Winter Springs seeks to annex part of Oviedo in unusual land deal

The Winter Springs Commission is considering allowing for a retail center project on two adjoining parcels located off of State Road 434, with room for an estimated six to eight tenants and a space totalling around 11,100 combined square feet. The move could see Winter Springs annex part of Oviedo.

The issue, however, isn’t the project proposal itself, but the two parcels upon which it’s located, with the property’s west end designated as Winter Springs while its adjoining east end is considered to be a part of Oviedo. 

Terrilyn Rolle, the director of community development for Winter Springs, explained the issue to the Commission during its Jan. 27 meeting, saying that the dual city designations impact the service of utilities. 

“The commercial development that they’re proposing is allowed in the C-2 zoning designation on the Winter Springs parcel, and there are city utilities available for that,” Rolle said. “However, the Oviedo parcel does not have Oviedo utilities in proximity, and they’re asking for Winter Springs to consider providing water utility to the Oviedo parcel.” 

Attorney Frank Kruppenbacher, representing the retail space applicant HARBCO General Contractors, and Sam Sebaali, CEO of Florida Engineering Group, presented a proposal to the Commission during the meeting asking the city to consider extending use of its utilities as a courtesy. 

Kruppenbacher said his client would be prepared to do whatever is needed legally to move forward with the project. 

“Our client is in kind of a unique position, because they got this property that immediately abuts the city,” Kruppenbacher said.  “[The client] can’t reasonably do anything with it if they try and connect to Oviedo [utilities], given distances.” 

Rolle said that during a pre-application conference in November of 2023 with the City of Oviedo, it was brought to the applicant’s attention that they’d have to provide septic and make a request of Winter Springs to supply water to the parcel. 

“In July of 2023, the city manager of Oviedo sent a letter to [former interim manager Phil Hirsch] regarding the situation and that Oviedo would be open to a wholesale agreement with Winter Springs, for Winter Springs to supply the water and Oviedo would bill the developer,” Rolle said. 

A month later, she said the recommendation was sent back due to reasons including, but not limited to, the city’s issues with its consumptive use permits, or CUP, as well as development priorities and that the offer would not be in the best interest of Winter Springs. 

Sebaali said as far as sewer utilities are concerned, the applicant would build a lift station to serve both retail centers, and that they essentially were “not asking for any additional infrastructure.” 

Deputy Mayor Cade Resnick questioned if there had been discussion on the possibility of Winter Springs annexing the land into the city, to which Sebaali said he wasn’t sure of from a legal standpoint. 

Kruppenbacher added that while the applicant was prepared to annex, they’d “have to get Oviedo to work with us on that.”

City attorney Anthony Garganese told the commission that Oviedo would first have to de-annex the property before it could be entertained for annexation into Winter Springs. 

“I mean, the properties are contiguous … but the city can’t annex property that’s already in another municipality,” Garganese said. 

Without annexation, any benefits for Winter Springs to provide the utilities would be nonexistent, Deputy Mayor Cade Resnick said. 

“Oviedo would be billed, Oviedo would get the benefit, we would have both the water consequence and sewage consequence,” Resnick said, a sentiment later echoed by city manager Kevin Sweet. 

“The pushback from the city has been you’re tapping into limited resources,” Sweet said. “As far as water capacity for benefiting a project that’s not located within the city limits, yes, you would be paying for the water usage … but that’s taking away from a few other things, as far as our ability to provide the same resources to a business entity within the city limits.”

Commissioner Mark Caruso questioned what type of retail tenants were anticipated for the space, to which Sebaali could not offer specifics yet, but did say each building could potentially feature a restaurant in addition to other retail stores. 

“We’re trying to kind of make sure we’re not putting the cart before the horse,” Sebaali said. 

“To the commissioner’s question with regard to usage, that’s kind of a big answer, specific to talking about gallons per day, and if you’re talking a full service restaurant versus a typical boutique retail space that water consumption is a bigger conversation,” Sweet said. “I think we would need some more details to understand what that full impact is, especially if we’re talking full service restaurants.”

“My concern is to have another retail center vacant,” Commissioner Victoria Bruce said. “And so understanding who the anchor tenants would be, that would be interesting and helpful.”

Kruppenbacher told Sweet he raised a good point and that if the commission was able to give them the “green light” to continue with further dialogue on the project, the applicant would address the matter.

Mayor Kevin McCann said he felt in the case of no annexation, the water usage should be charged at the same rate as it would be in the other commercial space and not sold to Oviedo at wholesale pricing.

“When we have water infrastructure that needs to be repaired and replaced and worked on, we’ve got major utility issues, we don’t want to wholesale it,” McCann said. 

Rolle told the Commission that staff had already confirmed Oviedo’s position to not de-annex the parcel and that the discussion would more so be if the Commission wished to provide utilities to the parcel and enter the wholesale agreement for Oviedo to bill the developer. 

“That’s their terms, and that’s been made clear,” Rolle said, followed by Sweet who added that Oviedo’s city manager had told him directly that he didn’t believe the de-annexation process would be “feasible.” 

Despite this, members of the dais appeared to signal a request for annexation should be attempted once more. Garganese said the Commission still needed to indicate for himself and Sweet if it would be interested in exploring the proposal further, regardless of the annexation. 

“Whatever the chips are that can be obtained during those discussions, we bring it back and the Commission has the final say, yay or nay, on providing water service outside of the municipal boundaries,” Garganese said. 

“I’m seeing in the affirmative,” McCann said, following agreement from the dais. 

With the applicant intending to address the concerns raised by the Commission, city staff will continue with the direction to pursue some form of an agreement with Oviedo. The Commission’s next meeting will take place Feb. 10. 

In other news, the Winter Springs City Commission:

• Unanimously approved the site/final engineering plan, aesthetic review and development agreement of the Greenway Kia North retrofit, which plans to demolish the existing dealership on site and replace it with a new 36,100-square-foot dealership building. 
• Passed a unanimous motion to direct Sweet to maintain communications with the state’s legislative delegation and lobbyists to move forward and submit appropriation requests for three city priority projects off its 2025 appropriations list. The identified projects include improvements to the city’s reclaimed water systems, potable water treatment plant and potable water system. 

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