TREMONTON CITY CORPORATION
CITY COUNCIL MEETING
AUGUST 3, 2021

Members Present:
Connie Archibald
Lyle Holmgren
Bret Rohde
Rick Seamons—excused
Lyle Vance
Roger Fridal, Mayor
Shawn Warnke, City Manager
Linsey Nessen, City Recorder

CITY COUNCIL MEETING

Mayor Fridal called the August 3, 2021 City Council Meeting to order at 6:00 p.m. The meeting was held in the Tremonton City Council Meeting Room at 102 South Tremont Street, Tremonton, Utah. Those in attendance were Mayor Fridal, Councilmembers Archibald Holmgren, Rohde (joined via Zoom), and Vance, City Manager Warnke, and City Recorder Nessen. The following Department Heads were also present: Fire Chief Robert LaCroix, Community Services Director Marc Christensen, Public Works Director Paul Fulgham, Police Chief Kurt Fertig, and Treasurer Sharri Oyler. Councilmember Seamons was excused.

1. Opening Ceremony:

Mayor Fridal informed the audience that he had received no written or oral request to participate in the Opening Ceremony. He asked anyone who may be offended by listening to a prayer to step out into the lobby for this portion of the meeting. The prayer was offered by Councilmember Holmgren and the Pledge of Allegiance was led by Councilmember Vance.

2. Introduction of guests: Mayor Fridal welcomed those in attendance.

3. Declaration of Conflict of Interest: None.

4. Approval of Agenda:

Motion by Councilmember Holmgren to approve the agenda of August 3, 2021. Motion seconded by Councilmember Archibald. Vote: Councilmember Archibald – aye, Councilmember Holmgren – aye, Councilmember Rohde – aye, Councilmember Vance – aye. Motion approved.

5. Presentation on Proposed Property Tax Increase—Shawn Warnke, Tremonton City Manager

Manager Warnke notified the public that the decision by the Council to increase taxes or not would be made during their regular meeting on August 17. No decision will be made tonight. He then gave a presentation about what is being proposed. Currently our fire department staffing model is voluntary, on-call. Volunteer firefighters sign up for one of two shifts (evening and daytime) in three person crews. Currently we are not able to staff all those shifts. It then reverts to our previous system, which is a page going out when there is an emergency. Firefighters then respond from home or work. Over time, our calls have increased. To look at the issue closer, we engaged Bryan Potts, a certified public accountant and firefighter in Smithfield. He reviewed our call data and met with the fire department. We also conducted a survey. The challenges with our current staffing model is growth in calls. It is difficult to ensure back up for calls happening simultaneously and our crewmembers are aging with some retirements nearing. Our on-call volume for EMS in 2007 was over 600 calls. Currently that is up to 1,200. We will continue to see that grow in the years to come. Fire calls are less predictable, but we are approaching close to 250. We average 3.5 calls per day for EMS and Mr. Potts said one to two calls stretch a volunteer fire department. Our fire department has served the community well for many years under this current model. We had 34 people participate in our survey and of those members 13 have served more than 20 years, while five have been here 10 to 20 years. When asked if they believed there was a problem with the fire department’s staffing and having sufficient personnel to respond, 80% said yes, there is a problem. When asked about commitment level, 79% gave one of three responses: I would like to give more, but presently cannot, I am giving all I can, or I am giving all I can plus more. Our volunteers work day jobs and a lot of our calls occur then. Over time, our response time has increased and in these situations time is critical. That adds pressure to our staff when we have to provide services at two different locations. In 2019, the average age of our fire department was 49, while the average age of our top three employees with the most hours was 58. The survey showed 57% of the hours worked in the fire department are done by employees 50 to 60 years old and 80% define their commitment levels as giving all they could and would like to give more, but could not.

Manager Warnke said based on this information, the City came up with a framework for public safety and ensuring a timely response with available resources. Cost is an important consideration for the community as is having capital reserves to meet ongoing demands. Providing fire and emergency medical services is expensive. It is important we have reserves to provide adequate equipment. We also need our personnel trained to reduce risk while meeting the demand of today and tomorrow. Based upon key findings, the Council felt it was appropriate to consider other staffing models. This has gone on for a couple years. We currently respond to 1,400 calls with one full-time fire chief and three on-call firefighters. Previously the proposed staffing level was nine full-time firefighters to provide 24/7 coverage (three full-time firefighters at the station). Paid on-call individuals would respond to the second call. The discussion was about increasing property taxes, but instead a decision was made to hire a full-time fire chief to help evaluate the operations and affirm some of the findings while making adjustments. Our wonderful chief has helped us analyze the situation and come up with an appropriate staffing model. He was asked to scrutinize operations, as well as expenses and revenues. The City also looked at the General Fund to see what could be done to provide additional resources to the fire department. We have even applied for grants. Our fire chief will continue looking at the lowest cost possible for supplies, renegotiated disposable supplies and contracts, and evaluates where we can make decreases in operational expense. The City has received a rural paramedic licensure that allows us to bill at a higher rate when the chief attends a call and renders his skills. This is a way to increase service and revenue. We also looked to increase disposable supplies as far as billing. He found software that would help with ambulance reporting and billing. Our new policy is to bill individuals for the initial response and evaluation even if they are not transported. Many times supplies were used, but not billed for. We are also charging events in the City that need EMS standby. We continue to find ways to make our department fiscally sound. Some of the changes we made in fiscal year 2021 were to the way we do business licensing. Part of that process includes an analysis and fee for disproportionate calls for fire responses. We looked at calls we received from dispatch and the types of businesses that utilize those services. Those pay a portion of that cost per call. That is something we have implemented and business licenses have increased to help sure up additional resources to the fire department. Several years ago we adopted a Transient Room Tax, which is transferred to the fire fund. Often time’s, individuals pass through and use our EMS services, which is often difficult to collect on. There are also fire impact fees that can be charged to new businesses and residents.

Manager Warnke said in fiscal year 2022 we continued to evaluate operations and the question is still about staffing. We have proposed six full-time firefighters. Two would be full-time, benefited employees and one would be a part-time employee. Individuals within our fire department or firefighters outside the community could become a part-time employee while the second call would be the same system we have with our volunteer response. We have looked at ways to reduce the property tax that is being requested. I mentioned the $60,000 in Transient Room Tax and business license fees. We have $200,000 we are requesting from an increase in property tax. There were additional resources from another fund to pay the debt service for a fire truck ($74,000 annually). That funding source would continue to pay that until it is paid off. It is proposed that the first call would be for firefighters staged at the station, who are ready to respond. When they are not responding they would have lots of opportunities to train and do business inspections, as well as education and fire prevention. The second call would be paged to firefighters who are within the City and would be responding from home or work.

Manager Warnke explained that Utah’s property tax system is revenue driven. Tremonton, as well as other taxing entities, are entitled to the same revenue it received the previous year, plus new growth. We do not increase our revenue in a given year with the exception of new growth. However, this year we are proposing additional revenue. Taxpayers do not pay the same amount every year. It can go down, but goes up mostly. The County does a reappraisal every five years. The tax rate adjusts up or down to deliver the same revenue for these entities each year. As homes and property increase, the amount of tax you pay goes up, but for the City it stays the same, except new growth because we have to provide services for new growth. We need $200,000 to provide additional resources to the fire department. There is a rational connection between paying for something that is used to protect your property. For that reason the proposed increase seems like an acceptable consideration. Property taxes are a stable source of revenue. This would be a permanent change in the staffing model and the level of service citizens would receive.

Mayor Fridal called a Public Hearing to order at 6:40 p.m. to discuss the proposed property tax increase. There were 36 people in attendance.

6. Public Hearing regarding the proposed property tax increase

Note 1: Under Utah Code 59-2-919 8 (b)(i)(B)The City shall provide an interested party desiring to be heard an opportunity to present oral testimony: 1) within reasonable time limits; and 2) without unreasonable restriction on the number of individuals allowed to make a public comment.

Note 2: Under Utah Code 59-2-919 (9), the City is announcing that the City Council will make a final decision on budgeting additional ad valorem tax revenue at the August 17, 2021, City Council meeting to be held at 7:00 p.m. at the Tremonton City Offices, in the City Council Chambers which are located at 102 S. Tremont Street.

Resident Larry Dille read a letter from his neighbor, Lynn Martineau. It stated I understand the need for emergency services. I recognize the growing demand in our growing community and have deep appreciation, gratitude, and respect for the people who do a job I cannot. When discussing the question for funding emergency services no one has ever said we need more personnel or equipment because property values have increased. I am quite certain the conversation is much more along the lines of we need more personnel and equipment because there are more people to protect and help. At different addresses I fenced my yard so my children and pets could be managed on my property and kept off the streets and out of traffic and not on public property. Both times I have used my investment to put less demand on emergency services because my children and pets were contained on my property where I could be responsible for them. Both times the County saw the same action as an opportunity to take more money from me in taxes. I suppose I should have kept that money to pay taxes opposed to making my property safer. Property taxes are a counter incentive for self-improvement. The message seems to be, do not make your home safer or more comfortable because you will pay more for it in taxes each year. Do not bother making the community safer. Property values may increase, but the only way a homeowner can take advantage of the increase is to sell their home. Residents who wish to remain there will pay higher taxes where the only gain is to help share the cost for new residents moving into the community. The current property tax rate on new homes cost a larger tax base. Existing residents should not be penalized because more homes are being built. It is well past time to examine other ways to fund emergency services. I have added four children to the community and in doing so I added to the demand for emergency services. I was willing to pay my fair share for emergency services for a household of six and now that my kids have moved out I am still very willing to pay for emergency services for my household of two. I am very frustrated to be paying more for emergency services for a household of two than I was paying for a household of six. As I approach retirement age and living on a fixed income without cost of living increases or opportunities for career advancements I really should plan on having less disposable income as property tax increases. I guess I need to accept the reality that a property tax will wipe me out of the home I built and the community I love.

Mr. Dille said I would like to add a couple words. I am grateful for the presentation—it cleared up a lot of things for me. I have some very close friends who are in the fire department and EMS and I am a registered nurse. I respect the service that is presented. This should have happened long ago. Our community is big enough and strong enough to support full-time employees in that department and support that. However, with the increase in our assessed property tax this year, our property taxes were assessed over 100,000 more than last year and that represents more than an 11%. I think with the new construction that is going on maybe we should consider better funding than we have and try to make things work.

Resident Russell Scott said I live in an area that is one of the furthest from emergency services. When I got the Truth in Taxation notice I passed it out to my neighbors to let them know what will be going on. In watching all the growth I second what was said about assessment and values, and what is going on with the cost. I think there is going to be enough and we do not need this increase. I know emergency services are important and what needs to happen, but I think at this point with what is going on in the City with growth and assessment values, and the taxation that is going to come from those, I think that is sufficient from what we have.

Resident Jeff Hoedt said I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you. Thank you for what you do, you do incredible things for the community. I am a more recent resident and retired two years ago. We have a lot of close ties with family in the region and are glad to be here. I spent 38 years of my career in state and federal safety programs. I worked more than 17 years with the federal government with the US Coast Guard. I was a civilian with them and managed a national program where we were held accountable to congress on our budget proposals for any changes. I would encourage you to adopt some of those things. I submitted a paper recently and hope you had a chance to read that. One of the things I learned in my career was how much gratitude needs to go out to the first responders in the community. I think you know that and do that, but I want to reiterate that. They deserve it, especially the volunteers. I give them a ton of credit for what they do. Up to now all I have seen on the City’s website or the newspaper is a number of calls for EMS not fire. I would hope that is not your final goal because you are not going to reduce calls. The more homes you permit will increase the population and retirees and others are coming into town. There will be an increasing demand, not a reduction. I appreciate you discussing the response times, which is not an ultimate goal. The goal is the desired outcome and then you have objectives below that you are trying to achieve to accomplish that goal. You then have to alternate strategies you have implemented to get there. Hiring a full-time staff is a strategy. I would encourage you to go beyond just number of cases. You stated what the response time is, but go beyond that. For safety programs you are trying to reduce casualties and the ideal goal would be to eliminate that, but that is not realistic. You want to reduce casualties and property loss. The first question that hit me when I read the article on this proposal and having full-time staff, was will that save lives and reduce other injuries, causalities, medical issues, as well as fires. I have not heard any talk about that and I am encouraging you to look at that more in depth so you can truly make an informed decision as to what you can expect out of this additional staff. I would expect a reduction in response time and that is what you alluded to, but never gave numbers. What will be the reduction in response time with these additional resources? When I look at the timeframe from 2013 to 2019 the time to arrive changed by a little over a minute and a half, which could make a huge difference in some cases. What can we expect in numbers? I hope your data can give you that. I encourage the City to look at those numbers. How many of the average calls are life threatening? How many lives might have been saved in that additional minute and a half with a quicker response time with these additional resources? I encourage you to put those pieces together. We were required by congress to do cause and affect analysis if they were going to give us more money to implement new initiatives. They wanted to know what we could expect. We also had to do post measures to report to them in the future to show what it accomplished. It enhances accountability and puts more pressure on you as decision makers. If you just say it is for safety and there is no measure then there is no accountability and you cannot be held to anything because you did not say how it was going to improve. I encourage you to step forward and do that research and be able to tell us what the expectation should be if we get the additional staff. This will help you further explain it, particularly to someone in opposition. They can field the problem a lot better if they know specifics. I want to know how many people are dying or getting injured or having medical issues. How many property losses are there in dollars or buildings or whatever the count would be? It would help people to understand the problem.

Resident Patty Haltiner said honestly I have a lot of questions. She explained she comes from a family of firefighters and has seen that commitment first hand as they have responded to calls. They are very dedicated and do a wonderful job. I was surprised the response time has increased. I am fully on board with funding the fire and police departments, but I have questions as to why or if it is only Tremonton City getting taxes raised? You keep saying the percentage of calls is going up and it will continue to go up with new building and increased population, but what percentage of those calls are actually in Tremonton City limits? What percentage is elsewhere? What percentage is hospital transfers because I know from experience a lot, if not the majority of the calls are hospital transfers. If that is still the case then is the hospital looking into funding their own transport service rather than using our EMS? What if you have three full-time people you are paying to be at the fire station and there is a transfer that takes them out of town? Now we are to the second call with the volunteers. I am not sure I feel comfortable with my taxes going up to pay for that service. If there is a large percentage of calls that are not in Tremonton then are those contracts going up? Are those in the County and other towns also going to see a tax increase to help provide for EMS services that they are using or is it just our tax dollars that are paying for those services? If my building catches on fire am I billed from the fire department for those services? If I have the ambulance come to my home am I billed? And if we are billed for those services then we are also paying extra property taxes for those services. It seems like a double billing and double taxation. I am all for the fire department and I know they need to be there. I just do not know if raising our property taxes is the right way to fund that. The building that is going on in our City limits and valley, the property tax money that you are getting is increasing without raising our taxes just from all those extra homes and apartments. If you are not getting an increase in tax revenue from that then is there a way to build that into those building permits? They need an upfront fee when they build those homes and apartments because they are adding to the population and to the need. They need to pay extra upfront to help provide those services. I am a business owner and have more than one property in the City so for me it is a 33% increase and that is a lot. It may be only $40, but when you times that by three or four that is a lot of money in one year, especially coming off the pandemic and losing businesses. It is a hard time for people. I wonder if you have looked at other options. I know there is a need, but are there are other options? Is the 12-hour shift why people are not responding because people cannot commit to 12 hours? If they signed up for six hour shifts would more people be able to sign up and respond? Are those things going to make a difference? Maybe someone was available for that call, but they did not sign up because they could not do the whole 12-hours. I understand why they are doing sign ups, but it seems like a 12-hour shift is a lot to commit to when people are working. They sometimes cannot do that. Maybe shorter shifts or some other options would be good before raising property taxes. I have more questions and hope you can answers those. Thanks for your time.

Resident William Pickett said six months after we moved here my kids took me to the hospital in town and they said there is nothing we can do for you, you need to go to Logan. The fire department and EMS were there and said we can take him. We got a bill for about $3,100 for the trip from the hospital to Logan. Our insurance got it down and it ended up being only about a third of that. I am not sure the billing rates will do any good when you get done with Medicare contracts and other things they all end up getting suppressed. The actual funds you are getting from them are not what you might think. When I was here last, Manager Warnke made mention of the fact that property taxes are reevaluated once every five years. I took a look when I got home and they are not. When we moved here in 2018 we had a property tax that was reevaluated in 2020 and 2021. That is three out of four years they have reevaluated. Our home went up from $320,000 to $474,000 so if you raise none of my taxes by rate I would still be paying more. I will pay $536 more than I paid last year for taxes and where that goes I am not sure. I will have to talk to the County about that. I know my taxes jumped a whole lot when we bought the vacant piece of property behind us to manage the weeds. We were told since we bought that piece of property it was added into our property value. In the last four years my taxes have gone up and we have not done a thing. I am just now getting back to where I can do stuff with my property after having suffered with cancer treatments. The value of my property has not gone up that much because I have not been able to do anything to it. I want to thank you for your efforts and keep up the good work. Let us see what we can do to help out those of us who live here.

Resident JG Bronson said I brought my tax assessment of my property that comes out from the County and virtually everything goes to schooling. I do not have any children at home and I paid dearly in the past for schooling my children. It was difficult for us back then, but we went through it. I have a couple observations that might be helpful as you consider this increase. I keep hearing that it is okay to raise taxes on personal property and businesses. I have often wondered why we do not just lump them together because businesses never pay taxes—consumers do. I spent many years as a professional tax preparer helping businesses. Every one of my businesses was taxed heavy and guess what they did? They increased the price of goods and services, and me as a consumer ended up paying it. I do not want to have a tax increase because ever since I have been here I have had a tax increase, every year. It seems like it comes up and that increase is there and then next year it increases again and you never get a release or go back to reducing taxes. It is always increasing taxes. I wonder if we could reduce taxes or not have all these increases, if the school is the one taking most of the taxes it seems it would be helpful if we all donated old cars or something of value to them. We pay extra for kids to take a shop class and computer classes so why do we not get them to refurbish the stuff we do not want. Thank you for your time.

Resident Bruce Hancock said our bill for our big Tremonton business license has been $45. This year when I opened it up I was surprise to see it was $450. It was all going to the police and fire departments for responses. When did this happen, over night? My point is you tax businesses, you tax the residents, but it does not seem like anything gets done. I have lived up on Radio Hill for 21 years now and 1000 North is pothole city. The road is falling apart, you guys know that, but it has been that way for 21 years. I am a little frustrated. Our property taxes just keep going up. When I first bought up there our property tax was $1,500 now we are $3,600. That is a huge increase. We need to support our schools because education is important, but we have to stop taxing the residents to death because we are hurting ourselves and those in retirement. With all the building that is going up where are the impact fees going? I paid $10,000 to build my new home and where did that go? Why is some of that money not earmarked for things like this? As a business owner you are taxed and double taxed. I have tried to buy property for my business in Tremonton two or three times and I get told by Manager Warnke that we are looking for a bigger tax base. Well over the six year period I have been trying to do this both pieces of property have sat vacant. No one has bought them, there are weeds there, but I am too small and we are looking at bigger tax base to expand the City. Here we are asking the dang residents for more and more money, but when a citizen comes forth and offers decent money to buy property you are told no. We end up buying outside City limits and have to go to the County because no one in Tremonton is willing to work with us. My offer was never presented to the Council. It was presented to Manager Warnke and it went nowhere. I do not think we have good accountability in the City.

Resident Michael Leighner said I spent 32 years in the military and 10 years in the County Sheriffs Department as a paramedic. Five years were spent as a volunteer firefighter. We live on what is called a golden hour and it takes longer for a person to respond from their residence to the firehouse and wait for two other people to respond. Do you want to be the one that the stopwatch starts and it is past an hour? The chief needs the funds. It is important. We just had a fire in the City and a fast response by firemen and mutual aid saved a lot of property. The City Council contracts with Intermountain Health Care and if we do not charge them for transports, why not? When someone needs medical supplies that should be on the medical bill and sent to the hospital and billing department. This City is growing. We are not little Tremonton anymore. We are going to keep growing so when he comes back and wants more money what is the City going to do? Complain about it? We need to look at the big picture. He needs the money to mange and run his department and save lives and property. That is the main thing. Can you put a price on a life?

Resident Ned Darling said I moved here three years ago and have not enjoyed the tax increases. He reviewed some statistics about the Box Elder School District and their employee’s salaries. He said they are 15.2% higher than other schools in the region. The highest paid employee in the school district is a teacher who gets paid $165,167.52. The second highest is $116,760.76. The average school salary is $61,475. I am not saying the schools are not important because they are, but I do believe there is a lot of wasted money in these programs. We need to look through that. Thank you for your time.

Mayor Fridal closed the Public Hearing at 7:21 p.m.

7. Adjournment.

Motion by Councilmember Holmgren to adjourn the meeting. Motion seconded by Councilmember Vance. Vote: Councilmember Archibald – aye, Councilmember Holmgren – aye, Councilmember Rohde – aye, Councilmember Vance – aye. Motion approved.

The meeting adjourned at 7:21 p.m.

The undersigned duly acting and appointed Recorder for Tremonton City Corporation hereby certifies that the foregoing is a true and correct copy of the minutes for the City Council Meeting held on the above referenced date. Minutes were prepared by Jessica Tanner.

Dated this day 17th of August, 2021.

 

Linsey Nessen, City Recorder