Construction In Post Falls To Cost More City Council Votes To Establish Impact Fees To Offset Expense Of Extending City Services

If Harold Lundy of Spokane puts the mobile home park he eventually wants to build inside the Post Falls city limits, it will cost him about $55,000 more in January than it would now.

Starting next month, Lundy and anyone else who builds within Post Falls will be paying impact fees to offset the cost of extending city services to new buildings. The City Council approved the fees at its Tuesday evening meeting.

The fees will add $1,025 to the cost of building a residence.

Nonresidential developers will pay more. It will cost them $1,036 for every 1,000 square feet of floor area for commercial or shopping center buildings. Office or institutional buildings will cost $849 for every 1,000 square feet of floor area. Industrial, warehouse and agricultural buildings will rack up fees of $182 for every 1,000 square feet of floor area.

The fees will generate about $1.59 million for parks, $1.52 million for infrastructure and $225,500 for the Police Department over the next five years, Gary Young, planning and building director for the city, estimated.

Throughout the process of creating the ordinance, the city has heard criticism from developers who say impact fees will encourage businesses to build elsewhere.

At Tuesday’s meeting, Bob Templin, owner of Templin’s Resort Hotel, urged the city to wait to pass the fees until after the school bond election in March and until after Louisiana-Pacific Corp. has sold property downtown.

“I can’t think of a worse deterrent to L-P’s attempt to sell their property,” Templin told the council. “I’m for impact fees, but I’m not for them at this time.”

But other groups, including the North Idaho Building Contractors Association, have supported Post Falls’ impact fees because without adequate infrastructure, developers will not build in town anyway.

, DataTimes