By Brian McBride
Associate Editor

Standing in the front of the four-story building with its ocean-blue windows and green-built features, officials with the Toho Water Authority celebrated the grand opening of the utility's new home that will house staff from several offices around town under one roof.

Located at 951 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., employees will begin moving into the new 54,000-square-foot facility Aug. 6. It will be open for business Aug. 8.

The authority, established in 2003 by a special act of the Florida Legislature, serves 73,000 water, 71,000 wastewater and 10,000 reclaimed water customers in Kissimmee and unincorporated areas of Osceola and Polk County, including Poinciana. The group held a special ribbon-cutting ceremony at the building Thursday, allowing people to tour the new facility.

“This is a grand day for Osceola County, the city of Kissimmee and for Polk County,” Authority Executive Director Brian Wheeler said.

The authority had been operating out of several pockets around the city, including the second floor of Kissimmee City Hall. The new $10.7 million building will allow the authority to establish departments it couldn't before, such as human resources and customer service, because of space limitations, Wheeler said.

“It creates an efficiency of operation,” Wheeler said. “It improves our ability to serve the community.”

But there was more than just one landmark being celebrated. The authority is currently going through the submittal process to receive a silver certification through LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design). LEED, developed by the U.S. Green Building Council, is an internationally recognized green building certification system providing verification that a building or community was designed and built using strategies intended to improve performance in areas such as energy savings, water efficiency, carbon dioxide emissions reduction, improved indoor environmental quality and stewardship of resources and sensitivity to their impacts.

That silver certification would be a first for Osceola County, said project manager Erick Kleinsteuber, vice president of KZF Design located in Orlando.

“That's a very big deal,” he said.

Some of the green features included, according to an authority press release, are:

• Water efficiency: Landscaping is irrigated with reclaimed non-potable water with a drip and flow technology reducing water use by more than 50 percent; and the building is designed to have an estimated water savings of 171,215 gallons per year by using low-flow water features.

• Energy efficiency: The air conditioning system is designed to save an estimated $235,000 over its life cycle, and high-output/low-energy interior and exterior lighting will save an estimated $10,000 a year.

• Materials: Both the building and finished materials are designed with recycled content including concrete, steel and carpet.

• Air quality: Air brought into the building is designed to be electrically monitored for pollutants and filtered accordingly.

The building and all its environmentally sensitive offerings is now a finished product that began five years ago, Wheeler said.

“It feels good to come to the end of a long process,” he said.