Fruitland stymied on traffic light plan
City leaders will search for other options
By JESSICA KELLER
ARGUS OBSERVER
Wednesday, July 2, 2008 11:02 AM PDT
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| The City of Fruitland intends to install a four-way traffic light at this intersection at Northwest 16th Street and Allen Avenue in Fruitland to help mitigate traffic anticipated to come from upcoming developments. The city is still reviewing options as to how it will pay for its portion of the project. |
FRUITLAND — The City of Fruitland is exploring other options to pay for a traffic light at the intersection of 16th Street and Allen Avenue in Fruitland after learning proposed latecomers agreements would not be feasible.
City Administrator Rick Watkins said last week, Susan Buxton, an attorney the city hired to look into the possibility, reported she found some cases where the city cannot be considered as a developer in a latecomers agreement project.
“Her studies have found the public entities cannot be the developer and collect fees for itself,” Watkins said.
Watkins said the City Council was considering establishing a latecomers agreement to pay for the traffic light. In a latecomers agreement a developer makes an infrastructure improvement and pays for the entire cost, a portion of that cost, however, is reimbursed by other developers who move into the area to the original developer.
In light of the information regarding the proposed latecomers agreements, the city will have to look into other options for the traffic light. Currently, the city has the option of implementing an impact fee program, a local improvement district or pay for the traffic light with existing city funds.
The traffic light was identified as a safety recommendation corresponding with traffic the proposed Spring Creek Manor development project is expected to bring when complete. Spring Creek Manor entails an assisted living community with 44 residential lots, two assisted living center lots, four commercial lots, four high-density multi-family lots and one common lot on 22 acres of land off of Allen Avenue.
Watkins said he is not sure what the City Council will decide regarding its portion of the traffic light cost. An impact fee program could take a considerable amount of time to implement. Although Watkins said currently there isn’t a set timeframe to install a traffic light, the City Council has received a state grant to pay for a portion of the project, and he is certain it could be installed within a year.
Watkins said, the developer of Spring Creek, Doug Clegg, is ready to move forward with the project, and wants the traffic light completion to correspond to the facility’s completion.
“They want to make sure that it all dovetails together,” he said. “When one is operational so is the other.”
City Council members have been hesitant to move forward with an LID because the city can only issue an LID within its jurisdictions, but not county properties that would benefit from the improvement, Watkins said.
“So they’re a little hesitant of putting that burden on the existing users, or existing city properties,” he said.
Fruitland Mayor Tom Limbaugh said he has seen LIDs work really well in some instances and not well in others.
“As long as I’ve been working with the city since ‘82, we’ve never done an LID, and I don’t know if Fruitland has ever done one,” he said. “So it’s something new to us, and you just have to make sure that if you do something like that, that it’s fair. And when you do a traffic signal and you create a district around that signal, is that fair. And I just don’t know.”
He said it seems the only way it would be absolutely fair is for an LID to cover a portion of the improvement, and the city to pay for the rest.
“I’ve just seen other entities do LIDs before, and it almost seems like you’re shoving something down people’s throats that they don’t want, and we don’t want to do that,” Limbaugh said.
The city does have unencumbered funds in the state revenue sharing fund, as the last option, Watkins said.
While the traffic light is raising questions for city staff, once complete, Watkins said he thinks it will be positive because it will open up an expanse of acreage between Northwest Seventh to Northwest 16th for development by providing safe access. That acreage has been targeted in the city’s comprehensive plan as ideal for development because it would infill existing open property within city limits.
