CC - Agendas - City Council - REGULAR - 11/4/2008

Home

Prescott City Council Regular Voting Meeting — October 28, 2008 Page 12 view is that the impact fee ordinance is the most specific and so, generally speaking, in statutory construction the more specific ordinance will be given effect. 1 Councilwoman Lopas said that she agrees with some and disagrees with some of them. In the Courier it talked about the Brown Family and their loans being called. People are not pulling permits to build because they are cannot get a loan; it is a credit crunch that is causing the crisis. Delaying the impact fee is not going to change the credit crunch. It is a national issue and is beyond local control. Mayor Wilson said that they all received a memo from Mr. McConnell on the effects of deferred implementation of the water and sewer impact fees. He said that it is important to recognize some of the things said, such as the $3.2 of growth-related project work that is crucial should not be delayed under any circumstances, and will of necessity have to be financed through a bond issue. If they do not approve these impact fees, what they really have to say is they are going to stop that kind of work because they don't have the money. It is not an issue of the economic times, it is an issue of whether to continue the plans they have or not. Councilman Lamerson said that he agreed with what Councilwoman Lopas was saying, but that was his point on the nature of impact fees. They build billions of dollars in infrastructure in the community and charge people a one-time fee to do certain things and then it is there forever. Impact fees are the wrong fees to use to try and deliver all of the basic services and capital improvements. They are a very volatile way to try and compel growth to pay for growth. He said that every year they go into the budget scenario where they discuss raising impact fees knowing that they are not keeping up with the ball. It is • like they are using the wrong mechanism, but keep using the same tool. If they are not collecting impact fees they will have to go to the ratepayers. Councilwoman Suttles said that they all received a letter from the Yavapai County Contractors Association. Councilman Lamerson feels that impact fees are not the way to go, there has to be a different route. The YCCA submitted a list of 21 different ways of dealing with impact fees, but as soon as they pick one, there will be another group stating it is not fair to them. Mayor Wilson said that YCCA submitted 21 categories with no recommendations, which could be done by looking on Wikipedia to find every financing mechanism in the world. He thinks they should pass the impact fees as they are a year into the cycle and that gives them a year to come up with a solid recommendation to bring forward.