John Bartus, city administrator for Key Colony Beach, joined Good Morning Keys on KeysTalk 96.9/102.5FM this morning to talk about what’s going on in the city.
How is the city hall project coming?
Bartus said, ‘First off, we’re going to have an addition to the building, and that’s going to be the new part of the construction. But the contract is also going to include storm hardening and flood proofing of the existing marble hall building, and then the post office as well. We will put in impact glass and make sure everything is ready to go. So those will easily survive, hopefully, the next storm or two that come through here. Hopefully we don’t have that to worry about for quite some time. But anyway, the 90% drawings are due early next month, and I believe the July 17 meeting, the Commission will indeed vote on, I think where the next step after that would be whatever little comments that they might have, then those will be incorporated, and then we’ll put the drawings out for bid to see who was out there and who might want to come take on this project. We’re really excited about that to probably be able to put these bids out by August. That’s what we’re looking for, and we’re on track to do that.”
With hurricane season upon us, it’s important to be vigilant and prepared.
Bartus said, “Everybody right now, during this slow part of the hurricane season needs to make sure they get their disaster plan in place, what they’re going to do, whether they evacuate or whether they stay here, make sure you have your hurricane box, your supplies ready to go, any groceries, non perishable stuff, water, things like that. So you do have that in case we do have something come through and there’s a little disruption in service, and also make sure that your evacuation plan is ready to go as well, so you know where you’re going, what you’re going to do and we’re working basically with our local police department. We work with the sheriff’s office, and we contract with the city of Marathon for fire and EMS services, and they’ve been a wonderful partner in helping us get ready for this hurricane season, too. Please listen closely to what the local National Weather Service office is going to do. I mean, they work closely with the National Hurricane Center, and their forecast products are second to none.”
It looks like the Stewardship funding is in the state budget again this year.
Bartus said, “A lot of the local governments down here have been depending on that for helping projects move forward. I mean, last year, Key Colony got a million dollars out of this fund for a UV tank at our wastewater plant, and I believe tomorrow, we’re going to have a meeting with a lot of the local stakeholders to come up with our formula that we had before, under an existing interlocal agreement to help figure out how we’re going to divide the money up between all the local governments and people that need this water quality improvement. It’s not just wastewater. Stormwater projects and canal restoration are also projects that can be assisted with this funding. So anything that helps water quality down in the Florida Keys that that’s the kind of stuff that stewardship helps fund.”
Some of the drastic changes proposed for the state budget this year didn’t happen.
Bartus said, “I’m very happy about that property tax reform did not go anywhere this session. And the same thing with the tourism taxes, there was some serious proposals to do away with those, and that would have really had a disastrous effect on our local budgeting processes and some of the funds that local governments have come to rely on. So I’m really happy that that didn’t happen. This legislature, we’re just awaiting now the governor’s signature, but I don’t see a problem there. But again, we’re going to have to be vigilant, because I believe these issues are going to once again come back up next year. One thing that is good if you rent commercial property, if you’re a business owner, you rent commercial property starting in October, there will be no more sales tax assessed on your commercial net.”
It looks like there wasn’t anything in terms of insurance in the budget.
Bartus said, “Sadly, no. That’s something that the legislature keeps kicking the can down the road there. I really hope that at some point they decide to do something that will protect especially Citizens policy holders. It’s long overdue. I mean the Keys have been such a donor community to Citizens. They’ve made more than a billion dollars of clear profit on us over what they paid out compared to premiums they’ve collected. So insurance reform is something that’s necessary, and hopefully next legislative session, they will get around to doing something about that.”
The July 4 celebration will be held in Marathon and it will be spectacular.
Bartus said, “If I can just have a quick plug for our local Rotary Club of Marathon that works closely with the city of Marathon to put on our July 4 celebration. We have the best small town fireworks display in America. This, I have no doubt, is going to be music of the beach, and the Rotary Club will be providing food and drink and basically we say, buy a burger, send a kid to college, because all the money we raise goes to our local scholarship fund. So we’re looking forward to that. It’s going to be a long day, it’s a hot day, it’s one of the longest days of my year, but it’s so worth it, and especially when you see those fireworks at night. Wow.”