After taking last week off, the Summit County Council meets Wednesday afternoon.
One of the first orders of business is the first quarter financial report from Summit County Financial Officer Matt Leavitt.
County Manager Shayne Scott said spending has been down thus far.
“We've just really had some good sales tax numbers the last—not even just a couple of months—couple of years,” Scott said. “So things are looking really, really positive.”
But there could be more expenses on the horizon. When High Valley Transit broke ground on its new facility in the Silver Summit area, the ground didn’t break.
The bedrock they found—as well as other planning oversights—has driven up the budgets for other county construction. That includes the proposed Silver Summit County Services building and new Mountain Regional Water facilities.
The council continues to discuss whether to amend plans for the Silver Summit County Services building, and Mountain Regional Water is on this week’s agenda. The water company is requesting a budget increase of $1.4 million.
The council will also hear an update about the Board of Equalization’s work to assess properties correctly. The board has had to handle thousands of appeals from last year, when many people saw jumps in property values, and by extension, taxes.
County Assessor Stephanie Poll will present on those developments, as well as introduce the data analyst hired into a newly created position designed to guard against inaccurate property assessments.
Early Wednesday afternoon, the council will interview seven candidates for the South Summit Cemetery Maintenance District for just three slots. Appointments could come later in the meeting.
The council is also set to discuss how to use money won from a settlement with Big Pharma over the opioid addiction crisis.
The council could also allow Scott to rent a house—or more accurately, a cabin that he says “needs a little bit of work”—from the county. Since taking the job in February, he’s still been commuting from Kaysville.
In Summit County it seems like not even the manager of the whole county can move in, at least not any time soon.
“Without running the risk of being too personal, I think the mortgage rates—I would really like to own something, and the mortgage rates are just so prohibitive in that,” Scott said. “So I think maybe a year or two of just renting somewhere, whether it's here or somewhere else. I think that'll give me some time to really figure out my next move.”
Wednesday’s meeting starts at 12:15 p.m. The council will interview candidates for South Summit’s cemetery district but then go into closed session for a bit.
The meeting will reopen at 3 p.m. and run until 6 p.m., when it will be time for general public input and a public hearing about expanding county road maintenance.
It’s at the Sheldon Richins building in Kimball Junction, or on Zoom.
