Commissioners Propose Cuts and New Spending Ahead of Budget Vote
The first vote on the total $247 million budget is scheduled for Wednesday
Sept. 4, 2026
By Beth Kassab
In response to political pressure from state government to reduce expenditures, the Winter Park City Commission appears poised to spend less money maintaining its tree canopy as well as on code enforcement and parks programs and reduce a proposed increase to the library. But it is considering a new $45,000 payout to a local nonprofit called Men of Integrity that aims to mentor youth.
The commission is also in favor of raising more revenue for the city by adding red light cameras, starting a new program to charge non-residents for parking at the dog park at Lake Baldwin and Dinky Dock and charge credit card convenience fees on transactions with the city based on discussion at a recent work session.
The $247 million all-funds budget will be heard at the next commission meeting on Wednesday when the board is scheduled to take it’s first of two votes on the spending plan for the financial year that will begin Oct. 1. The city is expected to adopt the same property tax rate for the 19th consecutive year, though revenues from taxes have increased as a result of growing property values.
At least one commissioner pushed for more cuts to spending. Commissioner Warren Lindsey said he would prefer to reduce raises for city employees from 4% to 3.5%, but did not get consensus from other commissioners.
Lindsey said he viewed a smaller raise as part of the “painful reality” of local governments facing significant reductions in property tax revenue if Amendment 3 passes in November.
“My recommendation is that we do it this coming year and not wait until November,” he said. “I feel it’s the responsible thing to do.”
But Mayor Sheila DeCiccio and others said they didn’t feel comfortable with reducing staff raises and pointed to an ongoing hiring freeze that will help conserve funds.
The group agreed to keep open a vacant code enforcement position ($75,000), freeze two vacant fire positions ($200,000) and reduce winter hours at city pools, which would reduce part-time parks staff ($100,000).
Commissioners said they would review the open positions mid-year and determine if there was a need to add any of them back into the budget.
In addition, the city appears poised to cut back significantly on its tree program by removing from the budget a vacant tree specialist position ($73,680); axing the vacant tree permitting position ($60,000) and cutting a watering truck as well as new tree plantings (approximately $270,000).
City Manager Randy Knight said the city is no longer saving many trees on private properties that owners or developers want to cut down because of changes lawmakers made to state law. It’s another example of pre-emption by state government to limit how local governments can make decisions.
While the city forestry department typically plants hundreds of trees per year on city right-of-way, the city is running out of public land for those plantings, Knight said.
Also on the chopping block is $25,000 in funding for the library, $12,000 for an appreciation event typically held for people who serve on city boards, some Halloween and Easter events put on by the parks department some postage and printed materials that go to utility bill customers.
Even with the $25,000 reduction, the Winter Park Library is still slated to receive nearly $50,000 more than last year in support from the main city budget as well as the Community Redevelopment Agency budget for a total of $2.5 million.
Each year the city spends a quarter of one percent of gross revenues in the general fund, electric utility fund and water utility fund — or about $480,0000 total — on nonprofit community groups. This year those expenditures proposed as:
$105,000 for Mead Botanical Gardens, a $3,000 increase over last year
$99,900 for the Winter Park Historical Association, also about a $3,0000 increase
$43,800 for Winter Park Day Nursery, a $1,300 increase
$20,000 for United Arts representing no change from last year
$45,000 for Men of Integrity, which had not received any funding since $18,000 two years ago
Men of Integrity is a nonprofit that operates out of the Winter Park Community Center and serves about 24 boys, including 10 in high school and 14 under the age of 12, said Antwon Carter, the group’s leader. Many of the kids attend Winter Park schools but some travel from outside the city to attend the weekly program.
He wrote to the city in August and asked for the money to support his mentoring program that provides help with college readiness, STEM activities, financial literacy, fieldtrips and a hot meal during weekly meetings among other services.
An administrator for the program provided the Voice with a copy of Men of Integrity’s most recent tax filing that show’s the group’s revenues are typically less than $50,000.
The group said it mostly relies on volunteers and out-of-pocket expenditures by Carter.
“This mission is also deeply personal to me,” Carter said in an email to the Voice. “I grew up in Winter Park, and I understand firsthand what can be produced when a young person is given a strong foundation. For generations, programs centered around the Winter Park Community Center have played an important role in youth development. Whether young people came directly from the surrounding neighborhood or were brought there by their parents, the Center provided a place where they could experience mentorship, structure, opportunity, and the positive influence of the broader community.”
Carter, who said he now lives in Apopka, appeared at the budget work session and told commissioners the $45,000 would provide a needed infusion of dollars to reduce the group’s need to ask for more in the future.
Some commissioners, including Lindsey and Kris Cruzada, questioned if the group should receive the full amount of its request without providing more information to the city.
But there appeared to be enough commissioners in favor of the expenditure to move it ahead to a vote on Wednesday as part of the overall budget.
The nonprofit expenditures from the CRA budget are proposed as:
$14,000 for the Enzian Theater, a $4,000 increase
$51,500 for the Heritage Center, a $1,500 increase
$44,300 for the Welbourne Day Nursery, a $1,300 increase
$50,800 for the Winter Park Playhouse, a $1,500 increase
$398,610 for the library, part of it’s overall $2.5 million in city funding
When it comes to raising more funds for the city government, red light cameras and credit card convenience fees are among the top projected generators.
Police Chief Tim Volkerson said the city is still considering where additional cameras could be placed and, if they are approved by the state, they likely would not be up and running until May or so and could generate some $750,000.
Credit card convenience fees could yield $1.2 million for the city when people buy permits, pay bills or conduct other business at City Hall.
And a pilot program to charge non-city residents to park at Dinky Dock or the dog park at Baldwin Park could bring in an estimated $100,000 or more when it begins as early as the spring.
Paid parking has long been a controversial topic in Winter Park ,which offers free parking throughout the city including along busy Park Avenue. If the pilot is successful, city officials said it could expand to other areas and, once again, be aimed at non-residents.
Blue Bamboo Looks to Lease Space to Visual Artists
The performing arts venue has hit multiple obstacles as its rent for the old city library building increases
Sept. 3, 2026
By Beth Kassab
Beset by the death of its founder last year, construction delays and increasing rent, Blue Bamboo Center for the Arts is now facing the loss of $12,900 in annual funding from the city as it presses forward with a new plan to lease space on its second floor to visual artists.
City Commissioners appeared in agreement at a budget work session last week to end its yearly contribution to Blue Bamboo, one of seven local nonprofits that has traditionally received dollars from the city in recent years.
“Why are we funding Blue Bamboo if they are paying us rent?” asked Mayor Sheila DeCiccio at the work session called for commissioners to evaluate potential cuts to the budget as financial pressure intensifies on local governments as voters prepare to vote in November on property tax reductions.
The commission is set to take its first budget vote next week.
The day before that meeting, Todd Weaver, a former city commissioner who is now vice chairman of Blue Bamboo’s board, appeared before the group to ask for a month-long extension to secure a certificate of occupancy for the second floor of the old library building that the group leases from the city.
Weaver said construction was nearly complete and the group would begin paying the new higher rent amount this month. The commission granted the extension for the group to bring the space into compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act and other city codes.
Weaver told the Voice the second floor will be partitioned into 21 visual art studios that artists can rent.
The plan comes about three months after a contentious meeting between Blue Bamboo Chairman Jeff Flowers and the City Commission in which Flowers was seeking changes to the group’s lease because, he said, he was having trouble finding an arts group that could afford the rent in the wake of the original tenant walking away and construction delays as well as the death last year of founder Chris Cortez.
The commission did not agree at the time to grant the group any rent reductions or allow it to deviate from keeping the building as an arts hub.
So far, the group has invested about $1.5 million into the building, including more than $900,000 in grants from Orange County’s Tourism Development Taxes.
The music venue on the first floor opened more than a year ago and boasts a calendar full of events most weeks from Thursday to Sunday.
Weaver said he could not speculate on when the visual artist spaces will open on the second floor.
On the Chopping Block: Police, Fire, Community Groups, Trash Collection
This week, in an email to residents, Mayor Sheila DeCiccio asked what should be cut in the city budget as a result of state-ordered reductions
Aug. 7, 2026
By Beth Kassab
After years of stripping power from locally elected mayors and commissions when it comes to everything from regulating where apartments can be built and how tall to whether cities can ban gas-powered leaf blowers or plastic straws, state leaders have reached a new level of micro-managing local governments: mandatory lists of budget fat.
Cities and counties will be required to publish those lists starting next year as a result of a new law (HB1329) signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis this summer.
But Winter Park is getting a jump on the exercise.
With potential property tax cuts looming in the form of Amendment 3 on the November ballot, city managers asked each department to lay out cuts to reduce their budgets by 10% (This exercise will be mandatory for local governments next year as a result of the new law.)
The results?
Here’s just a sample of what’s on the budget fat list in City Hall:
Eliminate a code enforcement officer position that is currently vacant ($75,000)
Eliminate funding for the Public Art Advisory Board ($15,000)
Eliminate the mailed printed version of quarterly Winter Park Update newsletter and monthly inserts in utility bills ($71,900)
Eliminate the use of accepting cash for city services like permits or other needs at the City Hall windows ($50,000)
Eliminate two vacant firefighter positions ($200,000)
Close a Fire Rescue engine company ($1.25 million)
Begin closing the library every Monday ($210,000)
Reduce garbage collection to one day per week ($300,000)
Reduce tree plantings, canopy maintenance and eliminate residential tree permits among other changes ($600,000 combined)
Eliminate the Historic Preservation Grant Program ($100,000)
Eliminate four police detectives, one traffic officer, one community service officer and two officers dedicated to homeless outreach ($1.15 million)
Eliminate body-worn cameras and live crime center for the police department ($300,000)
Reduce funding to community organizations such as the Winter Park History Museum, the Albin Polasek Museum & Sculpture Gardens, Mead Botanical Garden, Blue Bamboo and more. ($243,500)
You get the idea. And that’s not the complete list.
Also, to be clear, the spreadsheet of potential cuts provided by City Hall included about 45 items. Some of those were ways to increase revenue for the city (such as adding more red light cameras, which could result in $750,000 in new revenue). Even so, the total did not add up to $9.5 million or about 10% of the proposed budget’s nearly $95 million general fund. The proposed all-funds budget, which includes the utilities and other funds, is up to $247 million.
The Voice totaled the spreadsheet to about a $7.8 million overall reduction (including some revenue gains proposed).
“As you can see, getting to a budget cut of 10% would not be painless,” Mayor Sheila DeCiccio told the community in an email she sent out this week. “It could mean fewer police officers and detectives, longer emergency response times, reduced park maintenance, one-day a week trash collection, and fewer community programs.”
She asked residents in the email what they prefer to cut, explaining, “I’m writing this email because I believe you, our Winter Park residents, deserve to see the potential cuts that are being discussed. As always, I’m committed to full transparency.”
Winter Park staff estimates Amendment 3 would require cuts of $3.4 million in 2028 and $6.7 million in 2029. So far shy of the 10% exercise. But not far off once a few years into the new tax structure if it wins by the required 60% of voters in November.
The Voice has heard from some readers who appear to be under the impression that police and fire or other “essential services” can not be cut under Amendment 3, which would increase the homestead exemption ultimately to $250,000.
But that’s not the case. Cities and counties will still provide emergency services, to be sure, but at what level?
Florida House Republicans approved language that would ban local governments from reducing money for law enforcement, firefighters, and first responders below the level in either fiscal year 2025-26 or 2026-27, whichever was higher. But the Senate never approved that version and it died during the Legislative session.
That’s why police and sheriffs’ organizations have spoken out about the potential impact of the amendment and cuts that could result from it.
“The Florida Sheriffs Association is significantly concerned with Constitutional Amendment 3, which potentially allows Tallahassee to control your local budgets, creates longer law enforcement response times, limits communities’ abilities to provide road repairs and stormwater removal — these are a few things voters deserve to be aware of,” the organization said this week on Facebook.
And the soaring cost of police and fire service is a main driver of the growth in the budget the City Commission will consider this month.
Record-high pension costs for police officers and firefighters as well as a new labor contract with the Fire Union that included a 12% pay increase in 2026 will account for 70% of new costs in the proposed 2027 budget.
In 2021, for example, the starting salary for a Winter Park police officer was $22.84 an hour or about $48,000 a year. Today it’s $30.34 an hour or more than $63,000 a year.
Police Chief Tim Volkerson has said the increases are the result of pressure on wages from other departments who have raised pay as they have struggled to hire and retain officer.
The city has 121 full-time police staff and three part-time staff slated for 2027, up from 115 full-time staff and 13 part-time staff in 2023.
The budget for the fire department is up from $13.2 million in 2020 to a proposed nearly $19 million for next year. The department has grown from 81 full-time staff and two part-time staff in 2023 to 84 full-time staff and three part-time staff.
Translated into savings for individuals residents, homesteaded property owners would pay about $818 less per year to Winter Park. The total tax savings per year for Winter Park homeowners if the ballot measure passes would be $1,783, including the reduction paid to the city as well as the reductions in taxes paid to Orange County and St. Johns River Water Management District. (Taxes paid to schools would remain unchanged under the tax proposal on the ballot.)
The City Commission is slated to hear public input and consider portion of the budget at this meetings this month on Aug. 12 and Aug. 26 before final adoption of the budget by the end of September.
The attorney and Winter Park resident said he would like to preserve the house. The real estate agent for the sellers said the offer was too low.
July 6, 2026
By Beth Kassab
Matt Morgan, the Morgan & Morgan attorney who lives in a home on Winter Park’s Historic Register, said he made a verbal offer of $10 million last year to purchase the entire Merrywood lot and reinitiated the offer last week with, he said, the intention of preserving the nearly 90-year-old estate that is significant because of its age and as the largest and most ornate home built by architect James Gamble Rogers II.
Mick Night, the real estate agent handling the transaction, said the sellers considered Morgan’s offer to be too low. He said he didn’t include the information in his discussion with the commission because he never had a conversation with Morgan about saving Merrywood.
“There was never a discussion with Matt about preserving the house a year ago,” Night said. “His offer was for the land.”
Morgan agreed that such a discussion did not take place. He added that his offer at the time was not contingent on a lot split and that he is interested in seeing the home maintained.
Lakefront lot splits are generally prohibited by Winter Park, which is why the amendment to the comprehensive plan is required. The change requires a second vote after the state takes 45 to 60 days to review the amendment, likely landing the next time the City Commission considers the matter sometime in August.
A greenlight for the lot split would pave the way for the old house to be demolished — a demolition permit is already active and set to expire Aug. 31 — and two new lakefront homes to be built in its place.
“They [the City Commission] heard there’s no other options … yes there is,” Morgan told the Voice after reading news stories about the vote. “If I see a bulldozer pull up to that house and I didn’t say something, it would bother me.”
Commissioners were told that more than 100 people toured Merrywood and not a single person was willing to purchase and preserve the home because it was too expensive, required too much work or both. Commissioners heard about the attempts to market and sell the estate from one of the sellers as well as the prospective buyer who has the property under a contract that is contingent on the lot split receiving final approval and Night, the Sotheby’s real estate agent who represents them both.
Morgan walked through the home with Night nearly a year ago in early August just as the property became available. Morgan said that a short time later he sent Night a voice memorandum communicating the $10 million offer that he says was not contingent on a lot split. By the time Morgan heard back from Night, he said it was early September and Night told him that that the property went under contract shortly after Morgan toured the estate.
That contract belongs to Tara Tedrow, the land use attorney with the Lowndes law firm who grew up next door to Merrywood and applied for the comprehensive plan change that would allow the lot to be split in two so that she could build a home for her family on one portion while the other is sold.
Night said $10 million was too low for Cathy and Raymond Gilmer, the siblings who inherited the property when their parents, who had lived in the home since 1977, died.
“That was not a number the Gilmers, last summer or anytime since then, have ever been open to selling the property for,” Night said.
Night declined to give the price of Tedrow’s contract on the lot. During a public city work session on June 22 he estimated the land value of the lot to be in the range of $13 million to $15 million.
Night told the City Commission that, while he never listed the home on the MLS, more than 100 people toured the property, including what he estimated to be 15 to 20 people qualified to make such a high-dollar purchase and that none offered to preserve Merrywood.
“All left the property shaking their head, hands in their face,” Night said during a June 22 work session with the City Commission. “They just don’t see it. We haven’t had traction with one buyer.”
Two days later at the regular Commission meeting, Mayor Sheila DeCiccio asked Night: “Is there anyone interested in purchasing that home?”
He replied, “The answer is no. Not one of the viable buyers, much less anyone else, left that house and said, ‘Wow, there’s so much potential here.'”
Night told the Voice on Monday that his comments at the commission meetings intended to convey that he didn’t receive what he considered to be “bona fide offers.”
“There have been many offers,” he said, but none have been “anywhere near reality” on price.
At one point in the June 24 meeting, Tedrow suggested that the price of the Merrywood portion alone would be about $12 million if the lot was split. It’s unclear how that figure is reconciled with Night’s estimate that the land value of the entire lot is at least $13 million.
Morgan said if the city allows the lot split without assurance that the house is preserved then “the city gives everything and gets nothing in return.”
“If the city voted to allow this, they are voting to allow all residents to split lots in the future and get nothing in return,” Morgan said. “It would be one thing if there was some type of meaningful consideration for the city in exchange for the lot split, most notably, preservation of a very important historic home to the city. However, as currently contemplated, in my opinion — the buyers would likely make a meaningful profit and the people (the city) would get nothing in return.”
Morgan isn’t inexperienced when it comes to historic homes. He spent $10.5 million in 2022 for a house that sits on about 3 acres on Winter Park’s Lake Maitland, according to property appraiser records. The 1926 home was designed by Maurice Kressly, another notable local architect, and was placed on the city’s historic register in 2002 by previous owners. It is larger than Merrywood at about 10,000 square feet.
He told the Voice that his original $10 million offer for the entire Merrywood lot still stands and that he made a second $5.5 million offer on Friday to purchase a portion of the lot and preserve Merrywood.
“I think it’s important to the community that the home not be torn down,” Morgan said in a text message to Night on Friday that he shared with the Voice. “For that reason, I am offering to purchase the Merrywood estate for 5.5M. We can split the lot at 1.835 acres each parcel and the current contingency contract holders can build their home on their 1.835 acre lot. I will make a covenant to the city that I will not tear the house down … Alternatively, my offer for 10 million for the entire parcel stands.”
It would be difficult or impossible, according to documents filed with the city and public discussion, to split the lot exactly in half with a straight line from Palmer Avenue to the lake without removing a portion of the Merrywood house that was added on in the 1960s as well as a portion of the swimming pool.
Morgan said if he purchased the entire lot he would also want the ability to split it in the future, but his interest didn’t hinge on that.
“I said of course I’d love that optionality [of a lot split] if I could get it, but it’s such incredible land and such an incredible house that wasn’t a contingency for me,” Morgan said.
He agreed the home is in need of a lot of work and would be expensive to restore. He said if he was the buyer he would look to renovate Merrywood over a number of years and not right away.
The chairman of the board of Friends of Casa Feliz, a group that advocates for preservation and worked with Tedrow and Night to get the word out about the house in hopes of finding a buyer, said news of Morgan’s offer is “extraordinarily encouraging.”
“It demonstrates what many preservation advocates have said from the beginning: Merrywood can be saved, and there is a real market in Winter Park for significant historic properties,” said a statement from Chairman John Bill.
He urged the City Commission to make saving Merrywood a condition of the approval of a lot split.
“To reward the demolition of this resource, now that there is a demonstrated buyer, with a change to our comp plan without requiring designation, would be unconscionable,” the statement said.
At the end of the discussion during the June 24 commission meeting, Tedrow said the sellers were willing to wait until the next vote before they demolish the house even though they are permitted to do so anytime.
DeCiccio said the agreement would “give another 45 to 60 days for someone to come forward for that property and purchase it and designate it historic so we’re buying more time.”
It remains to be seen if Morgan’s offer will be enough, if another buyer will step forward or if Merrywood will be the latest Gamble Rogers house to be reduced to photographs in an archive.
Night and Morgan are planning to meet to discuss the property.
The nonprofit music venue did not receive the assurances it was seeking from the City Commission that there was room to renegotiate the lease for the old library building
June 25, 2026
By Beth Kassab
No clear resolution emerged Thursday from a contentious meeting over the future of the Blue Bamboo, which was seeking a rent reduction or some other accommodations from the city government to continue operating in the old library building.
But none of the five commissioners expressed support in the work session for changing the terms of the Blue Bamboo’s lease, though Commissioner Elizabeth Ingram suggested handing the lease to another arts organization that could perhaps sublease space to the nonprofit music venue.
At issue, is the Blue Bamboo’s ability to meet its lease obligation when the rent is scheduled to double in August without subleasing the second and third floors.
Blue Bamboo Director Jeff Flowers said no arts organizations can afford the necessary rent on those floors and that he’s also been hampered by construction delays. He said he wants the flexibility to divert from the original vision of transforming the building into an arts hub and, instead, potentially lease space to non-arts nonprofits or commercial businesses.
Mayor Sheila DeCiccio quickly countered that she’s heard from a number of arts groups and the problem is not that they can’t afford the rent, but that they can’t work with Flowers and other leadership at the Blue Bamboo.
“We have letters from people who said they could not deal with you,” DeCiccio said, noting that Flowers and Blue Bamboo Founder Chris Cortez dictated the amount of the rent and other terms and were made aware of issues in the building that would need to be addressed during construction.
“You came to the commission with the rent figures,” DeCiccio said to Flowers. “We didn’t fight you on that. You gave us those.”
Flowers said the assertion that other arts leaders were unable to work with him on lease terms is false.
But Theresa Smith-Levin stood up to talk about why Central Florida Vocal Arts walked away from dealing with the Blue Bamboo nearly a year ago after working with the organization for more than a year to secure the city lease as well as a grant from Orange County funded by hotel hotel tax money.
She said she was shocked to read in Flowers’ recent memo to the commission that CFVA “lacked the financial capacity” to meet the lease.
She pointed to her organization’s tax return that showed stronger financial growth and capacity than the Blue Bamboo.
Smith-Levin said her group had no problem assuming half the rent or about $11,000 per month.
What she said she was unwilling to do was accept what she called a “bait and switch” of terms such as restricting CFVA’s operating hours to only before 5 p.m. and capacity limitations. She said the terms were unworkable for an arts organization that relies on evenings to host rehearsals and provide lessons for students.
She said the terms were in “direct contradiction” to the conversations she had with Cortez, who died of brain cancer last year just months after she walked away from the deal.
Flowers said he was “misrepresented” and asserted their disagreement actually hinged on whether CFVA could rent out space to others.
At one point, Ingram — whose own background is as an opera singer — suggested Smith-Levin’s group could take over the main lease of the building and rent space back to the Blue Bamboo so that it would not lose its investment in construction on the building.
Commissioner Warren Lindsey asked Flowers if he had a Plan B if he were unable to continue to meet the terms of the lease.
Flowers offered that he did not want to lose his organization’s more than $2 million work on the building.
“First, the plan is let’s work together and come up with a plan that works for both of us,” he said.
A number of people from the community spoke in favor of the Blue Bamboo and the opportunities it provides for younger musicians as well as the paying gigs it provides professionals.
DeCiccio, the only commissioner who voted against the lease in 2024, suggested that perhaps Flowers could attempt to secure additional grant dollars that would allow the organization to move to its own building.
Lindsey echoed that point, saying he appreciated the venue’s contribution to the arts, but that the commission needed to protect its interest in a highly-visible building.
“We have to be good stewards,” he said. “It’s a city asset.”
Blue Bamboo Seeks Rent Decrease or Other Changes to Lease
The music venue opened in the city building that was once a library last year but has failed to secure upper floor tenants to help cover rent that is scheduled to increase in August
June 22, 2026
By Beth Kassab
The Blue Bamboo will ask city commissioners this week for rent relief, changes to its lease that could allow for a private school or a commercial tenant on its upper floors or other changes that Executive Director Jeff Flowers says is necessary to sustain the group that transformed the old city library into a performing arts venue.
A City Commission work session is scheduled for Thursday afternoon to discuss a series of options proposed by Flowers.
In August, Blue Bamboo’s lease on the city-owned building is scheduled to double from $11,000 per month to $22,000 per month.
“Current earned revenue from performances and traditional nonprofit arts tenancy alone is insufficient to sustain this increase,” reads a memorandum from Flowers to the city.
A reckoning over the lease is playing out a year after the nonprofit held its first performance in the city space followed quickly by upheaval when Central Florida Vocal Arts, the original tenant slated to take the second floor and help pay the rent, walked away from the deal and then, a few months later, the death of Blue Bamboo founder Chris Cortez from brain cancer.
Since then, Flowers, a former Maitland city commissioner and Blue Bamboo board member who financed the early construction of the new venue, took over leadership of the small nonprofit and has tried to secure new tenants to occupy the second and third floors.
Flowers said the Blue Bamboo has hosted nearly 200 events so far and invested $2.3 million, including more than $1 million in grants, in renovating the building. Orange County pledged nearly $1 million in the form of a Tourist Development Tax grant toward the project.
City spokeswoman Clarissa Howard confirmed the Blue Bamboo remains current on its lease payments to date.
Any changes to future rent amounts or other changes to the lease will be a policy decision made by the Commission.
The elected officials could decide to offer the Blue Bamboo a rent reduction or changes to the lease that would make it easier for the organization to sublease out the second and third floors. Or the Commission could decide to hold to the original lease and potentially sell the building or use it for a different purpose if the Blue Bamboo can’t continue to meet the terms.
The arrangement is likely to be complicated by intensified budget pressures facing Winter Park and other local governments as Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Legislature are pushing voters to approve property tax cuts on the November ballot, a measure that would result in significant revenue reductions for cities and counties.
Mayor Sheila DeCiccio was the lone vote against the Blue Bamboo lease in 2024 after she questioned the group’s financial wherewithal to follow through on the terms it proposed to the city.
Cortez and Flowers assured the commission at the time that the group’s business plan was viable.
Then-Commissioner Todd Weaver championed the Blue Bamboo from the dais and joined the Blue Bamboo’s board of directors after he left office and is now listed as its vice president.
Awarding the lease for the old library to the Blue Bamboo ended the city’s years-long quest to find a use for the prominent building left vacant after the Library & Events Center opened on Morse Boulevard at the end of 2021.
On Thursday, commissioners are slated to discuss the matter but are prohibited from taking votes during a work session. The lease is likely to be up for an official vote sometime this summer.
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