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HomeMy WebLinkAboutERC Report RMC Title IV Docket 18 - Impact FeesDEPARTMENT OF COMMUNITY AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT ERC Report 2023 Docket #18, Impact Fees ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW COMMITTEE REPORT ERC MEETING DATE: July 3, 2023 Project Name: 2023 Docket #18B, Impact Fees Project Number: LUA23-000191, ECF Project Manager: Angie Mathias, Long Range Planning Manager Owner: City of Renton Applicant: City of Renton Contact: Angie Mathias, 425-430-6576 Project Location: All docket items are citywide. Project Summary: The applicant is requesting Environmental (SEPA) Review to review for the following non-project items: #D-227 Impact Fees: Staff reviewed the 2023 rates charged for impact fees and found them to be higher than other peer jurisdictions. Staff recommend adjusting the rate to be more aligned with peer jurisdictions. Also, the State enabled cities to provide a reduction in the rate charged to daycare facilities; specifically an 80% reduction. Staff recommend adopting this provision. Engineering staff would like to shift from using the 9th to the 11th Edition of the International Transportation Engineering Trip and Parking Generation Manual and making some other adjustments to rates as shown below. A few years ago, the City implemented a provision that set an expiration on the amount of time a new use could utilize a discounted amount of impact fees based on the previous use, single family residential was exempted from this. Staff recommend extending this exemption to all residential uses. Exist. Bldg. Area SF: N/A Proposed New Bldg. Area (footprint): Proposed New Bldg. Area (gross): N/A N/A Site Area: N/A Total Building Area GSF: N/A STAFF RECOMMENDATION: Staff Recommends that the Environmental Review Committee issue a Determination of Non-Significance (DNS). PART ONE: PROJECT DESCRIPTION / BACKGROUND #D-227 Impact Fees: In response to public inquiries regarding the increasing fees, staff conducted a jurisdiction comparison analysis to compare the transportation impact fee rates in other jurisdictions versus the current 2023 City of Renton fees. The sample jurisdictions used in this analysis included Federal Way, Auburn, Bellevue, Covington, Issaquah, Kent, Kirkland, Redmond, Sammamish, and Tukwila. The comparison analysis included three impact fee categories (transportation, parks, and fire) and focused on four use categories: single family, multi family, shopping centers and general office. The following four tables below (Figures A-B) illustrate the average (without the City of Renton) of all sample jurisdictions in comparison with the 2023 City of Renton impact fees (See Attachment A for more detailed comparisons). City of Renton Department of Community & Economic Development Environmental Review Committee Report DOCKET #18, IMPACT FEES LUA23-000191, ECF Report of Monday, July 3, 2023 Page 2 of 5 #D-227 Impact Fees Page 2 of 5 July 3, 2023 Based on this comparison analysis, the following conclusions were drawn: o The current 2023 City of Renton impact fees exceed the jurisdiction average for all four categories. o For shopping centers in particular, the current 2023 transportation impact fees exceeded the jurisdiction average by over 40 percent. The City is committed to economic development and seeks to remain competitive with peer jurisdictions. However, we cannot allow our infrastructure to significantly erode. Without new growth making a contribution, the alternatives are to raise revenue by raising generalized taxes or to not keep up with the demands of new development, thereby deteriorating existing services and infrastructure. In attempt to balance these priorities, staff is recommending the City adopt transportation impact fees that reflect the updated ITE Trip Generation Manual, 11th Edition, as well as reduce impact fees for certain use categories: A. Trip Generation Manual: The Institute of Transportation Engineers’ (ITE) Trip Generation Manual provides trip generation rates for various land use and building types. ITE Procedures estimate the number of trips entering and exiting a site at a given time. ITE Rates are functions of type of development based on independent variables such as square footage of the gross leasable area, number of gas pumps, number of dwelling units, or other standard measurable things. Currently, the city uses the 9th Edition of the ITE but an 11th Edition has been published, which provides updated modeling. Staff recommends adopting the 11th Edition ITE Trip Generation Manual, which will be applied to all future land uses when determining transportation impact fees. B. Passenger-Car Equivalent: Staff recommends adopting a “Passenger-Car Equivalent” to calculated trips for uses that have increased truck trips. The term “Passenger-Car Equivalents” (PCE) is used in traffic engineering to better reflect traffic operations with trucks present. Including the PCE rate to the transportation impact fee formula accounts for the increase in truck trips on uses such as Warehouse and Manufacturing, in addition to other uses such as High-Cube Storage and Fulfillment Centers. Trucking associated with such facilities creates significant impacts on local roadways and produces high levels of particulate pollution. For larger tractor trailer trucks, a PCE of 4 is typically used. For purposes of the TIF methodology, each truck is considered as a four-passenger-car equivalent. For example, if 10 trucks per hour are making a left-turn at an intersection, then a PCE volume would be 40 vehicles per hour. To ensure full mitigation of the truck and vehicle trips associated with uses such as warehouse, manufacturing, high-cube storage, and fulfillment centers, staff proposes to maintain the 2023 rate (11th Edition ITE Manual Impact Fee Rate) for uses that result in an increase in the Passenger Car Equivalent. C. Residential Uses: Staff recommends maintaining the 2023 rate for all residential uses, except for Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs), which will continue to be waived. With adoption of the 11th Edition ITE Trip Generation Manual, the transportation impact fee for residential uses would still remain over the jurisdictional average; however, it would be slightly reduced, as shown in the following table. D. Early Learning Facilities (Daycare uses): State law (RCW 82.02.060) allows local governments to grant a partial exemption of up to eighty percent (80%) of impact fees for low-income housing City of Renton Department of Community & Economic Development Environmental Review Committee Report DOCKET #18, IMPACT FEES LUA23-000191, ECF Report of Monday, July 3, 2023 Page 3 of 5 #D-227 Impact Fees Page 3 of 5 July 3, 2023 and for early learning facilities, without a requirement that the exempted fee be paid from public funds. State law provides that development of an early learning facility qualifies as a development activity with a broad public purpose for potential impact fee exemptions. The term "early learning facility" refers to a facility providing regularly scheduled care for a group of children one month of age through twelve years of age for periods of less than twenty-four hours. This definition would include day cares. City code currently provides fee exemptions for affordable rental housing; however, city code does not currently provide an exemption, or partial exemption, for early learning facilities. City staff agree that early learning facilities provide a broad public purpose for Renton communities; therefore, staff proposes a transportation impact fee reduction to 20% of the 2023 rate (11th Edition ITE Manual Impact Fee Rate) for daycare uses. E. All other Uses (Outside the Center Downtown (CD) Zone): For all other uses not included above outside of the CD zone, staff recommends reverting the transportation impact fee to utilize the 2022 rate (11th Edition ITE Manual Impact Fee Rate), rather than the 2023 rate, as shown in the following table. This reduction would amount to 88.97% of the 2023 Rate. This change would help ensure that the City remains competitive with peer jurisdictions, while still providing adequate mitigation for new growth. F. All Uses Within the Center Downtown (CD) Zone: It is not anticipated that the City will increase capacity of the roadways within the city center. Therefore, if new development within the city center is assessed transportation impact fees, those impact fees are not contributing towards capacity improvements within the city center, but rather for roadway capacity increases outside of the city center. City staff believes that it is reasonable to assess a reduced transportation impact fee for uses within the city center area. Furthermore, staff recognizes that there are clear differences in transportation demands within city centers compared to less dense areas. For example, trips within city centers tend to have much higher rates of walking, bicycling, and transit trips in contrast to less dense areas of the city that have higher rates of private vehicle trips. Therefore, in order to ensure that development within the CD Zone is not charged impact fee rates for capacity needs generated by development outside of the CD zone, staff recommends that transportation impact fees be reduced to 20% of the 2023 rate (11th Edition ITE Manual Impact Fee Rate) for all uses within the CD Zone. This reduction will be reevaluated after two (2) years. Currently, there is no time limit on the number of years a detached dwelling unit (single-family) is vacant to be eligible to use an impact fee deduction. Therefore, detached dwellings are exempt from the 3-year time limit that applies to other uses, as discussed above. However, this time limit exemption does not apply to attached dwelling unit types, such as multi-family development. Implementation and tracking of the vacancy time limit is challenging, as there is not a dedicated staff person available to track the length of time a building remains vacant. The same factors that make it arduous to track the vacancy of single- family dwelling units also apply to multi-family. Furthermore, multi-family dwelling units have a lesser impact on public facilities. Staff asserts that applying the vacancy time limit exemption consistently to all dwelling unit types is appropriate. Therefore, staff recommends extending the vacancy impact fee exemption from detached dwelling units to all dwelling unit types. DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNITY AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT #D-227 Impact Fees Page 4 of 5 July 3, 2023 Figure A Figure B Figure C Figure D City of Renton Department of Community & Economic Development Environmental Review Committee Report 2023 DOCKET #18, IMPACT FEES LUA23-000191, ECF Report of Monday, July 3, 2023 #D-227 Impact Fees PART TWO: ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW In compliance with RCW 43.21C.240, the following environmental (SEPA) review addresses only those project impacts that are not adequately addressed under existing development standards and environmental regulations. A. Environmental Threshold Recommendation Based on analysis of probable impacts from the proposal, staff recommends that the Responsible Officials: Issue a DNS with a 14-day Appeal Period. B. Mitigation Measures 1. None C. Exhibits None D. Environmental Impacts There are no environmental impacts that are anticipated to occur in conjunction with the proposal. E. Comments of Reviewing Departments The proposal has been circulated to City Department and Division Reviewers. Where applicable, their comments have been incorporated into the text of this report and/or “Advisory Notes to Applicant.”  Copies of all Review Comments are contained in the Official File and may be attached to this report. The Environmental Determination decision will become final if the decision is not appealed within the 14-day appeal period (RCW 43.21.C.075(3); WAC 197-11-680). Environmental Determination Appeal Process: Appeals of the environmental determination must be filed in writing together with the required fee to: Hearing Examiner, City of Renton, 1055 South Grady Way, Renton, WA 98057, on or before 5:00 p.m. on July 17, 2023. Appeals must be submitted electronically to the City Clerk at cityclerk@rentonwa.gov or delivered to City Hall 1st floor Lobby Hub Monday through Friday. The appeal fee, normally due at the time an appeal is submitted, will be collected at a future date if your appeal is submitted electronically. The appeal submitted in person may be paid on the first floor in our Finance Department. Appeals to the Hearing Examiner are governed by RMC 4-8-110 and additional information regarding the appeal process may be obtained from the City Clerk’s Office, cityclerk@rentonwa.gov.