The Palm Coast City Council Tuesday approved a controversial plan to raise water and sewer rates 36 percent by October 2027 and borrow $455 million to expand the city’s sewer and freshwater capacity, comply with a state consent order forcing the city’s hand on capital improvements, and assure bond-holders that the city can soundly make good on its financial obligations.
Combining water and sewer costs, a household using 4,000 gallons of water per month would see its water and sewer bill go from $90.73 today to $123.46 in October 2027, a difference of $32.73, or $393 per year.
The two coming bond issues represent by far the largest borrowing spree in the city’s history. To put it in perspective, when the city in 2003 bought Florida Water, what became the city’s utility, in 2003, it paid $82.3 million ($143 million in today’s dollars), and took out a combined Utility System Revenue Bonds of $146.5 million ($256 million in today’s dollars). The utility fund had an outstanding debt of $114 million as of last September. The city’s total debt is at $135 million. The new bonds will vault that amount well past the half-billion mark, and depend on continued growth to ensure debt payments, making it difficult for council members to maintain anti-growth postures: bond holders will demand otherwise.
Tuesday’s 3-1 vote was the culmination of a yearlong debate about the city’s infrastructure needs that the consent order made moot, narrowing the city’s choices. Mayor Mike Norris and Council members Charles Gambaro and Ty Miller voted for the increase. Council member Theresa Pontieri voted against. The fifth seat is empty since the resignation of the ailing Ray Stevens last week.
Members of the public addressing the council were largely critical of the decision (“I was beginning to wonder if Palm Coast was turning into the Titanic,” one resident said, lambasting the city for lowering property taxes only to shift costs to fees like utilities. “I don’t need any more fees coming in the mail every month. I’ve had enough of them.”). But the extent of the criticism was less than expected: even though the item was scheduled for an evening meeting, presumably to encourage public participation, it did not draw the sort of full house and incensed response that similar proposals have in the past.
The council had its supporters, too. “It has to be fixed,” Ed Fuller, a resident with close ties to elected officials, and who frequently addresses public issues said. “No one wants a rate increase. But the question is: what happens if we don’t get a rate increase? This system is going to fail.” The pain is inevitable, and unavoidable. “It’s not to assign blame for the past but to chart our course for the future.”
Pontieri explained her dissent. “I agree with everybody up here. We need to pay for these things,” Pontieri said. “There are needs. But I also think that if we do not approve this rate increase as is, I do not think there is not a way to get this done. I don’t believe that. I think there is a way to get it done, or we can take some of these projects and prolong them, phase them out in a longer approach. I do think that there are alternatives. So while I would support a large part of what has been presented here today–as presented, I cannot.”
The revenue from the two bond issues–one to be issued this year, the other in 2028–will be used to upgrade and expand Water Water Treatment Plants 1 and 2 and expand the city’s well fields from 67 to 73, among other needs the city considers critical. “The rate is as if both bonds were adopted,” Norris said.
Norris said the city is under that consent decree from the state, but he also blamed “bad leadership” and “bad management” in the past, “but we are in this situation as a community and we have to do what’s right,” Norris said. “Our city has overpromised on water and past leadership has not kept that at the forefront of their minds.” But addressing occasional public requests for a “forensic audit” of the city’s books, he dismissed claims that the city misspent money in the past even as he suggested that the state could send auditors “to put to rest the auditing requests of our citizens.”
To Gambaro, “we can no longer admire this problem. As an army general, we have to attack it and fix it. But I will pledge to you that I will continue to fight as hard as I can with all the connections that I have to get federal funding” to offset the bond costs ahead. “It’s something that we’ve all been saddled with, but I’m prepared to move forward and get this done so we can get started to protect our water and wastewater system.”
Miller echoed Gambaro’s thoughts. “It’s been said before: nobody ever runs for office to raise your water rates. We run for office to make your pocketbook a little bit slimmer.” He said infrastructure was the main concern among residents he spoke with during his election campaign. Since then, he said, the state’s consent decree was issued. “It’s not a fun thing. Nobody’s here advocating for this because we’re trying to take money out of somebody’s pocket. We’re trying to do the right thing, or I’m trying to do the right thing, fixing this one time the right way, instead of what’s been happening in the past,” when election pressures would keep councils from voting in the necessary improvements. “In consideration of that, people have not funded the things that needed to happen the right way because they wanted to get reelected.” He added: “You have to get it done, otherwise you live in a broken home.”
Council member Theresa Pontieri described the state the city found itself in as “death by a thousand cuts,” and noted the increases in garbage and stormwater rates residents experienced in the last few years. But she was opposed to funding all $415 million through the proposed rate increase. She did not approve of the “all-or-nothing approach.”
But there was a running misconception, an unfair misconception about previous councils–that those councils sat on their hands while the water and wastewater system crumbled. That’s simply not true. In 2013, the council approved a 17.6 percent rate increase over three years on top of a 46 percent stormwater fee increase it had approved a year earlier. In 2018, the council again raised rates 20.6 percent over four years. In 2013, the council agreed to limit the rate increase by foregoing plans for a new $24 million sewer plant. But in 2015, the city borrowed $30 million to build that new plant. Water and sewer rates continued their annual increases uninterruptedly, every year.
Pontieri was correct, however, when she pointed out that a 2018 utility study did not project the needed expansion at Waste Water Treatment Plant 1. That looks like a serious strategic error in retrospect, though the city had not projected that it would experience the surge of growth it did starting right around that time. (Neither the 2018 rate study nor a 2015 management analysis of the city’s wastewater system pointed to a needed expansion at WWTP 1. The 2015 study called for a second sewer plant.)
It is also true that every time the council increased rates those previous times, council members pledged that it was the last time such large increases were necessary. They said what Miller said Tuesday: “Getting it done now versus trying to push it later” was essential to avoid higher costs down the road.
Public criticism is closer to the mark regarding the council’s punt in 2024, when the council voted to increase water and sewer impact fees (the one-time fee developers pay to defray the “impact” of development on infrastructure) but not water and sewer rates. That precipitated the consent order from the state. But it was public opposition–the very same public that paraded before the council Tuesday evening–that pressured the council against adopting the rate increases.
See the rate breakdown and the presentation outlining needs in the document below.
THANKS ALFIN says
I liked the idea of shifting some of the fees in the monthly bill to property taxes. Wouldn’t change anything for me, but an out-of-towner who is renting a property out to a tenant who pays the utility bill, would then have to share the burden the rest of feel.
Hammock Bear says
We pay enough every month for our water and sewage . The already approved ThousandS of new homes and apartments that will begin construction should absorb the cost of this totally. The builders erred in the recent new homes drainage engineering thus the new homeowners and neighbors have a water Mess that has yet to be fixed each time we get a heavy rain. This is a Mess.
Deborah Coffey says
How’s electing all those Republicans for the past couple of decades working out for you, Palm Coasters?
Thomas Hutson says
Oh now don’t get up set just yet! Wait for the little old “1/2 cent “ sales tax for a beach with no parking or dune walk overs! But, but you can drive by and see the ocean!
Matthew T Morton says
crazy !!!! insane!!!! sickening!!
Tina Olive says
If something needs fixed as critical infrastructure for an entire city….It doesn’t matter the party incharge…..It has to be fixed…..Republicans and Democrats flush the same exact way……
Maverick says
Not only will our water/sewer rates increase, FPL just announced their future rate increases. Florida Power & Light requests rate hike across next 4 years
https://www.wptv.com/money/consumer/florida-power-light-requests-massive-rate-hike-across-next-4-years#:~:text=FPL%20tells%20WPTV%20the%20increase,to%20roughly%20%24142.37%20in%202026.
Land of no turn signals says says
Please whatever you do don’t have the developers cough up a little scratch to help off set the cost,and if you want to bring politics into it Democrat’s would likely be 3 times more.Sleepy Joe did such a great job running the country.
A resident says
Will the impact fee charged to the developers also be increased by 37%. Probably not.
Bob says
Time to get the hell out of dodge! Palm Coast sucks anymore. It turned into a giant crap hole like Orlando and Jacksonville Daytona.!!!
celia pugliese says
Thank you Vice Mayor Pontieri for being the only one dissenting vote. The deck of cards is often stack against the affected residents taxpayers while lobbying against tax or fees increases, safety, healt, preservation of value of our homes and peace and quite for a better quality of life.
I find it very much a conflict of interest though are from still lovely and caring residents, when some always stand up and take their 3 minutes to agree or applaud anything that elected or administrators decide opposite of what residents lobby or need and do it openly with justified reasons as is not expensive to them, when a spouse makes well over 100,000 a year as a City of Palm Coast departmental head, $360 a year increase easily affordable then for them not for most residents. I would say a word in their place and yes of course they have many ties to city officials. “The council had its supporters, too. “It has to be fixed,” Ed Fuller, a resident with close ties to elected officials, and who frequently addresses public issues said. “No one wants a rate increase. But the question is: what happens if we don’t get a rate increase? This system is going to fail.” The pain is inevitable, and unavoidable. “It’s not to assign blame for the past but to chart our course for the future.”
Good riddance says
I have lived here since 1997. My 1st house was $130,000 and I lived on the water with a pool and a dock. My taxes were $800 a year. Now we have horrible traffic, high taxes, high insurance costs, crime, and liberal democrat politicans who call themselves republican just so they can get into office. I have finally decided to leave Flagler County and move to Georgia where taxes are low and the people are real. Good bye and good luck. You New Yorkers and New Jersey people have ruined this place just like you ruined where you come from.
celia pugliese says
Furthermore besides Vice Mayor Pontieri our Ray Stevens would have voted with you! Too bad he is just out of his critical ill condition and Thank God upgraded to recovering. All our prayers for you Ray! You are and will be very missed in the City Council.
JimboXYZ says
“The new bonds will vault that amount well past the half-billion mark, and depend on continued growth to ensure debt payments, making it difficult for council members to maintain anti-growth postures: bond holders will demand otherwise.”
“The council had its supporters, too. “It has to be fixed,” Ed Fuller, a resident with close ties to elected officials, and who frequently addresses public issues said. “No one wants a rate increase. But the question is: what happens if we don’t get a rate increase? This system is going to fail.” The pain is inevitable, and unavoidable. “It’s not to assign blame for the past but to chart our course for the future.””
Alfinville, these are the 2025 stances of the victims of growth that was so grossly underfunded by the Federal & State that ultimately hits our bank accounts that were never funded for such growth over working careers of the retired. The next 4 years appear to be the same course & death grip of inflation of Biden-Harris, that DeSantis & Alfin were forced into that eventually mean the taxpayer picks up the tab for a lower quality of life across the board. When a politician makes bold statements that growth pays for itself, those liars are full of crap. The growth was sold as paying for itself, I knew 4 years ago they were coming back like this and extorting more money for any of it. And what will we end up with, the same water quality we always had or worse until the STF’s are upgraded & built, grid lock traffic. And all these approved residentials won’t have any occupancy to pay these higher rates & taxes. So there is plenty of blame to go around, this was forced growth that should’ve never happened. Wasn’t voted for, a flawed vision of 2050 that didn’t get to 2025 before imploding based upon lies & deceit that America, Florida, Flagler County would be any better than it ever was. The names of blame have to be said, it is their legacy. Norris inherited Alfin, and this is where we are, paying more for what we already had. I don’t know of anyone in Flagler County praising the gridlock traffic as a wonderful thing. All this inrastructure has to be maintained too. Get ready for those 2 new schools to add further to the misery of inflation, higher taxes & a crappier life in Flagler County. Currently those 2 schools are projected at $ 405 million to add to the current debt, the STF upgrades & new construction for capacity. Meanwhile roads won’t get paved, getting a pothole & micro surface makeover, in some hope that population growth will catch up and make the next rounds of inflation & taxes any more bearable. Alfin was fiscally irresponsible, Norris will use that as an excuse for inheriting Alfin’s lies & mess. The rest of us just write that check out every month to pay for the incompetence of past & failed, & I use the term with extreme sarcasm, “leadership”. That isn’t leadership, it’s incompetence. And now we have councils throughout the county meeting, freeze & roll back their wages & salaries, they need to feel the costs like anyone else does that isn’t pacing the inflation & taxation that they’ve set into motion. Tired of hearing that this area needs to attract “the best”, because with every raise, taxpayers aren’t getting the best or even better employees. Honestly, anyone with common sense can do the same job any of these “best” employees. we always seem to get the one’s that were run out of their last jobs form somewhere else. City Manager ? can’t field a candidate list worthy of filling the position, those aren’t my words, it’s just what I’m reading everytime they replace anyone.
JimboXYZ says
“Members of the public addressing the council were largely critical of the decision (“I was beginning to wonder if Palm Coast was turning into the Titanic,” one resident said, lambasting the city for lowering property taxes only to shift costs to fees like utilities. “I don’t need any more fees coming in the mail every month. I’ve had enough of them.”). But the extent of the criticism was less than expected: even though the item was scheduled for an evening meeting, presumably to encourage public participation, it did not draw the sort of full house and incensed response that similar proposals have in the past.”
Definitely the entire county is a crap show, the Titanic doesn’t even come close to an analogy. At least with the Titanic, that ship sunk and was gone. The local governments are hell bent on creating the perpetual Titanics, with no end in sight. We’re all “One of the Living” (Tina Turner), the days are coming when the living will envy the dead. Who needs any of this to ever become a nuclear holocaust/apocalypse to hate life on this miserable planet when you have politicians & governments ?
https://www.songlyrics.com/tina-turner/one-of-the-living-lyrics/
It’s the John Pitre, Overpopulation poster.
https://johnpitre.com/products/products-overpopulation-html
Joe D says
Wistful thinking to the people suggesting a FEDERAL GRANT BAILOUT !
In PRIOR Federal Administration’s, you MIGHT have gotten some SYMPATHY for our PRIOR governing bodies’ COWARDICE of not addressing these infrastructure issues in a more TIMELY MANNER , because increasing taxes and fees would not make them popular in the next election. Unfortunately, there is no more time to keep “kicking the can” of addressing crumbling infrastructure down the road! It’s got to be done NOW.
But in the current SLASH AND BURN Federal Budget cuts/Federal Employee firings at the hands of “President” Musk…you can most likely NOT depend on any FEDERAL GRANT rescue.
Remember TRUMP needs those budget cuts to pay for the tax cuts that are MOSTLY going to benefit those hard pressed millionaires and billionaires and wealthy corporations (who already pay less percentage in Federal income taxes, than the average working American…NOW).
Unfortunately the States (even the Trump loving MAGA state of DeSantisland)…and going to be left out on their own! At LEAST FOR THE NEXT 4 years!
Be CAREFUL what you VOTE for…you just might GET IT!
John M Costa says
So glad I am getting out just in time, sold my house and retiring to North Carolina no more $136 monthly utility bills for minimum amount of use of water soon to add 34% to that amount , my qtr bill is $200 for the entire year where I am going lmao !!! Greed and over building, uncontrolled traffic congestion put the place we lived for 28 years in the rear view mirror !!! Growth obviously doesn’t pay for
Itself the way these politicians give In To every builder who don’t pay for the growth ,roads ,schools, sidewalks etc: they are gonna keep picking ur pockets till it hurts even more good luck !!!!
Endless dark money says
Isn’t the plan to crash the economy and destabilize the government so the billionaires can buy up what’s left on the cheap? Interesting how 8 people have more than 4,000,000,000 people combined but let’s cut food stamps so they can have more haha disgusting and sad.
Misappropriation of funds says
Impact fees collected worked well in this instance didn’t they ???
MITCH says
We have such short memories. The pandemic had many families empty their saving accounts to survive. Does anyone believe inflation has stopped or those saving accounts have been magically restored? State/County/City tax increases instead of spending cuts are a sure way to make sure many saving accounts will never be revived and family suffering will continue way into the future.
Skibum says
As the old saying goes, you can pay now or you can pay later. In the broader scheme of things, local government TAXES are supposed to be sufficient enough to take care of essential services, particularly critical infrastructure needs and upgrades over long-term. It should be no different for whatever taxing structure a state puts into place to cover statewide infrastructure expenditures. But I have to tell you, here in Florida, EVERYTHING appears to be done backwards or extremely insufficiently! Particularly when it comes to what tax money is spent on and how and when both local and state government addresses paying for upgrades to infrastructure. When I retired and moved here from WA state, I have sometimes honestly feel like I now live in crazytoon world run by the insane asylum gone amok! Oh, I know I am bound to start getting the idiotic replies saying if I don’t like it here why don’t I beat feet back to where I came from. I often say that in my head anyway. But here’s the reality. Where I lived in WA state, oh yeah, a “blue state”, for more than 35 years, I never, ever, ever in that entire time faced the same type of constant idiocy about annual cutting of taxes, not having enough local cops on the street or highway patrol to adequately patrol the state’s highways, crime was MUCH lower than here in FL, the amount of road raging aggressive drivers was nearly non-existent, both homeowners and auto insurance was lower than I am paying here, and during that time I never experienced such an absolute disregard for the ongoing upkeep/upgrade of critical infrastructure such as water treatment, roads and other utilities until, like here, things are nearly falling apart before fixing them AND then telling residents there is a BIG bill coming because we never planned appropriately in the first place! FL local governments are so skewed trying to enact the latest “tax cut” that both important AND critical services are constantly underfunded. Same with the state, where regulations such as the critical ones to address all of the crumbling, eroding and collapsing high-rise beach condos when the state knows full well that the private associations will do nothing unless forced to address owners paying enough annually, and then actually using those funds to keep up necessary maintenance so their building doesn’t collapse onto the sand and kill more residents like what happened in Surfside a few years ago. Nobody likes paying taxes, but damnit, they are necessary for critical and essential services, and when you live somewhere that puts tax cuts as the highest priority and doesn’t take in enough taxes on a regular basis to keep up with infrastructure maintenance and upgrades like we are seeing in Palm Coast now, this is what happens, and everyone will be seeing a huge 32+% increase in their utility bill precisely because of poor planning and not doing the proper and important work of addressing long-term needs! We didn’t pay enough before, so now everyone will be paying a LOT more to make up for it. Maybe, just maybe, people will learn from this, but since this is Flori-DUH, I have my doubts.
TjMelton says
If ever a place like this needed an office of management & budget, notwithstanding the previous administrations, going forward, how in hell does the taxpayers know that the 36% increase in water & sewage bills will satisfy mandatory requirements to keep everybody happy, and keep the retired, fixed income citizens from demanding real accountability from a critical perspective of going through lies & more lies from elected officials sworn to serve them. Talk about “of the people, for the people”.