Built from the City's minutes records — no AI-written textBriefing final
The City's record
What the City's record shows
Built only from the City's minutes (712_CC_Sp_Minutes_08_14_2020.pdf). Page numbers are the minutes' own. Discussion is in the minutes' text; it is not summarised here.
Attendance (the roll call)
Listed present when the roll was taken: Jake Williams Jr., Alex Goins (printed “James Goins”), Don Boisvert, Lorraine Koss, Brenda Warner
(Checked against the ballots and the printed roll lines.)
Absences: no absence line could be read from the minutes' text, so none is stated here; the first page of the minutes is the record.
Also listed as present (staff and other roles): Anthony A. Garganese (City Attorney), Matthew Fuhrer (Interim City Manager), Monica Arsenault (Assistant City Clerk), Michael Cantaloupe (Chief of Police), Jack Walsh (Utilities Director), Bryant Smith (Public Works Director), Tammy Gemmati (Administrative Services Director), Rebecca Bowman (Finance Director), Nancy Bunt (Community Services Director)
Named on at least one ballot later in the meeting: Alex Goins, Brenda Warner, Don Boisvert, Jake Williams Jr., Lorraine Koss (participation, which can differ from the roll: arrivals and departures are in the minutes' text)
Adopted actions (2)
to select Stockton Whitten as the new City Manager for the City of Cocoa and to authorize the City Attorney and Interim City Manager to move forward with a contract and to authorize a final background check (moved by Brenda Warner, seconded by Lorraine Koss); CARRIED 5-0; ayes: Jake Williams Jr., Alex Goins, Don Boisvert, Lorraine Koss, Brenda Warner; nays: none — the City's minutes, p. 3
to adjourn the Special meeting of August 14, 2020 (moved by Don Boisvert, seconded by Alex Goins); CARRIED 5-0; ayes: Jake Williams Jr., Alex Goins, Don Boisvert, Lorraine Koss, Brenda Warner; nays: none — the City's minutes, p. 3
Agenda (the City's wording)
The City's agenda for this meeting is on file (CC_Sp_Packet_08_14_2020), but its item list has not been read reliably by machine yet, so no outline is shown.
Transcript Partial transcript
Machine transcription of the meeting recording. The words are the recognizer's, except where a passage is marked as corrected or machine re-recognized; most have
not been checked against the audio, so words, numbers and names can be misheard.
It describes what was said. It cannot establish who voted how, an amount or an outcome — the City's
minutes do that (above).
A time links to its passage, and “Copy link” copies that link. “▶ Play” opens the recording at that moment, on YouTube, in a new tab.
70 suspect passage(s) marked in place; inspection incomplete: language review.
How this transcript was made. New machine transcription of the whole recording, with 11 voices separated from the audio.
5 short machine repair(s) (5 word(s)) are labelled in place, with the original words beside them: an ordinary word was replaced only where two further machine readings agreed on a different one.
Checks run on this transcript: the recognizer's own warning signs and whether a voice was detected where the words are. Not completed: language review.
A second, independent machine reading was compared with it word by word: the same words for 93.1% of 3,047 content words.
Dotted words (91 places) are ordinary wording differences: hover or tap to see the other reading.
70 passages (19% of the words) are marked suspect: their words are not shown ("unclear audio") and support no statement: numbers, amounts, negation or names differ; the language review questioned them; or no voice was detected there.
Agreement between two machine readings is not verification.
Inspection is incomplete: language review.
Speakers were separated by voice. A plain name rests on evidence tied to that voice; “provisional” is a name from an earlier text-only pass and is not verified; “Speaker N” is an unidentified voice.
Flag: words were replaced by a machine repair · 00:00:02–00:00:02 · machine repair: words replaced where two further machine readings agreed (not checked by a person)
Father God, thank you for being with us today. Thank you for just being with us for the last few days as we make this vital decision for our city. Be with us today as we have conversation about our next city manager. May we make the best decision for our citizens of the city of Cocoa. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
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Honorable Mayor, Council Members, it's a pleasure to be with you today. You've had an interesting two days, and now it is time to vote. This evening, we will take the same process as we did on previous votes. You will have a ballot with your three candidates. I will ask you to rank them your number
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Thank you. ‸ We have a... Yes, sir. Oh, okay. We have a card here. Mr. Oliver, that wanted to speak. I'm a reference to our city manager, if you want to at this time. Just state your name and address. Or just your name. We have your address.
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over a decade through different projects. ‸ His experience at the county, he... I can say with ‸ all sincerity that we didn't always agree and probably more often than not we disagreed. But I left every meeting with him with the utmost respect for how he handled himself and
on the other side of the table and his staff. I think he would be a true asset for the city as you guys navigate ‸ our way forward together through the next period of time. Also,
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not able to be heard well. I want to thank Donna. It's been a great two days. Interesting process. You brought us some great candidates. Toughest decision I've ever had to make. And this is not my first time picking a city manager. But it's definitely much tougher than it was the last time.
the best choice for the city of Coco. Any city would be blessed to have in any of those three candidates. ‸ I think the way we did things, especially today with ‸ an hour and a half and an opportunity ‸ to interact with them, not just ask questions like we did in the video conferences, but ‸ to be able to do some back and forth, really gave me ‸ a better perspective about their personalities and allowed me to see them and not just their ‸ responses to and questions. ‸ So
just wanted to say thank you to Donna while she was still standing up here and say that no matter where we end up tonight, we're going to be okay. Thank you.
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just, the room is not a bad candidate here. And I really, you know, I did an analysis. It's like all positives for all three candidates in different areas. So it's even hard to compare them one to the other.
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the decision is going to be subject to have employment contract come back to the city council. At that point, you ‸ will have to vote again ‸ on a written contract. So at the very least, there is that opportunity to ‸ make the vote. And depending on the results, you know, if you wanted to take another ‸ vote after you vote to make this election, I guess ‸ you could do that.
Okay. Well, I just wanted to ‸ say a few things about the qualifications. Since we had the opportunity to take a deep dive today, and folks in the audience and at home did not, you know, ‸ haven't been privy to it yet. But I mean, when I started to jot things down, starting with Dr. Moffitt, I mean, that guy is data and science. And, you know, myself as an environmentalist, and ‸ having that background, that appealed. And his emphasis on process. And I just was very confident that there wasn't a plan he couldn't put into place and set up metrics to make sure it happened. And I also had a sense that he was a unifier. And that, you know, he... That different parts of our community could really embrace him. So he had all those things going for him.
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You want to get something done. I felt like, you know, he was on top of that. You know, just in the time we spent with him, he taught me things about finance. Site development. I think he'd be great with the developers. You know, emphasis on job creation. His emergency... You know, emergency experience. The
a real leadership position within the county. And she seemed fearless. So, like I say, I don't have any negatives on these guys. This is a tough decision. It is. Now, the good news is that they're all highly qualified and any one of them will do a great job. And the bad news is this is the most agonizing decision. ‸ So, that's...
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thank you, Donna, for the hard work that you put in to get us to this point where we are now and bring three terrific candidates to us. And then, like Lorraine said, ‸ they're all qualified. They're all super people.
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We got a lot of good answers. And I'm very proud to say that we're going to be in the process of doing this. And thank you again for all the things you've done
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One thing I can say is that no one can say that this process was not transparent. This was, it was difficult at times, but it was very transparent so that the citizens can be engaged in the process. Like I said earlier today, there are some cities that make this decision without even having citizen input at all. So the fact that we took the time to do this so strategically, I believe it's a plus. I've gotten a lot of texts, a lot of emails, a lot of calls up to midnight last night about this situation, which is a good thing. because I ‸ think that it shows that
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for, we didn't always agree through this process. But I think that's why we have five different people, five different mindsets, five different opinions. So, whatever we come up with, we just have to live with it. And so, I need my sheet ‸ ready. I'm ready to vote. So, thank you. Thank you,
because it was ‸ a learning ‸ experience for me ‸ and there were some super, super good candidates here. These three finalists here, man, ‸ they're all, they all stood out. But, you know, I'm looking at the big picture. I'm looking at the future of our city. I'm looking at, and we all are, and I'm looking at what we've been, where we're trying to go. And I'm basing it on some input that I got from some residents as well as their experience of the candidates. And I know early on there were some folks that was concerned about some candidates not having their ICMA certification, which, had they looked at the paperwork, you know, we were asking that they have that, but if they didn't, it wasn't a,
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you ‸ know. So, but I haven't heard that here recently. And, so, but anyway, with that being said, three super good candidates. I think they're always great, but ‸ I'm ready. I'm ready to make my decision so we can move forward and move our city forward and, and, and get to business. Councilwoman Warner.
mean, they could see what we were doing here and in the meetings and stuff, but, I had a couple people ask me what my thought processes were and how I handled this. So, I just wanted to say that when we first got the list from Donna and she had provided us with not just the resumes and, and the information that she had gained from talking to them, but any, you know, internet searches or any information that she had found about them.
but I also chose to make some phone calls and have some conversations, not with the candidates themselves, because I wanted to see the same thing that everybody else up here saw at the same time, but I did call the communities that they worked in and talk to people in those communities. I called elected officials, I called their staff members, and I actually employed some of our business people to call some of the business people in their communities and talk to them. So, I just wanted the public to understand that that was, that was my behind the scenes process that I was using.
And that was extremely helpful to me. The very first person I called about one candidate had no idea that they were searching for another job and literally cried. So, that was, that was tough to be the first person to tell somebody that their boss was looking for another job, But
out there because I realized during that process when you do decide to look outside your community for a job and you have a job, that you're putting yourself in a position where your community may not want you to come back after you go for another job interview.
and took that risk because they wanted to come to work for us. And I hope that whoever we do not choose still has a job to go to on Monday morning. And if they don't, I'll be happy to call again to their communities and talk to them. But that, to me, when I realized, ‸ wow, these people are taking a risk of losing their current position to come and interview with us.
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It's always a possibility when you use math that there's a tie, but obviously it's majority vote of the city council. So you all need to decide who you want to select. You can do another ‸ ballot.
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you can just discuss the two top ‸ two and decide ‸ which of the two gets first attempt at negotiating a contract and ‸ making it through the final background check.
have to select one of the candidates, right, subject to final contract being negotiated and completion of the final background check. So like I said earlier, you will have one other opportunity to vote, but you'll be voting on the terms and conditions of a contract at a subsequent meeting. But you need to give, you need to select one and give direction to proceed to the contract negotiation phase. Well, let's take a vote
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Thank you for, again, allowing me into the process. Thank you for the honor of serving the city. And so I appreciate, again, all that you all have done to make the process a fair and open process, and hope to serve you and the citizens of Cocoa well.
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