Port St. Lucie approves tentative 1-year and 5-year CIP; mayor flags $1.6 billion project backlog and stormwater needs

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — Mayor Shannon Martin said the city approved tentative one-year and five-year capital improvement plans and face a backlog of projects she estimated at about $1.6 billion, with roughly $275 million in projects proposed for the coming year.

“We did approve our, the tentative, one year and the 5 year plan,” Mayor Shannon Martin said during Coffee with the Port St. Lucie Council. She told attendees staff submitted 202 capital project requests to the city manager’s team.

The tentative plans group projects by fund and timeline, the mayor said, and include enterprise-funded items such as utilities plus general-fund projects. Martin said 140 of the proposed projects — which she said totaled about $795 million and included stormwater and other enterprise work — were analyzed as part of the multiyear list of needs. For the next 12 months the city identifies 82 projects with an estimated cost of about $275 million.

Why it matters: the backlog and schedule of projects will shape the city’s borrowing, rate and fee decisions and future service planning. Martin said the city has reduced…