St. Johns County has updated its impact fee ordinance to support land conservation as development continues to grow. At Tuesday's meeting, the Board of County Commissioners approved a new Conservation and Open Space Impact Fee. According to the county’s release, the fee will begin at 50% of the maximum recommended amount and will increase by 12.5% each year for four years, eventually reaching the full recommended rate. The revenue collected will be designated for environmental conservation efforts.
Along with the new conservation fee, the county has updated several existing impact fees. The Road Impact Fee has been renamed the Multimodal Transportation Impact Fee, and the Law Enforcement Impact Fee is now called the Law Enforcement and Correctional Facilities Impact Fee. The Impact Fee Schedule has also been revised using updated data. The county will phase in increases to non-school impact fees over time, which it states will help developers and builders plan more effectively. The revisions also end the previous indexing of these fees and discontinue subsidies that had applied to nonresidential development projects.
To address housing needs, the updated ordinance includes fee waivers for affordable housing projects. Developments with units reserved for residents earning up to 50% of the area’s median income can receive full waivers, while units for those earning between 50% and 80% can receive partial waivers. These units must carry a 30-year deed restriction to maintain long-term affordability. The ordinance will take effect once it is filed with the Florida Secretary of State, and the new or increased fees will begin 90 days after that filing, as outlined in the ordinance.
