By: Libi Uremovic| Original Article at Patch.com
Agenda Item 7.c New Mitigation Fee Schedule
The City of Beaumont is increasing Developer Mitigation Fees per house from $16,560.53 to $17,497.17. There are increases across the board totaling $936.64, but the largest increases are Fire Station Fees and Road & Bridge Fees.
LAND MANAGEMENT SYSTEM SURCHARGE:
A 2% Surcharge will be charged for ever Fee. The LMS will add another $350 to the Mitigation Fees bringing the total per house to $17,847.11.
Although it is called the ‘Land Management System Surcharge’; the Resolution states: “..the amount of two percent (2%) shall be applied and charged against EACH AND EVERY FEE OR CHARGE..”
The 2% Surcharge applies to any and all fees and charges by the City.
The purpose of the fee is to pay for the service. Since Beaumont Staff considers fees collected ‘their money’ they now want to add another charge to pay for any services provided by the City.
FIRE STATION MITIGATION FEE:
The Fire Station Facility Fee states: “In 1999, the City Council adopted a Fire Station Facility Fee of $181.00 per EDU.”
1999 was fifteen years and 10,000 houses ago. The City should have $1.8 Million in a Fire Stations Fund collected from Developer Mitigation Fees alone. AND $300 Million has been acquired through Mello Roos Bond Debt; of which a portion was scheduled to be used for Fire Stations.
But a Fire Station Fund Account was never established, the fire stations were never built, and the millions collected were embezzled through the City Staff’s numerous dummy corporations.
The January 20th Agenda Report states that the estimated cost of EACH Fire Station will be $4,720,536. At $532.42 per house, it will take 8,866 more houses to generate the revenue for one fire station.
To generate enough Mitigation Fees to build fire stations for Beaumont Residences today the City will have to collect mitigation fees from 26,600 new houses or 60,000 Beaumont Residences of ‘the Future’.
ROAD AND BRIDGES MITIGATION FEE:
Road and Bridge Mitigation Fees will increase $438.88 from $10,507.51 to $10,946.39. Calculating the same rate of growth as the Fire Station Mitigation Fees; the City will collect another $291 Million for Roadways.
BUILDING DEPARTMENT FEES:
The Report states: “The cost to process Photovoltaic Systems (Solar Panel) Building Permits is higher than the amount of money the City currently collects. The Plan Check and Permit fees are based on the valuation of the system the contractor puts on the application, which has caused issues as the valuations are not always accurate. Staff is proposing a $500 flat fee for the plan check, permit, and inspect of Residential Photovoltaic Systems less than or equal to 10 kilowatts.”
On December 2, 2014 the Beaumont City Council passed the ‘Climate Action Plan’ to pay for solar by attaching liens on their property to pay the cost. The additional $500 fee will ensure the property owner’s cost will be at least $500.