PID Transparency: Know Before You Buy
Homebuyers in Public Infrastructure Districts often don't learn about extra taxes until the night before closing. I'll require full disclosure before you make an offer, measurable goals, automatic sunsets, and a public dashboard to track it all.
Since 2019, developers in Utah have been able to create "Public Infrastructure Districts" — special tax zones where they borrow government money to build roads, water lines, and sewer systems. Then the people who buy homes in those developments pay it back through their property taxes. Sounds reasonable. The problem is how it's happening.
Right now, homebuyers don't find out about these taxes until closing. A family in St. George expected to pay $2,000 a year in property taxes. They found out the night before they signed papers that a PID tax would add $1,800 more — a 90% surprise at the worst possible moment. And it's not small: PIDs have issued $4 billion in debt across Utah, four times the total state debt. Sixty percent of all PIDs are concentrated in Tooele and Millard Counties — our district.
You don't know before you buy. The law now requires disclosure "at or before closing," which means the night before you sign is technically legal.
Nobody's accountable. These districts are often run by private developers who can set taxes and issue bonds, with nobody you elected in charge. When a development goes bankrupt — like a Coalville golf resort did in 2025 — it's unclear who's responsible for the debt.
Nobody tracks it. There's no public dashboard showing how many homes are in PIDs, what the annual costs are, or whether the promised infrastructure actually gets built. Federal regulators are watching, too — the SEC is coming to Utah this fall specifically to examine PID financing, a problem they're seeing nationwide.
Full disclosure at offer stage: you'll know the PID tax before you make an offer, with a clear picture of what you'll pay over 10 years.
Measurable goals from day one: any PID issuing bonds over a set dollar threshold will have to set specific infrastructure goals tracked by the state auditor — roads completed by a certain year, water lines serving a certain number of homes. Real commitments, not promises.
Automatic sunsets: if goals aren't met after five years, the district either revises and extends, or dissolves — no more debt hanging over a community forever. And public transparency: a state dashboard showing every PID, affected properties, annual costs, and progress toward goals, so voters can see what's happening in their backyard.
This isn't about banning PIDs. Developers need tools to build infrastructure. It's about demanding honesty. If you're going to ask Utahns to pay taxes for 20 or 30 years, they deserve to know about it before they buy.