Chamber wants new vote on impact fees

The Kalispell Chamber of Commerce submitted a petition of 155 signatures to the City Council on Monday, requesting a new vote to rescind March 9 decision to install road impact fees.

Former Chamber president Mark Lalum handed the signatures to the council.

During the public hearing segment of Monday's meeting, three people asked the council to revoke its March 9 vote, while three others requested that it stand by that decision.

Mayor Pam Kennedy said the council will discuss at a workshop whether it wants to revisit the issue.

The council voted 8-1 on March 9 to approve a compromise package of reduced road impact fees.

The compromise included making the new fees 38 percent of what was originally proposed - until April 1, 2011.

After that, the transportation impact fees will be 51 percent of the original proposed fees.

That means the original proposed road impact fee of $928 for a new house now will be about $355 through April 1, 2011, and roughly $473 after that date.

An impact fee is a one-time charge on a new home or commercial building that is built in or annexed into Kalispell. Its purpose is to help the city pay the extra capital costs of serving that structure.

The fees are based on the amount of traffic new buildings are expected to create.

High-traffic projects can expect to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars. Glacier Town Center and its planned centerpiece 550,000-square-foot outdoor shopping center could pay millions of dollars.

That prompted heavy opposition of the fees by Kalispell's biggest developers, the construction industry and the Kalispell Chamber of Commerce. However, there also was substantial support for the originally proposed fees.

In early March, Citizens For A Better Flathead turned in 314 signatures on a petition to support the untrimmed recommended impact fees.

There has been significant speculation that impact-fee opponents might file a lawsuit against the fees.