At a special meeting Monday, the Sun Valley City Council voted to request mediation to find a "more equitable" solution to funding countywide dispatchers' salaries.
If approved by voters in November, the salaries would be funded by a property-tax levy override that would raise $835,000 annually through an extra charge of $6.71 per $100,000 of assessed value.
The override was settled on as a solution to objections by the cities of Hailey and Bellevue that billing the residents of local municipalities amounts to double taxation. However, the use of property values as the basis of the funding formula has created strong opposition in Sun Valley.
"We need to find the most equitable way to sort this out," said Councilman Nils Ribi, who first broached the subject of third-party mediation at a meeting earlier this month. "With the right funding formula we can keep from having to go through this every budget year."
If the override is approved, Sun Valley would pay a much higher cost per call than the other partners in the deal. Based on call volumes from 2006, Sun Valley would be paying about $48 per call for emergency services. By comparison, Hailey, which saw more than twice the call volume that year, would pay just over $8 per call.
"We're definitely in favor of consolidated dispatch," said Mayor Wayne Willich.
The city has budgeted nearly $107,000 for that purpose in the upcoming fiscal year. Under the override levy, Sun Valley property owners would pay $152,808.
"How can I, in good conscience, tell our voters I'm for the levy when they're paying (almost seven times) more for a call than their friends in Hailey?" Willich asked. "A call into dispatch on a DUI should be the same, regardless if the driver is in a Mercedes or an old pickup truck."
Willich said that because of the relatively small number of voters in Sun Valley, the success of the levy is largely in the hands of the other municipalities.
If approved by the necessary two-thirds majority, the override would begin paying dispatcher salaries in 2010. Until then, the county and local cities would have to fund the salaries out of their own budgets.
With the council's approval, Willich will draft a letter to the Idaho Emergency Communications Commission, which under state code is responsible for mediating issues such as this.
County Commissioner Tom Bowman was on hand at the meeting and did not speak in opposition to the request for mediation, but said that it was too late to take the levy off the November ballot.
If mediation does not provide a satisfactory solution for Sun Valley, the only other recourse for the city would be litigation.
In addition to voting on mediation, the council approved the mayor's signing of a memorandum of understanding circulated by the County Commissioners that demonstrates support for the long-term funding of the consolidated dispatch operation. However, the council deleted the last line of the memorandum, which referenced the levy.
"We're quarreling over the funding method, not over consolidated dispatch itself or even the combined amount of funding," Councilman Dewayne Briscoe said. "We would hope that other cities would welcome the opportunity to participate in the mediation."
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