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Wayne Saunders
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Tab 10
"We can expedite the process," Lenhadrt said, "but we still need the survey and water-quality
results."
Daily Commercial, The (Leesburg, FL)
May 1, 2003
Whoops, we're off by $244,000
Author: PETE SKIBA
Somebody moved the decimal point.
In possibly the easiest slashing of an impact fee, Clermont City Manager Wayne Saunders
made a phone call to the consultant company that set up the fee structure and found it incorrectly
placed a decimal point -- again.
That phone call, before Thursday night's city council workshop meeting, saved anyone wanting
to build a theater in the city what amounts to a small fortune to most folks.
"Instead of an impact fee of about $287,000 for a 24,000 square-foot theater," Saunders said, "it
is actually about $43,000."
The decimal numbers in question were a .30 that should have been a .03 in the Impact Fee
Schedule received from the Hartman and Associates consulting firm. Saunders said to the
council that the .03 in the formula for impact fees on sewer and water results in the lower
number.
"Then the fees for police, fire and other impacts are figured," Saunders said, "and added with
about $43,000 total."
A few years ago, when Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church was planned, it was impacted by a
similar mistake, Saunders said. The decimal point mistake was discovered and the church paid a
smaller impact fee, he said.
Two years ago proposals for theaters got to council approval but didn't pan out.
One planned theater behind Sonny's Barbecue restaurant on State Road 50 succumbed to a lack
of financing, Frank Caputo, councilman, said. The other project was converted to a planned
office building.
Every council member seemed elated at the lowered impact fee and the prospect of a movie
theater in Clermont.
Impact fees are one-time fees paid by builders before construction and are meant to cover the
impact of their project on the area's services, such as sewer and water, to residents.
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