Description: In this passage, you are going to see the big events that are taking place in the collier county including the board of county commissioners meeting, the festivals, veteran’s services.
At the recent Board of County Commissioners meeting, interim emergency medical services chief Walter Kopka gave the Commissioner report on advanced life support or ALS engines. Kopka told the board about levels of service throughout the county and updated the board on some recent changes in service providers.
Marco lion was provided the ability to have the entire protocol and procedures that EMS transport medics have had for many years also the city in North Naples was given an opportunity as well, so that is a change. Historically, the ALS engines had the ability to provide a certain level of medications and procedures. Now they’ve got the ability to provide the entire procedures and protocols.
Kopka also gave us a preview of the upcoming board of county commissioners EMS fire service workshop. A forum to discuss emergency services throughout the county including the fire districts, North Naples as well as the cities in the County Commission, basically a workshop to look at the entire process and see what options are available for services. The board’s EMS fire service workshop will be held Thursday April 26th at 9 a.m. at the growth management divisions offices located at 2800 north horseshoe drive.
Commissioner Tom Henning sponsored a move to name the growth management divisions, transportation building, the Norman Feder transportation building in honor of retiring growth management division administrator Norman Feder recognizing Feder’s 12 years of dedicated service to the county.
Commissioner Henning commented that feeder greatly contributed to an enhanced transportation system in Collier County and spearheaded an aggressive expansion of the county’s road network that added or rebuilt 437 Lane miles in an era of unprecedented growth in Collier County, Feder guided the transportation division to meet the challenges of that growth. 1023 Collier County residents signed the application and supported of naming the building for Feder.
We have got an outstanding staff that’ll keep things going, the real critical component is that we not replicate the past. When I came here in 2000, we had basically disproved the theory that if you don’t build it, they won’t come, we didn’t build it and they all came.
So we built our way out of that, but now we’re in very tight financial times and we’re starting to pull away from it. The danger is that you also have to maintain everything you built and the growth is going to come again. So I hope they find the finances to be able to accomplish it. The Norman feder transportation building is located at 28 85 south horseshoe drive in Naples. Mr. Feder retired from County Service effective March 30th 2012.
As a matter of procedure,the board confirmed the appointment of two division administrators Nick Castling Guida and George Ilmaze. Nick was confirmed as the growth management division administrator replacing Norman feeder who retired marks 30th, the growth management division comprises 8 operating sections with an annual operating budget of 75 point three million dollars and a workforce of 338 full-time equivalent employees.
George Ilmaze was confirmed as the public utilities division administrator, the public utilities division comprises seven operating sections with an annual operating budget of 178.8 million dollars at a workforce of 394 and a half full time equivalent employees. Both appointments were confirmed unanimously.
The Bayshore gateway triangle community redevelopment agencies executive director David Jackson brought forth a recommendation that his contract be terminated. The Board of County Commissioners acting as the Community Redevelopment Agency board reviewed and discussed the CRA advisory boards recommendation.
Jackson told the board that the termination of his contract would preserve enough money to maintain two other staff positions for the 2013 budget year. Jackson’s contract calls for 20 weeks of severance pay for an early termination. The board voted unanimously to take a closer look at the contract and to bring the issue of contract termination back during the first meeting in May.
While acting as the Community Redevelopment Agency board, the board of county commissioners approved the purchase of two adjoining vacant lots on the corner of South first Street and Main Street in downtown immokalee. The land will be used for construction of the first Street Plaza which is envisioned as the Gateway to the city.
Currently our downtown is strictly an old-timey downtown except that we don’t have a town center, we don’t have plazas that are very typical in South America and Central American countries.
So this gives us a chance to have a beautiful entryway into our town and have a town center where you could go out and sit and play your guitar, your kids could run around playing and there will be a fountain, it’ll be our trademarks. The board limited the cost of the land acquisition to a maximum of $2,405,144.20. after the land purchase is complete the artists renderings will be turned into design plans.
The world while acting in his capacity as the Collier County Airport Authority voted on several Airport related items, approval was given for a site license agreement with the seminole casino for a hot air balloon event to be held at the Immokalee Regional Airport on April 14th and 15th, the inaugural blooms over a paradise festival will give people a chance to enjoy the outdoors and look on as more than 30 custom hot air balloons take flight. Attendees will enjoy tethered balloon rides, food, live music and much more.
Approval was also given to an amendment to a long-term ground lease with turbo services at the Immokalee airport. Executive director Chris Curry explains why the measure was necessary. Turbo services is the jet turbine testing facility that into a lease agreement at the Immokalee airport more than a year ago.
A condition of their lease was that they construct or start to commence construction within a year and because of the permitting process and the coordination with fire and other issues, they have not been able to construct their facility within the year. So in order to avoid them being in non-compliance with that requirement, we’re extending them six months to allow them construction which should start within the next month.
The board also approved the submittals of 2 grant applications to the Federal Aviation Administration, one for $725,000 for unlocking the airport and one for $800,000 for the Marco Airport. The grants are for the design of the restoration of runway 927 at the Immokalee Regional Airport and runway 17-35 at the Marco Island Executive Airport. Both runways are in need of a facelift.
We completed the taxiway project at the airport, however the pavement associated with the runway has deteriorated. The last time that any major work has been done to the pavement was in 1976, therefore we have requested through the FAA funding to design the rehabilitation of the runway this year and then do the actual construction next year. Curry explained that the FAA typically picks up 95% of the cost for projects like these, with the State Department of train exportation of the county splitting the remaining 5%.
On Friday March 30th, there was a ribbon cutting for the brand-new Isles of Capri paddlecraft park. When you look back at the original plans for this site, there were plans to put a high rise and a 50 wet slit marina on site.
And back during the mid-1990s when the state of Florida was actively purchasing environmentally sensitive lands and working here around Rookery Bay, we worked with a local community and with the landowners to set this side to side and long-term preservation.
So the the first step was to acquire the land using taxpayer dollars and that was a huge step forward. We were really concerned about the environmental sensitivity of this site, we’ve got sea grasses, magra forested, wetlands into gorgeous place to see coastal birds, go fishing and all sorts of things. So it’s a it’s a fantastic natural resource that we wanted to protect.
So we got that work done, the next step was that we got some funding from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to do some restoration work which took about 18 months but we were able to restore title flushing and integra forested areas that have been impacted by some previous work before the state purchased the property. That work is now finished and so we have a functional wetland and we are thrilled about that.
The last stage was getting the funding from the state of Florida to build the county’s first pak-rat park and this is an exclusive launch site for the use of kayaks, canoes and paddleboards as an outstanding natural resource.
Collier county parks will be involved in patrolling the park, make sure that everything is managed correctly. We have Rangers that will come through the park on a routine basis as well as maintenance crews that will keep the park up, keep the restrooms and make sure everything is as kept up as nice it is.
The operation will be dawn to dusk, so we allow little time for characters to get off the water at dusk if need be. And as people enter the park, the gates will close at dawn to dusk and it’ll keep people from coming in after those hours.
The Veterans Services Department, a part of the public services division, provides a myriad of services to those in Collier County, who serve their country. Collier County veteran’s services located small office, good things come in small packages.
Jerome, a marine who fought for his country in Vietnam is suffering from the effects of Agent Orange, he and his wife Cynthia needed help acquiring the essential benefits they were entitled to receive.
They moved from Michigan to the veteran service and they got a primary care doctor, Rick Torres as needed and they said that people around are so helpful and polite. Rick Torres also helped Cynthia receive dependents educational assistance, so she could take a beginners computer course.
Torres says that their goal at Collier County veteran service is to make sure that they are able to screen our clients and assist them in getting the maximum benefits for which they may be entitled to from the VA for their military service and also for their spouses for any benefits at the spouse where the children of a veteran may be entitled to.
The people who work in the service feel proud, a staff says that it is satisfying when he goes home at the end of the day because he knows he helped someone. The program can’t work except for those volunteer drivers, a drivers explains that he does that because he feels accomplishment helping those people.