Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Fees Development Services topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Consultants say city over‑collecting on some development fees; propose tiered schedule and new floodplain charge
Summary
MGT presented an update to Fort Myers' development‑services fee study, finding total user‑fee service costs of about $10.7 million and recommending tiered valuation fees, flat over‑the‑counter charges, a new floodplain review fee, and phased reductions for high‑end permits.
MGT consultant Georgia Morrison laid out a bottoms‑up update to the city's 2018 user‑fee study and told the council the consultant team calculated “the total cost of user fee services is $10,700,000.”
Morrison said the study analyzed building, planning, engineering and fire permitting and recommended a move from the city's current flat and job‑value approaches to a tiered schedule using ICC valuation tables. “We're recommending tiered fees charged on valuation of construction project using the standard ICC tables,” she said, and proposed flat fees for 14 over‑the‑counter trade permits and a new flat fee for floodplain plan review and inspection.
Council members focused questions on reserves, timing and the effect on affordable housing. Jerry Wolf of MGT recommended a reserve equivalent to 12–18 months of building‑department activity to cushion revenue swings. Wolf said: “Because of that, we recommend a 12 to 18 month reserve for building departments.”
City staff told the council they did not intend to implement full adjustments in a single step. The plan staff described would phase reductions for higher‑end fees, monitor the reserve balance over a year, then revisit further reductions if reserves stayed healthy. Staff and consultants also noted the study excluded nonuser impact fees and focused on direct/indirect cost allocations.
Council asked staff to return with implementation timing, sample bill‑level impacts (including single‑family and multifamily examples), and proposed language for a phased ordinance that would allow partial reductions and a monitoring trigger for subsequent changes.
