I attended my neighborhood council meeting last night. This is something I have not done for quite a while, and it was actually very interesting.
The largest portion of time was spent discussing the current strategy on impact fees. The mayor is proposing a 1 year moratorium on impact fees. This would be huge for new development activity, but I can’t imagine those developers that got charged the fees just prior to the moratorium will take the news sitting down. By not paying the $2.64/building square foot fees, a new development in Salt Lake City would have an effective rental rate advantage of about $.02/SF per month, over those that had to pay the fee. That might not sound like much, but in the uber competitive industrial real estate market $.02/SF per month on a big box warehouse could mean 100’s of thousands of dollars in savings over the course of a lease for the tenant. The Mayor and City Council will be holding a series of meetings in the coming month to discuss the issues and determine a plan moving forward.
See this link for more details on recent impact fee discussions at the city: http://www.sltrib.com/home/2983254-155/salt-lake-city-exploring-moratorium-on