A new settlement agreement that aims to widen Kelly Park Road to four lanes was approved by the Apopka City Council at its June 21st meeting. This agreement seeks to control the anticipated increase in traffic that's to come over the next 10 years due to growing residential and commercial developments.
The roadway agreement for West Kelly Park Road came as a response to residents' complaints over Apopka's road infrastructure needing to be in place when new developments occur.
Attorney Jacob Schumer explained that the City previously discussed separate agreements between Kelly Park VB Development, Golden Gem Investments, and Galvin-Harris Land Services. However, he said the three developers were able to come to one agreed plan in which they would provide between $15 million to $20 million in funding to widen Kelly Park Road in exchange for impact feed credits.
Schumer shared that the City would benefit directly from this integrated agreement by having automatic donations of stormwater ponds and roads at no cost to the City, interest-free funding for the project without the need to take out debt, and timely construction of the most important roads in the West Kelly Park Interchange area.
Without this integrated settlement, Schumer said the City would have to conceptualize and negotiate impact fees individually with each developer, resulting in different timeframes under permitting and development agreements.
"They, under the law, are only required to build the road that is necessary for the development rather than what the City may want, so like a bigger road or a three-lane if the City believes that it's going to be a major thoroughfare," Schumer said. "All this will be individually negotiated, and you'd have to wait out funding for Kelly Park Road or take out a loan in order to get that done."
Under this agreement, Schumer highlighted that the developers are not granted automatic approval, and plans will still be subject to the council's approval.
"They still have to come to you all," Schumer said. "They still have to come to staff for all the normal zoning site plans, construction plans, anything that they need to come to you anyway on they still have to come to you. It's not approval of the city code."
The estimated construction cost is $45 million, while the properties in that area are estimated to generate $80 million in impact fees, leaving an extra $35 million to spend on city improvements.
The benefits that the community will experience, according to Schumer, are better traffic flow, more commercial developments to serve residents, increased tax revenue, and newer roads funded completely impact fee money from new developments.
"None of this money will come from the general fund, and if for some reason the impact fees don't cover the construction of the roads, the developers still have to pay for that under this agreement," Schumer said.
Commissioner Diane Velazquez asked Schumer about the time frame of the development due to previous projects that failed to progress construction within the scheduled time.
"You know, we start something, and then it stagnates, and then it just goes by the wayside," Velazquez said.
Schumer replied that after the agreement's approval, the developers would have three years to complete the project.
During a public hearing, Apopka City Resident Albert Mckimmie raised concerns over the increased traffic that Golden Gem Road will experience due to retail developments in Kelly Park Road. He explained that vehicles would need to pass through Golden Gem Road to get to these new developments and suggested that the entire Golden Gem Road should be rehabilitated to avoid traffic jams.
"I don't think it's fair to residents to be discriminated against because, at this particular point, you're only prepared to rehabilitate part of the road," Mckimmie said.
Schumer explained that Golden Gem Road is not part of the settlement agreement because Orange County owns it.
"The Golden Gem Road has been something I've been working on kind of separately. We've talked about potentially including it, but the problem is it's not a City road," Schumer said. "I, of course, was part of a meeting with Orange County where we discussed it, and it was not clear how much money, if anything, Orange County would provide. They weren't very clear about that."
However, he continued to explain that a proposed agreement is ready to be sent out to Orange County requesting to transfer the jurisdiction of Golden Gem Road to the City.
The motion to approve the roadway funding agreement for West Kelly Park Road was motioned unanimously by the city council, with construction expected to begin in January 2025.
