For at least the past four years, Vero Beach officials have raised the possibility of the county taking over – and absorbing the costs of – the lifeguard operations on the city’s beaches.
Vero taxpayers will spend more than $860,000 this year – in personnel and operating expenses – for lifeguard coverage of Vero’s three beaches.
Last week, the County Commission was finally scheduled to publicly discuss the matter, only to have County Administrator John Titkanich remove the item from the meeting’s agenda.
He did so at the city’s request.
As Titkanich explained: City Manager Monte Falls, upon learning of the agenda item, called and asked that the commission’s discussion be postponed until the two men could meet again to work out some potentially pivotal details.
Among the issues Falls wants to raise with Titkanich is the city’s willingness to turn over to the county ocean-rescue equipment, including a lifeguard truck and other vehicles, needed to patrol the beaches.
Falls also wants to make sure commissioners know that the city still planned to purchase a new lifeguard tower at Humiston Beach Park as part of its project to replace the storm-damaged boardwalk.
Titkanich included the cost of a new tower ($100,000), along with the purchases of a truck and two side-by-side beach vehicles (nearly $75,000), in the background information he provided to the commissioners before the agenda item was pulled.
“If we’re getting out of the lifeguard business,” Falls said, “we don’t need all that equipment.”
Vero Beach Mayor John Cotugno, who insisted the city isn’t trying to “offload its obligation onto the county,” also made a request for a postponement in a conversation with Commission Chairman Joe Flescher.
Cotugno said the city simply would prefer that lifeguard protection on its beaches – which attract far more county residents and visitors than Vero Beach citizens – become part of the county’s Emergency Services District, which funds the Fire-Rescue Division.
Titkanich said the commission will decide how the expansion of the county’s lifeguard services to city beaches should be funded – if it approves such action.
He said he didn’t have a feel for which way the commissioners were leaning, but he wanted to meet with Falls as soon as possible.
“Trying to get on my schedule has been difficult as we prepare for the budget workshops, but Monte wants to speak further on this and we’re hoping to get together shortly,” Titkanich said, adding that he would like them to meet no later than next week.
Despite the delay, Titkanich said he still believes there’s enough time to include a discussion about putting county lifeguards on city beaches in the budget workshops for the 2025-26 fiscal year.
“Ideally, we would have liked to have had this discussion a meeting or two earlier, but we don’t do the budget workshops until July,” Titkanich said. “There are still details to be worked out, then the commissioners would need to approve it, but we do have time.”
Titkanich said the city’s offer is something the commissioners need to consider “in the current financial climate.”
In his background memo to the commission, Titkanich projected the resulting expansion of the county’s lifeguard operations, including supervisory changes and additional personnel, would require an increase of about $1.1 million in the first year, but his estimates included a purchase of the above-mentioned equipment.
He also wrote that his staff doesn’t believe the county’s General Fund can absorb the cost of more than $1.1 million first-year operations without a potential increase in the real estate tax rate.
“The same holds true, even more so for the Emergency Services District, presuming the services (ocean rescue) are consistent with what the voters approved when the district was created,” the administrator added.
Currently, county lifeguards are employees of the Recreation Division, which is supported by the county’s General Fund.
Titkanich said he included the lifeguard issue on the agenda because it was discussed during a joint meeting of the County Commission and City Council in October 2023.
“I still think it’s a good idea to have all the lifeguards under one organization,” Falls said, adding that he made such a recommendation to the City Council.
Commission Chairman Joe Flescher questioned Titkanich’s decision to put the lifeguard item on the agenda for last week’s meeting without first conferring with city officials.
Flescher’s chief concerns were asking county taxpayers to pay for lifeguards on city beaches and how the takeover would be funded.
“Based on the limited information I’ve been given,” the chairman said, “there appears to be a whole lot more than would have to be worked out before we could even consider such a proposal.”
