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While law enforcement officers in Weber County say a pay raise is necessary to keep employees from leaving the department, residents expressed concern at the county's proposal for a 25 percent increase on its portion of 2017 property taxes.
The county hasn't raised its part of the property tax bill since 2005, according to Weber County's website, but residents' total property tax bills have "likely gone up almost every year," due to property value increases and other taxing entities — such as cities, school districts, mosquito abatement districts or fire districts — increasing their tax rates.
Of the total revenue the tax hike would generate, 86 percent would be allocated to employee compensation in law enforcement, according to Weber County Clerk Ricky Hatch, while the remaining 14 percent would go to capital projects, such as storm water improvements, building repairs and renovations to a county parking structure .
Chief sheriff's Deputy Klint Anderson understands the predicament residents are in because his own city, fire service and school district are raising taxes.
"It's kind of a hard pill to swallow," Anderson said, but the sheriff's office needs more funding.
The pay gap between officers at Weber County and surrounding agencies is a "problem that's been building up for a number of years," Anderson says, and has drastically diminished the agency's ranks.
Weber County conducted a study comparing its law enforcement officers' pay to officers in similar ranks at other northern Utah agencies, and it found that deputy sheriffs in Weber County make $34,778 — 10 percent less than deputies at other agencies, which pay $38,346 on average. For lieutenants, Weber County pays $57,262 — 25 percent less than the average wage of $71,335.
The sheriff's office recently lost a seasoned lieutenant who changed his career to work for the local school district, Anderson said. Pay was the determining factor, Anderson said, noting that the lieutenant's pay increased by 60 percent with the change.
"It's a huge loss to us," he said. "I hated to lose him."
Of the 45 patrol deputy positions under his command, Anderson said, 11 are vacant. While seven people have been hired to fill some of those spots, they're still in training, which takes nine or 10 months, Anderson said.
"We're operating at 75 percent capacity," he said, adding that patrol deputies are the first responders on 911 calls. "It diminishes our readiness and ... impacts public safety."
Other police departments have been recruiting officers, especially veteran officers, he said, from Weber County.
"Half of my patrol deputies have been hired in the last 18 months," Anderson said.
The county has had a 20 percent turnover rate in the past two years, according to the county's study, and low pay was the main reason for resignations.
The county held a public hearing Monday that lasted about five hours, County Commissioner James Ebert said, and commissioners heard from a "cross section" of community members.
Many at the hearing said law enforcement officers deserved a pay raise, but that the money should come from other sources other than taxes, with some suggesting commissioners take a pay cut, according to the Standard-Examiner.
Residents' main concerns were transparency, the possibility of inefficiencies in county services or practices and the possibility of wiggle room in the county's existing budget, where it could afford to reallocate funds or where there might be more money than accounted for, Ebert said.
To address with the issue of transparency, Ebert said the county posted information about the 2017 proposed tax increase to its website.
The other concerns, Ebert said, take a bit more time to address.
The commission set the voting date for Nov. 29, when every county office will have presented its fiscal budget.
"We're asking each of these elected officials and department heads to check their budget for any inefficiencies or [places where it could be cut]," he said.
He said the county is reviewing its efficiencies and looking at whether it should make cuts to services.
On Nov. 29, the County Commission will have its tentative budget presentation and another hearing on the proposed tax, he said.
Some offices, such as the sheriff's department, have already focused on "fine-tuning" and cutting costs in the budget, Anderson said, but "we feel like we've cut to the point where any more cuts are so drastic that it hurts our ability to be effective."
"We've looked at every corner of our budget to try and find the money first," Anderson said.
But Ebert said commissioners want to show residents they've exhausted all other options before taking it to taxpaying residents. He said the county has spent the past 18 months to two years going over ways to decrease expenditures.
"This is a last resort," Ebert said. "We are in a critical moment here. We have lost a lot of talent [in the law enforcement agency]."
"I've got a lot of confidence in the commissioners that they're doing everything they can to minimize the impact on the taxpayer while still trying to fix or make whole the sheriff's office so that we can continue to do the job that the public expects us to do," Anderson said. "This has been a problem before even these commissioners took office."
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