§ 8.2. Santa Rosa County's Three Tiered Concurrency Management System (CMS)

The term concurrency indicates that necessary public facilities and services are available to maintain the adopted level of service standards when the impacts of development occur. Accordingly, the Concurrency Management System (CMS) involves the procedures or processes that the County utilizes to assure that development orders and permits are not issued unless the facilities and services deemed necessary are available concurrent with the impacts of development. More specifically, this system is implemented through the County's Concurrency Management regulations, which establish level of service (LOS) standards for five different types of public facilities and services, including sanitary sewer, potable water, solid waste, stormwater facilities, and public school facilities.

The County's current concurrency management system is described in the table below. This system is provided for within the County's Comprehensive Plan and Land Development Code and is statutorily mandated within the Florida Statutes. However, local governments are left with some discretion in the crafting of implementing regulations and policy. Public school facilities, transportation systems (roads, public transit, walking and biking facilities), and parks are now optional concurrency items under state statute while water, sewer, solid waste, and stormwater are mandatory concurrency items. Santa Rosa County has opted out of public school concurrency for those developments not requiring a Future Land Use Map amendment. The County has also opted out of transportation concurrency entirely. However, amendments to the Comprehensive Plan Future Land Use Map must be accompanied by a traffic analysis.

This traffic analysis must be provided by the applicant for large scale amendments (over 10 acres) and must identify potential roadway impacts caused by the development and any necessary improvements. The County has opted out of concurrency for parks and recreational facilities entirely as well. The following table ( Table 8-1 ) summarizes current Land Development Code and Comprehensive Plan policies for central water and sewer, stormwater, and solid waste (Tier 2) for most commercial projects and residential plats.

The three tiered system for Santa Rosa County, is also summarized by the following graphic ( Figure 8-1 ). It should be noted that new single family residences requiring building permits are required to connect to a centralized water and/or sewer system if such service(s) are available (basically in front of new house), regardless of whether or not these houses are constructed on a platted or metes and bounds lot (Tier 1). Tier 3 as shown on Figure 8-1 represents developments requiring a large scale comprehensive Plan Future Land Use Map amendment.

For example, if an applicant desired to change from the Agriculture (1 unit per 15 acres) category to the Agriculture Rural Residential category (1 unit per acre), a transportation study or impact analysis in lieu of meeting a concurrency test would be required, with any necessary improvements generated based on the level of development proposed and capacity available on the impacted roadways. This analysis is to be utilized by the Zoning Board and Board of County Commissioners in deliberation of the amendment request. A concurrency analysis would be required for public schools and conducted in cooperation with the Santa Rosa County School Board. Tier 3 developments are required to utilize the methodologies found in the adopted Interlocal Agreement for Schools which is included herein by reference.

Table 8-1 Santa Rosa County Concurrency Management System
(Tiers 2 and 3 Development Orders)

	LOS (Utility) Requirement	Developer Requirement
Central Water	>100 gallons per capita per day	No linear extension requirement is in place but if central water is immediately available, platted subdivisions (excludes metes and bounds subdivisions) are required to connect and install according to engineering specifications. Metes and bounds subdivisions are only required to connect if there is an existing line in front of home.
Central Sewer	90 gallons per capita per day	For Platted subdivisions only (excluding metes and bounds subdivisions)—required to connect if sewer is located within ½ mile of the proposed project. Metes and bounds subdivisions are only required to connect if there is an existing line in front of home. Certain engineering standards also apply and the utility is required to refund the developer one half of the cost to install.
Solid Waste	6 lbs. per capita per day for all county residents	None—this relates to landfill and disposal capacity.
Stormwater	(a) Retain the first inch of run-off; and (b) Drainage systems in areas with no positive drainage outlet shall be designed to include the retention of the twenty-four (24) hour, one hundred (100) year frequency storm with no offsite discharge. Except that, developments that provide a direct stormwater discharge to the Gulf of Mexico, Santa Rosa Sound, Escambia Bay, East Bay, Blackwater Bay, East River, Yellow River, and Blackwater River may have reduced detention storage requirements.	For platted subdivisions only (excluding metes and bounds subdivisions unless within a defined stormwater problem area).

 

Figure 8-1: Santa Rosa County's Three Tiered Concurrency Management Approach