ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. — County-wide flooding prevention was a major point of concern for Orange County Commissioners Tuesday.
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During their regular meeting, they were briefed on a number of projects meant to improve stormwater capacity.
Commissioners say the Orlovista area has been a point of focus for them.
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Last month, the county developed a plan to help residents there navigate the next hurricane season. Commissioners also received an update on that plan.
Temporary pumps will be used to take advantage of all the new space created by digging three retention ponds deeper than they were before.
They’ve actually tripled the capacity of those retention ponds since that construction began.
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However, on Tuesday, commissioners were told that county staff is working on a number of other projects.
In the next two years, a real-time flood monitoring program will be completed across the county, meant to help county officials project the impact of future storms.
County officials are also now considering increasing stormwater utility fees. Some cities already have the fee, but Orange County’s rate has been zero for years.
County staff is now in the first stage of studying raising that fee. The county says it could help retrofit older neighborhoods without proper stormwater drainage infrastructure.
“If we identify a need, we can go in there with a stormwater fee and start doing those neighborhood retrofit projects,” one county official said during Tuesday’s meeting. “We just don’t have that program. Those projects would look at water quality and flooding.”
The county is also working on updating its stormwater basin studies. That project should be complete by 2028.
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