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Home fee could land in court
By JAMES THORNER © St. Petersburg Times, published February 20, 2001 If you belong to a family of five making less than $41,500 a year, Pasco County might not tack $1,700 onto the price of your newly built single-family home. But that generosity wouldn't extend to buyers of new mobile homes. Regardless of income, mobile home purchasers would have to shell out an extra $1,200. Therein lurks potential legal trouble for Pasco's proposed school impact fees. The argument is this: If two families make the same income, why should the county financially penalize one for buying a mobile home rather than a site-built home? That's what the Florida Manufactured Home Association, a trade group in Tallahassee, wants to know. "Is it fair?" said Lori Killinger, an attorney on staff at the manufactured home association. "No." Pasco's impact fee ordinance, up for a vote by county commissioners on Feb. 27, would add $1,694 to the price of a new single-family home and $1,187 to the price of a new mobile home. The fee is expected to raise about $4-million each year to pay for new schools. At a meeting last week, commissioner Peter Altman moved to waive fees for families making 80 percent of the median income of the Tampa Bay region. That's about $41,500 for a family of five and $38,000 for a family of four. But as the ordinance is written, that break applies only to buyers of single-family homes, which include "modular homes" and other prefabricated houses, but not the triple-wide, double-wide and single-wide mobile homes that make up about a fifth of the county's housing. Killinger said the discrepancy could open the county to a constitutional challenge on the grounds that Pasco would be discriminating against mobile home buyers. But she's not sure that's the case. "Clearly they are being treated different. But I would have to research it before I could give you more of an opinion," Killinger said. Altman said he sees nothing wrong with encouraging ownership of single family homes, particular among people of modest income who might otherwise not buy one. "There's nothing wrong with the county providing incentives," Altman said of the impact fee break favoring single-family home buyers. "Do we really want to encourage more location of mobiles in the county?" At today's County Commission meeting, county staffers will estimate the loss in impact fees from exempting lower-income families. The rough numbers so far: The school system could lose fees on about 30 to 50 new home sales, a loss of about $51,000 to $85,000 out of the expected yearly take of $4-million. George Romagnoli of the county's community development office estimates families making 80 percent of the median income could afford a house costing about $88,000. Builders erect only about 250 houses in that price range each year. "How many people under 80 percent could potentially buy a house? Frankly, it's not that many," Romagnoli said. But county attorney Robert Sumner pointed out what he considers flaws in the estimates, including Romagnoli's exclusion of modular homes, among the most popular choices for lower-income home buyers. "It's hard to qualify what this study really means," Sumner said.
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From today's Pasco Times |
