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Coalition delays vote on purchase of Florida Water
By BRIDGET HALL GRUMET, Times Staff Writer TAMPA -- No one expected the largest utility sale in state history to happen overnight. In fact, it looks like the pending $520-million purchase of Florida Water Services will take at least one more month. The Florida Governmental Utility Authority, the four-county coalition angling to buy Florida Water's statewide holdings, decided Thursday to postpone the vote on the buyout until its July 18 meeting in Bartow. By then the coalition, which includes Citrus County, hopes to have more specific information from its consultant about the condition of Florida Water's 150 systems, along with the revenues and improvements expected for each system over the next five years. Those numbers will help the FGUA determine whether the $520-million purchase price is too high, a question raised by Hernando and several other counties. Bob Nabors, the FGUA attorney behind the deal, said the coalition could adjust the price if needed in hopes of showing the affected counties that the price is fair. "I think hopefully there is a light at the end of the tunnel in terms of developing a consensus among the counties," Nabors said. The FGUA, which also includes Nassau, Polk and Sarasota counties, is a vehicle to bring privately owned utilities into public ownership. The group would issue bonds to buy Florida Water. Then any county, regardless of whether it belongs to the FGUA, could take over the former Florida Water systems in its area by assuming that share of the bond debt. The purchase price is not only important to Florida Water's 260,000 customers, whose water and sewer bills would provide the revenue to pay off the bonds, but to the 27 counties that might want to take over the systems from the FGUA. Hernando County has about 35,000 customers served by the Spring Hill water and sewer systems. Citrus County has 16 water and sewer systems serving about 12,000 customers in Sugarmill Woods, Citrus Springs, Pine Ridge and other communities. Hernando County has hired its own consultant to determine the value of the Spring Hill system, which would cost $47.9-million under the FGUA deal. Bruce Snow, the attorney representing the county on utility issues, said Florida Water has cooperated lately in providing the information the consultant needs. But it is unclear whether Hernando County will have enough information from Coastal Engineering Inc., its consultant, to decide whether to support the FGUA purchase July 18. Coastal Engineering will not complete its report on the Spring Hill system until August, Snow said, although a preliminary report should be ready June 28. "It's going to depend on how much comfort Hernando County can get from the preliminary report," Snow said. "If we're not ready by July 18, that will have to be addressed at that time." The FGUA's decision Thursday signaled the third time the group has postponed a vote on the Florida Water purchase. Although they want affected counties to be comfortable with the sale, board members said they do not want the deal to linger indefinitely. "We need to come to a point in time where we're either going to do this deal or we're not -- not just keep continuing it," said Richard Wesch, Citrus County's administrator and member of the FGUA. "And it sounds to me like July will be it." -- Bridget Hall Grumet can be reached at (352) 860-7303 or bhall@sptimes.com.
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