Endorsement: Should Meridian voters pay more for public safety? | Opinion

Voters in Meridian will be asked to approve a $5 million public safety levy that would be used to keep on 13 firefighters, give raises to police officers and establish a city prosecutor office.

The Idaho Statesman editorial board endorses the levy and encourages voters to approve it.

The levy, which would be a permanent increase in property tax collections, requires 60% of voters to win approval.

According to the city, the money generated by the levy would:

• Retain 13 firefighter positions that are currently funded by a federal SAFER grant set to expire.

• Increase salaries for sworn police officers, helping the city compete in hiring and retention.

• Create and support an in-house prosecution team, shifting misdemeanor prosecutions from a long-standing contract with the city of Boise to Meridian’s own legal department.

Meridian’s population has grown from 75,000 in the 2010 census to about 143,000 today, with few signs of slowing down.

City leaders have been good stewards of taxpayer dollars in this time of rapid growth.

Meridian’s tax levy rate is about $200 per $100,000 of assessed taxable value.

The levy, if approved, represents about a 10% increase in the tax bill for homeowners.

Based on current conditions, the average single-family homeowner would pay approximately $20.11 per $100,000 of assessed taxable value per year.

The median home price in Meridian is about $550,000. With a $150,000 homeowners exemption, the cost of the levy increase would be about $80 per year for the owner of a median-priced home.

This is a reasonable price to pay for continued public safety services in one of the fastest-growing cities in the country.

If we have one hesitation in our support for the levy it’s based on a couple of notable incidents in the Police Department, one in which an officer repeatedly punched a suspect who was on the ground, his hands pinned behind him, and another in which an officer clearly lost his temper with an uncooperative subject and threw him to the ground. We hope that raising salaries comes with raising the standards of the Meridian Police Department.

But this is also a cautionary tale and a message for our state legislators: Quit hamstringing our cities and their ability to manage their budgets.

State legislators, led by House Speaker Mike Moyle, R-Star, have passed bills that limit how much in property taxes cities can collect, under the false notion that cities are spending willy-nilly and need to be brought under control.

Specifically, state legislators passed House Bill 389 in 2021, which imposed an 8% cap on local government property tax budget growth per year, including increases from new construction, annexation and foregone property taxes. Prior law allowed 3%, with additional revenue from new development not counted toward the cap.​

The bill changed how new construction and development contribute to tax rolls: Only 90% of the value from new construction and annexed property can be included in the budget base, while properties returning from expired urban renewal districts count at just 80% of value.​

This constrains city budgets, especially for fast-growing cities like Meridian that have a sharp increase in the need for services from new residents.

Among the Meridian-area legislators who voted for House Bill 389 were Reps. Jason Monks, James Holtzclaw, Joe Palmer and John Vander Woude and Sens. Lori Den Hartog and Scott Grow.

If state legislators had not imposed this top-down mandate on Meridian, perhaps there wouldn’t be a need to ask for this levy.

So when you head to the ballot box on Nov. 4, vote for the levy but also think about how you’ll be voting in the next legislative elections.

Statesman editorials are the opinion of the Idaho Statesman’s editorial board. Board members are opinion editor Scott McIntosh, opinion writer Bryan Clark, editor Chadd Cripe, newsroom editors Dana Oland and Jim Keyser and community members John Hess, Debbie McCormick and Julie Yamamoto.

This story was originally published October 28, 2025 at 4:00 AM.