After a long meeting billed as a “workshop,” the final answer on “mobility fees” to county staff from County Administrator Mike Merrill and the county commissioners was “no.”
Mike Williams, director of the county’s transportation and planning, and Ron Barton, who have worked together on a plan to source money for all modes of transportation, made presentations on how their department figured a “mobility fee” could replace the “impact fees” now paid by developers and others who build on property where no structure has been before.
Twelve focus groups have been held around the county on this subject in recent months; six with developers and six with concerned citizens representing areas and groups.
They’ve been exploring what citizens say are their worst transportation nightmares as well as fees developers paid to build their developments.
Williams and Barton wanted county commissioners to agree to draw up an ordinance initiating the mobility fee.
County Administrator Mike Merrill and the commissioners present said “no.” There were just too many unanswered questions.
The reason Hillsborough County’s Transportation and Planning staff wanted a mobility fee was that about 330,000 new residents are projected to move into Hillsborough County by 2020; as many as 600,000 by 2040; and roads, bridges, sidewalks and public transit are just not ready.
In fact, they are already clogged.
As previously reported in The Observer News, developers of new homes and retail space were under directives referred to as “concurrency” to build schools, parks and roads — until House Bill 7207 was passed in Tallahassee by Florida legislators in May 2011. That action forced the counties to pay for schools, parks and roads that, prior to H.B. 7207, they had not had to absorb.
South County was hit especially hard with “traffic clog” because it has both Gulf Coast tourist destinations and lots of undeveloped land that was at one time agricultural. Much development has occurred here in the last 30 years. Agriculture has been pushed farther into the center of the state, and homes went up quickly after legislators relaxed rules on developers.
Several Hillsborough County groups have been studying transportation. Williams and his staff worked with engineering firm Parsons Brinkerhoff and the group Go Hillsborough at multiple meetings that finally identified 400 projects as “critical” and also listed several ways to handle fixing the problems.
As reported in the Jan. 14 edition of The Observer News, county staff recommended that the best answer was the “mobility fee,” which would replace the impact fee but only be used for transportation. Transportation was defined, however, not only as roads and public transit (which is being handled along with HARTline) but also sidewalks, pedestrian trails, bike lanes and any other mode of moving from place to place.
The Jan. 14 edition also has all the website URLs listed for previous stories about the “dropping of regulations by Tallahassee and its effects.”
Staff presented its position on mobility fees to the administrator and commissioners formally in the Commissioner Boardroom at County Center on Feb. 4. Its goal was to have the county attorneys draw up an ordinance to initiate mobility fees and eliminate impact fees and another developer fee called a “prop share.”
As Barton explained, the new fee would come with two parts. The first part would be a mobility fee that would be transparent and that would change the fees on new development from about $1,800 for a two-bedroom house to about $6,500. A chart with different home and business types and sizes was shown. Another factor for charging flat fees would be whether or not the development was done in an urban service area.
The second part, Barton explained, would be a “companion piece so we can mitigate for certain kinds of business, industry and other development that will create jobs.”
“We’ve gotten about $300 million historically (annually) from developers,” said Merrill. “That’s $1.3 billion in the last 20 years.”
His question was how they were going to “buy back” the credits developers already had for things they had planned, platted, started or had even finished but not yet sold.
“Maybe we could have a reverse auction,” said Merrill. “We could tell developers that on a certain day the county is ready to pay 67 percent (of the 100 percent) they have to buy them back. Then they can bid. If one comes in at 63, we buy that one. If another lower, that one.”
The main thing is that these “credits” the developers already have are backlogged and, Merrill said, “there would not be any real money coming in for at least 10 years while we ‘burn off’ what they have in it.”
Williams explained that the mobility fee has three components: cost, demand and (the “credits” already mentioned).
As for the credits, “We can’t overcharge them (developers),” he said. “As to costs, we must figure on transportation projects by the mile, like how many trips on average would be made and how long they would be. It’s one way to figure a fair, balanced cost for everyone. The demand will be based on how much traffic a site is projected to generate.”
Commissioner Ken Hagan said, “We need more data. More information. There are no mulligans here. This is no panacea, especially the first 10 years. We need a broader and more comprehensive strategy. And we need to somehow be consistent in the way we target jobs and where.”
Commissioners Sandra Murman and Al Higginbotham have represented South County in the past and are quite familiar with the area. Each had questions about the process, and the math.
“How can a methodology be applied that is fair to everybody?” Higginbotham asked.
Several slides were shown that showed the amounts developers would pay for different sizes and kinds of development.
“That math doesn’t add up,” was a comment made several times.
It was pointed out by Barton that Pasco County “incentivized certain types of development so it could add new jobs.” He said Pasco had prepared by allocating $421 million to incentivize, by preparing with a few cents gas tax and other measures awhile back.
But Barton said Hillsborough doesn’t need that. “We don’t need to incentivize because we’re the center of gravity here. We have everything. We just need a laser focus on job creation.”
The proposal — written as it was — was denied, so 12 more focus groups will be held in the next few months: six with developers and six more with citizens.
All the charts, notes and presentations from the previous focus groups may be viewed at hillsboroughcounty.org/mobilityfees.