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The Board of County Commissioners is now to consider the appeal of the County's Administrator's proper encumbrance/expenditure finding and denial of 40 school impact fee refund requests filed by Impact Fee Consultants. ANALYSIS • Impact Fees To address infrastructure costs associated with new growth, Indian River County has, since 1986, imposed traffic impact fees on new development and those fees have been periodically updated. In 2005, the County commissioned and approved a comprehensive update of its impact fee program. That update and associated impact fee study were conducted by Tindale -Oliver & Associates, and at the request of the School Board included school impact fees (public education facilities impact fees). As a result, in 2005 the County began imposing school impact fees on new development. Relative to other local governments, school impact fees charged in Indian River County are low: $1,756 for a single- family home (2005-2014) and $1,702 (2014 -present) while Brevard, Martin, and St. Lucie counties charge between $4,400 and $6,100 per single-family home. In 2005, when the County adopted an updated impact fee ordinance and began imposing school impact fees, it also entered into an interlocal agreement with the School Board (see attachment #7). That agreement, which is still in effect, obligates the County to collect and transfer school impact fees to the School Board and obligates the School Board to spend school impact fees for facilities that benefit new development within the timeframe specified in the impact fee ordinance (6 years). The agreement also obligates the County to review school impact fee related requests in coordination with the School Board and directs county staff to review school facilities expenditures for consistency with the impact fee ordinance. In the 2005 impact fee study, as well as the 2014 impact fee study, a consumption -based methodology was used to calculate impact fees. That methodology, discussed thoroughly in 2014 during various impact fee public meetings and workshops, satisfies all legal requirements including the "dual rational nexus test". That test requires 1) charging a fee amount that is proportionate to the impact of new development and 2) spending fees on facilities that benefit new development. In the case of school impact fees, costs per permanent student station and student generation rates were used to establish the impact (cost) each unit of new development (residential unit) has on school facilities. With respect to spending school impact fees, on a quarterly basis School Board staff provides information to the County Budget Office showing that fees are spent within 6 years of collection on facilities (such as permanent student stations) needed to accommodate growth and development. To date, based on its review of data provided by School Board staff, the County Budget Office has found that all school impact fees were spent within required timeframes and for proper facilities improvements, consistent with the inter -local agreement and impact fee ordinance. • The Appeal The subject appeal has followed the provisions of County Code section 100.06 (see attachment #6), whereby a decision of a department head such as the Community Development Director can be appealed to the County Administrator and the decision of the County Administrator can be appealed to the Board of County Commissioners. In this case, the Community Development Director rendered decisions that F•\Community Development\Users\CDADMIN\AGENDA\Current Year \2015\11-10-15 Appeal by IFC of decision by County Administrator to Deny Requests for School Impact Fee Refunds.docx 2 97