CDD 6 delays budget adoption

LAKEWOOD RANCH — Members of the Lakewood Ranch Community Development District 6 Board are expected to move forward Aug. 29, with adoption of the 2013 fiscal year budget.

Supervisors voted Aug. 14 to postpone adoption of the budget to allow the district’s property manager to review budget documents in greater detail with resident Supervisor Bob Burnstein. At the meeting, Burnstein raised concerns that the district had not properly been budgeting for payments to the Lakewood Ranch Inter-District Authority.

“I’m concerned the reserves we have presently are far lower than (we should have),” Burnstein said, asking for a review of the budget. “Somebody’s responsible for these mistakes and we need to make sure there are no others as we move forward.”

Dale Weidemiller, the board’s vice chairman and vice president of land development for Neal Communities, said the district has handled money properly, and the confusion centered around how line items were displayed in budget documents.

“It’s all properly accounted for,” Weidemiller said. “We had anticipated for the last couple of years to use the fund balance to pay expenses, because there was a surplus.”

Costs for the IDA did increase this year from original budget documents, because of increased expenses associated with irrigation costs and the construction of a new maintenance facility.

The adoption hearing will now be held at 9 a.m. Aug. 29, at Lakewood Ranch Town Hall.

In other business, the board agreed to initiate discussion with the IDA about the agency’s becoming the district manager for CDD 6. The IDA currently serves as the district manager for Lakewood Ranch Community Development Districts 1, 2, 4 and 5. CDD 6 already participates in cost-sharing for the lease of Town Hall and other operational costs of the IDA.

Contact Pam Eubanks at [email protected].