Foothill Municipal Water District announced that it is considering a real property assessment to raise money to pay for capital improvements to the district’s water system. The district’s board on Feb. 16 approved exempting and excluding certain properties from the real property assessment should the district proceed with the assessment. To be excluded from the assessment, property owners must apply to the district based on the criteria below. Applications can be found at www.fmwd.com or by calling the district at (818) 790-4036.

Property owners may apply for the partial or whole exclusion of the following properties: Lands with conservation easements; lands where owners certify that they will not develop the land, and lands where there are ordinances and general land use plans prohibiting development.

If the property owner later develops the land, they will need to pay the retroactive parcel charge plus interest.

Other properties will be automatically excluded or exempted from the assessment. These include public agencies including the public schools in the service area; lands owned by mutual water companies and privately regulated water companies; parcels having a charge less than $1.00 annually; property owners if the retail purveyor is completely independent of district will not be assessed.

Parcels exempt or excluded from the assessment will not be eligible to vote regarding the levying of the assessment. Parcels partially benefited will have the weighted voting based on the amount of benefit.

The district will not process exemptions and exclusions submitted after March 9.

The real property assessment is to help finance the Local, Reliable Water Supply Program. This program was necessitated by three years of drought in Northern California, eight years on the Colorado River watershed and a decision by a Federal Judge that severely restricted pumping in the Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta due to the diminishing population of the Delta Smelt and has had impacts to the Foothill area.

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