ORANGE BEACH — Orange Beach City Council has approved a nine-month moratorium on certain residential multi-family projects and subdivision applications.

The suspension covers any multi-family project that contains three or more units and subdivision applications containing three or more residential lots smaller than 9,000 square feet per lot, according to the moratorium document.

The moratorium comes after the city postponed a vote to deannex city properties north of the Intracoastal Waterway, which would return them to county jurisdiction. The city is facing two lawsuits concerning the deannexation.

Exceptions to this moratorium include applications for development in the Beach Overlay District; applications for repairs and operations on existing structures as long as it does not increase density; and projects that have been submitted and have had paid applications to the Orange Beach Planning Commission before March 11.

At the March 18 council meeting where the moratorium was approved, Orange Beach Mayor Tony Kennon said "you just don't declare a moratorium" as there must be a problem that creates a valid reason for the temporary suspension and "a cure" to the problem.

Kennon explained that the move to approve the moratorium is for the city to complete studies on utility and infrastructure capacity to get ahead of the "completely unprecedented growth" in Baldwin County.

"The growth in Baldwin County is beyond the norm, and I think we all know that," Kennon said. "Gone unchecked and we will either be trying to catch up or we won't ever catch up when it comes to utilities, infrastructure, etc."

He said "every big city in Baldwin County" will approve a moratorium or something similar to evaluate the limits of infrastructure within the growth of the county.

"Everyone's looking at it in Baldwin County, and everybody in Baldwin County that lives here wants us to do it," Kennon said, "and, again, it's going to be some tough decisions to be made."

As previously reported by Gulf Coast Media, Fairhope City Council approved a nine-month moratorium earlier this month, which temporarily halted the development of certain residential multi-family projects and subdivisions. The Fairhope moratorium is similar to Orange Beach in its specifics for which properties are temporarily paused, the reasoning behind the moratorium and issues surrounding growth in Baldwin County.

The article states this is not the first time Fairhope has issued a pause on residential projects. There have been a few building moratoriums issued over the years due to the city's growth. The most recent hold on development was in December 2021, which lasted a year.

Orange Beach has "roughly 15,000 sewer taps" with 9,000-10,000 of those belonging to "those who have business licenses." Kennon said these properties generate "a higher tax source" compared to residential properties, which make up around 5,000 of the used sewer taps.

The ad valorem taxes gathered from residential properties alone is "not enough to sustain the level of services" in Orange Beach, he said.

"That is not a commensurate value of tax revenue compared to what we get off the beach," Kennon said.

The city's studies are to determine if the "5,000-plus units" that have potential to develop within Orange Beach boundaries would force the city to diminish the services they provide or a tax increase, both of which the city does not want to have.

"It is a conundrum because I think most of us here are all about property rights and the right to build," Kennon said, "but at the same time, our job as elected officials is to make sure we maintain quality of life and do the best we can to keep our taxes low."

The moratorium allows the city to study storm water drainage plans, "especially on Bear Point," environmental capacity and the effects on wetland conservation, pedestrian safety, traffic efficiency with potentially new roadways, traffic lanes on Canal Road and bridges, wastewater sewage capacity, city infrastructure and emergency services, potential subdivision amendments and parking availability concerns.

"So, it's a lot to be looked at and evaluated if you're fixing to see the possible doubling of your residential community in a very, very short period of time," Kennon said. "I think we've all worked very hard over this period of time to be extremely fair in walking this fine line between facilitating a healthy growth but at the same time not diminishing our quality of life for those who live here full time."

After council voted to suspend the rules to allow for immediate consideration at the March 18 council meeting, the council unanimously approved the moratorium, which went into effect immediately.