[njbchbum]

Originally Posted by Villages Kahuna

1. Fruitland Park would be crazy not to negotiate with The Villages with the intention of having the development of 2,000 homes with 4,000 new residents added to their tax roles. It will take decades, if ever, for "normal" development to achieve these numbers. The incremental tax revenues would fix any funding uncertainties Fruitland Park has forever!

2. The Villages reps speaking at the meeting were absolutely correct in noting that this developer is a known quantity. How they build, maintain and manage their development is clearly evident by just driving from the historic section south to CR 44. There's a reason why more than 95% of residents vote in the annual survey that they would recommend The Villages to anyone. Does it make sense to anyone that developing the dairy property piecemeal with dozens of different builders, probably over decades, would be beneficial to Fruitland Park?

3. As far as having Sumter County handle all the permitting and inspections for the property located in Lake County, what would you demand were you the developer? There is simply no way that The Lake County building department and other staffs are adequately staffed to handle the requirements of a development that will move at the pace required by the Developer. Think about it--if you were the developer, how might you react if you wanted to build 19 homes a week (the actual a pace to sell out the new property in two years), then have the Lake County building department say, "...oh, we're sorry, we're only staffed to handle 5-6 new home construction permits a week." Having the properly staffed and scaled Sumter County building department handle permitting and inspections would be a deal-killer issue were I the Developer. All Lake County has to do is authorize Sumter to do the job for these 1,972 homes only. Easy fix, but a deal killer if it doesn't get done.

bk - i agree with points 1 & 2 but hafta take exception to #3 since lake county is the county that needs the $$ received from all of those permits and inspections. and sumter county is likely not familiar with the lake county policies/procedures for permitting and inspecting [i don't know if there is a uniform way to do things between counties - but here in nj every town does something different].

perhaps the developer could convince sumter county to help train new staff for lake county if there is a uniform way of doing things among counties; or loan lake county several employees [an excellent way to get an inside look at what goes on in that office!]; or just process the work and give the fees to lake county!