Davis County committee reviews surveyor’s lean 2025 budget, replacement tablet and fee alignment

At a Davis County Budget Committee meeting, members reviewed the Surveyor Office’s modest 2025 operating request and discussed a planned replacement of essential field equipment.

The committee heard that the office’s controllable operating budget is very small. The chair displayed figures showing a 2025 base budget entry of $12,000 plus about $2,600 listed for equipment; the office is described in the record as requesting roughly $14,000 and $1,500 as additional line items. The presenter said the department had been asked at a prior meeting to reduce its budget by about $7,000 and that staffer Louise Miller had since identified further reductions totaling $9,554. “We did it together,” one participant said, noting the office had trimmed costs to almost match requested targets.

Committee members also discussed the surveyor fee schedule. One member asked whether fees had been compared with other counties; presenters said the 2025 fee schedule was adjusted to match adjacent Utah counties after those counties had kept a $40 fee for several years. The presenter told the committee they believe the revised fees are appropriate moving forward.

A recurring concern was the office’s reliance on a single specialized field tablet. Staff said the tablet is old (purchased around 2017–2018) and that a replacement is planned; they intend to keep the existing unit as a backup. The record notes the tablet and its specialized software are essential to field surveying operations and that loss of the device would prevent staff from doing field work until a replacement is available.

During discussion a committee member relayed that an outside engineer had asked whether the Recorder’s Office and the Surveyor’s Office were being combined. Presenters denied any knowledge of such a consolidation. “I haven't heard of anything like that,” a presenter said; the group observed that while some smaller counties combine functions, that arrangement can be less efficient and sometimes more costly.

A committee member asked about staffing and potential retirements; presenters said no staff had committed to retire at this time. The meeting included brief historical context about a past transition to the NAD 83 coordinate system. Presenters said Davis County previously used a local system and that, after legislative guidance, documents now must show relationships to NAD 83; the recorder’s office handled much of the related work.

No formal motion or vote on the surveyor budget is recorded in the provided transcript excerpt. Participants ended the discussion with acknowledgements to staff for budget trimming and for submitting an ordinance to the commission.