Public’s concerns over paperwork fees stall bill

Mayor Kirk Caldwell’s proposal to raise or begin charging fees for more than 40 permits and services tied to land use hit a snag at what was expected to be a final vote at a City Council meeting on Wednesday.

After Budget Chairwoman Ann Kobayashi said the administration had not addressed public concerns about whether the increased or new fees were justified, Council members sent Bill 70 (2013) back to the Council Budget Committee for additional work.

City Planning Director George Atta told Council members that the fees would mostly affect large-scale land use developers and have little effect on owners of individual properties.

All the proposed fee increases or new fees are linked to paperwork processed by city Department of Planning and Permitting staff. For instance, applications for all conditional-use permits for meeting facilities, day care facilities and schools would cost $1,200 plus $300 an acre up to a maximum of $15,000. Currently, a major conditional-use permit costs $600 plus $300 per acre up to a maximum of $10,000, while there is no charge for a minor conditional-use permit.

For the first time, the processing of an environmental assessment would have a fee of $600, as would the processing of an environmental impact statement, at $1,200.

The bill is projected to net between $500,000 and $1 million annually, but administration officials maintain that the more important goal is to try to recoup a share of the costs for work done by DPP employees from those benefiting directly.

The Building Industry Association of Hawaii and the Chamber of Commerce of Hawaii oppose the bill.

Gladys Marrone, BIA-Hawaii’s government relations director, said her group’s members are not opposed to paying increased fees "provided the level of service is improved." But city officials have yet to say how or whether the permit application process, known for taking a long time, would improve or become more efficient, Marrone said.

Atta, in response to questions by Kobayashi, said there is a natural nexus between fees and the work done by DPP workers. The fees would pay only a portion of the cost connected to the permits and services for which they are being assessed, he said.

Atta pointed out that fees have not increased in more than 10 years and that the bill aims to help Honolulu in "catching up" to what other municipalities charge for similar permits and services. Independent of any fee increase, he said, DPP is adding personnel to its staff, pursuing technological upgrades and addressing efficiency issues.

Still, Kobayashi said she had not seen enough to indicate that issues raised by the bill’s opponents have been addressed.

"We’d like to look into the concerns and see if we can establish some kind of nexus so that when increased fees are there, people know where the money is going," she said.

Caldwell told the Hono­lulu Star-Advertiser that the review work done by DPP staff on larger projects would incur tens of thousands of dollars in the private sector and that some permits the city processes at no cost are not even picked up by applicants.

The bill does not include any proposal to increase fees for building permits, which generate the most revenues among the permits and other services offered by the department because they are based on the value of work to be done. City officials noted that while building permit fees have not increased since 2003, a new planned review fee based on 20 percent of a building permit fee went into effect last year.

To see the latest version of Bill 70, visit bit.ly/1eUCQyD.