The Summit County Democratic Party is “disappointed” with how the local GOP and state Legislature are handling the districting process for Summit County Council seats, pointing out rising tensions from political polarization and the importance of setting aside differences to ensure smooth governance at the county level.
“I think districting is a fair question to debate and to see which method is a better method for the residents of Summit County, but it’s one we should debate openly and fairly,” said Democratic Party Chair Rory Swensen. “This bill was engineered and rushed through the Legislature, so our issue isn’t so much the map but the motive.”
The state Legislature this session changed how Summit County’s governing body is elected in what county leaders called an 11th-hour passage of House Bill 356. The new law requires Summit County to implement geographical districts for council seats instead of having five at-large councilors.
Gov. Spencer Cox signed the bill in March, but he said he intends to call a special session to make adjustments to it because of “unintended consequences.” For example, Wasatch County has both at-large seats and councilors elected in districts, and the new legislation forces Wasatch County to eliminate the at-large positions.
The Summit County Republican Party has praised the legislation, saying it ensures better representation for the East Side, which tends to lean more conservative than Park City and the Snyderville Basin. All the current county councilors are Democrats, and a Republican hasn’t been elected to a seat since 2016.
Yet Swensen said he doesn’t believe the issue is really about East Side representation. Instead, he claimed the Republican Party has struggled with unity and putting forth “good candidates who put good governance above party loyalty.”
He added he views H.B. 356 as the Republican Party’s way to deal with “being upset” about recent elections.
“We have a history of electing council members from the East Side, and we value that and we work hard to do that, so we agree with local representation, but we think this bill with five districts ultimately hurts the East Side,” Swensen said.
Swensen said the population is large enough around Kamas for the area to have its own district, but other unincorporated East Side residents would likely need to be grouped in with Pinebrook, Jeremy Ranch or other neighborhoods on the western side of the county to meet the state’s population requirements for voting districts.
“That dilutes the East Side,” Swensen said. “I live in Coalville, and I see this as a net negative and less representation for those of us in that area. We will always be, on the East Side, generally, a minority on the council. … What we would like to see is larger districts that have the East Side and the West Side incorporated into three districts with two-at large (seats).”
Summit County residents currently have five points of contact if they need to get in touch with a county councilor, Swensen said. If all five seats end up tied to geographical districts, though, he said a resident would only have one point of contact: the councilor assigned to their district.
“If we look at a middle ground with three districted, two at-large, that guarantees that every resident, no matter where you’re at, has at least three members accountable to them on a five-member County Council. You have a majority that you can lobby,” he said.
The original version of H.B. 356 also wiped all County Council members from their seats in November, but it was ultimately modified to allow seated councilors to retain their positions for the remainder of their terms.
However, four East Side mayors — Mark Marsh of Coalville; Kay Richins of Henefer; Jeremie Forman of Francis; and Matt McCormick of Kamas — recently sent a letter to the governor and state Legislature leadership asking for a special election to wipe the County Council clean.
Swensen and the county’s Democratic Party staunchly oppose the idea.
“I think it’s clear that they want a majority and to define county governance in the future,” Swensen said. “This [letter] was a completely partisan blitz attack on democracy. … It really seems to be an effort to nullify the voice of the voters. The voters made a choice in a free and fair election. This call is not a call for better representation. It’s an attempt to overturn the results of legitimate recent elections. Voters made their choice, and calling for a re-do is not democracy.”
The Democratic Party is also worried about potential gerrymandering, especially because the committee creating the district boundaries only includes the six municipal mayors — four of whom signed the letter asking for a special election — and one representative from unincorporated Summit County.
The Democratic mayors of Oakley and Park City were not included in the letter’s circulation.
“Redistricting must never be used as a tool to entrench partisan advantage or dilute the voices of voters,” the Democratic Party said in a press release. “We must reject gerrymandering in all forms and commit instead to fair representation for every resident of Summit County.”
Swensen said he and his party hope more representatives from unincorporated Summit County will be added to the districting committee if the bill is reviewed in a special session.
“In local politics, we have avoided a lot of the division and partisanship that’s infecting the nationwide politics, and we don’t want to see that happen here. We’re seeing that with this effort,” Swensen said.
He continued, “We are left and right. We are Republicans or Democrats or moderates, but we’re also neighbors. We live in these communities that are great places to live, and we all have the same goals to ensure that these remain great places now and in the future. There isn’t room for the partisanship and the division that we see at the national and state level, and I would encourage us to resist any effort to introduce more partisanship into our local governments.”
The County Council has shared similar viewpoints throughout discussions on the legislation, mainly expressing concern about the logistics of implementing districts and philosophical issues regarding state overreach and interference.
However, the council has also been criticized by the local Republican Party for its desire to amend the bill to allow a few at-large seats, with the mayors’ letter calling the council’s actions “a troubling disregard for representative balance.”
Summit County Chief Civil Deputy Dave Thomas in April said he expected Cox to call a special session the third week of May, but the governor has not yet made any announcements confirming a special session date.