Opinion: County Building Permit Fees Are Unfair Burden

Current permit fees in San Mateo County area are already higher than those of surrounding municipalities and the regulatory burdens are so onerous nearly every homeowner is currently in violation of some rule, yet the San Mateo Building and Planning Department is now proposing still higher fees and the institution of even more permit-only rules. See here: http://www.co.sanmateo.ca.us/Attachments/planning/PDFs/Drc-sign%205%2002-22-2012.pdf

Do you know that:

The current fee to just replace one bathroom ceiling fan connected to a duct system is $160+$29+$5+$1+5% legal +4% IT=$206.01. With the fees increase proposal this permit is going to be $215+$40+$5+$1+ 5% legal + 4% IT= $283.95 Part costs about $40, installation about $100.

Look at the actual permit cases. You can find these and other similar cases in  San Mateo County Building and Planning Database, click on each case # to go directly into the county's info. for that case.

Actual Case #1

A homeowner in San Mateo County obtained a permit to replace a water-heater. During the water-heater inspection, the building inspector went into the kitchen and issued a violation notice for what looked like an updated kitchen. (SWN2008-00025). Over the counter kitchen permit and one 10 minute inspection totaled an additional  $1,416 to the county. (BLD2008-00259).

Actual Case #2

County alleged illegal bathroom remodel and owner refused the inspector to come inside and investigate (SWN2009-00135). Eventually, the owner complied with the building permit requirement but was imposed a total of $16,930.45 of building permit fees, which included a penal investigation fees of $8,764.00 in excess of the $8,170.45 in building permit fees. (BLD2009-01421)

Actual Case #3

A North Fair Oaks Homeowner had a bathroom and kitchen remodeled without a permit and changed the windows from single pane to double pane within the existing window frame size and received a violation notice. The total cost of a building permit was $4,061, which included an investigation fee of $2,134, in excess of the $1,927 in permit fees. (BLD2012-00257)

The county erroneously collected a design review exemption fee of about $500 and made the Property Owner go through the design exemption process. After publication of the case in my previous post, the exemption fee was refunded to the Property Owner (PLN2012-00055).

Actual Case #4

A Homeowner in San Mateo County wants the fence in the back of his property to be 8 feet, 2 feet higher than the 6 feet allowed. He went through the planning process; costing him $1,805, which does NOT include the building permit fee. (PLN2012-00085)

Actual Case #5

An unincorporated Menlo Park homeowner put a trellis at entry in front yard and received a code violation notice SWN2010-00033 .

Actual Case #6

A Homeowner in North Fair Oaks had a tree house built without permit and received a violation notice SWN2009-00102 . The tree house had to be demolished and the Homeowner had to pay a fee of $1,879. 85 which included a $1,000 penal investigation fee (BLD2009-01218).

CAN THESE FEES REALLY BE SUPPORTED?

With the Building department struggling not to lay-off a single employee, the cost of permits has gone up tremendously in the last 7 years. We are at the point when it is frequently cheaper to do the work than to get a permit. The permit fees went up 160% in 2005 from the 2001 fee levels.

In 2005 a Building and Planning task force specifically recommended NOT to increase fees. Yet, the homeowner’s price tag for permits went up in 2009 (Board's resolution 070409) and again in 2011 (Board's Resolution 071529). Another fee increase is slated to be voted by the Board of Supervisors on May 24. http://www.co.sanmateo.ca.us/Attachments/planning/PDFs/Drc-sign%205%2002-22-2012.pdf

Please let the Supervisors know how you feel about these fee increases by emailing them:

Don Horsley, dhorsley@co.sanmateo.ca.us

Adrienne Tissier, atissier@co.sanmateo.ca.us

Rose Jacobs-Gibson, rosejg@co.sanmateo.ca.us

Carole Groom, cgroom@co.sanmateo.ca.us

Dave Pine, dpine@co.sanmateo.ca.us

and joining our mailing list by sending “subscribe” email to citizensunited@peninsulacompany.com.

Maria Rutenburg

Spokesperson

Citizens United for Building and Planning Reform

(650)7434915 direct  (650)6463122 fax

“Helping Homeowners Hang On in San Mateo County"

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