Lubbock’s city council is moving ahead quickly with a second vote on changes to the city’s roadway impact fee rates.
Impact fees are a one-time cost shared between developers and the city, paid with a percentage of new construction costs when it requires new or updated roadways in the area.
This year’s recommendation from the capital improvements advisory committee called for the council to maintain a 75% to 25% impact fee ratio, with the city paying the larger share. While the percentage ratio could stay the same, the estimated cost for impact fees would still increase because of inflation.
During public hearings, local developer and committee member Thomas Payne explained that impact fees were originally supposed to be a 50/50 split between developers and the taxpayers in the growing parts of town.
“If the city builds a street and there are no impact fees, then all of the citizens in the city and all of the districts of the city are equally sharing the cost of the construction of that new street,” Payne said. “And, I'll just add, a new street that some of those constituencies may never even see.”
Other developers, as well as district 3 city council member David Glasheen, commented that the impact fees could discourage growth for new businesses.
“Local developers have been successful in building roadways like Milwaukee that have contributed tremendously to the city,” Glasheen said. “But really major roadway projects typically required bond elections for the city to raise the necessary capital for our contribution to it.”
In the August 12 meeting, the council passed a motion from Glasheen to decrease the percentage paid by developers to zero. The vote was split 4-3, with council members Christy Martinez-Garcia, Gordon Harris and Tim Collins opposed.
The second reading is listed in the agenda for a special meeting of the city council to take place tonight at 5:30 p.m. at Citizens Tower.
After the City of Lubbock's systems were temporarily taken offline last week to respond to potential security concerns, officials have told KTTZ that tonight's meeting will be available to livestream on the city of Lubbock's website.
*This story will be updated.*