The Osceola County Administration building, for the most part, closed to the public during COVID-19 quarantine conditions in 2020.
County officials figured that, with few to no residents coming through, it was a great time to renovate, and streamline its space for better flow and customer service.
As operations slowly re-opened on the first floor of the building, home to permitting, planning and development operations, in 2021, the renovations kicked up a few notches. Earlier this year, the county unveiled all of its changes, paid for with money collected from permits and fees and not property taxes.
The result is a new airy floor plan that makes the best use of space. The customer service area was expanded by two windows, but they are bigger.
“This is the people’s space, so it’s your space,” said County Commissioner Peggy Choudhry, who led a tour of the new space Monday.
“The money was spent to improve customer service,” said Community Development Director Ray Stangle. “We had nice offices, but they weren’t what they thought they could be.”
The pandemic sent nearly all office workers home to do their jobs there, and it’s been a change that has remained mostly in place. About a third of office staff is now working from home on a rotating basis at any one time, allowing all county zoning, permitting and development staff to be in the same office space.
“It’s truly a one-stop shop,” Stangle said. “Before, if you needed a survey or some other piece to go with your permits, we had to ask customers to go over to the Beaumont Avenue complex and come back. Now they’ve moved in with us.”
Said Choudhry, “Permitting should not be an all-day affair.”
Deputy Administrator said going to that “hotel” aspect of running the office, with its reception area now inside the office rather than in the building’s entryway, allowed for the better use of the space.
“We used to take up this entire first floor; we had space issues,” he said. “What we didn’t have $50 million to build a new building. This space is more employee and customer friendly, we are truly a onestop shop for permitting.”
The other side of the first floor now contains three conference rooms, with screens that allow for the public to meet virtually with county staff that may be in any part of the building, or officials from other counties.
The building also features a new security system that allows staff to know who is in the building at all times.
