By Joey Chenoweth
TriValley Central
As cities everywhere ponder how to improve the present without jeopardizing the future, the two interests create a dissonance on many issues. On Nov 26, the Coolidge City Council discussed one such issue: impact fees.
Impact fees are one-time costs for construction companies who are building on city property. The money raised by the fees can only be used to pay for what it was charged for: general government, police, fire, sewer, parks and recreation, transportation and library services. In essence, they are a means of paying for the public costs associated with a new facility.
In Coolidge, impact fees were first established in November 2004, when the city applied a fee of $4,646 on the construction of a typical single-family home, with the cost increased or decreased based off the size of the commercial or residential building. By 2009, the fee had risen to $11,091 for the same building.
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