5.5.26 Pasco County Board of County Commissioner Meeting (Afternoon Session)

Oh, okay. Call me. All right. Let's see. Where are we? Ooh, okay. Okay. I have to go. My thoughts on that are endless. Whatever day that works, but if you wanted to do it before session starts. That is my only Right. 39 Do you need gum, Mike? Ready? Yeah.

Very good, James. How are you? So, I feel a little I feel a little shitty. I feel a little better now that I ate. Can you come pick up my phone for me, though?

David, I signed a flat, so Oh, I know. I had a Can you come here and grab my phone? It dropped. Thank you. It's a flat the the blueberry farm flat. blueberry So, [laughter] Look, I had a I had Look at I had a trash can right here. I took my medicine. How are you? That's what I take. Cam drove me. Cuz this morning I was really nauseous. Oh. So, About half time, so when I take it, I take it at I used to get shots. Yeah, my life. So, it's helped. And then I was a kids sports, lots of fun. Yeah. Well, I'm on the plane right now, so Nice. Wow. That's something. Right. Well, you did it for the kids. Well, you know, it's a long time. That thing never stops. I don't know how much as I ate this morning. When I got here, I thought that I was going to get sick. Yeah, you are. We're lions. Crazy thing is he didn't even he didn't even he didn't even show up. I know, right? Yeah, but I can't like Sorry.

[laughter]

Yeah. And then And then they had the MPO and they took the water. Oh. Yeah, that's true. We didn't have water.

Yeah. The ranch took the water. He says, "Is that for me?" And I said, "Yeah, that's for you." Good afternoon. Welcome back to the Board of County Commission meeting, to the afternoon session. Uh first agenda item we have up is P38. Uh Mr. Chair, I have publication for P38. Item P38 was published in the Tampa Bay Times on March 25th, 2026, and by affidavit of certified mailings and site postings. Thank you. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman. The title is P38, Planning and Economic Development, Economic Growth. Item P38 is PD 26-033. This is an ordinance amending the Pasco County Comprehensive Plan, providing for Comprehensive Plan Text Amendment CPA 17134 on Meadow Ridge. This is comes to you with a request to continue the item to the June 2nd, 2026 Board of County Commissioners meeting at 1:30 p.m. p.m. or as soon thereafter as may be heard in dates certain. Okay. I'll make a motion. Move to continue to June June 6th, was it? Or Is that right? A second. There was a second. It was a second to the continued date of the recommendation by staff. All in favor say aye. Aye. Item P39, do we have proof? Yes, we have um proof for item P39 was published in the Tampa Bay Times on April 15th, 2026. Item P39 is PD 26-0086. This is an ordinance amending ordinance number 2540, expanding the boundaries of the Newport Corners community development district pursuant to chapter 194 of the statutes, providing for miscellaneous provisions, providing for an effective date. This comes to you with a recommendation to accept public comment and and adopt the ordinance by roll call vote. Okay. Any questions for staff? Okay. This is a public hearing. Is anyone here from the public in person want to speak? Anyone online? No one's online. I don't have the sign-up sheet. Is there Was there a sign-up sheet there? Nick Tice? Yeah. Thank you. It's Okay, it's blank. Thank you. All right, so no one's here. We'll close public comment. Do I have a motion? I so move. Second. Okay, roll call vote. District 1, Commissioner Oakley. Aye. District 2, Commissioner Whitman.

Aye. District 3, Commissioner Starkey. District 4, Commissioner Yeager.

Aye. District 5, Chairman Mariano. Aye. Motion passes 5-0. And we'll move to item P40. Do we have proof? Yes, item P40 was published in the Tampa Bay Times on March 25th, 2026. Item P40 is PD 26-0475. This is an ordinance by the Pasco County Board of County Commissioners amending the Pasco County Land Development Code section 1104, flood damage prevention, appendix A, definitions, and other sections as necessary, for internal consistency, providing for applicability, repealer, providing for severability, inclusion into the land development code, and effective date. This comes to you with the recommendation to accept public comment. No action is required by the Board of County Commissioners. As this is the first of two public hearings, the second hearing will be held on June 16th, 2026 at 1:30 p.m. or as soon thereafter as may be heard in New Port Richey. Okay. Good. Um is the board here for a presentation? I know there's some good changes in here, but it's a pretty elegant setup. Good. Okay. All right. I guess we'll go to the presentation and see if there's any public comment. Anyone here from the public like to speak to item on P40? No one in the audience has signed up. Is anybody online? Mr. Keeler, no no one is online. Back to the board. No action required, you said? No action required. We'll continue this to the next meeting. Okay. Okay.

[clears throat]

All right. Thank you very much. And item P41. All right. Well, good afternoon.

Um can let me do publication real quick? I'm sorry. Item P41 was published in Tampa Times on March 4th, 2026. Thank you. Good afternoon. Um Mr. Chair, members of the board, uh Nick Geren, County Engineer. Item P41 is uh mobility fee increases. It is updated fee schedules and associated land development code amendments. So, to read the whole ordinance title, an ordinance by the Pasco County Board of County Commissioners amending the Pasco County Land Development Code Section 1302.2, mobility fees, to increase the mobility fees for various uses beyond the phase-in limitations in Section 163.31801, paragraph six, Florida Statutes, and other amendments as necessary for internal consistency, providing for applicability, dealer, [clears throat] providing for severability, inclusion in the land development code, and an effective date. Mr. Chair, um before Nick gives his full presentation, this item requires a unanimous vote of the board and um, my reading of the statute and the case law is that that requires a a a the entire board. So, I think you can take public comment, you can hear Nick's presentation, you can have a discussion, but my recommendation to you would be that you not take the final vote today until you should continue it to the final the final vote until you have a full board. Okay. I I wouldn't disagree with that at all. So, you can continue, Nick.

Thanks. Um, as a reminder to the board, mobility fees pay for new transportation facilities. They don't pay for existing backlogs and they don't pay for the maintenance of the existing roadways. [clears throat] They're supplemented by gas taxes. In Pasco County, we also have a penny sales tax and tax increment funds that go toward new capacity for our roadway network. The proposed fees in the ordinance update cover 25% of our projected nearly $7 billion of needed transportation facilities. The proposed fee increases do exceed the statutory limits, but consistent with the requirements of statute for this situation, we have a recent study justifying the increase due to extraordinary circumstances. We have conducted two public workshops dedicated to those extraordinary circumstances. We are proposing to implement the fees in this ordinance in two equal annual increments. And as your um chief assistant county attorney has just mentioned, we will be seeking adoption by unanimous vote of the full governing board when it is next assembled. So, that's where we are in the process. There was a conversation happen that happened in the first reading of this ordinance and I want to highlight that conversation for the board. It was regarding the amount of the size of a residential lot within the rural area of Pasco County that should be eligible for a discounted suburban mobility fee rate instead of the standard rural rate. In the draft ordinance in your backup material, the language proposed sets the acreage threshold for that lot to be 5 acres. There was discussion at the previous board meeting about reducing that threshold down to 2.5 acres. So, I've highlighted this because the current ordinance in your backup material does not have 2.5 acres in it, it has five. So, if you direct me at this meeting, we can change this and then we can present a consolidated ordinance to you when the full board is next assembled. Uh from the discussions I heard, no one's going to be unanimous vote if we don't have all the votes, uh it's not going to go anywhere. So, at this point I would leave it just as is and we'll have the discussion at the next meeting. That's fine. That 2.5 looks good for the sake of conversation, but I think we can land on a unanimous vote for you. Okay. Yeah. So. Mr. Chair, that was the only outstanding item I had. I'm not sure if there were others that you wanted to touch on. No, I mean you and I had talked about uh hockey rings, complexes, and golf courses, whatever. So, that can

be taken care of down the road. Okay. Well, did you did you want to discuss Um Or is that the reduced I mean, if you want us to change something on hockey rings and golf courses, this is probably the best time. That's how we do it. If you're asking for a change, you probably want to make that change before the next board meeting. So, So, let me bring my discussion up. So,

[clears throat]

way back when when we had the had that nice hockey rink complex coming in, there was a impact fees was scheduled. I think it's based upon $380,000 per rink. And it was like $1.2 million thereabouts and we staff was able to work it out to actually get the number down to close to $100,000. The theory was it's an attractor. It's good for tourist development, good for economic development and for the trips that's going to bring in. It's not just regular people coming in, but a lot of tourism. The single hockey rink, I'm not going to change that because to me that's going to be something that's going to be locally used. It's going to help, but it didn't seem to to warrant the same. So, I was thinking we should take a look at that and bring those numbers down now as we did before or if we have the vehicle to already do it, then we didn't have to, but so be it. Commissioner Whitney, thanks, Chair. Good idea. So, what you're proposing is we look at areas of regional uh impact. That's kind of what you're referring to. Like a significant I think

use. I think he's proposing that if it's a large hockey rink, it's a large tourism draw that it have be a subsidized rate. Which is what we did for how that applies. Yeah. But what was your definition of that item? Um May no doubt that the hockey rink is a region provides a regional impact. For the For good reasons. For good reasons, right? Yeah. I guess it's a problem we need to have at least four sheets of ice, but Nick, is this something you've looked at at all or That was my assumption as well. That a regional attraction would provide four separate rinks within the facility that was being proposed. And so, were you

than four pays the standard rate, more than four would be part of [clears throat] the discussion should we incentivize the mobility fees that are due for that larger investment in a regional facility. It's a good idea. So, do you have a fee schedule that would implement that concept? Well, I have a slide, but that was only one of two items and I'm not sure Let's go one at a time. Can you show us that slide? I have a slide that has both of them on it. Okay. All right. The next one will be golf courses, so You want to show us the hockey one so we can So,

[clears throat]

the we were again, we were asking you to accept public comment and then we're asking you to continue this until the full board is assembled. Yeah. I have to illustrate this suggestion by the chair, if you look right now, the fee schedules for ice hockey arena make no distinction as to the number of rinks or the size of the facility that would be built within Pasco County. I've shown you the amount that they would pay per thousand square feet of facility in the proposed fee schedule.

[clears throat]

If the board wishes to implement the chair's proposal that we incentivize these larger investments in four or more rinks of ice within Pasco County, then we could create a new row in our fee schedule, call it an ice hockey complex, specify that that means you must have four or more rinks, and subsidize the fee so that anyone building that large a facility would pay zero in mobility fees. Chair. Mr. Weatherton. What drives me batty with these fee schedules like why can't we just have a uniform rate? Like fair tax, everybody pay the same price, house a house, a use is a use instead of having all these different tiers and formulas and zones. I I just think if you're going to build a house, no matter where you're going to build it, I'd be president prejudicial of where somebody wants to choose to build their house or whether it's in the heart of an urban area or up up in north. I just think it needs to be uniform in general. I know we're not going to get there, but I just felt the need to say that on the record. So, anyway, that's all. All right. Mr. Mr. Oakley. Part of that problem with with making it all the same is in our urban area, you have so many homes close together, less than acres, and and so they they have more units. So, you you put those fees against them, but then you get out in the country, you going to have 5-acre tracts here and there. It Most time in all the argument was that you travel further on that road, so you have to pay more in because you're out in the rural, away from the urban. Urban, you've got all that traffic, everything, paying toward one thing. But that's a lot of different homes, multiple homes. Where out in the rural area, you got one. So, that's the reason it's been different like this before. So, if I'm not mistaken, Mr. Ghosting, if we lower that for the 2 and 1/2 acre lots, that has to be made up somewhere else, right? That that lesser amount It is subsidized by three different sources, which is the transportation portion of the penny, the second local option gas tax, and the portion of the tax increment funds. So, it is made up from another revenue source, but I think Nick will tell you that the amount of permits that use that particular fee reduction is fairly minimal. Well, okay. [clears throat]

So, I don't think it's going to be something that would break the bank.

So, it won't be earth-shaking, then. It's it's not. And my guess is even what he's proposing for the ice hockey and the golf courses is also going to be fairly minimal. These are not Not common uses.

Right. These are not common uses that are going to break the bank on it. So, if it was something on residential or general commercial, they probably would. But these are fairly unique uses that are not going to Right. be a significant impact to our system. These are more policy decisions for the board. And again All right. between all the people it's going to bring in and the economic benefit plus all the extra taxes they'll pay by building four rings both the one anyway. If we can encourage that I think it's a good thing. We're not getting a lot of building permits for ice hockey facilities or golf courses. I'm just being honest with you. Yeah, you don't seem I don't know if are there any golf Well, the one down at Two Rivers I guess that's a golf course. That's in Hillsborough County not here so. Um you don't hear of as many new golf courses coming about so. And so can we shift it to the golf course side? So my We're thinking with the golf courses we've lost Quail Hollow a few years ago. We lost Timber Oaks. We just lost the Links golf course. And there was a time when golf was declining. But golf is booming more than ever now. So now there's more demand for it. Uh it's it's it's hard let's say up in Hudson when you you got one close to pick from. And that's kind of what drove that. And it drives up the price etc. And people have to drive further to go play. Right.

So if you're going to put more golf courses up to me we can use it for the drainage anyway which is what these things were designed to do is accept your around it the drainage around it so however they set it up if you want to break it down we could to be whether it be a residential community so I'm just to build the golf course whatever it may be there's a lot of benefits to it as well that I think you know warrant a if not bring it to zero at least reduce it down dramatically. Mhm. Yeah. Commissioner I just wanted to ask a question. Nick was there anything magical with four sheets of ice versus I don't know what rings look like in other communities and if four is a good number or something more or something less I was just curious. I'm afraid that rigorous analysis was not performed in developing that. I I don't know if is or Adam or Kentswallow here or not. You're up in a couple items.

So, um we probably could bring Adam up. I It really depends on what level of rink number of rings you need to for it to be a tourism draw. Cuz that was really [clears throat] the intent. Um and Adam, do you have any thoughts on like how many rings you would need minimum for it to be a tourism draw? Uh yes, sir. I currently um the Ice and Wellness Center Ice is 4 and 1/2 NHL Olympic-size sheets of ice. It's constantly full. The event calendar is full. So, you probably need for an adequate amount at least three to pull off an an event. For obviously, the more sheets of ice, the better. But three for right now. So, that that was really the determining factor in my cuz at what level is it a tourism draw cuz that was the intent. So, I'm I'm comfortable with the four number. I think it just makes it that much more significant than if we're going to bring it down to zero, let's make them a little bit more of carrot. Yeah. All right. Okay. All right. So, we're comfortable with that. What do we What do we think about the golf? Yeah. I'm fine with Good. Okay. All right. We're good to make those changes? Thank you. This is great. All right. Any other questions for staff? Anything else to Uh we were asking for suggestions. Do we take public comment today? Yes, going to do that now. Okay. So, th- this is going to be heard in 2 more weeks at the Board of County Commissioners next meeting, but is anyone from the public would like to comment on this that's sitting in the audience now? Okay. Anyone signed up online? No one is online. Okay. So, we'll continue to the next meeting. Thank you very much. Okay. And now we'll go to public hearings. Mr. County Attorney? There's two rezonings on the agendas, regular and consent. Staff will present each application to the Board of County Commissioners. The staff of the Planning Commission has recommended approval if there's no opposition. The application will be considered by the Board without further presentation. Any individual disagreeing with the staff or Planning Commission recommendation or anyone wishing to object to any condition of the rezoning may at this time request that the petition be pulled from the consent agenda in which case that application will be heard under the regular agenda later on during the meeting. If you wish to speak to any petition, please give your name and address whether or not you've been sworn for the record. Okay.

And we'd like to swear in Yes, if you are here to speak on any of the uh next items, please stand and raise your right hands. Okay. Do you swear or affirm the testimony you're about to give is the truth, so help you God? Thank you. Okay. Okay, item P-42, you have proof? Yes, item P-42 was published in the Tampa Bay Times on January 21st, 2026 and by affidavit of certified mailings and site postings. The item was continued from the March 10th, 2026 BCC meeting where it was continued to the April 7th, 2026 BCC meeting where it was continued to today. Thank you. Okay. Good morning, Mr. Chairman. Octavio Soto, Planning and Development County Growth. This is item P-42, which is PD 26-7858. This is a zoning amendment in the name of SAV Property Holdings LLC, New Horizons MPUD Master Planned Unit Development. It's a rezoning request from an R-2 low-density residential residential district to an MPUD Master Planned Unit Development to allow for the development of 31 single-family detached units and associated infrastructure in Central Pasco County abutting south of Wells Road, approximately 635 ft west of Wells Road and Boyette Road intersection, containing approximately 10.4 acres. Uh this comes to you with a recommendation to approve the proposed zoning amendment subject to attached conditions of approval, and there's a presentation if so desired. Okay. Is there anyone here to speak in an opposition to item P42? No one online? No one's on WebEx. We have our consent. Item P43. Item P43 was published in the Tampa Times on March 25th, 2026. Item P43 is PDE 260479. This is the first amended and restated development agreement in the name of Wiregrass Ranch development of regional impact DRI, first amended and restated development agreement between Locust Branch LLC and Pasco County to improve the signalization of Wiregrass Ranch Boulevard and Chancey Road and other consistent revisions within the Wiregrass Ranch DRI located on the east side of Bruce B Downs Boulevard, State Road 581, extending from the intersection of State Road 581 to State Road 56 north to the intersection of State Road 581 and State Road 54 and on the south side of State Road 56 in South Central Pasco County. This comes to you with a recommendation to approve the development agreement and there's a presentation if so desired. Okay. Is there anyone in the audience, public that would like to speak to item P43 in opposition? Is there anyone online? No one's on WebEx. Okay. That'll close public comments, so the consent agenda is complete. Move to approve for the consent items. Second.

All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Okay. That'll take us back to our 37, where we got Florida Sports Coast annual report. Adam Thomas. Thank [clears throat] you, Mr. Chairman. Adam Thomas, tourism director. Um this is an information um presentation and it's going to be pretty quick. I'll try to get uh through this as fast as uh Connor can beat me in a foot race. So

[laughter]

So, in years past, we always looked at the the big numbers, the big wow factors, and and instead of boring you with all of the the great impact that our industry does, we thought that it would be great for us to to actually look at the programming of of how we're positioning and creating demand in the marketplace for for Pasco County. So, this is who we are. We're just north of of of of this who we are as Florida Sports Coast, and and this is how we kick off um our our our relationships, our conversations, our our meetings with uh with with potential uh consumers or tour operators. Uh just north of Tampa, you'll find a perfect destination for adventure, relaxation, and everything in between. Florida Sports Coast, located just 30 minutes drive from Tampa International Airport, is a vibrant getaway uh that is a perfect complement complement to Tampa's urban excitement. A place that welcomes you with relaxed uh with a unique mix of waterfront towns, rural attractions, and environments uh natural environments. So, we first start off um our our our business is never transactional. It's always relational, and we go to trade shows around the world actually building the demand for Florida Sports Coast and Pasco County. And these are some of the trade shows uh as an example of of the relationships that we're building in Market Florida. Huddle and Florida Encounter are the largest travel and trade show and planner uh shows that Visit Florida puts on on an annual basis, and we get to sit down with with tour operators and planners uh over the course of 4 or 5 days and and really showcase all the the the great attractions, the the the hotels, the meeting spaces, and the experiences that we have here. IPW is the is the largest travel trade show in the United States that we're going to be going to in 11 days. Uh we're going with um Saddlebrook and some of our other partners to actually again tell the story and start drumming up additional business for for Pasco County. The Express conference is a large uh fam fam tour with sports um international rights holders. Uh we use these fam tours to actually showcase um the many different attractions and and amenities that we have here in Pasco County. And again, going back to the trade show is the IMEX America, which we're meeting with plenty of many plenty of planners and rights holders to drum up additional association and corporate business for for our hotels. International trade shows, this is where the rubber meets the road for us when we start opening up new markets, um especially international. Uh the the biggest market that we're really focused on right now is Colombia with the new flight of Avianca coming in and out of Bogota on a weekly basis. We see a huge opportunity for our destination to really gain traction not only in Colombia, but the South America market. And you can see how we are going to different sports shows across the world to tell um everyone in Europe and

South America about the the great opportunities that lie ahead of them. Sports and events to Europe is an event that we went to Spain and pulled the World Federation of Calisthenics. And this is not just calisthenics that you see people doing burpees or jumping jacks or rope climbing. These are actually athletes that are pirouetting from bar to bar and flipping. And we held this event a couple months ago at the wonderful um Sunwest Park in in in Hudson. And 20 different countries actually came to to Pasco County to compete for for a weekend. So again, going into the international trade show, last year we actually went on the Rhine River. This was actually an event that we got to really showcase our destination to over 600 different travel agents and tour operators on the Rhine River stopping at 12 different ports. And actually our room was actually the trade show floor to where we actually decorated our room with all the Pasco County's uh activities is same as ITB trade show. Our sales efforts, you can see that we have a big international push when it comes to international sports. We are the sole sponsor of the Hayabusa dive team that actually trains and competes at Zephyrhills in Pasco County. We are the sponsorship our sponsor of the Colombian wheelchair rugby team. That's a national team that actually won their their national tournament in wheelchair rugby. They actually beat Canada actually after Canada lost to us in the the Olympics. So Canada had a had a really rough time with with with sports after after the Olympics. But international the the Florida International Cup. This is a huge soccer tournament that we actually partner with with Florida Premier Run and it happens every single year. So our international reach is actually going from South America from Chile to Argentina, Brazil and other South American countries to compete in Florida's Sports Coast Cup. Again, international sports efforts don't stop. We are continuously bringing in fan tours from around the world to actually tell that the showcase the Pasco County story on the sports stage. These are some of the big events that we hosted in 2025 and I want to kind of pull out the Tampa Bay Christmas Invitational because that is beginning to be one of our signature events on an annual basis bringing in over 600 room nights over two weekends. That tournament actually grew from just 30 little old teams that are division one, division two college ready basketball female basketball players to now a two weekend event and over 4600 room nights and generating economic impact of over 5.1 million dollars. Again, sports is the center centerpiece of our

distance in in in um this thing we to call tourism. Um and we did about 140 events last year generating close to 40,000 room nights, but I want to call out the Wiregrass Ranch Sports Campus of Pasco County real quick because that's your greatest investment as a tourism asset. And I I I want to just showcase some of the uh some of the highlights that that we generated uh last year 2025 since the takeover of of the Sports Campus from our previous operator to uh to Parks and Recreation, which was a great great uh partnership. So, 60 events at the Wiregrass Ranch Sports Campus generated over 22,804 night room nights uh and had an economic impact of over 25 and 1/2 million dollars. Um this is actually more than double the year over year because if we if we remember correctly the year before we only had 80 around 8,900 room nights for the entire year of the Sports Campus. So, we made that change, we brought it in-house, and we generated over 22,000. Year over year 25 to 26 on Q1, we're actually outpac- outpacing that uh and surpassing that uh quarter over quarter. Uh in 2025, we generated around uh 6,800 room nights for Q1. Uh Q1 in this year of 2026, we generated close to 11,600. So, the facility's doing its job. It's a unique selling proposition that we get to talk about and tout about um uh to all of all of our relationships. Uh but we're continuing to to to to generate impact. Got it. Sir.

If I could, just on that one point cuz it is such an important facility and again, infrastructure's everything and sometimes you go to these events, you got to park on the street, etc. Are you excited about that possibility of getting that parking garage? What do you think it'll do for room nights? I I think uh so we always we always take a look at the visitor experience, right? How can we increase the visitor experience because if we increase the visitor experience, that rate of retention on them coming back to have that same experience is a lot higher. So, the parking garage will increase that visitor experience. So, absolutely to your point uh Mr. Chairman, yes, it would it would be beneficial for not only that facility, but the surrounding community as well. I'm excited about it since I spent many weekends at volleyball tournaments in that facility, and it's an amazing facility. So, we're refocusing our efforts back on our fam tour, but again, we have three pillars of strategy of how we talk to our audience. One is is through sports tourism efforts. This is through our leisure efforts and and our scalloping, our kumquat festival, and our Florida Sports Coast Ale Trail that we actually brought in visitors to actually tell that story to publications and to their audience on social media and travel trade media. So, some of the campaigns I told you last year we kind of got a little bit more sophisticated with our media buys and purchases. You can see that our our our summer campaign is really actively hitting on the playful um playful experiences of of life is a game. That's based off of our our our rebrand of of of the Florida Sports Coast that actually won our won that award for the for the Adrian Awards. But, our audience, you can see that we're going after shop shopping, history, online content consumption, and local spending behavior is the the target approach that we were trying to get our visitors to to to really click and and find out a little bit more about our destination. And you can see our return on ad spend, and that's our ROAS. And every dollar that we spend on marketing brings about $119 back in visitor spending to to Pasco County. So, here's the results of some of that that engagement for our marketing campaigns. Again, this is just a snapshot over the spring and summer. We have multiple campaigns going at the same time, and this is just an example of what that generated. So, you can see that it reached over a million unique visitors, which total which gives us a 40,000 reach in total visitors actually messaged or engaged with the messaging of our campaign. And again, looking at the return on marketing or return on ad spend is every dollar we spend is $119

coming back into the county on visitor spending. This is really cool. This is the first time we actually did some in-flight sponsorship. We did a 15-to-30-second destination video. We all know that we have a couple hundred people on these little tubes that fly 30,000 ft in the air and we have a captive audience. They can't go anywhere, right? So, if they want Wi-Fi, they have to watch this video. So, we partnered with American Airlines JetBlue and Breeze on inbound flights coming out of those destinations. You can see the campaign results. Video video completions over 7,700. So, people are engaging. People are watching our destination and they're learning more about us as as a destination. I don't know if this video is going to play, Philly. Or is this Is it going to play? No? That's okay. We can keep moving forward. Again, this is somewhat just an example of our of our mobile fuse spring-summer campaign. You can see that there's life, there's engagement, there's there's there's activity, there's excitement going on with our creative. And here is something really cool with mobile fuse. We actually had a game where you collected coins and you move the the um the hot air balloon up and down up and down until you actually got three core points. And once you got the three points, it would actually went to one of our advertising and you got to click and move to our to our website. So, a pretty way pretty cool way of enacting or engaging with with our audience. And here's some of just the the campaign results of of Hopper, our travel booking engine. So, here's We're partnering with a lot of these booking sites, these book bed banks because that's what these tour operators are actually looking for when they're selling to the consumer market. They're looking for Hopper, they're looking for hotel beds, Expedia, um uh RateHawk. These are bed banks that they're actually buying through the the tour operators. We started this last year. It's our newsletter. It actually goes out to the consumer audience. So that tells you all tells them all about our unique events, festivals, attractions, and many things that's going on on a quarterly basis here in Pasco County. And you can sell you can see that we started it in October and the growth pattern is really exponential with over 2,000 opt-in subscribers to our our new newsletter. Social media is is is been a great way to engage and reach audience and new audiences. Um we ended this uh 2025 fiscal year just shy under 18,000 um or little over 18,000 followers and um on our social media channels. Now I'm happy to say that we're past 22,000 followers on our Instagram. So um we are gaining traction, we're gaining followers, and we're we're really making an impression in the marketplace.

So what does that all mean? So this is this goes back to the impact of of our industry and what we've done for Pasco County over the past year. Um and you can see that the direct spend of over 746 million dollars gets spread out over over a wide variety of accommodations, restaurant, grocery shopping, entertainment, transportation, and and other activities once they're in market. So with three-year look back and visitors, room nights, direct spend, and economic impact, you can see that we've grown over the past three years. Took a little blip in 2024, but we've grown year over year in 2025 to 24. Uh our economic impact uh last year was around 1.1 billion dollars to Pasco County's economy. And here's just the occupancy. This is really important. So when developers are reaching out to us wanting to know what the occupancy, wanting to know what the star report shows, uh what the market is dictating us. This is actually really good information that that we hand to uh hotel developers. And I just want to thank you again for for your support. Um I hope to see you next week on the 14th at our annual tourism [snorts] banquet. Uh I know some of you might not be able to go, but we'll miss you. But, thank you again, Mr. Chairman. All right. Thank you, Adam. Any questions for Adam? Just one. Adam, does all this lead to the fact that do we have enough hotels for the people we're bringing in? Because I mean, it's growing and growing, but doesn't seem like we're adding hotels very often. Uh I will tell you this, there is some leakage going over to Hillsborough County once we do bring in these big tournaments. There we are losing some um some room nights to to our partners down south. Yes, sir. So, there We have about 50 52 53 hotels in the entire county, but again, that's just one lodging segment of the entire visitor economy. We still have the vacation rentals, we have uh camps and So, you think that there's a need for some more hotels There is. Okay. All right. Thank you. Good question. I think it's important that we keep encouraging these hotels cuz they do so many so much good for us every step of the way. And when you first started here uh way back when we had the a great uh lacrosse tournament was here, but we found out that most hotel nights were going down to Hillsborough. Between the I think the hockey rink coming in, the sports complex coming in, all of a sudden a lot of hotels got built, and I think there's still a lot more demand for more. So, to keep that money right here in Pasco County. So, Yeah, I agree. Anything else for Adam? Yeah. Well, keep up the good work, sir. Thank you. Now, we go to committee reports. Mr. Oakley. Oh.

See if I got something. I have um Well, I'd like to ask everybody a question to begin with. Does everybody uh notice anything different around the courthouse here in Dade City? The uh historic courthouse, if you will notice by the entryways and all, we've added flowers. And I've been working at that, and some of them are absolutely gorgeous, and some need a little more attention. But uh the the flowers it's coming. So, we'll get it right one day and it'll be beautiful in every spot. But there we got a few that the weather we had this year or not very well for for flowers and plants like this cuz I plants at my house most of them got killed. I had to pull them and replant new plants around my place. So, but I you see some of that damage here around the courthouse but we're working at making it more attractive as we go. And our citizens and the people that come here and visit here in this community and all visit our courthouses on this side and on the west side need to see that. We have beautiful things here and we have a welcome it's like a welcome mat that you put out to invite people to be a part of your community. Uh the other thing we had on you see the pictures up now that the uh Fallen Officers Memorial we had last Friday went off very very well. Very well done. Um some of our folks that spoke I knew uh Nomita uh from city commissioner over here that she did a great job in her her talk that morning and also uh different ones but just a great thing to see and and um it really with a memorial being set and all that it really worked out great for our Fallen Officers Memorial. So,

[clears throat]

so a lot of praise to that for the officers and everything and their families uh during this time. So, that's all I have. Yeah, thank you. Be sure to wait.

Thank you. Yeah, I think I'd like to make a motion. Um this building needs its resident chaplain for the number of weddings that we have on the front and I'd like to nominate Commissioner Oakley to get his notary. That way he can officiate all the weddings that we have right outside his door. He can come in, go out, come back in. I'm just Well, they give [clears throat] me that opportunity, but I mean the clerk takes care of it for me. No. Um Another impressive uh had a a beautiful ceremony for the fallen law enforcement memorial. It was great weather. Uh National Day of Prayer coming up here at 7:30 uh Thursday morning, but most importantly uh heartfelt congratulations uh to Austin and Lauren and the Mariano family for baby Benjamin. How special is that?

picture there, Gina? Yeah, and um congratulations and may blessings to the Marianos as you guys continue to grow for the next generations to come. That's all I have. All right. Oh, there he is.

Oh my goodness. There he is. Oh, he definitely looks like his mama. Thank goodness.

[laughter]

Aw, look at that. So sweet.

happy times. Happy times. Oh. We need a baby holding day. That's precious. All right, Commissioner Yeager. Okay. I don't know what's first, Gina. Okay, so we um this was the Moonlight cleanup and we went from 100 tons to 212 100 tons. So, that was amazing. And next year I um I want to I want to break the record, but wait, men, what do you think about this? I want a trophy. I want a trash trophy, okay? And whoever gets the most tons in the cleanup gets the honor of having the trophy. Well, now I'm going to start gambling knowing Moonlight and having done donated many of many of roll off over the years to that. I think it's a fun it'd be fun tradition to start. But, uh uh I think certain diff- districts need, well, like I think I'd win an e-waste competition.

[laughter]

For our our neck of the woods. He'd probably win the ag award. General garbage, it might be a toss-up between uh that side of the day, is Oh, yeah. So, but yeah, no, I think it'd be fun. Anyway, I was super proud of of the team. They they just crushed it this year, and next year we're willing we want to break the record again.

Do you know how many tons you you captured? Uh-huh. Do you know how many tons you captured? Yeah, 212.

212? 212 what? Tons. All right, next slide. So, if we do that a couple years, doesn't that take care of where that's all cleaned up, we don't have to keep cleaning up that much?

[clears throat]

So, this was um the grand opening of the New Port Richey um firehouse, and this was their first house their first their first new firehouse in How many Do you remember, Mike? Is it like 70 years or something? It was crazy. So, it was much needed. All right, next slide. So, we um participated in Arbor Day, and we gave seven trees to Moon Lake Elementary, and this group that we were out with, they were the GFWC, the General Federation of Women's Club. So, every year they would like to do two schools. So, I think believe they did Anclote as well. So, they'd like to hit all the elementary schools in the county. So, that was great. And this was the Marjorie's Hope uh Waiters event, and they had 410 people attend, and they raised $65,000. Great work. And that goes to at-risk students. Um they get backpacks, haircuts, clothes. They They a store they can shop anytime they want to. It's a great, great cause. They gave scholarships away. So, that was that. And then, um this was the Operation Stand Down. So, I spent the day there Saturday volunteering and it's it's just an amazing event if no one's ever been there. I saw um Commissioner Weitman and I heard I just missed you, um Commissioner Mariano. But, the veterans get free dental care. I mean, they'll do dentures right on the spot there. They have nurses and doctors and most of all they get all the supports um that they need and and deserve. So, that was a great day and that's all I have. Yeah, the denture the denture thing is pretty impressive. I'll tell you what my uh our New Port Richey Rotary Club was a sponsor of that. That was very well received and you know, so so many veterans they don't get dental care. So, that is something that was vital to it. But, I I got to say reach out to Pat Templeton. She did a phenomenal job getting it all together to see it. The The happiness of everybody there having something to go work at and then get some help with really a great move going to the Concord. Yes. And now compared to what Veterans Park was was great, but that is the ultimate location cuz you got everybody under cover.

Yep. It worked very well. But, she did a phenomenal job. So. Um County Administrator. Yeah, just real quick. I want to give a shout out to our Parks Department. Couple of things. First and foremost, they uh recently won from the Southwest District of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection a a Stewardship Achievement Award recognizing their Conservation District for over 25 years of conservation achievements, whether that's the E-Lamp program, acquisition of property program, uh regulatory protection, as well as just uh waterways protections and and and progress. And it's And it's just beautiful. I had the occasion actually to be out at Withlacoochee Park um this past weekend doing a doing a trail run 10K. And actually, it's it's um everything looks amazing. They activated the spaces well, but it was also done for a cause and an awareness and something. Actually, I want to give a shout out to Commissioner Waitman on this is because the the event was about suicide and suicide awareness. And you know, Commissioner Waitman, you'd come to us a couple months ago talking about collaborating with the school board and that there's really an epidemic in our in our schools with with young people. So, we've collaborated with the school board to train, especially as we get into summer programs, over 250 counselors, our full-time people, our part-time folks on on what to look for in in order to help help prevent that. So, again, not only is our our parks guys just busy out there conserving, activating spaces and stuff, they're doing good for the community just through through awareness and other programs. So, I just want to thank you for bringing that to our attention, Commissioner, and just thank the board for its its support of our parks. Thank you. Well, and Mike, thank you for putting the team together and helping them go because, you know, when you get families that want to go out, they have fun together, it's good. It's just quality of life. And our people voted for it, they told us what they wanted, and I think we're doing a good job delivering and we'll keep on going. Madam Clerk. Yeah. Yes, um I have a couple things. So, at um um at one community now's event, we had Operation Stand Down on Friday, which um it part of the Veterans Court, and we work with the State Attorney, Public Defender, and the Judicial Circuit to those veterans that have court obligations to come. And we assisted um on 73 cases where veterans were involved. Um we waived over 20 uh 7 I'm sorry, $27,000 and 25 veterans left with driver's licenses. So, it was a it was a great great event. Um I just love being part of that. And then, um earlier in the month, um we held our Operation Green Light, and that's for all motorists who driver's license have been suspended because they

haven't paid on a court obligation. And we pull the cases from collections, uh uh wave collection fees and to allow them to get back on their feet. Um we waived over uh $60,000 to allow for that. And um almost 600 593 driver's licenses were made eligible for reinstatement through that program. So, [snorts] another great a great program. And then last week was my favorite program that we do and it is in partnership with Pasco County schools where kindergarteners through 12th grade um artwork gets displayed on the walls of the judicial centers. And um if you've ever been to the judicial center and you're on the other side of the counter from us, it is a very stressful time in your life. And to come into a building where you just have the blank walls, um it can be very intimidating. And then if you have the walls filled with beautiful artwork from beautiful student artist. Um so, what we do is we host the student artist annually, the new artwork goes up, and we have um in the program as part of the program, we have music from our high schoolers or middle schoolers. And uh we had a jazz band from Pasco um high school here in Dade City and Land O' Lakes High School in uh New Port Richey. So, as you're walking around enjoying what looking at all the artwork, you get to hear the beautiful music. And then we celebrate um all the student artists with cupcakes. And um it was it's just a a fantastic event. If you're ever able to come, um please do. It's every April. Um we had 336 student artists throughout the county. Uh we had 38 schools participating. So, very very excited. Thank you. Okay, wonderful. Mr. County Attorney. We have nothing further. Okay. And uh I was busy the previous week and moved my daughter back from DC, so I didn't I missed a couple of things in my office, etc. But uh again, that stand down was phenomenal. Um So. We'll will be adjourned. That's it? Are you sure? There's some kind of record. Yes, please. They said we can go. Keep that one. Honey, what time is it? Hold on. Nobody's moving.

[laughter]

It's too early. I mean, I need to get you in a loop too. Nobody's moving. Get through this thing. All right. No, I'm going to talk to Sandy on this one cuz it's been going on too long. Well, apparently he he's already gotten an action started, so I got to see what the deal is here. Right. And there's there's one that's on the little driveway. It's supposed to be shut down. That's where they're driving and stuff.