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B. All allowable fee waivers provided for the development or construction of affordable housing. Impact fees and utility capacity charges are one time charges applied towards new construction to generate the revenue necessary to make capacity producing capital improvements. Overall, these impact fees and utility capacity charges increase the cost of housing. Until Florida's 2019 legislative session, communities in Florida that adopted impact fees were required by statute and/or case law to apply those impact fees to all activities that create a demand for capital facilities. During the 2019 legislative session, however, Florida's Impact Fee Act was amended to allow exemptions for affordable housing (housing for households earning less than 120% of Are Median Income (AMI)). In March of 2020 with the County's most recent impact fee study and fee schedule update, Indian River County adopted a portion of the allowable affordable housing impact fee waiver/reduction allowance as part of the County's Impact Fee Regulations under Title X of the Indian River County code. Indian River County now provides: • impact fee exemptions for single family homes of less than 1,000 square feet (under air) for households with incomes below 80% of AMI; and • impact fee reductions at 50% of the calculated rate for single family homes between 1,000 square feet and 1,500 square feet (under air) for households with incomes below 80% of AMI. Impact fees for single family homes of any square footage larger than 1,500 square feet (under air) and impact fees for homes of less than 1,500 square feet (under air) not occupied by households with household incomes of less than 80% of AMI continue to be collected at the full calculated and adopted rates with no affordable housing reduction or waiver. Additionally, impact fees for multi -family housing units continue to be collected at full calculated impact fee rates. Consequently, impact fees for these land uses cannot be waived or reduced without being subsidized from another revenue source for a justifiable reason. Because of this, there are methods of fee payment to assist income eligible persons with the cost of impact fees and /or utility capacity charges. Currently, Indian River County provides SHIP program loans and grants of up to $20,000.00 per unit to income eligible households for the cost of impact fees and utility capacity charges for new units. The county also provides SHIP loans and grants for existing units to connect to the county regional water and wastewater system. To obtain SHIP impact fee funds, applicants must execute loan or grant agreements with the county, indicating that they will comply with the county's Local Housing Assistance Program's requirements. Those loans or grants are limited to income eligible households in the Very low Income (VLI) (not to exceed 50% of the county's median income), Low Income (LI) (51-80% of county's median income), and moderate income (MI) (between 81-120% of the county's median income) categories. Besides providing impact fee loans and grants, the county also provides financing of water and sewer capacity charges for new units and existing units connecting to the county regional system. The following policies from the Housing Element of the F:\Community Development\SHIP\AHAC\ANNUAL INCENTIVE REPORT AND LHAP REVISIONS\2020 Incentives 7 Report\BCC Item - Incentives Report\AHAC 2020 report v6 - 12-1-20 BCC Review.doc