At first glance, it looks like the home-building boom has returned to Battle Ground and the unincorporated areas that make up the massive school district in which the city sits.
School officials are anticipating a 23 percent bump in the total impact fees the district will collect from new housing starts this year. The district expects to collect around $1.6 million in impact fees compared with $1.3 million in 2009 and $1.4 million in 2008. Because the money supplements the district’s school development budget, the extra income will, in theory, accommodate new students that come from new housing, said Mary Beth Lynn, the district’s finance director.
“We have some schools that are at capacity. If those schools should grow, the impact fees will be used to add classroom space,” Lynn said.
However, homebuilders say there has not been a housing spurt inside the Battle Ground district, at least not a big enough building boom to account for the $300,000 boost in impact fees.
Instead, they attribute the increase to a 2009 Clark County fee hike that is hurting their business. The county raised school impact fees by 159 percent for homes built in unincorporated areas, which accounts for a large part of Battle Ground’s 271-square-mile district.
The increase to the school budget “is exactly related to an increase in building fees. It has nothing to do with any big jump in construction activity,” said Steve Madsen, public affairs director of the 800-member Building Industry Association of Clark County.
This year, Clark County raised its impact fees to $8,290 per new single-family home, up from the $3,200 per unit the county had charged since 2006.
The county tacked an additional $5,090 onto each of the 128 new-home permits Clark County has issued for houses in the Battle Ground school district since January. Figures were not available for the number of new housing starts during the same period last year. However, the county has issued more housing permits overall.
Since January, there were 381 permits handed out for single-family homes throughout unincorporated Clark County, an increase of 90 percent from the 195 permits issued in the same period in 2009.
The fee hike “forces us to raise prices,” which has hurt home sales in unincorporated parts of the county, said Michael Shanaberger, sales manager for Vancouver-based Manor Homes.
“I don’t have people pounding down our doors to live in the Battle Ground district,” he said.
But builders were given a yearlong break from the rate hike, said Marty Snell, director of the county’s Department of Community Development.
“We set it up so that instead of paying the increase, we had the builders pay the original fee when they pick up the permit, and pay the rest when they sell the house,” he said.
Today, builders must pay the full fee.
“It’s the school district’s budget,” Snell said.
He credited the increase in collections to both the rate hike and more homebuilding activity. Snell also pointed out that the district is geographically Clark County’s largest by far.
“When we’re issuing building permits in and around WSUV (Washington State University Vancouver) all the way to north Orchards, that’s the Battle Ground district,” Snell said.
No in-city surge
Higher costs outside the city limits have not triggered a building surge in Battle Ground, said Robert Maul, the city’s community development director.
From January through July, Battle Ground has issued 45 permits to build houses, representing little change from the 46 permits issued during the same period last year.
The city also has not increased its impact fee, at $6,104 per single-family home since 2008, said Maul, who predicted Battle Ground’s once-booming housing industry will return over time.
“The potential is there, but we’re not there yet,” Maul said.
In the meantime, the school district continues to grow by an average of 200 students annually for the past three years, said Lynn. She said money from impact fees helps build new schools, purchase land for new schools and add portable classrooms.
The district’s student population grew to 13,055 students in 2010, up 4.8 percent from 12,428 students recorded in the 2007-2008 school year.
“For the last three years we’ve been on a growth trend and I anticipate the trend will continue,” Lynn said.
Cami Joner: cami.joner@columbian.com or 360-735-4532.
