After a few dormant months, debate over plans to expand on Key Colony Beach’s existing City Hall building resurfaced at the KCB Commission’s Aug. 15 session.
In December 2023, the commission elected to cancel a previously-approved new City Hall, citing concerns over the building’s cost and the accuracy of bids received by the city. However, as Vice Mayor Freddie Foster reminded the commission, the city is still waiting to use $2.2 million in available Department of Environmental Protection grant funding – funds earmarked for efforts to harden the existing structure as an emergency operations center, or a potential addition to the building.
“Right now, I have a 50-50 match, and I’m thinking the only way we’re going to use that money is structuring a second floor,” Foster said. “I’m trying to get it to 70-30 … but I have to demonstrate a scope of work that identifies the difference between us spending the $12 million that we would have on a new City Hall versus what we’re doing now.”
Building Official Tony Loreno said that two engineers advised city staff that adding a second floor was “probably not a good idea,” instead suggesting an addition to the south or east side of the existing building, or an elevated two-level 5,000-square-foot building to be constructed at the current site of the city’s temporary post office trailer.
Secretary/Treasurer Tom Harding spoke in favor of a separate structure, while commissioner Doug Colonell said he still believed the addition of a second story was the most cost-effective alternative.
“I disagree with (a second building) because you’re doubling the amount of work,” Colonell said. “When somebody says (another building) is going to cost $2 million, especially an engineer, it’s going to come back $5 million.”
“When we asked these questions (to the engineers) about the second floor, it was immediate from both of them, much to my surprise, that they were just immediately shaking their heads going ‘you don’t want to do that,’” said Mayor Joey Raspe.
“If we have some structural problems in the building now, we should be addressing those in this renovation,” said Colonell. “I agree it’s a lot easier to just design a new building than figure that out, but I think that’s a good space, and it could be captured (for) a lot less money.”
Loreno said city staff would await reports from engineering firms K2M and Campbell Engineering Consultants before preparing a scope of work to obtain accurate estimates for expansion options.
Floodplain regulation changes
Two changes to KCB’s floodplain regulations, both unanimously approved at Thursday’s session, should aid residents in repairing or improving damaged or ground-level homes.
Mirroring a change made in Marathon in 2021, the city will shrink its “substantial improvement” time period from three years to one year, increasing the degree to which residents can repair or improve their homes without a legal requirement to demolish and rebuild. Known as a key stipulation in FEMA’s infamous “50% rule,” homeowners were previously required to demolish and rebuild their homes if the cumulative value of repairs, alterations or improvements over a three-year period exceeded 50% of the home’s market value. Under Thursday’s amendment, the cumulative total will now “reset” every year.
City Administrator John Bartus, who served as a councilman in favor of Marathon’s change in 2021, confirmed that the switch had “no impact” to Marathon’s class rating in the Community Rating System (CRS), used to secure citywide discounts on flood insurance premiums in exchange for policies that exceed minimum requirements of the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP).
A second change will revert the city’s required height above NFIP base flood elevations for new and redeveloped buildings from three feet above base flood elevation back to one foot above base flood elevation, as required by the Florida Building Code .
“Two years ago, the city chose to add the additional two feet, which of course would increase our CRS discount,” building consultant Ed Borysiewicz told the commission. “But at the same time, it made 85% of our city’s structures non-conforming. … This especially affects improvements (residents) would like to do in their homes.”
Borysiewicz said that in his estimation, the change should result in more than half of Key Colony’s buildings returning to a compliant status, but acknowledged the amendment likely “would and could” result in a hit to Key Colony’s CRS rating.
Planning and Zoning Committee chair George Lancaster said his committee’s recommendation for the amendment came with “the stipulation that the commission will diligently find the (CRS) points to make up for the ones that are lost.”
“When a community says to me that they would want to adopt a higher regulatory standard for CRS credit, I get on my soapbox,” floodplain and CRS consultant Lori Lehr told the commission, agreeing that potential CRS impacts could be mitigated with numerous other initiatives. “We say, ‘Look, you have to do what’s good for your community. Don’t do this for CRS credit, especially when it applies to higher regulatory standards.’”
