The Northern Palm Beach County Improvement District is an independent Special District created by the Florida legislature in 1959 to provide water management and infrastructure development in Palm Beach County.  Northern’s service area covers over 128 square miles and includes parts of Unincorporated Palm Beach County, Tequesta, Jupiter, Juno Beach, North Palm Beach, Palm Beach Gardens, Lake Park, Mangonia Park and  West Palm Beach.  Special Districts are unlike municipalities and counties in that some of them, including Northern, collect revenue from non-Ad Valorem assessments. This means that the amount of the assessment is not based on the value of the property.  Assessments are paid solely by landowners benefiting from the services that Northern provides.  The assessments collected do not duplicate services provided by other municipalities or districts and revenues can only be used for purposes authorized in its legislation.  Northern has over 75 geographical taxing areas called Units of Development that have unique budgets to defray the cost of services provided to that area.

Some of the services that Northern provides are:  storm water management, right-of-way maintenance including roadways and sidewalks, maintenance of canals, waterways and lakes, water quality monitoring, environmental mitigation and management, permit and plat review as well as hurricane response and emergency operations. 

Northern is governed by a five member elected Board of Supervisors.  Four of the five seats are popularly elected and one seat is elected by landowners.  Northern operates with a staff of twenty three full time staff and two part time interns.  Much of the maintenance and construction work is contracted out through a bidding process.  Northern’s staff manage the work of the contractors and are constantly inspecting the facilities.  They also make and schedule repairs and preventative maintenance work.

Northern maintains water levels in many of its Units of Development with pump stations and operable gates which enable staff to discharge excess storm water in a pre-storm scenario in order to achieve additional storage when it is most needed.  Staff can also utilize the operable facilities to reduce the duration of flood events.  They can open operable gates after the storm has passed (when the peak stage in the receiving waters has begun to decline) resulting in a shorter period of inundation. With Radio Telemetry, they have the ability to remotely monitor and operate water management systems.  Telemetry works by measuring and communicating data through wireless radio signals from remote sources to receiving stations. Northern’s system operates through 72 wireless radio units. Prior to a storm, the operations team can begin monitoring water elevations to determine whether there is a need to lower or “draw down” the levels to prevent flooding.  Northern staff use laptops, tablets, cellular phones and wireless technology to access the system from the office, out in the field, traveling, or at home.  Gates and pump stations can be operated remotely and water levels tracked to provide immediate action and real-time information.

Environmental management is also a large focus of Northern staff.  Northern employs an environmental team who supervise crews of workers to remove exotic plants and maintain approximately 2,000 acres of preserves throughout the District.  Some of these preserves are accessible to the public via boardwalks and nature trails.  These areas are a part of undeveloped Florida that provide homes to many species of plants and animals including endangered gopher tortoises and bald eagles.

Northern has an approximatly $45 million budget;  half of which is for debt service on bonds and notes outstanding.  The bonds were used to provide funds to construct much of the infrastructure within the Units of Development and all have fixed interest rates.  They are payable over long time periods, generally up to 30 years.  Notes are often used to finance larger repair and replacement projects where the cost of the project can be spread out over multiple years to minimize the impact to assessments.  

The Board and Staff of Northern Palm Beach County Improvement District are committed to providing their residents with high quality, cost effective services.