The Estes Valley Fire Protection District Board voted unanimously on Monday afternoon to direct staff to begin preparing for a November ballot measure to ask voters to approve a new local sales tax that would provide long-term funding for the district.
The board’s action follows the completion of a scientific voter survey conducted by the Welchert Company, a Colorado election consulting firm hired to gauge community support for a dedicated local fire district sales tax.
According to consultant Steve Welchert, the results indicate overwhelming public support for the proposal.
“This is a home run,” Welchert told the board, noting that the district enjoys exceptionally high favorability among area residents and that support for a sales tax remained strong even after survey participants heard arguments against the proposal.
The sample size included 376 completed interviews conducted between June 9 and June 16. Most of the interviews (327) were conducted via cell phone text invitations, and 49 were conducted by live caller phone interviews. The survey had a margin of error of 5.1 percent.
The survey found that approximately 82 percent of likely voters initially supported a one-half cent sales tax for the district. After respondents were presented with potential criticisms of the proposal, support remained essentially unchanged at 81 percent, suggesting that voter backing is both broad and durable.
Welchert told the board he was highly confident that voters would approve a ballot question if one were placed before the electorate this fall.
Replacing town funding and becoming financially independent
The proposed sales tax would allow the fire district to become financially independent from the Town of Estes Park, which currently transfers approximately $1.35 million annually to the district through an intergovernmental agreement.
That funding comes from an agreement established when the independent fire district was created. Rather than levying its own sales tax, the district receives 7 percent of the town’s total local sales tax collections. The sales tax arrangement ensures that visitors — who make up a significant portion of the Estes Valley’s economy — help pay for fire protection services.
The transfer is not a 7 percent sales tax. Instead, it represents a 7 percent allocation of the town’s total sales tax revenue.
Today, that allocation provides roughly 54.5 percent of the fire district’s annual operating budget. Most of the remaining funding comes from the district’s property tax mill levy, which accounts for about 37.2 percent of revenues, while construction permits, inspections, and related fees provide another 5.2 percent.
Town officials want to redirect that revenue toward the construction of a new public safety facility that would house the Estes Park Police Department and jail operations and serve as the community’s emergency command center during major incidents. The police department currently occupies space in the Town Hall building, a 90-year-old converted school. The current space is crowded for today’s police department staff and is considered inadequate for police operations.
Without a replacement funding source, fire district officials say they would eventually lose more than half of their operating budget.
Poll identified the strongest messages
According to Welchert, voters expressed overwhelming confidence in the fire district’s performance.
The survey found that 71 percent of respondents rated the fire district positively, with 52 percent describing it as “very positive.” Only about 6 percent expressed a negative opinion.
Respondents also identified the issues most likely to persuade them to support a sales tax.
The strongest message centered on protecting the community from wildfires, with 71 percent saying that was a “very persuasive” reason to support additional funding. Maintaining the district’s communications systems and volunteer firefighter response times ranked second, followed by the value provided by the district’s volunteer firefighters, who save taxpayers millions of dollars annually compared with a fully paid department.
Survey participants also responded favorably to messages explaining that tourists would pay an estimated 80 percent of the new sales tax, reducing the financial burden on local residents. Replacing aging fire apparatus also ranked among the strongest reasons for voter support.
Welchert cautioned that emphasizing the transfer of funding away from the Town of Estes Park was one of the least persuasive arguments.
Instead, he recommended focusing on wildfire protection, maintaining emergency response capabilities, supporting volunteer firefighters, and ensuring the district has the equipment necessary to protect the community.
Revenue estimates
District staff presented preliminary estimates showing that a quarter-cent sales tax would generate approximately $1.2 million annually — roughly replacing the current town allocation.
A one-half cent sales tax, the option tested in the survey, is projected to generate about $2.5 million annually, leaving roughly $1.2 million beyond the replacement of town funding for future capital needs and operational investments. Preliminary estimates indicate that a three-quarter-cent sales tax would generate about $3.7 million annually, while a full one-cent sales tax would raise just over $5 million annually.
Preparing for future needs
EVFPD officials said additional revenue would allow the district to establish long-term replacement funds for fire engines, ladder trucks, and other emergency vehicles, as well as address future facility needs.
As part of the board discussion, a presentation showed that replacing major fire apparatus over the coming decades will require hundreds of thousands of dollars annually. Based on projected inflation, a new ladder truck could cost $4.8 million by 2039 if current pricing trends continue.
Board members also discussed the aging headquarters station, where previous engineering studies estimated that renovating the existing facility could cost approximately $5 million in today’s dollars. District leaders said additional planning will be needed to determine whether renovating the current station or developing another facility would provide the best long-term solution.
Next steps
The board did not vote Monday to place a measure on the ballot. Instead, directors authorized staff to begin preparing for the likely possibility of putting the measure before voters while continuing work on the financial analysis and ballot language.
Ryan Leahy, who is a current board member and has also been a firefighter with the EVFPD, cautioned the board against getting ahead of its skis by asking voters to approve a three-quarter-cent tax, since the district has not conducted long-range strategic planning to accurately project its financial needs over the next several years.
While the board does not want to return to voters too soon after a sales tax question to ask for more money, the discussion focused on taking things one step at a time.
The district must notify the Larimer County Clerk by late July if it intends to participate in the November coordinated election. A formal resolution calling the election would need to be approved by the board by August 24, with ballot language required to be finalized by September 4.
Colorado districts embracing sales taxes
The EVFPD’s discussion follows the Colorado General Assembly’s 2024 approval of Senate Bill 24-194, which authorizes fire protection and ambulance districts to levy local sales and use taxes with voter approval.
Since the law took effect, at least 13 Colorado fire protection and ambulance districts have successfully secured voter approval for dedicated sales taxes, including:
- Aspen Fire Protection District: 0.5 percent
- Berthoud Fire Protection District: 1 percent
- Carbondale & Rural Fire Protection District: 1.5 percent
- Cimarron Hills Fire Protection District: 1 percent
- Clifton Fire Protection District: 1 percent
- Cortez Fire Protection District: 0.54 percent
- Dove Creek Ambulance District: 2 percent
- Eagle River Fire Protection District: 0.79 percent
- Evans Fire Protection District: 1 percent
- Frederick-Firestone Fire Protection District: 0.5 percent
- La Veta Fire Protection District: 0.5 percent
- Lake City Area Fire Protection District: 1.25 percent
- South Adams County Fire Protection District: 0.5 percent
If approved by voters, the Estes Valley Fire Protection District would become one of the latest Colorado special districts to shift part of its funding from property taxes to a visitor-supported sales tax.
Unbelievable!!! How can the Town gouge us even further? How can the Town make it even more unaffordable in Estes Park through higher sales taxes? How can the Town drive local spending away from local businesses toward businesses in the valley? Let us count the ways – too many ways to mention. Our Town should be contributing towards our fire district, and it should not be ALL sales taxes. $1.7 million is not too much for the Town to contribute. The biggest scam here (besides strapping our locals and businesses with higher sales taxes) is the bogus need for a new police station. Moving our centrally located police station to the edge of Town is a bad idea! I know the police sector is always using scare tactics to get more and more money, but for God’s sake, we have very little crime here. The police blotter showed two listed crimes last week, a DUI and someone arrested on an outstanding warrant. This is not high crime. Most crimes in this Town are DUI’s and other issues that occur mainly downtown. Downtown is where the action is and where dour police station should be. By the way, what does a new building in an out of the way location do to hinder crime. It does nothing!!! If we want to improve policing, let’s pay our officers more so that they can live here! Let’s give them the equipment they need, which we appear to be already doing (new cars, new tasers, new cameras, new drones, etc). Let’s not waste money on a new and unnecessary new police station. Let’s do more to help our locals through more affordable housing, through lower sales taxes, through lower gas prices, through lower water rates, etc. This constant use of consultants, to “tell us what we should be doing and how to use the sneakiest way to get it passed” is not good for dour Town. This Town was affordable 26 years ago when my wife and I and kids moved here from the Front Range. Now it just seems like our Town is just constantly looking for how we can frivolously spend more money to make our Town less affordable. We need to wake up to this mess and take back control and some sanity over our over-the-top and unnecessary spending habits.