Pasco County Government Chops Impact Fees

 

March 22, 2011

In two separate actions, the Pasco County Board of Comunty Commissioners agreed to a suspension of fees for building parks, libraries, fire stations and hurricane shelters through 2012 and started a process to replace costly transportation impact fees permanently with lower mobility fees. This latter action is the culmination of months of work by county staff and a stakeholders committee.

The Pasco Economic Development Council has been a strong advocate for the mobility fee concept, and President/CEO John Hagen was elated with the Commissions’ actions on the 22nd. "Creating a mobility fee and using it to help encourage growth into areas where it makes the most sense is very progressive and a positive move," he stated. "Reducing fees also makes Pasco County highly competitive for office and industrial development, which will help attract the high paying jobs that are in such short supply right now."

The short-term impact fee moratorium combined with the long-term mobility fee is a one-two punch that the business and development community had eagerly sought from the Commissioners. Pasco EDC, Tampa Bay Builders Association, local chambers, and Urban Land Institute members teamed up to work with the County to create a win-win proposal.

Barbara Wilhite, local attorney and Vice Chair of the Pasco EDC Competitiveness Task Force, played a key role in coordinating the efforts of the development community to reduce the fees. She noted that "there is so much opportunity here in Pasco County. This is another important step that the County has made to show that they are ‘open for business.’"

Now the County and its private sector partners will be focusing on obtaining relief from the state legislature with respect to the creation of an Urban Service Area in the populated areas of Pasco County. Formation of an Urban Service Area will simplify and streamline the development process and permit the kind of flexibility that developers across the county line in Hillsborough County currently enjoy. It will also allow County Planners to encourage the kind of mixed use transit-oriented development that results in more attractive, upscale neighborhoods and communities and less traffic congestion.

In related news, Pasco County was the awarded the One Bay Award by the Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council for its "New Smart Pasco" land using strategy. Pasco County has been engaged in a total transformation of its land use, development services, and permitting process since 2008 when it and PEDC invited the Urban Land Institute to bring a panel of experts to examine how it could improve. When Pasco County completes the rewrite of its Land Development Code, finalizes its impact fee changes, and finishes the permit streamlining initiative currently underway, it will emerge from the current recession as the most competitive player in the Tampa Bay region, if not the state.

Already, the County is seeing increased activity because of the new, simplified job creation incentive ordinance it put in place in 2010. "We have five job creation projects queued up to go to the Board of Commissioners in the next month," Hagen noted. "We think this is just the start."

The business and development community in Pasco County is seeing a bright light at the end of the tunnel after the Pasco County Board of Commissioners agreed to reduce impact fees at its March 22 meeting.