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BCC Minutes 09/09/1997 B (Pelican Bay Services Division Budget)BUDGET SESSION OF SEPTEMBER 9, 1997 OF THE BOARD OF COUNTY COHMISSIONERS LET IT BE REHEHBERED, that the Board of County Commissioners in and for the County of Collier, and also acting as the Board of Zoning Appeals and as the governing board(s) of such special districts as have been created according to law and having conducted business herein, met on this date at 6:00 P.M., in BUDGET SESSION at 8962 Hammock Oak Drive, Naples, Florida, with the following members present: CHAIRMAN: VICE-CHAIRMAN: Absent: Timothy L. Hancock Barbara B. Berry Pamela S. Hac'kie John C. Norris Timothy J. Constantine ALSO PRESENT: Robert Fernandez, County Administrator Michael Smykowski, Budget Director Item #3A PRESENTATION OF FISCAL YEAR 1998 PELICAN BAY SERVICES DIVISION BUDGET CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Good evening. I'd like to call to order the September 9th special meeting of the Collier County Board of Commissioners. On this evening's agenda, it's a pleasure to have Father Joseph Sterns from St. William's Catholic Church here with us to offer an invocation, and we'll follow that with the pledge of allegiance. Father Sterns? REVEREND STERNS: Let us pray. Lord, our God, look with love on the people of this community and keep them safe in your service. Guide all who are gathered here and help them work together for the good of all. Bless their plans and deliberations, and bring them success. Be with us always, for we place our lives in your hands. Now and always and forever, amen. (The pledge of allegiance was recited in unison.) CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: I'd like to thank everyone for taking the time to be here this evening. I do want to pass on -- I received a note from Commissioner Constantine, who asked me to share his apologies with the commissioners here present and the residents of Pelican Bay. Unexpected circumstances have resulted in his absence from tonight's meeting. We hope everything's okay. But he just wanted me to express to you his apologies for that, and he remains ready to assist the residents of Pelican Bay at any time. And I wanted to make sure that you were aware of that. Mr. Fernandez, do we have any changes to the agenda as presented? MR. FERNANDEZ: None that I'm aware of, Mr. Chairman. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: The one point I noticed is there is not a particular indication of where public comment will be, and I do know we will have some folks that want to speak on the budget. I assume that will be after 3(B), which is the recommendation, or should it occur between the first two? MR. WARD: It should occur -- you have two public hearings: One is for the consideration of the budget and the second is the resolution finalizing non-ad valorem assessments, so you can do it at both points. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Okay, we'll do that. And without further ado, we'll go to the presentation of fiscal year 1998 Pelican Bay services division budget. I can't hear. Can you folks hear okay? AUDIENCE MEMBERS: Not very well. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Okay, I think we're going to have to lean into them. Is that better? Okay, thank you. Mr. Ward? MR. WARD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First I'd like to welcome the Board of County Commissioners to Pelican Bay this evening for your annual public hearing for the consideration of the Pelican Bay services division budget for fiscal year 1998, and for the consideration of the resolution adopting the non-ad valorem assessments, such that we will be able to operate this division for 1998. I'm just going to take a minute or two and go through with you the proposed budget for fiscal year 1998, and essentially the impact of that budget financially on the residents of Pelican Bay. The division currently provides a number of services to all residents of Pelican Bay, and we levy both non-ad valorem assessments and ad valorem taxes here in Pelican Bay for the provision of those services. Generally speaking, what we commonly refer to as our Clam Bay restoration, our uninsured assets restoration, community beautification and water management, those services are provided to the residents of Pelican Bay on a non-ad valorem assessment basis. That means each resident of Pelican Bay will pay a per unit charge to the Pelican Bay services division for the provision of those services. And both for street lighting and security operations -- and security operations are essentially the provision of providing Collier County sheriff's patrols here within this community on a 24-hour per day basis, 365 days per year. Those are paid for by the community as a part of the ad valorem taxes that each resident pays and which is included on the tax bill that they receive in November from the Collier County tax collector's office. The budget for fiscal year 1998 is the culmination of a number of months' worth of work by the staff of Pelican Bay services division, and by the advisory board of Pelican Bay for this community. And essentially, it has been codified into an assessment per unit of 283.58 per single-family residential unit here at Pelican Bay for the services that I identified for you as non-ad valorem assessments. That does include, for purposes of this assessment, the funding necessary to handle the restoration of the Clam Bay system, which has been a significant issue for this community for the last few years, and which we hope will culminate in the issuance of permits not too far in the distant future, and will allow us to proceed forward towards the restoration efforts this coming winter. The ad valorem assessments for both street lighting and security operations -- let me go back one second. That assessment rate is about $20 per unit per year higher than what it was in the prior year, primarily related to some increases in operating costs that we have had during the year, and some of which is related to the fact that we charge on what we call an equivalent residential unit basis. And as units are developed within Pelican Bay, the number of units that are available for assessment actually decreased because a parcel of land that is in an undeveloped state gets charged as if it can build a full planned unit development density. And that is generally higher than what actually transpires when a developer comes in and puts a building on this property. So as the units go down, we have some shift in the assessment upwards to account for that -- those lower number of units that are available. In any event, the current assessment rate, as I indicated earlier, is 283.58. For purposes of your ad valorem tax rates, the millage rate that everyone was sent trim notifications for was .2768 mills. That means if you live in a home in Pelican Bay that has a taxable value of $200,000, you will pay $55 for both your street lighting and security operations to the Pelican Bay services division. And you can do the division off that two hundred thousand dollar number in terms of determining what your assessment will be. We have many homes in Pelican Bay that are in the million dollar range, for example, and if you have a home that has a taxable value of a million dollars, your ad valorem taxes will be $277 to the Pelican Bay services division for street lighting and security operations. With that, I'll stop at this point and answer any questions that the board may have. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: For clarity sake, Mr. Ward, again, the two items that are subject to an ad valorem are the street lighting and security operations? MR. WARD: Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: And the balance is subject to the equivalent residential unit assessment? MR. WARD: Yes, sir. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Questions of Mr. Ward on the budget? COMMISSIONER NORRIS: Mr. Ward, on page G2, under the revenue side of the column on the far right is a percent change, I assume, it appears to be, rather than as noted on the top of that column which says percent of total dollar budget. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Are you referring to 17.3 percent? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Yeah, net. The bottom half of the page. COMMISSIONER NORRIS: Under the revenue section it seems to be just change instead -- MR. WARD: It looks like a percent change number to me. COMHISSIONER NORRIS: Okay, that's fine. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: I guess having revenue 17 percent of your total budget would not be a good thing. MR. WARD: No, it would not. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Can you summarize for me the -- and I can see them in the percent of total budget. I don't know if everyone here has taken the time to weed through the budget. But really, the big hits and misses in the budget, what has caused an increase this year predominantly, and where does that fall, on the ad valorem side or on the assessment side? MR. WARD: Well, in terms of the street lighting and security operations, the ad valorem rate is actually five and a half percent lower than what it was in the prior year. The total budget has increased slightly because of operating cost increases, but we have an ad valorem tax base, a taxable value base in Pelican Bay of close to 1.8 billion dollars for fiscal year 1998, and I think it was something like 1.6 billion dollars in the prior year, so that's the primary reason for the decrease in the ad valorem rate itself. For purposes of the non-ad valorem assessments, last year about three dollars of that is accounted for the Clam Bay restoration funds. We assessed the units about $85 per unit per year. This year it's about $88 per unit per year. The balance of that is essentially in operating cost increases of no particular significance within the budget, just throughout the budget you'll see small changes for personnel services and benefits and other associated costs associated with this budget. And as I said earlier, of the total increase, which is about $20.83, about $2 of that is related to the number of equivalent residential units that are available in the system, so -- CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Any further questions of Mr. Ward at this time? (No response.) I think it would be appropriate at this time on this part of the budget to go to any public comment. Mr. Fernandez, I believe we did -- did we go through the process of speaker slips? MR. FERNANDEZ: Yes, we have them. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Because of the size of the group, it's probably not necessary to fill out speaker slips. What I might ask is if you have comments or questions on this part of the budget, if you would just use this microphone to my left or to your right, please step forward one at a time, and let's see if there are any questions that we need to address. MR. FERNANDEZ: We do have two speakers who have signed up to speak, Mr. Chairman, if you'd like to take them. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Let's call those two first, and after that, we'll just take whoever feels the need. MR. FERNANDEZ: First is Len Thornton, and then second is Allan Grossman. MR. THORNTON: I wanted to speak on the non-ad valorem aspects. Is now the appropriate time? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Good time. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: I've just been notified that actually for the record we do need speaker slips filled out, so Mr. Smykowski, if you could put those on the table here, if you would like to speak, please step forward and get a speaker slip and fill it out. I apologize, Mr. Thornton, go ahead. MR. THORNTON: Mr. Chairman, commissioners, members of the audience, my name is Len Thornton and I'm a resident of Pelican Bay, San Moreno. Now, the issue I'd like to speak to is the non-ad valorem assessment versus ad valorem taxes. I have two problems that I would submit to you about that. Number one, the non-ad valorem assessment is not fair and equitable. A study done by one of the residents in this community -- can you hear me -- indicated that if we switch from non-ad valorem assessments to ad valorem tax, 70 to 80 percent of the property owners in Pelican Bay would see the amount of cost to them lowered. A very small minority of the property owners in Pelican Bay would see it increase. In addition, the tax would be deductible, so there would be a further saving on the part of most of the residents -- most of the property owners in Pelican Bay, including the businesses. The second problem I have is how this is presented. The general rule in taxation, the general rule in how you share costs for government services, is ad valorem. That is the fair and equitable way to do it in the State of Florida and indeed in Collier County. It's done the overwhelming majority of the time. But the state law does provide for an exception, and the exception is you can do it on a non-ad valorem assessment basis. But that's an exception. So what you should start with is let's have an ad valorem tax, and if someone says no, let's go to a non-ad valorem assessment, then they ought to have to come here and give the reasons for it. I've never heard a good reason for it. There may have been in the beginning of Pelican Bay many years ago. So I don't think, for example, that you have in front of you now facts which would show you the comparative advantages or disadvantages of non-ad valorem versus ad valorem tax. You don't have that in the record, and I think you need that as a county commission. So with that in mind, I'd like to sit down and have whoever give the reasons why it's necessary to have a non-ad valorem assessment. And I'd like to have some time later, if you would allow me to, to answer those reasons. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: It's typically not protocol to have a rebuttal as if it were -- this were a court of law. I think that could drag on and end up in a debate situation, which is not the purpose of this evening's meeting. I do have a couple of questions for you, though. When you moved into Pelican Bay, was there any indication or any indication you know of that stated that at some point this would be changed from an assessment to an ad valorem? Is there anything you have seen in your review that has shown that that was a possibility or an eventuality down the road? Because I'm not aware of any, I'm just curious if you've come across that. MR. THORNTON: Actually, I think the county commission itself indicated -- I think it was in 1991 -- that there may come a time when the assessment system would be replaced by an ad valorem tax. I'm quite sure that that is on the record as a part of the county commission. I personally don't remember. I personally don't even remember being told there was going to be an assessment. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: That's not unusual. The reason I asked is, you and I discussed this last year about the same time, and I still wrestle with the one point that concerns me and that is this type of assessment has been in place since Pelican Bay more or less began. And when you buy into a real estate community or a real estate development with known quantities and known assessments, to 15 or 20 years later change that methodology is I think questionable at the outset. I think people bought into something that they knew about, and if we're going to change it later -- I understand your point that 70 to 80 percent would see a reduction. What that means is 20 to 30 percent would see a tremendous increase in order to fund an 80 percent reduction. MR. THORNTON: Not necessarily. Yes, some very affluent residents will see a big influence, but not as much as you would expect, because the property values total in Pelican Bay continue to go up, and it is deductible on your taxes. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Mr. Chairman? CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Yes? COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: What I recall from last year -- and maybe Mr. Ward could explain it to us again. But what I recall from last year is that the basis for a majority of the costs in Pelican Bay being borne on a flat fee methodology as opposed to ad valorem was because the benefit was received on a more even basis, that the benefit received bore little to no relationship to the value of the property that would otherwise be assessed based on its property value. Do I remember that right, Mr. Ward? Is that -- MR. WARD: Exactly correct, yes, ma'am. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Can you -- MR. WARD: Sure. The -- let me just go back a second. The issue has come up every year at the Board of County Commissioners' meeting here annually, and every year the advisory board goes through a rather elaborate process of evaluating whether to utilize a non-ad valorem assessment or an ad valorem tax. And there are pros and cons to which way you want to go. And I think Commissioner Hancock hit the nail right on the head. If you see an 80 percent or 70 percent reduction in some people's assessment, the other 20 or 30 percent are going to see a substantial hit, because you're essentially shifting the burden, the payment, onto users who are at the more upper end of that scale. At Pelican Bay, the issue really is that you have homes whose value are 100 or $150,000, and you've got homes whose values are in the six and seven million dollar range. And when you have those kinds of disparities in the prices of the real estate here in this community, then it has a significant impact when you go to an ad valorem tax for the kinds of services. But more importantly, as Commissioner Mac'Kie has indicated to you, the methodology that we use to establish essentially a maintenance assessment for this property was based upon the value you receive from the imposition for the services that are provided to you. And it's very hard to differentiate between a condominium project who has a value of 150,000 or $200,000 and a condominium project or condominium who has a six million dollar value. They get the same benefit from the landscaping program and from the water management system and those kinds of facilities, which are a majority of the costs in this project. That debate goes on every year within the advisory committee. They did have the debate this year and they chose to continue with the use or to recommend that you continue with the use of a non-ad valorem assessment, and that is what is before you today is that that recommendation has been codified essentially in your budget and in these resolutions that you have before you. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: My thoughts on that is that while it would be extremely politically popular to make 70 to 80 percent of the people in Pelican Bay happy, it wouldn't be the fair thing to do based on the benefit received. And as a result of that, I'm going to support staying with the recommendation of the committee and that is stay with the flat fee assessments. MR. THORNTON: Commissioner, can I speak to that? CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Well, let me -- there are some questions up here, Mr. Thornton, and then we'll go to that. COHMISSIONER NORRIS: This argument really goes back to the age-old argument of whether you're going to ask each resident to share equally in the cost of those services which are divided equally to all residents, or whether you're simply going to soak the rich. To put it down into a nutshell, that's the way that discussion goes. But what I need to take issue with Mr. Thornton about is the statement that non-ad valorem assessments are not widely used in Collier County. They're very widely used. You'll find them very prevalent in our utility operations, for example. Non-ad valorem assessments, sewer assessments are widely used, and your neighbor to the north up here, Naples Park, just had a non-ad valorem assessment for their drainage program that was recently installed. And we could sit here and have Mr. Smykowski list probably 100 others, if he wanted to. So to say that they're not widely used and they're an exception is probably not as accurate a statement as it could be. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Mr. Thornton, I believe you wanted to respond to something Commissioner Hac'Kie had said. MR. THORNTON: Oh, yes. As to the benefit, Pelican Bay is a wonderful place, a beautiful community, very well known. If we continue to make it beautiful and make it nice, a million dollar house is going to appreciate ten percent a year, and the two hundred thousand dollar condominium is going to appreciate ten percent a year. It's going to be an equal benefit. The more money you have, the more affluent your house, the more you are going to benefit. Let me suggest this to you: It might even benefit more. For example, the Clam Bay restoration project is included in the non-ad valorem assessment. Now, how much more valuable are the high-rises, very expensive high-rises, along the mangroves and the houses along the Strand, costing somewhat less than the Louisiana Purchase. COHMISSIONER HAC'KIE: Only slightly. MR. THORNTON: And how much more are they going to benefit rather than the retired widow in a two-bedroom condominium on U.S. 417 I submit to you that they have a much bigger stake in this than is immediately obvious. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: I think you've made a point with the Clam Bay restoration. And I will tell you to the north of Naples Park, when we did the drainage system, those who lived immediately abutting the swale that was being improved, that went from a dirty ditch to a true swale, paid more than those who lived away from it. And that's the idea of a benefit unit is that you can tailor the charges to those who benefit more versus those who benefit less. However, when this was going through the MSTUBU, that recommendation either wasn't made or wasn't acted upon, and I don't know which, in the recommendation. So I understand your point there, and I don't think there's a lot of argument that that's not the case, that someone who immediately overlooks that derives more benefit than someone who doesn't. However, since the community has assets that are dependent upon the access to the beach, I think that's where the rest of the community gets drawn in on a little more even keel. The difference between saying any home in Pelican Bay, by purchasing that, you have the right to access the beach through these boardwalk systems, and the fact that those boardwalk systems are either in a healthy mangrove or a swamp pit has an extreme impact on the value of any home in Pelican Bay. So the tie may not be as -- I mean, the difference may not be as wide as you have indicated, but yes, I think there is a difference there. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: And there's also the bottom line, as I understand it, it's part of the functioning of a water management system that does benefit the entire community, regardless. MR. WARD: I think with respect to Clam Bay, I could literally make the opposite argument that in terms of whether -- of the benefit unit. We have homes in Pelican Bay that -- single-family homes in Pelican Bay that essentially front U.S. 41 and those single-family areas that are worth six, seven, eight, $900,000. We have condominiums along Bay Colony area and the beach area in Pelican Bay in the same price level. So, I mean, the differential in the ad valorem, using an ad valorem versus a non-ad valorem assessment for Clam Bay, I -- you know, for purposes of that argument, I think you can literally flip the argument and make it both ways. The key to the benefit assessment is what are the values in terms of the kinds of improvements and the kinds of services that you are providing to this community, and how do they establish a relationship to that level of service? For Clam Bay, for example, we went through a pretty long discussion at the advisory board level as to primarily recreational benefits that you get in Clam Bay from having that asset available to you. That's why this community took a very aggressive approach to funding the restoration efforts and why it is available to all residents of Pelican Bay. There's no question that if you live in a high-rise along Pelican Bay Boulevard or Bay Colony you get to see it, so it has a little bit different approach. But the functionality of the system itself is really based, for purposes of this assessment, on the recreational elements that are provided to all of the residents of Pelican Bay uniformly and consistently through this community. So that's why we choose to use this same ERU methodology for purposes of Clam Bay that they chose to use for the balance of the other kinds of services that were provided. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Let me ask, Mr. Ward, of all the members that sit on the MSTUBU, how many live directly on Clam Bay? MR. WARD: I actually have no idea. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Most of them that I know don't -- MR. WARD: Don't. I think that -- CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: -- so I wanted to eliminate that as a suspicion for why that recommendation was made. MR. WARD: Yeah, most of them do not. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Are there any other questions for Mr. Thornton? COMMISSIONER NORRIS: No. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: No. MR. THORNTON: I would just say, as an alternate suggestion, I would submit that the board really needs a study, something to show them what the various advantages and disadvantages are; how this tax or assessment impacts on particular residents. And I would suggest -- it might be too late to do it this year, but that you would consider making such a study so that any individual here would know, you know, if you have an ad valorem tax, they will pay X dollars, if they pay a non-ad valorem assessment, it will be X more dollars, plus it will not be deductible. Just where that burden falls I think is a factual matter that this board needs, and this board cannot delegate to someone like the MSTBU, that this board needs itself. Thank you for listening. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Thank you, Mr. Thornton. MR. WARD: Just one final comment for the board. That issue actually has been done two years in a row. I'm sure most of you-all know Russ March, who has been on our board for a number of years, who is, I believe, a proponent of the use of ad valorem tax, and he's done quite extensive work with respect to that information. It has been reviewed extensively at the MSTBU advisory board level, it's codified in our minutes, and has been sent to the Board of County Commissioners for the last few years. So I think the basic premise that the advisory board has used is what is the most fair and equitable way in order to provide the service and the cost of those services to the residential community. And I think they've chosen consistently for years now to recommend to you the non-ad valorem assessment. And I would encourage you to continue looking to your advisory board for that kind of guidance. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Thank you. Mr. Fernandez, do we have another registered speaker? MR. FERNANDEZ: Yes. Our next speaker is Allan Grossman. MR. GROSSMAN: You've covered it all, as far as I can see. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Thank you, Mr. Grossman. Do we have any other registered speakers? MR. FERNANDEZ: No. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Is there anyone in the audience that would like to speak on the matters of this budget that has not registered? Item #3B RESOLUTION 97-355, APPROVING THE SPECIAL ASSESSMENT ROLL AND LEVYING THE SPECIAL ASSESSMENT AGAINST THE BENEFITED PROPERTIES WITHIN THE PELICAN BAY MUNICIPAL SERVICE TAXING AND BENEFIT UNIT - ADOPTED Seeing none, that concludes the presentation of the budget. I believe no action is required on that. However, on item 3(B), which is a recommendation the board of county commissioners adopt a resolution approving a special assessment roll and levying the special assessment against the benefitted properties within the Pelican Bay municipal service taxing and benefit unit. COMHISSIONER MAC'KIE: Motion to approve. COHMISSIONER NORRIS: Second. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: We have a motion and second. Is there a discussion on the motion? COHMISSIONER NORRIS: There's no public speakers. This is the same issue, right? MR. WARD: This is the same issue, yes. COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Same issue. COMMISSIONER NORRIS: I mean, there's no one that wants to speak on whether we're going to adopt the resolution or not. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: I just wanted to make sure that everyone who wishes, to get the opportunity -- COMMISSIONER NORRIS: Right. That's another way of saying has everyone -- COMMISSIONER MAC'KIE: Said their piece. COMMISSIONER NORRIS: -- that wishes to speak had their opportunity to do so. Okay. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: There's a motion and second on the floor. Is there any discussion on the motion? (No response.) Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Opposed? (No response.) Motion carries four-zero. We're at that number four item which I read says adjourned. I do want to -- Mr. Thornton, again, you've brought up an issue that I'll get to deal with over the next couple of months. We'll have some discussions with you and some other people about that to determine if there is a role for this board in that, and I'll be glad to work with you on it. MR. WARD: Commissioner, I just have one final comment. I have put in the record the two letters that we received from the residents relative to the assessment proceeding. CHAIRMAN HANCOCK: Okay. Thank you. And with no further business, we'll adjourn. There being no further business for the good of the County· the meeting was adjourned by order of the Chair at 6:35 p.m. BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS BOARD OF ZONING APPEALS/EX OFFICIO GOVERNING BOARD(S) OF SPECIAL DISTRICTS UNDER ITS CONTROL ATTEST: DWIGHT E. BROCK, CLERK TIMOTHY L. HANCOCK, CHAIRMAN These minutes approved by the Board on presented or as corrected · as TRANSCRIPT PREPARED ON BEHALF OF GREGORY COURT REPORTING SERVICE, INC. BY CHERIE LEONE, RPR