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ZEBULON - On October 8, 2025, the Pike County Board of Commissioners and Pike County Planning and Development was served with a letter of demand for the refund of an impact fee and an administrative appeal placed before the Board of Commissioners for an impact fee paid on September 8, 2025.

The letter was written by Attorney Troy R. Covington of Bloom Parham. This is the same law firm that contested Henry County Impact Fees and won in Henry County Superior Court earlier this year. The letter was written on the behalf of Pike resident David Hughes regarding the impact fee of $6,775.99 placed on the construction of his personal residence on Cook Road. Hughes informed the county at the time of payment that he was paying under protest because he believed the impact fee to be illegal pursuant to Pike County’s Code of Ordinances in Chapter 157.

As a payor of this fee to Pike County, Bloom Parham argued that Hughes has the right to bring this administrative appeal to Pike County.

Pike County Times spoke with Pike County Manager/Attorney Rob Morton today, and he advised that the county is waiting on additional information before making a response.

History

The history of impact fees was outlined in this letter with the original ordinance being enacted on May 10, 2006, amended on May 9, 2012, and the amount of impact fees for single family detached housing being raised from $2,404.15 to $6,775.99 on February 1, 2023.

According to the letter, reasons for impact fees being “invalid and illegal under Georgia law” include not following the county’s ordinance which states that any amendment to the ordinance – including any updates to the development impact fee schedule – shall follow the procedures required under the Georgia Development Impact Fee Act (DIFA) which clearly states that state law must be followed in OCGA § 36-71-3(a). A list of reasons was then given to back up this argument.

First, the letter states that requirements in state law include OCGA § 36-71-5(a) which requires the establishment of a Development Impact Fee Advisory Committee prior to any changes to the impact fee schedule. The letter states that Pike County passed the change to the impact fee schedule without this mandatory advisory committee.

Second, the letter goes on to say that state law under OCGA § 36-71-6 also requires two public hearings to be held regarding changes to the proposed ordinance with the second hearing being held at least two weeks after the first hearing. The letter states that the Pike County Board of Commissioners did not hold even one public hearing prior to making changes to the impact fee for single family detached housing on January 31, 2023.

Hughes’ attorney declared that the current impact fee for single family detached housing is illegal because the county did not follow its own ordinances or state law.

Third, the attorney made the argument that the calculation of the new impact fee was not sufficient to ensure that the fees met the compliance requirements of DIFA since state law requires that new growth and development shall be used to pay the cost of public facilities for new growth and development only. OCGA § 36-71-1(b)(4) and §36-71-2(4) The letter went on to say that this includes showing a reasonable correlation between the fee that is being charged and the improvements that will come from that fee.

The attorney laid out a case that the county did not follow those guidelines based on minutes from the December 14, 2022 and January 31, 2023 meetings which show that the Board of Commissioners relied on the combined use of a 2021 recommendation from Paragon Consulting that allegedly took the Impact Fee Methodology Report from the original fees in 2006 and writing in the margins of the document to update the work originally done by Ross and Associates 15 years prior.

The letter stated that the increased impact fee likely caused new growth and development to pay more than its state regulated share in the cost of public facilities because even if the calculations from 2021 were correct at that time, there was no way to know that the calculations were correct from 2001 and the county did not implement any changes until two years later with no adjustments for the two years that had passed since the original calculations were made.

Readers can view TITLE XV: Land Usage, Chapter 157, Development Impact Fee Ordinance by clicking here: www.pikecoga.com/uploads/1/3/3/6/133643513/chapter_157_-_impact_fee_ordinance.pdf Page 18 still shows the 2006 impact fee schedule of $2,404.15 for a single family detached housing dwelling.

Demands

The letter stated that because the county failed to follow the rules and procedures required to change the amount of impact fees charged for single family detached housing from $2,404.15 to $6,775.99, the county must stop charging this impact fee of $6,775.99 immediately.

Attorney Troy R. Covington pointed out that the county is currently working on revising its impact fee ordinance and “seems at least to be trying to follow the right steps.” However, until the process of updating the impact fee ordinance has been completed according to the county’s ordinances and state law, Covington states that the county should return to charging the prior amount of $2,404.15 for single family detached housing impact fees “if it charges any residential impact fee at all.”

He also said that the county should refund the difference of $4,371.84 to David Hughes and everyone who has paid the new impact fee because this is the difference between the current impact fee of $6,775.99 and the original fee of $2,404.15 changed by the county on each single family detached housing impact fee since February 1, 2023.

Covington noted that a group of concerned stakeholders of Pike County brought these concerns to the attention of commissioners in a September 23, 2023 letter, but the Board of Commissioners chose to respond through the county attorney in a January 31, 2024 letter that the Board “took the steps necessary to effectuate the action taken by the Board on January 31, 2023.”

He said that response was incorrect for reasons already stated and that the Board realized that its prior actions were improper because it is “currently engaged in the process of trying to fix its faulty work through another rewrite of the Ordinance” including trying to follow the requirements of DIFA through commissioning an updated Impact Fee Methodology Report with a Capital Improvements Element to support the proposed changes and putting together the advisory committee required by state law. He said that it remains to be seen whether these actions will result in a final product that will stand up under state law.

The letter ended with a warning that if Pike County refuses to “right its wrongful actions regarding the improper implementation of the January 31, 2023 impact fee” through the refunds outlined in the letter, Hughes and likely others who have paid this impact fee “will not hesitate to further appeal” the Board’s decision to the Pike County Superior Court, which is the remedy laid out in Pike’s Code of Ordinances § 157.12(B) for those who have a disagreement with these fees.

Covington pointed out that Pike’s Code of Ordinances do not have an appeal hearing as part of an administrative appeal, but if the Board chose to evaluate this appeal by conducting a hearing, Hughes “would be happy to participate.”

Closing

The Henry County impact fee case was settled on February 4, 2025 and ended in a judgement that ordered the county to stop charging impact fees that the court ruled were illegal, pay back over $14 million in overages to illegal fees in the county, and pay $500,000 to the plaintiff’s attorneys in fees and costs on the lawsuit. Click here to read from the Bloom-Law website: www.bloom-law.com/bloom-defeats-henry-county-impact-fees-county-ordered-to-pay-back-over-6m/ And click on “2.5.25 Order on Parties’ Cross Motions for Summary Judgment” in blue at the bottom of the page to read the multi-page ruling from the Bloom Parham website.

According to the Henry Reporter in a February 21, 2025 article, “Henry County Impact Fees Dismissed and Refunds Ordered in Court Ruling,” Henry County adopted its original impact fee ordinance in 2003, hired Bill Ross of Ross and Associates as an outside consultant to update the impact fee methodology report in 2020, and adopted the new impact fee ordinance in February of 2023 without following specific state law including the creation of an advisory committee as well as making errors in their methodology. Click here to read the article: henryga.news/2025/02/21/henry-county-impact-fees-dismissed-and-refunds-ordered-in-court-ruling/

For those wanting to dig deeper into this subject, Pike County Times has done extensive research into this matter and put that into notes in blue in at least three county commission meetings.

New Business, Section o: Discussion of the Planning and Development Fee Schedule. pikecountytimes.com/secondary/BOC12.14.22.html

Links to state law, the impact fee letter, links to copies of CIE reports transmitted to the state, old and new fee schedules, the amount paid to Paragon for changes to the methodology report, and the motion to go with Paragon’s study and go with CM Brandon Rogers’ percentages starting on February 1, 2023. pikecountytimes.com/secondary/BOC1.31.23.html

New Business, Section c. Approve/deny use of Impact Fees for Impact Fee Study which includes a reference to the stakeholders letter mentioned in the attorney’s letter above as well as a request for a meeting with the county manager and planning and zoning director that ended with direction to speak to the county attorney who advised that there would be no further response from the county in February of 2024. www.pikecountytimes.com/secondary/BOC3.13.24.html

Pike County Times will continue to follow up on this matter as information becomes available.

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