She had been thinking of whether she wanted to run for a third term as early as the middle of 2024.

Commissioner Bob Stevenson made the decision to not run for a third term, meaning that if Kamalu chose not to run for reelection, there would be two open seats on the commission.

Her House representative is Stuart Barlow and her Senator is Stuart Adams, and she was contemplating running for the Legislature because she didn’t know if they were going to run again.

“And I was serious,” she said. “I even told some people, ‘I may run for House or for the Senate, because I think that would be a really good experience for me. And I’d like to serve more.'”

Ryan Comer, Standard-Examiner

She was on an airplane coming home from a conference in Washington, D.C. at the beginning of March 2025, and in that moment, she said she wasn’t even thinking about her decision of whether or not to run for a third term.

“But I had the strongest impression come to me that it would not be in the best interest of Davis County to have two open seats this year in 2026,” she said. “And it was strong. It was clear. I’m like, ‘OK.'”

Turnover has made Kamalu grateful she had that thought.

She said since then, the controller has changed, the information services director has changed, the animal care director has changed and the human resources director has changed.

The sheriff will be changing, as Kelly Sparks is retiring.

“We have had some big amount of turnover, an unusual amount of turnover,” she said. “And so I’m really glad that I had that strong thought, because, by golly, it’s very clear to me that the experience that I have and the work that I do and the stability that I bring to the leadership of Davis County and to the people of Davis County, the residents of Davis County, is really, really needed right now.”

Commission challenges

Kamalu knows there have been big challenges facing the county over the course of her time on the commission.

She recalls the first meeting she had with delegates.

“The very first event, a gentleman came in who is a delegate, and he knew exactly who I was,” she said. “I had no idea who he was. And he said to me, ‘You’ve had to do some really hard things.’ He knew exactly who I was.”

She referenced the code blue legislation, which she said “blew up with bad information” and “lack of accuracy,” and the property tax increase, which she said was “after nine years and 32% accumulated inflation and a ton of federal money” used on one-time projects.

“We wished we didn’t have to do that property tax increase,” she said. “We wish we didn’t have unhoused people in our county. We wish the state always worked with us and didn’t give us unfunded mandates. But because that’s not our reality, we have to do our very best to educate, educate, educate, listen, listen, listen.

“But, occasionally, there is going to be a decision that we have to make, which is the right decision, that either people won’t agree with it or they don’t like it or maybe they don’t even understand the reasons behind the decision. … We filled three or four rooms for the public hearing. We did three open houses first to educate, but there were lots of people who didn’t go to those, and one of the three commissioners was working against us. … The last time the county did the tax increase, they did three public open houses and they had three people show up to the hearing because the people didn’t want it, but they understood the why. They understood the mechanics of property tax, which most legislators don’t even understand the mechanics of property tax.”

Property tax increase

Kamalu said that Controller Scott Parke did a policy analysis. She said in any good policy analysis, you should study a “do nothing,” which was a 0% increase.

“And so going through all of the departments, keeping service levels as they are, saying no to everything that wasn’t required by law, was the 30%,” Kamalu said. “Can you believe it? But … 30% does not have context. So that just means we’ve gone nine years and we’ve had 32% inflation. No one’s cost of doing business is the same as it was in 2016. No one’s. Not an individual, not a household, not a business and certainly not government. We haven’t grown government, except for where the state has required us with unfunded mandates. And we’ve had several of those things, hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars in those things. And none of them is a bad thing, but they just don’t, I think, always realize the impact on property tax.”

According to Kamalu, Parke said a 0% increase would be “draconian.”

Kamalu said she never made a motion for 30%, even though people have said she did.

“I had just said I was willing to keep service levels where they were,” she said.

According to Kamalu, Parke said $6 million in cuts would be necessary to balance the budget with only a 14.9% increase, which ultimately got approved via the support of Kamalu and Stevenson.

She said Parke would consider $2 million to be “a little bit of budget dust,” because the budget’s bigger at $380 million.

“So he was willing to just kind of see how things played out for $2 million of it,” she said.

For another $2 million, she said Parke and the HR director talked about a “pretty creative” idea to offer “an early retirement incentive for people who have been with the county for a long time.”

She said for the remaining $2 million, Parke hopes it can be addressed with the October budget meetings.

She said the increase is explained by the need to provide services

“And in fact, there’s law that requires that we do,” she said. “And so you were elected to do the hard things. You were elected to run this government as efficiently as you possibly can, but to still run it. And all of this property tax was just for the general fund. And the general fund has the criminal justice and the public safety in there, as well as all the other offices required by law. That’s what the general fund does.”

Animal care

The animal care facility has been criticized because of its cost and size.

Kamalu said the current facility was constructed in the mid-1980s.

“There’s someone running who’s big on data. Well, yes, you have to be big on data in government,” she said. “We almost do nothing big without a feasibility study. So there was a very in-depth feasibility study to just make sure we shouldn’t add on to the existing building, and yeah, it was way past its life, way past its life. And way past the size that’s needed for the population of humans and animals and staff.”

She said this isn’t a recent issue, but it was brought up “by a small group” as an issue.

“And then I think just disinformation kind of spread,” she said. “It’s not in the general fund.

“I remember in Kaysville … the city was trying to get public support for a new police building. And I was a brand new planning commissioner, and they said, ‘You can tour it. Come and see.’ And I’m like, ‘I should go see.’ And so I went and I was horrified. I was horrified. They had this old building. The carpet was rolling. They couldn’t keep the law with the crime lab. It was insufficient. There were two portables for the officers. Meanwhile, we had built this new wonderful fire station. I’m like, ‘Why the heck would people be fighting a new police station?’ But what had happened is maybe one person or a very small group just didn’t believe it, didn’t support it. And so they kind of created a narrative of a Taj Mahal. It’s the same exact thing. It’s the same exact thing.

“There are sometimes people who want to fight and they don’t want to believe and they want to fight it, and they feel like they have a duty to fight it. And so they create a narrative, and unless people go see for themselves, they don’t know. They don’t know.”

Davis Park Golf Course and prayer

Kamalu also spoke of concerns related to the Davis Park Golf Course and prayer

She acknowledged that Fruit Heights passed an updated general plan that said housing could be put on the golf course if it sold but that all three commissioners have been public about never selling the land.

She said a Fruit Heights resident asked if the land could be designated with some protection in the future. She cited that the Valley View Golf Course has a protective designation “from decades ago because of the funds that were used to purchase it” and said the use cannot change.

“I have asked the Davis County planner to look into whether any sort of protection or conservation can apply to the Davis Park course,” she said. “I would be in favor of a protective designation if that is possible.”

Regarding concerns about commission meetings not starting with a prayer, Kamalu said none of the commissioners are opposed to prayer.

“We’re not sure why or when it stopped being an agenda item. We don’t know,” she said. “When people have wanted to offer a prayer, they have offered that prayer. We can put it on the agenda for them, if they would like it to be, or they can simply do it in the public comment period. … No problem.”

She said it has been discussed as a commission and is with the attorneys.

“I have given lots of public prayers as a commissioner because I get asked, and I’m happy to do it, and I’m happy to be asked,” she said. “And I would imagine any of the commissioners would feel similarly. So it just really has to do with what is safe for the county concerning liability.”

Concluding statement

As part of her concluding statement, Kamalu said there’s a reason Davis County is a very desirable place to live.

“It is well run; it is beautiful,” she said. “There are all the things for quality of life that people want in Davis County. It’s clear there has not been mismanagement of Davis County. And it is very important that we keep that going.”

Contact Standard-Examiner editor Ryan Comer at rcomer@standard.net.