After 14 years of appointing representatives, Hideout Local District 1 held its first election as legally required by Utah Code last month. However, only landowners within the district had a say, and landowners with more property than others had a bigger say.
And despite community members emailing the district with concerns and questions about the legitimacy of the winning candidates, those same candidates this week ratified the election results.
“(The district’s lawyer) said right at the onset that any challenges that were received via email or letters were not a legal way of challenging the election,” candidate Brian Cooper said. “He intended to certify the election regardless.”
The district, which was established in 2010, is responsible for levying taxes for infrastructural projects within district boundaries.
The three winners who ratified the election results Monday while community members passionately asked them not to are the same representatives who had been erroneously appointed before: Will Pratt, Dave Heavrin and Thomas Baxter.
All three of them work with Mustang Development, a large landowner in the district owned by Bob Martino, who previously served as a mayor of Hideout. Since he was voted out, Mustang Development has sought litigation against the municipality.
Brad Christopherson, the district’s lawyer since Febuary, said that although the land-ownership method of district voting is relatively unusual, it will remain the voting method for the district until the three trustees vote to change it.
Not everyone is happy the election results were approved, especially as their concerns went unaddressed or unresolved by the district.
Hideout’s attorney Polly McLean said some constituents didn’t get a ballot until after the voting period closed.
Others who ran against the three trustees questioned the process as a whole.
“I got involved because we got a note from our local district. They were having this election and wanted to know if there were people who wanted to be candidates,” Jeff Schiff said before the proceedings.
He had previously been unaware of the district. After he was unable to find founding information about the group, he decided to throw his hat into the ring.
After the election results were released showing he wasn’t among the winners, Schiff said he got a message from the district’s manager, Dave Merrell, who asked about the candidates’ issues with the district.
“We’re interested in transparency,” Schiff said. “There are three issues that we’re concerned about.”
He said their first worry was the legal validity of the election, given the district hadn’t held one in over a decade.
“There are some questions as to whether or not the district can hold its own election per Utah statute,” Schiff said. “They are essentially self-appointed district trustees.”
The second was how the election was conducted. Schiff said he called the district almost two weeks after ballots were required to be in, and they told him they were counting email ballots as provisional.
“In Utah State law, there’s no ability to submit an email ballot,” Schiff said. “And that ability was certainly not given to the citizens of the district. I’m concerned about whether those ballots were counted.”
He also doesn’t believe Pratt and Baxter receive services from the district, nor do they expect to receive services from the board. He said that’s a requirement for trustees even if they are agents for landowners in the district.
“That agent would have to be somebody who lives in the district. Mr. Haverin does, but the other two don’t, Schiff said. “I don’t know if they have plans to move into the district, so that would disqualify them from participation.”
Schiff’s third major concern — which he considers the greatest — is about the land apportionment voting that was followed in the election. He believes the district’s needs and population have outgrown the voting method.
“District voting by apportionment by land volume is something that was created by the state Legislature for the purposes of rural districts where there’s no one living on the land,” he said. “That was the case when this district was set up in 2010. There were 19 units on this land and it had to be less than one unit per 50 acres and they met that criteria, but that’s certainly not the case now. So they’re trying to grandfather in a voting mechanism that I don’t think was ever the intent of the Legislature.”
During the public comment period of the meeting, defeated candidate Ed O’Rourke asked Christopherson about Utah Code 17B—1-306, the section that Schiff believes should prevent two of the three trustees from serving in their positions and would require the election at a more usual time. The code went into effect in May.
He asked if the district was asserting they were able to follow the law that existed before the code update.
Christopherson wouldn’t hear it.
“I am not going to answer that question,” he said.
“Well, that’s basically what you stated,” O’Rourke pushed.
“17B-1-1402 was in effect when this was created,” Christopherson said. “You can draw your own conclusion.”
Further explaining his analysis after the meeting, Christopherson again did not officially say the district assumes it operates under the relevant code that was prevalent when it was founded, but he did argue that such an assertion could hold weight.
“I’m not going to get into specifics, but in general terms, when a law is passed and it changes the nature of everything, unless it specifically addresses these particular issues, then you’re really grandfathered in under prior code,” Christopherson said. “We were in discussions with the Lieutenant Governor’s Office, the Utah Associated Special Districts. The way that it was handled was consistent with how it was founded.”
Christopherson said the three trustees are eligible to serve as trustees because they are all agents of property owners. And although they’re not official state-registered agents, Christopherson argued they don’t need to be.
“That’s not a registered agent with the state. That’s just an agent, little ‘a,’ not big ‘A,'” he said. “There’s a lot of confusion on what that means. … Nowhere did it say registered agent.”
He said he thinks the concerns stem from people who didn’t like the election outcomes and therefore wanted to challenge or learn more about it.
“And that’s fine,” he said. “Get more information about it.”
During the meeting, District Clerk Amy Anderson addressed how votes were received and counted and explained email ballots were accepted as provisional.
“I printed them and marked them as provisional,” she said. “When we had the original come in in the mail, then I set them aside and counted the original in the mail.”
She said only eight ballots were emailed without the actual ballot also being sent in.
“It probably was an error on my end because I don’t think I was supposed to accept them,” she said. “It wouldn’t have made a difference in the outcome.”
Cooper said the next step for concerned Hideout residents will likely be seeking help from the Lieutenant Governor’s Office.
As well as ratifying the election, the district also went through a slew of regular business to ensure its in line with state code, including appointing district staff, setting a regular agenda for meetings and approving a 2024 budget.