Bonner County announces fee increase

SANDPOINT — County officials decided to raise building structure and land use fees at a public hearing on Thursday.

The decision followed a proposed amendment by Planning Director Jacob Gabell to revise the fee schedules.

AM0014-22 adapted the fee code for titles 11 and 12. The Title 11 fee schedule addresses fees for the permitting of physical structures in Bonner County. The only change for Title 11 created a $400 fee per RV park or campsite, plus an additional $25 per lot or site.

Title 12 saw several changes to fees regarding land use. The fee for a minor notational change increased from $275 for a preliminary plat and $260 for a final plat to $300 for either case. The amendment increased the hearing examiner fee from $50 to $225 and created a $65 fee for a hearing examiner site visit.

Gabell said “minor notational change” was listed in three separate places. Having a standard fee across the board made more sense. The hearing examiner fee was adjusted to the actual cost that the examiner charges the county, Gabell said.

The site visit fee “may apply” because it is in the contract with the examiner, Gabell said. While Gabell does not expect site visits to happen often, “but if it does, we have a fee that we could charge.”

Commissioner Jeff Connolly said “it is a good idea to look at it every year and … tweak it a little bit … just to stay on top of it.”

Gabell said the county did its “major change back in April and I expect to do another one of those next April. I want to stay in that same time period.” But, according to Gabell, “when we run into problems when we need to fix these things, it makes sense to do these minor changes” earlier.

“The RV/campground change in Title 11 was a big problem that needed some fixing,” Gabell continued.

There were no public comments. Connolly moved to adopt the fee changes. The motion passed unanimously and the fee changes took effect upon passage on Thursday.