Shohola imposes recreational impact fee

By TOM KANE

SHOHOLA, PA - Since Shohola is growing so rapidly, it must find a way to provide recreational facilities for its increasing population.

“We have a township park with picnic tables and areas for play but we’re going to need more as more people settle here,” said Shohola Township Supervisor George Fluhr.

Fluhr explained that it wasn’t right to impose taxes on the people who have resided in the township for years in order to pay for new construction of recreational facilities.

“There’s a provision in the Pennsylvania Planning Code to provide for just such an instance,” Fluhr said. “It’s called a recreational impact fee ordinance and it has been adopted by many townships south and west of us where growth has boomed.”

Fluhr said he saw no reason not to adopt such an ordinance in Shohola.

Shohola planner Carson Helfrich of Community Planning and Management LLC attended the township board meeting on November 8 to explain the provisions of the proposed ordinance.

“When plans for a new development are presented for approval, this ordinance gives the township the right to impose fees under certain conditions,” Helfrich said. “If developers of, say, a gated community want to dedicate a section for recreation, they would not have to pay the fee if they set aside a section of the property for residents and allowed the general public to have access. But, if they restrict it to only residents as so many do, they would have to pay the fee.”

The fees would be placed in a fund to pay for the construction of future recreational facilities.

The board, which set a fee of $500 per unit, approved the ordinance unanimously.

An apartment house, which is not a normal subdivision, would have to pay the fee depending on the number of units in the building, Helfrich said. A builder of a single home or a small number of homes would not have to pay the fee. “It’s meant for larger developments, which is what’s happening to the township,” Helfrich said.

In other business, the board approved the 2008 budget, which has a .25 mil increase, bringing the total township tax to 8.25 mils.