[Mleeja]

Originally Posted by Advogado

A fair question.

I was trying to keep the original post relatively short. If anything, the $100,000,000 figure that I cited is understated, but I used it because it is easily verifiable. As reported in several sources, including the October POA Bulletin (see page 2) and in the on-line news website, the road improvements necessitated by the Developer's massive expansion of The Villages will cost $100,000,000. Those roads should be paid for by an increase in the Developer's $901 impact fee, but they are not, thanks to the County Commissioners. Instead, those roads are being paid for with our 25% tax hike.

Note, also that Sumter County only collects impact fees from the Developer for roads. Collier County, where the Commissioners were not handpicked by the Developer, also requires the builder of a house in a retirement community to pay impact fees with respect to the need for expansion of the following infrastructure, in addition to roads: Community Parks, Regional Parks, EMS, Schools, Government Buildings, Libraries, Law Enforcement, Jail, Sewer, and Fire-- all totaling about $20,000. All this data is available on the Collier County website. Why doesn't Sumter County collect impact fees from the Developer for any of these other items? I don't know and could only guess.

Now some simple math with really big numbers: The Developer reportedly is going to build 60,000 new houses. The Developer pays an impact fee that is $1,699 less than the builder of a single-family house outside The Villages in Sumter County. If the County Commissioners had just increased the Developer's impact fee to the non-Villages rate, it would generate the following extra revenue: 60,000 x $1,699 = $101,940,000. Eureka, the new roads are paid for without a property-tax increase.

Alternatively, if the Sumter County Commission calculated impact fees like Collier County does, that would generate the following extra revenue: 60,000 x ($20,000-$901) = $1,145,940,000. Eureka, nobody would have to pay any property-tax at all for the next few years.

You keep making an apples and oranges comparison. You even acknowledge it in this post. In Collier County the impact fees cover a lot more than Sumter County. Many of the areas that are subject to impact fees in Collier County are paid for by the developer within The Villages. The same principle applies to impact fees for homes permits in Sumter County but outside of The Villages. It is very difficult to get the number of single family home permits have been issued in Collier County, but I am willing to bet it is nowhere close to the permits issued in Sumter County due to the development of The Villages. It is call Economies of Scale!

I will just make a short comment about the POA. It is a political organization. It may have started out as an advocate for the residents, but that is long gone. Their goal is to oppose the development of The Villages and to take over our method of government. This can be seen as board members of the POA are running for seats on the CDDs.