[BATN] SF suspends controversial sidewalk encroachment fee Date: 26 Jan 2006 08:45:55 -0800 Published Thursday, January 26, 2006, in the San Francisco Examiner City suspends controversial sidewalk fee Residents faced fines for altering public pathways By Justin Jouvenal Mayor Gavin Newsom's office suspended a new law Wednesday that drew protests from bewildered property owners who had received hefty bills from The City for improving public sidewalks with greenery, new pavement and railings. Some 680 property owners, who had received bills for encroaching on city sidewalks, won't have to pay them until city officials review how the fees are being imposed and possibly make changes to the ordinance. The ordinance was intended to compensate The City when property owners appropriate public sidewalks for personal or commercial uses, but it has also snared people that created beneficial changes to sidewalks. "It's clear that the fees are not being imposed as they were designed to," said Peter Ragone, a spokesman for the mayor. "This is an appropriate action." The ordinance, which Newsom sponsored, requires property owners to pay an annual fee of $3 per square foot for ramps, awnings, poles or anything else they own that occupies a public sidewalk. It went into effect in August. Ed Lee, the director of the Department of Public Works, said DPW will take a critical look at the fees and could possibly rescind them in cases when people actually created a benefit for the public, such as putting out a tree in a planter. DPW officials said the average bill for city residents was about $200, but some ranged to more than $1,000. "We need to make better distinctions," Lee said. Mellie Malcolmson, a 74-year-old woman who spent $3,000 to build a railing on a steep sidewalk in front of her Filbert Street home, was relieved to hear about the moratorium. She said tourists, elderly neighbors and she and her frail husband use the railing to get up and down the sidewalk. Malcolmson received a $1,200 encroachment bill from The City for installing the railing. "My husband has a 24-hour caregiver and that's not cheap," said Malcolmson, whose husband had a major stroke. "I'm just happy I don't have to shell that out." The property owners that received the bills had been careful to follow city code -- the DPW was able to bill them because the owners had taken out sidewalk encroachment permits in the last five years. Supervisor Michela Alioto-Pier has also sponsored an ordinance that would repeal the encroachment fee. E-mail: jjouvenal@examiner.com [BATN: See also: Insane SF regulation penalizes street landscaping, greenery http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BATN/message/28508 SF sidewalk encroachment fee penalizes landscaping, trees http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BATN/message/28507 ] Email article texts/URLs for posting to . Manage your subscription by sending a blank email message to: BATN-subscribe@yahoogroups.com to subscribe, BATN-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com to unsubscribe, BATN-digest@yahoogroups.com to switch email to digest mode, BATN-normal@yahoogroups.com to switch email to normal mode, BATN-nomail@yahoogroups.com to switch email delivery off. See http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BATN for web access & archives.