Voters in a quarter of Oregon’s 36 counties will vote in Tuesday’s election on whether to raise local property taxes to fund struggling fire districts and departments trying to keep up with rising costs and record acreage burned. The tax levies and bonds for firefighting and emergency services are among more than 80 local ballot measures Oregonians in 27 counties will be asked to vote on by Nov. 3. Others include raising local property taxes and bonding – essentially taking out a loan – to pay for school infrastructure, libraries and parks. In several counties and cities, voters will decide on new taxes for hotels and whether to ban marijuana or psilocybin sales. And one town of roughly 250 will decide on a 1-cent gas tax to fund local roads.
Getting local property tax payers to chip into firefighting budgets was on many ballots in the May primary and still more in the midterm. The state has experienced a succession of big wildfire seasons, including this year’s which burned a record 2.1 million acres. There are 16 local measures on ballots to fund rural fire departments and districts in nine counties mostly in southern, eastern and central Oregon. Most are levies meant to cover annual operating expenses, and one would ask voters for permission to merge the Monitor and Mt. Angel Rural Fire Protection Districts and fund them collectively.
Property taxes fund the bulk of local fire departments and fire districts, but Measures 5 and 50 that passed in the 1990s essentially limited the growth of those taxes across the state by basing property values on a rate-limited assessment rather than market worth. Other property tax suppressants, such as urban renewal districts and enterprise zones meant to incentivize development and job growth with low to no property taxes for a number of years, also siphon dollars from fire departments.
One of Umatilla County’s two fire districts – Umatilla County Fire District #1 – is asking voters for a tax levy that would send $13.9 million over five years to the department, despite large growth in the county property tax base from data centers in the last two decades. Umatilla City Manager Dave Stockdale said the district has received a bit more than $100,000 a year since 2024 from enterprise zone revenues, but the department serves a small portion of the city and does not include much data center activity. The other fire department – Umatilla Rural Fire Protection District – is planning a ballot measure in May 2027 to ask for tax increases for funding as well.
Kyle Sipe, president of the Umatilla County Rural Fire Protection District Board, said the agency has been asking for more money for years, and has been left out of community benefit agreement discussions that the city and county have had with data center developers. Those are basically amounts the developers agree to pay for public schools, police, fire and other services in lieu of the taxes they are being saved from paying through enterprise zone and strategic investment agreements. “They’re approving building four story apartments in our town now, and we don’t have a ladder truck that’s able to reach the tops of them,” Sipe said. “We can’t even afford to buy an AED (defibrillator) for one of our emergency vehicles right now.” The fire department operates on about $950,000 per year, but costs will be over $1.1 million next year, he said. Besides local property taxes, the city currently sends the district $89,000 a year from one strategic investment program deal with a data center company, and $250,000 per year from enterprise zone revenue the city collects and that goes into its general operating funds, according to City Manager Dave S
