Santa Rosa County will be temporarily forced to cease collection of educational impact fees, after a Santa Rosa County judge granted a motion for temporary injunction on the grounds that the school district’s impact fee study was sloppy and ill-advised.
In a huge blow to the School Board and a huge win for the Home Builders Association of West Florida, Circuit Court Judge Darlene Dickey granted the motion for temporary injunction late Wednesday. The order came three weeks after a June 10 hearing in which attorneys for the school board argued that the implementation of impact fees were constitutionally sound and necessary to accommodate the growth of the school district.
However, “the County failed to meet its burden of proof in establishing the calculation of the School Impact Fee was based on the most recent and localized data for both the costs of school facility construction and the cost of land,” Dickey wrote in her order.
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In the 58-page order, which does not end the case but keeps the county from continuing to collect fees until the case is fully decided, Dickey laid out reasons she believed the school district and county (who are jointly represented by the same law firm) failed to meet the burden of proof necessary to implement impact fees in the first place.
Dickey claimed the board’s study that was used to calculate the impact fees used inconsistent data from several different years, had multiple mathematical errors and contained gross generalizations about the area’s population growth and the specific need for new schools.
“The Santa Rosa School District has not geographically identified new growth, and it seems to have generalized the fact that Santa Rosa County is growing,” Dickey wrote. “The County has experienced a steady growth of approximately 1.9% over the past five years. The School Board did not do ‘heat-mapping’ to justify the need for a school impact fee in the parts of the county experiencing the exponential growth that was described to the BOCC (Board of County Commissioners).”
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Dickey also said the study appeared to be a case of “the tail wagging the dog” and compared the HBA’s complaint about "illegal taxation" to the Boston Tea Party in 1773.
“Almost 250 years ago, a lot of tea was thrown into the harbor as a revolt against government’s taxing authority,” Dickey wrote. “The Court finds Plaintiffs’ interest to be free from unlawful taxation is deeply rooted in history and tradition to the extent it should be recognized as a right worthy of protection in a temporary injunction.”
The HBA was represented by attorneys Kenneth Bell, Megan Moon and Mike Tanner of Gunster, Yoakley and Stewart in Tallahassee and West Palm Beach; Stephen Moorhead of the Moorhead Real Estate Law Group in Pensacola; Susan Schoettle of Susan Schoettle-Gumm in Sarasota; and Carson Bise of Tischler Bise in Maryland in the matter. The School Board and County were jointly represented by Tallahassee-based law firm Nabors, Giblin and Nickerson.
What does this mean for impact fees?
The court battle is far from over, although Dickey did note in her order that both parties wanted the matter settled as expeditiously as possible.
For now, this means that the county will no longer collect impact fees ($5,000 for single-family houses, $4,000 for mobile homes and $2,750 for multi-family units) upon issuance of building permits in Santa Rosa County. Funds that have been collected so far will still be held in escrow until the matter is fully settled.
No fees collected so far: Santa Rosa County has collected $0 in impact fees since ordinance went into effect May 4
Though the judge's order is temporary, it is indicative of how she feels about the case if she were to decide it today. The HBA is "substantially likely to succeed on the merits of their claim that the ordinance is invalid," Dickey wrote.
That means, if it wants to succeed, the school board must address the concerns outlined in her order, which could very well mean conducting a brand new impact fee study, making it clearer exactly how impact fees will benefit those who pay them and outlining all available funding the district has as its disposal without the impact fee.
Attorneys for both parties could not immediately be reached Wednesday night. A date for the next hearing has not yet been set.
Annie Blanks can be reached at ablanks@pnj.com or 850-435-8632.
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