by Michelle Peot

I recently attended the Hurricane Valley Fire District Truth in Taxation hearing for a proposed property tax increase to cover a funding gap in emergency services. During public comments there was much frustration targeted at the district; however, a deeper look at the underlying reasons reveals short-sighted, wasteful state and county level decisions that have left our first responders with few funding options, and has put our community at increasing risk.

Increasing burden on our first responders from tourism

Increased tourism impacts our community in a number of ways, but one of the most consequential is the additional load placed on first responders. Between 8/21/2023 and 6/30/2024, the Hurricane Valley Fire District had a total of 2699 transports. 28.3% came from residents outside of the district.

Not only are our first responders required to respond to routine house calls and auto accidents, they are also asked to provide full-time, onsite staff and emergency vehicles for sporting events, like the Iron Man and the high risk Red Bull Rampage downhill mountain bike event. While the fire district is allowed to charge for the events, the fees are at cost, which is insufficient to fund additional full-time local staff to backfill the gap in steady state coverage. Consequently, existing staff would either have to work overtime, or the district would need to scramble to find event coverage from other localities.

Fire district staff also participate in search and rescues, which tend to be extremely resource intensive events for all involved. They often require complex extractions from remote, difficult to access locations with victims whose exact location may be unclear. If we look at the publicly available data for WashCo Search and Rescue (SAR), since the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the proportion of rescued individuals from out of state has outpaced those in the county and is on an upward trend. To date, for 2024 46.0% of victims have been from out of state, 23.9% out of county. For context, on average, 33 person*hours are spent per incident, although this figure also includes non fire district personnel, including SAR volunteers.

Lack of transparency in Transient Room Tax expenditures

Like many other localities, Washington County and its municipalities charge a transient room tax (TRT) on lodging less than 30 days in duration. Hypothetically, TRT revenue could be used to mitigate the impacts of tourism, including the burden placed on emergency services. However, the state legislature made this extremely difficult with their TRT statute that favors tourism promotion and facility and land acquisition over sustainability of community essentials, like emergency services. Only counties <40,000 in population that encompass National Park or Forest Service land, are automatically allowed to use TRT money for emergency services, and it is capped at 4%. Further spending discretion is up to the County Commissioners. At the Truth in Taxation hearing, County Commissioner and 2024 candidate, Gil Almquist, stated that the commissioners are entitled to spend 47% of TRT revenue on tourism marketing. In fact, we have so much money earmarked for marketing, that event organizers can apply for marketing grants.

What kind of tax revenue are we talking about? In their 2023 report, Washington County’s tourism marketing machine, Greater Zion reported a whopping $15.5M year-over-year revenue from TRT. I called Greater Zion for details on how that money was being spent, but they couldn’t point me to any publicly accessible documentation. One project that was detailed was part of the $10M agreement, 20 year agreement with UT Tech’s marking program. Much of early spend appears to be centered around the stadium and athletics program. What has been purchased so far is print, digital, and other advertising, including a giant “Greater Zion” sign for the UT Tech stadium.

Furthermore, with Instagram, AllTrails, and countless other social media users all documenting the wonders of Zion and surrounding recreational areas in an arguably more authentic way than Greater Zion at no cost to taxpayers, is marketing really the best use of tax revenue?

Alternate sales tax proposal for fire district funding

At the Truth in Taxation hearing, District 72 representative Joseph Elison stated that he had floated a sales tax proposal as an alternative to the sales tax increase. Elison didn’t bother to return my phone call, but I tracked down his bill. It allows special services districts to impose a sales tax on certain items to help fund emergency services, subject to a long, convoluted list of exemptions. This band aid solution puts the burden on residents without addressing the underlying problem of unaccountable, frivolous TRT revenue spending and negative community impacts that are a direct result of the TRT-funded marketing operation.

Near-term solutions

The ideal solution would be to amend the TRT statute to tie emergency service funding to the proportion of visitors’ emergency service usage, regardless of county size. However, other options are possible and not mutually exclusive:

● Allow the fire district to charge consulting, not at cost, rates for their onsite event resources. This could help fund additional staff for backfill.

● Municipalities should impose impact fees for new developments to help fund emergency service facilities as allowed by state statute.

Why elections and doing your homework matter

We are in this mess because of decisions made by state and local elected representatives. In our polarized electorate, it may be tempting to blindly pull the lever for your party, and unfortunately, for many of our local elections, there is no second choice. A better approach is to understand how the decisions of that candidate might affect you and our community by looking at their likely motivations:

● Could they personally profit from their office with their business or their family members’ businesses, or financial investments?

● Do they serve as a board member on a business that would benefit from their office?

● Who are their major funders?

● What is their plan for ensuring the sustainability of our community’s resources, including water, housing, transportation, recreation, and emergency services?

While UT has ethics rules requiring disclosure, there is no mandate to recuse from decisions from which you could personally profit.

If you want to dig in more, there are additional resources. For candidates running for a federal office, including the US Senate or US House, see the Federal Election Commission’s website or for higher federal and state offices, the donor aggregation site, Open Secrets. For state and municipal candidates, see UT’s Financial Disclosures site. At a bare minimum, find out where the candidate works and/or what businesses they own on a site like LinkedIn.

Fire district funding exists if we have the political will