[Stu from NYC]

Originally Posted by dewilson58

Even IF it's not retroactive, the increase only collected ~$2mil and will not put a dent in the $50mil collected. I think it was an extremely weak showing for all the promising to the voters.

Could be a first step.

[Stu from NYC]

Originally Posted by Bill14564

I'm not sure what that has to do with anything. Those impact fees apply to anywhere in the county. If Costco wants to build on a location in Sumter County then the impact fee it will be required to pay was just increased by an amount between $360,000 to $587,000 depending on how the store is classified.

What if Costco came to the county commissioners and said we want to build within the county and would supply say 500 jobs. Than say what will you do for us to incentivize building here.

Wonder what the county would do?

[Bill14564]

Originally Posted by Stu from NYC

What if Costco came to the county commissioners and said we want to build within the county and would supply say 500 jobs. Than say what will you do for us to incentivize building here.

Wonder what the county would do?

I have no idea what the county would do. However, I suspect that waiving impact fees for one builder and not another is not an option.

What if a builder came here and said they wanted to build 60,000 homes, hire residents to support that construction, and obviously increase the property tax base. What would the county do for them? Today's answer - increase the building fees by 75%.

[Burgy]

Originally Posted by Mleeja

Say goodbye to hopes of getting your Costco, Trader Joe’s or other favored retail outlets. Say goodbye to the Rick Scott Industrial Park attracting any big time distribution centers. Hope you’re all happy that you have stuck it to “The Developer”.

Wasn't very interested in having them. Those who are should just live in an overcongested population center

[Advogado]

Originally Posted by dewilson58

Happy with the $800???
When do we all get the 25% reversed??
Should we be writing letters???
Are the commissioners getting impeached??

Your posts include a number of dollar amounts. Could you explain the source and your calculation? For example, your unsubstantiated revenue numbers SEEM to only include houses built by the Developer and not to include any houses built by others, as well as commercial construction built by anybody.

You also continuously quote the EMS Team as saying that the raising the Developer's sweetheart road impact fee would allow the massive property tax increase to be "completely reversed". To the best of my knowledge, and I followed their campaigns closely, you are misquoting them.

Rolling something back, which is what they actually promised, is not necessarily the same as revoking it-- although that would be the goal. How far back the property-tax increase can be rolled, if the Developer is finally required to pay for ALL his county infrastructure, can only be determined when the Commission contracts for an appropriate impact-fee study on the non-road infrastructure like fire, police, etc. Maybe more than a total rollback? I don't know, and neither do you.

[dewilson58]

Originally Posted by Advogado

Your posts include a number of dollar amounts. Could you explain the source and your calculation? For example, your unsubstantiated revenue numbers SEEM to only include houses built by the Developer and not to include any houses built by others, as well as commercial construction built by anybody.

You also continuously quote the EMS Team as saying that the raising the Developer's sweetheart road impact fee would allow the massive property tax increase to be "completely reversed". To the best of my knowledge, and I followed their campaigns closely, you are misquoting them.

Rolling something back, which is what they actually promised, is not necessarily the same as revoking it-- although that would be the goal. How far back the property-tax increase can be rolled, if the Developer is finally required to pay for ALL his county infrastructure, can only be determined when the Commission contracts for an appropriate impact-fee study on the non-road infrastructure like fire, police, etc. Maybe more than a total rollback? I don't know, and neither do you.

O Darling.....weak, weak, weak.
As posted, the $2mil is assuming a couple thousand Villages homes. It's not unsubstantiated. That has been your silly posts all along. TV sweetheart deal and the high taxes as a result and TV must pay for all improvements. If you want an all-in number, just ask the county. The future commercial numbers can not be calculated.


I heard both rollback and reversal. You too have posted reversal. I posted your quote a week ago. If you want to back away or say you never said it...........I don't care. That's ok.


Is that what you voted for???.................$800 increase for The Villages and costing them only ~$2mil. Are you happy???



Their ~$2mil increase in home prices will NOT PAY for all the improvements that you have been storming about.

[golfing eagles]

I hope all the increase the impact fee crowd is happy. Looks like they have successfully supported a shift in cost of new infrastructure from the tax base to new homeowners. Yeah, yeah, they repeatedly state that it is shifting the cost to "the developer", but we all know that is never going to be the case

But now that we have established a precedent for having those that benefit foot the cost, I have a list of further changes I would like to implement:

I have no kids here, so I don't want to pay school tax
I don't use the library, so I don't want the library tax
I don't need food stamps, or an EBT card, or whatever they want to call this handout today, so why should I pay for it?
I'll probably never need the fire department, so cross that off my list of taxes, but I'll be happy to use them on a fee for service basis
While I'm at it, let's get rid of all those taxes and fees on a cell phone bill that go to subsidize Obama phones and people who stiff the phone company, same with cable TV and my ISP.

Or, and this is just a wild thought.......
Perhaps those things benefit society as a whole and therefore the individual taxpayer indirectly, since there is a vested interest in a more educated population, one that is better read, one that is not starving on the street because their house burned down.
Just as residential and business expansion in TV benefit the county as a whole by providing jobs, new access roads, new firehouses and equipment, more retail shopping opportunities, etc. Just a thought, no need for any avocados to get their undies in a bunch

[Advogado]

Originally Posted by dewilson58

O Darling.....weak, weak, weak.
As posted, the $2mil is assuming a couple thousand Villages homes. It's not unsubstantiated. That has been your silly posts all along. TV sweetheart deal and the high taxes as a result and TV must pay for all improvements. If you want an all-in number, just ask the county. The future commercial numbers can not be calculated.


I heard both rollback and reversal. You too have posted reversal. I posted your quote a week ago. If you want to back away or say you never said it...........I don't care. That's ok.


Is that what you voted for???.................$800 increase for The Villages and costing them only ~$2mil. Are you happy???



Their ~$2mil increase in home prices will NOT PAY for all the improvements that you have been storming about.

I retract nothing based on your post. While I am always glad to be educated, it sure sounds like your numbers are speculation. You still don't seem to want to understand that the Developer's sweetheart deal was not just the 40% on his roads. It includes the 0$ he pays for all his other county infrastructure. I give up repeating this to you.

Also, why should I dig out numbers from the county? You are the one citing the meaningless $2 mil, which is a number you seem to have pretty much pulled out of your ear. I have not cited numbers, because really meaningful ones will only exist after an impact study of non-road infrastructure.


Finally, would you please cite at least one instance where somebody on the EMS team, during the campaign, said that just making the Developer pay for his own county roads would allow a complete reversal of the 25% property-tax hike? I never heard it and I suspect that I paid a lot more attention to the campaign than you did. It has always been obvious that more than than would be necessary. If the EMS team was claiming that, you would have thought that the heavily Developer-financed puppet incumbents would have called them out on it. The puppets did not do so because the EMS team DID NOT MAKE FALSE CLAIMS.

BTW, I have no idea where you heard what you think you heard from the EMS candidates during the campaign. You would be more credible with some specificity.

Bottom line, the impact fee issue was decided by Republican voters, in the primary, 2-to-1 in favor of ending the Developer's sweetheart deal. Admit it. You lost.

[Advogado]

Originally Posted by Bill14564

What about an additional $360,000 if Costco is considered a Discount Club or an additional $587,000 if Costco is considered a Discount Superstore? Do you think a half million dollars in additional cost is chump change for them too?

Think a little deeper.

First, where do your numbers come from?
Second, a higher County impact fee will be offset by lower property taxes. (The Daily Sun propaganda hides that fact.) The Costco financial analyst would consider all costs, including property taxes.
Third, for a company like Costco, building depreciation (the impact fee would depreciated, i.e., be written off and deducted over the life of the building) is a relatively minor part of total costs.

Don't rely on the Daily Sun for information affecting the Developer.

[Bill14564]

Originally Posted by Advogado

I retract nothing based on your post. While I am always glad to be educated, it sure sounds like your numbers are speculation. You still don't seem to want to understand that the Developer's sweetheart deal was not just the 40% on his roads. It includes the 0$ he pays for all his other county infrastructure. I give up repeating this to you.

Also, why should I dig out numbers from the county? You are the one citing the meaningless $2 mil, which is a number you seem to have pretty much pulled out of your ear. I have not cited numbers, because really meaningful ones will only exist after an impact study of non-road infrastructure.


Finally, would you please cite at least one instance where somebody on the EMS team, during the campaign, said that just making the Developer pay for his own county roads would allow a complete reversal of the 25% property-tax hike? I never heard it and I suspect that I paid a lot more attention to the campaign than you did. It has always been obvious that more than than would be necessary. If the EMS team was claiming that, you would have thought that the heavily Developer-financed puppet incumbents would have called them out on it. The puppets did not do so because the EMS team DID NOT MAKE FALSE CLAIMS.

BTW, I have no idea where you heard what you think you heard from the EMS candidates during the campaign. You would be more credible with some specificity.

Bottom line, the impact fee issue was decided by Republican voters, in the primary, 2-to-1 in favor of ending the Developer's sweetheart deal. Admit it. You lost.

I'm still looking for quotes from the candidates, but this guy Fenstermaker seems to have heard it. From his 12/27/20 article in the paper:

"The EMS Team promised to roll back the tax increase, making up the lost revenue by increasing the Developer’s impact fee to a reasonable level. "

and

"...the Developer’s sweetheart rate should be continued and our 25 percent tax hike not rolled back– as you guys pledged to do."

[Bill14564]

Originally Posted by Advogado

Think a little deeper.

First, where do your numbers come from?
Second, a higher County impact fee will be offset by lower property taxes. (The Daily Sun propaganda hides that fact.) The Costco financial analyst would consider all costs, including property taxes.
Third, for a company like Costco, building depreciation (the impact fee would depreciated, i.e., be written off and deducted over the life of the building) is a relatively minor part of total costs.

Don't rely on the Daily Sun for information affecting the Developer.

My information comes from the 2019 Road Impact Fee Study and several websites giving 144,000 square feet as the average size of Costco store.
(Interesting: If you were not able to do that simple research and calculation, what exactly do you base your assertions on?)

Show me your/any analysis that shows a half million dollars in savings from from property taxes.

Third, are you kidding? If writing off the impact fee is relatively minor then let's just set it as $50M and cover the entire 25% right there? It won't be done because it isn't that "minor." It would be nice if the tax laws were really that simple but they aren't.

[dewilson58]

Originally Posted by Advogado

Bottom line, the impact fee issue was decided by Republican voters, in the primary, 2-to-1 in favor of ending the Developer's sweetheart deal. Admit it. You lost.

I loss nothing.
As posted, I don't care if the discount is eliminated.
I don't think TV cares either...............they can add $1k or $2k to the price of a house.


The $2mil figure is not meaningless................it's an estimate of what TV might pay on a couple thousand new homes in one year. If you can't do the math take ~$800 impact fee increase on ~$2500 new homes.



I'm laughing at you...............the sweetheart deal (as you call it) is still in place.
I don't care what EMS promised or didn't promise, I did not vote.
The voters may have voted to end the sweetheart deal, but the new commissioners have not ended the deal as you wished.

[npwalters]

Originally Posted by Bill14564

What about an additional $360,000 if Costco is considered a Discount Club or an additional $587,000 if Costco is considered a Discount Superstore? Do you think a half million dollars in additional cost is chump change for them too?

yes

[dewilson58]

Originally Posted by Advogado

.

So this thread is asking.................$800, are you happy??


You wanted the "sweetheart deal" to be eliminated.......was it??......NOPE.


You wanted the 25% increase to be rolled back.........how much needs to be rolled back to make you happy???

[Aloha1]

Originally Posted by Bill14564

In what way did they abrogate their fiduciary responsibility?

Some would argue that their responsibility is to all their constituents, all the residents in the county. If this action increases income which leads to reduced taxes while not negatively impacting the future stability of the county finances, isn't that exactly what they are supposed to do?

Simply put, their PRIMARY responsibility is to properly research and debate any and all issues that affect the County's ability to grow and prosper. They said they would do just that and then convene in July to debate and perhaps vote. Instead, they did not research nor did they bring in any outside consultation . They went ahead without really knowing what they were doing because, "Well we sort said we'd do this if elected", REGARDLESS of the consequences.

That is a failure of their responsibility.This is not like a parent screwing up with a child, this is screwing with the futures and livelihoods of tens of thousands of working Sumter County residents because a bunch of retired transplants developed a severe case of NIMBY.