HomeMy WebLinkAboutConstituent Letter - Read Before Packet - 3/21/2017 - Memorandum From David L. May, Fort Collins Chamber Of Commerce, Re: Capital Expansion Fees - Agenda Item 10March 20, 2017
Fort Collins City Council
300 LaPorte Ave.
Fort Collins, CO 80521
Dear Mayor Troxell, Mayor-Pro Tem Horak and Council Members Campana,
Cunniff, Martinez, Overbeck, and Stephens;
We are writing to, once again, share our strong concerns about the possible
increases to the Capital Expansion Fees at your March 20 regular session.
These fees are still not ready for adoption. We encourage you to consider the
following concerns:
• These fees are anti-affordable housing at their core.
o The Capital Improvement Expansion Fees as they relate to smaller units
directly impact our ability to build multi-family and dense products in
our community. Adopting them as they are presented will have the
unintended consequence of driving the creation of that affordable
products outside the GMA.
o As well, these fees will directly impact the overall cost of housing in
Fort Collins. There are currently 5,010 apartment units in the
development review pipeline – every single one of those homes will see
an overnight increase in the cost to the ultimate user of approximately
$3,131.00. And that’s just for Capital Expansion Fees.
• This proposal fails a key Council goal of the fee review process, which
was to get a comprehensive look at the impact of fees. What is now before
you splits the fees back apart, meaning that you lose the opportunity to see
the overall impact of city fees on development. It makes sense to delay this
adoption until the new Council is seated and can see the whole picture.
• This process fails the triple bottom line test. In the rush to secure new City
revenue, there has been no triple bottom line analysis of the impact of these
fees individually or in total. These fees will directly impact the cost of
housing in our community.
• This proposal is not revenue-neutral. Staff has estimated that adoption of
these new fees will generate an additional $1 million over the next six
months. That clearly argues to the fact that the fees are too high and makes
the case for mitigating the impact by phasing. That money ultimately comes
out of the pockets of residents.
March 21, 2017
City Council Meeting
Agenda Item #10
• The timing of when the fees are assessed is a problem. The Ordinance
requires that the fees be assessed at the time of the building permit. This is
too late in the development process and results in unexpected increased costs
for projects that could be in the development review process for 12-18
months. (That, by the way, is another topic for another day. Taking that long
to get through the development review process is damnable.) We would
prefer to see fees set for the project at a preliminary submittal, such as the
PDP submittal.
In closing, these fees are not ready for adoption and we encourage you to delay
action on this ordinance.
Sincerely,
Fort Collins Area Chamber of Commerce
David L. May
President & CEO
cc: Darin Atteberry, Mike Becksted, Tiana Smith