Council to hear presentation on water, wastewater and irrigation impact fee study
City consultant Public Re-sources Management Group (PRMG) will present the findings from its water, wastewater and irrigation impact fee study to City Council members Wednesday in a special workshop session.
As required by state statute, the city must periodically update its Utility Capital Expansion Fees. The city last updated the combined water, wastewater and irrigation fees in 2012 and the combined fees for single-family homes has not increased for the past 10 years.
PRMG is recommending a decrease in the wastewater impact fees while the water and irrigation fees should see an increase. Increases to the water and irrigation fees would be offset by the wastewater fee decrease.
To minimize the amount of the increase of the existing fees, city staff recommends implementing all fee decreases while discounting water and irrigation impact fees by 6 to 7 percent.
The city is divided into two sewer districts with District 1 generally south of Pine Island Road where utility service is available. District 2 is the northern section where utilities expansion is about to take place.
A typical single-family home in District 1 would pay $51 more in impact fees for water and sewer service with no irrigation connection under the PRMG recommendation. In District 2 the impact fee would show an overall decrease of $980.
Adding a connection to the irrigation system raises the impact fee by $1,031 in District 1 for a total fee of $6,167. There would be no change to the existing fee total of $6,750 in District 2 since the decreases to the wastewater portion is offset by the increase to water and irrigation.
The consultant’s proposed alternative fees should not have an adverse affect on the utility system’s recent revenue sufficiency analysis results, the report states. The city may elect to increase water and irrigation impact fees in the future.
The Committee of the Whole meeting is at 4:30 p.m. in Conference Room A2000 at the Nicholas Annex, 815 Nicholas Parkway.