The sand berms have to be 20 feet from the water’s edge. And Jetty East doesn’t have that much space, so …

The meeting over the prospect of a Destin High School has been rescheduled for 6 p.m. next Monday, rather than Thursday morning.

Kisela: The sand is piled up on the beach, 30-50,000 cubic yards from the recent dredging. “At this point we do not have authorization from the private landowners to transport any of that material off their land.” Still working on that. Anticipate being able to get it off state land by the end of the week. Would like to enter into a contract for transporting sand in the hope it will pass. DEP/FEMA money from past hurricanes could fund it. Cost: $2.50/cubic yard of sand to place it into berms.
Barker: Didn’t DEP get permission to put the sand there? But not to take it?
Kisela: Corps doesn’t need permission, it has an easement to put the land there. We got permission from the owner two years ago for another project, but this time we haven’t gotten permission yet. We’re still hoping. (We means the city, I hope that’s clear).
Wood: “Are they the same homeowners we’re trying to help by building up the beach?”
Kisela: This is primarily Destin Pointe, Jetty East and Holiday Isle (the homeowners association of the latter, I assume).
The motion passes unanimously.
Kisela adds that the city’s DEP permit only allows berms, not beach rebuilding.

Weidenhamer suggests Destin look at other steps taken by other cities for ideas that can be used. And study other cities for problems that haven’t shown up here yet and ways to solve them.
Wood: How long before these properties get new owners that we can apply the law too?
“I see this as a derelict boat issue” meaning it’ll take a long, long time to take action on clearing this up.
Kisela: It’ll take at least a couple of months to get the ordinances drafted, and the code-enforcement process will take just as long before the city can take action.
Wood: Suggests the city “think outside the box” to find solutions.
Windes: The police can’t do anything unless they catch someone in an act–they can’t watch houses 24/7. “It’s time to send a little bigger stick over wherever it needs to be sent.”
Applause from the audience.
Trammell: Is there a way to schedule code-enforcement operations on the weekend and in the evenings so they can move immediately when we get calls?

Vote on the motion: Unanimous.

Weidenhamer adds staff shoudl not only look at the problems now, but at problems that might arise.
Windes: What does the reference to incompatibility mean in the staff recommendations?
Land use attorney Scott Shirley: When drawing up the rules, the council would decide which parts of the city are incompatible with such boarding houses.
As to grandfathering in existing houses, that’s something they’ll have to work out as they go along. Some of the houses may have other code violations that can be acted on.
Jim Wood: As long as code-enforcement just talks to them at the door, the boarders will say whatever will satisfy the city. Can we get beyond the door?
Kisela: If there’s a criminal violation we can call in the police to go inside.
Trammell: In my neighborhood we don’t have the “mother in law” house we have “permanently living in remodelers.” The owner rents the house out and has the residents pay for their rent by remodeling the home. “They weren’t charged rent, they were bartering.”
Shirley: “I’ve been one of those permanent remodelers.”
Bagby: “So has the mayor!”
Shirley: “If it makes you feel any better, i got the job done.”
Trammell: “It’s been three years and they’ve not got the job done yet.”

(Oh, the deed of gift issue passed unanimously).

Kisela: Staff needs council direction. We have 15-20 “accessory dwelling units” throughout the city, and would like to change the ordinances to require the property owner live in the main house (which would discourage renting the property out to two dozen people) or restricting the “mother in law apartments” to genuine in-laws or the like. At present, owners have to sign statements they won’t separately lease the accessory units out, but they can get around it by signing a general lease or not requiring a lease.
Also believes code-enforcement can crack down a little harder. “We also have lockout units being created in the main structure, which is a clear violation of our code. We need to be more assertive.”
Tom Weidenhamer: Moves to have staff draft an ordinance setting the appropriate restrictions (which I’ll go into in detail for Wednesday’s paper).
Sam: This is a huge problem. Had one near my house, a while back. She regrets that it cuts out a source of affordable housing but “it has not helped as far as degrading our neighborhoods.” Has visited some of the houses–they’re clearly boarding houses because they have big, apartment-buidling size trash cans–and while some look nice, others are a big problem.
Bagby: Fine with the owner-occupied main-house rule. Not comfortable with restricing who can use accessory units: He shared one with another boarder himself when he got out of college. “it’s when you get 20 living in one bedroom that you have a problem.”
Trammell: Agrees on owner occupancy and on relatives-only rule.
Dewey: It looks like there are a lot of rules that have been violated. If we’re passing more rules, will they be violated too?
Kisela: Some of these are hard to deal with when there’s no separate lease, but staff does realize the importance of cracking down on this.
Wood: I do want more options for affordable housing–but after seeing what happens at some of these properties, I agree we need to crack down.
Weidenhamer: “This type of workforce housing is certainly something we didn’t have in mind.”

At issue: exempting a lot from the usual rules of subdividing property so that two landowners (the Mings) can give part of the land to their grandson

A city report says the road is badly in need of resurfacing. While the city had planned to do it with funding from the Harbor Community Redevelopment Agency, it needs to happen sooner, using more immediately available funding.
Sam Seevers: Moves to put the $116,000 from another part of the budget.
Dewey Destin: We’re going to be working on it in a year or so as part of the corridor management plan, aren’t we? Do we really need to make this change now?
Kisela: No, it’ll be more like 3-5 years, and that’s too long. He says it won’t make all the changes in the corridor management plan, but it will preserve it until that later project begins.
Unanimous.

Bagby: Moves to have LPA host a workshop and invite CLT and developers.
Trammell: We have to make sure developers know about it. They’ve been complaining they never got notified of the relevant meetings to attend.
Kisela: We can go through the Building Industry Association and trust them to alert everyone.
Weidenhamer: A lot of people came to the housing-fee discussions to take a stand. We should definitely notify everyone who gave their name when they spoke.
Bagby: We should call our individual LPA members and tell them to show up (the LPA has a record of not having quotas at meetings). “We could be kicking this down the road for six months” if we don’t.
Motion passes unanimously.

(funny, I’d thought this would be a routine agenda item)
Sandy Trammell: Agrees with Bagby.
Windes: “This is what we need new councilors for, to abolish what was done right before they came on board.”
Trammell: This isn’t unmaking that, we’re simply putting the workshop under the LPA.
6-1, Windes voting no, to reconsider the original motion to create a blue-ribbon panel.
There is now a lot of discussion over the parliamentary procedure they need. I won’t recap it in detail (and I’m quite sure you don’t want me to).
Fortunately, City Clerk Rey Bailey found the original motion in the minutes, so they know exactly what they’re voting on.
Sam: Going to vote no (that is, not to support the Blue Ribbon Committee). Thought the blue-ribbon panel was a good idea, but the technicalities of appointing members (only one from the land trust, for instance) have turned her off.
The vote: 6-1 against creating the blue-ribbon committee, with Windes voting no. Barker: “The motion passes–no, the original motion fails.”