×

Chester doubles city’s municipal fee

CHESTER — City Council doubled the city’s municipal fee on Monday in the hopes of putting the community on firmer financial footing.

The municipal service fee will cost each homeowner and each business owner $7.50 a month, or $90 a year. The fee had been $45 a year, among the lowest in the Northern Panhandle.

Council held a second reading and adopted the enabling ordinance by a vote of 4-0 during Monday’s special meeting. Councilman John “Woody” Woodruff was absent.

Monday’s vote was stalled briefly when council had to take a recess in order for City Clerk N. Marlene Fleming to find the proper version of the ordinance.

Council has been discussing the fee increase, and other potential revenue sources, since learning in May the city likely will lose the racetrack video lottery revenue it has counted on from Mountaineer Casino, Racetrack & Resort for years.

Chester’s 2 percent take of that revenue, distributed annually by Hancock County commissioners, was $140,000 in 2013, $140,000 in 2014 and $89,000 in 2015. Commissioners have said this year’s revenue-sharing amount likely will be zero.

What’s more, council learned in June the city’s liability insurance premium was going up by $60,000, adding urgency to the municipal fee increase.

The new municipal fee will raise an estimated $130,000 a year for the city’s general fund, including such expenditures as police and fire protection, street maintenance and improvement, parks and recreational facilities, sewerage and sewage disposal and the collection and disposal of garbage.

Mayor Larry Forsythe said the fee increase mostly will replace video lottery money that has been lost over the past few years.

“It pretty much is just bringing us back up to where we were before we lost the money from Mountaineer,” he said.

Forsythe said he would have preferred to look at places in the budget to cut before making any decisions on the municipal fee.

“I just felt that there were areas where we could reduce without raising the municipal fee that much,” he said. “As time goes on, I guess we can go back and redo it. We’ll just have to wait and see.”

Council’s pursuit of the municipal fee increase was not without resistance. City businessman Bob Reed circulated a petition in opposition to the increase but, in the end, he did not gather enough signatures.

Reed would have needed 30 percent of the “qualified voters” in Chester to sign the petition. He submitted a petition with 535 signatures, only 398 of which were deemed valid by Fleming.

Had the petition reached the 30 percent threshold — 571 signatures out of 1,904 voters — it would have forced a municipal election on the municipal fee question.

City resident Cindy Smith, a candidate for mayor in 2014, spoke in opposition to the fee increase at Monday’s public hearing.

“We should be allowed to vote on this. This is not fair,” she said. “You’re doubling these prices. I understand the city’s broke, but the residents of Chester have a right to vote — yes or no.”

City Solicitor April Raines responded that the West Virginia Code authorizes municipalities to raise their fees. The legal way to force a vote is by petition, which failed in this case, she said.

The ordinance, in addition to raising the fee, changes the composition of the Municipal Fee Board, a five-member body whose purpose is to make recommendations to council about the fee. The board, which has not been active for years, must now include two members of council.

The ordinance sets a deadline of Nov. 30 for payment of the $90 fee and a late date of Dec. 31, after which point a late fee of $45 is assessed.

Municipal fee statements must be mailed by the city clerk’s office no later than July 30, with the exception of this year.

NEWSLETTER

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper? *

COMMENTS

Starting at $4.73/week.

Subscribe Today