Planning Commission hears FCS presentation on Sammamish parks and transportation impact-fee update

Sammamish City Planning Commission met Nov. 6, 2025 and received a technical presentation from consultants at FCS Group and city staff on proposed updates to the city—s transportation and parks impact fees.

The presentation by John Guilarducci, principal at FCS, and Doug Gabbard, the project manager, walked the commission through the legal framework, a project list with eligibility percentages, and a scaling method required by recent state changes that ties charges to unit size, bedrooms or trips. David Pyle, Sammamish Community Development Director, introduced the consultants and said staff will return with code edits and implementation options.

Why it matters: impact fees are one-time capital charges developers pay when a new unit is built; state law and recent statutory changes require fees "to reflect the proportionate impact of new housing units" so smaller or multi-family units bear a smaller share. FCS—s draft calculation uses the city—s growth forecast of 2,100 dwelling units between 2025 and 2044 and converts forecasted vehicle trips into 2,477 PM peak-hour person-trip ends to establish the denominator for transportation fees.

What the consultants presented: FCS said total transportation projects listed as eligible in this iteration totaled roughly $32.2 million; after deducting the city—s existing impact-fee balances the net eligible amount shown in the presentation was about $29 million. Dividing that net eligible cost by the 2,477 PM person-trip growth produced a proposed rate of about $11,779 per PM peak-hour person trip. Applying industry trip factors yielded sample per-unit numbers in the mid-$16,000 to $17,000 range for a typical single-family dwelling before applying scaling.

For parks, FCS used a historical-investment approach: value of existing parks and improvements divided by current population gives a capital value per person, multiplied by forecast population growth and checked against a parks project list…