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Summary Minutes:Regular City Commission Meeting February 20,2014 City of Sunny Isles Beach,Florida <br /> limited amount of time, she has been instructed to do this within a period of one year and this <br /> is a huge undertaking. As she speaks to people around the country who are engaged in these <br /> sorts of cultural arts foundations the information that is coming to her, including from our <br /> own local Knights Foundation, is it takes about three(3)to five (5)years for something like <br /> this to become successful. If the Commission does want to proceed with this it needs to be <br /> patient, and we are right on track in terms of the schedule that she is following to make this <br /> happen. She does not think Commissioner Levin is alone in the push and pull of public/ <br /> private ventures. She recently read an article in the Wall Street Journal about the Park <br /> Foundation that New York City has created, and it has raised a huge amount of money. The <br /> debate is whether the City's budget should be used for maintenance purposes after private <br /> money has been given to create these various parks. There is an enormous debate going on <br /> and a lot of push and pull about that. Also former Mayor Blumberg had created an art <br /> Foundation,and the new Mayor DeBlassio has appointed his wife to run that Foundation and <br /> it is definitely a crossover between the City and all of these private groups. What she is <br /> getting is that same push/pull that is happening everywhere around the country. Historically <br /> it has been the City that does all the cultural arts and parks but with taxpayer dollars <br /> shrinking across the nation and there is encouragement nationally for there to be more <br /> volunteerism and more private contributions,this is what has arisen. And as she reported in <br /> our first discussion in that Workshop,the National Civic League is starting to endorse private <br /> Foundations to assist and affiliate with cities to support activities. In fact, when she first <br /> inquired about it,we got an email from the Executive Director of the National Civic League <br /> commending the City for taking this kind of progressive approach for cultural arts. <br /> Mayor Edelcup said the concept was to create a Foundation that would supplement revenues <br /> to the City in order to provide additional cultural programs that maybe the City could not do <br /> on its own and this would be a mechanism that would aid the City and maybe reduce the <br /> City's internal budget for cultural programs. By having an independent organization this <br /> became a 501(c)(3)that would permit tax deductible donations by individuals,not for-profit <br /> people, or it would also open the door to additional grants that would be available to <br /> Foundations that are not necessarily available to the City. This was a project that we were <br /> trying to start and in the worse case if it failed, it was worth the effort to start it to see what <br /> could be determined and what could be raised. If nothing got raised then the City is right <br /> back to square one where it is currently today and it funds 100% of whatever it does every <br /> year. If the Foundation is successful, the City may no longer have to fund 100% of all the <br /> cultural events that takes place or the City and the Foundation can create more events then <br /> what is currently available. In addition, we are reaching out through the Foundation to <br /> people that are philanthropic in nature as well as other governments of other Foundations that <br /> give grants to Foundations such as this one that wouldn't otherwise be available to the City. <br /> It was really his thought that this agency or Foundation that we were going to create had to <br /> get its birth through the City but it truly would be an independent organization once it had <br /> been created. Ms. Dannheisser said but there is a transition. Mayor Edelcup said but you <br /> have to get from point A to point B and so what we did was hire Ms. Dannheisser to see the <br /> feasibility of putting together a structure such as this. There was never a commitment that <br /> the City would fund it in the future or that the City would ever make donations to the <br /> Foundation,and Commissioner Scholl said it was actually prohibited. Mayor Edelcup said it <br /> was creating a Foundation to look for outside funding run by an independent group because <br /> again you couldn't get the conflict of interest. If we have people on the Commission on the <br /> Foundation, you automatically create a conflict of interest. <br /> 21 <br />