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HomeMy WebLinkAbout006 - 01/17/1984 - ESTABLISHING A TRANSPORTATION UTILITY AND FUNDING THEREFOR ORDINANCE NO. 6, 1984 OF THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF FORT COLLINS BEING AN ORDINANCE ESTABLISHING A TRANSPORTATION UTILITY AND FUNDING THEREFOR WHEREAS, the Council of the City of Fort Collins , Colorado, has determined that the local streets of the city are an essential element of the transportation network of the city; and WHEREAS, the Council has further determined that there is a need to create and establish a system by which funding for the maintenance of the local street system can be assured. NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT ORDAINED BY THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF FORT COLLINS that Chapter 96 of the Code of the City of Fort Collins, Colorado, be adopted as follows: Chapter 96 Transportation Utility Fund 596-01 . Declaration of purpose. There is hereby created a Transportation Utility within the Transportation Services Fund for the purpose of providing for the maintenance of local streets as defined in Chapter 99 of this Code, and for the maintenance of those portions of collector and arterial streets as defined in Chapter 99 which are equivalent to local streets. The Council hereby finds, deter- mines and declares the necessity of providing maintenance and upkeep of the City' s local streets and related facilities as a comprehensive Transporta- tion Utility with such maintenance to include, without limitation, the following activities: patching, crack sealing, seal coating, overlaying and other activities as are necessary in order that local streets and related facilities may be properly maintained and that the health, safety and welfare of the city and its inhabitants may be safeguarded. §96-2 . City administration. The Director of Public Works (Director) shall be responsible for the administration of this chapter. The Director shall be responsible for developing administrative procedures for the fund, administration of fees, consideration of variances, developing maintenance programs, establishing standards for the maintenance of local streets, and all other activities related to the purpose of the Transportation Utility. §96-3 . Establishment and revision of transportation utility fee. The City Council may establish by ordinance a transportation utility fee (Fee) to be paid by the owners or occupants of property within the cor- porate limits of the City. Such fee shall be established in amounts which will provide sufficient funds to properly maintain local streets. Assess- ments against individual properties shall be based upon frontage, traffic generation, and developed use of the property, but the amount of the fee assessed per front foot against individual properties shall not necessarily be equal in all cases, and the City Council may, by ordinance, establish such amount dependent upon the use of the property or the proposed use of the property under existing zoning as such use relates to the vehicular traffic which will be generated by the property. Collection of the Fee against each property shall be made by a monthly charge to be added to the utility bill for such property, and shall commence on the 1st day of April , 1984 for developed property, and for undeveloped property upon issuance of a building permit for such property. The City Council may from time to time by ordinance change the Fee based upon revised estimates of the cost of properly maintaining local streets, revised categories of developed use, revised traffic generation factors, or other factors. §96-4. Transportation services fund. All fees collected by the city and such other moneys as might be available to the city for the purposes of this chapter shall be paid into the Trans- portation Utility Division of the Transportation Services Fund (Fund) . Such revenues shall be used for the purposes of the operation, administra- tion, and maintenance of the local street network of the City. It shall not be necessary that the operations, administration, and maintenance expenditures from the Fund specifically relate to any particular property from which the fees for said purposes were collected. To the extent that the Fees collected are insufficient to properly maintain local streets, the cost of the same may be paid from such other city funds as may be deter- mined by the City Council , but the City Council may order the reimbursement to such fund if additional fees are thereafter collected. All amounts on hand in the Transportation Utility Division of the Fund shall be invested by the Director of Finance in investments proper for city funds. All funds collected pursuant to the provisions of this chapter for operation, admin- istration, and maintenance shall be separately designated as such and shall be used solely for those purposes. §96-5. Transportation Utility Fee. Subject to the provisions of Section 96-7 hereof, there is hereby imposed upon each and every developed lot or parcel of land within the city and the owners and occupants thereof a transportation utility fee. This fee is deemed reasonable and is necessary to pay for the operation, administra- tion, and maintenance of such existing local streets as may be established within the city. §96-6. City to maintain local streets; exception. The city shall maintain all accepted local streets within city-owned land, city rights-of-way, and city easements and may maintain other accepted local streets within or adjacent to the city. Such local streets speci- fically exclude private streets and streets not yet accepted by the city for maintenance. -2- 596-7. Determination of transportation utility fee. The fee established herein shall be based upon the following factors: the amount of frontage in lineal feet that each lot or parcel has on the right-of-way of an accepted street; the base rate maintenance cost for each foot of frontage; and the developed use of the property (which includes the amount of vehicular traffic generated by the property) . The Director shall determine the category that shall apply to each lot or parcel within the guidelines herein set forth and shall establish the fee in accordance with the category of use and the following factors: A. Frontage. Except as otherwise herein defined, the frontage of each lot or parcel shall be measured along the right-of-way of the street on which the property is located. In the case of a lot or parcel having frontage on more than one street, the frontage shall be measured along all streets on which the lot or parcel has frontage. B. Base Rate. The base rate maintenance cost shall be $0.0143 per foot of frontage per month for all developed properties within the city. C. Categories of developed use. Each lot or parcel shall be placed by the Director, in a specific category of developed use, which category shall be based upon the actual land use of the subject lot or parcel . Such categories shall include: Single Family Residential Multi-family Residential Non-residential D. Traffic Generation Factor. The traffic generation factor for each category of developed use shall be as follows: Single Family Residential 1.00 Multi-family Residential 0.65 Non-residential 4.00 -3- E. Fee Formula. The monthly fee for each lot or parcel shall be calculated according to the following formula: Monthly fee= (base rate) X (frontage) X (traffic generation factor) F. Minimum and Maximum Fee. Notwithstanding the forgoing, the minimum charge for any lot or parcel shall be seventy-five cents ($0 .75) per lot or parcel . In the case of any lot or parcel whose category of developed use is determined to be multi-family residential , the monthly fee shall be not less than the equivalent of seventy-five cents ($0.75) per month per dwelling unit, nor more than one dollar and fifty cents ($1 .50) per month per dwelling unit. In the case of a lot or parcel of land having frontage on more than one street, and having a category of developed use determined as single family residential , the total street frontage shall be divided in half for the purposes of determining the fee. §96-8. Billing for fee. The fee shall be billed and collected with the monthl utility bill for those lots or parcels utilizing city utilities and b'Wd and collected separately for those lots or parcels and owners thereof not utilizing city utilities. In the case of those lots or parcels which are not occupied by the owner thereof, the fee shall be billed with the monthly utility bill , if any, which billed to the resident of the property. All such bills shall be rendered monthly by the Department of Finance and shall become due and payable in accordance with the rules and regulations of the Department of Finance pertaining to the collection of utility fees, and the Director of Finance shall place all such fees so collected into the Fund to be deposited and separately kept to be used only for the purposes provided herein. §96-9. Enforcement. Any charge due hereunder which shall not be paid when due may be recovered in an action at law by the city. In addition to any other remedies or penalties provided by this or any other ordinance of the city, failure of any user of city utilities within the city to pay said charges promptly when due shall subject such user to discontinuance of any utility services provided by the city and the City Manager is hereby empowered and directed to enforce this provision against such delinquent users. The employees of the city shall , at all reasonable times, have access to any premises served by the city for inspection , repair, or the enforcement of the provisions of this chapter. -4- 596-10. Unpaid charges to be a lien. A. All fees made pursuant to this chapter shall be a lien upon the property against which such fee is assessed from the date said fee becomes due until paid. The owner of every subject lot or parcel shall be obligated to pay the fee for all service provided for his property, which obligation may be enforced by the city by action at law or suit to enforce the lien. In the event that a tenant in possession of any premises shall pay said fee, such payment shall relieve the owner from such obligation and lien; but the city shall not be required to look to any person whomsoever other than the owner for the payment of such fees. B. No change of ownership or occupation shall affect the appli- cation of this chapter, and the failure of any owner to learn that he purchased property against which a lien for transportation utility fee exists shall not affect his responsibility for such payment. Any delinquent amount may be enforced by assessment upon the property so served and certification thereof to the County Treasurer for collection under and in pursuance of the authority and procedure provided in Chapter 16 of this Code. §96-11 . Administrative review; appeals. A. Any owner who disputes the amount of the fee made against such owner' s property or disputes any determination made by or on behalf of the city pursuant to and by the authority of this chapter may petition the Director of Transportation Services for a hearing on a revision or modification of such fee or determination. The Director of Transportation Services may hold such hearings himself or, at his sole discretion, may designate an officer or employee of the Transportation Ser- vices Unit as a hearing officer with authority to hold such hearing. Such petitions may be filed only once in connection with any such fee or determination, except upon a showing of changed circumstances sufficient to justify the filing of such additional petition. B. Such petitions shall be in writing , filed with the City Clerk, and the facts and figures shall be submitted under oath either in writing or orally at a hearing scheduled by the Director of Transportation Services or the Hearing Officer. The hearing, if any, shall take place in the City of Fort Collins , and notice thereof and the proceedings shall otherwise be in accordance with the rules and regula- tions issued by the Director of Transportation Services. The petitioner shall have the burden of proof. -5- C. Within thirty (30) days of filing of the petition, the Direc- tor of Transportation Services shall make findings of fact based upon all relevant information, shall make a determin- ation based upon such findings and, if appropriate, modify such fee or determination accordingly. Such determination shall be considered a final order of the Director of Trans- portation Services, which order may, within thirty (30) days of its issuance, be appealed to the Director of Public Works for a hearing on a revision or modification of such fee. Any such appeal to the Director of Public Works shall be in writing, filed with the City Clerk, setting forth the specific errors and omissions of the Director of Transportation Ser- vices in his determination, and such hearings shall take place in the City and notice thereof and the proceedings shall otherwise be in accordance with the rules and regulations issued by the Director of Public Works. The appellant shall have the burden of proof. D. Within thirty (30) days of filing of the appeal , the Director of Public Works shall make his final determination and, if appropriate, modify such fee or determination of the Director of Transportation Services in accordance with the facts submitted, to the extent that the Director of Public Works finds such facts to be true. §96-12. Notice of decision. Every decision or determination of the Director of Transportation Services or the Director of Public Works shall be in writing, and notice thereof shall be mailed to or served upon the petitioner within a reasonable time from the date of such action. Service by certified mail , return receipt requested, shall be conclusive evidence of service for the purpose of this chapter. §96-13. Disposition of fees and charges. The fees paid and collected by virtue of this chapter shall not be used for general or other governmental proprietary purposes of the city, except to pay for the equitable share of the cost of accounting, management and government thereof. Other than as described above, the fees and charges shall be used solely to pay for the cost of operation, administration, maintenance, repair, improvement, renewal , replacement, and reconstruction of the local street network of the city and costs incidental thereto; provided, however, that if there are amounts in excess of the amount required to satisfy the purpose of the fund, the City Council may, by ordinance, authorize the transfer of such excess amount to any other fund of the city. -6- §96-14. Utility refund for the elderly. Eligible applicants under the provisions of chapters 106 and 113 of the Code are also eligible for refund of the transportation utility fee under the same provisions as the referenced chapters. BE IT FURTHER ORDAINED that this ordinance shall become effective beginning the first complete utility billing period following April 1, 1984. Introduced, considered favorably on first reading and ordered pub- lished this 3rd day of January, A.D. 1984, and to be presented for final passage on the 17th day of January, A.D. 1984. C)c Ma of �ATTEST: City Clerk Passed and adopted on final reading this 17th day of January, A.D. 1984. 9J"'_Cz May r ATTEST: City Clerk -7-