Mount Vernon city planner Laura Eckles has established a fee schedule for the city of Mount Vernon that will be reviewed annually.
Mount Vernon city administrator Chris Nosbisch said that many of the ordinances of the city refer to a fee schedule, but the City hasn’t updated that on an annual basis in many years. By doing this and compiling fees from different city departments, it is something the City can review each calendar year.
“Groups like parks and recreation or planning and zoning would still have a say on these different fees,” Nosbisch said. “They would meet and determine if their rates stay the same or need to increase each year and communicate that to the City to address as we move forward.”
Keeping the fee schedules updated also helps in not having multiple ordinances that would need to be amended for anytime fees are changed by a group.
“If we have to amend ordinances every time we change a fee, that requires publication and public hearings every time we change the ordinance,” Nosbisch said. “By making this a single document those ordinances all refer to, we can make any changes to it via resolution instead.”
Mount Vernon City Council member Stephanie West noted that dog licensing fees, as well as the ATV/UTV license fees should be included on the fee schedule as well.
City seeking RFPs for legal servicesWith the long-time city attorney for the City of Mount Vernon looking to retire in the next year, the City will be seeking requests for proposals for a new city attorney.
Mount Vernon city administrator Chris Nosbisch said with the retirement, it is probably best for the City to look for requests including the hourly rate attorneys would charge for their services. He expects individual attorneys and larger law firms would apply for the position and the City could review those closer to budget time.