TOWN OF EASTON, MARYLAND
Talbot County Municipalities
March 29, 2004
Councilmember Maureen Scott-Taylor Councilmember Moonyene Jackson-Amis
Also in attendance were Mayor Robert C. Willey, Town Attorney Mr. Christopher Kehoe, Mr. Norman Fegel Commissioner of Trappe, Ms. Cheryl Lewis Town of Trappe, Mr. Dave Thompson, Esq. Town Attorney for Trappe and Oxford, Mr. Philip Dinkel Commissioner of St. Michaels, Ms. Sherry Thomas of St. Michaels, Mr. Edgar Harrison of Trappe, Ms. Bryna Booth, Esq. Attorney for Oxford and Trappe, Ms. Kathleen Radcliffe Commissioner of Oxford, Mr. Sidney Campen Commissioner of Oxford, Mr. Tom Hamilton Town Planner Easton, and Town Clerk Mr. Robert Karge.
At 6:00 p.m., the Town Attorney stated that this is the second meeting of the municipalities. Participants introduced themselves.
The Town Attorney stated that it is his understanding that the meeting tonight is to specifically discuss the possibility of the municipalities formulating a common position with regard to the county’s proposed excise tax and more specifically to see if we could come up with a new proposal directing the county how the county should spend the money and what economic arrangements the county was planning to make for the municipalities in return for their collection efforts which is something the enabling legislation requires the municipalities to do.
Ms. Cheryl Lewis distributed and outlined their position.
Mr. Jensen arrived at 6:17 p.m.
The Town Attorney stated that in the earlier version of the proposal, that for every dollar raised in excise fees inside the municipality, there would be a certain percentage of the dollar would be spent within a geographical mile(s) of the municipality for road improvements and the rest would be up to the county’s discretion.
Ms. Lewis discussed the serious need for funds in the middle and high schools. She stated that this needs to be specified. Once that is removed, then you would have the remaining amount which should be distributed. She stated that 10% should remain in the municipality for collection efforts. Ms. Lewis discussed what the split is based on. She stated that Trappe is still not keen on the whole idea.
Ms. Lewis discussed negotiations.
The Town Attorney, Mr. Kehoe, suggested that the county develop a capital plan for each municipality.
Discussion occurred regarding impact fees versus excise taxes.
The Town Attorney stated that he does not believe there is any difficulty in having municipal and county impact fees although care must be taken not to collect these twice.
The Town Attorney stated that he would guess that the Town of Easton’s most urgent capital improvement would be a road connecting east from Marlboro Road to Route 50 to provide a way to get across town without accessing Goldsborough and Dover Street.
Discussion occurred regarding how fees for approved developments in the Town of Easton would be spent. The Town Attorney stated that most of the money would be spent on road improvements. They discussed improvements to be made with the Elm Street development impact fees.
Discussion occurred regarding negotiations being outside of the municipality and the county having the opportunity to negotiate anything they wanted.
Discussion occurred regarding Ms. Lewis’ basic premise; taking the education proponent off the top and then essentially require that the remaining money be allocated on a 75/25% basis.
Mr. Thompson stated that indications are that the county is thinking in terms of the money they can raise through a combination of taxes and the problem he has on Trappe’s behalf and Oxford’s behalf and as a taxpayer, is that the county has not told how much money they want to raise and how they are going to break it down between an excise tax and an impact fee. He stated that the things it can be used for are exactly the same things that are spelled out in the excise tax enabling legislation from last year which are roads and schools. Mr. Thompson stated that the predicate for the tax needs to be the capital projects that they are going to fund with the tax; not what the consultant says they can get
The Town Attorney discussed Tischler’s numbers which he stated are based upon some type of projections for capital projects in the county.
Mr. Thompson discussed the element of that in the road piece of the Tischler/county study. He stated that once the town talked to him about roads and he studied the geography of Talbot County a little bit, he realized the state roads basically serve all the towns for ingress and egress. Mr. Thompson stated that he ended up backing away from the roads component and suggested that this not be a piece of it. Mr. Tischler made it clear that every resident in the county uses Easton road that Easton pays for that the county doesn’t fund so why should there be a road component of an excise tax or impact fee that is going to apply within the Town of Easton. He stated that the County Council argued with Mr. Tischler about this so the road piece seems to be up in the air at this time.
Mr. Thompson discussed Caroline County’s excise tax which just applies to new lots.
Mr. Thompson stated that he is looking to the county to say that this is what we are going to raise, here is what we are going to spend it on and here is how we want you to collect it if it is going to be collected within the towns.
Discussion occurred regarding Queen Anne’s County impact fee study.
Ms. Lewis stated that the Tischler study says the impacts that apply to municipalities are libraries, parks and recreation, community colleges, public schools and general government.
Mr. Ford stated that one of the things he had hoped for in discussions between the towns and the county was not only a consensus on the fees but also how they might be used to direct and manage growth in this county.
The consensus was that everyone wants a dialogue about the tax so we can make it work in our own jurisdictions; explain it to our people, collect it and make it work for the county generally.
Mr. Kehoe suggested taking the first step and writing a letter to the county council saying we want to have a dialogue with you with regard to how the excise fees and impact fees are going to be structured telling them that we have some ideas of our own and these are our spokespersons and let us know when you want to meet with us because we want to meet with you to have meaningful dialogue before you formulate your legislation and before your plans get cast in stone because we want to have our say in it.
Discussion occurred regarding Ms. Spence and Ms. Harrington’s desire to meet with representatives from the municipalities to talk about issues.
Mr. Kehoe recommended against a letter as he stated this is something of real importance to our county and towns; probably the most important thing the elected officials will deal with in this term. Mr. Kehoe recommended meeting with the whole county council.
Mr. Jensen stated that he would like to see Mr. Thompson and Mr. Kehoe work it out and come back to the Councils.
Ms. Lewis suggested incorporating the ideas of the municipalities, write the letter, take it to their next meeting by being on their agenda and ask for an open meeting to discuss the issues.
Ms. Jackson-Amis questioned if the library was part of the impact fee.
Ms. Lewis stated that this is part of the impact fee. She discussed the acquisition of a library in the lower half of Talbot County. She stated that in this respect, the developer that buys that building should not be buying into the library impact fee.
Ms. Jackson-Amis stated that Easton is carrying the largest library in the county and she thinks that when they get their library, their figures should be projected so that at this point and whatever the improvements are, the library is going to come up based on the population somehow to be spread out across the municipalities as they currently exist and we need to plan for this.
Discussion occurred regarding the expansion of the library or the use of a new branch.
Ms. Jackson-Amis asked that we be real clear about the actual impact of the school. She stated that her concern is that the school populations are down in so many places so if there is nobody going to the schools; she is trying to figure out what this money is going to.
Ms. Lewis stated that Mr. Tischler’s study said that the money needs to go for the upper schools. That is the only place where there is a need.
Discussion occurred regarding the needs for schools.
The Town Attorney reviewed what steps should be directed to the County Council. He stated that the letter to the county should ask for a time when designees of the four municipalities could meet with the county council as a whole so that it is on the record.
Mayor Willey stated that the letter is a good idea but he thinks it should be hand delivered and read openly in front of the media to be part of the record.
Ms. Jackson-Amis agreed that the matter should be placed on the agenda and the letter read. She stated that she thinks everyone should be there for the discussion and be a public meeting with clear discussion.
Discussion occurred regarding Trappe and St. Michaels sharing an objection to the tax due to the development coming to their towns and their previous negotiations.
The Town Attorney asked if the letter should include a point regarding the specific financial arrangements that have been made with developers.
The Town Attorney stated that if you impose impact fees, you must build capital improvements. You cannot accumulate the money in the vague expectation that at some point in the future, you can do things not currently specified.
Ms. Jackson-Amis stated that her objection is if the towns get the impact, if we get the developer to absorb that impact, then for the county to superimpose an excise tax is wrong and that is her concern from the very beginning. So now they have enabling legislation so they can do this.
The Town Attorney stated that the county should say that when you have development in Easton or Trappe, St. Michaels; it has impacts on municipal services and you should collect impact fees for them if you want to or negotiate arrangements with the developers but it also has impacts on the county demands for services and we are going to collect impact fees on those things as well.
It was the consensus to send a letter to a public county council meeting and be put on the agenda to read the concerns aloud to the media and public.
Municipal services that the impact fee would cover across the county were discussed.
Mr. Ford asked if the letter should begin with a consensus on the disagreement in principal with the impact fee and tax at the county level.
The Town Attorney suggested wording such as we agree that new development should fund its fair share of the future capital requirements for the county; we disagree with you as to the best way to accomplish that.
Mr. Jensen stated that there are legitimate county needs.
Discussion occurred regarding not approving of an excise tax until we know what it is.
The Town Attorney stated that we could say that we collect funds for capital improvements and some of them should be credits against the county impact fees which would give municipalities what they want.
Ms. Thomas stated that she is concerned about wording because she is worried that their developer that they have a signed developers’ agreement with may not be exempted.
Ms. Thomas discussed development enhancement fees.
Ms. Jackson-Amis stated that we should be on record opposing the excise tax and if we have to go along, we go along kicking and screaming.
Mr. Jensen stated that he will be upset if the fees are not used properly. He stated that there is a town government and a county government and his problem is that the county government is encroaching on the town government.
Mr. Campen stated that they met with the school board and asked how the development would impact them and asked them what they should ask for. She discussed the county’s goals versus the municipalities’ goals.
Discussion occurred regarding goals of future council persons and elected officials.
Mr. Kehoe suggested putting together a letter that reflects the desire to have a dialogue with all of the county to set forth some specific proposals and to express some concern about how county impact fees and excise taxes could affect municipalities’ abilities to impose and collect impact fees and excise taxes, negotiate financial or infrastructure improvements from developers of large developments and a concern about the fairness of imposing impact fees or excises taxes upon situations; basically describing Midlands.
Mr. Ford stated that the consensus of the room was that the letter should state not only concerns about how these impact fees and excise taxes are applied; county versus municipality but also whether they are a good idea or not at all to be applied at all within the municipalities.
Discussion occurred regarding no one actually objecting to the county collecting excise fees for the schools that no one could address.
Mr. Jensen stated that it is fine to start that there is concern that we are not sure if it is a good idea in the municipalities.
Ms. Jackson-Amis asked that something be added regarding retroactivity. She stated that she is concerned that these taxes not be applied in a retroactive manner.
Mr. Kehoe stated that Maryland has the least restrictive doctrine of retroactivity of any state in the country. He discussed Douglass Landing and Midland which is under construction now. He stated that the law in Maryland is if the county wanted to impose an impact fee on Douglass Landing or the town wanted to impose an impact fee, either jurisdiction could do that.
Ms. Jackson-Amis stated that we could say that we want the county to consider no retroactive application of the excise tax on those that have vested and we define vested.
Mr. Kehoe stated that the county may agree with you but they are going to say that vested means pretty consistently in the county means you have to a building permit to build your house.
Ms. Jackson-Amis discussed projects already in the pipeline.
Mr. Campen stated that when approaching the county, you may want to be careful to reserve the right of St. Michaels, Trappe and Easton to do the initial impact and extract from that developer what the towns’ needs are without turning this over to the county so they say that this is what we perceive your needs to be.
Discussion occurred regarding addressing both concerns; the concern about specific developments and concerns about preserving the towns’ ability to negotiate.
Ms. Thomas stated that developers will eventually go to the county and not the municipalities to see what they are going to want from them.
Mr. Kehoe stated that as he understands it, Mr. Thompson and someone from St. Michaels will get together and draft a letter for the signatures of Mr. Ford or Mayor Willey and the Presidents of each of the other Commissions to the County Council saying we want to meet with you with regard to impact fees and excise taxes and we want to express our concerns with regard to the impact fees and excise taxes as they may apply in the municipalities, and we have a specific proposal to discuss with you with regard to how the impact fees and excise taxes would be administered, how towns would be reimbursed for their expenses and helping to administer it and how the funds should be spent. He stated that this draft would then get circulated to the various elected officials and if the majority of each jurisdiction agrees upon, then each jurisdiction will finalize it and it will be sent to the County Council by calling and getting an agenda slot with Mayor Willey, Mr. Ford, and the Presidents of the Commissions delivering the message to the County Council asking for negotiating sessions. Mr. Kehoe stated that there is no reason that everyone has to agree on everything.
Ms. Jackson-Amis discussed a response letter to Mrs. Spence and Mrs. Harrington, which states that regarding your letters to the municipalities, what we have decided is that we will meet with you all at once.
ADJOURNMENT
There being no further business, upon unanimous consensus, the regularly scheduled meeting was adjourned at 8:15 p.m.
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Town Clerk