Summary The City provides water and wastewater utility services throughout its corporate limits. The City Commission approved the creation of infrastructure improvement areas on Sept. 24, 2018, including the Alachua East Wastewater Collection Infrastructure Improvement Area, the Alachua West Wastewater Collection Infrastructure Improvement Area and the Alachua West Water Distribution Infrastructure Improvement Area.
The creation of these areas is beneficial for economic development to occur in an organized, planned and cost-effective manner via master planning. By implementing a master planning approach, the City is able to ensure infrastructure improvements are made in a manner consistent with this purpose. Without a master planning approach, infrastructure development would occur in a piecemeal manner, which is not in the best interest of the City.
Ordinance 19-24 furthers this goal with the creation of the Alachua East Water Infrastructure Improvement Area. The Area is located north of U.S. Hwy 441 and South of CSX Railroard near NW 89th Street. The City has water service that terminates on the east side of NW 89th Street.
Ordinance 19-24 establishes that infrastructure improvements be paid for by developments or initially funded by the City and reimbursed by developments and users. The Area being created by Ordinance 19-24 authorizes the City to initially fund the improvements and be reimbursed by developments through infrastructure improvement area fees specific to the Area.
Infrastructure improvement area fees are broken into two (2) categories - those for non-residential establishments and those for residential establishments. Fees for non-residential establishments are based on the square footage of the gross building area that will connect to the City infrastructure. Fees for residential establishments are based on a flat amount per residential unit that will connect to the City infrastructure.
The fees for the Area have been developed based on the estimated total costs to complete construction of the improvements established in the master plan for the Area, factoring the anticipated future development and water connections in the Area.
Ordinance 19-24 does not authorize specific allocation of funds for any infrastructure improvements. Such allocation requires authorization by the City Commission through its annual budget adoption or specific City Commission action. |