I love a good debate. I was raised in a family that treated rational argument and analytical wrangling as high art — and as one of our family’s favorite forms of game playing. We entertained ourselves by discussing the proper solutions to insoluble social questions, the meaning of poetry, the differences between men and women, the existence of God.
A good healthy debate, as I was taught as a child, does not necessarily require you to believe the side you are advocating. Give me a good debating partner and I will gladly advocate for, or against, the benefits of fluoride in the public water supply. But a few rules must be observed. The debate must strive to be rational — based on reason rather than idle whim. You must back up any facts you assert with reasonable evidence. You can attack your opponent’s logic, but you are not allowed to attack his personal character; no name-calling is allowed.
As a result of growing up in such a family, I’m prone to get excited and even emotional when involving myself in a debate — be it private or public. I try my best to remain calm, but when I witness an advocate of some position bending the limits of rational thought, or offering as evidence some possibly false information, I confess I struggle to keep my tone civil.
I had a bit of a problem controlling myself during the PAWSD Question & Answer session following the roll-out of a proposed $357 million Dry Gulch Reservoir project last Monday night, February 23 at the Vista Clubhouse. After spending half a year working with a range of consultants on a revised Dry Gulch proposal, PAWSD officially threw out their former plans for a 35,000 acre-foot reservoir project, priced at $150 million — and appears to have replaced it with a reservoir project half that size priced at $357 million. PAWSD Special Projects Manager Sheila Berger, Durango water engineer Steve Harris and BBC consultant Tom Pippen took turns explaining how PAWSD, through careful study, had come up with a water storage proposal priced at over four times the per gallon price of last year’s proposed project.
Following that fascinating presentation, PAWSD gave members of the audience about 30 minutes to address questions about the $357 million proposal to a panel of experts, including Berger, Harris and Pippen as well as PAWSD Manager Carrie Weiss, PAWSD attorney Evan Ela, PAWSD water conservation consultant Denise Rue-Pastin, San Juan Water Conservancy Chair Ernie Amos and PAWSD Finance Manager Shellie Tressler.
I had a couple of questions. I tried to ask them in a civil tone.
“This might be a legal question for Mr. Ela, or perhaps for Mr. Pippen. It’s my understanding that, according to Colorado state law, a water district [like PAWSD] is not allowed to charge impact fees. Am I correct in that?”
Attorney Evan Ela, to whom PAWSD has paid many thousands of dollars over the past three years to defend the proposed Dry Gulch reservoir project, responded.
“Well, there is an impact fee statute on the books in Colorado, and it does not allow water districts to impose impact fees. It reserves that right to counties and municipalities.”
“So if PAWSD wanted to collect an impact fee,” I asked, “they would have to work through the Town or the County, is that correct?”
“That’s correct,” said the attorney.
“So then, the [$7,120 per EU] PAWSD Water Resource Fee is not an impact fee?”
“That’s correct.”
“So how is the Water Resource Fee different from an impact fee?”
Mr. Ela paused to think for a moment.
“Well, as I said, an impact fee as defined by our state legislature is set out in Title 29 of the Colorado Revised Statutes, and it specifies what it can be used for. The fee being imposed by this district is under its innate powers as a water and sewer district under Title 32. It has the power to assess fees as necessary to plan for growth.”
Translation: Colorado state law specifically specifically prohibits water districts like PAWSD from collecting impact fees. But Mr. Ela is asserting that under Title 32, PAWSD is allowed to collect fees as necessary to plan for growth, so long as they are not impact fees.
Well, then, what is an impact fee?
According to the Colorado Municipal League, “Planning literature generally defines an impact fee as a one-time charge assessed against new development that attempts to recover the cost incurred by a local government in providing the public facilities required to serve new development.”
Senate Bill 15, passed by the Colorado General Assembly in October, 2001, governing “impact fees and other similar development charges,” does not precisely define the term “impact fee”, but the law does imply certain qualities unique to impact fees, such as the fact that impact fees — unlike administrative fees, special assessments, and other government fees — are levied only on new development. Existing residents do not pay impact fees.
I’ve been writing in the Post about impact fees for a couple of years, and, up until composing this particular article this morning, I truly thought I understood what the term ”impact fee” meant. But Mr. Ela’s response has challenged me on that point.
It seems that Senate Bill 15, in legally outlining “impact fees and other similar fees,” intended to define the proper use of those fees only for cities and counties. Water districts are governed by a separate section of the Colorado Revised Statutes, and from what I can gather — as an amateur investigative reporter — the laws are not all that clear but do suggest that water districts have more latitude than cities and counties with the types of fees they can levy.
The only thing that seems to be clear from my recent investigations is the difference between a “fee” and a “tax.” As the Colorado Municipal League states it, “A tax is a general revenue raising mechanism; a fee is charged to cover the cost of a specific activity, service or infrastructure.”
As Mr. Ela’s answer indicates, there is no clear distinction — in the way the fee is calculated or collected — between the PAWSD Water Resource Fee and a typical municipal impact fee, except that the water district is not allowed to collect impact fees and so does not call the WRF an “impact fee.” The PAWSD fee is quite simply collected using different legal powers from those granted to a town or county.
That thought frankly gives me the willies. The PAWSD Board of Directors — five volunteers duly elected or appointed to direct the policies of our local water district — apparently have the power to levy almost any fee they desire, without the slightest need for public approval, so long as they can justify it as necessary to any future water project.
And we seem to have a PAWSD Board and staff furiously planning a $357 million reservoir complex — to be built in maybe 40 years, and to be funded by growth — in a community where no apparent growth is occurring and where construction industry unemployment is over 20 percent.
One question that was not asked on Monday night: Does the PAWSD Board have any sense that putting a $357 million project with no apparent revenue source into their official planning documents might have an effect on the number of people willing to invest in property in Pagosa Springs?
There were, however, a few other questions that did indeed get asked that night.
Bill Hudson began sharing his opinions in the Pagosa Daily Post in 2004 and can’t seem to break the habit. He claims that, in Pagosa Springs, opinions are like pickup trucks: everybody has one.