Local News in Brief : Torrance Budget to Raise Fees

Torrance officials unveiled a $105-million city budget this week that includes increases in fees for business licenses, trash collection and crude-oil production, as well as a new tax on businesses that generate their own electricity and a 100% boost in what the airport pays in lieu of property taxes.

Despite the grab-bag of revenue increases, City Manager LeRoy Jackson said that to balance the books, the city must defer its plan to put $1 million into an emergency reserve.

“This is a little more risky than we like to be,” he said.

Increases in the business-license fees are expected to generate an additional $200,000. A new 6% tax on electricity generated by businesses will produce $500,000, with Mobil Oil Corp. to pay the largest bill.

The city expects to reap $168,000 by charging residents in areas served by Torrance sewer lines a service fee of 4.9 cents per hundred cubic feet of water. (The fee is already charged residents of areas, including much of the city, served by county sewer lines.)

An increase in the so-called “severance” fee charged for oil extraction will generate an additional $25,000. And the city decided to boost the fee charged the airport, which is run as a city department, from $250,000 to $500,000. The fee, which is in lieu of property taxes, has not been raised for more than a decade.

Refuse charges also are to rise from $9.25 to $9.75 per month for a single-family residence.