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PURSUING A BETTER COMMUNITY

Lyle Holmgren
Mayor

The pursuit of a safe, healthy, caring, and flourishing community is something we all strive for. In Tremonton, this can mean many things, but generally includes public safety, environmental and physical health, maintaining our small-town feel, and economic security. Recently, I shared some of the results from a 2022 survey conducted by Utah State University where residents in Tremonton were asked to participate in the Utah Wellbeing Project. Residents were asked about their connection to our community and to provide information that would help researchers assess our community’s well-being as well as the local perspectives of its residents. They were asked where their moderate or major concerns were in the city. Water supply led the list with 91% of respondents expressing moderate or major concerns, followed by roads (84%), affordable housing (79%), and public safety (77%).

One year after the survey was completed, I would like to report on the four areas, according to the survey, where residents were most concerned and what the city has done to alleviate some of those concerns.

Water Supply
Water is the number one concern of survey respondents with 91 percent expressing moderate to major concerns over the availability of culinary water, especially as the city grows. These concerns are widespread and reasonable. Back in late July and early August 2017, demand for culinary water exceeded the city-owned culinary water supply, a cause of concern for the city council. Figure 1.

Figure 1



Note. This chart compares the city’s culinary water use in 2023 (blue line) with 2017 (red dashed line), a savings of more than 30 million gallons as of June 30, 2023

Secondary Water. That year, the city started an ambitious secondary water project. The Bear River Canal system has three canals that pass through and around Tremonton providing the city with a stable source of secondary water. Developing it would preserve high-quality culinary water for commercial and indoor residential use.

In 2018, Tremonton City began purchasing water shares from willing sellers and requiring residential and commercial developers to provide the city with water shares equal to the ground that would be irrigated by homeowners or commercial businesses in their development. The intent of the project was to leverage our culinary water system with secondary water for irrigation, to be good stewards of this natural resource, to be good neighbors with agriculture, and conserve water wherever possible.

The project is performing very well. So far in 2023, Tremonton residents saved more than 30 million gallons of culinary water by making the switch to secondary water.

Figure 2

Note. As more residents continue to replace culinary water (blue line) with secondary water (yellow line), culinary water usage per household is expected to decline.

Service Areas 2, 3, and 5 are now completed, covering a large portion of the city. Service Area 5 alone will connect 550 homes including North Park School, Library Park, and churches to our secondary water system.

Our next project area will be the completion of Service Area 4 in the southern part of the city. Construction will begin this fall or next spring, bringing an additional 300 homes, including churches, schools, and the cemetery in the southern part of the city onto the system.

Construction of Service Area 4 will be paid for in large part by a $2 million grant from the Utah Department of Natural Resources, Board of Water Resources. By the close of 2024, the majority of Tremonton will have secondary water supplied to homes, apartments, businesses, parks, schools, and churches. As new growth comes to Tremonton, the city will require all new residential and commercial developments to install secondary water infrastructure to their developments and provide the city with Bear River Canal Company water shares, at their cost.

Aquifer Storage and Recovery (ARS). One of our major year-round supplies of culinary water comes from the springs north of Deweyville. What if we could inject the excess water from that spring during the winter months into an existing aquifer already owned by the city and then retrieve that culinary water during the summer months when demand is high? That makes sense, right? Especially if it can be done cost-effectively.

By simply pumping the excess water from city-owned springs in the winter through existing lines and into the nearby Cedar Springs aquifer when demand is low, the city can retrieve the water when demand is high by pumping it from the aquifer. The system is called an aquifer storage and recovery (ARS) system and will be installed in late 2023 or early 2024.

Accomplishing these projects will provide a plentiful supply of culinary water to Tremonton for many years to come.

Roads
The upkeep of existing roads and the construction of important transportation corridors is a major part of the city’s responsibility. Admittedly, there are potholes and areas that need patching.

When you see an area that needs repair, let us know.

This summer there are several roads are being chip sealed and 1000 West Street was milled down and resurfaced. During July, the following projects have been completed or are scheduled:

Chip Seal. You have probably noticed crews recently laying a chip seal on many of the city’s streets. The chip seal followed by a tacky coat (flush coat) of tacky oil. The chip seal and flush coat will help preserve the life expectancy of our surface and collector streets where secondary water pipe was installed last year. Crews will be laying chip seal and applying a flush coat through much of July.

1000 West Street. Crews milled two inches from the surface of 1000 West from Main Street, along the fairgrounds to the railroad tracks to remove the potholes, cracks, and other deterioration followed by a 3-inch paving. This project has been completed.

1000 North Street. The city is currently securing slope easements from property owners to improve and widen 1000 North Street from approximately 2100 West to approximately 2650 West.

The city will bid for the 1000 North project this winter and construction will begin during the summer of 2024.

These road projects will improve safety, and drivability as well as enhance the longevity of Tremonton’s roads.

Affordable Housing
In 2022, Tremonton City working on strategies for developing a moderate-income housing plan. The city is required to report to the State of Utah on progress towards these strategies annually. The City has budgeted the funds that are restricted in the development of affordable housing necessary to implement these strategies.

A couple of the strategies being considered are:

  • Invest in the rehabilitation or expansion of critical infrastructure that facilitates the construction of moderate-income housing.
  • Create or allow for, and reduce regulations related to, internal or detached accessory dwelling units in residential zones.

Recent increases in mortgage interest rates have caused the housing market to slow down throughout the state and here in Tremonton. The pause in housing is giving our planning commission and city council time to further develop effective strategies, test those strategies, and report them to the state. And more importantly, provide more affordable housing opportunities for our community.

Police, Fire, and Public Safety
Police. This year, the Tremonton City Council is proposing an increase to the city’s portion of the property tax assessment by 50.2 percent. This amount equates to an increase in property tax revenue for Tremonton City of $1.02 million and will help fund five new positions in our police department (one sergeant, three officers, and one civilian office staff), the funding will also provide the necessary vehicles, personal gear, equipment, fuel, and building upgrades for these new officers to do their job.

Currently, the police department does not always have at least two officers on duty 24/7. There are times when only one officer is on duty which creates an unsafe situation for both the officer and our community. At times we face staff shortages when officers attend training, take personal leave, fulfill military assignments, or are out on leave due to injury or administration leave. This leaves officers working hazardous shifts without backup, which is a significant concern.

Recruiting, training, and retaining capable police officers are vital for the well-being of our community. In Utah, there is a shortage of qualified and experienced officers. The result of this shortage is that communities are competing to fill critical positions. Tremonton is a great place to live and a great place for officers to serve. We want our officers to feel safe, so a key part of retention is to ensure that there are two officers per shift, so they won’t have to work alone.

One of our concerns in Tremonton and Garland is identifying locations where drugs and narcotics are being sold. We want to identify those people who are preying on those with addiction problems. The program is called hotspot policing. In the last two years, our police department has identified and shut down six locations in Tremonton and Garland where drug traffic was taking place, a 33 percent increase.

Community-oriented policing is a proven way to improve the relationship between our police department and citizens. This summer, our police have supported dozens of young entrepreneurs in both communities who were selling everything from lemonade to cotton candy. Kudos to our officers and to the moms and dads who built some cool stands for their kids to sell fun stuff!

Fire/EMS. The Tremonton Fire Department is now a full-time, paid per call and, volunteer fire/EMS department. We are in the process of making conditional offers to three very qualified candidates who will fill the role of captains in the department and will soon hire a full-time fire chief.

In 2021, the Tremonton City Council went through Truth in Taxation to raise enough revenue to hire nine full-time fire/EMS employees. The reason for the full-time employees is to improve public safety with better response times, training, and business inspections. In September, the nine full-time fire/EMS employees were hired and the response times from dispatch to en route decreased from an average time of 6:01 minutes from April 2021 to September 2021 to 3:32 minutes after the full-time employees were hired, a 41 percent decrease in response time.

We are a diverse and capable community working together and building a city that will preserve what we love about our community for generations to come. We are doing this through thoughtful planning that makes the best use of our resources without compromising our small-town values.

Our goal is to foster a healthy, caring, and flourishing community.