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LAW OFFICES <br />• COLEMAN, GLEDHILL & HARGRAVE <br />A PROFESSIONAL CORPORATION <br />129 E. TRYON STREET - <br />P. O. DRAWER 1529 <br />HILLSBOROUGH, NORTH CAROLINA 27278 <br />919.732.31% FROM THE DESK OF <br />FAX 919.732.7997 GEOFFREY E. GLEDHILL <br />February 24, 1998 <br />-~ Margaret Brown, Chair <br />Moses Carey, Jr. <br />Bill Crowther <br />Alice Gordon <br />Stephen Halkiotis <br />Orange County Board of Commissioners <br />Post Office Box 8181 <br />Hillsborough, North Carolina 27278 <br />RE: Impact Fee Reimbursement Policy <br />Dear Board Members: <br />Last year, the Board considered expanding its impact fee reimbursement policy related <br />to affordable housing to include rental housing. I have been asked to present pros and cons of <br />such a policy expansion. I have enclosed a copy of my June 26, 1996 letter to the Board as <br />background for your consideration of the policy expansion. The conclusion of that June 26, 1996 <br />letter is that spending County money on a project which will directly benefit families or persons <br />of low to moderate income over a sustained period of time satisfies the public purpose <br />requirement for spending County money. A policy which reimburses school impact fees for <br />projects exclusively committed to renters with incomes at or below 60% of the HUD published <br />area median: income (the Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill metropolitan statistical area total median <br />family incot~)-satisfies that public purpose. The enclosed chart may help you see the population <br />at which this: reimbursement policy is aimed. <br />The obvious. first "pro." of making impact fee reimbursements available to such rental <br />projects is that it will arguably increase the number of affordable housing units available and <br />arguably make those housing units more affordable. Requiring the units in the project to remain <br />affordable for a significant length of time assures the availability of affordable housing for the <br />period of affordability. <br />A "con" is that the housing may not remain affordable in perpetuity and that at some <br />point the housing units may be rented at market rates. The question becomes whether the <br />County's investment in impact fees is sufficiently "amortized" over the period of required <br />