Consultant outlines draft impact fees; council asks for peer comparisons and housing analyses

A consultant on Monday presented a draft impact-fee program for North Augusta that would assess new development for city capital needs in parks, sanitation, transportation, water and wastewater.

Carson Bice, the consultant, told the City Council the package includes a mixture of fee methodologies: a consumption-based (or “incremental expansion”) approach for most categories and a plan-based approach for transportation. Under the draft, a representative single-family home would pay roughly $5,100 in total impact fees (about $4,602 for parks/transportation/sanitation and about $516 for water and wastewater, the report shows). Draft per-unit fees listed in the presentation include about $1,607 for parks and $193 for sanitation; transportation fees are higher under the plan-based calculation.

The consultant said the transportation portion relies on the city’s draft master transportation plan and a 10‑year capital improvement program (CIP) that totals about $51.8 million. Of that total, he said, only about $8.8 million is attributable to new growth under the allocation method used — leaving a $43.0 million shortfall the city would need to fund from other sources if it adopts the plan-based fee level.

Why it mat…