- April 20, 2024
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Palm Coast needs major upgrades at its public works facility, but it will not implement an electric public service tax to get them, the City Council decided in a workshop Jan. 29.
"We’ve got to figure some creative way of finding the funding, but I don’t want to hear 'FP&L,'" Councilman Jack Howell said at the workshop.
The city has been hoping to upgrade the city public works facility off U.S. 1 for more than two years, and council members say some of the conditions there are dangerous —including standing water that seeps inside the building after major rains. But a proposal to add an electric tax to pay for the renovation generated pushback from residents when it was proposed last year. Now, council members are looking at how they can use the revenue sources the city already has, and maybe some grant money or short-term borrowing, to collect the $21 million that city officials believe the construction will cost.
Councilman Eddie Branquinho recently spent about five hours at the facility, and found the need urgent, he said.
“And believe it or not, I was scared. I was scared," Branquinho said. "It’s inhumane how some of these people work."
After recent rain, Public Works Director Nestor Abreu said, water seeped into the main building from the east side.
Mayor Milissa Holland said the city needs to move forward on the issue.
"We cannot kick this can down the road," she said. "It’s one of our largest departments that maintains so much of our infrastructure, as well as our fleet." She added that after major storms and hurricanes, it's public works employees who are out on the roads with first responders, cutting downed trees out of the way so that roads can be reopened and electricity restored. "But they go back to this facility, and they’re sitting in a wet building," she said.
There are three options for building the facility, interim City Manager Beau Falgout and Construction Manager Carl Cote explained to the council.
The city could do it all in one phase, using debt funding. That would require coming up with a new revenue source to support the debt funding. Or, the city could divide the project into two phases, with the first one debt funded and the second pay-as-you-go. That would also require a new revenue source for the debt-funding phase. The third option would also divide the project into two phases, but would make each phase pay-as-you-go, with no debt funding.
Dividing the project into phases would add an estimated 15% to the total project cost, according to a city staff presentation.
Still, council members liked the third option, which city staff members called "Option C."
Branquinho suggested that the city seek alternative funding options to move forward with the two-phase, pay-as-you-go Option C, and implement some quick changes in the meantime to fix the most serious problems at the facility.
Doing that would mean putting off planned work on other projects, including the Long Creek Nature Preserve, Graham Swamp Trail extension, Quail Hollow Neighborhood Park, Northeast Corridor Trailhead and trails and the Matanzas Woods/Indian Trails Neighborhood Park.
The city can only bond money against certain sources, and those sources do not include sales taxes or property taxes. But it could borrow against its stormwater fee revenue, city staff members said.
Holland said that Pasco County had managed to get FEMA grant money for one of its facilities. Palm Coast should look into potential grants, she said. She also suggested that the city consider consider combining its public works division with its stormwater division so that stormwater money could be used for a joint public works/stormwater facility.
Falgout said he understood "loud and clear" that the council preferred Option C and wanted everything possible done to accelerate the improvements. He said he would direct staff to prepare more information on funding options.
