SALEM -- Frustrated by lack of agreement over county firefighting issues, the South County Council of Mayors has reportedly issued a notice that its cities will no longer fight county fires unless a pact or compromise can soon be reached.
The mayors then agreed to keep the document from the media and the public until May 7, Payson Mayor Gordon Taylor said. But he declined to reveal specifically what was in the letter handed Utah County Commissioner Gary Herbert on Monday because of the agreement to keep it secret.However, the south county mayors then issued a press release explaining the threatened fire protection loss. It says that if a new agreement is not signed by May 7 the cities will no longer provide county fire protection and ambulance services.
"We've continued to go to county calls in our districts, even without contracts, because those people depend on us to protect them and their property," Salem Mayor Randy Brailsford said. "I guess what we're saying is that it seems to us the cities care more about county residents than some of the county commissioners."
"I don't believe they would leave the citizens in jeopardy," Commissioner Jerry Grover told the Deseret News on Tuesday.
The contracts run for five years, but officials questioned if they then become voidable or automatically die. They may continue on until replaced by a new contract or are canceled, Herbert said.
But Salem and Spanish Fork city attorney Junior Baker said the contracts may have already expired because they have gone past the five-year anniversary. They were signed in the early 1990s. If the contracts are deemed expired, then the cities would face liability issues in fighting county fires, Taylor said.
"It is our feeling that fire and ambulance protection should be considered critical services by the County Commission, but evidently they don't feel the same sense of urgency that the cities do about protecting their own people," Santaquin Mayor Keith Broadhead said.
The mayors developed a contract that spelled out how fires were to be fought and how the county would pay the cities to fight them. Mayors are also concerned over allegations that it is county practice to send an observer to check out a county fire before firefighters are dispatched, Baker said.
A major issue is how a county fire protection tax is distributed. South county mayors contend their fire departments fight most of the county fires and should get most of the money. The south county mayors put together a formula that would determine how they would like those funds divided up. They total some $400,000 and are paid by about 14,000 residents who live in the unincorporated areas, Herbert said. Most of those residents are in the south. Total county population is about 354,000.
According to the proposed formula, half the money would go to all Utah County cities depending on their annual fire call-out history. The other half would go to cities based on the size of the structures they have to house county equipment, which would give the bulk of the money to south county cities. The county has contracts with cities in central and northern Utah County and can't approve what the south county mayors want without redoing all the contracts, Grover said.
Rather, county officials would like to see a cost per call method of payment, Grover said. He has has no problem with the county paying fire fighting costs if the cities would do the calculations.