March 3, 2026 • 16 mins
Mollica is one of three candidates running for Seat 2, left vacant after former Commissioner Rob Long ran for the Florida Legislature.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, Joel Malcoln for WJ and O dot com. My
election spotlight on the city of Delray Beach. One race
there there would have been two, but in seat four,
Angela Burns, the incumbent running unopposed. So this is the
seat left vacant by Rob Long, the city commissioner, who
(00:21):
was running for State House and did get elected, so
he is now one of our state representatives in Tallahassee.
But this seat now is vacant and there are three
candidates running, including Judy Mollica.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Thank you for joining me, of.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Course, thank you for having you all.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
I'm going to get into some of the issues around
the city and talk about your thoughts on certain things.
But let's first, you know, let you get to know
we always have new I know you've been around Delray,
but we always have new people moving to the area
all the time.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
So tell us more about you.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
First of all, how long have you been in Delray
Beach and work experience into anything else you'd like to share.
Speaker 4 (01:02):
I'd be happy to I've been in Delray Beach for
about eight years. Prior to that, I was in golf stream,
which when you're in golf stream, which is sort of connects.
Do you think you are in Delray Beach until I
actually moved to del A Beach, and that's when I
started becoming Even before that, when I was in Golf Stream,
I became very very involved in the community. Professionally, I'm
(01:24):
a broker owner of Ocean East Properties, which for many
years I've helped families, seniors and businesses put down their roots,
grow and thrive in our community. But giving back to
my community has always been a priority of mine, and
so that's why I serve on a lot of the
boards and community things that I do.
Speaker 3 (01:43):
Like I'm for.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
Instance, I'm on my second term on the Planning and
Zoning Board at Dela Beach and the Affordable Housing Advisory Committee.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
As far as being on the Affordable Housing and Advisory Committee,
obviously you're a real term by trade, as you mentioned.
Is that something that just felt like a natural thing
for you to board for you to be on well.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
I think affordability is a huge.
Speaker 4 (02:13):
Issue in a lot of different areas, but particularly in
our community where so many of the properties have become
very very extensive, we necessarily have to think of afford
affordable housing and workforce housing to keep some of our teachers, firemen, policemen,
and everyday workers to be able to live, and also
(02:35):
our family members. We need to have a place for
people to stay in Delay Beach. One of my priorities
is as running for city Commission, is affordable housing. And
I've been on the Planning and Zoning Board approved a
sessory housing dwelling units where people can put a smaller
(02:56):
place right on their property, and we are forgiving some
of the setbacks in order to allow for that to
work out. Another idea that I have is a public
private partnership that could include city owned land and a
developer that could provide affordable housing and then after a
(03:19):
period of time, that land asset would go back to
the city.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
If you were to get elected, would you have to
leave these boards these committees?
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Yes, I would. I don't think that I can serve
on both.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
All right. I wanted to ask you also, have you
run before for the commission?
Speaker 3 (03:39):
I have not.
Speaker 4 (03:39):
I've not run for anything political since sixth grade when I.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
Ran for class president.
Speaker 2 (03:45):
Did you win?
Speaker 3 (03:46):
And I did win that election, Joel, Yes.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Oh that's great, that's awesome.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
I never tried to run for any of those I
didn't think i'd have a shot, so anyway, all right,
So I got lost in that one.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Now I forgot where I was going with this. Oh yeah,
Is there.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
One specific trigger that made you say, you know what,
this is the time I want to run? Or was
it just the seat is you know, is open and
you know what was your thought process?
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Well, the seat becoming open.
Speaker 4 (04:18):
I knew that was going to happen even before the
special election, and it was almost as people drafted me.
A lot of people encouraged me because I do have
deep groups in the community with my community work, and
I also became very very aware. I'm a co founder
and president of Friends of do Rey, which, through newsletters
(04:40):
and videocasts, we keep residents connected and informed about.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
What's going on in our city.
Speaker 4 (04:45):
And because of that role, for the past five years,
I've been attending all of the City Commission meetings and
keeping track of the d DA meetings and the cr
meetings and really keeping my finger on the pulse of
what's going on in the city. And and then Trueline
not for Profits. I realized that I have a lot
of success in collaboration and problem solving, so that all
(05:09):
sorts was the perfect storm that made me still want
to give some more by held in our city.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
I just want to positively.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
Influence the city that I love and help protect the character,
the charm and the liveability for these Delray Beach Now.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
Is this is this going to be a full term? Was?
Speaker 1 (05:30):
In other words, was at this point? Was Rob Long
had he still been here? Would he have been up
for reelection at this point?
Speaker 3 (05:40):
Exactly right?
Speaker 4 (05:40):
If he had decided he had already decided to run
as a state representative because.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
That held the seat.
Speaker 4 (05:52):
Unfortunately, Yeah, he passed away, and then Rob had to
run in.
Speaker 3 (05:57):
A special election.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Okay, all right, so the shreat.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
Was going to be open at any rate?
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Yeah, all right, so this is a full three year term,
I believe. Yeah, and this, uh, this race is obviously
open to all voters. It's called seat two not not
district too, although some.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Cities the districts.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
There are no districts.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
Yeah, and even even some cities that do districts, like
I was just covering Green Acres and even there, you know,
they do districts. But the but, but the voting is
open to everybody. And then there's some that do districts
and they're only open for those in the district. So
it's just I like to always make sure that it's clear.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Yeah, you're absolutely right.
Speaker 4 (06:38):
We are a four mile by four mile beachside cities. Huh,
we represent everyone.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
It feels bigger than that. For some reason, it does.
Speaker 4 (06:50):
Doesn't it well west, it feels like part of the right.
It's not officially in our municipality.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
Yeah, similar thing to BOCO. What happens with BOC of
retone proper And uh, let's talk about the noise. This
is getting a lot of play in the news, the
news stricter enforcement enforcement of noise ordinances in the in
the I believe it's mainly in the downtown area, but
you can correct me if I'm wrong. But handheld devices
(07:20):
that are going to be given out to folks that
are going to measure these noises. And I believe it's
the first time in many years that the noise ordinance
is changing in Delray Beach. So, as you're probably aware,
there there's a lot of concern about that from the
people that go downtown to go into the clubs in
the bars, but also the people that perform there and
(07:42):
the and and I would assume the owners of those
businesses as well. So walk me through what's what's going
on there and what what the concerns should be or
shouldn't be.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
For many years, residents have concerns and voice their concerns
about noise, lebbles, noise from leaf blowers, noise specifically from
the loud cars and motorcycles. When you're trying to dine
outdoors on Atlantic Avenue or any of the restaurants even
off the avenue and some loud car or motorcycle goes by.
(08:17):
You know, my dog jumps, I jump, it's hard to
have enjoyment. And so there's been a concern and we
started the city took a look at this, I think
as early as twenty twenty two. But it's a noise
is a difficult thing to enforce because it's kind of
(08:37):
unless you can measure it properly. How do you write
the how do you write.
Speaker 3 (08:41):
The ticket oject?
Speaker 4 (08:42):
So we have got these sound devices that police and
code enforcement can use, and people.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Do have a concern that they're going to be.
Speaker 4 (08:53):
Cracking down on like Tin Roof which is an open
air entertainment area, Johnny Brown's which is an open ear
entertainment area, And what I mean by that is it's
not enclosed on all sides. It has opening and I
don't think that's what the city is concerned about. The
city is more concerned about to the loud vehicular noise,
(09:13):
and we're hoping to get some enforcement on that. And
also part of the ordinance is shortening the time that
the lawn services can do.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
The work, so you're not going to be waking up
at seven.
Speaker 4 (09:26):
Am on a Sunday morning with the leaf blowers outside.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
So there's a positive that people who otherwise might think
this is a negative because they're worried about the bars closing,
you know, or being forced to close, or getting fines
or whatnot. I think that I don't see that being
reported that much.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
That aspect of it.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Yeah, I do not.
Speaker 4 (09:48):
I think most of the people that live in the
city do it for a reason. They do want to
be around the vivacity that is the city of Delray Beach.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
But what we don't want to be is be disturbed
by our neighbor at six.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
Am doing their lawn blower or by some louder And
I don't know why motorcycles like to have that loud
sound of the cars, but it must be. It must
be a auto lover's.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Thing or something. But I hope that gets enforced.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
So we're talking mostly about the noise of the vehicles,
not necessarily maybe the music playing from the cars and
whatnot that.
Speaker 3 (10:26):
Could be as well. I have a friend who.
Speaker 4 (10:30):
Has a neighbor that does installations of these great thing
boomboxes inside of cars, and they very often test it
right next to her house. So those and that young
people want to have their music and enjoy it, but
sometimes they want to have their windows down and make.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
Everybody else enjoy it too. So this the new.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
Sound equipment and the new enforcement could crack down on
some of that stuff too.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
I understand that there was a contract issue last year
with regards to the Delray Beach Police Department, so many
of our municipalities in Palm Beach County have been turning
to the Sheriff's office. Like I mentioned, I was talking
to the folks at running for the Green Acres seats.
I think it was ten or so years ago that
(11:16):
they went to PbSO from their own del Rey obviously
keeping their own police department, but there were some contract issues,
and I understand things have worked themselves out.
Speaker 2 (11:25):
What's the status there they have.
Speaker 4 (11:28):
In fact, it was a one year delay in the
contracts negotiations and.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
They did.
Speaker 4 (11:38):
Just weren't moving forward. Where the contracts were stalled. In
the interim, we lost about twenty seven officers that went
to neighboring departments. And all we need to do is
sort of streamline that process. I believe it should be
made public so we can watch it and see what's
going on. I think it's very, very important that we
(12:02):
retain our officers because we spend a lot of money
on training them, so.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
It's a good fayer.
Speaker 4 (12:11):
Investment to retain our officers.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
Let me talk about property taxes.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
This is something that I definitely want to hit on
in a city as as big and popular as Delray Beaches.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
Going through the legislature right now.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
You know there were several bills, but I guess one
looks like it's closest to getting through. But it would
it would eventually eliminate all non school homesteaded property taxes.
And I know that we have the state CFO saying
one thing going into different I don't think he went
into del Rey specifically, but Palm Beach County overall not
(12:53):
looking great according to his report. And then you do
have people with the cities concerned about well if you
you know, if you take this away, we wouldn't be
able to give you this, And where do you stand
on this issue?
Speaker 4 (13:06):
I believe that if those bills passed by a referendum,
it's definitely going to hurt city budgets. Municipalities survive on
that we have. Our militarrate is lower than less Home,
Beach and Point and some of our neighboring communities. That
(13:27):
that budget is how we pay our bills. First of all,
we have debt that we have to pay, and part
of our military is that debt service that we have.
But then we have our police and fire, which take
up about fifty three percent of our entire budget that
has to be paid. And then we have infrastructure, roads, parks,
(13:50):
So there's expenses that unless we had a way to
backfill it, I don't know how we would survive. And
the potential backfilling could be somebody had mentioned sales.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
Tax, which would be very little of the.
Speaker 4 (14:03):
Current sales tax at the moment, but if they did
have to raise that's that's a regressive tax that's going
to hurt the lower income. Alternatively, we could do non
advalorum tax where every you know, we spread out the
cost of that budget, let's say of fire and everybody
gets the.
Speaker 3 (14:22):
Same amount of bill.
Speaker 4 (14:24):
So and the person in the twenty million dollar mansion
on the beach is going to get the same non
advalrum bill that the person in a seventy thousand dollars
home in a fifty five and up community would get.
And that's regressive too. That's definitely going to hurt our.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
Lower income residents.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
All right, I want to ask you a final question
I give to all my election candidates.
Speaker 2 (14:55):
When I speak to them, when I.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
Do these interviews, and three candidates in this race it's
a no and seat, Why ultimately should folks choose?
Speaker 2 (15:02):
In a nutshell, Judy Molica.
Speaker 4 (15:06):
Oh, I think I'm the best candidate because for many
years I've served this served Delray with deep community engagement
and strong leadership. I am a well known community advocate,
skilled at bringing people together and finding solutions. All right,
(15:27):
my agenda is the community.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
Didn't mean to interrupt you there, All right, Well, Judy,
I appreciate you you joining me speaking to the voters
of the city of Delray Beach.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Again. This is the seat too, the only race it's going.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
To be on your ballot if you're a registered voter
living within the city limits of Delray Beach. March tenth
is election day, no early voting, although vote by mail,
but by the time this airs, we will have passed
the deadline to have a mail ballot mailed to you.
But again, we do appreciate uh Judy Molica, candidate for
(16:04):
Delray Beach seat too.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
Thank you for joining me.
Speaker 4 (16:08):
Joel Joel Joel, so I couldnt announce that I appreciate
your good work. Thank you for doing this and getting
the word out and voters.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
I appreciate it.
Hey, Joel Malcoln for WJ and O dot com. My
election spotlight on the city of Delray Beach. One race
there there would have been two, but in seat four,
Angela Burns, the incumbent running unopposed. So this is the
seat left vacant by Rob Long, the city commissioner, who
(00:21):
was running for State House and did get elected, so
he is now one of our state representatives in Tallahassee.
But this seat now is vacant and there are three
candidates running, including Judy Mollica.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Thank you for joining me, of.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Course, thank you for having you all.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
I'm going to get into some of the issues around
the city and talk about your thoughts on certain things.
But let's first, you know, let you get to know
we always have new I know you've been around Delray,
but we always have new people moving to the area
all the time.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
So tell us more about you.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
First of all, how long have you been in Delray
Beach and work experience into anything else you'd like to share.
Speaker 4 (01:02):
I'd be happy to I've been in Delray Beach for
about eight years. Prior to that, I was in golf stream,
which when you're in golf stream, which is sort of connects.
Do you think you are in Delray Beach until I
actually moved to del A Beach, and that's when I
started becoming Even before that, when I was in Golf Stream,
I became very very involved in the community. Professionally, I'm
(01:24):
a broker owner of Ocean East Properties, which for many
years I've helped families, seniors and businesses put down their roots,
grow and thrive in our community. But giving back to
my community has always been a priority of mine, and
so that's why I serve on a lot of the
boards and community things that I do.
Speaker 3 (01:43):
Like I'm for.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
Instance, I'm on my second term on the Planning and
Zoning Board at Dela Beach and the Affordable Housing Advisory Committee.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
As far as being on the Affordable Housing and Advisory Committee,
obviously you're a real term by trade, as you mentioned.
Is that something that just felt like a natural thing
for you to board for you to be on well.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
I think affordability is a huge.
Speaker 4 (02:13):
Issue in a lot of different areas, but particularly in
our community where so many of the properties have become
very very extensive, we necessarily have to think of afford
affordable housing and workforce housing to keep some of our teachers, firemen, policemen,
and everyday workers to be able to live, and also
(02:35):
our family members. We need to have a place for
people to stay in Delay Beach. One of my priorities
is as running for city Commission, is affordable housing. And
I've been on the Planning and Zoning Board approved a
sessory housing dwelling units where people can put a smaller
(02:56):
place right on their property, and we are forgiving some
of the setbacks in order to allow for that to
work out. Another idea that I have is a public
private partnership that could include city owned land and a
developer that could provide affordable housing and then after a
(03:19):
period of time, that land asset would go back to
the city.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
If you were to get elected, would you have to
leave these boards these committees?
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Yes, I would. I don't think that I can serve
on both.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
All right. I wanted to ask you also, have you
run before for the commission?
Speaker 3 (03:39):
I have not.
Speaker 4 (03:39):
I've not run for anything political since sixth grade when I.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
Ran for class president.
Speaker 2 (03:45):
Did you win?
Speaker 3 (03:46):
And I did win that election, Joel, Yes.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Oh that's great, that's awesome.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
I never tried to run for any of those I
didn't think i'd have a shot, so anyway, all right,
So I got lost in that one.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Now I forgot where I was going with this. Oh yeah,
Is there.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
One specific trigger that made you say, you know what,
this is the time I want to run? Or was
it just the seat is you know, is open and
you know what was your thought process?
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Well, the seat becoming open.
Speaker 4 (04:18):
I knew that was going to happen even before the
special election, and it was almost as people drafted me.
A lot of people encouraged me because I do have
deep groups in the community with my community work, and
I also became very very aware. I'm a co founder
and president of Friends of do Rey, which, through newsletters
(04:40):
and videocasts, we keep residents connected and informed about.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
What's going on in our city.
Speaker 4 (04:45):
And because of that role, for the past five years,
I've been attending all of the City Commission meetings and
keeping track of the d DA meetings and the cr
meetings and really keeping my finger on the pulse of
what's going on in the city. And and then Trueline
not for Profits. I realized that I have a lot
of success in collaboration and problem solving, so that all
(05:09):
sorts was the perfect storm that made me still want
to give some more by held in our city.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
I just want to positively.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
Influence the city that I love and help protect the character,
the charm and the liveability for these Delray Beach Now.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
Is this is this going to be a full term? Was?
Speaker 1 (05:30):
In other words, was at this point? Was Rob Long
had he still been here? Would he have been up
for reelection at this point?
Speaker 3 (05:40):
Exactly right?
Speaker 4 (05:40):
If he had decided he had already decided to run
as a state representative because.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
That held the seat.
Speaker 4 (05:52):
Unfortunately, Yeah, he passed away, and then Rob had to
run in.
Speaker 3 (05:57):
A special election.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Okay, all right, so the shreat.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
Was going to be open at any rate?
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Yeah, all right, so this is a full three year term,
I believe. Yeah, and this, uh, this race is obviously
open to all voters. It's called seat two not not
district too, although some.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Cities the districts.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
There are no districts.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
Yeah, and even even some cities that do districts, like
I was just covering Green Acres and even there, you know,
they do districts. But the but, but the voting is
open to everybody. And then there's some that do districts
and they're only open for those in the district. So
it's just I like to always make sure that it's clear.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Yeah, you're absolutely right.
Speaker 4 (06:38):
We are a four mile by four mile beachside cities. Huh,
we represent everyone.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
It feels bigger than that. For some reason, it does.
Speaker 4 (06:50):
Doesn't it well west, it feels like part of the right.
It's not officially in our municipality.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
Yeah, similar thing to BOCO. What happens with BOC of
retone proper And uh, let's talk about the noise. This
is getting a lot of play in the news, the
news stricter enforcement enforcement of noise ordinances in the in
the I believe it's mainly in the downtown area, but
you can correct me if I'm wrong. But handheld devices
(07:20):
that are going to be given out to folks that
are going to measure these noises. And I believe it's
the first time in many years that the noise ordinance
is changing in Delray Beach. So, as you're probably aware,
there there's a lot of concern about that from the
people that go downtown to go into the clubs in
the bars, but also the people that perform there and
(07:42):
the and and I would assume the owners of those
businesses as well. So walk me through what's what's going
on there and what what the concerns should be or
shouldn't be.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
For many years, residents have concerns and voice their concerns
about noise, lebbles, noise from leaf blowers, noise specifically from
the loud cars and motorcycles. When you're trying to dine
outdoors on Atlantic Avenue or any of the restaurants even
off the avenue and some loud car or motorcycle goes by.
(08:17):
You know, my dog jumps, I jump, it's hard to
have enjoyment. And so there's been a concern and we
started the city took a look at this, I think
as early as twenty twenty two. But it's a noise
is a difficult thing to enforce because it's kind of
(08:37):
unless you can measure it properly. How do you write
the how do you write.
Speaker 3 (08:41):
The ticket oject?
Speaker 4 (08:42):
So we have got these sound devices that police and
code enforcement can use, and people.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Do have a concern that they're going to be.
Speaker 4 (08:53):
Cracking down on like Tin Roof which is an open
air entertainment area, Johnny Brown's which is an open ear
entertainment area, And what I mean by that is it's
not enclosed on all sides. It has opening and I
don't think that's what the city is concerned about. The
city is more concerned about to the loud vehicular noise,
(09:13):
and we're hoping to get some enforcement on that. And
also part of the ordinance is shortening the time that
the lawn services can do.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
The work, so you're not going to be waking up
at seven.
Speaker 4 (09:26):
Am on a Sunday morning with the leaf blowers outside.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
So there's a positive that people who otherwise might think
this is a negative because they're worried about the bars closing,
you know, or being forced to close, or getting fines
or whatnot. I think that I don't see that being
reported that much.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
That aspect of it.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Yeah, I do not.
Speaker 4 (09:48):
I think most of the people that live in the
city do it for a reason. They do want to
be around the vivacity that is the city of Delray Beach.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
But what we don't want to be is be disturbed
by our neighbor at six.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
Am doing their lawn blower or by some louder And
I don't know why motorcycles like to have that loud
sound of the cars, but it must be. It must
be a auto lover's.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Thing or something. But I hope that gets enforced.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
So we're talking mostly about the noise of the vehicles,
not necessarily maybe the music playing from the cars and
whatnot that.
Speaker 3 (10:26):
Could be as well. I have a friend who.
Speaker 4 (10:30):
Has a neighbor that does installations of these great thing
boomboxes inside of cars, and they very often test it
right next to her house. So those and that young
people want to have their music and enjoy it, but
sometimes they want to have their windows down and make.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
Everybody else enjoy it too. So this the new.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
Sound equipment and the new enforcement could crack down on
some of that stuff too.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
I understand that there was a contract issue last year
with regards to the Delray Beach Police Department, so many
of our municipalities in Palm Beach County have been turning
to the Sheriff's office. Like I mentioned, I was talking
to the folks at running for the Green Acres seats.
I think it was ten or so years ago that
(11:16):
they went to PbSO from their own del Rey obviously
keeping their own police department, but there were some contract issues,
and I understand things have worked themselves out.
Speaker 2 (11:25):
What's the status there they have.
Speaker 4 (11:28):
In fact, it was a one year delay in the
contracts negotiations and.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
They did.
Speaker 4 (11:38):
Just weren't moving forward. Where the contracts were stalled. In
the interim, we lost about twenty seven officers that went
to neighboring departments. And all we need to do is
sort of streamline that process. I believe it should be
made public so we can watch it and see what's
going on. I think it's very, very important that we
(12:02):
retain our officers because we spend a lot of money
on training them, so.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
It's a good fayer.
Speaker 4 (12:11):
Investment to retain our officers.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
Let me talk about property taxes.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
This is something that I definitely want to hit on
in a city as as big and popular as Delray Beaches.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
Going through the legislature right now.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
You know there were several bills, but I guess one
looks like it's closest to getting through. But it would
it would eventually eliminate all non school homesteaded property taxes.
And I know that we have the state CFO saying
one thing going into different I don't think he went
into del Rey specifically, but Palm Beach County overall not
(12:53):
looking great according to his report. And then you do
have people with the cities concerned about well if you
you know, if you take this away, we wouldn't be
able to give you this, And where do you stand
on this issue?
Speaker 4 (13:06):
I believe that if those bills passed by a referendum,
it's definitely going to hurt city budgets. Municipalities survive on
that we have. Our militarrate is lower than less Home,
Beach and Point and some of our neighboring communities. That
(13:27):
that budget is how we pay our bills. First of all,
we have debt that we have to pay, and part
of our military is that debt service that we have.
But then we have our police and fire, which take
up about fifty three percent of our entire budget that
has to be paid. And then we have infrastructure, roads, parks,
(13:50):
So there's expenses that unless we had a way to
backfill it, I don't know how we would survive. And
the potential backfilling could be somebody had mentioned sales.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
Tax, which would be very little of the.
Speaker 4 (14:03):
Current sales tax at the moment, but if they did
have to raise that's that's a regressive tax that's going
to hurt the lower income. Alternatively, we could do non
advalorum tax where every you know, we spread out the
cost of that budget, let's say of fire and everybody
gets the.
Speaker 3 (14:22):
Same amount of bill.
Speaker 4 (14:24):
So and the person in the twenty million dollar mansion
on the beach is going to get the same non
advalrum bill that the person in a seventy thousand dollars
home in a fifty five and up community would get.
And that's regressive too. That's definitely going to hurt our.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
Lower income residents.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
All right, I want to ask you a final question
I give to all my election candidates.
Speaker 2 (14:55):
When I speak to them, when I.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
Do these interviews, and three candidates in this race it's
a no and seat, Why ultimately should folks choose?
Speaker 2 (15:02):
In a nutshell, Judy Molica.
Speaker 4 (15:06):
Oh, I think I'm the best candidate because for many
years I've served this served Delray with deep community engagement
and strong leadership. I am a well known community advocate,
skilled at bringing people together and finding solutions. All right,
(15:27):
my agenda is the community.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
Didn't mean to interrupt you there, All right, Well, Judy,
I appreciate you you joining me speaking to the voters
of the city of Delray Beach.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Again. This is the seat too, the only race it's going.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
To be on your ballot if you're a registered voter
living within the city limits of Delray Beach. March tenth
is election day, no early voting, although vote by mail,
but by the time this airs, we will have passed
the deadline to have a mail ballot mailed to you.
But again, we do appreciate uh Judy Molica, candidate for
(16:04):
Delray Beach seat too.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
Thank you for joining me.
Speaker 4 (16:08):
Joel Joel Joel, so I couldnt announce that I appreciate
your good work. Thank you for doing this and getting
the word out and voters.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
I appreciate it.
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