Civic Affairs
From Sustaining Jackson Hole Wiki
I. Overview of Civic Affairs in Teton County
For the purposes of Sustaining Jackson Hole, “Civic Affairs” covers all activities related to government and civic duties.
There are four different levels of government in Teton County: municipal, county, state, and federal.
The Town of Jackson is Teton County’s only incorporated municipality, and is governed by a Town Council consisting of a Mayor (elected every two years) and four non-partisan council members (each of whom serves a four year term, with half the seats being contested every two years). The Town Council oversees the Town Administrator, who oversees daily town activities and implements policy directives of the Council. Unlike the County, the Town of Jackson either hires or appoints its employees.
Teton County is governed by the Board of Commissioners, a five member partisan elected body whose members also serve four year terms. Legally, the County Commission is considered an extension of the State of Wyoming and so, unlike the Town Council, has no power of ordinances. Many of the functions of the county government are performed by sovereign elected officials, including the sheriff, attorney, clerk, treasurer, and assessor.
Under Wyoming law, any entity with the ability to levy property taxes must be directly accountable to the voters, i.e. governed a popularly-elected board. In Teton County, besides the town and county governments, three additional such bodies exist: the St. John’s Medical Center board, the Teton County School District board, and the Teton County Natural Resources Conservation District. Other governing boards, including the Airport, START, Recycling, Parks & Recreation, and Housing Authority, are jointly appointed by the Town Council and County Commission.
Teton County lies within all or part of three Wyoming State House of Representatives districts and two Wyoming State Senate Districts. The county is also represented by Wyoming’s two United States Senators and one United States Congressperson.
II. Participants
Meeting Attendees
• Michael Faraday, Jackson Hole Conservation Alliance Board
• Keith Gingery, Wyoming State Representative
• Chuck Herz, Teton County Democrats
• Jan Livingston, Teton County Director of Administrative Services
• Bob McLaurin, Town Administrator
• Bill Scarlett, Teton County Republicans
• Andy Schwartz, Teton County Commissioner
III. Civic Affairs Indicators
A. Voting
A1. Voter registration and turnout
Rationale: Voting is the cornerstone of democracy, and the combination of voter registration and turnout indicate the community’s involvement in its governance. Monitoring registration and turnout gives a more complete picture of community involvement as registration can be compared to population. In turn we can compare registration to turnout and gauge the percentage of voting-age population who are participating. Post-purge turnout is an indicator of turnover in the community.
Comment: Teton County purges its voter rolls in the early winter of all odd-numbered years (i.e. following every general election), removing the names of those who have left the community. Voter registration numbers peak the day of each general election, because Wyoming voters can register at the polls. Voter registration and turnout are calculated two ways, based on the number registered as of each general election, and on the number registered post-purge.
A2. Applicants for Town and County Boards
Rationale: The number of applicants for positions on Town/County Boards is an indicator of public involvement or desire for involvement in civil service. Unfortunately, the most recent data compiled are from 1999. Forty-one volunteers are appointed to serve on 7 county boards, and fifty volunteers are appointed to serve on 7 joint county-town boards.
B. Public Safety
B1. Volunteer EMS & Firefighter Personnel
Rationale: Volunteering as a firefighter or EMS personnel is indicative of the interest in civic duty for the community.
Data: Jackson Hole Fire/EMS has 90 volunteer fire operations personnel and 60 paid and volunteer EMS personnel housed in six stations: Jackson, Wilson, Hoback, Moran, Alta/Driggs, and Teton Pines.
Comment: Until 2004, the Jackson Hole Fire Department and Teton County EMS were separate organizations, with separate budgets, administrations, facilities, and the like. The data reflect the newly-consolidated Jackson Hole Fire/EMS department.
B2. Crime Rates
Rationale: The role of government includes addressing issues of health, safety, and welfare. Changes in type and severity of crimes reported could indicate where resources need to be concentrated
Comment: Data was compiled through the Wyoming Uniform Crime Report, available online at http://attorneygeneral.state.wy.us/dci/.
B3. Jail Population
Rationale: Changes in the numbers of maximum, medium, and minimum security inmates indicate shifts in the types of crimes being committed. Additionally, maximum security numbers dictate the size of the county jail.
Comment: The Teton County Detention Center has a 35 bed capacity. The maximum security numbers have increased considerably over the past years. Data provided is for the male population, and is current as of April 5, 2004. Corresponding to the rise in maximum security prisoners, there has been a 49% increase in the percentage of felony/violent offenders from 2001-2004. There could be several reasons for this change in jail demographics, including types of crimes committed, redefinition of crimes, sentencing guidelines, court & jail capacities, and police priorities.
B3. Calls for Service
Rationale: The total calls for service indicate the demand for services by public safety personnel.
Comment: Joint dispatch receives all calls for emergency services in the valley (e.g., EMS, Fire Department, Police Department, Sheriff’s Office). Calls can be those transferred to dispatch, calls directly on the non-emergency line, or calls to 911 (i.e. emergency calls).
C. Town and County Finances
Rationale: Local government is expected to not just address citizens’ health, safety, and welfare, but to provide both residents and visitors with a variety of other services. The amount of its revenue is an indicator of the degree to which the government can afford to provide services; how it spends its money is an indicator of the community’s priorities. Ideally, we would like to identify the bundle of goods and services provided to the community by the local government. Additionally, many goods and services that are not provided by the government are overseen by local non-profit organizations.
Comment: Although both local governments follow generally accepted governmental accounting procedures, the two governments’ financial records do not lend themselves to “apples-to-apples” comparisons. As a result, there is no easy way to determine how much money is being spent on particular governmental services.
IV. Civic Affairs Indicators Wish List
• Attendance at public Town and County Planning Commission and Town Council and County Commissioners’ meetings
• Amount of time committed per call by a police officer or deputy to determine
relative availability and response time of personnel
• Trends in the Teton County Drug Court
• Services provided by local non-profits that would otherwise be provided by the
government
V. Statement of Ideal
Every Teton County resident will:
• receive all services the community deems appropriate, delivered at exactly the time
needed, without waste;
• feel complete personal safety within the home and community; and
• actively participate in civic affairs by voting in every election, regularly attending
public meetings, and being involved in volunteer service to the Jackson Hole
community.
Comment:: The overarching principle guiding civic affairs is that they be conducted with civility; i.e. recognizing - if not embracing - the fact that a diversity of opinions exists in our community, and using intelligent and respectful discourse and debate to identify common ground on which to move forward. Additionally, in an ideal world, all those choosing to participate in the public discourse would make it a point of being informed about the issue at hand. While difficult to measure, these principles form the philosophical core of the Civic Affairs Statement of Ideal.
• ...receive all services the community deems appropriate, delivered at exactly the time needed, without waste;
While the particular services the community provides residents will change over time, the Ideal Statement reflects the over-arching goal of delivering each service in the most efficient and effective fashion possible. It should be noted that many services in Teton County are provided by non-profit organizations. Should these organizations lose support, their services would have to be absorbed by town and county government (see the Philanthropy chapter for more information about these services).
• feel complete personal safety within the home and community;
Rather than the absence of crime and fire, “complete personal safety” was chosen because the group felt that a sense of personal safety is not necessarily correlated to the amount of crime and fire. Put another way, if the ultimate purpose of law enforcement is to ensure citizens’ sense of safety, the absence of crime may not mean someone feels safe, and a high crime rate may not mean someone feels threatened. However, absent a regular survey on sense of personal safety, crime rates can be used as a proxy.
• actively participate in civic affairs by voting in every election, regularly attending public meetings, and being involved in volunteer service to the Jackson Hole community.
“Voting in every election” means that 100% of all Teton County residents aged 18 and older will vote in every election; “being involved in volunteer service...” means contributing meaningful amounts of time to locally- oriented causes.
Ideal Indicators/Additional Steps Needed:
To gauge progress toward Ideal, the community in general, as well as each of the various governmental and non-profit agencies involved in Civic Affairs, needs to accurately measure the following items related to the components of its Statement of Ideal:
• ...receive all services the community deems appropriate, delivered at exactly the time needed, without waste;
Each governmental agency needs to establish measurements for:
• unambiguously defining and measuring performance, and
• unambiguously defining and eliminating waste.
(The Teton County government is in its second year of performance
measurement. A report detailing the findings of this study is pending.)
• Additionally, a complete inventory of services provided to the community by non-profit organizations is necessary to determine what roles the government would have to play should the non-profits no longer be able to provide the services they currently provide.
• ...feel complete personal safety within the home and community; Each public safety agency needs to establish a regular and accurate program of assessing residents’ sense of personal safety. (Until such a system is in place, crime and fire rates can be used as a proxy measurement of personal safety.)
• ...actively participate in civic affairs by voting in every election, attending public meetings,
Teton County needs to establish: • an accurate inter-census population count – both in general and of those age 18 and over; • a way to determine why those who do not vote choose not to, and • a means of gathering data on attendance at public meetings, including demographics of attendees
• ..and being involved in volunteer service to the Jackson Hole community.
• Jackson Hole’s non-profit community needs to establish a central repository and mechanism for gathering and tracking information about themselves. • Each individual non-profit organization needs to establish a mechanism for regularly and accurately measuring the number of volunteers contributing to their organization, and the hours each serves. (Until such a system is in place, a tally of volunteer hours donated to all of the community’s non-profits could be used as a proxy for, and complement to, degree of participation.)
