Londonderry, New Hampshire Impact Fees

Topics: Community Impact | Zoning Regulations

The town added to its zoning regulations a section on Impact Fees, which stated that the purpose of such fees was to “assess an equitable share of the growth-related cost of new and expanded public capital facilities to all types of new development in proportion to the facility demands created by that development.” Impact fees help the town “to provide adequate public facilities to serve new growth, and provide new development with a reasonable benefit in proportion to its contribution to the demand for such facilities.” The town developed a fee schedule to go along with this regulation. A big box retailer, which uses large amounts of water and sewer capacity, would be assessed an impact fee under such a regulation. The town also allowed itself to deny a project which is “scattered or premature, (or) requires an excessive expenditure of public funds.” Wal-Mart opponents could seek to amend their zoning code to require impact fees on commercial projects over a certain threshold of water or sewer usage.