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BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS
County of Monroe Mayor Holly Merrill Raschein,District 5
Mayor Pro Tem James K.Scholl,District 3
The Florida Keys Craig Cates,District 1
., Jl Michelle Lincoln,District 2
Robert B.Shillinger,County Attorney** David Rice,District 4
Pedro J.Mercado,Sr.Assistant County Attorney**
Cynthia L.Hall,Sr.Assistant County Attorney**
Derek V.Howard,Sr.Assistant County Attorney** Office of the County Attorney
Christine Limbert-Barrows,Assistant County Attorney** I I11 12'Street,Suite 408
Peter H.Morris,Assistant County Attorney ** Key West,FL 33040
Patricia Fables,Assistant County Attorney (305)292-3470 Office
Joseph X.DiNovo,Assistant County Attorney** (305)292-3516 Fax
Kelly Dugan,Assistant County Attorney
Christina Cory,Assistant County Attorney
Nathalia Archer,Assistant County Attorney
**Board Certified in City,County&Local Govt.Law
January 17, 2024
Kevin Madok, CPA
Clerk of the Court, 16'Judicial Circuit
Monroe County Courthouse
500 Whitehead Street
Key West, FL 33040
In Re: Hardee v. Monroe County, Case No.: 05-CA-255-P
Dear Mr.Madok:
Please find attached a scan of the transcript of the attorney-client closed session held before the Monroe County
Board of County Commissioners on April 19, 2006, in connection with the above-referenced litigation. The
litigation has concluded; under Fla.Stat. 286.011(8), the transcript may be made part of the public record once
litigation has ended.
Thank you for your assistance in this matter. Please contact me if you have any questions.
Sincerely
Digitally pthi.L.HC 11,, i L Hall
DN:m=Cynthia L Hall,o=Monroe
County BOCC,ou,email=ha11-
Cynthia@mo unty-fl.gov,
Cynthia L. °ial l Dab,:MAV.1615:54:37-0Yff
Senior Assistant Monroe County Attorney
Attachment: Scan of Closed Session Transcript dated 04-19-2006
1 MEETING OF THE
2 MONROE COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS .
3 ATTORNEY—CLIENT CLOSED SESSION
4 RE: EVELYN KIMBERLY HARDEE v. MONROE COUNTY
5 HELD AT THE
6 COMMISSION CHAMBERS
7 1200 TRUMAN AVENUE
8 KEY WEST, FLORIDA 33040
9 APRIL 19, 2006
10 8 : 30 — 8 : 45 AM
11 COMMISSIONERS PRESENT:
12 MAYOR CHARLES "SONNY" McCOY
13 COMMISSIONER DAVID RICE
14 COMMISSIONER GEORGE NEUGENT
15 COMMISSIONER DIXIE SPEHAR
16
17 ALSO PRESENT:
18 SUZANNE HUTTON, ESQ. , COUNTY ATTORNEY
19 ROBERT B. SHILLINGER, ESQ. , ASSISTANT COUNTY ATTORNEY
20 THOMAS J. WILLI, COUNTY ADMINISTRATOR
21
22
23
- 24
25
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1 MAYOR McCOY: Everybody ready for the closed
f 2 session. A closed attorney client session pursuant
3 to Section 286. 011, Florida Statutes will now be held.
4 It is estimated that this meeting will take approximately
5 thirty minutes . The persons attending the meeting will
6 be county Commissioners, the County Administrator,
7 Tom Willi, County Attorney Suzanne Hutton, Assistant
8 County Attorney, Bob Shillinger. Attorney Bruce
9 Johnson, Esquire and Scott Alexander, Esquire who
10 are acting as special litigation counsel for the County
11 in the case that is the subject of this closed session.
12 Since the law prohibits any other person from
13 being present at the closed session, the commissioners,
14 the County Administrator, the attorneys for the
15 County and the court reporter will now remain in this
16 meeting room. All other persons are required to leave
17 the room. When the closed session is over, we will
18 re-convene and re-open the public meeting. This public
19 meeting is now closed.
20 MS. HUTTON: We ' re closing the public meeting.
21 You are either going to have to adjourn to another room
22 or we need to get you guys to leave for just about ten
23 minutes . Thank you.
24 MAYOR McCOY: I now call this closed
25 session to order. For the record, this meeting is
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1 being held upon the request of County Attorney Suzanne
2 Hutton, who announced at a prior public meeting held
3 on March 21, 2006 that she needed advice concerning
4 the pending lawsuit, Evelyn Kimberly Hardee versus
5 Monroe County. At that meeting, the Board approved
6 holding today' s closed session and public notice was
7 given by publication in the Key West Citizen on 3-26-06,
8 the Keynoter on 3-25-06 and the Reporter on 3-24-06 .
9 A copy of that notice is being given to the court
10 reporter for inclusion.
11 After all have been identified we are going
12 to then proceed. My name is Charles McCoy.
13 COMMISSIONER SPEHAR: Commissioner Dixie
14 Spehar.
15 COMMISSIONER RICE : Commissioner David Rice .
16 COMMISSIONER NEUGENT : Commissioner George
17 Neugent.
18 MS . HUTTON: County Attorney, Suzanne Hutton.
19 MR. WILLI : County Administrator, Tom Willi .
20 MR. SHILLINGER: Assistant County Attorney,
21 Bob Shillinger.
22 MS . HUTTON: And for the record, attorneys
23 Bruce Johnson and Scott Alexander are not attending .
24 We figured that it would save a certain amount of
25 costs in having them travel down here and it ' s
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1 a matter, I think, that Mr. Shillinger is more then
?' 2 ready to address to you.
3 MAYOR McCOY: We have a court reporter to record
4 the fact that the attorneys Alexander and Johnson are
5 not attending and are not expected to be in attendance.
6 MR. SHILLINGER: Thank you. Yes, Mr. Johnson and
7 I spoke last week and we talked enough about the case
8 that I am familiar enough that I can present the
9 questions we need to for consideration and it would save
10 the county about $1, 500 to $2, 000 in costs and fees to
11 fly them down for what we think is going to be a five
12 or ten minute closed session. We thought it was
13 expedient in the interest of fiscal expense to not
14 bring them down.
15 Let me give you a little background on the case.
16 Evelyn Hardee was working for the Department of Children
17 and Family Services in the Upper Keys . She was walking
18 in the courthouse up in Plantation Key. She slipped and
19 fell coming down the stairway that connects the first
20 floor to the second floor.
21 If you ' re familiar with that courthouse, you will
22 know that those stairways -- you go inside the building
23 and then you exit out of the building and go up in an
24 exposed stairway and you re-enter the building upstairs
25 so it ' s open to the elements .
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1 The stairs were -- she claims they were slippery.
2 Other courthouse employees have indicated that they have
3 never had a problem with the stairway so it ' s basically a
4 slip and fall case .
5 Her damages are pretty high. She has got some
6 really significant injuries regardless of who is at
7 fault. Whether she was at fault or whether we bear
8 some liability because it ' s our property.
9 The only question in this case is going to be --
10 the main question in this case is going to be liability,
11 who is at fault .
12 We have an internal document from our own safety
13 person who indicates that this is a situation that needs
14 to be corrected. Now does that mean we are at fault,
15 not necessarily. I mean you can take remedial measures
16 without admitting liability.
17 Our own building official has indicated that the
18 stairway itself, if it were built today, would not pass
19 today' s codes . We ' re still researching whether it would
20 be -- it would pass the codes when the building was C O' d
21 back in 1980 or 181 . Obviously we think it was because
22 the building received a C 0.
23 So, again the only question we are coming down
24 to is liability.
25 MS . HUTTON: You might not want to go any further
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1 for a few seconds .
2 MR. SHILLINGER: Okay.
3 (Brief pause) .
4 MR. SHILLINGER: Okay. Thank you.
5 MAYOR McCOY: Are we talking about rise
6 to the tread ratio.
7 MR. SHILLINGER: We ' re talking about the lack
8 of handrails on both sides of the stairwells and then
9 there is an issue with the rise up to the tread.
10 MAYOR McCOY: Okay. The rise of tread
11 hasn' t been altered.
12 MR. SHILLINGER: No.
13 MAYOR McCOY: But the handrail is a
a.; 14 requirement .
15 MR. SHILLINGER: Right. So we ' re at this point
16 in the lawsuit where we are starting to take some
17 depositions and incur some costs . Her firm, the
18 Plaintiff made an offer to settle, an offer of judgement
19 of $35, 000 .
20 Our excess insurance carrier Florida League of
21 Cities and their consultants have recommended that the
22 board seriously consider this so we ' re holding a closed
23 session to see if you are going to seriously consider
24 this offer to settle for $35, 000 .
25 It would be our recommendation that you not
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1 take any formal action. That way we can go back to the
2 Plaintiffs and say the board hasn' t authorized us any
3 settlement and the only authority we have is up to the
4 County administrator ' s authority to settle for $25, 000
5 and use that as a counter offer because if they are
6 at 35 surely they are going to come down a little bit .
7 We might get them for 25 or they may counter proposal
8 and come some where in the middle . So it ' s a very
9 simple case in terms of -- it ' s not a complex land use
10 case . It ' s a slip and fall case . We are going to have
11 to have Doctors and experts and those types of people
12 if we were going to go to trial on something like that
13 and it would probably cost us $35, 000 to go to trial
14 once all is said and done .
15 So that is why we are having a session today.
16 We have an offer to settle . It is the recommendation
17 of Mr. Johnson and the County Attorney' s office that
18 you take no action; that we go back to them and say
19 you considered it, you didn ' t take any action. You
20 didn' t make a counter proposal, but the only authority
21 we have is Mr. Willi ' s $25, 000 settlement authority.
22 MAYOR McCOY: Okay. The only thing I
23 would say since I am in the industry there was no
24 handrail there .
25 MR. SHILLINGER: There is one handrail . The
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1 question is are there two and apparently now there needs
2 to be two.
�w.
3 MAYOR McCOY: The rise to tread issue
4 hasn ' t changed.
5 MR. SHILLINGER: Right.
6 MAYOR McCOY: So, we ' re just talking about
7 there is only one handrail instead of two handrails .
8 MR. SHILLINGER: Right .
9 MAYOR McCOY: Of course she had county
10 insurance anyway.
11 MR. SHILLINGER: She is a state employee.
12 MAYOR McCOY: She has state insurance .
13 MR. SHILLINGER: Right .
14 MAYOR McCOY: Which took care of insurance .
15 MR. SHILLINGER: And she was on duty so it was a
16 workmans comp issue as well .
17 MAYOR McCOY: Receiving all of that .
18 MR. SHILLINGER: Right and we are -- we would
19 make sure that any settlement included a satisfaction
20 of any workmans comp lien so we wouldn' t be liable to
21 a claim from the workmans comp case of some sort of
22 subrogation claim.
23 MAYOR McCOY: Okay. Commissioner Spehar.
24 COMMISSIONER SPEHAR: I would like to give the
25 county administrator the ability to counter with 25 .
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1 MR. SHILLINGER: Okay. Again, at a closed
2 session we aren' t supposed to take any formal action,
3 but by taking no action that is, in essence, what you
4 have done .
5 COMMISSIONER SPEHAR: All right .
6 MR. SHILLINGER: Any other questions .
7 COMMISSIONER RICE: No .
8 COMMISSIONER NEUGENT : No.
9 MAYOR McCOY: It appears there are
10 none so I guess you can just proceed on that basis .
11 MR. SHILLINGER: All right .
12 MAYOR McCOY: Obviously been taken care of
13 anyway. As far as I am concerned the disparity is ten
f
14 thousand dollars and this is something that is
15 additional .
16 MR. SHILLINGER: The settlement would be a
17 settlement payment to her and we don ' t really control
18 how she pays off her bills or her lawyers or anything.
19 MAYOR McCOY: She is a state employee
20 so we are going under the assumption that she
21 has insurance.
22 MR. SHILLINGER: Right .
23 MAYOR McCOY: Do you need anything else
24 from us?
25 MR. SHILLINGER: No, unless you have any
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1 other questions . Thank you.
2 MAYOR McCOY: Thank you.
3 MS . HUTTON: Close the closed session.
4 MAYOR McCOY: This closed session is
5 now terminated and we will now reconvene to the public
6 meeting.
7 (Proceeding was concluded) .
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1 CERTIFICATE
2
3 STATE OF FLORIDA
4 COUNTY OF MONROE
5
6 I, Lisa Roeser, certify that I was authorized to and did
7 stenographically report the foregoing proceedings and that the
8 transcript is a true and complete record of my stenographic
9 notes .
10 DATED this 25th day of April, 2006.
11
12 qjze'1
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14 Lisa Roeser
15 Registered Professional Reporter
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