The Dakota County Board of Commissioners voted Nov. 4 to adopt the county2026 fee schedules and incorporate them into the 2026 budget following a public hearing.

Lucas Chase, audit manager in the county finance department, told the board the proposed schedule included multiple categories of changes: newly added fees, fees eliminated because authority shifted to the state, and fee increases intended to recover costs or reflect market rates. "The effective date for most of the fees, basically, all of them will be January 1," Chase said. He said departments were instructed to "start with the inflationary increase of 3%" and then apply cost-recovery where applicable.

Chase listed specific additions and removals. New or reinstated fees include family childcare licensing fees returned to the county schedule, an enhanced services per diem at the juvenile services center for youth who require additional staffing or medical/behavioral-care plans, radon test-kit charges in public health, a small fee for bicycle-tire recycling in Environmental Resources, and a $24.50 administrative pass-through fee added to certain hazardous-waste disposal contracts. The county also added a $75 fee for an address-protection program created by statute.

The county removed several fees after statutory or program changes. Chase said corporate foster-care licensing authority moved to the state, an out-of-county mental-health per diem was consolidated under a statewide per diem, and the refugee health assessment fee is no longer applicable. Elections removed a fee for physical address-label printouts after switching to electronic distribution.

Chase said 36 fees increased by more than 5%, and that 14 fee changes related to wells rose by more than 100% following statutory revisions. Parks, public health and community-services fees also saw multiple increases. "A lot of those were statutory required increases with, I think, 14 related to wells," he said.

The public hearing drew no in-person, online or written comments. Commissioner Helverson moved to adopt the fee schedules; Commissioner Droste seconded the motion. A roll-call vote recorded approval by the full board.

The presentation noted that, after adoption, finance will incorporate the schedules into the 2026 budget and begin an in-depth cost-recovery analysis and Metro-area benchmarking for the 2027 fee process.

Details not specified at the hearing included some per-fee formulas and the complete list of fee amounts for every line item; Chase said departments performed the calculations and provided examples during the presentation.