09-0969
	To Planning and Land Use Management Committee City Administrative Officer report 0220-04851-0014, dated July 26, 2017, relative to a comprehensive fee study for services provided by the Department of City Planning.

Conclusions of City Planning  (Reports (December 29, 2016, Part 1), December 29, 2016, Part 2), (December 29, 2016, Part 3)

The final fee study report concludes that the City should try to recover as much of the cost of services as is feasible, but recognizes there are policy factors that often warrant adoption of fee levels at less than 100%. The recommendations and proposed fee structures in the fee study report are legally defensible and establish a nexus between costs of providing services and each specific user fee that is charged. For the time period reviewed, the cost of case processing related services was approximately $29.8 million while revenues from these services was $22.1 million, resulting in a difference of $7.7 million (or 74%). Based on these findings, the Department needs to increase fees by roughly 25% to achieve a greater amount of cost recovery.

However, as indicated earlier, economic policy factors require that some fees be subsidized, such as appeals and historic clearances. The estimated value of the subsidies is roughly $3 million, which will require an appropriation from the General Fund for case processing related services provided by the Department.