THE VILLAGES — Some homeowners in The Villages encountered a setback Friday, a leftover effect of the regional drought.

About 400 residents of the senior-oriented community turned out to protest a maintenance fee increase.

The protesters live in The Villages Community Development District 1 in northeast Sumter County and one of four quasi-governmental divisions within the massive subdivision that spans three counties.

The district's Board of Supervisors met Friday to adopt its $1.12 million budget for the upcoming fiscal year, which starts Oct. 1.

One provision considered by the board was a 47 percent hike in District 1's maintenance fees, a move that affected lot owners, whose costs vary with their property.

The increase, the board said, was needed to build up the district's financial reserve. Supervisors had spent nearly $400,000 over the year on internal road projects and to line the bottom of two lakes in an effort to retain water in them.

The fee hike apparently touched off a firestorm among the retirees — so much so that board Chairman Vernon Gwynne reminded the audience to stop inundating the staff with irate, sometimes profane, telephone calls.

"The buck stops with me," Gwynne said. "Angry calls with swear words don't move any of us forward." 

Gwynne attempted to justify the outlays, saying the board was responsible for maintaining the quality, beauty and safety of the property.

He also talked against blaming the developer, reminding the group that the district owned the lakes and collects the assessments.

"In the vernacular," Vice Chairman Jack Johansson said, "we're tapped out."

Johansson called the effort at the lakes "a compassionate act to help people sell their homes with the lakes almost empty."

Board member Seymour Rosenblatt, who said he too wasn't happy about having to pay more, tried to pacify the crowd, vowing to fight to reduce the new increase by at least half during next year's budget talks.

The audience members, who at one point unanimously raised their hands when Johansson asked who opposed the increase, remained unswayed.

Resident Bernie O' Donnell, a retired engineer, drew large applause when he criticized the attempt to fix the lakes. He analyzed the original work done on the lakes and said the repairs wouldn't have been necessary if they had been built correctly at the start.

Another man told the board that they, as "fellow citizens and homeowners," should "jump up and down" in complaining to the developer about having to pay the repair costs. A third encouraged them to reject the proposed budget and rework it to cut expenditures instead of raising fees. 

Those sentiments captured the consensus of the crowd, but the board said it was under a tight schedule as the budget had to be submitted to the state by Sept. 15. The board slightly criticized the residents for not getting more involved at the beginning of the budget discussions. 

Ultimately, the board voted 4-1 for adopting the budget with the increase.

Member Russell Day dissented. 

After the meeting, Day said he opposed the budget because of the increase and because he wants a state investigation into the sales of some properties. Some people, he said, paid more when they bought along those lakes, without being told they were simply retention areas, and now have watched the water disappear.