audience to speak on item number
32?
14:54:35 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Move to close.
14:54:37 >> Second.
14:54:38 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion from Mr. Miranda.
Seconded by Mrs. Montelione.
All in favor of the motion say aye.
Opposed?
Mr. Cohen.

14:54:46 >>HARRY COHEN:
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I move an ordinance being presented for second
reading and adoption, an ordinance rezoning
property in the general vicinity of 102 and 110
north 20th street in the city of Tampa,
Florida and particularly described in section 1
from zoning district classification IH industrial
heavy to PD planned development, air conditioned
storage and open storage, providing an effective
date.
14:55:06 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Second.
14:55:09 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion from Mr. Cohen, seconded
by Mr. Miranda.
Please record your vote.
14:55:12 >>THE CLERK:
Motion carried unanimously.
14:55:21 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Item number 33.
14:55:22 >> David Smith, 401 East Jackson Street here on
behalf of the petitioner.
In the interim, we have made all the changes to
the site plan.
It has been certified, and we request your
approval today.
14:55:45 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Okay.
Anyone in the audience like to speak on item

number 34?
14:55:48 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Move to close.
14:55:51 >> Second.
14:55:58 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion by Mr. Miranda, seconded
by Mrs. Montelione.
All in favor of the motion say aye.
Okay.
Mr. Maniscalco.
14:56:05 >>GUIDO MANISCALCO:
An ordinance presented for
second reading and adoption, an ordinance rezoning
property in the general vicinity of 1220, 1280
north O'Brien street in the city of Tampa, Florida
and more particularly described in section 1 from
zoning district classification PD planned
development, office, business/professional and
medical, retail, hotel, commercial recreational
facility, indoor, vocational business school, to
PD planned development, office, business
professional and medical, retail, hotel,
restaurant, venue place of assembly, bank, without
drive-through, personal services vocational
business school, commercial recreational facility,
indoor, hydroponic garden, providing an effective
date.
Miranda second.

14:56:53 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion by Mr. Maniscalco,
seconded by Mr. Suarez.
Please record your vote.
14:56:57 >> Motion carried unanimously.
14:57:02 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Let's have a motion to open 35 through 37.
14:57:15 >> So moved.
14:57:16 >> Second.
14:57:17 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Anyone to speak on 35 through 37,
please stand to be sworn in.
35 through 37.
(Oath administered by Clerk).
Item 35.
14:57:33 >> Mark Bentley, 201 North Franklin Street.
I represent the petitioner Acardi Acquisitions,
ask to continue to October 15th to allow the
Barrio Latino commission to vacate, which is
scheduled for September 22nd, and we will renotice
both the Barrio meeting and the City Council
meeting.
Thank you.
14:57:58 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Anyone in the audience like to
speak on the continuance of item number 35?
Seeing none.
14:58:04 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Move to continue to October

15th at 10:30 in the morning, the year 2015.
14:58:11 >>HARRY COHEN:
Second.
Motion from Mr. Miranda.
Second by Mr. Cohen.
All in favor?
Opposed?
Item number 36.
14:58:20 >>HARRY COHEN:
Motion to be removed from the
agenda.
14:58:28 >> Second.
14:58:28 >> Motion by Mr. Cohen.
Seconded by Mr. Maniscalco.
All in favor of the motion say aye.
Opposed?
All right.
Item number 37.
14:58:36 >>THE CLERK:
On item number 37 the first public
hearing was continued to September 10th at
6:00 p.m.
So we need to continue this until after that date.
14:58:52 >> So moved.
14:58:53 >>THE CLERK:
I recommend the 17th.
14:59:03 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
Got a motion from Mr. Cohen.
Second by Mr. Suarez.

Discussion on the motion?
Seeing none, all in favor of the motion?
Opposed?
All right.
Motion carries.
Number 34.
14:59:14 >> Jan McLean, city attorney.
We are here on the continued public hearing on
item number 34, which is the proposed resolution
for the increase to the assessment for the
stormwater services.
We were asked to come back to answer two questions
from the meeting last week, and the two questions
were what are the terms and conditions of the
contract with the tax collector?
And what would be preliminary estimate of costs
associated with doing -- utilizing the city
utility billing system to collect stormwater
assessment.
Mr. Baird and Sonya will address the second
question.
I looked into the contract which was an education
for me since I have been doing this for nine years
and not seen the contract, so thank you very much
for focusing my attention on that.

The contract has, in 2003, when the utility was
created, has been in effect ever since then.
It's been renewed automatically every year unless
the council advises the tax collector by January
15th of that year that they will no longer use
their services.
So the question posed to us for this year, we need
to use their services to collect for the
assessments for this year because we did not give
them that notice.
That's all that I have for that portion of it.
15:00:52 >>HARRY COHEN:
I just want to ask you a question
so we can be clear about this.
The action that we are taking today related to the
service assessment, it's only for this coming
year.
In other words, we are only binding ourselves for
a year.
And this piece of the assessment is not something
that we have any plan in the next fiscal year, so
we aren't borrowing against this year's money.
15:01:24 >> >>JAN MCLEAN:
No, we are not.
15:01:25 >> The decision is still out in front of us
regardless of what happened today.
15:01:33 >>JAN MCLEAN:
As far as capital improvement, yes.

This is just the increase to the rating from the
current service assessment that's been in place
since 2003.
15:01:42 >>HARRY COHEN:
Thank you.
15:01:44 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Any other questions?
All right.
Are you finished with that presentation?
15:01:51 >>JAN MCLEAN:
Yes, sir.
15:01:57 >>BRAD BAIRD:
Public works and utility services
administrator.
I will address the second part of that is the
preliminary costs associated with if we were to
use the utility bill for collection purposes for
the stormwater assessment.
It is certainly possible to do that.
Tampa first issue we come across is that we are in
the process of replacing our 24-year-old billing
system.
So right-of-way, and I will get into the details
of the cost.
Right-of-way, that would mean that we would be
essentially doubling our database cost doing it
one time for the old system, and then another time
again for the new system in a couple of years.
The biggest issue is that our current customer

base is approximately 30% renters, and so we do
not have information on the owners for those
residences.
So that would result in an additional 24,000
stormwater only utility bills.
So assuming we would bill monthly, I'll go through
the costs really quickly.
It will result in the following additional cost.
First, the one-time upfront cost.
The renoticing will cost about $150 new for the
renoticing.
Much like we did this time.
And then secondly, the upfront, the bigger upfront
costs would be the billing database update that I
just mentioned, which would be approximately
250,000 to manually add that owner information,
the mitigation credits and the assessment
variances to the existing billing system, or to
the new billing system if we were to wait and do
that.
It would be a similar cost.
But if we were to implement in FY 17 with the
existing billing system, and then in FY 18 with a
new billing system, it would amount to
approximately $450,000 in upfront costs.

So total, if we were to do this the following
year, or try to, in late fall of next year, put
that in place, it would result in upfront costs of
about $600,000.
Then the annual costs associated with changing
this collection method would be about $216,000.
And they would include things like annual database
maintenance costs for about a half of an SCE,
postage, printing, lockbox reconciliation fees
which are essentially a banking fee, and then
credit card fees.
15:05:15 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Thank you, chair.
Mr. Baird, is that 216,000 above what we are
currently paying?
15:05:24 >>BRAD BAIRD:
Correct.
15:05:24 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
So all the activities you are
talking about are activities we do not do now
because the tax collector does, is that correct?
15:05:33 >>BRAD BAIRD:
No, but this would be for the
additional utility bills.
15:05:36 >> And we can't do what the tax collector does in
terms of --
15:05:43 >>BRAD BAIRD:
Correct.
15:05:44 >> So an additional $216,000 that we bring in
in-house on an annual basis?

And then we have 216 per year additional to what
we already pay.
15:05:58 >>BRAD BAIRD:
That is correct.
15:05:58 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
Thank you, chair.
I just wanted to clarify.
15:06:02 >>BRAD BAIRD:
If I might, I wanted to close with
it doesn't make financial sense to collect the
stormwater assessment via the city's utility bill
before the new system is in place.
However, if we want to consider this billing and
collection option after the new billing system is
in place, I would just advise that additional
investigation would need to be done to look at
what are the overall financial impacts to the
city, and depending on what assessments,
stormwater assessment looks like after we go
through the public hearings.
And it's just to give you an idea would be things
like additional bond coverage costs, borrowing
ramifications and collection percentages.
We would need to look into that further.
15:06:53 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Thank you.
Any other questions?
All right.
15:07:01 >>JAN MCLEAN:
Your question asked assessment

resolution.
If it's for one year.
It is for a year, or it can continue on.
I just want to clarify.
15:07:15 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
Anyone wishing to speak on item number 34?
Come forward.
15:07:44 >> My name is John Moll, 4104, 4107 North Lynn,
and 504 West North Bay.
I live in an area which has what they call
umbrella houses.
They were houses that were built before in the
20s, or actually my house was built in 1908.
And I have a picture here of water on gravel.
It goes underneath it.
It's nothing connected to the stormwater system at
all.
The same way my house right here, the water comes
over the roof, goes under the house.
It's not connected to the stormwater system
whatsoever.
I took this aerial because the stormwater people
have drones or something going over taking
aerials.
They look at roofs but they don't look any closer.

There's in a scrutiny what's underneath it.
Underneath mine is bare ground.
In this notice I got, this is going to cost me
$268 a year.
And like Mr. Miranda, I'm cheap.
I don't like to pay for things not used.
It says in 2003 the City Council enacted an
ordinance to create a stormwater utility and
provide a dedicated funding source for stormwater
management on the city's stormwater service.
Since that time, I thought there would be
retention, but that is not the case.
There's no verification that the surface is
impervious.
If they came out, the water sinks like it's
supposed to.
Since that time, 2003, stormwater service charges
have been imposed on all properties and utilize
the city's system.
I don't utilize the city system.
I don't use it for the wastewater that comes in
the house.
I have a septic tank that's been there for a
hundred years and it works perfectly.
The wastewater, I brought this to their attention,

came out, and to --
(Bell sounds)
-- verified that is not connected.
And I hope that you suggest maybe that somebody
can verify what they are talking about.
Any questions?
15:10:31 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
I was going to suggest, Mr. Moll,
you might want to contact them to much see if
there's any mitigating --
15:10:42 >> It doesn't apply.
15:10:43 >> It doesn't apply because you are not mitigating
enough?
You know, and I will just say one thing, Mr. Moll.
You live in the city.
And it's hard to say that everything you do does
not affect someone else, unless you do have an
engineering study that's part of the issue.
15:11:01 >> I don't have any.
15:11:04 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
I know that.
My point is we can take your word for it but then
we still have to approve it because everyone can
say I don't affect anyone else.
So if you feel this strongly about it and you have
been at the meetings we have had so far so far, I
suggest looking into that because the cost may be

more cost effective for you in the long run.
And that's just my suggestion.
15:11:24 >> I'm being charged for something I'm not
getting.
Why would you pay for something you aren't
getting?
15:11:35 >> I don't disagree with that in terms of what you
said, but I this I in terms of why we have the
mitigation credit set up is so that you can show
that you are not affecting the stormwater system.
15:11:45 >> It's obvious, they can just drive by and look
at the house.
15:11:49 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. McLean, the way I understand this, in order
for somebody to get mitigation credit, they have
to hire an engineer.
15:12:07 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Mr. Tillou --
15:12:10 >> They have to hire an engineer which I imagine
it's not inexpensive.
They have to go out there and apply, and they have
to go out and low at the house.
15:12:21 >>JAN MCLEAN:
They don't have to hire an engineer.
They would apply to the city.
The code requires that they have an engineering
study.

But our staff, our stormwater staff has worked
with individuals to see what kind of engineering
reports that they would have of that we could rely
on in order to demonstrate that they don't utilize
the city.
They don't have to hire an engineer.
15:12:48 >> They will apply with the city.
The city will go inspect themselves?
15:12:53 >>JAN MCLEAN:
I'm not sure that they do a field
trip each time bull the code -- all right, some
demonstration, some evidence that they are not
discharging to the city.
15:13:03 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
If somebody brings a
photograph, or they bring an 8-second production
of something, they show it to the city.
I don't know.
15:13:14 >>JAN MCLEAN:
The code requires an engineer.
15:13:23 >>BRAD BAIRD:
The stormwater engineering section
has been accepting site plans for that purpose.
So they do not need to hire an engineer for that.
And with that determinant that the simple site
plan would suffice for residential parcels.
15:13:38 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
And I'm not trying to belabor
this, Brad, but do they go out?
15:13:43 >> Yes, they can draw it up.

15:13:45 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
Then I got no problem with
that.
Thank you, chairman.
15:13:50 >> Okay, I'm Ed Tillou, Sulphur Springs.
This came up last week, but I wasn't able to stay
because I was trying to get breakfast as I
mentioned, and the thing is, I failed.
So no breakfast for me.
Just like this morning.
Okay.
The thing is, I distributed material about my
handout of today, and at a CRA meeting, because
it's a planning and architectural concept, I might
be able to get to it at the CRA meeting.
But this is -- I don't know how to make this go
down but I don't have time.
Okay.
I gave this to you about urban runoff.
This is what I did with the state of Maryland
stormwaters, water and sewer, and I will say even
though I'm an engineer, and I think requiring
engineer work, this may be a good idea.
So it seems a little unfair that a private
individual would have to do that when there's a
variance process which could take care of the --

my predecessor's speaking, that it wasn't made
available to him.
So you either got a variance process or you don't.
But in any case, urban runoff, what I came to
speak about was this.
I also gave you this, too.
But this is what was called a rational method for
determine stormwater runoff.
And we used it to call it much the Chicago method,
Chicago rationale.
But in any case, there's two -- even years ago,
people would do the engineering made a big joke
out of it.
But, anyway, which I don't have documentation of
right now but it's the runoff coefficients, the
drainage area which should include many groups.
So maybe give this man his variance quickly, or
the other people hear about this because a lot of
groups, it goes to the gutters and comes down onto
people's property.
But the people that would really be clobbered by
this are the commercial people.
(Bell sounds)
And you are doing something that's right.
In other words, impervious area is the generator

of the stormwater, and maybe about 20 years, I
don't know, sleepy hollow, fighting each other or
something.
But the point that came to me was this.
Rainfall intensity is on the increase so go after
the culprit.
17 cents a gallon increase on gasoline.
That would yield $250 million of our 20-year time.
Go after the culprit.
Go after the cars.
17 cents increase.
(Bell sounds).
15:17:09 >> And the county at 12 cents for their
transportation.
You know, the Obama Administration, it should be a
dollar 50.
That's what the subsidies for cars are.
15:17:25 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right, thank you.
Next.
15:17:26 >> Mike Peterson, Greater Tampa Association of
Realtors.
I wanted to thank you for the continuance to
October 1st of the workshop on the methodology
behind these stormwater fees.
And because of that, the question was asked

earlier about is this only good for one year
and/or perhaps continued?
This is important because this fee that I believe
you are about to pass, this increase, is still
based on a methodology that a lot of people have a
concern with.
The fact that we are going to discuss that
methodology in October doesn't quite get it done
for today, but I understand where you are.
So I just wanted to clarify that if my
understanding is correct that if we do determine
we have found problems, we want to correct it now,
in the October workshop, it is likely to be
inapplicable to this particular service fee going
forward with the following year after we have made
some corrections.
If that's the case, then I kind of understand
where we are heading.
Thank you for the continuance and the workshop.
15:18:30 >>FRANK REDDICK:
State your name for the record.
15:18:31 >> Mike Peterson, Greater Tampa Association of
Realtors.
15:18:34 >>HARRY COHEN:
That is why I asked the question.
15:18:36 >> I thought I would get it on the record.
15:18:44 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.

Comments from council?
Staff, does that complete your report?
All right.
What is the pleasure of council?
15:18:59 >> Do we need to close first or read the
resolution?
Do you want me to read the resolution?
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I move a resolution of the city of Tampa, Florida
relating to the provision of stormwater management
services provided by the city's stormwater
utility, imposing stormwater charges against
developed property located in the stormwater
service area for the fiscal year beginning October
1, 2015, approving the increased rate of
stormwater charges, approving the stormwater roll,
directing that the stormwater roll be certified to
the Hillsborough County tax collector and
providing an effective date.
15:19:32 >> Second.
15:19:35 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion from Mr. Coven.
Seconded by Mr. Suarez.
All in favor of the motion say aye.
Opposed? All right. Thank you.
15:19:43 >> Move to close.

15:19:48 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Got a motion from Mr. Cohen,
seconded by Mrs. Montelione.
All in favor? Opposed? All right.
New business. Mrs. Montelione.
15:19:56 >>LISA MONTELIONE:
No new business, sir.
15:20:00 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Been a long day.
15:20:01 >> Very exciting day.
15:20:07 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Mr. Cohen?
15:20:08 >>HARRY COHEN:
I don't have any new business but
I do want to say that I think this council showed
tremendous leadership in what we did rate now on
the stormwater fee.
Our residents have been really inundated with
flooding this summer and our people have demanded
that we address the issue and for the time in 12
years we did something really meaningful.
A lot of people came don't just do something
that's a Band-Aid.
Do something that's actually going to make a
difference.
And I think it's very, very good for the city that
we were able to make this decision.
15:20:44 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
Mrs. Capin.
15:20:49 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
Thank you.

I thought he was going to praise us for all of our
actions today.
Here we go. A motion the committee currently
scheduled for October 22 at 5:45 to November 12 at
5:45.
15:21:10 >> Moved by Mrs. Capin.
Seconded by Mr. Maniscalco.
All in favor? Opposed?
15:21:26 >>YVONNE CAPIN:
A motion in regard to presenting a
commendation to Theo Wujcik to be presented at the
Tampa Bay museum for the cultural arts ceremony
October 22.
15:21:39 >> Second.
15:21:41 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion by Mrs. Capin.
Seconded by Mr. Suarez.
All in favor? Opposed? All right.
15:21:47 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
I am going to make a motion for a
commendation to Delano Stewart for a long-time
contract attorney for the City of Tampa, and of
course many of you who know Delano. He has been a
leader in the legal world in Tampa for many, many
years, and they want to present it at his last
civil service board meeting, which will come in
October.
15:22:14 >> Second.

15:22:16 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Motion by Mr. Suarez.
Second by Mrs. Montelione.
All in favor of the motion say aye.
Opposed?
15:22:24 >>MIKE SUAREZ:
That's it, sir.
15:22:26 >>FRANK REDDICK:
Mr. Miranda?
15:22:26 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA:
No, sir.
15:22:29 >>FRANK REDDICK:
All right.
A motion to receive and file.
15:22:31 >> So moved.
15:22:34 >> Second.
15:22:34 >>FRANK REDDICK:
We stand adjourned until 5:00.
5:01.

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