Lemoore council agrees to pursue one-time fee in lieu of CFD for Chipotle site; staff to finalize agreement

Lemoore City Council agreed July 1 to pursue a one-time payment from CalGold Lamar LLC in place of establishing a Community Facilities District (CFD) to cover certain public-safety impact fees for a proposed Chipotle at the Kmart shopping center.

City Manager Marissa Trejo told the council the developer asked to avoid the time-consuming CFD formation process and offered a lump-sum payment instead. “What if I pay this one-time fee that's equivalent to between four and five years worth of what he would have paid for a CFD in order to not go through that process and have a waiver?” Trejo said, summarizing the developer’s proposal.

Trejo said the city staff recommended accepting the approach so construction would not be delayed. She described the developer’s proposed location as adjacent to Panda Express in the Kmart shopping center and said the one-time payment would be split between police and fire impact funds in the same manner CFD revenues would have been allocated.

City staff told council the CFD process typically takes several months (staff estimated three to six months) and that the city’s published estimate for annual CFD revenue from that site would have been about $1,100 per year for public-safety fees; the developer offered a one-time payment staff said was roughly $5,000. Trejo said the one-time payment would be deposited into the same funds the CFD revenue would have supported.

Councilmember action: Councilmember Gornick moved to bring the waiver forward and Councilmember Brewster seconded. The motion passed on a 3-vote majority as recorded at the meeting; the city clerk’s minutes record the motion as passing “3 in favor.” The staff memo noted the developer was connected to the meeting via Zoom to answer questions.

Why it matters: Accepting a one-time payment rather than forming a CFD can shorten permitting and construction timelines for a commercial tenant but removes multi-year CFD revenue flows and may set a precedent for how the city treats similar requests. Several council members asked staff to review the city’s CFD ordinance language to avoid unintended precedents in the future.

Council direction and next steps: Council instructed staff to finalize the waiver agreement, prepare a formal council item explaining the payment amount and how funds will be allocated, and return with any recommended amendments to the city’s CFD ordinance so that future requests are processed consistently.

No final CFD formation was completed at the meeting; council approved the staff-recommended path forward to accept the developer’s one-time payment proposal and to return with a formal agreement for execution.