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Council wrestles with new water impact fee proposal, tables final resolution for clarifications
Summary
After a consultant presented a water impact-fee study recommending a consolidated culinary water impact fee (approx. $13,805), the council initially voted to adopt an ordinance but later identified inconsistencies in the resolution and tabled the fee schedule for revision and public-notice checks.
Manaway's council spent significant time Feb. 19 reviewing a water impact fee analysis and a proposed ordinance to consolidate multiple connection fees into a single culinary water impact fee.
Sunrise Engineering summarized the methodology for allocating project costs between existing residents and future development, noting that projects such as a new well, a booster station and upsizing Main Street pipe were partly eligible for impact-fee funding. The consultant said eligible future-share estimates for some projects were about 39 percent and that the town's total existing water rights were 1,227 acre-feet while current needs were approximately 845 acre-feet. “An impact fee can only be charged for additional capacity that's built into a system for growth,” the consultant said.
Councilors discussed simplified fee administration and the proposed single fee, which staff summarized as roughly $13,805 per connection. During debate members raised concerns about how several existing fees would be combined, a line in the draft resolution that incorrectly referenced a business-license section, and highlighted changes in the version sent to council (yellow highlights). The council initially moved to adopt the impact fee ordinance on the floor, but after discovering inconsistent language in the resolution and fee schedule the body voted to table the specific resolution (identified in the meeting as resolution 2026-02-19-02B) until staff can reconcile the documents, confirm public-notice requirements and ensure the fee schedule and ordinance language match.
Councilors asked staff to prepare a corrected resolution and fee schedule and to bring the revised materials back with clear highlights and the legal notices required for ordinance adoption. No final fee schedule was implemented the night of the meeting.
