Home construction costs went up as much as $475 per unit Wednesday with the Salt Lake County Commission's passage of a "park impact fee" ordinance.
Commission Chairman Jim Bradley first proposed the ordinance a month ago but withdrew the idea for some "fine tuning." The result is a fee schedule that has the support of most builders and community councils.Fees will be imposed on all new single-family and multiple-unit construction in the unincorporated county and will be based on land values and population estimates.
The fees will range from a low of $150 in Copperton to a high of $475 in Granite. If the current housing boom continues, officials said, the fees could generate as much as $300,000 a year for new parks.
Kent S. Lewis, deputy county attorney for planning, said the fee will be assessed prior to the issuance of a building permit. He also said the ordinance allows revenues from one area to be borrowed for park construction in another neighborhood. Loans must be paid back within 10 years, however.
Commissioners said the impact fee is intended to supplement, not replace, general revenue funding of park development. The extra money is expected to increase the number of neighborhood parks, which the county defines as "a park which is designated to serve primarily the residents of the neighborhood . . . in which it exists."
The ordinance establishes a standard of 1.5 acres of neighborhood park land per 1,000 population within each of the county's 23 planning districts. It also gives the County Commission the option of waiving the fee if a builder can show that "there is no reasonable relationship between the impact of the development and the need for neighborhood parks."