By Marc Crail
District 4 City Council Representative

City Council had a full agenda so I've selected several of the items to share that I think you might like to hear about. Please keep in mind that I reporting from my own perspective only, not in any official capacity.

Throughout the pandemic we have tried to be flexible as we do our best to navigate the ever changing situations that we find ourselves and our city in. The Mount Dora Arts Festival is certainly one of the longest running and most loved events that we have in town. The Arts Festival is the single most important fundraising source for the Mount Dora Center for the Arts and it regularly brings over 100,000 visitors to town. Once people come to town for the Arts Festival they tend to come back later to shop, dine, stay and play here. The 2021 Arts Festival is scheduled for February 6-7. It will be smaller this year because some exhibitors and shoppers are reluctant to participate because of COVID-19. The City has agreed to forgo collecting event fees this year. With fewer booths it will be a bit easier to spread them out (10' apart) which will help with social distancing. Masks will be required. Food will be consumed only in a food court area. With these changes this event that is essential to the Arts Center and to our local economy will look different but we hope it can happen safely.

We approved a Resolution to add a couple of new businesses to the retail plaza near Target. A Panda Express drive through will be built there and another retail space will also be built.

You may recall that I've previously mentioned that the City is going to build two solar array fields in order to generate a total of about 6 Megawatts of electricity. Those solar arrays will be located on City owned land near Wastewater Treatment Plant II near the intersection of US Rt. 441 and SR 46 as well as near SR 19-A. Of course we will spend money to build them but we anticipate over $700,000 in cost savings over the 30 year lifespan of the solar farms. Good news I think.

We approved a Resolution to hire a company called CPH to create a citywide Transportation Master Plan. As new residential, commercial and retail developments are built it is critically important that we have traffic rules and regulations in place so that our City infrastructure is designed and constructed to handle the increased traffic. We want to have "smart growth" in Mount Dora and in order to do that our old 2007 master plan needs to be updated. It will take about a year and will cost us $200,000. I've been a big proponent of this project so I''m pleased that it is happening.

Every once in a while a Developer approaches the City with an unsolicited proposal for a Public Private Partnership called a P3. We're always interested in partnering if the proposal is beneficial to both Mount Dora and for the Developer.

There are costs involved for the City to reviewing P3 proposals. We are working on setting up some rules that will cover our costs while encouraging Developers to give us their best ideas. We're looking for win-win opportunities so we have begun to work on the parameters of P3s.

Remember that we will be voting on two Charter Amendments this year. City Council supports both of them. If you'd like more information before you vote visit: mountdoracharter2020.com

I've got a quote for you that I found on TheHealingMoon.com.

"The first to apologize is the bravest.
The first to forgive is the strongest.
The first to forget is the happiest."

Please stay safe and stay well.
Marc Crail
District 4 City Council Rep.

​For more news and events in Mount Dora, Tavares & Eustis, click here.  ​​​​ For local things to do, click here and for the area's free mobile app, click here. ​

By Marc Crail,
Mount Dora City Council, District 4 Representative 

On Thursday, September 29th City Council held a "Work Session" to discuss several outstanding items. A Work Session is a public meeting but it is for discussion only and not actions are taken.

Our discussions today involved several interrelated topics including planned renovations to Cully Lott Park and the Lincoln Park Swimming Pool, a proposal to build additional pickelball courts, a possible community center that could include 2 indoor basketball courts along with rooms, etc. and an update on the CARES Act. Most of these discussions were preliminary but there were some worthwhile ideas.

At this point I'll just comment on the CARES Act. CARES Act funds are federal dollars divvied up among the states to help County and City governments pay for expenses that they have incurred dealing with the COVID-19 Pandemic.Mount Dora's share of the money allotted to Lake County is about $770,000. That figure might go up if other cities don't utilize some or all of their share of the available money. Our City staff has worked very hard to document all of the various COVID related costs we have incurred and we hope that the Lake County Commission will approve our request. That would be a big boost for us but the trick is that all this money must be spent (not just encumbered) by December 1. That doesn't give us much time to work with but even if we can only manage to utilize part of the available dollars it will help our City's bottom line.

The following was not on our agenda but I've heard recently from numerous friends, neighbors and constituents who have recently received their vote by mail ballots. If you're planning to vote in person you may have similar questions about 2 Mount Dora City Charter Amendments that are up for a vote this election. What do these Charter Amendments mean?

The first one would be a switch from 2 year terms for City Council members and our Mayor to 4 year terms. This would save the City the expense of holding elections every year which can be quite expensive.

The second Charter Amendment would limit any Council Member or the Mayor to serving no more than 8 consecutive years in the same office. It's the local version of setting "term limits".

I've described the amendments in very simple terms. If you'd like more complete information, you can visit the City's website to find more details. I should add that the entire City Council endorsed both of these amendments meaning that we all support their passage. There are no tricks in the ballot language; vote YES if you agree with the change or vote NO if you don't support these changes.

As usual, the information in this report comes only from me. I'm not reporting in any official capacity for City Council as a whole.

I found a wonderful quote for you from Dr. Martin Luther King. "The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy."

Thanks for your continued participation in the progress of our city.

By Marc Crail,
Mount Dora City Council, District 4 Representative 

​​For more news and events in Mount Dora, Tavares & Eustis, click here.  ​​​​ For local things to do, click here and for the area's free mobile app, click here. ​

By Marc Crail,
Mount Dora City Council, District 4 Representative 

​This month both of our regular City Council meetings are on Thursdays rather than our usual Tuesday meetings. The reason for this change is to comply with state deadlines with our budget process.

As usual I have selected several agenda and discussion items from our nearly 5 hour series of meetings to highlight for you. Please keep in mind that I'm reporting to you from my own personal perspective not as an official representative of Mount Dora City Council as a whole.

After nearly 25 hours of public discussion and deliberation over the past several months we have closed in on the millage rate needed to fund our 2020-2021 city budget and I've got some good news to report to you. In my last report a couple of weeks ago I said that I thought that we would ultimately be able to reduce the needed millage rate from the 6.2 mills that appeared on the TRIM Notice we all received in the mail last month to 5.977. When you're building a budget, you keep tweaking the numbers based on new and better information that you get along the way. How much money will we get from the State or County, etc.? How can we maintain a safe level of reserves? When will our tourist driven economy begin to recover?

We have now determined that we can balance our budget at the even lower "Roll-Back" rate of 5.9603 mills. We have now tentatively set the 2020-2021 millage rate at that Roll-Back rate and baring some unlikely financial problem we will finalize that 5.9603 mills rate in two weeks on Thursday 9/24 at 5:30 p.m. That means that the Mount Dora portion of your tax bill for next year will not increase in most cases. These are all public meetings and if you want to see how the sausage is made or make comments or ask questions you are welcome to attend. That meeting will be in the large Mount Dora Community Building where social distancing is possible. Masks are required.

We passed a number of Resolutions. Several of these resolutions included sizable grants from state, county or federal sources. That grant money allows us to do more needed projects with fewer local tax dollars. Here are a couple of examples. The first is a grant from the Lake County Water Authority that will pay 50% of the anticipated $133,000 cost of designing and installing a "Baffle Box" pollution capturing device at Lake Gertrude.

Along the same lines, we accepted $1,500,000 from a County Economic Development grant to help pay for a master lift station. The rest of that project's costs will ultimately be reimbursed by developer funded Impact Fees.

The Fire Assessment fee that we each pay on our homes will remain steady at $219 for next year. Commercial properties pay into that also but the amount they pay depends on the square footage of their business. Obviously a large business like Walmart or Publix pays more than a small mom and pop store. We will be investigating possibilities for somehow decreasing that Fire Assessment fee over the next several months but any decrease wouldn't take place until next year.

Our city's "Charter" is very much like our country's Constitution. You might recall that last year we voted to approve several "Charter Amendments". At least once every five years a Charter Review Committee made up of seven citizen volunteers carefully reviews our Charter and recommends changes that they believe will improve the operation of Mount Dora. As I recall there were five or six Charter Amendments on last year's ballot and all of them were approved by the voters. Since last year's amendments won approval two additional Charter Amendments will be on the ballot for your consideration this year. You will be receiving more complete information about them in the next few weeks. If approved they would change the terms of our mayor and city council members from two years to four years and would limit any mayor or city council member to serving no more than eight years in the same position. FYI, all of our current City Council members fully support passage of these Charter Amendments.

Since we've been talking a lot about taxes lately I've got a quote for you from Oliver Wendell Holmes who once said; "I hate paying taxes but I love the civilization they give me".

Thanks for your interest in our city and thanks too for allowing me to serve as your District 4 City Council Representative.

By Marc Crail,
Mount Dora City Council, District 4 Representative 

​For more news and events in Mount Dora, Tavares & Eustis, click here.  ​​​​ For local things to do, click here and for the area's free mobile app, click here. ​

For more news and events in Mount Dora, Tavares & Eustis, click here.  ​​​​ For local things to do, click here and for the area's free mobile app, click here. ​

By Dr. Marc Crail
District 4 City Council Rep.
​
Your Mount Dora City Council and City Staff met August 25th from 9:00-2:30 to continue formulating our budget for the 2020-2021 budget year that begins on October 1. Rather than to get into specifics at this point I'd like to give you some general information. The final millage rate will be set by Council on September 24th. Regular readers already know this but I want to remind you that I'm not reporting to you on behalf of Mount Dora City Council. I am one of seven members and what follows comes strictly from my own perspective.

Within the past week or so you and I received our TRIM Notice from the Lake County Taxing Authority. That TRIM Notice DOES NOT reflect what your actual tax bill will be when you get it in the fall.  Every taxing agency in Lake County is required to provide you with the highest possible millage rate that they might possibly decide to levy on taxpayers. I can't speak for the County Commission, The Lake County Water Authority, The North Lake Hospital Board, The Lake County Schools or the Lake County EMS but in Mount Dora, we would rather estimate a higher potential millage rate and then just before the deadline when we have as much information as we can gather, we reduce the millage rate to something lower. For example, on your TRIM you will see that we chose 6.2000 mills but I think that it will be lowered to 5.9770 mills. That appears to be the number that we can balance our budget with.

Every homeowner has some different circumstances from his/her next door neighbor. Here are a couple of examples. These examples assume that you own your own home and that it is your primary residence. That means you qualify for a "Homestead" exemption. Most of us fall into that category. In each of these examples your Mount Dora taxes would be virtually flat if we do settle on 5.9970 mills.

EXAMPLE #1:
A home with a 2020 market value of $182,607 would pay $3.23 more Ad Valorem taxes to the City of Mount Dora next year than was due last year. That's about 30 cents a month more.

EXAMPLE #2:
This house with has a higher assessed valuation, $260,000. It has a market value of over $500,000. This homeowner would only pay about 22 cents more next year in Mount Dora Ad Valorem tax than this year. That's about 2 cents per month more than this year.

You might pay more or less than our two example houses.  If you've owned your home for 25 years you will likely pay less. If you just moved in last week I think you will likely more. Please keep in mind that Mount Dora isn't the only taxing entity. School taxes are about 38% of your taxes, Lake County accounts for about 24% of your tax bill, Mount Dora gets about 28% and other taxes Like Saint Johns River Management District and the North Lake Hospital District, etc. account for the remaining 9% or so.

Here are some other related items:

We have heard from the State of Florida that they anticipate that Mount Dora will be receiving about $382,000 less from them this year. That represents about a 16% loss in state funds. We can all understand that the virus has resulted in big losses in state sales taxes, etc.

• Mount Dora Electric customers will not see an increase.
• Mount Dora Sanitation rates will increase by 2.5%.
• Mount Dora Water/Waste Water rates will increase by 3.6%.
• Mount Dora Storm Water rates will increase by 50 cents per month.

We'll keep working on the budget as we get more data right up until our deadline. I have been very impressed with the hard work of our City staff and my council colleagues.

My quote for you today comes from Thumper, of the Disney movie Bambi who said; "My momma always said...If ya can't say nuffin nice, ya shouldn't say nuffin at all."  I think that rabbit had a very smart momma, don't you?

By Dr. Marc Crail
District 4 City Council Rep.

For more news and events in Mount Dora, Tavares & Eustis, click here.  ​​​​ For local things to do, click here and for the area's free mobile app, click here.