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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes Watershore And Beach Advisory Committee - 03/01/2018 WATERSHORE AND BEACH ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING Regular Called Meeting, Thursday, March 1, 2018 5:30 pm Staff Conference Room, City Hall 1201 Leopard Street, Corpus Christi, TX Members Present Members Absent Staff Present Cliff Schlabach Jennifer Pollack Darren Gurley Terry Palmer Carrie Robertson Meyer Martha Lawhon Phillippe Tissot Jyoti Patel Daniel Mazoch Meredith Darden Mukesh Subedee I. CALL TO ORDER Meeting called to order at 5:30 pm. II. ROLL CALL The roll was called and a quorum was present. I. ADOPTION OF MINUTES Minutes from the February 1, 2018 meeting were distributed for review and approval. Terry made a motion to accept the minutes as presented, Mukesh seconded, unanimously approved. Motion passed. IV. HEAR FROM THE PUBLIC There was no one from the public in attendance. V. BUSINESS FOR DISCUSSION/POSSIBLE ACTION 1 New Business a. Plastic in Our Local Waters: A presentation by Dr. Jeremy Conkle Dr. Conkle is a professor at Texas A& M. Dr. Conkle mostly talked about 2 areas locally that this study covered; the coast and the bay. The coast plastic mostly comes from the loop currents and is deposited on the beach from the long shore current. In the Bay, debris will stay for 1 to 3 years because the bays are well contained. Dr. Conkle had pictures showing some of our local beaches with lots of trash. After the trash is in the bay for a few days it starts to break down into smaller pieces and therefore probably going to be consumed by smaller animals. A lot of the trash from the shore is picked up but there is still a lot in the sediments in the bays. Dr. Conkle also showed photos of fibers and plastics actually in some of the sea life. In one particular study on crabs; 75% of the crabs tested had some debris in their system. Currently the coastal bay waters are being examined; samples are being extracted for analysis but this work is depended on the weather cooperating. He also showed us some footage of a drone program they are working on to look at trash on the beaches. b. Clean up area shorelines of Hurricane Harvey debris Terry wanted to note that there is still debris around the campus and other area and wanted to know who was responsible for cleaning those areas up. Darren thought that it was the property owners. It was noted that the beaches are clean. Code enforcement would be the group to enforce any cleanup. c. Beach Parking Permits (Increasing, Revenues, Fund Balance from FY2017, Revenue Use) Cliff reminded the committee that the issue of raising the parking permits was mentioned by Jerry Plemons at the previous meeting; it was brought up at PRAC. Darren explained that the City is 2 looking for revenues and they are looking at the Parks and Recreation Department but doesn't believe that the parking permit price will be increased. Darren gave out some handouts; part of the ordinance explaining the funding, a recap of the revenues from fiscal year 2016 to current and the listing of outlets that sell the parking permits. The ordinance explains the funding and how it may be spent, it also states that the City cannot spend more than 10% on administrative cost. He then explained the review of the sold permits from 2016 to current. The total revenues are split between the City, Nueces County and Port Aransas, based on the miles of beach each entity is responsible for. The revenues that the City gets go to the Beach Permits and Beach Operations. The budgets are greater than the revenues so the City must cover the difference from the general fund. If the price of the permits were increased that would mean the City would have less to fund, therefore taking less money from the general fund. This is why they would want to raise the price. Also in these numbers were about 6000 permits lost due to Hurricane Harvey. The sources of funds for the general fund come from property tax, service fees, permit sales, State HOT funds and the General Land Office. Jerry wanted a recommendation from WBAC on this but Cliff wants to wait for the next meeting when more WBAC members are present. Jerry wanted WBAC to know that it is predicted that the general fund will be $9 million in the hole next year. d. Proposed North Beach Offshore Islands Greg Smith wanted WBAC to have a recommendation on this for the March 20th City Council meeting. Cliff had relayed WBAC previous recommendation to the Council without much success. The Council will be voting on the conceptions of these plans, especially Plan 2 which includes the offshore islands. The main purpose of the islands is to block the view of the industries across the bay. This is the recommendation WBAC is going to make: The Watershore and Beach Advisory Committee recommends against using dredging material for the offshore islands and secondly WBAC recommend a study to be conducted to evaluate means and methods of slowing shoreline erosion on North Beach and improve the resilience of the beach. Phillippe made a motion to accept this recommendation, Terry seconded, unanimously approved. Motion passed. 2 Old Business a. Update: Fire Regulations Jay has not met with the Fire Marshall yet. b. Update: Six Pack Projects TIRZ approved the ADA mats, now it has to go to Council. Darren has the go ahead to take the money out for the pavilion and then return it. The pavilion (1 at the boat ramp) has been approved with a budget of$1 million. The pavilion will be a wooden structure with a tin roof, about 60' by 20' and Darren is working on getting pricing. Regarding the showers; beach operations will be building them. VI. PARK AND RECREATION ACTION COMMITTEE—Jerry Plemons • Jerry reported that the meeting lasted 3.5 hours and most of the discussion was about money and budgets, not much to do with WBAC. There was discussion regarding Capital Improvements but it was decided to wait until the next WBAC meeting to discuss; when more members were in attendance. What Jerry did relay briefly was where the dollars are spent and where the dollars were planned to be spent. • Jerry next spoke about the 2018 bond proposal of$4,300,000 because there is nothing for WBAC. Jerry asked if there was anything WBAC wants so that he can bring it up at the PRAC meeting, he told the committee to just let him know before March 13th. On the third page of the hand out is the "wish list" and one of those items is the Oso Foot Bridge but it is not funded. If WBAC wants it, they need to give Jerry a recommendation. • The Parks and Recreation Department needs grant writers, please spread the word. VII. STAFF LIAISON REPORT • ATONS—There are 35 ATONS bent or missing that need to be replaced. There are 3 poles that need to be straighten and 1 that's missing. The 2 at the end of the jetty will be trickier to replace. C:AUsers\NormaD2\AppData\Local\Temp\Minutes Watershore And Beach Advisory Committee-03_01_2018_3769846\Minutes Watershore And Beach Advisory Committee-03_01 2018.doc 3 • Spring Break—The traffic pattern will be one way onto the beach at Newport Pass, and Zahn Road will be one way out. There will be 2 way traffic on the beach and an emergency lane in the center. • The solar restrooms at the boat ramp and 3A suffered lots of damage. The one at Whitecap didn't but Darren made the decision to pull all of them from the beach. Darren will recommend that the restrooms will be put out in the morning and brought back to the beach yard in the evening. The damages to the restrooms is about $3,000. The Skid-O-Kans are still on the beach. • Darren spoke about spending his day with FEMA on the Packery Channel looking at the damage. There was only 1 person from the City there and she was from Finance so Darren stayed. Darren said that it sounded like FEMA wanted to fund the whole project. These FEMA people do the costing and the City should get 90% of the project cost back. Engineer had done a preliminary estimate and that cost was $6 to $8 million. Kudos to Deidre Williams! VIII. IDENTIFY ITEMS TO BE PLACED ON NEXT AGENDA 1. Beach Parking Permit— Recommendation 2. Update: North Beach Offshore Island 3. Update: Fire Regulations 4. Update: Six pack projects 5. Oso Foot Bridge 6. Update: ISAC 7. North Beach Items IX. ADJOURNMENT As there was no further business the meeting adjourned at 7:30 pm. Martha Lawhon, Management Assistant C:AUsers\NormaD2\AppData\Local\Temp\Minutes Watershore And Beach Advisory Committee-03_01_2018_3769846\Minutes Watershore And Beach Advisory Committee-03_01 2018.doc