Summit to vote on bigger council with full-time manager

Summit County, one of the most diverse counties in the state, will vote today on whether a bigger council with an appointed full-time manager will better balance the interests of its east-side farming communities and growing west-side resort towns.

"We have all ends of the spectrum," Summit County Commissioner Bob Richer said of his constituents. "So there are certainly challenges when you look at adding additional personnel."

A governance study completed earlier this year recommends that Summit County change its governance structure from the current three-member commission to a five-member council, with an appointed county manager as chief executive. The county heard public input until last week, and if the current commissioners approve the proposal, Summit County residents will vote on the issue in November.

The county's current commission includes Richer from the Snyderville Basin, Sally Elliot from Park City and Ken Woolstenhulme from Oakley. Elliot favors the proposal, Woolstenhulme opposes it, and Richer declined to comment on his position until the commissioners' vote today.

"I've never heard a compelling argument in keeping the three-member council," said Eric Easterly, chairman of a seven-member committee that did the governance study. "It would be like having a school district without a school-district superintendent. Or a city operating without a mayor. You can do it, sure, but you need someone at the helm dealing with day-to-day issues."

Summit County has a population of 35,000, and about 22,000 people reside in the unincorporated Snyderville Basin. Easterly said that a change is needed in the current commission structure because of the booming population growth in the county.

But Woolstenhulme said allowing a county manager to take on administrative duties and manage the county's annual $40 million budget would create unknown costs and take too much power from the county commission. "We'll no longer have control over the management of it," he said.

Twenty-four of Utah's 29 counties now have the traditional three-member commissions. But three counties have adopted one of the three additional forms of county government allowed by state law:

• Wasatch County has a seven-member council with an appointed manager;

• Morgan County runs with a seven-member council with no executive;

• Salt Lake County governs through a nine-member council with an elected mayor.

In 2004, 61 percent of Summit County voters favored re-evaluating the structure of the County Commission. The initiative failed with east-side voters but passed in Park City and other west-side towns.

If the commissioners do not approve the proposal, 10 percent of registered county voters can petition to put it on the ballot.

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E-mail: astowell@desnews.com