Whitefish eyes tax levy to expand EMS services

Whitefish voters likely will get a chance to decide if they're willing to raise taxes to pay for the city's planned conversion to around-the-clock emergency medical services.

The City Council on Monday will vote on a resolution calling for a levy election to fund fire and rescue service that would be available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. City Manager Gary Marks told the council earlier this month that a levy request is the only remaining option to pay for the expanded service.

A half-million-dollar federal grant that would have helped the city make the transition and offset costs for five years fell through two weeks ago.

The levy would add 24 mills to the city's current levy of 111 mills, raising $464,759 the first year. It would be an ongoing assessment, costing homeowners about $100 to $150 a year or more depending on the assessed value of their home.

A property owner whose home has an assessed value of $200,000 would pay $98 a year; those with $300,000 homes would be taxed about $147 annually.

State law requires the city to use the examples of properties with assessed values of $100,000 and $200,000 as part of the ballot question.

"The most obvious disconnect for Whitefish property owners with this requirement is that Whitefish property is typically valued at much higher levels," Marks said in his manager's report to the council.

The assessed value used for the ballot issue is not the same as the market value that most people understand, he added.

If the council opts to move forward with the levy request, it would be conducted via a vote-by-mail election, probably in mid-August.

The additional tax revenue would allow the city to hire six additional firefighter/paramedics and expand the department to have three rotating shifts of four emergency-service workers on each shift, with two "floaters" to cover leave time.

Currently the department is staffed with the fire chief, fire marshal and eight firefighter/paramedics, allowing daily shift work from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., with a call-out system during night hours.

The need for around-the-clock service is warranted, Marks said, given the increasing number of night calls. In 2001 the department responded to 432 night calls; that number has doubled since then, to a projected 860 night calls this year.

Response times are longer during night hours - typically about 10 minutes - because firefighters are responding from home. Day-time response times are about three minutes.

Whitefish will use money from bonding its tax-increment finance district to build a new emergency-services center on Baker Avenue across from Safeway. Construction of the new facility is high on the city's capital-improvements priority list.

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by e-mail at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com