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Town’s fee study finds large shortfall; consultants propose restructuring and examples for public review

Finance & Investment Committee · April 6, 2026
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Summary

A user‑fee study covering planning, building and engineering finds Los Altos Hills recovers roughly 43% of full service costs (about $1.5M collected vs. $3.4M full cost), and consultants proposed fee rebalancing with sample project examples and possible phased implementation.

Consultants from MBS presented a user‑fee study to the Finance & Investment Committee on May 1 that shows the town currently collects about $1.5 million in planning, building and engineering fees but would need about $3.4 million to fully recover the cost of providing those services, according to Nicole Kism, principal at MBS.

Kism described a standard, bottom‑up methodology: identify direct and indirect costs, allocate overhead, estimate time per service and compute fully burdened hourly rates. The study produced a full‑cost recovery recommendation for most fee categories; building permits…

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