01/05/2009: "CC Cuts Stormwater Fee 90%"

//11/05/2008 // Citing concerns that now is not the time to impose new fees -or raise taxes- and after reducing the Capital Service Charge fees by 90%, the County Council passed a storm water funding ordinance on Tuesday.

The ordinance does retain a base fee of $22.97 that everyone will pay, but the fees to fund actual projects (capital improvement) was reduced (as shown below)

The new ordinance is the result of a years work by the three member council sub-committee of Gene Knapp, Rich Peterson, and Howard Rosenfeld. The new ordinance replaces the one the voters rejected last year in the county’s first referendum.

Only two members of the public showed up for the public hearing on Tuesday, and both spoke against the ordinance as proposed.

County Councilman Rich Peterson has chaired the council subcommittee that was charged with drafting a new ordinance, and at the last minute he had questioned the need for the new fees the committee -including Peterson- had proposed for the Funding Ordinance for storm water.

Peterson had sent a memo to the Council stating that he had conducted research that lead him to withdraw his support for any fees, other than a “base fee”, to fund the stormwater ordinance. ( Related Story )

But at the hearing he had harden up on even more, and suggested to the full council that they take a second look at the base fee structure as well.

After bouncing ideas around, Councilman Bob Myhr suggested a simple solution, and after some additional discussion, it was agreed to simply reduce the proposed fees by 90^, and call it a day.

Fees as passed by the County Council:
ig-SW_Fees (49k image)

Motion made, motion passed; on to the next agenda item.