§ 262-737. Special powers.

The district shall have the following special powers to implement its lawful, single, and special purpose and to provide, pursuant to that purpose, basic systems, facilities, services, improvements, projects, works, and infrastructure in and subject to the stewardship overlay, each of which constitutes a lawful public purpose when exercised pursuant to this charter, subject to, and not inconsistent with, the regulatory jurisdiction and permitting authority of all other applicable governmental bodies, agencies, and any special districts having authority with respect to any area included therein, and to plan, establish, acquire, construct or reconstruct, enlarge or extend, equip, operate, finance, fund, and maintain improvements, systems, facilities, services, works, projects, and infrastructure. Any or all of the following special powers are granted by this Act in order to implement the special requirements of this university new town community within the stewardship overlay and the single special purpose of the district:

(1)

Water management and control for the lands within the district and to connect some or any of such facilities with roads and bridges. In the event that the board assumes the responsibility for providing water management and control for the district which is to be financed by a benefit special assessments, the board shall adopt plans and assessments pursuant to law or may proceed to adopt water management and control plans, assess for benefits, and apportion and levy special assessments, as follows:

a.

The board shall cause to be made by the district's engineer, or such other engineer or engineers as the board may employ for that purpose, complete and comprehensive water management and control plans for the lands located within the district that will be improved in any part or in whole by any system of facilities that may be outlined and adopted, and the engineer shall make a report in writing to the board with maps and profiles of said surveys and an estimate of the cost of carrying out and completing the plans.

b.

Upon the completion of such plans, the board shall hold a hearing thereon to hear objections thereto, shall give notice of the time and place fixed for such hearing by publication once each week for two consecutive weeks in a newspaper of general circulation in the general area of the district, and shall permit the inspection of the plan at the office of the district by all persons interested. All objections to the plan shall be filed at or before the time fixed in the notice for the hearing and shall be in writing.

c.

After the hearing, the board shall consider the proposed plan and any objections thereto and may modify, reject, or adopt the plan or continue the hearing until a day certain for further consideration of the proposed plan or modifications thereof.

d.

When the board approves a plan, a resolution shall be adopted and a certified copy thereof shall be filed in the office of the secretary and incorporated by him or her into the records of the district.

e.

The water management and control plan may be altered in detail from time to time until the appraisal record herein provided is filed, but not in such manner as to affect materially the conditions of its adoption. After the appraisal record has been filed, no alteration of the plan shall be made, except as provided by this Act.

f.

Within 20 days after the final adoption of the plan by the board, the board shall proceed pursuant to F.S. § 298.301, as amended from time to time.

(2)

Water supply, sewer, and wastewater management, reclamation, and reuse, or any combination thereof, and any irrigation systems, facilities, and services and to construct and operate connecting intercepting or outlet sewers and sewer mains and pipes and water mains, conduits, or pipelines in, along, and under any street, alley, highway, or other public place or ways, and to dispose of any effluent, residue, or other byproducts of such system or sewer system.

a.

The district may not purchase or sell a water, sewer, or wastewater reuse utility that provides service to the public for compensation, or enter into a wastewater facility privatization contract for a wastewater facility, until the governing body of the stewardship community district has held a public hearing on the purchase, sale, or wastewater facility privatization contract and made a determination that the purchase, sale, or wastewater facility privatization contract is in the public interest.

b.

In determining if the purchase, sale, or wastewater facility privatization contract is in the public interest, the stewardship community district shall consider, at a minimum, the following:

1.

The most recent available income and expense statement for the utility;

2.

The most recent available balance sheet for the utility, listing assets and liabilities and clearly showing the amount of contributions-in-aid-of-construction and the accumulated depreciation thereon;

3.

A statement of the existing rate base of the utility for regulatory purposes;

4.

The physical condition of the utility facilities being purchased, sold, or subject to a wastewater facility privatization contract;

5.

The reasonableness of the purchase, sales, or wastewater facility privatization contract price and terms;

6.

The impacts of the purchase, sale, or wastewater facility privatization contract on utility customers, both positive and negative;

7.

Any additional investment required and the ability and willingness of the purchaser or the private firm under a wastewater facility privatization contract to make that investment, whether the purchaser is the district or the entity purchasing the utility from the district;

8.

In the case of a wastewater facility privatization contract, the terms and conditions on which the private firm will provide capital investment and financing or a combination thereof for contemplated capital replacements, additions, expansions, and repairs. The district shall give significant weight to this criteria;

9.

The alternatives to the purchase, sale, or wastewater facility privatization contract and the potential impact on utility customers if the purchase, sale, or wastewater facility privatization contract is not made;

10.

The ability of the purchaser or the private firm under a wastewater facility privatization contract to provide and maintain high-quality and cost-effective utility service, whether the purchaser is the district or the entity purchasing the utility from the district;

11.

In the case of a wastewater facility privatization contract, the district shall give significant weight to the technical expertise and experience of the private firm in carrying out the obligations specified in the wastewater facility privatization contract; and

12.

All moneys paid by a private firm to a district pursuant to a wastewater facility privatization contract shall be used for the purpose of reducing or offsetting property taxes, wastewater service rates, or debt reduction or making infrastructure improvements or capital asset expenditures or other public purpose; provided, however, nothing herein shall preclude the district from using all or part of the moneys for the purpose of the district's qualification for relief from the repayment of federal grant awards associated with the wastewater system as may be required by federal law or regulation.

The district shall prepare a statement showing that the purchase, sale, or wastewater facility privatization contract is in the public interest, including a summary of the purchaser's or private firm's experience in water, sewer, or wastewater reuse utility operation and a showing of financial ability to provide the service, whether the purchaser or private firm is the district or the entity purchasing the utility from the district.

(3)

Bridges or culverts that may be needed across any drain, ditch, canal, floodway, holding basin, excavation, public highway, tract, grade, fill, or cut and roadways over levees and embankments, and to construct any and all of such works and improvements across, through, or over any public right-of-way, highway, grade, fill, or cut.

(4)

District roads equal to or exceeding the specifications of the county in which such district roads are located, and street lights, including conditions of development approval which sometimes may be different specifications then the normal specifications of the county. This special power includes construction, improvement, pavement, and maintenance of roadways and roads necessary and convenient for the exercise of the powers or duties of the district to:

a.

Implement its single purpose;

b.

Include as a component thereof roads, parkways, bridges, landscaping, irrigation, bicycle lanes, and jogging paths, street lighting, traffic signals, road striping, and all other customary elements of a modern road system in general or as tied to the conditions of development approval for the specific Ave Maria Community Development; and

c.

Plan, implement, construct or reconstruct, enlarge or extend, finance, fund, equip, operate, and maintain parking facilities that are freestanding or that may be related to any innovative strategic intermodal system of transportation pursuant to applicable federal, state, and local law and ordinance.

(5)

Buses, trolleys, transit shelters, ridesharing facilities and services, parking improvements, and related signage.

(6)

Investigation and remediation costs associated with the cleanup of actual or perceived environmental contamination within the district under the supervision or direction of a competent governmental authority unless the covered costs benefit any person who is a landowner within the district and who caused or contributed to the contamination.

(7)

Conservation areas, mitigation areas, and wildlife habitat, including the maintenance of any plant or animal species, and any related interest in real or personal property.

(8)

Using its general and special powers as set forth in this Act, any other project within or without the boundaries of a district when the project is the subject of an agreement between the district and the Board of County Commissioners of Collier County or with any applicable other public or private entity, including a homeowners' association, and is not inconsistent with the Collier County Comprehensive Plan, the Growth Management Plan, and the stewardship overlay which implement the single special purpose of the district.

(9)

Parks and facilities for indoor and outdoor recreational, cultural, and educational uses.

(10)

Fire prevention and control, including fire stations, water mains and plugs, fire trucks, and other vehicles and equipment.

(11)

School buildings and related structures, which may be leased, sold, or donated to the school district, for use in the educational system when authorized by the district school board. The stewardship community district is granted the special power to contract with the Collier County School Board and, as applicable, the Board of County Commissioners of Collier County, and with the applicable landowner developer of the lands within the jurisdiction of the district, to assess the school district educational facilities plan, and to implement a management and financing plan for timely construction, maintenance, and acquisition, at the option of the stewardship community district, school facilities, including facilities identified in the facilities work programs or those proposed by charter schools. The stewardship community district is granted the special power to determine, order, levy, impose, collect, or arrange for the collection and enforcement of assessments, as defined in and pursuant to this Act for such school facilities. The stewardship community district created under and by this Act is eligible for the financial enhancements available to educational facilities benefit districts to provide for financing the construction and maintenance of educational facilities pursuant to F.S. § 1013.356, and, if and when authorized by general law, to acquire such educational facilities. This Act, in the place of an educational facilities benefit district, authorizes the Collier County School Board to designate the Ave Maria Stewardship Community District. The stewardship community district is authorized to enter into an interlocal agreement with the Collier County School Board and, as applicable, the Board of County Commissioners of Collier County and applicable private landowners and developers, and the Ave Maria University in order to provide for such construction, maintenance, and acquisition and in order to receive the applicable financial enhancements provided by F.S. § 1013.356. The interlocal agreement shall among other things consider absorption rates, sales rates, and related data of existing and projected schools, racial, ethnic, social, and economic balance within the Collier County School District under applicable state and federal law and the provision of school attendance zones to allow students residing within a reasonable distance of the facilities constructed and financed through the interlocal agreement to attend such facilities. It is provided, because these facilities are funded by assessments and not by taxes of any type, that the provision of these facilities may be multiuse and, consistent with the provisions of this Act, shall be first liens on the property upon a showing of special and peculiar benefits that flow to the applicable property as a logical connection from the systems, facilities, and services, resulting in added use, enhanced enjoyment, decreased insurance premiums, or enhanced value in marketability so that the legislature finds that the provisions of the Florida Constitution for free public schools are implemented and enhanced.

(12)

Security, including, but not limited to, guardhouses, fences, and gates, electronic intrusion-detection systems, and patrol cars, when authorized by proper governmental agencies; except that the district may not exercise any powers of a law enforcement agency, but may contract with the appropriate local general-purpose government agencies for an increased level of such services within the district boundaries. Notwithstanding any provision of general law, the district may operate guardhouses for the limited purpose of providing security for the residents of the district and which serve a predominate public, as opposed to private, purpose. Such guardhouses shall be operated by the district or any other unit of local government pursuant to procedures designed to serve such security purposes as set forth in rules adopted by the board, from time to time, following the procedures set forth in F.S. Ch. 120, as amended from time to time.

(13)

Control and elimination of mosquitoes and other arthropods of public health importance.

(14)

Waste, waste collection, and disposal.

(15)

To enter into impact fee credit agreements with Collier County. Under such agreements, where the district constructs or makes contributions for public systems, facilities, services, projects, improvements, works, and infrastructures for which impact fee credits would be available to the landowner developer under the Collier County applicable impact fee ordinance, the agreement authorized by this Act shall provide such impact fee credit shall inure to the landowners within the district in proportion to assessments or other burdens levied and imposed upon the landowners with respect to assessable improvements giving rise to such impact fee credits, and the district shall from time to time execute such instruments, such as assignments of impact fee credits, as may be necessary, appropriate, or desirable to accomplish or to confirm the foregoing.

(16)

To establish and create, at noticed meetings, such government departments of the board of supervisors of the district, as well as committees, task forces, boards, or commissions, or other agencies under the supervision and control of the district, as from time to time the members of the board of supervisors may deem necessary or desirable in the performance of the acts or other things necessary to exercise its general or special powers to implement an innovative project to carry out the special purpose of the district as provided in this Act and to delegate the exercise of its powers to such departments, boards, task forces, committees, or other agencies such administrative duties and other powers as the board of supervisors may deem necessary or desirable but only if there is a set of expressed limitations for accountability, notice, and periodic written reporting to the board of supervisors which shall retain its powers.

(17)

Consistent with stewardship of the rural lands stewardship area zoning overlay district and so long as not inconsistent with the applicable local government comprehensive plan and development entitlements, the district may coordinate with the landowner developer and with the university on the phasing of the delivery of infrastructure and may create phase entities or units for its charter purpose. Toward this end, and so long as it implements the purpose of the district under this Act, the board of supervisors may designate units of development and adopt systems of progressive phased development by units with related management planning, implementation, construction, maintenance, and financing within its phased unit. If the board of supervisors proceeds to designate such phased units of development, it must adopt at a noticed meeting pursuant to F.S. Ch. 120, as amended from time to time, a rule setting forth detailed procedures and authorizations for such phase unit processes. A committee, department, or agency of the board shall be given express duty of oversight with monthly written reports to the board of supervisors. No such phased units can begin or operate until or unless the required noticed rule has been adopted. With regard to any phased unit, there shall be no bonded indebtedness and no levy of any lienable or nonlienable revenue, whether to amortize bonds or not, within the boundary of a phrased unit other than by the board of supervisors and pursuant to the powers, procedures, and provisions of this Act and other applicable laws.

(18)

To plan, establish, acquire, construct, or reconstruct, enlarge or extend, equip, operate, maintain, finance and fund buildings and structures for district offices, maintenance facilities, meeting facilities, town centers or any other project authorized or granted by this Act upon a showing at a noticed meeting of its efficacy to the specialized single purpose of this district for the new university town community in the rural lands stewardship zoning overlay district.

(19)

To plan, establish, acquire, construct or reconstruct, enlarge or extend, equip, operate, maintain, finance, and fund edifices and facilities for the provision of healthcare, and to include the operation of any one or more of such facilities when authorized by applicable public or private agencies providing healthcare and upon a showing of efficacy to carryout the purpose of the district in the rural lands stewardship zoning overlay district.

(20)

To enter into an agreement with the Ave Maria University, upon a showing of efficacy in implementing the single specialized purpose of the district in the stewardship overlay, for the planning, establishment, acquisition, construction or reconstruction, enlarging or extending, equipping, operating, maintaining, financing, and funding of any innovative system, facility, or service constituting a project as defined in this Act.

(21)

To adopt and enforce appropriate rules following the procedures of F.S. Ch. 120, in connection with the provisions of one or more its systems, facilities, services, projects, improvements, works, and infrastructure.

(22)

The enumeration of special powers herein shall not be deemed exclusive or restrictive, but shall be deemed to incorporate all powers express or implied necessary or incident to carrying out such enumerated special powers, including also the general powers provided by this special act charter to the district to implement its single purpose.

(23)

The provisions of this section on special powers shall be construed liberally in order to carry out effectively the single purpose of this district under this Act and to secure for the district its ability to be innovative in and for the rural lands stewardship overlay.

(Laws of Fla. ch. 2004-461, § 4)