911 bill is sailing through

A bill that seeks to prevent municipalities from imposing disproportionate fees on foster-care providers for the use of emergency services earned unanimous approval Friday in the House Health and Human Services Committee.

HB272, sponsored by Rep. Wayne Harper, R-West Jordan, stems from a failed ordinance in South Jordan that would have required the city's foster families to register annually with police and would have limited the number of 911 calls they could make.

The South Jordan City Council opted to pull the ordinance from consideration at its Dec. 6 meeting after several foster-care officials expressed concerns that the proposal was discriminatory.

Harper said South Jordan isn't the only city to contemplate such an ordinance, though it was the only one cited during the committee meeting. The goal, he said, is to make sure any fee imposed on foster families would also apply to every other member of the community.

"We're just trying to make things equal across the board," Harper said.

South Jordan city officials said they felt the city was being targeted when they learned of Harper's bill in mid-January. However, spokesman Chip Dawson told committee members the city is "not opposed to the bill as it's currently written."

South Jordan officials have said the proposed ordinance was drafted because calls from foster-care providers to police and fire departments resulted in an "unreasonable expense" and workload on city personnel. Some foster-care providers within the city have turned to police to address nonviolent domestic issues or behavior problems of a foster child.

The ordinance would have limited foster families to three free emergency calls in a 12-month period, with a $100 fee being assessed for each additional call.

Under Harper's bill, municipalities still would be able to charge a fee to those using 911 for false emergencies, as long as that fee is not only imposed on foster families. That would still allow South Jordan to address what Dawson said is "a very, very small problem that's becoming a very, very big problem."

"We can still charge a fee in the future to those making non-emergency calls to 911," he said. "As long as municipalities have the ability to charge a fee for someone who's abusing that service, the city of South Jordan is fine with that."

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