After complaint, board debates impact fees

By COURTNEY LAMDIN | Staff Writer
courtney@miltonindependent.com

After Ray Morisseau fell down the half-staircase and into a basement wall in his raised ranch home, he and his wife, Donna, decided it was time to make a change.

Ray Morisseau, 73, has neck and back issues, and his balance is wobbly, Donna Morisseau, 70, said. The couple tried to sell their Route 7 Milton home they purchased in 1984 without luck. So they asked their youngest son, Stephen, and his 10-year-old daughter to move in upstairs, and they would convert their basement into a kitchen and living space. There was already a bedroom and bathroom.

When Donna Morisseau applied for a zoning permit, she discovered she had to pay $3,188, the impact fee leveled for accessory apartments, before she and Ray could occupy the space.

“When I first went over there, I was so mad, I walked out in tears,” Donna Morisseau said.

So she contacted Selectboard chairman Lou Mossey, who broached the issue at the November 21 meeting. In light of the Morisseaus’ situation, board Vice-Chairman Darren Adams said impact fees should be studied further and possibly eliminated in certain situations.

Specifically, Adams said issuing high fees for trying to help family members isn’t right.

“This sort of thing is going to happen more and more often as healthcare costs are increasing and nursing home costs are increasing,” he said. “Do we really want to assess a family a huge fee for doing the right thing?”

Milton has had an impact fee ordinance since 1990 to offset the burden a growing population puts on town services, Town Manager Brian Palaia said. Vermont law requires towns adopt a capital improvement program to use impact fees for projects like sidewalks, road improvements and other infrastructure.

The last few years, the town has collected $150,000 in impact fees annually, with more than half of it going toward debt service for the 1998 Herrick Avenue elementary school addition, Palaia said.

Impact fees also help pay for the municipal complex and fire station, projects whose bonds run out in 2016 and 2023, respectively, Palaia said.

That’s why impact fees are necessary, board Chairman Mossey said – otherwise, the tax rate would increase.

“We could do away with impact fees if the community was willing to pay for everyone else’s projects,” Mossey said. “When it comes to my neighbor putting an addition on his house, I don’t think I would need to pay for that.”

Several neighboring and other Chittenden County towns don’t charge impact fees for accessory apartments, which are defined in Vermont statutes as owner-occupied dwellings with a unit smaller than the primary one with potable water, wastewater disposal and facilities for cooking, sleeping and bathing.

Planning officials for Westford, Williston, Essex and South Burlington said their towns don’t charge accessory apartment impact fees.

Jane Dion, assistant zoning administrator for the town of Colchester, said no specific impact fees exist for accessory apartments, but a $735 fee is leveled for additional units created in a home, $600 more if there’s not an existing bedroom in the new unit.

The impact fee for an accessory apartment in Georgia is $465, said Cindy Deyak, the town’s zoning administrator.

Milton has a regular residential impact fee for $4,250. The $3,188 for accessory apartments, one-bedroom units and elderly housing units is a 25 percent discount off this price. There are also additional recording fees ($10 per page) and a $25 charge for a certificate of occupancy (CO).

According to Milton’s impact fee ordinance, last updated in 2008, to obtain a CO, the homeowner must pay the fee in full – not in installments like the Morisseaus, who are on a fixed income, hoped.

Though the Morisseaus paid the fee, Donna Morisseau almost wishes she didn’t even apply for the permit. She’s considering attending a future Selectboard meeting to push for an exemption for situations like her family’s.

Adams realizes that the town keeping tabs on who’s living in the units and if they’re just being rented out is a difficult task. He’s asked Palaia to do some research into the matter to see if any more exemptions can be worked into the ordinance.

Palaia said the 25 percent discount is already an exemption, but Adams thinks more should be done for families, he said. Adams realizes nothing might happen, but this is an issue he’ll press, especially heading into budget season. The board reviews the capital improvement plan, which dictates which projects use impact fees for funding, each year before and after the March vote.

In the Morisseaus’ case, Mossey thinks the fee was appropriate because the change of use will have an impact on the town.

“Is the formula [for impact fees] we’re using correct right now? I think so, but without any future investigation, we’re not sure,” he said, adding, “This board is willing to look at anything we’ve been doing and come up with a better way if there is one.”