Amid valley-wide efforts to consolidate fire agencies, a bill meant to ease budgetary restrictions on fire districts and expedite consolidation is under deliberation in the Idaho Senate. On March 9, House Bill 765 passed through the Idaho House of Representatives. On Wednesday, the bill passed through the Senate Local Government & Taxation committee. A second hearing on the bill was held Friday and it was filed for a pending third reading, according to the Legislature’s bill tracker.
If passed, the bill would remove a cap on annual property tax increases accounting for the annexation of new land into fire districts. Idaho District 1 Representative Mark Sauter, R-Sandpoint, a co-sponsor of the bill, told the Express that the bill would undo a rule created by the 2021 House Bill 389, which limited the maximum increase in the property tax budget of a fire district in that scenario to 8%. He said the new bill would make it easier for districts to serve community needs.
Sauter cited a specific example, saying that when the Middleton Star Fire District absorbed 900 new homes into its district it only received a budgetary increase from the the property tax revenue of 600 homes. Sauter said the district chief told him they were serving 300 homes for free and this was not sustainable.
The bill would also allow a fire district to absorb part of another district without full consolidation and allow municipal fire departments to consolidate with pre-existing fire districts without needing to first create a separate district. At least three-fourths of “the owners or contract purchasers” of the area to be annexed into a fire district would need to petition for the annexation to kick off the process, which would include a hearing.
