A rarity is about to happen in the annals of Manteca growth.

A residential developer is moving forward to installing 100 percent of required “off-site” improvements before the first house is built on the southwest corner of Airport Way and Woodward Avenue..

That is in addition to forking over $8,000 more per home than any other developer for city needs including  funds to purchase a CNG powered solid waste collection truck.

Tonight the City Council is expected to approve acquisition of easements that will allow developers of the 827-home Lumina at Machado Ranch to meet their commitments to install:

* traffic signals at Woodward Avenue and Airport Way.

*a roundabout on Airport Way midway between Peach Avenue and Woodward Avenue. It will be the first roundabout on Airport Way.

*a roundabout on Woodward Avenue at Bella Terra Drive.

The developer also agreed to install traffic signals at Atheron Drive and Airport Way before selling any homes.

But the developer of the Manteca Crossings commercial project on the northwest corner of Atheron Drive and Airport Way will beat them to it. So instead they will reimburse the commercial center developer for the pro-rated cost of their share of the traffic signal.

The bottom line is that two intersections on a  major corridor will have traffic signals in place before additional growth impacts them.

As such, it is the first wave of development the city will see that can be tied to the policies of the current council era that started in 2022 with the election of Gary Singh as mayor.

Projects approved on the watch of the current council have been more aggressively pushed to make sure 100 percent of the impacts they are creating on the city are covered either with fees or in actual improvements.

In some cases, they are traffic signals where the developer as the initial project puts them in upfront and is reimbursed later when others develop land with defined areas of benefit.

In the past developers simply paid toward the signals that weren’t installed until such time as enough growth occurred to put them in place.

It’s not that other developers haven’t installed major improvements in connection with their projects.

But it happens in phases as homes are built and their project builds out closer to where the improvements are located.

Raymus Homes, as an example, is moving closer to installing a roundabout on South Main Street — the first on that corridor — at Raymus Paerkway in conjunction with the 1,301-home Griffin Park project.

It should be noted, Raymus Homes advanced making improvements they weren’t required to do to widen Union Road south of Woodward where growth likely wouldn’t occur for years.

But unlike what is happening at Lumina, it didn’t happen when the first home was bult in a project impacting the arterial.

That said, by widening Union Road in advance, Raymus Homes’ effort made sure the improvements were made now instead of 10 to 20 years from now.

The current council has also started requiring projects advancing under their watch to have community facility districts in place in perpetuality that will help fund police and fire services as well as neighborhood parks, street lighting, and storm drains they install to serve new neighborhoods.

The council has also secured a higher property tax cut from annexed property from the county.

All of those actions will cover the impacts of growth approves on their watch going forward, but it doesn’t make up for shortfalls that occurred in the past.

That is why the council is asking voters for a three quarter of a cent sales tax hike on the Nov. 5 ballot.

Signature Homes — the builders of the envisioned 827-home Lumina at Machado Ranch —  agreed to:

*A fee of $598.54 per home to purchase a CNG sold waste collection truck powered by compressed liquid gas produced from menthane gas and food waste at the city’s wastewater treatment plant. Once all homes are built, the fees collected will cover the cost of one new truck.

*Another $2,500 per home will be paid as an infrastructure fee. It is designed to cover shortfalls in the established growth-related fees that have not been updated that the developer pays when they take out a building permit.

 *They will pay a $2,500 fee per home for the Phase V wastewater treatment plant expansion. If the fee, that has yet to be established is less, the developer will pay the lower amount. If the established fee is higher, the developer will pay the higher amount.

*A $2,4014.46 per home fee will be allocated for use by the City Council at their discretion. This is similar to the bonus bucks paid two decades ago in exchange for sewer connection certainty.  More than $30 million was collected back then that went to help pay for the Union Road fire station, traffic signals at Tidewater Bikeway crossings, the skate park, soccer field lights at Woodward Park, and fireworks, among other things as well as plugging in more than $11 million in general fund budget shortfalls over the course of several years. The Lumina bonus bucks will top $2 million.

Based on the agreement that was in place with San Joaquin County when the land was annexed the county the city was to  receive 80 percent of the city’s share of every property tax dollar collected as the county’s share  going forward.

The city was receiving  14 cents of every $1 paid in property taxes on most land that has been in the city more than 20 years. That means the city would have received only 2.8 cents of every dollar under the previous agreement.

That meant the county was collecting more money from development without having to provide day-to-day services such as police and fire.

The county agreed to a 60-40 split of their share of tax dollars collected from the new neighborhood going forward. That brings the city’s “take” close to 18 cents for every dollar in property tax paid by a Manteca homeowner.

Under an independent analysis of the project, the 80-20 split was shown to have a negative impact on general fund revenue. That would mean the new growth would have not been paying its fair share of needed city services such as police and fire at their current levels. As such, it will would have diluted the level of current services or else forced the city to find new revenue sources.

It is why the council also slapped an annual $69 per home police and fire services shortage fee on the 1,247-home Manteca Trails breaking down west of Lumina on Woodward Avenue.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com