Officials mull seizing complex after repeated flooding issue
After discussing the suffering of many older residents who live at a sprawling retirement community next to Shingle Creek that systemically floods, Osceola County leaders are considering seizing the land through eminent domain, among other options.
The Good Samaritan Society in Kissimmee was devastated by flooding in 2017 s Hurricane Irma and now Hurricane Ian. Osceola County Manager Don Fisher directed County Attorney Frank Townsend to look into what can be done about the retirement community’s repeated flooding.
“He’s looking into one, simply for anyone that rents a piece of property... shouldn’t there be a prominent notice that you are in a flood prone area?” Fisher said at a commission meeting Monday evening. “Even to the point of evaluating... from a public purpose standpoint an eminent domain to potentially look at the building, is that a significant enough public issue.”
In an interview Wednesday, Townsend said eminent domain, the authority local governments have to confiscate private property after compensating the owner, is an option on the table if there’s a public purpose for the government to condemn the property.
“I’m still researching it; I mean obviously it was a terrible situation out there,” Townsend said.
Many residents who lived in the retirement community during Irma said Ian’s flood was much worse.
“Happening again twice within five years there’s definitely a flood issue on the property and that’s what the county is concerned about happening again in the future,” Townsend said.
Townsend said he and the county manager are “looking into anything the county can do and what’s available to the county to prevent it from happening again or mitigate it should it happen again.”
The retirement community in Kissimmee was built before modern codes and many of the buildings are in a floodway, Fisher said in an email.
The county has records of three significant floods that all required evacuation, he said: Ian, Irma and in 2004, after Hurricane Charley. The retirement community is located near Shingle Creek and was not labeled a flood zone when it was initially built.
“If someone tried to get a permit to build there today they would not be able to,” Commissioner Cheryl Grieb said Monday.
Good Samaritan Society, which has multiple retirement communities spread throughout the country under the same name, recently celebrated its 100th anniversary. In
2019, it merged with Sanford Health, creating what industry press described as one of the nation’s largest nonprofit health systems.
Flooding at the Kissimmee location has caused environmental problems in the area.
After Irma flooded the retirement community, its wastewater-treatment facility had to be shut off, which sent waste into Shingle Creek and the retirement community’s homes.
“We have been working with FEMA on a multiyear Hazard Mitigation Grant to decommission our wastewater treatment plant and we have completed the work that has been approved so far,” Aimee Middleton, Good Samaritan Society vice president of operations, said in an email. “This will help protect the quality of water in the event of future storm impact.”
Middleton did not respond to questions about the county’s potential acquisition of the property through eminent domain.
In 2019, the retirement community asked for $50 million in state and federal emergency management funding to elevate units on stilts. U.S. Rep. Darren Soto wrote a letter in support of this grant.
According to Soto’s office, Good Samaritan did not receive the grant.
In 2020 the retirement community asked FEMA for $2.5 million grant to improve sewage lines and infrastructure, which became the community’s priority over the stilts.