By Bryce Abshier – Contact Bryce@VoiceofSouthMarion.com
At a recent Belleview City Commission meeting, Public Works Director Bob Titterington addressed a significant budget shortfall for a new water utilities plant. He revealed that while the city had budgeted $25 million for the project, the lowest bid received was $48,607,000.
According to officials, the higher-than-anticipated costs are due to rising prices across all categories.
Titterington expressed his desire to collaborate with the lowest bidder, to explore potential solutions. One idea he suggested was to break the project into phases to align it with the city’s budget. “It will need to be done at some point in time,” Titterington explained, noting the influx of development in South Marion County.
The Voice recently reported that Belleview will eventually provide water to over 1,600 new homes in the Baseline Road and SE 92nd Loop area.
Commissioner Mike Goldman raised concerns about the shortfall. “Should we be looking at how many undeveloped lots we have and increasing our water and sewer impact fee?” he asked. “It would seem like you would need to have major increases to come up with a $23 million shortfall.” Residential impact fees are initially paid by developers to cover the costs associated with growth and the added strain on existing community infrastructure. There is ongoing debate about who ultimately absorbs this cost: do developers bear it, or do they pass it on to homebuyers? Advocates for lower impact fees argue that high fees inhibit growth and unfairly penalize regular citizens looking to buy homes. Many local residents, however, believe that higher fees are justified, given the rapid and unmitigated growth in Marion County. They argue that the burden of covering the cost of growth should fall on those contributing to the increased infrastructure strain, rather than generational Marion County property taxpayers.
Commissioner Ron Livsey also questioned the city’s capacity to meet future demand. “If all of the developments today, that are in construction, filled up within the next year or two, do we have enough water and sewer to supply those?” he asked.
Titterington responded, “If they went in a year or two that might be a problem. The problem with wastewater or water is that it’s not something you can do overnight. This project, we’ve been working on it since I’ve been here. So we started three years ago, and then we probably have two years for construction, so it’s like a five-year period to get this done.” He further noted, “We were in good shape until the bids came in at 50 million instead of 25 million. It’s cost prohibitive right now to move forward.”
Predicting the pace at which planned developments will turn into new housing construction can be difficult. One such site approved for development has remained vacant for over a decade. Further potential delays could be caused by an economic recession. The Belleview City Commission agreed for Titterington to meet with the low bidder to explore a phased-construction approach.
