Friday, May 8, 2009

A problem in search of a solution

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The mere suggestion that the question of whether the cities of Ketchum and Sun Valley should merge be placed on a ballot next fall raised a storm of protest and produced a spate of bumper stickers that pleaded "Save Sun Valley."

The knee-jerk uproar and inflamed rhetoric that ensued drowned out any rational consideration of the costs or benefits of such a move, let alone consideration of how it might have been accomplished.

How different the move by Ketchum to seek a contract for law-enforcement operations with the Blaine County Sheriff's department. While it would be a contract in name, its goal is to accomplish a money-saving operations merger.

The major difference between the two "merger" propositions is that unlike the two cities, Ketchum has a well-known problem to solve. Its budget is suffering from a severe drop in local-option sales taxes, which help pay for law enforcement and emergency services.

In the case of the two cities, the merger proposal looked to the public more like a solution in search of a problem.

New reports show that year to date local-option tax receipts have tumbled more than 23 percent compared to the previous year. March receipts alone were down 38 percent.

Local-option tax revenues account for about 50 percent of the city's operations budget—a big chunk—so the city is right to be looking at ways it can economize.

Economizing was the ostensible reason for merging Ketchum and Sun Valley as well, but public perception in both cities was that the problem was not pressing—especially in Sun Valley—and therefore needed no solution and no new thinking.

Ketchum's revenues depend on local-option sales taxes and reflect the condition of a local economy that is suffering from the ongoing national economic crisis.

Like the tourism business upon which it depends, the Ketchum Council has recognized that it cannot go along doing business as usual. The nation's economic trouble is everyone's trouble.

Ketchum has stumbled in public a couple of times in its attempt to get contract talks underway, but is moving ahead.

On Monday, after hearing public comment, the City Council voted to direct the city manager to negotiate a contract for law enforcement services with the county and to come back to the council with a draft for review and public comment.

As a contract for services, the city will not be bound to the sheriff's department for more than the term of the contract, which likely will be one year.

If consolidated law enforcement works out well, it could be a blueprint for consolidation of other operations.

Sometimes it takes a crisis for people to shed their parochial blinders.