Originally Posted by golfing eagles (Post 1906251)

Again, and for the 10,000th time----Whether county infrastructure costs are financed through the property tax or an impact fee makes NO DIFFERENCE WHATSOEVER to the developer. Any additional cost will simply be passed on to the new home buyer.

PS: If this issue finally gets resolved, what will you have to post about? :1rotfl::1rotfl::1rotfl:

Originally Posted by golfing eagles (Post 1906251)

Again, and for the 10,000th time----Whether county infrastructure costs are financed through the property tax or an impact fee makes NO DIFFERENCE WHATSOEVER to the developer. Any additional cost will simply be passed on to the new home buyer.

PS: If this issue finally gets resolved, what will you have to post about? :1rotfl::1rotfl::1rotfl:

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1906291)

First, your statement that paying for his own infrastructure through a reasonable impact fee would make “NO DIFFERENCE WHATSOEVER to the developer” is absurd. Why do you think he and his suppliers spent almost a quarter of a million dollars last year in a failed attempt to keep his puppets in office and he has launched a propaganda and lobbying campaign to stall and block an end to his sweetheart impact-fee deal?

Second, think about it: If, as you seem to indicate, the Developer could simply increase his prices in the amount of the proposed impact fees without negatively impacting his sales and profits, he should fire his CFO for not already having increased prices, thereby leaving money on the table. If businesses could simply pass on higher costs without reducing sales, no business would ever go bankrupt.

Third, from a policy standpoint, if the Developer passes some (or even all) of higher impact fees to the buyers of new homes, fine. The costs of the new infrastructure will then be borne by the people benefiting from it, not by the current residents, most of whom are only getting negative effects from the massive growth.

In summary, the Developer is lining his pocket at the expense of current residents via a combination of a sweetheart impact fee for himself and higher property taxes. As to your question about what I will post about if this situation gets corrected, I don't know, but I would be happy to see the present abuse of current residents ended. I try to limit my posts to subjects that I know something about and care about.

Originally Posted by golfing eagles (Post 1906304)

In summary, you're wrong.

If TV was a development struggling to sell homes you would be right. Just look at the home sales around Juliette Falls. However, here they are selling as quickly as they can build them, so yes, the developer would have no problem passing on higher impact fees to the new homebuyer

And if you don't think residents of Sumter County get a huge benefit from TV, you're blind.
30 years ago Sumter County was the poorest county in Florida, now it ranks 10th or 11th. Better infrastructure, better retail, better employment---the list goes on

It is clear you care about this subject---but KNOW about if? That remains questionable.

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1906313)

You have not said one word about the issue here: Why should the current residents pay for county infrastructure necessitated by the Developer's massive expansion of The Villages? Somebody has to pay for it, and that somebody clearly should be the Developer.

Originally Posted by dtennent (Post 1902941)

In the small rural upstate NY town in which I lived, I was involved with the Planning board and eventually became the head of the Town Board. I knew the budget inside out. With that experience, I am not surprised that a large tax increase came after years of no tax increases. I am aware that there has been incredible increase in the tax base. However, residential development has a large infrastructure upkeep in the long haul. Roads don't last forever. With more residents, there is an increase need in the sheriff department, the court system, health department and many other government services. I am sure that the new board members are on a steep learning curve about the budget, how the county government runs, etc. I applaud that they are taking 6 months to learn enough to make a sound decision regarding the impact fees as well as our tax rate. Hopefully, as they go through the process, they will help all of us learn some of the intricacies that impact their final decision.

Originally Posted by Northwoods (Post 1906418)

Excellent post. It's refreshing to hear from someone who can speak from experience.

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1906313)

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1906619)

Deferral of action until July is putting millions of dollars into the Developer's pocket at our expense. The phone number Messrs. Estep and Search is 352-689-4400.

Originally Posted by dewilson58 (Post 1906482)

Prior expansions have been supplemented thru the current impact fee structure with no tax increases. The County should have increased taxes a percent or two over the last ten years. If they would have done this, the County would not have increased taxes by 25% in one year. The math is there. SO, Pay Me Now, Pay Me Later. Later is here.


So all this whining is for less than $1 per day.


County Taxes, State Taxes & Federal Taxes are used for roads that I will never use and that you will never use.


Less than $1 per day.



Even if the Impacts Fee were at 100% of the Professionally Recommended structure, the property taxes would have still increased by over 22%.


Less than $1 per day.


:cryin2:

Originally Posted by dewilson58 (Post 1906625)

Yes, hate to defer action and get the inexperienced Commissioners educated........uneducated Commissioners & posters is much better. :1rotfl:

Originally Posted by dewilson58 (Post 1906477)

Nothing new from the refreshing post.
All points stated before.
=Tax increase after years of none.
=Developments have infrastructure.
=Roads wear out.
=Expansion need sheriff, courts, health, etc.
=Trio are inexperienced, clueless and need education


:shrug:

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1906633)

Originally Posted by dewilson58 (Post 1906477)

Nothing new from the refreshing post.
All points stated before.
=Tax increase after years of none.
=Developments have infrastructure.
=Roads wear out.
=Expansion need sheriff, courts, health, etc.
=Trio are inexperienced, clueless and need education


:shrug:

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1906677)

I am having a lot of trouble understanding your position. A simple question, which you continue to dance around as you criticize the EMS Team as "clueless": Who should pay for the County infrastructure necessitated by the Developer's massive expansion of The Villages-- the Developer or the current residents? Somebody has to pay.

If you answer "both", how should the costs be split? Right now the Developer is paying 40% for the roads and 0% for everything else. The current residents are now paying 60% and 100% respectively. Two thirds of the voters decided that this isn't fair.

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1902538)

IT HAS TO BE GREAT TO BE ABLE TO SET YOUR OWN TAX RATE

Background of the 25% Property Tax Hike. In case any readers still don't know about the Developer's sweetheart impact fee and our huge property-tax hike to preserve it, they can watch this video, recorded at the County Commissioner's hearing on September 24, 2019-- as the Developer's puppets on the Commission were about to hike our property tax 25% to preserve that sweetheart fee: Scott Fenstermaker--How can five guys screw 125000 people? - YouTube

As a result of that property-tax increase, we the voters of Sumter County, last year, woke up to what had been going on and tossed out the three Developer's puppet Commissioners (Butler, Burgess, and Printz) who were up for re-election, and we voted in the EMS team of Estep, Miller, and Search. We did so on the basis of a promise by Estep, Miller, and Search to roll back the property tax hike by requiring the Developer to pay for his own county infrastructure through a reasonable impact fee.

Now this tax-reform process is in doubt.

The Developer's Efforts to Keep His Sweetheart Impact Fee. This process is in doubt because the Developer is doing everything in his power to preserve his sweetheart impact fee. He is lobbying the County Commissioners, packing a Commission meeting with his contractors and allies, filling the meeting parking lot with his contractors' heavy equipment so there were no parking spaces for the public, and running a series of propaganda articles in his newspaper vilifying impact fees. His latest ploy is an attempt to “voluntarily” raise his sweetheart road impact fee by 40% in exchange for protection from imposition from any other impact-fee increases. Well, a 40% increase of his sweetheart road impact fee won't come close to covering the costs of all county infrastructure that the Developer should be paying for.

A Comparison of Impact Fees. It is interesting to compare the impact fees that the Developer would pay in Collier County (where his puppets do not set impact fees) with what he pays in Sumter County:
In Collier County, the builder of a retirement community would pay impact fees for:
>Community Parks,
>Regional Parks,
>Roads,
>EMS,
>Schools,
>Government Buildings,
>Libraries,
>Law Enforcement,
>Jail,
>Water,
>Sewer, and
>Fire.
The total of these impact fees in Collier County is approximately $24,000/house, the exact amount depending on where in the county it is built.

In Sumter County, the Developer pays an impact fee of only $972 for roads. (This is only 40% of what the impact-fee study calculated each of his houses is costing the county for new roads). THE DEVELOPER PAYS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING FOR THE OTHER INFRASTRUCTURE that Collier County collects for. Who pays for all the stuff that the Developer doesn't pay for? We, the residents (individuals and existing businesses), do. The Daily Sun articles claim that reasonable impact fees in Sumter County would “paralyze” growth here. Nonsense. The impact fees are 25 times higher in Collier County, and growth there has not been “paralyzed”. Reasonable impact fees allow lower property taxes and are good for the economy. For the truth about the economic benefit of paying for new infrastructure via impact fees, check out this report: Paying for Prosperity: Impact Fees and Job Growth

What Voters Can Do Now to Get Our Property Tax Rolled Back. If the EMS Team had stuck together and stuck to their promises, with 3 of the 5 Commissioners, the process would have started already. But, for some reason, Mr. Estep made a motion to delay even considering the necessary impact-fee increase for six months, and it was passed with the votes of Mr. Search and Developer puppet Breeden. After Mr. Estep was criticized by the public for his motion, Mr. Search came to his defense in the on-line news, calling voters who believed Mr. Estep's campaign promise of tax reform “ill-informed”. In light of the Developer's brazen proposal to set his own tax rate, it looks like the Developer thinks that he has flipped at least one member of the EMS Team and thus controls at least 3 of the 5 votes. Meantime, the six-month delay puts millions of dollars into the Developer's pocket, at our expense, as the Developer pays impact fees at the sweetheart rate and we subsidize him as our property tax accrues at its inflated rate.

Given the fact that the Developer feels confident enough about his influence over the County Commission to believe that he can set his own tax rate, what can we, the voters, do to successfully roll back the massive property-tax increase? I have to admit: I don't know.

The Sad Conclusion. The sad truth is that we won the battle by voting out the Developer's puppets (Butler, Burgess, and Printz). However, in light of the votes of Mr. Estep and Mr. Search, the Developer may have won the war. Probably all we can do is contact Messrs. Estep and Search and insist they keep their promise to us. We can also contact Mr. Miller and thank him for keeping his. Contact information is available here: About the Commissioners | Sumter County, FL - Official Website Obviously, contacting Messrs. Gilpin or Breeden would be a waste of time. We have to vote them out next year.

Originally Posted by Mleeja (Post 1906685)

Why do you continue to post lies? Comparing Sumter County to Collier County is like comparing apples and oranges. They are both just fruit! In Sumter County the impact fee covers just roads. All the other stuff you mentioned are built and paid with the development bonds.

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1906705)

........Bottom line: somebody has to pay for the additional infrastructure-- the Developer or the current residents. You seem to be arguing that it should be the current residents. If so, why don't you simply say so instead of accusing me of lying.

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1906633)

I am not "whining" about "less than a dollar a day". I can afford it, but some people cannot. And the Developer's impact fees should not be limited to 100% of roads, as you imply, He ought to be paying for ALL the county infrastructure necessitated by the massive expansion of The Villages, and if some of those costs get passed on to new home buyers, fine.

The real issue here is the crony capitalism that is putting hundreds of millions of residents' dollars into the pocket of the Developer. He packed the County Commission with his puppets. The puppets then gave him a sweetheart deal on impact fees and hit the residents with a massive property-tax increase.

And I have been doing something to address this malfeasance, not "whining". This includes doing what I could to replace 3 of the Developer's puppet Commissioners with the EMS Team in the last election and insisting that the EMS Team keep their campaign promise. If anybody has been "whining", it is the defenders of the Developer now that his sweetheart deal on impact fees is under attack.

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1906619)

By about a two-to-one margin, the voters of Sumter County have already rejected the pseudo economics set forth both on this site (in posts by a couple of Developer defenders) and in the Daily Sun (in a series of so-called articles written by the Developer's Minister of Propaganda, David R. Corder). By electing the EMS Team to the County Commission, the voters decided that the current residents of Sumter County should not give the Developer hundreds of millions of their dollars by paying, through the residents' property-taxes, for county infrastructure that the Developer should be paying for through his impact fees.

Now, it is up to the new Commissioners, Messrs. Estep, Miller, and Search, to make good on their campaign promise by ending the Developer's sweetheart deal on impact fees and cutting our property taxes. With a majority on the Commission, they should do so NOW. Commissioner Miller is trying to do so. Commissioners Estep and Search voted to defer action until July.

Contact Commissioners Estep and Search and ask them to keep their campaign promise and to do so now. Deferral of action until July is putting millions of dollars into the Developer's pocket at our expense. The phone number Messrs. Estep and Search is 352-689-4400.

Originally Posted by Aloha1 (Post 1906758)

You are entitled to your opinion. You are not entitled to your own "facts". Has it ever occurred to you that your basic premise is WRONG??

Originally Posted by dewilson58 (Post 1906811)

I've tried and tried to educate him/her............but not receptive.
Not sure what the driver is, but definitely has a slice to it.
:gc:

Originally Posted by Aloha1 (Post 1906758)

You are entitled to your opinion. You are not entitled to your own "facts". Has it ever occurred to you that your basic premise is WRONG??

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1907249)

And what basic premise is that?

Originally Posted by dewilson58 (Post 1907266)

:blahblahblah:

.....your indisputable facts are not.



Your false premise is that the Developer should pay for the county infrastructure. That is an opinion. Most independent consultants recommend discounts. Most Counties have issued discounts.



Another false premise is that increasing the impact fee to 100% is going to get the 25% increase reversed. It won't.

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1907283)

Originally Posted by dewilson58 (Post 1907306)

Thank You for all the PM's.


I know, I know......................let it go, someone has an agenda!!!


I will make an attempt.


:pepper2:

Originally Posted by dewilson58 (Post 1907306)

Thank You for all the PM's.


I know, I know......................let it go, someone has an agenda!!!


I will make an attempt.


:pepper2:

Originally Posted by Robbie0723 (Post 1907326)

The OP's posts remind me of virgins talking about sex...

Originally Posted by Happydaz (Post 1907362)

It is amazing the way that the frequent, “professional” posters on this site pile on someone who disagrees with them. All are frequent posters who have thousands of posts and favor the developer on every topic. Here are some facts. 2 out 3 voters in Sumter County voted the three incumbents up for reelection out of office in a landslide election. Residents of Sumter County are looking for increased impact fees. There are more of us than there are of you. The voters of Sumter County spoke. No matter how much pressure the developer and his allies put on us we are not caving in. The articles in the Daily Sun were pathetic and one sided. Villagers I spoke with laughed at the Daily Sun and the reporter who wrote the article. We want change to come to Sumter County and want a more equitable road impact fee.

Originally Posted by dewilson58 (Post 1907302)

On January 19th, you stated the 25% would be rolled back by eliminating the Developer sweetheart impact fee deal. This is why you are so upset with EMS because they have not done it yet. There are probably more posts from you, you can search.



You are learning (finally), increasing the impact fee to 100% would give a partial reversal of the 25%. Maybe 2%. I know this 2% figure is a shock to you, but I'm glad you finally realize it. All this whining over a discount which equated to 2% increase.....what??, $50/year???



Your statement, "Imposing impact fees to cover ALL the Developer's infrastructure would allow a 100% rollback, conceptually." is totally wrong. (false premise, again) Included in the 25% tax hike was to cover increased operational expenses. These expenses are unrelated to the infrastructure costs. Increases the impact fee to cover 100% of the infrastructure costs will not cover increase in operating expenses.


Need expert opinions.................Google and call them. Call Tindale Oliver if you want. The 40% fee was presented as an option to Sumter County by TO.

Originally Posted by Advogado (Post 1908053)

I stand by what I said both in my post that you quote and elsewhere. You have the incredible ability to: (a) refute statements that I have never made, and (b) ignore the clear language of statements that I have made.

I have never said, anywhere, that merely raising the Developer's road impact fee on roads would finance the elimination of the 25% property-tax increase. Although the Developer certainly should pay 100% of the road impact fee, that by itself, will not be enough-- although you never explain the 2% figure that you throw out. As I have tried to explain to you, the Developer's sweetheart impact fee consists of paying an impact fee of 40% for county roads and 0% for his other county infrastructure. The current residents have been making up the shortfall through our property taxes.

To eliminate his sweetheart deal and allow an appropriate“rollback” (a term that both I and the EMS Team have used) will require the Developer not only to pay 100% of the cost of his county roads, but also pay 100% of the cost of his other county infrastructure. Calculating the amount of the total revenue that this will generate, as I have said repeatedly in response to your misstatements, will require an impact fee study. Once that study is done, it will be possible to determine the extent the the 25% property-tax increase can be rolled back-- maybe less than a 100% reversal but maybe even more. You don't know, and I don't know.

I am done responding to your half-baked comments and nitpicking posts that never really express your position on the real issue: Who should pay for the county infrastructure necessitated by the Developer's massive expansion of The Villages-- the Developer or the current residents? Would you please read the Brookings report to which I gave you a link to so that you can understand why the answer to that question should be: “The Developer.” That is what the voters of Sumter County decided by a 2-to-1 margin in the last election.

Originally Posted by Northwoods (Post 1907491)

Is a "professional" poster someone who has a different opinion than you do?

I think people voted out the previous commissioners because there was a 25% tax increase. The EMS team ran on the promise of "rolling back" the 25% tax increase. So... they have to deliver. I am assuming the EMS team is realizing that is a lot more difficult to deliver now that they are in office.

I would bet many Villagers don't fully understand or care about impact fees... they just want to roll back that tax increase. I would also bet the same Villagers would be outraged if businesses or UF-Shands decided not to come to Sumter County because of the increase in impact fees. I'm not sure who is paying for the new Southern UF-Shands structure, but it was the Developer that negotiated that agreement and put forth that vision... not the commissioners.

The EMS team has to learn how to negotiate. The Developer has presented a vision of a new hospital, new schools (for all those workers we need) and non-Villages housing for workers. It would be disappointing to see all of those things go away because there was a stalemate between the commissioners and The Developer.

Originally Posted by Robbie0723 (Post 1907326)

The OP's posts remind me of virgins talking about sex...