THOUSAND OAKS : Water District Hikes Fee for Developers

After a short public hearing, the Calleguas Municipal Water District approved a plan to hike the fee developers pay to connect new properties into the district’s water system.

Don Kendall, general manager for Calleguas, said no one showed up at Wednesday night’s public hearing to challenge the plan to raise the one-time fee charged to commercial and residential developers.

“We opened the public hearing, we closed it, and then the board adopted the charge effective Jan. 1, 1994,” Kendall said.

The only group that appeared to take any interest in the proposed rate hike--the Building Industry Assn.--expressed only minor objections to the plan in a letter sent to the Calleguas board, Kendall said.

Elaine Freeman, a member of the industry group’s board of directors, said her members generally accepted the need for the rate hike although commercial developers believed the $5,580 more they will pay per acre was high.

She said the group also questioned some of the numbers used to determine the fee hike, including Calleguas’ population and land use projections into the year 2010.

“The one good thing is they’re going to review their projections every year and they can adjust the fees accordingly,” Freeman said.

As a result of the rate hike, developers will pay $1,158 instead of $950 to connect a single family home to the Calleguas water system. The fee will go from $595 to $927 for multiple residential units, such as condos.

Commercial property developers will pay $8,930 an acre instead of $3,350. Public projects, such as parks, will pay $4,476 an acre instead of $1,802. Only fees for industrial projects will drop, from $5,029 to $2,420 an acre.

Calleguas officials hope the rate hike will raise $50 million over the next 10 years.

They plan to use the revenue to help fund the district’s $167-million capital improvements projects.