Impact Fees

Since new houses sometimes create a need for new schools, sewers and emergency workers, a Bucks County legislator wants school districts and municipalities to have the power to charge developers a fee for every home they build. "It's also a way to try to deal with the suburban sprawl issue. It's the penalty side of it," said State Rep. Scott Petri, a Republican. "Developers would be penalized for building new developments on farm ground. " Petri's bill will be heard Tuesday by the House Republican Policy Committee.

Gov. McGreevey denied yesterday that a new $150 million "petrochemical" levy in his proposed state budget was really a "stealth gas tax" increase. In a contentious give-and-take with reporters, he described his "petrochemical environmental impact fee" as "a tax paid on the use of petrochemicals, whether it's for plastics or Vaseline, for petrochemical usage. " McGreevey introduced his $26.3 billion budget Tuesday, outlining an array of spending increases and new programs that were applauded by a variety of interest groups.

Builders' groups expressed support yesterday for two anti-sprawl measures that may be passed in the lame-duck legislative session beginning today. But the endorsement came as developers condemned the McGreevey administration's other "smart-growth" efforts, contending that regulations designed to curb building in environmentally sensitive areas will drive housing costs up by a third. For the first time since Gov. McGreevey introduced his anti-sprawl proposals in January, bipartisan legislative support appears to be aligned for two of them.

Gov. McGreevey's proposal to allow towns in New Jersey to declare a one-year moratorium on building would do more harm than good. Such action would unfairly single out a narrow slice of the business community, devastate a major part of the state's economic engine, create layoffs, deprive people of homes, and polarize the Smart Growth debate. If the homes being delayed meet all legal requirements, they still will be built. With one million people projected to move into New Jersey in the next 15 to 20 years, we agree with Gov. McGreevey that growth is one of the most serious issues we face.

Sprawl - how to control it, how to live with it, and who has done more to fight it - was the undercurrent of a debate last night between Republican candidates for the 143d District state House seat. Incumbent Charles T. "Chuck" McIlhinney Jr. and Betsy Helsel, a Plumstead Township supervisor representing dissident Bucks County Republicans, touched on the subject in responses to questions on impact fees for developers, pollution, the proposed Route 202 bypass - and even slot machines.

Impact fees provide one of the most potent weapons for both sides in the battle over sprawl. Many residential builders contend that the fees charged by municipalities to offset the costs of development are excessive and result in higher home prices that shut first-time and lower-income buyers out of the suburban market. The National Association of Home Builders, the umbrella group for 205,000 of the country's builders, published a handbook in 1997 to help its members block local impact-fee legislation.

Growth and planning are issues that greatly concern the members of the Builders League of South Jersey and the New Jersey Builders Association. We applaud Stephen M. Sweeney, director of the Gloucester County Board of Chosen Freeholders, for his recognition that New Jersey must meet the shelter and workplace needs of a growing population ("Gloucester County: Much gain, no pain," April 17). We also agree that providing for our social and economic necessities need not come at the expense of the environment.

The 2000 census shows that Gloucester County is one of the fastest-growing regions in the state. Once the farm capital of New Jersey, Gloucester County is now a semiagricultural, suburban, bedroom community where people move to raise their families in a safe, affordable, clean environment. According to the census, Gloucester County's population grew more in the last 10 years, 10.7 percent, than the statewide average, 8.9 percent. The reason is that Gloucester County combines the appropriate mixture of farmland and open-space preservation, business and economic development, and residential growth.

What happens when your neighbor is about to approve a 100,000-square-foot office complex near the town border, and the only thing you get is more traffic? If you're Lower Makefield Township and your neighbor is Newtown Township, you ask PennDot to reject Newtown Office Commons' application for an access permit on the northwest corner of the troubled intersection of Lindenhurst Road and the Newtown Bypass (Route 332). At least until the traffic plans are improved. The developer, Brandywine Realty Trust of Newtown Square, awaits final approval from the Newtown Township Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors, said Thomas Harwood, Newtown Township's zoning officer and public works director.

Wary after losing revenue to changing tax laws for public utilities, Limerick Township has rewritten its zoning laws and negotiated a $5 million payment from the company building a natural-gas power plant here. PowerWorks, a private firm from Connecticut, agreed last month to pay the maximum spelled out in a new zoning ordinance, $3.5 million in impact fees for emergency services and $1.7 million to the Municipal Authority for sewers, said Township Solicitor Joseph McGrory Jr. Township Manager Ed Fink said the revenue might go toward building public parks, improving roads, relieving the debt of the township, and bringing public water to the Linfield area, near where the plant will be built.