CITY COUNCIL UPDATE: AUGUST 15 MEETING

By Marc Crail
Mount Dora City Council Member, District 4

I'm happy to give you this update on the August 15 Mount Dora City Council work session and regular meeting.   I am just one of seven city council members and not its spokesman.  I try to be unbiased in my reports, but what you're receiving is strictly from my perspective.
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There were 2 meetings this evening. The first meeting beginning at 4:00 p.m. was a "Work Session" discussing the proposed FY 2017-18 Capital Improvement Projects budget. This is another part of the ongoing budget development process which will culminate at the September 19th meeting. Let me back up for a moment....

There has been a lot of chatter over the past few days spawned by a recent newspaper article alleging that Mount Dora City Council is recklessly considering a 25% millage increase. Our current millage rate is 5.9970. Regular readers of this blurb might recall that in my report to you following the July 26 meeting I took great pains to explain that we had voted unanimously to TENTATIVELY set the FY 2017-18 millage rate at 7.0 in order to allow ourselves latitude as we continued to refine the budget over the next 2 months.

I said then that it was highly unlikely that the final rate would be that high but that it is very difficult to increase the millage rate after August 1. The tentative millage rate can easily be lowered right up to the final budget vote which is likely to be on September 19.  That is exactly what happened. I've asked for some additional information from our Finance Department which will help me to more accurately explain the likely outcome. I will send out a "Special Edition" just as soon as I have it!  Thanks for your patience.

After the budget work session ended we began our regular meeting at 6:00.  The Fire Department held a "Pinning Ceremony" as 3 fire fighters had their badges pinned on them by family members. The women and men who serve our community as members of our fire department are special people. It was thrilling to see their joy and pride. They have difficult and sometimes dangerous jobs and we appreciate everything that they do to keep us safe.

Two new preliminary plats were approved tonight for separate residential developments.  26 new lots were preliminarily approved on the east side of Bridgeport Bay Circle at Lakes of Mount Dora and 22 new lots will be coming on line at Summerview at Wolf Creek Ridge. Mount Dora continues to grow.

We also began the process of designing a new sewage lift station to serve the downtown area. It will be located near the corner of Alexander St. and 5th. Ave. That new lift station is needed because that part of town has just about outgrown the current lift station's capacity. We don't want to risk a spill of sewage anywhere especially near Lake Dora.

We've asked Lake County's permission to reduce the speed limit on 5th. Avenue from 30 mph to 25.

I have 2 quotes for you. The first is; "Don't believe everything you read in the newspapers." by Andrew Card. The other is from Mark Twain who quipped; "If you don't read the newspaper, you're uninformed. If you read the newspaper, you're mis-informed."

Thanks for caring about our wonderful city!
Marc Crail
District 4 City Council Rep.

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