The City of North Plains has had a Transportation Utility Fee (TUF) in place since 2003 to help pay for much-needed ongoing maintenance and repair of streets, sidewalks, and streetlights in town. An important part of that is the City's Pavement Management Program to repair, rehabilitate and maintain the more than 15 miles of streets and surfaces (see document at the bottom of this page for more details). The TUF fee appears on all (residential, business, school, and non-profit organization) water utility bills and is based on calculations of the vehicle trip generation for different customer classes (residential, industrial, institutional, mixed-use, and retail/office).

After a study was conducted in early 2022, the North Plains City Council approved the first increase to the TUF since 2011. Effective July 1, 2022 the fee is $5 per month per residential dwelling to take care of deferred maintenance and increasing costs.
The previous TUF amount of $1.33 per month for a single-family residence had remained unchanged since 2011. Non-residential units will also see a change, based on the size of their buildings, as businesses and other organizations generate traffic and wear-and-tear on our roads. Even with this change, North Plains’ TUF fee is one of the lowest of all Washington County cities. The preventative maintenance this fee helps fund can extend the life of a street by decades and costs significantly less than restoration of streets that are left in disrepair.

What’s the difference between the use of TUF and Fuel Tax Revenues?

The TUF and fuel tax revenues are both critical to helping with important maintenance and improvements. The TUF fee goes towards the ongoing maintenance of roads, sidewalks, and streetlights, while the fuel tax helps fund the new construction of roads, intersections, and sidewalks. Here is the prioritized plan for transportation projects to be funded in part by the fuel tax.

Supporting Documents

North Plains Pavement Management Program Report_2021