Poor voter turnout, you say? Only 3 ballots were cast for one Pierce County tax measure
In a community that draws in tens of thousands of visitors during ski season, only three Crystal Mountain residents voted on a proposal on the Nov. 2 ballot to raise the levy lid for the fire department.
As of Nov. 8 election results, all three voted in favor of raising the levy for the Crystal Mountain Fire Department. There are 42 registered voters in the district, according to the Pierce County Auditor’s Office.
The levy lid increases the tax cap that Crystal Mountain Fire Department can ask from property owners. Currently, the department receives 84 cents per $1,000 of assessed property value. The levy lid would allow the fire district to tax up to $1.50 per $1,000 of assessed property value.
The Crystal Mountain Fire District is run by Paul Sowers, who also oversees the neighboring Greenwater Fire Department.
“I was torn between disappointment and amusement,” he said on Monday while also thanking the people who did vote. “There is an attitude that your vote doesn’t matter. This is a perfect example of when it does. It makes a huge difference when people vote.”
Greenwater and Crystal Mountain are run like a single department in every way apart from administration. The departments share between 20 to 30 volunteers depending on the season.
Volunteers train together, respond to calls together and work out of the same three stations. Sowers keeps the financial books of the two districts separate to comply with state law, since taking over the two agencies in 2015.
The fire department in Greenwater is in a better financial position than in Crystal Mountain, Sowers said.
Greenwater has more residents than the Crystal Mountain Ski Resort area, which sits largely on federal land. A main source of revenue for fire districts is taxes on private property.
The Crystal Mountain Fire Department’s annual income is about $70,000, and the levy lid would increase that to about $130,000, Sowers said.
The fire chief hopes the bump in revenue will help purchase newer engines, fund repairs and maintenance of existing engines and cover the costs of equipment for volunteers.
Visitors come to Crystal Mountain year round, and Sowers said the fire department needs to invest in a four-seat ATV with a utility bed to reach lost hikers.
“It’s going to allow us to go from moderate service to expanding our service,” Sowers said. “We have more guests coming up there than before and we need to have more services 365 days a year.”
