By Sarah Lombardo
The proposed reorganization of Saratoga City Hall could lead to higher building-inspection and permit costs, according to the city's building department and codes enforcement administrator Joe Oncay. But it could also be skirting the law.
If implemented, the new plan could have the Saratoga building department making a profit. And that violates California law, Oncay said.
The plan calls for eliminating the codes administrator and a building inspector position, both held by Oncay, and replacing the community development director with a community development manager, who would oversee a new department created by the merger of the public works and community development departments. The reorganization also suggests an increase in building and planning fees by 10 percent.
The savings from the personnel cuts and the increase in fees will create a $267,000 surplus in funds for the building department. According to Oncay, that money either must be carried over to the next fiscal year to be used only toward building department costs or must be refunded to residents who have paid building department-related fees over the year.
"The law is very clear on this," Oncay said. "The whole concept is to make sure we charge just what it costs us to do business so that the citizens don't pay any more than they absolutely have to in order to keep the costs of construction down."
California government code, section 66014, states, "Notwithstanding any other provision of law, when a local agency charges fees for zoning variances, zoning changes, use permits, building inspections, building permits ... those fees shall not exceed the estimated reasonable cost of providing the service for which the fee was charged."
The law was created to keep cities from gouging residents on building costs and using the money for other departments.
According to Oncay, the city could be violating state code under the proposed plan.
But Saratoga Finance Director Thomas Fil said the city, if it implements the proposed reorganization, will be within the law.
"The state law allows for full cost recovery for services rendered in performing a number of building inspection-related tasks," Fil said. According to Fil, the city currently has a number of building department employees working at a variety of tasks elsewhere in the city.
Fil said the city staff is suggesting including the costs of those other tasks in building department fees to recover costs.
Oncay disagreed, saying that costs incurred through other functions, such as planning and zoning, should be tacked onto the zoning fees, not building-inspection and permit fees. And he also said he knows his interpretation of the law does not make people happy in this time of budget-tightening.
"I know that a lot of people have a problem with this, and I can only say that this is the state law," he said. "My responsibility is to enforce all of the laws in California that pertain to the city of Saratoga and building and code enforcement, including the laws which discuss the collecting of fees and how those fees will be used."
Oncay, who has already told council members their plan is illegal, said he intends to draft a memo to the City Council informing them of what he feels is the intention behind the state code and what is wrong with the current proposal, including the impact it would have on service to residents.
The City Council will hold its next budget workshop on April 22 in the Senior Day Care room of the Community Center to discuss the reorganization proposal.
This article appeared in the Saratoga News, April 9, 1997.
©1997 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.