Tampa City Council will hold a workshop Thursday morning with land use hearings in the evening. If you’re unfamiliar with council workshops, they are an opportunity for council to have deeper discussions on issues facing the city beyond a 5 minute staff update on the regular agendas. During a workshop, there isn’t a general public comment period, rather there is an opportunity to speak to each agenda item. Council can’t take formal actions during a workshop; they may make motions to set an action on future agenda. This week’s workshop agenda consists of 9 items including:

• the first step in increasing impact fees
• Senate Bill 180
• Housing needs assessment
• Tampa HOPE (temporary housing)
• Coastal Action Plan
• Live Local Act
• Update on parking lot reforms in Ybor
• land development entitlements and process for Central Business District (CBD) and Channelside
• July cycle of Land Development Code

Additionally there will be a 5 minute presentation from the mayor’s Hispanic Heritage Committee to open the meeting. Doubtful they will discuss the recent suspension of the Women & Minority Business Enterprise program that surely will affect Hispanic owned businesses working with the city.

The evening land use agenda has 5 applications to modify the future land use map (2 additional applications are requesting a continuance) along with 3 alcohol beverage permit applications. All items are first readings and if approved will return in 2 weeks for final approval. Consult the agenda and map for more details.

The agenda previews on Tampa Monitor are generally focused on what council is voting on and do not get into details on workshops. However item 1, proposed increase to the Multi-Modal Transportation Impact fee is worth some background prior to the workshop. Impact fees are intended to fund development related to the growth generated by new projects and ensure current residents do not shoulder the costs. They can only be used in the part of the city the development occurs and cannot be used for general maintenance or existing issues.

The city of Tampa hasn’t increased the fees since they were put in place in 1989. You read that correctly, for 36 years, the City of Tampa has been charging 1989 rates. Even after the impact fee was modified under the Buckhorn admin to include “multi-modal’ in 2014, the rate was not increased. In essence, the city has subsidized development to the tune of nearly $140 million over the last 25 years. Currently the transportation impact fee in the city of Tampa—averaged across all districts—is $1,772. Adjusted for inflation in 2025 dollars that is $4,694. Hillsborough County updated their fee in 2022 for a single-family home in the urban core to $9,183. Manatee County updated their fees September 9, 2025 to $19,768 for a single-family home.

Why they haven’t been increased is the $140 million dollar question. The current effort dates back to at least 2022. At that point, there was also discussion of adding a “public safety” impact free to help with the cost of building new police and fire stations. That discussion died after the mayor made clear through staff discussions she wasn’t inclined to implement a new fee. And while the existence of a preliminary study on the transportation fee from August 2023 indicates it was being explored, in August of 2023 the mayor was pushing for a millage rate increase instead. When that failed, the focus of the public and council shifted back to other revenue opportunities. In November of 2023 Council member Hurtak motioned for staff to report back on what the next steps were for updating the transportation fees. Staff requested a continuance.

“We require additional time to conduct some Multi-modal fee research, evaluate study factors, and estimate time and schedule information. It is desirable to have a comprehensive discussion about next steps in a workshop format.”

That discussion didn’t happen. Instead, a new motion was made to “move forward with the Mobility/Multi-Modal Impact Fee Study move forward to initiate the increase and impact fees; further, that Staff be requested to provide an update on the progress of the study on May 2, 2024.” For the May 2 agenda, staff again requested a continuance with the same justification as the November continuance. The item didn’t appear back on the agenda until 8/29/24 when once again a continuance was requested until January 2025, same justification. Finally in January of 2025 a memo was sent to council outlining a work order would be coming before council in February to start an 18 month process of updating the fees.

When the Tampa Monitor reached out to Mobility staff for an explanation for why there was a 17 month gap between when the initial study was completed in August of 2023 and the work order in February of 2025, a multitude of explanations were provided from staff turnover in 2023 to the 2024 hurricanes. The firm that did the initial study has been under contract with Mobility since 2022. The follow up study that currently is underway was not procured through a competitive contract. There was no Request for Proposal/Qualifications or scoring involved. A work order was issued to the same consultant that prepared the August 2023 fee framework study. A work order that took 17 months despite the initial study clearly outlining the next steps.

Additionally staff noted “regulatory compliance.” During the 2023 study there were attempts in the state legislature to curb local municipalities from increasing their fees. That was in addition to the law passed in 2021 that already limited cities and counties from raising fees more than 50% over a 4 year period unless they could demonstrate “extraordinary circumstances.” An attempt to modify the law in 2023 failed, however in 2025 a new law was passed that eliminated the “extraordinary circumstances” clause. That goes into effect January 1, 2026. Which leads to Thursday’s workshop.

Somehow a study council and the public were told was going to take 18 months to complete when approved in February is now being fast tracked to try and get under the wire. State law requires at least 2 public workshops, a meeting with the planning commission and 2 public hearings for adoption. The second public workshop was set for the October 30th workshop agenda.

But it gets more complicated. Manatee County, who originally increased their impact fees last summer the 50% over 4 years as allowed by state law without doing using the “extraordinary circumstances” clause. The voters were unhappy and voted the majority of that commission out last fall at which point the new commissioners revisited the impact fees ultimately leading to the current rates that are between 69% to 169% of previous fees. That led to a lawsuit filed by local developers. Which has now led to the DeSantis administration getting involved and sending a letter in August to Manatee County “warning them not to go forward with their plan to raise impact fees.” The grounds? SB 180. Jason Garcia at Seeking Rents has the details. Including threats of withholding state funding. SB 180 happens to also be on the workshop agenda this week as concerns with the implications of the law have slowed work on the Comprehensive Plan update as well as the Land Development Code rewrite. There is a class action suit filed on behalf of at least 20 cities and counties. At the core it’s a fight over home rule and whether land use decisions are going to be made at the local level or in Tallahassee. Thus far City Attorney Andrea Zeldman has shown little interest in pushing back against the state or federal government.

Regardless of what might happen it’s key to understand this workshop is the first step. What ever increase is settled on, state law requires 90 day notice before it can be implemented and is phased in over 4 years. Any changes will have minimal impact on the FY26 and FY27 budgets.