House Bill would prevent City from regaining control of GRU
BY JENNIFER CABRERA
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – A new amendment to House Bill 1451 would prevent the City of Gainesville from regaining control of Gainesville Regional Utilities (GRU) by deleting the Charter language that created the GRU Authority.
According to a bill analysis created after the amendment from Rep. Demi Busatta (R-Coral Gables) was adopted without objection by the House Commerce Committee, House Bill 1451 does the following:
- Requires certain public meetings and reporting for municipalities that provide utility service or intend to provide utility service in areas outside of their municipal boundaries.
- Limits the rates, fees, and charges that a municipal water or sewer utility may impose on customers outside the boundaries of the municipality to no more than 25 percent in excess of those imposed on customers within the boundaries.
- Limits the rates, fees, and charges that a municipal utility may impose on the water or wastewater customers it serves within the boundaries of another municipality, where the serving utility uses a water or wastewater treatment plant located within the boundaries of the other municipality to provide such service.
- Expressly preempts to the state the subject of a regional utility authority created by the Legislature through charter amendment after January 1, 2023.
The last bullet point would include the GRU Authority, which was created by the legislature through a charter amendment during the 2023 legislative session. Voters inside the city limits of Gainesville overwhelmingly approved two recent ballot measures (in 2024 and 2025) to amend the City’s Charter and delete the language creating the Authority, and the question of whether the City can amend that section of its Charter is currently pending in two lawsuits.
The bill’s next step is a vote on the House floor. A similar Senate bill (SB 1724) does not have corresponding language.
The city of GNV is subservient to the State…case closed.
To anti-democratic statists like you, yeah. We don’t live in Russia, so hopefully the courts will remember where we live.
Ah Comrade! A comment worth commenting on.
Please remind the local $0ci@li$ts, it’s the United States of America, not the Union of Soviet $0ci@li$ts of America.
But we’re not in the Confederacy either. That was another place a bunch of Democrats went all in for nullification.
Someone has to be a grown-up. It certainly is not the GCC.
That sounds like a great solution – GRU customers outside the city limits should be protected.
Gainesville’s history of transferring funds from GRU to the city coffers, driving up utility costs for those who don’t have a vote in the matter, is troublesome.
It’s good to know that the state legislature is looking out for citizens.
You never have a vote in your utility company’s decisions. Who are you kidding?
Jazz – not a fair argument. Not all utility companies are alike. Some are businesses that aren’t forced to charge rates by a group of elected officials who want utility rates to be a slush fund for their pet projects and boondoggles.
When the city was running the show, city voters could vote for GRU leadership but county voters could not. Yet many of us county voters are forced to use GRU for our services. It was a decades long scam that finally came to an end and needs to stay that way.
In the country, you are forced to use whatever utility company trades or buys your area for coverage AND NEVER have a say. THE CITY OWNS GRU so their citizens have a say. The county doesn’t. If you want a simialr level of control, lobby the county to start or buy a utility company
City Commission be like…😤😡🤬
Their loyal servants, bondservants, and vassals,…😳🥹😢😭
Remember, it’s the City Commission’s mismanagement and misuse of GRU funds that have gotten us to this point.
The ill-informed also shoulder part of the responsibility for remaining complacent for so long.
GRU had an A rating – same as FPL – when the state took it over. Cut the crap.
Our local totalitarian wannabes are incapable of representing the majority’s best interests. It’s their thinking that put GRU in its predicament, and will take the independent Authority to get it out.
The totalitarians are in Tallahassee screwing with property they don’t own. The authority answers to the GOP, it is not independent.
It is a shame that we are offered renewed hope due to a representative from Coral Gables instead of our “Authority” or local representatives.
Why would “local representatives” give control of their property to the state?
Glad you got swamped in your election. Did you run on butt kissing Tallahassee?
The city is incapable of fixing itself. Outside sanity is required.
Go Ron!
Hopefully now ALL of Alachua county customers will have a say and not just the minority in Gainesville proper. Fingers crossed. Well done!
The county residents don’t own a utility. Of course they don’t have a say. The city does!
WTF IS WRONG WITH YOU ALL?
This logic runs counter to your lefty roots. Just saying.
I sincerely hope nobody is planning to state they didn’t see this one coming.
I think this clearly counters the city lawyers argument to the appeals judge if the legislature didn’t want us to alter the city charter to remove their law they would have wrote it in. Only lawyers and judges would argue that they don’t what the legislature intends when they explicitly write a law to say they are appointing an authority.
Welcome to the free state of totalitarian
Harvey and crew – party is over. Thanks for squandering millions on attorney fees and special elections. Maybe you all should take a field trip to Key West and find out how annexing from the State of Florida would look? Take the School Board with you.