Champaign City Council Warms to Idea of Stormwater Drainage Fee

Champaign City Council members told city staff Tuesday night to prepare to issue debt for pay for the next stage of flood control improvements along the Boneyard Creek. And they also told staff to look into a way to pay for fixing flood control problems in city neighborhoods ---- a stormwater drainage fee.

Champaign city officials say a special fee charged to property owners --- perhaps 50 dollars a month on a single-family home --- could be used to pay for storm-sewer repairs and upgrades. At last night's city council study session, several residents from flood-prone neighborhoods said they favor such a fee over the current cost-sharing program, where residents in the affected neighborhood would pay 75 percent of the bill. Jim Creighton, the spokesperson for the West Washington Street Watershed Steering Committee, says there's nothing wrong with having all city residents share the cost of neighborhood drainage repairs.

"Others do benefit from fixing our drainage problems", argued Creighton. "It first stabilizes, then improves our neighborhood's property value, thus allowing us to make home improvements, increasing our properties further, ultimately increasing the tax base which helps all of us."

But a resident in the John Street Watershed didn't want to reject the cost-sharing model out of hand. Kelly Bean, who serves on her neighborhood's Watershed Steering Committee, says she knows a lot of residents ready to share the bill for drainage repairs.

"I have a number of checks dropped by my house", said Bean, "from families of moderate income that are ready to see the big pipe go in the ground in the John Street Watershed Area. This needs to happen yesterday."

While they wanted to preserve the cost-sharing option, Champaign city council members directed city staff to study the stormwater drainage fee idea further, along with other funding options. Finance Director Richard Schnuer says more details on the proposed fee could be ready at a study session in Dember.