Utah’s Taxpayer Debt Trap | 11-09-26

[00:00:04] Broadcasting live from atop the Rocky Mountains, the crossroads of the West. You are listening to the Liberty Roundtable Radio Talk Show. Glad you're with us, ladies and gentlemen. This is Lowell Nelson riding shotgun this morning with your host, Sam Bushman.

[00:00:33] We want to talk about Transparent Utah next. There seems to be blossoming, burgeoning right here in Utah. We saw a number of agencies, quasi-governmental agencies that are fleecing the taxpayers. We need to talk about that. And Tina Cannon, our Utah State Auditor, came and gave a marvelous presentation last Friday evening at the Highland meeting. And what she had to say is really alarming.

[00:01:03] For years now, legislators in Utah have been vesting taxing authority in these unelected, unaccountable agencies, these quasi-government agencies, which have been bonding for money to finance their projects, which have put Utahns into billions of dollars of debt, right, just in the last few years, since about 2019, actually. So it's amazing how deep into debt they have plunged us.

[00:01:32] And so she was talking about that. One of the big first agencies is MITA, the Military Industrial Development Authority. It is a public-private partnership that supposedly helps to build infrastructure for military bases, you know, like Hill Air Force Base. Utah's MITA created one of the state's first public infrastructure districts. We call those a PID, Public Infrastructure District. That's what the PID stands for.

[00:02:01] MITA created a PID in 2020. So PIDs were basically authorized by the legislature in 2019. So the following year, MITA created one of the first PIDs to help build roads and other projects for Extel's luxury development near Park City. It doesn't quite sound like very military to me, right?

[00:02:21] Well, since then, nearly 250 PIDs and infrastructure financing districts, which are called IFDs, infrastructure financing districts, very similar to PIDs. Anyway, 250 of these PIDs and IFDs have been formed in the state since 2020. So like just in the last five or six years.

[00:02:44] And they have issued more than $5 billion in debt, which is overseen by boards of unelected developers and private citizens. You heard that right, folks. Boards of unelected developers and private citizens. Now, why is this a concern? Because they are taxing the citizens who live in those districts.

[00:03:09] If you live in a PID or if you live in an IFD, then you get hit with more taxes than if you don't live in a PID. You know, since 2019, Utah has created hundreds, like I said, between 250 and 300 of these quasi-government agencies. And, you know, so the state auditor, Tina Cannon, was increasingly concerned with these things.

[00:03:37] And she invited the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, that's the SEC, to Utah to come take a look at these things and talk about them. Because she was, you know, the legislators were not believing her when she's talking about the risks, the increased risks. And now that's something that I don't understand when we have these legislators that don't believe the risks. But yet they're the ones that can supposedly vote this stuff in.

[00:04:03] And from what I understand, these aren't even clear votes where people understand what they're voting for, right? Yeah. Basically, she said there's only two or three legislators who truly understand what these agencies do. And are and can do to people. And some of these legislators are on the boards of these kids. And they're the ones who are benefiting. The developers are benefiting because they get money.

[00:04:33] They can finance their projects at a much lower rate because they're using municipal bond rates to get their money to finance the projects. And yet they're not passing those savings on to the people who use those projects. They're pocketing. It's basically a windfall for developers and anybody on the boards of these kids. Let me stop you there and talk for a quick second about contracts. I don't know if you know this, Lowell.

[00:05:02] But if you and I have a contract with each other, it needs to be clear to both sides. There can't be any hidden language or third party involvement that we're not aware of. And in this case, I think the taxpayers are the third party that are being betrayed by this. Whether the legislators know what they're doing or not in creating these contracts with these private entities and all that is one thing. But the fact that the third party, the people like us are left out. Three-party contracts when the third party doesn't get the details of exactly what's being agreed to and going on.

[00:05:31] And there's this big windfall of cash where the taxpayers are on the hook. Number one, I don't know if the taxpayers will be able to pay it back at some point because the burden will be so great. That's a whole other, you know, boogeyman down the road thing for right now. But this third party contract thing is a real thing, though. I wonder if we, the people, the citizens could sue over this and win. That is an interesting idea.

[00:05:54] Now, you know, it turns out that when a buyer of a new home that is sitting in a PID, they really don't learn about the additional tax burden until closing time. Right. And so if you're if you're if you're buying a home in one of these subdivisions, which was financed through a PID, then you're going to have an extra either more tax,

[00:06:19] more property tax on existing tax line, or you're going to have a new tax line on your property tax notice. And so instead of paying like one to two thousand dollars a year for your property taxes, it might be twice that because in some of these the tax burden in some on some of these properties in these PIDs are equal to another mortgage. And so it's like you got two mortgages.

[00:06:46] You're paying the equivalent of two mortgage payments every month instead of one, simply because the tax burden is so high on the properties in these PIDs. Now, these PIDs, they're they're popping up all over the state. It's not just, you know, some urban place. I mean, let's be clear, they're popping up all over the country. Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah, that's that's true. And there's a map showing where all of these are popping up in Utah at Transparent. Let me get the website on that.

[00:07:17] It is transparent dot Utah dot gov. So very easy to remember because, you know, Tina Cannon, she's our state auditor. And boy, she's a tenacious accountant, basically a CPA who who is running the auditor's office. And she wants transparency and she just can't handle all of the complaints that are coming into her office because of these PIDs.

[00:07:44] And so putting this online so that we citizens can see what's going on is one of the best things that she can do. So you can find this information at transparent dot Utah dot gov. And you take a status project, for example, out there in Box Elder County, this 40,000 acre data center planned for Box Elder County. It's a status project.

[00:08:08] Right. And so the equipment that would go into this data center has really has a useful life of only seven to ten years. And yet the bonds that would be purchased to finance this project, if it ever happens, are 30 and 40 year bonds. So it's passing the cost of this equipment. Well, it's not sustainable because then you're faced with these big bonds that you still have left,

[00:08:35] plus how to update the equipment to keep the thing running in the first place. And if you don't, then there's no money at all in the project. And if you do, then you're agreeing to even more debt. And so the problem is that, you know, somebody realizes that this is not sustainable. And somebody is perpetuating this on innocent people, whether they be lawmakers who aren't in the know and or we the citizenry. And to me, though, that's that's it's criminal enterprise, though. So, however, sadly, what will happen in government is no one will be responsible and there'll be no accountability as far as I can see.

[00:09:06] Yeah. These PIDs, they're supposed to post advance notices or board meetings. They're supposed to post their budgets because they manage taxpayer money. But Tina says fewer than half of these PIDs are complying with the transparency requirements of Utah. And altogether, so far, they've issued $5.3 billion of debt. That's an amazing number. And that's up from $3.6 billion just one year ago.

[00:09:36] And so she her office expects the debt to balloon to $13.8 billion when the 150 not yet bonded PIDs obtain their financing. So there's a bunch of these PIDs that haven't even been financed yet. But the question is, can they be stopped then? If they haven't been financed yet, we can just jettison them, right? Well, that's the hope. That's the big hope.

[00:10:02] And if enough people get upset about this and pound on their legislators' doors about this issue, then they're going to find a lot of sympathetic legislators who before now have ignorantly voted for these things, but they're going to be apprised of the dangers of them and they're going to be voting against them in the upcoming legislative session. So we have an opportunity, folks, here in Utah to really make a difference and stop this insanity.

[00:10:29] So at the current pace, Sam, there will be 500 more PIDs formed in Utah over the next decade, and they would issue about $45 billion in debt over the next 10 years. Yeah, but nobody can pay that, Lowell. It's just not sustainable. It's not. You'll bankrupt the state just like the nation's already bankrupt, $40 trillion on the federal side, and now billions and eventually trillions on the state side if we don't get a handle on this immediately, ladies and gentlemen.

[00:10:58] And whether you live in Utah or not, you need to learn about these PIDs. Give the term for these again. People need to look for these in their state, Lowell. Yeah, Public Infrastructure District, PID. And you've got them all over the country, like Sam said. I just think that Utahs are looser and more egregious than those in the rest of the country. But if you're in another part of the country, you should take a look at this because it's becoming a very popular method

[00:11:25] or avenue for developers to finance their projects. And it's a windfall for them. They are not passing the savings on to the people who purchase their homes or their apartments or whatever. However, the Salt Lake Tribune reported just a couple of weeks ago, Sam, quote, one homeowner of an apartment at the Black Desert Resort in St. George pays property taxes of $10,000 a year due to PIDs, as reported by the Utah. How can one person have that kind of bill but not the others?

[00:11:55] I don't understand that. Is that possible? Well, it is because if you're in a subdivision that was financed by a PID, you'll have an extra line and item. No, I know, but aren't all the other homeowners in that subdivision hit with it too? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Everybody in that PID gets hit with that same thing, yes. And so it's unfair because the counties and cities, they're not pecking winners and losers.

[00:12:21] They're now agreeing with one developer who comes in and says, we've got to do this PID thing. And if they agree with that developer, that developer now has a distinct competitive advantage over any other developers who may have wanted to go in and build a subdivision. That's true on the front end, but on the back end, though, this developer is going to take the beating if we educate right on this, where people kind of get aware of what really happened and who did what and who was involved in everything else.

[00:12:48] We need to make the punishments on this thing swift and clear that this is unacceptable behavior. Yeah, there are some real estate agents, thankfully, Sam, who are refusing to show properties that are located in a PID because of the high tax burden. I mean, if you're a real estate agent, right, and you sold a home to somebody and then afterwards they had buyer's remorse because the taxes were too high, you do not want to be that real estate agent. And so some of them are now boycotting all the PIDs.

[00:13:17] That's a good development. We've got to spread the word, ladies and gentlemen, everywhere around the country this is critical stuff. And, you know, you say, well, why haven't people already rioted about this or why isn't this well known? Again, they were hoping that it wouldn't be till the end of the bonds, you know, 10, 15 years later where there's no accountability. We need to get on this right now on the front end of this thing or while these things are not yet matured and find a way where we can get a law that says, hey, we're going to renegotiate these things. This is criminal enterprise actions. We've got to, you know, we've got to do something about it.

[00:13:47] But Judge Napolitano asks the appropriate question, Lowell. Does the government work for us or do we work for the government? And right now, sadly, we work for the government when they should be working for us. His other headline says this, though. What has the government done to our freedoms? And when you think about these PIDs, then you kind of really think both of those questions are in line, right? You're absolutely right, Sam.

[00:14:15] Napolitano writes, quote, we pay its taxes, we obey its laws and regulations, finance its wars, submit to its surveillance. We're told that all of this is necessary for personal safety, collective prosperity, and national security. And yet the government has become totalitarian while individuals have become powerless. End of quote. You know, it just reminds me of that saying that when people fear the government, you've got tyranny. And when the government fear the people, then you've got liberty.

[00:14:45] So we have a situation now where, you know, it really feels like we've got tyranny right here in River City, even though most people feel like they're free. They sing that song about being, you know, aren't we glad we live in America where at least we know I'm free or something?

[00:15:03] Anyway, we are not as free, nearly as free as we think we are, because the states did not vest in the general government any authority to surveil its citizens without a lawful warrant. And that prohibition is plainly stated in the Fourth Amendment. And yet the NSA literally captures every keystroke, Sam, every social media post you make, every telephonic conversation you have of every person in America.

[00:15:31] They are recording it. It's stored in the data centers. And they've got bots that search that data for any, you know, words which might be a national threat like bombs or, you know, stuff like that. But they've got it. And because they've got it, it's unconstitutional what they're doing. Privacy is supposed to be a natural right that's protected by the Constitution. And this loss of privacy instills fear in people.

[00:16:00] They hesitate to criticize government officials. And that really is the beginning of self-censorship. This is how surveillance destroys freedom without ever having to prosecute anybody. If you fear being heard by the government, then you begin to self-censor your conversation. Tragic but true, ladies and gentlemen. It looks like Judge Napolitano asked the right question. What has the government done to our freedom?

[00:16:28] Murray Sabrin provides a great solution, Lowell. He does. He is writing what he calls the Abolition Manifesto. We first mentioned this just a couple weeks ago when we talked about the dedication and the preface to this book. Today we're going to highlight the introduction to this book. There's eight chapters of this book all about this manifesto.

[00:16:56] Basically, it's a journey of why the principles in 1776 have been discarded and replaced by virtually the very same policies that ignited the American Revolution. Murray Sabrin talks about the very first big abolition movement in the United States, that of abolishing slavery. But he says that today America faces another question.

[00:17:22] Quote, what institutions of government have become incompatible with the principles of liberty proclaimed in 1776? End of quote. That's a great question, Sam. I would say about 80-90%, by the way. Yeah, me too. This book, he writes, The Abolition Manifesto, it argues that we need to abolish any government powers, institutions, and expenditures that have no legitimate constitutional foundation.

[00:17:51] Starting with PIDS. Starting with PIDS.

[00:18:23] Creates fiat money through the Federal Reserve. Accumulates unprecedented debt. And increasingly assumes powers never granted to it by the Constitution. End of quote. I just took that phrase out of the introduction because it so well describes what's happened here in America. And Murray goes on to suggest that we shouldn't ask whether these programs are popular.

[00:18:49] The real question we should ask is whether they're constitutional and consistent with the principles of 1776. And, of course, Sam, I agree. You know, the framers and the ratifiers, they understood that government itself had to be restrained. And he writes in here in his introduction, quote,

[00:19:07] The Constitution established a federal government of limited and enumerated powers, not a government with authority to do whatever a temporary majority, a president or a Congress or a federal bureaucracy might consider desirable or politically popular. End of quote. Because that's what we have today, Sam. When you think about it, if it's a popular program, then Congress keeps running it. They don't ever ask the question, is it constitutional? Constitutional.

[00:19:36] And that's the question they really should be asking. Yeah, they need to really ask, is it constitutional, number one? And number two, have we been delegated authority to do this? Absolutely. I mean, I know that the two are identical, really. But the reason we ask the question a little bit differently is, you know, one is even if you don't understand the Constitution completely, the question is, did we delegate authority for them to do that? It's a really easy answer. Yeah, yeah. And very few politicians will ever ask that question.

[00:20:05] But we citizens, we can influence these politicians by asking them these very same questions, right? Look, Mr. John Doe, when you voted for that bill, did you first ask yourself, is this a constitutional law, right? Am I enacting something that is constitutional?

[00:20:26] And number two, did the states vest in me as a member of Congress, part of the general government, did they vest in me authority to do this, to enact this law, right? And if more citizens would ask their members of Congress these questions, then we would sensitize them to begin asking this question themselves, if they're honest.

[00:20:50] And what we need to do as individuals is ask that of those who work for us, our House and State, I'm sorry, House and Senate, legislators on the general level and on the state level, and even local levels, county commissions, et cetera. Hey, have we delegated authority for you to do that? And if the answer is no, and they still do it, we need to remove them and find somebody who will. Well, we need to give them a chance and ask them about it, talk to them about it, give them a chance to go like David Crockett. Oh, my gosh, I was wrong.

[00:21:19] But after that, it's time to find somebody who will obey their delegated mandate. Nothing more. It's important. Nothing less, Lowell. That's right, Sam. And we need to do it early in their so-called political career. I mean, I hope no politician actually makes a career out of politics.

[00:21:39] But, you know, if they start in the city council and then they maybe move up to the county commission or they move up to a state legislator position or whatever, then basically the die is cast. If they're in the city council and if they start awarding PIDs to certain developers, then you know you've got a bad apple on the city council and you need to get rid of them early, quick. Or if they support these flock cameras or any of those other kind of spying tools.

[00:22:08] There's a lot of simple ways. The good news about this, folks, I know we've got a long road of hope to restore America. But the good news is people are starting to sit up and take notice. Some of these issues are so blatant violations that even the average Joe that's not even interested in politics goes, wait a minute, hold on. And they decide that it matters and they decide they want to do something about it. And that's our hope now, Lowell. Yeah. And Murray Sabrin, he concludes his introduction with a fairly bold statement, but it's a hopeful statement.

[00:22:36] He says, quote, the welfare warfare state is not inevitable. The Federal Reserve is not necessary. An income tax need not be permanent. A system of corporate welfare is not a requirement of a free economy. Perpetual federal deficits and an ever expanding national debt are not laws of nature. A permanent global military presence is incompatible with peaceful foreign relations.

[00:23:02] And dependence upon government programs need not define the relationship between citizens and their government. End of quote. So I just love this. Murray Sabrin. Sam, did you say two weeks ago, do you know Murray personally? Yeah. Oh, yeah. He's been on the show with us several times. We'll get him back to be interviewed by me and you. It'll be a great interview. And I want to say this. Donald Trump, you've got two years left, my friend. Meet Murray Sabrin, sir.

[00:23:29] That's a perfect invitation to Mr. Trump. I hope people are listening and will encourage President Trump to talk to Murray and to take his message to heart. His last sentence here that I've quoted out of his introduction. Economic independence means keeping the fruits of one's labor. Monetary independence means sound money that does not systematically erode purchasing power. Political independence means government constrained by a written constitution.

[00:23:59] And personal independence means accepting the responsibilities that accompany liberty. End of quote. That's declaring our own independence, Sam. That's what Murray is suggesting we do. Sam? Lowell Nelson, everybody, doing a phenomenal job as always. I'm just telling you right now, one of the premier organizations in the country making a difference. RonPaulInstitute.org. CampaignforLiberty.org. Thank you, Lowell. You're welcome, Sam.

[00:24:27] Lowell Nelson, doing a phenomenal job as always. I'm Sam Bushman. Spread the word. Share the love. Stand for the proper role of limited God-ordained constitutional government, would you please? This is Liberty RoundTable Podcast. God save our constitutional republic.