Economic Development

The City of Fellsmere is committed to supporting economic development efforts throughout the city. City staff work with local businesses, institutions, and non-profits to ensure that Fellsmere is a great place to live, work, and play while maintaining it’s historical heritage. Economic Development services that are available include:

  • Business attraction & site selection assistance
  • Access to labor force data
  • Business recruitment
  • Business retention and expansion assistance

The goal of these efforts is to market the City's many economic advantages in order to enhance the competitiveness of our local economy and to maintain a strong and diverse revenue and job base in Indian River County.

Why Choose Fellsmere?

Located on Florida’s east coast, midway between West Palm Beach and Cape Canaveral, Indian River County is within 3 hours of over 17-million consumers, or 90% of Florida’s population. The county offers competitive property tax rates, and no state income tax.

The City of Fellsmere has thousands of acres of developable land and quick access to I-95. Land within the City of Fellsmere is designated as Opportunity Zone properties. To view a map of our Opportunity Zone, please click here. Created to encourage investment and be used as a development tool to support economic development, Opportunity Zones was created by the Federal Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. For more information on Opportunity Zones and Opportunity Funds, please click here.

Incentives

The City offers several incentives to encourage economic development. For annexed properties, the City has entered into agreements with various landowners with obligations to provide land to the City to attract new businesses. The City also offers expedited permitting and undertakes grants or other Public-Private Partnerships to help businesses overcome large infrastructure costs.

In 2010, the City passed an ordinance to create an Economic Development Ad Valorem Tax exemption (Ordinance No. 2010-10) to encourage new businesses to locate and existing businesses to expand within the City. The intent of this financial incentive is to create new jobs and improve tangible property to promote and strengthen the local economy and enhance the health, welfare, and general well-being of the citizens of Fellsmere.

In 2011 the City created the Fellsmere Economic Enhancement District (FEED) (Ordinance No. 2011-04) in order to apply a Brownfields designation on approximately 1,012 acres to allow redevelopment of these properties potentially contaminated. Under the state’s Brownfields Redevelopment Act, a Brownfields Area must be a contiguous area of one or more sites where the expansion, redevelopment, or reuse may be complicated by real or perceived environmental contamination. Under this designation, property owners and developers are able to apply  to receive limited liability protections and financial incentives to offset the costs of remediation and rehabilitation of the property. When used properly, this is a very powerful economic development tool.

In addition, Indian River County has a Local Jobs Grant program. The program offers financial incentives to eligible "targeted" firms for creating new full-time higher-wage jobs within the County and maintaining those jobs over multiple years.  Those targeted industries are included in the county’s Comprehensive Plan. For more information on Indian River County Incentives, click here.

Business Continuity and Resilience Planning

In response to manmade and natural disasters, we have compiled the following information and resources for our business community to address preparedness issues while building in flexibility to handle potential business interruptions:

Free or low cost business assistance can also be obtained from the following organizations:

Workforce Training and Education

Training programs in educational institutions are attractive features for businesses looking to relocate to a new area. The following are programs that provide needed technical training and educational opportunities for the local workforce.

CareerSource Research Coast (CSRC) provides a system that connects employers and job seekers in the workforce development area of Indian River, Martin, and St. Lucie counties.

The School District of Indian River County offers programs to assist not only those students with aspirations of continuing their academic learning, but also those students who choose to expand their technical and vocational skills to quickly enter the workforce after high school. The District’s Career and Technical Pathways Program offers technical training to students while they are still in high school.

Indian River State College (IRSC) offers more than 100 programs leading to Bachelor's Degrees, Associate Degrees, Technical Certificates, and Applied Technology Diplomas, as well as Career Training programs.

 

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