Carbon County Commissioner Casey Hopes is starting the new year off with two new fellow commissioners at his side, Larry Jensen and Tony Martines. Castle Country Radio had a chance to speak with him to see how the process has been thus far.
“It’s been great – the coordination, the conversations we’ve been able to have good dialogue together. The other thing is they bring in new ideas and a new perspective so it’s been refreshing to see those,” explained Hopes. “I appreciate the work that the past commissioners I’ve worked with have done but this is a new set of ideas, maybe new possible direction that we’ll be able to take things. I’m really excited and optimistic about our future.” The trio has been busy this month in reviewing the county’s budget and looking to have another successful year economically as last year where no reserve funding had to be used to supplement the budget.
Another big project the county has been working on is the opioid crisis in the area since Carbon County has in recent years suffered more deaths per capita from opioid drug overdoses than any other county in the state of Utah. “So what we need to do in our community and what is happening is we have a couple groups, one The CARE Coalition who is out there trying to keep people from getting addicted, mainly focusing on our children. The other side of that is we have Carbon-Emery Opioid Coalition that’s working on putting all the resources in place and changing the dialogue about addiction,” stated Commissioner Hopes. The expectation is to dedicate the necessary resources to end the opioid epidemic that has taken so many lives in the area.
There are some new Emergency Water Protection (EWP) Projects taking place in the county that are sure to help with flooding situations in the spring. “So this year we are starting a couple more projects where we’re going to work on some areas behind Westwood, some areas in Spring Glen and South Meadows all of which were flooded and affected in those last storms,” said Commissioner Hopes. The plan is to install canal dumps and some flood structures so those residents will not have to feel the impact of floods in the future.
To see watch the entire interview with Commissioner Casey Hopes visit www.koalitv.com