Ravaudage asking for $300k reimbursement from city
The mixed-use development is looking for a 50% reimbursement for improvements in newly annexed zones
Nov. 2, 2023
By Beth Kassab
The Ravaudage development on the corner of U.S. 17-92 and Lee Road is already entitled to as much as $1.2 million over 10 years in city reimbursements for road improvements and is now looking for an additional $300,000.
The new reimbursement, which will be up for consideration at next week’s City Commission meeting, is tied to improvements on sections of Lewis Drive and Bennett Avenue, which were annexed into the city in 2020 and so weren’t part of the original agreement with the developer.
Multimodal Transportation Impact Fees paid by businesses within Ravaudage is expected to raise more money than the reimbursement amount estimated at $301,327. Impact fees are paid by developers to cities or counties as part of the development approval process. The dollars are typically used to offset additional costs to local governments to be caused by the new homes or businesses such as police, fire, sewer or schools.
“It is anticipated that the planned fitness facility is likely to generate impact fees in excess of this amount,” stated a staff memo on the proposed agreement, apparently a reference to the newest type of development underway in Ravaudage.
The memo also stated that the agreement is the “final change” to the original 2017 agreement that specified up to $1.2 million in city reimbursements for road improvements at the development.
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If the city is legally obligated to reimburse then do it, if not, then don’t. Taxpayers’ money should not finance private ventures.
How much does this property generate in tax revenue?
The city subsidization of Bellow’s Ravaudage must cease already. The $1.2 million given already was a singling out of one developer. Choosing winners and losers. Ravaudage is a grossly inappropriate county-style appendage to our city. We have to live with it but we should not have to subsidize it. Where are the promised civil services- like the fire station he was supposed to add? Enuf is enuf.
Ravaudage was not a chosen winner. (Is there ever a loser in WP commercial real estate? Oh yeah, OAO, but I digress) Mr. Bellows shopped the $1,000,000+ tax generating revenue to City of WP, Maitland and Orange County. Why would WP want a Maitland/OC tax generating machine on our border with no benefit to our taxpayers? I think annexing it was a no-brainer and the amount of the latest ask is logical based on original agreement. I hope he continues redevelopment all the way to I-4. WP needs new sources of revenue if spending by this commission is going to exceed 7% per year.
Bellows was the chosen winner, not Ravaudage. Ravaudage is not a developer, it is a development. Other developers have not been so blessed with favor by other city commissions. Other developers have paid for their own infrastructure. One contrasting development example sits due east- the Whole Foods Plaza.
You’re comparing a property’s re-development that was inside WP boundaries (Whole Foods) with a property that was outside WP’s jurisdiction (Ravaudage). If WP is going to feel the effects of more development than we should have it inside our city, providing millions in property taxes over the years. As someone smarter than me wrote:
“The city commission in 2012 unanimously agreed to annex this project into Winter Park to receive the tax benefits, rather than leave this land in Unincorporated Orange County and have the impact of the approved development without the tax benefits.
Again, Ravaudage would have been developed as part of Unincorporated Orange County if Winter Park had not annexed it, and, the entitlements granted in Ravaudage by Orange County are not available anyplace else in our city.”