September 15, 2026 Town Council Meeting — Recap

The September 15, 2026 Town Council meeting, in the order it happened. Roll-call votes were taken, but the record this recap works from does not capture them member by member, so there is no vote table. See the note on the record.

Who was present

All five members were present for the whole meeting: Mayor Critton, Vice Mayor Thomas, and Council Members Mack, Randolph and Jordan. The record this recap works from begins just after the roll call, during the vote approving the agenda, so members are named below only where it is clear who is speaking. The meeting adjourned at 9:54 PM.

Dr. Phillips Charities: the standing Hungerford update

The chair of the charity's Eatonville initiative advisory committee gave the standing update. A community conversation and dinner is set for October 7 at 5:30 at Macedonia, with invitations to follow at residents' doors, and a mailer explaining the initiative began reaching households that day. Monthly updates are posted on the charity's website.

She spent much of the update on the property's history, describing the Hungerford family's role as stewards of the land from the late 1800s, a 1930s foreclosure attempt defeated in court, and a 1951 suit opposing transfer of the property. She credited a Hungerford descendant's recent Orlando Sentinel opinion piece making that case. She also said questions raised on social media are welcome, and invited residents to bring them to the committee directly.

Two Council questions did not get dates. Asked when the groundbreaking would be, she said it is still to be determined. Asked whether the purchase agreement with the Orange County school board has been finalized, she said the goal is a school board meeting this fall. The school board meets at longer intervals than the county commission, she said, and the date would be shared as soon as it is known.

HostDime: inspections underway, no completion date

The company's chief executive gave the update the agenda breakdown was watching for, and said he would try to appear every other meeting.

Where construction stands. Electrical final inspections took place that day. Mechanical finals were being scheduled for the following week, with Orange County fire inspections hoped for two to three weeks after that. The final certificate of occupancy — the Town's sign-off that a finished building can be used — would follow those. He said nothing is currently preventing that certificate from issuing, provided the Town's building inspector keeps scheduling the final inspections.

No date, and a dispute about penalties. Asked repeatedly when the building would be finished, he declined to give one, saying past dates had hurt him and that it would be done when it is done. Council Member Mack pressed repeatedly, saying he had heard July, then August, then September, and that he could not tell residents the answer is that it will be done when it is done. He also returned to the Wi-Fi commitment he says the company made verbally at the groundbreaking.

On the Town's daily penalty, the executive said he is losing about $70,000 a month while contractors remain on the project, that his own costs exceed anything the Town could impose, and that understanding the delays would help more than penalties. He also put his own numbers on the delay: a change in fire-inspection jurisdiction, from the Town to Orange County, set the project back about a year and a half and cost roughly $600,000 that he said was not passed on to the Town. On September 1 the Chief Administrative Officer put the accrued total at $99,250, with none collected. No figure was stated on September 15, and the Council took no action on the third amendment it discussed on September 1.

Flooding, the pond and the sidewalk. He said the drainage problem was escalated to senior leadership at the project's engineering firm. A site meeting with the Town's civil engineer, the site contractor and the general contractor identified three contributing causes: a drainage swale off the property to the south, a conflict with Duke Energy infrastructure, and an elevation problem created by the site contractor. He expected resolution by the end of the month, and said the drainage issue does not block the certificate of occupancy.

Asked about sidewalks by Council Member Randolph, he said Orange County had the company pay roughly $38,000 into a sidewalk fund rather than build a sidewalk along its frontage. The county never built one. He said the company would ask for those funds back and build the sidewalk if the Town wants.

Other answers. Council Member Mack asked about safety, noise, water and power. The executive said the facility is a closed-loop design that recycles its cooling water, that generators run about an hour a month for testing inside sound-attenuating enclosures, and that under a Duke Energy program the utility can draw on the facility's power during a major event in exchange for a lower rate. One member suggested the Council tour the building, and another asked for a community open house, which he offered to schedule with Town staff within about four weeks.

Citizen participation

Five speakers. Topics only, in keeping with this site's practice of not identifying people who speak from the floor:

• The data center, the legal appointment and the CRA. Speakers raised benefits residents might see from the data center, questioned how the Town's temporary legal engagement is classified, pointed to state law bearing on the rental ordinance and on code-enforcement fines, and asked the Council to let the CRA expire and bring its work back to the Town. One speaker questioned the Town's position on the $892,083 the CRA says the Town owes it.
• The town's future. One speaker spoke about the history of Black towns and urged the Council to be careful about what it cannot verify about the data center.
• Police conduct and the company's promises. One speaker described poor treatment by officers, questioned the Town's logo as it appears on police vehicles, and said the company had promised internet service and other benefits at the groundbreaking.
• Construction quality and flooding. One speaker urged the Town to use certified inspectors on its infrastructure work, citing corrugated pipe found under Catalina Park sidewalks years after a 2016 project, and raised flooding after the previous night's rain.
• Access and document volume. One speaker described difficulty getting a meeting with an elected official, and criticized the Council for approving long documents, particularly from the CRA, without time to read them.

Ordinance 2026-7: farmers markets tabled for a map

Tabled before the public hearing opened. The Town Planner presented the change, which would permit farmers markets in the C-3 commercial district. It follows the Planning and Zoning Board's August 13 recommendation. She described the conditions attached to it:

• a definition of a farmer's market as a temporary, open-air use with multiple vendors;
• customer parking based on the code's existing business-use standard;
• one parking space for every three vendors;
• no parking along residential streets, a condition the Planning and Zoning Board itself added;
• an alternative parking plan for a market that cannot meet those standards.

Most of the discussion was about geography. Members asked which parcels are affected, whether the change reaches the west side of town as well as the east, and whether a market could be held on People Street. The planner explained that nearly all of the Town's commercial land is zoned C-3, that C-1 covers a small area in the northwest, and that the change adds an option rather than approving any particular market.

One member said they were not prepared to vote without a printed map they could carry while walking the streets, and another agreed that more time would produce a better decision. The attorney advising the Council said it could either hold the noticed hearing and vote, or table the item to a future hearing, and that tabling was within its discretion. A motion to table was made and seconded, and the item was tabled on a roll call; the record captures three members answering. Staff will re-notice the hearing, provide the maps, and notify residents of the new date. No member of the public spoke, because the hearing was never opened.

Ordinance 2026-8: rental homes tabled on legal advice

Tabled, with no public hearing opened. After the Clerk read the preamble, the attorney advising the Council recommended that it not proceed. The reason given was Florida Statutes §83.425, a 2023 law she described as reserving the regulation of residential tenancies to the state.

The attorney told the Council the statute preempts — overrides — local rules on residential rental properties and the agreements behind them. On that reading, she said, the Town could not lawfully enact the ordinance in the form presented. Her recommendation was to table it, look at what the Town can do through code enforcement applied evenly across similar properties, and return after staff and counsel have done more work. A member asked whether the right step was to table the item or to remove it entirely. The Mayor noted that she heard no objection, called for a motion, and the ordinance was tabled on a voice vote.

That is the question the breakdown raised before the meeting. The draft would have required landlords to screen tenants a set way, and the statute's own text names "the screening process used by a landlord in approving tenancies" among the subjects reserved to the state. The packet carried no legal review. The attorney said the matter had also been discussed at the workshop noticed for 6:30 that evening. The Town does not broadcast its workshops, and no recording or minutes of that session have been posted.

What this does not resolve. The draft attached to the agenda was a marked-up 2023 ordinance, still carrying that year's Council on its signature page and setting no fee amounts. Nothing in the record says what a rewritten version would cover, or when it returns. In her closing remarks the Mayor directed the Chief Administrative Officer to prepare administrative information on the code-enforcement path, describing the goal as making sure property owners maintain their properties whether or not they live in them.

Walk-on: a federal audit of the Town's post office (Resolution 2026-48)

Approved. The first of two walk-on items, neither of which appears in the posted packet. The resolution authorizes a formal request to the United States Postal Service for a contractual evaluation, cost audit and ZIP code realignment of the Eatonville contract postal unit, and authorizes the Mayor to execute the necessary correspondence. It was moved, seconded and approved with no questions.

Walk-on: emergency legal counsel for six months (Resolution 2026-50)

Approved, as amended. The second walk-on is an emergency resolution employing legal counsel for six months, which the preamble ties to authority in Resolution 2015-2. The attorney who presented it was Camille Evans of Endow Law, an Orlando firm; Council members welcomed her and her team by name at the close of the meeting. She was not the attorney who had advised the Council on the two ordinances earlier in the evening.

The terms stated on the record. The firm would be paid a flat $10,000 a month. She said that fee does not cap the hours the firm will work but excludes extraordinary matters such as litigation, that it reflects an onboarding period the firm would normally bill separately, and that the firm tracks its time and will show the Town what the work would have cost at hourly rates. The scope she named includes the Planning and Zoning Board acting as local planning agency — the body that reviews land-use changes before they reach the Council — and the historic preservation board, meeting attendance, agenda preparation, briefings before meetings, negotiation of agreements, and review of matters coming before the Council.

The amendment. She asked that the resolution name the law firm rather than her personally, since the firm provides the services. The Council amended Section 2 accordingly before approving it.

What was said about cost. Members asked whether the Council, rather than the administration, sets the rate. In that discussion, previous legal work was described as billed hourly and running some months to $15,000 or $17,000. A member said a budget amendment would follow if litigation or another extraordinary matter arises, and that costs tied to a private development should be passed through to the developer rather than absorbed by the Town.

What the record does not say. Nothing in the meeting explains what became of the engagement with TG Law, which the Council approved on August 4, or why the appointment was made on an emergency basis now. The resolution was not in the packet, so residents had no advance notice of it.

Consent: three sets of minutes

Approved on a voice vote. The consent agenda carried the minutes of the July 21, August 4 and August 18 meetings. The packet had attached two of the three sets, August 4 and August 18; the motion covered all three. The August 18 minutes are the ones whose closing line records "Mayor Gardner" moving to adjourn, as the breakdown noted; nothing in the meeting indicates they were corrected before approval.

Staff and council reports

Chief Administrative Officer. The budget hearing is this coming Monday at 5:30 — September 21, the second of the two hearings the budget requires. The Town's audit is still being finalized, including a first-level audit covering grants, with next year's audit already started to avoid falling behind. On the Wymore Road water problem, he said he met that day with Ms. Mundy and the state transportation department and spoke with Orange County; an early theory about the source has given way to the possibility that water is reaching the road from Lake King through culverts. He described potholes that cannot be fixed by repaving until underground work is done, said an infrastructure meeting was set for that Thursday, and said the Town may set up a line of credit — borrowing it can draw on as bills come due — to manage cash flow on coming projects.

New counsel. The firm described its onboarding: due diligence on the Town's material agreements, and a request that members raise issues ahead of meetings rather than at them.

Town Clerk. No report was given. Members praised the chamber upgrades she oversaw, including new carpet, paint and a wall-wrap collage of Eatonville landmarks.

Council. Council Member Mack reported the deaths of his uncle and aunt and asked for prayers, asked the administration to bring the police-community concerns raised in citizen participation to the chief, and welcomed the new counsel. The Mayor reported on the mobile mammography event held that past Saturday, September 12, which Council Member Randolph brought to Eatonville, and said she used the service herself. She announced a girls' mentoring kickoff this Saturday at the Denton Johnson Center, 10:30 AM to 12:30 PM, and a Chamber of Commerce "state of the chamber" event the same evening, which the Town sponsored.

She also raised two items for the new counsel. She asked the Chief Administrative Officer, working with the firm, to obtain an Attorney General opinion Council Member Randolph had requested, and she asked counsel to look into trademarking the Town's logo, saying it should not be used around town without permission. She complained about the condition contractors leave streets in after Town work and asked who checks on them. She closed by responding to the evening's CRA comments, saying the agency's tools are only as good as the governing bodies allow them to be, and that the Town would continue redevelopment work with or without the CRA.

A note on the record

This recap is drawn from a machine-made transcript of the Town's recording of the 7:30 meeting. That transcript garbles proper nouns and figures — it renders the new law firm as "endowed logging" and "dial law," and the Town's name half a dozen ways — so this recap paraphrases rather than quotes wherever exact wording could not be recovered. The firm's name was confirmed against the firm's own website, and the attorney's name appears clearly in the transcript of the resolution discussion. Figures appear here only where they were stated plainly enough to read with confidence; the resolution numbers 2026-48 and 2026-50 are as read from the dais and could not be checked against a posted document, because neither resolution was in the packet. No minutes of this meeting have been posted, and the Town neither broadcasts nor posts minutes of its workshops, so what the 6:30 workshop covered is known only from references made at the 7:30 meeting.

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Sources. Meeting recording · September 15 meeting packet · Town meetings portal