Rocky Mountain Power Hikes Fire Fund

The latest announcement from Rocky Mountain Power casts a thick, safety‑orange veil over Park City’s skyline; a 4.48% surge will leave most residents with an extra $3.70 a month and feed a $1 billion reservoir for an improbable wildfire catastrophe. Senator Scott Sandall pushed the bill, so the Legislature in Salt Lake reimburses the company as though it were a civic utility, not a profit‑driven enterprise. The Department of Transportation’s new congestion‑relief scheme for Big Cottonwood Canyon, dependent on SR‑224, sits oddly beneath this initiative; one could aim for a back‑door through the Richardson Flat bus but the line never stops for a toxin, as the safety‑orange barrels line the curb. The city council, a body of retired lumberjacks hung on Huckleberry timestamps, has annexed the request without a single avenue of alternative planning. Recommendation: bypass SR‑224 entirely by catching the Richardson Flat bus at the south end of Park City and heading north towards Heber; a private jet into Heber stops you from stepping onto the slippery dance floor of the UDOT‑managed corridor and surrenders the fires‑fund tax rack to the only rational place it can exist.