Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
West Palm Beach commissioners review 2019 fire-assessment study and weigh fee update ahead of March 23 decision
Summary
City finance staff and a consultant reviewed the 2019 fire-assessment study, showing the city could legally raise residential assessments from the current $100 toward a $231 maximum; commissioners requested more data and will decide whether to raise the fee and whether to commission a full study update at a March 23 workshop.
At a West Palm Beach City Commission workshop, Chief Financial Officer Bridget Souffrant and consultant Sandy Newbarth of Accenture reviewed the city’s 2019 fire-assessment study and laid out options for raising the residential assessment from the current $100 per dwelling unit.
The presentation explained the assessment is a property charge used to fund fire-protection services only; Newbarth said, “A Fire Assessment is a charge imposed against property to pay for Fire Protection Services,” and noted that EMS costs must be excluded under the controlling case law. The consultants told commissioners the study uses a court-tested “historical demand” methodology that apportions costs by where calls for service occurred and that the Desiderio v. Boynton Beach decision in the Fourth District upheld similar methods.
Why it matters: the commission must decide how to cover rapidly rising fire-suppression costs. The city’s five-year average assessable budget used in 2019 was about $20.5 million; Souffrant said the current fire-suppression budget is roughly $54 million, and the assessment presently funds about 13%–43% of assessable…
Already have an account? Log in
Subscribe to keep reading
Unlock the rest of this article — and every article on Citizen Portal.
- Unlimited articles
- AI-powered breakdowns of topics, speakers, decisions, and budgets
- Instant alerts when your location has a new meeting
- Follow topics and more locations
- 1,000 AI Insights / month, plus AI Chat
