By BRIAN WALKER

Staff Writer

POST FALLS — The Post Falls City Council on Tuesday night approved fee increases, a budget with no property tax hike and expressed interest in creating a new City Center Urban Renewal District.

The budget includes a 1 percent cost of living allowance for employees and up to a 3 percent merit pay increase.

It also includes three new full-time positions — two police officers at a total cost of $146,159 and a city arborist at $51,056.

Council member Alan Wolfe said he believes the budget takes into account the needs of staff during rapid growth and the taxpayer who is funding the services.

"As a citizen, I always had questions of whether the city is being good stewards of tax dollars," Wolfe said. "I question every check that is written. I've come to the conclusion

that the city does an excellent job of spending the money that the citizens provide."

Wolfe said, being more frugal than many, he maybe could have pushed for shaving perhaps $200,000 from the budget.

"But this is a $53 million budget," he said. "Does everyone spend every nickel the way I do? No."

Growth, city officials said, prompted the need for the additional positions. Post Falls' population increased by more than 1,500 last year and there are 13 subdivisions being developed this year.

No one spoke for or against the budget proposal during the public hearing.

The council also approved water, wastewater and water connection fees that will increase by a total of $3.77 per month ($73.36 to $77.13) for the average homeowner.

The wastewater is the largest increase of the three at $3.25. That hike was driven by mandates by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to clean up the Spokane River. Post Falls, along with other agencies, discharges treated wastewater to the river.

The fees will go into effect on Oct. 1.

The sanitation fee of $10.93 will remain the same.

During the fee public hearing, Post Falls resident Joe Doellefeld, who owns a small restaurant, pitched the idea of the council reviewing its fees for selling alcohol. He said it took his business three years to finally have beer and sales outpace the $775 in fees he pays to the state, county and city.

"Adjustments is probably a better word than increases," he said, referring to his suggestion to review alcohol fees.

City Administrator Shelly Enderud told the council that staff will review such fees.

In other business, council members said they'd like to have a meeting with the Urban Renewal Agency to consider opening a new City Center Urban Renewal District that could include the Idaho Veneer property and areas north of Interstate 90 and south of Seltice Way.

The current City Center District closes in 2018. The current district boundaries may be included in a new district once the current district is closed.

"This would reset the values of those properties to the value at the time the new district is created," Enderud wrote in a memo to the council.

Proponents say a new district could assist with funding infrastructure such as curbs, sidewalks, street work, parking and landscaping to attract businesses to the city center. It could also assist with development of the Post Falls Landing project and the section of the Idaho Veneer site that was not being utilized and recently sold.

"I see huge potential for a new URD in that area," council member Lynn Borders said.

It takes about 18 months to create a URD.

Urban renewal districts have a base tax rate when the district is created. That base tax rate continues to be collected by the county and remitted to taxing entities over the life of the district. As a district is improved, has new construction and increases in value due to improvements, the incremental tax created by those improvements in excess of the base tax is allocated to the URA to pay for the public improvements that have been made within the district.