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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1999 04 20 Other Memo from Clerk APRIL 20, 1999 HANDOUT FROM CLERK AMY LOVINGFOSS. CITY OF WINTER SPRINGS, FLORIDA 1126 EAST STATE ROAD 434 WINTER SPRINGS, FLORIDA 32708-2799 Telephone (407) 327-1800 Memorandum To: From: Tuscawilla Lighting and Beautification District Advisory Committee Members Andrea Lorenzo-Lu8~m City Clerk Amy Lovingfoss, Cler~ Via: Date: Monday, April 19, 1999 RE: Request for portion of the March 30, 1999 Minutes Verbatim As requested, 1 have reviewed the tape of March 30, 1999 and am providing you a verbatim transcript of the conversation with Mr. Jim Avitable, Representative, The Reserve at Tuscawilla. Some blanks in the conversation exist because Mr. Avitable was not near a microphone, which made it difficult to hear. Mr. Jim A vitable: "I have a number of questions with respect to the Tuscora entrance and is my primary reason for being here tonight; and the issue of which intersections get included, and how you do that, may be effected by some of my comments. But I'll hold off if you want to wait; conduct your business. 1 don't know what the forum here is of your meeting". Chairman Donald A. GJ1more: "Well, we have the right to give you five minutes at the beginning of the meeting to say what you want. We would evoke that right if we have a large number of people here that wanted to talk. Since we are talking in small areas, 1 would just as soon wait until we talk Tuscora and then you could talk on Tuscora and give us your thoughts. That we can proceed, if that's Ok with you all. Anybody have a problem with that"? Vice Chairman Gary Hillery: "Aren't we at Tuscora now"? Chairman Gilmore: "I don't know where we are". Several people were speaking at once Board Member Moti Khemlani: "He's requesting, Mr. Chairman, five minutes; give him five minutes". Chairman Gl1more: "I understand that". Board Member George Morris: "I think it's good to give him the time". Chairman Gllmore:"Do you all want to listen-go ahead take it now". Mr. A vitable: "As I said, I've been requested to attend on behalf of Lisa Karlovic, who's with the Homeowners Association". Board Member Khemlani: "For the record, just again, one more time, just put your name on the"- Mr. A vitable: "My name is Jim A vitable and I am a property owner over in The Reserve and I also happen to be a registered Professional Engineer and knowledgeable in projects of this type. And so I'm acting as a representative and somewhat as a consultant to my neighbors, if you would". Mr. A vitable: "Lisa wanted to be here tonight and could not, so she asked me to attend. I wanted to say on the record, right up front, that we are very much in support of the project. There are some concerns with respect to the close (?) of the Tuscora and anything that might affect our walls. I think what you're going to find is that we prefer right now that none of the walls be touched and none of the proposed landscaping to occur overlapping our existing landscaping. We also would prefer to have a little bit more time to review that. I would make myself available to work with Bill, and anybody from his staff, to get together and try to come up with a common resolve; I think you know what it's like dealing with the public participation process on these things. We can get forty people to have forty different ideas; we don't want to hold you up either. I understand the fast track and what it takes to get a project ready and out to bid in thirty days; he needs answers and he needs them quick". Mr. Avitable: "What your also going to need, is you're gonna need some type of Ok or approval from us to actually go into that easement and there's going to be some messy issues to deal with if you advance the design towards construction documents. Some of those issues include who's going to take care of the lights? How do we disrupt service that's already there? Future maintenance issues on the wall. How do you define where your landscaping starts and stops and ours starts? And from the basis of the neighborhood, we've invested a lot of money to take care of what we have there. We're not necessarily sold on the merits of disrupting that, which is for the sake of conformity, so to speak. I think I'd be willing to act as a liaison; I can read plans probably as well as anybody and try to define some of those issues and how we can deal with them. But at the point we are right now, the Homeowners Association would prefer that the walls not be disrupted and the landscaping not be disrupted. There may be a way of working with Bill so we can enhance what's already there". Mr. Avitable: "I understand you have had communications with the Developer. You should know that as of next week, or very close to next week, that Developer as no longer gained control of the Homeowners Association". VIce Chairman Hillery: "What kind of a commitment do you have from him to continue with the proposal to put your sign up there"? Mr. A vitable: "Our understanding is that he is entirely on the on the hook for doing that" . Vice Chairman Hillery: "Or you could get money". Mr. A vitable: "Well, he hasn't offered that, to be truthful, and I'm very doubtful as to whether or not he will". Several people were speaking at once Chairman GIlmore: "Who owns the walls that are there now"? Mr. A VJ'table: "The Homeowners Association". Chairman GIlmore: "You own the walls and you own the land"? Mr. A vitable: "Yes and we also, in some cases, those walls do not go up to a property line. There's actually five feet of actual property on the other side of the walls and an easement there within. So this adds complexity to the issue of doing this entrance. I'll be the first one to tell you that as of right now I'm not in any high state of preparation to tell you exactly where that wall is. But, and probably that's the first thing I'll be working with your consultant to try to work out a resolution on this; but I think that you're going to find if, you know, we only had a half dozen members of the neighborhood association, neighborhood at that association meeting, Lisa is in the process of polling everybody to find out what the overall consensus is. We've (?) consensus, (?) to be in favor, we would like to see that wall stay exactly as it is". Ms. Kangee Graham7 Landscape Management Consultant: "Can I ask a quick question? On your statement about the five-foot, basically the statement the wall is possibly sitting in the middle of that ten-foot easement, where do you get that information"? Mr. A vitable: "Engineering drawings. It's not uniform throughout the whole location". Ms. Graham: "But you, but the Developer did come up with some drawings"? Mr. A vitable: "I have drawings myself". Ms. Graham: "Oh, great". Mr. Avitable: "That does not mean that those are 'as builts'. It does not. That's very important because if you've got surveys that are actually physically gonna locate it, I find it's not precisely where those drawings are. But, in general, what you've got is from. the back of the sidewalk to the back of the sidewalk on the other side of the street. That's basically public right-of-way and that is what the City maintains and takes care of. Our neighborhood pays and takes care of everything from where the back of the sidewalk is to up to the wall and everything on the other side of that wall from that easement" . Ms. Graham: "On that ten-foot easement, since you've seen the drawings and we haven't, is it the back of the sidewalk or is it two feet in"? Mr. A vitable: "It's supposed to be the back of the sidewalk, but that isn't necessarily how they built" - Ms. Graham: "Which would, when I measured it from the back of that pillar going down Tuscora to the sidewalk is approximately ten feet. So that wall sits right on that far edge to give that easement for landscaping. On the front you have about six foot, but it does a little jig around some trees and such like that. So the right-of-way, another issue it that ditch is only being filled in the first fifty or so feet and after that the ditch is actually enlarged going down through there, so that's another thing we need to address, who maintains that area from the length (?) to the wall on 434". Mr. A vitable: "1'11 be happy to meet with anybody and go over any field issues if you want; that's very easy for us to do". Wee Chairman Hillery: "One of the questions I asked at that meeting the other day was the location of the water control, sprinkler control, source of the water and the other thing was, the lights are not working. Where, and they appear to be hooked up, well one of them doesn't have a lens or a bulb, where is the meter for that lighting system"? Mr. A vitable: "I could find out the answers". Board Member Morris: "That's behind the opposite wall". Mr. A vitable: "More than likely". Vice Chairman Hillery: "It's where"? Board Member Morris: "Behind the opposite wall. Meter on the water controls". Mr. Kipton D. Lockcuff, P.E., Director, Public Works/Utility Department: "And the irrigation is via well at the entrance to phase two. Used to be potable and they switched it to the well". Board Member Khemlani: "I have a conceptual question, Jim. This is just personal opinion. If we gave you an offer that said we would better the entrance, we would reduce your costs by taking over the landscaping responsibilities, in writing; watering responsibilities, in writing; and that we would face the corners, and I'm using the face very lighting because, loosely I should say, because I don't know what face means. It may mean just putting a cover around your wall, it may mean, in order to do a good job, to cut part of the wall and attach it with the bricking totally matching just like a professional job, and a difference would be that we would have an entryway which would be compatible with the rest of Tuscawilla. As well as a reduction in your cost; as well as assurances that we will take care of it for the next thirty years; as well as it's not going to impact any security or anything else. If you had to make a decision, or if you had to just give me your opinion today, would you prefer to just make that same comment you made earlier"? Mr. A vitable: "This issue is, again, the length of the landscaping that you'd be willing to take on responsibility for. As you know we're responsible for that intersection; we're also responsible for all the way down Tuscora to our entrance for The Reserve phase one and phase two and down to the right-of-way. What we will be concerned with is that it needs to be more than just a little patch down near the intersection will be taken over, that is our expectation (?) the Tuscawilla neighborhood's entrance, and so, the issue is if you would be willing to take that down in the intersection of The Reserve, or something like that, it might be open for discussion. But it's still somewhat messy being involved in these types of projects myself. It's very difficult to control contractors, and you're talking about one set of contractors coming in and plant these, another set come in to maintain on a regular basis". Mr. A vitabJe: "Last year we had a great deal of difficulty because there was a (?)pump, or some type of a pump, that rusted up and malfunctioned. As a result of that, we didn't have any irrigation supply to the green areas, and the landscaped areas along that section, and everything almost died. While we the Homeowners Association watched on, knowing that we were paying our dues and there wasn't much that we could do other than fighting contractors trying to make that happen. It will be a difficult sell, 1 believe, for Lisa to approach everybody in those neighborhoods and say that the City could do a better job and stop here. If the City were to take on whole responsibility, we knew that we were going to be able to go to one source and say their responsible for everything out there, we just have to worry about our little front area. That might be a little different, but it is not clean. There is not a nice, neat place where you can break this and I'm not certain that it's going to be a very easy or equitable thing. We've taken on a big maintenance"- Vice Chairman Hillery: "Conversely, what if we were to see if, or you establish, that a certain cost is, that portion of it that we occupy, and you take care of it and we provide" - Mr. A vitabJe: "I think the issue here is that we have a wall that's right were it is right now, the way we like it, with the exception of the contractor finishing his work. We would like to see the contractor, Developer, responsible for finishing that work as what we paid for. Whether he has done it to date is immaterial. It folded into the cost of my house and every other house in that neighborhood. For you to come back in and spend more dollars to potentially add some value to that, by making it more common, does not necessarily benefit in the eyes of everybody in our neighborhood. It may be an overall benefit for the sake of uniformity but for the dollar spent, and again, 1 don't know what the dollar spent and I'd be willing to look at that and give a better opinion, 1 don't believe there is going to be strong support for it. 1 think people would prefer to just say this is what 1 bought, this is what 1 paid for, 1 expect the Developer to finish his commitment and leave it the way we expected it". Mr. A vitabJe: "On the flip side of that, if you're talking about accentuating that, remember we have an intersection under construction-a second issue that I'll throw out here. You're gonna bid a job at Tuscora, which is going to be an intersection that's under heavy construction by the DOT for another, maybe three to six months, at least". Mr. Lockcuff: "Another twelve to fourteen". Mr. A vitabJe: "Ok, it's probably not wise to really put that in such this package. The, 1 would, 1 have not reviewed the contract documents that are under design, development right now by the DOT out on 434, however 1 would like to see those. 1 would say that when that (?) that contractor was not in sight, DOT is going to allow you access to that sight, but up until now, 1 don't know if they will". Ms. Graham: "Are you aware that that intersection is being raised three feet; that your radius on that median is actually being drawn out, five foot sidewalks. You made a comment that you were concerned about the disruption of the present landscape. That's pretty much going to be disrupted". Mr. A vitable: "I can imagine that my next charge is going to be to go talk to them. But it doesn't really matter. DOT still has no right to touch those walls. They may have the right to dig up what they have to dig up for public purposes, but without paying us damages, they have no right to do anything but disrupt it and replace it. So, they may have to get an education on that process as well". Vice Chairman Hillery: "I imagine there might be a question on what kind of words or lettering we use out there. If we were to, what would you put there? The Reserve; Tuscawilla; The Reserve at Tuscawilla"? Mr. A vitable: "There are a lot of issues that people will take, the people in those neighborhoods are not intending to look down on what you are doing, by any means. We think it is great and, you know, the current main entrances and three priority points, I think everybody in the neighborhood would really like what's being done to it. There's going to be an issue with respect to you putting the Tuscawilla neighborhood's name on a wall that we don't pay for. Now if the Tuscawilla neighborhood paid for the wall, that would be different, but you know, we spent some heavy dollars putting that in. It wasn't something that, I'm sure, the Developer wanted to do, but they were required to build the road and required to build that entryway as part of the development and we all came in and purchased our property, this is what we were shown as what it was going to be". Board Member Khemlani: "So what I'm hearing, Jim, is, that was, I was going to take the opposite view instead of going all out and do things that I thought earlier, as I was trying to insinuate, and cut your costs, make it more consistent if we just went the opposite and said, look, if you go and pay for that wall, you want the Developer to comply with what you paid for, God Bless you, thank you for paying your one hundred and ten dollars a year to take with the rest of Tuscawilla, you'll be happy with that". Mr. A vitable: "I think so, and I think I can get that for you in writing to make sure that you're not"- Board Member Khemlani: "That was the message I thought he was giving but I just wanted to make sure". Chairman Gilmore: "What I've heard, what, if I could sum this thing up. Number one, they will own that wall; we have no rights on that wall except for what they let us have. Now if, you obviously have some thoughts on that and have offered to work with Bill Starmer on it and I would think that this Board would look in favor to that". Board Member Khemlani: "I think so. I would". Chairman Gilmore: "See what they come back with". Board Member Khemlani: "We had information, preliminary information from some of the people that 1 know in the development and the Developer. I didn't talk to the Developer as much, but 1 talked to some of the people, was different from than what you are saying and if the majority of the people are thinking like you, it not only, because we were doing it for the end March, that's how short. But if we feel we are intruding on your expectations, gee, there are so many better things we can do with that money, you have no idea". Mr. A vitable: "That's why 1 wanted to make sure 1 come in today and try to be supportive and on the same token try to steer things the right way. What 1 suggest, let me get this information back to Lisa. If Bill can get a copy of my business card and maybe we can touch base and if 1 could get your business card. All I'm interested in is this one intersection, if you can maybe give me a time to come back out here and look over the sight. Quickly saying, whatever we need to get you, we will be happy to do. 1 just know that it's not a nice, clean break no matter what happens and"- Board Member Khemlani: "I think it's pretty clean. We understand; we get the message. 1 think it's very clean. It's the best of both worlds. We're happy to save money and you're happy to stay where you are and 1 think it's the best of both worlds". Vice Chairman Hillery: "I couldn't understand why you were so cooperative". Ms. Graham: "I think one of the concerns this Board has had on some of these different entrances is going in and making the improvements and having a thirty year guarantee that it's going to be taken care of a certain way and looking at whether the Homeowner's Association, or the residents behind those and around those signs, are going to maintain their area just as well over that length of time period. 1 mean, that's something that"- Board Member Khemlani: "But if he gives us in writing that they prefer the alternative, 1 think there's no need to, it's a mute point. Personally 1 have no problem with that". Chairman Gilmore: "Anybody else have any comments? Work with Starmer and see what you can come up with". Mr. A vitable: "Do you want me to call you or do you want to call me? I know you've probably got a number of other things to take care of, when you're ready to talk to me, you just give me a call, Ok"? Mr. Bill Starme~ President, Starmer Ranaldi Architecture and Planning, Inc (SrI): "Give me a holler, we'll get together". Mr. A vitable: "Alright, Thank you very much. If I can be of any other help, feel free to call" . (Shortly afte~ Mr. A vitable leaves the meeting) Copy: Ronald W. McLemore, City Manager Kipton D. Lockcuff, P.E., Director, Public Works/Utility Department DOCS/cco/arl/tuscawillalcorresl0002.doc.