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Several projects will receive funding from the increase. The commission agreed to it by a 3-2 vote.
By CHRISTINA HEADRICK
© St. Petersburg Times, published November 3, 2001
CLEARWATER -- A divided City Commission voted late Thursday to more than double stormwater utility fees over a five-year period.
The initial increase would raise the fee beginning Jan. 1, from $4.54 per month to $6.13 monthly. By 2006, the stormwater charge on residents' monthly utilities bills would be $9.35.
The rate increase allows the city to finance about $72.4-million worth of projects that will reduce flooding and better cleanse water that is draining into local waterways, said Tom Miller, assistant director of engineering.
The vote for the rate increase was 3-2, with commissioners Bill Jonson and Ed Hart voting against it while other commissioners expressed strong support.
"These are ongoing, long-term problems that have plagued the city for years," said Commissioner Whitney Gray, who said she hoped the rate increase would help the city tackle the problems as quickly as possible.
Jonson, however, urged his fellow commissioners to lower the planned rate increase by budgeting $10-million in Penny for Pinellas sales tax revenues to pay for some drainage projects. The move could have reduced the total rate increase by about $1.
Originally, city voters approved spending about $15-million in Penny funds on drainage projects when they voted to extend the sales tax for another decade, but the projects were later removed from the city's Penny spending list, Jonson noted.
Margie Simmons, the city's finance director, told Jonson that funding some projects now and some later with other funding sources would be more complicated. The current plan is to use money generated by the rate increase to pay back a large loan that will fund the projects.
Simmons warned that the city's available Penny funds may decrease, too, because they depend on how much money people spend, and the economy has slumped.
Mayor Brian Aungst said that he would like to spend any unbudgeted Penny funds for things such as downtown or beach redevelopment projects.
Projects to be paid for with the additional stormwater revenues include improving drainage along Myrtle Avenue, dredging Stevenson Creek, eradicating serious flooding problems in the College Hill area in central Clearwater and restoring the east Clearwater flood plain at the Friendly Village of Kapok. That project involves purchasing the park and relocating residents there.
In addition, the fee increase pays for rising costs for city maintenance of retention ponds and ditches, the cleaning of storm pipes and street sweeping, plus two new employees who will address water quality issues and handle the finances of stormwater projects.
"These are areas that are long overdue for attention," said Commissioner Hoyt Hamilton.