Most households in Ceres will see a 3.6 percent increase in the assessments they pay on their property tax bill to pay into the city’s various Landscaping and Lighting Districts (L&LD).
The districts were formed to help the city recoup the cost of street lights and take care of landscaping along medians and sound walls and in some cases newer parks. In newer subdivisions the city requires homes to be annexed into Community Facilities Districts, which is a different method of collecting assessments for services.
“Everybody in each district pays a little bit different (amount) depending on how much landscaping and lighting they have,” City Engineer Michael Beltran reported at the August 12 Ceres City Council meeting.
The typical L&LD fee in one area is $37.64 per residential lot for the year and much higher for businesses and industries. Another district pays $77.74 per year and yet another pays $115.82 per year.
Beltran explained that the increases can only be tied to the rate of inflation but stated that the new assessments do not cover all of the costs “but this is all we can do as far as raising rates.”
To continue collecting the L&LD assessments, the city was required to go through legal steps, including declaring its intention to levy assessments, approve an Engineer’s Report, and schedule and notice a public hearing and adopt a resolution ordering the assessments. The council had to complete the tasks by August 13 to allow time to process the paperwork necessary for the county assessor to place the assessments on the tax roll by the August 15th deadline.
All of 1987 Landscape and Lighting District assessments are exempt from Proposition 218, as they have only been adjusted based on an inflation rate voted on by the property owners.
The city commissioned the Temecula firm of NBS to produce the engineer’s report, which is required to calculate costs spread out over 6,478 parcels in the city. The report called for an increase of 5.124 percent in assessments based on the West Urban Consumer Price Index.
City Engineer Michael Beltran presented the engineer’s report, detailing what parcels are within the L&LD and specified that the costs total $525,718. It includes $210,669 for street lighting costs. Other costs are:
• Right-of-Way Landscaping, $60,160;
• Westpointe median landscaping, $27,227.90;
• Brown Annexation median landscaping, $42,870;
• Brown Park $46,274;
• Darrah Street landscaping, $2,500;
• Davante landscaping, $20,044;
• Eastgate master plan area landscaping at, $108,201
• Overhead costs of $7,771.
Councilwoman Rosalinda Vierra remarked that she is aware that medians in the Brown Annexation area of southwest Ceres are neglected with weeds and broken sprinkler heads. She also said Darrah Street property owners are assessed and “paying for piles of dirt” where trees used to be.
“Are we actually enhancing their property based on the fees and lighting that they’re paying for?”
Beltran said the fees are not for landscape enhancement but can pay for tree and plant replacement. He also added that trees should be going in on Darrah Street “soon.”
Increases for CFDs too
In other action, the council held a special meeting on Wednesday to implement inflationary increases for two Community Facilities Districts in Ceres.
Community Facilities District #1 will see its assessments rise from $340.93 to $353.43 annually while District #2 will see an increase from $1,010.74 to $1,047.79 annually.
