A state Senate bill that would allow counties to exempt lowincome workers from paying service fees would not affect Monongalia County’s service fee, the bill’s author said Thursday.
Senate Bill 219, sponsored and introduced in the Senate on Jan. 15 by Sen. John Blair Hunter, DMonongalia, would exempt workers who are not required to pay state or federal taxes from paying a service fee.
But the bill does not retroactively change the law that authorized Monongalia County’s proposed service fee, said Delegate Barbara Fleischauer, D-Monongalia, who wrote the bill. Fleischauer said the bill would make changes for future referenda on service fees but would not allow Monongalia County to exempt lowincome workers.
“What the County Commission did was based on the law that is cur- rently in effect, and that would be the only thing they would have the authority to do.” Fleischauer said. “I think the only way you could have a vote would be based on the law that is in effect on the day of the vote.”
Hunter previously told The Dominion Post that the changes in the bill were designed to make a service fee “a little more palatable for the opposition.” But he didn’t know how SB 219 would affect the proposal if it’s approved by voters in Saturday’s special election.
Fleischauer said the purpose of SB 219 was to address some voters’ concerns about a service fee. She said the new wording would allow counties more flexibility in setting up service fees.
The original only allows counties to charge a uniform fee to all workers, which some said hurt low-income people, Fleischauer said.
Under the provisions of the new proposal, counties could set a service fee of up to 1 percent of an employee’s income, Fleischauer said. And the county could exempt people who don’t pay taxes because they have too little income.
The bill would also lower the barriers to charging impact fees on developers, Fleischauer said. For instance, a county could charge an
impact fee if it has planning districts in place, rather than a comprehensive zoning law.
“It would also nudge the county toward a comprehensive plan,” Fleischauer said. “It would allow impact fees to be collected right away, but they could only be used once we really had a comprehensive plan. I think there is much stronger support for comprehensive planning than there ever was before.”
Chance for change
Charleston lawyer Dale Steager, who helped draft the county’s service fee order, agrees with Fleischauer that SB 219 won’t affect Monongalia County workers.
But he said that if the service fee passes Saturday, it could be changed later on with another referendum vote.
Through another vote, he said, the county could go back and exempt low-income workers.
He said the county would likely have to make the change before any bonds were sold. The terms of the bond would require the county to say how they would be paid back, and most likely would not allow the funding source to be reduced.
“Once the voters approve the referendum, then even if at that point in time the statute is changed, that would allow the County Commission to exempt certain folks from paying the fee, that would have to go back to the voters,” Steager said. “If you’ve taken out a piece of the revenue stream, something else has to give.”
