Bight Board gives up $1.3 million to cover new City Hall budget gap

 

 

BY PRU SOWERS

KONK LIFE STAFF WRITER

 

 

 

In a close 4-2 vote, the Key West Bight District Management Board agreed to turn $1.3 million of its reserve fund over to the city to help close a budget gap in the new City Hall construction project.

 

 

A tie vote would have meant that the motion failed. But convinced by a legal opinion stating that the rent collected by the Bight Board from tenants at the Key West Historic Seaport belonged to the city, which owns the Seaport, four members voted to bail the city out of the financial challenge it has faced in funding the new City Hall on White Street.

 

 

“This would be a budget transfer and not a loan,” wrote Doug Bradshaw, Port and Marine Services Director, in a memo to Bight Board members before the vote. “If the budget transfer occurs it will leave the Key West Bight reserve fund with approximately $4,861,754. It will not affect all currently funded projects in the Key West Bight or funded budget items.”

 

 

Bight Board President Michael Knowles had initially questioned whether the reserve fund was only to be used by for Seaport maintenance. However, since the city owns the Seaport property and rents it out to various commercial tenants, the money can be used for non-Bight projects.

 

 

The bill for the new City Hall has steadily increased since the May 2014 estimate of $15.5 million. Costs have continued to increase, led by the recent addition of a $500,000 contingency fee to the budget, a standard practice for construction projects to cover unforeseen costs; and approximately $150,000 for Art in Public Places, which requires some construction projects in Key West to donate one percent of the total project cost to the fund.

 

 

Those additional costs have brought the current City Hall project total to $18.7 million, creating a $1.553 million project shortfall in the city’s project budget, one that city officials were counting on the Bight Board to solve.

 

 

In addition to the Bight Board contribution, surplus funds from other, non-Seaport municipal projects that came in under budget will be used to cover the full cost of the City Hall project.

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