I am amazed that Lexington County Council has found a new way to tax property owners. They call it a “fee” but it is a horrible tax for the small business owners who were closed due to covid,with less revenue and fewer customers.

To rental property owners with tenants in arrears, vacant commercial buildings and vacant retail spaces this is a nightmare.

I hope that the voters of Lexington County will call every council member and request they vote “NO.” Protect our small businesses and property owners.

IN THE COUNTY’S own words, these problems have been neglected for years as deferred maintenance. Now they want to impose a fee because they have said before that if elected they will not raise “taxes”.

It is a 2-fold problem, neglect of maintenance for years by Lexington County and then raise taxes significantly for property owners at the worst time for our businesses and our community.

The fee will vary based on an estimate of the additional storm water runoff it sends off-site from its property.

This estimate is tied to the amount of impervious area (rooftops, driveway, parking lots, etc.) on the parcel.

THE STORM WATER fee is going to be charged to single-family residential (SFR) properties in 3 tiers and non-single family residential (NSFR) properties on the basis of the “typical” residential property.

The typical residential property in Lexington County has about 2,800 square feet of impervious area (SFIA). This is termed the “equivalent residential unit” or ERU.

Each NSFR property will be charged a fee based on its total impervious area (IA) divided by 2,800 square feet.

Single family residential (SFR) properties will be charged on the basis of which of three tiers they fall into.

Credits will be offered for those NSFR properties that have well-maintained detention ponds and water quality structures, as well as offered to educational institutions, organizations and businesses for providing qualifying storm water education.

IT IS ESTIMATED that the monthly storm water utility fee will be billed annually on the tax bill beginning in October 2021 for the 2021 year and will be in the range of $4 - $8 per month per ERU.

The tax is on a fast-track schedule for approval by the County Council by year-end.

For industrial, commercial and retail businesses it could be thousands of dollars.

Lexington County said “the new fee is needed to mitigate $114 million of systemwide storm water repairs and $76 million to address community flooding projects.”

Why is there $114 million in deferred maintenance on Lexington County’s storm water system? That is the critical question.

We need to do away with “tax and spend” elected officials.

Pete Oliver is local businessman and former Small Business Administration official.