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Aventura
Not So Fast
City manager recommends postponing annexation
By Randy Abraham
Aventura city administrators want to postpone a decision on
annexing the unincorporated area west of the city because of
uncertainty about the potential financial impact of recently
approved state property tax reforms.
City commissioners in September agreed to study the feasibility of
annexing an area roughly bounded by County Line Road to the north,
the Florida East Coast Railroad to the east, Interstate 95 to the
west and Northeast 191st Street. The area has about 6,680
residents, mostly in single-family homes, and includes a
commercial area along West Dixie Highway. Its tax base is about
$822 million, based on the county’s 2007 preliminary tax roll.
The study area is about half the size of the one the city first
considered annexing in 2004. That area, with about 16,000 people,
stretched all the way south to the North Miami Beach city limits.
“It’s a smaller area than we originally studied,” said Aventura
City Manager Eric Soroka, who authored the report. “We were trying
to identify a compact area to serve and focus on Ives Dairy Road.
Some areas along Miami Gardens Drive would be expensive to
service.”
However, Gloria Romero Roses, president of the Sky Lake-Highland
Lakes Area Homeowners’ Association, requested including in the
study area Ojus Elementary School, the Hillel Community Day
School, the Michael-Ann Russell Jewish Community Center, the St.
Lawrence Catholic Church and Temple Sinai.
“There’s value in these particular community assets,” she said.
Soroka’s study showed Aventura could absorb the area without
having to raise property taxes, a major concern among
commissioners who are still trying to determine the effects of a
2007 state mandate to lower property taxes and a voter-approved
Jan. 29 referendum to increase homestead property tax exemptions.
Plus, because of a long-standing Miami-Dade County policy, all
revenues from an unincorporated area’s electric franchise,
cigarette and utility taxes would continue to flow to the county,
even if the area were annexed. The county would also continue to
provide garbage collection and disposal service, and, for a
two-year transition period, police service. Planning and zoning,
parks and recreation, building permitting and other municipal
services would become the city’s responsibility upon annexation.
“Despite the marginally positive results of the study, it is
recommended that the City Commission move on this issue cautiously
in light of the property tax reform vote and falling residential
property values that could reduce projected revenue estimates and
create a financial hardship on the city,” Soroka wrote in a memo
to elected officials. “It is recommended that any action on this
matter be delayed until the end of the year to allow the effects
of pending property tax reform proposals and falling residential
property values to be studied.”
Furthermore, the city’s feasibility study surmised that the city
would receive the electric franchise, cigarette and utility taxes
from the annexed area. If the county doesn’t agree to give those
up, it could be a deal-breaker, according to Soroka.
“It is important to note that if the county is not willing to make
concessions relating to the city retaining electric franchise and
utility tax revenues, this would adversely affect the revenue
projections by $1 million. Without overcoming these obstacles,
[annexation] would not be prudent from a financial standpoint.”
Soroka said he included the disputed fees when the County
Commission said last year that it would reconsider retaining fees
from unincorporated areas. However, when the cities of Homestead
and Florida City recently proposed annexing nearby properties, the
county held to its original position, raising doubt that the city
of Aventura would ever collect those fees. “In light of the
county’s recent decisions, it doesn’t look good,” he said.
The City Commission backed off of annexation in 2004 because the
county’s stance on retaining the franchise and utility fees would
have cost the city $1.4 million and contributed to a budget
deficit of $1 million one year after annexation.
Residents of the study area considered forming their own municipal
government, but after the county created a Municipal Advisory
Committee to draw up a budget for the would-be city, county
commissioners in 2004 established a moratorium on the formation of
new cities.
The City Commission will consider Soroka’s recommendation at its 9
a.m. workshop on Thursday, March 20. |
