Windermere Town Council approves increase of tree mitigation fee

Windermere Town Council on Jan. 14 approved a resolution for an updated tree mitigation fee of $225, an increase over the Tree Board’s recommended $175 fee.

Town Planner Brad Cornelius said the tree mitigation fee had not changed in more than 10 years. In 2014, the fee was approved to be $75 per one-inch diameter breast height. 

“This has been an issue for some bit of time in the town of Windermere,” Cornelius said. “It is definitely time to update it and revise it.”

The Tree Board looked at tree mitigation fees in other jurisdictions to help with calculating a recommended fee for Windermere. A calculation of what would be the “maximum defendable” mitigation fee, which was $225 per one-inch diameter breast height of a tree removed and not replaced. 

Tonya Elliott-Moore, the assistant town manager and Public Works director, said the Tree Board recommended a $175 fee as a reasonable start and the board thought there might be hesitation from council to approve a $225 fee. 

But Town Council members said they wanted the maximum fee as the total amount collected from a $225-per-inch fee wouldn’t be much more than a $175-per-inch fee. 

The resolution was approved unanimously at Town Council’s meeting Tuesday, Jan. 14. Council member Mandy David was absent.

Cornelius said the money collected through the tree mitigation fee will go toward a tree fund that allows the town to enhance the street canopy and protect trees. 

Elliott-Moore said the fee allows town staff to enforce the tree ordinance. She said town staff typically receives phone calls and photographs of the tree company and the address where the tree was removed. Then staff goes to look at the stumps that were left, which gives staff an idea of the size of the tree.

“There are very rare occasions when a tree comes down in this town and somebody doesn’t reach out to me and let me know,” Elliott-Moore said. “This fee is to go back and say, ‘You shouldn’t have done that, and now you owe us money,’ because it’s hard to be everywhere at all times. We have a good mitigation fee we can take back to start replacing the canopy that is lost.”

Draining improvements

The Town Council also approved unanimously an increased cost of $5,528,687 to the West Second Avenue drainage improvements project. 

The Florida Division of Emergency Management awarded a grant to the town to provide funding for the drainage improvements, but the project experienced delays due to challenges during the bidding process. The bids received exceeded the original budget allocated, which originally was estimated at $2.5 million in 2019. 

“The reason it’s coming back to (council) is because when the bid went out, it came in much higher than anticipated,” Elliott-Moore said. “We had to go back to FDM, take the project completely back through their process in order for them to approve the price increase and also approve the fact only one contractor bid on the work.”

Elliott-Moore said the project has not changed since it initially went through public input and meetings. The only change was the cost. 

The design of the project — which includes slightly widening the street, stormwater improvements and potable water upgrades — is 100% complete. 

The proposed start date for construction is around Feb. 1. 

Although the cost of the project was the only aspect of the project on the council’s agenda for the meeting, residents Jeff Szukalski and Matine Pawlicki said they are experiencing issues on their properties due to the drainage work. 

Mayor Jim O’Brien said the drainage improvements are being done in stages, so “until it’s complete, it will not function at its maximum.”