Safety Harbor city commissioners voted unanimously to authorize a purchase agreement of up to $500,000 for a small residential lot next to the Public Works complex — a price tag that has climbed considerably since the deal was first discussed, and one taxpayers will help cover through their utility bills.

The commission’s 5-0 vote on Aug. 17 followed an earlier 5-0 vote on Aug. 3 authorizing staff to open formal negotiations with property owner Kevin King for the 0.66-acre parcel at 2157 Railroad Avenue. The vote doesn’t finalize a sale, but it clears city staff to move toward acquiring the land for a planned Public Works expansion and future emergency operations facility.

The city has had its eye on this particular lot for years. Back in September 2018, Safety Harbor paid $350,000 for the eastern portion of King’s property, excluding the western residential parcel that’s now on the table. As part of that earlier deal, the city secured a right of first refusal — meaning if King ever decided to sell, Safety Harbor could match an outside offer or buy at appraised market value before a private sale went through.

That right is now being exercised under pressure. Public Works Director Renee Cooper told commissioners that King notified the city in July of his intent to sell, and staff later learned an outside buyer had already made an offer — triggering a 20-day window for the city to act. King himself pressed commissioners not to drag their feet during public comment: “Time is of the essence, because there isn’t anything in there about a time situation, and I do have a contract on it. … We need to go.”

Here’s where residents should pay attention. Earlier discussions around this purchase referenced figures in the $300,000 to $400,000 range. The property has since been listed online for $500,000, and staff asked the commission to set that figure as a hard ceiling for negotiations. Whether that jump reflects genuine market appreciation, the leverage created by an outside offer and a hard negotiating deadline, or some combination of both, it’s a substantial gap between what the city expected to pay and what it’s now prepared to authorize — and it’s happening because a private seller, not the taxpayers footing the bill, controls the timeline.

City Manager Josh Stefancic was direct about the number being a cap rather than a target: “The idea of the 500 was to set the ceiling … but obviously, if it were to settle, if the number were above that $500,000, we’d come back to the commission.” That’s a reasonable safeguard, but it’s also worth noting that once a ceiling is set at half a million dollars for a two-thirds-acre residential lot, there’s little incentive left for anyone at the negotiating table to land meaningfully below it.

The funding mechanism deserves scrutiny too. Rather than draw directly from the General Fund or take on debt, staff plans to split the cost across reserves from the General Fund, the Stormwater Enterprise Fund, the Water and Sewer Enterprise Fund, and the Sanitation Enterprise Fund. Commissioner Jacob Burnett pressed for clarity on the arrangement: “I noticed we’re suggesting that we can pull from the general fund along with our enterprise funds. Because of the use we’re going to have it for, it opens us up into the other places, right?” Stefancic confirmed the logic — because the site will support multiple municipal functions, the city can tap utility ratepayer funds that would otherwise be off-limits for a simple land purchase. “If this were to be just a park facility, you would not be able to utilize the enterprise funds to help pay for this,” Stefancic said.

In other words, residents who pay their water, sewer and stormwater fees are underwriting a real estate purchase that a narrower designation would have blocked them from funding. City officials frame this as smart, flexible budgeting that avoids new debt or draining general reserves. It’s also a reminder of how enterprise fund structures, created to keep utility fees tied to utility services, can be stretched to cover adjacent government expansion once enough departments are folded under one roof.

Commissioners are also weighing what to do with the city’s existing secondary Public Works site on Ninth Avenue, valued around $470,000 across two parcels, once building maintenance relocates to the new campus. Mayor Joe Ayoub floated selling it to offset costs, but Cooper noted no sale can happen until space is actually built at the main campus — meaning that potential offset is years away at best. Commissioner Andy Steingold urged the city to slow down on any disposal plans regardless: “I just would like to hold onto it, because I just think that we’re challenged all the way around. We don’t hold that much property outside of parks.”

Vice Mayor Nancy Besore and Commissioner Kevin Shanks both voiced support for consolidating Public Works operations under one roof, calling the city’s original 2018 investment worthwhile. That may well prove true. But as the deal now stands, taxpayers are being asked to trust that a rising price on a residential lot, financed partly through utility reserves, will ultimately pencil out — with the promised offset from selling city property still contingent on construction that hasn’t started and a Facility Master Plan that hasn’t been finished.

The purchase agreement remains pending final appraisal verification and confirmation of the competing offer’s terms before the city can close on the property.

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