There is currently a proposal in the Finance Committee of the City Council for this Thursday for a “Capital Plan” to increase the Stormwater fees for the residents and businesses of Westfield and create new positions to do the work. While I understand the need for maintenance and repair of the systems and the requirement by the Federal Government that this be done, an increase in this fee needs to be discussed further and accounting documentation needs to be provided for the current and past fees that were collected to see what projects have been done with these funds. One issue that I have with this is that the residential developments that were put in and the commercial developments that were done under the “Stormwater Management Program” required the installation of onsite retention / detention and treatment of all stormwater on these properties. This process is an extremely expensive undertaking by the property owner’s, and in many cases reduces the size of these developments and useable area. If the developers / owners are required to install and maintain these areas, why should they also pay a separate fee? The argument has been made that you still need to pay the fee because you “use the roads”. What is the “Excise” Tax for? Meals Tax? Rooms Tax? …… The proposal indicates that the fees would increase up to $50.00 for residents by FY21 and as high as $4,200 for some businesses. I would like to see more discussion on this, and maybe some public input as well.
John Beltrandi
